Author's Notes: It's been more than a year and a half since I last updated this story, and I left off on a cliffhanger. I have discontinued this story sometime last year, around the time of the premiere of Xros Wars. I am currently planning a revamp of this story, but before that happens, I want to upload as much of this story as I had written. I sincerely apologize for this incredibly long wait, and while I don't think the upcoming chapters will justify it, I want to at least show you the rest of this story.

Usually when you fall from impossible heights, you would be lying on the ground, most likely dead. If the drop wasn't that much, you would probably be getting back up. For Alex and the rest, that wasn't the case. As soon as they had fallen down the mysterious hole leading to who knew what, Alex and his "friends" simply opened their eyes and they were standing in a massive room with metal walls. It was probably as large as a museum, with walls that went on for quite a while. Everywhere they looked, they could only see children in their age group that seemed just as confused as they were. Then Alex realized that neither Yuusuke, Derek, nor Kekio were standing with him.

"Well, at least I lost them," Alex told himself scratching the back of his neck. "Still, what is this place?" There were many people that were talking to each other, and Alex tried to ask as many people as he could in case they knew anything. Some people seemed to be trying to ease the situation by talking about personal stuff, to make them forget something that shouldn't be so easily overlooked.

"SILENCE!" a voice boomed throughout the massive boom. The conversations had ended as soon as the deep voice began. Everyone turned to the front to see a man with a golden, horned helmet - similar to those that the Vikings wore - and a dressed in a flowing, green robe that seemed to have branches running down the middle. His beard flowed just to his waist, caught up in many of the branches.

The man that had just roared with energy was now reduced to coughing violently. "This world is getting too old for me to keep staying," he muttered under his breath. When he spoke, his voice echoed around the room, which helped deliver his weakening voice.

"Children of the Earth, I apologize for taking you from your homes without forewarning, but please, my people in dire need of your assistance. Make no mistake, this is certainly a dangerous task I am asking of you, but-"

A storm of angry teenagers came running towards the old man. Without hesitation, he reached into his left sleeve and took out a golden staff. His robes turned a dark red color, the branches on his outfit turning to flames that for whatever reason didn't scorch his beard.

"Please, allow me to finish," he requested. The people that were suddenly rampaging ran off, muttering curses. The man shook his head before he continued. "You are all clearly unprepared for this. It seems the trials will be good." People began to whisper at the mention of the word "trails". "No, there is nothing to worry about. The trials are simply to measure which of you will be worthy to handle this task. Those of you that fail will be returned home and you memories will be wiped, and so will those that witnessed your...disappearance. Those of you that succeed will be taken on an adventure where you will be place in a life-or-death situation."

"Life-or-death!" a voice shouted in a thick German accent. "Some of us don't want to die! Just let us all go and deal with this yourself." Yuusuke was standing next the person that had spoken. A boy with wild black hair, pale skin, and black clothes, including a coat.

Many voices joined in unison, agreeing with the voice and shouting angrily.

Yuusuke chuckled. "You sure caused up a ruckus, Quint. That's not like you."

"I just spoke my mind, that's all."

The old man raised his staff, which silenced the crowd yet again. However, there was smile on his face. "A wise boy you are. For years, the my people have tried our best to maintain this situation. We believe that you humans may give us the power we need. In order to verify that belief, we have established a set of 'trials' that you must each complete. We suspect that ultimately only a select few of you will pass these trials, but we will just have to deal with that."

Suddenly, six tunnels in the wall began to open. What appeared to be the back of trains appeared.

"Now then, choose your ride."

Alex was sitting on his desk, looking outside the train that kept speeding along the tunnel, but there was only blackness. The other passengers had been blathering to each other about so many things that only the loudest of the bunch were able to catch his attention. The bench Alex was resting his knees on bumped, and Alex could tell that someone had sat down.

"This is so crazy," the person had said. Alex turned to see who it was, and he recognized it as the girl from the bus stop a week ago.

Alex tried to think of how to make conversation. He simply said, "Hey, you're that girl."

The girl looked up, recognizing Alex. "Oh yeah, I remember you. I don't believe you told me your name."

"Alex," he said, sitting down his seat. "And what's yours?"

She told him, "My name is Hana."

"So, Hana, do you have any idea what's going on here?"

"You think anyone here would?

"Well, no. I just wanted to have a conversation."

"You probably shouldn't. If we don't pass these trials, then our memories will be wiped and you and I will forget any conversation we have."

"That's a pretty negative way to look at this."

Hana looked down at her feet. "I'm sorry. I'm just trying to look at this from a logical point of view."

"Forget logic for now. What we're doing right now hardly makes any sense, and I don't think we can do anything about that, so let's just get this over with."

Yuusuke stood outside of the train he had chosen to ride on, watching the tracks speed away from him. "So how's your summer going, Quint?"

"Ja, it's going good. What have you been doing so far?"

"Well, I've been stuck with two weird kids and Alex."

"Alex doesn't count as a weird kid anymore?"

"Good point. The thing is, I was wondering if he would help me with these two people I got involved with, looking for something called the Digital World."

"The Digital World, huh? Sounds interesting, but why call Alex."

"He and I talk sometimes at school, and he seemed like someone I could trust with this weird stuff."

"But he's not your friend, right? I sure can't stand him, especially since he's been calling be a Nazi ever since I started going to school. Talk about stereotyping. Anyway, this Digital World you mentioned. Think it's got something to do with this?"

"That's a strange idea, but it wouldn't surprise me. Still, I looked it up, and I got the impression that the Digital World was shut down."

"You looked it up? What kind of place did you go to?"

"Wikipedia, obviously."

Quint's hand promptly met his forehead. "Go on."

"Apparently some group called Paradiso started a Digital World project, so I thought that it might be connected."

"So who are these two 'strange people' anyway?"

"This girl named Kekio and her cousin Derek."

"Oh, it's a girl, huh? Is she cute? That would explain why you would work with her."

"Shut up. I'm only doing this because she asked me to."

"Online? Wow, I'm keeping an eye on you and this girl."

"It's not like that. Our moms are friends, and they introduced us."

"Oh. That's it? And here I was praising you like you were some smooth actor. Guess I was mistaken."

"Our train's going to stop soon, we should probably head back in."

"What makes you think it's going to stop? Are you just trying to change the subject?"

"I thought I told you to shut up."

Derek had this misfortune of not being able to find anyone he was familiar. Just how many people were there here if he couldn't recognize a single person? Coupled that with the fact that everyone was running around like idiots, sometimes stepping on his feet. He was about to stand up and shout at everyone to stop, but he was stopped when he noticed that the young man sitting next to him was giving him a cold stare. He seemed to be about Derek's age, dressed in a black shirt with blue pants. His black and red zigzag streak in the middle of it, and odd look in Derek's opinion. It was like he was trying to dress up as a character from some typical Japanese comic book. The boy recognized that Derek was staring at his hair specifically and just sighed.

"Just...sit down. If you're going to yell at them, they'll either ignore you or beat you to a pulp."

"Hey, why are you trying to act all high and mighty?"

"I'm just trying to be reasonable, unlike the idiots I see here, not including you of course."

Derek brushed off the boy's comment, but sat down nonetheless. "I'm Derek Namio."

The boy stared at Derek for a few seconds. "Lance Summers. I'm not sure that our names are important anyway, since they'll probably just take our memories if we fail. Listen, kid."

"Don't call me 'kid' when you're probably the same age as me."

"You're sixteen?"

"Yes."

"Alright then. Kid," Derek obviously didn't like that. "I'm really not good with people I don't know, so just don't bother me. If somehow we get stuck on the same team, then I'll probably take you seriously."

Daniel's head was starting to hurt. "It's going to happen again. I'm going to black out, and them I'm probably going to find out that I've passed the trials." Daniel felt like he was about to throw up, and grabbed the railing near his seat, until a voice spoke to him."

"Don't get sick now." He looked up to see a girl with a white blouse, a black skirt, and brown hair. "My name's Sheena Greyan. Good luck with the trials." The girl's sweet smile made Daniel cheer up enough to forget about how sick he was feeling.

"Thanks, I hope you win too."

Unfortunately for Kekio, she spent her entire time on the train alone.