For what seemed a very long time, everything was silent. Outside Tai's window, birds were whistling and next to his bed, the little machine that measured his oxygen levels, pulse, etc. continued to beep and whirr. All eyes were on me, and I could barely think let alone explain, react, or function.

"That's retarded," Daisuke said eventually, and it was enough to jumpstart my thoughts back into some semblance of order.

I frowned at the binder. "It doesn’t make any sense."

"Well, what are the options?" asked Koushiro from his perch on the windowsill. He held up two fingers in a little v shape and ticked them off carefully with his other hand. "Either someone chose a name at random and happened to land on Ken's or they knew precisely what they were doing and chose it purposefully."

"Or Ken did it," Iori added, watching my face closely.

Daisuke, always loyal to a fault, made a face and glared over his shoulder at Iori. "Don't be stupid," he said.

Iori continued to stare at me for a moment longer. Then he shifted his gaze to Daisuke and raised an eyebrow. "I'm not," he said levelly. "I'm being objective."

Now, objective is not a word often used to describe Iori Hida. He has made a successful, stable, and often extremely profitable career out of never being objective. And certainly when the topic open for debate is whether or not I can be trusted, he’s come down on the same side of the argument more than once.

In the years just before I, unofficially, excused myself from the Digidestined, however, Iori and I had settled into a fairly comfortable friendship, and so I truly believe he was speaking out of caution rather than any lingering bitterness over who I have been or what I have done. Had our positions been reversed, I probably would have acted the same.

Daisuke, of course, has never been that reasonable.

"Shut the fuck up, Hida," he snapped and then in one smooth motion, he turned all that righteous indignation over to me for justification. "Ken, what the fuck?"

If I have made a habit of disappointing Daisuke, it is only because he asks the impossible of me everyday. If I am at all worthy of the respect and... adoration that so many people have given me so freely, the reason is the same.

I shook my head. "I don't know. My best guess would be the same as Koushiro's and that," I added, looking Iori straight in the eye, "isn't a very convincing argument."

Hikari spoke up next, sitting in the one visitor's chair next to Tai's bed with her arms wrapped protectively around Torio's shoulders. "Is this really the best time to be doing this?," she asked. "I can't see how any of this can get sorted out here of all places."

"Here, here," agreed Takeru.

"Right," said Tai, elbowing his way to a slightly more leaderly sitting position. "Jyou and the good people of Saiseikai Hospital inform me that I'll be freed tomorrow morning, assuming nothing serious happens overnight. I want you all in my office at eleven am, sharp." He looked pointedly at each of us. "And I do mean all. Let Miyako and Mimi know, and someone see if you can get fucking Matt down here for once. We’re clearing this up once and for all, understood?"

Daisuke snapped off a little salute. "Sir, yes sir!"

"Good," said Tai, smiling faintly. "Now I'm supposed to be resting or something, so scram." He made a little dismissive waving motion which managed to coax a laugh out of his nephew.

Hikari and Torio were first to say their goodbyes, giving Tai another round of hugs each and making him promise to call the second he was released. Jyou ushered them out, muttering reassuring medical information to Hikari as they went. Iori and Takeru followed; Takeru's notepad had suddenly reappeared, and he was ruthlessly grilling Iori on security procedures at the consulate. Iori was doing his best not to look irritated.

Daisuke, Koushiro, and I left last.

"Izzy," Tai said suddenly as we were heading to the door. "You'll make sure Kari gets home okay?"

Koushiro smiled and inclined his head slightly. "I will. Don't worry about it."

"And if she tries to call that bastard ex-husband of hers-"

"I'll make sure she doesn't," Koushiro said and smiled ruefully. "Get some rest, Tai. The world didn't go to pieces the last time you took a break. Logic suggests this pattern will continue."

Tai snorted and waved his hand at the door. Koushiro left, and Daisuke, after giving Tai a wide grin and a brief thumbs up, followed. When it was my turn to leave, however, an unanswered question sprang to mind, and I paused in the doorway.

"I was talking to Hikari about her argument with Sora," I said, only half-turning so that I could just see Tai out of the corner of my eye.

"Oh?" replied Tai, looking carefully bored.

"She said she'd promised you she wouldn't say what it was about."

"Did she?" said Tai, now blank rather than bored.

I sighed. "Did we always keep this many secrets from each other?" I asked, although I meant it more as a rhetorical expression of frustration than an actual question.

Tai answered anyway: "I don't know," he said. "Why don't you tell me?"

I didn't take the bait and without another word, I turned and left. Outside Tai's room, Daisuke and Takeru were waiting for me. They'd been in the middle of a heated debate, but they went quiet as soon as I set foot in the hall. It occurred to me then that my self-appointed deputies were probably in the midst of re-appointing themselves my personal escort; in all likelihood, they were now as interested in keeping an eye on me as they were in helping me with my investigation.

In retrospect, I know that was an unfair thing to assume but at the time, it seemed the only logical explanation for hushed conversations in corridors and the sudden bloated silence that greeted my arrival.

"What now, Ken?" Daisuke asked, shoving his hands into his pockets and leaning back against the wall in an attempt at appearing casual.

I shut my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose for a moment, sorting through all the information I'd received in the last thirty-six hours. A third of it was pretty much irrelevant now. Another third may never have been relevant to begin with. I was left with one final third, and even that was made up of information and odd coincidences that were hardly suspicious in and of themselves.

Tai and Hikari were keeping a secret; that I knew for sure. But Hikari said the secret was Tai's and not hers. If that was true, simply arguing with Sora wasn't quite motive enough, especially since the only other evidence connecting her to Sora's murder was the fact Torio had worked at Daisuke's restaurant for a while. And that was hardly anything at all, really.

And assuming that this latest attack on Tai was related (and it was safer to assume that than it would be to ignore it and find out later that I was wrong) and assuming he hadn't had help knocking himself unconscious and hiding the weapon, he was probably off the suspect list as well.

Yamato was still in Tanegashima. If the person who assaulted Tai and the murderer were one and the same, it wasn't Yamato.

Which left Daisuke. He'd had ample time to get in and out between my meeting with Tai that morning and when we'd left for Hikari's house that afternoon. Shit, I thought wearily.

"What did you find out from Iori?" I asked, opening my eyes and glancing at Takeru.

Takeru shrugged. "Not much. The logbook was a temporary measure while they set up something more permanent and, uh, foolproof. He picked it up from the front desk shortly after Tai got moved here, and he brought it straight here."

"The man who works at the desk knows who I am," I pointed out. "He wouldn't have been fooled by someone pretending to be me."

Takeru and Daisuke exchanged a look and then Takeru shrugged again. "There are a couple of shifts for the front desk. Maybe someone else was on duty at the time."

I frowned, but it was as good an explanation as any. Tsutsui was energetic, not stupid, but if another consulate employee had been working then anybody could've strolled in off the street and put my name down at random. I made a mental note to congratulate Tai on his terrific security system.

"Why'd they even need a logbook?" Daisuke asked. "I mean, Tai didn't know he was going to get attacked, right? So?"

"According to Iori, Tai was mostly worried about who was leaking all the info about Sora’s murder," Takeru said. "Not to mention all the crazy stuff the Biyomon and Nariko Tanaka are threatening."

I blinked. "Wait. Nariko Tanaka? I've heard that name before."

Takeru rolled his eyes. "She's crazy. She's been the poster girl of the anti-Digimon movement for months now. Really, she hates Tai more than she hates Digimon if you ask me. Although... I wouldn't say she's a murderer."

"No," I said, frowning. "I mean, I've seen her on television, of course, and I know Tai doesn't think much of her, but her name sounds familiar beyond that."

I looked at Takeru, but he was shaking his head helplessly.

"She's one of the kids," Daisuke said suddenly and when I raised an eyebrow at him, he kicked at the floor with his shoe, faintly uncomfortable, and continued. "You know, one of the kids. Oikawa, dark spores, kids in a van? One of them."

"Ah," I said and left it at that. I didn't think to ask Daisuke why he remembered that. I didn't think it was odd that Takeru and I had forgotten.

"Is she a new suspect then?" Takeru asked.

If only, I thought to myself. Out loud, I said, "No. I expect everyone at the consulate would recognise her on sight, and it's even less likely she’d be able to put strychnine into Sora's ramen."

"Well," said Daisuke, looking even more uncomfortable. "Not exactly. I mean, sure, she couldn't, but there are a lot of crazy fucks out there who hang on every word she says. Had to fire a couple of our waiters last month 'cause they kept picking fights with the customers."

This time, Takeru sighed. "Do you remember when life was simple? I remember when life was simple, and the bad guys all announced themselves with dark this and dark that, and all we had to do was show up. No offence, Ken."

"None taken," I replied. Then, taking a deep breath, I made a decision. "All right, we'll go see Nariko Tanaka."

"Great," said Takeru, grinning, "I call shotgun."

It was past dinnertime as we drove away from the hospital, but Takeru assured us that Tanaka was a workaholic and would probably be working late. "I had to do a story on her once," he said, "and she called me from her office at one in the morning. She'll be there."

Tanaka's office was a set of three leased rooms on the seventh floor of an office complex. Sure enough, when we'd taken the elevator up to her floor and Takeru had finally remembered which door was hers, we found it unlocked. I knocked anyway, just to be polite.

Tanaka herself opened the door. She looked exactly like she had on the television earlier that afternoon: short, sharp grey suit, black-brown hair stopping just above her chin. At first, she seemed a little annoyed at having been disturbed after office hours, but then her eyes fixed on me, and all emotions slid off her face like rain on a window.

"Ichijouji-dono," she said in a flat voice. "What an honour."

"I'm sorry for coming so late, but I was hoping I could talk to you, Tanaka-san," I said. "May I come in?"

Her fingernails, painted a neutral flesh colour, dug into the door frame almost instantaneously. "No," she answered. "You can talk just as well in the hall as in my office, I suspect." Then her mouth twisted into a tiny, tight smile. "Is this about your dead friend? The red-haired one? I apologise if I seem rude for calling her that, but you Digidestined never did stoop to introducing yourselves."

"Bullshit," grumbled Daisuke from his place by my right elbow. He would've said more, but I had the presence of mind to grab his wrist and give it a squeeze. I'm in charge this time, I wanted to tell him. I'm not sure if that's the message he received, but he stayed quiet. And Tanaka's smile only widened in response.

"I would appreciate any information you can provide," I said as calmly as I could manage.

"I don't know anything you don't already," replied Tanaka. "The Digimon are dangerous. Yagami thinks we can co-operate, work with them, but that is, as your friend eloquently put it, bullshit."

"So what?" demanded Takeru, and I sighed because while Daisuke and I have an understanding that doesn't really require words, there was very little I could do to make Takeru shut up. "You want to just seal the whole Digital World off? Think of what we've accomplished since finding the place! Think of what you had to go through to get there!"

"Yes," Tanaka spat, her smile gone and her face twisting into a grimace. "And think about everything I wouldn't have gone through if we'd never found it to begin with. It was just handed to you, all of you, and you think that makes you more qualified to make decisions for the rest of us. You think it makes you better. It doesn't."

She shut her eyes and didn't say anything more for a moment. Daisuke, Takeru, and I didn't say anything either. I can't speak on their behalf but for my part, I was silent because at least part of me agreed. How many times before had I asked myself that exact question? Who would I be, what would I be doing now, if I'd never been taken to the Digital World? If Oikawa and the dark spore had never inserted themselves into my life and almost destroyed everything?

Of course for me, unlike Tanaka, these questions were always followed up by one I find far more frightening: what would my life be like if I had never met Daisuke? Or the others, for that matter. I had that to hold onto. Tanaka had nothing.

"Any information you have, Tanaka-san," I said quietly. "About Sora or about the trouble in the Digital World. This affects all of us, now."

When she opened her eyes again, she seemed more composed. "I'm sorry Ichijouji-dono," she said. "I'd like you to leave now."

And because there was really no way around that sort of ultimatum, we did. We took the elevator back down to the first floor and managed to slip out just before the janitor locked the doors for night. The air felt heavy with rain although there weren't any clouds in the sky, only a few wisps snaking out from behind a tall office tower.

"Heading home now?" Daisuke asked. It wasn't cold out, but he was rubbing his arms like it was.

"Yes, I suppose," I said. Truthfully, I was reluctant to go home to Miyako and Mimi, knowing it would only mean recounting all of the day’s events yet again.

Daisuke looked up at the sky and then at his shoes. "I can drop you and Takeru off, if you want."

In truth, I wanted that very much. But I wanted many other things as well, things which at the time I was refusing to allow myself to think and things that I am somewhat embarrassed to remember even now. At the time, I worried that allowing myself this one thing, no matter how small it was, would start me in a direction that I wasn't quite ready to face, so instead I looked at my own shoes and said, "That's okay. I prefer walking."

"Oh," said Daisuke. He sucked on his lip for a second before blurting, "You aren't going to disappear on me again, are you?"

I shook my head. I couldn't really think of anything to say.

"You promise?" he prompted, looking up again, right into my eyes.

"I promise," I said.

"Fuck," said Takeru who was sitting on the steps of Tanaka's office building with an amused expression on his face. "Just get a room already."

I probably blushed. Daisuke flipped his middle finger up in Takeru's direction.

"Fuck you, T.X."

After that, we waited until Daisuke had gotten into his car and driven out of sight. Then Takeru stood up and brushed dust off his pants, and we started to walk.

"He deserves better than that," Takeru said after a while.

"I assume you mean Daisuke?"

"Yeah. Look, Ken, I can accept that you'll never tell me why you ditched us all for three years, but this is Daisuke." He made a gesture with his hands like a scale dipping one way and then the other. "You and Daisuke. Daisuke and you. Don't you think he deserves to know?"

I exhaled slowly. "Yes, actually, without a doubt. But that doesn't mean I'm going to tell him."

Takeru looked at me closely and then made a face somewhere between exasperation and understanding and looked away. "Yeah," he said. "I know."

And that, for the time being, was that.

Mimi was out the door and halfway down the walk before we were even within half a block of my house. She ran up to us, breathless, and linked arms with Takeru to escort us back to the house, demanding updates all the way back. When we reached my house, Miyako was waiting in the doorway with our son hanging onto her pant leg.

"Iori called half an hour ago, Ken," were the first words out of her mouth. "What is going on?"

I gave my son a half-hug and frowned a little in Miyako's direction. "Let's put the kids to bed. Then I'll fill you in."

Mimi and Takeru made dinner (by which I mean, Mimi told Takeru what to do, and Takeru tried his best not to set my kitchen on fire) while Miyako and I rounded up the children and did our best to explain why they were going to bed at eight-thirty. When that was finished and we’d all gathered around the dining table, Takeru and I explained between mouthful what had happened since we’d last seen Mimi, including Tai's plan to gather all the Digidestined in one room and hope we didn’t kill each other.

"Good," said Mimi. "It's about time we all stopped being silly about this."

Miyako nodded thoughtfully. "Seems like a trainwreck waiting to happen, though. Do you really think we can put Matt and Daisuke in a room together without it getting really, really awkward?"

This last question was directed toward Takeru who snorted and rolled his eyes. "Forget Daisuke. Do you really think we can put Matt and Tai in a room together without something exploding?"

"Touché," said Miyako.

"Hm?" I asked, pushing the remains of my dinner around my plate. Mimi was (and is) an amazingly good chef; at the time, however, I just wasn’t very hungry.

"Tai, Matt, Sora," Takeru said, punctuating each name with a stab of his fork. "C'mon, Ken, even you know about that."

"Oh," I said. "Right."

It was something of an in-joke at the time, or so Miyako had informed me, that no marriage between one of our eleven and someone outside the group had lasted more than three years. Takeru's marriage, which eventually went down in flames, prompting one of the nastiest custody battles Tokyo had seen in the last few decades, held the current record for longest lasting. Hikari's, which had gone in the other direction – freezing where Takeru's had exploded – had been the shortest, lasting for only a month after Torio was born.

And somewhere in the midst of all that wreckage, Yamato, Sora, Miyako, and I had emerged as some sort of idealized, shining pinnacle of what married life should be.

It's due to this bizarre and wholly inaccurate mindset that no one ever spoke much about Tai and where he fit in. It was easy sometimes to forget, as I had done near the outset of this adventure, that Tai had been in love with Sora when they were young and had probably continued being in love with her up until the very moment she died. That he was almost certainly still in love with her even now.

It was easy to forget until you remembered that Tai had gotten blind drunk at their wedding and fallen into the wedding cake that Mimi had spent nearly a month straight designing and executing, that he only rarely showed up to gatherings which both Yamato and Sora were going to be attending, and that -- on the odd occasion he did -- he spent most of the time joined at the hip to either Hikari or Koushiro and hardly said a word.

"Do you really think there will be trouble?" I asked Takeru. It was Miyako, however, who answered.

"He loved her, Ken. It's hard to let go of something like that, even if you know they love someone else." She paused, refolded her napkin, and added, "Or so I'd imagine."

Mimi nodded her agreement. Takeru raised his eyebrows in curiosity. I did my level best to avoid looking Miyako in the eye.

We cleaned up dinner soon after that, and Miyako bustled around the house, making sure that the guestroom had fresh pillowcases and that Takeru was fine sleeping on the couch.

I fell into bed almost immediately, feeling more exhausted than I had in years. For a while, I tried reading, but my mind kept wandering. There were too many questions still unanswered – questions that, in one of Takeru's detective novels, would've added up to exactly the answer I was looking. In practice, they were just distractions, a collection of random events that meant nothing.

And yet, even though my brain told me that this was the logical way of think about things, I couldn’t help but feel like there was something I was missing. One tiny fact that was right there in front of me. One tiny fact that would make everything else make sense.

Miyako came to bed shortly after. She went through her nightly ritual of brushing her hair and polishing her glasses before lying back against the pillows and staring up at me.

"So, how was it seeing Daisuke again?" she asked, and her voice was sharp and brittle.

And there it was, not wholly unexpected, our elephant in the room.

I shifted in bed, edging onto my side so I could look at her, not quite certain what to say. She looked back at me for a moment but very quickly she shut her eyes, brows crunching together in a fleeting expression of pain before smoothing out.

"No," she said slowly. "No, I don't really think I want you to answer that."

She turned off her light without another word and rolled over on to her side, facing away from me. I stared at her back for longer than I can quantify, wondering if I should answer anyway, if only to clear the air between us. Instead, I turned off my own light and pretended to go to sleep.

The next morning was largely spent hustling the kids off to school as quickly as possible. Takeru and Mimi took care of lunches while Miyako and I made sure books were in order and fielded questions about why they had to go to school so early.

"Mommy and Daddy have a meeting to go to, sweetheart," Miyako told them and though they didn't seem happy with that answer, they quieted down a little.

By ten-thirty, we were out the door and driving down to the consulate in Miyako's car. The guy running security at the parking garage gave us a funny look as we pulled up. Clearly he was more used to sports cars and sleek, black limousines than dusty, maroon station wagons but after Miyako explained who we were, he let us through.

Tsutsui was on duty at the main desk, but he was busy sorting through a stack of brown cardboard boxes. He waved at us as we came up and shouted, "Don't worry about the security stuff, Ken! They're expecting you."

"I'm glad he's taking the security procedures seriously,” grumbled Miyako, and Takeru grinned.

When we got up to Tai's floor, Chako showed us through immediately. She looked exhausted, but she gave us all a relieved smile that seemed genuine.

Inside the office, Miyako and Mimi were on Tai within three seconds flat. Mimi ran over and hugged him tightly around the neck while Miyako hovered and asked him if he was really up to this and reminded him that his hair looked even stupider now than usual.

"Hello, Mimi," said Tai, looking a little smug about all the attention. "Yes, Miyako, I'm fine. And yes, I'm aware my hair is stupid."

"Are we the first ones here?" I asked when the chatter had died down and Mimi had finally been pried off.

"Izzy had to go take a phone call," Tai said. "He should be back soon."

In reality, Koushiro didn't return for nearly half an hour. By then, all the others had arrived.

Kari and Daisuke came in shortly after we did, muttering to each other about something they clearly didn't want to share. Daisuke gave me a look as he sat down on the other side of the room next to her; I need to talk to you afterward, it said. I nodded.

Iori was next, followed by Jyou. By this point, Tai's office, which was not big to begin with, was almost full. Chako had to bring in more chairs from the conference room across the hall, and even then Iori ended up standing, propped against Tai's only windowsill.

When Koushiro and Yamato finally arrived, the others were busy doing the rounds, exchanging all the "how's work?" / "how are the kids?" that they hadn't had time to get out of their system at the hospital. I, of course, was seated by myself, watching Mimi and Daisuke bond over their newest kitchen equipment.

"Almost like the old days, isn't it?" Koushiro observed.

"Seriously, Izzy," Yamato said, "I think you're the only one who says that fondly. The old days involved a lot of almost getting killed, in case you've forgotten." Koushiro just smiled inscrutably, so Yamato shook his head and turned to me, cocking an eyebrow. "So, Ken, should I be heading over there to beat the living shit out of our Daisuke or what?"

I opened my mouth to make up some stupid answer about how we should wait or how the evidence was inconclusive when Tai clapped his hands together.

"Can we get started?" he bellowed, although we were all already paying attention.

"We aren't all here yet," Koushiro answered, taking the seat next to me that Miyako had abandoned in favour of socializing.

Tai blinked, did a quick a head count, and frowned at Koushiro. "I count eleven," he said.

Koushiro shrugged, as if to say "well, you're the boss," but said out loud, "Give him five more minutes."

So, we waited. In intensely uncomfortable silence. Now, that all the smaller conversation had been broken up, the others all felt somehow obligated to start the group discussion. But where to start? The possibilities were nearly endless. Sora's death and the murder investigation were obviously near the top of the list, but there was also the impending civil war in the Digital World, the information leaks, Tai's attack (not to mention Tai's secret which at least Takeru, Daisuke, Hikari and I were aware of), and that perennial favourite, me and any of the hundred stupid things I had done in the past three years.

With all these choices, no one was certain where or how to start. Until Tai did it for us.

"Been a long time, man," he said, looking at Yamato.

Yamato snorted and almost succeeded in not smiling. "I'm not hugging you, if that's what you're waiting for."

There was a beat and then...

"Do it," urged Takeru from somewhere in the knot of people on the left side of the room, and we all laughed. Fears about Tai and Yamato's ability to get along had been greatly exaggerated, it appeared, and the universal sigh of relief was almost a literal one.

There was a knock on the door at that moment, while we were all still smiling at each other and for the first time in years, just being together without fights or drama. Almost as a unit, we turned to look at the blond newcomer standing in the doorway, and he, in turn, looked at each of us, smiled brightly, and waved.

"Sorry for crashing the party," he said in an awful American accent.

Hikari and Miyako were out of their seats almost immediately, with surprised shouts of "Willis!", and Daisuke was bounding across the room to punch the blond man in the shoulder and throw an arm around his neck.

"Yeah, I missed you too, Davis," said Willis, rubbing his shoulder ruefully.

"I'm easy to miss," Daisuke replied with an understanding nod.

"Hardly."

"You're Willis?" asked Tai, thumping into the large chair behind his desk while Willis nodded dutifully. "Ok, cool. Nice to meet you officially." Tai clapped his hands again to signal the meetings official start and waited for a second while Daisuke steered Willis away from the door and over to his side of the room. Then he turned to me, made an open-handed gesture, and said, "Ken, wanna get us started?"

Put on the spot like that, I cleared my throat, looked at my hands, and stalled. When I looked up again, the others were all watching me patiently (or, in Daisuke’s case, less than patiently.)

I began like this: "I don't have much to say that you don't already know. Within the last few days, three things have happened. One is that Sora was killed. Two, the Biyomon are now threatening some sort of retaliation for her death. And three, yesterday, Tai was attacked."

I took a breath and looked at Daisuke. Then I looked at Yamato, and I took another breath. "I don't have any answers yet. I don't know if any of these three events are connected or if none of them are. But I can tell you that Sora's death was not an accident. She was poisoned, and the probability that it was one of us or someone close to one of us is fairly high."

"Murder is usually personal," Takeru interjected in a solemn voice.

I nodded. "I've followed up on some leads since then, but my results have been inconclusive at–"

Yamato burst out of his seat at that with enough force that Koushiro, sitting beside him, almost fell out of his. He froze for a moment then, almost self-consciously, with just shy of a dozen shocked facing staring at him.

"Did you do it?" he asked finally, looking at the wall in front of him rather than at anyone. But every person in that room knew who he was talking to.

On the other side of the room, Daisuke didn't blink, didn't shift in his chair, showed no sign that the question surprised or offended him. "No," he answered levelly, "I didn't."

Yamato closed his eyes. "Ok," he said when he opened them again, "ok."

A second uncomfortable silence fell, until Willis whistled a low note.

"Awk-ward," he said, and Takeru and Daisuke both smiled.

"Yeah, anyway," said Tai, leaning forward in his chair and lacing his fingers together on the desk. He gave Yamato a pointed 'must you always be such a drama queen?' look to which Yamato returned a 'takes one to know one' grimace.

"With that out of the way, what do we do next?" asked Koushiro calmly.

"If I may," said Iori from his half-seat on Tai's windowsill, "Ken's informative recap skipped over one important issue: our perpetrator appears to be framing Ken. Has there been any progress on that?"

"It hasn’t been at the...top of my priorities," I admitted carefully. "And I'm operating on the assumption that when we find the person who killed Sora," I paused and nodded quickly at Tai, "and who attacked Tai, he or she will also be the person who wrote my name on the time sheet."

Iori raised an eyebrow. I tried very hard not to roll my eyes.

"Look, you are free to trust me or not as you please. At this moment, I am less concerned with that and more concerned with finishing the job." I threaded a hand through my hair in frustration and added, "Hopefully, as Takeru has been my shadow for the last 24 hours, you should at least be able to trust his judgement if you cannot trust mine."

That caused Iori to pause, and he shot his jogress partner a corner-of-the-eye look that made Takeru instinctively sit up a little straighter and try to appear more professional and trustworthy. Iori has that affect on people these days.

"Fine," he said at last and sunk back into the concave of the window, temporarily satisfied.

"I repeat," said Koushiro, "what do we do next?"

Willis cleared his throat. "It may not really be my place," he began, "but it seems to me that this isn't really a question of what we do next." He motioned at me. "Ken has the investigation in hand. Tai and the consulate will handle the political problems. The rest of you will likely just be in the way."

"Crap, not you too," said Daisuke, throwing up his hands. "Why does everyone want to break up the band?"

Willis gave Daisuke a small smile. It was a familiar expression, like a thousand smiles I'd smiled at Daisuke before. Leave it to you to worry about that, the smile said, to care that much. Something in my chest clenched in a sudden, tight panic.

"I'm not suggesting we break up the team," Willis said. "I'm just saying that some of us might help most by being patient."

Next to me, Koushiro was nodding. "That seems logical," he said. "Too many chefs and all." His eyes flicked in Tai's direction and raised his eyebrows slightly, in an almost-challenge.

Tai hurumphed and sat back, clearly not entirely comfortable with the idea that he could not, in fact, be everywhere and do everything. "So I guess what you're saying is we should just back off and let Ken keep on keeping on?"

Willis gave a noncommital half-shrug. "More or less."

Tai considered this. "Fine," he said finally, waving in my direction. "Do what you need to do, Ken. But," and he let the word hang in the air, ominously, for a moment, "whatever you do, make sure T.K. is there to watch you."

I stiffled a groan while, across the room, Takeru perked up.

"Seriously?" he said.

"Seriously," said Tai. "While we're all probably irreversibly fucked if it turns out we can't trust Ken, a second set of eyes won't hurt. Ken just demonstrated that a second ago. And you're the perfect choice, probably the only real choice."

Takeru looked a little confused at that, as did many of us, probably, so Tai continued: "You aren't a suspect," he said. "You're one of the few who hasn't been since this started. And we trust you. Every single one of us. Even Matt and Daisuke, and they disagree on more things than even Matt and me." Tai smiled slightly, but it faded quickly. He looked at Takeru with serious eyes. "You've seen everything, from that summer to now. You're the only one. You're our witness, in every sense of the word. It makes sense to have you witness this too."

"Oh," Takeru said, looking blitzed but also thrilled as if Tai's approval was something long-sought and hard-won.

"So are we excused then?" Yamato asked. Tai's eyes jumped over to him, and his eyebrows twitched together in brief irritation. Yamato sighed and pressed his hand to his temple. "You'll do what you do. Izzy'll do what Izzy does. Ken and T.K. get on with the investigation. That essentially what we've decided?"

"Essentially," Tai said slowly, glaring at Yamato for, no doubt, stealing his show.

"Good," said Yamato, rising to his feet and stretching. "Because I am so completely fucking jetlag I could puke." He looked at T.K. who was still had an expression somewhere between shocked and smug on his face. "Where are you staying?"

"With us," said Yolei, gesturing first at me and then at Mimi and Takeru. "You're welcome to move in too, although I think we can only offer you a spot on the floor at this point."

Yamato grinned. "Done."

"Fine." Tai stood up. He looked around the room, making a point of catching each of our eyes before moving on. "We're all clear on what we're doing?"

There was a general buzz of agreement and nodding of heads. Yamato snapped off a lazy salute that may or may not have ended in a rude gesture; Takeru barked out a "Yes, sir!" Daisuke just rolled his eyes.

"Good," said Tai. "Now get the hell out of my office."

We laughed and then slowly, all except Koushiro, we did.

Miyako ran over to Yamato immediately, catching him by the elbow and steering him out the door. I followed, and she, Yamato, Mimi, Takeru, and I took the elevator down together. I listened to them discussing sleeping arrangement and directions, and suddenly I was struck suddenly by how relaxed Yamato looked. Nothing like the nervous tension of that night at the hotel or blistering anger of the first time I'd seen him. He seemed almost himself again, only tired and rougher around the edges than usual. As we hit the ground floor, he caught my eye over his shoulder and smiled quickly. It was almost a vote of confidence, I think.

Iori and Jyou had disappeared by the time the elevator doors opened on the main lobby. Since they were some of the only ones with truly demanding day jobs, this made sense, and I briefly wished I'd become a doctor like my mother had always planned. Willis, Daisuke, and Hikari had caught the first elevator ride and were now staked out near the big front windows, catching up. I suppose I must have been watching them rather closely because when Miyako looked back and asked me something, I barely heard her.

"Hm?" I asked, pulling my eyes away from the trio near the window and looking at Miyako. She frowned back.

"I said are you ready to head home?"

I tried to look her in the eyes, but a movement just off to the left distracted me. I turned my head and caught Tsutsui checking in at the front desk.

"Not just yet," I told Miyako. "You should probably go ahead without me."

Her eyes narrowed, but all she said was "Sure, Ken."

There was an argument brewing here. I knew that clearly, and I also knew that it was probably an argument worth having - we had, after all, been putting this one off for quite a while. But at the time, my priorities insisted that Tsutsui and the case come first, so I gave Miyako an apologetic smile and took off for the front desk, with Takeru at my heels.

Tsutsui was busy with a stack of pink and yellow order forms, but he looked up as we approached and smiled broadly. "Hi, Ken! Is there something I can help you with?"

"Maybe," I said. Behind me, Takeru had taken out his notebook again and was waiting with pen poised over the the first blank line. I leaned in a little closer, trying to suggest without needing to say it that this was a confidential conversation. Tsutsui's smile faded a little and for the first time in the brief span I had known him, he looked serious. "Were you on duty last night?" I asked.

"When Mr. Yagami was attacked?"

I nodded.

"No, sorry. I had a dentist appointment that afernoon." Tsutsui blinked. "Why?"

"Nothing," I said with a shake of my head. "Don't worry about it."

"Ok, Ken," Tustsui replied. "Have a good day!" And he waved brightly before diving back into his forms.

As we walked away from the desk, Takeru shut his notebook and peered at me.

"What're you thinking?" he asked.

I sighed and pinched the bridge of my nose. "That I should've known that would be too easy."

Takeru snorted.

"Actually," I said, shaking my head in the hopes that it would miraculously clear, "I'm not sure I am thinking right now. That might be a problem."

"Might?" asked Takeru, raising his eyebrows ironically. I shrugged, and Takeru relented with a smile. "Are you still thinking it's one of us, then?"

"Yes," I said and then, "Well, maybe."

"Convincing."

I frowned. "I know you all think I'm wrong. God, I hope I'm wrong. But if it isn't one of us then I have been going about this from the wrong angle entirely."

"Oh? asked Takeru. Somehow, almost magically, the little notebook was out again.

"I've - No, we've been assuming that this was about Sora, that the murderer had something against her. That's fine if we also assume, like you said, that it was personal. But what if it wasn't?" I looked Takeru in the eye. He stopped writing and looked back. "If it wasn't, then it's more than likely that this wasn't about Sora. It was about us."

Takeru looked surprised. "The attack on Tai makes more sense in that context."

I nodded distractedly. Suddenly I had that same nagging feeling that the answer was in front of my eyes, within reach, but I couldn't quite make it out. "The leaks to the press and the Biyomon make more sense too," I said. "And so does framing me." My eyes widened at this little epiphany. "That's it, isn't? They weren't trying to kill Sora. They were trying to take us down."

Takeru was quiet for a moment. Then: "Tanaka?" he asked quietly.

I frowned again, looking off toward the windows. Daisuke and the others were still chatting enthusiastically. Hikari was laughing.

"I don't know," I said finally. "I don't think so." Takeru looked confused, so I added, "She just doesn't seem the type to me."

"She certainly didn't seem to like us much."

"That's true," I said hesitantly. I wasn't quite ready to admit to Takeru that what Nariko Tanaka had said had struck a tiny, well-hidden chord with me -- a lingering doubt I hadn't quite forgotten. "But her problem with us and with the Digitial World seems to be choice and her lack of it. I don't think she's the sort of person who would force a choice on others. She wants people to pick her over Tai. That would be the real victory."

"Hm," said Takeru, unconvinced. He seemed ready to say more, but we were interrupted by a loud shout of "Daisuke Motimiya, don't you dare!" from Hikari, and we turned just in time to see Daisuke bounding over toward us.

"You two ready to stop being totally boring yet?" he asked, throwing an arm around Takeru's neck. Willis and Hikari trailed over more slowly, Hikari still sporting a vaguely irritated air while Willis simply shook his head in amusement.

"I'm glad to see you taking this so seriously there, Davis," Takeru said.

Daisuke sniffed and raised his chin. "Excuse me for finding a bright side to this fuck-up, T.L." He grinned at me expectantly. "What's the next move, Ken?"

I stiffened. I knew this feeling. It was not entirely unlike the one I had felt that night in Tanegashima with Yamato and Takeru. I was part of the team again. Daisuke was offering me a chance to take back the last three years, to simply ignore the fact that they'd ever happened and begin again. We could be jogress partners again – friends.

It was the chance I had been longing for and dreading since the case had begun. And knew I couldn't accept.

(I suppose I should explain fully at this point. Takeru is giving me a look that seems to suggest that an explanation is long overdue.

To put it simply and with as little elaboration as possible, I have been in love with Daisuke since I was, approximately, eighteen. It was a well-kept secret. I'm certain Miyako knew, and a handful of the others may have suspected, but the topic had never been officially broached for discussion. Daisuke never knew.

At least, I don't think he did.)

I ordered my face into something impassive, cold, and, hopefully, ultimately, unreadable. I had had a lot of practice with this particular expression over my lifetime. Slipping back into it was almost like reuniting with yet another old friend.

"Your next move is to go home," I told him and then I watched as his face fell, regrouped, and rose again as something angry.

"What the hell?" he barked. "I mean, fuck, Ken–"

"Go home, Daisuke. This isn’t your fight."

He let go of Takeru then and stormed over to me, fists clenched at his sides. Face-to-face, I was still about a head taller then him, not that it had ever really mattered. Daisuke can command a room through force of will alone.

"Like hell it isn't," he growled. "We're a team."

I stared down at him. I'd like to think I didn't flinch.

"No," I said. "We aren't."

And that, more or less, is when he punched me. It was a hard punch; he wasn't trying to hold back. But I suspect it would have hurt more if I hadn't been expecting it. I knew, after all, that what I was saying would make Daisuke angry. That's why I was saying it. Because if he was angry at me, there was a good chance that he would storm off and leave me in peace to solve this case and carry on with my life as it was. To keep on keeping on, as Tai had said.

Daisuke was breathing heavily and shakily when Willis took his first step forward and laid a hand on his shoulder. Hikari and Takeru were looking at each other and carefully trying to pretend they were somewhere far, far away.

"Hey," said Willis softly. "C'mon, Davis. Calm down."

But Daisuke... didn't. He shrugged off Willis’s hand and glared at me for a long, silent minute.

"You know what?" he said finally. "Fuck you." And with that, he spun around and stormed out of the building. It didn't occur to me until that moment that Daisuke had wanted to tell me something during the meeting and that that information might well be lost permanently now.

In Daisuke's wake, Willis looked nervously from me to Takeru to Hikari. He jerked his thumb in the direction that Daisuke had just exited and said, "I guess I'll go after him?"

Takeru, falling easily into his customary role as second-in-command, nodded and as Willis headed off, he turned to me and raised an eyebrow. "You okay?"

"Fine," I answered, resisting the urge to rub my cheek. My nose wasn't bleeding; no teeth had been damaged. The only permanent damage seemed to be a throbbing along my jawline and the vague feeling that I could not be more of a dick even if I really, really tried.

Hikari frowned and echoed my thoughts: "You can be really awful when you try, you know?"

"Yes," I said sourly. "Somehow I'm beginning to get that impression."

Hikari blushed immediately and gave me a small, sad smile. "Come one," she said. "I'll give you two a lift home."

I shook my head. "No thanks. I'll walk."

"You sure?" Takeru asked. His concern was still clearly written on his face.

"Yeah," I said. "I could use the time to think."

I told them to pass onto Miyako that I would be home soon, and we parted ways. It was barely past noon by the time I headed out. The rain clouds that had been missing the night before were finally moving in and as I walked down the street, I saw a dozen or so pedestrians glance up and curse themselves for not bringing umbrellas.

Although I had told Takeru that I needed time to think, that was only half-true. What I really needed was time to recentre myself. I needed to get a better grip on myself before I could face Miyako again.

It has always been tricky, balancing my feelings for Daisuke with my obligations to Miyako. I will openly admit now that this was one of the reasons I abandoned the Digidestined like I did. I was afraid, and I was also well aware that my track record when it comes to resisting temptations had not been stellar. It seemed easier to avoid him, and thus the problem, altogether.

But things with Daisuke have always been inevitable. Indelible. Like gravity or prime numbers. Like birthdays. Like change. I had almost forgotten.

I rubbed my jaw then, waiting for a stoplight to turn, and I thought about the summer we met. Thirty-degrees on a playing field that was mostly torn up by the time I arrived. I thought about shaking hands and the scratch on my leg and how hard it had been to pretend that I didn’t care about beating him.

At the next intersection, I stopped. The light was green, but I couldn't convince myself to keep going. Not home, at least. I turned, and I began walking toward Daisuke's.

It was much further away. By the time I reached his building, it was close to 2:00. Daisuke lived in a large high rise, with high ceilings and large windows. It is, I suppose, a testament to the fact that I had never really let him go that I remembered exactly which window was his.

With a mental reminder that this was probably the stupidest thing I had ever done in my life, I took a step toward the building, followed by another and another. One of the building's other occupants let me in as she headed out, so I was able to slip past the intercom and onto one of the elevators without alerting Daisuke to my presence. It was clever, I thought, heading off a potential fight before I had my foot in the door.

When I got to Daisuke's floor, I took the familiar sharp right and headed down the corridor to his apartment.

And when I got there, I froze.

The door had been kicked in – that was clear from the way the wood had cracked around the hinges. Even from the corridor, I could see that Daisuke's apartment was a mess with books and shelves toppled. The TV screen had been broken, and bits of glass sparkled across the carpet. From somewhere in the back, near the kitchen, the radio was playing a cheery pop song about dreams and homework.

I took a careful step inside, trying not to disturb the scene as best as I could.

"Daisuke?" I shouted.

No answer.

My stomach rolled and for a moment, I was certain that I was going to throw up.

"Davis?" I shouted again, louder this time.

Again, nothing.

Slowly, I moved from room to room. It was a numb, automatic reaction, a gut instinct that prompted me to keep moving and stop thinking. The mess – signs of struggle, my mind supplied – was almost entirely confined to the living room. And Daisuke was nowhere to be found.

I swallowed against another wash of bile and fear and reached into my pocket for my cellphone. Slowly, in short, sharp fits, I dialed Takeru's number.