Prologue

Thomas Grayson had to admit, he felt like a kid again. How many times had he wished he could go on an adventure like this? Admittedly, it wasn't really him, it was an avatar…but, then again, hadn't the process leading up to this been something of an adventure in itself? He had gotten to use his imagination and his skills to create something that he was genuinely excited about. Something that he and thousands of other people could enjoy. Was it a little juvenile? Maybe. But there were a whole lot of people who felt similarly to him about this, and it wasn't his place to determine whether their actions were appropriate for their ages. And he knew that they would love this. Granted, it wasn't quite the first of its kind—but it did have some original features that weren't found anywhere else.

They still had a lot to do…but for the moment, that wasn't so important as what they had already done. They had a working prototype, which was what he was testing right now. He had already found several problems, but that was to be expected, and he was confident that they could work things out. And when they did, they would finally be able to release it. To show the world their great project:

Digimon Net. The next big advancement in the Digimon franchise.

Tom's fingers moved across the keyboard, guiding his character through their Digital World. Behind him was his partner, whom he had chosen at the beginning of his game. This was an original creation of his; he had put a lot of effort into this, helping with the design of eight new Digimon and their evolutionary was testing the current version with his personal favorite, a Digimon named Ignemon, a rocky quadruped with fairly short legs, but a long tail and neck. It was a slow Digimon, but powerful, in terms of both Strength and Defense stats. At the moment, it was in its Ultimate form, CorunAmpelomon, whose crystals covering its body provided a strong shield, and whose twin tails could whip around and smash into enemies, causing a lot of damage. But, a few seconds later, CorunAmpelomon's Digivolve Meter ran out, and he reverted to his Rookie form. Tom had to crack a smile—CorunAmpelomon was big and powerful, but Ignemon was kind of cute, really.

Tom yawned widely, and his eyes wandered to the clock on his desktop. 1:15… He really should get to bed…

He turned back to the screen. He had been playing for hours, for a large part of the day, but the entire adventure was much too long to be completed in even that much time. That, and one of the features of this game was that the player's avatar (and Digimon) required regular rest (as well as food). He would need to put his avatar and Ignemon in Sleep Mode. And anyways, his report on the prototype wasn't expected for several days. He had plenty of time to complete this adventure. Maybe even do another, to get a better idea of anything that needed to be fixed.

He sighed. Yeah, it would be good to get to bed. Running his fingers over the trackpad, he moved the mouse to select the Quit option. His game data was automatically saved, so he didn't need to worry about losing his progress. With some regret, he clicked, and watched as the image of his avatar and partner Digimon disappeared. Yawning again, he went off to the bathroom.

However, when he returned a few minutes later, he had thought of something he wanted to check. Though he had first decided that it could wait until the next day, it had continued to nag at him, and so he had decided that he could take a couple minutes to check before going to bed. He could wake up his avatar for a short time.

He sat down at his desk, opened his computer, and opened up Digimon Net again. A moment later, after entering his username and password, his adventure was back up on the screen. Like always, he couldn't resist a smile whenever it came up. He had always wanted to program a video game…

But his joy was to be short-lived.

Just a few seconds after he had re-accessed the program, something happened that he hadn't seen before. Another window popped up in the center of his screen. He frowned. It looked like a terminal window…there was code running along it, but it was going too fast for him to read any of it. Damn, he thought. Is this the game acting up?

But then, the code stopped running, and a single line of text was visible on the screen: "Conditions Met. Begin Scanning Process."

Tom barely had time to wonder what that meant before a bright red light shone from his laptop camera. "Ah!" he said, turning away and putting up a hand. What the hell was this? Was there something in the program that was making his computer act up? This really wasn't going to be pleasant to work out. And things had been going so well, too. "Why does this have to happen…?" he groaned.

But then, the light faded. He looked back at his computer, only to see the window in the center of his screen running a whole new mess of code. He peered at it, trying to make any of it out, but it was impossible. Then, it stopped again, and a new line of text came up: "Scanning Process Complete. Begin Upload Process."

Upload? This was even worse. What was it uploading onto his computer? Had someone hacked the program and inserted a virus?

Suddenly, he felt a strange sensation throughout his entire body. He frowned. What the…?

Then, a thought struck him. "Wait…" he said, turning back to the computer, and feeling stranger by the second. "No, no way. That's impossible. That's completely imposs—"

But he was cut off as a bright white light encompassed his computer screen, getting brighter and brighter until it filled the entire room. When it faded, the chair that Tom had occupied a moment ago was empty.

Thomas Grayson was gone.

Obligatory Disclaimer: I do not claim ownership of the Digimon franchise or any of its components, including existing characters*.

*Of which there will be several; this story will mainly focus on original characters, but there will be a number of existing characters to help/hinder them along the way.