Memories Prologue: Memory's Sleep
A group of eight children, five boys and three girls, were having a party
to celebrate a great victory.A group of four children, two of each gender, celebrated a great victory. But it was tinged with bitterness.
But their celebration had a bittersweet tone to it. They had had to leave behind their digital companions to return home.
They had had to leave behind one of their number in the digital world. And the reason for that was even sadder. He was to guard it, without even the help of a digpartner, until one unknown thing happened. All they knew, all that they ever would know in all probability, was that it involved the departure of another two.
Still, the two youngest knew somehow that this separation might not be permanent. At the parting, they had heard, echoing through time, the cries of others parting in the same fashion. And they heard too echoes of a reunion... but for two pairs, no more.
Still, the two who had to leave were perhaps the happiest there. Although their task was still a mystery—they knew only that it was dangerous in a way, and that this danger might extend to death—they still had a purpose. The others only could look back nostalgically and remember the great things they had done. Hope and Light still had reason to continue the fight. Besides, with their digipartners dead none wanted to live any longer. Eternal loneliness... and Friendship was not yet a trait guarded. Only Wisdom, Hope, Light, Honor, and Compassion had Guardians.
Those young two sat together quietly, as the only ones who realized this: that the events of the past months would all too soon be wiped from people's minds. Many would go on in their daily lives, and purposely forget that danger had all-too-recently racked both worlds. Though youngest, they had a grasp of human nature far beyond their seven years. They knew that everyone would block the memories of entrapment in the convention center as too unpleasant. And few had minds open enough to even accept in the first place the drama, the final fight that had erupted above the heads of watchers in the realworld. All had watched, unable to look away, but how many understood the cosmic meaningof that battle? And how many would remember it, not just with a fading logicalsequence of events but with a clear grasp of the gut terror of that fight?
The world would forget those five—now four—soon to be two—young heroes in time. The Lightkeepers who had given them their task had assured them of that. None of the digidestined wanted the fame they surely wouldaccrue; a spotlight that shines brightly shines with uncomfortable heat.It was easier to be forgotten, to even forget what had happened themselves.Easier to forget the pain of their fights, easier to forget the joys of friendshipthat had been torn from them. Easier not to explain to greiving parents thatGennai, Takeru, and Hikari would not be coming back. Easiest to pretend thatall this had never happened, that there were never five children pulled outof oneworld to save two. Easiest to pretend that instead there had beenthree lesschildren born, and that the remaining were all perfectly normalin their way.Easy... but easy was not the path of a digidestined. In givingup their past,the last two gave up a bit of who they were.
The two looked back at the others, who were still celebrating. Almost as if they hadalready forgotten.
"But we never will, right?" the boy spoke suddenly.
"We never will." echoed the girl more firmly, understanding his unvoiced meaning.
The two who were leaving took out their digivices. They then took off their crests... one pink, one yellow. They placed them on the digivices,and the crests flashed with light. The mirror screens of their digivices reflected this light temporarily, but soon began to glow with a light oftheir own.The light spread to Takeru and Hikari, and for a brief moment—Gennaiwould have been technical and termed it a nanosecond—they illuminatedtheentire park's twilight. Then all three—light, Takeru and Hikari—vanished. Being not quite there, they would be partly immune to the effects of thememory wipe. Instead of their memories dying, they would sleep. Perhaps forever. Perhaps to be awakened someday.