When Naki's mother arrived at the lab, Izzy explained the situation to her. He didn't tell her about her daughter being a Digidestined, for fear of causing unnecessary and undesired problems. Instead he told her that the "accident" was a random natural phenomenon, and that Naki had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Mrs. Yasushi seemed to accept this, and was apparently just glad to know that Naki was going to be alright.
"Thank you very much," she said, bowing. "If it weren't for you I don't know what would have happened."
"Don't mention it, ma'am," he replied. The sliding door that led to the lab's restroom opened, and two figures walked out - one human, one digimon.
"Naki!" exclaimed the worried mother as she engulfed as she engulfed her daughter in a hug. The girl seemed surprised at this display of emotion, and couldn't react appropriately.
"What's the matter Mom?" she asked.
"What's the matter?! When I heard you were caught in an accident I was worried sick!" Again she glomped her confused daughter.
"Accident? What're you-" Before she could finish, she saw Mr. Izumi making a series of gestures. They were quick and a little confusing, but Naki got the general idea. Her mother didn't know what really happened. "Oh, oh yeah, the accident," Naki said quickly. "Right...don't worry Mom, I was okay."
Suddenly the mother grew angry. She let go of her daughter and gave her an accusatory stare. "Why weren't you with Patamon and Salamon, young lady?! Didn't we tell you to stay with them at all times?" She looked at Black Agumon disapprovingly. "And where did you find this strange digimon?!"
"You look pretty strange yourself," he replied crossly. Before Mrs. Yasushi could retaliate, Naki held the digimon's jaws shut and smiled nervously.
"He's just joking mother, honest! Right Agumon?" He didn't reply, vocally or otherwise.
Izzy purposefully cleared he throat, getting everyone's attention. "I'm sorry to interrupt, but if it's alright with you I'd like to do one more test with Naki. Just to make sure there aren't any long term effects from the accident."
Mrs. Yasushi stood up and unwittingly fidgeted with her purse. "If that's what you think is best, sir."
"Is that alright with you, Naki?" Izzy asked the girl.
She looked down at Black Agumon, who obviously wasn't enjoying himself. "Is it just one more?"
Koushiro nodded. "Yes, I promise. Your mother can take you home within the hour."
Naki nodded in compliance. "Okay. Is that okay with you Agumon?" The digimon looked up at her apathetically, and eventually nodded.
"Then it's settled," concluded Izzy.
****
Within a five-minute walk of the building Izzy's lab was in, a few human members of each team of Digidestined were eating an early dinner while discussing what to do about their digimon, who were all at home asleep. The group consisted of Tai, Matt, Sora, Davis, Joe, and Kari. Matt and Sora, however, were at another table eating by themselves and having a sweet, private conversation. The only one who seemed to care about this was Tai, who couldn't help but stare. It didn't take long for one of the others to notice.
(Hey Joe,) Kari whispered so that Tai wouldn't hear, but in truth he probably wouldn't have noticed a bomb going off in that restaurant. (Did you notice how Tai's been acting?)
Joe looked at his friend carefully, and nodded. (Yeah, he does seem a little preoccupied.)
(A little?! He hasn't taken his eyes off those two since we got here!)
(Are you serious?)
(Watch.) Kari quietly signalled to Davis to hand Tai's basket of fries (even in a fancy restaurant, he goes for the burger and fries...) to her. Davis complied, though he didn't think it was a good idea. Tai didn't even notice.
"Mmm...good fries, eh Tai?" she asked, taking a bite of one of his.
"Yeah," he agreed, nodding slowly yet still looking at the Ishida couple.
"Tai, I didn't order any fries."
"Uh-huh." Still looking.
"Tai, you're on fire."
"Okay." The unattentive Kamiya reached for another fry, only now realizing that his basket was gone. He looked angrily at Davis first (he always got blamed first), then at his sister. He snatched his food back while they laughed. Sora and Matt looked over with confusion.
"What's so funny?" Matt asked.
"Nothing!" said Tai quickly as he forcefully set his basket-o'-fries back where it belonged.
"Is something wrong, Tai?" Sora asked.
"No! You guys just enjoy your meal!" he ordered. The other three at the table held their breath and didn't move a muscle.
Sora and Matt both looked confused, but they nodded. "Uh...okay," the blonde answered unsurely. "Take it easy Tai." The two resumed their conversation, while Tai returned his attention to Davis, Joe, and Kari.
"What the heck are you guys doing?! That wasn't funny!" Tai said angrily.
"What's the matter with you?!" Kari hissed back. "Don't you know it's rude to stare?"
"I wasn't staring!"
"Tai, Greymon could have snuck past you and you wouldn't have noticed," said Joe.
"Yeah, what's the deal?" Davis chimed in, only half-focused on the conversation.
"None of your business!" Tai retorted. He tried to end the subject by focusing entirely on his hamburger, but Kari didn't let him off that easy.
"Tai, I've been your sister my whole life. For the last thirty I've been smarter than you. You can't fool me."
Tai looked at her angrily as he swallowed a bite of his burger. "What are you talking about?!"
"I know that you still-"
Tai pointed at her quickly as a silent warning. "Don't, say it."
"Why not? Everyone here knows."
"No they don't!"
Joe nodded. "Sure we do. It's not that hard to figure out." Davis nodded in agreement and continued munching on his noodles.
Tai held his hands behind his sagging head. "Oh man...why does stuff like this always happen to me?"
"You two weren't serious. How can you still fell this way about her?" Kari asked. "And you're a married man!"
"Not only that, but she's married to your best friend," Davis added.
"Thanks a lot for reminding me Motomiya," groaned Tai.
"Tai, you have to relax," warned Joe. "You don't want to say anything you'll regret."
"I'm trying!" he barked in reply. "I know it's wrong, but I can't keep lying to myself. This is driving me crazy!"
"Just calm down," insisted Joe. "She'll here you if you get any louder." Tai forced himself to relax. Once Tai was calm again, Joe continued. "It's okay if you feel like that, but you have to realize that Sora doesn't love you anymore like you do. She loves Matt now. Whatever you and Sora had when we were kids is gone now."
"But I don't want it to be gone!"
"Don't want what to be gone?" asked Sora as she and Matt joined them at their table.
"Uhh, nothing, nothing!" Tai insisted.
Sora looked confused. "Then what were you guys talking about just now?"
Tai looked at the other three for help. "We were talking about...uh..."
"Our crests!" said Kari quickly. "Tai doesn't want our crests to be gone! Eh heh heh..."
"Well, that goes without saying," said Matt as he gave them all a strange look.
"Is that it, Tai?" Sora asked. "Why wouldn't you want us to hear?"
Tai was sweating bullets. "I uh...didn't want to worry you guys about something so trivial. Worry is contagious, you know!"
The blonde raised an eyebrow, causing Tai even more discomfort. "Whatever you say Tai."
*phew*
"Have any of you tried using the crests again?" Sora asked.
Joe shook his head. "After seeing Tai's failed attempt I wasn't anxious to try."
"Me neither," agreed Matt. "It looks like they aren't as strong as they used to be."
"Then why did they even reappear?" Kari wondered. "If we can't use them, what's the point of having them?"
"Good question," said Tai. "I think that it has something to do with that girl. None of this stuff with the crests started until we found her in the Digital World. Plus she has a crest of her own."
"It doesn't make any sense," said Matt. "Why make ours reappear with no power if she has a fully functional crest?"
"Maybe they're handing the jersey over to the new player," suggested Davis. Nobody had a clue as to what he was talking about.
"Come again?" Matt said.
Davis took a drink of his soda and sighed with satisfaction. "When you replace a player on a soccer team, the old player has to was the jersey and give it to the new player. At least, that's how it worked on my team."
"We had a pretty cheap team," muttered Tai, remembering when he was on that same team.
"What does that have to do with our crests Davis?" Sora asked.
"Maybe your crests are just being handed over to her, but are just being fixed up first until they are where they need to be."
"That doesn't sound likely Davis," said Joe. "That's not how the changing of the guard works, so to speak."
"Actually, that may not be too far from the truth in this case." Everyone turned to see Izzy walking to their table. The redhood took the last available seat.
"So how's the girl?" Sora asked. "Is she doing okay?"
Izzy nodded. "Yeah, she and Black Agumon are doing just fine." Looking at Sora's plate of leftover sushi, he asked "Are you going to finish that?"
She giggled and handed him the plate. "No, help yourself." Izzy thanked her and hungrily dug in. With all the work he had been doing today, he forgot to eat.
"Black Agumon..." Kari repeated softly. "When you say that, it makes me think of someone else."
"Me too." They didn't say the digimon's name, but they all knew what digimon they were referring too. BlackWargreymon, the dark digimon who had helped them in their final battles as Digidestined.
"You don't think they're related, do you?" Davis asked.
"There are more virus type Agumons out there," Izzy answered. "There's a chance that it isn't him."
"But...what if it is?" Kari wondered. "Would he remember us?"
"He doesn't seem to remember anything prior to entering the Dark Ocean," the scientist replied. "All he knows is that he and Naki are meant to be partners. He doesn't even recognize the crest he came with, so I'm not sure if asking him about it would help. It'd probably just confuse him."
"Izzy, you said that what Davis said about the crests isn't too far from the truth," said Joe. "Were you serious about that?"
Izzy took a drink of water from one of the complimentary glasses nobody ever drinks from. "I was examing her crest when I discovered that it isn't actually the same kind of crest as ours. It doesn't function as an energy amplifier like ours did."
"You mean her crest is different too?" said Sora. "What crest is it?"
"It's not a crest of anything. Neither I nor my datafiles could find a match for the symbol on it. It seems to be just a meaningless symbol, though I'm sure it has a meaning of some kind. Otherwise it wouldn't be there."
"Weird..." muttered Tai.
"It gets weirder. The energy inside it was different from the energy our crests have. It's negatively charged."
"What?" Davis said. "Does that mean it's evil?"
"Not exactly. The energy inside her crest attracts our energy like a magnet. It feeds off and stores the power of our crests. So in essence, the power of our crests is being absorbed by hers."
"What!"
"You've gotta be kidding!"
"We've gotta stop this!" Tai said. "We've gotta destroy her crest!"
"Tai, are you crazy?!" said Matt. "We can't destroy her crest! She's a digidestined like us."
"But she's stealing our crests!" he retorted. "She must be working for some evil force or something! This crest of hers could be the reason our digimon are so weak!"
"Tai, calm down!" commanded Sora. Tai looked her eye-to-eye in protest, but immediately looked away. Sora could see redness in his cheeks- something she hadn't seen in years.
"Things might not be as they seem Tai," warned Izzy.
"Izzy's right," said Kari. "This is probably just one of Gennai's plans. He made our tags and crests, so he probably made this one too and is continuing the line of Digidestined."
"You don't actually believe that," said Tai in mild amazement.
"Not everything has to be a world-stomping threat Tai," said Matt. "You've been in politics too long."
"Are you sure about that?" Davis said. "I'm gonna have to go with Tai on this one. Don't you think Gennai would have told us about this if it was one of his plans?"
"He can be very secretive when he wants to be," Matt commented. "Plus he's never around when you need him."
Sora smiled. "Now you know that's not always true."
Matt smiled as well. "It seems that way sometimes." Tai looked like he was about to hang himself with Davis' noodles.
"There's only one way to find out," said Izzy. "Tomorrow, we've gotta go into the Digital World and find him. Whether it's his idea or not, he's got some explaining to do about our crests and this new girl's."
None of them could disagree with that idea.
****
The drive home was much too unhappy for Naki's taste. During the entire trip, her mother seemed tense. It wasn't too difficult to guess that Black Agumon made her uncomfortable. Naki couldn't figure out why her mother disliked him so much, but apparently Black Agumon returned the sentiment. Naki wondered if it was because he was a virus type digimon, but that wasn't likely. Betamon was a virus type, and mother didn't have any trouble with him. Then again, Betamon wasn't a very outspoken digimon- almost the exact opposite of Tohru, who spent the whole car ride asking about what happened as if his life depended on it.
"So this Agumon saved you from your accident," he said, heavily accenting the word "accident". Naki wondered if he somehow knew what really happened, or if he was just being a pain like usual. The latter was the most likely.
"Yes, he did," Naki said proudly, hugging Black Agumon protectively. The digimon was obviously less than pleased at being held like a ragdoll, but he didn't try to escape.
"Looks kinda wimpy to me," Tohru commented. "I bet he wouldn't last ten seconds in a battle with Betamon."
Black Agumon was about to say something back, but Naki cut in. "We're not going to fight Tohru! I don't want him getting hurt, and I don't want Betamon getting hurt either!"
"Hah! You're just chicken!" he said back. "Na-ki is a chi-cken, Na-ki is a chi-cken."
"I am not!"
"Are too!"
"Are not!"
"Are too!"
"Are-"
"Both of you be quiet!" their mother said.
"But-" Naki protested.
"I don't want to hear it! Just be quiet."
The rest of the ride was in silence. Tohru was obviously happy at the result of his taunting, which made Naki even angrier. She knew he didn't care about getting yelled at, and he knew that she really didn't like it. It was a common thing between them, but Naki had yet to handle the situation correctly.
Once they arrived home, they piled out of the vehicle in the garage and went up the stairwell of their apartment building. Tohru continuously gave his sister nasty stares, while Black Agumon did the same to the boy's back. After four flights of stairs they reached their home- number 504. Mrs. Yasushi tested the door, and found it opened already.
"Your father must be home already," the mother said in surprise. She walked inside followed by her children and their digimon, and indeed they found him sitting on the couch inside. On the chairs next to him were Tokomon and Nyaromon, looking very relieved when they saw who was at the door.
"Nyaromon, you're okay!" said Mrs. Yasushi as the little digimon leaped into her arms. She hugged the feline happily and tightly. "I was so worried!"
"You worry too much," Nyaromon replied, smiling at the woman who had been her partner for over two decades. "Was there any doubt that we'd be fine?"
The woman smiled, on the verge of tears. "You know me. Always a worry-wart."
Just like me, thought Naki. I guess she was right about me and mom being more similar than I thought.
After their little reunion, Nyaromon looked down at Naki with an angry expression that was very much like her mother's. Naki knew that Nyaromon could be worse than her mother on occasion- mother didn't have claws.
"Naki! You had us worried to death!" the white-furred digimon cried. "We looked all over for you, and found nothing!"
"You worry too much," said Naki with a smile.
"I do not!" she said defensively. "I'm just-"
"-very cautious," finished Mrs. Yasushi. Nyaromon looked at her with playful anger.
"Exactly. We were supposed to watch you, and you go running off!"
Tokomon hopped onto the head of the couch to join into the conversation. "Next time if you want to go somewhere, tell us."
"But you guys were sleeping so peacefully," Naki replied.
This got her father's attention. "Sleeping?" He looked at Tokomon. "You were sleeping when you were supposed to be watching my daughter?"
Tokomon sweat-dropped. "Well uh...that is..."
Nyaromon was also trying to come up with an answer. "We were just resting our eyes. If it wasn't for Elecmon's good food we wouldn't have fallen asleep!"
As the parents and their digimon continued their little argument, Tohru watched from the hallway quietly. Again, in all the excitement, he felt that he was somehow robbed. Last year, when he had placed high in the tournament he got special treatment that night from his parents. This year he got first, and nobody has done anything but dwell on what happened to Naki!
The boy smiled to himself. He had a plan. Naki would learn what happens when you steal the spotlight from those who deserve it. Tohru looked at the bored Black Agumon and laughed inwardly. He would get his payback.
