Searching for Cover (Ryusuke)

[stormecho]

The subway was filled with shadows.

There were quite a few people moving nearby - it was only mid-day, after all - but Avari couldn't spare any attention for them. Everywhere she looked, she almost expected to see him, either in that human guise, face split with a fanged grin, or in his Digimon form, angelic wings spreading out as if to welcome her. She had thought the subway would be easier to take, underground, not like the street where she had first met him, but... it was just as difficult.

Tsunomon wriggled a little in her grip - she was carrying him under her arm, heedless of what little he had said to her. There had been frantic apologies at first, more words in that moment than she had ever heard him say, but she hadn't been in any shape to listen. She could ignore the ache of her arms - she wasn't even sure if she was bruised or if it was just a trick of her own mind at this point - but she couldn't stop her thoughts from running in terrifying circles.

There had been no mistake, she had never thought herself safe, but now... despite the fact that this was a technical victory - she was here, after all, walking freely and not dead or imprisoned - it all felt worse. Like she was seeing the world through a filter, everything skewed and distorted with emotions. Dread had taken up residence in her gut, cold and heavy until she was surprised she could move. Not feeling would have been so much easier - but she couldn't act, couldn't lie. The masks she slipped into all seemed to be broken and the knowledge that everyone around her was seeing her - not Shion, not any other identity she could have used but whatever little was left of her after all this time - only made her fear grow.

Still... the subway would be crowded. No one would bother to look at her. Walking a little faster now, she tried to manoeuvre towards the waiting train, heedless of who she might jostle or bump into.

[yagami]

Some days were good, some were bad - unfortunately, almost all of his last month or so fell into the latter category. Ever since getting pulled into the digital world that first time his luck had more or less been slowly going downhill from that point on - the next two weeks after that had been spent wandering around said world at random, looking for a way back to his own, and during that time he'd managed to mangle the connections between his shoulder and his prosthetic rather badly. While the flesh under the base of the arm had begun to heal, returning to the real world ironically came with something of a drawback - best he could tell, bacteria and viruses of the traditional sort apparently didn't exist in digiworld, as his shoulder had somehow gotten infected less than a week after returning, in large part because of the liquid that had been seeping out from under it. In a way it was Ryusuke's own fault - he'd taken a stupid risk that had resulted in the injury in the first place, and instead of seeing a doctor first thing he had gone right to the person responsible for the arm to get it looked over and fixed before simply returning to his daily routine.

That was more or less how he had ended up on the subway to begin with - a mode of transport he rarely ever used, but the best means to visit the doctor proscribing him the antibiotics needed for his shoulder as well as administering them. Not at all a pleasant process - his shoulder still stung from having the artificial nerves and the real ones reconnected after removing the limb to allow the docter access to the infection. Still, it looked like his luck was finally turning around; Monodramon, realizing that he wouldn't be able to stay hidden forever, had agreed to return to the digital world as long as they stayed in contact every other day, something that Ryusuke had readily agreed to for some measure of peace, and his shoulder was now healing much, much faster than before - hopefully it would be back to normal by the end of the week.

Moving towards the waiting train, dressed once again in his black jeans and tank top, Ryusuke again glanced at the beige duster he'd picked up while he'd been in the city - an odd find, and for some reason he'd felt compelled to get it. Especially strange considering how closely it resembled the rimson duster that seemed to randomly appear on him every time he'd been to the digital world thus far - Ryusuke had hated the thing at first, but at this point he couldn't help but wonder if the look was growing on him at least a little bit. As he took hold of the left handle bar and began stepping onto the vehicle, trying to avoid using his right arm, Ryusuke pulled himself onboard, turning slightly in the process and catching a glimpse of something he could not have possibly expected to see. Turning his head fully, Ryusuke saw that he had not made a mistake. Mixed in among the people moving for the same train he was on was Shion, if he remembered her name right, and on top of that was a small orange thing tucked under her arm - easily mistakable for a stuffed animal to those who didn't know any better, but to the people aware of their existance it was unmistakably a digimon, probably the same one he'd seen with her in Toy Town. Slightly dumbfounded, Ryusuke simply stopped in place as she moved to board the train through the same door he had come through, probably having missed him in the rush to get on.

[stormecho]

For once, she wasn't paying much attention to the faceless masses boarding the subway alongside her. Surely none of them were people she had met before, and they wouldn't care about one girl trying to get home, carrying a stuffed toy of some sort. She was safe from that sort of scrutiny, after all. Besides, she couldn't spare the attention to worry about anything that wasn't Gear. Not even Valus mattered.

She would have been angry at her partner for leading someone else to her, but she didn't have the strength for anything but fear. Maybe he didn't know that, thought her silence was another way of taking out her anger - and she couldn't care enough to correct that line of thinking.

Avari was quite certain Tsunomon didn't deserve something hollow and empty and useless as a partner like her, but she couldn't feel guilty about it. How much worse would her life have been, if Gear had been her partner instead? If she hadn't already been destined to meet with Tsunomon, she would have taken the Digivice and signed herself away to a new kind of imprisonment, with someone utterly too understanding of what she was.

Another hiss from the In-Training Digimon under her arm as she moved to step onto the train. For a moment, she looked down, and then decided to keep going forward when he interrupted.

"_{Ava... Shion!}" That was when she noticed what - or rather, who - he was staring at, and she felt her day continue to spiral downward, rivalling the day her parents had died for the worst day she had experienced. The boy who had been travelling with Renamon, who had known Valus, who had met her. It hadn't been that long ago, she knew. Not long enough to forget her. She was tempted to stop, stay where she was, take a different train home - but eventually she sort of lurched forward.

This was bad - beyond that, really. She couldn't lie, couldn't hide her fear, but she had to. Otherwise, he would know as much as Valus, see her and not Shion and then she would be vulnerable -

It was a struggle to even speak. Her voice sounded rusty to her own ears, not quite wavering. "Hello." Maybe he would leave it at that, let her sit down and go home in peace.

When had she ever had that kind of luck?

[yagami]

... well, this was uncomfortable. Awkward and uncomfortable. As Shion climbed onto the train Ryusuke saw the digimon under he arm whisper something to her, beginning to say something that clearly wasn't "Shion" before stopping himself and saying her name - odd, but then again so was the whole situation. To be completely frank Ryusuke hadn't expected to see anyone from there in this world - a foolish thought in hindsight given that his cousin and a number of his friends had found their ways there plus Monodramon who had been spending the last week or so at Ryusuke's house, but there it was. If anything Ryusuke should have expected it - while he'd had yet to see Valus, a surprising if not impossibly improbably number of people who Ryusuke knew seemed to be getting involved with the whole mess in general, so it only figured that some of the things from that world should bleed back over to this one as well.

As Shion climber onto the train Ryusuke kept quiet, although he knew she'd finally seen him after her partner had pointed him out - what he couldn't understand was the sudden change in her that seemed to come as a result of it, but then again she seemed like she'd changed in general. Ryusuke wasn't all that good with people or social events, but he was observant, and a number of small details drew his attention, first and foremost the fact that she seemed to be a lot more jumpy than usual, almost like she was constantly looking over her shoulder, expecting to see someone or something there that she wanted no part of. What Ryusuke didn't get, though, was why he seemed to make it worse, noting the hesitation that took hold of Shion as she moved to step onto the train. Back in the digital world she had seemed somewhat shy but sure of herself, but this...... she seemed to be a nervous wreck compared to before, and it made Ryusuke somewhat curious and concerned as to what could've brought on such a change.

As Shion entered the vehicle the doors closed behind her and Ryusuke reached up with his left arm to take hold of one of the pole next to him, not quite tall enough to reach for the railings on the ceiling but remembering what had happened the last time he'd tried to ride on the subway while standing and not braced against something. As he did so he glanced rather awkwardly over to Shion as she greeted him with a simple "Hello" before speaking.

"Hey. Sorry, just didn't expect to see anyone from that place here for some reason. You live in the city?" Ryusuke asked, replying with the intent to try and break the awkward silence. That, and he was curious; seeing Shion of all people here raised a number of questions, along with a particularly unpleasant thought that he would rather not have thought of - if she was here there was every chance that Valus might've been somewhere here as well. His name wasn't Japanese so Ryusuke was hoping that simply wasn't the case, but at the very least he would no longer be particularly surprised if that did turn out to be the case - dismayed, yes, but not caught off guard.

[stormecho]

She had known, objectively, that other Digidestined lived in Odaiba. BlackGabumon had once mentioned that Valus lived not too far from her. Which must have been how he had gotten to him so quickly, so easily. And brought Valus to see -

To see her. Not Shion, but her, Avari, her name crooned by the demon who had chased her into the Digital World. Valus had seen who she was, had seen her vulnerable and terrified, and she couldn't forgive him for that. Nor could she forgive BlackGabumon, though she wasn't angry at him in the first place. He had never had her trust, but... now she would have to be so much more careful around him. She had become complacent, believed him to be a minimal threat, even a useful form of protection. And he had shown her how wrong she had been to even think that.

Now wasn't the time to brood. She tightened her grip on Tsunomon ever so slightly as he asked a question.

"I... didn't expect to see you either," she said, tasting bitterness. She was telling the truth, and a part of her was gibbering in fear, urging her to shove him away and flee - jump off the train before it began to move, hide away forever. Most of the seats had been taken, and she carefully walked over to one of the few left, seating herself and angling Tsunomon so that no one would notice if he blinked or did something else a stuffed toy wasn't supposed to do.

"...Yes, I live here." No address was forthcoming, of course. She wasn't going to be stupid, even if - even if she could still feel her skin crawling, the chill at the back of her neck.

Subways made for awkward silences. Maybe he would leave her alone if she just didn't say anything more. She turned her head, staring out the windows of the opposite sides, feeling dread close in again as the doors closed and the train began to move. She was stuck here now until the next stop. Still, watching it speed into the darkness of the tunnels was comforting. Nothing could hide here.