Author's Note: It's been, what, two years? Believe it or not this has been open that entire time, aging like a fine wine I guess. I do like Part I, but it just didn't touch on everything or acknowledge all the loose ends. So I knew something had to come next, but damn was it elusive. I think I finally figured it out though. So to all who read this, especially anyone returning from two years ago, thank you for your patronage and I hope you enjoy the (actual) conclusion to Aftermath! Any comments are, as always, welcome and appreciated!

Koji stared forward dispassionately, pressing his back into the drywall of Dorian's apartment, arms folded across his chest. He'd hoped to come here alone, to spend some time… he didn't know, negotiating with the space. Making peace, or at least trying. But (and he really shouldn't have been shocked by this) Dorian was there. At first Koji thought he was just a painfully slow packer and had settled in without comment. Ice blue eyes had flicked to him when he'd entered, acknowledging his presence, and that was the extent of their interaction. Sound was muffled in the thick air between them, so much so that after a while it seemed there was no sound at all. Just silence. Then Dorian paused outside the back room with the chair and there was stillness. Suspension.

"Ashamed," Koji finally growled, unable to stand the stalemate.

A moment stretched between them, elastic but strained.

"That too," Dorian admitted, the smallest of smiles twitching at the corners of his mouth. "But mostly… I'm afraid."

"Of what? It's over."

"I know. Still…"

He pressed a hand to the doorframe, staring into the darkness. Addressing it more than Koji. The Chosen of Light followed his gaze and felt a twinge of fear snap in his own gut. The inky blackness cloaked the room's interior almost perfectly, leaving everything but a fine outline up to their imagination. It was the carcass of the monster they'd battled and all the wounds inflicted by the monsters they'd created. It was the memories they wished they could just forget, the changes now rigidly set into their reality. It was the choices they couldn't take back.

"I should be happy," Dorian whispered to the dark. "I know that. I know I should be grateful that things ended well, despite my involvement. And I am, but mostly I'm just afraid. I didn't think things would turn out like this, that they would go so far, that I… would care so much."

"What, did you think stabbing us all in the back would be easy? That there wouldn't be consequences," spat Koji, unsympathetic.

"That's exactly what I thought," he chuckled. "It's funny, isn't it? Just like a child, trying to hold water then getting mad when it runs through clenched fingers. But do you want to know what's even funnier? I think, deep down, I believed once we defeated Tache things would just go back to the way they were. That the power of friendship would prevail and we could just start over."

"The power of friendship, huh," Koji scoffed, giving a little snort of his own. "Friendship doesn't shelter you from the consequences of your actions. It doesn't mean we can't hurt each other or that all sins will be forgiven by default. Grow up."

"You really are a cold bastard, aren't you."

The French Digidestined surrendered and turned away from the door, facing Koji with a sad smile and interlaced fingers. Koji just sort of shrugged, accepting the accusation without protest.

"It's a sticky subject, though: forgiveness. Trying to determine who sinned the most, who needs to apologize to whom, what constitutes an apology in the first place… what metric separates justified from unjustified. And even if forgiveness can be obtained, does the friendship continue? Can trust ever be reestablished?"

More silence, this time brittle, splintering in the space between navy and ice blue eyes.

"Don't make this about me," Koji finally snarled, gaze hard and dangerous.

"I'm not," Dorian answered quickly, raising one palm to ward off the younger boy's hot glare before returning both hands to his sides. "I'm just asking questions. Looking for your perspective."

And again the silence, burning now like a strained muscle as they forced it to contain everything they didn't want to acknowledge. Until it couldn't anymore, until Koji broke eye contact and elected to stare at the floor instead, as if speaking to it rather than Dorian would make things easier. As if such a simple action could change what he had to say, what he'd come here to confess. His own dirty secret and sin, brought to this place to join the others. Even as he made the decision to just do it the words stuck in his dry mouth and his heart clenched. It was over and yet he, too, was afraid.

"My perspective, huh? When this all began those were easy questions, and in a lot of ways they still are. This situation, though… if I'm being honest, I don't know what I think anymore," he finally admitted, keeping his arms folded across his chest and curling his fingers into fists, tighter and tighter as he continued:

"You make me sick, what you did to my brother, what you put him through, it all makes me sick. But I was there; I remember the Ocean. Everyone else just woke up at home with no idea what had happened and they'll need to deal with the consequences of things they don't know they did. But me? My memories overlap; I can still feel the pain of the Ocean inside me and the exhilaration of having it there. I can remember doing things, and honestly wanting to do them, that repulsed me then and now. I had no control and still it was all me. And the absolute worst part is that, no matter what I do or how I think about it, I keep coming back to the conclusion that… maybe you were right. Maybe Takuya was right. Maybe doing whatever it takes, hurting whoever you have to, even destroying the world, is the right thing to do to save someone you love from that place…"

"Become a monster to kill a monster," Dorian paraphrased with a sad, ironic smile. "Do they know? Your friends?"

"We haven't talked about it. We've barely talked at all. I can't look at them without seeing Koichi in that damn chair," he jerked his chin towards the back room as if to throw a ball of disgust at it. "And when they look at me- I can't stand Izumi's pity or Takuya's shame. Slinking around like I'm something fragile and pathetic. Like I'm some kind of victim."

"I understand how infuriating that is. How-" he broke off, his breath catching in his throat with a strange choking sound. "Let me rephrase: I did… horrible things, and I claimed it was in Ysault's name. She should despise me; I can't believe that she doesn't. Yet when she looks at me it's with those compassionate eyes of hers and I-"

"Hate it," Koji finished, solemn. "Like I've never hated anything before. Like I want to rip them apart for not ripping me apart."

Dorian smiled mirthlessly, maintaining the good sense to keep his brilliantly blue gaze downward.

"Maybe that's my punishment. Maybe having to move forward, having to continue living with these changes, having to shoulder the burden of Ysault and even Bahar's forgiveness, is justice. It's an ironic and excruciating penance to pay for my sins."

"You want to hear ironic? When this all began, when Koichi came back from being Duskmon, I forgave him without a second thought and couldn't understand why that tore him up. I never blamed him, not for a second, never resented him. I never looked past the victim to the choices that had brought him there and I called that kindness. Now he's doing the same goddamn thing to me and I- I realize I had no idea. How did he process having no choice and still feeling like he chose? How did he survive all that friendship bullshit we threw at him? Because I don't know what I'm supposed to think or feel or how I'm supposed to just get over it and move on with this suffocating normalcy of everyday life. I want him to blame me, to be angry like he was when I took his place, to lash out or do something to punish me!"

Koji didn't yell, he rarely yelled, still the words held such force they echoed off the hollow walls and vacant floor. Bouncing once, twice, and then spiraling into void of the back, black room. For a moment they stood in the vacuum, not making eye contact, the anonymity of a confessional grate between them. Then Dorian breathed, inhaling through his nose. The tendons in his neck strained, his tight ribcage redirected the expansion up through his shoulders, and in a single, decisive sweep, he looked straight into Koji's eyes. Contrasting blues, equally cold and vibrant, melding as a razor sharp wire of empathy cut into them both, binding them.

"That may be what you want from your brother," he said, quietly piercing. "But is that what you want for him? Because for me, as much as I resent Ysault's forgiveness, I cannot bring myself to resent her for her part in it all. As much as I cannot stomach her absolution I cannot un-see that she's more a victim than any of us. I can't forget how she was cornered, how she cried out for help and I drove her further into despair, how much I love her even though she will never love me in return, not in the way I want her to. Tache, the Dark Ocean, we are all It's victims and we're all It's solders. Tools It picked up and used with ease and instruments of It's downfall. No one wanted to be either and unless I've made a wild misjudgment no one wanted to be both. Desire doesn't change reality. Belief doesn't alter fact. A cut still bleeds even when you wish it was not so. If we're to have the audacity to dish out compassion, doesn't it follow that we must accept some in return?"

"You saying we should be less forgiving," Koji said after a moment, holding the contact with an edge of hypocritical accusation.

"To an extent, yes," Dorian clarified, nodding a little and twitching like he was trying and failing to smile. "But mostly I think we need to be more tolerant of forgiveness in general."

"Where's the justice in that? Sounds like you're just trying to take the coward's way out. As usual."

It was a scoff, harsh and snorted through his nose. Koji looked away again, curling his lip and flaring his nostrils like he could smell something disgusting. Running a hand through his hair, Dorian's first response was to run his tongue over his front teeth and shake his head, caught off guard even now by the extent of the Chosen of Light's ability to be deliberately obtuse. Then the smile he'd been working on finally manifested and he leaned back against the doorframe, resting his head.

"Back in the Digital World, I presume it upset you when your brother rejected your good will and sought a more violent atonement for his sins," he started, staring through his long lashes and down his nose at Koji.

"Your point," Koji shot back, tightening arms that had been threatening to relax across his chest.

"If I rephrase, then it hurt you to see him like that, correct? I find it easier to endure pain inflicted by loved ones than to hurt the ones closest to me myself, or more succinctly, I'd rather suffer than be the cause of someone else's suffering, at least, someone I care for. In that regard, I think we're more alike than you'll ever admit. I think… we might all be alike in that way. If it were up to me I'd gladly accept pain and rejection, things that hurt me, as punishment. I agree that that would be justice. Yet if there are still people who care about me, then all my self-flagellation cuts them just as deeply. Do you understand?"

The silence returned, pooling between them like a liquid into which Koji stared, first angry, then pensive.

"That's cruel," he finally scoffed, closing his eyes and shaking his head. "Though by now I should expect nothing less from you."

"An apt description," Dorian agreed, reaching across his chest and rubbing his neck. "I understand that you have no reason to believe me or trust that I'm not manipulating you in some way. Nevertheless, I hope you'll understand the conclusion I've been trying so hard to reject: that I cannot carry out my own justice against myself without deepening the wounds of those I love. As much as I want to give up and let my demons take their pound of flesh I must keep trying least I do even more harm. If I may, you should be grateful your friends are at least close by. You can't let distance dissolve your bonds."

"Cities are bigger than you think," Koji answered, giving him a quick, wry grin. "If I wanted to I could just fade into the crowds, just disappear altogether. Not deal with any of it. But you know something? For all your two-faced bull shit you've been right more often than not. I don't like it, and I really don't want to give you the satisfaction, but I guess since it's just the two of us I'll just tell you I think you're right now."

"That's the nicest thing I've heard from you."

"Don't make a big deal out of it; I've known since I was a child that all growth is equal parts necessary and painful. I just found your perspective… informative is all. You may have your friends' forgiveness, but you will never have mine."

Koji looked him dead in the eye, one last time, then pulled himself from the wall and moved towards the door. Dorian followed him with his vivid gaze, silent once more. But this time he was smiling into the stillness, a small spark like the dawn, warmth that was inevitable but not yet able to dispel the chill. When his fingers curled around the door handle Koji paused, speaking without turning.

"This was…" he trailed off, gripping the knob tightly.

"You don't have to say it," offered Dorian, adjusting his white scarf so it draped more evenly around his neck. "This is already a much kinder sendoff than I deserve."

"I don't leave debts unpaid," Koji snarled, resisting the urge to toss the Frenchman a dirty look. "So as much as it pains me I have to thank you. For this. Now, even though it's going to be agonizing to move forward, at least I'm done here."

"As am I," Dorian agreed still smiling that tiny smile that Koji couldn't see but could feel on his back. "I won't say au revoir since that implies that we'll meet again, so instead, farewell and good luck."

"God you're insufferable," Koji sighed with a shake of his head and a warm smile of his own. Then he sobered, taking a deep breath and pushing the door open. As he passed over the threshold he raised his free hand over his shoulder, cutting two fingers through the air in a final sendoff.

"Later."

Koji closed the front door to the apartment complex and ducked under the hazard tape, still smiling a faint, amused smile. Never had he pictured himself speaking casually with the French Digidestined, let alone sharing his opinions or taking any form of advice. Yet the conversation had left him feeling oddly light, in spite of the burdens he now accepted he couldn't shed. If nothing else, he supposed, it was nice to have resolution. It was good to be fortified and ready to move forward.

"Find something interesting?"

He started, unable to suppress the surprise before his body seized up and flinched away from the sound. Reprimanding his limbs internally and berating himself for being caught off guard, he righted his orientation and confronted his would-be stalker with a disgruntled frown. Koichi looked back at him from the shade of the building, blinking eyes that were identical to his and yet much, much wider. Both knowing and innocent, startled and calm. His features were passively sad and his voice was gentle but skittish. Rather like a deer.

"So you're following me now," Koji accused before he could filter his responses through his newfound enlightenment.

"Wouldn't be the first time," his twin answered, looking like he was trying to smile but failing. When Koji didn't respond he looked away, tucking his chin towards his chest. "I'm sorry. It's an invasion of your privacy; I don't know why I did it."

Finally succeeding in his smile, Koichi turned and started back towards the train station. His hands twisted each other like they weren't sure what they should be doing and his back hunched forward as if Koji had kicked instead of scolded him. Making an inappropriately loud noise, Koji's breath caught in his throat and he jogged about ten steps, catching the older brother by the shoulder.

"Wait. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to bite. It's just that I…" He chewed his lip, looking for the reason he'd acted so defensively. "I'm not used to not knowing you're there."

"You don't have to lie to make me feel better," Koichi chastised without turning towards him. "Not before and especially not now. I shouldn't be here; I knew that and I came anyway."

"But I'm glad to see you. I- I've missed you."

"We live together, Koji."

"You know what I mean. Don't act like you don't. Don't come all the way out here and then pretend it wasn't for a reason."

It was Koji's turn to chastise and his brother shuddered, looking back over his shoulder knowingly. He tried to do something reassuring with his face for perhaps a moment too long before giving up and letting his hand slide back to his side. Koichi didn't run away once free, on the contrary, he turned fully to face his brother. A mild sadness permeated his being. He opened his mouth to say something but Koji raised a hand again, jerking his head down the street and away from the train station.

"If I remember the map right, there's a little park just up that way. I don't want to be here anymore, so lets go find a bench or something. Unless you had some business?"

"No," Koichi interjected quickly, shaking his head. "No I… I don't like this place either, I just came to see you. I came because I… miss you too."

Now Koji's smile was full, like the warm light which he embodied, vibrant and almost out of place on his usually annoyed face. Wordlessly he jerked his head to indicate their path, then turned and started down it without checking to see if Koichi was following. For a moment his brother just blinked at his back, bemused by this somewhat sudden change in demeanor. Then he noticed he was being left behind and scampered forward, coming up beside him. The two just walked like that, in a silence that wasn't quite uncomfortable. And still there was something…

"This is weird," commented Koichi, stopping and watching Koji's feet come around and settle by the first bench by the park's entrance.

"Yeah," he agreed without arguing, draping his arms over the back of the bench and looking skyward. "Ever since I've known you there's been that psychic thing. Now everything's so quiet."

"It's more disturbing than that," Koichi muttered, his voice taking on a sharp edge as some barrier cracked inside him. "I can see you, as if you don't have a care in the world, but as far as I can tell you might as well not be there at all. Like you never came back and I-"

He broke off, allowing his eyes to dart to Koji's face before returning them to the cement, biting down on his lower lip to hold back whatever confession or accusation was bubbling up inside him. Whatever it was he wanted so desperately to keep buried and simultaneously expose that he'd relapsed into stalking his twin rather than speaking with him. Koji leaned forward slowly, bracing his elbows on his splayed knees and interlacing his fingers. His stare, in sharp but not unexpected contrast, was unrelenting.

"Finish it," he said, firm but not harsh, the most diplomatic of demands. "You what?"

"I-" Koichi balled his hands into fists and steadied his gaze against an adjacent tree, breathing deeply. "I don't know what I did wrong."

"Did wrong," Koji repeated, confused at first. Realization brought forth a heavy sigh and a headshake. "You didn't do anything wrong. You saved the world; you know that, right? I've just been, you know, processing. I feel like such an ass, and I know things happened and I can't go back and change them, but I can't help it. I knew what you went through as Duskmon was hard, I got that you had to be profoundly strong to have survived it, I just never understood how hard or how strong. You're… amazing. I don't know how you managed to fight off the Dark Ocean."

"Don't you?"

Koichi was so genuinely bewildered he turned fully and met Koji's eye. For a long second the two just stared at each other, equal parts expressionless and unrestrained. Swallowing, Koichi took up the seat next to Koji, knees pressed together and back rigid. He ran his thumb over the edges of his fingernails, pensive.

"You're how I did it," he finally said, making meaningful eye contact with his feet. "You're more important to me than anything, even myself. When I didn't care about anything I still cared about you and you- you never turned away from me, even when I was at my most depraved. I didn't save the world, Koji, I just saved you. The world was a convenient consequence."

He didn't have a quick, witty, sarcastic, comforting, or any variant of response. Unless you count stunned silence as a response. This stillness. Koji couldn't seem to get away from it today. Even looking at his twin seemed a horrible effort, like staring into a corridor completely saturated with shadows. Empty and simultaneously brimming with monsters, the kind of void that devours those who stare for too long. Or maybe it wasn't that he feared being swallowed; maybe he was afraid he'd do the swallowing. That his light would burn too brightly from atop this high pedestal, that his brother had to be talking about someone else.

"I know what you're thinking," Koichi whispered with an almost chuckle, directing his gaze forward and interlacing his fingers. "I can't hear anything, I don't feel anything, but still I think I know. You're thinking that I must be stronger than you, or care more, because I was able to turn back the Dark Ocean and you couldn't. It's such a fragile form of knowledge, so uncertain, but still I know. Just like I know that you haven't even considered that the Dark Ocean had been feeding off a piece of me for years, something that I could take back but you couldn't, or that I had help."

"What can I say, you've always been more generous than me," remarked Koji, neither confirming nor denying his brother's presumptions.

"You're not the only one to wonder what might've happened if our situations were reversed, Koji," he scolded, tensing. "How many times did I regret going after you five years ago, wished I'd been strong enough then not to have become Duskmon in the first place? Had you come after me, would you have confronted me? If you'd fallen and entered the Digital World as a spirit, maybe Cherubimon wouldn't have been drawn to you at all. Maybe if it had been you and not me, we would never have ended up here. Maybe this outcome was inevitable. I'm tormented by that thought, by quantifying how much suffering could've been avoided if I was you, no matter how much I try to rationalize it away. Having you sit there and tell me how much more virtuous I am in comparison to yourself really unnerves me. I don't understand how you could think that and at the same time I think the same thing about you. But I-"

He broke off, licking his lips and swallowing hard. Still the twins couldn't look at each other, couldn't face the vulnerability that was so excruciatingly necessary to moving forward. Slowly, though, the knots were loosening and the tangles were pulling free. Old mattes, things their psychic connection had allowed them to avoid, messes their newfound clarity laid bare. Koji reached over and placed one palm on top of Koichi's clasped hands, letting his fingers rest lightly on his brother's skin before giving an encouraging squeeze. Koichi nodded, swallowing again.

"I know if you'd had all the advantages I had, if you'd really been in my shoes, you would've defeated the Ocean and saved the world too. Even if you don't believe me, even if no one believes me, that's something I know in my core. Like when I was Duskmon and I didn't remember anything of myself except for you. We can't go back and it's pointless to even think about it, I know that. Still I- I can't take this distance. Please don't shut me out? Please don't let me shut you out?"

"Just because you can't read my mind anymore doesn't mean I'm shutting you out," Koji grumbled, straightening but not releasing his brother's hands. "Though to be fair, I haven't really been making an effort…"

"An effort…" Koichi repeated in a low, sad voice, pulling his hands out from under Koji's and crossing his arms. "I'm sorry, I don't know why I'm so wound up about this. It's all in my head and I'm reacting like it's real; I never learn."

"Come on, cut it out," he chastised, tilting his head and finally making eye contact. "You're not wrong, I've got this burning shame about what happened and I've been not dealing with it. So yeah I've been distant, but I'm not trying to shut you out. You should understand better than anyone that sometimes you need to process your secrets before sharing them, so you can protect the people you care about."

"Yes," this time Koichi did grin as he spoke, a matured version of his usual soft smile. "I do understand that. I've just never been on the other side before, not like now anyway."

"Sucks, doesn't it?"

At that he outright laughed, and his laughter, rich and genuine for the first time in such a horribly long time, was contagious. Koji found himself chuckling, then joining in with reckless abandon. Social norms and niceties be damned. In fact, let the entire world (which they had just expended a lot of time and effort saving) be damned. For now, for this ephemeral, beautiful moment, there were only two people who mattered. And they were sitting together on a park bench giggling like children at a fart joke.

"I don't know what's gonna happen now," confessed Koichi, wiping a tear from his eye with the ball of his palm. "I don't know if I can go back to being normal, or if I was ever normal in the first place."

"Normal's overrated," Koji answered with a shrug. "Our lives may be a little less sci-fi inspired, but I think they'll still be basically the same. Tell you what, moving forward, how about you just be you, I'll be me, and no matter what happens, no matter what kind of upside-down situation we find ourselves in, we'll be brothers."

Koichi turned his body so he could face Koji fully, identical and yet profoundly different. Two parts of the same whole and two separate bodies connected by an indestructible gravitation. Now, finally, choosing to emerge from the aftermath stronger for having survived it. Together.

"That…" he whispered. "Sounds manageable."