Edited 4/30/2021

Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon or the song, Run For Your Life, by the Beatles.

TW: Gun Violence

"Well you know that I'm a wicked guy

And I was born with a jealous mind

and I can't spend my whole life

Trying just to make you toe the line."

There was a time that I trusted my intuition as fact. I'd have a drop in my stomach, a feeling in my chest, a scent, or deja vu, and I just seemed to know things I shouldn't.

The day everyone met at summer camp I was home sick with a high fever. I'd dreamed of Tai and the others, and not just Sora, who I knew, but all the rest. I saw them running through a lush forest, lost, and scared, yet brave, and courageous. I woke up worried but knew deep down that my brother would be okay. I remember focusing on the boys with the light hair, I'd never met anyone with hair so naturally blonde before, I thought they must be angels who would protect my brother from harm.

When I was thirteen I woke up one morning to the smell of my grandmother's perfume. It surrounded me with its heavy musk, notes of vanilla, patchouli, and sandalwood. Tai walked into the room several minutes later, his face grim, I looked at him with tears in my eyes and asked if our grandmother had passed. She hadn't been sick, it was just age, just her time, but he didn't have to tell me, I knew.

At sixteen I'd been at rehearsal for a school play when I'd collapsed with pain in my ankle, a sharp jab that went away as quickly as it came on. I got up and started running for the gym, when I barged through the doors into the basketball practice I saw the team huddled around the floor, surrounding TK who'd been tripped. He dislocated his ankle and was on crutches for six weeks.

The night my grandfather passed I dreamed of him and my grandmother, when they were young together, at a festival. She wore a pale, pink, yukata, smiling so brightly, and him shy and unsure. That morning I woke to the smell of his cigar smoke knowing, just like with her, that he was already gone, but at peace because they were finally together again.

The feelings in my chest, that I'd trusted so much to guide me as an adolescent, had been suffocated and extinguished over the past four years.

"You seem distracted today."

I stopped picking my nails and looked up at Christine. She was in her late thirties, average height, with mousey brown hair and bright blue eyes. She smiled warmly at me, inviting me to say something, anything, during our session today. It had been about a month since the show and since Michael's call. I started therapy right before that night and had been coming twice a week since then. I'd been pretty open with her so far but today was different.

"I woke up feeling weird," I shrugged. "I'm not really sure. It's probably just paranoia."

I was trying to reason with my intuition, trying to do what I'd done over the past several years and talk myself out of what I already knew, that something was coming. I'd been having this dream the past few nights, sticky-looking orange hair like it was stained the color. I woke up each night unsettled, remembering nothing but the hair. I really wanted to believe it was just a dream.

After I started seeing Michael, things changed, and my instincts about people never seemed right. I walked into situations I would have run from in the past. I could never read him, or who he would become as the days changed. Eventually, I stopped tuning in, I stopped listening to my heart and stopped trusting myself.

Her voice guided me back to the present, "That's a valid feeling, all things considered."

Of course, it was. Michael hadn't been arrested yet, and there was a warrant out for him, but after the show, he disappeared. I spent every day since then looking over my shoulder.

"How much longer is your brother going to be here?" She moved to a more comfortable subject, someone she knew I could talk about, a solvable problem.

"He's leaving at the end of the week," I was sad to see him go, having him here had been a huge source of comfort. Davis had gone back about a week after the show, while Tai decided to stay longer, hoping to still be here when Michael was caught.

"How are you feeling about the status of your relationship with him, do you feel good about where you are?"

After Michael, my parents, and TK, Tai had been the largest focus of our sessions.

"He feels bad leaving right now, and I can tell it's straining him. So, things have been a little more tense than I'd like before he goes, but that part of it can't really be helped. Besides that, I think we are good, we've talked through everything else. I'm lucky we were always able to communicate so well, even after all our time apart, it's like we picked up where we left off."

"Did you pick a date to go back and visit?"

Go back, the thing she'd been encouraging me to do since session two. Going back home was part of my "recovery plan." Seeing my family again, trying to make amends with all the friends I'd left behind, and trying to make amends with myself. I talked with everyone about it, and as a group, we decided to all travel back for the holidays this year. I couldn't remember the last time we'd all been together for them, because of how much longer Matt had been in the States, it was maybe close to six years. It was an easy decision for everyone once we started talking about it.

I didn't realize how much better I'd feel knowing I would see Tai so soon again. After talking through our relationship, and what had changed since leaving, there was a part of me that felt grateful for our time apart. I never thought I could survive in this world without him, he was my protector, my best friend, and the person I could rely on for anything. Maybe If I never left I'd still feel like I needed him, maybe I'd still be basing all my biggest decisions on what he'd think. Our relationship felt different now though, I felt like an equal, someone who had experienced a dark part of the world and survived. I didn't feel like his naive little sister anymore.

Therapy hadn't been all shiny though, and some days I left feeling worse than when I walked in. Some days, especially ones where we discussed the miscarriage or the abuse, I'd go home and be low, laying in the bedroom in the dark for a long time. Replaying our conversations over, and over, again, while seeing the scenes play out in my head. Once I'd processed it though I did start to feel better. I'd see that things weren't my fault, that certain reactions were warranted, and that I didn't need to feel guilty forever. So, I'd take the initial pain, or crazy, I felt after therapy if it meant I'd work through the sludge in my head and gain clarity back into my life.

When I left that day, there was a cloud that continued to hang over my head, even though we hadn't gone into anything extremely serious. I walked out into the late summer heat feeling almost dazed. I wished I had someone come with me today, normally TK, Sora, or Tai had been coming, and waiting, so I didn't have to walk alone, but today our session had been earlier than usual and I didn't want to wake anyone.

It was just around nine in the morning now and the city was still bustling with commuters. I thought about stopping and grabbing breakfast. I rushed out so quick I hadn't even eaten anything. I wondered if that had to do with the way I felt, of course, I'd feel off if I didn't eat.

I was about a block away from the subway when I felt his hand loop around my waist and something hard pushed into my back.

"Walk," Michael's voice was low, as he pushed the object under my shirt, I could feel the metal against my skin. He put his mouth against my ear and I felt the heat from his breath on my skin, I felt sick, bile crept up into my throat, but I swallowed it back. I wanted to scream or beg for help from the people pushing past us, but I felt completely paralyzed. With a simple pull of the trigger, he could kill me right here. So I walked.

He said nothing else as he pushed us through the streets, and around corners, until the commuters thinned out and the buildings looked less, and less, welcoming. He guided me towards what, I assumed, must have been an abandoned warehouse. It was a three-story, brick, building that took up half of the street, windows had been smashed on some of the upper stories, and where a sign once hung was just a blank, metal, plate.

He looked behind him and then took us through a door and into a large empty space. Once we were inside he pushed me towards the floor. I hit the concrete, and dust that had long sat untouched went into my lungs. I coughed and tried to ignore the pain in my hands, and knees, from the fall. I turned and pushed myself further back trying to create more distance between us. I looked around the room trying to find another exit. I saw two separate hallways, both dark, but no other obvious way out. There was dimmed light coming in through thick, distorted, windows.

He started pacing back and forth while mumbling under his breath. I'd never seen him look so disheveled. His hair was sticking out as if he just woke up when it was usually carefully placed. His eyes were bloodshot and he had dark purple circles under them, clearly showing his lack of sleep. His face, normally clean-shaven, was covered in stubble, he rubbed his hand over his jaw before focusing on me.

I stood, slowly. "People will be looking for me," my voice was calm, calmer than I thought possible for the current situation.

"Let them come. I can take care of all of you at once," his hands flew in the air, the gun pointed this way, and that, as it was held lazily in his hand.

"Michael, just let me go. I won't tell anyone I saw you," I put my hands up in front of me, in a show of surrender, thinking maybe I could still reason with him.

He tapped the gun against his head, "You think I'm stupid," He was mocking me, and trying to scare me.

It was working.

His eyes were wild and dark, his pupils were so dilated I wondered if he was on drugs.

I thought about my brother, how I'd just gotten him back, and my parents who I hadn't even fully mended things with. I thought about the friends who I was desperate to apologize to, about Sora and Matt, who'd taken care of me like family over the past several months. Then TK, I saw his face in my mind wanting to imprint it there, his crystal blue eyes, sweet smile, and golden hair.

I just got my life back. I wasn't ready to lose it. I wasn't ready to let go.

"What did you think Kari? You were just going to tarnish my name and walk away as if nothing happened?" He shook the gun at me, his finger stayed off the trigger, it was the only thing my eyes could focus on.

"I don't think I'm coming out unscathed considering what got us to this point."

"Watch your mouth," He strode towards me, pushing me against a wall I'd backed up into, putting the gun against my face, "I didn't ask for your fucking input."

My breath hitched, and I felt the cold steel against my skin, as I stared down at the barrel.

He pushed off of me and started pacing, "You all think you're so goddamn smart, and special, the chosen ones."

"We didn't ask for it-" I tried to respond but he cut me off.

"I didn't tell you to talk!" He edged closer, but backed up again, his footprints erasing the dust from the floor.

He stopped dead in his tracks and looked toward me again with those wild eyes. "If you open up a portal I'll let you go."

I felt my blood run cold, he had lost his mind, he knew I couldn't do that. "What are you talking about?"

"Don't play stupid Kari, you know what I'm talking about. I'll go there. I'll take what always should have been mine."

"You-you know that's not possible."

"Oh, you all said that, but it's a lie. I know you always kept the rest of us away!"

He was delusional. He had to be.

"Was that why you picked me?" I tried to keep my voice strong but I was wavering.

"Why else would I have spent so long on you?" I flinched, even after everything it was still painful to hear, that I was just a tool. "Come on, you know you aren't even my type. I'd have taken Mimi if she had half of your power, but she's nowhere near as useful as you should have been."

"Useful?"

He strode towards me again, "Light, innocence, and purity." He pushed against me and let his fingers trace against my face. "Corrupting you should have been the solution. I'd cause pain to create destruction. It should have been enough!" He slammed his fist against the wall, so close to my head, I thought he was going to hit me.

"It was easy, watching you suffer because you're so pathetic. Watching you beg for me to stop and watching your light dim. I could see it, ya know. Like an aura around you, slowly start to die out. I should have just extinguished the flame earlier."

I shook my head, "I don't glow. I don't shine. I'm just a person!" I felt tears prick my eyes as I screamed back at him. I fought against them, not wanting him to see my fear.

He stepped back, pointing the gun at me again. "LIAR! You don't deserve the power. You don't even see it. It's wasted on you."

"I don't understand what you think you'll find there. I don't know what you thought I'd open up."

"That's why you're bunch was always so stupid." He backed away, pacing again. "You had a world at your fingertips and you did nothing with it! Except for that one guy who took over for a while, until he bitched out. If you take that world you'll eventually get this one."

"We stopped everyone from doing exactly that? You think if you found a way in we wouldn't stop you too?"

"So you do have a way in!"

"No, I said if you found one."

"More Lies!" He pointed the gun at me again, for the first time with his finger near the trigger, and I thought my heart would stop at that moment. No one was coming and no one could save me. This was it, after everything I'd faced in life, it would be a man with a gun that took me away.

Before that happened though, I needed to know, "Why Trevor's sister?"

A wicked smile crossed his face, "She was pissing me off, so I hit her. She was going to press charges, so I pushed her. She was nothing."

He said it as nonchalantly as someone giving you their grocery list. I felt chills run down my arms and tears, silently, fell from my eyes.

"Last chance Kari, help me get in, and maybe we can take it together," he moved closer to me.

I was shaking my head, "There isn't a way."

I'd never get to go home, never get to see my family all together again, and I'd never get to see TK again.

"So if you won't let me in, maybe destroying you, putting out the flame, maybe that's the way."

I closed my eyes and thought of TK.

I heard a shot, and then there was nothing.

I woke up to an empty bed, not unlike other days, because she was always the first one up, but it felt different today. There was a note saying she would be back just after nine in the morning, and it was a little after eight-thirty now. I rolled out of bed and threw on a pair of gym shorts, and a black t-shirt I had laying on the floor, before heading out into the apartment.

The last month had been a bit of a whirlwind. The first week was paralyzing. We waited, hoping that Michael would be caught, but he was nowhere to be found. I'd lost it after the phone call. Kari had finally fallen asleep from pure exhaustion, but I'd been wired, and pacing around the apartment, when Matt, Tai, Davis, and Sora had finally made it back. They stayed out, wanting to give us some time, and in all the chaos I realized I hadn't even called any of them. I started rambling, nonsense I'm sure. I don't remember what I was saying, just that my voice was shaking as much as my body was.

I think someone had been saying my name. Finally, I felt my brother's hands gripping my arms, he shook me a bit. He got me to sit down and explain everything. For the first time in years, I saw real fear cross Tai's face. It was quick before it moved to rage, and then it was him then that starting pacing. Sora tried to convince the two of us that the police would take care of it, but even Matt was looking ready for blood. Davis, strangely, stayed back. For the first time, he looked afraid to jump into a situation that he wasn't directly part of. At the end of the day, we knew we were dealing with a murderer, and it changed everything.

Davis, apologetically, left soon after, needing to get back to Japan and to a life he was trying to build there. Tai would be leaving soon as well, he'd been getting all his travel plans in order over the past few days. We started making plans to go home for the holidays, and it felt good to know we'd see our friends again soon. I don't know how my brother and Kari stayed away so long. I'd only been gone a few months and truly missed each and every one of them.

I heard Tai in the bathroom so I headed into the kitchen. I made breakfast, cleaned the dishes, and started writing at the kitchen counter before he emerged from the bathroom. He was still toweling off his hair from the shower as he glanced at the clock on the wall.

"She's not back yet?" I looked at the clock, it read nine-fifteen. She should have been walking through the door any minute.

I picked up my phone and called her but it went straight to voicemail, "She puts in on 'do not disturb' when she's in sessions."

He looked weary, "She'd have been done by now."

"We'd know if something was wrong," I reasoned, but there was a feeling eating away at me that made me second guess myself.

"Would we?" He walked over to his bag, digging through until he found a shirt, and tugged it over his head. He picked up his phone, "No messages, either."

Suddenly my phone started ringing. I looked down feeling a lightness assuming it was her, but it was immediately crushed by the weight of the number attached.

There are certain moments you never forget in your life. One was the day I understood the weight of my parent's divorce and the knowledge that my brother was leaving me too. One was the moment I met Kari, and another was the day she disappeared.

This moment, this call, and the voice talking on the other end, this would be the worst.