Frontiers Unexplored

29) Recovered Soul

This chapter contains mentions of ableism and suicidal thoughts. It isn't anything overly descriptive or graphic, but I would still advise you to proceed with caution. Take care of yourselves, everyone. 

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Takuya and Chihiro had been walking in the direction Duskmon had disappeared in for quite some time. Neither of them had said much of anything since they left behind the rest of the group, and Takuya almost relished in the silence. He looked down at his hand and stared at the folds of the fabric that made up Koji's bandanna, admiring the way the seams came together. When he happened to catch a streak of blood between the shadows, he'd glare intensely, trying to forget about how he should have been the one to take the blow from Duskmon's blade. 

"What happened to you?"

Takuya suddenly stopped looked at the bandanna, and he glanced up to look over at Chihiro. "What do you mean?" he questioned. He forced himself to drop his hand down by his side just so that he didn't keep torturing himself with the knowledge of what he had done to Koji. 

"When we were captured, your data was glitching out," Chihiro answered simply. Their hands had been shoved into their pockets, and their gaze was locked with the dusty ground. Their foot scuffed on the ground, kicking up some of the dust to make a small cloud. They turned to face Takuya soon after. "What the hell was that about?"

Takuya hesitated before shrugging. "To be honest, I don't know myself," he admitted. "I thought I was transported back home... To Earth. It was a mess, but... I thought I crossed over the barrier between the worlds, but that couldn't be possible. Patamon said that I never left that spot. My body became transparent, and nobody could touch me."

"Well, he's right," Chihiro confirmed with a sigh. "I don't think that I could ever tell you how terrifying that was to see, you know. I have no clue what could have happened to you, but it wasn't pretty. Duskmon must have majorly messed you up during that fight."

"You could say that," Takuya muttered, but he knew that it didn't have much of anything to do with Duskmon when the details were examined with a closer gaze. This was all his fault, plain and simple, and the guilt had caused him to split apart from everything he had ever known. Flamemon had changed everything, and his supposed trip back to Earth had changed his perspective on all that had happened up to that point. That was likely an understatement, and he imagined the way the fog rolled in around him when Duskmon appeared out of the corner of his vision. 

Chihiro didn't know to answer this, suspecting that there was more to it than Takuya was letting on. "You know... It reminds me a little bit of what happened to Izumi when we were on the beach," they eventually whispered. 

This surprised Takuya enough to make him stare at them with wide eyes. "What do you mean?" he questioned. He didn't see how there was a connection in the slightest, but he was more than willing to hear out Chihiro if they had a potential explanation. He was willing to grasp onto anything that would tell him about what was going on. 

"Do you remember when Zephyrmon took over for the first time?" Chihiro asked. Takuya tilted his head in response, so Chihiro elaborated further. "Izumi said that she didn't remember anything that happened when Zephyrmon first took control. She was dreaming about completely different events than what was unfolding before her. Her body was doing one thing, but her mind was doing another."

"You think there was a disturbance there?" Takuya inquired slowly, unsure of if he was understanding them fully. The idea wasn't completely unheard of given how strange the Digital World had proven itself to be. People blacked out even on Earth under certain circumstances, so there wasn't any reason for them to completely throw out the possibility.