Chapter Text
Return
5th April, 2003
He was alive.
He was alive.
As they stood in the elevator shooting towards the surface once more, Kouji wasn’t sure what to think. He’d gained a brother, there in the digital world, and hardly gotten to know him at all amid their frantic, futile race to defend the last fragments of it from the Royal Knights. And then Lucemon had awoken, beaten all kinds of crap out of them and suddenly Kouichi was disappearing right in front of him. The brother he’d spent most of his life not even knowing about was taken away from him again, and he’d been forced to pack his grief and shock into a tight ball because it was that or die. And the truth was, it still hadn’t sunk in that Kouichi was dead, was gone forever—and then suddenly he wasn’t?
Kouji’s head and heart were knots of hot, messed-up emotions, and he was so glad that the only people around him were Takuya and the others, because they at least knew him well enough to not ask how he felt. Takuya led, as always, guiding them out of the lift and to the meeting which Kouji had been waiting so long for. Ever since the corrupted spirits of Darkness had been defeated, and pulled away to reveal his honest-to-God twin. Out of the elevator; a hard right round the corner and down the stairs. Down one flight, and another. Closer and closer and—
—and he was gone. Gone again. He didn’t remember stopping to ask the people at the foot of the stairs where Kouichi was—Takuya and the others would fill in those blanks in his memory later. He was off, running once more to catch up. Chasing his brother down darkening streets, on and on; past the pain in his side; past the faint, breathless cries from the others to wait up. Block after block to the medical centre. Through corridors, up stairs. All he could think of was Löwemon’s static-laden voice bringing him hope. Kouichi was there, somewhere in that building. He couldn’t even explain to the others how much he knew Kouichi needed him, but need him Kouichi did. He could feel it, in his gut. In his bones. With every fibre of his being he knew he had to hurry. Knew there wasn’t much time.
Knew which room he needed, even though no one was going to tell five children the way to resuscitation. And then to burst in, only to find out that they were too late? NO. He wasn’t going to accept that. He wasn’t going to give up. They’d been through too much, faced too many odds. There was no way he was going to have survived all that only to lose Kouichi now.
In all honesty, it didn’t matter if he’d brought Kouichi back through sheer stubborn refusal to let go, or if the last act of their digivices had somehow done…something. He knew he’d be reliving that moment for the rest of his life anyway, so there was plenty of time to stew on it. All that mattered there and then was clinging to his brother. The brother he’d lost and found, and lost and found, and never planned on losing again.