Here's the new chapter
Chapter 9
Tap. Tap. Tap.
"Kari?"
Kari sleepily stared at Gatomon. "What is it? And keep it down, or you'll be seen."
The dorm was silent. Kari's dormmates, Hermione, Lavender and Parvati, were already fast asleep long time ago, and Kari had just been drifting off to sleep when Gatomon had gently tapped her on her ankle.
"There's an owl."
"What?"
"Owl."
Kari pulled back the curtains around her bed, gazing blearily out into the semi-darkness. Through the dim light shining in through the window, she could make out a dark shape of a bird tapping insistently on the glass.
She went to the window and let it in. "Fireball," she whispered, recognised the reddish-brown owl that belonged to her older brother, Tai. The owl was carrying a package wrapped up in paper, which it dropped onto her bedside table before flying off again.
"Bye, Fireball," Gatomon said quietly, before pouncing on the package.
Kari shot a warning look at her digimon before climbing back into bed and drawing the curtains around her shut. Then she pulled out her wand.
"Lumos."
Gatomon had torn open the paper wrapping of the package, revealing a thick sheaf of white printing paper that had been stapled together.
"There's a note." Gatomon held out an envelope. Kari took it.
Kari,
Hi, everything okay there? It's not here… The news are being hushed up in the newspapers but everything's all over the internet. Well, it used to be, but even the articles on the internet have been taken down, guess who? But our computer genius Izzy managed to retrieve quite a lot of info from the net, which we've printed out and sent to you.
Don't worry about it, we're trying to figure out what's going on. If we can't then, well… Oh well, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.
Bye, and take care.
Love,
Tai.
Typical Tai. He never wrote much in letters. This letter was no exception.
Gatomon scrambled over to her side as she picked up the stack of papers Tai had sent her. Kari was quite good at speed-reading, and before five minutes had passed, her eyes were wide open in shock and she felt completely awake. The articles were all from the internet, and all of them carried an almost similar story.
Strange unidentified creatures had been sighted in parts of Japan, and not even the Japanese Ministry of Magic knew what they were. The creatures only appeared briefly before disappearing into thin air. And wherever these creatures appeared, destruction followed.
Kari shuffled through the papers, finally selecting one article at random. She read through the article slowly. A park had been discovered completely burnt down to the ground. Even its metal benches had been damaged so badly that all that remained were shapeless structures of twisted metal. A witch living nearby had reported seeing a strange, bird-like creature apparently struggling with a few hooded figures shortly before the entire park exploded into flames.
"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Gatomon whispered.
"Digimon," Kari whispered back. "But what are they doing here in the human world? Something must be wrong with the Digiworld."
"There should be other Digidestinied guarding the Digiworld,"
Gatomon said. "We should have faith in them."
Kari nodded. "I guess you're right. But I'm still really worried. Tai and the others must be worried about it as well, otherwise Tai wouldn't have contacted me. But now we really have to get some sleep, I'm dead tired."
"You have to get some sleep," Gatomon corrected her. "I'm going off to tell Patamon and Veemon."
"Be careful," Kari whispered, but Gatomon had already jumped off the bed. Gatomon gave her a wink, then scampered quietly out of the dormitory.
&&&&
"AND THAT'S SO GREAT! WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME A SINGLE WORD ABOUT IT? JUST GREAT! I COULD HAVE-"
"SILENCE!" Madam Pomfrey roared, running over to the small group gathered around Kouji's bed. "One more word – one more word – and you're OUT!" she panted fiercely, glaring straight at Takuya, who took a few steps backwards in alarm.
"We're so sorry, Madam Pomfrey," Zoe said, putting on her sweetest smile that could have melted even Dementor's heart – that is, if Dementors even had hearts. "I promise that I'll put a Silencing Charm on him the next time he opens his mouth."
The matron glared at each and every one of them, eyes flashing. "Are they disturbing you, Minamoto?"
"Course not," Kouji said quickly. "Can you leave us?"
Madam Pomfrey shot all of them one more glare before stalking away, muttering about 'how tactless, incredibly dense and ungrateful youngsters were these days.'
"We had better apologise to her," Tommy said, staring after her. "I bet she's going to be complaining to our Heads of Houses right after we leave."
"Oh, who cares, it's not like I'm on my deathbed anyway," Kouji said dismissively. "I'm going to get her to let me out of here by tomorrow."
"So that's why she looked so peeved when she let us in," J.P concluded. "So, you were saying that there's something wrong with the Digiworld?"
Kouji nodded. "I don't know how bad the situation is, but hopefully what I saw is in an isolated area only. Looked as though there had been a war or something."
"Do you think Ophanimon could be trying to send you a message?" Tommy asked.
"So, what do we do?" J.P asked. Only Zoe answered.
"The only way we can be sure that the Digiworld is fine is by actually going there and checking it out for ourselves. But since the only way to get there is by the Trailmon, you can't expect all of us to go all the way back to Japan and see if there are any Trailmon in the Shibuya station…"
"Unless Trailmon come to the Hogsmeade station as well," Tommy put in.
"So my point is that we can't just go running off to the Digiworld when we have no solid proof that we're needed there," Zoe continued.
"Zoe's right," Kouichi said, speaking for the first time. "If the Digiworld needs us, either our Spirits or the Angel Digimon will find a way of contacting us and telling us what exactly happened."
"So you're saying that we should just sit on our backsides here and do absolutely nothing?" Takuya fumed.
"We wait," Kouji corrected him. He glanced at his brother. They had decided earlier not to tell anyone else that Dumbledore knew about the Digiworld. At the moment, all of them were helpless to do anything, so far away from home in a foreign land.
"If you say so," Takuya said grumpily.
"Good," Zoe said brightly. "Now, if you don't mind, I've got some killer project to complete for McGonagall on Partial Transfiguration, and we've to hand it in three days." She got up.
J.P got up too. "If you don't mind, I haven't finished mine either. Wanna do it together?"
Zoe nodded. "Sure. Well, we'll be seeing you guys around."
"And hey, we'll meet up by the lake later in the evening, 'k?" Takuya added.
"Gotcha."
&&&&
"Thirteen times."
"What?" Kouichi looked up from his book. Draco Malfoy was sitting across the table from him, smirking at something. They were in the library, catching up on some subjects and finishing their homework.
"Thirteen times," Draco repeated. "What do you have in your pocket, a dragon egg?" He smirked. "You've checked your pockets at least thirteen times."
Kouichi smiled sheepishly. "I thought you were supposed to be studying, not counting the number of times I check my pocket." Indeed, he had been anxiously checking his pocket regularly for his D-Tector – he had taken to carrying it around with him recently, afraid that he might miss a warning from the Digiworld. Subconsciously his hand strayed to his pocket again.
"Fourteen times."
"Come on, we've got to finish Flitwick's stuff," Kouichi said, trying to divert Draco's attention. "I still need about three more solutions for this question."
"Which one?" Draco leant over the table, reading the heading on Kouichi's parchment upside down. "Name six spells you would use if you were trapped in a burning building, and why. What have you written already?"
"Well, I put in Aguamenti…" Kouichi checked the book he had open in front of him.
"Reducto," Draco said, carelessly flicking open the lid of his ink bottle. The cap bounced over his notes and rolled to a stop above a diagram of a werewolf, leaving a trail of bluish black ink. "To blast away any debris that's blocking your escape route."
Kouichi was just about to write it down when he heard it. The voice.
"Kouichi."
The voice was oddly familiar. Suddenly he remembered it, and he froze in the middle of writing down his answer. The last time he had heard that voice was in the Digiworld. Ophanimon.
"Kouichi."
Kouichi turned to Draco, who was wiping off the ink from his notes with his wand. "Did you hear that?" Kouichi asked him quietly.
"Hear what?"
"Kouichi."
"That," Kouichi said quickly. "Did you hear that?"
The look on Draco's face was odd. "No, I didn't hear anything," he said casually, going back to his work. "Are you sure you heard something?"
Kouichi stared at Draco, who was suddenly very immersed in a book. "You're lying," he said softly.
Draco slowly looked up to face Kouichi. A tense moment passed between them. "But I really didn't hear anything," Draco said. He looked rather disturbed.
"You're lying," Kouichi said again. Then he felt it… Something seemed to snap inside of him, and he started to boil with anger. Draco was lying to him… "You're lying." This time, when he said it, a trace of Darkness lined his voice. But when he heard his own voice, he gave a start. This was precisely how he felt when he had attacked Kouji… He clenched his fists. Control yourself…
"It's not a good sign to be hearing voices," Draco said quietly.
"You heard the voice too, didn't you?" Kouichi asked, trying to remain calm.
"I didn't hear anything." The two of them stared at each other, hard.
Kouichi stood up abruptly. A thousand words passed through his mind, and he decided that it would be better to leave them unspoken. "I'm going to get more books," he said rigidly.
"I'll come with you." Draco stood up as well.
In complete silence they walked over to the bookshelves. The library was nearly empty, with the librarian Madam Pince busy dusting the Charms section. Kouichi randomly chose a row, and walked right to the end. He could just see Madam Pince magically directing a feather duster through the gap in the shelves.
"What do you have in your pocket?" Draco suddenly asked. His voice was soft and menacing.
"Nothing," Kouichi replied coldly.
Then Draco made a sudden lunging movement, throwing himself at Kouichi. They crashed to the floor, grappling with each other. Draco was quick – in a few seconds he had wrestled Kouichi's arms away and ripped aside his robes. Kouichi gasped as Draco snatched out his D-Tector. For a split second, both boys froze, staring at the black device in Draco's hands.
Kouichi pushed Draco off him and grabbed his D-Tector back. He was just stowing it back into his robes when a loud voice boomed out.
"What on earth are you doing? Fighting in the library?"
Both boys stood up hastily, not looking at each other. Madam Pince was glaring at them, her feather duster hovering threateningly in mid-air.
Kouichi slowly looked up and chanced a glance at Draco, and found Draco glancing back at him.
"I'm sorry," both of them muttered, more to each other than to the furious librarian.
&&&&
"Where's Kouichi?" Takuya asked Kouji. Zoe, J.P and Tommy were nearby, both Zoe and J.P lying down on the grass with books open in front of them. Tommy was skipping stones across the lake, only half-heartedly listening to their conversation. "He was supposed to be here ten minutes ago."
Kouji glared at Takuya. "He's in detention with that Draco Malfoy. For fighting in the library."
Takuya gaped. "Kouichi? Our Kouichi Kimura? In detention? Will wonders never cease, man. He's really changed a lot."
"Takuya-" Zoe began, but Kouji had already jumped up.
"I'm going back to the castle," Kouji said coldly. Without another word he stalked off in the direction of the Hogwarts castle.
Takuya stared. "What on earth is wrong with him? Can't a man make a comment without getting the cold shoulder every single time?" he sat up and frowned after Kouji. Then he sighed. "I really don't get what's wrong with him."
"You are what's wrong with him," Zoe snapped. "He's obviously worried about Kouichi. Kouichi hardly ever talks to Kouji now, and Kouji's just disturbed by that. And you have to go and make things worse by commenting on it."
Takuya groaned. "I guess you have a point. I think I better go after him…"
"You think?" Zoe said. "You had better do it."
Takuya groaned again. "Wish me luck," he muttered darkly, sprinting across the grounds after Kouji. He only managed to catch up with the angry Kouji in the Entrance Hall, which was deserted. "Hey, Kouji!"
Kouji turned around, looking annoyed. Before Takuya could say anything, a familiar voice greeted them.
"Hi, Takuya, Kouji!"
It was Ron. Harry and Hermione were with him as usual, but Harry was glaring at someone else, who had just appeared from the corridor leading down to the dungeons. Takuya turned to see who it was, and stiffened as well. Draco Malfoy and Kouichi, both of whom looked rather awkward about something.
An extremely silent and tense moment passed. Everyone was either glaring or looking away from each other. Then something dark brown soared into the Hall and stopped on the highest banister. The owl blinked down at everyone, as if trying to decide who to deliver its letter to.
Ron suddenly gasped. "That's Fred and George's owl! Why are they writing now?"
He stepped forward, but the owl suddenly took off. The owl flew directly above Draco and Kouichi, neatly dropping an envelope into Draco's hands. Before anyone could comment on this, the owl flew off again, leaving the situation in the hall tenser than ever.
Ron ran up to Draco. "What's that? I'm sure that was my brothers' owl. Who's delivering letters to you with their owl?" he demanded. He snatched at the letter, but Draco grabbed it back. However, Ron was fast enough to read the name on the envelope – Draco Malfoy.
Draco held the letter so tightly that he crumpled it. He turned to look at Kouichi. "Can we talk? Not here, back in the common room."
Kouichi was startled, but he nodded. "Okay." He glanced at Kouji, and felt rather guilty. But something told him that this was important.
They ran back the way that they came, back to the Slytherin common room. Kouichi gave the password – Salazar – as Draco was skimming through his letter, and they stepped into the common room. It was half-full with Slytherins. Draco glanced around.
"Not here, in the dorm," Draco said quietly. Kouichi was rather surprised but he nodded.
They had to go up a short flight of stairs to get to their dorm. The door to their dormitory was closed. Kouichi stopped, keeping one hand on the door handle. "Are you okay, Draco?"
Draco nodded numbly. "I think that Ken's in there," he said quietly.
"You think?" Kouichi pushed the door open. Then he stared…
&&&&
Kouichi stared down at the dark green creature. He had seen it once or twice in the Digiworld. If he was correct, that creature was called a Wormmon… What he had seen when he had opened the door was this – Ken, sitting on the edge of his bed, reading through some Muggle-looking papers, and a green bug creature sitting on his shoulder.
"Um… Hi," Wormmon said uncertainly, looking up at the three Slytherins who had been staring uncomfortably at each other for about a whole minute now. "Why isn't anyone saying anything?"
Kouichi stared at Ken. "Are you… a…"
Ken nodded. "I'm a Digidestinied," he said quietly. "You're one too, aren't you, Kouichi? Every time I go near you, my Digivice detects something… That's you, isn't it? My Digivice has been detecting yours."
Kouichi was shocked at this statement, but he nodded as well. Another tense moment passed. Then Kouichi looked at Draco. "You're probably wondering what is going on…"
Draco gave a hollow laugh. "This is amazing… Simply incredible," he said softly. Even as he spoke, he reached down into his robes and pulled out something. Ken and Kouichi gaped at the thing in his hand.
"You see," Draco said, his voice now a mere whisper. "I'm one too."
&&&&
R&R
Ken