Disclaimer: I own nothing involved in this story unless I invented it myself. This is written for fun, not for profit. All forms of feedback eagerly accepted. Concrit is loved the most, but everything is welcome.
Fandom: Digimon Adventure
Title: Communication Issues
Characters: Jun & Momoe
Word Count: 2,144||Status: One-shot
Genre: Friendship, Drama||Rated: G
Challenge: Written for the 2014 Advent Calendar Challenge, day #13; Written for the Diversity Writing Challenge, section E, #23, write in present tense; Call It Heads Or Tails, Level 2, third person present.
Summary: [one-shot, Jun & Momoe; Advent Challenge Day #13, Diversity Writing Challenge; Call It Heads Or Tails Challenge] During a time of crisis, it's only natural that one should want to contact one's best friend. Even when that time of crisis is an invasion from another world.

Jun fiddles with her phone and peeks up now and then to see if any of those strange monsters were glancing at her. After taking Daisuke away, she didn't think any of them were. She worries about what's going on, but so is everyone else. Her parents cling to one another, murmuring softly when they think that she isn't listening to them. She lets them; better that they can do something to keep them selves occupied.

When she stands up, her mother looks at her worried and calls her name. Jun waves one hand, trying to look as if she isn't half as terrified as she really is.

"I'm all right, I just need to stretch my legs a little. I'll be back in a few minutes." She means it. She doesn't think there is a way that she could get out of here anyway. Those things are everywhere and she has no idea on how to fight any of them, or if they can be fought at all.

Her parents don't want her to go. She can see that clearly, but she needs to. Her reasons are more than just getting air and exercise, but they won't listen, she knows that. So she doesn't tell them.

She works her way around, dodging around clumps of people, avoiding anyone who looks as if they want to cling and talk at the moment. She wants to talk but not to them.

She refuses to admit that she is also looking for any sign of her brother, and that it worries her when she can't find any. Wherever he is, he's getting into trouble of some kind, and it's her job as his big sister to either stop him or at least record it somehow, so she can embarrass him with it later.

Or in this case, maybe to save his life. She can't be certain what is the right thing to do. But whatever it is, she'll do it if she can find him. That doesn't seem likely to happen, and it worries her far, far more than she will admit, even to herself.

But finally she finds what she's looking for: a place where no one else is hiding, cowering away from the monsters and it has cell phone reception, a pure out and out miracle in the last few hours.

It might not last long. She's not sure why it's there now. But she isn't going to miss her chance, not at all.

Swiftly her fingers move over the numbers, and she waits for an answer. Her heart pounds a little; at any moment her safe little haven could be no more, and she wants to finish this call beforehand.

"Hello? Jun? Is that you?" Momoe! Jun breathes a deep sigh of relief.

"It's me. I wasn't sure if you'd get this or not. Things have been so weird around here lately."

"You're telling me! Is it true? Are there monsters?" Momoe has always had a level head on her shoulders, contrasting strongly to Jun's far more energetic and impulsiveness, a trait of almost every Motomiya.

"There are monsters." Jun doesn't want to admit it. But it's hard not to, not when one of them is floating not all that far away, and it looks like a ghost and she's never liked ghost stories and she's ducking underneath a flight of stairs and hoping that her connection holds. "They're grabbing everyone they can find, I think. I've seen a lot of people from school and their families."

Momoe breathes out a nearly silent sigh. "I don't think I've ever been this glad that Mom and Dad took us to see our grandparents this weekend."

"I know how you feel," Jun agrees, and wishes that her family were with their grandparents instead of here. "Are Miyako and Chizuru all right?"

"They keep watching the news about this. Miyako's worried about a friend of hers; he's supposed to be coming in on a plane sometime today or tomorrow."

Jun casts a glance upward and wonders how any plane could possibly see it land in all of this fog. Perhaps they will divert to somewhere else; she's heard about such things when real fog comes in, and surely this magic fog is no different – and how could it be anything other than magic fog when an actual vampire is in the area?

She has heard people talking about the monsters and many of them mentioned their leader, word brought from somewhere she doesn't know and can't guess at, and he is a vampire and her skin crawls until she wants to take a bath but there isn't a bath to be had, not here.

"Jun? You still there?" Momoe sounds worried and Jun can't blame her at all. This is every nightmare that two teenagers could have coming true.

"I'm here." Jun fidgets a little more, keeping an eye out to see if the ghost creature came near her. It floats on, and as far as she can tell has not even seen her. She has never liked ghost stories and this does not change her mind at all. "It's just as well Miyako's not here anyway. They took Daisuke and all the other kids around that age somewhere. They would have taken her too if she were here, I bet."

She also feels Miyako would have put up a fight if they had; she's quite nearly as energetic as Daisuke is. The thought of seeing the little girl punching a ghost in the face brings a smile to Jun's lips. If only it could happen without Miyako being in danger, then that would be a fair sight to see indeed.

Momoe's thoughts do not seem to run in that direction, however. "You're right. Like I said, glad that we're not there. Are you going to be all right?"

A good question. One that Jun has no answer for. But she invents one on the spot anyway. "Of course we are. This can't last forever, can it?" A thought she doesn't like passes by; what if it does? What if this is only the beginning of the end?

She will not let the thought remain. It cannot happen like that. People will bring back order. The monsters will go away. Or this will turn out to be some sort of strange dream or hallucination. She wants that last to be the one that happens, because that would mean that none of them are in any real danger.

That Daisuke, the brother she can't stand and at times wonders why he was born, is safe. Words she will never tell to anyone, not even to Momoe, who would understand.

"I hope it doesn't, anyway." Momoe says something else after that, but a rash of static interrupts and Jun can't understand it.

"Momoe? Are you still there?" Jun doesn't want the call to end yet. She wants to be able to talk to Momoe until this ends completely, when she can walk back to her room and throw herself down on her futon and chat about boys and music and movies and everything else that she has always talked with Momoe about.

Momoe's voice comes back, a little fainter, a little tinnier, with some of that static still flickering around the edges of what Jun can hear.

"Jun? It's getting harder to hear you."

"I know. I almost can't hear you." Jun's stomach clenches hard and she knows that time is running out. She wishes that she had some way to stop all of this herself, that she could be strong and brave and fight these monsters instead of hiding from them.

"You'd better be careful. If those things get mad that you're using your phone..." Momoe's voice trails off, and Jun hopes that she's still there. But again, what she says is true, and something Jun has to keep in mind. This is why she chose this place to make her call. None of the monsters are watching over here. They're all watching where the other people are. None of them so much as look at her. Jun likes that. It makes it easier to breathe and to think.

But she can't stay here forever. Her parents are already worried about her, and with Daisuke gone, they're only going to worry even more.

"I'm getting low on charge, too," she says, taking a moment to glance at the screen. If only she could have brought the charger with her! But she has the phone only because it had been in her pocket when the monsters broke into the apartment. No packing of bags had been allowed.

Momoe is silent for a few moments, and when she speaks, her voice is low, as if she presses herself against her phone. "Be really careful. I don't want anything to happen to you."

"I don't want anything to happen to me either," Jun replies, trying to sound brighter than she feels. She has not made this call to worry anyone, but to reassure Momoe that everything is as fine as it can be.

Which is, of course, a huge lie, but she will not take it back. If she must lie to keep her friend calm, then Jun will do so. Gladly.

"Do you think you'll be able to call again?" Momoe sounds as if she wants the answer to be yes. Jun knows that she wants the answer to be yes. But this time the truth falls out before she can stop herself.

"I don't know. I don't think so." If the monsters don't find her phone and take it from her, or keep her from using it, then the charge will run out far too soon. Then she'll have nothing at all to do but wait to see if Daisuke returns and what else the monsters might have in mind for them. It isn't something that she looks forward to.

Again Momoe is quiet, save for the flickers of static. "I'd tell you to stay safe, but I know you too well. So just be careful. Don't get yourself hurt."

Oh, how Jun smiles at that. How many times have they gotten into trouble together because Jun wants to do something that no one else wants her to do? Too many for her to remember at the moment. She cannot be certain if she can do anything now, or what it might be if she can.

Another ghost comes by and this one seems to look more in her direction. Jun swallows quickly. She can't let her phone be taken. It gives her something to focus on in all of this.

"I have to go." She will not tell Momoe about the ghost. She will not worry her friend. "I'll talk to you after this is over." She wants to keep that promise. She swears to herself that she will keep it, that she and Momoe will look back on this and laugh one day.

Or decide to forget it all with the arrival of whatever new trend comes, whichever she feels she can deal with better. She cannot guess which it will be. But she wants to forget right now.

"Right. Talk to you later." The static flares and Momoe's voice is gone, leaving Jun feeling far more alone than she did only a brief second earlier.

"What are you doing over here?" The ghost asks and she tries hard not to shudder at the sound of its voice. She fails.

"Just going for a walk, that's all." She stuffs her phone into her back pocket and hopes that it doesn't know what a phone is. They come from another world, don't they? Do they have phones there? Jun doesn't know. Jun doesn't want to know.

The ghost hovers closer and Jun fights back a shudder. She remembers a time when she and Momoe were attempting to sneak into a concert and were found by a security guard. This is scarier. Much scarier, for the guard would only throw them out. This ghost could do much worse things to her.

"Get back there!" One hideous blue scaly arm extends from under the sheet, gesturing to where the rest of the captives are. She just nods, glad to get away with her phone and as much sanity as she can manage.

When she returns, Daisuke is there, and their mother has her arms around him, holding as if she plans to never let him go. He has little to say, just that he went through a line and saw a talking cat and the vampire that rules all of these monsters.

Jun curls up next to her family and waits. Surely this will all come to an end sooner or later. Someone is going to stop the monsters. They have to. She just doesn't know who. But someone.

The End