Present: The Digital World
Tsuriai pulled herself away from Rakunamon,
wiping one of her many tears away. "Veric?" her voice trembled
as she cried. "I'm never going to see Daddy again, am I?"
She looked into her digimon's watery eyes for answers, sniffling all the
while. "Or Uncle Matt or Uncle Tai." Then she lowered her
head, shutting her eyes tight as their painful memories struck her heart.
"I'm never going home again."
But Rakunamon didn't have any answers for her. "I don't know, Suri," he spoke truthfully to her.
The girl continued to hang her head, hiding her red face from him as she cried.
Oh, Suri, his little heart reached out to her. All she wanted was to be home with her father and uncles again. Just to see their faces again would have made her the happiest girl in the world. Then it hit him. That's it! His dark eyes glimmered with the greatest idea. Quickly, he lowered his head beneath that of his best friend's. He nuzzled her with his soft, furry nose.
Slowly, Tsuriai lifted her head. "Hmm?"
The raccoon-like digimon just smiled at her, his expression so full of hope. He was excited about something. "Would you like to see your family again?" he asked her.
"More than anything!" she sniffled in response.
Rakunamon's smile just kept getting bigger and bigger. "You can."
The blonde girl gazed down at her furry friend with a puzzled look on her face. "I can see them?" she asked. "But how?"
He turned his attention to her arm, reaching out and touching a small device wrapped around her wrist. "Look in here," he told her.
Tsuriai looked down at the watch on her
arm. "My digivice?" She swung her head around, staring at
her companion in disbelief. "But how...?" she stammered.
She knew what he was implying. On her modified wristwatch, she once stored
holographic image files of her and her family. But Veric deleted them all
when he uploaded himself from the damaged microcomputer onto the watch's small
hard drive. "I thought..."
"Just try it," Rakunamon urged her, not letting her finish. He placed a comforting paw on her hand, setting it just beside her digivice. "Trust me."
She just sat there, gazing down upon the Rookie-level digimon that rested in her lap. "Veric..." Hope started to fill her heart.
"Go on!" he told her. He couldn't help the slight chuckle that escaped. "That thing's not going to respond to MY voice!"
Finally, a smile played across Tsuriai's face. It was small, but it was a show of happiness nonetheless. Then she lifted her arm. "Open folder:" she commanded it. Then she told the device where to find the one she wanted, sending the miniature computer through directories and subfolders. "Multimedia. Images. Family." There it was, where it had always been. The folder still existed. "Oh!" Tsuriai gasped. She brought her other hand up to her mouth in utter shock, her eyes wide with amazement. "They're here!" she breathed in. "They're all here!" Then she turned to face the little raccoon. "But..." she stuttered. "I thought...you...didn't you...?"
"I couldn't do it," Rakunamon shook
his head a little. "Those pictures are so important to you," he
explained. "I knew that. And when you asked me to remove them
from the hard disk to make room for my programming, I realized the sacrifice you
were willing to make just so you could save my life." His face
started to turn warm as he blushed. He lowered his head, closing his eyes
so that he didn't have to look into Tsuriai's. "Those image files are
your only link to home. I just couldn't take that away from
you." Then, quietly, almost in a whisper, he told her, "I love
you too much to let you give up something so special just for my sake."
The blonde girl sat frozen in her spot on the shore of the lake. Her eyes sparkled with tears once again, but this time, they were tears of happiness. Her heart warmed at Rakunamon's words and what he had done for her. He saved all those pictures just for her, even though it meant less space for his program. And he did it out of friendship. "Oh, Veric..." Suddenly, Rakunamon felt two gentle hands touch the sides of his face. Tsuriai leaned down and placed a sweet little kiss on his head and then she leaned her forehead against his. Their eyes were level with one another, and now they looked to each other with a fondness that only best friends could share. "I love you, too." The two of them spent the next few moments like that, with him cuddled in her lap while she pet him. Then, Tsuriai reached over and removed her digivice, holding it in her hand. "Open file:" she commanded. "Takaishi Family 1." One by one, she and Rakunamon went through the holographic images, both laughing and crying at happier memories. It was good to see familiar faces, even if they weren't real. It was the closest to home they'd felt in a very long time.
And then, the most terrible thing occurred. "Oh!" Tsuriai gasped.
Rakunamon saw it, too. "Oh, no!" he breathed. He pointed his paw at the digivice. "What's happening?"
Both of them sat there, paralyzed by confusion and fear. The holographic image being displayed was fading in and out like snow on a television. The picture was supposed to be one of Tsuriai with her mother and father and uncles at a picnic. But, instead, all it showed was an image of her father with Uncle Matt. She and her mother were nowhere to be found. And neither was Uncle Tai. "What's happened?" Tsuriai asked. But she didn't wait for an answer. She went to work immediately on the wristwatch.
"Maybe the file got corrupted somehow," Rakunamon offered.
But Tsuriai just shook her head at the theory. "I wish that were the case," she spoke sadly. Her voice hinted at dread as well. "Look," she told him. Then she pulled up several other holographic image files, even ones they had looked at previously. They were all starting to change. "I'm not in them anymore," she showed him. "And Mom and Uncle Tai and Ryoichi," she went on. "These are all just pictures of Daddy and Uncle Matt."
And then, another episode came on. Tsuriai's arm, all the way up to her shoulder, phased in and out, turning ghostly and translucent. The same happened with Rakunamon, stretching from the tip of his tail to his back legs.
That's
when it hit him. "The future," Rakunamon sighed.
"It's already changing." He pointed his paw at the girl's
digivice. "The alterations in the pictures prove that you and I don't
exist there anymore." Rakunamon turned his head up to look at Tsuriai.
"TK and Kari are never going to marry," he continued. "And
you and Ryoichi won't be born. That's why you guys aren't in the
images."
Suddenly, a rustling noise came from behind them. "Oh!" both of them gasped. In the shadows of the trees stood two dark figures. Their hearts raced with panic. Tsuriai and Rakunamon had been found.
