Dragon Lady: Hi!

Ken: Hello again.

Dragon Lady: While I wait on "Magical Game" I decided to put this out.

Ken: *sighs* You all know dl, she just can't keep to one project at a time. -_-;;

Dragon Lady: *blushes* ^^;;; Yeah…um…*coughs* I'm going to keep trying really hard on "Magical Game", and "Dangerous Games" is coming along as well. This one should be a little easier though, as I have something to look at to help me.

Ken: This fic is not an original idea! So don't go flaming dl and telling her that she didn't think it up herself. Because she takes no credit for the plot. She didn't think it up.

Dragon Lady: Sadly this is true. I hope that if there are fantasy fans that read my work, that they are 10th Kingdom fans. *crosses fingers* I only know a few people who have seen it or read it myself. It's a very good book, and an even better movie! If anyone watched it when it first came out it was a five part mini-series on television about a year or two ago.

Ken: So dl's modeled this story after it. ^^;;; She had to pick a FIVE part mini-series…o.O When is she ever going to get all this done?!!

Dragon Lady: ^^;;; *ignores Ken's rants* I have the movie, and the book. So some things might be word for word here, if I like how the book phrased it. Or some scenes might follow the movie more closely than the book. But whatever the case, I'm sure that my fan fic won't do it justice. If you haven't seen it, go look for it! Anyone who loves fairy tales will love this! Its got new twists that are just the best. ^_^

Ken: All right. So. Without any further delays. The story.

Dragon Lady: Have fun! ^_^

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The 10th Kingdom

Adapted for Digimon by: DigimonDragonLady

Ken sighed as he stared out over Central Park from his fifth floor apartment window. Sure, the view was great. Especially at night; the park looked so dark and foreboding then. But the apartment in which he lived, was terrible. Very small, and it could barely be called a two room apartment. More like one small room, and a closet.

And it was shabby. But shabby was his life. Ken supposed that he should be thankful, after all, they got the apartment for free because of Osamu's job. His brother was the janitor for the building. Or as Osamu preferred to be called, "chief mechanic and fixer of all things not in his job description". Ken was a waiter at a small on the other side of Central Park.

Things weren't going to well right now. The apartment owner, a snobby parsimonious old man, constantly threatened to fire Osamu and turn them out of their apartment, Ken himself was barely raking in enough money to buy one nights dinner, and his life had become dreary and dull with absolutely nothing to look forward to, at the age of twenty-one. He didn't hold out much hope for the remainder of his years.

Thinking about this brought an old memory to surface. Ken remembered waiting once, on a woman, who was clearly a tourist, and having her say to him, "Oh it must be so exciting, living in New York. How exactly does it feel?"

Ken had looked her in the eye and told her to close her eyes and imagine the most excruciatingly boring and uneventful day that she had ever had, where just everything in the world seemed to go wrong. The woman had done as she was told, a small smile playing over the corner of her mouth as she did so. "There," Ken had said. "Now you have my life in perfect focus."

Speaking of work…Ken glanced down at his watch. He stood slowly, and moved into the tiny kitchen area of the apartment. He set out Osamu's dinner; a plate of barbecue ribs. He put them on top of the microwave. All his brother need do was reheat them. He made sure to always set out Osamu's food, because otherwise the boy might not eat at all, or consume mountains of junk food instead.

With that accomplished he wheeled his bicycle out of the front closet (which was even smaller that the closet sized bedroom), and started out the front door.

Ken steered carefully around the paint cans and various other tools in the hallway. After blowing one tire on one of the stray nails that Osamu let get scattered around, he'd learned to be more careful around his dearest brothers workspace. He made for the elevator, and encountered his brother in the hallway just outside of it.

Osamu had the call box open, and the wires were dangling from it. The elevator doors were jammed open with his toolbox. And so Ken's way to the street and outside world was effectively blocked.

He didn't notice this, of course. Osamu was alerted to Ken's presence when he coughed slightly. "Look at this," he instructed, holding out a wire for him to see. Ken rolled his eyes and obediently studied the wire, all the time pretending to be extremely interested in it.

"This," Osamu proclaimed. "Has been gnawed."

Oh, great. Rats eating the wiring. That was all his life needed now. With his luck, the rodents were probably congregating in their apartment as they spoke. He wondered though, why if it were truly rats at the wiring, why he hadn't seen any furry electrocuted bodies lying around. But he wasn't going to comment on it. Osamu would have a theory.

His brother always had a theory. Ken didn't have to prompt him to get him to tell him his theory. Osamu seemed to always have a speech prepared. He'd simply been waiting for the proper audience. Ken.

"This isn't my job, you know. This is an electrician's job. But who has to fix it?"

Ken gave a small inaudible sigh. This was the part where he was supposed to respond, You, Sam. But he didn't.

Osamu shoved the wire back in the box and frowned at him. "Where do you think you're going?" he asked.

"To work, Sam," Ken replied dryly. "Like I do every day."

Osamu's frown deepened at his tone, and he stuck an "Out of Order" sign on the wall above the open wiring box, then with a sweeping motion bade Ken to enter the elevator. Ken carefully wheeled his bike in and turned it around, giving his brother room to follow him and get to the control panel.

Osamu did something to make the elevator doors close, and they started down slowly. Ken always began each work day with a prayer that the elevator would not break down on him, as it was often out of order.

"Take the stairs on the way back," Osamu told him as he stared at the mess of old wires in front of him. "…Just in case."

Ken nodded absently, not really paying attention to the warning. "Your barbecue ribs are on top of the microwave," he said suddenly, as if just remembering.

Osamu frowned. Perhaps that hadn't been the right response. Ken didn't care. "I can't believe all the things I have to do today. I've got to look at the boiler again. There's air in the pipes," he explained. "The system needs to be drained and bled, there's a leak in number nine apartment, and now this elevator." As he spoke the elevator to which he was referring shuddered to a stop.

"Take the stairs on the way back," Osamu said again, glancing around the inside of the elevator as if extremely unsatisfied with its performance.

Ken was going to be late for work if he didn't hurry. "I'll see you later, Sam," he said, giving his brother a small backwards wave and wheeling his bike quickly out of the elevator death trap.

Ken thought for a moment that he had made good his escape when his brother said, "Don't go across the park." Every day he would say that. And every day Ken would ignore him. "You hear me? You promise?"

And so Ken did as he did every day, and said, "Sure, Sam."

She was almost to the door.

"Have you got a jacket? Its windy out there. You'll catch a cold!" He should have looked earlier if he were that concerned. But Osamu had other, more important things than his brother's health to worry about. Like how to fix the elevator and boiler and get money to buy food for the two of them.

Ken didn't bother to answer him. Just waved again. Finally, he was at the door. Osamu's voice came floating back to him as he exited the building. "What have you left me for dinner?"

* * *

Prince Yamato was leaning out the window of his carriage on his elbow, with his head propped up on his hand. It was bothering him that he had to be in such a stuffy old carriage when he could have been enjoying the beautiful day outside. Hunting maybe. He eyed the woods wistfully. There would be plenty of game in the forest. And he'd much rather be chasing it than stranded here with his royal escort.

"Where exactly are we going?" Yamato asked in the most obviously bored voice he could manage.

"The Snow White Memorial Prison, your majesty," his manservant, Giles, answered.

Wonderful. Doom and gloom would be all he'd see when he could be enjoying the sunshine and fresh air. Splendid indeed. "Is it much farther?" he complained. "Couldn't we stop and go hunting?"

"We shall be there very shortly, sire," was the only reply he got.

Yamato sighed in disgust. It figured. After a few minutes of allowing his mind to wander aimlessly over more interesting subjects he returned his attention to what Giles was saying.

"Your stepmother has applied for parole again," he was saying. "Which will, of course, be turned down. This is simply a routine courtesy visit."

Yamato nodded absentmindedly and moved his attention once again back out the window, where he could see the Snow White Memorial Prison in the distance. In what seemed like no time at all, the carriage was pulling up at the prison's enormous doors.

Yamato frowned in irritation. Where was everyone? The last time he had visited, the prison governor had had a whole crowd of people there to greet him, waving and cheering. While the warden and his guards waited to escort the prince inside. "Not exactly the red-carpet treatment," Yamato muttered to himself. "Where is everyone?"

"I'm sure they can't have forgotten about your visit, your majesty," Giles responded. Giles was halfway to the door before Yamato exited the carriage, and then proceeded to join him on the front step.

His manservant pounded on the knocker loud enough for it to be heard two Kingdoms away. Yamato found the old man's anger on his behalf incredibly amusing.

The door opened. Yamato heard it more than saw it, because at the time he was glancing over the prison grounds. Then he turned forwards in time to see his servant stumble backwards, bleeding at the neck. Someone had cut his throat!

Instantly, Yamato was alert, but he was startled when someone grabbed his arm and yanked him inside. Yamato tried to pull himself free, but he couldn't. The grip on his arm was much to powerful. The door was closed behind him, and he had to blink several times before his eyes became accustomed to the gloom of the prison's interior.

Yamato was in trouble now. He was standing before a group of trolls, hideous looking creatures, but whom to him, didn't seem incredibly bright, who flanked his stepmother, the Queen.

He was in trouble now. The entire Nine Kingdoms were in trouble now. Unless he could do something. But he didn't know what that something might be. Oh, dear.

* * *

Ken sat up very slowly. His entire body ached, it felt as if he were on fire, but his forehead ached the most. He'd fallen off his bike before, or course, but he'd never crashed and burned like this. He hadn't seen the dog run across his path until it was too late.

When he put a hand to his forehead, it came away sticky with blood. He stared at the blood on his fingertips for a moment, as if contemplating what to do about it. Ken decided that it was just a cut, and prayed that it wasn't bad enough to need stitches.

One glance at his bike told him that he would be late for work, but at least he'd have an excuse this time. The front wheel was completely buckled. There was no way to ride it, and no way to fix it. At least, not here.

The damage to his bike must mean that he'd hit the dog pretty hard. Ken looked around for the animal, that he just barely remembered seeing some minutes before, and found a pile of golden fur lying beside the path they were on. It wasn't moving.

"Oh, my God," he said. "I think I've killed it."

Ken felt like he was going to be sick to his stomach right then. He'd never before in his life killed anything, not even accidentally! As he moved towards it, the dog twitched. Ken let out a soft sigh of relief. So it wasn't dead after all. The dread he'd been feeling instantly disappeared.

When he put a hand out to run through its soft fur, the dog looked up at him with surprisingly intelligent eyes. The dog's eyes were a bright blue, and in the moonlight, seemed almost to shine. Ken frowned. Blue eyes? How unusual.

"Are you all right?" he asked the animal, as he searched through its fur for any broken bones, or blood; for any injury that would require immediate care. He didn't find anything.

His hands moved around the dog's neck, but of course, the dog didn't have any kind of a collar. Some people were so irresponsible with their pets, he frowned. "So you haven't got a collar, hmm?" he asked. Great. A stray. But he looked so well cared for, that he had to have an owner somewhere.

The dog seemed reassured by his voice.

Behind him, Ken heard a low, wolf-like howl. The hair on the back of his neck prickled with fear. Even the dog seemed alarmed at the sound. Then he realized just how bad his position was. Injured and alone in the park after dark, in a secluded wooded area. There were no real wolves in Manhattan, but the human wolves were very dangerous indeed.

Ken looked at the dog and he looked back. Apparently they now belonged to each other, at least for the night, until she could find his owner. He got up, picked up his bike and straightened its mangled wheel enough so that it could be wheeled along beside him.

The dog stood with him, and as he hurried out of the park, he followed faithfully along.

* * *

Things didn't look good for Prince Yamato. Following along at the heels of some stranger, who'd just run into him with the most bizarre and strangest metal contraption he'd ever seen. It was unheard of! How utterly humiliating for royalty such as himself!

He was acting like a common street animal. But what other choice did he have? This young man certainly couldn't understand him, as he was a dog. And would he believe him even if he could? Something told Yamato that no, this was one human who was not used to having strange things happen to him.

It was embarrassing that he was sticking to this person like glue. But, again, what else could he do? He didn't understand where he was at all. It was a enormously hideous new world. There was a terrible smell upon the air, as if someone was burning to many lamps in one place, and the noise was incredible to his sensitive dog ears.

And he'd heard the wolf. The man must be hot on his trail at that very moment. And Yamato couldn't allow himself to be caught. The safety of his Kingdom depended on it!

He turned his thoughts back towards the events that had occurred in his own world, maybe an hour earlier…

~* * * * * *~

"You're a long way from your castle, Yamato," his stepmother began speaking. "Perhaps you should have stayed there." The Queen was smiling her secret little smile. Yamato swallowed hard. He'd never forgotten that smile.

"You'll pay for this," he stammered.

The Queen laughed. It was a soft laugh, which made it all the more menacing. "On the contrary. I think you will beg at my feet."

Then Yamato noticed the dog beside her. "Do you know what this is?" she asked, stroking the dog. "It's a very special kind of dog. Magical, of course. I hope you like dogs, Yamato. You're going to spend the rest of your life as one."

From that point things had happened in a blur of motion. She'd released the dog, and it had rushed at him, not fiercely as if attacking, but instead, as if in play. But Yamato had backed away regardless. Damn her, she knew he hated dogs.

When the dog jumped up on him, placing its front paws on his chest, Yamato began to feel very odd indeed. It was as if the room he was in was spinning, and very fast. He felt dizzy and sick, and things and faces began to melt together. He felt almost loose inside of his own body. Like…he wasn't attached anymore.

He was shrinking, and things were growing dimmer. While there wasn't as much light, things in the room had gotten much louder. And his perspective had shifted. Previously he had been facing towards the Queen and staring down at the dog. Now he was looking at…his own sash? That didn't make any sense. How could that happen?

Curiously, Yamato glanced up, and saw his own face. Oh, no. He didn't like the way this was looking at all. Afraid, he glanced down and saw that his own hands were feet. Hairy feet. Golden hairy feet. He…he had become the dog! He whirled and glared at his stepmother.

He tried to shout at her, "You'll never get away with this!" Instead, he barked. Wonderful. He was a dog, and he couldn't be understood.

The dense looking trolls around the Queen applauded when he barked. Yamato growled at them. The trolls began to laugh and clapped even harder with their clumsy hands.

The Queen's own smile, had faded. "Grab him!" she ordered.

Yamato did the only thing that he could think of as the trolls started towards him. He wheeled around and ran from the room down a long, dark corridor, towards who knew where. Deeper into the prison he went.

He wasn't very good at running as a dog. His new tail made it awkward for him, but he soon got the hang of it. One picked up things quickly, he supposed, when in fear of one's life.

He had absolutely no idea where he was going. His heart was pounding, and he was hopelessly lost.

He could hear the trolls behind him, shouting and making the most outlandish noises. Did they honestly think they could catch anything by being that loud? Yamato frowned, even though he could hear them as if they were right behind him, he could tell they were still a long way off. Interesting, he'd always been told dogs could hear better than humans. Now he knew it.

Yamato came to some stairs ahead. Good. Down. Maybe there would be a back exit! Or perhaps he could find somewhere to hide from the trolls. A dog-sized hiding spot. They definitely weren't the sharpest knives in the drawer, that was for sure; he could tell that just by listening to them.

He dashed quickly down the stairs. His nails clicking and paws slipping madly on the narrow stone steps.

"Out of my way, amateurs," he could hear a new voice saying. It clearly was not a troll. "This is a job for a wolf."

A wolf? A talking wolf? Someone his stepmother had set after him. Apparently she didn't hold much faith in the trolls either. Weren't wolves superior to dogs? So much for hiding in a small dog-sized space. The wolf would smell him out in no time at all! He began to panic much more than he already was.

Yamato was so preoccupied with this bad new turn of events that he didn't even notice when he came to the end of the stairs and ran head long into an enormous pile of junk. The whole thing came crashing down around him, pottery breaking and smashing and making a horrendously loud noise.

The Prince, in his new dog body, went sliding across the smooth stone floor uncontrollably before he finally came to stop at a large mirror at the end of the room. Or rather, he crashed into that as well.

It was a full length mirror with some kind of elaborate design on the frame. AS he looked at it, the silvering shifted. "He's over there!" He dimly heard one troll shout. Oh dear, they'd find him any minute now. That wolf had to be much closer…

As he stared at it, an amazing world opened before him in the mirror. First an ocean, and then a statue of a large green woman holding a torch. He continued to stare at it in disbelief.

The image before him kept shifting and changing. Now it showed a bridge, and a city like none that he had ever seen before. Buildings made of smooth stone reached for the sky and crowded together. There were so many lights reflected from it, that it was hard to look at just one thing in detail.

The footsteps coming towards him had gotten very loud. Yamato's heart was pounding. Someone had gotten close. The wolf? There was no other way out of this room. And no place that he could hide from a wolf. If he wanted any chance at safety, he had to go through that mirror.

"What's going on here?" the wolf demanded. Yamato caught a glimpse of him from the corner of his eye. Lean and muscular with reddish colored hair.

This was it. If he wanted to escape, it had to be now. He turned once more towards the mirror. The image before him was now one showing a grassy place. It looked manicured, but it was full of trees, and much better places to hide. Yamato gathered what little courage he had left, and jumped through the mirror.

~* * * * * *~

And doing that had, of course, brought him to this man. And he now knew that the wolf had followed him. And possibly the trolls after him. He was in great danger. Maybe, just maybe, he could find some way of conveying to the young man who walked before him what had happened. Maybe…

Oh, this really didn't look good.

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Dragon Lady: Whoo hoo! Yamato the dog prince. Dog formerly known as prince. *giggles* Sorry. That was the title given to part one of the book. Of course I'm no where near done with part one here.

Ken: Obviously.

Dragon Lady: Daisuke's our wolf, by the way, if anyone didn't figure that out, and we'll get some Kensuke/Daiken going in the next chapter hopefully. And lookie, nice long chapters here. ^_^

Ken: Funness. ^_^

Dragon Lady: Okay, well…that seems to put him in a better mood. ^^;;;

Ken: ^_^

Dragon Lady: So, what did you think? I know people keep hinting at me for some Taito, and while I love that coupling myself, I find it much more difficult to write for; and the way I've set up the characters, this story just lends itself more easily to Kensuke…but I'll see what I can do. But Yamato fans should be happy, because he has a nice big part in this story. ^_^

Ken: Reviews would be nice.

Dragon Lady: Yes. Plenty of nice reviews! …Please? ^^;; And I'm really sorry, I didn't want to end it here, but it was the only reasonable place to cut it off. Otherwise this chapter would have gotten much too long. The whole thing is going to be incredibly long. I mean, we're probably talking around twelve some chapters at the least. I don't want it to be that long. But its probably going to end up that way. -_-;;

Ken: See. I told you this was a bad idea. But no. You wouldn't listen. And now you're stuck. Because you know people aren't going to let you quit on this.

Dragon Lady: Shut up, Ken. -_-;;