Epilogue

Perrin quietly pulled the sheets up to her son's neck, tucking the young a'ladon in as she smoothed his fine auburn hair back lovingly. The child peered closely at her with his bright blue eyes, eyes that had never once left her face during the story that she had just finished telling to the boy. "Mother?" he asked quietly.

"Yes son?"

"Lord Takeru and Lady Hikari… were they really gods?"

Perrin smiled gently at the boy, though the question gave her pause to think. She had been preparing herself for it, of course, but not when the boy was still so young. But perhaps she should have been, as it was well within his inquisitive nature to ask. The problem was that, despite the work of her husband in the past six years, the overwhelming perception among their people was still that the two young humans were indeed gods. Their physical appearance and liberation of the slaves had established that perception as an accepted and verified truth; no longer simply proverbial.

The young woman knew that the boy, despite his princely status, would face troubles from his friends and the priesthood if he should be told the truth, but she would not lie to the boy. "No, son, they weren't. They were simply two good and noble friends who came to us when we so desperately needed help."

The other sat up in bed, shedding his sheets as he peered closely at his mother. "But then why did they have to leave?"

The queen stopped, and seemed for a moment to consider an answer that would satisfy the child's five-year-old mind. "Do you know all the times when your father has to leave us to journey to the Dell of Atonement for the meetings with the Saurians?"

The boy nodded.

"Do you like it when he's gone?"

A shake of the head.

"Well neither does he. He doesn't like being away from you, but it's something that he has to do. And that's like what happened to Takeru and Hikari. Just as your father is helping the Saurians who are suffering, they came to help us when we were. And just like we miss him when he's gone, Takeru and Hikari had family who loved them where they came from and who missed them when they were here with us."

The boy's little brow frowned in thought, then he gave a short nod. Leaning back on his pillow, he yawned deeply and closed his sleepy blue eyes. Then, "Mother?" one final time.

"Yes?"

"Will I ever get to meet them? Even if they're not gods, I think I'd really like to."

Again Perrin paused. The last words that Lady Hikari had spoken to her (she had never been able to shake the habit of thinking of the girl as 'Lady' Hikari) were a promise that if they were ever needed again, the a'ladon people shouldn't fear to call for them. "You may, someday, T'Kay. Someday. Now go to sleep, son," the young queen ordered, snapping off the light.

*****

T.K. and Kari sat quietly at a park bench near the girl's house, hands intertwined in silent affection. It had been scarcely two week since their return from the world of the a'ladon, and that night there was to be a gathering for the Digidestined at Tai and Kari's house. As such, the pair wanted some private time alone before being thrust in among all their friends at once. As she stared out into space, Kari ran her the tips of her fingers repeatedly around the back of the boy's hand, and the electric thrill that ran down his spine in response was not unlike the charge of the crest of Hope when it enlivened him.

As it happened, the week that they had spent in the a'ladons' world had entailed a passage of almost no time at all in their own. If either of the children had suspected as much before departing, they might have stayed for a much longer time. As it was, they had left the moment after seeing Mylam (who had returned to what T.K. assumed was his 'rookie' form shortly after their battle) and Perrin safely wed. The boy had, of course, stood for the prince in the capacity of a 'best man', or at least the equivalent station for the creatures. Both human children had rather expected the joining ceremony to be similar to a human wedding, but in reality it had really been more like a wild party, and by the end of that night both of them had been utterly exhausted.

A pensive look suddenly appeared in T.K.'s eyes as he stared off into the distance. Kari, without even having looked at the young boy, immediately picked up on the change in his demeanor. "What's wrong?" she asked.

"I guess I'm just… worried," the other replied. "I have been since we got back."

"Worried? Why?"

His frown deepened. "I was thinking that, in a way, what happened over there was almost our fault."

"Our fault? T.K.! How can you say that?"

Now he turned to look at her. "Think about it, Kari. We threw the dark angel from our world to theirs, and it turned out that she was the one that allowed the Saurians to enslave the a'ladon. How many thousands of their people died because of that carelessness use of power? If we hadn't used the unity like we did--"

"She would have killed Sora, Matt and Tai half a year ago," the girl finished for him pointedly. "T.K., you can't blame yourself for that. You didn't know where we were sending her, and you couldn't control it."

The boy looked at the girl, and allowed his frown to give way as his eyes caught hers. "I guess… I know. But then, what about the other one? Despair?"

Kari shook her head. "I don't know. Hopefully he was sent somewhere where he can't do any harm. If not… if not, I suppose we'll hear about it soon enough." And with that the girl rested her head on T.K.'s shoulder, and suddenly, though nothing had really changed, everything again felt right in the world for the young boy.

To be continued...

Notes on a'ladon culture: The a'ladon are an otherworldly Celtic-type culture of warrior digimon for books 3, 5 & 7. The dance that TK and Kari join in at the beginning is an Irish reel, and the instrument that interrupts the dinner is a bagpipe. Mylam's instrument is a tin whistle.

On language (small spoilers for future books): In the a'ladon language, an apostrophe in front of a word is always a modifier for the actual word the follows. The small "a" proceeding an apostrophe and a word indicates the word "the" for a proper noun. Thus "a'ladon" is "the People". For a common noun, it would be a capitalized "A", or A'ladon a generic "the people". The small letter "l" is a possessive, generally "your"; therefore in chapter one "l'angelum" is "your angels" and "l'valere" is "your truth". And **spoilers follow** the capitalized "T" is a an affectionate term usually assigned to very young children by parents or close relatives, and denotes a fond "little". Thus, T'Kay is "little faithful one" where Kay = faithful one, and T'Kai is "little promisekeeper", where Kai = promisekeeper (or keeper-of-the-promise). Rarely do a'ladon boys keep the "T" modifier to their names beyond their 11th birthdays, unless there is a specific reason to do so, such as marking the difference between a father and son with the same name, i.e., 'Junior'.

A capital "D" is normally in reference to supernatural evil or an aspect thereof, such as a demon or devil, as in "D'assan" or "D'aevis". Often a'ladon will forgo even speaking the name of such a creature, as the "D" is considered as much as a vulgarity.