Taichi sat alone with Takeru in the hospital room that the sleeping boy was residing in. Sora had finally managed to convince Yamato that he had to eat real food rather than just snacks from a vending machine. When Yamato had tried to point out that Taichi hadn't eaten either, Taichi was rather pleased and smug that he could counter with the fact that he had eaten before he came to the hospital. It finally took Taichi's solemn oath to look after the kid (not that he thought it was necessary, since Yamato knew that Taichi was always looking out for Takeru) to get Yamato to leave to dinner with Sora, leaving Taichi alone with Takeru. He smiled fondly at the sleeping kid, whom he adored as if Takeru was his own little brother. If he had a little sister, he wouldn't mind if she dated Takeru.
A flash of dizziness hit Taichi for just a second, something that he might have attributed to lack of food if he didn't know that he had just eaten not that long ago. He shrugged it off as a reaction to the smell of the hospital; that potent smell of cleanliness and the hint of bleach was enough to make anyone light-headed. It could also be one-too-many soccer balls to the head were finally catching up to him after all these years of playing.
During their first adventure, the more time Taichi had spent with Takeru, the more it had filled him with a sense of longing. He frowned at that thought, but then he supposed that he had always sort of wished that he had a younger sibling of his own. He had seen the bond that Yamato and Takeru shared, despite the separation that their parents had forced upon them.
Takeru stirred and opened his eyes. "Yamato?" he asked.
"Nope," Taichi answered, coming to his feet to stand next to the bed. "It's just me, buddy."
A flicker of a smile crossed Takeru's lips as his eyes came into focus on Taichi. "Taichi?" A sudden somberness fell down on Takeru's features. "Are you mad at me?" he asked, suddenly.
Taichi was taken aback and his brows furrowed in confusion. "No," he answered. "Why would I be mad at you?"
Takeru's frown deepened and he rubbed his eyes with the palms of his hands. "I don't know," he said. "It just feels like you should be mad at me for some reason."
Taichi grinned. "Not unless you've done something I don't know about," he teased. He was alarmed when Takeru began to sit up. "Hey, take it easy," he cautioned.
"I'm fine," Takeru said, waving him off. "I feel much better really." His gaze fell away from Taichi to the window, where snow was beginning to fall again.
"Is something wrong, Takeru?" Taichi asked, remembering the discussion that he had with Sora in the hallway, when she confided to him that there was something else the matter with their young friend. Taichi was beginning to see what she was talking about, since this was the first time he had seen Takeru awake since arriving that the hospital and the young man was not acting like he normally did. Some of it could probably be attributed to the illness, but there was no way an illness could bring Takeru down to this level of melancholy.
"Have you ever got the feeling that you've forgotten something?" Takeru asked, keeping his gaze away from Taichi.
"Sure," Taichi said, lightly, trying to give some kind of reassurance to Takeru. "Happens to me all the time. I'm fairly certain Sora was the only reason I ever passed high school. I could only seem to remember when soccer practices were and not when any of my assignments were due."
Takeru looked at him now with a hint of smile, bringing back the boy he knew so well if only for a second. The smile quickly fell away. There was a pause of hesitation before Takeru shook his head. "Never mind," he said with a resigned sigh. "I'm sure it's nothing." He cast a hesitant smile in Taichi's direction. "So, what have you been up to recently?" he asked in an overly casual tone. "I feel like I haven't heard from you in a long time."
Taichi recognized the change of subject for what it was, but let it slide as he talked to Takeru. It was getting ever clearer to him that Yamato's worry was warranted and something was wrong with Takeru, but there was a few things about Takeru that were different from the kid he had known long ago that he didn't know how to go about getting him to talk to them about it. It was a wonder that he told them about being attacked in France at all. Taichi frowned in mid-thought. If there was one thing he knew for certain about Takeru it was that he disliked having anyone worry about him. There was another reason Takeru told them, Taichi was sure of it, but he couldn't think of what it was.
Before he could think on it anymore, Yamato returned, this time without Sora.
"Where's Sora," Taichi asked, voicing the obvious question.
"She went home after dinner since we were reassured that Takeru was going to be fine," Yamato paused for a breath for before adding, "Though only with my promise that I would get some sleep at some point tonight."
Taichi flashed his best friend a smile. "Sounds like Sora," he said.
Yamato nodded, but looked passed him and smiled when he saw Takeru, clearly happy to find his brother awake again. He walked up to the bed and ruffled an affectionate hand through Takeru's head. "How are you feeling, buddy?"
Takeru gave a smile to his brother, looking much more normal to Taichi as he did. Takeru smiled so often that it was almost painfully obvious when he wasn't doing so. Taichi watched the scene with the familiar sense of longing coming back to him. "I wish I had a brother," he said, almost not quite realizing he said it out loud until the words were out of his mouth. Both brothers fixed him with a blue gaze. "Uh…you guys just have such a great bond that I was just kind of wishing I had someone like that," he explained.
A familiar teasing glint flashed into Takeru's eyes before he asked, "What about a sister?"
Taichi frowned in thought. "I guess that wouldn't have been so bad either," he said, finding the idea of having a sister not as bad as he first thought. When he was really little, he remembered really wanting a brother because Sora's mood swings (sweet one minute and then stark raving mad at him in the next) in their early years of friendship had kept him so off balanced that he was sure that having a brother would have been better than having a sister, especially if she had turned out to have Sora-isk mood swings. But now he was thinking that a sister wouldn't have been bad at all and somehow it felt more right. "As long as she didn't insist on taking me shopping with her," he added with a grin.
"She would have had Mimi and Miyako for that," Yamato said with an eye roll.
"That's true," Taichi said as those words brought him into a new line of thought. He wondered if his sister would have been chosen as a Digidestined; if perhaps there might have been an Eighth Child to the original group. He looked at Takeru. It certainly might have been easier on the kid if there had been someone his own age in the group.
Takeru smiled up at him. "Well, you'll always have us, Taichi," he said with a warming smile.
Taichi grinned and threw an arm around Takeru's shoulders and ruffled his hair like Yamato had done just minutes before. "You betcha," he said. "There's no way you're going to get rid of me that easily." The three boys laughed, and Taichi felt a little bit of the haze that had fallen since Takeru's arrival at the hospital lift just a bit.
Yuuko stood in the only empty room in the apartment wondering exactly why she had left the room in its current state for so long. Taichi had moved out over two years ago, taking most of his stuff with him and they had gotten rid of the rest. Yuuko frowned a bit. At least, they must have gotten rid of the rest because the room was empty, though she couldn't really remember doing so. She brushed the thought away; she must have done it and that was that. It still left her with the problem of why she hadn't put this room to good use since then. She must have had a plan at one point, since they hadn't just starting piling storage in the room or anything. She just couldn't think of what it was.
She paced around the room, putting together a floor plan in her head. The computer would go nicely in one corner, and then she could have more room near the kitchen to store food and appliances. She could set up a desk along the other wall for the hobby that she was going to pick up. She hadn't decided what it was yet, but with her child away from home, it was certainly a good time to pick up one.
The front door opened and Yuuko went out to see Susumu arriving home. "I'm home," he called as he set down his briefcase to switch from his work shoes to his home slippers.
"Welcome back," Yuuko replied with a smile.
"What were you doing in Taichi's room?" he asked.
"Oh, just deciding that we should finally do something with it," Yuuko said with a slight wave of her hand. "It's been over two years since Taichi left and since we don't have anyone else to occupy it, the room might as well be used somehow."
Susumu smiled. "I think that's a great idea," he said. "What did you have planned?"
Yuuko told him of her ideas. As they sat down to dinner, Yuuko mind wandered to her words. She and Susumu had discussed the possibility of having another child, and Yuuko couldn't remember why they hadn't. She loved her son with all her heart, but she had always sort of wanted a little girl of her own. She had wanted someone to dress up in cute pink dresses and do up her hair in pretty pink ribbons. Not that she wouldn't have loved another little boy but she had wanted another girl. She frowned in confusion since she really could not recall why they hadn't had another child. A wave of dizziness flowed through her for just a moment.
"Are you all right, Yuuko?" Susumu asked.
"I'm fine," she assured her husband, letting her thoughts focus back on the present and what she was going to do with Taichi's old empty room.
It was after Takeru had fallen asleep again as the day turned into night that Taichi left the hospital to head home. Yamato was torn between staying with his brother and going home himself. He knew that Takeru was going to be okay, but it was still hard to leave him alone in the hospital. As he sat puzzling over what he should do, he heard the door open and turned to see who was coming in. His eyebrows lifted in slight shock. "Dad?"
His father blinked tiredly at him. "Yamato? What are you still doing here?" he asked.
Yamato smiled sheepishly at his father and waved a hand at Takeru. "I guess I just couldn't leave him," he said with slight resignation at himself. He quirked his brow quizzically at Hiroaki. "Did you just hear about it?" He probably should have expected his father to be late, but this was hours after the fact and it was completely different situation from leaving Takeru at the airport.
Hiroaki shook his head as he walked over to stand by to the bed next to Yamato. "I was here right after it happened, but I left to go back to work after the doctor said he was recovering when his friend offered to stay with him until you got here. His teacher called me and I came right away. I feel somewhat responsible for the severity of his condition, since I probably could have prevented it. He didn't look well this morning, but when he told me he didn't feel that bad, I didn't force him to stay home."
Yamato nodded in understanding. Takeru, despite the fact that he would go out of his way, even to the point of putting himself in danger (Yamato remembered the events of last summer with a shudder) to help a friend he knew in need or in trouble, disliked having people worry about him or thinking he wasn't capable of taking care of himself. Yamato knew that mostly came from being the youngest of the group of the first Digidestined and his wanting to be helpful and not slowing down the group or being a liability in their fights against the evil Digimon. Then they had come to their second adventure and Takeru had to step up as the most experienced one that the newer Digidestined had to rely on, and Yamato knew Takeru had felt that weight of responsibility to make sure that nothing happened to the others because he was supposed to know what to do because he had the most experience. Now, with the most recent events, the fate of the worlds had been literally thrust onto Takeru's shoulders, and Yamato was beginning to wonder if it was starting to be too much for the young bearer of Hope. Takeru was strong, but everyone needed the help of others sometimes.
Yamato watched as Hiroaki placed a hand on Takeru's forehead, like Yamato had when he first arrived, and smile fondly down at the blond boy, which caused Yamato to smile at his father. Despite his rough appearance and brusque attitude that often put others off him, Yamato was well aware that Hiroaki cared deeply about his family, particularly the little soft spot (the same one Yamato had claim to) he had for Takeru, the son he had spent so much of the young boy's life separated from. With Takeru's usual cheerful and upbeat attitude, it was hard not to let the boy deep into your heart, as Yamato very well knew.
He let his gaze trail back to his sleeping brother. He still had the feeling that something was wrong, but he also knew that the Digidestined hadn't failed yet in anything they had put their minds to, and it was unlikely that they were going to this time. As a team, all of them together could overcome any obstacle.
The hospital released Takeru the next morning since no complications cropped up during the night. Since his father was at work, Yamato was the one to drive him home, since he didn't have any classes either due to the fact the university was also on its winter break. Takeru was still on the road to recovery, so he still felt a little physically weak and hazy, but his fever was at least gone and he hadn't felt dizzy and/or ready to pass out since he had regained consciousness yesterday.
When Yamato dropped him off at the apartment, Takeru could tell that he wanted to stay, but Takeru assured him that he would be fine and that he was just going to relax all day and recuperate (after a solemn promise that under no circumstances was he going to go outside or do anything that would jeopardize his health).
Takeru spent the day lounging on the couch, trading between watching the television and reading a book and complete boredom. Suddenly he wished that he had asked Yamato to stay, but he hadn't really wanted to deal with a hovering Yamato all day, since that probably would have been worse than being bored.
His thoughts traced back to the strange dreams he had while sleeping in the hospital. He couldn't really explain it or really remember them at all. All he knew was there was a girl (he had no idea what she looked like), she was in trouble, and he was supposed to help her. There was something he had to remember as well, but he had no idea of what it was. He usually didn't think anything of his dreams, but for some reason, this one (which he had half-delirious with fever) seemed to stick with him. The dream is what led him to ask that question of Taichi.
As night began to fall, Takeru thrust his thoughts of the strange dream into the back of his mind and went into his room to go to bed. He rummaged in his drawer for a pair of pajamas, but his hand stopped when he brushed up against something that felt like a box. His fingers clasped around the object, and he pulled it warily out of the drawer. It was a small white jewelry box. All Takeru could think to do was stare at it in puzzlement, since he didn't really own anything that could even remotely be called jewelry (the closest things he had to what would be an accessory were his hats and his D-3, but neither of those were anything like jewelry), let alone something that came in a little white box. Memories of the previous Sunday came flooding back to him as he remembered going to the mall with Mimi to pick this out, but now he was wondering why he ever thought he would need something like this.
He tentatively opened the box and stared at the delicate ring set into the box. The ring was clearly made for a female, but he didn't know who exactly he would have bought it for. The stone, at first glance, looked like it could be white, but colors swirled over its smooth surface. It was an opal, the stone of hope, he remembered as Mimi's words from a few days ago. As he gazed into the stone's surface, flashes of his dreams came back to him, willing him to remember whatever it was he had forgotten.
Forever…
A wave of dizziness ran through him as light flashed across his gaze. The ring box slipped from his fingers, snapping shut and rolling underneath his desk as it hit the ground.
Takeru blinked in confusion for just a moment before going back to his task of getting his sweatpants from his drawer. He knew that he wasn't completely well yet and was looking forward to the restful peace that sleep would grant him.