Arthur followed the smell of bacon and fried eggs after he woke up, and found himself in the kitchen, where to his surprise, Evelyn stood frying bacon on the stove, with Sarah helping her. At the table sat their digimon, their mouth's positively watering in excitement at the smell, and Miranda, who sat taking the scene in.

"Good morning, Arthur" Miranda greeted as he took a seat next to her with Elecmon hopping into the seat right next to him.

He nodded his head at her "Good morning" everyone in the room seemed to be in higher spirits than they had been the night before, them actually sleeping somewhere other than the ground probably helped things along on that front.

"Will figured out a way to make coffee" came Evelyn's voice over the crackle of the food cooking, saying it without turning around. She pointed a finger towards a coffee pot with the black liquid in it.

"I'm not much of a coffee drinker, but thanks" he wiped the last vestiges of sleep away from his eyes as he thought, Will must have gotten up earlier than Arthur had anticipated. But that begged the question, where was he?

"He's gone out on patrol with Max, trying to make sure that whatever they fought last night isn't going to come back" Miranda answered his non-asked question. He looked at her with a questioning glance, trying to figure out how she had known what he was thinking, when she answered that as well "I could just see the question on your face, you're a pretty easy person to read" she commented idly.

"You kinda are, Arthur" Elecmon agreed.

Arhtur looked at him like he had just been betrayed "You're not helping Elecmon" The digimon simply went back to waiting for the food. Another question popped into his mind, one he wanted to actually ask "Did Will and Max tell anyone before they left?"

It was Sarah who answered "Oh, yeah, they told us right before" she answered from where she flawlessly flipped an egg in the pan.

"Our parents own a restaurant" Miranda said again, most likely seeing a look on his face "Sarah inherited all of the cooking abilities"

"I see," Arthur said. "Has anyone gone to check in on the Tokomon this morning?"

"No-one else is up, so unless Will and Max stop on their way back, I don't think so" Miranda answered "Why?"

"I figure we should try to talk to them, we're already eating their food and sleeping in their beds" Arthur answered, trying to sound like he had thought about this. Because he had tossed and turned most of the night doing so. If the Tokomon had any information, they might be able to leverage the fact that Will and the others had saved them to their advantage. Arthur didn't want to come off as some sort of goon or mercenary, but he also wanted to get the group back to their world.

"Then why don't we go and do that now?" Miranda asked. Arthur hadnt expected Miranda to volunteer to go with him, truth be told, he didn't think that she liked him very much. She turned to look at Evelyn "How much longer do you guys think?"

Evelyn looked up and seemed to think for a moment "Probably thirty minutes, maybe forty, to get everything done and cooked for enough for everyone to eat"

Miranda turned to look at Arthur "What do you say? We could go and talk with that Tokomon and be back in time for breakfast!"

Arthur dumbly nodded his head, not able to argue with that "Okay, let's go"

He stood and Elecmon came with. As they were exiting the kitchen Evelyn called out "Don't be late, I can't guarantee that the others won't eat everything!"

They walked out of the house, which the fact of it being there still weirded Arthur out, and began to make their way to the village.

"There's a reason I asked you to come by yourself" Miranda admitted, she seemed almost unsure how to continue.

"I figured as much," Arthur admitted. He didn't say anything more, he wasn't going to guess about what she had wanted to ask him, if she wanted to know his answer, then she would have to ask him.

"Why were you so mad last night? I mean, I've seen you get mad,like when we all fell asleep that first night, but it was almost unreasonable lastnight"

He felt Elecmon's mood change with the question, Arthur could tell that his partner thought that she had asked the wrong thing, but Arthur couldn't fault her for the question. He had been mad, angrier than he could remember being in a long time. "I was, wasn't I?" he sighed, trying to collect his thoughts "A lot of it had to do with what I said, you know the whole they left us without any watch and that they should've woken us up"

"Yeah, I agree with that, but everyone was kind of over it after the argument, you weren't" she observed.

"I'm getting there" he said and sighed again. He pondered how much to reveal to this person that he in truth barely knew. She seemed nice enough, but appearances could be deceiving. But still they were stuck in this world together, and he needed to learn to trust the others. "I was most angry with Will"

"We could all tell, '' Pinamon said from her position just behind Miranda.

Miranda didn't say anything, imploring him to continue, which he did so "Will and I have been friends since we were practically babies, I don't want to see anything bad happen to him, especially now" he added as an afterthought.

"What do you mean?" she asked tentatively, knowing that she was touching on something that she might not want or should know.

He swallowed, and debated how much of the story was really his to tell, most of it certainly wasn't, but Miranda has gotten him alone to try to talk things out. "At the beginning of the summer" he started "something bad, like really bad, happened to Will and his family" he remembered that being a very dark time in his friend's life "He didn't come to school for the last week, and then when I saw him next, it was like he wasn't there, he hasn't been the same since"

There was a grim silence at that, as Miranda seemed to understand, maybe not what had happened, but what Arthur was trying to say. Finally, after a moment of hesitation she asked "Do you think he's in danger of-"

"Killing himself? No, I doubt it, but I wouldn't put it past him to stop caring about life, and not care what happens to him" Arthur admitted. He wasn't enjoying this conversation, but it almost felt liberating to talk about it to someone "I'm afraid that Will doesn't care, and so he does dumb things like last night"

"Have you talked to him?" Miranda asked

Arthur shook his head "Will's not the easiest person to talk to when he gets like this" Arthur admitted. Even Arthur, who Will was most comfortable around, had a hard time getting certain things out of him.

"You should sit him down and tell him these things, he won't get better if he just bottles it all up" Miranda pressed. She stopped and turned around "It's the only way that he's going to get better."

Arthur knew that "I was hoping to be able to talk to him at camp, try to get him to be like his old self again" he chuckled darkly "Then everything happened, and I haven't really had the chance to talk to him one on one"

"Well, I doubt the others will want to leave today to do anything" Miranda observed "You should try today"

That hadn't exactly occurred to him, he had been so focused on surviving and planning ahead the last few days, that he hadn't really thought that today would be "Yeah, maybe I will. Thanks for making me talk Miranda, you don't know how good it feels to talk about this with someone else.

"You're welcome" they came to the outskirts of the Tokomon Village. "It's too bad what happened here," she said as they looked around. The devastation looked worse than when they had come through the previous night. One of the building along the main road had a human sized hole in one of it's walls, while one of the other buildings had been completely burnt. Small craters and footprints littered the road and the area surrounding the buildings.

"Yeah, it is" Arthur had to agree. He may not have liked that Will, Max and Evelyn had stood up to the digimon attacking the settlement by themselves, but he understood the reasoning.

One of the Tokomon approached them "Hello humans" it said "I am the Tokomon that you spoke to last night" it appraised them "Where are the ones who saved the village? I wish to thank them again"

Arthur took a step forward, painfully aware that now all of the eyes in the village were on him "I am Arthur, and the three who saved the village last night are still in the house"

The Tokomon looked him up and down, and then looked at their partners. Arthur worried for a moment if Tokomon was going to take offense to not having Will or one of the others here, but instead the digimon smiled and said "Any friend of theirs is a friend of our village, please come inside to our meeting tent and we can discuss more there!"

Arthur heard Miranda let out a breath and he turned and looked at her "For a second there, I was afraid he didn't like us"

"Me too" Arthur admitted as they pushed through the tent flap and entered into a moderately sized tent, a single large beam of wood holding the material up in the middle. They followed Tokomon to the back of the tent.

"So, what brings you here?" Tokomon asked as he turned around to look at them.

"First things first, I wanted to thank you again for allowing us to stay at the house" Arthur said, trying to emulate diplomat speak that he saw in movies and television shows.

The Tokomon's face lit up "It was no trouble! We were happy to see it finally used!"

"Do you know where it came from? Why it was stocked with food?" Miranda spoke up for the first time since the conversation had started.

The Tokomon elder looked down and shook his head "No, not really, that house has been here long before our village was set up, and we have been keeping an eye on it since we arrived here"

That didn't make a whole lot of sense, buildings just don't appear out of nowhere. "Can you tell us a bit about the area were in? Were not exactly from around here" he didn't know how much the Tokomon knew about where humans came from, but he didn't want to cause a panic if it didn't know about the different worlds.

The Tokomon looked confused at his statement, which probably answered Arthur's own unasked questions "Well, of course you wouldn't know anything about the area, you are human. To answer your question though, this area of the Digital World is known as Sector 29, and it was largely peaceful until recently"

Arthur didn't know if he would call the area that they had spent the last week in peaceful, and based on Miranda's own expression, she agreed with him.

"Do you know why there has been the sudden increase in these attacks? We have been attacked several times since we arrived and are hoping to get to the bottom of what's going on" Arthur continued his questions. He was hoping that he found a lead somewhere, because he was afraid of returning back to the others empty handed.

"No, not really sorry" the Tokomon said with clear regret tinging it's voice "Our former protector, an Angemon, mentioned something about a great evil, and went to combat it, but nothing else"

A great evil? Arthur didn't like the sound of that. And he also didn't like the idea that the village's protector had gone off to fight it without any real explanation. This trek out here was seeming more and more like a bust to Arthur.

"There is one other thing, a temple to the north, a few days into the Megabyte Desert, stands a temple. It's protected by Aguinmon, he might know more about what has been going on" the Tokomon finished.

A Digimon temple sounded interesting, and if they headed out, it would give them a reason for all of the walking they were bound to do, the real question was, would the others go for it? Maybe after a couple of days, but probably not now. Even Arthur had to admit that it was nice sleeping in a bed, after roughing like that had been.

Arthur inclined his head slightly "Thank you Tokomon, if you need anything from us, please let us know" he turned to leave before the Tokomon stopped him.

"Please know this, we would not have survived without your friends' actions, please do not be angry with them over it" the young digimon pleaded.

Arthur merely nodded his head at that and turned back and left. They walked out of the village in silence. When they got far enough that they were out of ear shot of the Tokomon, Miranda started "Sooooo" she dragged on "There's an ancient temple a few days away, that might" she emphasized the work might "have answers. That sounds great" she looked pointedly at him "If its true"

Arthur thought on that for a moment "I don't see any reason for them to lie about it" he rubbed his chin. "No I think it's more likely that they are telling the truth"

"What do you guys think" Miranda asked the accompanying digimon.

"I think Arthur is right, the Tokomon aren't known to lie" Elecomon said.

"I have to agree, Miranda" Hackmon sounded almost apologetic as he said so "But Elecmon is right, the Tokomon are basically children, they don't have a good reason to lie"

It was silent for a moment before Miranda breathed out a long breath "Maybe I'm just being paranoid, it's been a long week"

Arthur nodded his head "It has, but I think everyone's been doing well though" It had been shocking to see, Arthur had expected everyone, himself included, to breakdown at the realization that they were in another world and no real path back to their world. Instead, they had done well, not panicked and had won every fight that they had been in. He wondered if that was because of their partners.

"Looks like Will and Max beat us back" Evelyn noted at the additional shoes just outside the door. Arthur nodded his head.

"We should get in there and tell the others"He said.

LINE BREAK

Miranda watched the others as they took in the news. Galen looked down in thought. Sarah seemed to be thinking as well. While Evelyn looked downcast that the Tokomon didn't know of a way back home. Will's expression was unreadable, Diane and Max both seemed content or at least that they had expected this to turn up nothing.

"Why are there temples in the Digital World?" Galen asked suddenly, pushing his plate to his front as he did.

The Tokomon hadn't thought to answer that question, and Miranda hated the fact that she hadn't thought to answer it. "They didn't say"

Galen brought up his hand and wiped his eyes "It just seems weird to think about"

Betamon looked at him "Why Galen?"

"Well, I mean, you guys are digital, right? What do you need for religion?"

"It may not be about any sort of religion, it could just be a term for something that were messing up in translation," Evelyn suggested, her body tilted toward them.

Arthur cleared his throat and said "Whether it's religious or not, we need to keep our eyes on the ball, and decide whether or not we are going to go to this temple"

"We should, right?" Sarah interjected as soon as Arthur finished speaking "I mean what are we going to do if we just stay here?"

"At least we're comfortable here" Diane stated truthfully.

"I think we should go" Max said "Maybe not today, but soon, if it doesn't turn up anything useful, we can always come back" he suggested. Miranda agreed, it didn't seem like the Tokomon would force them out of the house. And they would probably feel safer if they were around.

Evelyn spoke up "I agree with going, if for nothing else than to just get a look around"

Diane sighed in defeat "I guess I agree as well, like Max said, we can always come back" the red haired girl leaned back in her chair.

"What about you Will?" Arthur asked. Miranda tried to look without seeming to interested. After the conversation with Arthur an hour before, she had wanted to see how Will acted herself.

Will for his part looked as though he wasn't prepared for someone to ask him about his thoughts "I'm sorry, what?"

Arthur sighed, so Miranda answered him "We were asking for your opinion on if we should go to the Temple" she hoped that she was helping the two.

Will looked between them for a moment, he cleared his throat and said "Yeah, i guess so" he didn't sound too sure "We will have to prepare, water and rations to last us the whole trip, and we will want to make sure that the digimon are fed and drink enough. They're our lifeline out here, it might even take us a few days to gather enough water and supplies for it"

Arthur seemed to think on what his friend was saying "Yeah, Will, you're right, We can take today off, but tomorrow we should look into getting what we need for a push into the desert" he looked at Will "Some of us should go and see how far a trip it is to the desert from here"

Will nodded at that and to her amazement spoke yet more, in what was the most he had spoken since they had been transported to the Digital World "Yeah, who knows if it's a few days north of here, or a few days of traveling in the desert to this temple" he stood up quickly, and his bandaged arm came into view.

Miranda winced at it, she had only seen a little of the blood before he had washed it, but it had looked painful, although you wouldn't be able to tell based on looking at him right now "Agumon and I will head out now and check it out" he turned to leave but Evelyn grabbed his good arm and held him, they stared at each other for a moment before Arthur began to speak

"Hold your horses Will, two of us should go" Miranda didn't miss the thankful look that Evelyn shot at him as Will turned back to look at Arthur. The two stared at each other, and without looking away, Arthur continued "I'll go with you"

When Will didn't fight back, Arthur looked around the table "Any objections?"

None were raised, and the impromptu meeting came to an end. She stayed back as the others dispersed to do what they were going to do for the day. "Are you sure that's a good idea?" she asked Arthur.

"Yeah, it'll probably help me and Will get on the same page" he said as he rubbed his chin "and it's not like we will be gone all day, just long enough to get to the desert, and then come back"

"It's not that I dislike the idea, it's just that the tension is still there between you guys"

He shook his head "We'll be fine, we have a mission, and that's something that he and I can agree on, and besides" he looked at her pointedly "And it gives us time to speak on things" he said rather vaguely, but she knew what he was saying.

"Well good luck"

Agumon came to a stop as the four of them finally came to their destination, the border between the forested region and desert. "I really wish I understood this place" he heard Will mutter underneath his breath.

Agumon wished that he understood humans better, what was so confusing about the forest turning into desert? It was how it always looked. He asked them as much.

"In our world,you don't just have a forest as green as the one we've been in and then a desert, it slowly transitions into it" Arthur explained, he walked from the hard grassy land into the desert, with its sand. "I just don't understand how this is possible"

Agumon felt Will's bafflement through their bond "Well, we've been traveling with monsters that transform into stronger versions of themselves when we need them to, nothing in this world makes sense"

"You think of me as a monster Will?" Agumon couldn't keep the hurt out of his voice.

Will's eyes grew large and he quickly turned to look at him "No! that came out wrong Agumon, I don't think you're a monster" he corrected quickly.

The reassurance from his partner was enough to make him feel better. He looked towards Elecmon and felt momentarily guilty looking at his friend. When Will and Arthur had been arguing with each other the previous night, Agumon had felt Will's anger seep into himself, and he had thought that if it came to blows, he would have to fight Elecmon, and at the moment, he hadn't had a problem with that.

Agumon shook himself out of that, and looked up at the two humans, as they stared off into the desert, a grimace on both of their faces. It hadn't escaped Agumon's notice that these two always seemed more grim than the other humans, and discussion with the other partner digimon had only confirmed that fact.

"There's not much reason for us to stay here all day" Will spoke, his partner turned to look at Arthur "Unless you had something else in mind?"

Arthur shook his head "No, we'll have to be prepared to make the trip" Arthur gazed back into the desert, and seemed even more uneasy than he had a moment earlier. He looked down onto where the dirt turned to sand "Will, are we good?" he asked suddenly, rushing through the words.

Agumon felt Will's astonishment through their bond, and he carefully watched as Will turned to look at his friend. And in lieu of answering he stated "I had to do what I did last night, there wasn't a choice"

Arthur sighed "I know" he looked up from the sandy ground "But I'm worried about you Will, worried that you just don't care about life and-"

"I'm not suicidal Arthur" Will nearly yelled. Agumon briefly wondered why.

"I'm not saying you are, but look at what you've don't since you've come here" he held out his hand, raising a finger as if he was counting "You've jumped up to get a close to battle as you could, you charge in recklessly when confronted, and then you go off and fight a champion level with a rookie, all by yourself, you don't ask for help, you just do it" Arthur finished, red in the face, and after taking a few deep breaths, he continued "I just don't want you to get yourself into something that you can't get out of"

Will looked at his friend "Arthur, I couldn't stop myself last night, I was just up and running before my mind caught up, same thing when I decided to go fight DarkTyrannomon, the idea just pops into my head, and I can't help it"

"Will, for my sake, for all of our sakes, hell for your sisters sake, please try to fight that feeling, it doesn't do anybody any good if you go and get yourself killed" Arthur had a pleading look in his eyes, Agumon could see it, and based on the anguish coming from his partner, so could Will.

Will nodded his head slowly "I'll be fine, but I'll try to not get into fights by myself"

"Good" Arthur straightened up and cleared his throat "We should get back to the others, they'll want a know what we've found"

Agumon was glad that that conversation was over, and he hoped that the sullen, seriousness of the past few hours would pass away. He looked to Elecmon, who seemed in a good mood. Agumon felt like he was in a good mood as well.

Devidramon looked at the reports he was getting from the Airdramon, the children had stopped Ogremon's and DarkTyrannonmon's attack on Tokomon Village, and Devidramon gritted his sharp teeth in anger. He had explicitly ordered Orgemon to not attack the village until after the children had passed, but in his excite or stupidness, this was a Orgremon they were talking about, he had disregarded orders.

When Mephistomon returned, Devidramon would surely be blamed for the failure, and then he would be deleted. Which meant that he had to have something to make up for the failure at Tokomon village. He had a plan, based largely off of the one that Mephistomon had been preparing before the Master had called him away. Devidramon knew that the humans next stop was the temple in the desert.

That temple, which could be broken up and flung all over, if the humans survived that, it would take days for them to come back together and pose a threat, during that time, Devidramon would have his forces hunt them down and crush them individually. This way he could have something to give in exchange for the initial failure at Tokomon Village, he hoped it would be enough, and also, it might gain him the notice of the higher powers.

Sarah wiped her brow as she and Evelyn sat at the dinner table, a pencil dangling from her free hand, as she and the other girl worked to figure out the amount of food they had. Huckmon sat curled at her feet, while Kotemon sat next to Evelyn. "The canned food will stay good, but i'm concerned about the fresh stuff, the eggs, the vegetables and the meat we found in the fridge" Sarah had just finished explaining.

"Things don't seem to make sense here though" Evelyn responded "I mean we've been eating those apples things for nearly a week, some of them we've had for a week and they still haven't gone bad"

Sarah had to admit that was true, but it went against everything her parents had taught her to trust the wellness of food that hadn't been cured. "Besides, didn't the Tokomon say that they've been keeping this place up for years?"

"I guess" Sarah agreed. She looked down at their list that she had been writing "I hate to suggest this, but what if we left a bit of food out tonight, and see what happens, not a lot, just a little so we can figure out what the deal with it is"

Evelyn chewed on her own pencil for a moment "I guess we could do that" she finally agreed "What do you think" she suddenly turned and asked the digimon, who had stayed silent throughout their conversation.

"I don't really know,I just know that I agree with you" Kotemon admitted, while Huckmon gave a huff from where he lay curled up on the floor. Sarah let out a small sigh and set the pencil down.

"Maybe we should call it quits for now" she suggested. They had been at this for a couple of hours, since the boys left, and had made good progress on it.

Evelyn looked down, but something in her eyes showed some guilt "I suppose we can"

She gathered up the papers and set them on the counter, and stood looking at them for a moment "What's wrong?" Sarah asked

Evelyn waited a moment "I miss my parents"

Sarah sighed again, so that's why she had been dragged into figuring out their food situation, but she couldn't plan the girl, she missed her parents and her brother too "I understand Evelyn, I miss mine as well"

Evelyn turned around, eyes slightly red "It's just, really gotten to me since we've been here, in this house" she paused, and Sarah was struck with uselessness "I mean, everything here reminds me of what it was like to be home and with them"

She gently walked forward and wrapped her arms around the girl, she didn't know if it was the right decision, but it couldn't hurt, right? "Hey, we'll get home, and we will see our parents again, we've got our partners" her mind shot to Huckmon, who she felt had taken an interest in the discussion "and we've got each other right?" she pulled back and looked at Evelyn.

Evelyn wiped her eyes, nodded her head vigorously, as if to convince of herself while saying "Yes, you're right of course, sorry about that"

Sarah smiled "It's fine, were all missing home"

Kotemon came up beside Evelyn "Come on, lets go do something with our day off!" he yelled. The digimon's enthusiasm made Evelyn crack a smile and she gave a small wave before she was dragged out of the kitchen,

Sarah smiled, and hoped that she had made Evelyn feel better. Hours passed, with dusk on them, everyone had gathered back in the kitchen, eating the sandwiches while there was general conversation around the table. " I'm surprised that Arthur and Will aren't back yet" Galen had said between bites "I thought that it was only a few hours" he took another bite, while everyone thought on it.

"The suns still up, maybe they got side tracked?" Miranda suggested, but her twin looked miserable, she had stayed back and talked with Arthur, and if Sarah knew her sister, she guessed that she was feeling bad about not going.

Just as everyone was starting to get nervous, the front door swung open, then was slammed. With first Elecmon and Agumon rounding the corner coming into the room, eyes fixated on the food on the table, with Arthur and Will coming a few moments later. They looked just the same as they left, with no obvious signs of battle. The two's digimon began to fill the faces full of food, while the two boys sat down next to each other. Sarah was relieved to see that there didn't seem the tension that was between the two of them when they left.

"Arthur, we were getting worried about you two" Max greeted as he handed out the two plates that Sarah and Evelyn had set aside for them.

"Yeah well, it's a longer ways than we thought, it'll us at least half of the day to get there" Arthur said before the took a bite of the sandwich.

"Any sign of the temple that the Tokomon were talking about?" Miranda asked.

Will shook his head and Arthur answered "Nope, It's not in sight"

"We'll have to plan for a multiple day journey then" Diane said, her mind must have already been turning.

"We'll need to ration water, and bring enough food for several days," Galen added on.

"Evelyn and I took stock of our supplies while you were away, we have plenty to take with us, and this house has lots of water we can carry, so we shouldn't be too worried about that" Sarah jumped in "Plus the extra food we've scrounge up in the last few days"

Arthur had largely been quiet while they discussed their plans "We should spend the next couple of days preparing all of this before setting off" he paused and then looked at Sarah and Evelyn from across the table "You two have already taken on handling the food, could you continue that, get everything ready?" Sarah didn't know why Arthur had seemed to take on a leading role in their group, but at least he was asking "Yeah" she answered "I think we could do that"

"Good" and then he turned to others "We need to gather enough wood to make a fire each night, with kindling, leaves and that kind of stuff, to start it" he paused, and then said "Galen, could you, Max and Diane start work on packing the supplies, like bandages and things like that, me, and Will and Miranda will take on getting the wood and kindling"

Sarah stole a glance at Max, who looked uncomfortable at Arthur's leadership, but when Galen answered for them, he deflated a bit"

"Good, we'll take the night off, and then get to work tomorrow"