Digimon Sundial

Chapter 2: Aspen

"Time never forgives"

The sunlight was enough for his eyes to open, and the curtains being put aside, enough for him to realize he was almost late for school again.
He had that dream again...

A dream he began to chase, it started with a simple, lonely word in a black void, then 2 words, then 3, then the void gained a slit, weak orange shine in the middle, he kept chasing the source of that shine, the vertical orange line... But all he managed to do was to stay asleep more than he should.

He said goodbye to his mother, and ran out of the door, everything seemed normal... Finally, after having to adapt to his theorically normal life, after having to feel "at home" again, everything seemed to begin to click together.

His mother felt relieved as she saw her son leaving in the scooter, the sudden amnesia he suffered 2 years ago seemed to be a one time only crisis... One that nobody could explain, one that they could win against just recently.

He should be in his final year at school, but the amnesia made it impossible for him to work properly, he had to recover those 2 years he lost, and he was doing well, his grades way better than the ones he had before the "Accident".

But deep inside, something was lacking.

"That new game, Digimon World, seems pretty interesting, I don't know about all these AVR things, but it may be the real deal..."

"AVR? You mean Advanced Virtual Reality?"

"Yeah, some call it perfect VR, after all, you truly feel like being in that virtual world yourself, all thanks to these weird particles they created, some dimensional stuff"

"That's crazy... Never heard about those particles before, and you say they're only used for this videogame?"

"Crazy, huh? Guess they must have too many cons for their use in space or hospitals, still, somewhat shady we heard about their existence just now."

A flow of water interrupts the speech, as the boy in the uniform was drinking from his bottle at that school break, the girl at his side listening curious.

"The catch is the time they're taking, just recently the game began to offer passes for closed betas, and MAGAMI said they're taking like 7 years in making the game, at this point, they better pray it'll pay off the wait, these things can cost you some big bucks"

"But those Digimon things are too cute! It'll be great to interact with them!" -The girl smiles while seeing a truck with the MAGAMI logo in the back passing by at the intersection of that city, where the school was located- "I'm sure they'll succeed... Just imagine a whole new world to explore... Hey, I think there was someone in our class that digged all that monster stuff, right?"

"Oh, yeah, the guy of the accident..." -The boy felt lucky when he noticed the student he was talking about close to them, but not enough to hear what he said.- "...At least formerly, now he doesn't even recognize the things he drew back in the day"

Both were somewhat dubious of wanting to talk to that guy, after all, he always felt wirthdrawn and distant since they met him, and being 2 years older didn't help matters, but the teacher said they should try to make him remember, try to go back to how he was 2 years ago... It was the only way they could help.

"Yo! Aspen!" -Both approach Aspen, who simply turns to them after seeing the truck with the MAGAMI logo leave, his eyes still feeling empty and cold, probably unintentional, as his mouth tried his best to smile and look cheerful- "Been hearing about this new Digimon game? Seems like they're finally letting some lucky ones to play..."

"They're in close beta, right guys?" -Aspen responds, his voice being low at first, then he fixed it, he still had some problems expressing himself- "Seems like a big deal."