Stray Hope

I don't own Digimon

--o

'Thoughts'

"Speaking"

-)o(- Scene change

--o

He rubs the back of his neck as if doing so would help with the headache he's currently experiencing, though he's careful not to rub it too much since he's currently getting a tattoo done on his back. One that he's designed himself. Though he can't seem to recall where he's seen some of the symbols before, he knew that he's seen them before though.

"Geeze, Thor, calm down already. You'd think you'd be use to having Blue rile you up by now." Zen pipes in, mistaking his action for irritation. "I'll be a whole lot calmer when I beat the snot out of that shit head." He grows out, everyone seems to believe that lie, not that he care whether or not they do.

His right hand rests on top of his left hand and then rests his chin on top of that. His headache slowly builds as the buzzing of the tool continues to hum at a steady pace. He tries to keep his body from stiffening; he makes the occasional grunt or snort whenever it sounds like a question is sent his way.

His vision clouds and he can see those damnable eyes. He grinds his teeth, trying to banish not just the vision but also the feelings it invokes. He doesn't like the feeling of helplessness, let alone the aching feeling of loneliness, as if a part of him had been torn out…

The vision fades as the buzzing of the ink pen vanishes. He blinks his eyes for a few seconds as he tries to focus on seeing what's in front of him. "Just think, by the end of the month, your tattoo will be completed." He hears Kana, another member of 'his' crew, remarks as he sits upright.

"You're taking a break, Washi?" He states as he turns to look at the tattoo artist. "What? Does your royal highness want to hurry this piece of art along?" Washy counters in a teasing tone as the neon green Mohawk tattoo artist puts away the ink pen.

"I thought you had all this month free is all; correct me if I'm wrong." He says, watching as Washi gets Zen and Kana to help clear up the ink pots. "My mom's in the hospital. She's in for a broken leg from falling off a chair. So, I've gallantly volunteered to return home for this coming week to help out around the house until one of my more responsible siblings are able to take over." The green haired tattoo artist says.

"Which basically translates into a week long party at your mom's place until one of your relatives kicks you out." He says in an amused tone as he takes his tank top from Zen. "You know me too well, 'Thor.'" Washi says, flattering his eyes at him in a flirting manner.

"Kana, you better teach your boyfriend some manners or else I'll take a whip to him." He threatens in a flat tone and on hearing that, Washi shakes his head while Kana just chuckles nervously. "Sure, boss, I'll get right on that." Kana says, clearly not sure if he really means it or not.

He pulls the tank top over his head, he's careful not to jar his tender back in the process. "You know, TK? You really need to get laid, if only to get melt some of that icicle that's in your ass." Washi adds before being hurried into the back room by Kana.

"Well, excuse me if I don't think with my dick." He snaps just before the pair vanish from the door way. "Speaking of dicks…" Zen muses and he glances to where Zen is pointing and rolls his eyes as he gets a clear view of members of Blue's crew cornering a young woman.

With a smirk fixed on his face, he grabs his leather jacket before heading out the door to do his version of stress management.

-)o(-

'Just greet, Kari, what else can go wrong today?' She curses silently to herself as she tries, unsuccessfully, to get away from the three men that were harassing her. Before she knew it, she found herself cornered in an alley.

"You'd think that you dick heads would be smart enough to, I don't know; see if someone was in the tattoo parlour before doing something like this." She glances beyond the threesome to find at the entrance of the alley a blond and burnet standing there.

"We weren't doing nothing wrong, just grabbing a piece of stray ass." The bald one says and she can hear the quiver of fear in his tone. The look in the blond's blue eyes seem to dance in delight as the blond slowly approaches them. The neon coloured punk gulps slightly to her right, though she didn't take her eyes off of the familiar looking blond, though she can't seem to put her finger on where she's seen him before.

"It doesn't look like this 'ass,'" The blond empathise the word 'ass,' "likes being treated like this." The blond stops about two feet from the thugs. She can feel the confidence that seems to leak off of the blond, it wasn't dissimilar to what her brother, Tai, sends out, only she really didn't like the look of anticipation that's housed in the blond's eyes.

"Come on, TK. We haven't even touched her!" The guy to her left stutters out as the guy takes a few steps back. "Does it look like I care? Just because you didn't get the chance doesn't mean much, now does it? After all, thought becomes action, and action becomes the deed." The blond now known as TK remarks smoothly, the blond's eyes flicker to her before returning to graze at the bald guy that had been the leader of the three.

After a few seconds of tension, the guy on her right breaks the silence by yelling out a battle cry as he charges forward to land a blow on TK. The blow misses TK's head; all TK seemed to do was tilt his head to the side. Then one moment, TK was there and then he wasn't.

A pained grunt comes from her left and she turns to find TK standing slightly to her left, the thug was clutching the side of his face. With a strangled cry, the bald man and the first attack charges towards TK, though as she watches, all TK does was evade their attacks, as if they weren't even there.

'He's toying with them!' She muses to herself as it dawns on her that TK doesn't seem to be in a hurry to finish this. The look of enjoyment that's shining from the blond's blue eyes made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up.

She feels slightly sick on figuring that out, since it stirs old memories and feelings. "STOP toying with them!" It takes her a moment to realise that she spoke her thought out since TK's graze turns to look at her, a look of surprise were evident in his eyes.

She feels her face redden and within moments of looking away from TK's, it sounds like TK did indeed do as she had asked. She glances up from the ground to watch TK frowning slightly, his right hand seems to twitch slightly. TK snaps out of it and glances to her, his eyes were icy.

"So, is there anything else I can do, your 'holiness'?" TK asks her, sarcasms oozing out of his tone. She blushes slightly, though she wonders why TK say 'holiness' instead of 'highness'…

"I don't know, are you capable of doing anything?" She snaps, for some odd reason, she's irritated by how TK handled this. TK snorts and seems to study her for a moment or two before shaking his head. "Whatever, angel-face, whatever." TK replies once the blond turns his back on her.

Her graze shifts from the blond to the burnet and then finally to the fallen guys on the ground. She tried to feel pity for them, but somehow, just couldn't, so she made sure not to step on anybody as she heads to the entrance of the alley. Her feelings were mixed as she watches TK head across the street, to the tattoo parlour across the way.

"Could you, I don't know, maybe walk me to a friend's place?" She finally asked in a voice that carried across the street. TK pauses before turning around to look at her once more.

"Oh?" TK asks in a flat tone with his left eyebrow raised up. TK's friend seems to find this slightly amusing from what she can tell from the sly grin on his face. "Well, isn't this how this encounter is supposed to end? The hero walking the heroine away from the place that he rescued her." She states in an amused sort of way, though she can't help but wonder why she's trying to get TK to walk her to her brother's dorm.

'Well, he's not hard on the eye, that's for sure.' She admits to herself. "Thor would love to walk you to your destination. I'm Zen by the way." Zen says as he pats TK's shoulder.

TK gives Zen an icy look but the burnet doesn't seem too phased by it. "Thor?" She asks in surprise and Zen replies in a slightly nervous tone, "Well, you can always hear the results of TK's handy work, get it?"

While she doesn't get it, she nods anyway. "So, what's your name, angel-face?" Zen asks as he pulls his hand off of TK's shoulder with a slightly shaken smile on his face. She mentally rolls her eyes at Zen's antics, although from the look in TK's eyes, Zen probably has a valid reason to be fearful of the blond.

"Fine, where is it that I'm supposed to take you?" TK cuts in before she can introduce herself. She wanted to him a dirty look for interrupting her, but then, she gets this feeling that it would be pushing it a little too far…

-)o(-

"Whoever they are they've added more to that program, Gennai." He tells the robed man. "Thank you, Izzy." Gennai says and he can tell that Gennai's trouble about this whole thing.

Not that he could blame the Digital man, he, too, doesn't like the look of this, especially since they can't seem to find a trace of a connection linking this program to any outside source. "Gennai! Gennai! We've got a problem!" An orange Digimon bolts into the room that's on his computer screen.

"What's wrong Patamon?" Gennai asks the small looking Digimon. He frowns slightly and wonders what Patamon is whispering to Gennai. Gennai looks alarmed and he asks, "What's wrong?"

Gennai doesn't reply as the robed man gets to his feet and heads out of the room, following the worried orange Digimon called Patamon. 'Must be something really important if he forgot that I was here…' He thinks as his frown turns thoughtful as he begins to think up possible reasons for Gennai's haste out of the room.

-)o(-

Earlier

He had just been staring at one of the two corner stones of the Digital world. One represented Light while the other represented Hope, something that has yet to shine since that incident with that Digimon about six years ago…

His ears drooped as he recalls the events that happened. 'TK…' He muses for like the millionth time since the corner stones were created to monitor Hope's infection with the Dark Spore.

Something happens that snaps him out of his depressing thoughts. 'I'm pretty sure that's not suppose to happen…' The orange coloured Digimon thinks as the light coloured parts of Hope's corner stone begins to glow and the dark purple begin to leak out an icky looking mist.

He waits for a few minutes but when the blackish purple mist and the teal coloured light begin to battle, he bolts out of the underground chamber, heading to find the one person who could possibility make sense of what's happening to Hope's stone, and maybe with TK as well…

Present

Though it had taken him about ten minutes to get Gennai and return to the underground chamber, the phenomenon had only grown more violent while he had been away getting the robed Digital man.

"This isn't good, is it?" He asks before landing on Gennai's shoulder. His eyes wide as he watches the storm of light and shadow play out.

"Something's upset the balance between TK's crest and the Dark Spore imbedded in his neck." The robed man tells him. He felt so helpless… anger flares up within him as he feels the frustration of his situation once more keeps him from his human partner.

In the end, like always, he can only sit around and watch as the interplay between the purplish mist that represents the Dark Spore battles with the light that represents TK's crest, Hope. 'I'm just so tired of this, all of it. If I don't do something to help TK, then what the right do I have calling myself his partner? He needs me…' He tells himself as he lies on Gennai's should, watching the struggle before him play out, reflecting the struggle that TK is going through right now…

-)o(-

'Why the hell did I have to come inside the dorm with her?' The blond wonders as he walks down the hallway with her. His head was killing him and he personally doesn't want have anything more to do with this girl with reddish hazel eyes.

He really doesn't care what her name was, in his view; this will likely be their only encounter if he has any say in the matter. He rubs the back of his neck, the spot at the base of his neck burns and no matter how often he rubs the spot, it doesn't seem to help. He pulls his hand away from the spot and shoves it into his jacket pocket.

He keeps his face carefully blank as he stops before one of the doors. He turns and watches the girl he saved from Blue's thugs pause before a door on the other side of the narrow hallway. He frowns slightly as he reads the number on the door.

If he's right then one of the occupies is…

The girl knocks on the door and after a few seconds a blond opens up the door. "Matt! Is my brother in?" The girl asks his elder brother. He turns away and begins to walk away, hoping that the elder blond doesn't spot him as he hurries out of sight.

"TK! TK!" He hears the girl call out, he stops and turns, the reddish hazel eyed girl catches up to him. Matt's a few steps behind her, Matt and his eyes briefly meet. He looks away from his brother, deciding that a certain part of the wall was more interesting.

"Have you two… met?" The girl asks slowly. "He's my little brother." Matt admits and he shrugs, glancing quickly at Matt's face, he turns his gaze to the girl.

-)o(-

She glances between the two blonds before asking, "Have you two… met?" She watches as TK glances up at Matt for a second or two before gazing at her after Matt replies, "He's my little brother.

She doesn't know what to say to that as she glances back and forth between the two. "So, how have you been, TK?" Matt asks in an uncertain tone, as if expecting to get slapped or something.

"I'm fine." TK says in a flat tone, TK's blue eyes flickering between them. "It's been about three years since…" Matt says, trailing off at the end.

"Yea well, our 'mother' was pretty clear as to the part that if I didn't 'shape up and fly right' that I'm not welcome under her roof. As I recall, you and dad were of the same mind." TK states in a bitter tone.

She could feel the tension in the air and she can't help but glance at Matt. From the sad look on the elder blond's face pretty much told her that he regretted that. The tension breaks as Tai calls out, "What are you two doing over there? Come on! Izzy wants to talk to all of us."

As Matt and her look down to where her brother's head is coming out of the dorm, by the time she looks to where TK had been standing, she finds that he's gone. She glances into Matt's face and feels bad for bringing up this bit about TK…

-)o(-

Currently, it's about two am in the morning and he had been unable to sleep. So he climbed up the fire escape to get to the roof, a place that he usually goes when he's unable to sleep, either by Zen entertaining his latest girlfriend to DJ having his music up a little to loud.

His living arrangement for about the last three years has been sharing an apartment with Zen and an underage barkeeper named Hachi or to use his nick name, DJ for his collection of CDs and Tapes. Not that he could afford another place with what Zen and him do for a living. And he knew it could be worst considering the kind of neighbourhood he finds himself living in.

He's a highly intelligent teen; he had even been called a Genius back when he attended school. Back when he was living with his mother. He might not have been able to, say, balance the country's budget, but he was ranked up there.

If he were to be truthful with himself, he's not sure when he got to be that smart, it kind of cropped up between age ten to eleven. It was also around that time did he begin to have those headaches and that itch on his neck. Things had changed from then on, he knew that had even though he can't always put his finger on it, but something in him had begun to change him. He got a heck of a lot better at sports, he could see a lines going from point A to B, C, and D, and, of course, this need to fight, a desire to beat those that oppose him into bloody pulps...

'And enjoy doing it.' He muses to himself in a matter of fact way. Now that his headache has calmed down, though it's not totally gone, he's able to think a lot more clearly then he did this afternoon.

So now, he's trying to pin point the point to what caused his headache to go into overdrive and so far, all he's been able to come up with was that spending time with that girl likely boosted the fading headache. How being with her could cause said result, he's not sure at the moment, and he's not looking to find out either.

'So then, that end that. I mean, what are the odds that I'll ever met her again? After all, Washi isn't going to be around for a week, so there isn't any reason why I'd visit that part of the city. For now, I'll just focus on those commissions and if I need human contact I'll just head out with DJ and hang out that the Drunken Dog. There's always someone that shows up that starts a drunken brawl…' He muses, a slightly feral grin appears on his face as he recalls the last drunken brawl he broke up for the owner, Genma had paid him for that since the bouncer at the time had been found knock out by a flying beer bottle.

With that mentally resolved, he allows the exhaustion that's lurking within to take over. After all, life for him will continue as it has been for the last three years, nothing has come up that has disrupted what bit of control he has over his life and he don't doubt his ability deal with those that try to crop up to disrupt it either.

-)o(-

When soft snores reach his ears, he relaxes and moves out of his hiding place from under Izzy's bed. It's been about a day since the incident that happen down in the chambers occurred. He does feel slightly guilty about sneaking off without informing anyone of his plans, but his resolve to find his partner eclipses his feelings of guilt.

He leaps into the air and within a few seconds, he's hovering in Izzy's room. He glances around, getting a better look and then spots a likely way to get out of the Digidestine's room. He flies towards the slightly open window and after a lot of effort, he manages to widen the window opening enough to wiggle out of the room.

He hovers before the window for a few seconds as he takes a good, long look at the city that lies outside of Izzy's room. He swallows slightly as despair tries to overwhelm him but he gives himself a few mental shakes before flying off in a random direction, confident that at journey's end that he'll be reunited with his human counter part, the one who left a gapping whole within his heart…