A blonde man wearing sunglasses paced up and down with worry lines across his forehead. Two ladies, his assistants were busy tapping away at their respective laptops, spouting co-ordinates of the wild ones. Of all days, today there were three wild ones on the loose in three different places at the same time. Yamaki flicked his lighter all the while studying the strange numbers on his screen. The digital fields appeared randomly like once or twice in a year despite the strong barrier they had set up. Even then it was usually one digimon. Those were easily handled by Hypnos. But on this day, no matter how strong the juggernaut programme was, those digimon were just not sent back to the digital world. He slammed his fist on the table and fumed. Just then the three red dots on the screen suddenly disappeared.

"The wild ones are gone. I detect the signals of several digivices," said Reika. Without having to say anything, everyone knew at once who had stopped the wild ones.

"Those tamers just seem to have the knack of being in the right place at the right time, huh?" said Megumi.

Yamaki was relieved. His was almost about to dial their numbers himself. Yet, he couldn't shake the uneasy feeling inside of him. The two ladies got off their respective floating seats and stood beside him. They were discussing about the sudden appearance of the three digimon when the screen behind him flashed with a strange beeping sound. This startled the three adults who immediately turned around with alarmed expression.

On the dark screen, silver letters slowly floated down like the computer had been infected with the acid-rain virus. The message read thus:

"He who has transcended time,

Will once again arise from the dead

Those who were defeated will stand tall

The one to lead us to glory and victory

Is the cold, heartless one

This time the world will be shrouded in darkness."

They read it in shock and Yamaki tried finding the source of the strange message to no avail. There was no trace of the sender. No link, no path even from the digital world. It was like the message had come from some kind of rift. Megumi had the presence of mind to note down the message. Once she did, the message vanished from the screen. Try as he might, Yamaki was unable to retrieve it. To make matters worse there was a sudden blackout causing the entire building to be shrouded in darkness. The whole of Hypnos was in an uproar as they received a call from the power station stating that something was eating away at the supply and then the government called them to say that the prime minister was threatened by a blood-coloured message on his personal computer. Yamaki banged his hand against the table's hard surface in frustration. Too many things were happening all at once. Just then, one of his colleagues came in to inform that the Tamers had arrived to see him. He asked him to send them in. Within minutes, they were all assembled in the dark room.

"Woah! It's dark in here! Aren't there any flashlights?" asked Hirokazu.

Just then he saw the scary image of Yamaki as the latter flicked his lighter, causing the flame to illuminate his face. "Aaah!" screamed Hirokazu. "Man, Mr. Yamaki. You scared me!" Ruki elbowed him and he muttered a quick apology.

"What happened, Mr. Yamaki?" asked Takato. The older man grunted.

"First three abnormal digimon appeared. No matter what we did we couldn't get rid of them. Then the disappeared just like they appeared, though I assume you guys have something to do with that." The tamers nodded. "Lastly, a weird message came on the screen after which we had a blackout."

"What message?" asked Jian. Just then the lights came on much to everyone's relief. Now they didn't have to be creeped out by a certain blonde's face while he spoke to them.

Megumi stepped forward on her boss' command and showed them the crypt she had noted. Even as the tamers went through it, they couldn't make any sense. One tamer felt familiar shudders down his spine, though he knew not why, as he read the first few lines. He felt as if the fog in his head weighed heavily on him.

"I wonder if this is connected to the message we got from those digimon we fought," stated Takato. Yamaki raised an eyebrow while the brown-haired tamer explained.

"It is possible that the two are linked," said Yamaki.

"Could this be a reference to the D-Reaper perhaps?" asked Juri.

"I'm not sure. As far as I know, the D-Reaper wasn't something that surpassed time," answered Reika. "At least, that's what Shibumi and the others said."

"Then that must mean it's some kind of Digimon. If it's one that has been around in a long time, I'm guessing the Digimon Sovereigns might know something," suggested Jian.

"Good idea, Jian," said Takato.

"That's my partner, ain't he smart?"gloated Terriermon. Jian gently knocked the bunny on its head. All eyes were now on Hypnos' boss. Yamaki rubbed his chin. "I don't know. It would mean that we will have create another ark, one that can pass through the barrier we set up. We will also need to provide you guys with communication devices and such, not to mention you'll be risking your lives, again" He made sure to emphasize the last word.

"Oh, come on," said Ruki. "It's not like we haven't been able to handle ourselves before. We'll be just fine."

"She's right. If there is a threat to both worlds, then it's our duty as tamers to stop it," said Takato.

"We aren't kids anymore. We can handle ourselves," added Kenta.

Yamaki looked at each of their determined faces. "Fine," he relented. "You'll leave in 5 days. That's the amount of time that it'll take for us to get things ready." The tamers nodded and left.

That evening, each of tamers informed their respective parents. Takato's parents made a fuss over him and his mother helped him pack over the next few days (albeit a lot of unnecessary things as well). On the main day, Takato made sure to take only those things he required and quietly left the other things in is room before leaving. Juri's father and step-mother were both worried for her and didn't want her to leave. However, the high school girl remained firm about her decision. Even though she didn't have a partner anymore, she would still fight alongside of her friends. Her father gave her a tazer and pepper spray with hopes that it would help her somehow. She gave both of her parents and Masato a hug before leaving. Jian had tried to leave his sister Shaochung behind but the younger girl was two steps ahead of him. She, Ai, Mako and their respective digimon managed to pack their things and make a quiet getaway by telling their family that they were off on a camping trip. Kenta and Hirokazu said quick goodbyes to their families before pushing off (rather neither wanted their family to see them cry).

After she informed her mother and grandmother, Ruki went for a photoshoot with her mother where they two modelled together as a mother-daughter team. Once Ruki was done with her packing, Rumiko handed her two photos of that day's modelling. One was a single picture of Ruki in a black halter neck gown and the other was one with her mother, the two wearing traditional kimonos. She thanked her mother and then left.

The legendary tamer had returned home briefly to pack his things. He planned to leave behind a letter so that he didn't have to face his parents with guilty face. Unfortunately for him, his father caught him trying to leave in the middle of the night and he ended up spilling the beans to both his parents. Naturally they were both upset. His father gave him a royal shelling and threatened to lock him inside the house. His mother on the hand, was calm and told him to go much to her husband's surprise. "He's grown up, I'm sure he can take care of himself," she said.

"Thanks, Mom. Dad, I will come back, I promise." His father said nothing, balled his hands into fists.

His mother made a few quick snacks for her son and the little dragon. Mr. Akiyama reluctantly agreed to drop him off at Hypnos. Ryo felt even worse but his father patted him on the head before leaving and told him to come back safely to them.

Soon, all the tamers were gathered at Hypnos. Jian was chagrined upon seeing Shaochung, Ai and Mako but the middle school girl wouldn't back down.

"I thought I told you it was dangerous and you couldn't come!" yelled Jian, losing all composure.

"We are not little kids, Jian! We're tamers too and we will fight!" argued Shaochung.

"That's right, onii-san (big brother). Mako, Shaochung and I can handle ourselves," said Ai. But the martial artist was not convinced. The three children and Jian were arguing until Ruki intervened. She placed a hand on Jian's shoulder. "Loosen up, Jian. We went into the digital world when we were younger than Shaochung, Ai and Mako here. We've also been equally reckless. Besides Shaochung's certainly much mature than she was before. Let them all come. They're tamers too after all. If you're that worried, then why don't we be the chaperones and watch over them?"

Jian let her words sink and relaxed. Sighing, he gave in. The three children cheered and thanked the flame-haired girl. With that they were all set. Yamaki handed each of them a communication device. Without further ado, the portal to the digital world was open. In came the white vehicle, a much bigger one than the previous one to accommodate the grown up tamers and their digimon. Once they were inside, Guilmon spoke to the AI. "Nice to see you again Ark! Thank you for helping us last time."

The Ark made a squeaking noise as if to agree.

"Ok, ark! Time to take off! Next stop, the digital world!" said Takato. Each tamer sat on a seat that had been added into the arc. Fastening their seatbelts, the arc slowly moved and was soon following the created path into the digital world.

A/N: Though some of you may find the Japanese names, attacks a bit hard to accept, I really hope you will continue to read this fic for the story.