"Daisuke is dead." I simply said.

We sat in silence for a bit. We, the four warriors of a bygone time, were all that remained of what we had once considered a tight knit group.

Koushiro: The Computer Nerd.

Miyako: The Pregnant Chick.

Iori: The Quiet One.

And me: The Shadow-Of-Her-Former-Self; all sitting around Miyako's living room, everyone drinking tea besides Iori who had managed to find some prune juice in Miyako's fridge.

I hadn't brought myself to call Koushiro that night due to the police finally turning up as I begun to place pressure on the call button. I gave them my statement, showed them the text and still couldn't come up with an adequate reason for not seeing the knife whilst trying to wake him. I think I said something about the mind seeing what it expected to see and I left it at that.

They suggested that I call a relative to pick me up, and I had realised in all my dithering that I hadn't even considered calling my mother. Slightly ashamed, I had finally broken down on the car trip home, only to have my tears stemmed in anger when I found that Taichi was back in the house, and he was still drinking from his stash.

I didn't even tell him what had happened.

I did however send an email to Mimi and Sorato, before calling the rest, minus Jou and Takeru, and asking if we could all meet at Miyako's tomorrow. They all must have known something was up by my tone, but I didn't let on, they needed to hear this face to face, not over the phone.

Ken couldn't get off work at such short notice, and Taichi was still snoring his head off when I left at midday.

I showed the three of them the text and recounted the previous night, leaving out nothing except the details of my hesitation in calling them, mainly because I knew Iori would be particularly displeased with my feelings towards him, but also because I didn't want to admit that out of everyone, Koushiro was the one I would have called.

After I had finished and everyone had gotten over the shock, Koushiro beat Miyako to asking me if I was alright. I wasn't, but I couldn't say that.

"Just a little shaken up, is all,"

"Don't you lie to me Hikari Yagami, I know you too well," It was Miyako, she may not have stood up and adopted her usual accusatory pose, but her eyes were blazing like she could see straight through me, which she could. Her face softened in self-satisfaction and she dropped her line of questioning, "Have you told Ichiro?"

I looked away from her as I answered in the negative. I could feel her eyes switch back up to full force solar radiation.

"You have to tell him, Hikari. Honesty is the pillar of a good relationship,"

Coming from a girl who managed to get knocked up a month after she officially started dating Ken, after having a major crush on him even before she met him, I couldn't help but feel a little annoyed that she was the resident expert on relationships.

"Well it's not like I can say to him that I went to have dinner with an old friend I hadn't seen in three years based off one text message I'd received only that afternoon."

"Uh, yes you can, because it would explain the fact that you found his body and why the police have told you not to leave town,"

"But he wouldn't understand, we'd had a bit of a disagreement, and he just… he just wouldn't…"

"So why did you go?" It was Koushiro, changing the subject. I silently thanked him for it and I'm sure Iori did too.

"I had questions, they needed answering," I stated matter-of-factly, "Wouldn't you have had questions if you'd been the one he contacted?"

"I wouldn't have gone over there that night though," said Koushiro offhandedly, "You could have called him if all you wanted was to ask him questions,"

"Are you here to comfort me or put me on trial?" I couldn't believe that I hadn't thought about calling him back. I preferred not to think about it.

"We're here because you asked us," said Iori, the first time he'd really joined in the conversation.

"Not me, I'm here because going somewhere else would've taken too much effort," said Miyako, "Of course we're here for you, like Iori said, we're here because you asked us to be,"

"But we aren't here to comfort you," I was surprised at Iori's frankness. "How could you not tell us Daisuke was, you know... why couldn't you tell us last night?"

"I was…" I changed my mind, "that is, I thought, it would be better to tell you face to face, and I didn't want to have to have the same conversation five times over,"

"Why didn't you invite Takeru?"

I almost dropped my teacup.

"Iori!" hissed Miyako.

"He has a right to know, Hikari, he knew Daisuke just as well as everyone here, no matter what he's done since,"

"You can't say that," I said weakly.

"But you just complained that you couldn't tell Ichiro because he didn't know about everything and now you're saying you can't tell someone who does?"

Koushiro gave Iori a warning but I barely heard him; I was too busy staring at the little quiet boy who was asking me questions that even I would not dare ask myself.

"I know exactly why you can't tell Ichiro, it's the same reason you couldn't call Daisuke to ask your questions, and it all stems from the reason you can't talk to Takeru. You have got to stop blaming him for what happened three years ago. He couldn't have known what was going to happen."

There wasn't much I could say to that so I mumbled a thank-you to Miyako for her hospitality and stood up to leave.

How could he say that? Did he not know what Takeru had done, did he not realise how completely Takeru had destroyed everything we had worked for time and time again, had he forgotten my, his, everyone's sacrifices?

He didn't know how I had felt, how I still felt, about that day three years ago. How I had been almost ready, ready to give in and finally make a choice, and give in to those feelings I'd had ever since the summer it had all happened again, as childish and innocent as they had been at the time.

I had been ready to give my light to his hope, and then he went and destroyed it all. Everything I now wished to forget was destroyed in that one night and it had all been because of that stupid, idiotic Takeru.

And as for what happened later, well that pretty much ruined any chance of forgiving him.

I made it out of the door before it all came rushing back; the times spent in a world that was ours, and ours alone to enter. I remembered all the friends we'd fought to protect, the friends we'd all made for life that were gone. We'd done so much, and then it was all just gone, like it had never existed. And it had all been so simple, so easy for the gate to open, so easy for it to go unnoticed, so easy for the information to fall into the wrong hands.

I sat down and let it all out, I remembered what my Gato' had done, all the battles fought, all the pain she had suffered before she met me, all the pain she had suffered to be with me, and then the final sacrifice that she, that they all had made, and stopped the suffering forever. And I cried. I cried like it had happened yesterday, I cried because I knew that what Takeru had hoped to achieve, could have been done verbally in one sentence. I cried because Iori had sided with him, and I cried because Iori was right.

I cried because I realised I wasn't crying over the death of a friend but my own messed up life. I cried because Ichiro wouldn't understand. I cried because I was sitting alone outside my pregnant friend's apartment while she was tearing shreds off the person who had sent me out here.

I cried because it was Koushiro who had come out to comfort me, and I didn't want to talk.

I cried because out of everyone, out of the twelve of us who supposedly understood each other so well, he was the only one left I could count on.