Dominance - #8: Enigma
Disclaimer: Digimon, Ken Ichijouji and Daisuke Motomiya aren't mine (**sniffs sadly**) and neither is anyone else. Nothing's mine except the fic and everything's borrowed and no profit's been made. So don't sue.
I can't believe I'm doing this. I can't believe I can't stop him from doing this to me! I can't believe I let this happen in the first place! Daisuke Motomiya was anything but happy at the moment, as he followed the boy genius Ken Ichijouji towards his home. Funny how they were going to his home and yet Ken was leading. But Daisuke knew better than to anger the other boy, whose secret identity just happened to be the Digimon Kaiser, his own sworn enemy.
Ken tossed a glance over his shoulder at Daisuke and smirked. "You could at least walk beside me you know. I don't bite ... much." He laughed slightly as Daisuke's jaw dropped. In the real world it was so hard to believe the sort-of normal boy was a cruel dictator and conqueror - as well as a pervert at times. Daisuke didn't even want to repeat some of the things Ken had murmured to him on their way here.
Chibimon kept completely still in his arms, not fidgeting for once. Perhaps the fact Ken was in front of them kept him quiet as well. But it was strange, not to have to deal with the hyper digimon. It didn't make Daisuke feel any better. Nothing was normal right now. Hell, nothing had been normal for months but anyway...
Ken paused outside Daisuke's door. Daisuke, not wanting to get Ken mad in any way, stopped as well. Ken arched an eyebrow. "Aren't you going to go in?" he asked politely. "This is your home after all."
"Oh yeah," he muttered, blushing slightly as he went inside, Ken after him. They met Jun on her way up the stairs, who immediately stopped, gawking at Ken, who pointly ignored her. "Are Mom and Dad home?" Daisuke asked, wanting to get this embarrassment over with as soon as possible.
"Huh? Oh yeah, Mom's in the kitchen," Jun said, snapping out of her trance momentarily. Then, deciding she should be moving, she quickly hurried up the stairs again, as Daisuke walked towards the kitchen, Ken a small distance behind him.
His mother looked up from the dishes as soon as Daisuke walked in. "Where have you been? We've -" She stopped short as Ken appeared behind Daisuke, gasping slightly.
"Uh Mom, I was .. er ..." Daisuke stammered, racking his brains desperately for a plausible excuse and not having much luck.
"He was over at my house," Ken interrupted smoothly. "He told me he needed help with some of his schoolwork and I was glad to help. It went on longer than we expected it to, I'm terribly sorry." Daisuke simply kept his mouth shut as Ken spoke, figuring every adult simply believed whatever came out of Ken's mouth, and hoped his mother wasn't an exception.
As it happened, she wasn't. Nodding, she even gave Daisuke a smile. "Dear, you should have told us you were going to study with Ken." She didn't even bother to wonder how on earth her own son had ended up being on friendly terms with the boy genius, never mind why Ken would have even considered helping him with his schoolwork.
"Um, I guess I ... er ... wanted to surprise you to prove I was really trying this time," Daisuke stuttered, firmly resolving to give Ken the biggest mouthful of his life when they were alone, before Ken went and did something terrible to him. Feeling Ken's gaze burn into his back, he added, "I was wondering, would it be okay for me to stay at Ken's for the weekend? We're really going to get stuck into schoolwork y'see." Yeah right. Schoolwork will be the last thing on Ken's mind ...
But his mother beamed. "Of course dear! Just go and get your things then!" She smiled politely at Ken, hardly able to wait for the opportunity to tell all of her friends that Daisuke was on speaking terms with the famous Ken Ichijouji! They'd all be so jealous!
"Thanks Mom," Daisuke said, quickly backing out of the kitchen and hauling Ken out after him. Once they were inside in his room, he breathed a sigh of relief. "That was close. Er, would you mind actually helping me with my work by any chance?"
"Perhaps," Ken drawled, sitting down on his bed. "If you're very good and do as I say I might." Daisuke fought the urge to roll his eyes, as he went around grabbing things absently and stuffing them into the first bag he found. Ken, while he was a boy genius and fantastic soccer player, could be really annoying when he put his mind to it.
"Okay, I think I have everything," Daisuke said at last, pulling the bag onto his shoulder and gathering Chibimon in one arm.
"Finally," Ken murmured, getting up and walking to the door. As he passed Daisuke, he smiled slightly and quickly drew a finger across the other boy's cheek before exiting the room. Daisuke and Chibimon both stared at him for a moment before following.
"You scared too Dai-san?" Chibimon whispered, as they followed Ken outside.
"Oh yeah," was the quiet reply.
It was going to be an interesting weekend.
Daisuke had managed to convince himself that the remarks Ken had made about his parents when he had come to his house two days previously had just been Ken trying to make him mad. He figured no one could have been serious about those type of comments, especially not Ken. After all, everyone loved their parents, right? But when he followed Ken inside his home, he began to get an insight into the boy genius' life, and began to realise the reasons for those comments, as well as the cause for Ken's personality to develop as it had.
The house was empty when they came in, and while Daisuke and Chibimon appeared surprised, Ken did not. "They're out again," he said calmly, closing the door after them.
"Where are they? Do they work overtime or something?" Daisuke asked, looking around. He had to admit, the Ichijoujis had taste, the colour scheme was really done well. His mother would have been green with envy.
Ken glanced at him, eyebrows lifted in surprise. "Well, they could be working overtime, but it's extremely unlikely. They've probably got a meal with someone important to discuss something about me again." He snorted softly. "One of the benefits for having a boy genius for a son."
"I guess so," Daisuke answered, beginning to get an idea of Ken's home life. The boy, for everything he had, was lonely. Maybe ... maybe that was why he wanted him so badly. It had to get pretty lonely in that base of his, 'specially since he was supposed to hate most digimon. Maybe all of that anger was just a shield to hide how lonely Ken really was, as well as all the pain he secretly harboured? Maybe ... Daisuke sighed. This was confusing ...
"You might as well come back and dump your stuff," Ken decided, shrugging off his coat and hanging it up. "Is the digimon staying with you?"
"Yes," Daisuke answered firmly. There was no way he was leaving Chibimon alone, not in a strange place. As it was the home of their enemy it might freak the little guy out a bit too. Ken didn't look too happy but only sighed and nodded, as he went back to his room.
It was as mysterious and as closed off as Ken was, reflecting the boy's dark personality. Cool twilight entered the window, highlighting the laptop computer that was Ken's gate to the Digital World, that was atop the extremely neat desk. Bookshelves were filled tightly with too many books to count and Daisuke suddenly felt a deep urge to go over to them and look through. Ken, correctly guessing the reason for the look of longing on his face, smiled. "You can look through them," he murmured, leaning against the ladder that led up to his bed as he watched Daisuke dump his bag and, with Chibimon still in his left arm, went over to the shelves and immediately started browsing.
To his intense surprise he discovered he actually recognised some of the titles. Maybe Ken wasn't as high and mighty as he was made out to be. However he absently tossed a glance at Ken's textbooks on his desk and felt his jaw drop. He didn't even understand half of those titles! He shook his head slightly. He was suddenly glad he hadn't the same intelligence as Ken. He didn't even want to wonder the amount of pressures that came with schoolwork like that ...
"I don't expect you to understand half of those anyway," Ken drawled, looking smug as well as incredibly relaxed. Daisuke immediately felt his defences spring up.
"Did I insult you when you came round to my place?!" he demanded. "No. At the very least you could be polite!" Of course when he realised exactly what he had said to someone who could really hurt him, he wanted to smack his forehead and groan. Why didn't his brain ever work when he wanted it to?
But the biggest astonishment was yet to come. Instead of Ken becoming angry or lashing out (which he definitely expected), the boy looked at him, visibly startled. Without saying a word, he turned and quickly left the room.
Daisuke sighed slightly, as Chibimon shifted in his arm. "Should you have said that Dai-san?"
"I'm not sure," Daisuke replied quietly. As absurd as it seemed, it appeared he had unintentionally hurt Ken's feelings. It hit him then that he had started to see Ken as a thing - the Kaiser. He had forgotten that Ken and the Kaiser had two very different personalities and that even the Kaiser had feelings. For one of the first times, he had to apologise to his own enemy. "I think I hurt his feelings."
"It's hard to remember Ken has feelings," the little digimon replied. "He's so mean to us most of the time it's like he wants us to think he doesn't have any."
Daisuke felt his jaw drop, as he stared down at his digimon, dumbfounded. For a small little ball of blue, Chibimon was smart. He had correctly guessed what he and the other Digidestined had wanted to ignore. It made it so much easier to battle Ken if they convinced themselves he was just evil and had no feelings. If they started to remind themselves he was human and could be hurt emotionally as much as any of them, battling him was so much harder. And yet an In-Training digimon admitted this? Talk about irony.
"You know Chibimon," he said, "you're right. Maybe Ken needs to be reminded he has feelings too. Would you mind if I let you alone here for a while?"
"Sure," he agreed. "Just put me on the bed and I'll be fine." He snuggled into the covers as soon as Daisuke put him down on the bed. "Are you going to apologise to Ken?"
"Yeah."
"Good luck then. It might be harder than you think." The digimon refused to say anymore when Daisuke asked what he meant, instead to all appearances, going to sleep. Sighing and then taking a deep breath, Daisuke turned and went out of Ken's room, trying to find the other boy.
It wasn't that hard to find him. He was standing by a large window, staring outside. Even though Daisuke wasn't the most sensitive person in the world, but even he couldn't help but feel a twinge of guilt when he saw Ken's eyes were unnaturally bright.
"Ken," he said softly, approaching him. "I'm sorry for saying that. It's just ... well being belonged to someone isn't something I've got used to yet. Bet you're going to whip me or something once we get to the Digital World, right?"
"No Daisuke," Ken murmured, fighting to keep his feelings under control. "I'm not. I realise now you're never going to be completely submissive to me, there'll always be a part of you no one will be able to control. And that's okay, as hard as it is for me to admit that. Daisuke, do you know why I chose you?" He turned slightly to stare at Daisuke as he waited for him to answer.
"Uh ..." The question caught the former Digidestined leader off guard. "Well, sort of. I just assumed it'd be a good victory for you if you got the leader on your side or something." It'd be too much to hope for if it turned out Ken liked him. That was too much to hope for entirely.
"Not precisely. Daisuke, it was your energy and ability that first attracted me to you. You were so vibrant and so unlike me, I couldn't help it." Daisuke decided not to mention to him that at times it seemed Ken was the more vibrant of them. "That was what I liked about you the most. Your looks were good too, an added bonus I suppose." He only smiled slightly as Daisuke turned bright red from embarrassment. "Don't bother denying it, it's the truth."
"All right so," the other boy replied meekly.
"You were the direct opposite of me. You valued friendship and life a lot more than I did. You didn't see the need to prove anything - well apart from the fact you were better than Takeru," he added. "Dammit Daisuke, I wanted you so badly and the only way I could see to get you was by force." He sighed, to all appearances looking depressed,
Daisuke couldn't reply to that. How did you reply to something like that? He didn't even want to imagine how much it had cost Ken to say those things, admitting things wasn't his strong point. Admitting something like this ... well he had the feeling this had just been a first for Ken, as well as him. "Hey, it's okay," he murmured, as he closed the last few spaces between then. He slowly wiped away the tears that spilled from Ken's eyes, feeling a tenderness he hadn't ever imagined feeling for anyone. At long last, he was seeing the human side of Ken, the side he tried so hard to hide. He even felt he could learn to like this person fully, for all of his faults, as great as they were, as well as his strengths, which to be frank, were amazing. He felt he could learn to really like Ken for a long time to come.
Ken laughed bitterly, shaking his head slightly. "I can't believe I'm doing this, crying in front of you," he said. "I'm the Kaiser, I'm not supposed to feel weakness. Hell, I'm Ken Ichijouji, I'm not supposed to cry! It's just ... it gets so hard sometimes ..."
"Hey, stop. I understand. You don't have to explain if you don't want to." Daisuke couldn't believe he was being this nice to Ken and he couldn't believe how vulnerable Ken was. He was now getting the full picture of Ken and his life. Underneath that mask of the boy genius, soccer star, heart throb and Digimon Kaiser, there was simply a desperately lonely and pain-filled boy who wanted a friend and didn't know how. For all of Ken's brilliance, it was a simple thing that he couldn't do. Befriend someone.
"Why should you try and help me?" Ken asked, looking wary. "I'm caused such suffering and pain to you and your friends. I've slaughtered countless numbers of digimon. Hell, I've even bound you to me and humiliated you in a way I can't even begin to understand. Why are you trying to help me now?"
"'Cause you're lonely," Daisuke replied. "You're sad and you're lonely and you can't reach out for help. Besides, I don't hold a grudge easily anyway. And well ... um ... I - I'd like to be your friend. I can be your friend if you let me ... and a lot more." At this, Ken's face shot up and blue eyes met brown, both afraid and overjoyed at the same time.
Then Daisuke lowered his head slightly and pressed his lips against Ken's hesitantly. For the first time it was because he wanted to and not because he had been ordered to. To his surprise it wasn't that bad, and it definitely wasn't that bad when Ken quickly pulled him closer, as the kiss deepened. Once it was over, Daisuke simply held Ken, for the first time at ease with him and enjoying the feel of Ken's slender body in his arms.
They stood there for a while, simply holding each other.