My apologies for the wait, but it couldn't be helped. But I got there in the end, and that's what matters, right? Thank you once more for your kind reviews, it really means a lot that you take time to give me feedback on the story, and it is much appreciated. Thank you! :-)
Oh, and as a note, this chapter wasn't intended to be a chapter in itself at all. It was supposed to either be at the end of the previous one, or at beginning of the next, but as it went it turned out that it needed to be like this if I were to get in the detail I wanted. Besides, there is more of the whole gang in action now. ;-)
Enjoy, and please review!
CHAPTER 7: A VISITIt was not long before the group, with Taichi at the head, found themselves stood in a car park outside a large, pale green warehouse with a small office-like complex attached to the north end. It was just before 3pm- not long after the meeting, but this was something that Tai felt he had to get out of the way. Progress had to be made quickly.
They had taken Joe's car and the minibus that Matt had turned up in with Katie (Tai assumed that it was intended to transport his band, but it proved to be perfect to carry most of the numerous Digidestined) to the small make shift factory, stopping on the way only to allow some of them to change into more formal wear- Sora now donned a ladies business suit, as did Kari with TK in the male version. The rest, however, were fine as they were- Matt was a rock star, so he didn't need to look like a businessman, and Joe was already in a suit, complimentary to his chosen profession. The rest looked... well, normal, even Davis with Tai's old goggles planted firmly on his head.
Taichi himself refused to change from his casual clothes, saying that by the plan, he would need to be comfortable. And in his current clothes, he was comfortable. Following this, he had briefed the Digidestined with his plan, giving them all roles to play once they arrived at Aoba's office.
And here they were.
"Alright. This is it everyone." Tai said crisply as he turned to address the group, his face becoming deadly serious. "Remember, stick to the plan, and everything will be fine. Sora?
"Hm?"
"You're up front. Where is Aoba likely to have your old designs stored?"
She thought for a moment before replying, "He has a filing cabinet near his desk, they are probably in there."
"Good. Now, Davis, this is perhaps the only time I'm not going to tell you to be careful, so make the most of it, okay?"
"Ha! You can count on me to mess things up, Tai!"
The older man's expression eased with amusement.
"Yeah, I know."
Davis blinked. "...hey, wait a sec-!"
Tai smoothly cut him off as he said, "The rest of you, you know what to do, don't you?"
"Sure!" they replied in unison.
"Excellent. Oh, one more thing... Ken?"
"Yes Tai?" the policeman-in-training answered.
"Whatever happens here, you didn't see it."
Ken grinned.
"Gotcha."
The ex-castaway looked over them carefully, taking a moment to see if they were prepared. They returned his gaze with quiet confidence, and small smiles.
They were ready.
Tai spun to face the doorway, and said,
"Let's go. Sora- take point. You know what to do."
There was a cheer from behind him, as Sora quickly moved to the head of the group and walked towards the main entrance. Tai followed closely with even strides, and the Digidestined moved behind him, quietening down and immediately bringing up an appearance of interest at their surroundings.
Tai suppressed a smile at their unity- a ghost of times past.
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"Sora!" Aoba said as soon as they entered his office. "Are you alright? I saw what happened last night, and I can't explain it! It was crazy!"
"Hello Shigeru," Sora replied with a tired smile. "I'm alright, you don't need to worry. I... think that things are going to be okay. These are the investors I mentioned on the phone..."
She gestured behind her as thirteen young adults followed her into the room; adults who Aoba recognised had been at the show.
"Ah, hello to you all!" he said, standing up from behind his wooden desk and making his way to them. He offered his hand, and Takeru took it after a moment, shaking it firmly.
"I'm glad," he said, "that you didn't lose interest after last night. You understand, of course, that there must have been a mistake in the plan somewhere..."
"Oh, of course," Tai replied quickly, standing just behind and to the right of his brother-in-law. "But we don't like to make hasty decisions you know, and I'm sure that we can find the problem and correct it."
The meaning behind his words was not lost on all of the Digidestined, because the smarter members of the group picked up on the small signals Tai was giving out- such as how he was staring right at Aoba as he spoke. But no one said anything about it, and the target of Tai's scrutiny certainly didn't notice.
"I'm sure we will, Mr. Kamiya, I'm sure we will. Well, I'll introduce myself to those of you who don't know me; my name is Shigeru Aoba, and I run this little factory here. We take designs from fashion designers, such as Miss Takenouchi, and turn them into wearable clothes."
As he spoke, Tai took the opportunity to take a look around the room. It was quite different, as offices go, with a lot of cultural decorations- mostly of Africa. There were tribal masks, headdresses, spears, shields made from stretched animal skin- the whole works. The walls and floor however were quite different, reverting back to the norm of the office. Pastel blue walls with deeper blue for the carpet, the furniture taking on a wood grain effect which looked a bit too artificial to be real. So, they were veneered, Tai assumed, which was appropriate for Aoba- many things look ugly beneath the surface. And near the main desk, was a cold grey filing cabinet.
He stayed that way for a few minutes, before Aoba's voice caught his attention.
"Well, I'll take you for a look around, so you can see the place for yourselves. The workers are quite efficient, so please, try not to interrupt them."
Immediately, Davis looked at Tai, their eyes meeting. The older man nodded slightly, causing a mischievous grin to break out on the younger man's face.
Everything was going according to plan.
They left the office, following Aoba out into the small reception area (where the main entrance was located) and into a set of double doors, which led them into warehouse -the factory- itself. It was pretty large inside, arranged into a number of different departments dedicated to a certain task, such as cutting or sewing. The longhaired manager began to lead them around the factory floor in a clockwise direction, giving a running commentary on what was happening around them.
Tai followed, and like the rest of the group pretended to be interested in what he was being told. All he had to do was wait until Davis made his move- then the real fun would begin.
"This, is where we draw the bits onto the fabric," Aoba said as they entered a room built into one corner of the factory, where eight young women were standing by desks and drawing around templates onto large sheets of fabric with chalk. When they were all inside, he addressed the questioning looks of the workers.
"Girls, we have some visitors here- say hello to some associates of Miss Takenouchi."
They all responded with various greetings, except for one 'geeky' looking girl who wore large glasses and had her hair pulled back into a lose ponytail. Instead, she looked down and remained silent.
It's odd, how silence can be so good at catching attention, and it quickly caught Davis'. Which was good, for the young lady in question was most certainly the nervous type- Tai could tell by how she was attempting valiantly not to appear to have noticed them.
"Hey, what are ya drawing?" Davis asked her, leaning over her shoulder. The girl stepped away quickly, looking quite surprised at the question, and stammered an answer.
"Erm, well, I- I'm drawing around this template..." She looked at Aoba nervously, then at Sora, then back to Davis. This caused Tai to frown slightly.
"Cool! Hey, I wish I could do something like that," Davis continued, either not realising how stupid he sounded or simply not caring, "but I was never good enough at drawing. Nah, gimme a spatula over a pencil any day! You see, I-"
"Mister Motomiya, if you don't mind," Aoba interrupted, a little annoyed at the distraction to one of his workers (for less people working is less output, and less output is less cash), but Davis continued in his way.
"Hold yer horses Mr. Aoba! I was just being friendly, that's all."
As he spoke, Davis took a step back, and leaned on a conveniently large stack of templates. The stack, unable to take his weight, quickly began to topple and smashed down onto the floor.
"Oh my! I'm sorry," he continued, back-pedalling away from the mess of shaped paper- only to collide into another.
"Aw jeez! I'm really sorry about this-"
And another...
"Oh I am such a klutz-"
And another.
In the fresh chaos that he had just created (with oddly disturbing skill), Davis was able to glance towards the doorway from which they came, just in time to catch a glimpse of a dark green coat- clad figure disappearing through it and melting into the shadows.
----------
As he closed the door swiftly and silently behind him, Tai immediately began to move towards the only filing cabinet in the room. Once he arrived in front of it, he fell back upon the instincts he had developed upon his island and began to feel it, as though he did not understand what it was for, nor why it was so smooth; but it was something he had always done when faced with something unexpected, and helped him feel at ease.
Slowly, he brought one hand to the handle on the top drawer, and pulled- but nothing happened.
Tai frowned as his eyes became as hard as ice. He tried again, and received the same results.
The cabinet was locked. He should have expected this, really, and for that was quite angry with himself.
'C'mon Taichi,' he thought, 'you've fought huge monsters and lived off a rock by yourself for years- surely you can beat a lock that's about the size of your thumb..."
He wasn't certain that the documents he needed were in there however, but knowing his luck they would be. So, undeterred, Tai moved to the desk and began to look through the drawers for a certain item.
He couldn't hide his grin when he found what he needed- a small set of keys.
He took them out and began to try them in tern upon the silver lock at the top of the cabinet, being as quick as he dared without making too much of a noise. After all the receptionist, who was just outside in the main entrance, had been quite alert (he had used the classic technique of throwing a stone from a nearby potted plant across the room to distract her) and he didn't want to push his luck.
Eventually he found the right one, and unlocked the cabinet with an audible 'click'. He began to swiftly leaf through the numerous folders held within, and upon finding nothing relevant in the top drawer moved down to the next one.
Again, he found nothing, and were he as he was in his youth, he would be getting pretty annoyed by now. But, Taichi knew that to get results, he had to be patient and keep trying.
So he did, and in the third drawer down he found what he was looking for- a folder labelled 'Takenouchi, Sora'.
He pulled it out and laid it on Aoba's desk, briefly noticing how much it looked like a school file, and flicked through it to find what Sora had described to him after he had outlined the plan to the group a short time back. Eventually, he found it -or at least something that looked like it- about twenty pages stapled together, stamped with yesterday's date.
"This is it," Tai muttered, as though someone was in the room with him. He smiled at his achievement- it had been a while since he had done anything for himself. After all, the last thing had been to build his raft...
But that didn't matter right now, for he had what he needed- now, all he had to do was get back to the group before Aoba realised he was missing.
----------
"Hey," came a quiet voice from behind a certain walking blonde-haired rock star.
"Ahh! Jeez man, don't do that!" Matt replied, trying vainly to keep his voice quiet. He turned to face Tai, who had snuck up on him so quietly he had no idea he was there until he had spoken.
"Sorry," Taichi said dryly, obviously not really meaning it. "I need to speak with Sora."
"Oh, okay, how long do you think you'll need?"
"A couple of minutes. Give me as long as you can."
"Gotcha."
Matt sped up his pace, catching up with 'Aoba the tour guide' in a couple of strides, nodding slightly to Sora as he did so. She caught the look, and began to slow down, waving her right arm from below the elbow as she did so. As she was towards the front of the group, still following the factory manager, everyone but the guide saw the signal and knew what it meant.
Question time!
"So, uh," Matt said, starting off quickly, "what does that do?" He pointed to a random machine in their vicinity, which happened to be a sewing machine.
"Oh, it's a sewing machine," came the rather flat reply from Aoba. "It sews... you know?"
"Yeah, but does it sew well? You gotta have a good sewing machine. Can't sew without a good sewing machine," Yolei added. Everyone else, in almost perfect synchronisation, stroked their chins with thumb and forefinger and nodded sagely, as though some ancient knowledge had just been bestowed upon them.
"I can assure you, Miss, that the equipment here is of the finest quality."
"Needles too?" Izzy asked.
"What about the thread?" Mimi added.
"Hey, thread always makes me think of spaghetti, which reminds me, what's the cafeteria like here?" Davis said, ignoring the look of annoyance he received form Aoba.
As the pointless, and some would say ridiculous, distracting questions were let lose upon the hapless warehouse owner, Tai moved closer to Sora.
"Here," he said, pulling out a folded wad of paper from his deep coat pocket, "Is this it?"
She took the sheets and began to flick through them, her brow furrowing in concentration.
"Yeah," she replied absently, "this is it..."
She soon sped up in her movements, expression becoming a mixture of confusion and anger. Tai waited patiently for a conclusion from the girl, looking up occasionally to see how the gang was going. To be honest, he was becoming amused by their efforts, for by now Aoba was looking quite spaced out.
"Tai..." Sora eventually said, still looking at the documents, "These- my designs, they've been changed... It's no wonder they fell apart!" She looked up at him, sadness clear in her eyes, but he made no movement to comfort her. He just stared back, his brown eyes empty of all emotion.
"Alright," he eventually replied, taking the paperwork back form her. "You're certain?"
"Yes... the measurements, the material, they've been altered slightly... What are you going to do?" She began to shake.
Tai didn't answer her question, but instead simply said quietly,
"Let's carry on. Pretend nothing has happened."
His voice rose in volume as he addressed the whole group, who were still throwing out completely random questions.
"People, please, the questions can wait till later. Remember, we have other appointments...?" The all fell silent, and Shigeru looked at him gratefully. "Lead on, Mr. Aoba."
"Of course, Mr. Kamiya. This way everyone, if you please..."
The man led them around for a short time, but they soon found themselves going back into his office, the tour apparently over. And it was there that Tai decided that he ought to make his move, for he felt that if he didn't soon, the Sora would- and that wouldn't be pretty. Besides, he didn't think that she knew, or at least understood completely how she had been made a fool of for the last few years.
As Aoba talked to the group about the miscellaneous details which he had forgotten to cover during the tour, Tai walked slowly around the room and observed the African-like décor once more. The tribal masks were very interesting (he'd always thought them to be a little scary), and now he felt that he could truly admire the workmanship involved in hand making them to such a high standard.
But they weren't what he was really looking for- and it didn't take long for him to find his quarry.
"Mr. Aoba", he said when he judged he was close enough and when the man had stopped talking for a moment, "I'm sorry for asking such a forward question, but is your company... trustworthy?"
The longhaired man blinked.
"Of course," he replied, "...shouldn't it be?"
Tai barely restrained himself from smirking when he noticed the pause and the way that his eyes flickered around the room.
'Liar.'
"Well could you explain to me then, why have you been altering Sora's designs?"
The man was smarter than he looked; Tai gave him that, for he immediately picked up on his use of Sora's first name (thus meaning that he knew her as more than just an acquaintance). He could see it in his eyes. And, he also knew that he had been found out.
"I-I- I don't know what you're talking about, Mr. Kamiya!" he spluttered.
"Yeah? Well, how do you explain this?" he said, as he pulled out the papers taken from the filing cabinet and held them up for all to see. "These have been altered. Sora tells me so. They have been changed so that they will fall apart when used. Isn't that right?"
"What?! No! Why would I do such a thing?"
"Because you are under payment from Kirishima. Why else?"
There were some gasps around the room. Tai suddenly found all eyes on him, questioning, so he explained.
"At the concert, I saw you receiving money from her for 'altering the designs', as you put it. It looked like quite a sum, too... But, you know, that's the trouble with the world today, isn't it? Everything revolves around money."
The Digidestined immediately turned from a group of apparent businessmen and women into a pack of very pissed off young adults.
"What!?" Mimi screeched. "You bastard! How dare you!"
Eleven of the others followed her lead, leaving only Sora out, who remained quiet as she watched Aoba. Tai took the opportunity as attention was taken away from him to move back towards his target. No one noticed.
"I don't have to take these accusations!" Aoba eventually shouted as he broke away from the Digidestined, backed up against a wall though he was. "Takenouchi!" he continued, "you can consider our partnership over! I will not take this abuse from kids like you!" He raised arms in anger above his head and moved towards the door. "Good day!"
And with that, he made his way towards the doorway. The Digidestined were prepared to stop him of course, and were about to, but suddenly the necessity of doing so became irrelevant.
THUNK!
The room fell completely silent as a hunting spear, being thrown like a harpoon, shot just under Aoba's armpit, caught some of his shirt, and impaled itself into the wall- effectively pinning the longhaired man there.
Very slowly, as if expecting another spear to appear at any moment, everyone turned to see Taichi standing across the room, with a display of two spears (one of which was missing), and a skin shield behind him.
Tai himself was holding a position like a Javelin thrower- his right arm was extended, as though he were reaching out for something, whilst his torso twisted so that his left leg was bent in front of his right. Slowly, a frown appeared on his face –though what that was directed at, no one could tell, because his eyes were unfocused as he did so- and he stood to his full height.
His coat only made him seem taller.
He strode forward, feet thumping on the ground and seeming to echo in the quiet of the room. When he stood right before Aoba, he slammed both hands into the wall at either side of his head and brought himself face-to-face with the other.
"Mr. Aoba..." he said quietly, voice laced with danger, "I know you are lying. Your panic says it all really- we've figured you out. So let's stop this little charade, shall we?"
The ex-castaway's eyes bored into the man before him.
"Tell us what is going on. Now."
The older man was absolutely terrified.
"She, she paid me to make the dresses faulty so that Takenouchi would go out of business and she would take over and get rid of her rivals and become the best and she has been paying me for years now but I didn't want to do it honest but I had to pay of my collage debts and my mortgage on this place but I didn't mean to hurt her or anything I swear I'm a nice guy really please don't kill me I don't want to die!!!"
Tai blinked. He had never heard anyone talk so fast.
"Alright, alright, shut up."
"Please don't kill me!"
"O-KAY! I'm not going to kill you!"
The pitiful blubbering mass that was Aoba slumped against the wall, still pinned, but obviously a little relieved.
"But," Tai continued as he gestured to his right, "she might."
Aoba followed his pointing finger, only to come into eye contact with Sora, who looked so angry that one might have thought that Tai had been sick in her hat and not told her. Again.
As Aoba looked back at him with pleading eyes, Tai gave him a small smile.
"But I think that's for her to decide, right? Come on, everyone- we should leave the two of them to sort this out alone.
"Goodbye, Mr. Aoba. This has been... interesting."
And with that, the ex-castaway spun on his heel and marched out of the office. The Digidestined followed him shortly thereafter, but not before taking turns to glare at the man pinned to the wall, and soon, only Sora was left with him.
They gathered in the car park, all looking at Taichi with a mixture of fear and wonder.
"Where did you learn to do that?!" Davis abruptly asked him.
"Oh, uh, fishing," he replied, as if nothing had happened not five minutes before. "I had a lot of time to practice on the island, but I'm a bit off..."
"Off? Tai, you hit him perfectly!" Matt almost shouted, trying to get some form of reaction from his leader.
"Nah," he said as he began to rub his right –gloved- palm absently. "I was aiming for his groin."
Tai looked back at the office, calmly, with a thoughtful expression on his face, utterly oblivious to how all the males around him winced and bent over slightly.
"What do you think Sora's going to do, Tai?" Kari asked, eyeing the pained expression on her husbands face. Tai shrugged in response.
"Dunno. I don't think that she would really hurt him, I mean, she is the Bearer of Love and all-"
This time, it was he who was cut off as the sound of an almighty slap came from the building, and caused all of them to wince. Tai raised his eyebrows after a moment and sighed.
"'Course, I could be wrong..."
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"What's with the leg?"
Tai blinked as the voice filtered through to his mind, and raised his eyes from their observance of a large, spidery crab leg to see who had been asking the question.
"Uh, nothing, Takeru," he replied to the boy sitting to his right at the rather large dinner table as he dropped the object in question onto his plate. "Just remembering... Just a couple of weeks ago, I was eating this stuff a lot..."
"Well that can't have been so bad, I mean, you've gotta love crab!"
Tai smiled softly, an expression which looked strange on his ruined face.
"It tends to lose its appeal after about three years."
After their victory at Aoba's warehouse, their had been a need felt to celebrate, and so they had headed to this rather fancy restaurant. The idea was that they would all contribute to the bill which no doubt would be quite large; but odds were that in the end, it would be Matt who paid for most of it, seeing as he had so much money anyway thanks to his profession.
After a suitably large table had been put together for the group, they had chosen a buffet meal and had been given quite a choice- though, much to Tai's chagrin, it had mainly consisted of seafood. And he had already had enough of that to last him a lifetime.
Still, he could eat crab. He liked eating crab. Or rather, he was proud of the thought of eating it, even if he did find it tasteless nowadays- the point of the matter was that he had taught himself how to get it. And the way that his right hand suddenly twitched reminded him that he had done quite a lot to prepare it, too.
He couldn't help but feel a little annoyed at how people took all of this food for granted, though. Just like they did with the room, the warmth inside it, and even the lighting. He had had to provide all of that himself, and not expect anyone to do it for him.
That was what he had been thinking of, until TK had broken him out of it. And for that, he supposed, he ought to be thankful.
"Hey," Tai asked, gesturing across the table towards a grinning Davis, "what's he so happy about?"
"Same as the rest of us, you know, that we won?"
"He was acting that way before we left Aoba's place, though."
"...oh right! Heh, he swapped numbers with that worker you know, the one he talked to."
"When he made that mess?"
"Yeah, the young girl, with the glasses."
Tai laughed quietly and reached for his glass of water. "If I didn't know better," he said, "I'd think he was related to Matt. Must have been pretty smooth about it to pull that one off, right?"
"She was about to die from embarrassment when he asked her about it."
Tai made to reply when a voice caught the attention of the whole group.
"Guys, c'mon, quiet down, we need to sort this out," Matt said, leaning over the table. "We have to figure out what to do now, right Tai?"
"That's right."
"Okay, so, uh, what's the move?"
"Well I guess I should look for a new manufacturer," Sora said, her voice filled with a small sense of satisfaction. "Someone who isn't going to mess me around."
"Yeah! And we can all help ya, right Tai?" Davis said excitedly.
"Actually... I have a different idea," Tai replied, just before taking a sip of water.
There was a pause, then Davis continued,
"Y'mean we're gonna give someone else an ass-whoopin'?"
"Well... not really, but the first thing we should do here is learn from our mistakes."
"Tai, you sound like Izzy," Matt said, causing the group to laugh. Tai remained quiet though, but looked mildly amused nonetheless. "What makes you say that?" he continued.
Taichi looked directly at the blonde rock star, wondering how he should explain. He was reluctant, of course, but it was like Joe had said- he had to prove that he was worthy of their respect and trust.
So... He told them how he had learned as best he could.
"Have you ever tried to open a coconut?"
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Thump.
In the east, a young man blinked at the unexpected noise.
He stood, slowly, and turned away from the sea to face the palm trees behind him. His eyes narrowed as he wondered at what it was, and as no answers came to him, he began to get a little nervous. Because, he didn't know where he was. He had been stuck on this beach for a few days, and had had no time to explore due to his immediate need to find food- as such had no idea whether he was on the mainland or not.
Which meant that he didn't know anything about the local wildlife.
His muscles tensed, ready for a fight, and he waited to see what –if anything- would appear.
However any ideas of a lion or tiger leaping from the trees and trying to eat him were dashed as-
Thump.
-something landed right next to him.
The brown-haired youth frowned, and knelt down to see what exactly it was. He was soon presented with a deep green sphere-shaped object, about the size of a football, though it was something that took him a moment to recognise.
"A... coconut?" he said, more out of necessity just to hear a voice than to let anyone else know.
He gave a small smile. Perfect- a coconut would provide a source of food as well as a clean drink.
He took a little while to gather a few more, carrying them by using his blue trench coat like a sack, and dumped them near to a large black volcanic rock. Then he took one and, after tossing it around in his hands like it was a football, threw it as hard as he could at the stone wall.
There was no noticeable change to the outer husk, so he tried again.
And again.
And again.
Driven by hunger and thirst, he did this for over half an hour.
Getting increasingly frustrated at his lack of progress, the young man took the coconut in his hands and began to hammer with it at the wall in an attempt to shatter it. But that just seemed to make even less progress, and it was tiring too, so he switched to a rock protruding from the ground, one which rose up into a very blunt point.
He knelt down in front of it and began to hack down with the big green ball, getting angrier and more frustrated as he did so. Again, nothing happened. So next, he tried bracing it against a rock that had a cup-shape in it, so that it remained still as he attacked it. Then he looked for a smaller rock.
Once he felt that the stone he held was suitable to the task, he began to smash it down upon the object of his annoyance with all his might.
Naturally, he was quite surprised when after his fourth strike, the volcanic stone fell apart in his hand like slate.
Still, his persistence appeared to have paid off when he realised that the remaining fragment he held was sharp- like a knife, or an axe head.
The young man stared in surprise at his good fortune –it was about damn time something went his way- then bit his lip and started hacking away with his new tool.
It cut well, bringing out a small smile on his face, and he began to carve grooves down its length at certain places around it, creating a number of handholds. After a while, he grabbed one and pulled. It took a while, but eventually the green husk came away to reveal the classic image of a coconut- a small and hairy brown ball.
His face exploded into a full-blown grin at his accomplishment. He'd done it! He had a clean drink, at last!
Now he just needed to open it, so he took the easiest method available. With a grunt, he brought it down sharply onto the blunt grounded rock.
His grin didn't last long as the coconut split neatly in half, causing him to lose almost all of the milk inside. He managed to catch the last few drops in his mouth, but it was barely anything (besides, the shape of the piece made it hard to drink from anyway) and thus, not enough to satisfy him.
As the waste of effort hit him, he threw his half of the coconut down in disgust. But getting angry wouldn't help- he could only learn from his mistakes.
So, he tried once more, using the working techniques he had learnt. And after he had managed to get a hairy brown ball again, he tried something different using the fragments of volcanic rock, which were quickly becoming his makeshift toolkit.
He took a piece which came into a long thin point and began to tap it in with another rock like a chisel. When he judged that it had gone in deep enough, he twisted it back and fourth and pulled, as if he were trying to open a bottle of wine. It popped out- and he downed all of the coconut milk in one.
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"So you see," Tai said after he had finished his little story, "like I did with the coconut, we have to learn from what went wrong. In your case Sora, it was relying on someone to do such crucial work for you."
Everyone looked at him in wonder, surprised that he had told them about part of his life struggling for survival. He had been so reluctant before, yet he had done so to achieve a goal here and to make his point clear; as such, no one doubted that he had given his plans a lot of thought.
"What shall we do?" Matt asked, smiling at the group's leader like he had a close friend back.
"Easy. We're going to do the work ourselves."
There were a few gasps around the table, and a number more grins.
"Is this is why you wanted us around?" Izzy asked. Tai nodded in reply.
"Like I said earlier, I don't know how long it will take, it depends on how things go. But you will all need to help in some way if this is going to work, and don't expect to be paid a lot for your troubles. If you want to drop out, now's the time to say so."
There was no reply, which brought out a bright smile on Sora's face at how the group –her friends- were rallying to help her. Despite the heartache of the last few weeks since he had been found, she couldn't be more thankful of Tai's return.
Then, Davis spoke. She initially felt saddened when he did, assuming the worst, but then realised what exactly he was doing in the process.
"You gave these to me once, Tai, 'cause you thought that I should be leader..." he said as he pulled Tai's old goggles from his head. "But I'm not cut out for it. They should stay where they belong. Here... they belong with our real leader."
Tai blinked in surprise, then slowly reached across the dining table and took the blue item from his younger friend. He looked at them for a long time, not uttering a word, as if he were debating something with himself.
A cheer went up from the Digidestined, including Jun and Katie, as Taichi Kamiya put on his goggles once more.
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