Like I said before -- I'm not a fan of romances in Digimon. Therefore, no romance is safe in this fic, as I mix and match them to my heart's desire, because I can, daggit. Like I also said, bribes work. Bribes work very well. (Iori/Cody centered fics work well, too. ^_^) However, it make take a while for me to work in any bribed romance, because I made a chart that will work until sometime in the middle of Part 3 that I want to stick to as close as possible. This fic is confusing enough!
Besides, I have the sneaking suspicion that I'm not actually writing this fic -- it's writing itself, and I'm just along for the ride.
::glances over her shoulder at the amassed Digimon characters, all whistling or in poses of supposed innocence::
And there are some romances that will just not work. This fic will not degenerate into a lemon anything. ::watches several readers get up in disgust and sweatdrops:: Yaoi and yuri pairings...ehh. There are too many romances in this fic already, with an even twelve characters in the romance pool for Part 3 -- and there's no telling who'll end up with whom yet...
"How do I end this thing?!"
"I know! I know! 'The End.'"
FRIENDS, FOES, AND
ROMANCE; OH MY!
TAAAAAAKE TWO!
by Rb
It was a peaceful morning in the Kamiya
apartment, until an alarm clock went off. Tai fell off his bed.
"Owww..."
It was par for the course.
Kari, awakened by the noise, stumbled into his room and over to
her brother's side. "Tai, why's the alarm going off so
early?" she complained, rubbing an eye.
"Well, you want to be ready for Sora's tennis match,
right?" Tai grinned.
"Tai, the tennis match isn't until one in the afternoon.
It's 6:30 AM."
Tai paused. "Good point." He got up, yawned, and darted
for the bathroom.
Kari rolled her eyes. "Boys..." Being sensible, she
went back to sleep.
---
Joe woke up and managed to stay in the bed. He smiled to himself.
The new and improved, not-a-nerd Joe...soon to be a chick-magnet.
Well, sort of. He went to a prestigious private school, and Mimi
had informed him that girls like school uniforms.
"They make guys look sooo hot."
"Maybe that doesn't count here, though, since everyone in
Japan wears school uniforms..." Joe muttered fuzzily.
Also, he was going out on a date today. His first ever date...he
wondered if his date would be pretty. She'd better be.
Mimi had written, in her last e-mail, that girls liked guys who
were already taken. He wasn't sure how that logic worked, because
if a guy was "taken," wouldn't the girl want a guy she
could actually go out with? This advice was in the same category
as the "dyed hair colors, like pink, blue, orange, and
green, are sooo sexy!" as he'd read in an earlier Mimi
e-mail. If that was true, he should have had more girlfriends
then...then...some guy with a LOT of girlfriends, because his
hair was naturally blue.
Mimi...
Hmm. Mimi herself was in America. She did visit Japan every so
often. Was he going to date...Mimi?
His stomach flip-flopped. Joe groaned. "I knew there was
salmonella in those eggs!"
He went to the bathroom and splashed water on his face. He stared
at his reflection in the mirror. Did Mimi...would Mimi...Just
because she hadn't mentioned she was coming to Japan didn't mean
she necessarily wasn't.
Joe thought for a moment. Would he mind so much if his mysterious
American date turned out to be Mimi, a not so mysterious
ditz?
But very, very, pretty...
Joe walked back to his room and decided to check out the content
of his closet. He had a date with Mimi to prepare for! Let's
see..what colors look good with pink?
---
Matt woke up with a splitting headache. Ugh, what had he been
DOING last night that had given him such a pain in his skull? It
sounded as if someone was screaming incomprehensibly...
Matt blinked fuzzily. The reason for his headache, he discovered,
was that T.K. had managed to drag his CD player over to the head
of his bed and was blaring one of his American rock CDs at the
highest level of volume. And he remembered quite clearly what he
had been doing last night -- talking to one of his MANY (heh)
girlfriends, avoiding that ANNOYING June, playing a really long
game of some sort with T.K., who was spending the weekend at his
home, and composing some music before finally getting to sleep.
The previously unintelligible lyrics went something like,
"don't like hesh-don't like rap-kicked ol' sally 'cause
she's fat-I'm a jerk I'm a punk took a shower cause I
stunk-smoked a bong killed a cat-had my nuts attacked by
rats."
On second thought, maybe they were still unintelligible.
"T.K.!" he yelled, barely able to be heard over the
cacophony of the music. "TURN THAT -- " the music
reached a crescendo, drowning out his next few words, " --
MUSIC DOWN!"
The track stopped, and T.K. scampered into the room and turned
off the CD. "Well, Matt, it was the only way I could get you
up!"
Matt facefaulted. "You are so dead, little brother! Never
wake me up before two when we don't have school!"
"But Matt! You promised to take me to Sora's tennis match
this afternoon!"
"I did?" Maybe he really had done something
wrong last night, he'd completely forgotten about his promise.
(Selective amnesia. ^_^) "No way!"
"Please?" T.K. asked, going bambi eyed. It didn't go
quite as well as it had when T.K. was cute and little and eight,
but Matt's heart still melted at his little brother's pitiful
face.
"Oh...okay, fine. I'll get ready. But never wake me up
AGAIN!" he said fiercely, adding in an undertone,
"you'll get arrested for disturbing the peace!"
"Sure thing, big bro," T.K. beamed, any trace of tears
looong gone.
---
"Sora?"
Sora looked up from her breakfast to see her mother watching at
her. "Yes, Mom?"
"I...I want you to know..." The mother looked at her
daughter closely. Sora was dressed in her tennis outfit already.
She looked older than her actual age.
"Mom?" Sora asked again.
"I want you to know I'm proud of you, no matter how you
do." Her mother abuptly left the room.
Sora's eyes teared. "Thanks, Mom." she said in a
slightly choked-up voice.
Hence the sappy mother-daughter scene went, until the phone rang.
Sora picked it up. "Hello! Takenouchi residence, Sora
speaking," she responded.
"Hi, Sora! This is...well, Tai."
Sora sighed silently. "Yes, Tai?"
"Um, I just want you to know that I -- I mean, Kari and I --
know you're going to do great!"
"Tai...you told me this last night. And in school yesterday.
And the day before." Perhaps it was cruel of her to enjoy
the spectacle of Tai Kamiya making a fool out of himself every
time she spoke to him or was even in the same room as him. He was
just so funny!
She did prefer, however, the old Tai that wouldn't know the
emotion "love" if it hit him on the head in big block
letters a lot more than this lovesick fool.
"Oh...I did?"
Sora sighed audibly. "Yes, Tai, you did."
"Sora, is something wrong?"
What, that my best friend for years has finally discovered
I'm female and has decided to forget I'm also a human being?
"Ah, nothing. See you later."
*Click!*
Tai stared at the phone receiver. "I think I offended
her..."
Kari, who had woken up completely by this time, wandered into the
kitchen just in time to hear the end of the conversation. She
gave him a look. "Well, duh..." She rubbed an
eye blearily and picked up a piece of fruit. Biting into it, she
added "anyone could see that..."
"Really?" Tai blinked innocently, and started dialing
the phone again. Kari sighed and left the room.
---
Izzy typed furiously at his computer. "Hmm."
He looked at the time. "Oh, it's almost time for Sora's
tennis match. I should watch my protege there."
He packed up his laptop and a large paper bag and started off,
after calling a goodbye to his mother.
---
Mimi giggled. "No way, he did WHAT?" she said to the
phone.
The person on the other end of the line must have said something
funny, for Mimi giggled even more.
After all, what else do American thirteen year old girls do at
ten PM at night?
(I have included Mimi in this fic, officially including all of
the Digidestined and making it a 'real' Digimon fic. Now I must
go retch. Excuse me.)
---
"T.K.! You want me to get to this stupid game, are you
READY?" Matt yelled after hanging up the phone.
"All right!" T.K. said, opening the door to the
bathroom cautiously. "I'm coming."
Matt got a good look at T.K. and his jaw hit the ground, attached
with the rest of his body as he facevaulted. "Who are you
and what have you DONE with my little brother!" he asked as
calmly as he could, jumping upright.
"Um...Matt? Close your mouth, you're letting in flies. Let's
go, big brother."
"What the...?" Matt asked, taking in T.K.'s outfit with
a few irate eyebrow twitches.
"Izzy told me to dress like this...to impress Kari and
Tai," T.K. admitted sheepishly.
"Little bro?" Matt said cautiously, eyebrow still
twitching.
"Yes?"
"Never, ever, take Izzy's advice again."
"You have my word," said the uncomfortable T.K.
---
Joe looked at the bouquet of flowers in his hand. They were pink,
of course, because Mimi liked pink. Didn't she? Unless she'd
changed her tastes dramatically in the last few years. That
didn't seem likely, but she was a girl, she was capable of
changing her tastes quickly enough if she decided to...
Joe paused, and looked at his companion. "Touya?"
"Yeah?" asked his bored friend.
"Smack me."
Touya complied without changing expression. Joe grinned. "I
need that."
"Mmhmm." Touya looked at his watch. "The girls
should be here soon." He produced a comb out of his pocket
and started slicking down his black hair.
Joe daydreamed the minutes away. Mimi...Mimi...Mimi...so nice
and gentle, and caring...Mimi...Mimi...
There was a tap on his shoulder, and he turned around to see his
heart's desire's face after so long. "Mi-KYAAAAAA!"
---
Tai sat by Sora's bed, manfully suppressing his tears. Her
hospital room wasn't quite as bland as most, being literally
covered in flower arrangements. Normally, there were doctors and
nurses scrambling in and out of the room, caring for the
intensive care patient. But for the moment, he was alone.
The other Digidestined had all came and gone, except for Mimi,
who was in America. All of them were distraught about Sora. Who
would have thought that a tennis ball could be hit so hard that
it was literally lodged in her head?
The doctors didn't give her very good chances. It was just so rare,
this tennis ball-itis!
It's time, he thought to himself. I...have to tell
her. He gulped. How much I care, how much I've always cared.
Tai considered literally singing to tell her how he felt. It
always seemed so much easier to tell people how they felt through
song. However, his throat had a frog in it, so he took out the
tape player and cassette tape he'd taken from Kari's collection
and discreetly pressed 'play.'
His ears were assailed by the more-or-less melodic sound of the
words, "there's this girl I know from school, wonder why she
thinks she's cool? 'Cause everybody knows she's just that slut
named -- "
"Sora...might not like this music," Tai said after
listening the rock beat for a few moments. "What kind of
music does Kari listen to, anyway?" Shaking his head, he
turned to the unconscious form of Sora, still lovely, even with a
tennis ball popping out of her skull. "Sora, I...I've known
you for a long time. But I've only lately begun to appreciate
some qualities about you...like how you always care about
everyone...and how you're so nice and sweet...and how you look
really good in the school uniform." He touched her cheek,
the one on the side of her head not impaled by a tennis ball,
lightly. A lock of reddish hair fell on her smooth cheek and his
rough hand. He brushed it away, noting how it felt like silken
wires.
"I've got to tell you," he said as his throat
constricted. Stupid frog! I'll never eat Mom's cooking again!
"Sora, I...I love you!" he wept as a single tear fell
out of his eyes.
"Tai..." The voice was faint but he still heard it.
Actually, it wasn't that faint, rather loud, in fact, especially
for someone with a tennis ball attached to her head.
"Sora?" he asked, hardly daring to believe it.
"Tai?" the voice said again, sounding...annoyed?
"Taa-aaii! TAICHI KAMIYA!"
Tai jerked. "Huh?"
Kari's annoyed face came into existance. "Tai! Big bro! The
bus is almost at our stop!"
"...Oh." Tai said.
Kari settled back into her seat next to Tai, paused, and gave him
a side-long look. "And I don't know what you were dreaming
about, but you mentioned Sora's name. Loudly. Next time you have
a *ahem* dream like that, can you please keep it to
yourself?"
Tai blushed a deep red. "Ah. Okay. I'll try."
---
Izzy walked down the street until he reached a phonebooth. He
walked in and spent about two minutes in there, not making a
phone call, but apparently talking to himself. He spoke very
loudly, and his comments were audible to the passers-by.
"How is anyone supposed to CHANGE in this type of...there's
no place to...and absolutely no privacy...WHAT'RE YOU LOOKING
AT?!...this is very uncomfortable...stupid
liars...ahh...oh...okay, this is MUCH better."
After he left, passers-by still stared at him, but for a much
different reason.
---
Kari walked a dozen paces ahead of her older brother. This was
either early teenage anxiety about being seen with an
embarrassing relative, or perfectly normal paranoia about someone
who was, ahem, sane with average or above-average intellect being
seen in public with someone who had more hair than brains -- and
had said hair in a really, really bad hair style.
Make no mistake, Kari loved her older brother dearly. She
respected him, looked up to him, and would even demonstrably risk
her life to save Tai. However, this didn't stop her from thinking
Tai desperately needed to cut his hair.
"Hey, Kari, wait up," Tai said, his longer legs
matching Kari's strides perfectly.
"What?" she snapped. She was still upset with her older
brother not allowing her to date T.K.
"Kari, I know you're upset at me because I don't want you
dating T.K. --"
Well, isn't he brilliant...
"But I had to. You see...there's something about T.K. that I
didn't want you to know. I didn't want you, ah, corrupted."
Kari gave her brother a long look. "What would you know
about T.K. that I wouldn't? He's one of my best friends, he's
sweet and innocent and the least perverted guy I know! If
anything, I'd be corrupting HIM!"
It was Tai's turn to look uneasily at his sibling. He decided to
ignore the loaded comment, and gulped. "Kari... I didn't
want to tell you this. But the truth had to come out."
Kari stopped walking, faced her older brother, and started
tapping one sneakered foot impatiently. "What?"
Tai bent down to Kari's ear and whispered a few choice words in
her ear.
Kari's facial expression changed from boredom and impatience to
shock and horror. In a voice so loud that several startled birds
flew off telephone wires and several passers-by (who had just
composed their faces after seeing Izzy) stared. "DID YOU
JUST TELL ME THAT T.K. LIKES HANSON?!"
To Be Continued!
Heh, heh, heh, I'm evil.
No insult intended to anyone who likes Hanson...what am I talking
about? Of course there's insult intended! What kind of person
would I be if there was no insult intended to anyone who likes
Hanson?
::looks around suddenly and ducks several bullets::
Ahem. If anyone's interested, the music Matt's listening to is
Blink 182's Degenerate (my brother has the weirdest taste in
music...) and the song that Tai plays (by accident) is
Skasmopolitan's "Slut Named Rachel." Awesome song,
dudes.
On second thought, maybe I shouldn't complain
about my brother's taste in music...
Is Tai lying when he says T.K. likes Hanson? Will this fracture
T.K.'s and Kari's relationship? Who is Joe dating, anyway? Will
Sora win her tennis match? Will Mimi get another line in this
fic? (Probably not.) What's Izzy doing?
Well, if people will REVIEW this fic, I'll write it faster. -_-;;
I want ten reviews before I post the next part! I know you people
are reading...REVIEW! FLAME! I DON'T CARE! MAKE IT TWO WORDS!
CALL ME THE DEVIL! JUST FREAKIN' REVIEW!
::ahem:: The review box is juust down there, I leave you to do as you SHOULD...^_^;;