Takeru laid the six tickets out on his desk with a small huff of disappointment. Of course he was excited—it was his brother's concert, after all, and he was going with his closest school friends. But he couldn't help but picture her there with him. Laughing and singing along, voice crystal clear. Fiddling happily with her camera in the dim lighting. Standing shoulder to shoulder in the sweaty crowd, just sharing space. And then, on the way home, their usual friendly banter, talking about lighthearted things and serious things and everything in between.

He sighed again. He hadn't even been expecting anything different. Her just being there, with him—that was enough. But alas. He picked up his phone and sent out a group text.

'Hey guys. About the concert, it's tomorrow 7PM. Let's meet in front of the Odaiba Blue Live House by 6:30. I'll bring the tickets. '

One by one, the replies came in.

'Gotcha.'

'Yep. Dinner before or after, anyone?'

'Omg, so excited!'

'Thank youuu! See ya there!'

'Takaishi-kun! Thanks for the text. I haven't been to that live house before… if I get lost on the way there, can I call you?'

Ever the indulgent gentleman, he replied, 'Of course!' to Kikuchi's heavy-handed question before putting his phone down and flopping onto his bed.

The digital clock still read 7:30PM. His mother was away on a business trip until Monday, and he hadn't made dinner yet. Before he knew it, he was reaching for his phone again.

What am I doing? He wondered, watching his fingers enter Hikari's name into the recipient space.

'What are you doing right now?'

He stared, blinking, at the message he had typed, daring himself to push send. He sent this sort of message often enough to all of his friends, and to many of his girl friends as well. It was casual to him—he enjoyed it. This seemed different, more weighty. His fingers mashed at the delete button and started typing again.

'Are you free right now?'

He erased again, shaking his head.

'Wanna grab ramen?'

They did this sometimes, on the way home from school or in between other commitments, but never on a weekend. And certainly not out of the blue like this.

'I want to see you.'

There they were. His honest feelings, typed out on the screen in front of him. One button away from… from what? They'd never discussed their personal feelings for each other before, so he had no way of knowing how she would react. With a resigned chuckle, he erased the entire message and was about to throw his phone back on his bed when it rang.

A new message. From…

He jolted upright, heart in his mouth, and opened it immediately. Kikuchi had sent a reply as well, and he noted it in passing, reminding himself mentally to reply to it later. But his eyes were fixed on his most recent inboxed message.

'It looks like oniichan's on his own tomorrow. Ran-chan's surprise birthday party is tomorrow. We found out she was busy on the day we were planning to have it, so we moved it last minute. Oniichan's going to be sad… Have fun at the concert tomorrow!'

He read it, smiled, read it again. He didn't want to seem too eager, but his answer was already flowing off his fingertips. 'You sure you don't wish you were coming?'

Gratification came moments later when his phone lit up again.

'Is this your 'Hikari is jealous' theory again? I'm not buying it.'

What was she doing? Was she lying in bed just like he was with nothing much to do on a Saturday night?

'Maybe you could play along just a little. For my sake.'

He could imagine her pert smile and the shake of her head at his silliness. 'Me not playing along is for your sake. Everyone else seems to fall for everything you do. You have to have at least one friend to hold you accountable.'

He laughed out loud at this. Maybe it would be okay.

She's a girl. Just a girl. Just like always—be smooth, casual, charming.

'Hikari-chan, what are you up to?'

The reply came quickly. 'Trying to figure out how to break the news to oniichan. What about you?'

He gave it some time, not wanting to be obvious. 'Just thinking about what to eat. Mom's away on a business trip, so it's just me. Wanna get ramen?' Then, after some thought: 'Have you eaten yet?'

'Nope! Mom and dad are out tonight, so it's just me and oniichan. Ramen sounds good! I'll ask oniichan.'

Oh, he thought, heart sinking. Of course, it only seemed natural that the three of them would go together. Just like when they were little.

'He said he was fine. It's so weird! He's probably starving (as always) and I know he's probably too lazy to cook… '

Takeru could practically see the sly smile on her brother's face. He knew, as dense as he was. Since the task of protecting Hikari fell to him as her older brother, Taichi could tell when someone else (ie. one small boy with a green hat) was trying to fill those shoes.

"Takeru-kun. "

His heart jumped a bit at her voice, but he turned around and executed a perfect smile. "Hey."

She was wearing an oversized sweater over a loose, white nightgown that skimmed her knees. It was refreshing seeing her dressed down in what she would normally wear around the house. He couldn't remember when he had last seen her like this. He was glad he hadn't overdressed.

Once they were seated with steaming bowls of ramen—shio (salt) for her, miso for him—in front of them, he spoke up. If she could ask about his girl friends without losing face, he could do the same.

"You were eating ice cream at lunch the other day."

She blushed. "Hehe, yeah. There was a season exclusive flavor out, and I wanted to try it."

He added a dash of pepper to his bowl and continued to lead on with his line of questioning, maintaining a blasé demeanor about the whole thing. "How do you always find time to go to the convenience store during lunch?"

She took a sip of her soup, smiled. "I didn't know you were there too," she commented.

"Huh?" He was momentarily thrown off.

"The roof. You were there, huh? You could have said hello."

He chuckled, trying not to appear as flustered as he was. "Uh huh. Well, you seemed to be having a good time with your friends, so I didn't want to interrupt."

"Hmm, I see," she conceded mildly.

Silence, except for their slurping. Having her beside him filled him with a small, comfortable elation that seemed to banish any loneliness he felt regularly. As he enjoyed the rich saltiness of the broth and their contented silence, he pictured daily life with her—coming home together, eating dinner, sitting together in the living room doing separate things, but still together. A far cry from being completely alone until his mother came back late from work or from her frequent business trips.

He then recalled his unanswered question and tried once more. "Anyway, how do you always make it there so quickly? We run straight there from class and the roof is still so crowded. It doesn't seem like you would have time to go the convenience store."

"Oh, I don't go to the convenience store. My friends go, and they offer to get something for me every once in a while. Sometimes people just bring stuff to me."

He held his voice steady, indifferent. "Guy friends?"

Her eyes smirked at him. "Does that bother you?"

It was his turn to smile, shaking his head. "If I said yes, I feel like I would be losing."

She was piling noodles onto her spoon methodically, dipping it into her bowl to add some soup. She always ate carefully and sparingly. Even after all these years her delicate and feminine nature was awe-inspiring to him. Especially when she laughed, tilting her head slightly downwards and to the side, hand over her mouth, a breathy, beautiful sound.

"The other day was from oniichan though," she said.

"Taichi-san?"

She nodded, eyes shining. "He forgot his lunch box and I left home early to bring it to him at morning practice. I asked him to buy me ice cream in return, and I was just kidding, but he actually showed up with it at lunch time."

He wondered if her face lit up the same way when she talked about him. "That's Taichi-san for you."

They sat and chatted in the steamy warmth for a while—he went on in detail about his latest basketball match as she listened good-naturedly, reacting appropriately at all the important parts. She in turn, shared about the recent feature she was in charge of for the fashion section of a magazine the school's publication club was releasing, and he gave tips about recent trends and popular stores. The conversation flowed smoothly from topic to topic; they discussed school and classmates. Takeru's friend Fujioka was in Hikari's class, and a few of Hikari's friends were in Takeru's class—they exchanged stories, commented on mutual friends, noted upcoming tests—it seemed as if they never ran out of things to talk about.

After a while, when the last few dregs of soup had been consumed, Hikari spoke up, her voice grave. "Takeru-kun, there's something I've been feeling lately."

Normally this comment would have caught him off guard, but the look on her face was painfully familiar, reminding him of their times together in the Digital World.

"What is it?" he prompted gently.

She hesitated. "I think something's happening. In the Digital World."

There it was. It struck him that they may be going back for the first time in three years. Hikari's connection to the Digital World was uncanny in its reliability. "What do you mean by something?"

When she looked up and met his gaze, she was the girl with the whistle again. "I feel something dark stirring. I haven't felt this way in a long time.."

He grabbed her hand, afraid of her slipping away. "You'll be okay. It'll be okay." He was always there, trying to ground her.

She gave a faint smile and shook her head as if to clear it. "Yeah, you're right. Right now, it's just a feeling…"

"Have you talked to Taichi-san about it?"

This cast another shadow across her face, which surprised him. Before, she always went straight to her brother with any of her worries, particularly those regarding the Digital World.

"I… I'm still thinking about it, " she answered. "Oniichan… he's changed. He's—"

She paused here, as if struggling to find the right words.

"He's become an adult?" Takeru could guess what she was trying to say.

"Yes, something like that."

It wasn't that his personality had greatly changed. She still had to wake him up in the morning so that he wasn't late for practice, and he still goofed around and sulked and floundered as usual. But there was a disassociation between the Taichi she knew now and the Taichi that had been their leader during their previous adventures in the Digital World. He seemed to see a lot more, and he thought a lot longer and a lot harder about things. If things had been black and white before, they were now a million different shades of gray; things that had come easily and decisively were no longer so.

"I don't want to compound his worries. Besides…" she made a face. "First, I need to tell him I can't make it to his game tomorrow."

Takeru sighed. "We both have it cut out for us with our brothers, huh?"

They split the bill. He gallantly offered to pay, but she didn't fall easily for his chivalry and insisted that they split it evenly before parting ways.

"Hikari-chan," he called out to her as she walked away, hood pulled over her head for warmth. Though summer was just around the corner, spring nights were still chilly.

"What is it?"

This time it was his turn to look somber. "If something happens, let me know."

Her eyes widened a bit, but she acquiesced. "Okay."

"See you Monday, then."

"Huh?"

Yamato stared down at his bass, and then at his amp, which cut out abruptly with a hiss. His keyboardist drummed a few keys, but there was no sound.

"What is it?" Takeru asked. He was at the concert venue several hours early, as planned, to hang out and help Yamato get things set up.

"Electricity went out," his brother assumed. "That's odd.."

Hikari's words came back to him then, and he ran to the dressing room, where he remembered seeing a television earlier.

"Oi, Takeru!"

Yamato followed, arriving in time to see the local news broadcast on the small wall television that Takeru had just switched on. He joined Takeru on the red dressing stools scattered around the room to watch. Shots of Kuwagamon flying through the sky from several angles played as the announcer spoke about the strange airborne creature that had appeared as if from nowhere. Distortions crackled around the Digimon in streaks of pink and purple.

"That's not… is it?" Yamato murmured.

A steady, sinking feeling filled Takeru, but he was not as surprised as Yamato was, seeing that he had been privy to Hikari's suspicions. "I think it is," he stated calmly, springing into action.

Trouble once more. After two harrowing experiences in the Digital World, the first of which happened when he was only seven years old, it was safe to say that Takeru (and Hikari, of course) were officially veterans. He stepped smoothly into the role of chosen child, partly because he knew it was his duty and partly because he knew Hikari would be catapulted right into the midst of the trouble, as usual. He willingly involved himself, and he would be there when she was.

He whipped out his phone and dialed Andou, who was the first on his alphabetized contacts list. The concert was probably off. Electricity would most likely not be coming back, given the circumstances. He would have to call them one by one to make sure they got the message. "Hello? About today's concert, it looks like it's going to be cancelled. ...I'm sorry. Uhuh. See you."

Yamato, who had been watching all of this in bemused surprise, grinned suggestively. "Your girlfriend?"

Right, you already know who I like, so you know there's no way that's true.

"Don't worry, I love you the most, oniichan." He laid it on thick, and Yamato scoffed.

"What're you saying?"

Yamato pressed a few keys on his phone, waited, then frowned. "Taichi isn't answering. "

Takeru was already in the process of calling Ogawa, who was next in his contacts. "Isn't he playing a match? Oh, hello? About today's concert, it looks like it's going to be cancelled. … Yeah, it's a bummer. Uhuh, probably. See you."

Kikuchi was next. She was in the middle of picking out her outfit for the night, trying to decide between feminine and innocent and mature and chic. When her phone rang, she pounced on it eagerly.

"Takaishi-kun! W-what's up?" she cried into the phone.

"Hey, about today's concert.."

"Uhuh!"

His sounded slightly on edge. "It looks like it's going to be cancelled."

Cancelled? Her heart sank. "Ah, I see… no, it's okay! … Oh, wait! Takaishi-kun!"

"Yeah?" His voice was as kindly as ever, but there definitely was a bit of impatience to it. Was he in a hurry about something? It was clear that something had come up… could it be Yagami-san? The very thought sent jolts of anxiety through her.

"Takaishi-kun, promise to hang out with me sometime soon instead!" she insisted.

"Hmm… I think things are going to get a bit hectic for me, so I can't make any promises, but I'll try," he answered honestly.

What did he mean by hectic? "Takaishi-kun, what's going on? What's making you so busy?" She tugged frantically at one of her braids. Maybe she would get her hair cut.

"It's nothing really. Family related stuff. Sorry, but I've gotta go now."

Family stuff. "O-okay. See you at school!"

Click.

Kikuchi threw her phone on her bed. Exasperated, she turned her attention towards her desk, fingering the picture of Takeru that sat there. She had taken it during one of the school team's basketball games, during a break in their cheerleading routine. Yamanaka and Fujioka were in the background as well, but she had eyes only for Takeru. He was so sweet and kind, so cool...so self-assured and different from the other guys. And yet, he was unfathomable. There were times when she read too deeply into his actions and found herself thinking that he maybe had feelings for her, only to realize that he treated other girls exactly the same way. And then, there was Yagami-san. Hikari. She was the only one who seemed different. Kikuchi knew they were childhood friends—in fact, she had gone to elementary school with Hikari, though she had never been close with her. Other than that, he never mentioned her, never spoke with her, except in passing, and never clearly answered questions that others asked about her. Despite this, they always silently met up with each other after school and walked home together. She had watched this several times, seen how the light in his eyes changed and became somewhat more… innocent, more unsure, more nervous, when Hikari was with him.

She stared at the picture of Takeru and thought sardonically that the two should just date already and be done with it instead of leaving her hanging.

She grabbed at her phone. "Hello? An-chan? Yeah.. I heard it was cancelled. It sucks. Wanna get Misaki-chan and the others and get some grub?"

Digiegg 2: Facts, Odaiba

The setting for Digimon is in Odaiba, a set of islands off of Tokyo that is connected to the mainland via bridges (one of which is the famous Rainbow bridge). Odaiba is a completely man-made set of islands and is currently a pretty popular tourist location. This doesn't quite register while watching the series with the original chosen (advernture, 02, tri), but I imagine everywhere in Odaiba (maybe even their schools?) probably smells of the sea due to the proximity. Taichi crosses several bridges on his way to school in Tri. Interesting to think that Taichi crosses the ocean on his bike ride to school every day!