"I remember when I used to sit on hospital beds and hold people's hands, people used to be shocked because they'd never seen this before. To me it was quite normal." – Princess Diana

"The car hit him in a rather good angle for someone to get hit by a car with." The doctor said, trying to make TK feel better as they walked into the Intensive Care Unit. "His knee has several fractures on its cap, and his ACL is torn – so don't expect him to run any marathons in the future. However he'll be able to walk and that's very good news. The intensity of the breaks on his leg is around his right ankle – it appears he tried to jump the car when it came at him, almost made it too. His ankle almost shattered, and it has over forty cracks around it, but we managed to make a form of paste from the shards that were floating out of their original places and we glued the majority of the ankle together without prohibiting movement to the structure. It's going to be a rough rehabilitation but he'll make it though and will be able to walk without a limp in at least a year or two. He's lucky that the bone didn't completely pulverize into powder. I know a woman who did that to her entire tibia and she's still limping two years later.

Anyway, the other contact spot was his upper right arm and shoulder where he crashed into the windshield. There was a lot of glass that had bounced back and imbedded itself in his shoulder and even his face. We got the glass out, and the worst damage that was done to the area was a clean break on his radius and another, but smaller, clean break on his ulna. His shoulder seems to have several large bruises but nothing that won't heal over time.

The biggest surgical issue we had was an aneurysm that formed on his Parietal Lobe, however he's a fighter and we took care of it. Though I need to warn you, we were operating on the part of the brain where language and memory are, and though we don't believe we damaged anything there are risks with the surgery. He was not conscious so we couldn't make sure that the language portion of his brain was not damaged by the removal of the aneurysm, and he may have difficulty remembering things as well as the possibility of amnesia. He hasn't woken up yet, so we can't be sure of anything right now. He's most likely going to be in a large amount of pain when he does though, but that's the be expected due to the trauma of his injuries." TK looked up at the doctor with big eyes. He had Patamon clutched to his chest and was holding Gabumon to his side, both taking in the information and forcing themselves to remain lifeless.

"Sir…he's a singer…if he doesn't…if he has…what if he can't…" It seemed the youngest brother was the one with the speaking problems at the moment; he just couldn't form the words he wanted to.

"Speak?" The doctor asked understandingly. The boy nodded, gulping as the worst case scenario came to mind. "There's a fairly good chance we may be able to operate again and fix what we had accidentally hit the first time. However let's not worry about that yet. He's alive, and we won't know what's wrong until he wakes up. He's in here if you want to stay with him until your parents arrive."

The boy jumped at the chance, running into the room and taking in the sight of his broken and unconscious older brother. He noticed the doctor had left him alone, and he placed the digimon on the ground, closing the door. They moved to Matt's side as TK pulled up a chair next to him and held his older brother's hand.

It was cold to the touch, but the heart monitor assured him that everything was okay. The young teen felt tears in his eyes as he rested his head down on the bed beside Matt. The threats that were involved with the surgery would be disastrous to Matt's career, and the young boy didn't want to think about that. Gabumon looked up at the boy and smiled through his own fear.

"Don't worry TK, no matter what happens, Matt's tough. If he can't sing, he'll play the guitar. If he doesn't remember the guitar he'll pick up a harmonica – or play the triangle. If he wants to do something he'll do it, no matter what people say. Don't worry about a thing." TK looked at the furry coated digimon and forced a smile himself.

"I know, but I should have been there…I could have saved him."

"If you had been there, you would have been hit too TK." Patamon said flying over to him and sitting on his head. "Don't think that you could have done something if you couldn't have. You can't change the past TK."

"Yeah…I know." TK sighed and closed his eyes, snuggling his head into the sheets as he found himself spiraling into a deep and troubled slumber.

Tai and the others ran through the hospital doors two hours later. Once Matt and TK's parents went up to the front desk and they were all directed towards the room, everyone took off running. Several nurses yelled for no running in the halls, but they were ignored.

Entering the room Davis had already started asking (yelling) how Matt was doing in the hall but when they entered and saw TK fast asleep. Kari was beaten to the motion of slapping her hand on his mouth by Yolei who quickly hissed a 'shhhh.' Everyone squeezed into the room on the other side of the bed, but the brothers' parents had yet to arrive. They had stopped to ask a doctor about Matt's condition first. Gabumon and Patamon looked up at them and sat up.

Kari moved to wake the younger boy, but Tai stopped her. He shook his head and pressed a finger to his mouth signaling they should be quiet. His sister nodded, but moved to place her jacket over the boy's shoulders to keep him warm – he still was damp from the rain.

"Why shouldn't we wake him up?" Davis asked rubbing the back of his head in confusion. The group glared at him.

"Use your head Davis. His brother was just in a car accident when they drove twelve hours just to avoid you!" Tai snapped back quietly.

"Besides, think about how stressful it had to have been finding out your brother was seriously injured like that. He's probably exhausted – not to mention that it's four in the morning!" Sora added on.

"Yeah but…I wanna know what happened." Davis said crossing his arms.

"You're just being selfish!" Mimi said angrily, than turning to Jo she went on. "You're a doctor; can't you read his charts and see what's wrong with him?"

"I don't know how to read charts yet. Sorry." He shook his head.

They either sat on the floor or leaned against the wall while waiting, but they all went through agonizing silence for a long time before anyone tried to say anything. When the silence did in fact lift, it wasn't Davis who spoke, but Yolei. She looked at the original digidestined and sighed.

"Can you tell us now what happened to TK?" The six other people groaned. They had been pestered by that question all day, and now wasn't the place to answer it. Even if TK was there, they didn't want to wake him up just to ask his permission and have him sit though an terrible conversation about that time. Izzi mentioned that when he told the others about them being called back to the digital world a second time TK had changed the subject when Kari said they hadn't meant to keep it from them. That had pretty much put a damper on any chance the boy would be interested in explaining the situation. Obviously they had meant to keep it from them, and now they also didn't want to have to explain that they had lied.

"Not right now. It's not a good time." Izzi whispered.

"I agree." This time it was Ken who spoke, and everyone was astounded that someone who didn't know what happened was so willingly accepting the lack of knowledge.

"You what?!" Davis yelped. Cody covered his mouth and hissed for him to be quiet, everyone turned to the bed where the youngest blonde shifted restlessly in his sleep before finally settling down. Patamon however was glaring at Davis. He obviously wasn't too happy with the boy.

"It's not the time or the place to do this. Matt's in a hospital bed and TK's dead tired. We've been hounding everyone all day to find out what's happened, and they keep saying that they won't say anything else about the topic until TK and Matt agree about it. We should not keep pressing the issue if we already know what the answer will be."

"Why the big secret though, I mean, we've known each other for years, why isn't anyone saying anything to us?" Davis asked angrily. Again everyone hissed for him to be quiet. "No I won't be quiet. Tell us what happened to TK's chest!"

"There's something wrong with his chest?" They all looked up at the doctor that the brothers' parents had found. The older kids glared at Davis angrily, why douldn't he just keep his big mouth shut?

"No, nothing recent that is. Several years ago he was injured and it's left him with a bad scar, but other then that nothing that we know of." Nancy Takaishi stated, shooting an annoyed glance at Davis who in turn looked away in growing shame.

"I'd like to see the wound sometime; there may be a way to remove it."

"You could?" Hiroaki Ishida asked surprised.

"There is a possibility." The kindly doctor said smiling at them.

"Then yes, tomorrow could you-"

"Don't make decisions for me without talking to me first." Everyone turned to look at the young blonde who was starting to sit up. His eyes were half closed and his face clearly showed how tired he was, however he still had the strength to grab Patamon and storm out of the room leaving everyone staring in awe in his wake.

In the hospital's cafeteria TK slammed the paper cup down under the Poland Springs water jug's nozzle. Patamon sighed and rubbed his head slightly against the teen's side. It was subtle, but the comfort was there. The digimon knew he couldn't speak because they were public yet the action still told the boy what he wanted to get across.

"Hey, kid." The teen turned around to see a young man around Matt's age and a woman next to him. The girl had on a tight black tank top and chained pants, while her male counterpart had on a similar outfit only his shirt was certainly not a tight tank top.

"What?" TK asked, leaning against the wall and trying to stop the mounting headache that he was starting to get.

"You came in with that boy, what's his name – Mattie – right?" The digidestined frowned, these people were actually attempting to call Matt 'Mattie' ? If the older teen had heard he'd have started a fight…

"Matt. Why?" Damn this headache is getting worse. He placed the cup down on the top of the water jug and brought his hand up to massage his temples.

"Yeah, we got into this argument in the car and I didn't see the light. Tried to stop, ya know? We wanted to come over and - "

"Shut up." TK snapped looking up at the couple. His eyes were dark with fury and the intensity of the gaze made the man take a step back in surprise. "You want to apologize? Fine. Go ahead. Apologize for what though? You don't have a damn clue. You're just here because you think it'd be polite. You're not sincere about it, and you don't give a damn, so just shut the hell up." Patamon inwardly groaned- trouble was starting.

"What's your problem kid? We're here to say we're sorry!" The girl asked angrily, flicking some of her hair behind her shoulder.

"My problem is that you hit my brother with your damn car and you're not even sorry about it!"

"Sorry?! That's a brand new 2005 Celica and he busted up the hood and the windshield, of course I'm fucking sorry!" He shouted back. Patamon knew what was coming and the only bright side of it all was the fact they were still in a hospital – which also happened to be the downside…

In less then a second TK's knee had come up and imbedded itself in the man's stomach while he dropped his digimon to the ground. While the driver gasped in pain the teen had taken the liberty of shoving him to the ground, he punched him hard in the jaw.

Somewhere someone was screaming but he didn't listen, he didn't care. He kept punching until the man angrily punched him back, throwing him off of him TK hissed in pain as the man hit him in his solar-plex. He felt himself get pulled back to his feet, only to get hit again on his jaw. A hand wrapped around his throat and his head was slammed into the wall. Seeing double, the young boy's own hands went to the one around his neck, cursing when he couldn't move it.

"Attacking your elders isn't nice kid." The man snapped, emphasizing this point by shoving him back into the wall.

"Stop it Rei! You'll kill him!" The girl shouted, trying to pull her boyfriend away from the kid.

"If I let him go he'll just keep attacking, right kid?" He slammed TK back into the wall, the boy growled his protest but it didn't get him anywhere. Seeing no other option (literally as dark spots began to cloud his vision) he brought up his leg and kicked out hard, twisting it so that his shin made contact with the man's stomach. It was a surprise hit and the hand around his neck loosened just enough for him to get out of the hold.

He felt his legs coming out from under him and he fell to the floor coughing, trying to regain his breath. To his right Patamon was fuming. He'd been in the human world long enough to know that he couldn't interfere or else there'd be a panic, but how dare that human creature lay a hand on TK.

"Little brat!" The man (Rei) hissed, rubbing his bruising ribs. He grabbed a fistful of the boy's hair and raised a hand to punch him again when a cup filled with hot chocolate hit him hard on the side of his head – spilling hot water all over him. Screaming in pain the man pushed TK away and fell backwards, trying to get the water off of him. Meanwhile a strong arm took hold of TK's and helped him to his feat.

"Did you make a deal with Matt to look after me when he can't?" The blond asked glaring at Tai as the soccer player laughed shiftily and turned around without answering. Kari was standing in the doorway and when TK picked up Patamon and started towards her she ran to his side worrying.

"You're bleeding…" She said wiping her hand across the small trail of blood that was falling from his mouth. He gently moved it out of the way and wiped it off himself before wrapping an arm around her shoulders as they followed Tai back to Matt's room.

"You worry too much." He whispered. He lowered his head to kiss the top of hers when chills went down his spine. Glancing up, Tai was glaring at him from over his shoulder. Kari hadn't noticed, but the boy immediately backed off, deciding to hold her hand instead.

Five years earlier

TK's hands twitched in the darkness. His entire body aching as he struggled to sit up. Voices he recognized but couldn't interpret were speaking. A door opened and closed. His body ached and his chest was searing with pain.

"Matt…" He whispered, arms shaking as he forced himself to get into a pushup position. Knees falling to the floor, he maneuvered himself to sit up, though his chest hurt and his eyes were blind in the dark. However his chest protested the action, making him fall back to the ground in pain.

Voices continued to swirl around his already muddled mind. A hand on his shoulder, a hand on his head, something clasping his ankles, something on his chest, who was touching him? Where was Patamon? Matt? Tai? Kari? Everyone?

I don'tlike it…stop touching me…stop touching me….

The hands were thrown off, but still the pain stayed and the feeling of there being something around him did not waver. He felt consciousness slipping away and soon he fell back, into the dark.

"What is it?" the Miragemon asked as Abyssmon sat over the child.

"He's fighting it rather hard for someone so close to dying." The digimon replied moving back towards the door. "Call me if he wakes again, the more he fights the weaker his body will be. He's unintentionally killing himself with his struggling."

Matt sat up quickly his breath short and his heart racing. Gabumon looked at him carefully from his position with the other digimon. It had been two nights since TK's original disappearance, and nightmares were common. To protect the children from the monsters that had kidnapped TK in the first place, the digimon created a circle around them all at night.

"Matt? Can't sleep?" Gabumon asked gently as the boy's harsh breathing broke the silence of the night. He struggled to get out of his sleeping bag, then tripped over his own feat several times before he managed to get out of the 'protection circle' and into the woods.

The other digimon didn't dare move, for they could hear the boy heaving in the dark. Coughing soon filled the night and they shared worried glances. The pre-teen was definitely sick. His furry digimon had confirmed it while he was sleeping. He was running a fever and his body had been taxed to its limit.

"How long has he been like this?" A sweet voice asked as the gagging noise continued.

"Sora…" Biyomon whispered as the redhead walked over to where the bird-digimon was sitting.

"He sounds terrible…"

"He needs medicine, and he needs to relax!" Gabumon muttered looking back at to where Matt had disappeared to.

"Why hasn't he said anything? If he's so sick he should-"

"You know Matt, he wont say he's sick or in pain until he's found TK." Agumon said sadly.

"He's killing himself…" She whispered. "This is suicide, if he doesn't get any medical attention he's going to die!"

"I don't know if I can come back if I leave." A weak voice said from the shadows. "And I can't leave until I find TK…" Sora moved over and helped Matt walk to his sleeping bag, her face etched with worry. Once he was inside it she continued.

"But what if it takes us longer then you can hold out? You'll die!" Her hand touched his forehead and he winced when she drew it back in astonishment. "Matt you need a doctor, your fever is very high!" The boy looked up at her with half open eyes, his hand went to Sora's neck and he gently pulled her closer to him. He kissed her, and for a moment, nobody moved. The digimon were staring wide eyed, and it seemed like the world had stopped spinning.

"If I'm dying…at least I got kissed while I was doing it." He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and fell backwards, asleep.

She stayed like that for a long time; her face beat red, and her heart pounding. When he shifted in his sleep, she made a quick getaway.

In the morning Biyomon told her that Matt's fever had gone down in the night, and that he was looking a bit stronger today. He packed up his things in silence, and when the group was getting ready to keep moving he took the lead as usual. She bit her lip and hurried up to him, tapping him on the shoulder to announce her presence.

"So…Matt…about last night…" She started quietly.

"What about it?" He asked looking at her confused.

"Well…I mean…what happened…" She mumbled awkwardly.

"What are you talking about?" Now a look of pure bewilderment crossed his features, his head tilting to one side in complete confusion.

"Well…when you…"

"Oh…that…" She sighed in relief; she wasn't making a complete fool of herself. "You saw that?"

"Huh?" Or maybe she had…

"Look, I'm fine okay; I probably just ate something bad."

"You don't remember the-" She stopped herself from going on. The fever…he was delusional and delirious…he didn't remember. He was looking at her oddly, but she didn't keep going.

"Okay…" He walked past her and Biyomon looked up at her from where she was in Sora's arms.

"Sora? Are you okay?" Several tears fell from her eyes and Sora buried her head in the digimon's feathers.

"My heart…it hurts…" She said crying.

When Tai walked into the cafeteria to find TK, he was surprised to say the least that there was a full on fight occurring and that very few people were trying to stop it. The nurses and other orderlies had tried to stop the fight early on, but a code blue had caused them to leave the scene. Then the girl who was with the man tried to stop it when he had begun to strangle the teen.

Kari had started screaming for the fight to stop as well, but nobody seemed to hear her. Finally when it seemed that if it didn't stop soon someone was going to get seriously hurt, Tai stepped in.

First he stopped Kari's screaming, and then he moved over to the vending machines. Putting in the two dollars he needed for her his drink he waited for it to vend. Then, after taking a sip he threw it in the air, as it came back down Tai kicked the cup at the man's head. It opened, as he knew it would, and spilled all over him causing just the distraction he needed to pull the boy from the fray.

"Did you make a deal with Matt to look after me when he can't?" Tai just laughed before turning away. The boy would never know just how right he was.

Windstar: well chapter four is done. I had several thoughts for the quote for this story, but I thought the above fit it best. Next chapter's coming soon!