A Little Bit Country
Author's Note: Set after Digimon Adventure: Last Evolution Kizuna. Enjoy the story and R&R.
Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to or of the Digimon series.
Pairing: Established Wallace x Michael.
Summary:
Wallace would have stayed in Menoa Bellucci's delusion given the choice.
"Isn't this private property?"
Wallace crossed over the dead grass. Fact was, nobody lived there anymore. The house he grew up in for the first small period of his life had stood without occupant while time passed around it, a hollow signpost relating to backpackers and vagrants a past they had no involvement in.
But to Wallace, it was an authentic memory of Summer Memory, Colorado.
Much had happened since his hot, sun-drenched childhood days playing with his twin Digimon. Chocomon disappeared, came back, went on a rampage, died, and came back again.
He met Daisuke and the others, was abducted by Eosmon, then came back as well.
Yet as he aged, here time remained still. His former homestead became one of America's ghost monuments, left behind in the modern age. A faded, yellowed leftover from a more bustling, golden era when American independence didn't look so fractured and fragile.
It was a breeze blaming his personal problems on anything besides himself. He tried to remember the good between the bad, like Daisuke – like Michael – but it only made him angrier.
It was all downhill from here. Menoa Bellucci parted with Morphomon. Daisuke's peers already parted with theirs.
Wallace knew the pain of losing your partner Digimon. Knew the pain of killing your partner Digimon. That's why he kept returning. Returning to this town…
His years were filled with pain. But it was pain he'd been through before. Familiar ground where he could hide out, away from the pain he hadn't lived yet. The pain of saying goodbye to both Chocomon and Gummymon once he grew too "old" to have partner Digimon.
Michael bent down, pushing a tire lying in the dust vertical. With Betamon's help, he got some rope through it and over a tree branch to elevate a tire swing.
"Want to swing?"
Being the self-centered prick he was, Wallace assumed Michael meant him. "That ain't secure. I'll break a bone."
Terriermon and Lopmon glided on, using their ears to sway the tire.
"Oh." Wallace realized.
Michael laughed.
Michael took part in the big stuff. He and Daisuke and Mimi guided disoriented Digimon from the Real World to the Digital World. He and Mimi searched for survivors in the rubble of the Twin Towers. Saving the world shit Wallace never took part in.
Shrivelling from the heat, Michael took off three-quarters of the clothing he was wearing.
After a while, the summer heat became too much for Wallace too, and he nodded off.
When Wallace recovered, Michael had gone to the porch shirtless to watch Betamon, Terriermon, and Lopmon swing on the swing.
Wallace still felt crappy, but his surprise at Michael's state coming out of his wooziness gave him a slight pick-me-up.
Huh? He's got pants now.