A.N.: I want to say, thank you so much to everyone who has left a review recently! I've been a little overly focused on getting the chapters out of the door when I've posted, and neglected thanking people. But honestly, I've been a little overwhelmed by some of the kind things people have said about this story, and I only hope I can keep writing something people enjoy!

I've taken a bit of a break from HF recently to work on my own novel, and I apologise for the comparative radio silence that doing so has caused. I do keep my profile a little more up-to-date though in terms of how I'm getting along, so if I don't post a chapter for a while, you are always welcome to check over there and see where my focus is. Anyway, on with the story:

Monday, 8:43am

Sleep eased slowly into wakefulness. Sora's head was pounding, and it was hard to focus on anything at all, even the strangely hard bed beneath her. Someone was calling her name, over and over.

"Mother?" she said blearily. Her throat felt dry, and she swallowed, trying to bring some moisture into her mouth. "Where… what time is it?"

"Sora!" the voice cried again. "Sora, it's me!"

The odd, floaty feeling behind the pain in her head was easing enough that she knew the voice now.

"Piyomon? But where's mother?"

Rubbing her head, she slowly opened her eyes and found her partner's face scant centimetres from her own. Squeaking with surprise, she rolled away and yelped as her arm smacked into something hard.

"Sora! Are you okay? I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you!" Piyomon cried. "I was just so worried about you, because you wouldn't wake up!"

The background behind her partner came into closer focus - something dark and grey? Where was she? It didn't look anything like her bedroom…but she wasn't at home, was she? She was…was…

The room swam lazily into solidity, and she opened her eyes wide, taking in the solid stone walls and ceiling. The room was utterly empty save for her partner and herself, and a thin mattress of some sort which she was laying on. There were no windows, just a large, solid-looking wooden door with no handle.

Something was very wrong with all of this. Where were they, and how had they gotten there?

"Piyo, what happened?" she asked, trying to make sense of the jumble of thoughts in her head. She felt groggy and lightheaded - almost as bad as the time she'd had the flu.

"I don't know what happened, Sora," Piyomon said. She sounded worried. "I'm so sorry. I couldn't protect you, and then you started acting all funny, and then… something hit me and I woke up here, but you wouldn't wake up, Sora. Not for so long! I was really worried about you."

Slowly, head throbbing, Sora managed to sit up. The room seemed to spin for a moment before settling into place. It wasn't large - two of the thin mattresses end on end wouldn't have fitted in any direction. From an upright position she could also see what looked like a mug by the door.

"Where are we?" she asked, leaning back against the wall behind her.

Piyomon sat down beside her. "I don't know, Sora, but I think Yamato might have taken us with him to the other world."

Despite the pain in her temples, Sora's head snapped up. "Yamato?" she cried. "Is he here? Did you see him?"

The past few days were coming back to her now - he was missing. In danger, and no one knew where he was.

"Sora… don't you remember? He came back, and then we all ended up in the strange room, and that man was talking to you."

She stared at her partner. "What? I don't…"

If they had been at home, Sora could almost have believed that Piyomon was playing a trick on her. Even in spite of how out-of-character it would be for her partner. But they weren't. They were in an unfamiliar room in an unknown place, and she had no memory of arriving there. The knowledge that there were gaps in her memory - especially gaps which Piyomon remembered and she did not - was not a nice one.

She scrubbed her forehead for a minute, half hoping that it would somehow set of a wave of memory. After all, there was a chance she was just tired and groggy from being asleep, wasn't there?

When she realised it wasn't working, she slumped forward.

"Piyo," she said, her voice low with worry. "I need you to tell me everything you remember. I don't- the last thing I remember was…was…" She frowned. "I was at Yamato's apartment, and I think I was making tea? But everything from the last few days is all muzzy."

"Sora, are you okay? Did that man hurt you? You told me it was all fine."

She looked up. "I did? Wait, what man? Piyo, I don't remember anything like that."

They stared at each other for a long moment, before Piyomon took a breath.

"Weeeell," she said, tipping her head to one side in that adorable way which meant she was thinking. The familiarity of it gave Sora comfort, even despite their surroundings.

"You mentioned Yamato?" she said, hoping to prompt her partner.

"Yes! You were getting things ready for dinner when he appeared, but he was acting very strange, and then all this black stuff appeared - and it was the same as when he disappeared, so I tried to warn you but I think I was too late. Everything went dark, and then we were in a strange room with lots of furniture like in those films you watch where people talk funny."

Despite everything, Sora couldn't help smiling a little at that. Her smile faded completely as Piyomon started talking again, the words coming out in a rush as her partner got caught up with her explanation.

"And then someone grabbed you, and I tried to protect you but there was another man who hit me with a long gun, and then the strange man stared at Yamato and made him fall down. But he told the man with the gun that everything was okay, and then he started staring at you, and you were staring back and not moving. And then you told me that it was alright, but I knew it wasn't, because he told people to take Yamato away and you didn't even look to see where they took him, and I tried to get you to answer, but someone hit me again, and it all went dark and then we were here, and you were asleep, and I tried and tried to get you to wake up, Sora, I really did, but you just stayed asleep, and I was really worried about you."

Piyomon was sobbing by the time she finished, and Sora clung to her desperately, partly to comfort her and partly because the whole situation seemed horrible. What could they do? Where were they?

Monday, 9:14am

Miyako opened her eyes and immediately closed them again. Urgh, why was everything so bright? Blinking, she looked around and realised why - she was sleeping on a pad on the floor of Hikari's bedroom, and no one had thought to close the curtains in the chaos of the night before. Sunlight shone through, right into her eyes.

Wait. Daylight. If it was light outside then that meant…

"Eeek!"

She scrambled to her feet, searching for a clock on the wall for a moment before reaching for her D-Terminal instead. Beside her, Mimi, Palmon and Poromon stirred, and she could hear the rustling of bedsheets up on Hikari's bed.

"What's going on?" Mimi asked, as blearily as Miyako felt.

"We overslept!" Miyako cried, throwing back the sheet and trying to straighten her rather crumpled clothes. "It's gone nine - we've got less than three hours until midday!"

Saying it out loud gave her a rush of energy - it certainly made the situation seem more urgent, at any rate. She was pretty sure that she was running on pure adrenaline as she burst through the door into the living room.

Jou looked up blearily from his makeshift bed on the floor, his arm still wrapped around Gomamon. He blinked a few times before patting the ground around him and finding his glasses.

"What…" He looked around. "What time is it?"

"The morning draws on," Alwyn said, lowering a book. "But I do not know the hour."

"It's after nine," Miyako said. "We need to get everyone up and work something out. I… I hadn't really planned to sleep this long."

There was movement from the sofa. "I don't think any of us did."

Ken sat up, stretching. "One of us should message Daisuke and make sure he's awake. Although I think we can assume he isn't, or we would have been plagued with messages from him."

Miyako frowned. "You think he's okay?" she asked. "None of us have stayed in the digital world overnight by ourselves before."

"Well, uh…" Ken cleared his throat, keeping his gaze lowered. "I…"

"Oh, Jou and I were apart from the others for ages," Gomamon announced loudly. "We all got split up more than once, and we were fine."

Jou smiled at his partner, and Miyako belatedly realised the reason Ken looked so awkward. He had been alone in the digital world - for quite a long time. She felt her cheeks turning red, and was glad that everyone had turned away from her so that no one noticed.

"Besides, Daisuke is with Gennai," Jou said. "It's perfectly safe there."

"Mm, Gennai's house is weird, but it's not really dangerous," Mimi added, appearing behind Miyako at the door.

Somehow, despite the fact that they had both been asleep on the floor, Mimi managed to look every bit as neat as she had the day before, whereas Miyako was pretty sure her hair was a mess of tangles.

The door to Taichi's room opened, and Mrs Takaishi emerged, rubbing her eyes. She looked as though she had hardly slept at all. "Is there any news?" she asked.

Miyako shook her head, and headed for the table. "I'm just about to see if Taichi's up," she said. "At least we all followed his advice and got some rest?"

Hikari emerged at the door, and walked over to the table. "We should head to a shop and get a load of batteries," she said. "I'll need to take plenty so that we can keep the D-Terminals working."

The door to Mr and Mrs Yagami's room opened, and Hikari's mother peered around the door. "Everyone's up?" she asked.

Mimi nodded, walking into the kitchen area. "I can make tea, if you don't mind, Mrs Yagami," she said. "We should think about breakfast too."

Mrs Yagami nodded. "I…I've eaten," she said. "I got up earlier, but you've all been so tired that I didn't want to wake you, especially as Taichi wanted you to get enough sleep."

The others bustled around as Miyako started up the laptop, drumming her fingers on the table as she waited for everything to load. Poromon fluttered over and landed in her lap, and she blushed.

"Sorry, Poromon," she said. "I didn't mean to forget you. I guess I'm just a little…stressed?"

"It's okay, Miyako. There's a lot happening. I'm sure you'll work it all out soon."

She hugged her partner, glad for his company. It helped her to believe that he was right, for one.

The laptop finally loaded. Ken pulled up a chair beside her, and their partners hopped down to let them work. In all the chaos of the evening before, they hadn't made a lot of progress translating the document. So far, it only seemed to be telling them things they already knew - and not even in an interesting way.

"Okay," Miyako said, opening the file and reviewing their progress. "So, we have… 'Much may be said of the history and origin of this world. It was formed as a tangent of its parent', bla bla bla, 'the birth of the world shaped its future', something about destiny and eternity, and then we get to the other worlds part."

Ken nodded. "I made a small amount of progress while you were asleep, but just what you see there.

Miyako scanned the rest of the text in the document:

::Beside are the worlds other than this; they are many, and of different ages each. Brought into existence as reflections, they blossom into full realities independent of their creator. Each is separate and yet as one, for when the balance tips here, so shall it everywhere, until the time-::

She frowned. It was progress, but not as much as she would have liked.

"Well, I guess we should keep working," she said with a sigh. "It won't translate itself."

The phone rang, making everyone jump. Mrs Yagami dashed over to answer it, smiling awkwardly at the room. Miyako looked around briefly to see that everyone was watching the woman. She wasn't surprised, to be honest.

"Hello? Yagami residence, Mrs Yagami speaking."

There was a pause. Miyako could have sworn everyone in the room was holding their breath.

"Oh, hello Mrs Izumi. No, we haven't heard anything more yet, but Miyako is just checking, isn't that so?"

There was a collective sigh as everyone realised it wasn't news about Yamato or Sora. Miyako nodded, although she'd already noted that there were no news messages since the night before. It was probably past time to give Taichi a wake-up call, anyway. She turned back to the laptop, as Mrs Yagami continued speaking.

"I…Oh dear, I hadn't thought of that. No no, you're right. I'll ask the children what they think. I don't really know what to suggest. Taichi said last night that they're all safe, but they can't get back….Yes, of course. I'll let you know as soon as we hear something." There was a click as she hung up the phone. "Miyako, could you ask Taichi something for me?"

Miyako turned around once more. "Sure thing, Mrs Yagami. What did you want me to ask him?"

"Well, Mrs Izumi just pointed out that you're all missing school right now, and suggested we think of an explanation."

"Uhhh… right. Let's hope he's awake enough to answer that one quickly, eh?" Miyako said. "And, um, I might need to borrow your phone after this to call my parents and tell them about what's going on."

She turned back to the laptop and quickly tapped out a message.

::Taichi, we have a problem. Your mother just asked me what we plan on telling the schools, because we're all currently missing our first lesson of the day. I meant to ask you last night, but with Sora vanishing and then you going off-radar, it sort of slipped my mind. What exactly can we say?::

She phoned her parents quickly while waiting for a reply. It wasn't a lot of help - they were annoyed that she wasn't at school, for one - but it passed the time, and at least she was able to explain that she had a really good reason for being absent.

By the time she was able to sit back down, Taichi had replied. Ken was staring at the screen, looking worried.

::Oh shit. Honestly, I have no idea. I'm pretty sure they won't accept "trapped in another world" as an excuse. I mean, we could try something like, food poisoning - maybe say we all hung out and ate some dodgy chicken. Ask Jou for how to make it convincing. But that only buys a week or two, and it falls apart if they want doctors notes. The other option is…well. Koushiro says we could get our parents to report us missing. It's technically true, and it doesn't have a time limit, but it does mean unwanted attention when we get back. I dunno. This is the one problem we never had to deal with before.::

"Oh." She sat down next to him. "Are you okay with that?"

He sighed. "I'm not sure how I feel, really. We still can't be certain I'm caught up in this, and we won't know until… either something happens or something doesn't. I don't want my parents to worry, but…"

Mrs Yagami had walked over, almost unnoticed. She frowned at the message on the screen, and then rested a hand on Ken's shoulder.

"Did you want me to invite them over?" she asked. "I feel as though they're about the only ones who haven't been here recently, and, well. It might be easier to explain in person."

"What are we explaining?" Jou asked.

Miyako sighed, and turned to face the others. "Koushiro thinks the best thing we can do is declare everyone missing," she said.

Mimi put her head in her hands. "Well, if my parents decide to move back to America after all this, you'll know why, okay? Why can't we ever have nice adventures?"

"What about you, Daisuke and Iori?" Jou asked.

Miyako frowned, thinking. "Well, if I know Iori, he'll have gone to school today. We can probably expect a message from him at lunchtime to ask what's going on. But Daisuke and I are already skipping lessons, and… I don't know. You need someone here who can keep contact with everyone. If Ken is pulled across, one person won't be enough. I have to sleep. I think we have to go 'missing' too."

"But you're not missing," Mrs Takaishi said. "You're right here."

"Everyone still here after midday could go and wait in the Digital world for a while," Hikari said, pulling the door to her bedroom closed. "We should have a better idea of what's going on by then, and you can't call until you know if Mimi and Jou are going to completely vanish or not."

"Urgh, I don't want to think about that," Mimi said, hugging Palmon tightly.

""We have to," Jou said glumly. "We can't just reappear there without a plan. And if we're going to officially disappear, we owe it to our families to let them know what's really going on."

"Easy for you to say," Mimi snapped.

"Yes, because my parents have always been so supportive of anything which might disrupt my education!" Jou replied, clenching his fists tightly enough that his knuckles turned white.

"All right, all right, calm down!" Hikari said loudly, face screwed up into a grimace.

Everyone turned to stare at her. Miyako couldn't remember the last time she'd heard Hikari raise her voice. Hikari herself seemed surprised, and clung to Tailmon, shaking a little.

"We're all… upset, or confused, or…or scared," Hikari said, looking at each of them in turn. "And if Taichi were here, I'm sure he'd know just what to say. But he isn't here. He's stuck in another world, and we need to find a way to get him back - because very soon, almost all of us are going to get stuck there. So we need to…to stop all this fussing and just work together. Because I'm pretty sure that's what Taichi would say if he could see us all right now. He's not fussing. He's getting on with it, trying to find a way back. And, well, we should too."

There was a short silence after she finished talking. Miyako drummed her fingers on the table.

"You're right," she said. "We need to make an action plan - and quickly, because there's not a lot of time before midday. Alwyn, what can you tell us about your world?"

Monday, 10:25am

It was a pretty surreal feeling to watch the people of the Forest City winding down for the night, and know that back at home, the others hadn't even had lunch yet. Taichi wondered how they were getting on. Miyako had messaged to say that they were going with Koushiro's plan - which in hindsight, probably was a better idea than his own. Not that he planned on admitting as much. After all, the food poisoning thing had to have been a pretty close second. And he couldn't say he was relishing the thought of his face being plastered all over the news, which it almost certainly would. Now there was a nightmare to have to go home to.

Koushiro was starting to get on his nerves, too. They had been there all of…what, a day? Apparently his friend was in some sort of tech withdrawal - especially as they had agreed to only have one phone switched on at a time to save power. In the absence of a computer, Koushiro had busied himself with what remained of the city's archives. Which meant that Taichi had been dragged along to a dusty, dingy room in a part of the city so old there was no electricity. And it was purely to carry out the sturdier looking books and scrolls into the more modern lighting offered by their new quarters.

"Any chance you're going to explain why you want so many of these damn things that I have to make three trips to carry them all?" he asked, as they made their way back towards the more modern tunnels for the second time.

He was piled high with a heap of books and papers which stank of dust and damp, while Koushiro - thanks to his broken wrist and injured feet - was burdened only by the torch which lit the corridor. The flame really wasn't bright enough for a creepy old place like this. In the wake of a fortnight's nightmares - which had turned out to be real, no less - the flickering shadows everywhere were giving him the crawls.

Koushiro sighed. "Ithel said that no one remembers this prophecy we were mentioned in, because the archives are incomplete and no one has seen the 'Fates' who made the prophecy in over a century. But they do have a lot of books and papers here, and I'm reasonably sure there must at least be a few references to it somewhere. Seeing as I… well. As I appear to be something of an invalid for the time being, I may as well make productive use of my time and see if I can translate anything useful."

"I still can't believe they let you out of bed," Taichi remarked. "You couldn't even walk an hour ago."

Koushiro grimaced. "This is more important," he said shortly. "I can sit down once I have something to do while I'm sitting. We don't have the luxury of wasting time."

"You're limping again. You know they said one dose of that tonic was all you were gonna get today."

"All the more reason to gather as much material to work with before I am rendered immobile once more," Koushiro said, turning away to stare at the wall while he walked.

Taichi felt a prickle of guilt. Had he pushed too far? Koushiro was pretty outside his comfort zone, after all. The Digital world was one thing - it was all code and computers. A whole world practically made for a computer genius to dissect. So far, this place seemed to be pretty much the opposite.

Best to change the subject then, really.

"I wonder if Takeru's awake yet," he said, as casually as he could manage.

"No doubt he needs the sleep," Koushiro replied. "It's a miracle he didn't break anything."

Taichi shook his head. "Nah. I mean, sounds like you guys didn't fall far. You had to have hit at a really unlucky angle to have done your wrist like that, really."

They walked in silence for a few seconds. Koushiro seemed to be limping more than he had a few minutes ago. It didn't help that he only had thin slippers to walk in. They'd been promised fresh clothes in the morning, but apparently that was a good ten or twelve hours off.

"Taichi, is there… a reason for your sheltering Takeru as you have been?" Koushiro asked as they finally reached a stretch of corridor with electric lighting. He left the torch in a bracket on the wall, and used his now-free arm to brace himself as they walked.

Taichi sighed. "I'm not sheltering him Koushiro."

Koushiro didn't answer. After a moment, Taichi sighed again.

"I just… Look, none of us know where Yamato is right now, or what's happened to him. But I know we're gonna find him at some point, and when we do, I don't want him to find out we didn't take care of his little brother, okay? You know what he's like. I mean, I know he'd do the same if it were the other way round."

"Ahh. You're worried about Hikari," Koushiro said, nodding. "And because you can't look after her, you're being the big brother for Takeru instead."

"No! I mean, well, kinda. But I'm serious about Yamato, too. I know he's out there somewhere, and he'll be expecting me to make sure Takeru's okay. I mean, jeez. You saw his face when he thought Takeru got trapped in wherever it was they were."

They walked through a door propped open by a stack of mouldering books, and Taichi dumped the heap he was carrying onto a desk.

"Right, that's your lot for now," he announced. "No way are you walking any more today…or, tonight, or whatever it is. I'll go fetch Agumon or Tailmon to carry the torch if you really want that last load of books, but you are resting."

Koushiro shook his head with obvious impatience. "Don't be ridiculous, Taichi. We don't have time-"

"Bullshit. I was there, Koushiro. They said your arm won't be properly healed for at least a week. You have plenty of time to rest. Hell, you shouldn't even have been doing this much. Takeru is isn't even awake yet, and you're up and walking around? If you don't rest up now, when we do need to move, you won't be ready."

Koushiro sighed. "Are you listening to yourself? A week. We don't have the luxury of me being idle for that long. Whatever is going on, it's escalating too quickly for that. We still know virtually nothing about what's going on, or why we're here, or what this world even is!"

Taichi ground his teeth with frustration. Why did Koushiro always have to be so damn literal about everything?

"Look," he said, leaning on the desk and gesturing to the heap of books. "I'm not saying you can't do all…this. I'm just saying, maybe leave off walking for a bit - at least until the doctors can look at your feet without wincing in sympathy. Like I said, I'll even go and fetch the rest of this stuff, okay? Just… sit down. Please. Rest physically."

"That's all very well, but without my laptop, I'll need writing materials. A notebook, pens, pencils, whatever they have. And some way of keeping my notes in order, which means I need to find someone-"

"I'll find someone," Taichi said. "Do as the doctor ordered and sit down."

He scowled at the other boy until Koushiro sighed once more and sank into the chair by the desk. The look of evident relief on his face as he did so helped convince Taichi that he would stay there.

"Finally," he muttered, and headed for the door.

He'd just reached the corridor when Koushiro called him back. With a sigh, he turned back into the room. Koushiro had already opened one of the books, but wasn't paying it any attention.

"You do realise we may have to leave before my wrist heals? A week is a long time - too long to expect to be able to wait here. I'm not taking risks, Taichi. I'm simply trying to gather what information I can while I have the chance."

Taichi reached up to rub the back of his neck. The only thing worse than Koushiro getting caught up in some weird and obscure kind of quest for knowledge was when it made sense. "I know," he said at last. "So, now you've done this, make sure you can leave with the rest of us when the time comes, okay? We're too split up as it is."

A.N.: Yes, it was something more of an expositional chapter this time. Fear not! It's the lull before the midday storm - and I'm really looking forward to the events which will start to unfold in the upcoming chapters. The second plot arc approaches!