Ranamon=Lanamon

KaiserLeomon=JaegerLowemon

Wolfmon=Lobomon

Fire.
Bright, burning, passionate and from time to time annoying fire.
She knew that fire. It wouldn´t hurt her. How she knew she didn´t know, but in her existence of not knowing she found something worth fighting for. Something she knew.

Hot. So hot.
But not painfully hot?
Heat always hurt, but not now.

That heat felt grand. So grand, that he didn´t understand its existence. How could he? He didn´t even understand his own.

He couldn´t disappear anymore.
He had missed his chance. Now there was a reason to stay in this existence. But he wouldn´t have given up anyway.

The presence hadn´t come again.

Instead there came fire. Hot, unbending fire. And that fire made him restless. Why couldn´t he move? The light didn´t come to him. Then he was going to search for it. Not moving was not going to stop him.

After seeing that the hurt MetalGarurumon safely touched down on Imperialdramon´s back and devolved, WarGeymon entered the safety zone with Takuya in his hands. As soon as Wargreymon was inside Kari heard Davis inform Imperialdramon that they were ready to leave. Shortly later bright light blinded her, implying that yet so many other Digimon were dying. She swallowed painfully, closing her eyes, not wanting to see.
No matter that the battlefield was already far behind them. Only seconds had passed since WarGreymon and MetlaGarurumon had returned. It was dead silent. All mourning the innocent Digimon they had killed.

Kari was the one to break it. She took a step out of the crowd. WarGreymon was just putting Takuya down; a mischievous smile on his lips and happiness dancing in his eyes.

He sank down to the ground rather tiered, closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Momentary happiness replaced by an anxious frown. She quickly wondered what could have made him tired, but the thought didn´t last long in face of her anger. He couldn´t see her, and maybe that was good. Kari clenched her fist once and released it again. She had never done anything like this, but only, because in her eyes no one had deserved so yet.

And she hit him, leaving a red mark on his cheek. Takuya´s eyes flashed open. This time it was confusion in his eyes. To Kari there was nothing to be confused about.

"What were you thinking?" She screamed at him. Behind her everyone held their breath. Kari was not often angry, but if she was no one dared to talk back to her. Because there always was a justified reason for her anger.

"How many Digimon do you think died because of you!" She shuddered just thinking about the numbers. " Just because we can´t let the enemy have either of you!" Would it not mean the doom of their world, Kari considered just leaving him behind. But she scratched that thought. Takuya had to have a reason for his action and not meant harm. At least she hoped.

"Well, sorry about that!" His brown eyes burning with anger, he jumped to his feet. Making everyone behind her gasp, he had talked back. Had Kari not known better, she would have said fire was blazing in those eyes, literally.

"But we have got a situation on our end, as well!" With that his eyes lost his focus on her and wandered to something at near her shoulder. A slight happiness returning to them.

"The others are still alive."

"Really?" She jumped. Kochi had walked up next to her. She hadn´t noticed him at all! She hadn´t even felt his darkness! Despite her fear and wariness of it.
Creepy.
It had much to do with his element, Kari knew that, and that she wasn´t fair, but she couldn´t help it.

Darkness.

To her it represented all that is evil.

Takuya nodded and set back down. Tired again, but relief not entirely leaving his features. She could only guess why, though.

"Wolfmon, Fairymon….everyone said so." And a smile returned. A smile that Kari had not seen yet on him. "They are alive, but we have to hurry. Ranamon and the others said they can wait, but apparently we have to get our human friends out there fast." His smile turned sad.

"What are you talking about?" Davis blabbered in between. "Imperialdramon is going to devolve, by the way."
True to his words Kari felt the ground disappear below her. Groaning filled the night as a dozen children landed painfully on hard ground.
Night?
Imperialdramon had carried them to the other end of the Digiworld. After a second look Kari recognized the surrounding area as Coela Beach.

"Can´t you say that earlier, Davis?" Mimi complained "Next time you do that I'm going to make you eat Mrs. Yagami´s homemade food."

"Why only me?" Davis tried to hide his discomfort, but it was kind of obvious in his voice. "Ken is as responsible as I am."

"Maybe, but he doesn´t do this on a daily basis." Sora countered as she got to her feet and beat dust out of her jeans.

"I don´t-" A glare shut him up.
Kari felt somewhat sorry for him. Most of the 'unpleasant' stuff that happens isn´t really Davis fault. It just …. Kind of happens.

"So Takuya, would you mind explaining the reason behind your actions?" Joe stepped close to him and took his pulse, because Takuya still hadn´t gotten up or moved, which is an amazing feat, considering they fell quite a number of feet from Imperialdramon´s back. Kari felt a bit guilty., though she knew it couldn´t have been her fault.
Takuya opened a tiered eye. He almost seemed as if he was going to fall asleep on the spot.

"I´m all right, Joe. Just tired." Koichi hadn´t left Takuya´s side either. Unconsciously Kari took a step back. It was night. Darkness.

"….You see when we got out of this whirlpool, Agnimon and Vitramon inside me and Lowemon and KaiserLeomon inside Koichi kind of…-

"-resonated-"Koichi explained. It was creepy. He was almost invisible in the night. Even with all the stars, the moon and few flashlights.

"Yeah, that. We kind of needed to know if it was only the other Spirits inside that fortress or if our human friends were there, too. And since Kari couldn´t get me closer I took matters in my own hands."

"You do of course realize that we could have gotten you closer if you had explained." Tai pointed out. Kari didn´t know how much truth was mixed in his words. They would have tried. Surely. But if they would have made it with any less sacrifices...

Takuya shrugged and smiled lazily. "I didn´t think that far ahead."

Silence. Dead silence. Not even wind was blowing.

"Just great! We seriously have to take care of a third reckless idiot?" Matt exclaimed disbelieving." Just as Tai finally started using his head more and only Davis was cause for worry we got ourselves a third one."

"Hey!" Came the unified protest from the two. The two who still had energy to complain.

Kari suppressed a giggle. As did many others.

"So what about your friends?" Cody asked when there was no longer a danger of bursting into laughter as soon as one opened his mouth. At his question any laughter was drowned anyway.

"Alive." Takuya´s voice as hardly more than a whisper. "For now." He had his eyes still closed. In fact he hadn´t opened them during the entire conversation.

"But we have to hurry." Kari almost jumped. She had already forgotten again that Koichi stood there. He just faded into the night. "Wolfmon said so."

"Who is that?" Davis asked.

"The human Spirit of Light."

"Human?" Echoed through the Digidestined. Takuya had explained the each Spirit was made of two parts, but he had provided no further details.

"Yes, but more than that Takuya is going to pass out every second."

"He sure does look like that." Tai looked around. "But why? He had plenty of energy before- There is it!" He pointed at a glowing TV.

"…making contact with Wolfmon was this exhausting." Takuya answered as he slowly rose to his feet. Kari would have liked to support him, but Koichi was too close to Takuya for her to help him out. And Koichi already did that. She wanted to catch up to her brother who was walking at the front. Mostly, because she was afraid of Koichi, but she slowed down as she heard Takuya´s tiered whisper.

"Gabumon." Said Digimon turned around while they marched towards the TV. Kari saw him search for the speaker of the quiet voice and his eyes finally settled on Takuya. Mostly, because of Takuya´s half opened eyes were clued to him.

"What is it?" Gabumon left his place next to Matt and fell back to Takuya and Koichi. Kari saw him trying to mask his worry about the Darkness.

Takuya managed a half smile. Kari could swear she saw his eyes glaze over.

"I´m sorry you got hurt because of me."

Some tension fell from Gabumon. Kari saw it.

"Don´t mention it. I´ve seen worse. And it really is just a scratch." Kari couldn´t tell if Takuya heard him. He really seemed ready to fall over by the second. And each step only added to that.

Izzy listened to the reports.

Few minutes ago his friends, Takuya and a new boy returned. The fact that one bonus was with them told Izzy already before the reports that the mission had been a success.

And now he listened to the reports; suppressing the urge to interrupt the speaker -Tai in this case. Interrupting would only take more time for him to get all his answers as he had learned with time. Instead he added a note to his mental list of questions every time. The things that caught his attention so far were the not-so-good news about the Demon Lords and the part about Agnimon taking over Takuya´s body. That was more curiosity than the need to know, though. He added that to the list he had to ask Takuya or possibly the new boy –Koichi- about, seeing how Takuya was sleeping like dead on his bed it was likely the latter. On the very top of that list were very basic questions about the Spirit-system. Izzy didn´t know even close to enough to satisfy his curiosity. Last time he had been interrupted and it had slipped his mind, but now it wouldn´t. Taking over a body and the word 'host', as Takuya had used had way to much in common.
But Izzy had to be careful that his curiosity wouldn´t get the better of him. He had to focus on the important things and mail it to Gennai.

"How many Spirits does the enemy have?" Izzy asked when the reports were finished. The air got tens from on second to the next. Not that it hadn´t been tense before, but now he could cut it with a knife. It was after all the question that pretty much said their chances of victory.

"All, but us." He feared as much.

"And they are still alive?"

Koichi nodded. "Wolfmon said so." Another thing to the list of curiosity questions. The Digimon. He hadn´t found the Digimon mentioned by Takuya in his analyzer; Agnimon and Vitramon. Gennai didn´t have any information on them either much to Izzy´s frustration.
How come he had two partners in the first place? Izzy guessed it had something to do with both representing fire and the 'two parts of one entirety' part. He couldn´t wait to find out.

"That weren´t exactly the best news, but not the worst either." He summed up. "I´m going to write a mail to Gennai. Against 8 Spirits we hardly stand a chance." And there was something more, but didn´t feel the need to mention that. "I´d say we are finished for today. Koichi and Takuya will stay here for the time being. You can go home. That is if no one has a question."

"I do!"Izzy couldn´t exactly say that he was surprised. TK had eyed Koichi darkly the whole time.

"I´m against it." TK stared at Koichi with angry eyes. "We should erase Darkness from the face of the earth."

"I agree." Gatomon added. And Patamon nodded eagerly. Izzy swallowed nervously. He didn´t exactly have any valid arguments to protect a Darkness boy. Not to mention that he himself didn´t have the best experiences with it either.

"Why?"

It was simple question. One where the answer should have been obvious, and yet Koichi still asked it.

"'Why?' Do we need a reason?" Gatomon fletched her teeth in Kari´s lap. "Darkness is evil. It should be gone forever."

"Yeah. To tell the truth, your presence is sickening." TK said with as much poison as he could muster. It was one of the rare moments where TK was not a kind collected teenager.

Koichi only shook sadly his head. "No, it is not.

Darkness is not evil. Darkness has existed much earlier than evil.
It is the same with Light. It has existed before good. It just happens that over time Darkness has attracted evil as Light has good. In the beginning there was no difference between the two." His eyes wandered between Gatomon and Patamon and back. "I thought Light Digimon like you knew that. Darkness is not evil. It is purely neutral."

That stuck hard. Izzy could see it. Partly because of the accusation between his lines and partly because he was trying to tell them that Darkness was 'not evil'. Even Izzy had a hard time believing that particular piece of information.
First Gatomon and Patamon were caught off guard and couldn´t argue back, then the room seemed to get hotter and sparks flew through the air. Koichi didn´t break eye contact first. It was Gatomon. The stubborn cat. Izzy deduced from that that some part of his explanation was true. Which part that was Izzy couldn´t tell.

"Then tell me one thing." TK spoke again, seeing how his and Kari´s partner apparently were no longer able to argue. "Are you saying you can control the power of darkness?" His voice was still hard and poisonous.

"Control it?" Koichi asked for confirmation, Izzy guessed. And to his surprise Koichi shook his head once again. "No one can control Darkness. One can manipulate, corrupt and use it, but one can ever control it. Not even me, it´s embodiment."

"So what are you saying? That you are 'neutral' as well, or that you are waiting for somebody to use or corrupt your Darkness?"

A faint smile touched Koichi´s lips. "As long as I'm not corrupted I'm neutral. That means I act the way I think is what I am meant to do. And in this case it means that I team up with you." At first it didn´t sound logic to Izzy´s ears, but the more he thought about it, the more he could see the distant meaning that was implied.
Being teamed up with them was neither good nor evil from Koichi´s point of view. Izzy, of course, would have said it was good. But maybe that was not so. The key to the hidden thread of logic was 'act the way he thinks he is supposed to'. Izzy could also read in those words:" I´m not going to work with you because you are trying to protect a whole world, but because for other reasons." That would put Koichi in a neutral position.
Interesting. Very Interesting. Koichi´s way of reasoning. His motives. And his point of view. Izzy couldn´t wait to bombard him with questions once the others were gone. But for now he had to push his curiosity in the far sides of his mind. Izzy could safely bet that no one, save maybe Ken, had understood Koichi. The room was filled by a confused silence after all.

He was about to explain when Gabumon came first.

"You know he is right, Patamon, Gatomon." Oh yeah, Gabumon was a light type, too. It had completely slipped Izzy´s mind. Why hadn´t he said something before? Gabumon must have been as opposed to Koichi as the other two were. Oh….. except of course he knew about Koichi´s reasoning already in the beginning. But how did he? And why hadn´t he said so before? It could have saved time and a whole awkward situation. And Matt too, for that matter.

"Yeah, if you four could just swallow your prejudice you could feel that his Darkness is only dark and not evil." TK stared at his brother disbelieving as did Kari, as did everyone else in the room.

"What are you talking about?" TK finally managed to ask. Still terribly disbelieving with eyes round as tennis balls.

Matt shrugged. "I just thought, he wasn´t that bad of a guy and suddenly the Darkness didn´t feel any more evil than Davis."

"Me too." Gabumon confirmed. TK´s eyes narrowed and he glanced over to Koichi. After a while he said, "It isn´t to me."

"But to me." Kari gasped, staring at Koichi this time. "It´s not evil at all."

Koichi smiled rather timid, not avoiding eye contact with TK. One sided sparks flew again.

"All right can we go now? I´m starving. It´s already past 8." Davis said after he got bored from all the silent starring. Chibimon was already chewing on his sleeve.

"Well, sure. You are free to go. If I don't mail you, you can go to school tomorrow." Izzy almost smiled at the groans that came back as a reply. After the others were gone he winked Koichi over to him and started to work down the incredibly long list in his head.

"Do you want seconds?"

"Yes, please, Mrs. Izumi." Koichi raised an eyebrow at him. "You are aware that it´s already your third 'seconds', right?"

"So?" Takuya asked with his mouth full.

"No, nothing." Still one eyebrow sky-high.

"You know, just-"He swallowed his food."- by worrying you are not helping anyone. Not Koji, not anyone else."

"Yeah, I know, but…." Koichi sighed. He was deliberately avoiding eye contact with him, Takuya noticed. Of course he does, though. Koichi had never been a type of forward confrontations.

"We can´t do anything, but to trust and wait for Izzy and this Gennai to come up with a plan to save our friends. As a matter of facts, they aren´t exactly in the best position to give up on our comrades." Playing patient and all is nice, but Takuya was consuming a huge amount of food just to stop himself from running off again.

"How long does a conference with that guy last anyway? He has been at it for an hour." Seriously, Takuya couldn´t talk that much, even if he wanted to. Then again, he was no genius. His brain didn´t produce more thoughts then he could say.

"It might still take a little longer." Mrs. Izumi added from the kitchen. "The longest one he had so far took an entire day."

"A day!" He almost choked on his food. "How can two people talk that much?" And he had already skipped out on explaining everything to Koichi. Tai had to do that for him.

"Can I have another seconds Mrs. Izumi?"

She smiled and refilled his plate.

"Are you telling me you talked with this Gennai person for over 5 hours and you didn´t come up with one decent plan?" Takuya sat disappointed on the floor in Izzy´s room. He was not pleased. And neither was Koichi, but of course he did a much better job at masking his emotions.

"I´m sorry." Well, his apology seemed honest. Not that that would have any effect on Takuya. He was restless, inpatient and worried. His friends were dying. "It´s just, that we don´t have enough firepower to guarantee your safety or a save place for you to wait while we would attempt a rescue. And-"

"We don't need a guarantee or even a save place! Time is running out." His temper was getting the better of him. And he knew it.

"I know, but-"

"Why can´t we just come along? I did last time, and it´s not that I was captured."

"Takuya." Koichi tried. They weren´t getting anywhere like this. One some part of himself he knew that, too, but he didn´t listen to it. His temper and fire were blocking that little voice out quite beautifully.

"Do I have to remind you that Gabumon got hurt in the process and that possibly hundreds of innocent Digimon died?" He interrupted him with a sharp voice. It seemed that the whole Digimon killing business was a bit more serious here than it was back in their dimension. Surely Takuya didn´t like killing them, but if it was necessary Warriors did not hesitate. To him it was clearly a necessity, but the Didgidestined here definitely thought differently.

"No! I do remember that, but if we don´t hurry they are going to die. And at the same time it would mean that this world is done for. There is no time to worry about a stupid plan."

Izzy sighed. "I know that. But losing one or two of you would mean the same. We cannot act harshly. Moreover, we don´t even know where the fortress is. A battle plan is no good if we don´t have a goal."

Damm it! Takuya hated this. Doing nothing but waiting. Relying only on others. And worst of all not being able to fight. And his flames were burning so strong. They felt the same. Agnimon and Vitramon, too were cursing.
If only he could fight! No matter what the price!

…

Huh?

Somewhat the fire burning in him dimmed. Just for a second. Just a little. But Takuya knew it did. What was it? Insecurity? Nervousness? Fear? No that's absurd.

"Takuya?" That was Koichi.

It was hesitation. But why hesitation? Agnimon retreated a bit from his consciousness; reading Takuya`s emotion the way Takuya read his. There was something Agnimon didn´t want him to know about.

But only Agnimon. Vitramon was still there. Did that mean that only Agnimon knew about this? Unlikely. More like a difference in opinion. Something Agnimon wanted to hide and something Vitramon didn´t feel the need to hide….

"Are you ok?" This time it was Izzy.

But Agnimon knew him. As well as Takuya knew Agnimon. So he knew that Takuya would not ignore this matter. So Agnimon had better prepare himself.
But, geez, this whole predicting-other-peoples-thoughts-thing was not something he liked to do. And he was already only predicting himself. Well kind of.

"Please excuse me for a bit. I have a bone to pick with a very dear friend of mine." He only got questioning and confused looks from both Koichi and Izzy. Takuya crossed his arms and legs, let his face fall into a frown, clearly telling do-not-talk-to-me-now.

"What did he mean by that?" Izzy asked into the now quiet room. Koichi didn´t answer, instead his eyes were analyzing Takuya. To Koichi there was no doubt with whom Takuya was going to have a talk. What bothered him, was that usually they didn´t need to stop a conversation or sit down to 'think'- Takuya, of that he was sure, was not thinking. Usually emotions and opinions were the same between the host and the Spirits, he mused. Moreover so, since it was Takuya. Fire was not known for its great depth or being complex. And Takuya had the strongest bond with his Spirits. Everyone was close with their Spirits, but Takuya was special. So close that, according to Lowemon and KaiseLeomon, there hardly was any difference at all between their characters. Only, maybe that Takuya was more accepting.

There was the problem. What could Takuya make say 'to pick a bone'?

Let´s see… The Fire Spirits characteristics are free and unforgiving. That could not be the point where they would disagree. It was the core of all three of them. Then what else? What could possibly make them disagree? Not their safety, not the others safety, not that something needed to be done. No….wait. Like this he didn´t make any process at all. None of them would be concerned about small things. Then…

What did Takuya think of as most important? Assuming Takuya was thinking the same way he did, it would be his friends.

What did Agnimon and Vitramon think of as most important? Even if the differences in character to Takuya may be small it could be important. Hence Koichi decided that he would heavily rely on his Spirits for that question. They had known the Fire Spirits longer than him. The reply came as soon as Koichi finished his thoughts. And it surprised him a bit. Not that the most important thing to the Fire Spirits was Takuya, but that he felt uneasiness from Lowemon and KaiserLeomon.

"I´m not sure, but I´m going to have a talk with my Spirits as well. It seems they know something."

"Go ahead. But please tell me about it." Koichi nodded slightly and closed his eyes.

If you have questions concerning Izzy´s logic, don´t hold back. Ask. I´ll try to explain.

Thanks for the reviews. And please review again.

My next updates (at least 5 chapters) will start coming on December 24th. Please be patient till then.