A/n: At long last I found and saved the file with all my plot points and ideas and half-written chapter eleven for this story.

That's literally the reason why this has taken so long. No joke. ...Sorry.

A Rumor in St. Petersburg
11 — Just You and I
[Tyson's POV]

Somewhere between a failed, drunken mac-and-cheese project, board games, and half-Russian, half-English told stories, I fell asleep in the family room with the oddly comforting presence of the intoxicated Demolition Boys and with Kai on my lap. I was absolutely drained from the days events, so after we finally got the toddlers to sleep I don't really remember much of what happened. Like I said, only the mac-and-cheese failure of a cooking project, for starters, because Spencer and Tala were booze-hungry and wanted it. I say disaster because the two of them made the mac-and-cheese explode in the oven.

Let me recap for you, slowly: Tala and Spencer, some of the scariest people I know, made stove-top, ready-made mac-and-cheese in a pan on the stove and then baked it. Somehow, it exploded. And let me just say they must've made a whole lot of it, because there was still enough for the two of them to gorge on despite the mess they made.

Another aspect of the night—a highlight really—was their game of drunk scrabble. Now, reminder, that I wasn't too thrilled with their decision to drink from the Hiwatari bar and therefore didn't participate, but I'd be lying if I said that watching a bunch of lightweights drunkenly spell wasn't absolutely hysterical. For real. Bryan, despite having what I could guess was the highest tolerance of the bunch, start crying when he couldn't remember if 'pizza' had an 'e'. I swear I can't make this stuff up if I tried. They seemed to only be able to finish their game after midnight (I wasn't keeping track of time) and tried for a game of Uno Blast. They were so drunk they couldn't even complete one round. They just mocked and laughed and teased and giggled and insulted each other. I fell asleep with them recounting stories of when they were little, before the Abbey.

Of course I didn't forget Kai! Kai was present in the festivities of the after hours, but he barely took part in any of it. Between feeling sick most of the morning after rolling down a hill the length of a standard Olympic pool and being swamped for attention by the kids all afternoon, he was exhausted. I realized today that Kai meant a lot to them: the Demolition Boys, their siblings. Well, obviously, but what I mean is...I guess I got to experience it.

It's not just Dimitri that's head-over-heels for Kai. Aleksei, Lara, Viktor, these kids adore him. They complete for his attention and want him to participate in the games they play. They tell them stories of what happened to them while he was away. They make drawings and little string bracelets for him in their arts and crafts moments. They're clingy, Kami, are they clingy. They're always hugging him or holding his hand or touching his hair or face-paint. They want to use his belongings and see his beyblade. And they miss him. It's so plainly obvious that they miss him, and in their random, fleeting quiet moments, they never forget to tell him that they miss him.

It doesn't go unappreciated, because it's just as obvious that he misses them too. The kids, his friends here, his family. I've realized now that Kai is reserved and quiet by nature. It's like here in his house, he lets go of all his worries and lets his walls come down. He talks more, he emotes more. I swear up until four days ago I would swear on my life that Kai didn't have a sense of humor, or didn't know how to laugh. Here he doesn't get a moment's rest. I can see that the way he's had to divide his attention to ten people is wearing him down as much as an intense training day with the team. But he doesn't seem to mind it. It occurs to me that Kai is homesick.

When I realized it, it scared the shit out of me.

What has the our team, the BladeBreakers, been doing to entice Kai to stick around? What have I been doing? I know what the answer is: nothing. We've done nothing and we continue to do nothing. I mean sure, arguably, we saved Kai from the Abbey, and yes, arguably, he willingly joined and then re-joined out team. But we haven't made any effort in making him feel...I don't know...accepting isn't the best word for it, but something akin to that. I mean, between the initial five of us, Kai was the only one that didn't click right off the bat. And now, thinking back on it, we didn't really try that hard to help him fit in. Sure, he found his niche with us, but...damn, we've been assholes, now that I think about it.

I agreed to come on this trip to spy on Kai! I've been sending detailed emails and of-the-moment texts to the team about our days! Kai has been nothing but welcoming to me. It's like Vladimir said, he's willingly and uncharacteristically decided to let me in on this side of his life and here I am, about to screw it up.

Needless to say, I felt even worse during my day yesterday. It wasn't until the end of the night, after the kids had finally been put to bed and I was sitting on the couch with him drinking hot chocolate that the feeling subsided. I put a hand on his mug, preventing a nasty spill all over his lap. "Careful, Kai." I chuckled lightly. He blinked in disbelief of his own carelessness, heaving a sigh of tiredness.

"Thanks, he murmured, taking a long guzzle at the drink as he relaxed into the couch. He sat Indian style, curling his toes under his butt and pulling one of the sheepskin blankets close by over him. He threw it over my lap as well. "Uh, Tyson, listen...I'm...I'm sorry I didn't really give you that much attention today. I didn't mean to ignore you, with what happened this morning. I'm not upset, it was my fault, I was just—."

I couldn't help but grin. Kai was apologizing. Badly, stumbled and all nerves, but apologizing. I bump my shoulder against his, coaxing him to look at me. "Hey, I get it. I'm not mad either. Accidents happen, right? We'll just pretend it never happened." I said in reference to earlier. "You don't have to apologize for spending time with your family. They haven't seen you in a while, it wouldn't be fair for me to take up your time with them. They...they missed you."

Kai had the uncanny ability to read people like a book. That was no different for me. He looked to his stumbling friends. Ian stood on the coffee table and I assume it was Katy Perry he was trying to sing. Or Kesha. I wasn't sure. Bryan and Tala had rolled away on the floor laughing. Before they completely left my line of sight, I saw Tala roll over Bryan and stay there. He wiped what must've been drool from his lip and kissed him. When he pulled away, Bryan pulled him back, and they were out of sight. Spencer was beat-boxing for Ian, but it was as bad as Ian's singing. Thankfully, they'd stopped drinking, and put evidence of the booze away.

"Is this what your family is like?"

"Was. Then it stopped." I admitted with ease. I didn't want to think to much about it. "And then I found a new family, and we're kind of like this too." Kai elbowed me at my corniness. "You know what'd be great though?" I prompt, putting his empty mug and mine away. "If we got the quiet guy to serenade us with some Disney songs." I laughed; I earned a smack for that one.

"Shut up, Tyson." He told me. My grin only widened, because he couldn't hide his grin. He laid down and stretched out on the couch, head on my lap, and told me to find something good to watch on TV. He was sound asleep in ten minutes. I realized then that if the Demo Boys were telling the truth, and Dimitri wasn't lying about Kai's desire to leave, that I was going to have to give him a reason to stay.

So I will. I decided then and there, making myself comfortable where I sat, that I was going to earn Kai's friendship, and give him reason to stay with us in Japan.

I wake up the next morning feeling much more well-rested than the past few days. It's funny. So far Kai and I have done one half-legitimate beyblade practice, but I'm more tired than I usually am back home on our training schedule. I was relaxed and warm. So warm! Not to complain that Kai's house is cold, but since I'm not from around these parts I'd personally dial up the thermostat a few notches. I drew a deep breath, mentally preparing myself to open my eyes, and two things became very clear to me. One, the scent I smelled was completely familiar: a cinnamon-clove woodsy smell. Familiar and comforting and the kind of smell you could breathe in forever. Two, my nose was tickled by hair. This leads to the conclusion that there's only one thing, er, person, keeping me as warm as I am.

I open up my eyes, and sure enough, there's a mess of light and dark blue hair in my face. How awesome...I just slept the entire night spooning with Kai.

...Hahaha, I wonder how many of his fans wish they could say THAT?

As funny as this was, it didn't stop me from blushing like crazy or that odd, uncomfortable feeling from the "oops-kiss" from yesterday. I mean, we mutually agreed that we wouldn't linger on what happened. I'm not...entirely. See, I wasn't bothered by it. At all. Like, I wasn't disgusted or anything. I was OK with it, all labels of it being an accident aside.

Is that weird? Is this normal?

I start racing through ideas on how to get out of this without waking up Kai. Oh, yeah, and by the way? First time I ever wake up before him. First time. Props to me. Anyway, yeah, right, getting out from behind Kai? Not gonna happen. He's hugging my arm. Hahaha greeeeat. Just when I think I'm going to have to wake him up, I hear hushed murmurs coming from down the stairs. I'm greeted with the smiling faces of Dimitri and Yuliyanna.

"G'morny, Tyson." The toddler smiles, waving at me from his aunt's arms.

"Good morning, Dimitri. Good morning, Yuliyanna." I end up blushing harder now that Kai's mom is witness to our current...er...situation. She simply gave me a sweet smile, whispering back a good morning as well. She set Dimitri down on the ground, who was eager to show me a picture he drew. It was me, him, and Kai walking all the dogs. He even wrote our names crudely in crayon, in Russian Cyrillic.

"For you." He told me, and I grinned stupidly.

"I love it." I reply, and I do. He couldn't be more happy about it. His attention, like mine, averted to his aunt Yulia waking up her son gently. She whispered to him, rubbing his cheek and getting him to let go of my arm. She ran her hand through his hair, eyes crinkling with her smile. I don't know what she was telling him, but she was making him whine and grumble and giggle like a stubborn kid that didn't want to get out of bed for school.

"Come, Kaike-bear, up, up. You're crushing Tyson." She coaxed a little more firmly now. Kai answered in Russian and she laughed, translating for me. "He just said he crushes you in beyblading all the time." Haha, did he now? Remind me again who's the world champ, Kai? That's right, me. "I just might have to help Tyson and show him my secret move." She threatened him. Without any warning she ripped the blankets off the two of us, pulled Kai down on the floor, and mercilessly began tickling him. Kai's laughter filled the room, followed immediately by Dimitri's. He joined his aunt and helped. I watched from the couch as the scene played out and nostalgia hit me. I don't know how I remembered it, or even that I had this memory, but I remembered me, my mom, and Hiro doing the same thing once upon a time.

"I'll meet you guys upstairs, I'm gonna go change." I excuse myself. I run into the bathroom for a shower before any of them get a chance to see my tears.

"Kai, have I ever told you that the only complaint I have about your house is we have to walk or drive really far to get anywhere?"

"You say that about everywhere you go. What kind of athlete are you?"

"A winner." I drop down in the snow and sit, winded. "Ok Kai, you win. I admit it. I am extremely out of shape since the world tournament." I pause to catch my breath. I look around when I don't hear my team captain. "Kai?"

"We're here!" He shouts, coming back up over the last small hill I've yet to face. He's dressed in his old white scarf, a gunmetal black parka lined with off-white fur, thermal pants under his dark jeans (why he decided to wear jeans in this freezing cold weather is beyond me), and black snow-boots with red and blue detailing. He runs through the snow with unparalleled ease, sliding down the last bit to stop right in front of me. He grins, nose and cheeks cherry pink. There's this childlike anticipation in his eyes and it's contagious. He's not wearing his blue triangles today (His mom smeared his 'war paint' on purpose and told him to give it a rest today) and it's like I'm meeting Kai for the first time again. Not because he's not wearing his triangles—although I admit I catch myself staring at him more often than I'd like to admit; it's such a pleasant change— but because with his mom home for the day and looking after Dimitri, and the boys having left long before we woke up, all his responsibilities were lifted from his shoulder. Kai was...dare I say it?

I think this is the closest I've ever seen Kai to our age. As close as his personality will allow, anyway.

"The lake's just over this little hill." He prods, reaching out and offering me his hand. I whine and frown. He mirrors the frown with some frustration. "Oh quit it, would you? You made it all the way here, just cross the finish line."

"Whatever, sensei." I scoff, and he hoists me up to my feet and pulls me along with him. When we reach the top of the hill I gasp. Loudly. An enormous lake meandered through the pine forest and mountain hills, disappearing at a bend into the tree line far off in the distance. The backdrop of the snow-capped mountains and forest was magnificent, and the frozen lake glistened from the sheen of the powdery snow and frost that the wind blew across it. Kai was barreling down the hill, too impatient to wait for me anymore. He dropped the backpack he brought with him at the shoreline and ran straight out onto the ice. "Kai, be careful!" I holler out, surprised at myself.

Whoa. Talk about role reversal.

"It's fine!" He shouts back as I make my way to the shore. I tentatively press my foot down on the ice. Solid as a rock. I put both my feet on and try more pressure. The ice doesn't even splint. Kai races back to me, sliding to a halt about a foot in front of me, winded but thrilled. "This lake is frozen solid eight months a year, give or take. I used to come out here all the time when I was a kid. Still do when I visit, at least once."

The sudden reveal catches me off guard. "O-oh. It's...it's beautiful out here." I admit, taking in the scenery once more. "Quiet."

"Yeah..." Kai agrees in the same tone of voice as mine. "Dangerous too. You get bears and wolves out here all the time."

"Coo—are you serious?!"

"Perfectly."

"A-are you insane?!"

There's a shrug in his voice, "A lot of people think so."

I feel a hot flare of anger swell within me, and I can't even predict or control myself when I open my mouth next. "Don't say that." I scold him. I look down, nearly glaring, to where he's sitting and tying on a pair of ice skates to his feet. His crimson eyes shoot up to look at me through his bangs, shock at my reaction. "I was joking. Don't let anyone call you that."

I can't exactly tell what's going through his mind, but I struck a chord he chose to ignore using my favorite method of ignorance: sarcastic humor. "Tone down the hostility. I was kidding too." He offers. "Say, you're my shoe size, right?" He asks, pulling out from the bag a second pair of skates.

I shake my head and take a step back off the ice. "Uh listen, thanks but no thanks, Kai, I'd rather stand by and watch you. Aren't we supposed to be training or something?"

"We are, on the ice. Ice skating and beyblading go hand in hand."

"IIII'm not really in the mood for—." He glares, his first serious glare at me in what feels like forever, and I frown a pout. "Kai, I," I sigh in shame, "I don't know how to ice skate." His glares melts away. The phoenix simply shakes his head and rolls his eyes at me, tossing me the skates regardless.

"Then put those on and I'll teach you, idiot."

This is going to sound stupid, because half the reason Kai even joined the BladeBreakers in the first place (according to Mr. Dickinson anyway) was for him to teach us skills we lacked that he possessed. But I've never felt like Kai's actually hands-on taught us, y'know? It was all learn from what the opponent threw at you. Having Kai actually physically and literally hold my hands and teach me how to ice skate is different.

Good different.

"...Lean on your left foot and push out with your right diagonally. Do the same with the right. Good, keeping going. Keep your knees relaxed but your legs firm. Pretend like this is actual walking..." The same patience and care I've seen him give Dimitri and his other cousins he's giving me. Why is he never like this back home again? Oh right, we piss him off a lot. "Your balance is still off, you're all wobbly."

"I only started skating ever twenty minutes ago, cut me some slack." I complain, staring down at my feet with a vice grip on his hands.

"Pick a fixed point straight ahead of you and stare at it, like tunnel vision. That always helps regain balance." He advises. So I end up staring at him. He didn't notice, he was busy watching my footwork and making sure he wouldn't skate backwards into anything. Eventually I do regain my balance, and a smirk lifts the corner of his lips. He finally looks up, and in the brief moment we lock eyes we both turn away. I nearly lost my footing again but he held onto me.

"So...bears, huh? And wolves?"

"Yeah." He responds. "Mostly at night though, so we're fine."

Silence. The blades of our skates scrape ice, but nothing more.

"Have you spoken to the others these past few days?" He inquires tentively.

"Oh, ahm, not much. I haven't texted or emailed them in two or three days, I think."

"Oh. Alright."

Another pregnant pause.

"Listen, while we're out here...I should probably apologize for not giving you fair warning about what this trip was about. I know the others are off having fun and doing big things and babysitting isn't really—."

"Kai. I'm having fun. Honest." Bashfulness aside, I make sure he looks at me and sees the truth in me eyes. He seems relieved, and I swear he was maybe gonna smile if he hadn't tripped up on a chink of ice. He manages to regain his balance and hug me before we both fall. We both stood there completely still, getting over our mini panic attacks.

"My bad." He mumbles, head resting on top of mine. My brain processes what he says and I burst out laughing. To my delight, so does he. We spend hours out here on the ice. For the grand majority of it, Kai dances eight circles around me while I perfect my signature move: step, step, fall. It wasn't any easier when we launched our beyblades and began practice. I did catch on to what Kai mean about how much ice skating relates to beyblading, though. Immediately, in fact. I always kind of envied, mostly admired Dranzer's moves in the beydish. Here I was seeing the foundations of the technique, and how technical Kai got. It was pretty cool to see how detail-oriented he was. I hated the fact that he was yelling at me for doing such a poor job, but c'mon! Novice ice skater here, how am I supposed to focus on skating and blading?

I don't complain, though. I stand back quietly, listening to him talk about the physics and angles and mathematics behind even the most basic moves. To demonstrate, he himself mimicked Dranzer's moves. He'd race out far onto the ice, skates shredding fresh ice into the air on long and fluid turns. The swish-swoosh they made when he spun in place, tight and loose circles alike. Kai one graceful ice skater. I feel stupid for not realizing how much his beyblading technique draws form skating. When I had Dragoon copy Dranzer, I was blown away by how much more speed and precision I was able to apply to my moves.

I hooted and hollared with joy. And, y'know, fell a couple of times. That's not my point.

We winded down from training and skating practice when the sun began to droop down in the sky. My fingers and toes are completely numb, despite the two-dozen socks on my feet and layers of gloves on my hands. Same goes for my face, but unfortunately there's no thermal face masks I can wear. It was just Kai and I on the ice, hands locked together, in rhythmic step skating lazy ovals. Left, right, left, right. Left, sniffle, right, left. I shudder, curling up as much as I possibly can while skating.

"Kai, I'm getting dizzy." I shiver, and if that wasn't enough of a hint that I'm freezing cold as well then I don't know what it.

"Just one more," He exhales, masking a shudder, "loop." He then does the unimaginable and lets go. I make grabby fingers and panic, a pathetic noise squeaking out of my throat. "You're doing great, don't lose balance!" He encourages, skating a few steps backward to the shore. "Just come straight to me, don't think about anything else."

Okay. Get to Kai. Kai is the goal. Kai is the end of the level, like in Super Mario World. Blip-Bleep! Just look at Kai, Tyson. Look at Kai...Kai is looking at me like I might fall. Let's not blow this, I can do it. Kai looks...actually, he looks kind of worried that I might fall. I've never seen that look on him before. In fact, he seems so expressive today. I should get him to wear the triangles less, that's what's happening here. I'd never noticed the crinkle at the corner of his eyes when he smirked or grinned with mirth or sarcasm. And on that note, he tends to grin with the left side of his lips more than the right. He's got a dimple in his cheek on that side. With his nose and cheeks frostbitten rose-colored the way it is now, it makes him look a little like Dimitri.

Four strides is all it takes for me to slide into Kai's arms. He catches me in a hug that I return. Unlike last time, I feel more confident in my balance and have no need to linger. Unlike last time, I do. Kai gives hugs. Kai's hugging me.

And I'll be damned, Kai give good hugs.

"I like you more like this," There goes my mouth, talking faster than my brain can stop to double-check it. "The way you are just you and I, and with your folks." I lift my face up from his jacket, and shake my obnoxious bangs out of my eyes to smile up at him. He's blushing. It's funny and cute all the same. He averts his crimson gaze from me, pursing his lips tight to, for once, control his expression. He smacks my hat down over my eyes and lets me go. It doesn't even hurt when I fall back on my ass anymore.

"Yeah, well, don't get used to it." He promises. He knows as well as I do that it's an empty promise. "Let's go, it's getting late." My adrenaline's racing. My heart's pounding like crazy. For the first time all day I feel warm from head to toe. Why is that? I've cracked Kai's shell.

And I want nothing else but to get closer to him.

A/n: Uh...I don't have a whole lot to say here. Review if you still read? If you're still in this fandom? Sorry for the unexpected long-ass hiatus. I'm still gonna see this story through.

Personal fact? I don't like the new beyblade spinoffs. Like, at all. I gave them a try but...meh.

#OriginalBeybladeForever