Warnings: non typical violence

thirteen - the place we met

Akari had forgotten that man's face, for a long time. It was understandable. He had just been an old man she'd helped around a little. But to him she had been the source of a headache, and a confusing disarray of sensibilities, and a pawn in a great plant that had failed before it had even begun.

So Akari being so completely confused was understandable, though infuriating. But then, moments that meant everything to some, could only matter minisculely to others.

Still, she felt a tug of familiarity at her navel, a steady I know you nudging her all over in a way that made her skin crawl. Because he felt familiar. She couldn't put words to why but she knew it was so. It wasn't like looking at Taiki, whose resemblance she still couldn't see.

"Have we met before?" she finally asked, for lack of anything better to say. The voice from before was suddenly thrumming under her skin. The goddess was, for lack of a better explanation, awake. Awake and breathing in time with her, staring even when Akari herself blinked.

Bagramon regarded her, bending for a moment to see her face, then kneeling down to bring them close in height. The entire clearing tensed, even her in her shoulders, but he did not falter. "Human minds are a terribly forgetful device," he said to her and she frowned, wondering what that had to do with anything as he hunched in place, not even diminutive as he did. At most he was folded in, like an old man waiting for a green light.

She remembered the sound of the rain and then shook her head no. She had to be mistaken. And besides, it wasn't important. What was important was that he was here and he wanted something, maybe from Taiki, maybe from all of them.

Bagramon regarded them all with his strange eyes and Akari took the risk of looking back at Taiki, just for an instant. He wore a strange look. Nothing joyful or excited, or hopeful. His brow was furrowed, hands loose at his sides, and trying to curl up maybe into fists or around something solid and heavy to strike with. Which at first, was uncomfortable. Taiki wasn't prone to violence. He wasn't prone to lashing out in his pain either. He was one of those 'bottle it up and hope it goes away' types. Even this adventure had had him cautious, careful to minimize damages.

What had the other Taiki been like, Akari couldn't help but wonder. The one that had been willing to turn into a monster that protected with its every breath. Was he more violent because of the past he'd written, or less?

"We look nothing alike," Bagramon said suddenly, looking at Taiki. "We feel nothing alike. The watcher must be mistaken."

Taiki didn't even seem to breathe.

"And yet it must be true," he continued. "Only one of mine would be able to do as you are."

"Which. Is. What?" Taiki's words seemed to be forced out of his mouth, heavy with disappointment and a burning upset.

Bagramon turned away from him in dismissal and looked at the clearing once more. "My general isn't here." He seemed to smile. "Excellent. Then he will not have to deal with this."

"Your general." Nene's voice was frosty. "Is that so?"

Kiriha, Akari realized with bile rising up her stomach. "Deal with what?" she asked, buying time, hoping someone, anyone, had a plan to get them as far away from his wrath as soon as possible. Maybe with Sparrowmon? No, there were too many of them, he could barely fit two people.

She took a few steps back, hand curling around one of Taiki's clenched fists. She squeezed it, gently. After a few seconds (a few too long in her opinion), he squeezed back.

"I've got you," she said, so softly she was surprised she could hear it. "I've got you, okay? It's okay to feel whatever."

"Thanks. I'll try." His voice was just as quiet.

"I know."

Bagramon looked at them with something she couldn't understand. Friends held hands. Taiki liked to be touched, frankly, especially by people who actually loved him unlike this ass - oh there it was, there was the anger, the fear, the awareness.

But Taiki, he didn't say any of that. He just kept looking at Bagramon with that disappointment. Still Bagramon looked back, not answering. Maybe being so powerful, he didn't see much point in it.

"Your plans won't make a good world," he finally said. "You have to know that, don't you? This will just kill everyone."

"As was the intent of Noah's Ark." Bagramon's eyes flickered. "It was justified, and it is easier here."

"But it ends with guilt," Taiki reasoned. "God was guilty."

"I still am," whispered in Akari's mind like the wind. "Every day, every night, every spare moment I shut my eyes and hear them drown."

"That does not make it wrong." Bagramon moved forward again. They all took a step back. "That does not make it unnecessary. Guilt is only an emotion, and it is action that matters more than feelings, actions more than pitiful weakness. The world ended regardless of that fact, because of your kindness. I won't let you allow it to happen a second time."

"Me?" Taiki repeated, baffled and unable to quite articulate the utter untruths of what he'd just heard. "What could I do on my own?"

Akari wanted to smack him, earnestly.

"I'm one person," he continued, and sick horror filled his stomach. "It's not just me, is it?" Clever, clever grey eyes, staring unblinkingly up at a monster who might have been a man once. That was worse, really. "It's everyone here. That's why you're glad Kiriha's not here."

"Correct. He can be guided properly again." The bone arm lifted up slowly, creaking like old joints and another flash of memory - rain, old wheezing laughter, a free crosswalk - struck her hard again. "Too many of you know the end and don't care enough."

"We don't know anything!" Yuu shouted with sudden bravado. "And you don't either, do you?" Bagramon paused and triumph filled the boy's face. "You don't know a thing but what you saw and that's not the whole story. But you think we do. And you're going to threaten us until we spill. And then we'll die! Isn't that right?"

Nene's fingers tightened around his shoulders.

Bagramon regarded him now, turning to face him with his whole face, a blank frown filling his face in a way that made Yuu think of Taiki in Hell's Field before everything went to metaphorical shit. That simple, steady determination with the sword, the set realization that what had to be done had to be. "I would rather that not be necessary," he finally said after a while, and now Yuu could see, easily, why he had believed this man once and worked with him. There was something genuine there, lost in translation. "I would rather you see the reality of the situation and join me in a peaceful recreation to the new world. A world where everything falls into place anew, with a new generation. And if you allowed it, you would pioneer it."

"No." Taiki's response was immediate. He pulled away from Akari, moving forward in what she could only describe as pure reckless idiocy. "We'd pioneer a world starting from scratch."

"Two of them, in fact," Bagramon corrected. "You would be gods."

"Sounds lame," Shoutmon said suddenly, out of nowhere.

Which was their only indication before his mic went spinning and beaned Bagramon in the face.

"Run!" Taiki shouted.

They did, fleeing into the undergrowth. Behind her she heard Taiki and Shoutmon making proud noises at each other. Idiots, she thought fondly. Complete idiots.

Then again, Shoutmon couldn't be a king if the humans were gods. That would be weird.

They kept running, of course, and he didn't follow them. At least, he didn't seem to.

"We need to get to a place to Zone Transfer," Nene called. "Another clearing. There's one nearby." Yuu let out a wheeze beside her and nodded.

Zenjirou turned to say something, but then his eyes went wide. "Look out!"

Everyone but Taiki turned, but Taiki raised his Xros Loader with a grim, knowing smile. "Zone Transfer!"

Akari made to turn around. "No!" She shouted as the Digimon were sucked into the tiny screen and the ground was suddenly not under their feet at all, but much much further away.

Taiki threw the Xros Loader and it landed square in Akari's hands-

Right as a single black claw reached out and swallowed Taiki whole.

She screamed and so did the god, and so did everyone as the portal shuttered and shut before her eyes. The last thing she saw was Taiki's small, hopeful smile before the world rushed around them and turned a singular, chilling pitch black.

And then, Bagramon's whisper floated into their minds. "You have my thanks, and my most solemn regret."

Screw you, she screamed. Aloud and in her mind, over and over and over until she almost forgot her own name.

It didn't matter. She had a friend to save.