"Higher Max! Higher!" squealed Sefie. She gripped the chains of the swing. Max stood behind her, pushing her. "Maaaaax!!!"
"All right all ready!" yelled Max. He shoved her a little harder.
"Weeeeeeee!!"
"Not too high, Sefie," cautioned Jinjo. She hung by her knees from one of the nearby jungle gym bars.
"I know!" cried Sefie. She pumped her legs even harder.
"I'm surprised you came along Cody," said Max. He looked over his shoulder at Cody. The other boy was practicing with his Kendo sword.
."Hey, I may be busy, but I'll always find time to hang out. Plus," he shrugged. "They didn't seem like they needed me. They haven't really lately." He shook his head sadly. "They're off in high school land."
"Aw, cheer up buddy," said Travis. He skated towards a nearby bench, grinded and landed near them. He always had his skateboard. "You'll always have us."
"Thanks."
"Hey," said Jinjo, swinging up to do a handstand, then flipping around to sit on the bar. "Did you ever find that long lost relative?"
"Not yet, far as I know," said Cody.
Max's mind drifted a little, thinking about his Pokémon. I wonder what Pichu's doing right now…Probably bugging Caterpie for some of his extra ketchup packets. Chikorita and Totodile are probably having a water fight or something…Man, I miss them. Pichu…" Max sniffled a little, remembering all of them. How he longed for the open road again, to travel and train his Pokémon to their best. To compete in another gym battle was something he dreamed of. Even to take one of those stupid trainer tests again seemed appealing. A Jigglypuff seen from above. He snorted at the idiotic question. I wonder if I can go visit during spring break.
THWAK
Sefie's foot met with Max's head. "Sowwwiee!" Max shot a look at Sefie as she pumped higher into the air. He swatted at the stars and birds that he was getting to know oh so well. Stupid birds…
"That's the second time you've nailed me on the head, Sefie!" exclaimed Max.
"I don't mean to," said Sefie pouting. "Sowwiee!!" she suddenly looked at the entrance of the park. "Hey, isn't that…kinda everyone?" she squinted. "I see Taiyoshoes an' Sooda an' Yummy yummy yumato, an' Teek an' Davy an' Kari-Kari an' Kooshiekooshi zumi an' Lei-Lei…Oh wooooowww!" she exclaimed. Sefie slowed down her swing, leapt off, and ran to meet them.
"Does she have a name for everyone?" asked Max.
"Sadly," said Travis. "Don't worry, she'll get to you sooner or later."
"Guys?" said Cody in surprise.
Sefie leapt into the first person's arms. "Sooda!" she squealed.
Sora reeled back from impact. "Hey Sefie." She twirled the little girl in the air.
"Yeeeeaaaaaaaahhhhhhhh!"
"What's up guys?" said Cody urgently. "What's going on?
Tai grinned, "We found them."
Cody's eyes widened. "Really? Did you contact them yet?"
"Nope," Davis shook his head. "C'mon. We're in for some heavy-duty Digidestined-ing." Cody froze at the mention of the D word in front of his friends.
"Uh, yeah, we'd better leave," said Cody quickly, hoping his friends wouldn't say anything. "Uh, I'll see you guys later, ok?"
"Hey!" protested Max. "Why can't we go?" Jinjo elbowed him. "What?"
Sefie planted her fists on her hips, "Why can't we go?" she echoed. "It's n'fair Cody! Why can't we hang out with you too? You're leavin' us out a lot, and that's n'fair!"
Cody seemed torn. "I'm really sorry Sefie but-
"Well, I don't see why not," said Sora. Cody's eyes bugged. "They can come along if they want. They just might learn a thing or two." She winked at the kids.
"Yay!" Sefie jumped up and down like a mad pogo stick. "Super-duper-mega-awesome!"
"But- but- but-" stammered Cody. Yolei slapped his shoulder, knocking the wind out of him.
"Lighten up Cody," she laughed. "Let's go." She hooked her arm around his shoulders and steered him towards the school.
Kari beckoned the younger kids to follow. "C'mon."
Travis, Jinjo and Max looked at each other as they trailed slightly behind them. "What's going on?" asked Jinjo." Cody's never brought us with them before."
"And did you see the look on his face?" laughed Travis.
"What the heck's he hiding?" asked Max.
"Something tells me we're about to find out," said Jinjo.
"Wonderful deduction, Sherlock," muttered Travis. He was promptly bopped on the head.
They followed the group all the way to the elementary school and up to the computer club. Izzy and Yolei took their customary seats at the computer terminals while the rest of them hovered behind them. Cody squirmed while Max Jinjo, Travis and Sefie stuck together as a group, watching.
"We're going to need to confirm their authenticity," said Sora.
"Right," said Davis. "Wouldn't want them being rejected out of the system like a bad sock."
"Or like you asking a girl out." snickered TK.
"Funny, real funny."
"Uh, s'cuse me?" asked Travis. "Anyone wanna fill us in?" Cody blanched.
"Uh…"
"In a minute," said Matt. "What about the Digimon?"
"If you are referring to whether we have identified them, if they have any in the first place, no, we haven't learned anything yet."
"Wait a minute here," said Max. "Digimon. Are you talking about, you know, little monsters?" Pokémon! Pokémon! Its gotta be Pokémon!"
"In the movies!" blurted out Cody quickly.
"Those monster dudes that kept invading the city!" cried out Sefie. "No one believed me! One of them came into my art room and ate all the crayons! Everyone thought it was the boogie man, or me, but I didn't do it!" she frowned. "Well, I ate one of 'em but it was only one cuz I thought it was really blueberry flavored, and it kinda smelled like it but if didn't taste like it though….Yuck!" Sefie stuck her tongue out.
Sweatdrops.
Silence.
Tai cleared his throat. "Thanks for uh, sharing Sefie."
The girl poked her tongue between her front teeth in a grin. "Welcome!"
The earth element Digidestined gaped in realization. "Don't tell me they-" Tai nodded. "Are the ones-" Sora nodded. "There's only-"
"Yes, you're the fifth," completed Izzy.
"Wow," said Cody, still a little shocked.
"What's going on!" demanded Travis.
"Anyway," said Sora. "You kids are the next generation of Digidestined. So far, there have been two in this era."
"You guys," said Jinjo.
"Correct," said Izzy. "We are the chosen ones."
"Chosen ones of what?" asked Max. His Pokémon question could wait. Something else was going on. Something bigger.
"We are destined to protect the world we live in as well as the digital world." Izzy gave them a crash course in what the Digiworld was.
"I knew it I knew it I knew it!" cried Jinjo, practically dancing. "I knew it was possible. This is sooo kewl!"
Travis punched Cody's shoulder. "Hey, you never told us!"
"I couldn't." shrugged Cody. "Kind of a secret identity thing."
"So, what do we gotta do?" asked Jinjo, getting straight to the point. "You know, as "chosen ones'."
"We prefer to be called Digidestined," corrected Sora.
"Your mission, should you choose to accept, will be to protect the Digiworld, you Digipartners, and our own world from the evil perils that we are subjected to," said Yolei.
Sefie scowled at them, "English/Japanese please."
"Beat up the bad guys."
"Ohhhhkay!"
"Which brings us to the reason we called you," said Tai. "Right now, there's this program that's plaguing the digiworld. We don't know what it is, or what it can really do. All that we know is that it's destroying the Digiworld."
"Then you do know what it can do," said Travis. Jinjo and Max elbowed him. "Ow."
"Why don't you fight it?" asked Max.
"We can't get into the digital world anymore," said Kari. "The Digiportal was infected by the virus. It won't accept our Digivices, so we can't go in."
"That kinda, you know, sucks," said Travis.
"Yes it does." Nodded Davis. "Hey, where's our informant guy?"
"Right here!" Ntropy's digitalized voice squeaked from the speakers. "I assume all of the 03 DDs are there."
"Yup," said Cody on their behalf.
"Kewl. I got some goodies for you before we zap you into the Digiworld."
Izzy nodded and filled the rest of them in. "Yolei, Ntropy and I designed the Digivices ourselves, since they aren't pre-prophesized."
"They're not real digivices," said Ntropy. "Just tools that do the same things digivices do. You know, like keys to the Digiworld, linking DDs to their parters, communications…all that cool stuff."
"We designed it last night and Ntropy found a way to transfer them into the real world. Perfecto, right?" said Yolei.
"You're gonna make Digivices out of thin air?" asked Davis.
"Give or take a few molecules, yes," said Izzy. "Is the transfer portal ready?"
"Yup," replied Ntropy. "Uh, stand back from the screen, ok? I haven't worked the bugs out yet, so, uh, watch out… incoming!"
The screen glowed and an object came flying out of the computer. It hit the back wall with a loud thud.
"Steeeerike!" yelled Davis.
TK picked up the package. It was a box wrapped in several layers of bubble wrap. "What the heck did you do?"
"Uh, I didn't want them to break, so I took extra precautions," said Ntropy meekly.
"Can I have the poppy thingies?" asked Sefie.
After a few minutes of hacking the bubble wrap off, TK opened it up. Inside were five pairs of gloves kicked up notches unknown to man with high-tech gadgets.
"Those are for us?" said Travis.
Yolei took the box from TK and handed out the gloves. "Brown for earth," she handed the brown ones to Cody. "Blue for water." Sefie jumped with excitement. "White for wind." Travis grinned. "Yellow for Electric." Max nodded. "And red for Fire." Jinjo accepted the gloves with a bow. "Try 'em on for size."
The five of them yanked on their gloves. Sefie pouted a little bit. "They're too big." Sure enough, the gloves were several sizes too big. All of them were.
Yolei grinned. "Press the square button on the wrist." They did. The gloves suctioned the air out, leaving the gloves fitting form fitting comfortably. (AN: Think plug suits from Eva. They sooo rock!)
"Whoa, cool," said Jinjo turning her hands around. "One size does fit all."
"Whoaho!!" whistled Travis. "Totally wicked!" he turned his hands over. The middle three fingers of each glove were cut off in style, but the thumb was covered. On the top of his right hand was a small computer screen surrounded by touch keys. A swirled design was printed into the palm of both hands and on the top of his left. Each design was different for all of the support Digidestined, and so were the colors. Sefie was jumping up and down, showing hers to Izzy and Matt.
"Lookie lookie Matt-Matt! It's light blue! Isn't it pweety? Kooshie! What'sit do?"
"These are your 03 equivalent of Digivices. As you can see, we upgraded them from looking like Tamagachi beepers to more fashionable things."
"Your beeper?" asked Jinjo to Cody. He nodded and took it out to confirm it. The old Digivices really did look like chunky beepers.
"It's not just the style that makes it so spiffy," said Ntropy. "This design'll let you activate tools unlike the previous versions that didn't really do anything that you could control. If you raise your hand palm out to something, and say 'scan' you'll get information about it on the screen. You know, the window on the back of the glove."
Izzy nodded and continued. "It's also the communications device. Only the left hand fingers of the owner can activate the buttons. Call it a security measure."
"What's the with thumb and pinky thing?" asked Travis. He stuck only the thumb and pinky out and held them up to his head like an imaginary phone. "Ring ring?"
"Exactly! How'd you know?" Travis sweatdropped,
"I wasn't serious."
"Those are your mics and receivers for the comm device. It's a little more private that way. It's easer and more inconspicuous to use when in a public place….like in school."
"That's silly," protested Max. "Everyone's going to think we're nuts."
"Well, it's better than talking to your beeper, right?" Max kept silent.
"What about the designs?" asked Jinjo, lightly tracing hers with a finger. "I hardly think they're ornamental.
"Those are your crest symbols. In addition, they're your keys to the Digiworld."
Izzy nodded. "Correct. To be admitted into the Digiworld, you must have both gloves and be wearing them. You put your right hand over your left, and match up the symbols facing the computer screen. It automatically activates the built in digiportal program and sends you into the Digiworld."
"Mimi would call this a fashion statement," laughed Yolei.
"I call this an advantage," grinned Travis.
"Why don't you give it a shot?" encouraged Tai.
The support Digidestined looked hesitantly at each other. "Uh, you can go first aniki," said Sefie, half hiding behind him and half pushing him to the computer.
"Chicken," said Travis. He looked at Max. "Why don't you go?"
"Uh…Ladies first?" Max looked at Jinjo. Her eyes widened.
"Uh…"
Cody rolled his eyes. "C'mon, we're a team now, and we'll go in as one, better?" They nodded. "At the count of three… One…two…three!"