Chapter 1: A new Adventure
It has been four years since Belial Vamdemon's defeat.
The number of Digidestined has steadily increased over time and digimon are common knowledge to the world today. Children and adults of all ages have found their partners and are still doing so. The governments have decided to have an elected number of children from each country act as ambassadors to the digital world until further notice. Japan chose the Digidestined led by Taichi 'Tai' Yagami and Daisuke 'Davis' Motomiya for obvious reasons to be their representatives.
Thanks to that the Digidestined have attracted the public interest and as a result ended up with shrinking privacy; bothering even the most open minded once. However, said status does have its advantages as well: Yesterday Hikari 'Kari' Yagami, Takeru 'TK' Takaishi and Daisuke 'Davis' Motomiya were allowed to leave their lesson as soon as they received the SOS on their D-Terminals.
That privilege can only be used, however as long as the grades are acceptable.
Further the gates all over the globe can be opened now by all Digivices as long as they are not locked down by Gennai or his counterparts. Working together with Koushiro 'Izzy' Izumi, who is sponsored by many organizations, to gather information on anti-digimon (terror-)groups and further research on both worlds. Despite all security measures, however, the digital world is still a no-safety-guaranteed world. Which -logically speaking- it will always be, considering that there will always be evil digimon, the great changes that never stop and the vast amount of the unknown.
That is especially true now; 3 years and 9 month after BelialVamdemon's defeat the digital world has once again been thrown into chaos. For three month now villages have been continuously destroyed, digimon have been deleted and children have been hurt. And that without knowledge who is responsible. The only thing that had been known was that the enemy is huge in numbers and that High Level digimon are with it.
The digimon that have been identified are amongst others: Bakemon, Sangloupmon, Cerberumon, Devimon, PicoDevimon and Pantomon. There have also been rumors of a huge moving stronghold, but they have never been confirmed.
The situation has been judged dangerous enough to lock down all gates around the globe.
To deal with the thread the Digivices of the Odaiba Chosen Children have been upgraded to make entering the digital world possible for them.
"And then we decided to return." Davis finished the report concerning the army of a few hundreds of dark digimon, the moving stronghold and Kari's sensation.
The 12 Digidestined and 12 digimon were having a meeting in Izzy's room about the events at noon, where only Kari, Davis and TK had reacted in time. Still, even Jo 'Joe' Kido was attending.
The mood had gone downhill the more Davis retold the situation.
"So does that mean we have to face hundreds of evil ultra and mega digimon all by ourselves? Not to mention that we have no idea where -or how for that matter- the army will appear next?" Yamato'Matt' Ishida pointed out not too positively, his voice heavy with frustration.
"Looks that way," somebody out of the gloomy mass answered.
"We don't have to do it alone!" Mimi Tachikawa clapped her hands with newfound optimism. "I mean there are so many new Digidestined all over the world. I bet we could even outnumber them if we all team up."
"No can do. The new Digidestined can hardly evolve their digimon above Rookie. It would be a one-sided massacre." Izzy typed furiously at his PC, not even turning around to break the new bubble of good news.
"Also it is not only the army we have to worry about. From what Davis just told us we can deduce that the destruction caused all over the digiworld was not only done by the main army. Just a few strays are enough.
"Moreover Devimon are always bad news. Especially in such numbers. Even if we manage to defeat the army, add even all the strays to it if you want, the problem is, that all that evil that is needed to create so many Devimon will not have been taken care of. And we have no way to do so.
"The evil in the digital world has manifested itself through our opponents. And we have encountered only a few Devimon until now. With that many Devimon it would be like the Dark Masters and Vamdemon all over again times 10. Finally-"
"Gee, Izzy if you aren't careful you are going to kill the good mood," dry sarcasm obvious in Tai's voice the former goggle head shifted in seat.
"I'm sorry Tai, but that is how it is." Izzy still wasn't looking up from his PC. "And as I've been saying, finally there is still the problem with what Kari and Tailmon felt. Or are you still feeling it? No? Well at least something."
"How is that what they are feeling a problem? They didn't know if it was good or evil right?" Miyako 'Yolei' Inoue looked at the two for confirmation. "Maybe it is even a friend."
"Not happening either, I fear."
"Why's that?" Tai entered the conversation again. "We know that there are other dimensions, like the Dark Ocean, so it should be possible that there is something like… I don't know, a White Ocean, maybe? With many angel type digimon or something? I mean even if we don't know why or how they would be entering our digiworld it is possible, isn't it?
"It sure is, but that won't be it."
"And how do you know? It's not like you can see the future is it?" Matt added.
"No, I don't. But-" Izzy finally turned around to face them, his hands raised to stop interruptions." – it is highly likely and Gennai agrees with me." He moved further away from his Pc so that the other Digidestind had free view to the screen. It showed the head of a familiar young man with a hood and ponytail.
The young man raised a hand and smiled in greeting.
"Good day to you, Digidesined."
"Gennai!" They exclaimed in unison, smiles braking out on some faces.
"I just mailed him of Davis' report and my opinion of Kari's –let's call it prediction- prediction and well, here he is."
"So, how come the prediction is not about something positive?" Sora Takenouchi asked of the digital man, leaning forward to catch a better view.
"About that, would you mind telling me exactly what it felt like and what it was exactly that Kari and Tailmon said?"
"It felt like I was under water. Pressure from all sides, but not much or painful. That feeling was just there." Tailmon nodded from Kari's lap agreeing. "I don't remember saying anything specific." She looked at TK and Davis questioning.
The later continued.
"She said something about 'something is coming'. But why do you need a quote? The meaning of what she said is important, right?"
"In a sense, but right now the quote is equally important. In that kind of situation people tend to word the very essence of the 'situation' in the first words or sentences they speak. So try and remember please, Davis."
"It was 'something is coming' and 'I can feel something. It's huge' and 'it feels like pressure 'and 'not the Dark Ocean' and 'don't know if it's evil or not'. Tailmon said: 'something is off' and 'it feels wrong' and 'it shouldn't happen'. "
All eyes in the room and the PC stared at TK.
"How the hell did you remember all that?" Davis questioned, eyes almost popping out.
"Maybe because I actually don't forget things that were said just a few hours before. Unlike a certain someone."
"Are you saying that I'm forgetful?" Davis questioned, irritated already.
Grinning, TK responded. "Whatever could you possibly be talking about? When exactly did I say your name?" His grin was growing wider as he spoke. "But the way you talk it seems to me that you think of yourself as forgetful."
"What TK said. What TK said." Patamon echoed from TK's head.
Davis' head was turning red.
"Ahm! Why don't we get back on track before Davis explodes?" Tai gestured towards Gennai, hardly managing to suppress a smile. "We are still in a meeting that most likely concerns the fate of our worlds." With that the mood turned from amused to dead serious again and even Davis calmed down.
"Yes, well, the quotes sadly just support Izzy's and my assumption," Gennai said, turning the conversation back on track. "To explain what it means I need to know, how much do you know about different dimensions?"
"Dimensions like our world, the Digiworld and the Dark Ocean? They all exist next to each other, right?" Iori 'Cody' Hida stated. "And we don't know how many dimensions there are. The Dream World, where we fought BelialVamdemon is one of them, too. What does that have to do with anything?"
Izzy smiled approvingly, "It's like you said, Cody. We don't know how many there are or what kind of worlds they are. Gennai and I have actually thought about it before, however it turns out that this system of parallel worlds actually has a huge connection with our problems. Most likely anyway. For starters, doesn't anyone see something strange with our situation? Like with the evil in the Digiworld?"
"It's wrong of course," Mimi exclaimed, agitated at the mere thought. "These evil digimon are a thread to everyone who wants to live in peace."
"And they are way too many." Joe mused, a hand on his chin in thought. "And they just appeared."
"Exactly."
"I see." Ken Ichijouji drew the attention towards him without a problem despite his quiet voice. "What you mean to say is that it should be impossible for so much evil to appear in the Digital World; especially after Oikawa's sacrifice. So since the evil cannot be generated from our world it actually came from somewhere else. Like from another parallel world."
"That's exactly it, Ken. We have been thinking that maybe even another or many other digital worlds exist or other human worlds. It is possible," Izzy said.
"Which brings us back to our current situation. The army most likely comes from another world, which has either been concurred or destroyed. We should hope for the latter, because otherwise there is the possibility that our problem-army is but an advance party. If we take Kari's prediction into the equitation the possibility that whatever she sensed is friendly shrinks close to zero."
"Why's that?"
"What Kari sensed is most likely a breach in our dimension –let's call it wall- wall; the kind of wall that separates the Digiworld from the Dark Ocean for example. Our sensors have picked up said breach-signal as well. Which leads me to think that –looking back to our previous theories- it could be the main army.
"Or maybe just the mastermind." He added quickly, seeing how faces fell. "The possibility that it is -as Tai said- someone from an inter-dimensional police is also low, because if it was, then why have they not stopped or intercepted the army from invading us? Or interfered in the army's home dimension? Further if it really was any angel or just light typ digimon Tailmon should have been able to acknowledge the breach. Patamon, too, at champion level. But Tailmon didn't. Rather she said 'it feels wrong' and 'it shouldn't happen'. Not exactly the reaction you would give to a fellow angel. I could go on, but I think I made my point clear."
"But that doesn't mean that the possibility is zero, right? Maybe it really is help!" Davis jumped from his seat, having been lost somewhat around ' parallel worlds'. Izzy raised an eyebrow at him.
"Well? It doesn't, right?"
"No, it doesn't, but-"
"Whatever," the loud boy interrupted, before the genius went on and confused him again. "Let's hurry up and decide what we should do from now on. I mean villages are being reduced to rubble. Even now. And that stupid stronghold. We still don't know how it appears and disappears all the time."
"Before that, I've got a question. How come I don't feel that so-called breach anylonger longer? Doesn't it mean that whatever wanted to pass through already did so?" Kari questioned, frowning as she petted Tailmon.
Shaking his head in reply, Izzy sorted his thoughts and went on explaining. "Actually it doesn't. Am I right in thinking that you only felt it in the Digiworld? Thought so. I'm sure that if you'd return here now you could still feel it. That you can't, only means that the whatever comes is going to enter the Digiworld and not the Human World."
"But then how come I didn't feel the army? I mean it I can't imagine that I'd miss something so huge and evil."
"You'd better," Izzy replied dryly, "you see the sensors are still new, a result of the rising crisis, but you most likely didn't feel anything, because you either weren't in the Digiworld for a few hours which could have provided enough time for the army to slip in. Or because –and let's hope this isn't it- the existence of the army was too small for you to sense."
"We are currently noting a breach for the first time, which is why we have no data to compare it to. And now back to Davis question; I think it is save to rule teleportation out. Otherwise there would be no reason to cross the desert while being attacked. On our side we are rather sure that they are using some kind of camouflage. We are talking about a fortress of that size. There is no way to travel without being seen otherwise." As he finished he took a gulp of water from the bottle standing on his desk; he had been working for hour without break.
"Then what are we supposed to do? We can't just go and search for it by hand. We would never find it." Tai pointed out, irritated. "And we can't exactly split up and search either."
"No, you can't. Even if you would find it, at the moment we hardly stand a chance. Moreover so, since we don't know what is going to enter our dimension through the breach. I'd say you guys continue your daily routines until our side has found out more."
"We are stuck doing nothing or what?" That was Davis.
"So it would seem," Gennai agreed.
"But while we are doing nothing many digimon are dying! And you are telling us to sit and watch?"
"You are of no help to the Digital World if you are dead. But don't worry we are fast with collecting information."
"Can't we at least go and evacuate the digimon to a safer place?" Sora asked.
"….Only if you promise to be extremely careful. We do not know what they are after. If we lose just one of you it could mean the difference between victory and defeat."
"Alright!" The majority exclaimed, the time of forced passivity being over.
"So are we done now? I do have an appointment at a beauty salon." Mimi was already leaving, Tanemon perched under her arm.
"We should be." Tai looked around, then nodding. "Looks like we are."
"Well then, see you tomorrow." And she was gone, as busy as always.
Finally done! This is the longest chapter I've written yet. My fingers hurt.
Please comment and criticize.