Disclaimer: Digimon and its characters I do not own, because they are owned by some people I don't know, who don't own me and therefore are of no concern to me except that they own the characters that I write about, in the fics that I own but those guys who own Digimon don't own and—(G: For Pete's sake, they get the picture already! Shut up and move on to the Author's Note.)

A/N: Whee! Hooray for spur of the moment stories made up during IRC chats! This was an impromptu bedtime story for my good friend, Shimegami.EXE. It's not complete yet, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. ^_^;;; Oh, and by the way, I'm back, I'm bold, and maybe even beaut—(G: Don't even think about getting started with the dub Sailor Moon! Just tell the story.) Oh, fine. But hey, I'm back, and now here's the story!

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As the World Falls Down

Chapter 1

Up in the dimming Odaiba sky, tiny flickers of stars began to appear as dusk turned into evening. On the streets, people were hurrying home to their loved ones, according to their normal pattern of daily life. Everything appeared normal, and to everyone, it was just another, quiet day...

"Darnnit!" Yolei Inoue exclaimed as she tossed another burnt-out match to the side of the table. The black stub joined eleven of its buddies in a smoldering heap.

It was nearly 7 o'clock at the 22-year-old's new apartment. Ken was expected to come over at any minute, and she wasn't even finished lighting the candles on his surprise birthday cake. She took out another match and scraped it across the box to light it.

Shielding the newly-lit match with her other hand, she brought it closer to the last candle she had tried to light.

'Candle number 19, number 20, 21,22....' Yolei counted to herself.

However, just before she could light the last candle--the extra one she had added for good luck until his next birthday--the new match died.

"Stupid matches," Yolei muttered, throwing this one amongst the twelve others. She was prepared to take out another one when she heard the doorbell ring.

The lavendar-haired woman looked up to see the second hand on her clock skimming past the 12 where the minute hand was, with the short hand resting on the 7.

She should have known he'd be there exactly on time.

Hurriedly placing the lighted cake on the dining table, Yolei rushed over to the lights and turned them off

She stopped behind the door briefly to take a deep breath. It wasn't the private, surprise birthday celebration she was throwing him alone that was making her nervous. After all, as his girlfriend, she had thrown him unexpected dinners and such on numerous occasions.

It was the surprise she had for him afterward that worried her. Sure Yolei knew it was unorthodox for a woman to do these kinds of things, but knowing how shy Ken was, it'd be years before he took the first step.

She summoned up all the courage she had and calmed herself down before flinging open the door.

"Surprise, Ken!" the nervous woman cheered, putting on her best smile.

Her bright face instantly turned into one of confusion, though, as she was met with the cold night air.

"Huh?"

She suddenly felt a tugging at the leg of her pants and looked down.

"Pardon me, Yolei." A small, green digimon looked up at her.

The young woman just noticed a thin line of silk thread hanging from the recently pushed doorbell.

"Oh, Wormmon!" she exclaimed in astonishment. "What are you doing here?"

"I came over to see if Ken were here. He didn't come back home after his doctor's appointment."

"Oh?"

That was right. He had been having some neck pains lately and had gone to see the doctor today.

But that was hours ago.... Where could he be?

Now worried for a different reason, she replied to Wormmon, "Sorry, he hasn't come by here yet..." Gulping to try to tone down the uneasiness in her voice, she continued, "I'll call around. You just go home and relax. I'm sure he'll turn up."

"Thank you, Yolei. I really hope he's all right."

As soon as she had seen Wormmon on his way and reassured him some more that everything would be all right, she closed the door, turned the lights back on, and made her way towards the phone. She had just flipped to Davis's number in her address book and was reaching for the phone's receiver when another doorbell ring came.

Thinking that it might be Ken, Yolei bolted for the front door.

She threw it open and found that she indeed was right, but she wasn't so sure that that was a good thing.

Before her wasn't the usual, warm and friendly gentleman of a boyfriend, but a lanky, haggard man with a forlorn look in his downtrodden eyes.

"Ken....?" Yolei asked tentatively. Behind her, the 22 flickers of flame on the birthday cake kept eating away at their candle-stems.

But the indigo-haired man didn't even notice. Yolei wasn't even sure that he noticed her. She rested a tentative hand on his shoulder and ushered him in.

"Ken, what's wrong? Wormmon said he hadn't seen you since you went to the doctor's..."

She saw him flinch his blank eyes at the mention of the doctor. "Ken..."

Not liking the looks of that, she walked him over to the couch and sat down with him.

"Did the doctor say something, Ken?" she asked in a strained voice.

Eons of silence passed between them.

"Ken..." she shook him gently. "Ken, honey, please. Tell me what happened. What did the doctor say? I know it has something to do with that!" She was in a near panic by now. "Ken, say something!"

His soft, pale lips quivered open. "Yo-Yolei..."

"Yes?" Desperation was evident in her voice.

"I-I went to see him...He examined my neck..."

"And?"

Silence fell like a pestilence across them again.

Ken opened his mouth in an attempt to say what was on his mind, but no sound came out. Finally, he managed to sputter, "...He...he found a growth."

The news hit Yolei harder than a bullet train.

The indigo-haired man closed his eyes gently.

He didn't want to hurt her like this, but he guessed it was better to spit it all out and get it over with.

"He thought it might be a tumor." Ken took a deep breath before going on. "He took a look at my medical history and found that my neck had never been examined before. Heck, why would it? It's hurt on a few occasions, but not like recently, so I just brushed it off as cramps or something.

"Then he suspected that the Dark Spore may have infected my neck and slowly turned the surrounding cells cancerous over the years. I was hoping this wasn't true; it was just his suspicions after all, and he even said that might not be it for sure.

"So, we took a trip down to the emergency room and took some scans of my neck...." Ken swallowed hard.

This would be the most difficult part of all to tell.

"It seems like he was right," he choked. "They found where the Dark Spore was embedded and saw that all the tissue around it had become cancerous--and the worst part is, it's even penetrated my spinal cord.... They don't think I have very long to live."

Yolei opened her mouth to say something, and found it to be completely dry. "Isn't--isn't there anything they can do?" she stammered "Can't they separate it with lasers or just cut the thing out and replace it with tissue?"

Ken shook his head gravely. "We didn't catch it in time. It's already gone too far. They don't think I'll last more than a year."

By this time, the candles on the birthday cake were nothing more than puddles of wax struggling to keep their flames alive.

Yolei's mind had gone almost completely blank. All she could think was 'No, this isn't possible! This can't be happening. How could this have happened? This is just…wrong!'

Over and over the same thoughts rushed through her mind. 'No, this can't happen! This just can't! It isn't supposed to be like this.'

"No!" With that strangled scream, she bolted up from the couch. "This can't happen! It can't!"

"Yolei..." Ken stood up as well, prepared to calm her down by wrapping her in his arms, but she slapped his consoling hands away.

"You can't die!" Tears were threatening to stream down from her shimmering, amber eyes.

Before Ken could step forward in another attempt to comfort her, she quickly turned on her heel and ran for her room. In the process, a small, velvet box fell from her pocket.

Seeing that there was no way he could catch her before she slammed her bedroom door and locked it behind her, he turned his attention towards the small, indigo box. Shakily removing the ribbon on it, he pulled top off to reveal a golden ring on an indigo cushion. Inside was a folded up note in Yolei's handwriting.

"Ken," it read, "will you marry me?"

***

G: ....…Evil! I like! :D

Shi-chan: Hm, interesting that Yolei is proposing. Demo...that's just like her, isn't it?

Gaia: Yeah, I think that might be like her, :-P but couldn't think of anything more powerful than that from the woman of the couple. And hence all the nervousness beforehand.

Shi-chan: Yeah, true. Yay, ^_^ I like! Are you gonna kill him?

Gaia: Heh, we'll see…

(Thanks for the feedback throughout this, Shi-chan. :) )