Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to Digimon.

Warning: This is going to be a Yamasuke and it involves some not-so-nice material. The rating is more for later chapters than it is for this first one.

*  *  *

Ishida Yamato sat on the swing set in the park, watching the little children run around with their happy smiles and naïve ways. They laughed when they escaped the loving grips of their parents and cried when they fell to the ground. Most of their faces were rosy red from the cold that stung the air, but their eyes sparkled almost like glitter with a radiance that Yamato had not felt in years. A few of the children glanced in his direction, but only once – as if looking twice would burn their eyes from their faces. Loneliness was something Yamato had become accustomed to long before his arrival at the park, but something about the carefree look in a child's eye had always twisted his heart.

"Bitter day, no?"

Frowning and giving a sideways glance at this new arrival, Yamato said, "Only to some. I find this day rather relaxing."

"Is that why you appear so sour?" the man asked, sitting down in the swing next to the blonde. He handed a vanilla portfolio over, leaving the topic of Yamato's dreary look to hang in the air. He knew better than to push into someone's personal thoughts. Instead, as Yamato opened the portfolio, he brought up a new discussion. "Dante-Shi is paying us a great amount of money for this hit. I chose you because I know you can get the job done and you can do it well. This guy," the man pointed to the picture that Yamato had stopped on, "must be a deadly threat to Shi. I never knew the old coot to be so intent on getting rid of someone."

As soon as Yamato had come across the picture of his latest target he'd froze. Normally he'd just flip through the papers in the portfolios, briefly glancing over everything, but this was something else. This was someone else. Someone he knew. The man in the picture's eyes stared at him, almost accusingly, making him shiver. Apparently his comrade noticed his hesitation on the picture, knowing Yamato to be the type to not go over his job deeply until he was in the privacy of his own home, and leaned over to look at the picture more. When he couldn't see any reason for the blonde's pause, he began to wonder.

"I know him," Yamato said as the guy opened his mouth to ask. Blue eyes scanned the picture a bit more before lifting. "I grew up with this guy. He saved my life many times. I can't take this job, Aki."

Yamato thrust the portfolio back into Keshena Akihiko's hands. Akihiko looked at him, then at the portfolio, and back at him. "You have to take this. I already promised Shi the best of best, which is what you are. I don't care if you knew this guy, Ishida. You of all people know this is not based on personal issues. You're not the one who wants him dead; you're just the one doing the deed."

"Get someone else," Yamato growled, standing up to leave.

"Listen to me." Akihiko stood up as well and shoved the portfolio into Yamato's chest, knocking him back into the swing. He grabbed the chains and leaned towards the glowering blonde, using just as much venom to glower back. "You are going to take this job and you are going to do it well. Don't try to argue with me, Ishida. You knew once you got in this job that there would come a time when you'd have to knock off someone close. If he," Akihiko poked the portfolio for emphasis, "is not dead by the time limit, then he and you shall be dealt with, and trust me Ishida, you don't want to be at the other end of my pistol."

Akihiko stood up, straightened out his suit, and stalked off, leaving Yamato to hang his head, defeated. Yamato knew Akihiko wasn't lying about not wanting to be at the other end. For someone who'd retired from the job four years before, he still knew all too well how to use a firearm. Though Yamato would never admit it openly to just anyone, he was afraid of Keshena Akihiko.

Yamato played with the string that held the portfolio closed ominously. I know him… The thought wouldn't go away; it couldn't. You can't murder someone who saved your life numerous times. Sure they had never been the best of friends, but they had been friends nonetheless. They fought side by side in the digital world for goodness sake! This job was going to be the hardest he'd ever had and retirement sounded like a good idea once it was finished, if it was ever finished without him dying too in the end.

"Yamato? Ishida Yamato?"

Why does someone always have to do that when I'm trying to think? My singing days are over! Yamato glance up anyway, meeting a pair of familiar chocolate eyes. He stared at the young man standing over him with a raised eyebrow. "Do I know you?"

The man laughed. "Of course you do. Motomiya Daisuke ring a bell?"

Recognition on Yamato's behalf was instant. "Oh my… How've you been? Where've you been?"

"Ah… fine, here and there… places," Daisuke said softly.

"Here and there? Places?" Yamato frowned. "Daisuke, you disappeared right after high school. No one has seen hide nor hair of you since graduation day, or so my brother tells me."

"Oh, Takeru. How's he doing? He and Hikari ever get together?" Daisuke asked.

Yamato stared hard at him. "You're changing the subject."

"Am I? I didn't notice," Daisuke replied, in all seriousness. His smile faltered for a second, but then it was back to being bright and he sat down in the swing that Akihiko had occupied only moments before, rocking back and forth. "I told you. I've been here and there. Around. Places. Nothing more, nothing less."

"What do you do? Work wise, I mean." Yamato decided not to press into the mysterious life of Motomiya Daisuke. He knew he wouldn't want the redhead to press into his. What a shock Daisuke would find if he did.

"I work in… well, it's hard to explain, but it's a good business." Daisuke leaned back in the swing and began to push off. When he got moving pretty well he shot another smile in Yamato's direction. "It's been a while since I did this last, but anyway… what have you been doing?"

Ever since Yamato entered the certain business he did, he faced the problem of people asking him about his work. At first this had made him nervous and he got a little fidgety, but after years of doing what he did, a response had come to his mind and he got used to the lie so much, that it flowed nicely out. "I am a financial consultant." Now, how he had come up with this, he could not remember. All he knew was no one was interested enough in that particular line of work to dig any further.

"Oh," Daisuke stopped himself in the swing and turned to Yamato with a frown. "I always thought you'd go into something a little more exciting. Speaking of which, what happened to your rock star lifestyle?"

"It got old," Yamato said dryly. He didn't want to mention that the death of one of his previous band members had been his first job. That wouldn't smooth over well with someone he hadn't seen or heard of in years.

"What do you have there?" Daisuke asked, pointing to the portfolio in Yamato's lap.

The reminder of his latest job made Yamato bristle. He glanced down at the portfolio disgusted, but tried to hide this from Daisuke. "Just some papers from work that I'm supposed to finish tonight."

"I see," Daisuke said. "How boring."

Yamato's frown deepened. "Yeah, boring."

"So," Daisuke tried to lighten the conversation. "You never answered me about Takeru. He and Hikari have hooked up by now, haven't they? I can't imagine seeing them with anyone else. They've got that light and hope connection."

"Yeah, they got together. Perfectly happy married couple with two kids," Yamato laughed, relaxing at the new subject. He looked at Daisuke and shook his head with a tender smile, the initial shock of how long it'd been since he'd seen Daisuke starting to come back. "Wow, Daisuke, you really have been gone for a while, you know that? Your family went crazy when you disappeared; everyone thought you were dead. I know you and I were never much of friends, but it's nice to see you again."

"Never much of friends?" Daisuke snorted. "And here I was thinking you and I had some sort of connection since we were both the keepers of friendship – ironically enough. You mean to tell me that I was always a hassle? Oh, gee, thanks."

"Now I didn't say that," Yamato objected with a hearty laugh. "You amused me a lot when we were young. At first I thought I was going to kill you before you could save the digital world, but somehow you started growing on me. I don't think I've ever met anyone with the same mischief twinkle in his eyes. I always knew you were up to something, especially when you were trying to be serious."

"And I always will be up to something," Daisuke joked. He sighed and looked at his watch, frowning a bit. He got out of the swing and stretched. "Well, Yamato, it's been great seeing you again, but I must be off. My boss will be perturbed if I show up late. I hope you have a splendid afternoon. Maybe we should meet up for lunch tomorrow and catch up some more?"

"That would be… nice," Yamato said and the two finished making plans before Daisuke left.

There were so many things about Daisuke that were all too familiar. The way he walked, talked, laughed, smiled, and generally just moved. It was like he had been preserved for the past ten years, only to return as the same person. Yet there were also the things about him that were unfamiliar, like the knowing look in his eye that matched the mischievous one and his voice was a bit deeper. But those were the only two things that Yamato could tell had changed about him physically. He still had that silly, childish – but adorable – smile, but there was something different about it now, something that made Yamato wonder.

*  *  *

At first Yamato had been happy to see his long-lost friend. Daisuke had even taken his mind away from his latest employment. However, that initial, startled shock at having not seeing someone in ten years wore away over night and was replaced by something that sort of resembled anger. So when Daisuke showed up at the little café that he'd agreed to meet Yamato at, the first thing out of the blonde's mouth was, "TEN YEARS!"

"Huh?" Daisuke blinked and slowly slid into the small booth.

"Ten years! You've been gone for ten years!" Yamato snapped. He sighed at the blank expression Daisuke had and leaned back against the back of the booth. "Where have you been? What's wrong with you? Is this some demented little ploy of yours? Do you have any idea how much pain and sorrow your family went through because of you? Daisuke, we had a funeral for you! You are dead! You don't exist anymore!"

Daisuke looked out the large window at the people walking along the sidewalk expressionless. "So… tell me more about Takeru and the others. How have they been holding up these past ten years?"

"Are you even listening to me?" Yamato exclaimed. He quickly toned down with some other people in the café looked at him in surprise. His voice dropped softly, with a tinge of whisper in it. "You can't just show up and not expect me to be surprised and – at the least – angry, Daisuke. You can't. That's not fair to me, or anyone else for that matter. You disappeared for ten years and suddenly reappeared yesterday, as if it were a magical act. And look at you. You don't seem to have changed a bit!"

"Yamato, please, let's not talk about this. I did what I had to do for a reason," Daisuke murmured. He finally turned back to Yamato with a sad, mournful look. "Do you not think I know what kind of affect my disappearance had? Do you think I am clueless? Because I know exactly what I did, and I knew exactly what I was doing. Now I'm asking you to accept that and leave it be."

A waitress walked up before Yamato could reply. His eyes were locked with Daisuke's and he ordered a coffee without ever breaking the contact. It was Daisuke who looked away to the waitress, smiling falsely, and asked for water and a bagel. He winked at the waitress, making her giggle. She walked away – swinging her hips and smiling over her shoulder at Daisuke – and left the two of them to sit in silence. Yamato rolled Daisuke's words over in his head a few times, and finally decided that it really wasn't any of his business.

"Takeru is doing great," Yamato started. He caught the flash of relief that went across Daisuke's face and smiled. "He became an author, and talked about our adventures in the digital world. Of course, everyone considers it to be fictional, but we digidestined know the truth, right?"

"We certainly do," Daisuke laughed. "Do you ever think that there are a new digidestined fighting in the digital world right now?"

"All the time. In fact, I'm almost positive that if we went to the computer lab, we'd see them being sucked into the computer," Yamato joked. Daisuke nodded with a smile and opened his mouth to reply, but the waitress returned with their orders.

"A coffee for you," she said coldly and set the mug down in front of Yamato before turning to Daisuke with a warm smile. "And the usual for you."

"Thank you, my dear," Daisuke said kindly. This time it was her who winked at him and she made a kiss at him as she turned to walk off. Daisuke smiled back at her and sipped at his water, keeping a watch on her as she went to another booth.

"Girlfriend, Daisuke?" Yamato asked.

Daisuke snapped back to Yamato with wide eyes. "No. Never. I don't do the whole relationship thing."

"You just flirt and lead the girls on?" Yamato retorted with a sour expression.

"It's not like that," Daisuke said softly. "We're friends, her and I. I eat here almost everyday. She and I like to joke around. It's like-"

"YOU?"

Daisuke and Yamato both glanced up startled at the person who'd interrupted the conversation. A scraggly looking old man stood by their booth, having to grip the table to keep from falling to the floor from sheer drunkenness. He was looking at Daisuke with a surprised but smiling visage. Daisuke smiled uneasily back, glancing at Yamato with a look that explained he had now clue who this old man was.

"I knew 'twas you!" the old man hiccupped. "I neva forget a face!"

"Is that so?" Daisuke asked.

"Yeah!" The old guy stumbled a little as he tried to stand up straight. "Let me tell ya, ya did wondafully at that place."

Daisuke looked at Yamato amusedly out of the corner of his eye. "At that place, yeah…"

"Jenn, I think you are disturbing the customers." The waitress appeared behind the man and began pulling him reluctantly away. She smiled apologetically at Daisuke. "Sorry, he acts like this when he's drunk."

"No problem. It was rather amusing actually," Yamato said. The waitress glanced at him briefly before walking off. Yamato frowned and shifted his gaze back to the redhead sitting across from him. "She doesn't like me very much."

"She's like that. It took me forever to befriend her," Daisuke said, waving it off. "Pay no attention to it. I'm sure she'll like you eventually. Just give it time."

"What makes you think I'm coming back here again?" Yamato asked.

"Well," Daisuke leaned back against the soft cushion of the booth, "we have a lot to catch up on, and one day isn't nearly long enough…"

Yamato smiled. "Yes, I guess you are right."

*  *  *

"It's cold out here!"

Yamato looked at Daisuke with a bit of surprise. The younger man's face was pale and he was shaking. "Are you sick, Dai?"

"No, just cold!" Daisuke chattered. "Let's get going! It's freezing!"

Despite his companion's claims, Yamato didn't feel cold hardly at all. Yes it was windy and a tad bitter, but not cold enough to really bother you unless you were butt naked. Daisuke was wearing a long, black trench coat and yet he was still shaking. Yamato eyed him a bit cautiously as they walked on towards the apartment complex in silence, though it was not an uncomfortable silence.

They'd met up for lunch everyday that week, but today Daisuke had suggested Yamato come over to his place, saying he got off work at lunch time so he had the rest of the day to relax, and really wanted to do that at home – if it wasn't a problem for Yamato, that is. Of course there was no reason Yamato could think of not going over to Daisuke's. Truth be told, he was really quite interested in what his long lost friend's apartment looked like.

"We're here," Daisuke said as they reached the door. He pulled out some keys and hurriedly unlocked it, very happy to reach the warmth of the indoors. He left the door open for Yamato to step through and kicked off his shoes. Yamato closed the door and followed suit. Daisuke gestured for him to sit on one of the couches. "I'll be back in a quick. Make yourself comfortable. I'm going to get into something warmer."

"Honestly, I don't know how you're cold!" Yamato shouted as he closed the bedroom door. There was a half-laugh, half-snort from behind the door. Sighing, Yamato made his way to the couch and flopped down on it, closing his eyes. Daisuke's apartment strangely smelt like crayons.

"Okay…"

Yamato cracked an eye open to stare at the younger man standing over him. "Better?"

"Much," Daisuke grinned. "It's really getting cold out there. I'm going to have to start riding the bus or train to work."

"I think you need to see a doctor. It wasn't that cold," Yamato said. He straightened so that Daisuke could sit down. "So what do you want to discuss today? We've already gone over Takeru, Hikari, Taichi, why neither of us got married, political junk, and just about everything except each other…"

A frown crossed Daisuke's face. "I don't think I want to explain some things to you, and I'm sure there's something you don't want to tell me, so let's never discuss each other. How's that?" He waited until Yamato reluctantly nodded before continuing. "I was wondering if you'd like to hit the slab tonight with me. It's not often I get Fridays off, and when I get the chance, I like to get out and live. You in?"

"Sure, as long as you have decent places picked out. I'm not going to some ramshackle bar," Yamato laughed, subconsciously brushing hair from his face. Unlike Taichi, he'd decided he liked his hair the way it was and kept it at that perfect length where it fell into his eyes, but didn't get in the way.

"Of course not. You should have learned this week I have good taste," Daisuke joked.

Yamato rolled his eyes. "Yeah, so what you're saying is that lasagna was good taste?"

"One mistake! ONE! Give me a break," Daisuke pouted. "It's usually really delicious."

A feeling stirred inside of Yamato. It'd been a while since he'd had someone to joke with. He hadn't seen Taichi in forever and Akihiko's jokes were usually dark and death-oriented. Being around Daisuke made him feel warm, as luck would have it. It was nice to have a friend again. He'd seen Daisuke more in the past week than he had his own brother in the past six months. The irony of this didn't escape him at all. He almost wanted to wrap his arms around himself in a tight hug and breath in the greatness of friendship. However, he was not four.

"What time do you have in mind for all this?" Yamato asked. "The truth is, I really need to be cracking down on… my job… and, um, well, this week has kind of distracted me."

The perky chocolate eyes dimmed. "Oh… I'm sorry. You don't have to. I mean, I wont bother you if… I know you have your own life and all… it's just… I…"

"No! Not at all!" Yamato interrupted. "I'm enjoying your presence. I miss having someone around to make snide comments and laugh with me, and it's just great to see you, Dai. I mean… this week has been… well, I don't know how to explain it. It almost seems like you were never gone. I feel as if I've skipped ten years simply to meet up with you again. It's like everything came to a crashing halt when you reappeared."

"Thanks Yamato," Daisuke whispered. He smiled softly, eyes full of emotion again. "That really means a lot to me."

Yamato smiled back. "I'm glad. You've come to mean a lot to me."

*  *  *

"It's great seeing you and all, I mean it's been so long, but seriously Yamato, what's the deal? I have better things I could be doing, and so does Ken! He's supposed to be cracking down on a real important case right now. I don't have time for silly surprises. I could be making more money at this very moment, but instead I'm wasting my time waiting in your apartment for some surprise to show up. You'd better have a damn miracle for us."

Miyako stared at him hard, frowning and looking very irritated. Ken was sitting beside her with a frown, also, but not nearly as mean. His eyes were scanning Yamato intently, making the blonde fidget. He hated being near Ken. They were enemies if you broke things down: detective and hit man. There were others in the room: Taichi, Hikari, and Takeru, who were waiting patiently and rolling their eyes as Miyako continued her griping.

"I think this will be worth your while," Yamato said calmly, controlling his annoyance. He never could adapt himself to Miyako. She just rubbed his hair the wrong way, so to speak. He glanced at his watch. "It should be here any minute now."

"I'm very curious to see what it is he's got planned for us," Hikari said kindly and smiled brightly. "It's great to see you again, Yamato."

"Yeah, where have you been?" Takeru asked.

Before Yamato could answer, the front door of his apartment opened and banged closed. Daisuke's voice rang through the air.

"Hey, Yama, you wont believe what happened to me today!" There was a thump noise as Daisuke kicked off his shoes and a shuffling as he walked to the doorway where everyone was. "This guy walked up to…"

His voice died as soon as he saw that he and Yamato weren't the only ones in the apartment and his face turned to a look of horror. Everyone gasped – except Yamato – and Daisuke fell back against the wall, flattening himself as if trying to hide from the eyes of his ex-friends. Miyako's mouth dropped opened and all she could manage were a few stumbles of words. Takeru was blinking slowly in attempt to make sure he wasn't dreaming. Taichi gawked, and Hikari jumped to her feet – getting over the initial shock – and moved towards Daisuke.

"Oh my… Daisuke!" she cried and went to hug him, but he dodged and backed into the hallway towards the front door. Hikari looked confused, and by this time everyone else was on his or her feet and standing behind her.

Daisuke's horrified expression changed to shock, then disgust, and then pure rage. He narrowed his eyes viciously on Yamato, who was starting to move to him. "You son of a bitch… You had no right, you bastard! I trusted you!"

Yamato stopped at his words and his eyes widened in shock. "But, Dai-"

"Fuck off asshole!" Daisuke bellowed. With that he spun on his heel, pausing only to grab his shoes, and stormed from the apartment in his mere socks – slamming the door hard behind him.

Yamato ran after him, but he'd already disappeared down the corridor by the time the blonde made it out the door. He sighed and walked back inside. The others were still standing in the living room doorway and he just glared at them, leaning back against the door. "That didn't go well."

"Apparently," Miyako snorted. She headed back to the couch, followed by the others except for Ken. "Can you believe it? That was Daisuke! I thought he was dead – well… he might as well be. Honestly, did you hear what he said? I never knew Daisuke to have such a dirty mouth."

As the others started gossiping, Ken moved towards Yamato cautiously. Yamato was staring at nothing in particular now, hanging his head slightly and frowning in contemplation. Ken grabbed a pen from the hall table and pulled an old envelope from his back pocket. He scribbled an address on it and folded it up. Glancing over it quickly, he handed it to Yamato.

"Here – he's gone to this place, I bet. That is, if he hasn't changed in the past seven years," Ken said. Yamato glanced at him oddly before hesitantly reaching out and taking the paper from Ken's hands. Ken frowned. "You might want to go quickly. I can get the others out of here, if you'd like."

"How do you know where he would be?" Yamato inquired.

Ken didn't answer for a while, just stared at him, but when he did, he looked away, as if hurt. "If Daisuke wishes you to know, then he can tell you. Otherwise… You need to get going."

As much as he wanted to question some more about Ken's knowledge of Daisuke's whereabouts, Yamato knew it was pointless. Ken was a detective; he took a little work to crack information out of. He was lucky that the raven-haired man had taken it upon himself to do what he did.

Grabbing his coat and slipping into his shoes, Yamato glanced first at the paper, then at Ken, and then headed out of the apartment, shouting over his shoulder, "Get the rest of them out of my apartment."

*  *  *

The address Ken gave him was on the far side of town. He was frustrated that Daisuke could pick a place so far away, but he pushed those thoughts to the back of his mind, though, more worried about simply finding Daisuke, and apologizing – though he didn't know why he had to. The idea of reuniting Daisuke with the digidestined had come to him a couple weeks earlier when he felt the need to call his brother and catch up.

It had been nearly a month since Daisuke's smile was reintroduced to him. They had grown to be close friends, despite that they'd avoided the subject of each other. The creepy thing about it to Yamato, though, was that he was starting to notice little things about Daisuke in silly detail, such as how 'wonderfully deep' his 'chocolate' eyes were, or how 'musical' his laugh sounded.

Yamato knew he was gay; he'd known ever since high school. His first crush was Taichi, but that was over quickly. He lusted after Jyou for a while, but then when he moved on to college that fling had dimmed. He'd even had a crush on Akihiko once, but that was over very quickly when Akihiko held a gun to his head and told him to never think about him like that ever again. So it was no shock when he started noticing personal things about Daisuke.

"Here I am."

The place before Yamato was mostly dark with one neon sign that read, "Streamer's Blow 'n Glow". That struck Yamato as odd. The address Ken had given him was in one of the not-so-nice parts of town. This was the part of town that made him look over his shoulder every five minutes, which he normally did anyway since he was a professional assassin and had to constantly make sure he wasn't the target for once, but it seemed more reasonable to do that being where he was now.

"Well, better go inside…" Yamato whispered to himself, and with one last glance over his shoulder, he walked to the brown door.

There was a small hallway that was before him. He could hear music on the other side of the door, unnerving him a bit. As soon as he stepped inside he was hit with hot, humid air and colored strobe lights, and the music was horrendously loud. The first thing he saw was a stage and he instantly knew what the place was. He was a little startled, but if Daisuke went to a strip club when he was angry, then so be it. Men do that all the time, after all.

Before he could go any further, a large buff man stopped him. "ID!" the man yelled over the music.

Yamato rolled his eyes and dug in his pocket for his wallet. When the man decided he looked like the same person as in the picture, he smiled a toothy grin and stepped aside. Yamato stalked past and started looking around for Daisuke. There were only a few men and women sitting around the side of the stage and at some tables. Yamato frowned. He couldn't see Daisuke…

Upon turning his eyes towards the stage, he froze.

There was Daisuke, dressed in nothing but tight, black leather shorts, shirt cuffs, and a black bow tie. Yamato's eyes widened and he stared. Daisuke was dancing very erotically, but considering the place they were in… Yamato felt himself getting lightheaded from the revelation. He weakly fell into the nearest chair, never tearing his eyes from Daisuke. If he'd been astounded when Daisuke met him on the playground, he was doubly so now.

That was when Daisuke looked up, his cold brown eyes meeting Yamato's. He paused for a moment, but continued with what he'd been doing. He glowered dangerously at the blonde. As the song ended, he stepped to he edge of the stage and leapt off, getting a few howls from some people sitting there – one whom Yamato recognized as the old man from the café. He slipped through the chairs and tables with ease until he made it to where Yamato was sitting.

"What are you doing here?" He yelled, though it sounded subdued – being drowned by the new song starting up – so that it was almost threatening.

If Daisuke expected Yamato to be able to talk with him standing there in nothing but those tight leather shorts, then he was greatly mistaken. Yamato just blinked, infuriating Daisuke. He grabbed one of Yamato's pale wrists and pulled him from the seat. He dragged the blonde to a door that lead to the rooms behind the stage. They walked past a few curtains until they came to another door that had "Employees Only" written across its front.

The room was what was considered to be the dressing room of Streamer's, or so Yamato guessed. There were personal make-up areas with mirrors, and a long rack with all sorts of clothes on it, although each outfit looked as if only a yard of fabric had been used in making it. A woman walked past, giving a greeting to Daisuke, and looking curiously at Yamato. Daisuke muttered something in reply and continued to drag Yamato to the far side of the room. He pushed the blonde into a chair in front of one of the mirrors and opened one of the drawers on the dressing table. He pulled out a pair of plaid flannel pajama pants and began to slip into them.

"Okay," he snapped, folding his arms across his bare chest. "Spill. How'd you know to get here?"

"Ken gave me the address," Yamato said quietly. "You're a stripper?"

"No. I'm an exotic dancer. There's a difference." Daisuke unfolded his arms and paced back and forth in front of Yamato. He finally stopped, leaning on the dressing table and staring at himself in the mirror. "I should have known Ken would lead you here, that asshole. I'm going to kill him."

Yamato frowned. "Ken… he mentioned… seven years… but you've been gone for ten. I don't understand."

Daisuke eyes flickered towards him in the mirror. "Because I knew him seven years ago." He sighed and looked down again, idly picking at a piece of loose wood on the table. "Who do you think told him to be a detective? When he found me three years after I disappeared, I told him he needed to see about getting a job under that line of work."

"But I don't understand!" Yamato said sounding strained. "And the only way you can make me understand is if you tell me why you left, why you never contacted any of us, and how you ended up working here."

With a sigh, Daisuke turned around and sat on the table. He swung his feet back and forth like a young child, his anger slowly diminishing into sadness. "I wont explain those things to you. Don't ask me to. But I can tell you this: A month ago, when I saw you sitting on the swing, I nearly turned and walked away, but there was something about your face. You looked so miserable, so absolutely depressed… you didn't look like Yamato. So I said hey and we talked. That… what was it? Twenty minutes? I don't know, but that was refreshing for me. It was great to see you again, it really was. I hadn't realized how much I'd missed my friends from my childhood. Yet I knew I couldn't see you again. I knew it'd end up costly, but I had to tell you something so you wouldn't follow me; that's how I came up with the lunch thing. I wasn't actually going to meet you there. I don't know how I ended up walking to that café, but I did, and before I knew it a month flew by. Then came tonight. You said you had a surprise, and I was really quite interested. You don't know how it felt for me to have a real friend again. I mean, sure Jeanne and Itarou are good friends, but it's just no the same. Then I saw the others and they saw me and they found out I wasn't dead. They know now; they know. And I hate that they know. After ten hard years of avoiding every last one of you, and it was all ruined tonight because of you. That's why I'm pissed Yamato."

Yamato swallowed uneasily. That explained a few things to him, but not everything. "What about Ken? He met you seven years ago, so what happened there?"

Daisuke's eyes went cold. "I hate Ken and that's all you really need to know. He ruined my life and I hate him for it."

"Daisuke! Quit chatting with your friend and get a move on!" a woman yelled, leaning around the side of the dressing table. "You've got five minutes to change and then you're up."

"Well," he said, standing up with a stretch. "I've got to work now. You can stay however long you want to, but don't expect to be talking to me again. And definitely don't expect to ever see me again after tonight. The exit is over there, or you can go back into the club."

At that, Daisuke grabbed an outfit off one of the racks and walked off, leaving Yamato to think over what he said.

*  *  *

I know this was sort of a short beginning, but the next parts will hopefully be a bit longer… This isn't one of my main-priority fics right now so it might be a while before the next chapter comes out. If you actually like this fic – I really hope someone does – and want to know when the next chapter is uploaded I can email you, so just leave your email address in a review, or email me and ask me to. Anyway, review!