Disclaimer: I don't own digimon, and the prequel to this is "The Search for Light" by Fruitloop Trooper who has given me permission to write this sequel.

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She was moving down the corridor to the cells, following the orders given to her. Along the corridor she saw two of the prisoners and a cloaked figure.

"Meramon, attack them," she ordered. The fire digimon nodded and sent of a fireball.

Tai was about to jump out of the window when the blast hit the wall near the window.

"Huh?" a koromon asked as he spotted the meramon. The cloaked figure looked confused as he too noticed her.

"Another one?" the cloaked man asked. "A Dark Knight of Fire."

Tai looked into her eyes and his own chocolate orbs softened.

"Do I know you?" he asked.

She started to point her hand at Tai, but hesitated. Something wasn't letting her.

"I DO know you," Tai said, when the cloaked man grabbed him and jumped out the window. And she was left alone to ponder what she had just let free.

Sora awoke with a start and wiped the cold sweat off her brow. She sat up and placed a hand on her chest as she breathed deeply and steadily to regain control of her breathing actions.

It had been a long two years for her, and she had not got away from the incident with Myotismon lightly. She still had dreams about when she was the Dark Knight of Fire and when she, Matt and Kari were stranded in the Gobi Desert.

Her thoughts drifted to the young brunette and she let out a sigh. Hikari had, after the defeat of Myotismon, disappeared to the Digital World with no other clues. The only thing they had heard from her after that was a letter a month later to Mimi stating something about Tai, that was all Sora could gather when Mimi had given her an excited phone call, but she wouldn't tell anyone else what was in the letter. The strangest thing was that it was hand-written and it had no stamps on it, which meant that it had been hand-delivered by someone.

But that had been a whole twenty-four months ago. There had been no contact with Hikari since then, but nothing more on the digimon situation had occurred. There had also been a change in the Digital Gates that allowed them to travel between worlds. They had been completely blocked off and rendered useless. The Digidestineds' partners, however, were still with them and living quietly amongst the community.

Miko was handling life without her father better than anyone had originally thought she would. Now at the age of eight she was fitting into a single-parented life quite well. But she, like many of the other children in Tokyo, had nightmares about the incident. She saw her father in each and every one of them. She always woke up in tears and, for this reason, Mimi would never hire a public babysitter but would ask around the close Digidestined she knew and see if they could look after her daughter on the rare occasions when she went out.

Tonight had been a trip to the cinema, but Sora had not felt up to going. The nightmares she had been getting were gradually worsening, and the amount of sleep she got each night was decreasing. She was in pain, but she wouldn't tell anyone.

She stood up from where she had been asleep on Mimi's sofa and was thankful for the light from the television. Glancing at the clock she noticed it was about midnight, which worried her. Mimi should have been back by now and she should have woken her up.

She walked to the bathroom but, on the way, she passed Miko's bedroom. From inside she heard crying and talking. Intrigued she opened the door and gasped when she saw Miko on the bed, thrashing wildly.

---

She was watching from a distance a scene downtown. Her mother and all her mother's friends, except Sora, were there too. There was a tall digimon in front of them, threatening to attack and kill them. Without their partners they were powerless and were fear-stricken.

Just as the large lasers on the digimon's sides started glowing an eerie dark purple with blue electric sparks surrounding it, a ball of fire and a beam of bright, white light hit it.

Two figures in black cloaks landed on the shoulders of the menacing digimon and, from their hands came powers of sorts. The taller, a male, had balls of fire rapidly landing on the digimon's shoulder while the shorter, a female with long, brown hair shown by two strands that flew out, unhidden from the cloak, had a beam of light that wrapped itself around the digimon.

"Miko!" a voice called. She tried to locate it but found no one.

"Miko!" it called again. But she saw nothing to indicate that anyone knew she was there.

"MIKO!"

She sat up in her bed and looked into Sora's worried face.

"What did you see?" she asked. The young girl caught her breath before answering.

"It wasn't a memory," she stated, her voice breathy. "It was more like…a vision. It was downtown. Mom and her friends, except you, were all there and there was this big monster. And I saw him. I saw daddy."

"Come on, I'll make you a hot chocolate and you can tell me more," Sora suggested. Miko nodded and got out of bed.

She sat on the sofa while Sora made her a drink and she stared at the quiet television which was showing some sappy romance-movie.

But it stopped suddenly and a news reporter came on the screen.

"We interrupt this programme for a special news warning," the woman said. "Just recently a large digimon appeared in the middle of Odiaba outside the city's cinema complex. A group of young adults are in need of urgent rescue. If any Digidestined are watching this, do what you did two years ago. Please, save Odiaba." The screen switched to an image of the digimon and Miko gasped.

"Sora!" she yelled. "Sora! That's it! That's the digimon I saw in my dream!" Sora came rushing in and looked at the screen.

"Are you certain?" Miko nodded. "All right. Go and get Palmon, I'll get Biyomon and get dressed. We're going to save them."

---

Mimi stared up at the large monster in fear. She was now worried more for Miko's life than hers, even though the young girl was tucked up in bed. If she died, and the odds looked as though she was going to, then her little girl would have to grow up with no real parents at all.

The lasers on the side started charging up and she took a few steps backwards. She glanced over her shoulder and found the others doing the same thing.

There was the screech of a bird and everyone glanced over to see Garudamon with two figures flying towards them.

"Mom!" a young girl called. Mimi opened her eyes wide.

"Miko! What are you doing?"

"She's with me!" Sora called back. The large bird looked as though it were going to give off an attack, but a charged laser shot it down from the sky.

Miko screamed and clung to Sora tightly.

At the last second Garudamon yelled "jump" and they did. The landing was a little rough for all of them and Garudamon turned back to Biyomon, lying on the ground, unconscious.

"Mimi!" Sora yelled as she tossed the girl's digivice to her. Mimi caught it and the little, plant-like form of Palmon started to glow.

"Palmon digivolve to…Togemon!" Then the large cactus glowed again. "Togemon digivolve to…Lilymon!" The digimon now looked like a woman with a flower-like dress.

She put her two hands together and they formed a cannon.

"Flower cannon!" she yelled and a blast of energy went flying at the monster.

But the large digimon used a giant paw to swat it back at them and Lilymon, like Garudamon, fell from the sky and returned to Palmon.

"This is not good," Joe muttered as Sora and Miko joined them. All of them wanted to run, but none of them could.

Then there was a large blast of fire that hit the digimon's large shoulder followed by a beam of light. Two figures in long, flowing black cloaks landed on the shoulders, one slightly shorter than the other.

The taller, obviously male, shot balls of fire until burns and blisters appeared on the scaly skin while the shorter, a woman with two pieces of long hair flowing infront of the cloak hood, had a beam of light coming from her hands. It wound its way around the shoulders and all the way down to the feet, so it looked as though it had been bandaged in a glow-in-the-dark kit. The large monster toppled forwards and the man flipped off before the monster could hit the ground. The woman, however, walked backwards so she would still be able to stand when the scaly monster lay face-down of the floor.

The glowing bonds pulsed with white light and they seemed to tighten. The monster let out a cry of pain and, after a few seconds, it exploded into pieces of data that flew into the air. A portal appeared in the air and the data went through it before it closed again, leaving the stars and moon in the night sky to smile contentedly down on the world.

"Who are you?" Sora whispered. Miko walked past her and studied the man. She then lunged forwards and wrapped her arms around his waist.

"Daddy!" she squealed. The man nodded and stroked her hair.

"Yes, Miko, I'm back," he whispered. He pulled his hood back to reveal shot, chocolate hair and deep, hazel eyes.

Takeru, being near the front, stood infront of the girl. He tried to catch a glimpse of her face under her hood, but it was too dark.

"Is it you?" he whispered as the others surrounded the newly revealed Taichi. She just looked at him.

"I'm sorry," she whispered before turning and running off. Near the end of the street she kicked off the ground and flew into the distance.

Takeru watched her fly off until he could not see her any more and then he turned back to welcome Taichi back to the 'family'.

When he realised that his female counterpart was not with him, however, he suddenly looked worried.

"Where did she go?" he asked, although it was obviously (to Takeru) directed at him.

"She flew off," the blonde replied. Taichi sighed. He then knelt down and looked at Miko.

"Miko, honey, I need to go after…my friend, ok?" She nodded but looked as though she was going to cry.

"Are you coming back again?"

"Yes, I am," he answered, "and you won't have to wait two years this time." She nodded with a smile. He then turned to Takeru.

"Which was did she go?"

"She just ran down that street and then took off," he explained. Taichi nodded before following the path that the woman had taken before him.

"You think that was Hikari, don't you?" Sora's voice asked. He turned to see her standing behind him.

"No, I don't," he answered. "I know that was Hikari."

---

He landed on the roof of the hotel where they had been staying and walked through the roof entrance door and down three flights of stairs until he came to the room he and his sister were staying in.

He opened the door and heard gentle sobs coming from one of the bedrooms. Closing the door he then took his shoes and cloak off before walking to his sister's room.

"Kari?" he asked gently. "It's me, Tai. Can I come in?" He waited a few seconds but, when he received no reply, he entered anyway.

He found his sister curled up in a ball resting against the wall, her head on her knees.

"What's the matter?" he asked, sitting next to her. He placed an arm around her shoulders and waited for her to calm down.

"It's n-well…ok, there's no point saying it's nothing, is there?"

"No there isn't. Spill."

"It's just…you've got a family to go back to," she answered. "You've got your wife, your daughter and your sister. I've got my brother. That's it. I mean I'm not saying that you're not the best brother I could ever ask for, but I just feel…left out. You'll be immediately welcomed back into the group because of Mimi, and I've really got no ties there at all."

"What are you on about?" he asked, wiping away a tear. "You've got me, your sister-in-law Mimi, your niece Miko then there's Matt and Sora who you were with for at least nine years in the desert. Hell Matt's probably more of your brother than I am. Then that Miyako girl, she looks about your age. I'm sure she'll be your friend. Davis took a real liking to you and I'm not even going to get started on T.K. See? You will be welcomed back."

"But I just left with no clue as to why. They probably think I hate them."

"They won't, I'm sure," he replied. "Anyway once we explain what's been going on I'm sure they'll all understand. I'll tell you what, we'll go and see them tomorrow and explain everything then. I'm certain none of them will hate you. It was you that saved Japan."

"Yeah and we've already seen how they treated me there, haven't we?" she said with a little sarcasm in her suddenly cold voice. He squeezed her shoulders.

"That was Tokyo, not the whole of Japan. I'm sure everyone's had that at a time," he said softly. "But we just need to pick ourselves up and keep smiling. If you keep doing this I'll be sending you back to Gennai. I don't want you in that Ocean again." She nodded.

"I understand, onii-chan," she replied. "You stay at Mimi's tonight. Just spend the night talking with her. Get to know what you've missed."

"I'm not leaving you here on your own," he said.

"Well I'm not letting you stay here with me," she replied. "Go and spend the night at your old place."

"You're not staying here alone," he repeated.

"Yes I am, now go!"

"Hikari-"

"Tai, don't make me do something I'm going to regret." Her hands started glowing and he sighed. She might have been younger than him, but her powers surpassed his and he knew she could overpower him easily. His fire was strong, but she could manipulate her light into almost anything. He looked into her crimson eyes but they were strangely blank, as though she had learnt how to hide her emotion from them too. She had changed a lot over the past two years and Taichi finally realised, in that second, that she needed to be alone now more than ever. But, at the same time, she needed her friends.

"Fine," he said with another sigh, "I'll go. But you've got to meet me in the park at midday tomorrow. Agreed?"

"Agreed," she said. "Now go!"

"I'm going! I'm going!" he joked. She laughed a little bit, but he could have sworn it was a strained laugh. Something was going on with her and he needed to sort it out. He walked out of the hotel room (where they were staying due to the lack of parents) and closed the door behind him, shooting a final worried glance at his younger sibling. He then glanced at his watch and smiled to himself.

"Time for a little detour," he said. With that he went to the roof and flew towards a familiar flat.

---

Sora Takenouchi in front of her vanity table in her bedroom brushing her shoulder-length auburn hair gently.

She couldn't help thinking about what she had just seen.

"Daddy!"

"Yes, Miko, I'm back."

Taichi was back, and it was playing with her head and her heart. Before he had 'died', she had loved him, and over the years she had been guilt-ridden for years knowing that she had never told him and never would, because he and Mimi were married. It had driven her mad.

And then he had come back. He seemed so insecure. She had wanted nothing more than to run into his arms and tell him everything would be all right and that she was glad to be alive. But she couldn't. Mimi had been there, and Miko had beaten her there anyway.

She knew she was going to have to get over him, but she just couldn't.

Then there had been the conversation with Takeru.

"You think that was Hikari, don't you?"

"No I don't. I know that was Hikari."

There had been nothing, except the two bits of brown hair and the fact she was with Taichi, to say that she was Hikari, but Takeru had been certain, and even Sora had felt that it was her. But she had not caught the woman's face, and the whisper was too quiet for her to determine if it was Hikari's voice.

Things were so confusing.

There was a knock and she put the hairbrush back on the vanity table before going to answer the door.

There was no one there.

Confused she closed the door and then she heard the knocking again. But she realised it wasn't coming from the front door.

She walked through to the front room and gasped when she saw the cloaked figure on the balcony.

She quickly slid the door back and allowed the person inside.

Once the door was closed the figure pulled back the hood and he smiled nervously.

"Can we talk?" he asked. She nodded and gestured to the sofa next to her. The two sat down. "Look…I'm sorry for just barging in on you like this, but I need to ask you a favour. It's about Hikari."

"What about her?"

"I'm sure you know by now that she was my partner," he explained and she nodded. "Well she's not faring too well. She's hiding too much and I…I wasn't with her for nine years and you were. Plus you're a girl and…as you can tell, I'm not. I need someone who can get through to her. She's too enclosed."

"Do you know why?"

"I don't," he replied. "See how bad at being a brother I am? I don't even know what's wrong with her! I'm useless."

"No you're not," she reasoned. "I'll bet you're the best big brother in the world, and you're just perfect for her. So what if you're a little overprotective? Who cares if you worry about her? Who wouldn't? After all you've been through you're going to have a strong bond, and if you're used to having to search for the things you want to find then you'll never notice the things that are right infront of you." He nodded.

"Thanks, Sora," he said. "So how've you been coping?"

"Oh, you know, the usual…"

---

She enjoyed flying. It was the one time when she could feel at peace.

A faint voice called an attack and a flash of yellow light in the distance caused her to wake up from her trance. She looked forwards and saw Angemon swerving to the side. He fired a hand of fate and then swooped back amongst the trees ahead.

'No rest for the wicked,' she thought to herself. She pulled her hood up and forced herself forwards, her cloak billowing out behind her.

She reached the clearing and prepared herself to attack when she noticed something odd.

She hid atop a tree and watched. Where she had expected to find a group of the Digidestined fighting a rogue digimon she saw only Takeru and Angemon.

"I think I saw her," Angemon said, "but I'm not sure. I sent that attack down and flew back before I could get a proper glance."

"That's ok," Takeru replied. "I mean she might not even be flying."

"But I thought Sora said that Taichi told her that she loved flying," Angemon replied, stretching his wings and twirling his staff.

'So Tai put them up to this, did he?' she thought, slightly angry. Her fists started glowing slightly, but she didn't notice.

"I know," the younger blonde said as he rested against a tree. "I just wish I knew why she took off like that. I just want to talk to her." Angemon glowed and returned to Patamon.

"Maybe she's just having problems at the moment," he suggested.

"I do not have problems!" she yelled, and then clamped a slightly glowing hand over her mouth. Takeru had, obviously, heard the cry and looked up to the tree. Hikari pushed away from the tree and, letting her hand fall to her side, she let out a sigh before flying down to the ground.

She landed in a crouching position and she let her cloak fall behind her before she stood. She then pulled her hood back and looked at Patamon.

"I do not have problems," she repeated, slightly quieter. Takeru stood and walked towards her.

"Hikari…" he said, almost inaudibly. She looked into his eyes for only a few seconds before she had to tear her gaze away. "What's wrong? Have I done something? If I have then I'm sorry-"

"No, it's not you," she answered. "It's me." She took off her cloak and set it on the ground. She then sat down and rested against a tree trunk, patting the ground for the blonde to sit down.

"I just left two years ago with the only clue being that I was going to the digital world. Then we – the gates closed a month later, just after I delivered a letter to Mimi. That was the last time I was on Earth until now. I've been living there with my brother and…and I could've contacted you, but I didn't." He looked at her and studied just how much she had matured.

She still looked like she had when he had seen her two years ago, but her hair had grown from her back to her knees, which she kept in a plait save for two small sections that were swept behind her ears. Her eyes were full of trouble and masked pain and it was obvious that she was not the same happy nineteen-year-old that he remembered. She was a lot less cheerful, but it was obvious she tried to hide it. Either with a smile or with the hood of her cloak.

"Listen I don't think you hate us," he said. "I sincerely think that you had your reasons. If you didn't contact us then you didn't contact us. I can live with that, everyone else has. And it wasn't your fault that the gates closed, it just happened like that and-"

"But it was my fault!" she exclaimed. She then sighed and glanced sideways at him. He was looking at her, extremely confused. "When I first went through to the digital world I went about helping to restore all the villages. A month or two, Digital time, I reached Primary Village. That's where I found out that Tai had been reborn there and was growing rapidly to reach the age he was supposed to be. He was around six at the time. He had all his old memories though, so he knew well enough what to do if an opposing digimon came along."

"Which it did?" Hikari scoffed.

"Of course. We battled it and won, but our digimon were really weak afterwards. After a debate they gave themselves up so that they could close the digital gates. Taichi was in no fit state at the time to make the decision, the digimon were wounded and Gennai wasn't going to choose for us. So I chose, as there was no way they were going to be saved.

"They told us that we could take some of their data into us. It would prevent them being reborn in Primary Village, but it would make Taichi and I stronger and it would improve our skills in everything. Taichi and I said no, but it took less data then expected to close the link between worlds, so there was more of each of them left over. Gennai told us that the data was not able to be deleted as it had been to this world, and the only way to get rid of it would be to take it inside ourselves. He told us, at the time, that it would change our physical appearance slightly."

"But it gave you powers," Takeru said softly, "didn't it?" She nodded.

"Taichi's powers of fire were obvious, as Agumon and his evolutions were fire-based digimon. But Gatomon wasn't a fire digimon or…well…she didn't have a specific base. She was just cat-like. So now I've got this ability to always land on my feet and I have the power to manipulate light." He nodded, taking it all in.

"So…er…what's with the cloak?" he asked. "If it's personal you don't have to day, but I'm just interested."

"Well at first I was afraid of my powers, and when Taichi used his on impulse one time the whole village he was in looked at him as though he was a freak. The cloaks hide our identities when we used our powers, and then we could go through the same village without fear of discrimination. Taichi wasn't as bad as I was about it, but he wore it so that I wouldn't get mad at him." Takeru chuckled a little, knowing how much Hikari's opinion had always counted to Taichi.

"So…" he said gently. He sucked in his breath to say something else when Hikari jumped up and pulled him to the ground a little way away, her cloak in her hands. He was about to ask what when a red beam hit the ground. There was a low growl and a shadow jumped across the trees of the small clearing.

"Can you tell the future or something too?"

"No," she said, standing up. "I just heard it coming." When he looked confused, she added, "Gatomon's sensitive hearing."

"Digimon don't attack without announcing it," Patamon mused.

"That wasn't a digimon," Hikari whispered. She looked at Takeru and smiled apologetically. "Look, I'm going to have to go, but it's been…it's been great to talk to you again." He nodded. She gave him a parting hug and then turned and took a few quick steps forwards before kicking off hard and flying in the direction of the figure, putting on her cloak as she went.

"I've missed her so much," Takeru whispered.

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H-4-T: Ok. Well I hope that most of my chapters are going to be this long. I'm aiming for about 4,000+ words a chapter, but the least will be 3,000. Of course, there will be occasions where I will have short chapters, but I should explain any reasons why.

ANNOUNCEMENT!

Also for all those awaiting chapters on my previous stories, I'm afraid you might have to wait a while. You see the monitor that was connected to my hard drive with my stories on went kaput on the inside, and that knocked out the graphics card. I know have updated from Windows 98 (the currently broken one) to a Windows 2000 system (although I'd much rather have XP).

The plan of action is to get a little gizmo (I love that word) that will allow me to access the other hard drive through the 2000 system, meaning that you will get your chapters and I, effectively, will have two hard drives, one with an official copy of MS Word on it. This one need to be registered and I only have 17 trial periods left.

Well sayonara!

NOTE:

Thank you to Fruitloop Trooper who corrected Miko's age. I was only one year out, so that's not too bad, right?