"Why can't I do this?" Gazimon grumbled as I stared at the empty circle floating over my wrist. Despite our best attempts, we were unable to recreate the digivolution into Devidramon we'd pulled off yesterday.

"Maybe there's something we're missing?" I thought back to the night we'd unlocked it in the first place. "We only gained the power to digivolve when we were lost in our negative emotions. Maybe it's not a switch, where we unlocked the ability to digivolve and now we have it forever. Maybe it's like a reservoir, as we feel negative emotions it fills up more until it's ready to be used."

"So what, we have to just stew in our rage until we can do it again?" Gazimon and I looked at each other before closing our eyes at the same time. I thought back to my entire life. All those times I'd ever been made to feel afraid or alone.

When I'd learned my parents died, when I'd met my Uncle for the first time, the look of disgust on his face. The way everyone at school would swiper about me, how I was a bad seed. Every Time someone had accused me of something I hadn't done, and the way the teacher would always take the other kids' side because of course I did what I was accused of.

I imagined that Gazimon was doing the same.

Gazimon and I opened our eyes at the same time. She had an annoyed look on her face, the same I probably had. Before I said a word I just looked down at my wrist and saw the circle, still empty.

"Well that was a dud," I groaned before sitting down. Gazimon walked over and took a seat next to me as I rubbed my forehead to clear the oncoming headache. "All that did was leave me in a bad mood."

"Same story here," she grumbled before slapping the ground beneath her, "ugh and I really wanted to fly around in here too."

She flicked her arm towards the vast empty space of the laptop. I took a second to imagine Devidramon spreading out her wings and flying through the air, avoiding the roads like an obstacle course.

"That does sound fun," I snickered as I pulled my arm around her, "so when we figure out how to reach champion on command, are you going to give me a ride?"

"Maybe if you can prove you won't fall off," she scoffed before letting out a laugh, "Thanks for that, I needed a laugh after what we tired,"

"Yeah, my brain's not the funnest place either. Especially when I'm trying to brood on purpose," I narrowed my eyes and pulled Gazimon into a tighter hug, "plus what do you mean 'you needed a laugh'? I meant every word. There's no way you're hogging all the flying for yourself."

"But the whole point of flying is being able to fly around however you want. If I have to fly carefully to keep you from falling off, then what's the point?"

"You let me worry about hanging on," I told her as I imagined flying through the sky on Devidramon's… "huh. Where would be a good spot to ride from? Your hand just seems like a bad idea, but you move too much for your back to make sense either."

"Well I have a solution, don't ride on me when I go flying." she poked my cheek with her claw as I pouted. Looked like I'd lost this battle, but I'd try again when she actually managed to reach champion again… however long that would take.

She lowered her claw as I let go of her. We both sat back and took a couple seconds to just breathe.

"So…" Gazimon was the first to break the silence, "Why do you think it didn't work?"

"I have no clue." I admitted before getting to my feet and making my way to the exit. "Well, it's getting close to dinner time and we need to get going now if we don't want to be late."

Her ears perked up at the word 'dinner' as she followed after me. It was almost funny how food oriented she was. Almost being the keyword here. If it wasn't for the digihome providing a program to create food for her, Gazimon would have eaten me out of house and home by now.

Mostly because I would have been kicked out for stealing food, not because of how much she ate.

But I could spoil her for at least a day after everything we'd gone through since going on that mission. We emerged from the laptop as I glanced down at her. Yeah, she was still Gazimon.

Her emerging from the laptop in her rookie stage had been a surprise for everyone involved. It also made it much harder to stop her from eating her weight in food as soon as she stopped dancing around the room. Not that I could blame her for the latter. I'd act the same way if I knew I'd have limbs twenty-four seven from on.

"Okay, so let me just check to see if the coast is clear," I told her as I stuck my head out the door. I should have the house to myself for another hour at least, but always better to make sure. Gazimon just crossed her arms and waited for me to get on with it.


"Are we there yet?" Sarah asked for what felt like the eight time since they'd left.

"We'll get there when we get there," Betamon explained as Sarah did her best to not stare at him. It had been an eventful day since she'd seen her brother coming out of the TV. She finally knew where he'd gone that summer he'd disappeared, and why he was so different when he came back. She was still trying to wrap her head around it all.

Not the part where he'd gone to an amazing other world of monsters and adventure. No, the part she had trouble wrapping her head around was William being gone for three months for her, and one year for him.

He'd apparently grown up a lot in that year, even if he came back looking the same. And with age came… what did he call it, insight?

The point was that he was older and wiser and didn't have time to play with his little sister anymore. Not with all of the dangers coming after them. Like the one which had forced them to run away from home.

She hoped Mom, Dad, and Emma were okay. William had told her the danger was only after her, but it couldn't hurt her if she escaped with him into the internet. Her parents would be mad, but William told her they'd feel a lot worse if the danger got to her.

"Don't worry Sarah, we're just about there," William reassured her before coming to a stop. Sarah and Betamon stopped right behind him. "Perfect timing."

He placed his hand on the empty part of the tube only for a small section the size of his palm to sink. A second later, the rest of the empty section disappeared in a flash of light to reveal…

"Secret passageway!" Sarah rushed forward, avoiding her brother's hand as she tried to grab him. She floated through the dark tunnel as she slowly felt gravity taking hold again. She stretched her legs out to catch herself just as she spotted a light at the end of the tunnel.

She landed on both feet and immediately switched to running until she could make out what the light was. It was the end of the tunnel which seemed to open to a larger chamber. She ran even faster making it past the tunnel exit as she finally came to a stop and took in the sight around her.

It was a gigantic circular room, divided into five sections with a neutral flat area in the center with a single long corridor connecting it to the entrance. She slowly walked forward until she reached the central area and looked all around her.

The first section was rocky mountains made of yellowish rocks. A couple of dinosaur bones and utility poles poked out of the cliffs making a crisscrossing network of wires around the mountains. Behind it all was the symbol of an orange sun emblazoned on the wall.

The second section was a series of yellow platforms and walls in a honeycomb platform. Waterfalls of what looked like honey fell from the platforms into a large pool at the bottom. At the center of the area was a large ball of honeycomb and on the back wall was a purple carving of two balls connected to each other, one larger than the other.

The third section was a watery marsh, with a large lake in the center. Various vending machines poked out of the water, and next to the lake was a small wooden building with a dock going into the lake. On the back of the wall was a gray cross with little triangles in the corners made from moss covered stone.

The fourth section was a forest with a gigantic tree at the back that reached up into the ceiling. Surrounding it was a wild jungle filled with trees concord in vines, flowers and stone statues covered in moss. In fact the closer she looked, the more she could make out a couple of white stone ruins scattered around. The symbol was a bit harder to stop, it was built into the tree, a green teardrop made of shining green vines and flowers.

The fifth and last section on the other hand had the most obvious symbol. It was a star made from pink glowing lines suspended in the air. All around it were clouds and nothing else, all floating over what at first looked like a mirror, but on closer inspection turned out to be a reflective pool of water. And that was when she spotted it, the clouds were all connected by little bridges and the largest cloud at the top… it looked like a castle.

"Impressive, isn't it," Sarah jumped as her brother put her hand on her shoulder. She gulped and looked up, wondering if her brother would be mad at her. She felt the tiniest bit of relief when she saw he was looking out over the five sections around them, "Once we got our digimon back, this was the first thing we all built together. It's meant to be a home base to operate out of, and for us, a home to stay in until it's safe to go back."

"Which one's yours," Sarah jumped in place as her brother pointed towards the marsh and lake. She let herself feel a little disappointed when he lightly slapped her on the back. "I know it's not the coolest one, but look on the brightside. You can swim all you want, play with the fish and the best part… no bugs."

Sarah took another look at the lake again and found she couldn't argue with her brother. Being able to just leave their house and just jump into a pool was pretty cool. And no bugs was a nice bonus.

"I take offense to 'no bugs' being the best part," I voice called out as she looked around until she spotted a person standing in the honeycomb section. She was standing at the entrance of the large honeycomb room in the center. She jumped off the edge and floated down until she reached them.

She was a short skinny girl, almost the same size as Sarah despite giving off the air of someone much older. She was wearing a pair of jeans and a long sleeved sweater with orange and yellow stripes. She had long messy blond hair the same shade as the honey around her and thick round glasses. Despite her short size, she was hunched over and needed to tilt her head all the way up to look William in the eyes.

She blinked twice before standing up straight again. "You've gotten taller than the last time I saw you. What are you doing around here with the…" She paused before just pointing at Sarah.

"She's my sister, it wasn't safe for her to stay out at our house anymore so I brought her here," he stopped and looked around. "Where's Fanbeemon? I thought she'd be with you."

"She is, she's back in the honey house," she pointed at the honeycomb house she'd come out of, "Why do you have something to tell us?"

"Yeah I do," William looked over his sister and Betamon before pointing toward the house. "Betamon, take my sister to the cabin, while I talk to Loch. Sarah, don't worry too much about the cabin when you go in, we're going to make it bigger in a little bit anyway."

"Okay," Sarah nodded as Betamon led her away. She walked just slowly enough to catch the end of her brother's conversation before they took off.

"Loch, I need you to listen to me. Someone's managed to harness the power of Dark Digivolution."

"What!" Loch's eyes widened to their full size for the first time since Sarah had seen them.

"One of these new people with digimon partners, the one Faith told us about, he somehow managed to figure out a secret behind Dark Digivolution. One we never knew about. Who knows what kind of evil thing she must have done in order to discover this information."


"That reminds me," Gabi finished pouring the boiling water into the second ramen cup before setting it down, waiting for Gazimon's question, "how did you know that stuff about dark digivolution. You know, the whole 'controlling our negative emotions instead of letting them rule us' thing."

"Oh that," he popped open the fridge to get out two eggs before setting them on the counter. He'd need to wait until the noodles were done cooking before cracking them open and mixing the egg in. "I made it all up on the spot to be dramatic. But after I said it, it felt correct so maybe I was onto something."

"Huh," she pulled her eyes back to the ramen cup still cooking, "you know what, you making it up on the fly makes total sense. You get ten times more dramatic when you put on that costume."

Gabi didn't even try to word a denial as they went back to waiting for their food.