#(at the same time Taichi probably has enough experience by now he can handle a basic SMARTPHONE but if it's an UPGRADED SMARTPHONE DIGIVICE?

[lovinga3characters]

My, I do be loving all these fictional characters and the things you write for them :3c (the ABO hc clotheslined me but I've never felt better) I hope it's not too weird to ask but would you mind to write something about what would the Autumn troupe be like if they ever bottomed for their partner? Thanks in advance if you decide to do

Fuck YESSSSSS! 🙏👏🙌 I just want you to know that I was so hype when I saw this is my inbox!! Thank you for your support on my A/B/O Headcanons, here’s that Bottom Autumn shit you’ve been waiting for! 😝

Warnings: EXTREMELY FILTHY NSFW, penetration/pegging, kinks, hot boys

(I’ll be making these as in what they think about it, what goes down, and what follows after 😏)

Bottom Autumn 🍁 Headcanons

Banri 🍂

Just a warning: he’s going to immediately refuse your suggestion, no way ANYONE or ANYTHING is going near his ass 😤

Then he thinks about it... and he thinks about it... until the idea just doesn’t leave his mind

The two of you have fooled around early on in your relationship (or maybe even before), so Banri’s experimented with quite a few kinks

Each time sparked a new curiosity in himself and this time was no different, and he also saw it as a challenge, he could totally take it!

And so Banri secretly prepares a big surprise for you, his butt himself 😙

Step 1: he has to practice the game, which shouldn’t be too hard since he’s pretty much perfect at everything

The first time he tried to finger/put a toy in himself, Banri’s face was extremely red and his body was flaring with heat, it was sorta uncomfortable

“This is... hng... not that bad but I don’t see how- ohhh... shit- shit!”

Obviously, he gets into a good rhythm quickly and, as he gets closer to cumming, he finds it harder and harder to stop himself from sinking into his bedsheets

Step 2: master the game, which basically means he continued to masturbate like that for a while, somewhat enjoying struggle to keep his voice down every time

Because he’s just so fucking perfect, he can take a lot with some practice, eventually learning how to ride on a toy just fine

Though the original goal was to get used to it so that way when you did it, the feeling wouldn’t affect him, Banri hates to admit that the restlessness of wanting you doesn’t leave

Step 3: play the game, it’s show time 🤩

He’s grinning really wide when he makes you lay on top of the bed, that’s immediately suspicious

“Relax, sugar, and you can watch me feel good, just like you wanted... ahahh!”

Your jaw dropped as you watched him take off his underwear and hop onto your lap, reaching behind his back to grab a bottle of lube (where did that even come from-?!)

His smug expression at your aroused shock faltered as he sunk down onto the member, a bright flush returning to his face and chest

It felt different to Banri... maybe it was the fact that you were there, he tried not to think about it as he started moving

Okay, a big miscalculation on his part was your movement, any time you bucked your hips up he had to grit his teeth in order to not make a loud noise

You noticed and tried to lift yourself higher, harder, Banri visible shivered, glaring at you with hazy eyes, those eyes that either said “Don’t you dare” or “I dare you” 👀

So, you pushed him over, grunting with effort, and managed to move forward inside of him even more

Banri protested, of course, despite the long whine that was brought out when you ground against that same hot spot he liked

What truly gets him is when if you grab his hair while fucking him, Banri loves feeling the tugs in time with your trusts

“Ughn- yeah! Fuck... harder, do me harder... shut up! I’m ah- hah... saying this for your benefit-!”

He demands that you be rougher with him, saying that he could handle anything you did to him, no matter what

Banri’s moans are quieter than expected but it’s still fairly loud, he gets really riled up the faster you go

By the time he cums, he’s gasping and he actually moans when he releases, you’ve only ever heard him growl out an orgasm

If you want to piss him off (if you can), cum inside him, it turns him on and he hates it 🙂

Banri recovers quickly so even after you’ve banged him into the mattress, he’ll be fine, much to your frustration (note to self: go harder next time)

“Hahh... ‘m fine, just don’t think I’ll always let you top me, babe! F-Fuck... wanna go again?”

Fav positions: reverse cowgirl (he likes to ride you/be in control and getting his hair pulled so it’s a win-win), doggy style (similar reasons, he also gets a little insecure when you look at his face too much), and pinball wizard (Banri likes to do this position to you a lot so why not reverse it, also you can tie his hands behind him 😇)

Juza 🍰

He stares blankly at you for a couple of seconds, looks down, looks back up at you, then he wrinkles his eyebrows in confusion, as if asking “how?” 😶

But for real, Juza doesn’t understand how you’re going to manage that, he’s just really... big

You quickly reassure him that you can manage, and you begin explaining the process, and what you want to do, he goes really red with shock and embarrassment

He doesn’t disagree though, just shifts awkwardly in place before replying

“Would that... really feel good? Cause if you wanna, I don’t mind but... I dunno how- I’ve never uh-“

The actual idea doesn’t put him off surprisingly, he just cannot grasp the concept

Luckily you’re more than happy to demonstrate 🤗

Even though the two of you have been dating for quite a long time, although it was balanced who started the sexy times, it was always you who initiated anything kinky

After taking a bath, you instructed him to lay down on his stomach and he gulped as he slid off his undergarments

Smirking slightly, you reassured him that you would be gentle as you patted his butt, Juza only snorted in amusement

He flinched at how cold the lube was as you rubbed your finger over his entrance, he was as tight as you expected

You couldn’t see his face but by the time you worked two fingers, the back of his neck and ears were flushed and his breathing was staggered

Juza gasps when you decide to push a little harder, adding another to make him stretch, the action makes him jump

It’s pretty sexy to watch him squirm and his back muscles flex with effort to hold still, though he doesn’t make much noise

“Hmm... enough, ya don’t hafta mhg- be so careful. Just go already.”

As you pull out your fingers out, his body bucks backwards, then freezes, obviously not intending to do that

You go in slowly (after adding more lube, of course), and you heard him grunt as he grit his teeth together

Despite his insistence that it doesn’t hurt him, you still go gently, which he secretly appreciates upon feeling how burning it is 😅

Juza’s a pretty strong guy, so even having something up his ass doesn’t fold him completely

... Except for one thing, when you steady yourself by grabbing the back of his neck

It makes him feel breathless, especially when you start fucking him harder, squeezing the sensitive spot, his shoulders visibly shuddering

Once you get into a rhythm, Juza’s practically panting into his arm/pillow, eyes squeezing shut in flusteredness when a quiet moan escapes

“... Ghnn- hah! Hhhmn- fuck- my head’s feelin’ all... fuzzyyy...”

He’s starting to think that doing this kind of thing was harder then fighting people because the longer it goes on, the less he can handle the heat-

If you dirty talk or praise him, it doesn’t help 😉

You’re not really in the position to touch his cock, so he’s settled for rubbing it against his bedsheets, an action that gets increasingly desperate as he reaches closer to the edge

Juza’s moan just tumbles out of him when he cums, it’s deep and quick, he covered it at the last second by biting his hand 👌

He’s sweaty and a strange, warm sense of relief fills his chest as you pull out of him and kiss were you left small bruises

You’ll probably have to wipe him down because Juza can’t even look at you without getting frazzled... and just a little bit turned on again

“Th-Thanks... mmmm... it felt- well, it’s really good. I liked it, so... if you wanna, I’m tough so I can handle more...”

Fav positions: doggy style (particularly when he’s fully lying on his stomach, with either you grabbing his neck or putting his hands behind his back), scoop me up (you’re basically spooning him while being inside him, bonus access to your body heat and to biting his neck), and the chairmen (it’s less stressful than riding and you can touch Juza’s boobs pecs, much to his grumpy annoyance)

Taichi 🐶

You better not catch him while he’s drinking something because Taichi will have the most genuine spit-take you’ll ever see in your life

His jaw drops and he’ll whip around from what he’s doing to look at you like you’ve just stripped naked in public 😳

You want to what?! With his what?! That’s way too kinky for him and he’s never even done that- don’t you need to prepare a lot for stuff l-like that?!

“I mean, I wanna make you happy in that way too but- but- but that’s really a lot!”

He calms down after a while when you tell him that he really doesn’t have to if he’s so opposed to it, it’s just something you’ve thought about

Taichi doesn’t want to disappoint you, so if you explain exactly what you want to do, he’ll warm up to the idea (literally and figuratively)

The two of you have been dating for a long time now and though he does have some fetishes, Taichi is more of a giver by nature and gets embarrassed when you do things to him

Later, you ask him to lay back on the bed and spread his legs, he obeys after some hesitation, almost immediately covering his face with a pillow despite your coaxing

No matter, you’ll make him show his face soon enough anyway 😉

You slowly pulled down his undergarments, rubbing his stomach and thighs in reassurance when Taichi flinches

By the time you actually got to the prepping part, Taichi’s already pretty hard because you decided to stroke him at the same time so he doesn’t feel that much pain

To no ones’ surprise, he’s sensitive, his hips jumping up unintentionally as you move your fingers inside him with lube

His hole squeezes around your digits and you have to roughly wiggle to get anywhere, much to Taichi’s protests, who was already struggling to maintain composure as it is

When you finally get three in, his body was chasing yours, already close to cumming despite the painful sensation

It honestly looked like his face was going to explode based on how red and sweaty it was, breathing like he was running a marathon

“Ah- HAH! Don’t pull it out so suddenly... I-I can take more! Ngh... please?”

His face looked so cute, his eyes pleading, but the way his toned body arched against yours was undeniably sexy 😍

You tell him as much as you enter inside, slowly of course, and Taichi let’s out a high-pitched squeak in shock

His arms wrap around your shoulders/back, as if to ground him against the foreign sensation while the rest of him wanted to fly away

Giving him praise along with sweet nothings and dirty promises is really important, it arouses him but it also distracts him from the uncomfortable moments

Taichi whines and squeezes you tightly when you thrust more, pulling in and out of his ass carefully as he tried (and failed) to hold in his cries

By the time he’s close to finishing, Taichi is so loud and he is jumping up to meet your member in time while it hits that sweet spot inside

“Yes- yes- YES! More... oh g-goddd babe, please more- AH! IT’S SO GOOD...!”

This man wails and begs you to keep going, he’s really feeling hot now and encourages you with desperate pleas and breathless praise

Taichi’s nails might dig into your shoulders or create marks on your back (not that you really mind), a new kind of bright red on your skin that he’s never given you

Your hand could’ve stroked his wet cock, just a little, and he would’ve been a goner, cumming with a deafening yelp

Panting, Taichi is boneless against the bed, looking like he’s having an out-of-body experience, only reacting when you started to wipe the drool that leaked onto his chin from his lips

Please give kisses and aftercare thank you, he’s a good boy 🐶

He’s voice his hoarse but giggly as he keeps his body wrapped close to yours, dazed from his intense orgasm

“Heh-heheheh... ah- that was awesome! Felt really hot, I can’t wait to have more~! I-I can, right?”

Fav positions: missionary (the classic, this works because you can see his face and he can cling to you easily), the om (it’s extremely intimate which Taichi likes, it’s also easier to ride), and show and tell (basically means touching yourself while really close to your partner, he does this as a top but it’s fascinating to watch him do it with his butt, gets puppy embarrassed)

Omi 🐺

He’s surprised, that’s for sure, but not as surprised as you are when you find out that he’s... actually tried it before 😱?!

Omi blushes and says that when he was a part of his motorcycle gang, sometimes his buddies would offer some... different kinds of riding as a form of stress relief

He’s quick to say that it’s all in the past and he didn’t even do it that often anyways...

You’d have to stay firm in your convictions in order for him to agree, as it’s just slightly humiliating for him-

“Well, uh, if my baby is sure of what they want, I wouldn’t mind trying something new tonight.”

But, of course, Omi eventually agrees 😈

After preparing the proper supplies (with him double checking out of caution), you laid back onto the bed per his request as he straddled himself on top of you

He was already fully undressed, and the daring position allowed you to gawk at his sexy, muscled body in all of its glory, your hand instinctively reaching up to brush against his face in reassurance

Omi leaned into your touch, only pulling away to grab the bottle of lube to lace it onto his own fingers

You watched in awe as he leaned back with one hand, and fingered himself slowly with the other

He grunted with effort, clearly uncomfortable and not quite used to the stretch but continuing none the less, for your own benefit, he assured himself

Determined to not let you down, Omi pushed another inside, his strong fingers having no trouble doing so, though his eyes closed shut at the pain

You took some pity on the poor man and made a move for his cock, which was barely half-hard, making your lover take a sharp breath as you stroked it

With your combined determination, Omi eventually relaxed considerably, moving three fingers and groaning your name as you teased his arousal

“Are... you having fun down there? I- mmgh- I feel like I’m not quite reaching something. Let’s get to it...!”

He sat up completely and sighed as he slipped his digits out, Omi bit his lip as you lifted your member up to his hole

Swiftly but careful, your boyfriend sunk his body down, legs spread open, hands resting on your chest momentarily (nearly crushing you in the process)

After a few minutes, you pat his butt as if he was a horse that needed to ‘giddyup’, making him laugh as his eyes glittered seductively 😋

Omi then proceeded to fuck himself rather ungentlemanly, his own dick slapping harshly against his abs at every bounce

At first for Omi, it didn’t feel that different from his hand, just the thickness made him slightly more sensitive

He leaned back a little bit to adjust, and suddenly his nerves were electrocuted with pleasure, you were reaching deeper than he could on his own and-

“Ohhhh- hah... ugh, right there. I found it just- god this is a lot to- HHn- process...!”

Omi’s body was dripping with sweat as his face and neck flushed red, gruff moans and pants stumbling out of his open mouth

It’s probably best to use your hands to help out his now very hard cock, it looked as ready to burst as the rest of his body did

His thick, scratched thighs shook heavily as he slammed his ass on top of you over and over again upon nearing his climax

Omi is praising your own dazed expression as he grits his teeth to contain the sounds of his orgasm, only throaty growls escaping

While he pants and returns to his senses, you can only stare and gulp at the dripping cum on his pecs and his honeyed expression

He speaks as he leans down for a kiss, finally arising from your lap-

“You made me feel so hot, like a wildfire... mmm- spreading. Hrmph... thanks. For next time, did you want to touch me more~?”

Fav positions: cowgirl (is used to this pace the most and it’s a bonus for you cause it’s nice to watch 😉), CAT position (aka. the Coital Alignment Technique, its close and intimate, which he likes), and the stickman (basically you bend him over a sofa or table with his hands on his thighs, perfect for the kitchen, also easy to get rough with)

Sakyo 💴

You honestly thought you were going to fucking die on the spot from the sheer iciness of the glare Sakyo gave you

Like, you wish to top him, but are willing to fight him to the death for it? Because that’s the only way he’s budging 😠

The thought honestly makes him so embarrassed he wants to die

The embarrassment only increases if you threaten suggest to complain to Sakoda about it

That guy’s already way too involved in his love life, he doesn’t need to be involved in THAT kind of thing too-

“... I’ll consider it. That is all you’re getting from me... don’t you dare tell anyone. And stop looking so happy!”

Later in the week, Sakyo is searching online for... certain products and tells himself that if they have a discount, he’ll let you do it

... Of course, the oNE TIME- guess he has no choice now 😑

More time had past and just when you thought that it was a pointless endeavor, one night on his day off, Sakyo dragged you into the bedroom

He stared at you intensely from on top of the bed as he shook off his jacket and belt before tossing you a small box

You choked on your own spit as your jaw dropped... what the box contained was... a vibrating dildo 😩

Sakyo rolled his eyes and told you pointedly that you were going to use that on him, and if he didn’t like it, there would be no continuation, understood?

With a “yes, sir” and a heavy blush, you agreed, tackle kissing him against the sheets

By the time you poured the amount of lube he considered ‘safe’ and shoved the toy inside him, Sakyo was already halfway to being breathless, not expecting the sensation to be so painful (or so pleasurable)

He covered his face with his arms but even you could see he was flushed, biting his lip to not let you hear him make a sound

Unfortunately, you get into a steady rhythm, practically forcing his mouth to open even before you turn the vibe on all the way

Sakyo’s legs shake as his ass feels like it’s getting violated, unable to control the heat the spreads quickly up his spine and dick

“Urgh- enough! J-Just move mmn-! Move on alre-adyyy...!”

He snaps at you, refusing to make eye contact, even as you put his leg upwards to get a better angle

Your lover is trying so hard not to lose it, hiding and masking his mouth with his hands, eyes squeezing shut because jesus- nothing’s ever felt like this before-

It makes him feel all vulnerable, like you’re prodding at something more than just sexually, so feel free to lean down and kiss-mark his neck, it grounds Sakyo a little

Obviously, you want to see him melt completely, so you flip him onto his back, much to his shock

This encourages you to thrust even harder, his gasps and pulsing cock edging you on further 🤫

Sakyo isn’t loud per say, but he isn’t quiet either, only able to pant and convulse in a desperate attempt to pull himself together

“God damnit- hah! Don’t think I’ll just lay here and take it... Mmhmm... ohh fuuuuh... pleassse- argh-!”

He’ll play a bit coy, giving you a look that, especially without his glasses, makes him look like a smirking, devilish angel

... Sakyo almost regrets it, as he immediately goes back to being a sweaty mess when you smirk back on return

He’ll never admit it but the whole back and forth was sort of fun/sexy in way he thought an ‘old man’ like him shouldn’t be able to experience

With one final push that lifts his hips off the bed, he orgasms, silently screaming as he feels the sweet release wash over his aching body

Bruises on his hips, hickeys on his neck, drooling and sweaty, you know as soon as his senses come back down from the afterglow, Sakyo will tiredly lecture you

“Geez... that wasted a lot of energy, you shouldn’t have- hhn! ... Th-Thank you for making me feel good, dear. Don’t go crazy without my permission next time though.”

Fav positions: the sidewind (it gives you the best control, which he secretly enjoys but it embarrasses him), eagle position (it’s simple and makes him flustered and feel good, again, can be used softly), and the chair (a position that’s meant to tease you once Sakyo gets used to it, literally sits on your lap)

[adventure-hearts]

Oi, can you give me your thoughts on the affection that Sorato would show to each other?

This ask actually inspired me to write meta for the first time in a while! Thanks a lot, Anon!

So, a while back I read this book called The Five Love Languages. It’s about how  everyone expresses/experiences love in five main ways — words of affirmation, quality time, acts of service, receiving gifts, and physical touch — and how this affects interpersonal relationships, especially marriage. 

The book’s thesis is that everyone has a primary and secondary "love language”; for each of them there are multiple “dialects”, or different ways of manifesting love. In order to have a healthy relationship, you need to identify your and your partner’s language, so that you can give each other what you need (*).

Me being me, I immediately started to try and identify the love languages of each DA character, and predictably gave a lot of thought to Sora and Yamato’s. Based on my notes on this book, here are my headcanons about how Sora and Yamato express affection!

SORA

Primary love language → words of affirmation

If you consider Sora’s conflict in the original series, it was all about how unloved and unappreciated she felt in the absence of being told she was loved by her mother; and later, the feeling of feeling unappreciated by others in general. 

Piyomon best represents how words of affirmation is Sora’s primary love language. Actually, my theory is that all digimon partners do this, to some extent. Piyomon gives Sora exactly what needs to feel loved: telling her how much she likes and appreciates her, constant complimenting, cheering her up, making her talk about their feelings, etc. (at first, Sora was so unused to having this need met that Piyomon’s initial adoration made her uncomfortable). I also think Sora places so much importance in to what people say (or don’t say) to her that she’s prone to misunderstanding people when they say the wrong thing or don’t tell her what she wants to hear.

On the other hand, although Sora struggles with being on the receiving end of words of affection, she’s excellent at using it to show love to others. She’s the one who’s encouraging her friends, keeping morale up, and providing reassurance through gentle and encouraging words. There are dozens examples of this in the series:

“Piyomon, kakoiiii!”

Encouraging Miyako (02 eps. 02)

Calling everyone to to check in on them (tri. ch. 3)

etc

I think it’s pretty obvious that words of affirmation are key for Sora.

Secondary love language → acts of service

If Sora struggles with her primary love language, she overcompensates with her secondary one, which is basically doing things for others. 

This is the side of Sora who nurtures, organises, protects, cooks, sacrifices herself for others, and generally takes care of other people’s needs ahead of her own. 

The downside of this is that Sora feels overwhelmed when she can’t respond to other people’s needs, and feels unloved when people don’t do things for her in return. 

YAMATO

Primary love language → quality time

I believe Yamato’s main way of expressing love is spending one-on-one time with the other person. Again, the classic image is when he sits alone with Gabumon playing his harmonica. It’s symbolic of the Crest of Friendship.

Lots of Yamato’s issues in the first series probably have to do with his parents divorce stealing a lot of quality time from him as a child (i.e. neglecting him emotionally), and how as a result, he adopted the opposing attitude “I’m fine on my own, in fact I prefer to be”. Which is clearly not true, and it soon becomes apparent that this lone wolf act is him denying his true self and his true emotional needs. His obsession with being around Takeru and his jealousy when he spends time with other people is perhaps another clue. Yamato is the kind of person who feels loved when he gets someone else’s undivided attention, even if not a word is spoken. 

Gabumon’s entire existence of pure devotion and loyalty to Yamato and all their scenes together as a duo is ample evidence of quality time being his main way of expressing love, but other examples include his desire to be close to Takeru all the time, staying with Jou at the restaurant, “Let her cry”, having a one-one-dinner with Taichi to cheer him up, etc. Yamato doesn’t let a lot of people in, so when he deigns to spend alone time with someone, you know it’s serious.

Secondary love language → words of affirmation

This is maybe provocative, but I also think words of affirmation are incredibly important for Yamato. However, this secondary LL is very undeveloped, both by his discomfort with verbalized affection in general and especially when it comes to his attempts to express love for others through words. 

Still, Yamato’s need for words of affirmation is shown not just by Gabumon’s innumerable pep-talks where he cheers Yamato up by telling him how much he loves him and says all those wonderful things about him. Other examples would include the entire Dark Cave saga (including helping Sora), many of his interactions with Taichi (Yamato’s oversensitivity whenever Taichi says something “thoughtless” is also an example of the importance he places on words; but also, “Thank you for believing in me”!), and even his music career (writing songs about feelings while a bunch of girls screams their adoration at him? He’s getting something out of it).

How do LLs work in the context of (romantic) Sora/Yamato?

I’d say the first conclusion I took from this is both Yamato and Sora struggle with, and at times suppress, their primary love language. Having this in common is important, because it shows how similar they are emotionally, and probably makes them better able to empathise with each other.

Another crucial conclusion is that they're both fluent in the same love languages. Quality time could just as well be Sora’s secondary love language, and Acts of Service could easily be Yamato’s. So here are to people who — when in a healthy, mature state — are in the same emotional wavelength and therefore are perfectly suited to give each other what they need.

Now we’re getting into headcanon territory, but I think of the reasons why this couple works is precisely that know the importance of using “words of affirmation”. Do note that this love language isn’t just about saying “I love you” and “You look gorgeous” and “Here’s a list of the 438479287 best things about you″. It’s much more about saying “You can do it”, “That was great!”, and even “Thank you”. In this sense, you can totally see how both would be emotionally fulfilled by giving and receiving verbal encouragement and appreciation form the other. 

I think this love language both the strength of the relationship  — being able to build each other up — and also their Achilles heel — if one or both of them fail to develop it.

It’s all too easy to imagine a situation were Sora and Yamato don’t use enough  words of affirmation with each other, creating a vicious cycle. Of course, as we’ve seen, this love language is something they both need to work on and learn from their digimon partners! 

Overall, I’d say Sora is probably better at it, with Yamato often struggling to put his love in words without being embarrassed; I think any grand declarations would be saved for special occasions. 

I think Sora would be great at responding to Yamato’s need for quality time. Like, of course she’d be perfect at making sure they spend time together despite their busy schedules, at planning dates and activities and getaways. And she’d would be patient enough to just sit next to him in silence, waiting for him to open up. Sora herself would also benefit from Yamato’s tendency to want to spend one-on-one time, especially if Yamato used this quality time to listen to her and talk about feelings. Still, problems could emerge if Yamato thinks Sora isn’t spending enough time with him. 

I also believe Yamato would be pretty good at expressing love through acts of service, I.e. doing nice and helpful things for Sora. This is the kind of boyfriend who can cook dinner, do the laundry, handle car insurance, and who’ll jump in the middle of a battle to save her life. Trouble could arise if Yamato actually forgets to do something, or if Sora finds herself overwhelmed trying to do everything on her own.

Finally, a word about the remaining two languages (gift giving and physical touch). Of course they are present in this relationship! They just aren’t the main ways they use to express love. Again, considering Sora has the Crest of Love, she’s fluent in all the love languages. 

When it comes to physical affection / PDA, I think almost everyone in the fandom agrees this isn’t a couple who would be very demonstrative in public. I don’t think they would regard touching/kissing/sex as the predominant way of showing love and intimacy. I’m sure they’re a very affectionate couple (in private), but dealing with emotions would be the main dynamic in the relationship. 

Similarly, I doubt gift giving would be a huge thing outside of special occasions. I myself headcanon that Yamato is a not a great present giver, and if Sora was feeling ignored, there isn’t a diamond ring in the world that would make up for it. 

Well, this was a long tangent. I hope it answered your question, Anon! I’d be curious to see other people’s opinions, too.

(*) NOTE:

There are a bunch of quizzes to discover your own LL, but according to the author, the way to identify someone love language is by asking:

a. How they express love and appreciation for others; b. What they request more often; c. What they complain about.

[higuchimon]

[fanfic] Broken Siren:  Chapter 12

Hikari refused to move from Miyako’s side. Fury unlike any she’d ever experienced before seethed underneath her skin, fury she would like to turn on Vamdemon for what he’d done to her.

Tailmon rested one paw-hand on her arm. “He’ll be taken down. You can trust us on that.”

She glanced for a moment at the divine creature. “How?” It wasn’t that she doubted Tailmon meant it. She just couldn’t see how anyone could defeat someone like Vamdemon.

He’s a vampire. He has Yamato at his beck and call. Yamato could turn virtually all of our forces against us with a few words. We can’t block all of their ears. There’s not enough time and not enough ways to do it.

Tailmon tilted her head to where Takeru and Patamon stood in the doorway, back to them, most of his attention on Ken and Daisuke as they filled everyone there in on what happened at Vamdemon’s castle.

“The two of us can do it. I can’t promise that it will be easy by any means and there will still be a lot that needs doing after it, but we can.”

Hikari nodded a little, turning her attention back to Miyako. “I wish we could help her more.”

“We’ve done all that we can,” Tailmon reminded her. Phoenixes couldn’t be affected by healing magic. Miyako explained it to her that since phoenixes could die and be reborn, healing either happened by natural means or not at all. In this case, the option was ‘not at all’, and they still couldn’t be certain if she would heal or be reborn.

The thing is, I know I’ll be reborn. It’s happened before. But it’s different every time. I don’t know how long it’ll be for, and when I do come back, I’ll be weaker for a while. It’ll take me time to get back up to where I was. So it’s not something I want to do a whole lot, you know.

Then Miyako smiled, that bright flash that made Hikari’s world light up all around her, that made her feel as if anything at all could be possible, so long as Miyako stood by her.

But if it could help you...

Then Miyako blushed as she heard her own words and Hikari changed the subject, not wanting to talk about Miyako dying or herself dying or anything else but the pleasure they found in one another’s company.

She could die. She would come back, but she’d still die, and she’d still suffered and hurt and it was because of Vamdemon and it was to help find Hikari’s brother, and that was because of Vamdemon, and Hikari clenched her fists, a storm swirling in the deepest parts of her soul.

She pushed herself to her feet and stalked to the door, Tailmon a pace or two behind her. Takeru, Ken, and Daisuke looked toward her as she stood there, and she caught sight of Mimi and Sora a short distance away.

“We’re not going to let him get away with any of this. We have a way to kill him.” Her gaze flicked from Tailmon to Patamon and then back to the others. “When we are leaving?”

She didn’t want to leave Miyako. But staying here wouldn’t get anything done, and she wasn’t going to stay behind while they went to do this.

Silence hung between them all for almost a minute, before Ken spoke up.

“As soon as we’re all ready. Before sunset.”

Takeru didn’t want to spend so much as a moment without Patamon by his side. The thought of what could’ve happened without his furry partner sent chills all through him. He trusted his brother above anyone else in the entire world. What he didn’t trust was what Vamdemon would make his brother do.

Thousands of other questions surged and swirled behind his lips as he walked through the corridors. He stuck to the ones that would be empty this time of day; he didn’t feel like meeting anyone who wasn’t Patamon and the side glances he’d already noticed from the few servants he did pass made it even worse. He knew he and Yamato looked alike, but it was broad daylight. He’d never yet known of a vampire who could handle that.

What Ken and Daisuke told of their experience there spun through his thoughts as well. Not all of it made sense, but he hoped if he pummeled at it enough, something might.

“Patamon? What if we do kill Vamdemon?” He worked out what he wanted to say with each word he spoke, feeling his way through it all. “What about my brother then?”

“Killing Vamdemon will return his free will to him,” Patamon reassured him. “That’s not what we really have to worry about.”

“What is?”

“The fact your brother is a siren and there’s no real way to block off a siren’s control of someone else, as long as that someone else is human. Non-humans, like a dryad or a cupid or a werebeast, they’re not affected by a siren’s call. But humans always are.”

Takeru worried at his lower lip. Yeah, that was something to worry about. He can’t stay here, then. They wouldn’t allow it.

And as much as the thought twisted inside of him, he couldn’t blame them. He didn’t like thinking of his brother as dangerous, but he’d felt that power touch him, even if he hadn’t been forced to obey it. It wasn’t safe for people.

We can worry about that later. First thing to do is get him back. Maybe they’d get really lucky and somehow killing Vamdemon would turn Yamato human again? Maybe?

It remained a sparkling hope in his heart, regardless.

“Jou...” Mimi tasted the name, letting it flow over her tongue and all the way through her. It wasn’t a bad name, but it wasn’t one that she could recall having heard in this context before. A possible other vampire, one who didn’t serve Vamdemon at all. This could offer options for the future.

“Anyone you know?”

She shook her head at Sora. “I’ll ask the trees. There aren’t many places one can go where the trees can’t find them.”

“If he’s a vampire, then he probably found a place without trees,” Sora pointed out, a tiny quirk to her mouth. “No matter where his loyalties lie, a stake could kill him as easily as it could anyone else. It wouldn’t be smart to stay in a place that provides natural weapons against you.”

“There aren’t many beings a stake through the heart won’t kill,” Mimi pointed out. “But you’re right. I’ll ask anyway, though. It won’t hurt.”

Taking care of Vamdemon would be the first priority, though, and she wanted to ask for something else while she was there. The trees would help her. They always did.

She glanced for a moment at Sora. “She’ll probably come when I call. Do you want me to ask for your friend, too?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s already on the way.”

Their companions always knew when they were in need of assistance. The more help they had on this mission, the better.

Miyako drifted in a sea of light, the pain far away from her. She knew it existed; if she moved in the wrong way it shot through her worse than being struck by a thousand bolts of lightning. She wanted to avoid the pain, to cling to the wrappings of healing that would slowly put her back into top condition.

But what she wanted wasn’t what she needed to do, no matter how appealing it was. What she needed to do was wake up and take to the air once more.

There’s someone else there. Bad enough that Taichi and Yamato remained ensnared by Vamdemon’s foul ways, but Vamdemon had someone else hidden in his lair. She didn’t know who and she didn’t know why aside from one obvious point: he’d fed on someone. It couldn’t have been Yamato; vampires couldn’t feed off of other vampires. It couldn’t have been Taichi; he’d been fed from by Yamato before they left, and there wasn’t time enough for him to have recovered his strength.

So there had to be someone else in the castle, and that meant they had to be rescued. She hadn’t been able to tell anyone else about this, and the more she thought on the matter – as much as she could think about anything at the moment – the more she knew that she needed to go there once again.

Steeling herself against the pain, she pushed until her eyes opened and she could see the room around her. It wasn’t one of Vamdemon’s; there was far too much light there. She hadn’t expected to be there anyway, but she hadn’t bee certain of where she would be or even if she could help at all. If she’d been unconscious for too long…

“Miyako!” Hikari appeared in the doorway, eyes bright and worried all at the same time. “Don’t try to get up, you’re not healed yet!”

“I can’t wait until I am,” Miyako murmured, shifting herself up and hating every moment. She wasn’t even certain if she could change at the moment, but there were too many reasons for her to do it to not try. “How long has it been?”

Hikari’s hands wrapped around her shoulders and supported her. Miyako offered up a little smile, but still kept on trying to get to her feet. “Only a few hours. We’re all getting ready to go get Taichi and Yamato back.”

Thank goodness. I’m not too late.

Miyako clenched her teeth together and forced herself up. She couldn’t remember which parts of her had been broken, sprained, or dislocated in the fight, but enough of them had been wrapped up and salves and casts applied that going anywhere would risk her life.

It wasn’t as if she didn’t have more. This needed doing.

“You’re not going, Miyako.” Hikari tried to sound firm and did a very good job of it. Miyako wasn’t paying that much attention to it, though. “Miyako!”

She slowly brought her head up to meet Hikari’s eyes. “Yes, I am. Because I have to. There’s someone else there. Probably a blood pet for Vamdemon.”

Hikari didn’t move to let her up. “So why can’t we rescue them while you stay here and get better?”

“Because most of you are going to need to fight Vamdemon and if he thinks I’m still here resting, he won’t notice me sneaking in to get whoever it is and Taichi and Yamato. Someone has to do it, and he’s going to be on guard.”

Hikari pressed her lips together and started to shake her head. Miyako reached up one hand to touch the side of the princess’s face.

“I have to do this. He’ll know if any of you are missing. Yamato will have told him everything that happened that he saw. But he won’t expect me there, not after what he did to me. And any guards he has, I think I can still take them.” A small, weak smile touched on her lips for a few seconds. “Trust me, please.”

Hikari leaned into her touch and sighed. “You’re going to get yourself killed. You can barely even move right now. How do you expect to get there?”

A voice Miyako expected came without warning from the window. “I believe I may be able to lend a hand. Or in this case, a wing.”

Her eyes lit up at the sight of him as a sleek hawk, far larger than most of the breed, landed on the windowsill and turned his sharp eyes on her. “You look horrible.”

“Thanks, Hawkmon.” Miyako rolled her eyes at that, another smile flirting on her lips. “Nice to see you again, too.”

She glanced back at Hikari, whose attention flipped between the two of them in rapid sequence. “Your friend?” she asked at last, and Miyako nodded.

“We’ve known each other for a long time. He helped teach me how to fly.” Miyako held her hand out, wincing at the sharp lances of pain that drove their way up it, and Hawkmon flew over to perch there with all caution.

“And apparently I forgot to teach you that moving around when you’re injured is a very bad idea.” Hawkmon gave her a very stern look. “Your father would never forgive me if you failed to rebirth yourself properly because you were too weak.”

“What?” Hikari’s voice was a single clipped piece of pain and shock. Miyako dredged up a small expression that wasn’t exactly a smile, and rubbed the back of her head with her free hand.

“I’m not that beaten up. I wouldn’t be awake if I was. You don’t have to worry about it.”

She had to admit, if only to herself, that she was far closer to that point than she really wanted to think about. She could move. She could do so without too much pain if she focused enough. > She didn’t doubt that she could get to where Taichi, Yamato, and the stranger whose existence she only could intuit were, and get them out again.

What she wasn’t entirely certain of was how long she’d be able to push herself after that. And that, she really didn’t want Hikari to know.

To Be Continued

Note: Thank you for reading and I hope that you enjoyed the chapter. Please let me know what you thought of it if at all possible.

[terresdebrumestories]

Chapter 1/4: Epic Fail

✗ TECHNICAL DETAILS

FANDOM: Digimon Adventure 01/02/Tri RATING: Mature. WORDCOUNT: 10 032 PAIRING(S): Endgame Taito, though the fic is primarily Taichi-centric. Side pairings include Takeru/Hikari and discussion of past Sorato. CHARACTER(S): Taichi Kamiya, Yamato Ishida, Hikari Kamiya, Takeru Takashi, Daisuke Motomiya, Agumon, Veemon, Gabumon, Sora Takenoushi, and mention of the rest of the gang. GENRE: Misapplied matchmaking. Also future!fic. TRIGGER WARNING(S): Depression and discussion thereof, including one briefly mentioned suicide attempt in chapter two. SUMMARY: In which Taichi has questionable ways to handle his issues, everyone tries to be nice, and Yamato yells at him a lot. Same old, same old, except for the part where they end up kissing.

[II. Rock Bottom] [III. Get up] [IV. Start over]

“You,” Yamato hisses into the phone before Taichi is even done greeting him, “are the worst meddler in the history of sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong!”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Taichi replies without missing a beat, but all it gets him is a snort that ends on a jaw-cracking yawn.

There’s a sigh then, carrying the mental image of Yamato pinching at the bridge of his nose over the phone while Taichi tries to pull his socks on one-handed without falling on his face.

“Are you seriously trying to tell me you have nothing to do with Daisuke’s break up?”

“Okay, first of all,” Taichi corrects, eyebrows knitting in a frown of his own, “it’s not a break up when the people involved aren’t even dating. Second—come on, at least listen to me before you start groaning!”

Yamato mutters something about a headache, which Taichi hears as the jab it is even as the sound of a chair scrapping on floorboard rises and falls in the background, followed by the dull slap of a thick book falling shut. Taichi glances at the clock, and almost groans in turn when he realizes it’s past midnight in Paris, which means either Yamato forgot about calling him until it was time for him to go to sleep, or he stayed up just so he could yell at Taichi as fast as possible.

Freaking typical.

“Look,” he says instead of starting another argument—which, given his history and levels of irritation, he’s kind of grimly proud about—“he asked me if he should date that girl! All I said was that if he had to ask me then it might not be the best of ideas.”

“Which you knew was going to drive them apart,” Yamato says, but doesn’t ask. “But you still said it because she’s not one of us and you don’t like that.”

“That’s got nothing to do with it!” Taichi yelps, hating the way it makes him sound guiltier than he truly is or feels.

All he did was answer his roommate’s question and give a sincere piece of advice—Yamato may not like it, but that doesn’t make it wrong, thank you very much! Besides, it’s not like he’s telling Daisuke he should stop all kind of dating—or any dating at all really. If he’d tried to convince the guy to stay single, now that would have been egoistical and downright cruel, but Taichi has no motive of that kind, and he crosses his arms over his chest in annoyance, shoulders tightening when Yamato insists:

“Right. I assume it has nothing to do with wanting to keep him as a roommate either?”

“Of course not!” Taichi retorts, and he almost hangs up when Yamato sighs his ‘why are we even friends’ sigh. Instead, he insists: “It doesn’t, Yamato! I’m trying to spare him useless pain, why would you even think—”

“Because you’re still grumbling about Hikari and Takeru dating even after seven years—”

“I don’t mind them dating,” Taichi starts, but this time it’s Yamato’s turn to interrupt with:

“You tried to convince her their flat was too big,” he says, voice rising in volume and decreasing sharply, probably when he remembers the time it is at his place.

“Well it is a little—”

“It’s twenty square meters!” Yamato hisses, pitch climbing up as he makes obvious efforts to stay quiet, “And it’s not like it’s a new problem either—you’ve never really been okay with any of us dating.”

“I congratulated Mimi and Koush—wait, has she picked her new name yet?”

She only came out as a transgender woman a couple months ago, and she’s been hesitating on a new name ever since—it makes sense she’d want to take her time about it, but sometimes Taichi can’t help feeling like it’s a bit of an awkward situation.

“Not yet,” Yamato says after a moment of reflexion, tone calmer for the interruption. “But even if we overlook the fact that you also congratulated them on their breakup after only three months, your main source of happiness back then was, and I quote, that they ‘kept it in the family’.”

Taichi has to wince at that, because this was really not his shiniest moment. Still, he thinks as he locks his flat behind him and bypasses the elevator in favor of the stairs, more conductive to an argument, Yamato is definitely giving the incident more weight than it deserves.

“Alright,” he admits with a sigh even as he switches the staircase lights on, “the phrasing was a bit creepy but—”

“It was downright gross,” Yamato interrupts, apparently determined not to let anything slide, “and not just because of the wording—you can’t just act like there’s no one else we can date than other chosen children!”

“Well it’s not like anyone else is going to get what it’s like!”

It’s been fourteen years since their first trip to the Digiworld, and Yamato may dislike it but the fact remains that, as experience has proved numerous times, even the other groups of chosen children can’t quite share the experience. Turns out US-comics were wrong: when the strange monsters tried to destroy the earth, it’s Japan that got the worst of it.

It’s nobody’s fault, really, and Taichi hasn’t resented the fate he got saddled with in years now, but the other teams, they had it easy. And even if they hadn’t—even with the non-negligible amount of crap that fell on their noses—they didn’t go through it the same way Taichi and his friends have, they don’t carry the scars the same way they do. They have different cultures and different roles and different expectations and that’s okay...it just means not even them understand what the experience was like for the Odaiba kids.

“Daisuke doesn’t care,” Yamato says, voice muffled by a rustle of fabric against the phone receiver.

He must be getting ready for the night.

“How would you know that,” Taichi asks even though it is, admittedly, not the kindest argument to pick, “you barely even talk to him!”

“His sister does,” Yamato replies without a pause, but his voice sounds tighter around the words, “and so does yours, and they both agree he didn’t even seem to realize there was a difference to be felt until you shoved it in his head.”

Taichi didn’t think people could really splutter indignantly, but what he’s doing right now really does sound like it. It’s entirely Yamato’s fault, though, because the nerve—the willful misinterpretation is just—how dare he! Yes, sure, most of them are dealing with it okay—they’ve got mostly normal lives if you except the occasional star-struck Digimon and a recent offer for a documentary about their adventures from a very reputable history channel...and yes, sure, they’ve all got twelve other Chosen children—plus their Digimon partners—to confide in and rely on, and that plays a lot.

It doesn’t erase everything though—Taichi has yet to hear about a group of friends who’s faced as many cases of depression, of nightmares, of random outbursts and awkward moments as theirs has, and Yamato of all people should know how hard it can be to go through this.

To mention that would be a low blow, though, and Taichi steers away from the argument, bringing up his other concern instead:

“You haven’t met the girl,” he says, “there’s something off about her!”

“Akiko’s biggest flaw is that she’s not one of the people we’ve been exclusively hanging out with since fifth grade,” Yamato snaps, “and you know it. Maybe I haven’t seen her, but I know she’s as much of a scatterbrained dork as Daisuke, which—”

“Now you’re making it sound like he’s stupid!” Taichi protests.

He hears Yamato stutter a bit—there’s echo in the background, almost drowned out by the sound of traffic on Taichi’s end of the line, but it does still sound like Yamato has retreated to the bathroom—before he recovers and hisses:

“He dropped out of school to open a noodle cart for fuck’s sake!”

“Which he’s paying his part of the rent with,” Taichi points out, “and it’ll cover the rest of his expenses too, so if you think he doesn’t deserve better than a simple waitress just because—”

Yamato swears on the other end of the phone, and Taichi does groan at that, temples beating with a headache even as he reaches his bus stop and glares at the street. Stupid Yamato, shoving his stupid face on the other side of the stupid world, like there aren’t any decent universities in Japan offering the stupid biology degree he decided to go for.

At least if he’d stayed, they could have this stupid argument face to face and settle it over a cup of tea or whatever.

“Do you even hear yourself talking?” Yamato asks when he’s done hissing invectives into the phone, “’he deserves better than a simple waitress’, seriously? Did we take a jump back to the eighteenth century I wasn’t aware of?”

“All I’m saying,” Taichi ties to say, only to be interrupted right away, real anger cracking through Yamato’s voice this time:

“All you’re saying is you’ll literally grasp at any reason Daisuke shouldn’t date Akiko, all because you can’t stand the idea of him leaving you behind like your sister did!”

“Hikari didn’t leave me behind,” Taichi protests, hand closing tighter against his phone, “she texts me almost as much as you do!”

“And yet,” Yamato retorts, sarcasm dripping from his voice thick enough Taichi can hear it over the bustle of commuters climbing on and exiting the bus, “you still act like she did, including with this.”

Yamato sighs, like he’s had this conversation far too often already—he hasn’t, Taichi would know—and insists:

“I know you don’t mean to hurt anyone, Taichi, but that’s what you’re going to do if you keep going that way.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Taichi says, annoyed enough by now that he barely notices the streets his bus is driving by, and nearly misses the stop for his university, “I’m not going to hurt him.”

On the other end of the line, Yamato’s snort—wrapped in the sound of running water, possibly because he’s run out of patience and decided to brush his teeth in the middle of a conversation like some kind of animal—is quite explicit as to how much he believes that. Taichi takes a deep breath and counts the steps from his bus stop to the university gates before he has a chance to explode.

There’s a bit of scratching, the sound of someone spitting, and Yamato sighs again:

“There’s only thirteen of us in Japan, remember? And none of the girls are available. That’s a pretty limited dating pool you’re building him.”

“Mimi and Miyako are into dudes,” Taichi points out, but even he can’t argue when Yamato scoffs.

“Mimi is even farther away from Japan than I am and she’s not the long-distance relationship type. And the very idea of Daisuke and Miyako in any kind of romantic relationship is just begging for disaster.”

“Okay,” Taichi admits, because he may be as stubborn as Yamato, but even he knows a losing battle when he sees one, “no girl available. But Daisuke is bisexual.”

“And who do you think is going to date him? You, Iori, or me?”

“I don’t want to date Daisuke!” Taichi protests, ears warming up a tad too fast.

He’s not the last to call Daisuke easy on the eyes—to the guy’s face, even!—and he may or may not have toyed with the idea a little on one of the rare occasions he drank too much, but the truth of it is, aside from the rather obvious lack of romantic attraction there, that would make things even more awkward when well-meaning strangers mistake them for brothers.

Really, they’re better off as friends.

“Well,” Yamato deadpans, “then considering I’m not interested in dating him—”

“You’re not interested in dating, period,” Taichi replies, unable to hide the hint of triumph in his voice.

“It’s not about my issues, Taichi,” Yamato half-sighs, half-yawns as a door clicks shut in the background, “I’m not interested in anything remotely close to romantic with Daisuke, which leaves him with Iori, and I’m pretty sure his partners would murder Daisuke in less than a day.”

“Ken isn’t dating anyone.”

“I don’t think you’ll get our second token straight to date a guy.”

“We don’t know that he is,” Taichi protests, lowering his voice as he nears his classroom, fifteen minutes early, “he could still be in the closet.”

“We’ve hit every stripe on the rainbow-meter,” Yamato deadpans in a rustle of sheets, “either he’s straight or he’s clearly not ready for dating.” A yawn. “And even if I’m wrong, you can’t just play pair the spares with our friends.”

“They’re barely even your friends,” Taichi snaps.

It’s a low blow and he knows it—Yamato may not speak with Daisuke on a regular basis, but he’s already demonstrated he was willing to go the extra mile for the guy’s sake anyway. Out of all the chosen children Taichi knows of, Yamato is probably the one whose bond to the rest of their little community are the strongest—there’s a reason why the rallying point shifted from Taichi to him in later years, after all.

Yamato’s relationship to Daisuke is still nowhere close to what he and Taichi have, though, or even to what exists between Yamato and Jyou, or Koushiro, whatever name she might end up picking. Yamato is a devoted friend, and so is Daisuke—it’s just easy to see their circles aren’t exactly perfect matches.

“Fuck you,” Yamato replies, the gritting of his teeth almost audible even through the phone, “you don’t get to tell me I’m a bad friend when you’re the one about to send him head first into the fucking wall!”

“He and Ken like each other,” Taichi replies, ears burning at him without it being enough to stop him.

“So did Sora and I,” Yamato spits—this time Taichi forgets to keep an indoor voice when he protests:

“That was different!”

He wasn’t privy to the whole disaster—there are things about those five years of dating (and one year of post-breakup chilly awkwardness) not even Takeru knows about, both the former couple and their Digimons incredibly tight-lipped about the whole affair. Taichi stood by the two of them throughout it all though, left them in peace when they needed him to, yelled at them when they needed him to, and collected the freaking pieces when they needed him to.

He may not have seen the car crash, but he was there for the clean up and oh, boy, is he glad he had help with that, because he’d have ended up in the gutter right alongside them if the others hadn’t picked up the slack.

At some point it almost seemed like their group wouldn’t survive the shift.

“We liked each other,” Yamato repeats. “See how ridiculous you sound now?”

“Look, it sucked—big time,” Taichi agrees, because there was never any way to beat around that particular bush, “but Ken and Daisuke are older—they know what their sexualities are by now.”

“I didn’t at their age.”

Taichi swallows back another, more pointed low blow—he can still hear Yamato’s anger simmering under the thin layer of ice in his voice, and putting a spark to it now would really be asking for an explosion. Instead, he says:

“Hikari and Takeru are happy.”

“Exception that confirms the rule,” Yamato replies with a hint of dark humor, “the rest of our intra-dating attempts only ever ended up bitting us in the ass. I’m pretty sure we’ve all had enough of dating other Digisaviors for a lifetime, thank you very much.”

“Digisaviors?” Taichi repeats with a blink, “where the hell did you pick that?”

“That’s what they call us in France,” Yamato brushes off, “don’t try to drop the topic. I’m your friend, okay? And as a friend I’m telling you you’re about to fuck up big time and you need to stop.”

“And I am telling you, you’re wrong.”

There’s a break in the conversation while Gabumon’s sleepy voice whines in the distance—poor guy must have had a hard time staying asleep with Yamato talking almost nonstop for the last, what? Half hour? How is he even still awake anyway? Last Taichi checked, Yamato went out like a light at eight PM like the old man he’s always secretly been.

Taichi listens to his friend apologize to his partner in a more subdued voice—frowning when they switch to French for a couple of sentences before Yamato sighs-yawns again:

“You’re a brilliant politician,” he says, and Taichi’s chest warms at the words, even though he can’t quite manage a smile for it after such a long-winded argument, “but sometimes when it comes to our friends you’re so oblivious you make me want to slap you across the phone.”

“Well screw you too,” Taichi replies as the door opens up to let the previous class out, “I’ve got class. Bye.”

He hangs up before Yamato can say anything else, and spends the rest of the morning ignoring the weird mix of satisfaction and nausea hanging at the edge of his stomach.

{ooo}

Hikari and Takeru, when Taichi visits them for the first time, look nauseatingly domestic. It hasn’t even been three months since they moved in together—a fact which, Taichi might add, none of their parents were ecstatic about—but their cupboard of a studio looks homely and lived-in already. It’s tiny, sure, and the fold-up couch at the back looks enormous, cramped as it is between the tiniest of bathroom and a cooking area that barely deserves the name, but the kids move through it like they wouldn’t give up the occasional bump for all the space in the world.

Taichi kind of wants to gag, but that would be pushing it.

“I still think you’re too young,” he mutters around his cup of tea, and while Takeru stays silent—although close as he is, it’s impossible to mistake the way he stiffens at the words—Hikari doesn’t share the same restraints:

“If you start this conversation again,” she says with a daring look in her eyes, “I will kick you out.”

Taichi manages half of a placating gesture with his right hand while the left keeps his mug close to his mouth, hiding his face from view. The words press at the edge of his lips, lemon-sour against his tongue, but even he can only have the same conversation so many times before he gives up, and he’s had the this one with Hikari often enough that he knows her arguments by heart now.

‘We haven’t been kids since 1999, haven’t been at peace for that long ever, haven’t got any reason to breakup, haven’t got any reason to wait’—Taichi has heard it all.

If he’s being very honest with himself—he doesn’t like to, where this topic is concerned—Taichi is also capable of admitting that all these ‘we haven’t’s come shadowed in a lot of ‘we have’s. ‘We’ve been supporting and helping and understanding each other since before we were ten,’ Hikari probably thinks, but never quite says, ‘we’ve been sent to war younger than anyone else, we have a right to enter peace early, too’.

Maybe they do.

It doesn’t mean Taichi has to approve.

“Fine,” he says anyway, because there’s a difference between disapproving his sister’s choice and actively antagonizing her over it, “so how do you guys keep this place clean? Did my sister move in with a neat freak?”

“Of all the possible subjects,” Hikari starts with a long-suffering sigh, but Takeru beats her to it:

“Sorry, wrong brother.”

“It’s a dual effort,” Hikari approves, tone still stiff, while her boyfriend throws Taichi a worried look.

Taichi’s lips lift at that, thin and short-lived. He hasn’t forgotten the way he argued with Yamato last week—hasn’t missed the absence of texts other than the automated ‘go eat something’ Yamato sends so Taichi won’t forget one too many meals in profit of his political sciences textbooks and drop dead in a pool of his own sweat.

(Yamato’s words, not Taichi’s.)

Despite it all though, it’s impossible not to remember how insanely ordered Yamato’s bedroom always seemed whenever Taichi visited the Ishida’s, before Yamato decided a year in Moscow to learn Russian wasn’t long or far enough away and picked a French university for his higher education.

“How do you keep things clean?” Hikari asks after a pause—Taichi may have gotten a little sidetracked there, because she’s gone from irritated to almost worried in record time.

“Dual effort,” Taichi replies, deliberately paraphrasing her, although it sounds more flat than teasing, even to his own ears. “We clean up after ourselves in the common areas and we deal with our own rooms. Why, how many centimeters of filth did you think I lived in?”

Hikari’s fingers twitch, same as they do whenever their parents get a little too overbearing during their weekly phone calls, and Taichi almost takes offense at that—he’s ready to admit he didn’t start his visit in the best way, but there’s nothing to be annoyed about in what he just said, honestly!

“We’re just a little worried,” Takeru says in a soothing tone, one hand landing on Hikari’s shoulder all casual like, as if Taichi weren’t going to notice the way his thumb rubs circles over her jumper, “you’ve seemed a little down since we moved in here and—”

“It’s the end of November,” Taichi points out with a roll of his eyes before Takeru can finish his sentence, “I’ve got a ton of exams coming up. Of course I’m tired.”

He doesn’t miss the glance floating between Takeru and Hikari—doesn’t miss the little twist of Takeru’s lips like he’s seeing something he was bracing himself for—and he’s a little more forceful than he should be when he sets his cup down on the tiny coffee table:

“You know I can take care of myself, right? I’ve got the rent covered—”

“It’s not the rent I’m wo—”

“I know how to operate a washing machine and a vacuum cleaner, I can even cook, contrary to what your brother likes to pretend!”

“Hey, let’s not get Yamato involved,” Takeru says, raising his hands in defense, but Taichi’s annoyance is loose now, and he doesn’t really try to restrain himself when he says:

“Don’t worry, he doesn’t need me to involve him in pretty much every aspects of my life, he does that perfectly well on his own!”

Both Hikari and Takeru’s eyes widen at his words, and Taichi has to make a conscious effort to stay seated, breathe in deep and swallow some of his anger down. They’re trying to look out for him, he reminds himself. Sure, they’re insulting him—and possibly Daisuke, a little—when they act like he’s going to crash and burn now his little sister has left him behind, despite the presence of a roommate who proved a perfectly sensible leader and friend in difficult time.

Still, their hearts are in the right place, and Taichi clings to that for as long as it takes to calm himself down—at least until he’s reasonably sure he won’t let his words say imply things he doesn’t really mean.

“Look,” he manages after a while—the others, he notes, have waited him out, like defusing a bomb, and the thought makes him clench his fists together—“Daisuke and I may not be in the same state of domestic bliss as you, but that doesn’t mean we’re headed for disaster either, thank you very much.”

They share a look again—full of things they’ve already discussed to hell and back, Taichi bets, full of things they don’t want him to hear although, judging by the way they look at him afterwards, he might be concerned anyway.

“Okay,” Hikari says at last, articulation as careful as the hand she extends to touch Taichi’s knuckles with, “it’s just that I’ve—I’m a little concerned about that thing with the waitress—”

“Oh my—” Taichi cuts himself off to brush a hand over his face, “let me guess, Yamato called you?”

“I learned it from Daisuke,” Hikari replies, eyebrows drawing together, “I didn’t know Yamato knew you were involved.”

“When does he not know a thing about me?” Taichi scoffs, “Whatever I don’t tell him he can learn from any of us—even my own sister, apparently!”

“First of all,” Hikari counters, visibly refusing to back down, “I’ve already said I didn’t tell him about what you did. And secondly, can you really blame us? He’s the one who gets the best results when it comes to getting through to you!”

“He’s on the other side of the freaking world,” Taichi snaps at her, getting on his feet, “you guys need to stop pretending like he can control my life from there.”

“Nobody thinks that!” Takeru yelps, indignation written all over his features,but Taichi doesn’t believe him.

People running to Yamato as soon as they have a problem with Taichi—or what he’s doing, or how he’s living, apparently—is nothing new, of course, but for the love of everything, the guy left Japan over eight years ago, it’s time everyone started getting with the program!

“Look,” Taichi says, kind of proud of how he manages to keep his voice level despite the abrupt urge to yell until everyone leaves him alone, “I’ve got Agumon and Daisuke, I’m doing fine, and I don’t need Yamato to chaperon me, thank you very much.”

He gets to his feet after that, gathers his things and leaves before Hikari or Takeru can protest—before one of them can say something that will be blown out of proportion and they have a real argument.

Then he goes home, settles into some old comedy reruns with Agumon by his side and some leftover pizza in his plate, and waits until Daisuke comes home so he can investigates the guy’s feeling for Ken a little more thoroughly and finally clear the day’s frustrations and contrarieties out of his mind.

{ooo}

For a few days, Taichi worries Hikari’s intervention—and the text-based mutual apology they engage in the day after—means she’ll try to get more involved in his life again. Part of him wouldn’t mind, but she is his little sister: he’s the one that should take care of her, not the reverse. Much like the rest of their group, though, Hikari is simply too busy to make time for anything that isn’t her immediate life.

Taichi himself barely even leaves his flat unless he’s got classes or he needs to attend a work meeting in person which, given most of his meetings involve Digimon—and therefore a webcam or two—is getting fairly rare. The end result is that he shares his time between studying, trying to convince his country’s government to officially condemn the USA’s decision to maintain Digimons’ legal status as pets, and the blissful, mind-numbing relief of bad comedy and not wearing that isn’t at least at pajamas-levels of comfort.

He gets a couple of texts from Sora inviting him over to Kyoto—refuses, too tired to bother with the effort after so much mental exhaustion—and a long email from Kou’ he has yet to answer—he wants to, he does, but it’s kind of hard writing something long when the only thing you have time for in your life is work, work, work, and some bits of university crammed in there. Taichi can barely make time for Agumon these days, he can’t be blamed for not joining the others on their outings, collective or not!

The only positive effect of this, really, is that studying until the small hours of night means more chances of catching Yamato in the middle of his day, which means they end up texting even more than they did before their fight, saving Taichi’s social life from being entirely limited to his own flat.

Ken’s visit are a good thing, too, but for different reasons.

He’s constantly around these days. He pretends he’s there to see Taichi, which is a little ridiculous—then again, maybe Yamato’s theory has merit and the kid isn’t quite ready to put himself out there—but he’s always willing to talk about Daisuke—or Veemon, or the things he and Wormon do with the other two—whenever Taichi steers the conversation in that direction.

It’s adorable in how oblivious Ken thinks Taichi is, and kind of refreshing in the innocence of the scheme, although Taichi sometimes wants to tell Ken being more forward, or at least talking to Daisuke, would be more efficient.

Either way, though, his matchmaking projects are looking quite auspicious, and while he tries to keep them to himself so he can avoid Yamato’s disbelieving sarcasm and reproaches, Taichi can’t help but feel very satisfied by his good work.

{ooo}

“I will never understand,” Yamato sighs into the phone in the middle of a Saturday night in early-December, “how you can be such a brilliant politician and fail so completely at understanding people at the same time.”

“I’m going to pretend I only heard the nice part of this,” Taichi says, stretching his legs under his parents’ kotatsu, “but only because I feel magnanimous.”

His parents treated him to the best home-made meal ever for lunch—or at least the endless chain of instant ramen and leftover junk food he survives on when Daisuke doesn’t bring noodles back from work made it feel that way—there’s a heater roasting at his feet, and so far he’s spent his afternoon doing exactly nothing but watch Agumon snore the time away between two micro-naps of his own. Throw in his mother’s solicitude—her constant concern over his well being just short of overbearing—and the satisfaction of being positively toasty when it’s only six or seven degrees out, and you’d be hard pressed to find more mollifying conditions.

“I’ll repeat myself then,” Yamato replies, something sizzling on his end of the line.

Taichi glances at the kitchen clock, and raises an eyebrow when he realizes it must be around eight AM in France...by Yamato’s standard, it’s a positively indecent time to be having breakfast.

“You suck at figuring out what the rest of us want.”

“I don’t!” Taichi protests, patience shrinking faster than snow on a Meramon as he straightens up, “I told you, Ken just keeps talking about Daisuke—”

“Do you even let him talk about anything else?” Yamato interrupts with far too much sarcasm, “Maybe he’d be happy to talk about your job, too.”

“My job is boring,” Taichi replies with a shrug, nodding at his mom when she comes to sit beside him with her crosswords, “why would he want to ask about it?”

“He’s polite,” Yamato replies without missing a beat—the sizzling stops, replaced by the sound of a pan scrapping against something hard, and a persistent buzzing coming to an abrupt halt before Yamato continues: “he genuinely cares about you—oh and also you’re one of the people who has the most influence on whether or not Digimon will be allowed in the police force.”

“I’m not that influent, Yamato.”

“Fine,” Yamato deadpans, “maybe he’s just doing this because Hikari and I asked him to check in on you since he’s the one that lives closest to you with the most free time.”

“Right,” Taichi snorts, opening and closing his free hand into a fist near his head for his mother’s benefit, “like I’m going to believe that.”

“Then we’re back to the ‘your work is not boring’ part of that conversation,” Yamato concludes, so matter of fact Taichi can almost see him shrug.

“Please,” Taichi protests with a grunt loud enough to make his mother turn away from her crosswords and back at him, “last week I had to talk a bunch of Numemons not to attack the prime—”

“There was an attack?”

Taichi turns to look at his mother—the worried lines around her mouth and under her eyes, the frown crinkling at her eyebrows as her knuckles whiten around her pencil—and almost wants to slap himself in the face for being so careless. He’s usually better at controlling his vocabulary—but then it’s harder to remember when he’s talking to one of the others.

Now his mother looks pale and tense, bracing herself for the worse before Taichi can even blink, and he can’t blame her for it—he knows he can’t, not with everything he already put her through—but that doesn’t prevent the spark of irritation blooming in his chest, tightening the fingers of his free hand around his thigh as he reassures her:

“With stink bombs, mom. It’s gross, but it’s not dangerous.”

“Really?” His mother insists, and Taichi clamps down hard on the wave of annoyance roiling against his stomach.

“Yes,” he promises, hating the way it’s not enough to placate his mother’s worrying.

“Would you tell me if it was?” She insists, and Taichi sort of wants to answer ‘no’.

He never has, after all—not when he was a kid and it could have meant getting out of things entirely, not when he was a preteen he wasn’t even directly involved, not when he was a teenager and he and his sister cried into her shoulder for almost an hour. What else was he supposed to do, anyway? It’s not like she could have done anything but sit and wait, none of the people actually involved having time to stop and explain the situation to her—Taichi has done a lot of that when he was a kid, watching doctors and nurses busy themselves with his little sister without realizing there was another child there. He wasn’t about to put her through that as well.

He started counting the weeks until he could move out of the family flat when he peed his bed a few days after Yamato left for his semester in Moscow, and hasn’t even dreamed of coming back ever since.

“You know what,” he tells his mother, face aching with a stiff smile, “I think I’m going to take this call outside.”

“Sweetie,” his mother tries, easily sensing the distance, “you don’t have to—”

“No, it’s okay,” Taichi tells her, getting to his feet before she can touch him, “I’m feeling stuffy anyway. I can use the fresh air.”

He gives his mother one last would-be reassuring grimace, and tries not to look too obvious in his flight as he steps out on the balcony with nothing but slippers and a thick pullover to protect him from the cold. He sighs as soon as the glass door slides shut behind him, and purposefully keeps his gaze fixed on the skyline so he doesn’t have to watch his mother instead.

“Outsider freak out?” Yamato asks after a while, voice softer than before.

“It’s my fault,” Taichi says with a shrug—his voice is a little thick, but he’s pretty sure he’s going to catch a cold out there, so he doesn’t let it bother him too much—“I slipped.”

Yamato hums in response, and Taichi almost asks if Yamato thinks he should have known better, too, but his stomach constricts at the thought, and the question leaves a bitter taste of bile in his mouth when he swallows it down. Instead, what he asks is:

“Does it ever happen to you?”

“Like I talk to my parents enough for them to freak out.”

“Takeru could,” Taichi says, but Yamato scoffs.

“To my mother, maybe. Not the old man, though.”

Taichi nods at that, and then Yamato tells him to wait before he starts saying something in French—Taichi has no idea what. He’s not surprised by Yamato’s dismissal—has spent enough nights at the Ishida residence before Yamato left the country to take an educated guess as to why his friend is so close-lipped around his family—but that doesn’t prevent his heart from sinking as he listens to Yamato exchanges what must be goodbyes with his grandfather.

It’s hard to understand that kind of situation when you haven’t lived it, after all, and Taichi doesn’t need someone who doesn’t get it right now.

“Pappy flipped out once,” Yamato says after silence has stretched between them for several seconds with no ending in sight, “it was definitely my fault. We...talk more. Since then.”

“Do you tell him about the nightmares?”

Yamato makes a garbled noise around his breakfast that could mean anything from ‘I don’t have nightmares’--Taichi has countless middle-of-the-night texts and conversations that say otherwise—to ‘we sit at the kitchen table and swap war stories: I talk about Digimons and he talks about killing Nazis’ —or whatever Yamato’s grandfather did back in the French Resistance. Something in Taichi’s stomach twists at the sound, somewhere between envy and sadness, and since he can’t quite figure out which is which he decides to go back to safer grounds:

“Well, we can’t prevent them from worrying,” he says, trying to sound more cheerful than he really is, “but at least we can rejoice in the future success of operation Kensuke—and shut up, it’s a great portmanteau.”

“I didn’t say anything,” Yamato deadpans, and it’s easy to reply:

“You were about to.”

“You never know,” Yamato says with a rattle of cutlery jostling around in a plate, “if reason doesn’t work maybe aesthetics will.”

Taichi blows a raspberry into the phone out of principles more than anything else and, unsurprisingly enough, the only thing they exchange from then on is childish bickering, until Yamato has to beg out of the conversation so he can go attend his latest bootcamp. Taichi pretends to think Yamato is just admitting defeat, but the truth is he can’t feel his toes anymore and it’s a relief to come inside. He rubs some warmth back into his arms, wincing as returning blood prickles along his veins, and then startles when he realizes his mother is still there, looking at him like he just did something adorable.

Taichi hasn’t seen that kind of smile on her—or on his father, for that matter—since he was a child trying to act older than he was for his sister’s sake. The Digiworld and its host of complications erased that smile right off Taichi’s parents’ face when it turned out he really had to make decisions that should have been far beyond his years, and seeing it back because of something as simple as a conversation with his best friend makes Taichi pause.

“What?”

“I was just thinking how much you’ve grown,” his mother says, a touch of nostalgia gracing the edges of her smile, “not so long ago a disagreement with Yamato would have ended in a shouting match.”

Taichi’s face floods with heat, and he looks to the ground as he remembers a week of near complete silence in the aftermath of what should have been a fairly innocent argument. ‘I’m twenty five, ‘ma,’ he mutters instead of telling her about that.

She’s still smiling when he leaves, and that’s worth more than the exact truth.

{ooo}

He manages to phone Sora a few days before 2013 turns into 2014, and catching up with her somehow manages to shave something like ten years off his shoulders. It’s early in life, maybe, to think like that, but that doesn’t prevent Taichi from feeling the difference when the weight vanishes.

He’s not sure how they get around to discussing Daisuke and his growing crush on Ken, but he does know how flabbergasted he feels when she says:

“I just hope it’s not going to go too far.”

Taichi blinks at her through the video chat window, face owlish enough that Biyomon giggles at him from behind Sora’s shoulder. He’s a little too caught off guard to care though, because what on Earth?

“What do you mean, ‘too far?’”

“Well Ken is clearly not interested,” Sora explains with a wide shrugs—she pauses to answer a presumably important text before she finishes: “if Daisuke falls in love with him it’s going to make things really awkward. And painful.”

“Or not,” Taichi manages after chasing his own voice for a few seconds, “might be you’re wrong and they’re going to be perfectly happy together.”

Sora’s shoulders move like she’s putting their hands together—picking at the skin around her nails, maybe—and then she mumbles:

“Maybe.”

She sounds skeptical, at best, and changes the topic fast after that, grilling Taichi on his work and home life. He lies a little—makes up a couple of solitary outings just to spare himself the shame of admitting his social life has pretty much vanished, and does his best to sound like Digital World diplomacy is as fascinating a topic as it was when he started out—but mostly sticks to things that would be true if he wasn’t so busy and tired.

He brushes her off—gently—when she tries to warn him again, though. She may have the crest of love but she’s too far to have real clarity on the situation, and Taichi isn’t that brainless thank you very much.

{ooo}

It takes some effort not to gloat when Ken’s visits increase after their group’s New Year reunion—Taichi didn’t miss the effort Ken put in preparing the whole event and while simple kindness was definitely involved in the process, it certainly doesn’t explain the kid’s enthusiasm about it, or how much discussion of Daisuke’s qualities, life and project he can endure. Even Taichi is getting a little tired of the topic, and he’s the one who usually starts with it!

He’s had to slow down a bit in the past few days, because Wormon asked if Taichi was interested in Daisuke which wouldn’t be a problem if not for the fact that it isn’t what Taichi is going for at all. Besides, knowing Ken’s tendency to close up when he’s upset—second only to Yamato in that regard—if Taichi doesn’t set him straight, pun completely unintended, he might end up giving up on what might turn out to be the best thing of his life.

That would honestly be unacceptable.

So, Taichi makes it clear he’s not interested in Daisuke that way, keeps encouraging both Ken and Daisuke’s attention to the other, and celebrates with a much deserved sake shot one night—or maybe more like two or three.

(Agumon and Daisuke freak out when they find the bottle—not even half empty—so Taichi decides not to have a long-distance toast with Yamato about it, but that doesn’t prevent him from cheering a little every time he spots even the smallest sign of progress in his project.)

{ooo}

Taichi spends most of the weekend after New Year’s sitting on his TV with leftover cereals, watching reruns of Takeshi’s Castle while the others are either out or, in Agumon’s case, visiting a Tokomon village on File Continent. It’s not a bad program: it keeps complicated thoughts at bay and lets him idle the day away without guilt, which is all he’s asking for these days.

He spends an unusually bright Sunday morning like that, ignoring the world around him until someone runs up to his door—the footsteps echo through the corridor for a long moment before there’s banging on the door, and Ken’s voice calls out Taichi’s name through the wood. Taichi blinks and sighs at the sounds, peeling himself from the couch with the ache of too little movement in his joints before he makes his way to the door.

“Oh my—are you alright?” Ken manages, out of breath, when Taichi opens the door and nearly brains him in the process, “You weren’t answering your phone!”

“...I was sleeping?” Taichi replies, shaping the words with more care than entirely necessary, “what’s the matter?”

“Yamato tried to call you six time,” Ken replies, breathing slowly getting back to a normal rhythm, “you didn’t answer!”

“No,” Taichi repeats, more slowly, “because I was sleeping.”

It’s far too early for Yamato to be calling though—it must be around three AM in Paris right now, which is closer to late yesterday than it is to early this morning, and Taichi frowns when he realizes there’s only one possible explanation for the disruption.

“What happened?” He asks Ken even as he rushes back to his bedroom to retrieve his laptop, “Is Mr. Takashi going to be alright?”

“What?”

“Mr. Takashi!” Taichi repeats, opening his laptop in the same breath, “If it were a Digimon thing you’d have led with that so Yamato called for something else, and unless something happened to him or Gabumon, then it’s got to be his grandfather, so how is he?”

“I don’t know,” Ken replies, crossing his arms over his shoulders, “Yamato didn’t mention.”

Taichi pauses, confused.

“Then why on earth is he calling that early?”

“Taichi, it’s not early,” Ken says with the same careful enunciation Taichi used earlier, “it’s almost five PM.”

Taichi stares at Ken over the edge of his laptop, the orange glow of his screen almost painfully bright between them while he scrambles to gather his thoughts, and yet only manages a feeble:

“What?”

“It’s almost five PM,” Ken repeats like Taichi might break if the news is delivered too abruptly, “Yamato asked me to check in on you because you missed your phone call.”

“I—ju—what?” Taichi stutters, still unable to make full use of his braincells, “what do you mean he asked you to check in on me?”

“Well,” Ken answers with a heavy blush, “we’ve all been sort of worried about you lately, and you didn’t seem ready to listen, so I agreed to keep an eye on you...then when you didn’t answer on Skype or on your phone, Yamato asked me to pop by and I just...trusted his instincts, I guess.”

“...what?”

Ken’s face goes from flushed to beet red in record time, and Taichi almost feels his own eyes turn into panicked spirals as one realization follows another and he all but yells:

“What do you mean, you were keeping an eye on me?”

“Like said,” Ken says, shoving his hands behind his back, “we were all worried...I’m the one who lives closest, and your place is on my way from the academy, that’s all. Why did you think I spent so much time here?”

“To see Daisuke?” Taichi replies, hoping the high-pitch of his voice doesn’t erase the ‘duh’ from it.

“I see him every day while he works,” Ken points out, puzzlement pushing at the edge of his obvious discomfort, “I can talk to him there. Besides, if I were visiting him, I’d at least talk to him.”

“Okay,” Taichi answers, bringing his hands up to rub at the slowly-forming migraine between his temples, “so you’re...not interested in him?”

Ken blinks and looks down at his crossed arms as if expecting Wormon to be there—as if looking for comfort in the shared confusion—before he shakes his head with a helpless little shrug and says:

“You know I’m straight, don’t you? I mean. I’m actually demiromantic, but I’m still not interested in men.”

Taichi’s eyes widen, heart hammering louder and louder in his ears and against his ribcage as he absorbs the enormity of his mistake.

Months—he’s spent months encouraging Daisuke’s crush, shedding as much of a positive light on the prospective match as he could manage, plotting and congratulating himself on a project well-managed, and all that for what, exactly?

He shies away from the answer like stepping back from the edge of a cliff you were about to fall off of, clenches his fingers into fists, and tries to breathe deeply through his nose. What does his reasons matter? The result is exactly the same: he was warned against this. Extensively so, even, but it wasn’t enough to stop him, and now Daisuke’s the one who’s going to pay the price.

“Oh my god,” he mutters, “what have I—”

“It’s okay,” Ken interrupts, clearly misreading his intent, “what matters is you’re safe.”

Taichi looks back at Ken’s face then—stares at the concern in his dark eyes—and tries to listen to his friend’s word while his brain slowly turns into some bland cotton-candy thing.

“It’s just—you’ve lost a lot of weight in the past few months,” Ken says like he’s reciting a list, “you haven’t been playing soccer—Hikari said you didn’t even eat much even when your mom was cooking. And then Yamato told us you sounded bored about your work and you’d started texting him at odd hours—it wasn’t that hard to put two and two together.”

Taichi frowns at that, going over Ken’s speech in his head—abrupt weight loss, lack of appetite, loss of enthusiasm...and okay, he woke up at five today, but that’s just because work and university left him positively exhausted for heaven’s sake!

“You think I’m depressed?” He asks anyway, just to confirm—he manages to be disappointed at the way Ken’s face softens no matter what, and squashes the feeling as hard and fast as he can manage. “I’m not depressed,” he promises.

“Taichi,” Ken starts, but Taichi cuts him off:

“I’m really not. I’m just super tired—I see how it can look that way, but just because it looks like it doesn’t mean I am.”

“In my experience,” Ken starts, but Taichi cuts him off with a raised hand:

“Ken, I’m not depressed. Stop worrying, and tell the others too—I’m fine. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have something important to take care of.”

He all but pushes Ken out of the apartment after that, deploying considerable amounts of energy on convincing the guy not to worry—it doesn’t look like it works but, at last, Taichi is alone again, and he can finally catch a breath.

After all, if he’s going to have to break a friend’s heart—all through his own usual, pathological, bullheaded stupidity—he might as well take some time to figure out the least bad way of doing that.

If it even exists, that is.

{ooo}

Daisuke looks down at his hands while Taichi’s face catches fire, sweat boiling under his armpits while the burning heat of shame licks at his neck and ears.

It’s only been a couple of hours since Ken left the flat, and maybe Taichi could have given himself more time before he had to face this conversation, but what would have been the point? Delaying things protects no one but himself, and if anything he deserves the discomfort after what he did. He’s the bearer of Courage, dammit! He’s supposed to be a leader—to keep his team safe—and all he’s done lately is set one of them up for heartbreak while he made all the others worry!

Suffering for it won’t change anything to the situation, but at least it should ease his mind.

“I really am sorry,” he promises for what must be the third time in as many minutes, “I don’t—I shouldn’t have encouraged you without knowing...I shouldn’t even have gotten involved at all, actually. I never meant for you to get hurt—I’m so sorry.”

“Well,” Daisuke starts, almost—but not quite—managing to hide the shiver in his voice, “you were trying to help. That happens.”

Taichi opens his mouth to answer—tries to nod in assent and accept the forgiveness he’s so readily presented with—but the words stick at the back of his throat and he looks at the ground instead, fingers digging so hard in the flesh of his thighs even his knuckles ache. He stays silent, and lets the weight of his shame drag his shoulders down, down, down, until he’s almost kissing his own knees.

He barely resists the urge to bang his head against the bones when, after a long, painful silence, Daisuke leaves the living room and slams the door to his bedroom shut behind him.

{ooo}

“I can’t even believe anyone thought I’d make a good ambassador,” Taichi tells Yamato when he catches him on the phone a several hours later, “I’m so—so—stupid and selfish!”

Yamato half-yawns, half-grunts into the phone, and Taichi listens to the rustle of fabric on his friend’s end of the line, followed with another soft grunt when—Taichi assumes—Yamato realizes what time it is.

It strikes him, now, that there is quite a lot of irony in waking someone late at night so he can complain about being too selfish, but then the damage is already done by now—and Yamato will just call back if Taichi hangs up anyway.

“Sorry,” he says nonetheless, glad, for once, that Agumon isn’t here to witness the interaction, “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize—”

“Calm down, it’s barely past nine here,” Yamato tells him in a whisper—Gabumon must be sleeping in the same room, meaning Taichi could end up indirectly waking the Digimon up as well.

Things just get better and better.

“The real question is why are you up at five AM?”

“You were right about Daisuke,” Taichi admits in lieu of an answer, ears still burning, “about Ken—about everything.”

There’s a pause on the other end of the line—Taichi imagines he can hear Yamato frown, impossible though he knows it to be.

“I assume,” Yamato says in a careful tone, “that you apologized already and he didn’t take it too well?”

“He took it very well, actually,” Taichi admits in a tight voice, “better than I had any right to hope for. He thought I was just trying to be nice.”

“So you set him straight.”

Taichi swallows around the thick lump in his throat—refuses to let the burn of his eyelids become anything more, even if it takes some loud, deep breathing Yamato is sure to identify. At least the living room is dark now, and neither Daisuke nor Veemon have given any indication they wanted to come out so far.

“I didn’t even have enough guts for that,” Taichi admits, shame rushing back to life with the words, “I just sat there and let him figure it out for himself.”

“At least you didn’t lie,” Yamato points out, tone more gentle than it has any right to be—it stiffens Taichi’s back, claws at his throat until he hisses:

“You sound like you don’t even mind!”

“Fine. You were stupid, pigheaded and selfish, and you got Daisuke hurt, just like I said you would,” Yamato says, each words sharp as a knife, “does it make you feel better?”

“No,” Taichi admits.

In Yamato’s defense, it’s not like anything has a chance of succeeding at that just now.

“Then saying it was pointless,” Yamato says, voice barely above a whisper, “you’re a decent human being. You feel bad enough about this without me adding to it.”

“For all the good it does to Daisuke,” Taichi mutters, and Yamato snorts.

“I don’t think you can do anything about that just now,” he says, “you’ve said your piece, now give him space so he can think things through. Then we’ll see how it goes.”

Taichi sighs and nods, even though he knows Yamato can’t possibly hear that, much less see it.

Yamato’s right, though: there isn’t much to be done about Daisuke’s predicament right now, and it’s not Taichi’s place to do it. Excruciating as it is, the only thing he can do is wait.

“What if he doesn’t want anything to do with me afterwards?”

The question left Taichi’s lips almost of its own accord, cold dread flooding his lungs at the though. What if Daisuke decides to leave for good—what if the others feel like they have to make a choice, what if Taichi’s stupidity just damaged their group beyond repair?

“I don’t think he’ll do that,” Yamato starts, but Taichi snorts before he can finish his sentence:

“How would you even know that?”

“Because I wouldn’t,” Yamato says, matter-of-fact tone blurring into a yawn. “We’re not close friends, but we share a crest, remember? He’ll need time, sure, but I don’t think he’ll leave entirely.”

Taichi nods again, the motion just as useless as it was before, and wipes at the edge of his eyes with his palms. Really, he’s being pathetic—Yamato’s right. There’s nothing he can do to help right now, and sitting in the dark like an idiot won’t change anything to his situation.

With a sigh, he gets to his feet—winces when his knees crack as he straightens up—and then he says:

“He’d have a right to leave though. I basically broke his heart because I was afraid he’d leave the flat.”

“I know,” Yamato replies, “you messed up, there’s no hiding that. I just don’t think it’s entirely your fault.”

“I’m not depressed,” Taichi replies automatically, before he amends: “well, obviously I am feeling depressed, but I’m not actually sick or anything.”

“Then you’re doing a good job of pretending,” Yamato says, and Taichi pauses at the edge of his bedroom, one hand on the threshold to hold himself steady:

“I’m not,��� he insists. Then, tiredness stretching his voice into some sort of half-whine he barely recognizes: “can we just leave it at that? I’m not up for a debate about it. I’m fine. Overall.”

“Okay,” Yamato says in that way that means he still disagrees but doesn’t want to fight about it—in a way, it’s almost worst than having to argue the point. “You should go to sleep now, though. You’ll feel better tomorrow.”

“I don’t feel like sleeping.”

Taichi would say he’s not tired—if anything, it would salvage the sad remnants of his dignity, if only to his own eyes, even if not much of it is left to spare where Yamato is concerned—but the truth is he hasn’t been that exhausted since the weeks following the Reboot. It’s a bone-deep ache, something thick enough to coat his entire being and spirit, and right now he doesn’t have the energy to pretend otherwise.

It’s not like Yamato hasn’t already seen him at his worst, anyway. What’s one more instance in the grand scheme of things?

“At least go to bed,” Yamato insists, and Taichi honestly only agrees because putting up a fight is too much of an effort just now.

He makes his way to his bedroom on autopilot, free hand in front of him to avoid bumping nose-first into the wall as he feels his way to his bed. He collapses on it without bothering to take his clothes off—he only even put them on out of respect for Daisuke anyway—and keeps his phone against his ear when he pushes his head into the pillow.

It takes him a second to register the sounds of movement on Yamato’s end of the line, and then he’s yawning into the phone:

“What are you doing?”

“Getting my guitar out,” Yamato replies after a brief pause—he must have gotten earphones to free his hands, then.

“You think a lullaby’s going to put me to sleep?”

“I know I’ve put you to sleep that way before,” Yamato replies without missing a beat, “shut up and enjoy.”

Taichi chuckles, surprising himself with it, but he does manage to shimmy out of his dress pants and slip under the covers while Yamato tunes his instrument.

It barely takes half a measure of a tune from Spirited away before he falls asleep.