Disclaimer: I own Digimon, Mwahahahaha!! *Coughs* Okay I DON'T own Digimon,
but I could kidnap all the right people and then own it, and you can be
that Ken would be in season 4. But sadly the court says I'm not supposed to
go near the people who do own Digimon, so that blows that plan. I don't own
Digimon. ^-~
(A/N: I'm normal, really I am. ^-~ Anyway thanks for reviewing people. I think this is the last chapter. Sadly, this is a short story, but I think the sequel will be longer (and this will act like the prolog). I was really tired last night when I finished it, so sorry that it is not so great. Also I forgot to ask a bunch of important stuff. So please guys if you can help me, I would really appreciate it, and will do anything you ask me to. Research, story, whatever. If anyone can get me a bunch of info on the Four great beasts (Those Guardian things, I can't remember what they are called, but you know, the Dragon and those beasts). Also I was gonna ask what the word 'Rouge' is in Japanese or a word similar. Unfortunately I don't learn Japanese and so don't know these things. It's not really important now as I have changed my mind about something.)
'Revenge'
"And it all comes together'
Ken stared at the figure across from him, "How is that possible, you aren't…"
"Silence!" The figure held up its hand and Ken clamped his jaw shut, involuntarily. "I will speak now."
Ken shifted uncomfortably as he took in the fact that dangerous looking Digimon surrounded him, and they were enclosing around him, he had no escape. "Out of the frying pan into the fire huh Ken?" He mumbled to himself.
~~~~****~~~~
Davis and TK had caught the paramedics at the doors of the school and told them that they were friends. She agreed to them riding in the ambulance with Kari.
The pink-clad girl stirred and moaned. Fluttering her eyes open, she focused on TK, "Ken." She forced out, "He's in…danger." She swallowed and forced out another sentence, "You have to help him."
TK looked at Davis then back down at Kari, "We'll go to the hospital with you first, then we'll look for him."
"Go to the Digital world, I have a feeling he will be there." Kari sighed and lost consciousness.
The Paramedic looked quizzically at the two boys.
Davis scratched his head, "Er, she's delusional?"
~~~~****~~~~
"I don't understand." Ken looked around him and back at the figure.
"You aren't meant to, not yet. I haven't explained."
"Mae? How did you get here?"
The red-haired girl cocked her head to the side; "I live here. Mae is not who I am, it is just my name." The girl with striking green eyes shifted and her form became hazy as she morphed into something else. A humanoid creature. She had waist length, wavy brown hair; she grew a bit taller, so now she was half a head taller than Ken. Her dress was emerald green to match her eyes. Long, soft, flowing sleeves covered her arms, and the skirt flowed out at the bottom, covering her bare feet. "I am a very powerful being. My name is Mae and I was a guardian like Gennai, one of the firsts, until I was banished from my duties. I live alone now and act on my own accord."
"A Guardian, banished?"
"Yes Ken." Her words were very articulate, and Ken got the feeling she was very old, even though she looked about eighteen.
"Why do you have me surrounded?" Ken growled.
"You are being punished Emperor boy."
Ken stepped back, "I'm not the Emperor anymore!" He hesitated, "And if there are times when he is about, I don't know what I'm doing…"
"I know this."
"You, what?"
Mae sighed, "Do not worry boy Emperor, you are not loosing your mind. I was the one to hurt your friends, you did not."
At those words, Ken became enraged, but dared not go too close to Mae or show his anger too much, as the Digimon around him, looked ready to strike.
"I am a shape shifter. I took on your form." She illustrated this for Ken, showing him a mirror image of himself, with one error, her or the other Ken's eyes had a slight green tinge to them. Then she changed back to her form.
"My original plan was to punish you through your friends. For months Ken, I watched you as the Digimon Emperor. I watched you kill my friends, I watched you enslave them, I watched you watch as you made them fight each other and kill each other. And I could do nothing! I hurt so much. Your pain does not make up for the pain they felt, for the pain I felt."
Ken fell to his knees as tears rolled down his soft cheeks, "I'm sorry."
"It does not make it right Ken. I needed you to feel that again! It would be so easy for you to become him again. And I know you want to sometimes. To be free of the pain, the guilt. I know you Ken. We are the same you and I Ken. We both walk in the land of darkness and the land of light and yet we belong to neither."
"I am nothing like you! I did not know that what I was doing was real! You did!" Ken screamed.
"I understand that Ken. And yes, I admit what I did was wrong, but it was for a very important reason. To punish you. An eye for an eye. I have already stated that. My true plan was not to hurt them badly, but I hit Yolei too hard, I do not know my own strength, and when I heard the police say that you were going to be arrested for attempted murder, I started framing you."
"What?"
"Last night, I was the one to e-mail you. I was the one to shut down all the other ports. I wanted you and Yolei alone in one place, on my territory. I forced you through the port leaving Yolei and I alone in the room."
"But I didn't feel you push me though."
"I have incredible mind powers Ken. Such as telekinesis for one." She lifted a twig off the ground and dropped it at Ken's feet just by looking at it. "After that incident with Yolei, I changed my plans to make you the criminal. I took your form and made sure Cody identified me as you when I stabbed him, making sure not to harm any vital organs. When he fell unconscious, I used a cellular phone to call the hospital and tell them to send an ambulance over. It was a good thing Yolei slipped into a coma, because she could have ruined everything by waking up. She saw who I was, and I told her that I was going to come after you too Ken. That's why in the hospital she was mumbling something about you. Your friend's thought she was saying it was you. All except Davis that is."
Ken frowned at the woman standing across from him; he could not believe the things she was telling him.
"Your life became a nightmare in just a few hours, and my plan was working better than I had expected. You were suffering. You were petrified to be caged in a prison for a crime you didn't commit. Just like all the Digimon you hunted and caught and enslaved when you were the Emperor!"
"But what about the nightmare, and the blood on my shoes?"
She gave a small laugh, "The nightmare was induced by me, when Davis had left the room. I planted to the shoe in his room, taking away your real shoe. I followed you everywhere except when I was framing you. However Kari being the enlighten one she is, became suspicious of the whole situation and me. She went to the school and saw the videotape or a copy of it anyway as the real one went to the police. She saw a figure come out of the shadows ever so slightly. She saw me talk to Yolei for a brief moment and then hit her over the head, in that moment she saw a flash of green in the computer screen light. Something no one else noticed. My eyes. I returned to the shadows again when you exited the Digital world and saw Yolei on the ground. I watched you panic when those men thought it was you who had done the deed. I watched you sneak out the window and then I took on your form and ran out the building, no one saw me and later made my own port and returned to the Digital World. I had to stop Kari from telling the others, so I knocked her out, but realized that they would find out sooner or later, so that is why you are here. I created those blocks or gaps in your memory that is why you thought you were doing those things."
"How DARE you!" Ken exploded.
"Silence!" she snapped, "Ken, do you not see that what I did was for your own good?"
Ken's face relaxed in confusion, "For my own good? You hurt my friends to punish me for something I beat myself up for everyday! I don't see what you did that helped me."
"You have to be cruel to be kind, Ken, you of all people should know that." She began to walk around him, "Ken, I know that you ache for the Emperor to come back, so you stop feeling those feelings…"
"You know nothing about me!"
"Quite the opposite, I know everything about you."
Before she could finish, a Digimon lashed forward and attacked Ken. He flew backwards and hit the ground hard.
"NO!" Mae screamed, "Leave him be! You will not harm him!"
The Gomamon* looked at Mae in confusion. He was not the only one, Ken, from where he was lying, pushed himself up onto his elbows and stared at the emerald-clad woman. Surely this is what she wanted, for him to be beaten, for him to be killed. But then why did she stop the rock-type Digimon.
The Gomamon opened his mouth to ask her why she had stopped him, but she answered before it was formed.
"I do not want him killed. I just wanted him to learn his lesson. He has learnt it and now is free to go."
Ken was torn between feeling confused about this situation, or whether he should feel incredibly lucky. He chose the latter, considering that every Digimon there wanted a piece of him.
"You have a large cut on your arm Ken." Mae said as she approached the indigo-haired boy and stretched out her hand to help him up. He took it gratefully. "It must have been from the Gomamon's attack. I can heal that for you."
Before he could protest, she placed a warm hand on his upper arm, where his gray shirt had been ripped and crimson liquid had stained it. A Luke-warm sensation erupted from her palm and the area of torn flesh became numb as it closed itself and healed over, leaving a faint scar. She took her hand away and stepped back, her eyes downcast. "I want you to know I am sorry for my actions Ken, but you must understand I had my reasons."
Ken nodded, "I understand, and in a way, I think I am glad for it. You are right about me wanting to be the Emperor sometimes. This experience has taught me that I love my friends too much to do that to them. I will never resort back to him again, not even wish it."
She lifted her head to look into his eyes; "You are wise beyond your years Ken Ichijouji. If you come with me to the real world, I will heal your friends and erase this event from their memories, but I will leave it with you."
"Okay, but what about everyone else, the police I mean. Will they still think that I did it?"
"No, I will fix it for you Ken, do not worry."
~~~~****~~~~
"We should get to the Digital World now, TK." Davis urged as they watched Kari being rushed into the hospital.
TK stared after her, "I don't wanna leave her, but you're right."
Davis glanced to the right of him and noticed a ripple in the air, a few feet from where they were standing. It looked like space was being torn open, and it was. A woman with long brown, wavy hair, dressed in Emerald stepped out of the rip and a boy dressed in gray with indigo hair followed her. As soon as they were completely out of the silvery glow of the rip, it closed up behind them, as if it had never been there.
The blond and auburn haired boys stared at the two figures. Then TK remembered that he was angry with Ken for attacking Kari. He dived at him, but Mae held up her hand and TK stopped dead, as if he had just got stuck in cement.
"Do not disturb us. Your friends will be fine. Trust me."
Davis and TK nodded silently, a little dumbstruck and followed her and Ken into the hospital. Their mouths dropped as everything in the hospital froze. Everyone except them was dead still, and for a moment Davis thought they had entered a museum full of statues.
"I have frozen time in this building, I can not do it for long so you will have to hurry, if you are to follow me." Without another word she moved over to Kari, who was about to be wheeled into an ER. She waved her hand over Kari's head and the girls' wound healed before their eyes and she stirred. "One of you carry her, she will be fine in a few minutes."
Both Davis and TK rushed for her, but TK got there first and picked her up into his arms.
Davis fell behind to talk to Ken as they ascended the stares (as the elevator was frozen in time).
"So who is this woman and what the hell is going on?"
"It's a really long story Davis, and I'm not gonna bother telling you, since you are going to forget anyway."
Davis screwed up his face in protest, "I will not!"
"Yes you will, because Mae is going to erase all this from you memory, but not mine."
"What? Why?"
"It's for the best, and I had to learn something."
"Mae? As in, the Mae that was new at your school and you made friends with? But she doesn't look like her."
"She is a shape shifter. She's very powerful, but all this is not important right now."
They stepped into Yolei's room. Again, Mae moved over to the side of the lavender haired girls bed and waved her hand over the bandaged area. Yolei stirred just like Kari and woke up, fluttering her eyes open.
"Wha…?" she mumbled.
Mae swiftly moved over to Cody's room and hesitated when she was going to heal him.
"What is it?" Ken asked.
She turned to the whole group; "Your friend here was stabbed by a mugger last night that is why you are at the hospital. It is not serious and he will be fine in a few days." She waved her hand over the wound slightly, only half healing it.
"No, that's not what happened…" TK protested, but before he could go any further, Mae held her hands out to the side and a strong white ring of light was circling her waist. In an instant she screwed up her face in concentration and as she relaxed her face, the ring of light pulsed outwards passing through everything that it came in contact with it, including the group. It missed Ken.
It went out the hospital, to the school, to the police station (where a tape melted and disappeared), to the detective's office where a report changed it's words to fit Mae's story. To the Ichijouji residence where Mrs. Ichijouji was picking up her son's shoes at the front door and was about to go see if he was home. It stretched for miles and when it had done its job, it vanished.
Time in the hospital building resumed and the usual rush of people was seen and the buzz of frantic talking was heard.
Mae had vanished when the others opened their eyes.
A few days later, when Ken went looking for evidence of the young, redheaded Mae that he had befriended only a few days ago, he found no record of such a person existing. He smiled lightly to himself.
~~~~****~~~~
The wind tugged gently at her soft, flowing hair as she marveled the sight of the Digital world before her. Her toes just touched the edge of the grassy cliff she stood on. A figure walked over to her and stopped just behind her, taking her right hand in his. She squeezed it back and a tear rolled down her soft, pale cheek.
"I'm sorry Gennai."
"I know you are. I know it had to be done."
----~~~~----
Nic: And it's done! I hope everyone enjoyed how it ended.
Ken: Yeah, I'm cool with it, you didn't make me a murderer after all. But you still tortured me, although not as much as you intended.
Nic: No, I didn't want to, it was really unnecessary. But don't worry I make up for it in 'Doppelgangland'.
Ken: Oh, yay?
Kaiser: It was okay.
Nic: Everyone's a critic.
Wormmon: So is there a sequel?
Nic: There will be. But I really need some help with the bests, so if anyone can help me, please! Oh and that is if they all want a sequel, that is.
Kaiser: Why don't you do your own research?
Nic: I do, but my favorite site, The Digimon Experience, is closed or I can't get in or something. And they were the best site for that stuff, so if anyone can recommend a site for me, I would really appreciate it.
Osamu: Will I be in the sequel?
Nic: Maybe.
Ken: Will I be tortured in the sequel?
Wormmon: *Reading Nic's scribbled notes* Looks like it Ken-chan.
Nic: Damn it! Are my notes never safe from you muses!?
Ken, Kaiser, Osamu, Wormmon: NO! NEVER!
Nic: *-*;
(A/N: I'm normal, really I am. ^-~ Anyway thanks for reviewing people. I think this is the last chapter. Sadly, this is a short story, but I think the sequel will be longer (and this will act like the prolog). I was really tired last night when I finished it, so sorry that it is not so great. Also I forgot to ask a bunch of important stuff. So please guys if you can help me, I would really appreciate it, and will do anything you ask me to. Research, story, whatever. If anyone can get me a bunch of info on the Four great beasts (Those Guardian things, I can't remember what they are called, but you know, the Dragon and those beasts). Also I was gonna ask what the word 'Rouge' is in Japanese or a word similar. Unfortunately I don't learn Japanese and so don't know these things. It's not really important now as I have changed my mind about something.)
'Revenge'
"And it all comes together'
Ken stared at the figure across from him, "How is that possible, you aren't…"
"Silence!" The figure held up its hand and Ken clamped his jaw shut, involuntarily. "I will speak now."
Ken shifted uncomfortably as he took in the fact that dangerous looking Digimon surrounded him, and they were enclosing around him, he had no escape. "Out of the frying pan into the fire huh Ken?" He mumbled to himself.
~~~~****~~~~
Davis and TK had caught the paramedics at the doors of the school and told them that they were friends. She agreed to them riding in the ambulance with Kari.
The pink-clad girl stirred and moaned. Fluttering her eyes open, she focused on TK, "Ken." She forced out, "He's in…danger." She swallowed and forced out another sentence, "You have to help him."
TK looked at Davis then back down at Kari, "We'll go to the hospital with you first, then we'll look for him."
"Go to the Digital world, I have a feeling he will be there." Kari sighed and lost consciousness.
The Paramedic looked quizzically at the two boys.
Davis scratched his head, "Er, she's delusional?"
~~~~****~~~~
"I don't understand." Ken looked around him and back at the figure.
"You aren't meant to, not yet. I haven't explained."
"Mae? How did you get here?"
The red-haired girl cocked her head to the side; "I live here. Mae is not who I am, it is just my name." The girl with striking green eyes shifted and her form became hazy as she morphed into something else. A humanoid creature. She had waist length, wavy brown hair; she grew a bit taller, so now she was half a head taller than Ken. Her dress was emerald green to match her eyes. Long, soft, flowing sleeves covered her arms, and the skirt flowed out at the bottom, covering her bare feet. "I am a very powerful being. My name is Mae and I was a guardian like Gennai, one of the firsts, until I was banished from my duties. I live alone now and act on my own accord."
"A Guardian, banished?"
"Yes Ken." Her words were very articulate, and Ken got the feeling she was very old, even though she looked about eighteen.
"Why do you have me surrounded?" Ken growled.
"You are being punished Emperor boy."
Ken stepped back, "I'm not the Emperor anymore!" He hesitated, "And if there are times when he is about, I don't know what I'm doing…"
"I know this."
"You, what?"
Mae sighed, "Do not worry boy Emperor, you are not loosing your mind. I was the one to hurt your friends, you did not."
At those words, Ken became enraged, but dared not go too close to Mae or show his anger too much, as the Digimon around him, looked ready to strike.
"I am a shape shifter. I took on your form." She illustrated this for Ken, showing him a mirror image of himself, with one error, her or the other Ken's eyes had a slight green tinge to them. Then she changed back to her form.
"My original plan was to punish you through your friends. For months Ken, I watched you as the Digimon Emperor. I watched you kill my friends, I watched you enslave them, I watched you watch as you made them fight each other and kill each other. And I could do nothing! I hurt so much. Your pain does not make up for the pain they felt, for the pain I felt."
Ken fell to his knees as tears rolled down his soft cheeks, "I'm sorry."
"It does not make it right Ken. I needed you to feel that again! It would be so easy for you to become him again. And I know you want to sometimes. To be free of the pain, the guilt. I know you Ken. We are the same you and I Ken. We both walk in the land of darkness and the land of light and yet we belong to neither."
"I am nothing like you! I did not know that what I was doing was real! You did!" Ken screamed.
"I understand that Ken. And yes, I admit what I did was wrong, but it was for a very important reason. To punish you. An eye for an eye. I have already stated that. My true plan was not to hurt them badly, but I hit Yolei too hard, I do not know my own strength, and when I heard the police say that you were going to be arrested for attempted murder, I started framing you."
"What?"
"Last night, I was the one to e-mail you. I was the one to shut down all the other ports. I wanted you and Yolei alone in one place, on my territory. I forced you through the port leaving Yolei and I alone in the room."
"But I didn't feel you push me though."
"I have incredible mind powers Ken. Such as telekinesis for one." She lifted a twig off the ground and dropped it at Ken's feet just by looking at it. "After that incident with Yolei, I changed my plans to make you the criminal. I took your form and made sure Cody identified me as you when I stabbed him, making sure not to harm any vital organs. When he fell unconscious, I used a cellular phone to call the hospital and tell them to send an ambulance over. It was a good thing Yolei slipped into a coma, because she could have ruined everything by waking up. She saw who I was, and I told her that I was going to come after you too Ken. That's why in the hospital she was mumbling something about you. Your friend's thought she was saying it was you. All except Davis that is."
Ken frowned at the woman standing across from him; he could not believe the things she was telling him.
"Your life became a nightmare in just a few hours, and my plan was working better than I had expected. You were suffering. You were petrified to be caged in a prison for a crime you didn't commit. Just like all the Digimon you hunted and caught and enslaved when you were the Emperor!"
"But what about the nightmare, and the blood on my shoes?"
She gave a small laugh, "The nightmare was induced by me, when Davis had left the room. I planted to the shoe in his room, taking away your real shoe. I followed you everywhere except when I was framing you. However Kari being the enlighten one she is, became suspicious of the whole situation and me. She went to the school and saw the videotape or a copy of it anyway as the real one went to the police. She saw a figure come out of the shadows ever so slightly. She saw me talk to Yolei for a brief moment and then hit her over the head, in that moment she saw a flash of green in the computer screen light. Something no one else noticed. My eyes. I returned to the shadows again when you exited the Digital world and saw Yolei on the ground. I watched you panic when those men thought it was you who had done the deed. I watched you sneak out the window and then I took on your form and ran out the building, no one saw me and later made my own port and returned to the Digital World. I had to stop Kari from telling the others, so I knocked her out, but realized that they would find out sooner or later, so that is why you are here. I created those blocks or gaps in your memory that is why you thought you were doing those things."
"How DARE you!" Ken exploded.
"Silence!" she snapped, "Ken, do you not see that what I did was for your own good?"
Ken's face relaxed in confusion, "For my own good? You hurt my friends to punish me for something I beat myself up for everyday! I don't see what you did that helped me."
"You have to be cruel to be kind, Ken, you of all people should know that." She began to walk around him, "Ken, I know that you ache for the Emperor to come back, so you stop feeling those feelings…"
"You know nothing about me!"
"Quite the opposite, I know everything about you."
Before she could finish, a Digimon lashed forward and attacked Ken. He flew backwards and hit the ground hard.
"NO!" Mae screamed, "Leave him be! You will not harm him!"
The Gomamon* looked at Mae in confusion. He was not the only one, Ken, from where he was lying, pushed himself up onto his elbows and stared at the emerald-clad woman. Surely this is what she wanted, for him to be beaten, for him to be killed. But then why did she stop the rock-type Digimon.
The Gomamon opened his mouth to ask her why she had stopped him, but she answered before it was formed.
"I do not want him killed. I just wanted him to learn his lesson. He has learnt it and now is free to go."
Ken was torn between feeling confused about this situation, or whether he should feel incredibly lucky. He chose the latter, considering that every Digimon there wanted a piece of him.
"You have a large cut on your arm Ken." Mae said as she approached the indigo-haired boy and stretched out her hand to help him up. He took it gratefully. "It must have been from the Gomamon's attack. I can heal that for you."
Before he could protest, she placed a warm hand on his upper arm, where his gray shirt had been ripped and crimson liquid had stained it. A Luke-warm sensation erupted from her palm and the area of torn flesh became numb as it closed itself and healed over, leaving a faint scar. She took her hand away and stepped back, her eyes downcast. "I want you to know I am sorry for my actions Ken, but you must understand I had my reasons."
Ken nodded, "I understand, and in a way, I think I am glad for it. You are right about me wanting to be the Emperor sometimes. This experience has taught me that I love my friends too much to do that to them. I will never resort back to him again, not even wish it."
She lifted her head to look into his eyes; "You are wise beyond your years Ken Ichijouji. If you come with me to the real world, I will heal your friends and erase this event from their memories, but I will leave it with you."
"Okay, but what about everyone else, the police I mean. Will they still think that I did it?"
"No, I will fix it for you Ken, do not worry."
~~~~****~~~~
"We should get to the Digital World now, TK." Davis urged as they watched Kari being rushed into the hospital.
TK stared after her, "I don't wanna leave her, but you're right."
Davis glanced to the right of him and noticed a ripple in the air, a few feet from where they were standing. It looked like space was being torn open, and it was. A woman with long brown, wavy hair, dressed in Emerald stepped out of the rip and a boy dressed in gray with indigo hair followed her. As soon as they were completely out of the silvery glow of the rip, it closed up behind them, as if it had never been there.
The blond and auburn haired boys stared at the two figures. Then TK remembered that he was angry with Ken for attacking Kari. He dived at him, but Mae held up her hand and TK stopped dead, as if he had just got stuck in cement.
"Do not disturb us. Your friends will be fine. Trust me."
Davis and TK nodded silently, a little dumbstruck and followed her and Ken into the hospital. Their mouths dropped as everything in the hospital froze. Everyone except them was dead still, and for a moment Davis thought they had entered a museum full of statues.
"I have frozen time in this building, I can not do it for long so you will have to hurry, if you are to follow me." Without another word she moved over to Kari, who was about to be wheeled into an ER. She waved her hand over Kari's head and the girls' wound healed before their eyes and she stirred. "One of you carry her, she will be fine in a few minutes."
Both Davis and TK rushed for her, but TK got there first and picked her up into his arms.
Davis fell behind to talk to Ken as they ascended the stares (as the elevator was frozen in time).
"So who is this woman and what the hell is going on?"
"It's a really long story Davis, and I'm not gonna bother telling you, since you are going to forget anyway."
Davis screwed up his face in protest, "I will not!"
"Yes you will, because Mae is going to erase all this from you memory, but not mine."
"What? Why?"
"It's for the best, and I had to learn something."
"Mae? As in, the Mae that was new at your school and you made friends with? But she doesn't look like her."
"She is a shape shifter. She's very powerful, but all this is not important right now."
They stepped into Yolei's room. Again, Mae moved over to the side of the lavender haired girls bed and waved her hand over the bandaged area. Yolei stirred just like Kari and woke up, fluttering her eyes open.
"Wha…?" she mumbled.
Mae swiftly moved over to Cody's room and hesitated when she was going to heal him.
"What is it?" Ken asked.
She turned to the whole group; "Your friend here was stabbed by a mugger last night that is why you are at the hospital. It is not serious and he will be fine in a few days." She waved her hand over the wound slightly, only half healing it.
"No, that's not what happened…" TK protested, but before he could go any further, Mae held her hands out to the side and a strong white ring of light was circling her waist. In an instant she screwed up her face in concentration and as she relaxed her face, the ring of light pulsed outwards passing through everything that it came in contact with it, including the group. It missed Ken.
It went out the hospital, to the school, to the police station (where a tape melted and disappeared), to the detective's office where a report changed it's words to fit Mae's story. To the Ichijouji residence where Mrs. Ichijouji was picking up her son's shoes at the front door and was about to go see if he was home. It stretched for miles and when it had done its job, it vanished.
Time in the hospital building resumed and the usual rush of people was seen and the buzz of frantic talking was heard.
Mae had vanished when the others opened their eyes.
A few days later, when Ken went looking for evidence of the young, redheaded Mae that he had befriended only a few days ago, he found no record of such a person existing. He smiled lightly to himself.
~~~~****~~~~
The wind tugged gently at her soft, flowing hair as she marveled the sight of the Digital world before her. Her toes just touched the edge of the grassy cliff she stood on. A figure walked over to her and stopped just behind her, taking her right hand in his. She squeezed it back and a tear rolled down her soft, pale cheek.
"I'm sorry Gennai."
"I know you are. I know it had to be done."
----~~~~----
Nic: And it's done! I hope everyone enjoyed how it ended.
Ken: Yeah, I'm cool with it, you didn't make me a murderer after all. But you still tortured me, although not as much as you intended.
Nic: No, I didn't want to, it was really unnecessary. But don't worry I make up for it in 'Doppelgangland'.
Ken: Oh, yay?
Kaiser: It was okay.
Nic: Everyone's a critic.
Wormmon: So is there a sequel?
Nic: There will be. But I really need some help with the bests, so if anyone can help me, please! Oh and that is if they all want a sequel, that is.
Kaiser: Why don't you do your own research?
Nic: I do, but my favorite site, The Digimon Experience, is closed or I can't get in or something. And they were the best site for that stuff, so if anyone can recommend a site for me, I would really appreciate it.
Osamu: Will I be in the sequel?
Nic: Maybe.
Ken: Will I be tortured in the sequel?
Wormmon: *Reading Nic's scribbled notes* Looks like it Ken-chan.
Nic: Damn it! Are my notes never safe from you muses!?
Ken, Kaiser, Osamu, Wormmon: NO! NEVER!
Nic: *-*;