A/N: Hello! Sorry for the delay! Was watching Doctor Who. Here continues the story. Keeper, hehehe. Enjoy!

2.7

She awakes with Plotmon a mess of tears and giggling hysteria and doesn't ask.

The others aren't looking at her, though she doesn't quite concern herself with it as much as she should. The silence is awkward, everyone's Digimon is being carefully patched up by a skittish Jyou, and no one is looking at her.

Hikari doesn't speak, merely looks at her partner and hums in her ear. She can barely sit up, heck, she can barely breathe without her ribs protesting. She doesn't ask for forgiveness or understanding; she wouldn't want to do it if she was in their shoes.

So she doesn't ask for it and doesn't explain. If anyone will ask, they will ask when they are not so distraught or angry or hurt or confused.

In short, they will ask after she has utterly destroyed her own sense of self-worth, likely.

Stupid, she says to herself. Always doing things by yourself, going too far. Stupid!

Her thoughts continue in this track, even as the others whisper to each other and Jyou nervously goes to check her for a fever and any injuries of her own. She is compliant, but does not eat when offered. She thinks she'll vomit or worse, be unable to swallow.

It is Takeru, unsurprisingly, who breaks the silence later, as well as the unspoken line. He crosses it, ignoring his brother. His bright blue eyes still have that tinge of darkness of loss and the anger is back in her heart again, wondering how far the sadness in his heart really goes, and how Yamato can simply not see it. Or maybe he does.

God help him if he does.

"What happened?" His tone is not innocence, but sadness and accusation and childlike adultness. He is wise where her brother is simply worldly, and she only sighs.

"Me," she says gently. "Me and my darkness."

"Why?" When Hikari gives him a puzzled smile, he says. "Everyone's always saying nothing hurts you and makes you sad or bothered cause you don't say so and that they don't like it, but now something did." He frowns. "And they still don't like it."

"Did you like it?"

He shakes his head. "No... Tailmon attacked everyone."

"Bastemon," the puppy giggles, hysterical still. "You were in the way. You were!"

"Shh," Hikari says urgently, watching Takeru's eyes.

The boy only nods. "Saying stuff like that, ripping that other cat apart, it took ages for her to stop. Everyone got hurt. No," he says, tears rising and not falling. "No, I didn't like that at all!"

Hikari nods, taking it in, taking deep breaths. Plotmon chants in her arms, the word 'kill' made out in happy low tones that are making Tokomon cringe.

"But!" he says, clenching his fists. "I don't like what everyone's doing either!"

She almost catches the others start from their places on the other side of the fire. She agrees with them. "P-Pardon?"

Takeru shakes his head, fists even tighter and Tokomon nodding his head in a vehement sort of gesture. "You hide stuff all the time and they just kept hiding from you that they didn't like it. They just got upset if something was wrong with them! And they never said anything to you either! Something is bothering you and you are sad and I see it but they just say 'leave you alone'!"

He's worked himself up into tears and she smiles a little sadly and takes off his hat to pet his mess of blond hair. Plotmon is still giggling and crying but it is quieter now and though Hikari can still feel things are wrong, it's almost out of them, though their crest remains unfound and unknown. The others don't move and she wants to spit at them but doesn't.

"Why did you not tell us something was wrong?" he finally says, sniffling, making it quiet enough that she can pretend it's her.

Nobody notices. Hikari doesn't have to think about the answers too hard. "Because I was scared," she says, smiling. "Because I've tried telling people a lot and they don't ever believe me. So I'm scared to even bother. It's just easier to keep it all in my head."

"I'll believe you."

She forces herself to sit up. Pain is an understatement. "I know. I know you will. But not yet. I'm not sure. I can't tell anyone anything until I'm sure."

"Sure of what, huh?" Yamato had come over, the most aggressive, the most willing to stand up to her calm face and punch it. "Sure that you won't go off in a reckless rage and get us killed?"

They won't die! They won't!

She says nothing and Plotmon just continues to chant in her arms.

The word isn't 'kill' anymore. 'Protect, protect, protect.'

She goes back to sleep and lets them chew on that.