If there was one person that Haruka 'Haru' Yamaguchi knew she could talk to about anything, it was Guilmon. Her Digimon partner had been a relatively new addition to her life, but he was very much a welcome one. She loved having a dinosaur friend that hung off of her every word- nobody had ever listened to her before she arrived in the Digital World.
Well, not to do anything but mock her, anyway.
And he
did listen to her, or the coffee incident would likely have been repeated at least once. But no, once she banned Guilmon from caffeine, he never even
tried to touch it again, much to the eternal relief of her friends.
And she had
friends now. This was something new, something exciting, though Haru didn't tend to tag along on their adventures- as useful as a Stegomon might be, she just couldn't run as fast as the rest of them, something that her poor vision didn't exactly
help.
"Sorry about that," She had apologized the first time she misread a sign. "I normally wear glasses, just... I forgot them at home."
She'd expected everyone to laugh at her, the same as people back home did whenever she messed up.
"Well, that's just another reason for us to get home then, isn't it?" Daigo laughed.
No. No, this wasn't right. He wasn't supposed to be so good-natured about it, this didn't make any sense!
Even Kazuya had been somewhat nice about it- and Kaz wasn't nice about
anything, back in those days. "Hey, Riku, you can draw half-decently, right? Maybe you could draw things out here, so she can learn what they look like later?"
"My eyes aren't
that bad!" She protested. "Right, Guilmon?"
"There is nothing wrong with Haru," Her partner loyally replied, taking a defensive position.
"Well, I wouldn't go
that far..." She mumbled. But she found herself smiling, and thinking that it wouldn't be so bad if she
never went home, or if her eyesight
did deteriorate to the point of blindness, if it meant that every day could be like this.
People who she could talk to... Yeah, Haru could find herself getting used to this.
More than a year later, Haru found herself wishing she
had gone blind. It probably wouldn't have changed anything, beyond forcing one of her friends (And she was comfortable with calling them that, now.) to learn Digicode once she was unable to read it herself, but at least fulfilling the prophecy wouldn't have been
her idea.
"Maki, I-" she started, before stopping herself. Because, really, what was she supposed to say in this situation?
Especially when her translation was part of what had caused them to think this was a good idea in the first place. And it wasn't.
So much for her being the smart one
. Suddenly, everything her classmates said came back in full force: A know-it-all, teacher's pet, a half-blind lunatic who couldn't even remember that she couldn't see.
But maybe it would be okay. They'd lived through being torn away from home, the destruction of entire civilizations, a battle for the fate of both worlds. Maybe they could get through this, as well.
Not that she was the best with people. No, that was Daigo. But she trusted him to know what to do here. Maki was his best friend, after all. She'd focus on things she personally needed at the moment, like picking up the pieces after her whole world fell around her so that she didn't even have Ebonwumon's constant company anymore. It would be fine.
"Maki's gone." Was all that Daigo said after starting a meeting on the eighteenth of April. Riku was the first one to react.
"What do you
mean, she's gone!? I just talked to her a few days ago!"
"Well, you remember how her family lives on Heighton View Terrace? There was a Parrotmon there, he wanted to attack us to get back at our partners for some reason... left the portal open behind him." That probably wasn't the full story. Haru might not have been very good at talking to others before the Digital World, but she could tell that much. You didn't just
leave a portal open, after all.
"But she's still alive, right?" Kaz checked.
"She was when she went through the portal," Daigo shrugged. "But I'm pretty sure the Parrotmon was already dying when Greymon and Birdramon forced
him through, and time in the DigiWorld's weird, so..." Haru's mind leapt to the most important points.
"Greymon? Birdramon? There were Digimon
here?" She'd wondered if it was possible, but...
And that was how she learned of the existence of Sora Takenouchi. And for a moment, she considered trying not to be so sloppy, in order to impress the new kid.
That resolution didn't even last a week.
Taking an apprentice was easily, in Haru's mind, the best decision she'd ever made. Izzy seemed to get along better with kids his age than
she did when she was young, but that wasn't saying a whole lot. Still wasn't in the present, what with her three same-age friends that still lived on the same plane of existence as she did, but she
was better than she used to be. As it was, the harsher parts of her past was something she'd never really needed to deal with beyond acknowledging that it happened.
And then her student and his friend had hacked into the Digital World's basic access. And she found herself scrambling for the phone, putting in Daigo's number with the ease of having long memorized it- he
was the one
everyone went to when they had problems, after all.
Sometimes she wondered who he went to, but figured it wasn't important. He seemed to be holding up well enough, after all.
"Hello?"
"Hey, Daigo? We need to talk." She forced herself to calm down, reminded herself that her hope was more or less unfounded- the chance of actual closure was low enough as to practically be nonexistent, and she figured they'd all coped well enough. They didn't need it.
"This... this is going to be important, isn't it?"
"Of course it's important!" As if she'd call him in the middle of the day if it wasn't. "My apprentice found something, and I need to ask you." She paused again, composed herself.
"Haru, you need to ask your question first." She sighed. She'd just been
getting to that part.
"Tell me... what
exactly happened to Maki?" She should have asked this sooner, honestly. It was probably worse not knowing.
"Well... there was a portal by the bridge that collapsed. Parrotmon and Greymon were pulled into it. Maki... she
jumped." Which explained why she'd only met Sora's Biyomon, as well. But that wasn't important.
What
was important was that Maki probably didn't have any intention of returning to their world, if she'd decided that leaving it was the best option. So chasing her down in an effort to bring her back would probably be an exercise in futility. Which meant Haru didn't have to waste time chasing nonexistent leads, and could instead look towards the future.
Preferably, one where she could talk to her partner again.
If one were to ask Haruka Yamaguchi what the best point in her life had been, she'd say July 1998- February 1999. Not for any particular reason in her everyday life, but because, once she'd finished her (pathetically easy) homework for the day, if she and Riku didn't have a date planned, or she wasn't working with Izzy- like he
needed the help- or meeting with friends, she'd spend the rest of the day on her email, chatting with Ebonwumon.
He'd grown a lot from the Guilmon she'd first met in the Digital World and accidentally fed coffee to. But then, she supposed that was the wisdom of years talking. It was like having daily conversations with her own personal guru. Of all the Sovereigns, she'd easily say he'd changed the most.
For the most part. While he now called Riku 'Rikuto' and Kaz 'Kazuya', to him, she was still Haru. Even her own boyfriend called her by her full name rather than her old nickname more often than not these days, but Ebonwumon was still able to evoke those fond memories of... well, not a
totally happy childhood by any means, but of a time when everything felt wonderful because it seemed so much more
complicated.
It was amazing how boring things were when it felt like you knew everything, and Haruka sometimes had problems reminding herself that she didn't. At least, until she tripped on a textbook she left lying out, at which point everything started to balance back down a little. And then she'd tell Ebonwumon all about it in the hope that he'd find it funny.
For so long, things had worked that way just fine. And then she was woken in the middle of the night by her Digivice. Slipping her glasses on so she could see- her vision had been steadily getting worse recently- she instantly translated a set of runes that she'd expected never to see again.
Help us! -Maki
The next day, Ebonwumon stopped responding to her emails.
Had something happened to him? Would she ever know? She wasn't sure.
Even after losing contact with the Sovereigns, Haruka liked to pretend that everything was okay. She acted like she wasn't worried for her partner- he was a Mega Digimon and could take care of himself. He didn't need her anymore.
If he'd ever needed her in the first place.
Everything would be just fine. It had to be.
...She didn't like crying because it fogged up her glasses, but some days, she was sorely tempted.
But for the most part, she was able to keep it together. And then, one day, Izzy told her not to worry about meeting to work during the summer, because he'd be going to various camps for the whole thing. And she saw him off with a smile, telling herself that this was a normal part of life, and her loyal student was just growing up.
And then she got a notification of an email that was from the same server as the
Digital World. It wasn't Ebonwumon's address, but she still opened it, allowing herself to hope.
Maybe she shouldn't have.
Sender: Koushiro Izumi
Recipient: Haruka Yamaguchi
Subject: DigiDestined
Okay, let's just cut off the chance of panic and say that nobody's died yet. Okay, given that we were at summer camp, that's probably not very reassuring. But we're all fine, really, even Mimi's leg's gotten better. But... well... we're kind of stuck in the Digital World. Help?
If you're wondering why
we're in the Digital World, well, a portal opened up at camp. Five Digivices fell out of the sky, landing in front of the owner of this computer, Taichi and Hikari Kamiya, Mimi Tachikawa, and Yamato Ishida. Sora Takenouchi and Takeru Takaishi were in the area, as well as their Digimon, so they ended up coming along for the ride, thankfully. Otherwise, the past eight days would probably have been a lot
more difficult, not least because of the fact that Kari's partner is nowhere to be found, though she is currently caring for a Bukamon belonging to Joe Kido. (Yes, that
Joe. We're just as surprised as you are.)
On a semi-related note... we know a bit of what happened to Maki. Apparently, she ended up on File Island some time back and helped found a city, though she left to Server for research purposes a long time ago, and nobody on the island's heard from her since. A lot of Digimon seem to remember her, though. Mayor Jijimon, the Bakemon of the Overdell, and the Kunemon that's been acting as our landlady, amongst others. ...Well, landlady for most of us. Tai got evicted some time back for making a comment about insecticide.
Really, the biggest problem we've had to deal with are Black Gears randomly doing things- you remember those, right? But we have our Digivices, so it's really not a big deal. We'll try and get home as soon as possible, though if you find this and manage to respond before we get back, advice would be welcomed, particularly as to how you got back and whether it might be viable to try and contact your partners, from either side of the gate. Yes, Miss Yamaguchi, we will tell Ebonwumon to start returning your calls if we come across him somehow, not that we expect to. We're in the south.
We also found something you might be interested in: DNA Digivolution. If you haven't heard of it, basically compatible Digimon are capable of temporarily fusing into a stronger one. It's common enough that tournaments in the city allow it in team fights as part of their normal rules.
If you get a message after this containing little of substance, that's the message we plan to send in roughly twenty-four hours to give us a good idea of the time passing between worlds. It'll only work if you actually tell us the results, though, so make sure to do that.
Try not to worry about us too much, okay? - The new generation of DigiDestined
By the time she had finished reading the third paragraph, her glasses had become completely filled by fog.
