Disclaimer: Digimon does not belong to me. All characters and items within are all based around both the television show and the card game. None of these belong to me. (though I wish they did, like probably everyone else...)

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A Meeting Of Tamers

By Lady Geuna

Rated: PG

Summary: There is the Dark World, Dream World, Digital World, Real World, and the Tamer World. But what if Takato of the Tamer World discovers a key that could force all the worlds into one? The balance of the very worlds will shift like no one would've ever expected.

Another Universe, but mostly canon. Takes place some time before they meet Ryou and the Devas, and before their digimon are able to digivolve to Ultimate.

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"..." speech

'....' thoughts

/.../ around a SENTENCE will mean a flashback or memory.

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Names to know:

Rika: Ruki Makino

Henry: Jenrya Lee

Riley: Reike

Riley's Coworker(?): Megumi

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Translations other than the ones here can be seen in Chapter Two: Transferring... /Data Downloading/, k?

Itai- "ow"

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Chapter Four: A meeting of Tamers...

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The moment went by in a flash. It was all a blur of confusion, colors, lights...

Screams...

A streak of red. And then, data...

Data flying all around him.

Ken watched in a state of shock as Seadramon disappeared, it's data turning into glowing blue fragments. Stingmon watched the fragments fly by, completely still and silent.

Stingmon killed it. Because of him.

"Stingmon..." Stingmon looked down upon him, and Ken could tell his red eyes were full of regret... But nothing could be changed now. "Why?"

"I'm sorry, Ken," Stingmon said quietly. "I had no choice... He was going to hurt you... I couldn't let him."

'I killed a digimon... I killed a digimon...'

"Not again..."

He found it difficult to hold himself together as his vision blurred and went out of focus as wetness filled his eyes. A pair of arms wrapped around his cold wet shoulders in an effort to comfort him.

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Lee did the only smart thing he could think of. He remained silent as the boy wept into his friend's arms. There was something about the older boy, but he wouldn't say anything at the moment. Lee simply approached from the side, glancing back at Takato, who was desperately trying to dry himself off, with no help from Guilmon (who kept shaking himself off, getting Takato dripping wet all over again). But his friend continued trying to dry off his pajama, the both of them freezing wet in the cold.

He wondered for a moment where the digital field went, but didn't think about it too much. Digital fields have disappeared before, for their own reasons. Or someone else's.

The boy with dark hair seemed traumatized, horrified, his face turned from them and buried into his friends arms as he whispered what must've been words of comfort. "I killed it," he whispered. "I never wanted to kill again... Gods, I'm so, so sorry..."

Terriermon, who was starring sadly at the boy as well, tapped him on the head to get his attention. "Eh?"

"Lee-kun, why's he so sad?"

He frowned. By the sound of it, this kid had killed a digimon before... Or perhaps many digimon? He must've, considering how badly he was taking it, but Lee didn't dare to ask. "I think he feels a lot... stronger about this than some of us, Terriermon..." He looked around, trying to change the subject. This was making him uneasy. "Hey, where's Ruki? Takato got here, but she's usually right behind..."

"Who are you?"

Lee blinked, startled. The older boy, the one Terriermon called 'Ryou', was glaring at him with both wariness and malice. He wasn't anything like he was a moment ago, serious, tense and fairly calm about the situation. Worried for his younger companion... Now he seemed almost... dangerously protective of his friend. There was something about him that was terribly familiar, it was SO familiar it was almost annoying, on the tip of his mind...

Ryou took a deep breath and repeated, louder this time, "Who are you? Why are we here?"

Lee crossed his arms defensively. "I really have no idea. What are you doing here?" Did these two just get D-Arks or something? They had digimon. Where they new at this?

Lee jumped at the sound of a calm voice to his right.

"Who are these weirdo's?"

Lee frowned as Ruki stepped up next to him. Renamon appeared next to her, her gloved arms crossed and her head held high, as usual. Just like them to sneak around in silence. "They're not 'weirdo's', Ruki. They're kids like us." He thought for a moment, then asked, "Hey, when did you get here?"

She shrugged. "A few minutes ago... But Renamon thought we should stand back a little..." She eyed the lot of them and smirked. "It's a good thing, too. You're all going to turn into ice cubes if you stand around here forever. Since the digimon are gone you should leave."

Lee wrapped his arms around himself unconsciously, a weak attempt to protect himself from the chill he was feeling, starring at her in surprise. "Why didn't Renamon fight?"

Ruki looked away, her eyes to the ground. "She didn't want to." When she didn't say anymore, Lee didn't care to pry.

Lee noticed Renamon starring intently at something. Following her gaze, he found her watching Stingmon carefully... In fact, she seemed rather tense. But it was no sooner had Lee noticed this that the Stingmon was enveloped in a bright white light. In an instant, it had become a smaller creature that look very much like caterpillar. A Wormmon, unless he was mistaken. It crawled up to his partner, nuzzling his knee.

"Ken-chan... I'm sorry..."

'Ken' smiled, brushing away tears and picking up the digimon. "Wormmon," was all he muttered before hugging the Wormmon tightly. "Don't worry, it's not your fault..." A small blue digimon, a Veemon, clamped into Ryou's arm, looking sad.

This looked like it was going to be a difficult situation.

Ryou patted Ken on the shoulder before standing, still dripping wet and shivering. "Look, if you don't tell me who the Hell you people are, I swear--..."

"You swear what, tough guy!"

Both Lee paled as Ruki stepped forward, glaring right back.

Ryou took a step back, looking a bit sheepish now and not at all intimidating. Maybe because she was a girl...? "Um, look lady, I didn't mean anything..."

Ruki raised an eyebrow, examining him like he were distasteful, but also like she was trying to remember something. "Don't I know you from somewhere...?" Then her eyes widened, and a horrified look crossed her face. "YOU!"

Ryou's eyes also widened in shock, and he was struggling to contain some sort of smirk. "Oh... Hello again..."

Lee blinked, looking between the two. "You know each other?"

Ruki huffed, looked away. "I wish I could forget."

"It's a long story," Ryou explain shortly, reverting his attention back to Ken.

Ruki didn't comment on this, but said, "Why is Takato imitating a sea base?"

Lee paused. "What?" He turned to look where Takato had been a moment ago. "But I don't-" He stopped when he found Takato standing right behind him, his mouth hanging open and his eyes bulging out of his head. Guilmon was watching his partner's reaction with interest and Terriermon started giggling. "Takato? What's the matter?"

Takato's mouth flapped a few times, but managed to get out a few words.

"O.... Oh... MAN!!! TH-THEY'RE REALLY...!!!"

Lee backed up. "Takato, what's wrong with you!?" He looked like he'd seen a ghost or something.

He gasped a few more times, pointing with both hands at Ryou, Ken and their digimon. Both the boys in question looked right back with very startled, and very baffled expressions. "D-Don't you recognize who they are!?" He suddenly rushed forward, stopped right in front of Ryou. Ryou's eyes bugged out as Takato poked him in the arm, hard.

"Excuse me," Ryou said sharply, backing up a step. "I don't think I like you doing that." He eyed Takato warningly.

"OMG YOU'RE REAL! YOU'RE HERE! I never expected...!" He pointed at Ken, who scooted back a bit. "And you're him! The Kaiser! Well, you're good now, so that doesn't really matter, I guess..."

Lee was totally confused now, especially when Ken's eyes narrowed threateningly, his expression darkening.

Then it all hit.

The Wormmon. That device, it wasn't a D-Ark, it was a D-3, like in the game... A Dark D-3. And that expression... Put a pair of yellow framed purple tinted sunglasses over them and...

"Oh man..." He slowly put a hand over his mouth, his eyes widening like Takato's. "H-How...?"

Only Ruki was left now to stare at both him and Takato, glaring at Ryou now and then, looking annoyed and aggravated. "Can someone please tell me what you're gawking about?"

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Reike frowned, examining the new data that was coming in fast. Most of it didn't make sense, but she was working on it.

"When will Yamaki get back," she asked the darkened room, which was only light by the single large computer screen. She was alone now. Megumi had gone for a break after all that happened, probably to get a drink. And probably something strong...

She sighed, typing in a few commands in order to follow the data streams to there origin. Obviously, if they didn't originate from the Digital Plane, then they must have come from another. The data streams would lead right back. One in particular caught her eye.

It was odd... It was like the data of the Digital Plane, all the data going to this other Plane was... Dark...

She didn't know how else to explain it.

Almost all the data appeared in a spectrum of black and violet.

Violet, in a sense is the same thing as darkness. It's the only form of spectrum that light cannot pass through. So in a sense... As black is the absence of light, violet is it's destroyer.

"Boy," she muttered to herself, "that's a cheery thought... What's the matter with you, Reike?"

Reike adjusted her visor just to make sure she wasn't receiving any sort of interference. No, what she was seeing was correct... But the computer was having trouble deciphering the data. It was like there two new anomalies that bioemerged hours before. Unless they could directly analyze them, they couldn't get a tracer lock on them long enough to understand how they function.

'Can't hurt to analyze it a bit further.'

Typing in a few more commands, she send in a prob to go into the Dark Matter stream.

(A/N: Yes, in case you're wondering, this "Dark Matter" IS the Dark World. It's the only way I could describe it. And yes, there is such a thing as Dark Matter. It exists in space, and is impossible to penetrate with light. And when I mean impossible, I mean IMPOSSIBLE!)

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To be Continued in Chapter Five: Darkness rising...

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