Morrison breathes differently once he arrives in the Digital World, fingers trembling over the device that had suddenly appeared in his hands once Mike had decided to try to do as Shinsuke had suggested and show him his digimon partner. His eyes are wide and dark, scouring the world around them as if searching for some hint that this is a prank, some elaborate thing Mike had set up just to screw with him.

"I don't understand," he breathes, and for a minute, Mike feels bad, considers all of the different, more gentler ways he could've introduced John to this reality. "There's... been this whole other world, this entire time, and it..." He licks his lips and looks away. "It..."

"Yeah, it's kind of wild, huh?" Mike asks, partially sympathetic but mostly impatient for his friend to truly digest all of this so they could move on, and the true fun could begin.

"Yes," John finally settles on, the troubled look on his face only worsening as he turns to look once more at Mike's partner. "You say there's millions of creatures like... like him, roaming this world often and... some of them get corrupted and you have to fight them?"

"Yep, that's the gist of it," Mike says, keeping a close eye on John, trying to gauge his mood, what he might do next now that he has some idea of what Mike's getting at.

"So when I'd see you and you'd look... tired, or injured, or just off, it would be because of this?" he asks, voice strangely subdued.

"Yeah," Mike confirms. "But it's ok, we've always won in the end. And we'll continue to." This does nothing to help the anxiety flashing in John's eyes and Mike reaches out. "Hey, man, I swear, it's gonna be ok. There's a group of us and we do work to take care of each other, no matter what we might think of each other back on earth."

John swallows, and nods. "How- how many of them... I mean, I know sometimes I've noticed odd stuff, is it really that... common...?"

"Yeah," Mike says slowly. "Right now, there are eight Smackdown digidestined, nine if you count Xavier, but he's injured and can't accompany us right now, and there are seven Raw Digidestined. There are around twenty earth bound Digidestined."

"Earth... bound Digidestined," John says slowly, brows furrowing as he tries to make sense of that.

"Yeah," Mike says with a dismissive wave of his hand. "It's what Luke started calling them, it's basically those in WWE who have gotten released over the years. They get to remain on Earth with their partners. Rarely evil digimon appear in the real world, and Luke decided maybe it'd be a good system to not divide digidestined from their partners, and have a little bit of defense on Earth just in case."

"Huh," John says. "That's a really indepth system."

Mike nods. "We don't need them too often but it's nice that they're there if there's ever a problem and we need them."

John nods absently, scratching at his cheek as he peeks at the group of people mulling around before him, waiting for John to catch up so they can move on. "So Ziggler, Shinsuke, Carmella, Aiden, and you?" he asks. "You said there were eight, though."

"Yeah," Mike exhales. "It kind of depends on who's at the shows. The ones not here are Tamina, Heath and Gable."

"Oh." John frowns a little bit and rocks forward on his feet. "So that's why I'm here?"

"You're here because I thought you'd be a good, strong edition to the group, and Luke agreed," Mike informs him with a small smile. "But, mostly, I'm just selfish and wanted my best friend by my side here too. Things have been... rough lately, the digimon keep getting stronger, and we keep finding ourselves in difficult situations. Any extra help we can get is only a good thing."

John nods, clenching his digivice. "Ok, but... what about my digimon partner? How do I find it? Where should I go or what should I do?"

Mike stares down at Monodramon and exhales. "I'm not sure, honestly. They usually will find you. Might just need to wait a little bit. We can ask Luke." John follows as Mike walks over to Luke's base and knocks on the side of the rock wall. "Hey, Luke, Morrison wants to talk to you for a second."

The guardian of the digiworld easily slips out of his homebase and inclines his head towards John. "Ah, it went as I expected," he says calmly, looking down at John's digivice. "Welcome to the Digital World, John Morrison." He smiles at him. "What is it you want to talk to me about?"

"Thanks," John says, only growing more and more befuddled by everything going on around him. "Uh, so Mike says my partner could be anywhere, that it'll come to me. Do you... know what exactly it is? If there's anything in particular I should be doing to find it?"

Luke tilts his head and examines John. "Well," he says slowly. "That's the odd part of it all. I can see your power as a Digidestined, yes." He walks in a circle around John, staring at him. "But I have no idea about your partner. I suppose you'll just have to explore, most digimon are drawn to their partners so you should find it eventually. Fate has a way of working itself out." He reaches out on a whim and grips John's shoulder, his hand lingering there for a long moment. His eyes slip shut and his lips part slowly, John and Mike exchanging a confused glance before Luke snaps out of it and stands up straight, stepping away from John without an explanation on why he just did that, or the cause of his reaction when he did. "I wish I could tell you more, but some things in this world are shrouded in mystery for one reason or another." He smiles at them.

John mumbles, "Huh," and follows Mike back over to the others. "He's a weird dude," he says lowly to Mike, who simply chuckles.

"Oh, we know," he says with a congenial clap to John's back. "You'll get used to it."

After another mindbending trip through a digiport, John isn't sure he'd want to. He's standing on a rock overseeing a beautiful meadow, watching the others walk towards a village, and he takes in a deep breath of the warm summer air tickling against his skin. Everything looks different, everything feels different, but it all resembles earth so much that it's tripping him up big time. He shakes his head, sighs, and rushes forward to catch up with the others. Mike glances at him, offering him a small smile, and they walk side by side into the village.

John stands back while the others question the villagers, try to figure out what they may have been summoned here for. He's careful not to wander out of sight of the others, but he finds an interesting little shop full of fruits and other food items he's never really seen before, and he's curious. "How do I pay for these things?" he wonders, but no one rushes to answer him. "Huh," he mumbles, careful just to look and not touch, not wanting to make a wrong move in this strange place on his first day here.

"Hey, John!" Mike calls out and John quickly jogs over to the others. "The villagers aren't very forthcoming, so we're gonna go look around on the outskirts of the village, see if we can find something. They might be hiding something, or trying to protect themselves from whatever's going on."

"Alright," John says, following them around the village, keeping an eye out for... he's not even sure what. "Is there anything in particular-"

He never finishes his question because, out of nowhere, there's a sharp, blinding flash and Mike swipes an arm out, pressing John down into a crouch, kneeling with him. "Wait," he hisses, still gripping John tightly. He looks around, taking in the others all down nearby, and there's this weird, tense feeling in the air now, as if something has appeared, something dark and twisted and it feels familiar and not all at the same time. "What the hell..." Mike mumbles, still gripping John's shoulder tightly. "Shinsuke, what is this?"

"Darkness," Shinsuke says, his eyes narrowed as he tries to peek around, find the source of this as well. "Pure evil."

"I've felt this before," John breathes out and Mike stares at him, eyes wide and worried. "In... in the temple, I..." He groans and kneads his forehead with shaking fingers, trying to ground himself. "I've never wanted to feel something like this ever again."

Things in Lucha Underground he'd never talked about, what he and his wife had witnessed, had done just to survive. How one day its influence had just disappeared entirely, left everyone floundering but whole, or so he had thought. Now he's feeling the same sort of hopeless pressure here in this world, alongside WWE superstars, and it leaves him feel choked, desperate. Will I ever be able to fully escape that?

Mike's hand is a welcome weight against his skin and he slowly forces his eyes open, staring up into his partner's clear gaze. "It's ok, man. I'm here for you," Mike promises him, a massive Digimon kneeling before them in a protective stance. John realizes then that the others have grown as well, a line of creatures all determined to protect them from whatever this darkness is. His shock must show on his face because Mike chuckles. "Next time, I hope you can witness their digivolutions for yourself. It's quite the show." He squeezes John's shoulder once more before shifting to look ahead, watching and waiting for something to happen.

When it does, however, it takes them all by surprise, a tall, etheral looking woman appearing before them, decked out in green and gold armor. Half of her face is covered by a helmet, and she's balancing delicately on a wheel. John's jaw drops, but once the initial shock of her beauty has passed, it's easy to tell the sensation they've all been feeling has been coming from her. "How is that possible?" Shinsuke mumbles. "She is... she is Ophanimon. How could they corrupt such a being...?"

"She looks different than most Ophanimon I've seen," Mike muses, and Shinsuke glances over at him. "X-Antibody?"

"Yes," Shinsuke says slowly. "I believe so. But it's twisted, her body... everything looks... wrong about her." Her skin seems oddly faded, the armor covering her flesh a few shades off from the glorious colors that they ordinarily would be. Even her wheel looks lackluster and grim. "This isn't right. How could this be?" In the few months he's been back with WWE, John has never seen him this distressed.

Her lips twist up into a hideous sort of grin, evil intentions suddenly pouring off of her. "Oh, you precious digidestined," she coos. "I knew you would try to help this pathetic village. Fell right into my trap, you did." She moves suddenly, gripping the glowing pieces pressed into her shoulder armor, and snaps them together with the fluidity of someone who's done it a million times. Holding her lance out towards the humans and their partners staring up at her in fear and shock, she cackles with laughter. "It is time to rid my world of your unwanted presence!"