This chapter was finished in no time. Considering the word-count I need to write to every day and how long my chapters get it comes as no surprise. Anyway, here's the next chapter.

A Second Chance
Chapter 4

Two weeks passed since the incident at the construction site. Takeru went to meet Patamon every day after classes and after school activities finished. He could bring food for Patamon to eat and they'd talk until well after the sun set.

Their topics were varied, but mostly centred around the back and forth exchange of information about their worlds. Patamon opened up a lot after the first few days and was even enthusiastic about learning about the real world. Takeru also warmed up to their new situation. Neither of them had awkward pauses, stiff muscles or second thoughts. Being together was second nature now.

It was for that reason new uncomfortable thoughts surfaced in the teen's mind. During the entire time he spent with Patamon, he never once thought of progressing with his original plans to join the youth division. He mostly avoided Daisuke, though seeing as Takeru never brought the subject up with anyone, it might have been he didn't yet have another reason to confront him again. He left Takeru alone on the subject of Hikari. Despite being so confrontational, it seemed Takeru's explanation of their closeness was good enough. At least that much was off his back.

"Is there something wrong, Takeru?" Patamon's question brought him out of his musings. He smiled and shook his head.

"I was just wondering what I should do now. Before I met you, I was thinking of joining a program that would train me to eventually fight digimon. Mostly I was thinking I could spent more time with my father and brother. Or at least have something I can talk to them about and relate with."

"You're not thinking of joining them anymore, right?"

"No," Takeru said after a short pause. "I don't think I could now. It would feel too much like fighting you."

"I guess you'll just have to tell your family you won't do it after all." Patamon said. He bit into one of the meat buns Takeru brought.

"Or you could join us." A loud crunching sound followed the words. Both Takeru and Patamon whirled around to see a boy Takeru's age. He was leaning against a tree behind them, backpack hanging off one shoulder, a half-bitten apple in hand.

The two quickly stood up, glaring at the newcomer. He had short blond hair and blue eyes, strictly Caucasian features with no hints of Japanese. A foreigner. The boy motioned for them to calm down.

"Relax. I'm not going to rat you out. My name's Willis. You're… Takeru Takaishi, am I right?"

"Yes…" Takeru said, eyes narrowing slightly. "How do you know me?"

"I have my ways. The important thing here, though, is that you have gone and befriended a digimon. That's practically unheard of, even in my circle."

"And just what is your circle?" Patamon asked. Willis shrugged, taking another bite of his apple.

"We're just some people who don't think the way things are now between humans and digimon is good, and want a more peaceful solution."

Patamon glanced up at Takeru with a confused look on his face. Takeru let out a sigh, his stance loosening a little. "You're a member of a rebel faction, aren't you?"

Willis grinned. "Bingo! You get the prize."

"Prize?" Patamon asked.

"He's being sarcastic, Patamon." Takeru said.

"Oh, come on now, I am not." Willis pouted. "It's just all in good fun. You're right. I'm a member of a rebel group who goes against the military. In fact, I'm a digimon sympathizer. Like you."

"I wouldn't… really call myself a digimon sympathizer. Takeru said, glancing down at Patamon. He fidgeted with his bag. "I just want to be friends with Patamon and keep him safe."

Willis frowned and pointed at Takeru. "You befriended a digimon. If you're caught it doesn't matter if you're still loyal to humanity or not. They'll treat you like you betrayed your own race and you'll be thrown in jail for war crimes and Patamon will be deleted. You'll never be able to do anything if that happens, even if you are found innocent despite all the evidence against you. Your family will be stigmatized and your father and brother might lose their jobs. Forget about potentially joining them."

"Yeah, and won't the exact same thing happen if I joined your group and fought against my family and humanity? That's what you came here for, isn't it? To recruit me?" Takeru's voice was getting more agitated.

"At least you'd have been involved in a good cause instead of just sneaking around and hiding Patamon away like a secret pet!"

Takeru's gaze fell to Patamon, a pained expression on his face. Patamon was trapped here whether or not Takeru was friends with him or not. Still, was it right for him to go off with a rebel group like this?

"What do you think, Patamon? Should we join this guy? We'll be fighting against both humans and digimon if we do." Patamon crossed his chubby little arms in thought.

"I do admit I feel guilty just sitting here. I doubt we can really make a difference." Patamon said. "But I'm not scared of being deleted, Takeru. It wouldn't be the first time."

"Wait, you—"

"If you do join us, Patamon will be moved to our hideout. There's more people than just me, and we have other digimon that work with us. You won't feel so alone." Willis offered, his tone more gentle this time around. Patamon looked up to Takeru and nodded.

"Let's do it." Takeru said. He smiled down at his partner. "It's better than coming to the gardens every day worrying that I'll see military vans."

"If you're sure." Patamon said. He turned to Willis. "We accept your proposal."

"Great." Willis smiled. "You won't regret it."

He pulled his backpack off his shoulders and unzipped it. Inside were two nearly identical rabbit-like creatures, a white and green, and the other brown and pink. The white one groaned and leaned against the stiff backing of the bag.

"Willis, can we get some fresh air? We've been cooped up in here for a while."

Takeru stared wide eyed at the backpack, and glanced up at Willis. "You just carry digimon around that casually?"

"Sure, Terriermon. Can you hand me the smaller backpack in the other compartment? The one for emergencies?" Terriermon nodded and ran around front of the bag while the brown one hopped out. Patamon flew over to them excitedly, landing in front of the two digimon. Willis turned back to Takeru. "Well, yeah. How else are we supposed to go around together? They're my partners. I need them around."

"Wow! I didn't think I'd see another digimon!" Patamon said. "I'm Patamon, who are you?"

"I'm Lopmon." The brown bunny pointed to themselves. "I didn't think we'd meet another human-digimon duo."

"Yeah, you two're really steeped in it now." Terriermon said, trying to balance the backpack as he walked over to Takeru. "I mean, Willis has a hard time keeping us all out of trouble. You should have done the smart thing and walked away."

"Terriermon!"

"What? It's true."

"Things have been getting worse now that the anniversary for the war is coming closer." Lopmon said. "We've been thinking the military has been wanting to increase the force of their attack and pushing the war in their favour."

"Yeah. That's why we need to get more active more than ever." Willis said, holding open the bag. Terriermon and Lopmon hopped inside. "We should get going."

Takeru took the bag. "How do you expect Patamon to get past the checkpoints?"

"Simple, we use the weak points in the barriers." Willis said. "Usually we travel outside the barriers. It can be a tight fit, but at least we can bring along our partners. Well, some of us. Some digimon are a little two big. Luckily these two are small enough." He jutted a thumb at the two rabbits.

Takeru unzipped the backpack and Patamon flew inside. "This is a lot roomier than your jacket!"

He chuckled and zipped the bag up. "So, Willis, how did you get involved in all this? How did you get to Japan? When did you meet those two digimon?"

"You could say I've always been involved." Willis said, zipping up his own pack and walked toward the closest road leading out. "I met Terriermon and Lopmon about eight years ago when the gates in America started opening up. Back then they were just Toddlers. We'd been friends ever since."

"Toddlers?" Takeru asked.

"Oh yeah. I keep forgetting humans call their stages something different. You know the digivolution stages as Baby, In-Training, Rookie, Champion and Ultimate. But that's not what digimon refer to them as. They're called Baby, Toddler, Child, Adult and Perfect. Technically the stage is called Baby Two. But that's a rather awkward thing to say, so I just say Toddler. Kind of like a human lifecycle, wouldn't you say?"

"Yeah…" Takeru thought he remembered Patamon saying something about children and adults. He didn't quite understand what he meant, and simply did a smile and nod sort of thing. The main point had always gotten across, and that was the main thing. This made everything clearer.

Willis continued. "You could say I kind of started this group. When the war efforts in America got worse, I started spending more and more time on my own. My mom wouldn't understand, so I just pretended like I was in camp. Then when I had a girlfriend for a while I made the excuse that she invited me to study abroad in a student exchange program. But really, I broke up with her a long time ago. I came here because I wanted to see the source of where everything happened. See if I could do anything here."

"That explains why you know Japanese." Takeru said. "So you're living with someone currently? Or are you a vagabond?"

Willis laughed. "Vagabond sounds more like it. Though I still keep up the guise of a high school student. My mom would get suspicious if she phoned the school and they didn't know who I was. I mostly live in the hideout with the others. Rent's really cheap when you live outside the habitable zones, you know?"

"Sounds like you lead a pretty interesting life." Takeru said.

"Fairly, yeah."

Willis led them around the city, keeping inside the barrier as much as possible. It called for a lot of boarding and exiting of public transit, and a lot of footwork. Eventually, they landed in Shinjuku, specifically the area that was mostly abandoned by the city's protection since the initial digimon attack.

Takeru gently set his backpack down and looked around. "This is where you have your hideout?"

"Yep. I told you, I wanted to find the source of everything and Shinjuku is it. Come on, the hideout isn't that far from here." They passed through Shinjuku Park. Despite being so close to ground zero, it was still pretty intact. In fact, it looked like most of it was still inside a barrier, though on the very outskirts. Willis led them to the edge of the barrier and looked around.

"There's a weak spot in the barrier due to the prevalence of the gate. Once we pass through it's just a short walk to the building."

Willis walked through without much of a problem, though Takeru hesitated. Still, they'd gone this far. Takeru followed, looking at the surroundings carefully. Unlike the rest of the city, this area was rather beaten up. People still lived here, of course. But the upkeep wasn't as grand as inside the barriers. The buildings were shabbier and dirty. Occasionally Takeru could see rubble littering the sides of the streets.

"What happens to you guys if a digimon attacks the area? I mean, there's no barrier to protect you." Takeru asked.

"We've been working on getting our own barrier online, just for the hideout. Problem is, we'd like to make sure digimon can still pass through it safely when we want them to." Willis said. He stopped at a rather large old building. It looked like it used to be some sort of business shop. "Here we are."

Takeru stepped inside, unzipping his backpack as soon as the door closed. Patamon flew out. Most of the things from the shop's previous life had been cleared to allow extra room. Essentials were still kept, such as couches, chairs and tables. Computers littered the area, centring mostly on the back wall desk. The room was empty apart from them. Three entrances connected the building, the middle leading to what was presumably the living quarters of the original inhabitants. The leftmost looked makeshift.

"Where are the others?" Patamon asked. Willis sighed, rubbing the back of his neck as he went to sit at a table. Terriermon and Lopmon followed.

"Actually… a few days before I found you there was a big fight. Nearly everyone was captured and sent to prison. The digimon we were working with mostly fled back to the Digital World." A familiar voice caused Takeru to turn around. Standing in a doorway to the next room was Taichi, arms folded across his chest. Next to him was a small yellow dinosaur Takeru recognized as an Agumon.

"T-Taichi." Takeru said, surprise in his voice. "So this is the group you're with."

Taichi grinned, scratching the back of his head. "Yep, this is it. Kind of pathetic, wouldn't you say?"

Takeru sat down opposite Willis, and Taichi took a seat between them. The digimon crowded around the table. Takeru shook his head.

"I admit I'm a little disappointed. When Willis offered a group I thought it would be more than the three of us. I was expecting… more."

"Well, there wasn't a lot of us to begin with. But we definitely did get a big blow against us. I admit I was a little desperate when trying to recruit you. I was hoping I could bring our numbers back up, starting with you." Willis said. "Kamiya was the one that told me about you in the first place. He said you were a decent guy and I should look into you. I wasn't really expecting you to befriend Patamon."

"Wait, Kamiya?" Takeru looked over at Taichi. He laughed.

"I changed my last name to protect myself. I kept the kanji for 'kami' but took out the kanji for 'hachi,' replaced it with 'ya' and then switched them around so that 'kami went first."

"Wouldn't it have made more sense to use 'tani'?" Takeru asked.

"That's more typical. But I wanted the symbology of an arrow rather than a valley. Besides, Kamiya was how Willis misread my name when he first met me." Taichi said with a laugh.

Willis looked between the two and growled in frustration. "I have no idea what the heck you two are even talking about. Japanese is confusing."

Takeru gave Willis a sympathetic look, but Taichi only laughed harder, patting Willis generously on the back.

"Don't sweat it, Willis. You'll learn to read Japanese eventually."

"How the heck do you even get 'ya' out of hachi and 'gami' out of 'kami' anyway? This language makes no sense."

Takeru turned away from the squabbling rebel members and turned to the yellow digimon. "So, how did you get involved in all of this? You're Agumon, right?"

"That's right." Agumon nodded. "Most of the digimon working in this group were actually recruited by Willis. He's the only one any of us really trusted."

"Why's that?" Takeru asked.

"Patamon, let me show you to your room." Agumon said, getting down from the chair. Patamon glanced at Takeru before following Agumon. Takeru sighed and got up from his seat.

"Thanks for bringing Patamon to a safer home. It's probably best I get back. I have school tomorrow." Taichi and Willis stopped their bickering to look at him.

"Are you sure?" Taichi asked. Takeru nodded. Taichi stood up as well. "I can walk you to the station. It's not that far."

Takeru and Taichi walked mostly in silence the majority of the way to the Shinjuku station. It felt weird to Takeru, being in this situation. He never thought he'd see Taichi, or that he'd be associated with the people he was. Still, it seemed there was a lot about the rebel groups that Takeru got wrong. It was surprising to find Taichi in this group, but even more surprising that he didn't go all the way with the ideals.

Taichi stopped, folding his arms across his chest. "Mind telling me what's on your mind, Takeru? You've been staring at me for the last eight minutes."

"Oh." Takeru dipped his head a little in embarrassment. "I guess I was just thinking it was surprising that you're not that comfortable with digimon despite being with Willis' rebel group."

Taichi laughed nervously. "Yeah, kind of funny how that works, huh? Yeah, I admit I'm not all that comfortable with the concept of digimon. When Willis came here, he tried his best to get our group together by pairing us with digimon partners, but he's the only one that is truly comfortable around them. But I'm here because I feel that there really are other ways of sorting the conflict between humans and digimon. Does that make me a hypocrite?"

Takeru shook his head. "No. But I do think you'll be a lot happier and more successful if you and Agumon got along. You're both here because you both believe in the same thing. I'm sure there's more similarities you can find between each other than that."

They stepped out of the forest and into a more public area. Taichi rubbed the back of his neck. "You're right. I was kind of pushing the idea aside. But seeing you with Patamon, that it isn't just Willis being weird, I think I'll give it a chance."

Takeru smiled. "I'm glad."

They stopped in front of the train station and Taichi turned to face Takeru. "I'm glad you decided to join us. See you around."

Takeru waved goodbye and turned to the train station. With a deep breath, he got his ticket and boarded the train.

School was the one normal thing in his life now, it seemed. It didn't matter how crazy his life got, this was still a constant. He could focus better now that he knew Patamon was safe. Takeru grabbed his shoes from his locker, having just finished the last class of the day. He was busily chatting with a fellow member of the basketball team when something bumped into his shoulder.

Books and papers scattered to the floor, Takeru's shoes falling with them. A very nervous looking redhead dove to the floor to collect his things.

"S-sorry." He said, eyes darting this way and that in an effort to claim the papers before someone stepped on them. Takeru bent down, picking up his shoes, and the papers underneath. He dusted off the dried dirt knocked off from the impact.

"Here you go." Takeru said, holding out the papers. Glancing down at them, his eyes fell upon what looked like a schematic of some sort of insect digimon. Takeru's brows furrowed. The other man snatched the papers away and stood up.

"Thank you." He said curtly and walked away.

"Man, that guy is really losing it." Saburo said, shaking his head. "That's an upperclassman, Koushiro Izumi. He's always been a little eccentric, but he's been getting worse lately, it seems. Probably stress from final year."

"Yeah… Maybe." Takeru murmured. He watched as Koushiro slipped out the door.

The upperclassman and his papers were still on Takeru's mind when he arrived in Shinjuku to visit Patamon. Takeru opened the door to see Willis already there, talking with Taichi, who seemed to still have a work uniform on. Agumon, the rabbit digimon and Patamon were also huddled around the table.

"Tachikawa always goes on shopping trips with his daughter on Sundays. So it's logical that then would be the perfect time." Taichi said, glancing over at Takeru, and did a double-take. "Takeru! You're really quiet when you want to be."

"What's going on?" Takeru asked, walking over to the table.

"We're discussing a plan on how to infiltrate the military base where they train the junior division. That building houses a lot of military experimental technology for dealing with digimon." Willis said. "If we can figure out what they're trying to do and perhaps stop it."

"Wow. Sounds kind of dangerous." Takeru said. "Have you ever done this before?"

"A few times. But we haven't done much of anything since our friends were taken." Terriermon said.

"We just have to be extra careful now that we don't have backup." Lopmon said.

"You have that look again." Patamon said, walking over to Takeru. "Something's on your mind."

Takeru gave him a weak smile. "Yeah… today an upperclassman's been acting a little weird. He bumped into me and I saw he had a bunch of papers about digimon. I'm not sure what to make of it."

Taichi and Willis looked at each other. Taichi turned to face Takeru. "It could be that he's intending to join the military. Is he part of the youth division?"

Takeru shook his head. "He doesn't wear a uniform or anything that shows he is."

"Maybe for now you could keep an eye on him, if it worries you." Willis suggested. "Though there's not much we can do if he's just researching digimon."

"True." Takeru was silent after that, listening to Willis and Taichi's plans and making small talk with Patamon. He barely noticed the time until long past sunset. He said his goodbyes and headed to the train station.

Walking home from Tokyo Teleport, Takeru was surprised to see Koushiro Izumi across the street, nervously looking around as he walked with purpose to the east. He seemed almost jumpy. Takeru frowned. Maybe if he followed him he could find out what this was all about? He ignored the light and following Koushiro's path on the opposite side of the street. Koushiro walked all the way to Toritsu Shiokaze Park.

He kept to the thick of the brush, making it increasingly difficult for Takeru to keep up without alerting the older teen to his presence. He kept in pace, stepping when Koushiro stepped and kept his feet clear of fallen twigs. He stopped at what looked like a small campsite with a tarp overtop. Takeru craned in to see. There was a cage inside the tarp area. Inside, was a digimon.