The team had just set up for camp. It was nightfall and they were in the middle of one of the forests of the world they were in. All of their second Digimon had stayed back to protect the temple of protection in case anyone tried to enter. The group were all exhausted. The group had all agreed that T.K, Izzy and Axel should get the night off. However the three of them had agreed to continue working. T.K and Davis had just got a fire lit and the group all sat around it. Kari was in T.K's arms. Izzy had his arm around Mimi and Matt was holding hands with Sora. Gatomon was hugging Patamon as if he were a stuffed animal.
"So guys we need to sort out a system in which we can work as a team." Tai suggested. T.K then nodded in agreement. Izzy then pulled out his laptop. For some reason it seemed to have full energy. He then opened up a program.
"So what are the duties we will need to cover?" Izzy asked as he looked up from his laptop.
"We'll need people to search for food, so that would be mainly fruit and things you can find around here..." T.K quickly said. Izzy then started typing something on his laptop. Axel then pulled out some string and got a stick out and tied the two together.
"I can go fishing if you want, we should at least try to vary out diet. Since I know people will start getting sick of fruit." Axel stated. Izzy nodded and continued to type on his laptop.
"Actually that does sound like a good idea. Fish does sound nice." Gomamon said excitedly.
"We need some scouts as well to check the area is safe!" Tai commanded. Izzy again nodded and continued to type.
"Izzy what are you doing?" T.K asked. Izzy then stopped typing and looked over at him.
"At the moment I'm making a list of duties and then we will fill them out once people have been assigned a duty." Izzy explained. He then looked back at the screen and continued to type.
"Izzy how many people are we going to have doing different jobs?" Matt asked his voice had a sarcastic ring to it, almost as if he was trying to rein act one of those cheesy adverts on the television. T.K looked at Matt and tried to stop himself from laughing. The rest of the group looked at the two brothers confused.
"Well really it depends. I believe that we should have guard duties attended to at different hours. So for example Matt will take guard duty for a couple of hours and then T.K will take over." Izzy tried to explain. However he was still typing on his laptop.
"Izzy just tell us the jobs..." Tai groaned the group had made barely any sense out of what Izzy had said.
"Ok so we'll have three people fishing. Axel since you suggested it you'll have to put up with it. Joe and Kari I'm also putting you on that job as well. Kari because of Gatomon and Joe partly because I thought it would be funny and the fact that you have Gomamon." Izzy commanded. Axel nodded. Kari looked over to Gatomon, she still had Patamon in her arms.
"Do we have to split them up?" Kari asked. Izzy then looked up from his laptop.
"I'm afraid so, to keep our productivity up I don't want any couples working together. Is that ok with everyone?" Izzy asked. The group just looked at each other and nodded.
"I suppose we should start fishing now guys, if we don't then we might not return with any fish." Axel suggested. Axel then stood up, he then walked over to one side of camp. Joe and Wizardmon then walked over. Gomamon was perched on Joe's shoulder. Kari then pulled T.K into a passionate kiss. She then broke away and started to walk off. She then briefly stopped and looked back at T.K.
"Be careful Takeru." She gently whispered. She then walked to the other members of the fishing squad. Gatomon put Patamon down and started to walk off.
"Hey Gatomon, what you said the other day about me being you 'boyfriend' did you really mean that?" Patamon asked. Gatomon pretended not to take notice. She kept telling herself that they were Digimon and that it wasn't anything but there was certainly a feeling there. The fishing squad then walked off into the forest.
"Don't worry Patamon, given time Gatomon will tell you." Agumon said as he tried to cheer up his confused comrade.
"Anyway, next off is the fruit search group, that'll need I would say five people. How about Ken, Mimi, Davis, Matt and Cody?" Izzy suggested. He wasn't sure Matt would be to keen on the idea. But they needed to survive.
"Sure that sounds fine with me, anyone got a problem with that?" Matt asked. He then looked back to Davis, he knew Davis wanted guard duty, the fact that him and Ken were on search for fruit duty felt like a mockery.
"I should be fighting the enemies, not finding food!" Davis arrogantly shouted. The group then fell in hysterical laughter.
"Davis, there isn't any fruit here, you'll have to fly there using you DNA digivolved Digimon." T.K said. Soon the group had stopped laughing. Ken, Davis, Matt, Mimi and Cody had now all gone. The group felt glad. This was because Mimi did her speeches to Izzy that she does when they separate to do work. It always reminded T.K of a horrible movie made years ago. Where the crying girl would kiss the hero and tears would drop from her eyes.
"The rest of us are on guard duty I suppose." Izzy stated. He then threw some more wood into the fire. He then pulled out his laptop and started to look at some figures. Willis was in the corner smirking at the group.
"Soon you'll all be gone. I'll be the best of Wire's saints. I wonder when I should say timber..." Willis whispered to himself, he then made it look like he was napping the smirk still dormant on his face.
Meanwhile the fishing squad had found somewhere where they could fish. Sure it was a rapid but that was their only option. They otherwise would have to climb down a huge cliff next to a waterfall. Axel had made rods for Joe, Kari and Wizardmon.
"If the string snaps tell me, chances are it will, since this string isn't made for fishing." Axel said cheerfully as he threw his line into the water.
"What did you use as bate?" Joe asked as he fidgeted around as if he was looking for something.
"Your Digimon was kind enough to give me an earthworm." Axel stated, Gomamon then poked Joe's back. Joe then looked over to see his Digimon holding an earthworm.
"I picked out this one for you." Gomamon cheerfully said. Joe then attached the earthworm to his string and flicked his line into the water. Axel then lost grip of his fishing rod. The currents were too strong. Kari looked over at the water.
"You guys how are we going to fish? " Kari asked. Joe's line then snapped off as well. Joe looked up at the trees.
"I watched a documentary the other night. Beavers make dams, why don't we use that to our advantage? We're in a forest, we could cut down one of these trees and stop the river from flowing for a short while." Joe suggested. Axel and Kari looked at each other confused. Joe's suggestion sounded like something Izzy would say.
"Gatomon could you cut that tree?" Kari asked. Gatomon then nodded and started attacking the tree.
"Joe I have a question." Gomamon said. Joe looked down at his Digimon.
"What is it Gomamon?" Joe asked.
"How are we going to move the tree once it's down on the floor?" Gomamon asked. Gomamon looked like he was thinking but Joe couldn't be too sure.
"Well, simple we'll decide when it's down." Joe said. Gatomon and Gomamon then ran out of the way. The tree then fell down, however Joe couldn't move in time. Kari quickly ran back to get the others while Axel, Wizardmon, Gomamon and Gatomon tried to move the tree. Soon enough Tai, Izzy and Tentomon ran out with Kari. Tentomon digivolved to Kabuterimon and moved the tree out the way. Joe had been squashed several of his bones had been broken.
"What the hell happened!" Tai shouted. Kari looked down at Gatomon. Gatomon looked so upset. Tai looked so angry, Izzy had seen it once before and the last time he had seen it Tai had attacked him in his rage.
"When I cut into the tree there was a massive chunk out of it. It then snapped." Gatomon quietly said. She then ran into the forest. Wizardmon followed her. Kari then looked over at Tai.
"You know it was an accident." Kari said. Tai then looked down at Joe who looked as if he was crippled. Joe's bones then started to move back into place. He then sat up as if there wasn't an accident.
"Joe you're alive!" Gomamon shouted in joy as he ran towards his friend. He then jumped into his arms.
"It's almost as if we can't die, maybe we just regenerate back to a certain point. It'd explain what happened to Axel. In that task he broke his leg pretty badly but it just went back to normal. Maybe we can't die properly in this world." Izzy said to the group of people there.
"That would make sense, but when we return to the normal world will we have our broken bones?" Axel suddenly asked.
"It shouldn't. Hopefully we'll be fine." Izzy said. He didn't sound too sure but it was all they could do is hope Izzy was right.
"Right we'll take Joe back to base camp. You guys do whatever you want. You can come back to base if you really want." Tai commanded. Izzy and Joe then helped Joe up and walked out. Axel then pulled out his stick and tried some string to it again. He then tried to fish again. But the line snapped. The two then heard some sounds coming from the forest. They looked back.
"Light and protection, You'll be the first two to go. Don't worry soon all of your friends will be gone. I promise you!" A voice shouted. A dark aura then came from the forest hitting Kari to the ground. She was close to the river.
"Who are you and why are you doing this!" Axel shouted out. Another aura then came out and hit Axel. He went flying back and landed next to the river. A figure then walked out from the forest. It looked like Willis.
"I know you all thought I'd have the crest of destiny. Nope I'm one of Wire's chosen. Nice huh, my crest is betrayal. All of Wire's crest holders are up here you know. So bon voyage you good freaks!" Willis taunted he then kicked both Axel and Kari into the river. The flow of the river was unbelievably quick. Kari and Axel couldn't see where Willis was.
"Kari I'll push you out so you can warn the others and stop Willis!" Axel shouted. Kari then shook her head.
"When we regenerate we'll have to climb up the mountain, it'd be safer if there were two of us!" Kari shouted. Axel looked at her confused.
"What about T.K? Surely he'll need you!" Axel shouted. Kari then looked away. In the brief second she felt a kick under the water, she then found herself on the grass. She looked over to see the end of the river. It was the waterfall. Kari ran over and put her hand out for Axel to grab. However he couldn't reach out because he had barely any energy.
"Good luck Kari, stop Willis from getting the others." Axel said. She then witnessed as Axel fell down the water fall. It was so far down. That she couldn't even see the bottom.
"I will stop Willis from getting the others. I promise you Axel." Kari said. She continued to sit there. Waiting for someone to come along to tell her it wasn't her fault.
While that was all happening Gatomon was running through the forest. The small cat like Digimon then came to a stop. Wizardmon finally caught up to her. She turned round to him. Tears were dropping from the small cats eyes.
"What's the matter Gatomon? You can tell me." Wizardmon said. Gatomon then looked down at her paws.
"I killed Joe! That's what's wrong!" Gatomon shouted back at him. She looked really upset.
"Hang on you ran out of their before we could learn anything." Wizardmon said trying to calm her down.
"What if it was Patamon! What if it was him I lost! What if I lost his trust, what would I do then!" Gatomon shouted at Wizardmon. This had really hit her badly. Gatomon hadn't ever been this upset. Even working under Myotismon she'd never given off this kind of feeling. Well as far as Wizardmon could remember.
"Hang on how far in the forest are we?" Wizardmon asked. Gatomon then looked up.
"Oh no... Kari!" Gatomon shouted. She then ran back as far as she could Wizardmon continued to follow her.
"I hope Axel is ok! He's always found it hard being in this group. He only really knew one of them before he came in!" Wizardmon shouted as they ran along.
"Wait he knew someone?" Gatomon asked as they continued to run.
"Yeah he never told me who. He has lied to the group saying he hasn't ever been to the digital world. But he told me, when he went to the Digimon world he lost one of his friends." Wizardmon told Gatomon, Gatomon and Wizardmon finally made it out. They saw Kari sitting there.
"Kari what's the matter?" Gatomon asked as she ran up to her.
"Axel fell down the waterfall. He saved me from falling down, hopefully he'll regenerate like Joe did." Kari said. Kari then got up and started walking back to the camp. Gatomon and Wizardmon were following her. She saw everyone was in camp. T.K and Willis were talking. Kari briefly lost it and ran over to Willis and punched him in the cheek.
"Kari what are you doing?" T.K asked. He ran over to Kari confused.
"He killed Axel! Killed him! I saw it with my own eyes!" Kari screamed out. T.K sat her down on one of the logs and looked at her confused.
"He ran at me and hit me with a dark aura!" Kari shouted. T.K and Izzy's crests started to glow. T.K looked at his pendent it started to shine. He couldn't work out why. However that was unimportant, he had to talk to his future wife about the accusation she just made towards one of their team mates.
"Takeru you have to belief me I'm not lying to you." Kari said. She then started to cry. T.K started wondering to himself if she'd gone insane. Suddenly a javelin came flying into the camp. Everyone looked over to see Matt and Ian.
"Willis you tried to trap us when Matt returned in fact you tried to bury me alive!" Ian shouted. Willis then tried to run out of the camp but was stopped by Matt.
"So you think that you can try and kill us and then escape? No... It doesn't work like that!" Matt shouted at Willis. Ian then walked over to Willis's bed and pulled out a shovel. Willis looked back in shook, they had worked out he was trying to get rid of them. T.K stood up and walked over to Willis, he then looked on his neck and saw a crest. He then pulled it off.
"So you had the crest of betrayal huh? Well there are ways we can get revenge for Axel!" T.K shouted. He then nodded at Ian. After about half an hour Ian had created a whole for them to put Willis in. Patamon and Gatomon had told Terriermon that Willis was going to betray him as well so he had decided to return to the temple of protection.
"The reason we're burying you is because of what you did to Axel. Consider this his revenge." Izzy stated. Ian then hit Willis in the back of the head with the shovel he had dug the hole with. They then threw the knocked out Willis into the hole and started to fill it in. Willis had now been buried alive.
The morning had arrived and the gang all woke up. T.K looked over to see that Axel hadn't come back. But Wizardmon had left. T.K saw a note next to him. He started to read it and smile. He then got up and sat around the camp fire. Kari had her arms around him.
"Hey guys, this is Axel. I survived the major fall but it's not all bad news. I climbed back up. I also found a temple. However to ensure that you arrive to the temple I have had to sacrifice myself though. Don't worry it's not as bad as it sounds. I'm just doing to be locked in a small area. Move as soon as possible though the darkness is catching up to you!" T.K read out. He then looked up at everyone. They all looked tired, but they needed to get to the temple from the sounds of it. The group quickly made their way over to where the waterfall was. T.K had forgotten to take the letter with him. Tai then picked it up and started reading. He noticed a paragraph that T.K had forgotten to read out to them.
"I also found a temple that uses the power of light and protection. I'll stay there to protect it. Me and Wizardmon should be able to stop any dark forces from entering it. Also Tai I found someone who supposedly knows you. I'll let her tag along with me but she is holding a crest that suggests I shouldn't trust her. From Axel." Tai read out to himself. He then put the note into his pocket in case he needed it for later reference. Tai then followed the rest of the group out to where the waterfall Axel had fallen down earlier had been. There was a light aura in its place. Tai ran up to the rest of the group.
"So what exactly is this light?" T.K asked. The group then looked at each other trying to work out what it was. They had never seen this kind of aura before. It seemed to resemble a bridge. Kari then noticed a light in the middle of the aura. It was coming from the lower level and looked like a pillar that would be holding something up.
"I think it's safe to walk across." Kari said as she started to walk. T.K and Tai tried to stop her but by the time they had gotten there she had already taken the first step. She hadn't fallen through. Gradually the rest of the group walked onto it. Kari smiled at all of them. T.K however looked worried and hurt, she could've killed herself doing something as stupid as that.
"Kari what do you think you're playing at?" T.K asked, but at the same time it sounded like he was shouting. Kari couldn't tell if he was relieved or whether he was angry.
"Takeru... I'm sorry I didn't think like that." Kari quietly muttered out. The rest of the group had started to walk on. T.K briefly looked at Kari.
"Sometimes I don't think you understand." T.K angrily said before he carried on. Kari hadn't moved. Gatomon was still next to her. Kari then sat down on the aura and tears started to drop from her eyes. She felt so hurt, she had never heard T.K sound like that before. He sounded so harsh. Gatomon looked up at her.
"Kari what's the matter?" Gatomon asked. Gatomon also looked worried. She knew T.K was trying to protect her deep down but he had an awful way of showing it. Maybe it had something to do with Willis. He had just betrayed them.
"I don't understand what I did wrong..." Kari whispered to herself. She then started to go though the light. Gatomon then grabbed Kari but it didn't have any effect.
"Someone help me out!" Gatomon shouted. Cody and Armadillomon ran over to help her out. However soon they found that they were falling through as well. The others had run over but they hadn't made it in time though. Kari, Cody, Gatomon and Armadillomon had all fallen through the light aura. Tai fell to his knees. He then started to punch the ground where Kari had been. It didn't break at all. T.K was also doing the same thing. Tai then looked over to T.K, T.K then looked back. The two of them were both really angry. Soon enough the two were at each other's necks. Accusing the other of making Kari upset.
"If you hadn't of talked to my sister like that, none of this would've happened!" Tai shouted. He threw T.K to the ground.
"I was only trying to protect her!" T.K shouted as he pulled himself up. T.K went up to Tai and punched him in the chin.
"Hey you guys... Look at the temple over there!" Ian suddenly called out. Everyone in the group looked over to see a temple. Tai and T.K then went back to their little fight. Both of them throwing punches and kicks at each other.
"It's not my fault Kari has disappeared!" T.K shouted at the top of his voice. He then grabbed Tai. Tears were dripping off of his face. Whatever had happened to Kari it had a negative effect on both Tai and T.K.
"Well maybe if you'd been nice to her just a few minutes ago we wouldn't be in this mess!" Tai shouted at T.K. They clearly hadn't taken on board the temple which was near them. Ian and Guilmon ran up to them and tried to stop the fight. However they both seemed to turn on Ian.
"Get lost Ian, you shouldn't even be here..." T.K muttered out. Ian knew T.K was in a bad mood but it had hit his final nerve. Ian pulled out his javelin. The rest of the group stopped and looked over at them.
"Damn it to hell you two! Grow up! Right now our group doesn't need two more angry at each other. Just think, Willis would laugh at you if he saw you now. Bickering over Kari like infants! This place is like a test on our character, if we don't complete then the world will be destroyed! Our families will die, well your families! Now both of you get up and stop attacking each other!" Ian commanded. He had lost it; it was almost as if he was going to attack them. Agumon and Patamon ran over and helped out their Digi-destined partners.
"It's like you were having a fight with Matt again." Agumon sarcastically said as he helped Tai pull himself up.
"T.K you know sometimes I worry about you." Patamon said with a smile on his face. Davis then ran up to the two of them. Davis looked a lot younger then he looked before.
"Don't worry Tai soon T.J won't be with Kari and I'll make my move." Davis said sarcastically, he clearly was making a joke about the way he used to act. It was almost as if they had gone back to their old ages. Tai looked up to see that everyone had reverted. Back to the age they were when Davis and the others went into the Digiworld.
"We're all young again?" T.K questioned. He then felt the back of his head which had his hat on he then looked over at Davis he was wearing the costume he had when he used to go into the Digiworld.
"Guys look at this!" Izzy shouted. T.K and Tai ran around Izzy's laptop with the rest of the group soon gathered around it. The screen was showing a picture of everyone, it had their age under it and the name of the crest that they were supposed to hold. It also showed the crests that were needed to find each one. Izzy knew this because he had already had it happen to him in the past.
"So let's take a look at some of these..." Tai said as he continued to read the screen.
"See look hope plus knowledge equals protection. You can see by putting the symbols next to the faces." Izzy said pointing it out. It was a bit like a key but Tai couldn't make anything out of it. Izzy then turned to T.K and gave him the laptop.
"T.K you have to guide all of these people to their temples. I took a look at them quickly. It seems that Axel, Kari and Cody are all needed for the trust temple. Their door was opened when Axel made this light floor for us to walk across, you should consider this area a safe house for now. I'll start creating a sort of base camp around here where people can rest and prepare themselves for battle." Izzy said. T.K nodded at him. It seemed that he was going to have to help all of the Digi-destined in their challenges.
"So who's this temple for? I think it's for you Ian..." T.K said. He then looked up at Ian.
"It's a mixture of courage and reliability. That should create the symbol known as war." Izzy said. Tai, Joe and Ian looked at each other and nodded in agreement.
"Ok T.K it's up to you to open the door for us. C'mon lets go." Tai said. He sounded angry but a bit more relaxed. Hopefully he wasn't going to murder anyone in there. The four of them walked off to the temple.
"Well let's head back to base camp then." Izzy said with a smile. Mimi put her arms around him. Since they had reverted back to their younger selves Izzy was once again small. The rest of the group went back to base camp. However how would the Digi-destined reunite after Kari and Cody's disappearance?
"I hope that the other three are ok. I know Axel can look after himself but I'm not sure about Kari and Cody." Matt quickly said. Izzy looked back at them. They were at the cliff where the light aura started from.
"The best thing to do isn't to worry about them. There isn't anything we can do at the moment. Anyway I'm sure they'll be fine." Izzy calmly said back. Matt then nodded. The group had made progress since they had arrived here, but was it enough to stop Wire yet?
(Authors notes: Sorry for the delay everyone. I've been very busy at the moment. However don't worry the next chapter should be up soon.)