A/N: Prompt for this chapter is quiet.

Dripping Water
Chapter 14 - filling in (Zenjirou)

Taiki wound up out of school until exams, and Zenjirou wondered if that was in part to give him more time to relax or if he was really that sick.

He wasn't that sick, Akari clarified. Just that stubborn. Still. Zenjirou would feel better once he saw for himself. He figured he should tie up the loose ends Taiki has left behind first. Training with their school's kendo club had been great for practice and Zenjirou was happy to keep doing that if they let him (and his school doesn't mind either, considering they were knocked out in the preliminaries). The others were too much though, and he was only good at kendo anyway. He'd managed to waffle through a few days – but he wasn't Taiki, and Taiki had clearly been balancing too much on his plate as it was.

But clearly he'd been spending too much time at Taiki and Akari's school. People were starting to greet him in the hallways as he sought out the clubs. People were starting to greet him by name… and that was both gratifying and slightly awkward.

People were also asking him where Taiki was, because apparently he was less frightening than Akari and yet equally recognisable as Taiki's friends. Or maybe Kiriha had been the one to paint a target on his back. The guy was hardly subtle.

Still, it was weird being so well known in a school that wasn't his own. If he hadn't gotten along with his own classmates and club, he might have considered transferring in. But his own school was great, and he liked having a semi-rivalry with Taiki now that he'd gotten to know him better… And maybe a part of him was glad there was a little distance, so Taiki's perchance for helping people didn't see Zenjirou knocked off the ladder much earlier.

For Zenjiroiu, to lose to someone who didn't dedicate their time specifically to kendo meant he only had to train that much harder. But at one point it had felt like an insult, like someone substituting could defeat him so easily, like his own efforts paled in comparison. Now, he knew Taiki wasn't like that. Now, he knew Taiki didn't see things like that. Now, he knew Taiki wasn't as perfect as all that.

Still, that had taken a bit of coming to terms with.

.

The kendo club were happy to see him back. 'Hey! We thought you'd stop coming by with Kudou-kun out sick.'

'Being able to practice with you all is making me stronger too,' Zenjirou explained. 'Really, it's a win-win situation. And I really don't want to lose to Taiki again.'

Though he meant that in part as a jest, he really didn't want to lose to Taiki again. Now how he'd lost in the qualifiers last year. And not to someone like Taiki again, either, because the Digital World was so strange and unlikely a thing that it wouldn't happen twice in a row.

He wondered why he wasn't bitter about not being a General. Maybe it was because of Kiriha. Or maybe it was just that Kiriha (and Nene as well) dug up parts of Taiki that even Akari hadn't known about. And, according to Akari, Zenjirou himself dug out parts of him like that.

Most of their classmates, as far as Zenjirou could tell, didn't. Maybe that was why it was Akari and Zenjirou who'd, by some coincidence or twist of fate, wound up in the Digital World with him.

'Can't really help you with beating Kudou-kun,' the captain shrugged. 'It's a pity he doesn't stick with one club. His father's a sport's trainer, you know, and Kudou-kun's got a great head for strategy and great instincts too. He'd be awesome no matter what sports he decided to stick with… but he just doesn't stick with any.'

'They don't make him happy,' he shrugged. 'There's no point dedicating yourself to one sport unless you love that sport, right?'

There were mixed reactions to that. Some did kendo because they wanted to become stronger. Some did it as a form of self-defence (which may or may not amount to the same thing). Some did it because they really wanted to make it to the top. Some were having second thoughts with looming entrance exams.

'I mean…' He quickly backpedalled. 'Not that it's necessarily what you're going to do with the rest of your life, but being in a club's a commitment and you're here because, for whatever reason, you want to be. Here, specifically, as opposed to any other sport… or even any non-sport club, or the "go-home" club…'

The captain laughed. 'We got you. Granted, there's always the odd person following in the footsteps of their older sibling or parent who was an alumni, or something of the sort. But for the most part there's something about kendo that's attracted us and it's not the same for Kudou-san. We are grateful for his assistance, though. And in bringing you here as a part of that.'

'I'm grateful too,' Zenjirou grinned, 'though I was pretty pissed off when I first realised Taiki wasn't a hard-core kendo practitioner and had still managed to knock me on my butt.'

Taiki was just that sort of complicated person that needed multiple views to pierce him together.

.

'Zenjirou-kun?'

The captain's voice stopped Zenjirou on his way out. The rest of the club members trickled past them, as though they sensed it wasn't a conversation for them.

And the captain waited until they were all gone before speaking again. 'If you don't mind me asking… how did you become such good friends with Kudou-kun?'

'Uhh…' began Zenjirou ineloquently, because how was he supposed to explain the Digital World? 'Coincidence,' he said finally. 'Or fate. I was just walking around stewing over my defeat and Taiki was just there, on the banks of the river with a girl like he was on a date.'

Akari was going to flatten him if she ever heard him say that, though.

'Uhh, don't tell Akari about that though.'

The captain laughed. 'Don't worry. We all know not to get on her bad side. And we captains usually catch the worst of her tirades, considering we're the ones with the responsibility to cut practice short when our team can't keep up.'

'Taiki's not exactly part of your team, though.'

'No…' the captain agreed. 'And therein is the problem. He moves from one thing to the next, sometimes multiple things in a day, and I don't think even Hinomoto-kun has a good understanding of Kudou-kun's limits. And Kudou-kun certainly doesn't. They try, but that's honestly not a two-person load.'

'That's Taiki for you,' Zenjirou shrugged. 'Taking on the weight of the world.' And that was true in a more literal sense than the captain realised. 'But carrying that load was bound to break his back. Luckily he found the right sort of people before that happened, I think.' And then, realilsing he'd stuck his foot in his mouth again, he hurriedly amended: 'Not that there's a wrong sort of person, but you know how two people just click the right way… or the wrong way, as it is.'

'…yeah?' The captain blinked. 'You two don't strike me as having clicked the wrong way though.'

'Not us.' And as luck would have it, Kiriha was walking up to them. 'That'd be those two.'

The captain looked down the hall. 'The punk kid?'

Zenjirou coughed to hide his laughter. But it was true enough, especially since Kiriha had started dressing in that dark blue jacket and fingerless gloves of it. 'Yeah, that's Aunoma Kiriha. And don't ask me how they met. I don't actually know. Still, if you want to know what sort of people just run Taiki the wrong way, he's it.'

'Really,' said the captain, intrigued. 'How is he with kendo?'

'You know… I have no idea.'

.

Kiriha was, actually, bad at kendo but that seemed more lack of experience and muscle strength than poor instincts or ability. He certainly had the fighting instincts to lead one of the largest armies in the Digital World. As far as Zenjirou knew, he had more Code Crown pieces than Xros Heart did… if only because they prioritised the safety of their zones than collecting pieces. It didn't matter in the end, Shoutmon explained. The major players would eventually fight for the crown and the winner would take all, so as far as Code Crown fragments go they only needed one to be in the running. But free Code Crown pieces meant war would inevitably come to their doorstep, and so they fought for the zones they found themselves in, and the friends they made (or the digimon already had) along the way.

Taiki's army was power and friendship and good tactics. Kiriha's was power and good tactics and a ruthlessness that Xros Heart lacked. It wasn't necessarily wrong, in a war, but having become friends with so many digimon, Zenjirou agreed with Taiki's approach: so long as they could fight a war with minimal casualties, they should. After all, what sort of happy utopia would Shoutmon create on a land where the only thing left was blood?

Of course, if they ever found a time their compassion would cost them, it'd probably already be too late.

'Aren't we hardened war veterans?' he snorted. Luckily, the captain didn't hear him. Kiriha did, but he was panting too hard to give any response. He had stubbornness in spades as well. Another reason why he and Taiki had the sort of relationship they did.

'I came looking for Taiki, not a sparring match,' he grumbled afterwards, after the captain had left.

Zenjirou shrugged. 'You walked right into the opportunity. We were just talking about Taiki and digging him out.'

'Digging him out,' Kiriha repeated. 'Guess you could put it like that. Plastic baby shovels versus pitch-forks and pick axes… and kendo swords apparently.'

'Well, it wouldn't have happened without you.' Zenjirou grinned. 'Taiki may not have liked it much, but even Akari says she's seen more sides to Taiki in the Digital World than she had after years of knowing him.'

'It's hard to swallow,' Kiriha grumbled, 'that someone can be that strong without being wholly committed to the cause.'

'Tell me about it.' And Zenjirou knew exactly what Kiriha meant by that. It was what had bitten at him as well. 'But it's the Digital World and the people and diigmon he's met there that's dug all that up too, I think. He'll find his own dream eventually. I doubt he'll change too much otherwise, though. It's just the intentions behind them.'

'Intentions make a lot of difference,' Kiriha muttered. 'Plastic love is pretty obvious, you know. And not a pleasant thing.'

'I don't know,' Zenjirou admitted. And he hoped there was nothing akin to pity in his tone because Kiriha would skin him alive.

Or maybe he wouldn't. He only shrugged again. 'That's why I wanted power. At least then I wouldn't have to depend on others: their authority, their plastic love while they plot to steal my rights from out from under my feet. In the Digital World, I wasn't bound by laws of adulthood and inheritance and I wouldn't have to sit back and watch my extended family, my so called guardians, take what my parents had left me and pay none of it back.'

'They taught you how to fight a war, then.' Zenjirou winced as soon as the words were out of his mouth, but they were out by then. Too late to take back.

Kiriha snorted at that. 'They did, didn't they? I used to be a crybaby before that, if you can believe it.'

The hallway seemed remarkably long… or maybe it was because the two of them were having a normal conversation for the first time. Perhaps it was because there was no Taiki and therefore no quarrel between Generals. Or perhaps Taiki and Kiriha would always quarrel until they found the middle ground in their rivalry.

'Losses build character,' Zenjirou offered. 'But I think everyone was a crybaby at some point. A baby that doesn't cry is just weird.'

'If that's how you want to look at it…' Kiriha shrugged. 'Why do you follow Taiki around, anyway?'

'He grows on you,' Zenjirou grinned. 'Trust me, I was plenty mad the second time I met him. The first was when he beat me in a regional kendo match, by the way. And he's not part of the kendo team.'

'Of course he isn't,' Kiriha sighed. 'That guy's like a maid.'

'A maid, huh…' He could kind of see that. 'But he genuinely wants to help people, and it's not like he doesn't have his priorities straight. There are people he cares for beyond others, digimon he cares for beyond others, worlds he wants to save… Just because he doesn't have a solid dream right now, doesn't mean he won't find one when he's not scared to start looking.'

'He needs to get un-scared first,' Kiriha grumbled. 'That's kind of my problem with him.'

'Nah, your problem with him is he kicks your butt.' And Zenjirou was surprised he was still standing after all the times he'd put his foot in his mouth that day. 'Then again, you learn more about yourself in the process, even if you don't necessarily like it at the time. I think… just give him a bit more time to sort out his feelings, and the two of you will be great friends.'

'I'm not exactly looking for friends,' Kiriha said.

'You're awfully chatty, then.'

'Shut up.'

But Zenjirou thought that was more awkwardness, or maybe embarrassment, than anything else.

Kiriha really had mellowed out over the time they'd known him. And Taiki wasn't as perfect as he'd initially seemed. It just took their interactions with others to see that.

And Zenjirou had grown after meeting both of them – and Akari – as well.

He was glad he'd met them, and gone to the Digital World. He didn't even mind not being a General because he'd gotten a chance, and it wasn't like he was extra baggage without a Xros Loader.

Huh, he'd already decided, apparently. And for all of Akari's complaints and avoidances of the topic, he was sure she'd decided too. Whether for her own reasons or Taiki's, she wasn't going to let him leave without her. They'd be going back, once exams were over and done with. And they'd be setting the digital world free.

He wouldn't say no to a partner if the opportunity ever came up, though.