Haha. UH. This is my personal monster. I had ONE SCENE stuck in my head for five years and it refused to look any less cool the older I got. So I built a whole universe around it.

This is the beginning. I thought I would be satisfied with just this, but then I suddenly was full of conspiracies and well... now its long.

This is canon divergent. Only canon through Adventure episode 28. If something seems different, its on purpose.

One minute they were sitting around Gennai's strange underwater home, and the next they were fleeing for their lives. Small explosions pelted the building with debris. How had Myotismon found them? This was supposed to be Gennai's sanctuary, wasn't it? He told them they would be safe here.

Yamato gave a cry as the floor under him shook and he fell to his hands and knees. Gabumon was there instantly, pulling him to his feet. The others were scattering to avoid being hit. Jyou was screaming for Gommamon to evolve. Gommamon yelled that it would take the rest of the house down. Dust and water were everywhere. It was a terrifying blur.

Somebody screamed that the water dome was collapsing.

Yamato turned, and for a brief second, locked eyes with Gennai. For once his were blown wide, and he threw a wizened hand toward the blond boy. A sharp yank pulled Yamato backwards. A familiar shriek assaulted his ears, and his world collapsed in a heavy swirl of water and darkness.

Awareness came back to Yamato slowly. His head pounded and his mouth tasted like lake water. Gabumon's wet fur stuck to the side of his face. Someone was shaking him.

The shriek echoed in his ears.

Yamato flew to his feet, looking around at the others desperately. They were as sodden as he was, and eerily silent as they gazed at him. The chosen of friendship's chest heaved. His first yell made them flinch.

"TAKERU!"

Taichi hesitantly lay a hand on his damp shoulder. Yamato didn't have the presence of mind to shrug it off.

He couldn't breathe.

In front of them, the lake was boiling.

They looked for days. In the end, the looming threat of Myotismon destroying the real world became too pressing to put off any longer. Yamato protested vehemently. He would stay behind. Find his brother. Gennai was nowhere to be found. He was no help.

Taichi convinced him to come home.

They would be back to search as soon as they could.

Yamato wanted to hate Hikari. He wanted to turn his back on her and her stupid, innocent eyes and shy smile. Her digimon evolved into an angel. She was obviously a replacement. He wanted to hate her.

He couldn't.

Arrows of Light and Hope. Takeru was supposed to be here. There was a prophesy with him in it. Yamato balled his hands into fists and tried not to cry.

He held Taichi's hand anyway, wishing he was the one getting shot.

With Wargreymon's help, they managed to beat Venommyotismon. It was harder than Yamato thought it should have been.

Taichi and the others fought the Dark Masters.

Yamato looked for Takeru.

Sora joined him, and he found himself beyond grateful for the company. She took his moods in stride and it was incredibly helpful to have someone to search from the air.

Eventually, they heeded Mimi's call for an army to storm Infinity Mountain. They found Hikari crying hysterically, holding a bunch of dolls while Angewomon tried to hold Piemon off. The addition of Lilymon, Weregarurumon, and Garudamon allowed Angewomon to stop fighting long enough to do, well, something. She changed the dolls back into their friends.

Even with all of them back at it and working together, Piemon was too powerful. Even Wargreymon was having a hard time.

Taichi got too close to the battle and was knocked out by a rogue blast.

Hikari, to the surprise of all of them, ran forward and threw herself over her downed brother, protecting him from further injury. The brightest light Yamato had ever seen threw the battlefield into sharp relief.

Then a massive pink dragon roared past him, straight at Piemon.

Holydramon was the miracle they needed.

Yamato did not attend Takeru's funeral. His parents wanted to put him to rest. To ease their minds and move on. Yamato tried to hope. He sobbed in his bedroom instead.

When Taichi called, a spark flared in Yamato's chest for the first time in years. Hikari had returned to the digital world, and a new team was forming. He tried so hard, but he had been slowly giving in. Giving up. They had not been able to breach the barrier between the worlds since they were teleported back to camp in sixth grade. Yamato stopped talking about his brother. Stopped trying to remember

Information poured in.

The timelines had been re-aligned.

There was a human in the digital world.

He was evil.

Armor-evolving was the only way to fight.

It was easier than ever to gate back and forth. Going in didn't mean going for months.

Reuniting with Gabumon was bittersweet. He loved his partner, but painful memories pushed to the surface at every turn. He couldn't fight. He wouldn't. He would search again.

Hikari looked somewhat apprehensively at the cave in front of them. There was something odd about the way light seemed to emanate from within. Shouldn't it be dark inside? She whispered her concerns to Miyako, who was tracking the eggs on her digivice.

"Well, didn't you say your crest was light? Its probably just calling you the same way Iori could feel Armadimon," Miyako looked to her friend curiously. Miyako hadn't met her own digimon yet, but there was a good chance one of the eggs inside would be hers. She couldn't feel that tug in her gut that Iori and Daisuke had described, but she was eager to give it a shot. She was the only one without a partner.

"I already have Tailmon…" Hikari snuggled her partner in her arms. "What do you think?"

The cat digimon leaned out of Hikari's arms, taking a deep breath of the cave air. A serene smile graced her face, and she hummed contentedly.

"Whatever is in there is good. Even out here, I feel amazing. Its safe, Hikari. I can tell."

At that, the two girls slowly made their way through the passages. The light grew brighter, but never harsh. It was warm and dry, like a refreshing spring breeze.

The passage opened up into a round room, and Hikari's digivice activated, beeping and flashing.

"I guess it is yours!" Miyako laughed, as Tailmon hopped down and approached the egg. "Ooh, and look! Maybe this one is mine. Its got a cool little symbol on it, like a tiny sunburst!"

Hikari whipped around at that, startling Miyako with her cry.

"Don't touch it!"

Miyako froze, fingers inches from the egg. She turned her head and took in the nervous look on her friend's face.

"Um… why?" She tried to ask gently. Honestly, she was pretty annoyed, but the alarm on Hikari's face made her uneasy.

Hikari squirmed.

"It's not yours," She said softly. "I'm sorry, Miyako. But its not."

Miyako stood, a strange feeling swirling in her stomach at her friend's sad tone.

"Whose is it?"

Tailmon slunk over, sniffing and investigating the egg. She couldn't help but touch her nose to the symbol carved into its front. It was so warm.

A yellow glow erupted from under the egg, splashing dazzling lights across the cave walls.

Tailmon evolved without prompting, startling the girls with her sudden form change. She had to stoop to fit in the confined space.

The Perfect level digimon looked in shock at her own hands before directing her gaze to her partner.

Hikari looked stunned.

"Its still active…" Angewomon murmured.

Hikari ran from the cave. She had to find Taichi.

Taichi and Sora joined Yamato on his next trip.

Ken joining the team was an interesting change. Daisuke was more responsible than ever.

The team worked to rebuild parts of the world that were damaged, but Archnemon seemed to thwart their every effort.

Every chosen child stressed about her. A digimon that could make more digimon? How were they supposed to fight her when all she had to do was pull some of her hair and there was an army for them to deal with?

Blackwargreymon was truly a nightmare from the very pits of hell itself.

His existence warped the fabric of the digital world. In his creation, something must have gone very wrong. He rampaged without cause, a desperation and fury fueling him that the chosen children could never understand. Every attempt to reason with him was met with violence. He screamed at them to destroy him, to put him out of his agony. Yet when they came at him, he fought back with a vengeance.

In the end, it would take everything they had to try to take him down.

It still wouldn't be enough.

Yamato groaned, eyelids fluttering against the ripped cloth of his sleeve. He'd blocked the worst of the debris, but it was getting hard to breath with all the dirt and dust in the air. This was going badly. Many of the digimon were already out of commission, and some of the chosen mildly banged up themselves. They huddled together in groups, clustered behind rocks and trying to stay away from the worst of it.

How they were supposed to fight a Mega, Yamato had no idea. Archnemon had been a Perfect, and Blackwargreymon had destroyed her not twenty minutes ago. He seemed to be becoming more unstable with every passing moment. All they had was a bunch of Adult levels. Unless they somehow got their crests back… Even if they did, only Wargreymon and Magnadramon would be able to match him in firepower.

Yamato caught Taichi's eye and nodded. It was time to retreat. They would not survive much longer. He wasn't sure they'd ever felt this hopeless. Blackwargreymon was a Mega.

"Where's the closest TV?" Taichi called over the sounds of battle to Koushiro.

Piyomon went crashing to the ground beside them, Sora darting out to carry her to a safer spot.

"Not actually all that far, Taichi! The problem is we have no one to cover us when we run for it!" Koushiro yelled from his position a dozen or so feet away.

Another blast rocked them off their feet.

Taichi swore.

Yamato peeked as far around his cover as he dared, taking stock of who was left.

Angewomon, Stingmon, and Exv-mon flew around erratically, only managing to dodge because they were in the air. Gabumon and Armadimon lay on the torn up ground, too close to the battle to grab safely.

Yamato's eyes darted around, trying to find any possible advantage they could u-

What was that?

There was a… a golden circle rotating out across the field. Yamato could barely see through the smoke, but that's what it looked like. Something small and yellowish appeared to hop out of it. The chosen of friendship did not have time to see what it was, because a second later a huge angel flew out as well.

Yamato's heart lurched into his throat, but sunk a second later. This angel was purple, with a glowing sword. He'd never seen it before in his life. If Angewomon existed, there was no reason there couldn't be other angel digimon as well.

He squinted as another cloud of dirt blew by. What the hell was going on?

Yamato blinked, and suddenly the angel was rocketing towards them. He vaguely heard a few of the other chosen asking what it was in alarm. The angel got halfway to them before bursting into light. It caught everyone's attention, even Blackwargreymon. The dark digimon turned in midair with a feral screech, launching a Terra Force in the new digimon's direction.

The light faded a second before the energy blast hit, and a blue armored angel rolled out of the way at the last moment. It was fast. The angel continued its path towards Blackwargreymon, raising its arms.

"Strike of the Seven Stars!"

Balls of light appeared above the angel's hands, and hurtled at the dark digimon before he could react.

Blackwargreymon went down in an explosion of noise and light that made the very ground ripple.

"Holy shit!" Taichi cried, holding Hikari close. "What the hell is that guy?"

"I don't know, but somehow Blackwargreymon is getting up!" Daisuke warned.

The dark digimon was indeed attempting to get to his feet. He was obviously damaged, but would not be stopped. He let out an unholy scream and flew at the angel.

The armored angel only spread his arms wide, head tilted towards the sky.

"HALLOWED ASCENSION."

A lightning bolt ripped itself from the sky, and this time, Yamato had to look away.

The blast came with an accompanying thunder crash that left everyone's ears ringing. They held onto each other as clods of dirt flew past.

The silence after the attack was deafening in its own right. Yamato shook his head, daring to creep from behind the boulder and see the damage.

There was a crater under the angel, who had his head bowed. Sparkling data bits rose before him.

"Be at peace."

Yamato couldn't take his eyes off the angel, but a sudden unfamiliar voice called from the field.

"Jesus, Seraphimon, I think you got him!" There was a child running through the grass.

The boy skidded to a stop at the far edge of the crater, puffing and pulling out a digivice.

"Ohho, yeah. He was definitely the one causing all those distortions. That was a nasty virus corrupting him. Way to go!" He called up to his partner, who in a small burst of light, devolved and fluttered down to the boy's shoulder.

Yamato didn't need to see Patamon to know who he was looking at.

The two started chattering quietly to each other, rubbing their faces together in greeting.

"Who the hell is that?"

Daisuke and the others were cautiously coming out from behind their cover. They were dirty and scratched, holding their digimon with care. The younger kids had a collective look of amazement and curiosity on their faces. The older team froze at the sight of the boy.

The goggle-bearer frowned when no one answered him. He looked around in concern.

Mimi had a hand over her mouth, her eyes wide open in shock. Jyou was just blinking rapidly, shaking his head as if he didn't believe what he was seeing.

Sora was the first one whose reaction started to scare him. She was shaking slightly, tears filling her eyes.

Daisuke whipped his head around.

Taichi was pale, a hand clenched in a vice-like grip on his best friend's arm.

"Yamato…" The chosen of courage whispered.

Tears were pouring down Yamato's face.

"Yamato, are you okay?" Miyako asked, frightened by the normally stoic chosen's sudden show of emotion.

Across the crater, the boy's head snapped up.

Yamato did not dare believe it. There was no way. He was just so devastated that he was hallucinating. It had been years.

Takeru was staring back at him.

"O-onii-chan?"

His brother's voice sounded different, but it still wobbled in a familiar way. The way it did when he was scared and trying not to cry. That, more than anything else, was what put his feet into motion.

"Onii-chan!" Takeru cried, happiness filling his very being.

They ran.

Takeru jumped into Yamato's arms the way he used to. Except he was eleven now, and much, much taller than he used to be.

Yamato didn't give half a shit that he had the wind knocked out of him when they hit the ground. He was holding his brother again.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he was aware that everyone was probably staring at them, but he couldn't have cared less. He gripped the boy as tight as he could, sobbing his heart out. Years of thinking his baby brother was dead. Of trying to put on a brave face around the others. Of trying to convince his parents it was possible he was still out there somewhere.

None of it mattered anymore.

Takeru was squeezing back, hysterical laughter pouring from him. It slowly faded to crying, and Yamato did everything he could to hold tighter. He buried his nose in his brother's hair. He could not get over how much Takeru had grown. He used to be able to hold him easily, one hand covered so much of his back. Now he guessed there was only a foot difference in their height. They'd missed so much of each other's lives…

However long it was, eventually the crying ended.

Yamato pulled back slightly. His brother's face was smeared with tears, eyes puffy, and nose running. Yamato didn't think he'd ever seen something so beautiful.

Takeru smiled up at him through the last of his tears.

"Hi, Onii-chan."

Yamato choked out a laugh.

"Hi, Takeru."

He pulled the smaller and yet so much bigger boy in for another hug, wishing he never had to let go.

A hand on his shoulder startled him.

"Are we allowed to say hi, too? Or do you want me to go away?"

Takeru pushed backwards, staring up at the owner of the voice.

"Taichi!"

They sat up in the grass, Takeru still half sprawled across Yamato's legs.

"You guys can say hi, but you'll have to come over here. I'm not moving, ever." The chosen of friendship chuckled.

Taichi gave his arm a pat, and kneeled to wrap Takeru in a hug of his own.

"Welcome back, squirt," He congratulated, thumping the kid on the back a few times.

"Get out of the way, Taichi," Sora playfully pushed her friend out of the way. "Its my turn."

Yamato did have to move then, but he couldn't really hold it against the girl. Sora flung her arms around Takeru, and burst into tears as well, pulling back only to pepper him with kisses. Takeru submitted, laughing helplessly at his friend's exuberance.

Takeru looked over Sora's shoulder, reaching out a hand towards Jyou and Koushiro.

"I can't go anywhere, but I missed you guys too."

They stepped forward, shaking his hand and patting his back. Wherever wasn't wrapped up with Sora.

Mimi finally stepped forward. She rubbed Sora's back with one hand and pulled Takeru out of her grip with her other.

"All right, Sora, all right. I get to hug Takeru too."

The chosen of love relented, but simply changed her target. She alternated between hugging Yamato and Taichi instead.

Yamato would say he was embarrassed, but he couldn't really summon the feeling.

Mimi let Takeru go, and helped him to his feet, complaining about getting dirt all over themselves here on the ground.

"Takeru, Takeru, Takeru! Look! New kids and digimon!" Patamon flew over from where he had been greeting the others, and perched on top on his partner's head.

Yamato put an arm around his little brother's shoulders, and for a moment was just amazed he could do so. The older group parted and Takeru saw five unfamiliar kids looking at him uncertainly. Yamato walked them over and started introductions.

"Takeru, this is the new team. That's Daisuke, Ken, Miyako, Iori, and Hikari, and their partners, V-mon, Wormmon, Hawkmon, Armadimon, and Tailmon. Everybody, this is my little brother, Takeru, and his partner, Patamon."

Takeru gave an awkward little wave when none of them said anything. The one he had said was Hikari was gazing at him, the oddest look in her warm eyes. It seemed sad, wistful, maybe.

The boy turned to his brother, eyes wide.

"Which one was it?"

Yamato frowned. He didn't know what Takeru meant by that, but Hikari raised her hand in answer.

"I was the eighth child," She said apologetically. "I'm Taichi's little sister."

Takeru whipped around to look at his old leader in confirmation. Tachi nodded sheepishly.

Yamato was surprised when Takeru stepped forward, enveloping the chosen of light in a tender hug. Hikari was taken aback, but smiled at his friendliness and gave a tiny hug back.

Stepping back, Takeru said,

"When Gennai said there was an eighth chosen, I was so excited. I wanted it to be a little kid my age so I could have a friend to show around. I'm sorry I wasn't there to help you out."

Hikari blushed, opening her mouth to assure him he did not need to apologize. But she was interrupted.

"Okay, I'm sorry, but I am SO confused. Since when do you have a brother? Was he here the whole time?" Daisuke dragged his hands through his hair, upsetting his goggles.

Takeru looked to Yamato, his faced pinched.

"You didn't tell them about me?" He sounded dejected.

That popped the bubble of happiness Yamato had been enjoying. Pain reared up in its stead. He reached out with a shaking hand, grabbing hold of Takeru's shirt sleeve as if to remind himself that he was actually there.

"I'm sorry, Teeks. I don't know what you want me to say," Agitation flared in his chest. Not at Takeru. Never at Takeru. At who then? Oh. At Gennai. "The house was coming down around us. The lake was boiling, Takeru! We looked for you for weeks. We were kicked out of the digital world for years! Mom and Dad buried you! Everyone thought you were dead, so yeah… I- I stopped talking about you. I'm sorry."

Yamato wiped the stray tear off his face in annoyance.

Takeru was frozen, eyes watching his face gloomily.

"I kind of figured people would think that…" He whispered.

"Takeru, what," Suddenly having him back wasn't enough. He needed to understand. "What happened?"

The others gathered around, beyond curious as well. They had all grieved. They wanted closure.

Takeru leaned into his brother in a half hug. After so long, it was strange to be around people who knew him again. Patamon snuggled into his neck, humming encouragement.

"Gennai's house was coming down, like you said, Onii-chan. Everyone was panicking. I was scared and hid under the table. And then the water started rushing in, and you fell, I saw you. Gennai used a ton of his power to save you all. I don't know how, but he pushed everyone to the beach. He didn't see me right away. I yelled for him, but by the time he turned around, the water was inside. I couldn't swim, and the house was coming apart. I couldn't breathe… And then Gennai was there, holding me, and an air bubble blew up around us. And then we just. We disappeared. Like, it felt like I didn't exist for a second. When I opened my eyes, we were somewhere else. A huge forest. Gennai was almost out of energy. He was dying. He looked around and said that he hadn't meant to take us so far. He just wanted me safe. That he was sorry. And then he faded away…"

Yamato felt years of anger at the old man fade. There would always be some part of him that blamed Gennai for what happened, but at least he had died getting Takeru safe.

"Patamon and I looked around for you forever. Everything was terrible then. I was lonely and scared, and I knew Gennai said he'd taken us further than he meant to. But I couldn't find anyone on the digivice no matter where I went. I was so confused. None of the digimon we asked had ever heard of the chosen children. They had no idea who Myotismon was. It took us longer than it should have, but we realized we weren't on Server anymore."

The others murmured quietly at that.

"The digital world is much bigger than we ever thought. I mean, we saw a projection of it on Koushiro's computer, and it was as big as Earth. Did we really think that we had walked around the whole thing when we were traveling? Patamon and I ended up on Motherboard. A completely different continent. We were taken in by a village of digimon for a while. I was upset, but they were kind. They had no clue how to get us back to the real world. I stayed with them for months before the trouble started."

Sensing that this story would take some time, Taichi led the group over to a shady spot on the edge of the meadow. They sat down and let their exhausted digimon rest in their laps. Takeru and Yamato refused to let go of each other the whole time.

"What was the issue on Motherboard?" Koushiro prompted. He was very interested in the idea of learning about these other areas of the digital world.

"Well," Takeru set Patamon on his lap and toyed with his partner's ear wings. "At first we didn't notice much, but there was a dark mist that would creep unnaturally through the forest at night. Digimon were going missing… It was a dark digimon starting to take over the area. It didn't matter who it was, I never found out his name," Takeru talked over Koushiro's oncoming question.

"With the dark digimon came other chosen kids," The blond boy took in the stunned faces of his old and new friends. "At first I was so excited, I thought they could take me home the way they came in. But um, the problem with that was that they didn't speak Japanese. Like at all," Takeru scrubbed his hands through his hair in remembered frustration. "They turned out to be from Brazil. We could barely communicate at all. It was the weirdest thing, because they could understand the digimon, and so could I, but we couldn't understand each other. We stuck around with them for a little, because at the time there was safety in numbers. Eventually we were attacked, and Patamon evolved to Perfect. Holyangemon. We got away, but the other kids wanted to stay to fight again. I was sick of fighting. I wanted to go home…"

Yamato squeezed his brother's hand reassuringly. He had been so wrapped up in his own agonizing for years. He had concentrated on the idea of Takeru being found. Not often did he find himself wondering that if Takeru was alive, what was he doing?

"But the funny thing about Holyangemon… One of his attacks isn't really an attack at all. It's a gate. A portal. It took a lot of energy and experimentation, but we found out it opens up to some dark ocean thing. I guess it sucks up the evil digimon and puts them where they belong? I, I dunno. We didn't want to focus on that too much. It occurred to me that if we could change where the portal came out, we could get back to Server and see if you were all still here.

"It took, well. It took a long time to figure out, but after months of practice, Holyangemon managed to open it to a different place in the digital world. We were anxious to get off Motherboard, so we went through. Aaaand, we accidentally jumped right into the middle of a battle," Takeru chuckled while the others leaned forward in concern. "There were chosen kids fighting this giant, and I do mean giant, robot thing that was turning things into metal and then melting them. It was so flipping strange. Patamon was really tired from using the portal, so we just booked it away from there and found shelter. The kids and their digimon defeated the robot, and came and found me after. And get this, they spoke French."

Koushiro was bouncing in place, visibly restraining himself from interrupting with a million questions.

"So that was the start of us figuring out that each continent in the digital world is protected by a different region of chosen kids from Earth. Most of Europe protects Monitor. South America has Motherboard. Server just happens to be over Japan," Takeru smiled, excited to finally share his adventure with the people that it mattered most to. "We spent a good amount of time with the French kids. I knew a few words and phrases that Grandpa made me practice, so I wasn't at quite the disadvantage this time. I got into quite a lot of those battles, and Patamon grew a lot stronger. He was able to hold Angemon's form long enough that we felt safe traveling long distance by air. So we went everywhere. Questioned everyone we met about how far it was to Server. And as it turned out, it was really really far. Where China and Korea are in the digital world is all ocean. We couldn't fly that far, and without a massive boat or a Whamon to ride, crossing the ocean was not going to happen.

"We had to rely on Holyangemon's portal to get around the world, so that's what we did. Two years of trying to get back to Server, or at least File Island. But the world is so huge…" Takeru blew out a heavy breath. Yamato rubbed his back. His little brother shot him a mischievous grin at his next thought. "I stayed hopeful though. I mean. That's my thing, isn't it? So I found the more I stayed positive, and helped digimon out when I could, the more things started to change. The truer I was to my crest, the better my luck seemed to be. I found some North American chosen at one point, and one of them was taking Japanese in school. I found a village of digimon that made me a new backpack and loaded me up with food.

"I could never tell if it was just my imagination, but the longer I was in the digital world, the more the digital world seemed to like me. My clothes didn't fit anymore, and one morning I just woke up wearing something bigger," He held out his arms and gestured to the yellow sweatshirt he wore. "Couldn't like me too much, though, never gave me a new hat."

Yamato and some of the others couldn't help but laugh at the petulant scowl on his face.

"Our luck ran out eventually…Or I guess you could say it didn't. One day we were with a group of chosen from Africa, and we were attacked. It was- It was really bad. A couple of kids lost their partners. I think, honestly it's a bit hazy even now, I think I was hysterical. All I remember was running out in front of them all, thinking somehow I could save whoever was left," Takeru kept his eyes trained on his partner. "I blacked out or something, but when I woke up, Seraphimon was finishing off the last of the enemy. I still can't believe it, but Patamon made it to Mega."

"After that it was like something had changed inside me. I could feel the digital world around me like it was…" He petered off, unsure of how to explain himself.

"Like it was talking to you?" Hikari asked softly.

Takeru looked at her sharply, like she knew something she shouldn't. He ultimately shook his head slowly.

"It wasn't talking. Not with words. It was just feelings. I could tell if a digimon was kind or corrupted. If the land had been touched by light or darkness. Patamon could feel it to a degree as well, but to me it was clear. Its actually what guided us here," The boy looked up at his brother. "I didn't even know we had made it back to Server when we arrived this morning. We didn't get a chance to ask around. I came through the portal and I could feel how warped the area had become. The other chosen kids had been talking of weird storms and distortions lately, but no one had known where the source was. When we arrived, I could tell it was here. I could even see the ripples on my digivice. We could track it. I managed to figure out the direction it was heading, and when we used the gate again, that digimon was destroying everything. I hadn't even considered that it could be you guys fighting it, I just wanted to help."

Takeru slumped onto Yamato more, and the older boy wrapped his arms back around his brother.

"Blackwargreymon was… an artificial digimon. But there was something wrong with him. It was really sad. He was out of his mind," Hikari supplied somberly.

"I could tell. Even from far away, I could tell he was in a lot of pain," Takeru mumbled into Patamon's fur. "But Seraphimon was able to purify him. Wherever he ended up, I hope he feels better now."

Taichi and Yamato exchanged a look. Their little siblings' capacity for compassion never failed to amaze them.

The group was quiet in the wake of Takeru's story. Some of the digimon had nodded off, no matter how enthralled they had been in his tale.

"I think. I think its time we all headed home. We all need time to recover, and I'm sure Takeru wants to sleep in a bed for once," Taichi offered kindly.

Takeru's eyelids had been drooping, but snapped open at that. He pushed himself up shakily and held his brother's arm firmly.

"Onii-chan, how do I go back? Do I have to go to school again? I haven't been since second grade! I don't know if I remember how to write, or- or do math! Oh man!" A more horrifying thought occurred to him. "Onii-chan, I don't have to live away from you still, do I? I don't want to! Please don't send me off with Mom. I mean, I want to see her, but I want to live with you!"

Yamato's heart broke at the sight of tears brimming in Takeru's eyes again. He stood, bringing his brother with him.

"We will get school figured out, don't worry about that. And Takeru," He bent over to be face to face with the boy he once thought dead. "I'm not leaving you ever again. I promise."

Takeru burst into joyful sobbing and buried his face in Yamato's shoulder.

I promise.