Chapter Two
"Do you think we'll ever make it home again?" Cia asked, feeling more awkward every minute that passed with Matt near by. Hannah shrugged, and just looked down at Tokomon.
"We may never make it home..." Hannah trailed off, and looked back up at her best friend. "But hey, they made it home the first time." She smiled brightly, trying to convince Cia that all would be ok.
When it came to the Digimon, or the Digital World in general - it was Hannah who was wisest in that department. Cia was the other kind of wise - when it meant that her life was at stake - although Hannah was pretty good at that too. Not to say that Cia didn't know anything about the Digital World, but she knew enough to know what was going on. And she also knew that they had gotten home the first time - so she knew that it was more than possible for them to return home as well. But, she wanted to return home as soon as possible - there was a feeling in the pit of her stomach that made her feel almost cautious (well, awkward) when around Matt and she didn't like it.
She kept on questioning herself as to why she was getting this feeling. It wasn't as if she knew him, so why should she feel so awkward around him?
'I'm in the Digital World, maybe that's why I feel so uneasy.' She thought, looking down at Salomon.
The forest around them began to disappear as Tai led them into a waterfall. It was interesting to see how the water turned to a cave - a wonderful hiding spot for anyone looking for you. It was musty - and no one else was around, except a girl with pink hair sitting next to plant-like Digimon. She got up slowly, her eyes on the two girls that had entered the secret hide out.
"Tai?" She asked, looking from the boy to Hannah and then to Cia.
"Mimi," Tai said, obviously to the pink haired girl. "This is Hannah," he motioned towards the brown hair, deep eyed girl with a Tokomon in her hand. Mimi just stared on, and nodded slowly. "and this is Cia." Then a confused look came over her face.
"Nice to meet you Hannah and Cia." Mimi said, pronouncing Cia's name with a harsh 'k' sound.
"Oh..." Cia looked at Mimi. "You can call me Eustacia, well Cia for short." At this comment on Cia's full name, Matt shot his gaze upon Cia.
"Cia?" She said, with the harsh 'k' sound again.
"Well, more like 'see –ah.' " Cia said, although she always hated correcting people when they said her name wrong, which was often.
"Oh, well nice to meet you both." Mimi smiled, not taking any offense to the correction. Cia, feeling the awkward gaze from Matt, kneeled down and let Salamon out of her arms. Salamon began to walk around, happy to stretch her legs. She peered up at Cia with a concerned look in her light blue eyes.
Matt turned to look at Gabumon who was looking at his friend with curiosity. Matt didn't know why, but for some reason Cia just made him feel cautious and awkward - like somewhere he had seen her before - that he had met her - or that ... he blew the last thought out of his mind completely. He didn't want to think about any type of 'future' events. He pushed the cautious thoughts out of his head, and tried to suppress the knots in his stomach by pulling out his harmonica. As he began to play Cia seemed to relax, and so did he.
Tai looked at the brunette, Hannah, and smiled to himself. She was sweet, and shy, but it seemed like she knew a lot. 'Geez - a brain' Tai thought to himself. He usually wasn't the type to go for a girl who was pretty smart - it bugged him to when the braniac girls would ramble on about some equation they were trying to work out in their head. But, there was something else about Hannah - and he couldn't quite put his finger on it - but something drew him to her...
Cia looked around the dark cave as her eyes began to adjust to the lighting. It had some stones set up around a ring of wood and there were drawings of Digimon on the walls. It reminded her of the time that her family took a road trip to Arizona and she saw the Indian drawings on the cave walls.
There was glow to the walls, from the moisture of the falls, and it made it all look magical.
"Reminds me of the stars." Matt's voice said, as the music ceased, interrupting her thoughts. That's when she noticed how close he was standing to her.
Matt, feeling the knots in his gut again, ignored it all. He figured that he should be polite towards her because she probably felt the same way he had when he had come to the Digital World for the first time. Scared, unsure, and almost alone, although she was with her friend.
"Yeah, it does." Cia said, responding to Matt's remark. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him smile secretly to himself. She smiled slightly and the feeling in her stomach seemed to dwindle a little.
"It reminds me of Arizona." Cia said, looking at Matt from her peripheral vision again. He turned to look at her, and she felt a little awkward again.
"Arizona?" He asked, then a little glow began to fill his eyes. "What is the US like?"
"Beautiful, well except for the area where I live." It had the effect that she wanted, and she didn't know if she liked his attentions on her or not.
"Where are you from, not Arizona then...?"
"Indiana." Cia frowned. "If you know what a landscape of just farmland as far as the eye can see looks like, then you know Indiana's landscape." Cia laughed a little to herself, and heard Hannah laugh from somewhere in the cave too.
"She's not joking Matt." Hannah said, coming over and trying to figure out what they were so fascinated with.
"Looks like the caves in AZ." Hannah said, recalling the pictures that Cia had shown her of the west.
"Yup..." Cia said, and her gaze shifted from her friend to Matt, who was looking at her. Tai came over and looked at the wall art.
"Neat, isn't it?" He asked, looking at Hannah to see the reaction she would have.
"Yeah." Hannah plopped herself down on the floor and Tokomon climbed into her lap. She rubbed the top of Tokomon's head and could only think of a way to explain how Cia and her had gotten into the Digital World in the first place. The only way she would be able to actually come up with something was if Izzy was around to help her - he knew more about everything in the Digital World than she could ever possibly imagine.
"So," Tai said, sitting next to Hannah, Agumon accompanying him. "you just appeared?" He asked, referring to their conversation from earlier, introducing the subject a little awkwardly.
"It was weird." Hannah said, noticing Cia sit down - she was all a part of the equation too. Matt just stood, looking down at them all.
"We were just talking on MSN." Cia put in, trying to help Tai understand all that had happened.
"When Cia mentioned returning to Tokyo, everything went weird." Hannah said, and noticed Matt shoot his gaze over to Cia.
"You've been to Tokyo?" Matt spat out - interrupting the 'how they got to the digital world' talk. Cia looked up at Matt.
"Yeah, it was a long time ago though. My father was there on a business trip and Hannah had been with me." All of the sudden all eyes were on Cia.
"Go on." Mimi said, coming out of her little shell, becoming more interested in the conversation taking place.
"Don't you remember that night of the storm Hannah?" Cia asked her friend.
"Yeah, it was awful and gave me night mares."
"No joke - it had happened to both of us."
"Nightmares?" Tai asked, getting the gist of Mimi's direction.
"Yeah, we had both woken up screaming in our hotel room because we had seen this gigantic dinosaur and a humungous parrot fighting and they tore up all of downtown Tokyo - where we had just been that day and fell in love with. My dad came rushing in, wondering why we were so scared and when we explained, we all realized that there was an awful storm outside and had probably caused the nightmares." Cia looked at the Digidestined gathered around her, and turned to look at Hannah.
- -And Cia was the first one to realize why they all had the same look on their face.
"You guys saw it too..." Cia trailed off - and then it dawned on Hannah where she had seen the monster's before. When Izzy was figuring out how they were all tied to one another…
"Holy CRAP!" Hannah yelled - realizing that she and Cia were a part of the people surrounding them - the Digidestined.