Period: Digimon 02. Ep. 13.

"I wanna go home."

"hat's why we are here."

"Are you ok?"

"Humhum."

*Dialogue between Hikari and Takeru, from Digimon Adventure 02 - ep.13.

She was watching our humans interact with a calm smile on her angelic face. Even so, I could see the tiredness on her expression. Today has been a hard day on all of us. What with Hikari's abduction to this place, the Dark Ocean. I vaguely knew about it but honestly, it was more like a distant information. One of those that I can't access unless I am in my champion level. She must know more about it than me, thou.

Her yellow hair moves with the wind and she has a contemplative expression on her face while she watches my human. I can feel her gratitude towards him right now. After all, it was Takeru who led them to her partner.

"Tough day, hum?" I ask as I approach her.

"Hey! Look at you." She says with a wide smile and I'm enchanted, she's so strong, tall and beautiful... It's been a while since I saw her like this.

"Actually, look at you!" I gave her a little and shy smile as I start to fly until I am face to face with her. This is the first time that I am seeing her like this in what felt like years and being so...rookie was making me feel a little uncomfortable. She soon notices and frowns, confused by my unusual behavior.

"What's wrong?" She asks worried.

"Nothing… It's been a while since I last saw you like this."

"What? Am I ugly now?" she playfully asks.

As I look at her, ugly would never be one of the words that I would use to describe her. In none of her forms, actually.

Even knowing that she's just messing with me, I can't help but feel my cheeks heating up in embarrassment for what I am seeing, thinking ans feeling. She's messing with me, in a lot of ways. As she's still waits for my answer, I softly shake my head before professing my adoration for her. "You're never ugly!" I say with a strong conviction.

"Is that so?" She has a knowing smile on her face and it makes my heart beats a little faster as I held my breath.

"Yes, you're beautiful in all of your forms." I easily say as I lose myself in her. Her laugh is so soft and her touch is so gentle as she reach out to me, holding me in her arms and bringing my body to her chest, where I can hear and feel her heartbeats, in a warm hug.

"You're such a little charmer, you."

Her voice is so sweet. I hide my face on her neck in embarrassment, feeling her blonde hair tickling my nose. I am so foolish in love with her. She squeeze me a little and I feel, more than hear, her sight in contentment.

"You know…"

She says while separating herself from me while still holding me close.

"You're so cute as a Patamon, I don't think that I have ever really realized it as a Tailmon. Well, not like now."

As If I wasn't shy enough before, my face heats up again and I try to hide it with my pawns.

"All right, what's wrong? You're never this shy." She was bound to notice.

"Well, I guess I'm feeling a little insecure."

"Insecure? Why?" she asks surprised.

"More like…self-conscious, you know? I mean… You're an ultimate level digimon while I am just a rookie. I guess I'm realizing that you're actually so high above me now that… and you already were before…"

"Ok, let's stop there. You're not inferior to me, what are you talking about? And you don't have to be self-conscious about this. I've chosen you, all of you. In whichever level or form you come. And you're more than handsome to me, in all of your forms, you're precious. Don't be silly."

My face is still warm but so is my heart. She's so caring. I found it funny how our personalities changes a little when we evolve. For her, as an Angewomon, she's more open with her feelings and more affectionate too, than she is as an Tailmon. As for me, I become more calm and serious when I'm Angemon.

There is also the hierarchy thing to take into consideration as well. It only happens when we're in our angels forms for as in the angel's hierarchy she's above me so I tend to look at her as a superior. Its almost instinctual to wait for her order in a battle or to follow her. The good thing is that she never uses this over me unless in a battle, then, our relationship aside, she's my superior. Has been from the beginning, actually.

As I get lost in my thoughts, I feel myself being lifted up until I am looking directly at her face and uow, the helmet really makes an impact. I wish I could see her blue eyes now, thou, even so, I can't keep my eyes on her face long enough as my face heats up again. She laughs a little.

"Cute!"

"Humf…"

She laughs as I let a defeated sight escape after she rubs her nose on mine.

"I missed seen you like this." I say.

"I missed being like this."

"I wish I was Angemon now." I confess. Actually, I wish for a lot of things right now. She sees right trough me.

"Why? Wants to kiss me?" she asks provocative.

"Well…" There is no point in deny that.

She gives me a kiss on my cheek, as a consolation.

"While I do wish you were Angemon now just so we could kiss properly, I do love you, Patamon. And thank you, by the way, for helping me find her."

"You would do the same for me and Angewomon? I love you too."

I hug her and let myself relax in her arms while she caresses my back. We would have stayed like this for a little while if we weren't interrupted by our partners.

- Patamon, Angewomon. Let's go!

She freed me as I was surrounded by the armor-evolution light and soon enough we were both carrying our partners toward the portal that would get us away from this place.

…

...

"Hikari?"

Takeru call's her a little worried with her distant look. They were back to the real word for a little more than a couple of minutes but the holder of the light was distant and silent since their arrival.

"We're back…" He says, a little lost for words.

"I know…" Her smile is so forced that it's painful to see.

"Everything's ok now, Hikari." Tailmon tries to assure her.

"Yup! We've found you! And you don't have to worry. We're not going to lose you again, right, Takeru?" Patamon asks with an innocent, hopeful and jovial voice. It's impossible to not smile back at him.

"Yeh. We're not going to lose you again." Takeru says and, to himself, swears it.

"I am sorry, guys."

"Hã?" They all make a confused sound and Hikari continues as if she weren't interrupted.

"If it wasn't for…"

"Don't be foolish!" Takeru interrupts her once he sees what she's doing. "We're friends! We're together in this. We hold on to each other, remember?"

"But…If just I was stronger than…"

"You're week."

Hikari stops, surprised by his cold voice and he can see the hurt (that he caused) on her face. She looks at Tailmon, normally, the feline digimon wouldn't let anyone talk like this to her, but she, and Patamon, for that matter, were just watching them, with a serious expression on her face. Her partner silence was enough to confirm that she agreed with Takeru.

"You're being week right now. You're forgetting everything! You're whatever you want to be, Hikari. You're strong, not because you aren't afraid. You're strong because you're fight your fears. Because you don't let them stop you. A leader without insecurities, isn't a good leader. You're and Taichi are different people. And you both have different strengths. But the fact that you're not like him doesn't make you weaker. You're doing great, Hikari. We're doing great. You don't have to carry all of this alone, you know. That's why we do this whole digital world saving with a team. And you can depend on us, on me. I'm not going to leave you alone."

He's so serious while saying this that she has to smile for him. A true smile. In an impulse, she throws herself in his arms, hugging him. He's surprised but, after a moment, holds her closer to him.

They will ignore those hearts beating so fast for now.

It was the first time that they got so close to each other… Soon, Hikari felt the tears that she's been holding for a while now starting to fall and, in his arms, she cries. For a lot of things, really. For her fears and her insecurities with the new team, the pain and the sadness of the replacement of her brother and the others, for not having them with her to take those responsibilities from her's and Takeru's shoulders, for missing them, for her fear to fail, for the loneliness and despair that she felt while in the Dark Ocean…

She cried for everything that she's been carrying on her shoulder and that, for the first time, since the reunion with the digimons, she can share with someone else.

…

...

We watched them in silence. We already knew that sooner or later, something like that would happen.

The break down. Not the Dark Ocean. That one was an unpleasant surprise.

"Sometimes, I wonder… If we're not asking too much of them. They've been through so much and they are so young… There were things that they should've never experienced…"

Tailmon quietly confess her thoughts to me while remembering some of the darkest things that we have been through.

"I see and share your point but, at the same time, I don't think it's fair to everything that we lived until now if we don't recognize that not all of it was a bad thing. No, it definitely wasn't. There have been some pretty amazing moments too. And, truly, I think that at the end of this, it'll be worth it. Actually, I think it's already worth everything."

I say with a smile while pointing to our partners who have now separated from their hug and were trying to fight the embarrassment of it. We share a look and a knowing smile.

"You're right…It's already worth it."