"Hey, this one's for me," said Daisuke, tossing the rest of the day's mail on the table. He flopped down on the couch and shook the small package with his name on it, wondering what it could be. He checked the mailing label, but there was no return address.
"What's that?" asked Chibimon, hopping up on the back of the couch. It was early afternoon on a Saturday, and the rest of Daisuke's family had gone to see a movie. Invited to go along with them, Daisuke had declined, mostly because he'd rather be eaten alive by rabid dogs than be seen in public with his parents and his irritating sister. Unfortunately, his calls around for someone to spend the day with had produced nobody free, or at least nobody who would admit to being free. The only person he hadn't called was Ken, although that had taken effort; he was angry at Ken, he reminded himself. It became harder to remind himself of this every day, but he managed. He was angry at Ken for his part in that awful practical joke the rest of the old group had played on him during his sixteenth birthday party a month and a half earlier. Yep, he was Angry At Ken, and somehow he was going to keep that in mind until Ken apologized. The rest of them had apologized, even Takeru, and Takeru's participation hadn't felt like betrayal, the way Ken's had.
Arrgh. He'd gotten himself ticked off again. So he shook the package and tried to guess what it was while he worked his finger under the edge. "I dunno, buddy, but we're going to find out."
The adhesive on the edges of the plain brown cardboard rectangle finally tore, and Daisuke flipped the package to see what came out. "A videotape?" he said, frowning. "Who would send me a videotape?"
"Let's watch it!" said Chibimon, and the little Digimon bounced over to the television to flip it on while Daisuke turned the tape over looking for a label of some kind. The only thing present on the flat black plastic was a piece of masking tape, and it read in neat black capital Romanji, "WATCH ALONE".
"I guess this counts as alone," said Daisuke, going over to the VCR to put the tape on in. "We keep no secrets from each other, eh Chibi?"
"Right. Do we get popcorn?"
Daisuke sat down on the couch again and grabbed the remote control. "Let's see what it is first." He hit play.
For a moment, all that was visible was an expanse of grass and the bases of a few trees a dozen or so meters away. The camera angle was odd, as if the tape had been shot from just a few inches off the ground, and it had the grainy texture of a home video. It looked like a sunny, pleasant afternoon in a quiet corner of a park, or any number of possible locations in the Digiworld. Daisuke frowned, wondering where this was going, but after a few seconds he found out.
The head of a person appeared out of the upper right, laying down on the grass right in front of the camera. It was a girl, with her eyes closed, and holding something to her neck that Daisuke abruptly realized was another person. Long, indigo hair swept down across the girl's face and concealed much of it, and almost all of the second person, who was passionately kissing the side of the girl's neck. Daisuke's mouth fell open when the girl reached up and pushed a little of her lover's hair out of the way, and he recognized her as Miyako.
"What the hell is this?" he murmured. Chibimon didn't answer, not that Daisuke really expected him to.
On the screen, Miyako let out a low moan and opened her eyes. The second person moved up to kiss her on the lips, and she slid her hands into his hair, lifting it up. The bottom then dropped out of Daisuke's world as he recognized Ken, his jacket and shirt unbuttoned and hanging loose.
"Hey, that's Ken and Miyako!" said Chibimon, sounding as surprised as Daisuke felt. "I thought Ken liked you, Daisuke. Why's he kissing Miyako?"
Daisuke knew what this was now. This is Ken's revenge for me kissing Hikari, he thought, although he couldn't seem to find his voice to tell Chibimon. I knew that was the wrong way to get back at Ken when I did it. Why did I do something that stupid? He swallowed, his eyes glued to the screen despite the fact that every second of this was like broken glass grinding in his belly. As Ken had intended, no doubt about it. I didn't mean to kiss Hikari! I was just mad at Ken! God, how could he do this to me!?
The camera only picked up Ken and Miyako down to their shoulders, but Daisuke could tell by Ken's motions and Miyako's reaction when he slid a hand up her shirt. Miyako's head tilted back with a sensual groan, and Ken kissed the tip of her chin and lightly down the line of her throat. His dark hair, worn long because Daisuke liked it that way, brushed over Miyako until she combed her fingers through it. Through Ken's hair, his beautiful indigo hair which Daisuke had thought he had all to himself.
"God, Ken, I love you," Miyako whispered.
"No, you don't," murmured Ken, lipping her chin. "It's just ..." he kissed the side of her neck again, "... lust."
Ken's shoulder moved, and Miyako's mouth opened, a soundless gasp of pleasure as her back arched and her eyes snapped open, staring blindly upward. Daisuke felt sick as he watched Ken purr and Miyako tremble. It was pretty easy to guess where Ken's hand had gone next.
A pain at Daisuke's knuckle brought his attention to the fact that he had shoved it in his mouth and was now biting it. He wiped his hand off on his pants, still unable to look away. The horror deep inside him, that he had hurt Ken enough by kissing Hikari that he'd deserved this in return, was only made worse by the knowledge of what this had surely done to Miyako. Never quite able to accept that Ken didn't care for girls, she'd nurtured her crush into a full-out obsession, and had made it known on several occasions that she would be there for Ken if he and Daisuke ever broke up. Looks like she meant it, thought Daisuke bitterly.
Miyako had shut her eyes again, and was moaning Ken's name, too out of it to notice the calculating expression on Ken's face. He nibbled her ear, and turned a moment to look directly into the camera, ice and fury in his dark blue eyes. God, I really hurt him bad. What have I done? Then Ken pushed himself a little bit off of Miyako, and she suddenly relaxed, panting breathlessly and running her hands up into his open shirt and over his back.
"Oh, Ken, I want you," she breathed. "I love you, I've always loved you."
"Shhh," he said, kissing her gently. "You don't love me."
"Yes, yes I do."
"No, you don't. Say it, believe it. Say, 'I don't love you, Ken.'"
"But I do!" Miyako kissed him frantically, and Ken indulged her for a moment before pulling back again.
"Say it, or I'll leave right now."
"No!" begged Miyako, and Daisuke had to press a fist into his stomach to quell the nausea. "Don't ... you can't!"
"Then say it," said Ken, his voice low and coaxing.
Miyako gasped at something Ken did out of the camera's range, and then whispered, "I don't love you, Ken."
"That wasn't so hard, now was it?" He kissed her while unbuttoning her shirt and pushing it off her shoulder; then he kissed her shoulder instead. A reward for having done as he instructed. Miyako tangled a hand in his hair, groaning softly. Daisuke could feel Chibimon laying two tiny forepaws on his leg, but he couldn't force himself to look away, no matter how awful it was to watch his beloved, his only, the light of his life, doing this to Miyako.
Miyako didn't deserve this, he thought. This is my fault, she didn't deserve to be used in Ken's revenge on me.
"Say something else for me," said Ken softly, against Miyako's shoulder. Daisuke wondered that she couldn't hear the cold, hard edge in his voice, an edge that shouldn't be present in the voice of passion. "Say, 'I want you, Ken.'"
"God, Ken, I want you!" Miyako raised her head a bit, searching blindly with her lips and finding Ken's collarbone beneath his shirt.
"Say, 'I want to lose my virginity today, and I want it to be you, Ken.'"
Miyako again complied, her lips muffled a bit by Ken's skin, and Daisuke felt a new wash of cold horror. It was bad enough that Ken had somehow managed to tape himself making out with Miyako, he didn't actually have sex with her too, did he? Did he? Ken had assured Daisuke that he felt no attraction at all for girls; when Daisuke asked once how that was possible, Ken had asked in return if Daisuke felt something sexual toward sushi. When Daisuke laughed and said of course he didn't, Ken had smiled and said it was something of the same thing.
Daisuke leaned forward a bit, desperate to know that Ken hadn't actually had sex with Miyako, that he hadn't lied all this time, that he hadn't done such a cruel thing to Miyako just to punish an errant lover. Chibimon crept up onto his shoulder; he barely noticed.
Ken continued to put lines into Miyako's mouth as he did something to her off camera that made her pant beneath him. "Say, 'I want to make you forget Daisuke.'"
Without hesitation, Miyako repeated this. "I want to make you forget Daisuke, oh God, Ken!"
"Shhh. Say, 'I don't love you, Ken. It's just lust.'"
"I don't love you. I don't, it's just ... no, please don't stop!"
"Say the rest."
Miyako almost shrieked, "It's just lust, I don't love you! I don't love you!" Ken stared fixedly down at her, his eyes cold and predatory as his shoulders moved, his hands doing something beyond the edge of the screen. He ran his tongue over his lower lip. With her eyes closed, her expression transfixed with bliss, Miyako saw nothing. Daisuke, however, had both hands clamped over his mouth and was hardly daring to breathe.
In a hellish dawn of understanding, he knew now what Ken was doing. He'd confessed once to Daisuke, late at night and choked with shame, that he was sexually aroused by exerting control over another human being. It didn't matter the circumstances, or who it was - just being able to force someone to do his bidding was sufficient. By coercing Miyako to say things that she normally wouldn't, Ken was probably able to get himself inflamed enough to take Miyako.
He really did it. I can't believe it, he's actually going to do it. Daisuke shut his eyes, and moisture spilled down his cheeks and over his hands. A strangled sound from the television, however, forced him to look again. Miyako's eyes were open now, wide with shock and tension, although whatever was intended to come out of her mouth was muffled by Ken's tongue. She made a desperate "Mmmph!" sound and twisted, but Ken's hands - both of them - came down on either side of her head, holding her wrists. A few seconds later, the tension melted away out of Miyako, and she relaxed, her eyes drifting closed again. Ken's hands left her wrists, and his mouth left her lips, and she slid her hands back up inside his shirt while he softly kissed her shoulder. Chibimon slid back down onto the couch, still unnoticed by Daisuke.
"I always knew it," Miyako whimpered softly, as Ken began to shift again, making motions so familiar to Daisuke that he knew with no doubts what was going on, no matter that he couldn't actually see it.
"Knew what?" asked Ken, still with that hard edge in his voice that Miyako seemed unable to hear.
"That you're not really gay."
Because Miyako's eyes were again closed, she missed the narrow look that Ken shot her, even as his lips trailed over her ear. Ken glanced at the camera, then back down at Miyako. "Say something else for me."
"What?" asked Miyako breathlessly.
"Say, 'I'm not Daisuke, Ken.'"
"I'm not Daisuke, Ken. Oh!" Her breath caught at something that he did to reward her, sweat beginning to stand out on her forehead.
"Say it again."
"I'm not Daisuke! I'm not Daisuke! Oh! Oh! Ken!"
Daisuke couldn't watch anymore. The remote control forgotten, he stiffly got up and jabbed the stop button, turning haunted eyes back toward Chibimon.
"Chibi ... " he whispered brokenly. "What have I done?"
The blue monster tilted his head to one side, uncomprehending. "You watched a tape with me. Don't you remember? Why are you upset?"
Shaking his head, Daisuke sank down onto the floor. Of course the Digimon couldn't be expected to understand. Daisuke clenched the fingers of one hand in his hair, yanking viciously and bringing renewed tears to his eyes; somehow, the pain in his scalp managed to make him forget about the clawing anguish in his heart for a few blissful seconds.
"I can't believe he did that. I can't believe he did that to her. God, he must hate me."
Bouncing down to the floor beside Daisuke, Chibimon peered up at him, curious and concerned. "Who, Ken?"
Daisuke nodded dumbly, and then said, "I should call him. God, I have to apologize to him. I can't believe he did that!" A moment later, he couldn't hold the pieces together anymore, and he broke down into agonized tears on the floor. He wished he could just reach into his ribcage and tear out his heart to make it stop hurting; he felt as if he might burst from the weight of the tears at any moment.
"What have I done?"
------======*======------
A phone rang. A pale, elegant hand picked it up. "Moshi moshi."
"Oh, it's you." Ice in the low-pitched voice. "Did you get my present?"
Relative silence for a long time, although someone with sharp hearing might have been able to pick up the sounds of sobbing from the phone handset. Then : "Apology accepted, Daisuke. Don't do it again. You can come pick me up at seven. Goodbye."
There was a click as the phone was hung up again.
