Kyle had been angry before today. He had been upset before, too, and scared. He was no stranger to emotion, and - being a teenager - he'd had his moments of losing himself to it, but he was usually incredibly level-headed. Unless, of course, family was involved. They could bring out the worst in him, as well as the best, and it was quite natural that - being young, under pressure, and having a heart - he was still reeling, still fuming from seeing his grandmother in such a situation. Whether consent was involved or not, it didn't matter, he was still upset. Kyle was human, and so were his reactions.

Something about feeling so upset and so tense was making every sound, every voice, every little thing around him so much more frustrating than it might usually have been. Kyle wasn't really the type to emote in public - more to do with an apparent inability to openly express himself than anything else, though a general preference for thought over feeling may have had something to do with it too - but that didn't mean that it was entirely impossible, especially given the circumstances.

He was only half listening to all that was going on around him - even to Valerie and Jesús and, at one point, Lachlan. He hadn't really joined them for a conversation, it was just that... even when Valerie was clearly upset, she could still be a source of comfort, perhaps like an older sibling was supposed to. Not quite the same as the woman Kyle had just left in the hands of a British Healer, of course, but even so.

It was, of course, inevitable that Kyle's thoughts returned to her again. His grandmother; was she okay? She had been in that cage for an awfully long time. Almost frozen, stiff, turning blue. There had been icicles in her hair. And No-Maj weren't like wizards; wizarding old-age wasn't the same as No-Maj old age. What passed for elderly in the No-Maj world seemed more like middle age with witches and wizards, and since he had been introduced to the wizarding world, No-Maj seemed so fragile. He just... couldn't quite process that it had happened. A large part of him had half-believed that it had all been another trick - that's what these IMPS seemed to largely revolve around - but... no. Real. It had really been her.

As much as he wanted, maybe even needed that scholarship to truly cement his future, Kyle was suddenly unsure that this was the way he wanted to go about it. Had he known that he wasn't just agreeing to them throwing him in danger, but his grand-maman, it would have taken a lot of convincing to get him to partake in the challenges. She had been awake through the whole thing, freezing cold and suffering... If he had known, he would have refused, and worked himself to death for a scholarship at a top American Wizarding University, just like he had originally planned.

So lost in his own feelings and thoughts was Kyle that he didn't immediately register all of what was going on around him, not until Aurora was right there, going off at Valerie and even... insulting Jesús?

As a rule, Kyle didn't interfere in confrontations that did not directly involve him, but this was different. Anger was still coursing through him and what Aurora had just said seemed to linger in the air, and Kyle found himself actually wanting to bite back. Ultimately, however, he stayed out of it while Jesús made his own retort, and Kyle had no desire to talk over him, literally or figuratively.

When Jesús made to leave, Kyle met the older boy's look with a nod of his own, and took a step towards the exit himself. Almost as an afterthought, though, he stopped and looked back at Aurora with distaste. "Hope you're proud of yourself."

Leaving it at that, Kyle finally looked up at the scoreboard to see the standings, raising his eyebrows ever so slightly in surprise - two from Ilvermorny, two from Hogwarts; that was interesting - before turning back to Valerie (and Lachlan, of course) his expression still hard. "Let's get out of here." He had heard Valerie mention Ryan... and Kyle doubted she would delay going to check on him any longer than absolutely necessary. And Jesús too, of course.

As for the scores, Kyle would think more about how he felt about those later, when he had time to properly re-assess exactly how he felt about this competition. Other things took precedence right now. But yes, eventually he'd think about all that; talk with Valerie, review what he knew about Brent - his old classmate - and almost certainly seek out Levi Kenning. Levi was the only competitor in the final challenge that Kyle knew next to nothing about, but he certainly deemed him worth much more than just a passing glance or the occasional nod of acknowledgement.