This is a song for the genius child.

Sing it softly, for the song is wild.

Sing it softly as ever you can -

Lest the song get out of hand.

Nobody loves a genius child.

Can you love an eagle,

Tame or wild?

Can you love an eagle,

Wild or tame?

Can you love a monster,

Of frightening name?

Nobody loves a genius child.

Kill him – and let his soul run wild.

-'Genius Child', by Langston Hughes

When it is all over and done, and the only memory of Ken's reign and the attempted resurgence of Myotismon is a shadow of BlackWarGreymon over Highton View Terrace, the Chosen Children make a new tradition. They meet in the digital world on the anniversary of Oikawa's death, honoring the first of them all to die.

"Sometimes, I wonder if he's really dead," says TK, quietly, at one point. They are sitting by the edge of a pond, watching the other digimon and their partners play after the picnic has been consumed with hasty delight. Ken turns to the other teen at this opening; of all the digi-destined, save perhaps Cody, TK still talks to him least. Ken never passes an opportunity when it's presented.

"I'm not sure anyone dies, in the digital world," Ken says, thinking of Wormmon scattering to pixels in his arms. He wonders if TK is remembering Angemon's death, and does not ask.

"He turned into butterflies," TK says. "I think I saw them, once. But I might have imagined it."

Ken says nothing.

He has seen the butterflies far more than once.

"But I wonder if that would happen in the real world, too," TK continues.

"What do you mean?"

TK looks over to the others. Patamon is flying patterns with Poromon and Biyomon. Below them, curled on a rock and basking in the sun, Gatomon stretches and tilts her head toward them. The cat's blue eyes flash knowingly, and Ken suddenly feels uncomfortable.

If TK notices, though, this doesn't stop him. "Do you think – has it ever occurred to you, that not all humans can come here? Digimon can go to the human world, but we know they're still data there. Izzy has determined that pretty conclusively. But here... We're data, too. I mean, we've even gone inside computers." TK pauses. "I think, if a digi-destined dies in the digital world, they can't really die. But... I'm not even sure we can die in our world, anymore. I'm not sure we're... human, enough."

A shudder runs down Ken's spine.

TK turns to look at him more fully. "I'm sorry. I know this is morbid, I just..."

"It's alright. We're here to remember Oikawa, right? You should... You should talk to Izzy about this, sometime. It's. It's interesting." Ken forces himself to smile.

TK still looks uncertain. "Hey, are you - "

"Heads up!"

Both yelp, scrambling away as a soccer ball comes careening between them. Davis, panting and grinning hugely, jogs over. "Hey, sorry about that. It was Tai's fault," he adds.

"Was not!" Comes a shout.

"Want to join us, Ken...?" Davis picks up the ball, then frowns, looking between them. He narrows his eyes a little at TK. "Hey, you two okay?"

"Yes," Ken says. "A game sounds... nice, I think."

TK bites his lip, then smiles quickly. "I'll, uh, just go talk to... Izzy, then. Like you said. See you."

Ken nods.

Davis side-eyes Ken as TK walks away. "You sure...?"

"Come on," Ken says, already starting over to where Tai and the others are waiting. "Even without the spore, I can beat you at soccer any day."

"Hey!"

Long after the others have headed home, Ken wanders through the forests of the digital-world with Wormmon in his arms. It is hard to gauge time in the digital-world, but the sky has become dark, and the stars are shining. Wormmon yawns in his arms.

"Are we looking for something, Ken?"

"Not looking. Just..."

Ken falls silent.

In the canopy, a small cloud of glowing, iridescent butterflies flutter among the branches. They wing along almost in a line, and the air shimmers where they pass. They feel light, good, wholesome. Like the power of digivices and digivolution and walking through a portal, Ken thinks. Every positive power in the digital-world, concentrated and condensed into these benevolent, wandering forms.

The butterflies suddenly pause, then dive down. They wrap themselves around something Ken at first can't see. Then, suddenly, he can make out the form of a very familiar digimon – a Minomon, Wormmon's own in-training form.

Wormmon, also seeing, straightens in Ken's grasp. Ken half-expects to see a mirror-version of his partner appear in the undergrowth when the butterflies part from the glowing Minomon, but instead it rises and morphs into the unmistakable shape of a yellow Kunemon.

Ken smiles a little to see the digivolution happen. He wonders why Oikawa – for he must believe the butterflies are Oikawa's influence – would want this specific creature to digivolve. The thought makes him ache for the lonely, lost man he never knew. He steps forward hesitantly.

But before he can get a word out, the Kunemon flinches backward. "You!" He snaps.

Ken blinks, startled, and all he manages to say is, "Me?"

"You're the Digimon Emperor!"

Ken feels the blood drain from his face. He steps back, turning away. "Not anymore," he says quietly. He doesn't want to scare Kunemon; he is also wary of the potential hostility the digimon might hold toward him, and can feel Wormmon tensing in his hold, ready for a fight. "I haven't - "

"You did," Kunemon snaps. The digimon's high, nasally voice isn't frightened or vulnerable anymore; just angry. "It doesn't matter that you stopped. Do you think that erases anything you've done? The digimon you've hurt?"

But Ken has fought these particular demons already. Has overcome these doubts, again and again. "My friends believe in me," he says, holding onto that.

"Well, good for you!" Kunemon hisses. "My hive was destroyed by your rule, so I haven't gotten any friends, at the moment. You'll forgive me if I don't applaud your progress." Tiny sparks of blue electricity crackle around Kunemon's mouth; without Wormmon here, Ken doesn't have any doubts that the yellow larva would have attacked him already. "Do you think they are the ultimate arbiters of fate, these friends of yours? They are children. They pity you and you, in truth, never hurt them so severely. It is easy for them to give you their forgiveness. Your true victims, Emperor – we do not forgive you, and we never will. Think of that, the next time you look at your dear friends."

"Ken?"

Ken doesn't answer. He slides his last book on his bookshelf, so they are now organized by both genre and author name. He exhales, tilts his head, and then glances back around. Spotless. There is really nothing left in his room to clean.

Maybe he can make a mess, deliberately, and clean that.

Maybe he can find an excuse to go to Davis' house. It's always messy there, he reasons.

"Ken?"

"I'm fine, Minomon," Ken says, fairly certain now that he can keep his voice even. He doesn't look his partner in the eye, though. He moves over to adjust his laptop so that it sits parallel to the side of the desk.

"Yeeesss, well, I'm sure you are, but if you wanted to talk..."

"I'm completely fine."

Silence, for a brief moment. "...Okay, Ken."

Minomon doesn't sound entirely convinced. Ken turns, and sits himself at his desk.

If he completes his homework slowly, he thinks, that will occupy him for an hour or two. And if he is messy with his homework he can spend a few more minutes cleaning it up after. Nodding, he gets to work.

Ken wishes he went to school with the other digi-destined, and it is not the first time he has entertained this thought. But halfway through the day, he amends his line of thinking, and admits that it would be difficult, indeed, if any of the other Chosen Children were to see him now. They would ask too many questions with too-difficult answers.

At least no one at Tamachi tries to talk to him. Well, of course this is a mixed blessing. The sullen silence that deepens over the day might be allayed with company; but then, if his classmates are content to ignore the once-genius Ichijouji Ken, friendless as he apparently is, there is at least no one to bother him about his silence or moodiness.

So Ken sits at the back of each class, and the teachers, courteously, do not bother to call on him; even now, when his grades have dropped severely with the loss of his Dark Spore, he has among the teachers a reputation for hard-work, and they respect his silence. The students are less forgiving.

At the end of the school-day, Ken is looking forward to going home, seeing Minomon, and curling up with a novel or his studies. Maybe he will phone Davis or Yolei... no, not yet. Speaking to his friends seems like a very bad idea right now. Even talking to Minomon might prove hard.

As he walks home along the streets, a voice calls, "So, Ichijouji!"

Ken, purely by reflex, turns around.

Mazawa Teruo is in the same year as Ken, and has long been a rival for the top place in their class at Tamachi. But when Ken fell behind after the Dark Spore was removed from his mind, Teruo was not pleased; on the contrary, he seemed increasingly angry. He accused Ken of not trying, of growing lazy and truant. The explanation, "I'm just not getting magical help anymore," was hardly acceptable, so Ken couldn't explain his sharp decline. Ken still possesses a keen mind and with enough studying his grades are more than acceptable, but he has essentially given up hope of ever overcoming Teruo again.

"What did you get on your geometry exam, Ichijouji?"

Ken tells him, and can see the answer displeases Teruo. "You're not even trying anymore," the boy grouses, stepping closer.

Ken frowns. "Why does it matter to you?"

"You're pathetic, Ichijouji. What do you even have, outside your intelligence? And now even that's failing you. You won't have anything in life without education – no friends, and we all know how you ran away from your family..."

"Don't talk about my family," Ken snaps.

Teruo doesn't know anything about Sam. The other teen rolls his eyes at Ken's temper, plainly disgusted. Turning, Teruo moves to walk away.

And that would be it, really. Teruo never does more than harass him about grades, or snip about his lack of friends, but today, suddenly, something in Ken makes him step forward, and say, "But you're hardly one to talk about family, are you, Mazawa?"

Teruo stops.

"What?"

"The only reason you care half so much about what I do is because your brother lost a computer competition to me two years ago, and a scholarship with it. Second place, but no prize. I hear he's going to some awful University down by Osaka, now. Must be terrible for your family, isn't it?"

Actually Ken had felt terrible when this motive had occurred to him, sometime after the Spore had been removed from his body. The fate of Teruo's brother had never occurred to the crueler, Spore-affected Ken who won the tournament in the first place. I didn't deserve to win, he had always thought.

But now, today, he adds, "But do you really think you're going to amount to anything better?"

Two little spots of red appear on Teruo's cheeks. "Shut up, Ichijouji - "

Ken steps closer. "I heard your family can barely afford to send you here, so when you're in secondary school - "

"I said shut up!"

"You know he cried like a baby when he lost - "

Let it never be said that Ken can't goad people when he wants to.

With a cry of inarticulate rage, Teruo slams a fist right into Ken's cheekbone. He goes sprawling over the pavement. In another lunge, Teruo tackles him full-body, punching him once, twice across the face, then indiscriminately across the shoulders.

Ken is feeling dizzy and numb, his ears ringing, when Teruo pulls his head forward. So it takes him a moment to register Teruo's pale, shocked face. "Why aren't you fighting back?" Teruo cries. "What is this?"

The pressure on his stomach is abruptly released. Ken's head cracks against the pavement as Teruo releases him, scrambling suddenly to get away. There's a scuffle of feet on pavement, and then, as though Ken were the aggressive one, Teruo flees the scene.

And slowly, gingerly, Ken stands up, wipes up his blood the best he can, and keeps walking.

He decides to focus only on how to fend off concerned strangers, and how he will avoid seeing his parents face-to-face for a few days. It might keep him from focusing, for awhile, on just how better he feels.

Minomon frets something awful when Ken comes back, of course. Ken does his best to deflect the digimon's questions.

He washes his face of blood; his lips have burst open, and his face was scratched and bled on one side from hitting the pavement. Ugly bruises cover either side of his face, and will probably bloom all along his chest, too.

"Ken, Ken, please tell me what happened, are you alright?"

"I'm fine."

"You always say you're fine, Ken, and I'm not sure it means what you think it does!"

Ken smiles slightly. He holds out a hand, and Minomon curls into his hold willingly enough.

"If you can't tell me, do you want to call the other digi-destined?"

Ken looks out the window. "Has it occurred to you, Minomon, that we're all going to go our separate ways one day?"

"What?"

"Eventually. You know, we might be the Chosen Children, but our time is over. We've saved the world. Our part is done. It's already happening, in the older group. Mimi has gone to America, and Joe is going away to University... Matt has his band... I doubt I'll ever see or talk to my friends, in a few years." A pause. "I doubt we'll be friends..."

"Ken, that's silly. Don't talk like that. If you want to be friends, you just need to work at it, and of course you will be."

"That never helped me much in the past, now did it?"

"You'll all stay friends. You might even go to University together, or find other friends there... and it's so far, Ken, so many years before you have to worry about being split up, I don't know why you're wondering about it now."

"When I go to University," echoes Ken, very softly. "You know, I never really think this far ahead. Or even much ahead at all, really. I wonder if others..."

Ken trails off, and strokes Minomon for a moment. The digimon fidgets. "...Ken?"

Ken stills his movements. "I'm sorry. I'm – tired. I think I'm going to take a nap."

"...Alright, Ken. Feel better."

Ken wishes that he knows of a grave-site for Oikawa. Instead, after some wandering he finds himself at the site where Oikawa had watched the original digi-destined defeat VenomMyotismon years ago. This is as good as his grave, he decides. It's where his spirit was twisted...

And where Oikawa, poisoned by Myotismon, would go on to influence Ken to become the Digimon Emperor. But Ken has more faults than can be laid at the feet of Oikawa, though his days as the Emperor will always haunt him. He had not yet visited the Dark Ocean when his own confusion led him to wander into the street, leading Sam - irascible but noble Sam - to sprint across the road and take a hit from an incoming car for Ken's sake.

This ocean isn't so Dark, Ken thinks. He's standing on a cement block overlooking the sea. From here he can see the bridge that leads to Odaiba, where Myotismon attacked. But the city is different, now, repaired and reconfigured. In the daylight, cars speed easily over the bridge. It's hard to imagine the life-changing scene Oikawa might have seen.

So he stands and looks down, instead, where the waters lap gently at the artificial barrier that protects the land from erosion. Ken raises his arms, stretching out his fingertips to feel the breeze coming in. Water in the real-world looks different than in the digital world, somehow. And this is much nicer than the eerily still waters of the Dark Ocean.

Something pale and white floats to the surface close to where Ken stands. But the surface of the water is at least six meters down. He leans over, peering at the shape, and -

"Excuse me?"

Ken drops his arms, and turns around. Two young women are staring at him. One, a slender women probably about sixteen or so, is standing slightly in front and looks particularly nervous.

"Yes?"

"I think..." the woman picks at her black coat, glancing at her friend. Then she evidently changes what she meant to say. "Perhaps you should, you should not stand here?"

Ken blinks. "Why?"

Now both women look nervous. Ken does not know why. He is not particularly frightening, he thinks.

"Regulations," the second woman blurts.

The first turns, stares a little, then looks back at Ken. "...Yes. I think there are... regulations, against it. Rules."

"...Oh."

Shifting from one foot to another, the first speaker points a little way back, where Ken can see benches on the grass. "We are going to walk over there. And talk, a little. Why don't you join us?"

A little blankly, Ken says, "Alright."

Both women look relieved.

As they walk, the second, quieter woman moves over and takes Ken's hand in hers, squeezing it gently. When he looks up, she smiles down at him, her eyes shining strangely.

For some reason, his throat clenches. And Ken uses this as justification – at least to himself – for only listening as the girls talk gently, over the next hour, about random little topics, until finally offering to take him home.

"Davis is here, Ken dear," Ken's mother, Okuko, tells him the next day. Her eyes linger on his blotched face. His story is that he had a rough fight in the digital-world with a fighting-based creature. It clearly made Minomon resentful to back up his story, but all the digimon are accustomed to lying to adults.

The thought of Davis, though, sends a red flag running through his mind.

"Tell him I'm not here," Ken blurts.

"What?" Okuko is surprised.

Ken doesn't give her a chance to respond. He turns around and ducks into his room. He can hear Davis entering the house already, being accustomed to having free reign of the place.

"Where is he?" Ken hears Davis say from the other room, voice muffled through the wall.

"He says to tell you he's not here," says Okuko dryly.

Well, that didn't work.

There's a small pause. Ken can almost imagine the confusion on Davis' face – then the annoyance, then determination. A moment later, there's a familiar pounding on his door. "Open up, Ken! I know you're in there!"

Ken sighs.

"Hello, Davis!" Minomon calls brightly, conclusively ruining any hope of hiding. Shaking his head, Ken throws open the door.

Davis stomps into the room, offense bristling from every movement. He takes one good look at Ken and stops short.

Ken shuts the door hastily as Davis yelps, "Ken! What happened?"

"He won't say," Minomon tattles, sulking.

"It's nothing important," Ken says, which he feels is true.

"You're covered in bruises, Ken!" Now Davis is getting angry. "Who did this?"

"It's nothing."

"Since when do you lie about stuff like this?"

Ken sighs. "Let's not fight, alright? Did you come over for something?"

Davis clenches a fist against his thigh. "I wanted to see why you weren't answering my calls – I'm beginning to see why, though."

Ken just looks out his window, and pretends to be very interested in the clouds.

Davis looks over at Minomon. "You stick close to him, alright?" It's more a plea than anything, but Minomon nods.

"Ken," Davis sighs, running a hand through his hair. "We're your friends – why don't you just talk to us?"

"I think I want to go to the digital world," says Ken, when Davis has finally left.

Minomon perks up. "That sounds nice," he agrees.

"Alone."

"What? But Ken - "

"I just need some time to think, Minomon."

"It's not that! It's dangerous, Ken!"

"I've been to the digital-world plenty of times."

"With me! You can't go there without a digimon partner!"

"I'll be - "

"Oh don't say you'll be fine, Ken."

"...I won't be gone long." Ken puts on his coat, and has to turn away from Minomon's betrayed eyes. He picks up his digivice, and, when Minomon makes to try wriggling closer to the computer, turns the monitor brusquely around.

"Digi-port, open!"

The digital-world is a breath of fresh air, as always. Ken lands today on hard dirt, the kind mixed with rough clumps of clay. Barely anything grows here. In the distance Ken can see fences rising through the mist. He knows that even further on there will be mass graves and ramshackle houses. The Overdell is home to ghost and dark digimon that prey on dark dreams. He'd really just picked a random place in the digital world to come to. But this will do, he thinks.

But, out of the darkness, a light emerges.

Many lights, actually – tiny, swirling, glittering lights, playfully swooping through the air. A dozen gleaming butterflies float down in front of Ken, dancing so brightly before his vision that he sees spots. Ken recalls TK's words from the picnic:

"I think I saw them, once. But I might have imagined it."

Why Ken? Why now? The butterflies veer around his head, as if taunting him for daring to even think this question. Ken flinches, and raises a trembling hand to his mouth.

In the distance, he can hear the low chanting of Bakemon. Something in him, morbidly curious, wants to keep walking. But the terror incited by these small, cheerful butterflies is overpowering. Ken doesn't want to know why the dead Chosen Child has marked Ken – why the other evil Chosen Child is still, still obsessed with him, even in death.

Shutting his eyes against the horrible light of the butterflies, Ken closes his ears to the siren call of the Bakemon's chant and fumbles for his pack. He finds his laptop computer in blindness, and opens it.

"Digi-port, open!"

When asked, Ken will only tell Wormmon, "You were right – I shouldn't have gone." But he also says, "I think I'll go again, soon, though."

Because he probably will. His terror is already fading.

Besides – what can Oikawa do to him?

Minomon, apparently, has had enough. Ken doesn't know quite how, but the little larva digimon manages to wrangle use out of the phone while Ken is in another room, and calls Davis. "You told on me," Ken sums up, when he learns this.

Minomon looks at him, quietly defiant, and says nothing.

Bizarrely, Davis doesn't say anything directly about his going to the digital world when they talk over the phone. Instead he just says, "You should come over to the park tomorrow, Ken. A few of us are getting together."

'A few of us' means a few digi-destined, of course.

"I really don't think I - "

"You should come, Ken," repeats Davis, more emphatically.

Ken sighs. Sometimes it is easier not to argue. "Fine."

"Great. I'll see you there."

Davis, it turns out, has used the term 'a few' to refer to the entire group of digi-destined, new and old, minus Mimi who is of course not currently in the country. They all stare blatantly at Ken, who is still badly bruised, but they do not seem surprised, which means -

Ken gives Davis a very dark look. The boy just looks at him, smugly.

Minomon seems relieved to have humans around to talk sense into his recalcitrant partner, and appears to be commiserating quietly with DemiVeemon by some trees. Davis claps a hand on Ken's shoulder, which makes him wince. "So, Minomon told me about you being stupid in the digital-world yesterday... but," he adds, as Kari approaches, "we can talk about that later."

Ken is prodded rather unceremoniously toward Yolei and Cody. The game of the day, he realizes after the first minute of chit-chat, is for someone here to learn how his face has become bruised. Suddenly, this seems very absurd. He should just sigh, and say, I picked a fight, everyone, except no one would believe that.

He gathers that everyone has come to some very unsettling conclusions - "So, um, how are things are Tamachi?" Yolei asks, horrible as always at trying to sound casual. "Anything strange or...unpleasant, happening?" - which at least explains the apparent effort that has gone into getting all the digidestined together. Still, Ken thinks, it's a hasty conclusion to draw based on one incident.

(Of course, it is a nasty set of bruises...)

Kari separates from Davis long enough to offer him a few words. She has a painfully sincere way of speaking that can sometimes leave him off-kilter, but today there's something about the way she looks at him which almost makes him feel... guilty.

Not like he wants to tell her anything. But he's been looked at like that, before, and it has never turned out well. He walks away quickly.

Joe is blunt. "Look, I just want you to have these, and you have my phone number if you need help with anything. I hope you know, as a doctor in-training I'm very good with keeping confidential information, so please feel free..."

"I'm fine," says Ken, wearily.

"Sure." And Joe shoves half a dozen pamphlets in his arms, with titles like Bullying Hotline and What to do if... and Basic Medical Self-Help.

People filter in and out, though eventually the focus falls more off him – deliberately or not, Ken isn't sure – and it becomes more like a social gathering, which he prefers. At one point, when TK takes a turn wandering over to peer at his bruises and make awkward small-talk, Ken turns to him and asks, "Did you ever have that talk with Izzy?"

"What talk?"

"About dying, in the human world."

TK balks.

"Did he have any ideas – you know, on if we really die?"

TK worries at his lip for a moment, watching Ken. Then he says, "Izzy thinks, even as digi-destined we probably aren't that different. In the digital world, in the right circumstances, dying with a purpose – maybe we can die like Oikawa, leaving a bit of ourselves behind. But in the real world, we're probably just like any other human."

Ken considers this. "Thanks," he says.

"Thanks?" TK snaps.

Ken blinks at the sharpness of this reply. "For answering my question," he says.

TK looks at him for a moment, then stands abruptly. He walks across the room, waves over Patamon, and starts to talk to Matt in a low whisper.

Ken lets his thoughts drift.

"Do you want to visit the digital-world, Ken?" Wormmon asks. "With me, maybe, this time? You kept talking about going."

"No. I guess it was just a whim," Ken says. "I don't think I want to go back right now, at all. In fact the real world is just where I want to be right now."

After school the next day Ken doesn't go home, as he usually would. Instead he walks, walks, and keeps walking. He takes a subway, then walks some more, and steadily the buildings he passes get more and more decrepit as he goes. Soon he finds himself in a Ueno, and some of the houses have given way to tents and elaborate box systems. He turns his head to look at the strange people who eye him as they stride briskly down the street, shoulders hunched.

At one point, Ken finds an old man eyeing him in a familiar way from from the shadows. Like how Davis looks at Kari, and how Yolei looks at... well, everyone. But he thinks, no, and keeps walking. He'll know what he's searching for – or who – when he sees it. But this place is certainly... promising.

It's getting dark out. Ken Ichijouji, missing again, he thinks. His parents might be worried. But then, they are used to him being in danger, by now. He is digi-destined. They should be resigned to it, even...

A hand comes down, hard, and clasps Ken's shoulder.

Ken freezes. He can feel a breath against the back of his neck. The grip feel tight, firm – aggressive. He turns around, slowly.

Ishida Matt stares down at Ken. In his other hand he holds a first-generation digivice, and Ken can see that the screen is glowing with a tiny light. Matt has used the digivice to track him here.

"I think we need to have a talk," Matt says.

Ken clasps his hands in front of him, bowing his hands like a penitent.

"You keep doing these – dangerous things," Minomon says. "I don't understand it."

"I don't understand why everyone's so upset..."

And he doesn't, really. They're all gathered around, crammed in the training room of Cody's house like this is some sort of intervention, but Ken doesn't know what they're supposed to be intervening for.

"Ken, you're going off alone to the digital world, to creepy parts of town late at night... you still won't say how you got hurt... we're just concerned," Kari says.

"And even if you don't tell us," Sora adds, "You should at least be talking to your partner! Don't you owe Minomon that much? What would he do if something happened to you?"

Ken blinks at her, blankly. "He'd be okay, wouldn't he?" Ken turns to Davis. "You'd make sure nothing would happen to Minomon, right?"

When Davis just stares at him, Cody coughs, and says, "Ken – I think that was a rhetorical question."

"..." Ken hunches his shoulders. "Oh."

"Ken," Kari asks, "What do you think will happen to you?"

"Sora asked - "

"Theoretically."

Ken paused. "I just... I've just been thinking, a lot."

"About?"

"About... things from the past, I guess. What I've done, and..." Ken thinks, and says, "I've been thinking a lot about Oikawa."

This seems to catch a lot of people off-guard. But TK turns his head, and seems distressed. Matt and Tai exchange looks...

"Oikawa?" Yolei blurts.

It's TK who answers, in a blank, detached voice: "Because he died. And maybe because he sort of even sacrificed himself... Right, Ken?"

- And, predictably, everyone erupts at once.

Minomon clings to Ken mutely, and everyone starts raising their voices, trying to be heard. There are denials, demands for an explanation – but then people seem to realize that one important voice isn't saying anything, and a bit of the cacophony lessens, then goes quiet entirely.

Davis approaches Ken slowly, face trembling oddly, and looks at him. Ken recognizes, now, what it means when someone's eyes shine like that. Tears. A few slide down Davis' face, and the other teen grasps Ken by the shoulders.

"Is it true?" He asks.

Ken's hands are shaking.

"Is it true, Ken?"

Ken looks at him, helplessly, and can only say, "I was thinking." He looks at them, all of them, and finds no understanding. "I was just – I was just thinking."

They take him to the digital world, after that. Joe stays behind to talk to his parents – Ken doesn't look forward to that conversation – and the group materializes somewhere entirely unfamiliar.

They're somewhere west of Mt. Miharashi, on grassy, rolling plains. It's probably one of the more peaceful places he's seen in the digital world. But he's still not sure what he's doing here.

Tai looks around, but before he can speak, Cody points up at the sky. "Look at that!"

It's a sight he knows well by now; Oikawa's butterflies, which float gently over Ken's head and spin down in a slow spiral. Ken flinches.

Wormmon rears up, alarmed by Ken's own fear – but Davis steps forward. "Don't, Wormmon. Leave them."

Ken shoots his friend a betrayed look.

"Don't you see, Ken? They're not trying to hurt you – they're not - "

"They're not judging you, Ken," TK interjects.

If they're not judging him, Ken would sure like to know why the butterflies are so interested in him.

"Is that what this is about?" asks Yolei, upset. "You know no one blames you - "

"None of you," says Ken. "But the digital world itself blames me! Look at it!"

He jabs a finger up, and the butterflies swirl faster, tumbling over themselves in their haste to inspect his outstretched arm. One brushes an airy wing against his wrist, and the touch sends a fiery warmth through him; he jerks his hand back with a start.

"Ken, can't you see it?" Wormmon asks.

"See what?" Because he can't see Wormmon, now; everything is getting dark, and blurry, and -

"This isn't about Oikawa," Davis says. "If it was, he wouldn't have tried to help you in the first place."

" - H-help...?"

Carefully, one of the butterflies floats down to land on his shoulder.

The older digi-destined are mostly watching, allowing his closer friends to speak to him. But now Tai steps forward, the uncontested leader of them all. "Ken, look at that. You can't justify what you're going through because of this place, okay? The digital world isn't trying to punish you – it's trying to save you."

"No!"

The air rushes out of his lungs. He finds himself on the ground, on his knees, tears making his voice choked and thick. "It should hate me – you should all hate me – I've caused so much suffering, so much pain, why shouldn't I..."

"That wasn't you, not really," says Matt. Ken remembers a story – Matt had turned on the digi-destined once, hadn't he? But not like the Emperor -

"And you've repaid it a hundred times over," Davis adds quietly.

"I can't – I can never erase what I did. Never."

Wormmon crawls over to him. "Maybe not, Ken. But this won't fix anything, either."

"Nothing will – nothing – I can't - "

People are pressing against him from every side. It's suffocating. It's wonderful. "We'll help you," they say, and he hopes, he hopes that will be enough.

It's hard, and Ken feels like he's trapped perpetually in the world of the Dark Ocean, drowning slowly, while everyone else stands clear and free and can't see the waves that are crashing over his head. What's wrong with me, he thinks sometimes. Everyone assures him that nothing is, but...

His mother cries and his father tries very hard not to and they both spend a long time staring at pictures of Sam when they think he isn't looking, like they're wondering if they might not, soon, only have pictures of him too. They tell him, "talk to us, talk to us", and he doesn't know how.

It was easier, he thinks, when no one knew at all.

Everyone tries to help, tries to make sure he is never alone. He never is. Sometimes it's comforting; other times, he feels like insects are crawling under his skin whenever people talk, and he just wants to be alone. But no one trusts him that much, it seems, so he smiles and nods and bears it. It makes people worry less, to see him smile, even though a smile is nothing more than the movement of a few specific muscles.

Sometimes he feels ashamed of himself, the fuss, his own weakness; but one day TK touches his wrist, and says, "You know, I had my suspicions, when you told me you kept thinking about Oikawa... I told you I'd seen the butterflies once, too, remember?"

And suddenly he doesn't feel quite so guilty.

(And he decides to keep an eye out for TK, too; sometimes, it's shocking to realize how little you actually see people)

Just a few weeks after the day Matt had found him wandering the streets of Ueno, Ken finds himself looking through the list of the other children affected by the Dark Spores. He looks them up, one by one, to see how they're doing.

Then, he has to stop short, because one of the children - Noriko - is gone. By looking up her name on the internet he finds an obituary online; she downed a bottle of pills and killed herself eight weeks ago.

Ken sits back in his chair, numb. For a moment, he can't identify the sweeping horror crashing through him. He fumbles for the computer mouse, closing the screen as his hands start to shake. The corners of his eyes start to burn.

"Ken?" Minomon asks. "Ken, are you alright?"

"I'm - " Ken presses a fist against his mouth, trembling.

"Ken?"

Minomon inches closer, and Ken takes a deep breath.

"No, I'm not," he mumbles.

Minomon looks alarmed.

"But I'm... I'm not going to, to do this to you," Ken says, and it doesn't matter that Minomon doesn't understand. "I understand. I'm sorry, I – I'm so sorry."

He tries to seem happier. To make people worry less. He does. His parents even seem to buy it.

But -

I wonder what would happen, Ken thinks, if I just stepped out, right now – just leaped forward, and...

Traffic slows to a stop. He and Davis cross the street, carrying Minomon and DemiVeemon in their arms.

"So," Davis asks later, and side-eyes him. "How have you really been, Ken?"

Asked after an hour of conversation, Ken knows what question Davis is really getting at. "Okay," he says.

Davis looks suspicious. "And you'd say something if you weren't, right?" he presses. His eyes flicker pointedly to Minomon, Ken can't help but note.

"Sure, Davis."

"See, now, that didn't sound so confident."

Ken sighs, and raises one hand to brush a strand of hair from his face. "I'm not going to do anything, Davis. I'm trying, okay? I know what it would do to all of you, if – so I'm trying."

Davis stops walking.

"What?"

"What?"

"No, no, hold on." Davis puts DemiVeemon on the ground. "What it would do to us? Ken, are we even on the same page, here?"

"I – I think so."

Davis steps closer. "We're talking about you. Dying, Ken."

Ken flinches.

"Look at you! It makes you scared to even think about it, but – Ken, you shouldn't want to live for us, or be happy for us. Aren't you getting, I don't know, better? Happier?"

"I'm trying to be."

"For us," says Davis flatly.

Ken looks away.

Angrily, Davis grabs him by the shoulders. "Don't be happy for us, okay? Live for you. For your own life." Davis gives him a rattling shake for emphasis. "Okay?"

"I - "

"Okay?"

Ken looks at him. Davis' expression is fierce, like these thoughts in Ken's mind are another enemy he can stomp out if he just tries hard enough. But lurking in his eyes is something different; pain, and desperation, and fear.

And something shifts, and Ken, thinks, oh.

Someone cares about me.

A lot of people do, actually. He's not sure why that's such a revelation, really. He inhales slowly.

If living for others doesn't work... well, alright. But maybe his friends, then, can teach him how to live for himself.

A/N: During 'The Last Temptation of the Digi-Destined', all the digi-destined saw themselves living out some great scenarios - the things they thought they most wanted. Cody saw his dad alive. Yolei, who wanted to be noticed, saw herself as an only child. TK saw his family together.
And... Ken saw himself being killed by digimon.
Just something to consider, if you don't think that end-series Ken still has some stuff to work through.

Please note that if you are thinking of committing suicide, there are resources available to discuss what you're going through. You can call 1-(800)-273-8255 if you're in the US for the National Suicide Hotline. Feel free to PM me if you need to chat. Things can (and will) change, but only if you're around to see it happen.