A/N: Set in the same time as .tri, without the travesty of losing the 02 kids. No one has been back to the Digital World since the end of the first season. This one-shot is centered on Tai, and if I describe this story with one word, it's "somber". More notes at the end.
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See You Again Soon
Tai lays against the hillside with his hands behind his head. He stares up at the sky, gazing at its heavenly blue, free of white, fluffy wisps floating in it. Everyone is sitting around him - Matt, Sora, Mimi, Joe, TK, Kari, and even Izzy, who is staring intently at his laptop screen set on his crossed legs. It's odd to see them all gathered with him like this. Since their adventure in the Digital World six years ago, they continued on living in the real world. Tai remained close with Matt and Sora being in the same class every year, and of course he saw Kari at home everyday. But, as far as the others, he said his "good day" and shared small talk whenever they ran into each other, and nothing more. The Digidestined drifted apart throughout the years, and Tai only wished that returning to the Digital World could change that.
Still, the gathering before him strikes confusion, especially with Joe sitting beside him, when he is normally off studying somewhere; furthermore, Joe is happily chatting with Mimi, who Tai thought was still living in America. His thoughts are distracted the moment Izzy lets out a loud gasp.
"Guys, I don't believe it! I'm getting a signal!" Izzy shouts, and Tai sits up from his spot.
"What is it?" he asks, and everyone else forms a huddle around Izzy to look at his screen.
"Can it be?" Sora says, her mouth half open.
"No way…" pipes TK.
Tai's heart leaps in his chest. The awed look on his friends' faces tell him only one thing, and he gets up and joins them to watch along with them, the hope he's held onto for so long finally coming to fruition. They all lean over Izzy as the screen flashes before them, with familiar symbols running across the screen that Tai vaguely remembers as hieroglyphs from the Digital World. His heart continues to race as the symbols swirl and crash together, forming letters they can all understand.
But as the message unscrambles letter by letter, a tinge of worry crosses Tai's mind. He looks on with bated breath, but his hope only wanes until it disappears completely, when the symbols stop moving and the message shows as clear as the skies above:
"Farewell, dearest friends."
Tai opens his eyes to the sounds of his alarm clock. The beeps are quick and repetitive with a steady rhythm on his ears. It is the clock that he stares at every morning that nags him to get out of bed and get ready for another day at school. He closes his eyes, hoping that he is only dreaming and that he doesn't have to get up so soon. It takes a few more beeps to convince him that he isn't dreaming, after all.
Not anymore, anyway.
He gets up and dresses into his school uniform, then he spends a good while on his thick, brown hair. When he's done perfecting his style, he makes sure that all of his homework is already dumped into his backpack, which he slings over his shoulder after checking. Before he leaves his room, his eyes fall onto his desk, where a strange, blue device sits on top, glinting from the sunlight shining through his window. It is this strange, blue device, his digivice, that once sounded beeps in its own way, but hasn't done so in six years.
Before today, he always buckled it onto his belt, waiting, hoping for it to activate one day, so that he can return to the Digital World, and so that he can see the one friend he yearned to see once again.
Today, he left for school without it.
He rides his bike to school, and he flashes a smile to his classmates in greeting. Everyone smiles back, and it gets him in good spirits to carry the rest of the day with. His classmates know him as cheerful, outgoing, sometimes boastful, so wearing the smile that day keeps them thinking that, no less.
Izzy is the first to sense otherwise.
"What's up, Tai?" he asks when he passes him in the hallway.
"Not much, Izzy," Tai replies. "Just another day in paradise."
Tai says nothing more, but watches Izzy walk by, carrying his laptop on his side - The laptop Izzy used in the Digital World. All these years since they left, and it's hard to believe, even for Izzy, that the laptop is still in prime condition. Izzy had concluded it had something to do with exposure to that world, but until now, they aren't able to confirm it.
Tai opens his mouth to call Izzy, but he stops himself. It's the same laptop he saw in his dream, the one with the message too devastating to think about.
What was the point in saying more, anyway? Too many times he's asked Izzy if there has been any sort of message, any sort of sign, a blip on the screen, maybe even a beep… One more question to him is just going to be one more "Negative, Tai" in response.
"Do you miss it?" is all that Tai wants to ask, but, he hesitates.
When Tai enters the classroom, he finds his friends Matt and Sora sitting next to each other. He smiles at them and Matt holds his hand up while Sora cheerfully sends him a smile back. As Tai takes a seat at his own desk, he sees the two holding hands across her desk. They chatter back and forth until Matt's lips curl into a warm smile that Sora gives in return, a sign that Tai reads how fond they are of each other.
He wonders if they miss it, too. But, he doesn't want to dampen their moods.
"What's eating you, Tai?" Sora asks during lunch. Tai blinks, realizing he's now sitting at a table with Matt and Sora in the cafeteria.
"Hmm?" Tai lifts his head up from leaning against his palm with his elbow on the table.
"You've been a space cadet since we sat down, and you've barely touched your plate," says Matt.
"It's nothing."
Tai takes a spoonful of the curry rice, but senses Matt and Sora exchanging looks. They don't say anything else about it, but Sora continues to talk about Mimi's flight landing at Narita International Airport the night before.
"Are you sure you're okay?" Sora prods once more. "I thought you'd be excited to see Mimi, too."
"Of course I am," Tai says, though his distracting thoughts fail him. Any other day, his eyes would light up at the joy of seeing a friendly face again.
Tai brings his hand to the side of his pants, but he only feels his belt. He remembers then, that he decided to leave his digivice at home.
The thought of never seeing Agumon again...
The message from the dream remains on his mind throughout the day. He tries to distract himself by listening to every word the teacher speaks about Geometry and the Pythagorean Theorem. The teacher draws different types of angles lined with arrows on the board. Obtuse. Right. Acute. Lines and curves that signify meaning to the numbers and words that the teacher tries to help the class understand.
But the math on the chalkboard only reminds Tai of the digital symbols, the ominous words that crushed his hope in ever returning to that world. He scribbles the geometry notes in his notebook, but he decides to make sense of it later.
At the end of the school day, he walks along the sidewalk with his bike alongside him. He runs into Kari, who is chatting with TK and three of her other friends, Yolei, Davis, and Cody. It's a normal occurrence, and Tai is happy to see Kari in her element in this way. TK cracks a joke which makes Kari and Yolei burst into giggles, and Davis pouts at Kari.
"See you at home, Kari?" Tai asks with a small smile.
Kari smiles warmly in return, but her attention turns to Yolei who starts gushing about her date with Ken happening in a few days' time. Tai turns to walk away, not wanting to trouble Kari, but he notices that TK is still looking at him, his eyes full of concern.
When Tai reaches home, he takes off his shoes at the door and drops his backpack on the floor in his room before falling into his bed. He lays on his back, holding his phone above his face. He doesn't want to bother anyone with his thoughts gnawing at his brain, but he needs to let it out somehow.
When he reaches Matt's name in his contacts screen, then Sora's, he only scrolls past. They might be hanging out together somewhere.
Izzy? Tai knows he's bothered him enough.
What about Mimi? Does he really want to rain on her parade, too?
And then, Joe… Joe might be studying. But, he wouldn't be bothered by this, at least, Tai didn't think so. Tai decides to hit the call button to see what Joe might have to say.
The call went straight to Joe's voicemail. Tai lets his hand and phone fall against the bed, beginning to accept the silence surrounding him.
Suddenly, he hears a beep. Wait, no - it can't be.
Tai shoots straight up into a sitting position, his eyes immediately on his desk to check the digivice. The digivice, which, to his dismay, remains still. He turns to his side to see his phone lighting up, and sees that the beeps only came from Joe returning his phone call.
"Hey, Tai," said Joe. "Long time, no talk. How's it going?"
"Just wanting to know how you were doing," Tai says, feeling a wave of nostalgia hitting him as he hears Joe's voice. He truly hasn't heard from him in a while.
"Oh, you know... studying... The usual."
"Typical Joe - nose always stuck in a book." Tai says as he smiles at the image.
"Hey, all this studying is going to get me somewhere."
"I have no doubt about it."
Silence falls on either end. Tai doesn't want to bring it up, but, if he remembers clearly, Joe always had a good sense of reading the silence.
"Did you want to talk about something, Tai?" Joe asks, which Tai figured he would ask next.
But Tai pauses with hesitation. He doesn't want to talk about the dream, or the pained feelings that came with it. He fights within himself, knowing he should talk about something before it all piles up until he can't take it anymore.
So, he says the first thing that he feels the most important:
"I miss it, Joe."
"Ah, that's why you called," Joe replies, and quiet follows his words.
I'm sorry if I'm bothering you," Tai adds. "I could call another time..."
Joe chuckles. "Don't worry, Tai. It's okay. I miss it too."
After ending the call with Joe, Tai makes his way to the hillside that overlooks a lake. He feels a weight lifted from his shoulders after reminiscing with Joe about their beloved friends in the other world. He shared conversations with the other friends and even Kari once in a while, but it always did improve his mood.
He sits on the grassy hill, feeling the digivice on his belt this time. He removes it and stares at it, for some reason with a glimmer of hope that it will actually do something this time.
He frowns, seeing no sign of activity, and places it back onto his belt. What did he expect, anyway? It had always been the same for so long, no matter how many times he picked it up and looked at it.
But why does it hurt now more than ever?
"Tai?" calls Sora's voice.
Tai turns to see Sora and Matt approaching him from up the hill. They sit on either side of him, Matt with an unreadable expression, but Sora looking worried.
"You always tell us what's on your mind, Tai," Sora says, placing her hand over his. "Did something happen?"
"Nothing happened," Tai replies, staring with his lowered lids at the digivice on his fingers.
"Tai, it's gotta be something-" Matt starts, but Tai shakes his head.
"No, Matt. That's just it. Nothing happened. Nothing is happening. The digivice makes no noise. Izzy hasn't seen a thing. It's been this way all these years. Why is nothing happening?!"
Tai's voice rises, and he tightens his fingers around the device. He doesn't expect either of them to answer. He knows that neither of them have an answer for him, and he won't fault them for that.
Sora squeezes his hand in comfort, and he knows that she and Matt are ready and willing to listen to him. He finally tells them about his dream.
"I always hoped that one day, we could all go back," Tai continues, lowering his voice. "That we could see our partners again. I never thought I'd have to say goodbye for good…"
The thought hurts him, even more as he admits it aloud. There's a sting behind his eyes and a tightness in his throat, but he fights against it. He avoids the gaze of his worried friends, but he could sense his words affect them, too.
Matt places his hand in Tai's shoulder. "It was just a dream," he says, in attempt to make him feel better, maybe in attempt to make them all feel better.
"But, is it worth hoping for so long?" Tai asks. "What if we truly, never get to see them again?"
"We shouldn't lose hope," enters a new voice. TK appeared with Kari, both of them taking a seat in front of Tai.
"I agree," Kari says. "But even if we don't, at least we got to spend time with them. We did have lots of fun, for the most part."
Yet another voice calls his name, and they all look to see Mimi from afar, smiling and waving at them all. Joe and Izzy are with her, and follow her to join everyone else.
"Chin up, Tai," Mimi tells him. "Agumon wouldn't want to see you this way. He'd want to see you smile, just like Palmon would for me."
Tai realizes he agrees with her, and his lips curl into a smile. For a while, everyone sits together with Tai, and they talk and laugh together, just as they did before. It warms his heart, seeing his friends catch up and share memories, like nothing changed between them throughout the years. He lays on his back against the grass and stares up at the sky, not a cloud in sight…
"Guys, I don't believe it!" Izzy says suddenly after letting out a gasp. "I'm getting a signal!"
Tai freezes in his spot, hearing those words that are eerily familiar to him. He slowly sits up as everyone else gathers around Izzy.
"What is it?" Tai asks cautiously. He hears Sora say "Can it be?" and TK follows with "No way…"
Tai trembles in fear while his friends stare at Izzy's screen in wonder and unknowing what will happen during the next few moments. He then stops himself and fights the fear rushing through his mind. It was only a dream, he tells himself.
When Tai joins the others, the hieroglyphs fly on the screen, just like in his dream. Tai feels his heart pound against his chest, not knowing what the symbols will read this time.
Then, Tai hears a beep.
He hears the same beeping go off all around him. The symbols on the laptop screen continue to smash into each other, but as Tai brings out his digivice on his palm, he cannot believe his eyes.
His digivice is glowing. And, when everyone else takes their own digivices out, they find them glowing just the same.
Tai feels his heart caught in his throat as he looks back to the screen. Letters scramble together, but Tai immediately notices it is nothing like his dream. As the letters form, Tai can't help but surrender to the tears he had been holding back, and a smile forms when he sees the message bound together:
"See you again soon."
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A/N: Tried to keep thing canon and in character, outside of the other story differences, including the little Sorato you'd never think I'd write. ;)
Anyway, It's been a rough week. I'm dealing with loss and I thought it would help if I vented through fic. Writing's been my form of comfort anyway, but thought I'd let you know what's going on with me. Really appreciate all my readers and followers. Thanks so much for reading. Until next update. xx
*original post 2/8/19
*note edited 3/10/19