A/N: Just to add a bit of clarification to my previous note, I'm not literally warring against myself. I meant that I was fighting the shipping war in my story without a bias toward one side or the other. As mentioned, I already know how it's going to turn out, so there's no risk of things going south... well, no more than I make them go on purpose, anyway. ^_^

Regarding the second review by guest, I'm going to, uncharacteristically, actually answer a question that could serve as a potential spoiler: Yes. There is definitely is a connection... and that's all you're getting. I'll let you figure out the details yourself. And yes, I know... I'm evil. :P

Now, time for a bit of a detour from the main plot so we can explore a few more details of the convoluted past...

Chapter 11: Memories

I've never tried to block out the memories of the past, even though some are painful. I don't understand people who hide from their past. Everything you live through helps make you the person you are now.

The digidestined expected that immediately following the meeting with Wizardmon the hunt for them would begin in full. However, much to their surprise the assault didn't come. Myotismon's armies were still on the move in both worlds, but few of them went in pursuit of the children, and those that did seemed to have little interest in actually catching them.

The lack of interest from Myotismon was suspicious, doubly so because of the reports they picked up from the human world after the first week. The Hunters seemed to have gained an advantage and had begun pushing his armies back, even going so far as to nearly reclaim one of the lost sectors, though they would not be able to reactivate any of the barriers before they were pushed back out.

Whatever was happening, the children had no way of knowing, but they would take the opportunity to continue the search for the final crest regardless. It would be another week before they finally received a communique from Datamon warning them to flee. Something had happened, and just like that the enemy was on the move, the entirety of Myotismon's digital world army moving in unison to pursue the children.

The first members of the pursuit army caught up to them within two days. They fell quickly, but more inevitably came. Soon enough the children found themselves fighting off at least a dozen scouts every day.

All the while, Myotismon's main army would continue moving in slow pursuit of the children, gathering more forces that were funneled in from the human world while the advance scouts pointed the way for them. Rather than attempt to assault the children with all of his fastest armies right off the bat, he chose a much more methodical approach. His army couldn't match the children in terms of speed, but its sheer size allowed it to cover an enormously wide area in pursuit of the children, making it impossible to double back and slip by unnoticed.

Compared to what they were used to seeing in the human world, it was far less vicious and more pragmatic than the enemy's normal tactics. Speaking practically, the children didn't have an unlimited amount of space to flee in. Sooner or later they would be driven to the sea and surrounded, and then it would be over. It also limited their capacity to search for the final crest. If the crest was hidden somewhere in the lands behind them then it was out of their reach unless they found some way out of this mess.

To make things worse, the children also lost contact with the human world in this time. They were able to pick up a few public reports here and there, but nothing to let them know what was really happening. From what they read, it almost seemed as if the war had fallen into a lull, which would almost make sense considering that the majority of Myotismon's army was pursuing them in the digital world. However, given the previous reports about the Hunters' successes it seemed odd that they didn't try anything in this time to push back harder. It was even more suspicious for the fact that the sudden communication blackout came just as the pursuit began.

Something was happening, and more than just the events surrounding Hikari and Gatomon joining the team... things were out of order. They couldn't identify the cause yet, but the children knew that something had changed with the enemy and with the war as a whole. They needed to find out what as soon as possible, for anything that led to a change in Myotismon's objectives and tactics would require a change in the children's response. However, they would have to wait until after they escaped Myotismon's army before they could try to investigate.

As far as the chase was concerned, things were looking fairly grim. They were rapidly running out of space and the army was starting to close in. They had maybe two more days before they would be forced to the sea and trapped. Fleeing across the ocean was impossible. Even if they mounted the backs of all their aerial and aquatic digimon, they had nowhere to go. Their partners didn't have the endurance to cross a body of water that massive. They would run out of strength long before finding a place to rest.

They needed a miracle, and fortunately they received one just as they were pushed to their limit. A mere day before they were to run out of land, Koushiro was contacted by an unexpected source whom the team hadn't heard from in quite some time – Gennai.

"Where have you been? After we lost contact with you..."

"I've had to hide a bit to keep from getting caught. Myotismon and others have been looking for me, trying to intercept my transmissions before they got to you. Even now I'm in danger. I can't talk long, but I can still help you."

"We could use it. We're just about out of places to run."

"Not quite. I have an old friend waiting to help you out. I'm sending coordinates for a spot on the coast. Go there, and he'll take you to safety."

"An old friend?"

Taichi stepped into the conversation, looking over Koushiro's shoulder as others watched from the sides. They were all exhausted... even though they had only slightly picked up their pace from their normal travel speed, the constant knowledge that they were being hunted and they had no chance to stop and rest made the whole ordeal that much more tiring.

"Whamon."

Koushiro would answer just before Gennai did, having already pieced it together in his head. A friend from the sea who could transport them all to safety... there weren't a lot of possibilities for that one.

"Indeed. He'll be taking you all back to File Island, where you should be safe until we can come up with a plan to counter Myotismon."

"Are you sure we'll be safe there?"

Yamato this time, bringing up the biggest question of Gennai's plan.

"File Island is pretty small. We won't have much room to escape if Myotismon sends anyone to follow us."

"That's not a problem. Once you get close enough he won't be able to track you, and then you can go into hiding to escape even if he manages to follow you."

"That's part of File Island's design, isn't it?"

Nobody else knew what Koushiro was talking about, or had even suspected what he'd long since realized about File Island and its nature. There was a reason it was chosen as the place for them to first be called to the digital world to meet their partners...

"Astute as ever. File Island was originally created to serve as a sort of 'demo' of the digital world, a testing and training ground for the digidestined, whoever they would be."

"That's the reason for all the anomalies. The beach phone booths, the desert full of power lines... the factory with looping assembly line. Since they're all just part of a demo, they're not designed to actually do anything."

"Quite. But they also provide an additional advantage. Their nature is self-contained. They continue looping through their personal cycles in a way that's unnatural to the digital world. That means that they also disrupt most outside attempts to scan in, allowing you all to hide out there with ease. Unfortunately, it will also mean that you won't be able to connect out to the human world unless you're in one of a select few places."

"We can't complain. It gets us out of this mess, so we'll deal with it."

Taichi glanced to Koushiro, who nodded. He didn't like the idea of being isolated from contact with the human world for any period of time, but it was necessary for now, so he'd handle it somehow.

"I'll send you a map of locations where you can reestablish communication. I'll contact you again after you get there. Once you're off of Server it will be easier to elude Myotismon."

"Understood. Thank you."


The next day the group made for the coast where Whamon waited for them. It had been quite a while since they last saw him, so it was good to see that he was still okay. They had met quite a few digimon over the years and not all of them had survived being friends with the digidestined, to the point that they tended to avoid populated areas to keep from potentially drawing their enemies' attention to them.

The trip to File Island was short and uneventful compared to when they first left, years ago. There was no sign of pursuit, which was good for their friend. Once they had reached their destination they knew Whamon would be safe since he could dive far deeper than any of Myotismon's pursuit digimon, allowing him to escape any enemies that may try to hunt him.

When they reached their destination and Hikari stepped off of Whamon to the edge of the cliff, she felt as if she were stepping into a place of myth. File Island... this was where it all began. Everything that had happened between the two worlds started here. The silence that hung over her companions wasn't lost on her, either... they were stepping into their own past as well, and their memories of this place weren't all pleasant.

A single glance across their faces was enough to know what they were all thinking. Taichi and Jou sat, lost in thought. Yamato stood silent, apart from the others, his expression stern and hard to cover whatever he felt. Sora was much less opaque, the hint of tears forming in her eyes as she sat with the others, remembering... Koushiro was nearby, lost in his computer work, as always, checking the map to plan their course even though they all knew the island well enough that they didn't need it. Doubtful he needed to plan so much, but it was as much to distract himself as to actually help the group. And Mimi... she stood apart from the others, slightly ahead of the group, staring up and ahead at the most distinct landmark that was visible on the island... the mountain. Infinity Mountain. The place where everything changed.

"From where we are, the closest site where we can reestablish communication with Gennai is down the coast a ways, at an open field near Primary Village."

Hikari moved near where Koushiro sat, looking over his shoulder at the map of the island and all the places they could go to connect to the network. He was right about the site near Primary Village being the closest one, but it was also a rather awkward choice as it was out in the middle of an open field, away from anything, including cover. There was a far better choice a little further away, but Hikari didn't need an explanation to know why he didn't pick that one...

The mountain in the center of the island covered what was by far the largest connection site. It was also much more secure since they would likely be able to find caves to hide in at the base of it. However, the chances of the team actually going there given what happened there three years ago...

"Gatomon, let's go."

Hikari motioned to her partner, who quickly jumped up on her to cling to her good shoulder as she started toward the mountain. It wouldn't take more than a few seconds for the others to realize she wasn't heading toward Primary Village, and given that she had just looked at the map it was clearly not by accident.

"Hikari, what are you doing?"

She stopped, looking back over her shoulder as he brother spoke, catching Gatomon's expression in the process. She already knew what Hikari was thinking... she had become extremely familiar with the girl's mind and personality recently. Over the last few weeks they had talked almost non-stop about anything and everything, from the condition of the war and the plans of Myotismon and Katsu to their favorite foods, their lives outside of the war... literally whatever came to mind. They were three years behind the rest of the team in getting to know each other, but they were catching up quickly. And as an added bonus, it distracted Gatomon from thinking about her own past, which kept her calmer than silence would.

"Detour. I'll join you all at Primary Village later."

"It's too dangerous to go off on your own."

Hikari glanced over to Yamato and raised an eyebrow. Really? He was worried about her? In a place like this?

"Gatomon may not be as big as most, but she's still an adult. She's more than strong enough to protect me, and there are barely any hostile digimon on this island in the first place."

Silence. They couldn't argue with her logic and they all knew it. She knew they didn't like dividing the team, even for a short time, but ultimately that was there choice, not hers. They were free to follow her if they wanted... almost all of Infinity Mountain was inside a connection zone, so it would be a good place to set up camp, but they were simply unwilling to go back there.

The team's attention turned to Mimi then, who had taken a few steps to move to Hikari's side.

"I'll go with you. Your arm is still injured. You could use some help."

Mimi turned back to face the group, her eyes zeroing in on Sora, who immediately averted her gaze. She knew without a word what the girl wanted to ask, and it wasn't unreasonable... Birdramon was one of the faster digimon in their group, and she could also fly, which would help them to get to the top of the mountain much faster. Plus, having people who knew the island with her would help Hikari in any areas where they had to travel on foot and help her make faster time so she could leave and rejoin the team that much sooner.

Sighing, Sora would step forward, eyes still downcast. She didn't want to go back there... didn't want to remember... but it was the right thing to do. Had they only done the right thing the last time they were there, then...

"I'll go too. We'll go faster if we fly, and it's good to stick together."

The complete lack of enthusiasm in her voice was lost on no one, but nobody would bring it up either. Instead Koushiro would simply begin packing up his computer as he prepared to head out.

"Understood. We'll travel to Primary Village and set up camp. You can join us as soon as you're done with your other business. However, we need to leave now. There's no telling when Gennai will contact us, and I want to be set up before then so we don't miss it."

The digidestined would all give their acknowledgments and temporary farewells, the whole scene being far more awkward than anyone cared to admit. Koushiro was the only one thinking of their mission right then. Everyone else was stuck remembering the past while trying to pretend they weren't.

Mimi started toward the mountain on foot, leading the way for the two other girls. They would fly eventually, but first she wanted to talk to the girls in private before they took to the air. She'd wait until they were far enough away from the guys so as to not be heard, then she would stop and speak as Hikari passed on one side.

"Hikari... why do you want to go to Infinity Mountain?"

Hikari stopped, staring ahead as her partner nuzzled into her shoulder. The subject of Takeru and his fate wasn't traumatizing for the digimon as many other things were, but she still understood the feeling that the others must have had. Even mentioning it was painful. To go back there and see it first hand... it spoke volumes of the self-control these children must have had.

"You know there's nothing back there. Everything that happened... it happened three years ago. Even if anything was left after the battle, it would be gone by now."

"It's not about that."

She turned back to face the others, eyes meeting Sora's, which quickly averted, before turning to Mimi again.

"I need to understand... and I feel like I won't until I get back there and see it for myself."

"Understand what?"

"Everything. This whole war... did you ever stop and think that if the fight had gone differently then everything else would have too? Everything that's happened in the last three years... it all started there. I have to know why. Why was there even a digimon like him here, on the 'training' island that was made for the digidestined? What did he hope to gain by opening a rift to our world? Etemon and Myotismon... they both want power. Conquest. They're easy to figure out. But Devimon... if he wanted to rule, why start here? And why go to our world? You told me about the black gears. They could control digimon, but not humans, or else he would have used them on all of you. He could have taken over more in this world, but he opened the rift anyway. Haven't you ever asked why?"

The silence that Hikari got in response was answer enough for her. Of course they didn't. They didn't want to. That would require remembering what happened, what they did... both their guilt and their loss. They wanted to forget their past, not re-live it.

"I didn't either. Not until I got back here. I never thought I'd actually come back and have a chance to see it for myself. But now... we're going back to Server eventually, and this may be my only chance. I have to go there now. Even if I don't find anything, I have to at least try."

There was a momentary pause before Sora would step forward, digivice in hand as she motioned to her partner to stand in the middle of the group.

"Alright... if it's that important, then lets go."

Sora had still been holding on to the slim hope that they might be able to discourage Hikari from making this trip, but now it was clearly impossible. It was more than minor curiosity that drove her. She had clear reasons for making this trip and she was set on her course, so there was no stopping her. She was as stubborn as her brother sometimes... might as well help and get it over with as soon as they could, then.

In a few seconds Biyomon had evolved to her adult form and Sora was mounted on the back of her neck while the two other girls held on to her legs along with their partners. Next stop, Infinity Mountain...

It would take a while to get from the shore to the mountain at the heart of the island, but it wouldn't be an excruciatingly long trip, and they would be able to reach it without needing to stop to rest halfway. Once they arrived, however, Hikari and Gatomon would go to the peak alone. Mimi, Palmon, and even Sora would be dropped off at the base of the mountain before Birdramon took the other two to the peak and then returned to her human companion. With their digivices they could stay in contact, so Hikari could call for a pick up once she was ready to leave, and none of the others wanted to wait for her in the same place where the battle took place. The base of the mountain was already close enough as far as they were concerned.

Hikari didn't know what she expected to find up there, which was fortunate as it meant she wouldn't be disappointed. The peak was desolate. The remnants of the fight were visible in the ashes that marked the scorched stones around her. Moving to one end of the peak, she saw there something that resembled ruins, with broken bricks scattered about. Most of them had apparently been blown off the side of the mountain, leaving only a handful, barely enough to even make out what kind of building it was originally supposed to be.

Ruins and death. That was it. Whatever made this site special, it was long since forgotten in the wake of the battle between the angel and the demon. Now it was just a cold, windswept grave...

"This is a surprise..."

Hikari froze just as she was preparing to turn away from the ruins. Gatomon quickly jumped off her shoulder and moved ahead of her to stand between her and the large, green-skinned figure that emerged from the most intact section of the rubble.

"Of all the faces I expected to visit here, I didn't expect a stranger."

"Who are you?"

Gatomon's fur stood up and she hissed even as Hikari spoke. She didn't recognize this digimon, but she'd spent long enough around darkness to know it when she saw it. It was like a stench that hung on those that embraced it, and this one... he reeked of it.

"I'm what's left. Not sure if that means I'm the most or the least fortunate."

Though Gatomon's hostility and Hikari's wariness would remain, they would both relax slightly at his words, if only from the simple confusion of it. This level of philosophy and introspection wasn't what they had come to expect from dark digimon, and certainly not from hostile ones.

"I'm Ogremon, the last servant of Devimon. Maybe the only one, if you don't count all the digimon he controlled with the black gears."

"Ogremon... Hikari, did any of the others mention this digimon before?"

Gatomon would glance back to her partner, but only long enough to catch a glimpse of her face, then her gaze would return to the green-skinned brute ahead of her. She wasn't going to risk taking her eyes off him long enough to give him a chance to attack, if that's what he was planning.

"No... they only told me about general events before the fight. They never named any specific digimon... what are you doing here?"

Hikari muttered, glancing aside to the ruins in confusion. It was strange to see anyone up here at all considering the utter desolation of this place. If he were trying to build a new fortress to replace Devimon, that was one thing, but he wasn't. He was just... living here. Why? That made no sense...

"Protecting the peak. Making sure nobody tries to take over and make this place their home."

"Why?"

"Because it's Devimon's wish. He said this was a place of memory. A place that remembered the world and the way it was before."

Hikari's eyes went slightly wide. There. She didn't know what it was, but her mind caught something in Ogremon's words that hinted at what she sought. Devimon's desires, his reasoning, his innermost thoughts... things nobody knew except this one, his last surviving minion. All pieces of the answer to her great question... why?

"Before what?"

"I don't know. He never told me, and I never asked. I'm just a grunt, I do what I'm told."

"A grunt who stays to protect this peak even after his master is dead?"

"Devimon wasn't my master. I was his servant."

"How is that any different?"

"Simple. One is forced to serve, the other isn't."

Hikari paused, looking over this peculiar figure several times. For one who claimed to be a grunt, he seemed unusually thoughtful about things that most would consider trivial. Hikari wondered if that was because he'd had so long to think about it, or because he simply had so much of a different perspective from anyone she knew.

"Why would you serve Devimon willingly? What did he offer you?"

Ogremon laughed then, suddenly and unexpectedly. It was enough to catch even Gatomon off guard. She'd seen plenty of grunts in her own time, both the willing and unwilling servants of Myotismon, but this guy... he wasn't like any of them. Unfortunately, she didn't know what he was like, either...

"You can't buy me, little girl. Before Devimon, all I cared about was fighting. Day in, day out... I didn't need a reason to fight. I just loved it, so I did it whenever I could."

"So then, what changed?"

It was Ogremon's turn to pause. Hikari knew that look... memory. Recollection of things past... perhaps things he would rather forget? But no, that wasn't a look of regret or guilt. It was subtly different... he was... pensive? It was once again strange to see that sort of mood expressed by a violent grunt that claimed to care about nothing except fighting...

"Time, I guess... fighting is fun, especially with a rival like Leomon, but it gets old like everything else after enough years. Eventually I started wondering... was my destiny to just fight forever, or was there something more than that?"

"And that's when you met Devimon..."

Ogremon turned and took a few steps back toward the ruins, seating himself on one of the larger and more intact pieces of debris. By now Gatomon had settled down, fairly confident that this digimon wasn't going to try to attack them, though she wasn't sure why.

"You call him Devimon, but I knew him by a lot of other names before that. DemiDevimon, Pagumon, Zurumon..."

"You were there when he hatched?"

Gatomon cut in suddenly. From her experience, most evil digimon were previously good ones that had become corrupted by some manner of dark power or virus. She'd expected the same was true of Devimon, from the stories she heard. Perhaps an Angemon who fell to evil? But if Ogremon was speaking the truth, it meant Devimon was as he was from the very beginning.

"I found his egg in the wilderness. I was surprised since it wasn't in Primary Village, so I decided to pick it up and take it back there. No point in destroying it, it's no fun to hurt something that can't fight back. But on the way there it hatched and I knew right away why it wasn't with the others. Zurumon was a dark digimon, not welcome among all the other prissy, peace-loving digimon. I knew they wouldn't accept him in Primary Village..."

"So you raised him yourself?"

It was strange for Hikari to imagine that sort of transition. Originally a brute of a fighter, turning into a baby digimon's guardian and protector, and then later his servant?

"I don't know why I cared. He was just a squishy little runt. But there was something about him... I couldn't really explain it, but when I looked at him I knew there was something special there. I'd already fought more digimon than I could count, but only a few of them were more than just a road bump, and every one of those guys had the same thing in common. I can't describe it. I just knew that this guy was destined to be something great."

"And you wanted to be a part of that?"

"I don't know. Maybe? Maybe I just wanted to see something different than all the fighting. Something to answer all those questions floating around in my head. Then he grew up and started talking about things I couldn't wrap my head around. Destiny. The 'world from before'. The nature of the soul. He had plans. Big plans that would change the entire world, so I decided to help. I had nothing else to do except fight, and I wanted to see him succeed, especially after helping him grow up."

How strange it was... even a violent, destructive ogre showed signs of humanity, compassion... familial loyalty that even some humans failed to live up to, and to one that he wasn't even truly related to, no less. The more she saw, the more she learned that heroes were not as light, nor villains as dark, as people might assume. Not necessarily, that is... some, like Myotismon, were definitely as dark as people assumed, if not worse.

"So, what about you, girl? You know why I'm here, but I haven't gotten a word from you. What'd your kitty-cat friend say? Hikari?"

She froze in place a moment, suddenly anxious, though that feeling would fade quickly. Come to think of it, there was no real reason to be worried. Myotismon already knew her name, and besides that Ogremon had already shown that he wasn't hostile.

"I'm here because I'm looking for answers. I want to know why this whole war started in the first place. Why Devimon did what he did... tried to open a rift to the human world, wanted to destroy the digidestined... just what did he hope to gain?"

"Well, he got everything he wanted. It was never about the rift, or the digidestined. That was just bait, and a backup plan if things went bad."

Hikari paused and blinked. Bait? What? Of all things, that actually created more questions than answers...

"Bait for who, and a backup for what? And what do you mean it wasn't about the digidestined? I thought he wanted to destroy them... destroy us so he could conquer the digital world!"

Ogremon stood up, taking a few casual steps forward as he motioned back to the ruins he'd been sitting on.

"It's not complicated, girlie. He didn't care about conquest. He was trying to draw out the digidestined so he could destroy Angemon, and that's just what he did."

"But the black gears..."

"Those were just tools. They didn't even work, according to Devimon."

"They seemed to work pretty well in controlling all those digimon for him..."

"Yeah, but they weren't supposed to. They were made for something else, but he said they were broken or... flawed or something. He said they were just a substitute until he could destroy Angemon and get what he really wanted. And don't ask me what that was, he never told me."

A substitute... but that meant the black gears actually had another, hidden function that they didn't know about, and now it seemed they never would.

"What about the rift?"

"Like I said, bait. The digidestined ran away. Opening a rift lured them back and bam, fight on."

"You also mentioned a backup plan..."

"That was for the runt. It was a way out if the fight got bad. That was my job – if the peak went boom, to make sure the kid didn't get caught in the blast."

Wait... WHAT?!

"Takeru is alive?!"

Granted, she had suspected that was possible for quite a while, but... not like this. She'd thought that somehow he managed to survive that final battle with Devimon and escape, not that Devimon had deliberately called his... butler, or whatever Ogremon was, to protect him by throwing him through the rift to safety.

For Ogremon's part, he was confused. Hikari's reaction, the shock, meant that she didn't know, despite the fact that she was digidestined.

"...you didn't know? I figured the kid would be with you guys now."

"The digidestined have all believed Takeru's been dead for three years!"

Now it was Ogremon's turn to be surprised. That... wasn't part of Devimon's plan. Was it? He spoke a little of what would happen to the digidestined afterward, starting with that boy. He assumed that meant they would all be together, but... maybe not? Maybe the boy came first because he was separate from the rest?

"Enough people used that rift afterward to prove it was safe, and I know he went in. He was supposed to come out on the other end in the human world, safe and sound. That's the last I saw him, though. I figured he'd still be alive... Devimon said he'd survive it."

It was Hikari's turn to be stunned into silence, a rare occurance... everything was different now. The simple battle for their lives that went south had changed its face to reveal something far more complex and perhaps... far more sinister as well. Devimon had set up the whole fight, preparing the stage by convincing the digidestined he was after something that actually meant nothing to him. Then he protected Takeru, one of the children that were supposed to be his mortal enemies, even as he poured all his efforts into destroying that same child's partner. She once assumed that all the conspiracies began with the invasion of the human world by Etemon or Myotismon, but now it was clear they went all the way back to the origin of the war.

The last and worst question, then, was whether Devimon actually wanted this war or if he had an entirely different plan. If the latter, it meant there was potentially a whole other crisis looming somewhere on the horizon, and it was impossible to know what it was since Devimon was dead and his servant knew little to nothing of what the actual plan was.

"Hikari, we should go."

Gatomon finally cut in after an extended silence. They had come for answers, and in some ways they found exactly that. However, they also had more questions, and now they needed to figure out what to do about all this... Hikari simply nodded, face still blank, still too stunned to bring any emotion to her features.

"Do me a favor and don't tell your friends I'm up here. I figure they still hold a grudge, and frankly I'd rather keep trouble off this peak, if you don't mind."

Turning to Ogremon, Hikari would nod again as Gatomon ran back to her and hopped up onto her shoulder again.

"I figure I owe you at least that much for all the answers you gave me... thank you. Maybe we'll meet again after this war is done."

"Maybe so. And maybe next time we could have a good spar. Could use one after all this time sitting around and playing guard duty."

He stepped back into the ruins to hide from view as Hikari moved back to the edge of the peak to call for her pick up. Before long Birdramon would arrive to take her back down to the base of the mountain, and from there the trio of girls and their partners would proceed toward Primary Village to join the others.

Meanwhile, Ogremon emerged from the ruins to stand at the end of the peak and watch them fly away. Interesting girl... not the one he expected to visit, but it was just as well. Her ignorance of the history of File Island made her more curious and more likely to ask questions, which made it much easier for Ogremon to give answers. So... that was finished. At least one of the children now knew truth of what had happened three years ago, and she would put that knowledge to use in the future, as soon as it became relevant.

Devimon's wishes fulfilled, Ogremon could finally leave this place after going to pick up the last remnants of what Devimon had left behind. Three years was a long time to wait, and Ogremon was more than happy to be able to put all of this behind him at last. Time to prepare for the final task he had been given before the fall... he had to make sure everything was in place for when the war ended so that the last of the black gears would end up in the hands of the only one who could use them for their true purpose... Takeru Takaishi.