Disclaimer: Digimon does not belong to me and neither do most of the characters in this fic. Credits are listed at the end. Plot and any other random characters are mine though!

Letters have been sent to the "best of the best" for a tournament like no other. Set on an isolated island, the best Tamer shall be decided among plenty of Tamers who think they're the best. But darker forces are at work here. Survival is only part of the prize. Well, if there are any, if you catch my drift.

Chapter 3: People + Planes + Digimon + Jayden = Problems.

His name was Jayden Hart. He was twenty-three years old with a nice, charming smile, and very polite speech, not to mention an English accent. You could say he was young in age, but you couldn't say he was young in mind. He was mature beyond belief; he'd been through things that would have made people crazy or worse, cause them to commit suicide. It had happened. But not to Jayden. There was nothing off about him. Sure, his hair was shocking snow white, but that was because of something that had happened during his childhood. The doctors had deemed it trauma, and had told him it was the way his mind dealt with shock. Hair color was a small price to pay for his sanity. He considered himself a gentleman and loathed raising a hand or a voice to the opposite sex; that was crude, no matter the occasion. Clothing wise, he liked to look crisp and clean; he ignored trends- they always changed. So he stuck to the same outfit every day of the year: a white dress shirt underneath a white suit jacket, white slacks, a black tie, and black shoes. The only thing about him that held any color were his eyes: deep set amber, gold in the right light. He'd been refered to as a 'gold eyed demon disguised as an angel' once in his life. That person didn't really stand a chance against him and Wizardmon.

The D-Arc he was bestowed was pure black. He guessed it was to remind him that no matter how much white he wore, he could never be pure and untarnished. He was darkness, he was tainted and nothing could change that. It was him, on the inside. 'Dark and twisted'. Two other words used to aptly describe him. This person had survived. Still a thorn in his side. On the plane at the moment, actually. They weren't far from the truth. Jayden was dark and twisted, but he was fine with that. If that was what he had to be called while attempting to acheive his vision, then so be it. But he was going to get them back. It was fun to torture them; but he wasn't going to play favorites. No, his boss wouldn't like that. And frankly, neither would Jayden. He believed everyone in this tournament deserved equal opportunity to lose their sanity.

Gods he was excited.

XXXXXX

Mzuto was having a relatively nice day. He'd taken his medication, picked Arashi up on time, made it through the airport with minimal troubles and heck, he'd even met a few cute Tamers! The day was going quite nicely, especially since he and Arashi ended up in the same row (and it was near the window). The seating arrangement ended up being Coronamon, Kudamon, Arashi and then himself, which suited him just fine, seeing as Arashi promptly fell asleep on him, during the safety video (which no one really listened to) and during Jayden Hart's spiel (which even the Digimon ignored). So overall, it was a good day. Which meant it could only go downhill from there.

Three minutes and twenty-six seconds after the seatbelt light dinged off (and obviously, after their take-off), Jayden decided to pay them a visit. Well, really, it was only Mizuto as the other three had promptly fallen asleep. 'Traitors.'Mizuto thought with a frown as Jayden smirked at him, arms crossed over his chest while he stood in the aisle of the two rows.

"What do you want?" Mizuto sighed, managing to turn and glare at Jayden, while keeping Arashi asleep. He didn't want to deal with Jayden and an annoyed Arashi at the same time. He was only so sane. "If you're going to threaten us, insult us, or tell us your plan now, make it quick please? I sort of want to catch up on my sleep as well."

Jayden's smirk grew wider. "I'm hurt, Kobayashi! You think I'd threaten my two favorite Agents, much less insult them?" He exclaimed with mock sincerity. "As for the plan, I've no idea what you're talking about. My Boss just wanted an honest to goodness Tournament for the sake of sportsmanship." He shrugged, now resorting to inspecting his cuffs.

The Tamer couldn't help himself. He snorted in disbelief. "Right. Sportsmanship. The day you decide to agree to anything fair is the day that Sunmon learns to be mature." He grumbled under his breath. When he looked up, Jayden's face was closer to him and there was malice hidden behind the man's amber eyes.

"I forget how funny you can be, Mizuto. And I should say you forget just who I really am." His eyes flickered over to Arashi momentarily before he stood erect once more, pulling at his cuffs and straightening his lapels. "You might want to inquire about a certain e-mail Miss Kitayama received late last night. I'm sure you'll find it enlightening." He inclined his head slightly to Mizuto once and waved goodbye gleefully, heading back to where he came.

It took Mizuto a while to register what Jayden had said. And then he looked down worriedly at Arashi. E-mail? Was that why she'd been so pre-occupied when he picked her up that morning? With a sigh, he carefully moved Arashi so that she could sleep while he walked around the plane. Talking to Jayden always gave him headaches, for some bizarre reason. And it made his control slip….even with the medication.

Damn Jayden.

Xxxx

To say that Lili was impressed with the double-decked plane provided for the tournament would have been an overstatement. It could hold about 250 to about 290 people, if memory served her correctly. Well, she would have been more impressed has she been in a better mood; besides, once you've seen one plane, you've seen them all. Sure, these had those cool little tv screens on the back of each chair where you could watch videos, listen to music, or play games, but really…it was just to distract passengers so they wouldn't acquire restless leg syndrome, right? Or something of the sort. As the rather minute Tamer and her partner navigated their way through the crowd, they assessed the various other Tamers and Digimon they saw and Lili made a mental note to pull out her D-Arc as soon as possible so she could begin recording the competition.

"Alright…and this is…our…row." The Tamer trailed off in completely and utter disbelief, steely grey eyes narrowing dangerously to thin slits. "You have got to be joking." She double checked her ticket, looked up, then once again looked at her ticket, trying to convince herself that some flight attendant had gotten their row wrong.

It was right.

"I'm not exactly the most thrilled person on the planet either, you know." Marcus remarked drily, standing from his window seat to allow Gazimon to take his spot so that the seating order was now Gazimon, Marcus, Lili, then PawnChessmon. He wasn't taking any chances with Lili's Digimon; it had a freaking lance. How it made it through security, he would never know. But he preferred the seating arrangement; Gazimon was safely away from PawnChessmon and with Lili beside him, well, it was pretty easy to pretend that he wouldn't hear whatever she would say. Why? Because he had at least twelve inches on her. He could pretend that short people's voices didn't reach him.

Lili glared at him even more as she buckled hers and PawnChessmon's seatbelts. "Oh, really? I couldn't tell from your, well, oh, I don't know? Your sarcasm? You need to work on that by the by." She told him matter-of-factly with a smug smirk. Sure, she had to crane her neck upwards to even talk back to him, but it wasn't like height had ever been a factor for her before.

"What big talk for a little girl."

She bristled. "Hey, it wasn't my Digimon getting their butt handed to them by a 'little girl', now was it?" She snapped back.

"Hear hear!" PawnChessmon cheered, thrusting her lance torwards the ceiling with a grin. "What the lady says is true!" The Digimon pointed the weapon torwards Gazimon, who shied away from it, pressing himself up against the plane's wall as much as he could. Until Marcus shoved away the lance pointedly, almost stabbing the chair in front of PawnChessmon. Thankfully, the ones who were to be seated in that chair hadn't arrived yet. "Look at what you almost did, you careless human!" PawnChessmon seethed.

Marcus started a bit at that, but controlled himself. Patience was something one acquired quite quickly when having to grow up with two younger brothers. So Marcus resigned himself to leaning back in his seat, giving Gazimon a look that clearly told his partner to not let the jibing get under his fur. Gazimon looked almost defiant for a moment but nodded once, leaning back in his chair as well as PawnChessmon continued to rant on. It was a nice way to drown out the safety video and the Tamer on the screen, who had introduced himself as Jayden Hart. Turned out that he, along with various others, were 'proctors' of sorts to the Tournament. Marcus made a mental note to avoid the Wizardmon's Tamer; he looked...dangerous, despite inital appearances.

Lili, on the other hand, was muttering curses at Jayden, wondering where exactly she'd seen the man before. Something about him was too familiar and it was bugging her to not know the answer. PawnChessmon was having the same issue as her Tamer, so when Mizuto Kobayashi showed up suddenly, it took Lili a while to register it. In fact, the only reason she was aware of his presence was due to Marcus.

The aforementioned Tamer frowned up at the appearance of the new Tamer. There was something wary about the way the blond haired, grey eyed Tamer looked, and the wicked evil smirk on his face didn't help matters either. He was kneeling on the chair in front of Lili, peering smirking at her over the chair. This went on for about half a minute before it really got under Marcus's skin.

"Can we help you with something?"

Lili looked up when Marcus talked, a scathing remark already leaving her lips. But when she saw Mizuto, her eyes narrowed dangerously. "Well, damn my soul and call me Kapurimon…Mizuto Kobayashi."

"Long time no see, Lili!" The older Tamer replied cheerfully, though it was a contrast to how dark he looked at the moment. "How's my favorite Russian been?"

"A bit annoyed, now that you mention it. Where the hell's my twenty dollars that you owe?" She asked him, holding her hand palm up. She wasn't even going to mention the interest on that payment….she'd tell him after he coughed up the twenty.

"Still the same sneaky loan shark, huh?" The Tamer grinned. "I repayed you already; ask your mother- she can vouch for me." Mizuto returned easily, turning his grey eyes towards Marcus and Gazimon. "So, you two are Lili's next victims, huh? I feel for you guys. This girl's got a short temper; I guess it goes with the height." Mizuto snickered as he ducked down to avoid a jab from PawnChessmon's lance.

"Shut your mouth before I do it for you." Lili warned, cracking her knuckles while smiling sweetly at Mizuto.

"Aw, come on now, Lili! We all know you wouldn't be able to land a hit on me; you can barely reach my chin!"

That apparently did it for Lili as she scooted past PawnChessmon and joined Mizuto in the empty row he was occupying and swiftly socked him in the gut, smiling when he doubled over, wincing in pain. With a satisfied smile, Lili resumed her seat, giving Marcus a glare. "Any more insults from you, and the same thing will happen. But so much worse."

"Ouch….that freaking hurt!" Mizuto whined, rubbing his stomach as he looked over the chair again. "I'll have to remember to make sure to draw out your torture, when that day comes." The dark look was back in his eyes as his smug smirk grew wider.

Marcus thought that Mizuto was joking in a sick way, but when he saw Lili stiffen slightly next to him, he concluded easily that this guy was serious. Well, that was a damper on his day…Marcus shifted slightly, reaching for a Card in case he needed to use Gazimon. Screw getting disqualified from the Tournament; this guy was openly telling someone that he was going to torture them.

This Lili girl had odd friends.

"I never liked your sense of humor, Kobayashi; it sucked." Lili replied evenly, reaching for her own Cards; she never really understood Mizuto's mood swings. Their families had been business partners for a while and she'd always known him to be rather uplifting…and then she'd heard of Takahashi passing away and he'd sort of changed. That and his 'girlfriend' came on to the scene. Lili and Arashi didn't get along. At all. Nor would they ever.

"I'm sure you can find a plethora of people and Digimon who would agree with you, Miss Von." Kudamon suddenly appeared, slithering around Mizuto's neck, glaring at his Tamer. Making sure to give Mizuto's neck a good squeeze, he turned to Marcus and Lili. "I apologize for any…trouble he may have caused; he's a bit rude during flights, so you'll have to excuse him. Miss Von, PawnChessmon, Gazimon, Gazimon's Tamer," Kudamon inclined his head slightly, "Please excuse us; we must be getting back to our row before Miss Kitayama decides to find Mizuto herself. I'm afraid that won't be a pleasant sight."

"Yeah, because that girl is so strong." Lili muttered, recalling her battle with Arashi. That only fueled the hidden rivalry between the two female Tamers further. Mizuto claimed the reason for Arashi's loss was due to her major distraction by an event that had taken place earlier that week; Lili thought he was making up excuses for how weak his 'girlfriend' was.

"Maybe one day you'll find that out." Mizuto chuckled, waving to the two Tamers. "But, I guess it's time for me to depart. Such a shame...see you guys when we touch down."

Yup. Definitely odd.

Xxx

Okay, so I wasn't super happy with this chapter, and I'm going to have the other characters show up in the next chapter. Bleh...I really don't like this...I'm horrible with characterization DX I'm so sorry...But I'm forming relationships?

I liked how Jayden turned out though! He's such a fun person to work with...

Eh, anyway, tell me what you thought...

OC Credits
Lili- Happy2BMe

Marcus-shadownjohn101 (...don't hate me but I lost the freaking information on the card DX)

Til my next update,
nell