Three angel digimon stood silently before the teens. They had descended to the ground once the dark mist had disappeared. The others were still up in the sky took care of the rest of the forest, and saluted to the three on the ground, before leaving them behind with the teens.
"Digimon with light type attacks are part of the team trying to control the darkness. There light attacks makes the darkness disspiate," said Izzy as he tried to explain what happened.
Izzy could feel Tai's and Joe's eyes on him. He was also sure, without looking, Sora suspected him too with all the information he seemed to already have. Izzy glanced for a moment at Sora to see if he was correct. Sora stood with her arms crossed over her chest and Izzy knew she understood that she was being left in the dark about something.
Izzy hadn't wanted to reveal the others how much he knew of what was going on. He wanted to wait until they got to the team nearby. Izzy knew he was going to have some interrogating coming soon. He felt bad about leaving them in the dark, but he was requested help earlier than now because of his intelligence and researching skills. The others were more adapt at fighting and therefore were alerted until later. Izzy had been helping the others in the digital world for months now. Luckily, he had decided to take online classes this year and was able to complete them while he was in the digital world. Izzy knew he was lucky that he had chosen online classes because it had unknowingly allowed him to be an asset in preparing for the coming war.
Izzy shook his head of his thoughts, and focused back on the Angemon, Angewomon, and Darcmon that stood before them.
"What he says is correct. We are part of the scouting department. Within that department there are different legions. To make it short, we are part of the legion that watches for the dark mist and assigned to stop it before it gets too powerful. We are assigned to rescue digimon caught up in the dark mist as well," said Angemon as he gripped his staff tightly. The weak breeze in the air made his hair blow forward slightly.
"We were told to report to this area because we saw the darkness awakening, and research team Alpha alerted us that you were here. They located your position, and gave us your coordinates before it was too late. With the unexpected awakening they have requested that we escort you to the research center," said a Darcmon. Her eyes gazed at the children intently and warning them how serious this was.
"Alright," said Izzy as he eyed the others hoping they would comply. To his luck, neither Tai, Matt, nor Davis protested. Izzy figured the experience they had with the mist told them that they needed to be guided in case another awakening of dark fog happens.
So the teens finally began the journey to the team Izzy had mentioned. To be more specific, they were heading to research team Alpha. Izzy had been working with them for months on various projects. They had been trying to analyze the dark mist that was just faintly beginning to appear and had made some progress. The results of their investigation included the formation of a team to dissipate the dark mist. Izzy with a few others on team Alpha and with a lot of help from another team, made a survival guide book for the Digital World. It was given to almost every human in the digital world. The book listed the plants and foods that are good to eat, how to get water, and other survival tricks.
Little did the teens know, this step marked the start of the phase of no return in their journey. They could not turn back, no matter how much they wanted too after this point. At times, Izzy had wished there had been a way to turn back. He wished there had been a way to not let so many people be involved. Some of partners in the Digital World were only ten years old. Izzy still had nightmares of his experiences in the digital world. He would sometimes see Piedmon or Myotismon. He wasn't the only one either. Tai also had them. Tai had admitted it when Izzy brought it up one day. He wished so many people didn't have to be involved.
When they arrived to the outskirts of their destination everyone except Izzy and Cody were surprised at what they saw. What they saw when they had arrived looked like little town and within the town was huge castle. The castle was a bright white and had blue trim on the windows and on the door. The roof of the castle was even blue. You could see Patamons flying about in the air in the town. Flybeemon were also seen flying around. On the ground there many different kind of digimon.
Within the beautiful castle was the Research team Alpha. It was where they resided. They shared the castle with other teams and digimon as well. The castle was just too big for only one research team. The other research teams in different areas of the digital world had much smaller buildings and were only able to house the research team.
"We've never been here before," Tai said among the side conversations going on amongst there big group. Tai gazed at the humble houses and then at the big castle.
"I guess it goes to show just how big the Digital World is," said Matt.
"What do you think is in that Castle?" asked Mimi.
Angewomon answered, "The castle is our destination. That is where research team Alpha is. They are expecting your arrival. They are the ones that asked us to keep you safe and escort you here."
As the teens were making their way up to the castle, Takeru saw a Terriermon playing with a Labramon. They tussled on the ground and were making funny faces at each other and laughing. Takeru felt himself smile at the sight. He glanced beside him at Kari who was looking at the same thing. Takeru noticed how pretty she looked with that expression. Takeru quickly looked away when he noticed Gatomon had caught him. Takeru looked back at the Labramon and Terriermon and felt like there wasn't going to be any war. Everything was so peaceful and so many digimon were getting along in the town they were in. Takeru knew though; it was just the calm before the storm.
They entered the castle upon reaching it. Inside, they followed the angel Digimons up a flight of stairs and down a few corridors, before they stopped in front of a large door. The wood of the door was very ornate and had ancient digimon on it that no one in the group had ever seen before. The only one they knew on the door was Azulongmon. Darcmon knocked loudly on the door.
"Come in," came a masculine voice.
Darcmon opened the large doors. Inside was a large room and in the room sat about 20 people typing away at computers. Once the door had opened a girl with auburn hair quickly got up from her computer, and before Izzy was even through the threshold he was grabbed into a tight bear hug. She had her hair braided down her back, and she was slightly shorter then Izzy. Tai grinned when he saw Izzy's face go red and Davis started laughing.
When the girl finally let go of him, Izzy introduced her: "This is Lana."
Lana said something afterward to the group, but no one understood what she said.
"Is she speaking german?" Ken asked. His eyebrows were furrowed in concentration as he tried to figure out what language she was speaking.
"uh…yeah," said Izzy nervously.
They heard other voices speaking something they didn't understand in the room. The only word the others could make out was "Izzy." Izzy greeted them as they called out his name. He could feel stares drilling into his back. The eyes of friends not liking being left out of loop.
Izzy knew it was time to spill the beans.
"Izzy, what's going on?" Sora asked as she eyed him with her arms across her chest
"Yeah, I would like to know too," Joe said. Everyone nodded or spoke their agreement on the matter.
"Well, I have been informed on the situation earlier, when it was first beginning, and have been helping doing research for a while now. Most of you guys were contacted just now because we are at a stage where we need your help," Izzy stated. Izzy went on to tell them about what they have been doing and that he is part of research team Alpha. And that was also why he had the portal bring them so close to the team's headquarters. In the back ground, Lana would say something and Izzy would look at her and then say something. Lana was putting in information in that she thought Izzy should include in the briefing.
"Okay, I think I get what you are saying, but how can you work with people speaking a different language, dude?" exclaimed Davis.
"Ah, excellent question Davis! Have you ever noticed that digimon can speak whatever language their partner speaks? Digimon are obviously programed and designed to understand any language then. Under this premise we concluded that it must be part of their coding. Part of their data. Well proceeding from that information, we had a theory that since technically we are all made up of data when we enter the digital world, we could manipulate data to where we universally understand each other. The theory was a success. I can understand everything my team mates are saying. Everyone in the Digital World is able to too. Once someone arrives in the Digital World they get a notice on their digivice about linguistic scan and they also receive directions on how to get to the closest facility that has one. You did not receive one since I was with you and was taking you to one," said Izzy all excited, "I just need to set up the scanner."
Lana and Izzy headed to the left side of the room where a rectangular machine stood. At the top end of the rectangular object was another smaller one attached to it. It had an overhang. At the back of the machine Izzy flipped a few switches and the scanner turned on. It turned on with a low buzz sound. Lana sat a computer that seemed to be integrated to the machine with wires. She typed a way at the computer for a moment and clicked a few times before she hit the enter button.
In the large room they were in, besides the clicking and tapping of computer keyboards, there were two guys talking to each other. The conversation was in a different language. No one understood the conversation except everyone who had had the scan. The digidestined, except for Cody and Izzy, only heard noise to them and were out of luck if any of them had desired to eavesdrop on the conversation. They couldn't focus on anything being said. It all just sounded like noise to them. One of the boys had red hair and above his desk was pictures that lined the wall. The pictures were of digimon and their partners. Most of the flyers had red words inked across them except for one of them. The flyer only had the red words across the Dobermon. The partner's picture was untouched. The picture was of a girl. She looked about 16 years old. She had short platinum blonde hair and blue-green eyes. Kari immediately took notice of the flyers and wondered what they were for. Above those pictures were pictures of people with large X's drawn through them. Kari had a sense of dread with what that meant.
Lana abruptly called out something while looking at the group. She said it again, before she realized her mistake. Izzy had finished up his look over of the machine to see if it was running good.
"She said everything is ready," said Izzy translating her for his group of friends. "What you have to do is stand underneath that overhang of the machine and it will do a scan. The scan will alter your listening data to be able to understand any language. It will appear to us that everyone is speaking Japanese and writing Japanese."
"Izzy, not to sound rude, but are you sure this is safe?" asked Joe. "We won't gain the ability to turn into a digiegg or digivolve, right?"
"No, everything is fine. If you die in this world then your body remains it doesn't turn into data or turn into a digiegg. That's how our human coding is different," replied Izzy in a matter of fact way.
"Whoa, Izzy what's with the death, part. Chill man, who is going to die?" said Davis.
"Davis, what's happening is very serious. We may already have people who have died out here in the Digital World. Different departments were organized in the beginning when the sense of evil was just barely there. The intelligence department and Combat department as well as a few others were among the first. There is a branch which falls within both the intelligence and Combat department and it has had many people not return from their missions. Most of them are filed under MIA. The branch is called the general name of the scouting legion. One squad was completely obliterated. One person's body was torn in half. The digimon had been reverted to digieggs. And the digieggs had been tainted with evil data," stated Izzy. His eyes were so intense as they stared at his friends. Davis had grown quiet and his confident face had darkened in gravity of what was happening.
"This is your chance to back out now," said Izzy gravely.
"Izzy, I'm going under that machine. I'm not going anywhere," Said Tai as he clenched his fist. He was more determined than ever to help.
"I'm not running away either," said Kari with the same determined face Tai had. They were definitely related.
"Count me in too," said Matt.
"Edmund Burke said: 'The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.' I won't stand around and do nothing as evil tries to consume the Digital World," said Takeru.
"Takeru, you're right. Evil will prevail if we sit in fear and don't do anything. That's the last thing I will ever let happen here," said Sora and looked at Takeru and then let herself Gaze at Matt how was right beside him.
Eventually everyone agreed, and no one wanted to turn back. Izzy was partly relieved by the fact they now seemed to understand what they were up against, but he was still worried about what the future held.
"Alright, Tai, you ready," asked Izzy as he looked at Tai who was underneath the machine.
"All good," called Tai and gave Izzy a thumbs up.
Izzy put in the startup code and the scan started. Out of the floor came out blue rings. They were untouchable and circled around Tai until there was a beep. They then dissipated. The scan was complete. The process was the repeated for each digidestined and they were greeted by all the people in the room once the process was complete. They mingled and tested out the results of linguistic scan.
Tai conversed with a boy with red hair. His name was Glen. He had an agumon just like Tai. Hence, Tai took an interest in him. Davis talked to some of the girls that worked for team Alpha. Cody was already acquainted with Izzy's teammates from being in the digital world for training, and he seemed at ease with some of guys. They told inside jokes and laughed. Matt and Ken were talking with Izzy and a few others about the idea of manipulating data. Sora was by Matt's side too. Yolei and Takeru were meeting Cody's friends that were on team Alpha. Mimi was talking to Lana about their hair colors and also about what can be expected in their adventure.
Kari, after having talked to a few people and introduced herself to them, approached the pictures she had seen. She could now understand the writing. The writing read: found. Kari looked at each flyer. She still didn't know what the "X's" on some of them meant.
"Kari, what are looking at," asked Gatomon who appeared beside her on the desks below the flyers. Gatomon had noticed that Kari had stopped mingling with the others. Gatomon had previously been, across the room, sitting on a desk near Matt trying to understand what Izzy was saying about how they were able to manipulate the data of humans to be able to understand any language.
"I'm trying to figure out what these pictures are for," replied Kari. She had her hands behind her back. One hand was wrapped around the wrist of the other. She was nervously moving her wrist up and down. It was something that Gatomon had noticed early on about Kari. It was something she did when something was on her mind.
A boy with dark brown hair and chocolate brown eyes approached Kari and held out his hand to her.
"Hi, I'm Franz, I overheard you say you wanted to know what the posters were for," he said.
"Yes, that's right. My name is Hikari, but everyone calls me Kari," Kari said as she shook his hand that was held out to her.
"Those flyers are something Glen put up. He is the kid with the red hair over there talking to Tai, if I remember correctly," Franz said as they both turned back towards the wall to look at the pictures. The giant windows on both sides made the pieces of paper seem insignificant and tiny. It was like the windows drowned out the importance of the flyers.
"He put them up to remind himself that this isn't game he is playing. He is very big into chess back home, and, unlike chess, when a plan fails there will be real consequences. The ones with x's on them are of the team who died. Izzy mentioned them to you before he scanned you guys," Franz continued.
Kari looked over the flyers with x's on them. The people in the photos looked a few years older than Tai. They looked like young adults. It was hard to hear of people dying in the Digiworld since from her adventures none of them had ever died.
Franz glanced at Kari and smirked like he was trying to hold in a chuckle," Glen also has a big crush on that girl there with the really blonde hair. To me, I think he partly does it to remind himself that she is still missing. Though, he says it is to show the true beginnings of the war."
Kari eyed the girl with platinum blonde hair again. She noticed that beside the girl's photo was a picture of a Dobermon. It had the words "found" stamped over. Gatomon also noticed it and beat Kari to the punch.
"They found her Digimon, but not her?" asked Gatomon.
"Yeah, her Digimon used all his energy trying to protect her. He was reverted back into a digi-egg by his opponent. He was found back in Primary Village," replied Franz.
All of a sudden, Franz was tackled by a terriermon. He remained standing from the impact though, and Terriermon climb to the top of his head and started to pull at Franz's brown locks.
"You know that Glen doesn't like you telling people he has a crush on her," scolded the Terriermon.
"Ouch, ouch! She asked Terriermon!" replied Franz as he tried to get his digimon out of his hair.
Kari and Gatomon could only stare at the scene as Franz tried to get his Terriermon to stop. They definitely felt like they sweat dropped with how ridiculous a situation this was. The relationship between these two partners was very odd. It seemed like, for once, the Terriermon was the responsible one.
Abruptly, a loud sound echoed through the room. The members of team Alpha dashed to their respective desks mid-conversation with the Digi destined. Whatever was happening it was urgent. Before the digidestioned knew it, they were being shoved out of the room by an Andromon. They each carried out by the collar of their shirt or by their pants and the door was closed in front of their faces.
They turned around and looked at the giant corridor. They were surprised when a White Pawnmon approached them.
"I will show you to your quarters for now," said the Pawnmon as he started walking down the corridor. The teens followed Pawnmon. Tai and Davis did reluctantly.
"Gee, just when I thought I could really get to explore this place," sighed Tai. Davis complained about the same thing as well.
"I didn't know we were sleeping here," said Sora.
Pawnmon replied, "Izzy mentioned you might not know. Very well, the portal to the Digital World and the Human World are closed off. People from the real world can come in to the Digital World, but only under special cases allowed by team Alpha is anyone or anything allowed to go from the digital world to the Real world."
"So what you are saying is that we're stuck here, unless team Alpha opens a portal for us?" cried Davis. He then added, "I told my mother I would be home before dinner!"