She could see it, her body, moving out in the real world. Feel her hands sliding over Koji's flesh. Hear her voice as it whispered cruelty and manipulation. Tache's glee felt like frost in her chest, Its desire to control, to corrupt… to devour like a sickness in her stomach. Ysault hated it, she wanted to expel it and destroy it. For the first time since she'd succumbed, Ysault remembered how desperately she wanted to purge It from the world. This horribleness, this twisted distortion of a person's worst fears and insecurities. How could such a thing exist, so devoid of goodness? How had she allowed it to exist inside her for so long? This wasn't who she was- wasn't who she wanted to be.

It had started small, just inside the Ocean, like a nightmare. Vague and mismatched. She'd become aware when Koji had first arrived, though perhaps aware was too strong a word. More like… the glint of starlight. There had been another, someone who would not be broken; Ysault couldn't relate at all. This one though… He'd fought back, just as she had at first, and just as she had he'd lost. But no… that was too harsh. Every now and again he still struggled, lurching into wakefulness in a frenzied response to something she couldn't perceive. Curiosity was the first emotion to return to her fully; what was it that kept this Chosen of Light so strong in the face of emptiness? Was it an artifact of his element? Yet if that was the case, shouldn't Charity make her resistant to the heartless rampage Tache had usurped her body to perpetuate? Shouldn't she have been able to remain awake?

Then one eternity, she'd seen him too. Koichi, Chosen of Darkness, the source and the end. A visitor in the Ocean unlike anything she could've expected. His presence was tangible, powerful and frail. Koji still wanted to protect him, his brother, from the pit into which they'd all fallen. It was misery and apathy; Ysault understood why one wouldn't want a loved one here. She remembered love. The Ocean would have her believe connections only caused pain, that they were a weakness to be purged. However it couldn't stop her from questioning… then it couldn't stop her from rejecting. All the lies the Ocean had layered into her mind fell away one by one. The longer she was awake the more certain she became. This had to stop.

This tree, a thing born from herself and, she understood, Koichi, had to die.

The Ocean was beyond them, some force like a storm or a fire. A disease. It had no will, only hunger, no way out of Its dark dimension other than through a host. Neither Koichi nor herself had the power to destroy it. There was no winning the game. No, Ysault thought, they couldn't beat the Ocean, but they could stop playing. Without them the tree would crumble and all the souls It had swallowed would be set free. Without them, it would be the Ocean that lost Its mind.

Ysault wanted it done. She wanted to escape, to push Tache out of her body like a splinter. She wanted to be away from this place so badly it ached. The cold of it bit into her flesh, the damp freezing in her lungs. Every fiber of her being wanted freedom; still, she knew she had to wait. Hubris had been her downfall once before, when she'd believed Its parasitic will would simply dissolve before her. When her strength had derived from solitude and anger. When she'd let it happen. It had been stupid to let Tache in, stupid and arrogant and desperate. Once it was inside her everything had twisted and engorged. Disgusting. She wouldn't make that mistake again, no matter how badly she longed to just finish it.

No, Ysault needed to wait for Koichi. As he'd needed to wait for her, though she doubted he understood that. When this all began neither one of them had been ready. They hadn't understood the cost or foreseen the consequences. Yet together they'd become the Ocean's body and mind. Together they'd brought Tache into the Human World. They'd only be able to make it right if they were together. What, exactly, they had to do still eluded her… what were Charity and Darkness supposed to do against evil? Before, as a child, Koichi had willed his element to a form that suited him. And yet that's how it always had been.

The true power of darkness isn't malicious, not like the Ocean at all. Darkness is quiet, the place where secrets and pain are kept. Connections can cut you open and tear out your insides. Anger and fear can erase everything that you are. But darkness isn't the cause; it's where we store such things to fester. It's what we trust with the self we don't want to see. True darkness is kind and compassionate and soothing. Monsters may hide in the shadows, but only because we put them there. What are monsters if not secrets we can't accept? What's a demon but the thing you don't want to believe about yourself? What is Charity of not an understanding of that?

Thoughts swirled like mist as she bided her time. Tache was distracted, made giddy by Koichi's immanent arrival. It didn't sense her awakening, didn't notice when she began to extract herself from the tree trunk. To the thing in her skin she no longer had any significance; she was just a problem that had already been taken care of. Which suited Ysault just fine. Slowly, she experimented with movement, first her fingers making fists. Then her arms, tugging, wiggling, sliding out from the bark that encased them like taking off a particularly rigid set of gloves. Maybe the tree was weaker than it had been before, or maybe she was stronger than she thought. Bark crumbled like sandstone under her fingers, releasing her torso, her waist, her legs.

And finally she was free. Ysault pushed wet, honey hair from her face, glancing around to see if the Ocean noticed. No response. A grin of triumph pulled at her frozen face, spraying her cheeks with painful needles. Good. She liked the pain, it meant she was alive. Her gaze settled on someone below and the grin died. Gingerly climbing down, she shuddered when her bare feet touched the water. It felt hard and cold, more like a solid wall of ice than an ocean's surface. Briefly, she wondered how that made any sense. It pulsed beneath her toes, the waves pushing and pulling in an almost heartbeat. Then her attention returned to the someone and she found she didn't care.

"Koji," she breathed, kneeling before him. He was waist deep in the water, his arms held out at 90˚ angles from his body. "Koji, wake up."

His head twitched, his eyes cracking open in response to her call. She grasped his face, helping him to lookup. A small frown creased his features, his mind trying to think past the fog and comprehend what was happening.

"Tache," he said with disdain, unable to work up any more emotion. With a sad smile, she shook her head.

"No. I'm Ysault. One of the Digidestined, chosen just like you."

"Yeah, I guess you are like me," he muttered after a moment, dejected. His dark gaze fell downward, brow still creased. "Tache is running around in both our bodies."

"Not for much longer," she said forcefully, tilting her head to catch his eye. "Koji, listen to me, your brother's coming very soon now."

"No!" He jerked out of her hands, glaring with sudden anger. His fingers made fists, muscles straining against the branches that held him. "He can't come here!"

"It's not your choice," she whispered, giving him a compassionate smile. "It's his and he is coming. He has to, or this will never end. Do you understand?"

"I won't let this place have him," Koji snarled at her, blinking back the haze as it tried to take his thoughts away again. Ysault grabbed his shoulders urgently, bringing their faces close.

"Of course not. This place can't have any of us. Not anymore. That's why Koichi's coming, to set things right. And he can do it. The Ocean is going to tell you he can't, that he'll fall again and the world will drown in darkness. I know what that feels like, but you can't listen."

"Why not? It gets what it wants. You, me, I don't even know what it did to Dorian. If my brother comes here it will take him too. He can't come."

"Have faith in him, he's stronger than he was. Besides, he won't be fighting alone; we will be by his side. We won't loose."

"Forgive me if that doesn't fill me with confidence. I can't move and you… You're Ysault, the girl Tache has been parading around in for how long now? What can you do?"

"I don't know yet," she answered, not offended in the slightest. "I just know that Tache needs me to exist for now. And It needs to get inside Koichi to open the Human World to the Ocean… Tache is the Ocean but the Ocean isn't Tache…"

"You're not making any sense."

"Out there in both the Digital and Real world It's a parasite, but here Tache is nothing but a distortion. I may not know exactly what needs to be done, still, I know we can defeat It here. Once Tache is gone everyone will wake up and the Ocean won't be able to spread. We stop it here."

"Tch… You sound crazy… then again, Koichi's crazy too…"

"Koji? Koji!"

His head lulled down towards his chest, his eyes falling closed. She gave him a hard shake and received no response. Gritting her teeth, Ysault grabbed at the branches around his wrists, tearing at them with all her strength. They were like stone in her hands, cold and unyielding. With a low, grunting noise she moved to the root in the back of his neck, grimacing at its texture. Spongy and wet. She couldn't grip it, her nails just created slits in the white flesh as she dug in. Bracing her feet on his back, she heaved, pulling as hard as she could. But it was useless. Whatever power that allowed Ysault to be herself again could not be communicated. Dark mist excreted from the bark, enveloping Koji and stealing his consciousness away. Her breath caught in her throat, tears of anger and helplessness burning in her eyes.

Only she wasn't helpless.

"It won't take him. Remember that; don't let It convince you otherwise," she said, leaning through the mist to speak into Koji's ear. "It won't be able to take him and together Koichi and I will bring an end to this."