11.

Giving up the Crest hurts Gabumon more than him.

Not that it doesn't hurt a little. It's closing a part of himself that has remained open for years and years, centuries and centuries inside a computer and days in a world that moves too slow. Action is done behind closed doors, people are moved by words on a screen. There is no straightforward path.

Yamato takes up running. Takes up the heat of the sun on his back, the light guiding him home, the wind brushing his skin, filling his nose with the smell of the grass, the sweat pouring down the back of his neck.

His brother, smiling and leading him forward, laughing kindly at every exaggerated thing he does, teeth shining in the light. Never questioning their visiting together, sometimes joining him as he sings to the moon. The moon that someday he may want to reach. But for now he keeps his feet perfectly on the ground.

Gabumon is hurting from the loss of the power, but all Yamato needs to do is dream and his partner will rest easy. Even as the world falls apart in sick and twisted ways, and dark things coil beneath their paws, a single dream gives them the chance to run together again and again and he seeks out every chance. There is no going back.

His father worries, and he shows it now. It is good, different. It will continue. But this is Yamato's normal, bound by the changing moon.