Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon

Digital Manifest

Keepers

Chapter: 18/ Reflections

"Thank you for getting back to me in so short a time."

"Worried?"

"That you wouldn't show up? No. You owe me for helping you with Ahuramon, though it was mutually beneficial for both of us, it helped you survive, and with your sense of honor I highly doubt that you would simply discard everything that I've done for you, especially now that you're one of the newly manifested. I take it that you had no trouble leaving your shrine in Izumi?"

"Can we just cut to the chase here? The sooner we get this over with the better…"

"In a hurry, eh? Or is it because you don't approve? Oh well. You're business is your own, just like mine is my own. We all have our personal quests after all… our own duties. Makes me wonder how you can live with yourself, but that's beside the point. I've recently received a communiqué from one of my servants from the digital world… the one trying to find any traces of more Keepers? It seems that he's found one, and in a world where Ahuramon has recently sent an agent… and where I had lost two servants of mine as well."

"So you want me to handle this one now? To go to this other human world and deal with the Keeper that's there?"

"I feel that you are the most ideally suited for this task. The name Digimon Queen was mentioned in my servants last message at the time of his self-destruction…"

"Ah… I see now."

"Yes. She is quit the topic of conversation among digimon who are searching for a Tamer… well, she and the Legendary Tamer, especially the Legendary Tamer and with good reason."

"Do I sense an irony in your choosing me to handle this?"

"Well, that goes without saying…"

Ryan looked down at Richoemon, worry clear on his face as he sipped a drink through a straw, the little dinosaur wincing every so often from the injury that he had sustained in his battle with that other Gargomon. Ryan could sympathize. Taking a shot directly in the mouth like that had to be tantamount to a sore throat of the worst kind. He was lucky that digivolving had healed him from the worst of the attack; otherwise he'd be free floating data by now.

"Thanks again Rika," said the brown haired boy turning away from his partner to look at his red haired companion who had been walking with him since the incident at the park. After the battle she had taken the two of them down to a place that she knew and bought Richoemon a cold drink to take the sting out of his injury until they could get to Hypnos and properly have him looked over and tended to.

"Don't mention it," the girl said nonchalantly, shrugging her shoulders as she did so. "Your partner took a pretty brutal hit there. It was the least I could do to make him feel better, but it's really only something to help make him comfortable until we get down to Hypnos…"

"I'm not complaining…" Whispered Richoemon hoarsely in between sips as he held the Styrofoam cup carefully in his claws. Rika looked down at the little dinosaur and a smile crossed her face, looking a little bit like an embarrassed smirk before turning away, her eyes becoming introspective as she remembered the data packets that the Gekomon used to help heal Andromon when they first found him. There were occasions after battles where she wished that they could get their hands on some to help their partners feel better and heal faster, but unfortunately they didn't have an easy way to do that. The digital world was still a mysterious place that had yet to be fully explored, and entering and leaving it was still difficult to do even under the best of circumstances.

Oh well. No use complaining about what we don't have, thought Rika as she settled her gaze on the Tamer that she walked along side with. Her violet eyes shifted for a quick second as she caught sight of Renamon phasing in and out of view above them. Looking back at Ryan, Rika frowned, taking note of the worry that she saw in his expression. Of course, he had a lot of reasons to worry. He had been trapped in the digital world for who knew how long, with no idea what was going on with his family back home. To top it all off he had some crazy virus code stuck in both him and his partner. Granted, the problem seemed to be in remission now so there was little reason to be concerned about it, and he had regular checkups to make sure that things stayed that way, but…

Rika thought back to the fight in the park, when he had frozen up during the last few minutes of battle, at a crucial moment that would have cost both of them their partners and likely their lives as well, and her mind paused on the memory, pondering it for a moment with a cool eye as she read the expression on Ryan's face. The two of them continued onwards in silence for a few minutes longer.

"All right," Rika finally said, picking up the threads of conversation again. "What's up?"

Ryan blinked as he looked at the girl, startled.

"Huh? What do you me…?"

"Don't give me the I'm going to play dumb act," the red headed girl said, sounding slightly annoyed now. "I get that enough from Takato as it is…"

"I'm not playing dumb," grumbled Ryan as he looked away with a slight frown on his face. "It's just…" Ryan paused as his face softened, his gaze now looking inwards. "…It's nothing really…"

Ryan mentally winced as he felt Rika's penetrating gaze settle on him once more and he resisted the urge to check and see if any birds were taking flight out of a collective sense of self preservation. Ryan frowned again as he took a moment to roll the Tamer's question around in his mind, wondering whether or not he should just tell her what was on his mind. After all she was asking, and she did show some measure of concern, though just how much fluctuated depending on her mood. Frankly both he and Chris found her a little bit difficult to be around because of her rather forceful personality, but he had to admit that if nothing else it certainly got results. She had snapped him out of his own paralysis during the battle with that Gargomon and Richoemon digivolved because of that, healing most of his injuries in the process. If she hadn't been there Richoemon would most definitely be dead, and he himself along with him, and since she had been there with the other Tamers from the moment that he, Chris, Richoemon, Caramon, and Leomon had arrived in Shinjuku, offering help and a place to stay until their family was contacted and they were allowed to go home, he supposed that he owed her that much. He still wasn't too keen on the idea of involving the others in his problems since he barely knew them and could probably do without having something like this being dropped in their laps unexpectedly but…

"All right," said Ryan closing his eyes for a second and heaving a light sigh. "It's just that I have a lot on my mind right now. There's a lot going on that seems so uncertain right now, and sometimes…" Ryan paused as he considered his next words. "… I guess that I'm afraid of what might happen if things go too far and I can't get out of it. I don't like seeing anyone get hurt but no matter what I can't seem to stop that from happening. I'm… I'm not cut out for this sort of thing."

Rika looked at the boy out of the corner of her eye, measuring his words as he said them but at the present she said nothing in response to them, and kept her face neutral as she contented herself with just listening until he was finished with what he had to say. In the past she would have made a sarcastic remark, particularly in regards to his admittance of fear and his own lack of belief in himself as a Tamer, and that habit continued to come out every now and then, but as on other occasions where she had lent a listening ear to someone who needed it be it Jeri, Henry, Takato, Ryo… yes, even Ryo on the extremely rare occasion that he let his guard down enough… Rika listened carefully and did not interrupt, and only spoke when either asked a question or when the speaker was finished.

If nothing else, she could see where he was coming from. Having experienced the negative side of being a Tamer before, she could understand why Ryan felt the way he did. There was once a time where she was perfectly happy with fighting, living on the thrill that danger provided. But as time wore on, as it always does, events had drastically altered her view of things, and with what had happened to Jeri and Leomon in the climactic battle with Beelzemon she had come to dislike fighting. At the same time though she knew that she couldn't very well walk away from it either.

But how to convey that; her experiences, her thoughts and feelings on the issue was the real challenge here. Or at least do so in a way that didn't completely and totally crush the kid's spirit since he would be needing it if things continued on with the way that they had been so far.

This is something that's more in Henry's field of expertise, thought Rika as she narrowed her eyes in slight irritation. Rika turned her head to look at Ryan so as to get a more full view of his facial expressions, so that she could have an idea on how to best approach the subject. She saw reservation and uncertainty, and perhaps a faint glint of hidden fear to go with the first two emotions, but also a willingness to keep going despite everything that had been thrown at him so far.

At least he has the guts to admit that he's afraid, she thought.

"It's not easy," said Rika after a few moments of silence had passed. "Believe me, it's not, and out of all of us I think Jeri would know that best, and I get the feeling that you have an idea yourself otherwise you would still be stuck somewhere in the digital world, in that desert that Chris said that you and he wound up in when you were dragged into that place. This isn't something that you can just walk away from, especially when considering what's been going on lately. Quitting won't keep the bad guys from coming after you, and since you were chosen to be a Tamer that means that you have to act like one and accept the responsibility that was given to you."

Ryan frowned.

"Chosen… I don't get that. How exactly was I chosen? And just what are my responsibilities here? I've been given a digivice and partnered up with Richoemon," Ryan indicated the little orange dinosaur with a nod of his head. "But so far I have no clear idea what it is that I'm doing…"

"Then it's a good thing that you have us here to help out," said Rika, narrowing her eyes at the boy. Ryan held her gaze for a second before looking away, not at all satisfied with her response.

"And just what is it that you guys do anyway? From what I've seen you act a little bit like a police force for whenever digimon enter the real world and cause havoc."

Rika closed her eyes and hmmphed. "Henry could explain it better than me, or at least his dad can when we get to Hypnos."

Ryan glowered. He had just been at Hypnos prior to the fight with Gargomon. He wondered if Henry was still there, and if he could shed any light on things. Probably not. Rika he had learned was pretty experienced with this kind of thing, about as much as Henry and if she didn't have a clear idea about the ins and outs or the how's and whys then Henry probably didn't either even though he seemed to be the type who probably gave the matter a lot of thought. Maybe it was best to just go with the flow for now until he was surer about all of this. But he had to admit that he knew a lot more about what was going on now then he did before, and like Rika said, he and Chris had the Tamers to help them out as well.

Ryan sighed and ran a hand through his hair.

"Well… I know that I've said this a lot already…"

"Let me guess," interrupted Rika with a bland expression on her face. "You're going to say how much you appreciate what we're doing for you and your friend right?"

Ryan winced. The way she had said that sounded like either his saying thank you or just their presence overall was starting to annoy her.

"Um… yeah. Pretty much."

A small, satisfied smile made itself known on Rika's face, causing the boy to relax a bit at the sight of it.

"Don't mention it," the girl said in a soft, but amused tone as the two of them continued to make their way towards Hypnos.

The sound of someone knocking on a door resounded throughout the Katou household and a muffled 'Jeri, could you get that?' soon followed in response.

"Yes Mom!" Called out Jeri as she happily raced downstairs and skipped down in the direction of her home's door, mentally commenting on the oddity of someone taking the time to knock on the front door of her families home instead of just coming in through the restaurant area like most people did. Well, her friends occasionally did that when they brought their partner's along and didn't want to spook the customers (they needed no encouragement from Jeri's father for that) so then maybe… oh well. She would find out soon enough once she got there, and she was far too happy at the moment to give it more than a seconds thought. And she had plenty of reason to be. Her partner, Leomon had come back from the dead (though how he had done so was something that still piqued her curiosity, and the other Taemrs as well, from time to time) and she was going to hold a Welcome Back celebration in his and the other two Tamers honor. They may not have died and returned from the dead as Leomon had, but they had gone to the digital world and returned with him so it was only fitting to celebrate their return as well even if she didn't know them all that well. All seemed to be going well in her eyes. Two kids were back in the real world after months of being stuck in an alternate dimension… true, there looked to be some trouble brewing on the horizon but she felt more than ever, in an almost exuberant rush of energy akin perhaps to a high, that she and her friends would be able to handle it, and that together they would fight… and win. Life would return to normal… no, better than normal because now Leomon was back, and Impmon could finally, and completely let go of the guilt that he continued to feel over his part in the lion digimon's death…

Well, maybe that was a little childish to think let alone hope for given everything that they had all been through but Jeri really did hope that Leomon's rebirth would help Impmon find the strength that he needed to move past that stage in his life and forgive himself. Although she had forgiven him for what he had done prior to his return to the digital world shortly after D-Reaper's defeat she continued to sense a lingering guilt about him.

Jeri frowned as the image of the mischievous little gremlin, well; imp came to mind as she approached the entrance to her home. Where was Impmon, she wondered. Renamon had said that he was going to inform the Rookie Virus of Leomon's return but so far she had heard nothing from him and not even Leomon had so far mentioned anything about him from his travels throughout the city. It was rather unlike him given the amount of time that had passed. She had at least expected him to drop by just to check up on her, or ask about the new Tamers that had inexplicably shown up.

Well, maybe he just needs some time to adjust to it, thought Jeri as she grabbed hold of her home's doorknob and pulled it open, and a second later all thoughts of Impmon left her mind.

"Takato," whispered the brown haired girl as her eyes widened in surprise at the unexpected guest that now stood on her doorstep.

"Hey Jeri," chirped Takato, rubbing the back of his head tentatively as he fought back what looked to be a blush. Fortunately for Takato, Jeri didn't get a chance to take much notice of it as Guilmon piped in his two cents.

"Ohhh… no hello for me?"

"Guilmon…" Giggled Jeri as she bent forward and patted the crimson dinosaur on his head, causing Guilmon to laugh childishly.

"I'm telling you," said Chris irritably as he glared at his red trimmed digivice with a look that promised almost certain retribution to the little device if it didn't start giving him the information that he requested. "There was a signal just a few minutes ago and now there isn't one. I don't get it!"

"Maybe it's busted," said Kazu sarcastically. " 'Cause none of our digivices picked up anything…"

"Kazu," said Kenta in a voice that was a strange mixture of a whine and a scolding. "They did pick up something, but they stopped after the first second."

"Yeah, and what does that tell ya? Yamaki probably zapped it with one of his famous programs or something…"

"So why did Chris's digivice keep saying that there was a digimon signal in the park even after ours stopped?"

Kazu paused and frowned, looking downwards at the dirt and kicking at it with his shoe as he tried to come up with a reasonable comeback, but failed.

"All right," he said after a couple seconds. "You've got me there. Maybe the big bad digimon are capable of hiding themselves from our digivices or something, I don't know…"

Chris's eyes snapped up at the visor-wearing boy, widening in surprise as they did so before looking over at Kenta to see what he thought about that statement. It only took a couple seconds for it to sink in for both of them.

"Kazu?" Asked Kenta in shock. "Did you just…"

"Huh? What're you…?" The wild haired brunette halted mid sentence and blinked. "Dude. I don't believe this…"

"You don't think that…?"

"I was only joking!" Exclaimed Kazu. "I can't believe it! I was only joking about it, but now that I think about it…"

Kazu groaned in frustration and turned around, crossing his arms and glowering in an eerie imitation of Rika whenever she got annoyed at something. Chris looked over at Kenta.

"Do you think that we should tell Yamaki about this? I mean, we've only experienced this once so far as I can recall…"

"I guess so," said Kenta as he lowered his chin and raised one hand to scratch it thoughtfully. After a second the dark haired, bespectacled boy turned to look at the diminutive, pink colored fairy that floated next to him, watching him carefully. "What do you think MarineAngemon?"

MarineAngemon made a few high-pitched squeaks mixed with Pih's and puhs, to which Kenta nodded.

"Yeah, you're right. Yamaki should be told."

Chris and Caramon blinked.

"I still don't understand how you get all of that out of what he says," said Caramon in pure disbelief. Even after these past few days of knowing the Tamers, their digimon, and the odd quirks and personalities that each of them had there were still some things that was just beyond their grasp of understanding.

"Eh," said Kazu shrugging. "That's just how they are. MarineAngemon's a mon of few words and Kenta's brain is probably primitive enough to understand it…"

"Hey!" Cried Kenta indignantly.

"…But the way I figure it, it's probably like Morse code or something and only Kenta knows it. Seriously Chumley, a little play by play on what he says might help those of us who aren't in the know a lot."

"Um…" began Kenta only to be interrupted as Chris cut in.

"As fascinating as that sounds, don't you think that we should go and get a hold of Yamaki now? 'Cause the idea of digimon getting around your digivice's detection capabilities sounds way more important…"

"I don't know, Chris," said Caramon from his position on his blonde haired partner's shoulder. "Figuring out how to translate what MarineAngemon says sounds pretty important to me. Almost as important as figuring out where Calumon puts all that food he gets…"

Chris looked over at Guardromon to see the little creampuff of a digimon calmly munching on a piece of chocolate that Kenta had bought him to make him leave Kazu alone.

"You have terrible priorities Caramon. You better not be emulating Terriermon again. Okay, now is there a payphone nearby we can use?"

"Why?" Asked Kazu, raising an eyebrow in confusion.

"So that we can get in touch with Ya…maki…" Chris let the sentence die off as yet another revelation hit home for him, and a second later his shoulder's sagged as he let out a sigh of exasperation.

"Please tell me that you have his number…"

"Um… I might have left it in my other wallet," mumbled Kazu, looking over at Kenta, who blanched.

"What're you looking at me for?"

Why do I feel like I'm in a reenactment of the 'Three Stooges' comedy?

Chris's thoughts were suddenly interrupted as his digivice gave yet another alarm.

At the top of a building standing close to Shinjuku Park, air rippled and warped for a moment, and a second later tore apart as an all too familiar fog like barrier appeared before being blown away, revealing the figure that had crossed the barriers between the worlds. Standing tall, gaze fixated outwards and scanning the horizon was a female figure, white hair blowing in the wind as she held a long staff in a red gloved hand, seeing but at the same time not seeing, utilizing a mystical gaze that enabled her to penetrate the area around her as she scanned for any sign of her target. After a moment her mouth pressed into a thin line as she processed the information that she had gathered so far.

Gargomon you idiot, the figure thought irritably to herself. I told you that if you charged into situations like this without checking out the competition, one day something like that would happen to you.

The figure stood on the rooftop a moment longer, pondering what she had learned for a moment before vanishing from view, her crimson armored form disappearing like a kitsune's illusion.

Loki is not going to be happy about this…

A/N: Not too much going on in this chapter. Mostly character interaction and development (which I felt was important in the telling of the story) but it's more or less to set things up for yet again another action filled scene, one that will start the task of really driving the plot of this story forward. Anyway, hope that you enjoyed this chapter, and two kudos bars to anyone who can figure out who the mysterious character at the end is. Heh, she's going to have a very special role to play in the upcoming chapters (if you can figure out what that role is you get eight hundred kudos bars, a spoiler, and I will bow before your all knowing mind). Anyway, 'till next time then. Later.

-Crazyeight

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