Every Rose Has Its Thorns

Every Rose Has Its Thorns

By: Celestial Angel

Disclaimer: Everything Digimon is property of Saban, Toei, and Bandai. Celeste is mine. That's about all, I guess. Basically, the only things that are mine are Celeste and the basic plot. K? Well, that's all for the disclaimer.

Author's Note: Well, not much to say here, except for the obvious fact that this is a Mimato fanfic. Other than that, various people will drop in to give Mimi advice. Oh, by the way, the man mentioned in the first part is not, I repeat IS NOT Matt. Got that? Good. Also, this story is in no way related to Rainy Day, if you're wondering. Oh, and the part where it says 'scene change', it's actually a hallucination.

***

All she could do was cry. That's the only thing she could do as her fiancée advanced on her. She gently put a small hand to her cheek where a stinging blow had left its harsh mark; she knew that a large ugly bruise was forming there. She already had a black eye. It would take a lot of makeup to cover this one up. She winced slightly as her hand grazed the extremely sore spot. She felt a warm, sticky liquid flowing from the corner of her mouth and she wiped it away with the back of her hand. She knew what it was…blood.

She looked up again to see her fiancée almost ontop of her, his green eyes ablaze with rage, her own chocolate brown ones wide with fear. She screamed at the top of her lungs, her voice reflecting only a small portion of the sheer terror she felt.

He reached out and grabbed her arm at the elbow. She cried out with pain; his grip felt like a vise, harsh, cold, unfeeling.

" Shut up!" he yelled harshly as he backhanded her across the face again, slammed her head violently against the wall three times, and dropped her roughly to the floor.

She let herself fall back against the wall, her head landing with a thump against the drywall, leaving a large bright red spot on the blue paint . She slid to the side and let herself fall to the floor as blackness took over and a single crystalline teardrop found its way down to the plush white carpet.

***

Scene Change…

She giggled like a giddy school girl as her boyfriend swept her off her feet and carried through the park like a groom would carry his bride over the threshold, except there was no threshold, just a root on which she had sprained her foot.

She pretended to scream with terror, but instead it came out as a scream of delight.

" Oh! Help me!" she screamed, laughing all the while, " stop you fiend!" she screamed as she pounded her small fists on his back.

He turned his head to her ear and whispered, " I don't think so," he said, smiling.

" Stop, Frank, you can put me down now," she said.

" Nah," Frank said, " I'm having too much fun."

She frowned at him, then her frown turned to a pout. " Please," she pleaded.

He looked at her face and tried to appear stern, but eventually he broke down. " All right," he relinquished, " but not right now. Let me carry you to the lake, then I'll put you down. Okay? Deal."

She looked back at him. " Frank," she began, " people are looking at us."

He looked off into the distance, " So let them look," he said to the tall trees surrounding them. He looked back at her, his mouth twisted into a pout. " Please," he said using her own trick against her.

She couldn't resist that. " Oh fine," she said acquiescing. " Go ahead."

He smiled at her and proceeded to carry her the short distance to the lake.

***

The sun reflecting off the surface of the lake gave it the appearance of having a surface made of thousands of diamonds, each little one shining as bright as a star. The sun was high in the cloudless sky, its rays shining like shafts through the canopy of trees surrounding the lake. A slight breeze wound its way through the trees and found its way to the lake.

***

She let out a soft sigh as she watched her long chestnut bangs ruffle in the wind like ribbons. She let her chocolate brown eyes close as she imagined herself out on the lake, but instead of water, she was swimming in a sea of diamonds. It may have seemed like an irrelevant fantasy, but it had always been a wild fantasy of hers, not that she could afford it in her financial state.

She leaned against a metal rail, her back to the lake. " Why?" she asked herself. " Why did it have to happen to me? What did I ever do to deserve this sorrow, this pain?" She shook her head slightly. Even after their triumphant return from the digiworld, her life still didn't return to normal.

She and her family had moved to the east coast of America; she had rarely seen her friends. She only got to when she got to visit Japan. When she did get to go though, there was always a DigiDestined Reunion, and that included the 3 new good digidestined as well.

She smiled to herself as she thought wryly, * Those kids don't know what they're in for* Of course, with Kari and T.K. joining Daisuke, Miyako and Iori, they could at least guess as to what the evil Kaiser would do next. Anyway, back to the DigiDestined Reunion.

One of the times, everyone had met at Tai's apartment. Everyone had been there, including the new DigiDestined. Usually they were on alert constantly, having to escape to DigiWorld to foil the plans of the Kaiser. Anyway, as mentioned before, everyone had gathered at Tai's apartment for the reunion. Kari had heard that for once, everyone would be in Japan so she planned the party. Kari had everyone except Mimi and Matt and T.K. bring some kind of food. Mimi simply brought some stuff from New York ( Sorry, I don't know exactly where she lives when she moves. Gomen *_*;;) for them. T.K. had been in charge of getting the new digidestined informed of the gathering, and Matt convinced his band to join the party and maybe to play some music. As it turned out they couldn't because the neighbors started their ranting before the band even got through the first song, so the members of the band just stuck around and enjoyed the party.

Matt had introduced the band members when they had arrived. He had mentioned that one of the members, Frank Wirani was leaving Japan and moving to New York.

Mimi's heart jumped at this. Here was Frank, (who is the same guy she's now engaged to by the way), a hot guy who had a seemingly great personality, and a tie to her friends, and he was moving to New York. Maybe she would get to see him sometime, and she did.

Her thoughts drifted back to the present and the sparkling lake. She looked over to the nearby pavilion, and saw Frank leaning on the whitewashed railing. He was looking out over the water, the sparkles reflecting in his green eyes. His eyes were so deep that she would get lost in them if she wasn't careful. One lock of his raven black hair kept falling in his eyes in a way that somehow reminded her of Matt…

*Stop it!* she yelled at herself. * He's gone, you left him behind and there is no way that you are ever going to get to see him again. Why would you want to see him again?* she asked herself. * Why would you want to see him again after wht he did?*

She shook her head. "No," she whispered out loud. " not, I'm not going to think of that now. It's a beautiful day and I've got a great guy who loves me. I'm not going to put myself down."

She looked back at Frank again. He was lean but well muscled, and that made him not the type of person to get angry.

She cringed at this. She had thought about what she would do if he ever hurt her. Without Palmon and without fighting skills of any sort and lacking in natural physical strength, there would be no way to fight back. * No!* her mind screamed. * He would never do that! He loves me! He truly does!*

*Keep telling yourself that*, a familiar voice whispered to her mind. * Be ready to run. *

She closed her eyes; she knew how to respond to that. *Why?* She thought.

*You will know soon,* answered the voice, *but remember this, I will be there to help you. I will make sure you get through this. No matter what it takes…*

*Thank you Celeste* she answered, * I will remember.*

She opened her eyes and stared back out at the lake. The breeze was blowing harder now and it sent a shower of leaves from nearby trees around her, some hitting her gently. Her thoughts flew through her mind like the leaves on the wind. * What are you talking about Celeste?* she asked herself. * Why would I have to run? Tell me.* She waited for an answer but was disappointed when she received none. She thought about Celeste. She was a mysterious being who had appeared to the DigiDestined many times throughout their journey in the DigiWorld to help them correct the disturbances in the dimensions or something like that. Mimi knew that Celeste was probably helping the new digidestined as well. Even after the old digidestineds' return from the Digiworld, she still kept in contact all of them, but more so with Mimi than with the others. Still though, Mimi never let the others know about this, so far, no one knew about this except for her. Her continual contact with Celeste was her little secret.

Many times, Celeste provided her with bits and pieces of helpful information, and more often than not, her information had been right on. Mimi had been more than grateful for that, but this time, she couldn't help thinking that this time, Celeste was dead wrong about something. The thought message had come when she had thought about Frank. Did that mean that she would have to run from Frank?

She instantly dismissed the thought. *Nah, he'd never hurt me.*

Just as she thought that, the world around her turned seven shades brighter. She closed her eyes against the sun which before, was mildly bright, but now, even throug her closed eyelids, the sun pierced though like thousands of mini icepicks. Gradually, she got used to the light, but when she opened them, she expected to find herself in the park still, and she did, but the park was no longer as she remembered it. Rather though, it was as though she had been transported to a similar park on another world.

" Celeste?" she called out. " Are you doing this?" she asked, hoping that her friend was just playing a joke on her. She stood in silence for a few minutes and waited for an answer. When it became clear that she wasn't going to get one, she began to take notice of her surroundings.

The lake was as she had remembered it, except for the fact that it was now filled with a dark red liquid that resembled blood. The wind, which was still blowing, still sent multitudes of leaves cascading around her, but this time, when they hit, the did not hit gently, but rather, each one felt as though they were a hundred pound weights hitting her with the same force as though they'd been thrown at her, others cutting her like knives. She backed away but encountered the railing again. She put one hand on the railing for balance, and tried to use the other one to shield herself somewhat from the "leaves", but the effort was futile. They kept coming. After a few moments of this, she knew that she was covered in a multitude of bleedig cuts and soon to be bruises.

She looked over to where the pavilion was supposed to be; it was still there, and Frank was standing just where she remembered. He didn't seem to notice any change in scenery or anything; he just kept looking straight ahead at the lake.

" Help me, Frank!" she screamed.

For a moment, it seemed as though he didn't hear her, so she shouted again. "Frank!" she cried.

This time, she knew he heard her because he turned and looked directly at her. She knew he saw that she was being hurt, but he loooked at her once, then he sneered evilly at her before turning and walking away, leaving her, deserting her.

"No!" she screamed as she removed her hand from the railing and used that hand to reach out towards him as though she could make him stay and help her just by thought alone. It failed completely, but the moment that he was out of sight, the harsh blows stopped, and she looked up not knowing what to expect.

When she looked up towards the sky, she found that the abnormal sun had now expanded and filled the entire sky, changing it from a lovely soothing blue, to a dark blood red.

She pondered this for a second, but she couldn't continue because of an intense crushing pain that descended upon her head. She fell to the ground, clutching wildly at her head with her bleeding hands, desperate to find some way to stop the horrendous pain. She didn't know how to stop it, but she stopped when her hand encountered something warm, wet, sticky.

Despite the intense pain, she brought her hand to her face in an effort to discover what the liquid was. It was dark red blood. (Author's Note (A.N.)-Geez, there's a lot of blood in this no?)

" What?" she managed to whisper to herself despite the intense pain.

She felt herself growing faint; she knew she was going to black out. The last thing she saw before blacking out was a pure white light breaking through the blood red dome and the light surrounding and enveloping everything.