KAI REBORN (The Seven System)

Kai 

Ricky: Bro, you should just cancel the match man 

 Danny replied: Yes. 

Ricky: It's not worth it. You know how strong Chen is. He could kill you. 

The phone screen blurred as I scrolled through the groupchat,  each message reminding me of how big the risk I was taking was. My thumb hovered over the keyboard. They were right. Of course they were right. Chen would destroy me. He’d proven that already, hadn’t he?

But I couldn’t cancel. I wouldn’t. There was too much at stake. 

My chest tightened, and I forced myself to take a slow breath. Stay calm, stay calm. I took another breath in, then another. The wheezing started–the familiar whistle in my lungs, I was about to have an attack, that meant I needed my inhaler. The same inhaler which was now in pieces on the gym floor. 

 I forced my eyes trying to push the image away, but it felt like an annoying buzz in my head that wouldn’t just go away. The way Chen grabbed me by the collar during training, lifting me like I weighed absolutely nothing. My feet dangling off the ground like some toy. But I was used to it, that treatment, the embarrassment. I could take it, I could take all of it. What I really couldn’t deal with was to be without my inhaler which I literally need to BREATHE and worse, a girlfriend who was now not only doubting me but also ashamed. I saw her face earlier, Maya looked like she was literally repulsed and embarrassed of ME. She was ashamed of me. I couldn’t back out of this match now, it would just make me look exactly like the coward everyone picture me to be. 

“You really think you can fight me?” his breath reeked of protein shakes and overwhelming arrogance. “You can barely breathe without this, can you?” 

He’d snatched my inhaler from my gym bag. Held it up so everyone could see. I begged, I begged “please, Chen please, come on, man–” I tried to plead with him but my voice kept coming out weak. Pathetic. 

Maya was watching, she was seeing her boyfriend being disgraced. Her face twisted in disgust–emabrassment? I couldn’t tell anymore. 

Chen had smiled at her. Then he dropped my inhaler and stomped on it. The plastic crushed under his shoe like it was nothing. Like I was nothing. There was nothing left out and worse there was no way to get another one, it was the last one. The whole gym went quiet, no one said anything, even Maya was silent this time. I couldn’t blame her. 

“See you Saturday night, Kai,” Chen patted my cheek like I was some dog. “Try not to die before then.” 

Now, sitting on my worn-out couch in our tiny apartment, my chest burned with the memory. I tried to breathe deeper, fighting against my lungs. In through the nose, out through the mouth. The doctor said I could manage without the inhaler if I stayed calm.

Stay calm. Right.

I had no money for a new inhaler. The last one had cost forty bucks I didn't have. Mom needed her medication more than I needed to breathe properly. That's what I kept telling myself.

Now I needed to make things up with Maya. 

“Hey babe? Are you good? Uhm I was wondering if you would like to come over? We would have dinner and watch a movie?” 

I waited an hour, it was unlike maya to leave me on seen, but it was no issue she was 

Probably busy. Just as I was about to drop the phone, it buzzed with a notification from her. 

Maya: Are you really going through with this?

I stared at her message. Three dots appeared. Disappeared. Appeared again.

Maya: Chen's dangerous, Kai. Everyone knows it.

My fingers moved on their own.

Me:I'll be fine. I've got this.

I didn't even believe it.

The truth was simple and brutal: I needed this fight. The promoter, Old Man Zhang, had promised me two thousand dollars if I lasted three rounds. Two thousand. That was half of what the hospital needed to keep Mom for another month. If I actually won—though the odds of that were about the same as me growing wings and flying—I'd get five thousand.

I couldn't win. But I could survive three rounds. Maybe. I didn’t know what that man saw in me, probably desperation and sympathy, but whatever it was I had to survive on saturday. 

I had to.

"Kai?"

My sister Mira's voice cut through my thoughts. I looked up to see her standing in the doorway, still in her school uniform even though it was past eight. Her eyes were red and puffy.

My stomach dropped.

"What happened?" I asked, already knowing it was bad. Nothing good ever made Mira cry.

"The hospital called." Her voice cracked. She hugged herself, looking smaller than her fourteen years. "They said... they said we need to pay Mom's bill by Monday or they'll discharge her."

The words hit me like a body shot. All the air left my lungs.

"How much?" I managed to ask.

"Four thousand." Mira's face crumpled. "Kai, what do we do? They can't kick Mom out. She needs the IV, the medication, the monitoring—she can't come home yet. She's not strong enough."

I stood up and crossed the room in three steps, pulling Mira into a hug. She was shaking, or maybe I was. I couldn't tell anymore.

"It's going to be okay," I heard myself say. The lie tasted bitter.

"How?" Mira sobbed into my shoulder. "We don't have that kind of money. We barely have money for food. And Dad—"

"Don't." My voice came out harder than I meant it to. "Don't talk about him."

Dad. The word left a sour taste in my mouth. Three years since he'd disappeared without a word, without a note, without a single explanation. Just gone one morning like smoke. The police had been useless, suggesting that he'd probably run off with some other woman. 

Not that it mattered. Dad was gone, and he'd taken any stability we had with him. Left Mom to work herself sick at two jobs, always staring at the door waiting for him to return. Left me to drop out of college after one semester to pick up the slack. Left Mira to grow up too fast in an apartment that always leaked when it rained.

I hated him. God, I hated him. I hated that man so much the mere thought of him twisted my organs. Literally!

But hating him wouldn't pay Mom's hospital bill.

"Listen to me," I said, pulling back to look at Mira's face. I wiped her tears with my thumb, trying to smile. "I've got a fight on Saturday. If I win, we'll have enough. If I don't... I'll figure something out. I always do, right?"

It was another lie. I never figured things out. I just barely survived, scraping by on luck and prayer.

Mira sniffled. "The fight with Chen Wei?"

I nodded.

"Kai, you can't." Fresh tears spilled down her cheeks. "You saw what he did to Marcus last month. Marcus was in the hospital for two weeks. Chen's crazy. He doesn't stop even when people tap out."

"I'll be fine."

"You won't." Her hands grabbed my shirt. "Please. We'll find another way. I can... I can drop out of school, get a job—"

"No." I gripped her shoulders. "Absolutely not. You're staying in school. You're going to graduate, go to college, get out of this place. You hear me?"

"But—"

"No buts, Mira. You're the smart one. The talented one. You're not ending up like me."

Like me. A twenty-four-year-old has-been who couldn't even afford an inhaler. Who took beatings for money in underground fights. Who had a record of three wins and forty-seven losses. Three wins against guys even more desperate than me. Forty-seven losses against everyone else.

But at least I had some dignity left. At least I showed up. At least I tried.

And Maya would be there watching. Maybe if I lasted longer than people expected, if I showed some heart, she'd look at me the way she used to. Back when we first started dating two years ago, before the losses piled up, before the money problems got worse, before Chen Wei started training at our gym.

My phone buzzed again.

Maya:I hope you know what you're doing. Don’t embarrass me again Kai. 

I typed back quickly.

Me: I do. I'll make you proud. Love you. 

The three dots appeared and disappeared three times before her response came.

Maya: Okay.

Just okay. Not "I believe in you" or "I'll be cheering for you." Just okay. She didn’t even say anything about us having dinner and she didn’t say she loved me back, just okay. 

I swallowed the bitter taste in my mouth and looked at Mira.

"Go do your homework," I said gently. "I'll handle this. I promise."

She searched my face for a long moment, then nodded slowly. She didn't believe me either. I could see it in her eyes. But what choice did either of us have except to hope?

After she left, I sat back down on the couch and stared at my hands. They were shaking. From the asthma, from fear, from exhaustion—I didn't know anymore.

Saturday. Two days away.

I pulled up Chen Wei's last fight on my phone. Watched him dismantle his opponent in brutal, efficient fashion. The other guy had tapped out in the second round, but Chen had kept going, raining down punches until the ref physically pulled him off.

The crowd loved it.

I was going to die in that ring.

But what else could I do?

Mom needed the money. Mira needed hope. Maya needed... I didn't even know what Maya needed anymore, but I wanted to give it to her. I could give Maya the world if she wanted it. 

‘You mean if you could afford it’

 A voice whispered in my head. Now even the voices in my head were also calling me which in fact I was. 

My chest wheezed as I tried to breathe. The apartment felt too small, the walls closing in. Outside, an ambulance siren wailed in the distance. Somewhere in this city, someone else was having the worst day of their life.

At least I wasn't alone in that.

I closed my eyes and let my head fall back against the couch.

Two days, I thought. Just survive two days, then three rounds, then figure out the rest.

It was a terrible plan.

It was the only plan I had.