Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon.

A/N: Okay. As I said before, Alopemon is an arctic fox digimon. The scientific name for the arctic fox is, Alopex lagopus, a.k.a. Alopemon! (I even did research for this fic. I'm so proud of myself!) In the next chapter there'll be a new POV from one of the kids! Please read and review! Next I'll be updating MBFG. (It's next chapter is giving me a hard time so this one came first!)

Following the Footsteps of Destiny

Chapter 32: Tangled Up

Ryoko Ishida

Server, Eastern Hemisphere, Digital World

Ryoko slowly stepped forward and knelt next to his partner, staring at Alopemon in amazement.

"You're finally here," he whispered, reaching out and hesitantly stroking the little rookie's pale blue fur.

Alopemon stepped closer to him and placed a hand against his chest. "Ryoko, our friends need some help. We should go to them."

"Of course," he whispered, pressing his cheek against Alopemon's soft furry head.

"What about this lazy bum?" Takara asked, frowning at the large digimon who was sleeping against the pedestal. She gave Alopemon's guard a sharp poke in the ribs and crossed her arms over her chest. "Hey, you! Wake up!"

The digimon's eyes suddenly flew open, and he gave Takara a dark look. "Will you quit shouting in my ear like that? Don't you have any respect for digimon who are trying to get some rest?"

Takara glared at him, and the digimon suddenly stood up straight, staring at her in surprise. "Hey! You're a human!"

"Took you long enough to notice!" Takara said sarcastically. "What do you think you're doing sleeping on the job? You're suppose to be protecting Alopemon!"

"You won't tell Gennai, will you?" the digimon asked, looking a little nervous.

"I'm tempted to!" Takara muttered. "Lucky for you that Gennai has been captured, otherwise you'd be in big trouble!"

"Gennai has been captured?" the digimon asked, looking shocked.

"We'll explain everything later," Ryoko interrupted, giving the digimon a curious look. "Right now we have other things to worry about. Who are you?"

The digimon stood up straight and gave him a proud look. "I'm Ogremon. I'm a champion level virus type digimon, and my special attacks are Pummel Whack and Bone Cudgel."

"You're a virus digimon?" Takara glanced suspiciously at him, and Ryoko smiled as Sam rolled his eyes.

"So Gennai put you in charge of Alopemon?" he asked.

"Yeah, well it's not like I had anything better to do," Ogremon replied, shrugging his large shoulders. "You must be Ryoko."

Alopemon eyed Ogremon with amusement and shook his head.

"Yeah, you're definitely Ryoko," Ogremon said, nodding to himself. "I can tell. You've already passed the test without even having to say anything!"

Ryoko frowned in confusion, but Mickey interrupted them.

"Guys," the older twin said anxiously. "We have to help Matty and Dai."

"Come on, Alopemon," Halomon said urgently, tugging on the other digimon's arm.

"What's going on?" Ogremon asked, scratching his forehead.

"If you hadn't decided to take a nap, you would know!" Takara shot back.

There was a sudden loud noise at the door, and they all turned to see Dai and Matty race into the room.

"Matty! You guys found us!" Mickey gasped, grabbing his brother and dragging him away from the door.

"Yeah. At first we didn't know which tunnel to take, but then we heard Takara shouting at someone. It was easy enough to follow the sound, and it led us right here!" Matty replied.

Takara blushed and glared at Ogremon who smirked at her.

"Well, it's a good thing she was shouting, otherwise you guys might never have found us," Mickey said with relief. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," Matty laughed, turning to look at Takara. "Hey, Kara? What were you shouting about, anyway?"

"Long story," she muttered.

Ryoko turned to look at Dai who was staring at Alopemon.

"You've found your partner," Dai said softly.

He nodded and smiled at the other boy. "This is Alopemon. Now that I've found him, there's no way that BlackWidowmon can try to keep us apart anymore!"

"Good," Dai murmured and promptly collapsed onto the stone floor.

"Daichi!" he gasped, kneeling next to his friend and placing a hand on the goggle headed leader's shoulder. "What happened? Are you alright?"

Matty made a face and knelt next to Dai on the floor. "One of BlackWidowmon's attacks hit Dai and sent him crashing into the wall. He said he was fine, but obviously he lied to me."

"Did not," Dai mumbled before falling unconscious.

Ryoko managed to catch his friend, as the goggle headed leader slumped against him, and he stared at the others with wide frightened eyes. "Now what are we going to do? There's no way that we can get away from here quickly with Dai in this condition!"

Sam pulled up Dai's shirt and winced. "Ryoko, look."

He glanced over Dai's shoulder and let out a gasp. There were several large bruises on the goggle headed leader's back, and they were starting to turn purple.

"That looks really bad," Takara whispered, her hazel eyes filling with terror.

Alopemon placed a gentle hand against Dai's back and turned to glare at the door. "They're coming."

Angelicmon suddenly flew into the room, with Embermon in his arms, and landed next to Matty with a frown on his face. "We held them off as long as we could. Unfortunately they'll probably be here any second now."

"It's okay," Matty replied, stroking one of his partner's wings. "You did your best."

"Dai!" Embermon gasped, catching sight of his partner. The little rookie leaped out of Angelicmon's arms and raced over to the goggle headed leader's side. "I'm sorry I didn't stop her from hurting you."

Embermon's voice was barely above a whisper, and the little rookie hid his face against Dai's shoulder.

"Don't be dumb," Ryoko murmured, giving Embermon a gentle hug. "I'm sure you did everything you could to help Dai."

"Get back here so that I can finish you off!" BlackWidowmon shouted, bursting into the room with Gnomemon. She caught sight of Alopemon, and her face filled with fury. "Now look what you've done!" she snapped, glaring at Angelicmon and Embermon. "That little rookie wasn't suppose to join up with you fools!"

"I guess you showed up just a little too late!" Alopemon replied, stepping forward and narrowing his eyes at her. "I am Alopemon. I'm a rookie level vaccine type digimon, and my special attacks are Frozen Specter and Arctic Slash. If you want to hurt my friends, then you're going to have to go through me first!"

"That's exactly what I plan to do!" BlackWidowmon snapped. "You're standing in the way of my plans. I'm afraid I can't allow that! Venom Darts!"

Several poisonous needles shot out of the hourglass on BlackWidowmon's outfit and headed straight for Alopemon.

The little rookie ducked underneath her attack and leaped into the air. "Arctic Slash!"

Alopemon's tail started to glow a bright blue, and he slashed BlackWidowmon across the face with it.

She let out a gasp of pain and stumbled into Gnomemon.

"Well? Aren't you going to help?" BlackWidowmon shouted, shoving Gnomemon forward into the battle.

"Are these jokers trying to steal your partner?" Ogremon asked.

Ryoko nodded. "They're also trying to steal our Digivices."

"Well, then what are we doing standing around here chatting? I don't know about the rest of you, but I intend to be part of the action!" Ogremon snorted. "Bone Cudgel!"

Ogremon's weapon connected with the side of Gnomemon's head and sent the evil digimon flying into the pedestal.

"Well it's about time he made himself useful!" Takara muttered.

Ryoko grabbed Dai under the arms and quickly pulled the goggle headed leader towards the wall. His friend's head had fallen against his shoulder, and he felt a sudden stab of fear. What if Dai's hurt really bad?

The goggle headed leader's face was pale and every breath sounded just a little more shallow than the one before.

"Come on, Dai. Wake up," he whispered, tightening his arms around his friend.

The goggle headed leader did not reply.

"There's no way Embermon can digivolve now," Mickey whispered, gently rubbing Dai's shoulder and turning to watch the battle. "That means we're back to one champion!"

Ryoko nodded in agreement and gave the older twin a frightened look. The room was large enough for Embermon to digivolve in, but without Dai the rookie's chances of reaching the champion level were slim to none.

"It's still two if you count Ogremon," Sam pointed out.

"You're going to pay for hurting my partner!" Embermon snapped, glaring at BlackWidowmon. "Ember Blaze!"

The mega digimon leaped out of the way and attached herself to the wall. The eight spider legs sticking out of her back allowed her to climb the wall with ease. "Looks like I'm too fast for you!"

"If you think a couple of champions and a bunch of rookies are going to defeat us, think again!" Gnomemon growled. "Twin Knives!"

The gnome digimon sent one knife hurtling towards Angelicmon and the other one towards Ogremon.

Both digimon dived to the side and the knives hit the wall with a loud clang.

"Nobody attacks the Digidestined on my watch!" Ogremon shouted. "If Leomon heard about this..."

"You know Leomon?" Angelicmon asked, hitting Gnomemon in the stomache with his spear.

"We've met," Ogremon muttered, punching Gnomemon in the face with his large fist.

"Hey, guys! Let me have a turn!" Halomon called out, fluttering into the air. "Halo Rings!"

The tiny glowing halos hit Gnomemon right in the eyes, and the evil digimon let out a scream of pain.

"Nice one!" Angelicmon said with a laugh, as Halomon landed on his shoulder.

"Alright, I'll admit you guys are good," Ogremon grumbled.

"Will you hurry up and stop them!" BlackWidowmon shouted at Gnomemon.

She scuttled across the ceiling and glared down at Alopemon.

"Running away, are you? That's something bad guys tend to do a lot!" Alopemon smirked. "Frozen Specter!"

Ryoko let out a gasp as he watched Alopemon's shadow come to life.

The transparent image of Alopemon glowed a bright blue and leaped towards the ceiling. It slammed into BlackWidowmon, and she let out a scream as her whole body started to disappear in a block of ice that had attached itself to the ceiling.

"You think we should let her down?" Embermon asked, resting his arm on Alopemon's shoulder and staring at the ceiling with a smile on his face.

"Be my guest!" Alopemon replied, looking amused.

"Ember Blaze!"

Embermon's fiery attack exploded into the ceiling causing the ice to melt. BlackWidowmon fell to the floor with a loud crash and groaned. "Gnomemon, you idiot! Do something!"

"Right," Gnomemon shouted, leaping to his feet. "Earthquake Chaos!"

"What's happening?" Takara cried, as the floor began to shake.

Ryoko held tight to Dai and let out a cry of fear. "Our partners!"

The ground had started to break apart, and all of their partners had ended up falling to the floor.

BlackWidowmon jumped to her feet and used the opportunity to attack.

"Web Shackles!" she shouted with glee.

"Look out!" Sam yelled at their digimon.

Thin, sticky strands of thread shot out of the ends of BlackWidowmon's eight legs, and they began to wrap themselves around Alopemon, Embermon, Ogremon, Halomon, and Angelicmon.

"She's covering them in spider webs!" Matty cried, huddling behind his brother and peeking over Mickey's shoulder.

Soon their digimon were completely bound by webs, with no chance of escaping.

We're in serious trouble!

"Ryoko!" Alopemon cried, struggling to get free.

BlackWidowmon started to giggle, and Ryoko felt his stomache clench with fear.

"Those D-Coders are as good as ours!" Gnomemon cackled, stepping up beside BlackWidowmon's side and grinning maliciously at them.

Ryoko held Dai protectively to his chest and swallowed hard as BlackWidowmon began to advance on them.