Faking Redemption
Chapter 6

'I'm sure Psychemon's around,' Taiki-san offered, finally. 'Digimon go through cycles of death and rebirth and they don't always keep their memories, but we humans who meet them remember, don't we?'

'Taiki-san…' Because Psychemon had never been my partner, had he? We'd never really met. Perhaps we should have, in that place between worlds from where I'd watched the final battle with Bagramon, but it was Quartzmon who'd come to me in the end. Which one did I want to meet? Or did I want to put it all behind me instead?

What am I talking about? I knew full well putting it all behind me was the last thing I wanted to do.

'Or there's Quartzmon,' Taiki-san continued. 'Shoutmon can put you in touch whenever you like.'

'I certainly can,' piped up Shoutmon's voice – and honestly, if Taiki-san hadn't gotten around to mentioning that part, I'd have fallen out of my seat at his unexpected voice. 'Hello, Ryouma! That is Ryouma, right?'

'Uhh…hi,' I replied, or something thereabouts because really, what else was I supposed to say? Aside from Shoutmon having a good enough memory and sense of sound to be able to recognise my voice like that.

Taiki had more of his wits about him. 'Hello, Shoutmon,' he said warmly. 'How's everyone doing?'

'Organising, taking inventory, day to day running the digital world…' Shoutmon sounded like he was thumbing out a list. 'And babysitting baby Quartzmon. Gumdramon is teaching him to sneak into the kitchens.'

Gumdramon is teaching who what? I wondered. Really, that was far too mind boggling. I didn't even know what a baby Quartzmon would look like.

Taiki laughed. 'Well, this is the time to act like a child.'

'This isn't the time to be spoilt, though,' Shoutmon grumbled. 'Seriously, sometimes he's like the uncle who spoils his nephew and I'm the parent who has to clean up afterwards.'

'Though no child is going to go wrong with you raising them, right?'

'Definitely not.'

And I just sat and listened to that, letting the fragments of conversation pierce themselves together in my mind. So Quartzmon had hatched after all, was just a baby digimon – or had it already evolved into the child state and Taiki-san and Shoutmon weren't talking metaphorically after all? And he was causing trouble – but the sort of trouble little kids and apparently baby digimon all caused. Acting like and being treated like a normal newborn despite what he'd been before.

Lucky him, to be reborn without his memories or the weight of that responsibility.

But the opposite was also true. All the good memories were gone as well. The bonds. The truths. Any chance of actually finding out how much of Quartzmon had been what we'd witnessed at the end and how much had simply longed to be Psychemon, to be Astamon.

'There's more, too,' Shoutmon's dry voice was telling Taiki-san. 'We've got a Punimon who popped up and the two of them are getting into fights about every little thing. Like a pair of bratty brothers.'

'Is that so?' Taiki-san asked. He looked far too amused, honestly, though once we learned where the train of his thoughts were heading, it made a little more sense. 'Punimon evolve into Tsunomon, don't they?'

'Yep,' said Shoutmon. 'Or Nyaramon or Bukamon or DemiMeramon. And Tsunomon can evolve into a bunch of different things, including –'

Including Psychemon. I knew. But the chances of a random Punimon being the same Psychemon that had almost become my partner were ridiculously slim…

Though, in retrospect, I should have known by that point that the Digital World ran on lots and lots of what we humans called coincidences and miracles – and so did the human world, to an extent. Hadn't I already witnessed miracles and more than once?

And this time, the miracle is Punimon making a ruckus in the digital world. 'I wanna go! I wanna go!'

'Quiet down,' Shoutmon scolded. 'I'm talking to Taiki and Ryouma – whoops.' There were a few crashes after that, where both Taiki-san and I winced… I guess since we're both only children, that level of noise is… unexpected.

What follows is two voices, overlaying in a terrible symmetry and repeating the same thing over and over again, just louder than before. 'I wanna go! I wanna go!' And then they dissolved into what sounded like a bubble fight – since baby digimon weren't' capable of much more in the realm of attacks.

'Quartzmon! Punimon!' Shoutmon sighed. 'One day they'll survive in the same room together.'

By then, they'd progressed onto the "he's mine" vein of the argument, which was baffling since neither of them should remember anything about me at all, let alone want to be anywhere near me.

'And there you go,' said Taiki-san, still amused, 'though baby Quartzmon isn't usually that excitable. I guess that's Punimon's influence.'

'Punimon and baby Quartzmon are fighting… over me?'

To be fair, I was still having a time processing that.

'Well, they fight about everything and the kitchen sink,' said Shoutmon. 'But they're a little extra-enthusiastic now. They don't have memories of you, but they seem to instinctively remember… It's not quite the case of Damemon who remembered everything… Though we're not sure about Punimon actually, since the two of you never technically met.' He dropped his voice, presumably to stop the two babies overhearing him again. 'We didn't think it was a good idea for hope of a future relationship to ask Punimon if he remembered Quartzmon killing him. Especially since Quartzmon really does remember nothing. And aside from Gumdramon's and Punimon's influence, Quartzmon is quite good and well-behaved. And the other digimon all help out too, to teach him how beautiful the world we've built together is.'

'I…see,' I said, because Shoutmon was talking directly to me there and I couldn't think of another thing to say. And if the digimon (because all the others could forgive Quartzmon and work with him, then… what, exactly? Quartzmon didn't have his memories, or the weight of his past to bear as responsibility…

'That's good,' said Shoutmon with a smile in his voice. 'Because we could use the help.'

And I was thrown for a loop again, and by that point I was wondering if this wasn't just some elaborate set-up. They'd certainly had the time to organise it. Airu and Ren. Tagiru and Yuu. And Taiki-san and Shoutmon.

But at the time, all I said was: '…help?'

'Well, they are fighting more enthusiastically when it comes to you,' Shoutmon explained. 'Whenever we mentioned your name – we were checking Quartzmon's memories, and then Punimon overheard and reacted too and well, you see.'

Not physically, but I got the point at least.

'We're working on expanding the transportation system Wisemon organised for us,' Shoutmon continued. 'So then we'll be able to move between the Digital and Human worlds at will, without needing to go through unstable pathways like the Digi-Quartz.'

I saw where that was heading immediately. 'You'd trust me with them?' I asked.

'It's more a question of if you want them living with you,' Shoutmon corrected. 'They are quite noisy together. It'll be like getting little twin brothers that fight over every little thing.'

'Akari can tell you all about it,' Taiki-san piped up. 'She's got two younger brothers and a younger sister.'

The type of family my parents had always dreamed of. I wonder what they'll say when this actually becomes a reality.

But there wasn't really a choice. Not for me. I wanted them too much. And I owed too much – to them, and to the others as well. My parents would simply have to adjust to it, as bizarre as it would seem at first. But I think they'd manage. It was the closest they were going to get to a house full of kids until in-laws and grandkids came into the equation, anyway. And I'm in seventh grade. That won't be happening for a long time.

'I want them,' I admitted at some point – but, really, Taiki-san was looking as though he expected it. 'I want the Psychemon I never got the chance to meet, and the Quartzmon who was my partner. I want them both still, even after what's happened, and I know it's selfish…'

I was crying by then, and Taiki-san wriggled out of the hospital blankets to pat me on the shoulder.

'Why is it selfish?' he asked. 'They're both your precious partners. But without their memories and at this young and impressionable age, they're –'

'The weight of my responsibility,' I finished.

And they were. And would be. And that… was okay, because it was something I could do, to make amends and fill the hole in my heart Quartzmon had left behind. The perfect ending, really. The perfect outcome. And the trickle of my headache that remained was gone as well, like the headache was just a manifestation of my stewing instead of doing something productive, and of my inability to do anything productive in relation…

I could do something: now, through my digivice, and in the future as well. That changed things. That changed everything. And now that it was possible, it was so much clearer as well: it was the perfect ending: the outcome I'd wanted all along and I hadn't been able, back then, to put it into words.

But now I can.