A/N: Written for the Digimon Flash Bingo at the Digimon Fanfiction Challenges forum (link's in profile), #208 – athlete.
What it Meant to be an Athlete
Taiki was athletic, but not an athlete for quite some time. The conundrum was lost on most people, and those who did see it tended to misinterpret. They assumed he wasn't an athlete because he wasn't a part of any club, or was an athlete because he played occasionally for all of them.
But there were a few people that knew the truth: knew why Taiki couldn't be considered an athlete of any sort. People like Tatsuya who were part of the reason. People like Akari who were the witnesses. People like Kiriha and Dorulumon who thought enough to ask one of those people who did know the answer to that little puzzle.
The answer was all about heart. He played sports as a roundabout punishment, once someone dug into the roots of his reasoning. That's not why athletes played: they played because it was their dream.
For a long time, Taiki only played to help further other people's dreams.