Hi! I'm back! Thanks to everyone who reviewed and enjoy chapter 2!

As for the question of pairings…I'm not really sure. I'm terrible at writing romance (It always comes out like a corny Disney channel movie) so I'm thinking of putting hints of couples here and there, but nothing major. So, I'm sorry, but this probably won't be boy/boy, not because I have anything against it, but because romance just isn't my thing. I'm open to suggestions about the couples, but the one thing I WON'T write is Sora/Matt. Can't stand that. I really can't. I'd honestly rather write Sora with Joe than with Matt.

OK. Rant done. Read chapter 2. Review, pretty please?

b..d..b..d..b..d

"Davis!" An exhausted Ken gasped. "I need to stop."

"Why? We've only been running for four miles of so."

"Keep in mind I haven't exercised much and I'm still bleeding..."

"Oh. I guess we can stop for a little, than." Davis used his red tee shirt to wipe his face.

The two boys stopped and Ken leaned on a tree, breathing heavily. There was a few seconds of silence, then the winged boy started laughing. A high, breathy laugh that almost sounded insane.

"Uh, Ken? You alright?"

"Oh, yeah." Said boy gasped through his snorts. "I'm fine. My gardenias just tried to kill me, they already killed my big brother, and suddenly I can fly. Yes, I'm just great!"

Davis looked at his new friend with a look one might give an injured wild animal. "Sit down. I think you need to."

Ken slid down the trunk of the tree, his wings fluttering slightly, until he was sitting on the ground. He gasped several times; head berried in his hands, trying to regain his composer. Davis plopped down beside him. After a few minutes in silence, Ken spoke.

"Explain."

"What?"

"You owe me an explanation."

"Oh." Davis rubbed the back of his head "Well, you see...It all started...There are...Ugh, I can't do this. It gets way too complicated. This is Izzy's thing. Or even Tai's."

"Who are they?"

"Well, their-Oh, this part I can explain!- We're a…Well, we call it a clan. Like I mentioned, we're all different, and most of us have a pretty screwed up past."

"How about you?"

"Hum?"

"Do you have a-and these are your words, not mine-screwed up past?"

"Oh." Davis avoided eye contact. "I don't remember."

"You don't-"

"Amnesia." Davis explained, tapping the side of his head. "I can't remember a thing before the day Tai found me. I was in an ally, pretty beat up and crying my eyes out, talking some nonsense about finding a man who had the June. Which doesn't make sense because it was October."

"I-I'm sorry."

"Don't be." Davis said with a little wave of his hand. "Anyway, as I was saying, we move around a lot. I can't think of a time we spent more than a week in one place. But, no one complains (Well, Mimi does, but that's just her) because we can't let them find us."

"Them?"

"Tai will explain that, too." The boy gave an involuntary shudder. "All you need to know about Them right now is if They find us, bad things happen."

"Oh. Okay."

"Back to what I was saying. There are 12 of us, 13 including you. Ages range from, let's see, Rosie's the youngest, Joe's the oldest… From 8 to 17. And there's also-"

"DAVIS!" A new voice called out.

Said boy leapt to his feet. "Uh oh." He muttered "I'm in trouble."

A tall, thin boy with the unhealthy look of someone who had grown a lot in a short amount of time burst into the clearing. He was older than them both, maybe 16 or 17, and had a head of blond hair cut rather long for a boy with stormy, sea blue eyes. He wore an old back tee shirt and a pair of tattered jeans.

"Davis!" For a moment, the boy looked relived as his eyes fell on the red head. That, however, was soon replaced by anger and exasperation. "Davis, where the bloody Hell have you been? I mean, really, we wake up, you're gone, no note, no anything, and all Tai can tell us is that you were going to see some kid you met yesterday! Did you ever stop to think that it might be a trap? That it might have been them trying to find us? Did you ever think-"

"Hay, hay!" Davis interrupted, his hands held up in a gesture of surrender. "Matt, relax. Yes, that might have happened, but it didn't!"

The boy, Matt, was apparently not going to let him off that easily. "Do you realize how worried we've been?" He snarled, "Poor Sora almost had an aneurism! Even Tai couldn't calm her down, and that's saying something! Joe paced so much that he actually, I kid you not, wore a grove in the ground, and Yolei thought you had left for good! I mean, jeez, you know she has abandonment issues. Davis, you need to think of other-" He trailed off as his eyes fell on Ken, who was still sitting down. "Who's that?"

"That's uh, Ken." Davis looked sheepish as Ken struggled to stand up. "The kid I went to see."

Matt took in the wings. "He's…One of us?"

"Yup."

"And you just…Took him with you?" By now Ken had gotten to his feet

"Pretty much."

Matt looked as if he were going to launch in on another rant, when Ken began to sway on the spot.

"D-Davis? I d-don't feel so g-good…" And with that, the pale boy fell to the ground.

Under the veil that seemed to be covering his mind, Ken could hear muttered voices, muted words, then two lines, very clear.

"You ran four miles after he told you he had been friggin' stabbed? Congratulations, you have just snatched the idiot of the year award away from Tai."

"Well, he technically…Flew…."

Ken couldn't even take in how strange that sounded before he passed out completely.

b..d..b..d..b..d

The first thought Ken had as he came to was that he wasn't in his cot. No, his cot was hard and extremely uncomfortable. This surface was heard as well, but it seemed to cradle him in a way that calmed him down. He was laying on grass. Now the question was, why? Then the events of the past two days came pouring into him mind.

Where the heck was he?

The second this that he realized was someone was touching his arm…

No No No No!

He jerked it away and sat bolt upright, cradling the appendage to his chest. One thing Ken hated more than anything else was physical contact. The very idea of of it made his skin crawl. It brought back memories of doctors and needles and of being poked and pricked and probed…

"Hay, hay, calm down! I'm not going to hurt you." A soothing male voice said from his right. Ken turned slowly to face the person who dare lay a finger on him.

It was a boy much older than him, 17, maybe, 18 at most, with shoulder length dark blue hair and deep ebony eyes hidden behind thin silver glasses. A small scar cut across his cheek bone. He gave Ken a soothing smile, then spoke again.

"You know, you're going to hurt yourself more if you keep holding your arm like that."

For a moment, the winged boy had no clue what the other was talking about. Then he became aware of the throbbing pain in his upper arm. He looked to see the deep cut his uncle's knife had made.

"Oh." He whispered. "Ow."

"Yes, that's what I thought." The boy laughed, "I'm Joe, by the way."

"Hello, Joe. I'm Ken."

"Nice to meet you." Joe smiled again, then became serious. "Now, by the way you just reacted, I assume that you don't like being touched. That's okay, most of us didn't at first. But I can get rid of that cut very fast, if you'd just let me take your arm. And I'd suggest it, considering you passed out from blood loss and shock."

Ken considered this. What the boy was saying made sense. But still, he didn't know this boy…Well, he'd just have to fix that.

"What's your full name?" He asked.

Joe gave him a look of confusion, but answered none the less. "My name is Jyou Montgomery Kido the fifth (AN-I don't have a clue what Joe's middle name is, so bear with me.). I'm currently 17 years old."

Ken gave him one last scrutinizing look. "Fine" He said, handing over his injured arm.

Joe went to take it, but stopped. "May I ask what that was all about?"

"I, uh," Ken blushed. "I've been told not to let anyone touch you unless you know them. Now that you've introduced yourself, I know you. Problem solved. " Ken was mentally kicking himself. That sounded so juvenile.

"Ah." Joe said as if he understood, but he didn't. There was something that was definitely…Odd about this boy. But they were all a little off at first, now that he thought about it.

Joe laughed. "Alright. That makes sense. But, anyway, let me fix you up." The tall boy folded his hands, as if he were praying, and Ken's eyes widened as his palms began to glow a gentle, golden color. He placed them over the deep slash in Ken's arm.

Ken experienced a red hot burning sensation, which quickly went to a comforting warmth, which soon dimmed to nothing at all. And like nothing. No pain, no sting, no nothing.

"Wow." Ken remarked as he looked at his newly healed skin, only a scar remaining of the once deep cut "That'll come in handy."

A smile tugged at the corner of Joe's mouth. "It does."

"I'll assume that's your…Thingy?"

At the choice of words, Joe actually laughed. "We call them gifts, actually. And, yes. Davis is part dog, you can, apparently, fly, and I heal."

"Well, thank you."

He shrugged. "Don't mention it."

"What…What do I do now?"

"I guess you should go to where the others are." The older boy pointed through the trees to the right, "Our camps over there. Just keep walking, you can't miss it."

"Alright. I will." He stood and picked up his bag, which had been next to him the whole time. "Thank you again."

"And, again, it's not a problem. When you get there, tell them I'll be over shortly. I just have to clean up here."

Ken nodded, then walked in the direction he had indicated.

The newly winged boy was in utter awe of everything. The trees, the grass, the bugs, the way the moss grew on the rocks. All the little things most people didn't notice were so clear to him, because they were the things he had missed the most. Who cared if suddenly the whole world was topsy-turvy, that he had made friends with a boy who was part dog, that a young man had just healed his arm by touching it, or that a pair of flipping fairy wings were growing from his back. He was out of that stupid, stupid, STUPID attic room.

Ken continued walking, hoping he was going the right way, when he heard a rustling above him. He froze, imagining all sorts of horrible things in the tree tops, but he definitely wasn't expecting what did drop down.

A small girl, age 8 with cinnamon skin and dark hair tied in two braids, was hanging from the branch over his head by a tail. A long, brown, monkey tail. She dropped down and landed in front of him. Ken opened his mouth to speak, but was interrupted as the girl began to talk a mile a minute.

"Hello. My name's Rosa. Who are you? I would know, but the older kids think I'm too young to be at the meetings ." She had a musical Mexican accent. (Not an OC, she's the Mexican digidestined from season 2)

"I'm Ken-"

"Oh! I like that name! And you have pretty wings! I wish I had wings, or could control something. But all I have is this dumb tail. I like you. Want to be friends?"

Ken blinked. Had this happened yesterday, he would have completely freaked out. However, after all that had happened, he figured he could take this in stride. He smiled.

"Sure. We can be friends, Rosa. Will you show me where the, er, others are?"

"Oh, si. They're just over there." The tiny girl grabbed his hand and practically dragged him the rest of the way. They stopped by the edge of a clearing. In it there was a small camp fire, with 10 people sitting around it. Ken recognized Davis and Matt, who were sitting on either side of a tall boy with untamed bushy brown hair and brown eyes to match in a faded orange shirt.

"See you around!" Rosa grinned, giggled, then scurried away, her tail waving behind her.

Ken couldn't help but smile as the little girl's energy. He was about to step into the clearing, but froze as Matt began talking.

"I'm not saying we don't take him in. I'm just saying we make sure he's for real! For all we know he could be a spy for them or something."

Davis glared at the boy. "Yeah, because all spies have wings, right?"

"Well, yeah, there's that…"

"Listen guys." This was a short red headed boy sitting across from Matt, "I'm 99% certain he's not a spy. I've spoken to Joe, who has examined him, and he says that the kid has a slight case of malnutrition and hasn't been out in the sun for years-"

"Well that's obvious!" A high, girlish, somewhat nasal voice interrupted, "I mean, have you seen his pallet? If ever someone needed a tan, it's that kid! And also-"

"Mimi?" the red head cut in, "Shut up."

The girl, who Ken still couldn't see, sniffed and muttered something that sounded like 'how rude', but was silent after that.

"Also," The boy continued, "Whatever medicine they had him on did more harm than good. I've analyzed it, and it works kind of like chemo therapy. Meaning it kills off good cells because it's trying to get rid of the bad 'cancer' cells. The problem was that the kid wasn't sick with anything, much less cancer, so the stuff made him weak enough so that his gift wouldn't show up. Whatever the stuff was, it's bad news."

"I could have told you that just by the way it smelled." Davis shuddered. "It was evil."

"Well, then." The tall brunette in between Davis and Matt had finally spoken. "If Izzy's right, and he usually is, (This got him a smile from the red headed boy) then the kid isn't a spy and we have no reason not to help him. I would like to find out more about his power, though. He can fly, the wings are obvious, but can he do anything else? I really don't want a repeat of the Wills incident."

Ken decided it was time to make his presents known. "Unless you count knowing a lot of useless information from reading too many books a power, I think the wings are it." He could have laughed at the expressions of shock on their faces. He smiled shyly. "Hello. I'm Ken."

Davis jumped up and went to his side, then swung his arm around the boys shoulders, making him wince.

"Everyone, this is Ken." He said unnecessary. Ken wiggled out from under his arm.

The brunette boy who had spoken before stood up, rolling his eyes at Davis's antics.

"Hi, Ken. I'm Tai. How are you?"

"Umm…I think extremely confused sums it up nicely…"

Tai laughed. "We'll try to fix that. But, first things first, let's introduce everyone." He indicated that Ken turn around, which he did. And came face to face with the single strangest group of people he had ever seen, not that he'd seen many or, come to think of it, any, in his life.

"Okay, how do we want to do this?" Tai addressed the group. "I could introduce you all with names only and we can do gifts later, or you could introduce yourselves with gifts, or I could do both and you give a demonstration…"

"How about you introduce names, then we say powers and give a demonstration?" Matt said, looking rather board.

"Ah. Good idea." Tai slapped the blond on the back, causing him to fall forward due to the force. "We'll start with me, I guess. I'm Tai, we don't use last names, and I can do this." The older boy pulled off one think leather glove and flicked out his hand, palm up. A small tong of flame appeared in the center of it, pulsing and dancing. He held it for a moment, before snapping his hand into a fist, extinguishing it. "I can control fire, in a nutshell."

Tai turned to the person to his right. "That's Matt, our self-proclaimed cool guy."

The blond scowled at him in a friendly fashion, then turned to Ken. He too pulled off a one of his gloves, though his were plain cloth, not leather. He touched his fingertips together and pulled up slowly. A long, thin, crystal like rod grew from them. Matt smiled and uttered one word.

"Ice."

Tai rolled his eyes at the boy, then turned to the next person. "This is Sora."

A thin girl with short auburn hair cut near her chin smiled at him. She had on a yellow sleeveless shirt with a flower pattern on it.

"Hello!" She said, searching Ken's face with soft, amber eyes. "I can do this." She held up her hand and slowly squeezed it into a fist. Ken's eyes widened as a small pebble rose from the ground and floated to her. "I'm telekinetic."

"Next is Matt's younger brother, TK." This boy would have been the spitting image of his older brother, had it not been for two things. For one, his eyes were wider, almost more innocent looking. And also, there was the big difference. This boy was covered from head to toe in a thin layer of light orange, fuzz-like fur. When he smiled, you could see sharp canine teeth glinting, and his ears were pointed in an almost elf-like fashion. A white fishermen's hat cover a mop of blond hair the same shade as his brothers. (An-Yes, I KNOW I'm kinda ripping off the X-men here, but you try coming up with a bunch of original super powers.)

The boy grinned and stood up. Then he wasn't there. Ken blinked and looked around wildly, only to find him on the other side of the clearing. Then he was suddenly standing in front of the winged boy himself.

"I'm fast." TK said, before darting back to his seat. "Very fast." Ken just nodded numbly.

"And that's my baby sister, Kari." He indicated a girl in a too small pink shirt next to TK.

"Hay, I'm not a baby anymore, Tai!" The girl did resemble her brother, almost strikingly so, having the same dark brown hair and a similar build. The girl's eyes, however, were extremely unsettling. They were like those of a cat, deep brown with horizontal slits for pupils.

"I can…" She hesitated for a moment. "I can read minds, to a certain extent."

Ken wanted to ask what 'to a certain extent' meant, but Tai had already moved on.

"The kid with the lap top is Izzy." The red headed who had spoken earlier and did, Ken saw now, have a lap top balanced on his knees, looked up and gave a little wave before looking at the screen again.

"Izzy." Tai seemed exasperated, "Show the kid what you can do."

"Oh." The boys head snapped up. "Sorry, I was-"

"In computer land. I get it." Tai finished. "Just get you demonstration over with."

The boy sighed and pulled off one of his yellow gloves (Do we see a pattern, boys and girls?) The red head held up his hand in an almost cone-like shape. Electricity crackled at his fingertips.

"Comes in handy when you need to keep a lap top charged in the middle of the woods." Ken found his unasked question answered.

"That's Mimi." It was the nasal girl who had spoken earlier. She would have turned heads in any situation. Firstly because she was rather pretty, with honey blond curls and soft brown eyes. And also because her skin was blue. Yes, blue. An attractive light blue, but still blue.

"I," She said in her girlish voice, "Can talk to plants."

"But she can't make them grow." Sora piped up. Mimi scowled. This was apparently a sour spot.

"This little guy's Cody." A small, serious looking boy with jade green eyes and neatly cut brown hair stared at Ken. "He doesn't talk, really." Tai continued, "But he can summon water."

The boy now identified as Cody picked up a small white board, scribbled something on it, then turned it around.

"HELLO, KEN." Was written in big block letters. Ken smiled and waved back.

"And lastly we have Yolei."

"Looks like we have something in common, hum?" The girl had long, violet hair that hung to her waist and was held out of her face by a blue bandana. But from her back grew a pair of wings. Not semi-translucent ones like his, but large, red-brown and feathered, like an over grown hawk.

"Other than the obvious," Yolei said, folding her wings neatly on her back, "I'm a clairvoyant. I can see into the future, sometimes."

Ken nodded, feeling very overwhelmed. Were all people like this? The ones he knew were not, but Sam had once mentioned something about his aunt and uncle being strange, and that most people weren't like them. That…He couldn't even comprehend that. He decided that people in general were odd, and he left it at that.

"Can-"Ken faltered. "Can I have my explanation now?"

There was a moment's silence. Then everyone bust out laughing. Ken stood there, wide eyed and confused, trying to figure out what on earth just happened.

"Yes." Tai gasped, wiping away tears of mirth and sobering up quickly. "Yes, you really do need one, don't you?" He turned back to the group. "Anyone who doesn't want to hear this again, leave now."

Mimi stood up immediately, pulling Sora behind her. The blue skinned girl pulled her friend away quickly, Sora barely having time to wave over her shoulder before they were gone. Next Cody stood up, pick up the white board and jotted something down. He turned it around to show everybody.

'GOING TO SEE IF JOE NEEDS HELP. C U ALL LATER.' With that he walked away.

Yolei muttered something about checking on Rosa, then left as well.

TK grabbed Kari's hand and dragged her away. And everyone else stayed where they were. Ken sat on the ground next to Davis.

"OK." Tai began. "Might as well start at the beginning. Ken, have you ever lived in or near a place called Highton View Terrace?"

b..d..b..d..b..d

Unknown place, unknown person

"The boy has escaped the two agents?"

"Yes, Sir."

"Did he stop taking the repressor?"

"Yes, Sir."

"And do we know what he can do?"

"From what Agent Jennifer said, he has wings, Sir. And Agent Mortimer agrees."

"Odd. Not a very common gift at all. It will be fun to attempt to cure him."

"Do we send people after him, Sir?"

"…No. No, let's let this play out on its own. With our plan, we'll have them all here in a matter of weeks, anyway."

"Yes, Sir. Whatever you say."

b..d..b..d..b..d

"Highton View Terrace?" Ken repeated. The name triggered something in the back of his mind. "Wait, I think I remember! We lived there for a while. My family. But, God, I was really little. Like, two and a half. I was three when my parents died and we were sent to my Aunts."

"Right. It's an apartment building." Tai gave Ken a securitizing look. "Do you remember what happened there?"

Ken squinted in concentration. "There was an…Explosion, wasn't there? We moved after it."

Tai nodded. "They say it was a terrorist attack. Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't. All I know and care about is that some people who were there and under the age of 10 turned out like us. Different. Gifted."

"Yeah, gifted." Matt scoffed, rolling his eyes.

Tai gave him a death glare, which he returned with equal malice.

"Anyway." The fire user continued. "Me and Kari's parents died in the attack. So did Matt's and TK's. Matt and I were 6, and TK and Kari were 2, same age as you. We were kids. We were alone and scared, and they took advantage of that." Tai stopped, unable to continue. Matt sighed and patted his friends hand. He picked up where Tai left off.

"Long story short, we were kidnapped by them and brought to a lab. They wanted to find out what was up with us, why we could do what we do. We grew up in that lab, pretty much being experimented on every day. When Tai and I were 12, we managed to escape. The four of us wandered around for a while, then we found Izzy. Next we picked up Sora, and then Joe, and so on and so forth, until we found Cody about 6 months ago. And now we found you. You can stay, if you want."

"I can…Stay?" Ken thought it was too good to be true.

"Of course. Would we be explaining this all to you if you couldn't stay?" Davis looked annoyed.

"The others all have their own stories, but those aren't mine to tell." Tai finished. "Do you have any questions?"

"Just one." Ken searched for the right words. "Who exactly are they."

"That's part of the problem." Sighed Izzy. He had been so quiet Ken had forgotten he was there "We don't know. Are best theory is that they're some sort government organization. But for all we know they could be the terrorists, or some random group of scientists, or even a secret society of some kind. All we really know about them is that they want us. All of us."

"Then how can you tell if someone's with them or not?"

"There's only one sure sign." Said Tai. "Everyone who works for them has a tattoo on their left wrist that looks like this." He picked up a stick and drew a sideways hour glass in the dirt. "There's a color pattern too. The-"

"Left side's black. The right side's red." Ken finished in a whisper. His face had gone very pale.

"Yeah, how'd ya know?" Izzy asked, confused.

"Because," Ken croaked in a hoarse voice, "My aunt and uncle have the same one. On their left wrists."

There was complete, shocked silence in the clearing for almost thirty seconds. The all you-know-what broke lose.

"Did they see you?" Tai growled urgently. "Did they see you run away?"

Ken nodded numbly. "Just the general direction, I think."

"Crap!" Matt swore, looking wildly around. Tai, however, immediately sprung into action.

"GUYS!" He shouted at the top of his lungs. "PACK UP FAST! WE NEED TO GET OUT OF HERE NOW!"

To be continued…

Okay, boys and girls, let's review-

Tai- Controls fire

Matt- Controls ice

Sora- Telekinetic

Mimi-Can talk to plants

Joe- Healing

Izzy- Electricity

Davis- Is 'Part dog', superior hearing and sense of smell. Can run on all fours

Cody-Summon water.

Yolei-Bird wings, Clairvoyant.

Kari-Can read minds, cat eyes.

TK-Appearance, (Read above description) Speed

Ken-Wings, something else to be reviled later.

Ugh, this was supposed to be longer, but I had to break it up. Well, what can ya do? Oh, I know!

REVIEW!