(To preempt the foreseeable question: Pandora's Box, the final chapter, is ~50% done. It have 5,000+ words of notes alone to sort through—seriously, you should see my Scrivener file for this story—on top of any subsequent edits, changes, continuity checks, and just plain making sure the resolution I came up with actually, you know, makes sense. I want to make sure I put my all into it, which does take time, and I promise this little snippet took less than an evening's worth of time out of that writing schedule)
I was doing a Digimon Adventure episode binge-watch recently, and something re-dawned on me: we never actually get to see Takeru and Hikari "meet"
The first time they see one another in person, she's a little busy being captured by Vamdemon, and he's watching through the window of the television studio tower before sending Angemon out to help. Finding out the new girl has a holy angel digimon evolution too? Ain't nobody got time for that, because the first time they're standing side-by-side, they're otherwise occupied with staring up at the lack of disappearing fog because things weren't over yet. And it's a bit tough to exchange pleasantries when you're in the middle of contemplating shooting your brothers with a magic arrow of love, you know?
Even when they get back to the Digital World, they do not STOP. Immediately coming face to face with the Dark Masters. Rescued by Piccolomon before watching him sacrifice himself so they could escape. Landing on a beach, cold and tired, just long enough to reminisce about THE best minor characters of the entire series, the Telephone Booths, before Seadramon's lackies start going after them.
Geez, no wonder there was any formal introduction.
So I decided to make one up.
Sort of.
Timeline-wise, this would be an insert-scene for episode 42, Silent Whamon on the Bottom of the Sea. There was a very small window of opportunity during the brief downtime Whamon granted them after docking by the crescent island. Very small, which is why I might have had to take a few liberties with regards to continuity...but then again, what's the point of going through all that trouble of getting my creative license online if I can't use it to mess with the fictional space-time continuum?
o
AT THE BEGINNING
o o o
We were strangers, starting out on a journey
Never dreaming, what we'd have to go through
Now here we are, I'm suddenly standing
At the beginning with you
o o o
o o o
"...you do realize you're staring, don't you?"
Seven-year-old Takeru Takaishi blinked. Twice. Slowly, he turned his head towards the voice and found the bearer of Knowledge peering at him over the top of his PineApple laptop. One eyebrow was raised, and although Koushiro's expression remained otherwise neutral—almost impassive—Takeru knew him well enough to detect the hints of amusment in his dark brown eyes.
"Huh?" Realization struck him a moment later, and his whole body went rigid as he shook his head defensively. "N-no, I wasn't!"
"You were. And quite obviously, too."
Frozen in place, Takeru could do little more than watch, helpless, as Koushiro proceeded to...return to whatever it was he'd been previously working on. Something to do with Gennai, no doubt, judging from the frantic pace at which the clicking of keys rang through the air. One might think it dangerous to keep an electronic so close to water, even as high up as they were, but if Koushiro didn't seem bothered by the possibility, then there was little Takeru could do to comment on the matter. Or any matter, really. Not without drawing more attention to himself.
It was just the two of them for the moment, sitting side by side atop the front side of Whamon's back. The mammal digimon seemed completely at ease with the group of children and digimon lounging atop him, and as he had temporarily beached himself along the crescent island's sand bank, Takeru barely felt any movement. Yamato's harmonica playing didn't seem to be affected any, the sounds of melancholy melody ringing through the air at semi-regular intervals as Jou continued to fish nearby. Still waiting for that one, big catch to satiate his and poor Gomamon's stomachs. Mimi and Sora were huddled together on the opposite side, exchanging hushed whispers and fits of girlish giggles to such a degree that Takeru wondered why Hikari had yet to join them. She was a girl too, after all.
Then again...
When he thought Koushiro wasn't paying attention, he risked another peek at the newest Chosen. She was still sitting with her brother, hardly having left his side once. They were sharing a small meal Taichi managed to hook. With a little help from Tailmon's Neko Scratch attack, of course, slicing the fish into easily nibbled pieces. It was probably a good thing the fish around here were safe to eat raw, since Takeru was pretty sure Whamon would have noticed them starting a large bonfire.
She looks a lot like him. The thought crossed his mind, and he immediately wondered why his brain considered it worth noting. They were siblings. Brother and sister. Only a few years apart, at most, just like he and Yamato. Weren't people always telling him how much he looked like his big brother? And his mom? He and Yamato had definitely inherited many defining Takaishi features, not the least of which included their mom's blonde hair and blue eyes.
Maybe they looked like their mom too. Taichi and Hikari. Sure, Taichi's hair was bigger, and maybe a little redder. Hikari's eyes looked more red than his in turn. And Taichi smiled a lot wider. His laughter was louder. But the longer Takeru watched, the more convinced he grew. Nobody would ever doubt the two of them were siblings. Or that they were really close.
Much closer than he was with Yamato.
Jealous should have welled up inside him at the thought. Takeru had been around Taichi long enough to know what an amazing brother-like figure he could be. Encouraging. Supportive. Protective. Going so far as to blow on his food when it was too hot. Looking out for him in all the little ways big brothers should, while still giving him a chance to do things himself. There was even a time he wanted Taichi to be his big brother. Granted, he'd been mad at Yamato then, and the thoughts were fueld as much by frustration and anger as they were adoration, but still...
He should have felt jealous of Hikari. But...for some reason...he felt happy. Watching them. Seeing the smile on her face. Not as bright or smirking as Taichi, but filled with genuine contentment.
"Definitely staring."
Takeru let out a strained noise, realizing he'd been caught again.
"Who's staring?" Sora's voice reached his ears then, and Takeru had a sudden, fleeting urge to go bury his head in one of the island sand dunes.
"Takeru-kun." Somehow, Koushiro managed to carry on a conversation without missing a single keystroke. The corners of his lips were twitched upward in a very obvious smirk, further illuminated by the glow of his laptop. "He's been staring at Hikari-chan for the last ten minutes straight now."
"Have not!"
"I was timing you."
Alternating her gaze between the boys, Sora bit her lip to hold back her laughter as she bent down, placing her hands on her knees. Even then, the smile on her face was a little too much for Takeru's liking. When she moved to sit with them, leaning back casually with her weight balanced on her hands behind her, he inhaled once and braced himself for the oncoming tease.
"She is cute, isn't she?"
He still wasn't ready.
"Sora-san..." he whined, feeling his cheeks grow hot as his shoulders slumped. Lower lip sticking out in a pout. Feeling nothing but pure betrayal by the girl he looked to as an older sister.
"Just teasing." Her expression didn't change, however, as she repositioned herself so she could sit up a little straighter. Arms coming to wrap around her knees. The air was cool and fresh from the ocean breeze, and though she was wearing a sleeveless shirt, she didn't seem bothered by the temperature. "I can't blame you for being curious, Takeru-kun. This is the first time we're all in the Digital World with someone your age. Of course you'd look at her the way Koushiro-kun looks at a computer screen."
"...hey!"
Koushiro's cry of protest went ignored
Takeru did relax a little at Sora's comment. At least she wasn't teasing him anymore. Probably. If anything, she seemed far more understanding than he would have expected. Understanding, he could deal with. Particularly since she had unknowingly confirmed one of the biggest questions hovering around his mind.
"So Hikari-chan is my age?" He'd suspected. Fairly certain he'd heard someone mention how old she was at some point, but he hadn't been able to remember exactly and couldn't be positive until then.
Sora nodded. "She might be a little older, since she's already eight, but you both should be in the same year of school."
The same year...
That meant he and Hikari could have been classmates. If they'd gone to the same school together.
Not that Takeru didn't like his school. He did. He even liked most of the kids there. But...none of them would ever be able to understand. When all of this was over...when the Dark Masters were defeated...when they had saved both worlds and could go home again...when summer break ended, and a new school year began...he would have to go back to Setagaya for good. Alone. He had friends there, sure, but he already knew it would never be the same again.
None of them had been through the same things he had. None of them would know what it was like to have to fight, even though he hated fighting. They would never get what it was like to spend months and months with his fellow Chosen Children fending for themselves. No adults. Just each other. Sometimes, not even that. And they definitely would never come to know what it was like to share a bond the way he did with Patamon. His partner. His best friend. The pain he felt upon seeing Angemon die for the first time, thinking he'd lost him forever in those awful moments before his digiegg reappeared. The weight of each sacrifice as friend after friend fell in the act of protecting them.
Hikari would understand. She might not have been a part of the group until recently, but she had already been through a lot of similar things. She'd seen Wizarmon die protecting her. She'd stood at Takeru's side as they risked their brothers on the promise of a cryptic prophecy. Yamato and the others would too, obviously, but...for some reason...it felt different when he thought about her.
About what it would be like if he and his mom stayed in Hikarigaoka. He could be near his dad and brother and the other Chosen and see them whenever he wanted. And he could go to school with Hikari. And if things got bad, it would be okay, because she would be there and she would understand.
...that was, if she even wanted to.
He must have been staring again, because the next thing Takeru knew, there was a weight on his shoulder. He looked up to find her looking back at him with a knowing smile before lightly jerking her head in the general direction of the Yagami siblings. Taichi appeared to be getting up, arms stretching over his head as he said something to Hikari. Whatever it was, she nodded in understanding before turning her attention back to Tailmon, who had since fallen asleep in her lap.
"You never know unless you talk to her," Sora offered cryptically, her eyes following Taichi's retreating form. "And now's as good a time as any."
Takeru wondered what exactly she meant by that.
o
o
"Here."
Hikari's attention was drawn away from her slumbering partner as she looked up and saw...a leaf full of fruits being held out to her. They smelled sweet and reminded her a lot of the satonishiki cherries she would eat back home during the summer months.
"...oh!" Once the initial surprise wavered, she remembered to smile and graciously accept the leaf, cupping it carefully in her hands so that it wouldn't spill. "Thank you." It took a bit of extra maneuvering to place them properly down at her side without disturbing Tailmon, but once she was certain the gift was secure, she turned back to the boy who'd offered it in the first place. "Would you like to sit and eat them with me, Takeru-san?"
If he hadn't been so thrown by the formality, Takeru might have caught the slight hesitation in her voice when she addressed him. His own eyes widened, mouth forming a small, silent 'o'. Maybe it was because Taichi was so informal in speech, usually forgoing honorifics altogether, that her politeness was so unexpected. He tried to think back to if she'd called him that before, and he simply hadn't noticed, or if this truly was the first chance she'd had to address him directly.
Did that mean she didn't think of him as a friend? Or...was she nervous too?
"Y-you don't have to call me that." Shaking his head, Takeru made a point of relaxing his body as he took a seat across from her. If he looked tense, then that might make her more tense. That was the last thing he wanted. "Sora-san even said we're the same age, right? So I don't mind if you call me Takeru-kun."
A second passed. Then two.
Her expression was...difficult to read. Even looking directly at her, their eyes locked, it was hard to tell what she was thinking. Was she surprised? Curious? She didn't seem to be mad or offended, at least, although there was a moment in which he wondered whether or not he'd overstepped some boundary...
...but then she smiled again, and...Takeru had to look closer to see that her Crest hadn't been activated, because her whol face seemed to glow. "If you say so, Takeru-kun. And you can call me Hikari-chan. If you want."
He did, and indicated as such.
A shift. Fur against fabric. Hikari's eyes turned downward, and Takeru's followed. Tailmon's nose would start to twitch every so often. Face scrunching and un-scrunching as her tail swished behind her. On the fifth swish, Hikari placed her hand on Tailmon's back and began gently stroking her fur. Again and again. Over and over, each motion as serene as the last, until the feline digimon settled down again. Falling into a more blissful sleep.
Only then did Takeru understand what had happened. A nightmare. Tailmon...was having a nightmare. He never would have guessed just by looking at her, but combined with Hikari's actions, it made sense. It reminded Takeru of when he had nigtmares as a little kid (...well, littler kid) and his mom would stroke his hair as he cried.
Takeru liked to think he and Patamon were close, but he was pretty sure he wouldn't be able to tell what Patamon was thinking unless the little digimon told him. And unless he was talking in his sleep, or crying, or thrashing around, Takeru was even more sure he wouldn't be able to tell that his partner was having a nightmare the way Hikari had.
How did she-?
"You're very brave."
Hikari's voice cut through his train of thought. So sharply, it took him a moment to register what she had even said. Her eyes lingered on Tailmon, and she seemed outwardly undeterred by the thought of her partner having bad dreams. As if knowing they were gone now. For maybe half a second, Takeru wondered if he'd heard her talking to Tailmon after all, but then she continued:
"I wanted to tell you before, but I never had the chance." This time, she did look up, and Takeru saw the sincerity in her eyes. "Thank you. For helping to rescue me from Vamdemon. And when you stood by me when our digimon had to shoot those arrows...and when you stood up to Piemon like that...you're so strong, Takeru-kun. I wish I could be as strong as you."
His jaw dropped.
Hikari thought he was strong?
Takeru blinked several times in disbelief. A little voice in the back of his mind—one that sounded suspiciously like Koushiro—told him he was staring again. Very obviously. He didn't care. Not this time. Not when he had to make absolute sure Hikari was serious. That he'd heard her correctly and she wasn't trying to make fun of him or was preparing to say she was just kidding and that she didn't really mean it at all.
The others had called him brave before. Maybe even remarked at how strong he'd gotten. How much he'd grown. He was the youngest of them all, so it was a pretty noticeable improvement to go from the group crybaby to someone who had learned to hold back his tears and keep up with the others. But Hikari hadn't seen him in the beginning. She only saw him now. And for her to think that he was strong, even after knowing each other for such a short time...
Snapping back to reality, he furiously shook his head before leaning forward, fists clenched in determination: "But I was going to say the same thing about you!"
A little more forceful than intended, perhaps, but Hikari's only reaction was to tilt her head lightly to one side: "...me?"
"Mm!" He nodded, somehow fueled by her modesty. Maybe...maybe she didn't realize. Which meant it was up to him to prove it to her. "You stood up to Vamdemon! All by yourself! And...since we've been back...it's almost like you were here with us the whole time. You never once acted too scared or wanted to cry or anything like that. Not like I did when I came to the Digital World for the first time."
Silence.
Takeru froze.
In hindsight, it dawned on him that he had said too much. She'd called him brave, and here he was admitting to being a crybaby. What would she think of him now? Wincing, Takeru flinched back and wondered if she was going to tease him too.
She didn't.
Instead, her head dipped down and she murmured in a lower voice than before: "It's okay. I cried too."
Both eyebrows rose nearly to the brim of his hat. "You...did?"
A nod. She hesitated just long enough to wait out another of Tailmon's latest episodes, watching the digimon's tail settle back down again, before elaborating.
"I was with Yamato-san. We were hiding from the digimon working for Vamdemon. Oniichan was with us at first, but he said he needed to leave so he could rescue mom and dad. He told me to stay behind, and for Yamato-san to look after me. So I did. And we waited. For over two hours, we waited. And...I was scared. I remember...I asked Yamato-san if he knew when Oniichan was coming back and if things were going to be okay, and...he said he didn't know. So I started to cry."
Takeru listened intently throughout the entire story. Nearly forgetting to breathe. Because of this, the gasp he let out at the end was a little more audible than intended as he glanced over at his big brother. Surprised not only to hear that Taichi had left him in charge of his little sister, but that...
...he made Hikari-chan cry?
And history was in danger of repeating itself; when he looked back, Takeru thought he saw a hint of shimmer in the corner of her eye. He tensed, wondering if those were the first signs of tears and what he could possibly do to make them go away...when a thought came to him. Maybe not his smartest ever, but it was worth a try.
"You must really believe in Taichi-san a lot, don't you?"
The reaction was instantaneous. Her head lifted, and that little shimmer was quickly replaced by a sparkle at the mention of Taichi. As Takeru watched, her whole face lit up that much more, and she nodded with more conviction than he was sure he'd ever seen her carry.
"It's true. Oniichan is the most precious person to me. That's how I knew everything would be okay coming to the Digital World. Because I knew he would be with me and keep me safe."
It was like a weight had been lifted from Takeru's shoulders.
...well, nearly. Something was still nagging him—something he couldn't fully place—but he brushed that thought aside and focused on the fact that his plan had worked. Not only that, but he found himself nodding along with her sentiment in full agreement.
"It's the same with me! I don't know what I would have done if Oniichan hadn't been here with me all this time."
Hikari smiled back at him then in such a way that Takeru knew, in that moment, he definitely liked it when she smiled. Because seeing her smile made him want to smile that much more. Especially knowing he had done something to make her that happy.
o
o
Taichi strolled back up Whamon's back with his hands resting behind his head, pausing just long enough to let out a good stretch before continuing on. He hated leaving Hikari by herself, but nature had called, and he could only hold it in for so long before-
Sora was sitting nearby. Staring at something with great interest.
Tilting his head to one side curiously, Taichi followed her gaze...and couldn't help grinning at the sight himself.
"You think those two'll become friends?"
Sora glanced up at her own childhood friend as he came to sit, watching him settle in to the spot beside her, before turning back to the youngest Chosen. Takeru was saying something to Hikari with great enthusiasm. A story, no doubt, judging by the way his arms were wildly swinging about, adding vague gestures as embellishment. Whatever he was saying, it amused Hikari greatly, and she laughed loudly enough for the sound to carry back to Sora's ears. And Taichi's, judging by the look on his face right then. Sora's own lips tugged upwards.
"I think they already are."