Of Love and Death.

The Present Chapter 9: Don't Mess With Pheng Pt. 1

I'll warn you of a Pheng X Reina ship. Also there's a flashback that involves a fight and, well, threat of death, near misses with death, someone almost falls to their death, and someone threatens to kills someone else. I guess I should also put minorish Turbo character X OC warning for the rest of this book too. Who that is will become obvious, but I don't want to spoil it. 

     "And with a stellar display of strength, after a long stamina battle, Shu Kurenai takes the win with a survivor finish! Meaning that he wins his fourth battle in the Nationals, barely breaking a sweat!" Senor Hanami's words came through with an electronic tilt due to Valt listening via broadcast, not being in the stadium. Man, did he wish he could be there though. It may have only been a few weeks since he'd last seen Shu in person, but Valt missed his friend.

     Yes, I know. You haven't shut up about him since we left America, Valtryek snarked. Valt's partner was only a little bit annoyed. She was used to Valt's incessant chatter about Shu by now. After all, he'd had a crush on the white-haired blader since he was old enough to have a crush. Unfortunately, Valtryek had ended up hearing a lot about Shu's "dreamy eyes".

     I have. I'm about fed up with eyes by now, Valtyrek said, almost completely dead panned. Valt chuckled as he placed the bey in his launcher. He backed up a few paces, until he was far enough away from the stadium. In his mind, he counted down, three, two, one, let it rip! Each second, he leapt forward across the hardwood of BC Sol. As he reached "let it rip" Valt jumped up one more time, this time pulling the string at the apex of his leap.

     Valtryek went flying into the stadium, where she began spinning around. Today had been kind of slow. It had rained for the entirety of training, and everyone's energy had taken a hit. Well, except for Kit. But he had magic sky powers, so that made sense. Even from him, though, there'd been a lot of launching without battling, while mostly having your mind on whatever battle was playing on the big screen. Speaking of Kit, actually, where had he gone? Valt's friend had disappeared half-way through the day, and hadn't even shown himself for dinner.

     I can't wait to see Shu again, Valt mused, changing the subject of his internal monologue. Although Valtryek was fully capable of hearing the words, he was mostly talking to himself. He knew that he was going to America to watch the finals, but those were still two weeks away. He couldn't wait!

     A memory emerged from Valt's head. One that he'd kept at the forefront of his head because of how awesome it was. How he'd pressed his side to Shu's while they were watching the first round of the Nationals. He couldn't stop himself from blushing a bit as he thought back to that hour. His friend hadn't shied away from Valt either. That had been the best part.

     Not to mention all of the other moments Valt had gotten to share with Shu back when he'd visited. Like when Shu had placed his hand in Valt's hair, or when Valt had started talking to Shu with telepathy. That had been nice, the same kind of feeling as when he ate his mom's bread while visiting home. 

     Valt didn't miss Valtryek chuckling a bit at his thoughts. He didn't really care. He'd given up a bit of privacy when he'd started blading. Then again, it hadn't been so bad.  It was more like telling an old friend a secret, not someone just reading his mind without warning.

     So, Valt, are you ever going to tell him about your crush? Valtryek asked.

     Valt sighed, clenching his fist into his hand. This was a question that his partner asked him a lot. Every single time his answer was "soon". He'd been saying it since he was thirteen. He'd actually realized that he had a crush on Shu because of this question. That was fun. A nice period of questioning what it meant to like someone before he finally gave in and accepted that his partner was right.