Author's Notes: I apologize for the lack of updates, but they'll be regular from now on. I'm very sorry, but I've sort of regained my love for this fandom lately, so don't worry.


The crying was, Taichi thought to himself, more like whimpering than anything else.

He gingerly reached out to touch the boy's shoulder. Hyo flinched, and Taichi found himself staring down a four Agumon glare. He bit his lip, thinking. This wasn't a diplomat's area of expertise, because he wasn't talking to a diplomat. North Korea may have given that title to him, but Hyo was just a kid. Cautiously, slowly, Taichi reached out again, placing his hand over the boy's own. The skin was icy and rough to the touch. Tai knelt down beside him so that they would be on eye level. He could see faint scars on the boy's neck that had been partially concealed by make up, and he thought to himself that he could feel the bones in Hyo's hand far too well. Hyo's body shook with the force of his breakdown.

"It's okay," Taichi said softly, in his gentlest tone of voice. "We aren't going to hurt you. We're not going to get you into trouble either, okay? We're just here to talk."

Sora moved closer, hesitantly. "We're here to help you, Hyo."

At this, he shook his head vigorously. When he spoke next, his voice wasn't the epitome of calm and listlessness like it had been. Now it was a scared, hopeless child's voice, one that brought tears to Sora's eyes. "You won't help me. Everyone says they will, they always do. First ToyAgumon said he'd take care of me, and he couldn't. Pae-ssi says he'll feed me, but he doesn't, because I'm so stupid and I keep making mistakes and…" he trailed off, taking a big gulp of air. "And now everybody else is gone and I'm all alone and if I mess this up they're going to kill me and I can't trust anyone anymore and I want to go home!" Here, he dissolved into complete incoherency.

"Sssh," ToyAgumon warned, eyes going wide. He cast a terrified glance towards the door. "You know they're just outside the door. If they hear you-"

"I don't care anymore! I want them to kill me! I'm so sick of this…" and he buried his head in his hands, shaking his head and whimpering something unintelligible to himself.

As he sat there, he began to rock himself slightly, pulling his knees up to his chest. Wrapping his arms around his knees, he buried his head in them and sobbed. He looked like a mental patient, Taichi thought, though to his horror he noted he'd never seen a thorough breakdown in someone so young. Hyo's crying brought his digimon around him, a circle of protective and heartbroken monsters. There was a kind of hopelessness in their eyes. They had seen this before. This was how it had always been for them. There were used to it, and so all they could do was stand by and watch as their human broke down. Rough claws reached out to stroke the boy's shoulder, soft murmurs of reassurance in the same odd dialect of Korean Hyo that lapsed into, and quiet sadness was all they could offer him. Taichi was struck by the sudden thought that they were all trapped here. This was all Hyo knew or would ever know.

The boy stopped sobbing and listlessly stared at the floor, eyes dim and dead inside. Sora stood rooted to the spot, eyes taking in his every movement. She felt the urge to cry herself, though it wouldn't help the situation any. But it was the conviction and desperation with which he admitted to desiring death that made her shiver. More accurately, it made her blood run hot with righteous fury. He was broken in a way no one ever should be. His eyes were listless, hollow, like looking at a dead man, and he held no hope for the future within him. His small, bony frame shook with each intake of breath. He turned to look Taichi in the eyes and with his hair messed up and in his face, he somehow looked faintly like Hikari. The thought of his little sister in such a state made the Japanese man shudder.

"You're just here so they don't blow you up." Hyo said it like it was a fact, one he'd accepted long ago. There was no anger to the statement, no resentment, no disdain. Hyo didn't have it in him to be angry at anyone or anything anymore. His voice was steady now, but there was something about that that was even worse than a breakdown. "You don't care about me. No one does. If I died tomorrow they'd replace me like a broken washing machine and no one in the world would know or care. You would talk to the replacement like nothing ever happened. And you wouldn't ask what happened to me because you know what would happen if you did. Nobody cares about anything but themselves, in the end." He sounded resigned and disturbingly distant, as if he weren't all there. His eyes were fixed unseeingly on the ceiling.

Sora's russet eyes narrowed. "That's not true! We're here so we can help you and the other Digidestined of North Korea. Everyone's been speculating about your country's Digidestined for years, but we never had any way to know what was happening."

"Liar," Hyo said coldly. The word carried a ton of toxic, heartfelt cynicism; Sora took a step back from him, her eyes wide. "Jong-ssi got out. She made it through the Digital World, over to South Korea. She told everybody about what's been happening. I know she did. You're just here to keep yourselves from being blown up. You don't care. I don't blame you," he added softly. "It's too hopeless to care anymore about North Koreans."

Taichi was about to respond when Sora cut him off, her tone low and soft. "Jong Cho?" All the Korean digimon turned to stare at her. "Jong Cho, fourteen years old, eyes are dark purple?"

Ko Hyo's eyes went wide in shock. There was a broken horror in them as he asked, "She… she didn't mention us, did she?"

And he curled into his little ball again, but he didn't cry. He stared unseeingly at the floor and went still as a statue. His digimon murmured things to him that he did not respond to, which was just as well since the four of them seemed to be on the verge of their own breakdown. Specifically, ShadowToyAgumon was staring at Sora like a deer caught in headlights, his mouth open in shock. Digimon didn't need to breathe, but gasping like that was the universe sign of something not being right. The small creature stepped back as if Sora were a monster ready to strike, and then, slowly, with increasing panic, he began to shake his head and whisper 'no'. That whisper became a mantra as he kept backing up, into the table where he collapsed in shock. His claws were shaking. He turned to Sora suddenly as if having a revelation.

"She's on the South Korean team, isn't she? She's out there living a perfect life while we're all stuck here being starved and driven mad and she… she…" The digimon seemed to beyond words, hurt and angry all at once. "She promised she'd save us. Instead she saved herself and she didn't even take her partner, she just turned and ran."

All anger drained out of him as the toy digimon slumped to the ground, looking defeated. Biyomon tentatively placed her wing on his clawed hand; when he did not withdraw from the contact, she squeezed it gently. He looked at her with wide eyes, searching for something in the bird digimon's blue ones. She hadn't known, he realized. None of them had known that Jong Cho was who she was – they hadn't meant to drop a bombshell on a room. Cho had never let on that she had a partner left behind in North Korea. Somehow that cut like a knife, deeper than it would if the Japanese just hadn't cared. She had forgotten him, forgotten all of them, and moved on with her life. Of course, her Digivice had gone missing, but they hadn't thought, had never dared to think she'd abandoned them.

Taichi reached out and placed both hands on Hyo's shoulders. "Hyo? Are you okay? Are you… can you please just say something? Hyo?" He was really starting to get freaked out by the North Korean child.

SnowAgumon stood on his tiptoes to try to look Hyo in the eyes. "Partner?" he whispered, softly and gently. "Please, please don't do this again. Remember, you said you weren't going to do this anymore, we agreed it wasn't healthy. Please, Hyo, you're scaring me. Hyo…"

The North Korean boy closed his eyes. "I know they'll probably kill me when they see how badly I ruined this meeting. And I want them to kill me. I'm so tired. But if I die then someone else gets put into this same exact position." He hung his head. "We'll just… we'll just have to let Jong Cho go. Have to ignore what she's done. When we walk out of here we'll have to smile and talk like nothing's happened because I can't put anyone else through my life." He wiped his eyes, standing. His usual stoic expression was firmly in place. Hyo eyed Sora and Taichi warily. "You can't talk about either. This never happened. Because, you see, if it had it'd make everything complicated and they might go after Cho and try to kill her. It would put my entry into the Digimon World Alliance into question. So nobody ever mentioned Jong and we didn't talk about anything. I cried because I was nervous. That's all."

With that, he turned and walked towards the door. His digimon fell into formation around him, SnowAgumon in front, ToyAgumon and ShadowToyAgumon on either side of him and BlackAgumon behind him. His face was a mask of stoicism and indifference. Despite his frail physical appearance, his determination and emotional control were strong, and he looked as if nothing had happened. It would have been impressive under other circumstances, but now it indicated what a sick twisted country he was living in. This, Taichi thought with a growing sense of horror, was Hyo's life. He broke down, he had breaks from reality, and then he had to pull himself together abruptly, never letting the real gravity of the situation show to anyone save for his digimon. He had learned that people like Jong could get away with horrifying things and that was just how life was. Jong Cho had ripped out the hearts of what remained of North Korea's Digidestined, had betrayed them all, especially her former partner, but she couldn't be punished because Hyo didn't want her killed, in spite of it all. Why, they'd never know. If ever there was a valid moment to want revenge… But he didn't seem to have it in him to feel those kinds of emotions anymore.

"The government insists on taking you to see all the historical sites and landmarks." Hyo's voice was remarkably devoid of emotion. "It's standard treatment for all visiting diplomats. I hope you don't mind, Yagami-seonsaeng and Takenouchi-seonsaeng." Less than a minute ago he'd found out that his best friend had stabbed them all in the back and never looked back. Now he sounded like he was talking about the weather.

Taichi didn't know what was more horrifying: Ko Hyo or the people who'd done this to him.