Okay, this has a bit more Taito in it. This is also the last part that was written previously. From here on out I will have to write the chapters from scratch and that will take a LOT longer than just revising them, so bear with me. This is mostly a flashback (a very long flashback). I hope you enjoy it. ^_^ Please R+R
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Tragedy: Part 4
~~~~~Flashback 2 years ago in the real world~~~~~
Beep….beep….beep….beep…
The heart monitor was now a familiar sound to Yamato Ishida as he sat in an extremely uncomfortable hospital chair. When this had all started over a year ago he had gauged time by the continuous steady beeps. Once a second. Just like clockwork. There was no time device in the small white room that he so often found himself in so that was the only way he was able to determine how long he'd been there.
Now, though he wasn't ever sure of what time it was. The beeps had been slowing recently.
Once a second.
One every two seconds.
Four seconds.
Five seconds…
It kept getting slower and slower.
Even at the tender age of 9 he knew that it wasn't a good sign.
Matt sighed, got up from his chair, and approached his friend's bed.
Lying under white covers was a boy that was even smaller than Matt. The young child had tubes, wires, and needles all over him.
Matt cringed. He knew that Tai absolutely HATED needles.
Most of the tubes went into the brown-eyed boy's arms and wrists as they were attached to those accursed needles, but one went into his nose. Matt hated the sight of that but it was better than what had been. Only yesterday there had been another larger tube inserted into Tai's throat, but since then he had gotten well enough so that he could breathe on his own.
Suddenly Tai started to whimper in his sleep, moving about feebly.
Matt grasped his hand tightly in an attempt to soothe him. He'd been through this long enough to know that Taichi was having another nightmare. He'd been having them for the past year.
'No wonder.' Matt thought. 'With everything they've put him through.'
"Tai. Wake up." He called out to the brown-haired boy who now had tears running down his cheeks. 'Dammit Tai, you've got to calm down…please…'
The last time he had done this, Tai had been thrashing around so much that he had pulled almost all of the IV's out of his arms and detached the heart monitor wires from his chest. In the tender condition he was in, it had almost been too much for him.
"H-Help me….somebody….mom….Kari….Matt…" Tai cried in his sleep as he trembled under the nightmare's terrifying hold. "Yamato…help me…"
Matt stiffened at the name.
Matt had never liked his full name much so he had convinced Tai to make a promise to him when they were very young. Tai wouldn't ever call Matt by his full name unless he really needed help. He was always very good about sticking to that promise. For him to use that name he either had to be extremely scared or in a tremendous amount of pain. Matt thought it was both…
"Shhh…" he soothed. "I'm here Tai. Don't worry I won't leave." Matt kept talking to Tai with words of comfort. Gradually, he stopped crying and no longer looked as though he were in pain.
Matt breathed a sigh of relief and kneeled down on his friend's right side. He wasn't going to just go back and sit across the room again after that.
Matt knew what Tai's nightmares were about. After one episode about a month ago he had told him.
Tai had said that one night about two weeks after he had come home from his first long hospital stay he had woken up in the middle of the night and couldn't breathe. No one was around at the time. Sure, they were all just out in the living room, but he wasn't strong enough to sit up let alone walk out there and get them and there was no way he could command enough air to call for them. So he had done the only thing he was capable of, he had laid there gasping for each breath.
He felt helpless and alone, like no one cared enough to help him. He laid on his back, looking into the darkness and silently crying, which used up even more of his air, weakening him further.
He was alone.
What seemed like hours later, his sister came in to check on him. Being only 5 at the time she had panicked and ran immediately to get her parents.
They had gotten Tai to the hospital in time, but that experience had resulted in yet another two-week long hospital stay and ever after Tai had never been able to handle being by himself. That was why someone had been with him at all times through this ordeal.
Around the clock one of them would stay. Either Kari, Sora, Matt, or his parents were always beside him. In fact, his family and Sora had been with him for almost two days straight now. When Matt had arrived he had said that he would stay with Tai while the others went home to get at least a few hours sleep.
The Kamiya's had been reluctant to leave their little boy, but Sora had convinced them that Matt wouldn't let anything happen to Taichi and eventually they had left with the promise to return first thing in the morning.
Only a few hours had passed since then and Matt was still there with Tai. He hadn't woken up since he'd been there. Matt guessed he needed his sleep. Yesterday, the doctors had come in and run some particularly painful test on him and it had left Taichi totally exhausted.
Matt now hated those doctors for what they were doing to his best friend. One of the only people in the world that mattered to him. They had been running test after test on Tai for over a year now and they still didn't know what was wrong with him.
"Matt?"
Tai's eyes opened a little and tried to determine if the blurry, spiky headed figure in front of him was indeed Matt.
"Hey Tai." Matt said, trying to belay his saddened tone.
"Hey." Tai responded.
"How do you feel?" Matt asked, trying to sound nonchalant.
"You know me, man. I'm fine."
'But that's the problem.' Matt thought. 'I do know you and I know when you're lying…'
Tai started coughing and Matt handed him a glass of water. He wrapped one arm under Tai's back to hold him up and with the other he helped the seriously weakened boy to swallow.
Tai stopped coughing and Matt laid him back down on the bed, setting the glass on the bedside table.
"Thanks." Tai murmured. He sounded tired.
"No prob." Matt said, forcing a smile. "You know I'm always here for you Tai."
Then the door opened and a doctor stepped in.
"Taichi?"
Matt heard Tai curse under his breath. Matt did too. They both knew this guy. The only time he ever came in to check on Tai was when he wanted to run more tests and they were always the painful kind.
Matt hated this man. All he saw Tai as was an experiment. An enigma that this physco wanted to solve. If Matt would've had his way the jerk never would have been allowed within a mile of Tai, but his parents had been deceived by the other physicians and they allowed him to test Tai. Matt hated the fact that the person who was supposed to be helping Taichi saw him as nothing more than a guinea pig.
"We need to run some more tests, Taichi."
Matt spoke through gritted teeth trying to keep the hatred out of his voice.
"You just ran a ton of tests on him. Why do you have to do more so soon? Can't you see he's still weak?" Matt just didn't understand. Was he trying to kill Tai? His pulse was already so slow…and his breathing seemed to worsen every second.
The doctor grinned smugly, almost evilly at Matt.
"It is necessary, but I really don't have to explain anything to you. I have his parents permission." He stated waving papers in his hand.
Those damned papers.
Matt narrowed his eyes, but offered no further argument. He knew he couldn't win. If he tried to fight he would lose and wouldn't be allowed to visit Tai anymore. He didn't think he could handle not being able to come see Tai.
Matt sighed and turned back around to face Taichi, turning his back on the doctor who was swiftly moving over to get Tai ready to move.
Matt looked guiltily up at Tai. He felt like he had failed him, but when he glanced up he could read the words that his friend wanted to say, but was either too weak or afraid to. 'Thank you.'
The doctor began to detach monitors and machines from Tai and then quickly reattached smaller more portable versions. Matt had a bad feeling about this. He noticed the panic beginning to creep into Taichi and quickly moved to take his hand.
Tai looked up at him. The terror in his eyes was almost too much for Matt to bear.
"Don't worry Tai." He whispered to the boy. "It'll be over soon. You can't give up now, don't let these jerks win."
"I know Yamato."
Matt shivered. That name again.
"I'm just scared."
"Listen Tai. I'll be right here when you get out okay? I'll stay as close as I can."
Tai nodded. He refused to cry.
Without a word the doctor began pushing Tai out of the room. Matt followed behind as far as he could and was then locked out of the room they had just taken Taichi in.
Matt stood looking at the closed door for a while. Then a nurse saw him. She asked what he was doing and he told her that he promised to stay as close to his friend as he could.
The nurse smiled.
"Come with me." She said.
She led Yamato to a window. He looked in and saw Tai. He was lying on a metal operating table, even more wires and needles invading his small body. He was staring at the ceiling and his eyes were drooping.
Matt noticed the mask over Tai's face and figured that they were going to knock him out before they started whatever they were going to do.
'I have to let him know I'm here first.' Matt thought.
He banged on the window and screamed out Tai's name.
Sleepily, Tai looked over at him.
'I'm here man.' He whispered.
Tai read his lips and smiled just as the drugs took effect.
Matt sighed as the nurse ushered him away from the window.
'I'm here Tai. Hang on.'
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The next time Matt had seen Tai after that, he was in a coma. As it turned out, the doctor that had taken Tai away had given him the wrong drugs in that procedure and had almost killed him. Of course he was fired and had his license revoked. Unfortunately, it didn't happen soon enough. Tai was unconscious for a month and suffered dozens of seizures during that time.
Once, Tai's heart stopped. Before anyone could argue, his parents, Kari, Sora, and Matt were all shoved out of the room. They sat there in the waiting room for hours after Tai was taken to surgery. There wasn't a face among them that wasn't tear-streaked.
Finally, the doctor came. He explained that they had been forced to do a thoracotomy. Mr. and Mrs. Kamiya began sobbing immediately while the three children around them stood, confused.
No one said anything else, but when they saw Tai, they understood. He had a huge bandage wrapped all the way around his chest. They had also inserted another one of those cursed tubes down his throat.
Matt couldn't believe they had done that to Tai. His best friend. They had actually cracked his chest open. The doctors insisted that it was only used as a last resort, but that really didn't help Taichi now, did it?
About six months before the entire digiworld thing, whatever had plagued Tai for so long had just seemed to disappear.
After Tai was released from the hospital for the last time, Matt had just acted kinda nonchalant towards him. When Tai was sick, they had been absolute best friends, but after…it was just like Matt wanted to hurt him as much as possible…
'Why did I do that to you?' Matt asked himself as he sat by Tai's unnaturally still form. 'Why was I so cold to you when you needed me the most?'
Matt took Tai's limp hand in his. He had vowed not to leave his friend's side until he woke up.
'I know why. I was scared.' Matt gave Tai a sad smile. 'You scared me Taichi.'
Matt looked down at Tai and his smile vanished.
Joe had to take off his shirt in order to wrap his wounds. Now Matt could see the very vivid scar that Tai still had from that time that seemed so long ago. It ran all the way from the top of his ribcage to the bottom. There were tons of other scars from his many hospital visits, but you had to look hard to see them and Matt really didn't want to think about that right now.
"I was so scared Tai." Matt told the wounded boy aloud. "I never told you, but…when I stayed with you all those times…I just…I started to like you more and more everyday…a lot more…"
Matt half-expected Taichi to say something, but when no sounds were uttered from his blue-tinged lips, he continued.
"When you were released from the hospital and they said you were okay…I don't know…I just kinda kept my distance. You still seemed so weak and fragile and…and I guess I was just afraid that if I told you…that if I tried to hold you…I would break you."
Tears were brimming Matt's eyes now as he spoke.
"I love you Taichi. I've loved you for a long time, but I was just so scared. I didn't want to hurt you and I thought that was what I would be doing if I told you."
Matt cried next to Tai for a while, letting his guilt and sorrow overwhelm him.
Eventually he regained his composure and tried to think of what he could do to help his beloved.
When they had finally gotten Tai's seizures under control, he had an unbelievably high fever. His shirt was completely soaked with deep red blood. His goggles were found to have a small hairline crack on the left lens, but Tai himself was in far worse shape than his clothes.
Joe had told them of the final account of Tai's injuries. He had been right on most of his previous assumptions. Tai had lost around four pints of blood, he had two concussions, and his left arm was fractured. They had wrapped his arm as best they could; mainly they just kept Tai's black arm brace on it. Other than that, he didn't have any back injuries, save a few deep gashes, which was good. Unfortunately more of Joe's predictions had come true. Every time Tai coughed, he coughed up blood. He definitely had some internal injuries. It wasn't very much. Joe said if they were lucky, it would only turn out to be a small tear and would heal on it's own. Everyone hoped that was the case, for if it was a large internal wound, they wouldn't be able to do anything for him. All of his ribs had been totally shattered. His breaths now came in sharp, shuddering intervals.
At first, everyone had stayed right by his side not wanting to leave for fear something would happen. Gradually though, they started to tire. When TK and Mimi both fell over, sleeping, Joe and Sora carried them back to the fire. Noticing that Izzy and Kari were in about the same condition, Matt suggested that they go try and get some sleep with the others. Reluctantly, Izzy did so. Kari had flat out refused. About three hours later she had laid down and also dozed off. Matt carried her over to the others, who were all asleep along with the digimon, and placed her in-between Gatomon and Agumon. Then he returned to Taichi's side.
Joe had told him and the others that if Tai woke up he had to be kept as still as possible. His ribs were broken so badly that if he moved even a millimeter he could puncture a lung…It could kill him.
Matt sat there like that for hours. His hand never left Tai's as he tried to provide the unconscious boy with some degree of comfort.
Matt wished with all his heart that Tai would wake up. If only for an instant. Then at least he could tell him how he felt. Maybe…just maybe it would help.
Matt knew that life wasn't a fairy tale, but right then he would've slayed any dragon, climbed any mountain to have Tai look at him with his chocolate-brown eyes again.
Matt sobbed quietly to himself as he thought of all the times he had pushed Tai away from him when all he really wanted to do was run to him and hold the younger boy tightly in his arms and tell him it was alright. But now he didn't know if he would ever be able to do that even if he had the courage to. And that uncertainty was what was slowly eating away at his soul as he watched his love's breaths come slower and slower…
To be continued…
Alright, that's gonna be it for a while. I have A LOT to do. Truthfully, if you guys want any more chapters in this fanfic, then please start e-mailing me with ideas. I don't think I can do the rest of this on my own, so if you'd like to help then by all means, HELP!!! I know this part wasn't too good. It's because I didn't put very much dialogue in it, but I just couldn't make it any longer. If you guys give me suggestions so I can continue this series, I promise the next one will be better. As always, please R+R. I hope you enjoyed it! ^_^