Version 2.0 (June 1, 2007): An uncharacteristically short chapter, but I couldn't find all that much to expand on without getting redundant. Oh, well. A few things are explained in this chapter, so I guess I have to keep it. XP

Disclaimer: Dude! Digimon isn't mine, dude! But, dude! I do own one dude – Sulamon.

Old Demons

Those poor spirits…neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.
-Theodore Roosevelt

Dark Vortex.

That was the last thing he remembered for what seemed like an eternity. After that flash of red, darkness had closed in. It was distinctly different than the usual darkness of sleep, or even the kind that had permeated his dreams over the last several months. In some way he couldn't quite describe, it was both more suppressing and more acute than normal sleep.

Eventually, though, it had begun to wear off, and almost before Kouichi had become consciously aware of the darkness, it left him altogether. The first thing he noticed was that he was no longer wearing his pajamas, or to be more specific, he noticed that he was wearing tennis shoes. Confused, he opened his eyes to observe his new outfit, but was greeted by inky blackness. After blinking several times, Kouichi forced himself to admit that he really was surrounded by this unwavering darkness.

Resigning himself to his other senses, Kouichi felt his clothes, which turned out to be in the same style as what he had worn to the Digital World a year earlier: a long-sleeved shirt with a polo shirt over it and plain pants. He wondered if they were the same articles exactly – or digital recreations, seeing as the shirts had been cut off him in the hospital – or new ones.

While he was musing over this, his eyes began to adjust to the surrounding darkness, and he could make out vague shapes, which soon separated into distinct objects in varying shades of black.

As far as Kouichi could tell, he was in a park. The trees were an ashy gray, but the gray of the leaves was tinted slightly green. The color seemed to radiate from within, fighting against the dark coating and giving the trees a ghostly aura. Here and there, coal-like picnic tables and benches would ring the trunk of a particularly large, leafy tree. If he focused hard enough, Kouichi could imagine people lounging in the shade of the tree on a hot summer's day. Through the trees, Kouichi spotted an ebony playground, including a swing set, two slides, and monkey bars.

The ground claimed the deepest hue, and if not for the various plants and tables resting on it, Kouichi would have doubted there was even anything solid beneath him. In contrast, the sky was a sickly white, though even that seemed to be its own variation on the omnipresent darkness and did nothing to light the park. There was a black hole in place of a sun, and intermittent storm clouds made the sky seem more real, however slightly.

"How do you like my home?"

Kouichi turned at the voice to find Duskmon standing there, helmet tucked under one arm. His pale hair framed an even paler face, which looked eerily human without the helmet. His eyes, once blood-red but now a deep crimson, studied Kouichi intently as he smirked, lips pressed together into a thin line. He was, in an ominous way…handsome.

"Where am I?" Kouichi asked, backing away.

"Dusk," the digimon said, raising his eyebrow. His face…With shorter hair and human clothes, it could have passed for that of a respectable businessman. Kouichi shuddered. "What? Not to your liking?"

"What is this place?" Kouichi demanded, voice cracking.

"A shadow. A shadow of the Digital World, as well as of your world. The natives seem to call it Twilight; don't ask me why."

"Natives? You mean people actually live here? Or digimon?"

Duskmon smiled. It was possibly the creepiest think Kouichi had ever seen. "In a sense," the corrupted Warrior said. "Although to be precise, they are neither humans nor digimon. Similar, though."

Kouichi couldn't help scowling. Here he was, far from home in a black-and-white world, alone, and his former evil self was talking in riddles. Frustration and terror growing in him, he didn't know whether to yell at Duskmon or run away. "What are you talking about?" he spat at length.

Duskmon chuckled. "Oh, nothing too confusing. In fact, there's not all that much more to the explanation than what I just said." A strange look suddenly came over Duskmon's face, and his eyes grew distant, narrowing. He swore, shoving his helmet back onto his head. Scarlet fog seeped out of his armor's eyes, soon fading to a thin purple mist. Once it cleared, Kouichi saw no trace of Duskmon.

Confused, Kouichi turned a slow circle, searching, waiting for Duskmon to reappear. After a few moments, it became clear that the Warrior had truly left, at least for the time being, so Kouichi allowed himself to relax. The strangeness and stress of the situation, which had been pushed aside at Duskmon's arrival, returned. Feeling lightheaded, he stumbled over to the swings and took a seat on one. He stared at his feet as he attempted to sort out what exactly had happened and decide what to do next.

"I know when my dreams became nightmares," he sighed, suddenly aware of the silence. "So when did my nightmares become reality?" He shook his head, chuckling at his own words. Nightmares becoming reality. Sure. "I must be going crazy."

"You don't seem so crazy to me. But then, what do I know?" The voice laughed. Startled, Kouichi turned around to find a Gotsumon, or – remembering Duskmon's words – what looked like one. The digimon settled onto the swing next to the boy, a cracked magnifying glass bouncing against his gray rock chest. Kouichi couldn't keep himself from gaping. "What?" the digimon asked. "Is there something on my face?"

"No," Kouichi assured quickly. "No. I was just…What are you?"

"I'm a digimon, of course! Gotsumon's my name. What else would I be?!"

Kouichi blushed. "Sorry. I just…I mean, I heard that there weren't really digimon here, so I wasn't sure. I thought you looked like a Gotsumon, but since I heard that there weren't digimon, I was really confused, so…um…yeah."

"Do I know you?" Gotsumon asked suddenly.

"Huh?"

"There's just something familiar about you. Do I know you from somewhere?"

Kouichi frowned. "I don't think so. Then again, I did go to the Digital World for a while, so maybe we met and I just forgot you. Oh, sorry! I didn't mean –"

"Oh, yeah! You look sorta like that crazy Legendary Warrior that helped me find the Spirit! You know, you talk a lot more than him. More friendly, too."

Kouichi laughed. "You must mean Kouji, my brother. And actually, he talks a lot more than me. I don't talk around people. Well, not usually anyway," he added pointedly.

Gotsumon shrugged. "I have that effect on people. Anyway, what's your name?"

"Kouichi."

"Kouichi…Okay. Come on, Kouichi!" He hopped off the swing, grabbing Kouichi by the wrist and dragging him out of the park. Considering Kouichi was more than twice the digimon's height, the pair made for quite an unusual sight. Eventually they came to a road lined on one side by the park, which turned out to be one of the only clearings in a forest, and on the other by bleak gray plains. The road dead-ended at a lake, but a separate path led around the water to an enormous Victorian-style mansion.

"What is it?" Kouichi gasped.

"We call it Old Twilight," Gotsumon said. "It's where we all live."

"All? How many are there?"

Gotsumon led him onto the smaller path as he explained, "I guess 'all' isn't really right. There's around fifty of us here right now, mostly humans. Some of the digimon aren't willing to settle down. They wander around, but stay here overnight from time to time. Some even stay for a couple of days."

With a slight grunt, Gotsumon hopped across a patch of wet, mossy rock, then turned to help Kouichi as the boy slipped slightly on the moss. Throwing his arms out for balance, Kouichi blushed as the digimon's hand wrapped around his wrist.

"Huh, imagine that!" Gotsumon muttered. "One of the great Legendary Warriors trounced by a mossy rock." Kouichi's blush deepened. "You're just lucky I was here to save you from a slimy bath!" Chuckling, he continued walking.

Kouichi, however, paused. "Hey, Gotsumon?" he called. The digimon, stopping, turned around. "How'd you know I was a Legendary Warrior? I never told you that."

"You said you've been to the Digital World, though, right? Why else would you be there if you weren't one?"

Kouichi shook his head. "There were others who came on the Trailmon. I mean, Katsuharu and them were there for almost as long as…Well, they stayed almost until the final battle."

"Hm." Gotsumon thought that over for a moment, then shrugged. "Well, you are a Warrior, aren't you?"

"Well…yeah, but…"

"So that's it! I just assumed, and I happened to be right!"

Sighing, Kouichi followed the little Rookie as he once again began walking. When they made it around the lake, Gotsumon opened the mansion's door, gesturing Kouichi inside. So much was going on that for a minute Kouichi couldn't take anything in. When he came to his senses, he blinked in awe.

Beings – human and digimon alike – were everywhere; running, laughing, reading, even arguing. The building was at least ten stories high, and a few feet from the front door, youngsters ran through a large, indoor garden. The flowers had a hint of color in their petals, but like the rest of Dusk – or Twilight, or whatever – the hue was predominantly gray. Children ran to hide in the drab foliage, some barely able to walk. Digimon chased them – mostly In-Trainings, though Kouichi recognized several Babies and even a few Rookies. Teenage girls and young women watched from the edge of the courtyard and the second floor balcony.

Each floor had a balcony ringing the garden courtyard, hallways leading off to the left, right, and straight back. To Kouichi, it looked more like a hotel than a mansion. Kouichi could see people roaming the halls in pairs or trios; none seemed to be over thirty years old, and most of the boys were younger than fifteen. In addition to those in the garden, a few digimon were standing alone by the balconies.

"Who are they?" Kouichi gasped.

"For all practical purposes, they're humans and digimon." A humanoid being in a cloak approached. All that was visible was a head of pure white hair and a vaguely feline face with two small fangs poking out from his mouth. Looking amazingly vivid in the colorless world, his eyes were two vertical honey-colored slits. "But if you want to be accurate, the 'digimon' are fragmented data streams and the 'humans' are more like psyches. Ghosts, you might say."

"Who – what are you?" Kouichi asked, starting to feel redundant.

"Maybe you should take a Digital World history class," Gotsumon whispered, only adding to the boy's frustration.

The newcomer smiled. "I'm afraid my story is a long and confusing one, so I will only tell you a portion of it. I was once an Ultimate digimon called Sulamon. Back then, I was one of the Digital World's greatest fighters. This was long before the war between Human- and Beast-type digimon, at a time when the Digital Powers were just becoming aware of lost data. You see, every so often a digimon was simply not reformatted. The Powers were working on a way to recover the lost data, but each day program integrity deteriorated a little more.

"Hoping to buy themselves time, they created this world," Sulamon continued. "It was beautiful, a perfect opposite of the Digital World, and connected to it. Quite by accident, it was also linked to the Human World. Oh, you wouldn't believe how beautiful it was! Trees were yellow with rich red leaves. The grass was red, the sky was orange. The sun was dark and cast shadows of light. It was Twilight."

Sulamon fell silent. "So…" Kouichi prompted with no response. After a few moments of silence, he tried again. "So they had to just live here forever?"

"Oh, not at all! This is more like a waiting room. The digimon come here and enjoy themselves until their data is drawn through the Gate and they are reborn in the Village of Beginnings. While here, they don't have to worry about permanently losing part of their data."

"So what about the humans? How did they get here? Can they ever leave?"

"We aren't exactly sure how they got here, and we haven't been able to send them home. Most don't remember their life before coming here, and those who do don't want to even think about it, let alone go back. They don't age – some have been here as long as I have. They make friends with the digimon, to the point where some digimon refuse to be reconfigured. This isn't a holding pen anymore. It's a home."

"So the digimon remember, but the humans don't?"

"Yes."

"If you've been here so long," Kouichi asked, "why haven't you been reconfigured?"

"I am this world's caretaker in Lowemon's absence."

Lowemon? Kouichi thought, gasping at the mention of his Spirit. He considered speaking up, but Sulamon hadn't noticed his reaction and kept talking.

"I used to merely check up on Twilight, but then the war started. Early on, the Village of Beginnings was destroyed. A similar place developed in this world – Terminal Village. All the digieggs and digimon came with it exactly as they were.

"Without the Village of Beginnings," Sulamon said, "all the digimon who were deleted were sent here. By the end of the war, there were thousands of digimon here. Early on, I moved here permanently to avoid the fighting. By that time I was sick of it."

"How many digimon are there now?" Kouichi asked.

Sulamon frowned. "Too many. After the war, the Legendary Warriors rebuilt the Village of Beginnings. All but the oldest inhabitants of Terminal Village were immediately reconfigured. The Warriors came here. Eight of them stabilized this world, each shaping their own Sector. Lobomon and Lowemon, however, stayed here. They made this mansion the Gatehouse."

"Gate…" Kouichi's voice trailed off. "What kind of gate was it?"

"A Gate between the worlds." Sulamon paused. "Perhaps it would be best to show you." Leaving Gotsumon behind, he led Kouichi to a corner of the room. They took an elevator to the top floor – twelve. There were no rooms, no halls to the left and right as they followed the balcony around. In stark contrast to the rest of the mansion, no one was on this floor. Even the sounds from down below seemed muffled by the distance and foliage, as if this floor were in a completely different building. Overhead, an intricately carved dome covered the courtyard.

The carpet here seemed more luxurious than that of the first floor, but that may have been due to the fact that the first floor had endured more foot traffic, wearing it down over the years. Here, though, everything seemed decades newer, the carpet still fluffy, the walls still smudge-free. It could have been a first class hotel from a black-and-white movie.

In the middle of the back leg of the balcony, this floor's only hallway stretched back, once again lacking doors. Eventually it dead-ended at another elevator, which Sulamon ushered Kouichi into. The boy was surprised to see that the inside panel was almost completely bare, bearing only two buttons, one to open the doors and one to close them. To his surprise, the elevator automatically started moving, taking them back down to the ground floor. The doors opened to reveal a round room large enough to house a soccer field with no exit besides the elevator.

This place was unlike anything Kouichi had yet seen in Dusk. Rather than being muted to grays and black, everything had been washed of color. It was all white, but cast into deep shadow, which had no apparent source and stretched waywardly in all directions.

Vines had overrun the room. They climbed the walls, as if searching for a crack to take advantage of, and the only section of wall devoid of the foliage was the elevator doors. The vines twisted up tree trunks, hanging limp from the barren branches. If Kouichi had counted, he would have seen there were ten trees arranged in a half-circle around the room's central fixture, which jutted several inches out from the far wall.

"The Gate," Sulamon confirmed. It was a large arch – about twenty feet tall – made out of what looked like metal. Lines and symbols covered the Gate, overlapping so much they were impossible to decipher. A hairline seam ran down the middle and gave the impression of a massive pair of doors.

"How does it work?" Kouichi asked, approaching the Gate to run his hands over the carvings.

"That's something I don't know. There were symbols on the Gate that would glow one by one. When they were all lit, Lowemon would come. He'd travel for a while, surveying this world, gathering digimon who wanted to be reconfigured. Somehow he and Lobomon – from the Digital World – would open the Gate together."

Kouichi frowned. "So why did you say there are too many digimon here?"

"The Gate hasn't opened in a year," Sulamon said. "A year ago, our world became this place. We were cut off from the Digital World. To make matters worse, we had more digimon appearing than before. Duskmon was one of them. He wandered for a while, and we figured he was like any other digimon.

"At some point he started terrorizing us, and twisted the fabric of this world into what you see today."

So my Spirit did all this… Kouichi thought miserably. How much power does he have? And what other destruction could he be causing?

Sulamon paused, seeing the disturbed look on Kouichi's face. "I think you've heard enough for one day. Let's go get you settled in."

Kouichi nodded numbly and followed Sulamon to an unoccupied suite in the left wing of the second floor. The main room was a small kitchen/living room, complete with cabinets, a sink, a couch, and a microwave (which surprised him, but he decided not to ask about it). The door to the right was a fully stocked bathroom, including a shower. To the left of the main room, Kouichi found a comfortable bedroom.

Sulamon left him there, stretched out on the bed, where he had collapsed. So all of this was his fault. Despite his exhaustion, Kouichi felt restless and paced the suite as he dwelled on what his mistake had done to this world. It seemed his past was determined to never let him move on with his life. In fact, Kouichi thought, it seemed Duskmon wanted to do just the opposite.

-Child of Healing

Word count: 3120