I don't own Pokemon. Read and review! From emichii!

Chapter 7: Separated

It seemed odd to Tai when he and the others got to the Team Rocket hide-out. But then everything was always odd whenever Sora was involved. And why Sora?

Why did the Team Rocket hideout just made him think of her more than he already did?

Because he could remember, a few years back, when he and Sora went here, right to this very place (along with Gary and T.K), to rescue Agumon. But this time it was different.

They were all older. Hopefully wiser… and they were here on a real mission. And hopefully, maybe now, he'd finally be able to tell her his feelings…

Everyone went behind this big grove of trees and then they could see the hide-out. The warehouse with the red steel roof and the sign on the door that said: TEAM ROCKET HIDE-OUT.

"Gee, this brings back memories," said Sora.

"Yeah," Tai agreed. I really miss Agumon right now.

"Heh, that's a stupid hideout," Gatomon said.

"Let's go!" Davis said, to which Veemon said, "Yeah!!"

When they all got inside, it looked a lot different to what Tai, Sora and T.K had seen before.

"Whoa… they like… renovated or something." T.K said.

"Uh huh," Sora agreed.

It was so big. It stretched out away from them, so far and the floor was this shiny dark blue, kept so clean that you could slide all the way across it. But it had been renovated, and improved-an even tougher security system than before.

And running across the floor was this huge pool of water. And in the entire room there was no door, no exit, except for the door they had just come through.

"But there's no doorway or anything," Ash said. Huge disappointment spread across his face.

"Yeah," Tai frowned. "What are we meant to do?"

"…Have you noticed there's some kinda weird pattern on the floor?" Max said.

"Huh, whaddaya mean?" Ash wondered.

"See? There are these weird marks on each tile." Max pointed.

"Yeah," Tai said.

Yolie looked bored. "So… you think they're some kinda button or something?"

"Maybe. Who knows?" Max stared at the floor.

Yolie wasn't watching as she headed over towards the door. "Maybe we should just go and ask Izzy to find some way to get through this room… you know how he-ARGHHH!"

"Yolie?" Max turned just in time to see her crashing through the floor, she had just stepped on one of those weird marks. "YOLIE!" Max, Kari and Mimi yelled in alarm.

Kari and Max sprinted after her, but when they got there the floor was flat and shiny clean as if no-one had just crashed through it. And mysteriously, the mark on the floor had disappeared and changed to a different one.

"It's like some logical thing." Kari said.

Ash sighed. "I hate this."

"…Do you think if we ran around the floor pressing all the marks on the floor really really fast, something would happen?" wondered Sora.

"Where'd you get that idea from?" Tai spluttered.

"I think there's something under the water," said Misty, the first words she had said since they had entered the building.

"Why would you think that?" Ash said.

"Well," Misty said, "Maybe they purposely did that because they wouldn't expect us to go there." She was walking towards the water as she said that and didn't notice stepping on another weird marking just in front of it. Just then all the water shot up in the air, taking Misty up with it.

"AARRGHHH!" she screamed. "What the-?"

"MISTY!!" Ash yelled.

Just before Misty and the water disappeared, without thinking, Ash leapt straight into the streams.

"Ash, what on earth are you thinking?" Tai shouted. "If you do that then we'll all be separated!"

"Sorry-" Ash managed to yell as he, Misty and the water slowly disappeared. "But… I have to look after Misty,"

And they both disappeared.

"Well…" Sora said.

"This is great," Max said sarcastically. "Now Yolie and Misty and Ash are missing."

"What should we do?" Mimi asked worried.

Brock looked stumped.

"What are we? Are we stupid or something?"

"Eh?" They all perked up at the sound.

"Ya all gonna just sit here, staring at the ceiling? We've got work to do! We have to rescue that Wizard!" Kari yelled.

"That's right!" Gatomon chimed in.

"I guess we'll just all have to split up into groups… maybe we should just test our luck and see where these strange marks could lead us." Brock said.

"Then what are we waiting for?" Davis cried, he stomped his foot hard on the ground. "Let's go already!"

But when he stomped on the ground, the strange symbol didn't whirl him off to some unknown destination, instead all of a sudden, arrows and knives and other pointy objects came flying down from the ceiling as everyone stared in horror.

Kari took a giant jump to escape a falling knife- and landed in the water.

"KARI!" T.K shouted. Both he and Davis jumped into the water to rescue their princess.

Meanwhile, Sora was unable to escape as arrows fell- right in the direction of her.

"Sora!" Tai cried.

She was frozen solid, scared she couldn't do anything. Her eyes widened as he came barreling towards her.

Tai threw himself at her, to protect her from the arrows but it didn't mean that nobody would get away unharmed.

Sora blinked open her eyes and saw Tai looking down on her. But his face was twisted in pain. "Eek!" Sora sat up. "TAI!"

Thanks for reading! Don't forget to review!