A/N: Prompt for this chapter is mead

Dripping Water
Chapter 8 - bulls-eye (Zenjirou)

Zenjirou wasn't expecting to wait so long for Taiki and Akari at their school gate (since they were supposed to pick him up before going to the kendo club rooms). He also wasn't expecting to have company while he waited.

Though if he was going to have company, it would be either someone from his school, or one of the other Generals. And it was: Aunoma Kiriha, with folded arms and a blue jacket instead of the attire he'd worn in the Digital World. But that made sense. They'd been in the human world for about a week and a half, now. In their own houses, with their own closet full of clothes and he doubted he'd be touching the ones he'd worn to the Digital World again for a while. It was probably the same for the others, as well.

But at least if it had been Nene instead, they could have talked about something. Kiriha just stood there, arms folded and eyes scanning every student that passed… and causing a few to glare back.

Zenjirou sighed. 'You know, I'm waiting for those two as well. They're not going to just walk right past.'

'Two?' Kiriha repeated.

Well, that was something, right?

'Yeah, Taiki and Akari.'

'Hmmph.' He turned away from the crowd of students. 'I don't care about you tagalongs.'

'Just Taiki, then.' They'd been pretty disgruntled over being passed over in the Digital World, but at this point they were used to it. 'But, you know, he's hopeless on his own.'

'Hnn.' Of course, Kiriha wouldn't have seen. Or maybe he had, a little. 'You and your teamwork prattle.'

Okay, Zenjirou thought, not what I meant but that's true too.

They descended into an awkward silence again. Luckily, Akari showed up before it became unbearable.

But just Akari. No Taiki. 'He's finishing his lunch,' Akari explained. 'I swear, he's just gotten slower and slower. Why he can't be like my brothers who just inhale their food?'

'Whatever,' Kiriha grumbled – and Akari did a double take as she noticed him. 'I just want to know what he's hanging around here for.'

'Exams?' Akari blinked like he'd grown an extra head. 'They're like next week. Don't you have them too?'

He scoffed. Apparently wasn't too interested in exams.

'You're not going to be a General in the Digital World forever,' Zenjirou pointed out. 'Count yourself lucky time hadn't passed between leaving and coming back.'

'Lucky,' Kiriha echoed, before scoffing again. 'Two months have passed, and not a single person cares. In any case, since I plan on going back to the Digital World, it's easier to stay off the radar now.'

'Two months?' they echoed. No time at all had passed for them. 'But,' Akari added, 'we left on Marine Day, and it was still Marine Day when we got back.'

'Then you were the lucky ones,' Kiriha muttered.

Neither Zenjirou nor Akari knew quite what to say to that, except an empty apology.

'Where is Taiki?' Kiriha asked, finally. 'And when is he planning on going back to the Digital World?'

'After exams,' Akari replied, folding her arms like Kiriha had folded his. 'And some rest after that, because –'

Zenjirou slapped a hand over her mouth. Kiriha wasn't a friend. He wasn't even an ally half the time. It wouldn't do to blab about personal matters to them – when he, who he hoped was considered a friend, only knew about half the story.

Which kind of wasn't fair, but Taiki was very good at evading the topic and the usually straight-forward Akari hadn't offered any tidbits of her own, so apparently she didn't want to talk about it either.

'I'd rather talk to Taiki.' Kiriha, it seemed, wasn't deterred by Akari – and kudos to him, because many people were. If Taiki couldn't bring himself to say "no", Akari would put her foot down. She didn't do it very often, though. She, too, had a hard time saying no to Taiki, even when she thought it was for his own good.

But that was the thing. They were kids just like him. They disagreed on things. Sometimes, they'd argue. But who could say which one of them was right or wrong and didn't the person themselves usually know what was best for their bodies and their souls?

'It won't hurt,' Zenjirou cut in, before Akari could argue some more – and fair enough, because Kiriha hadn't exactly armoured himself to them. But Taiki probably would want to talk to him too, if he knew. Taiki was just that kind of guy. 'And you know Taiki will want to.'

'True.' She sighed, then turned around and led the way. She threw in a few landmarks too, probably for Kiriha's benefit though he didn't comment on the impromptu tour.

Except she stopped in front of an empty classroom and muttered something.

'Finished and ran off?' Zenjirou asked.

'At the gym, then.' She rubbed her forehead, then grabbed her own bag from a desk by the door and set off again with the boys tagging along behind.

Taiki wasn't at the gym, but at his locker, putting his bag away and changing shoes. 'Akari!' he called cheerfully, seeing them pass. 'And hey, Zenjirou… and Kiriha?'

So he hadn't been expecting Kiriha to suddenly drop in on them, either.

'What are you doing here?' Kiriha snapped. 'The digimon –'

'Time's not passing between our worlds at the moment,' Taiki explained, when Kiriha cut himself abruptly off. 'This is a good chance to regroup, and take care of a few things that had been on our minds.'

'Like exams?' Kiriha still looked like he was having trouble with the concept… and Zenjriou wondered why. No matter what you did, Japanese education was compulsory until high school so they had another three years to go. And most well-paying jobs required a university degree. It was just the way things were. And maybe if Kiriha was still officially missing, he could get away with missing his exams and making them up later, but for them who hadn't been of gallivanting in another world as far as the rest of this one was concerned…

Wait a sec… 'What do you mean nobody is worried?' Zenjirou exclaimed. 'What about your parents?'

'None of your business,' Kiriha muttered.

'And Nene…' Zenjirou mused, not really listening.

Kiriha sighed, annoyed. 'We're both orphans. Happy now?'

'We're sorry,' said Taiki, after an awkward pause. 'We didn't mean to dreg up anything.'

Kiriha snorted at that. 'Well, don't be, because I did.'

'Huh.' They all blinked in confusion at that.

Kiriha simply took something out of his bag and handed it to Taiki, who skimmed it and frowned.

Zenjirou peeked at it too (which he knew he shouldn't, but he was curious and tired of missing some major part of the tale). It was a print-off of something. A newspaper article. Which looked like it had nothing to do with Taiki at all, except then why were his knuckles going white?

Why couldn't they have been sitting down and having afternoon tea together instead? That might have been a more suitable setting. Maybe with some sake… when they were all old enough for it. His father always said serious discussions became a little easier with sake. Though he wasn't sure what this particular article had to do with anything.

"Tragedy for Young Track Team Member: Sano Tatsuya's Dreams Tripped Up."

'Who's Sano Tatsuya?' Zenjirou asked finally. Akari elbowed him – but really, he already knew he should have kept that question to himself.

However… 'I'd like to know that too,' said Kiriha.

'A classmate from elementary school,' Taiki replied quietly, eyes fixed on the paper. 'He wanted to go to the Olympics, and he knew my father is a sports trainer so he'd often want to practice with me. And I was looking at what sport interested me the most at the time and was with the track team then. And so we practiced: early mornings, every morning before school and weekends as well. And then in the evenings. There was barely enough time for homework.' He laughed, and Zenjirou wondered if that was where he'd gotten the hang of doing his homework late at night, with his daylight hours packed full. 'And then…' He waved the paper. 'Well, you read it.'

'Kid turned out to have a degenerative muscular condition that means he's in a wheelchair by ten and will probably be dead by twenty,' Kiriha summarised.

Zenjirou winced. He hadn't realised that was what Duchene muscular dystrophy meant. He supposed Kiriha had looked that up.

'Sped up by all the strenuous exercise we were doing,' Taiki added – and then it clicked, for Zenjirou. What was odd about his voice. What the article meant.

He was blaming himself, still, for something that was out of his control.