Author's Note: Hello dear reader! Really quick before you move on to the chapter, I just wanted to take the time to say "welcome" to any new readers, and "welcome back" to any returning ones. It has now been over a year since I last posted anything on this site, and even longer since I last posted anything in this particular fandom, but I nevertheless hope that you will enjoy this chapter, even if my writing may be a bit rusty. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: Seven years have passed since I posted my first Digimon fanfic on this site, yet I still don't own any rights to the franchise. Figures, huh?

"Returning home is the most difficult part of a long-distance journey. You have grown outside of the puzzle, and your piece no longer fits."

Prologue: Homecoming

Saturday, April 2nd, 2005, Airspace over Tokyo

"Good afternoon passengers, this is your captain speaking. We are approaching Haneda Airport and have been given permission to land, so we ask that all passengers return to their seats and fasten their seatbelts. I repeat; this is your captain speaking..."

As the message was repeated over the speakers once more in English before the captain switched over to Japanese, 13-year-old Motomiya Daisuke just shook his head and tuned it out, as he had remained seated ever since the flight had left New York. Instead, he glanced down at the photo album he had been looking through before the message had caught his attention and turned a few pages until he was looking at a photo that had been taken of his family, shortly before his parents' divorce. The Daisuke in the photo was grinning widely and held both of his hands in front of himself in the v-sign while the girl standing beside him, Jun he reminded himself, was glaring daggers at her younger brother for one reason or another and the two adults standing behind them just laughed.

The sight of the photo brought a fond smile to the present Daisuke's lips. Not as wide or expressive as his younger self's in the photo, but a smile nonetheless. It had been a little over 3 years now since his parents had separated and Daisuke had moved with his father to New York to better nurture his apparent "genius". At first, he hadn't been too happy that they were moving so far away from home, but over time his life had kind of just fallen into place over in America.

At least, that had been the case up until about a week ago, when his father had been hit by a car and fallen into a coma. Since there was nobody else in the states who could legally become his guardian while his father was hospitalized, this meant that Daisuke would have to return to Japan until his father woke up, so after a few phone calls back and forth it was decided that he would be living with his mother and sister in Odaiba, and be enrolled in the Odaiba Middle School for the duration of his stay. It hadn't dawned on him until he had dialed her number, but that call about whether or not he could live with her until his father woke up had been the first time since he left Japan that he had heard his mother's voice.

The realization had hit him a bit harder than he had expected, once it had settled at the back of his mind. He had never meant to ignore her, he had just been so busy with whatever task he had in front of him that he had kind of repressed whatever wasn't in his direct line of sight. And once he had realized this, he was reminded that family hadn't been the only thing he had left behind.

Turning a page over in the album, he was faced with a photo of his younger self playing soccer, dressed in the familiar red shirt and white pants of the team he used to play for. From the looks of it, this one had been taken right after he had taken a shot towards the opposing goal, if the still outstretched leg and bent over posture was any indication. Placed below this was a photo that must've been taken right after the same soccer game, and showed his younger self grinning widely and making a v-sign with one of his hands, while the other was wrapped securely around the shoulders of a girl who appeared to be around his age. The girl, who had light brown hair and was dressed in a yellow sundress, appeared to be laughing along with the auburn-haired boy in the photo.

'I wonder if she's still living in Odaiba,' Daisuke thought as he stared at the girl's face. If she did, there was a decent chance that they would be in the same class when school started up again in a few days. But even if they were in the same class, would she recognize him or even remember him? After all, he had forgotten all about her until his epiphany had caused him to pull out this photo album from a dusty shelf back in the apartment where he and his father lived.

Ding-dong!

"We will now begin the descent towards Haneda Airport. Please fasten your seatbelts and remain seated until the seatbelt icon goes out. We would like to thank you for flying with JAL and would also like to thank our sponsor, Massive Electronics Incorporated. I repeat..."

Daisuke rolled his eyes as the message repeated over the speakers again, but closed the photo album and put it back in his backpack so that he would be ready to move once the seatbelt icon went out. If Hikari still lived in Odaiba, and if they ran into each other again, then he would cross that bridge when he got there. No point in worrying about it right now.

With that dilemma cleared up, he looked out the window to watch as they got closer to the ground and almost did a double-take. After staring dumbly at the sight that greeted him for a few seconds, he proceeded to rub his eyes to make sure that he wasn't seeing things, but nothing changed. The entire city below him was covered in a layer of white the likes of which Daisuke hadn't seen since his family had gone skiing when he was 6 years old.

'What in the world?' he thought in shock as he leaned closer to the window as if that would allow him to better understand what he was seeing. 'Since when does Tokyo still have snow in April?!'

It had been a long time since Karatachi Yuuki had set foot in Haneda Airport. In the past, she would occasionally have reason to come here with her family, but these days she could barely afford to pay her rent and feed her daughter, let alone travel abroad. Despite that, the place hadn't changed much from what she remembered, yet it still felt so different to her when the plastic sliding doors parted to allow her entry, knowing that she would be leaving the airport with her son in tow.

While she waited for that familiar mop of auburn hair to appear from the stream of arriving travelers, she couldn't help but fidget a bit. Despite her attempt to stay in contact, she hadn't seen or heard much of anything from Shouichi about how their son was doing over in America and eventually, she had just accepted that neither of the men in her life had any interest in staying in contact with the family they had left behind. That had been until she had received a phone call from Daisuke out of nowhere, telling her that her ex-husband had been hit by a car and fallen into a coma, and asking if he could come live with her until his father was released from the hospital.

Her mind had instantly told her to say no. She could barely afford to put food on the table for herself and her daughter, there was no way she could support another person with her current economic situation, a growing teenage boy no less. But this was her son! Her baby boy whom she had wanted to see again ever since he had been taken from her 3 years ago! Before she had taken the time to properly think it through, she had told him that of course, he could come live with her!

As the crowd began to thin out, Yuuki could feel a lump forming in her throat when she had seen neither hide nor hair of him. What if he wouldn't come? Had something happened that she hadn't been told of? Perhaps he had found out how poor her economy was these days and had decided that he would rather live with his grandparents over in Kyoto instead? She couldn't blame him if that was the case, Shouichi's family had always been well off...

She was brought out of her thoughts as she caught sight of a familiar shade of auburn emerging from the flight gate, and Yuuki felt her breath catch in her throat as she laid eyes on her son for the first time in over 3 years. He looked so different from the little boy she remembered, with his auburn hair cut short and dressed in a white button-up shirt with its' arms rolled up and long dark blue pants that ended just above a pair of black and blue sneakers, but it was undoubtedly him.

Taking a deep breath to try and calm herself, she raised a hand and waved towards him. When he didn't immediately spot her despite that, she called out his name and began moving in his direction. That got his attention, and after a moment of hesitation, he lifted his hand and waved back to let her know that he had seen her. The seconds that followed were some of the most painfully drawn-out seconds that Yuuki would ever experience but eventually, the two of them came to a stop right in front of each other. Their eyes met briefly before they both looked away, at a loss for what to say.

Yuuki was sure that her heart was about to leap out of her chest, it was beating so hard. What was she supposed to say to him now that she had found him?! She had been trying to prepare for this moment over the last few days. She had practically memorized enough lines to cover an entire movie script just for this moment, but now that he was standing right in front of her she couldn't recall a single greeting!

'Just try to act normal,' she reminded herself. But what even constituted normal in their relationship? Should she try to act like she used to 3 years ago before he had moved away? But he wasn't a little kid anymore, she could tell that just from the way he held himself. But how did mothers usually greet their teenage boys? She only ever raised a teenage girl, so she had no idea!

Thankfully she was saved from coming up with a greeting as Daisuke's voice cut through the background noise. It was barely louder than a whisper, but Yuuki still heard it as if he had shouted it right into her ear. Two words, that she never thought she would get to hear from him ever again.

"Hi, mom."

It wasn't much, but it was all she needed to hear. Without thinking, she took one step forward and pulled her son into her arms. He was almost as tall as her now, she noted in the back of her mind as she buried her face in his shoulder. The young boy stiffened for a few seconds in response to the sudden contact, before he let go of his roller case and reached up to awkwardly return the hug.

"Daisuke," she whispered tenderly as she tightened her grip on his shoulder as if she was scared that he would disappear again if she let go. Perhaps she was, given how many times she had dreamt of this moment, only to wake up and realize that her son was still an ocean away from her. "You're home."

She could feel him chuckle awkwardly through the hug.

"Yeah, I guess I am, huh?"

Smiling to herself despite the uncertainty in his tone, Yuuki let go of her son and held him out in front of her by the shoulders, looking him up and down. Now that she got a closer look at him, she noted that he was a bit above average height for Japanese boys his age, but he wasn't particularly muscular. 'Figures he'd be too busy to exercise properly,' she thought with a hint of bitterness aimed at her ex-husband but did her best not to let it show on her face.

"And just look at you!" she said instead, her voice cheerful. "You've grown so tall since the last time I saw you! And so handsome!"

Daisuke chuckled awkwardly and reached up to scratch the back of his head in embarrassment while Yuuki reached down to take his roller case off his hands. At least that habit of his hadn't changed over the years. His face wasn't as expressive as it used to be 3 years ago, but she supposed that was to be expected. She had heard that it was common for teenagers to become a bit less expressive once they entered puberty. Jun had been the same.

"So how was the flight?" she asked as the two began navigating their way towards the exit. "And how come you brought so few things with you? I thought I told you we'd find a way to fit all of your stuff into our apartment one way or another?"

While their home was certainly much smaller than the one they'd shared before their family split up, the two Karatachi women who occupied it didn't own a lot of stuff to fill it with, and neither of them spent a lot of time at the apartment as it was anyway. It might be a bit of a tight fit if he brought too much stuff, but Yuuki was certain that they'd find a way to make it work. They always did.

"Well, the flight was uneventful. I fell asleep about an hour after takeoff," Daisuke said with a casual shrug, sounding a lot less awkward now that his mother was done gushing over him. "As for my stuff, Professor Leskinen promised that he would send whatever else I need via the mail. It's cheaper than bringing it along on the flight and carries less of a risk that I'll end up bringing along too much."

That made sense. As someone who constantly had to keep an eye on her bank balance, Yuuki could appreciate that her son knew the importance of not wasting his money if there existed a cheaper alternative, even if he and his father probably could afford it.

"Oh, alright," she responded as they rounded a corner. "So who's this 'Leskinen' person? I don't think you ever mentioned him over the phone?"

"I didn't?" Daisuke sounded honestly surprised. "That's strange, I was staying at his place for a few days after dad was hospitalized. He didn't think it would be a good idea to leave me alone in dad's apartment after such an incident. Anyway, he's one of dad's acquaintances."

'Wow, a responsible adult? What is this world coming to?' Yuuki thought sarcastically, but inwardly she couldn't help but take an instant liking to this "Leskinen" person for looking after her son. It was good to know that he had such people in his life.

"I see," she said simply.

For a few minutes, they walked in relative silence. Yuuki took this opportunity to try and reacquaint herself with her son by asking about his life in America, but outside of his academic pursuits, he didn't seem to have much to share, which only served to further antagonize her ex-husband in her eyes. From what he told her, he was usually too occupied either with his studies or with one project or another that Professor Leskinen had asked him to help out with on occasion to do much other than eating, sleeping and working.

This had been exactly why Yuuki hadn't wanted the family to move to America in the first place. She didn't want her son to be robbed of his childhood just because he happened to be a bit smarter than other kids his age. Of course, hearing him talk about his accomplishments now filled her with a bitter-sweet sense of pride, but it left a bad taste in her mouth knowing that they had come at the cost of other things that she'd wanted for him to have.

Almost 6 years had passed now since the artificial island of Odaiba had been covered in a thick layer of fog that had cut off all the district's communication with the outside world. When the fog had finally cleared a few days later, half of the district lay in ruins and the entire population had been gathered in the Convenience Center with no memory of the events that had passed. None remembered the ghost-like beings that had roamed the streets and shepherded the inhabitants of the island together in the center of the district, none remembered the monsters that had terrorized their neighborhood and none remembered the battle that had taken place by the Radio Station.

None, except the select few who had been involved in the battle itself. A select few, the majority of whom were going to gather in a messy three-room apartment in Odaiba this afternoon to discuss the recent unstable climate and its wider implications. One of these was a girl, merely 13 years of age, with light brown eyes and silky brown hair that was held to the left side of her face by a pink hairclip and reached to just above her shoulders.

While she and her brother made their way towards the Ishida Residence, Yagami Hikari found herself blowing softly on her hands to keep them warm while she reflected on the 5 years that had passed since she and the other Digidestined had last seen their partners. Almost a year after their adventures, they had been summoned back to the Digital World by Gennai so that they could release the power of their crests to repair the unstable barrier that was supposed to separate the Digital and the Real World. And while the release of their crests had indeed prevented the worlds from collapsing in on each other, it'd had the unfortunate side effect of severing all connections between the two worlds. It had been a difficult sacrifice for them to make, but they hadn't exactly had much of a choice.

After that, their lives had slowly but steadily settled back to normal. Sometimes in her weaker moments, Hikari had even found herself questioning whether or not the adventures she remembered from back then had really happened, or if it had just been a figment of her imagination. The invasion of Odaiba, meeting Gatomon and going to another world... it all felt so surreal compared to the mundane life she had lived for the past 5 years.

"Something on your mind, sis?"

Returning to the present, Hikari looked up to find that her brother had gotten ahead of her and was glancing at her over his shoulder. Like most of their group, Taichi hadn't undergone any drastic changes over the last few years other than having discarded his habit of using the goggles he had been given by their grandfather as a hairband, instead preferring to wear it around his neck like some weird kind of accessory. And despite that, much to their mother's horror, he still hadn't deemed it necessary to cut his hair. It was just as voluminous and messy as ever.

"Nuh-uh, just thinking about the past," she said with a slight shake of her head. "It's hard to believe that it's already been 5 years since that time."

Hearing what was occupying her thoughts, her brother just nodded in understanding and slowed his pace until Hikari caught up to him. Once he resumed walking, he reached up and clasped his hands behind his head with a thoughtful expression on his face.

"It's already been that long, huh?" he said as he looked up towards the sky, a solemn look in his eyes. "Man, time sure flies when you don't have the fate of two worlds weighing down on your shoulders."

A soft smile found its way onto Hikari's lips at her brother's attempt to make light of their situation. She knew that deep down, he was as frustrated by their separation from their partners as the rest of them. Even though they hadn't known them for very long, being unable to see or even talk to their partners made all of them feel incomplete, like an important part of them was missing. It certainly made Hikari feel anxious thinking about Gatomon, all alone in the Digital World.

"I suppose that's one way to look at it," she said with a giggle, doing her best not to let her thoughts linger on the depressing image that her mind had generated. She was sure that Gatomon was just fine. Her partner had the other Digidestined's partners to depend on, just like Hikari herself had the other Digidestined. And she knew that just like Taichi wouldn't allow anything bad to happen to her if he could help it, the same applied for their respective partners. "So did Koushiro tell you anything about why he wanted all of us to gather on such short notice?"

"Not really, but I think it's safe to assume that it has something to do with the strange weather we've been having recently," Taichi responded with a shrug, as the two siblings rounded the last corner of their route and their destination came into view. "Either way, we'll know soon enough. We're almost there."

Hikari just nodded in agreement as she looked up towards the balcony that was the home of their mutual friend and fellow Digidestined Ishida Yamato. Usually, when the group decided to meet up, they just gathered in the local park, but one collective glance out the window and there had been a consensus that they'd much rather meet somewhere indoors today.

A few minutes later, the two siblings had entered the apartment building and made their way to the floor where Yamato's apartment was located. Standing in front of the simple wooden door, Hikari couldn't help but think that it looked rather impersonal with its flat wooden surface and simple nameplate which identified it as the entrance to the Ishida Residence, almost as if the two men who lived there had forgotten to accessorize it properly.

Just as Hikari was about to raise her hand and knock politely on the door, Taichi beat her to the punch and simply opened the door and let himself in, announcing his presence loudly in the hallway as he did so. Hikari blinked owlishly at her brother's actions before a resigned sigh escaped her lips as she followed after her brother and closed the door behind her. Taichi was many things, but tactful and polite was not among them.

"Ah, there you are," a voice drew their attention in the direction of the kitchenette, where a mop of messy blonde hair had leaned into view from somewhere around the corner. "Just come in and make yourself at home. The others are in the living room, so we can start as soon as I'm done with these drinks."

Before either of them could respond, Yamato had leaned back out of view and by the sounds of it resumed cleaning the dishes in the sink.

"It's nice to see you too, Yamato," Taichi called as he leaned down to untie his shoelaces. Once he was done, he sprung to his feet and joined his best friend in the kitchenette, while Hikari opted to instead make her way into the living room, where she found the remaining 4 Digidestined occupying the two couches and talking amongst themselves. Or rather, 3 of them were talking amongst themselves, while the 4th member of their group was busy tapping away at his laptop.

"Good evening, everyone," Hikari offered as a greeting as she allowed her eyes to wander around the room and nodded towards each of its occupants in turn and received a collective greeting in response from the others, even Koushiro who appeared to be otherwise occupied. "How have you all been? It feels like it's been ages since we all met up like this."

"It does, doesn't it?" Takenouchi Sora said with a smile, as she scooted over to make room for Hikari on the couch she shared with Kido Jou. "It's a shame that we can't do it more often. There is always something going on that keeps us busy these days."

The bearer of the Crest of Love was probably the one who had changed the most over the years that had followed their adventures in the Digital World. She had originally discarded her trademark hat in favor of a hairclip that Taichi had given her on her birthday 5 years ago, but these days she just allowed her shoulder-length orange hair to fall freely past her shoulders.

"Technically speaking," Koushiro spoke up without taking his eyes off the computer screen. "it's only been 4 weeks and 6 days since the last gathering since 6 of us were present when we went out to eat at Kirinoya at the beginning of spring break."

Koushiro hadn't changed notably over the years that had passed, outside of his height and dress code. If anything, his experiences in the Digital World appeared to have inflated his fascination with computers and technology. While it all sounded like gibberish to Hikari, the young computer genius seemed to practically speak programming lingo like a normal person spoke their native language. She supposed that the Crest of Knowledge wasn't just for show.

"Well, I still think we could make more of an effort to meet up more often," Sora responded while Hikari took the seat she had been offered, doing her best not to meet the disappointed gaze of the blonde boy who was seated on the other couch along with Koushiro. "It's not like it would kill us to take a few hours out of our weekends to hang out."

"You say that now, Sora-san," Kido Jou, the holder of the Crest of Reliability, spoke up with a groan from his spot next to the orange-haired girl. "Just you wait until your midterm exam weeks this year. They'll make you wish that you had never been born."

Like Koushiro, Jou hadn't changed much on the surface outside of the way he dressed. But the way he held himself these days, with leisure and confidence, spoke volumes of how much he had matured since their adventures. Compared to the insecure pre-teen he had been at the time of their adventure, these days he truly gave the impression of the serene doctor that he aspired to be.

Except when it came to his exams. He still got worked up by those.

"Then we'll just try to schedule our gatherings in the weeks that we don't have midterm or final exams to study for. Problem solved!" Sora fired back at the slumped over senior student seated next to her.

Wanting to be left out of the bickering between the older Digidestined, Hikari reluctantly turned her attention to the room's last occupant, Takaishi Takeru. Like his older brother Yamato, Takeru had messy blonde hair and ocean blue eyes that revealed his mother's European heritage.

For a few seconds, the two youngest of the Digidestined locked gazes from across the table before Hikari looked away again, suddenly finding the turned-off television very interesting. Being the only Digidestined who was close to her in age, Hikari had always gotten along well with Takeru, but since he and his mother had moved back to Odaiba things had become a bit awkward between them.

They had gotten off to a good start. Since Takeru didn't know anyone else at their school, and Hikari's best friend had moved away just recently, it had felt natural for the two of them to spend time together. They would hang out during recess, eat their lunch at the same table and help each other out with homework after school. But recently, Takeru's interest in her seemed to have become a tad bit more intimate than Hikari was comfortable with.

It wasn't even that she didn't like Takeru. He was kind, courageous, understanding, intelligent, athletic and had a very charming smile that had always made Hikari feel warm inside. And even beyond that, he was her best friend. There was nobody else other than Taichi and maybe Sora whom Hikari trusted more than Takeru, and she knew that she could talk to him about almost anything. By all rights, he was the best male friend she could've asked for, especially after she had lost contact with Daisuke after he moved to America, but that was all he was to her: a friend. She didn't want to risk ruining the friendship they currently had by pursuing something more when she already felt uncomfortable with just the thought of it.

Thankfully, she was saved from dwelling too much on her complicated friendship with the bearer of the Crest of Hope by the timely arrival of their respective older brothers from the kitchenette, both of them carrying trays with some minor refreshments that Yamato had prepared for the meeting.

"Wow, would you look at that? Everyone actually made it!" Taichi said with a grin, as he set his tray on the table and plopped down next to Takeru on the opposite couch, completely oblivious to the tension between the boy and his sister. "Well, since we're all here now, let's get this party started, shall we?"

"I suppose it would be prudent to start the meeting before everyone is distracted by the food," Koushiro agreed, as he finally closed the lid on his laptop, and turned his full attention to his friends. "And since I haven't eaten anything since approximately 11:32 earlier today, I'll just get straight to the point, because I'm starving and those biscuits look delicious."

The moment they stepped through the slide doors, they were hit by a chilling gust of wind from the winter weather that reigned outside. Daisuke felt a shiver run down his spine and instantly hugged his arms closer to himself in an attempt to preserve whatever heat he could. Beside him, his mother zipped up her jacket and hid her free hand in her pocket to keep it warm.

"If you had m-mentioned that you still had snow over here, I would have d-dressed in something a bit more weather appropriate," he managed to stutter through the clattering of his teeth while he cast an annoyed look at the furred collar of his mother's jacket. The garment was certainly a bit worn out and what he assumed had once been a dark navy blue color had faded to a very dull shade of its' former self, but it looked a heck of a lot more comfortable than what Daisuke himself was wearing at the moment.

"I would have called you about it if I had woken up before you left," his mother said apologetically. "We didn't have any of this yesterday when I went to sleep, and when I woke up this morning you had already boarded the plane and turned off your phone."

That piece of information made Daisuke stop in his tracks, and almost caused him to stop shivering due to the absurdity of the statement.

"You mean that all this snow just fell over Tokyo overnight? Out of nowhere?" he questioned in disbelief, turning to look directly at his mother, who had also come to a stop beside him. While he was in no way a certified meteorologist, he had a hard time believing that this kind of weather would just appear out of nowhere.

"Yeah, the weather has been a bit wonky over the last few weeks," his mother laughed awkwardly while she allowed her eyes to travel over the bus terminals where they stood in search of the one that would take them in the direction of their home. "But we'd had over 25 degrees and bright sun over the last week, so I figured that it had settled down by now."

Shuddering as a particularly chilly gust of wind found it's way inside the collar of his thin summer button-up shirt, Daisuke had to bite back a nastily worded comment about how she still could've warned him that the weather had been going up and down lately, so he would've had the foresight to at least bring along a warmer jacket just in case it got colder again. Or how she could've brought along a jumper or something for him to wear when she left home that morning, even if she couldn't call him to tell him to bring something along.

A second later, his mother spotted the bus terminal she was looking for because she pointed toward a particular one in the distance and began walking towards it at a brisk pace, probably aware that her son was being turned more into a human popsicle for every second that passed. Daisuke was all too happy to follow along towards the terminal, bouncing on the heels of his feet to try and generate some warmth and hoping against hope that the bus would arrive soon.

Just as they reached the terminal that his mother had pointed out, however, something strange happened. Another strong gust of wind swept over the area, not as cold as the previous ones had been, but it still carried a cloud frigid snow into Daisuke's unprotected face, causing the auburn-haired boy to splutter and cover his face with his right arm.

The moment when his vision was completely covered by his arm, Daisuke practically felt how something shifted in the air. All the sound generated from the surrounding transports, the bustling from the crowd and the howling of the snowstorm became muffled as if someone was holding a very thick pillow over his ears, and even the bite from the cold air seemed to die down a bit. In the sudden stillness that settled over the area, Daisuke could hear how his heart was beating loudly in his chest as he removed the arm that he had covered his face with to protect it from the snow that had been stirred by that last gust.

However, what he saw when he did almost made his heart stop.

He was standing by the same bus terminal that he and his mother had come to a stop by just seconds before, but the entire surrounding area appeared to have been emptied. There was no longer any snow covering the ground, no buses moving about to pick up and drop off passengers and no people moving about as they tried to make their way to their designated bus terminal or hurried inside the airport to find shelter from the unpleasant weather. Even the weather itself seemed to have just... disappeared.

Feeling his heart rate pick up its' pace as his mind processed this disturbing phenomenon, Daisuke spun around in place in the direction where his mother had been just a few moments ago, only to be met with the same emptiness that permeated the area. He turned around to face the entrance to the airport, but even from this distance, he could see that the inside of the building was just as empty as the outside through the plastic glass that made up its' front. What in the world was going on here?

"Mom?" he asked breathlessly, feeling his windpipe close up a bit as he tried to come up with an explanation, any explanation, for what he was currently seeing. This had to be a dream, right? Yeah, he had fallen asleep on the flight to Japan, and this was just the last dream sequence before he was awoken by one of the flight attendants. That would also explain the unexpected weather!

Before he could pursue this line of thinking any further however, his thoughts were interrupted by an unexpected answer to his query.

"There has been an awakening. Have you felt it?"

The sound of an ominous male voice cut through the silence that weighed down on the area, a directionless echo that made Daisuke jump in fright and caused the hairs on the back of his neck to stand on end. Slowly, as if scared of what he would find, the auburn-haired boy turned around on the spot until he finally came face to face with another human in this world of nothingness.

On the opposite side of the road from where he stood, a figure about the same height as Daisuke himself stood. The figure was covered from head to toe in black attire, consisting of a pair of black boots, black loose-fitting pants and a black cloak complete with a large hood that left their face hidden in shadows. Daisuke could've sworn that the temperature in the area dropped a few degrees the moment he laid eyes on the hooded figure, a suspicion that was proven correct when he let out the breath he just now realized he had been holding while he was turning around and a cloud of steam escaped his mouth.

After a few seconds of staring at the each, during which the hooded figure didn't even move an inch, Daisuke swallowed down the lump that had formed in his throat and fixed his face into the best look of casual disinterest that he could muster at the moment.

"Who are you? What's going on here?" he said with a steady voice, sounding a lot more confident about himself than he felt.

For a moment, the figure showed no indication that they had even heard him. Then, just as Daisuke was about to repeat his questions, they reached inside their cloak and retrieved a small object that they then casually tossed towards him. As the object came hurtling towards his face at an alarming pace, Daisuke raised his hand and snatched it out of the air before it could nail him on the nose.

After throwing a glance towards the figure to make sure they weren't about to throw anything else at him, Daisuke then turned his attention to the small object that now rested in his hand. It appeared to be some kind of computer device, not unlike a bulky cellphone in its shape. It had a dark gray center and its edges were covered by a blue handgrip that fit snugly into Daisuke's hand as if it had been molded after his grip.

"What the-? What's this thing supposed to be?" he asked out loud and was just about to turn his attention back towards the hooded figure again when out of nowhere, a chilling gust of wind swept through the area again, bringing a cloud of powdered snow with it and forcing Daisuke to close his eyes and cover his face with his arm again.

As soon as he closed his eyes, his senses were overloaded by the sudden reappearance of everything that had been missing from the world just a moment ago. A shiver ran down his spine as his mind registered the return of the winter cold that had plagued him a few minutes before, and he had to briefly cover his ears as the sudden return of all the sounds from the surrounding area made his head ring.

Taking a few seconds to gather his bearings, he opened his eyes to find that the bus had already arrived at their terminal and that his mother had already stepped aboard and was talking to the driver about the payment. Chancing a glance at the surrounding area, Daisuke found that everything was back to normal, or at least as normal as a snowy day in March could get. The unpleasant winter winds were back, as was the sound of the bustling crowds all around him. It was as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened at all.

As if in a trance, Daisuke found himself taking a hesitant step to the right, just so he could look in front of the bus and across the street again. His eyes were drawn to the spot where the hooded figure had been standing just moments prior but found the spot void of any life. There wasn't even any sign that a person had set foot there since the snow had fallen, not even a footprint. Had it all just been his imagination?

By the time that the Yagami siblings left the Ishida Residence, it had already stopped snowing outside and the temperature had already gone back up to 24 degrees. If it wasn't for the blanket of snow that still covered the ground, one could've almost dismissed the snowstorm that had swept over Tokyo as a mere dream. Or at least one would've been able to if they didn't know the implications behind the unstable weather conditions, and what it could mean.

As they made their way back towards their own apartment building, Hikari couldn't help but feel a bit apprehensive about what was to come. The prospect of the barrier between the real and the Digital World weakening again simultaneously excited and terrified her. It excited her because if the two worlds became connected again, she might be able to see Gatomon again for the first time in 5 years, but that excitement was hampered by her worry about why the barrier was weakening.

When they had been called to protect the Digital World 6 years ago, it had been on the verge of total collapse. The 4 beings known as the Dark Masters had seized power over the world itself and had reformed it in their own twisted image. That had been the reason why the barrier had become weak enough for their worlds to connect, so did that mean that something similar was happening again in the Digital World? After their defeat of Apocalymon and the release of their crest powers, the world should've been restored back to the way it was before, so why was the barrier weakening again?

Koushiro had started the meeting by telling them, in terms that like always sounded like complete gibberish to Hikari, that he had recently come into contact with somebody who claimed to have been monitoring the stability of the barrier between the two worlds since the incident 6 years ago. This reveal had come as a shock to most of them because they had been under the impression that they and their families were the only ones who remembered what had happened during the Invasion of Odaiba, but Jou, ever the logical observer, had quickly pointed out that while they had been the only ones to retain their actual memories of the invasion, literally the entire world knew that something had happened during those few days that Odaiba had been cut off from the world.

Thinking back on it, Hikari couldn't help but feel a bit embarrassed at her naivete. An entire district had been completely cut off from the outside world for days by an unnatural layer of fog, and when the fog finally cleared half the district was revealed to have been destroyed. When put like that, Hikari felt stupid for ever thinking that only they knew about the Digital World's existence. Of course, other people would know that it existed after all that! They just didn't know exactly what it was.

Koushiro's mysterious contact had warned him that the barrier was weakening, and had confirmed that the unstable weather they'd had over the last few weeks was a direct result of this. This, of course, had raised many questions as to who this mysterious contact could be if they had the ability to monitor the stability of the barrier between the worlds, but after having spent half an hour discussing it and not come any closer to figuring it out, they had decided to just drop the subject and wait until Koushiro could shake more information out of them.

Until then, it was decided that the only thing they could do was to carry their Digivices around at all times and be on the lookout for anything that appeared out of the ordinary. As much as they would've preferred to be able to take a more active approach, there wasn't much that they could do until they knew what they would be dealing with. All they could do was to make sure that they would be ready to act the moment that something did happen. The world may be calm right now, but they all knew from experience that if Koushiro's mysterious contact was speaking the truth, this was just the calm before the storm.

"Uh, Taichi? Brother?" Hikari spoke up as she pondered the events that were sure to come. Once she had her brother's attention, she went on. "Could you tell mom that I'll be home in a bit? I want to drop by the park on my way home."

The park, the place where Hikari went when she needed time to think. It was a habit she had picked up a few years ago after her best friend had moved away from Japan and she had lost contact with him. When she needed time to herself, she would take a walk through the park where they used to play as kids and reminisce about a time when life was so much simpler than it was now. Even if it didn't solve anything, allowing herself to think back to the times shared between two kids who just wanted to have fun and trusted each other indefinitely always helped her calm down, and she really felt like she needed some of that right now.

"Alright I guess, just don't take too long. You know how worried mom gets when you're out late by yourself," her brother said with a shrug as he kept walking without losing pace. "If you're not home within an hour, I'll come looking for you, okay? Don't be late."

Thanking her brother, Hikari took a different turn at the next crossing and made her way towards the local park. Even though he masked it by bringing up their mother's potential reaction, Hikari knew that Taichi himself would be worried sick for her if she didn't come home in time and resolved to not linger in the park any longer than necessary. Her brother had always been very protective of her, but even he had come to accept that sometimes some people just needed some time to themselves to think on their own and that the best thing he could do to help them was to just give them the space they needed. He had certainly grown up a lot from the hotheaded boy he had been 6 years ago.

Once she made it to the edge of the Odaiba Park, Hikari slowed her steps and allowed herself to look around and just remember. She had so many happy memories in this place, just being here and taking the time to recall some of them was enough to lighten almost any weight on her shoulders. Memories of coming here with her parents and brother for family picnics. Memories of coming here to watch her brother play soccer.

Memories of meeting and befriending a cheerful and energic auburn-haired boy here, a summer over 9 years ago.

As she reached the swings, she dusted the snow off of one of them and took a seat. She slowly began to move her legs to make put the swing in motion, remembering the many times she had played with her friend on these very swings. They would take turns on who would get to be on the swing and who would get to push, and compete in who could jump the longest. Thinking about how excited she had been the first time she had beaten her friend in their competition, and how happy she had been when he treated her to a popsicle from the ice cream truck in honor of her accomplishment, Hikari found her lips being drawn out into a soft smile.

'Where are you now, Dai-Kun?' she thought as she raised her gaze upwards, where the clouds had just parted to reveal a clear sky. If she had been somewhere other than in the central part of Tokyo, she'd probably be able to see a sky filled with a thousand stars, but as it was all she could see was an endless void. 'Do you ever think about the time we spent in this park together, that summer so long ago? Do you ever wish you could go back to those days?'

There were certainly times she did. Heaven's knew that there were times when she wished she could go back to those simple days before her life became so complicated. Back to a time before she was part of a group that had saved the world, and maybe would have to do so again if recent developments were any indication. Back to a time before she had lost her best friend, and back to a time before one of her closest friends wanted more out of their friendship than she was willing to give.

She sat there for a good half an hour, just allowing the swing to carry her back and forth before she let out a sigh and jumped to her feet. It wasn't much, but she did feel a little bit calmer now compared to when she had left Yamato's apartment. Feeling a little bit better about her life, Hikari turned around and offered the swing a grateful smile, before she began making her way back home. There was still some time before she had to be home, but she preferred to be able to take her time and arrive a few minutes early than to cut it close.

Her family's apartment was located about a 10 minutes walk away from the park, so it didn't take her long to get back home. Once she neared the apartment building, she noticed that there was a moving truck parked by the entrance with its' cargo space open, reminding her that her mother had mentioned that they were supposed to be getting a new neighbor any day now. At the time, Hikari hadn't really thought much of it since she barely knew the other tenants in their building anyway, but the closer she got to the truck she couldn't help but feel a bit curious if maybe there would be someone around her age in the new family. It would be nice to have someone to walk to school with again. Since Daisuke had moved to America 3 years ago, she had been walking alone.

When his mother had told him that the apartment where she and his sister lived was a very modest home, she hadn't been lying. Located on the second floor of a rundown tenancy, just a stone's throw away from the local park where Daisuke remembered playing as a kid, was a small two-room apartment that was identified as the Karatachi Residence by the plate attached to its front door. The apartment consisted of little more than two rooms that neither exceeded 20 square meters in size, one of which had a small kitchenette in one of its corners.

It didn't take long for Daisuke to realize that his mother was a lot worse off economically than he had initially thought. When she had told him that Jun was attending Tokyo Denki University, he had assumed that their quality of life was about as good as it had been when the family still lived together, since college-level education was far from cheap. As it would turn out, that education was where most of Karatachi Yuuki's earnings had been invested.

"Well, this is... charming?" he said once he had looked around the apartment. Despite the rundown outward appearance of the building, it was easy to see that the inside of the apartment had been well cared for. While it wasn't anything excessive, like his and his father's top floor apartment back in New York, it had all the necessities for a comfortable lifestyle, including an old thick television and a full bookshelf.

"It's not much," his mother admitted as she glanced around the interior of the living room with a pensive look on her face. "But it's home. Anyway, you wouldn't mind sleeping in the living room, would you? Jun was very... vocal about not wanting to share the bedroom with you. We only have two futons right now, but if you can endure sleeping on the couch just for tonight we can buy a new one for you tomorrow."

Looking over towards the worn-out couch, Daisuke just shrugged in response. It didn't look too bad and truth to be told, he wasn't particularly eager to share a bedroom with his estranged mother and sister either. As accommodating as his mother had been so far, he just didn't feel very comfortable with the thought of having to share his private space with anyone.

"Couch will be fine, I'm not very particular about where or how I sleep," he said as he walked over and put his bag down by the couch as if to show that he was fine with the proposed sleeping arrangements. "Speaking of which though, where's Jun?"

At the mention of Daisuke's older sister, his mother frowned slightly and glanced over towards an old clock that was hung on the wall next to the bookshelf.

"At this point, she's probably already at work," she commented after thinking it over for a few seconds. "Her shift doesn't start yet for another 20 minutes or so, but she usually prefers to tag in a few minutes early in case the previous workers left something that needs to be cleaned up before her shift starts."

That was news to Daisuke. While he and Jun had never been particularly close, due in part to the 6 year age difference between them, he liked to think that he had known his sister quite well before their parents' divorce, and she had never struck him as someone who would willingly give up their spare time for something as tiresome as working a part-time job. However, a glance around the apartment gave him a pretty good idea of how much of it had been her own choice and how much of it had been a necessity, and suddenly he couldn't help but feel a little uncomfortable where he stood.

"Oh, is that so?" he said as he sat down on the couch, deliberately not looking at his mother as he did so. If their economy was so bad that Jun had to divide her attention between a part-time job and her university studies just to make ends meet, why had his mother said yes when he asked if he could live here? "Does she work the nightshift somewhere then? Or will she be home in a few hours?"

"She doesn't always, but I think she told me she would be working both nightshifts this weekend. Something about having to stand in for one of her kouhai, who would be unable to work the shift between Sunday and Monday due to school starting up," his mother said with a shrug, as she made her way over to the kitchenette, and began looking through their pantry. "Are you hungry, Daisuke-Kun? I was thinking about making curry rice for dinner. We still have some leftover rice in the cooker that needs to be used up."

Her sentence had been cleverly framed to make it sound as if the rice would go to waste if he didn't eat it. Had his mother always been this nudging with the way she worded her questions? Perhaps he hadn't given her enough credit, and she had noticed how uncomfortable he felt now that he realized the peculiar position that he had put her and his sister in. He was tempted to call her out on it, but a low rumble from his stomach reminded him that he hadn't eaten anything for about 15 hours now since he hadn't eaten anything during the flight.

"I suppose I wouldn't mind a small bite of something," he said instead but decided to keep an ear out for his mother's choice of words in the future. "Do you need help with anything? I'm pretty handy with a kitchen knife."

And he would take anything that could distract him from thinking too much about his mother's poor economy, and the difficult situation he had put her and his sister in by coming to live with them for an as of yet undecided amount of time.

"Oh, thank you for offering, but I think I've got this. I'm sure you're still exhausted from your flight," she said as her face reappeared from within the pantry with her chosen ingredients in her arms. "Why don't you take the time to clean yourself up? I remember always feeling a bit icky after a long flight, so a bath probably wouldn't feel too bad, right?"

Daisuke was really tempted to protest again, but he couldn't really argue with her on that. Being sat in the same seat for 14 hours straight would leave any healthy human feeling like a heap of sweaty rags, so a bath did sound pretty good.

"Alright," he conceded as he stretched his arms over his head, suddenly feeling very tired.

A glance in the direction of the kitchenette revealed that his mother was smiling and humming quietly to herself as she dug around in the drawers in search of whatever cookware she required. "Great! Take your time to relax and I'll call you over once dinner is ready. Oh, and the blue towel is yours."

Their activities for the next 40 minutes or so decided, the two went about their business. Daisuke got up from his spot on the couch and moved to prepare for his bath, while his mother brought out a cutting board and began dicing up some vegetables to add to the curry rice. Her cheerful humming could be heard even after Daisuke closed the door behind him and took in the appearance of the bathroom. Like the rest of the apartment, it was a lot cleaner and more well kept than the exterior of the building would've suggested. Whether it was his mother or sister who was responsible for cleaning the place, they clearly put a lot of effort into maintaining the quality of its' interior. This bathroom might even be cleaner than the one back at the luxurious Motomiya Residence in New York.

After having spent a few minutes inspecting the shiny white porcelain of the bathtub, Daisuke reached over and turned on the faucet, using his index finger to measure the temperature of the water. Once he was satisfied, he stood back up and began to undress, starting with his white button-up shirt and the white tank top he wore underneath. However, just as he was about to pull his pants down, his right hand brushed against a foreign object that was hooked to his belt.

It felt almost as if someone had cracked open an unboiled egg above his head and allowed its contents to run down the back of his neck, as his mind registered the familiar feel of the metallic object. Feeling his pulse quicken, his fingers slowly closed around the grip of the device before he unhooked it and brought it up to his face to stare at it in disbelief. It looked exactly the same as it had earlier that evening when the hooded figure had given it to him: a dark gray center that was surrounded by a blue grip that was perfectly molded to fit snugly in his hand.

After he had woken up from that strange vision he'd had at the bus terminal at Haneda Airport, he had just assumed that he had dozed off briefly and dreamt up the whole thing, since he could find neither the object nor any sign of the hooded figure who had given it to him. He was certain that he didn't have it on him when he had gotten on the bus, but clearly, he must've been mistaken or someone had planted it on him after he had left the airport. Both of those trails of thoughts led to lines of questions that he definitely didn't feel comfortable pursuing any further than he had to.

But even disregarding the mystery of how the thing had ended up on his person, this little device still bothered him! He was positive that he had never seen anything like it, but he still had this unreasonable gut feeling that he should know what it was. It felt so familiar where it lay in his hand as if he had held it hundreds of times before, and as he held it he realized that he could feel a strange warmth spread through his chest.

For a few seconds, Daisuke just kept staring at the strange device as if he was waiting for something else to happen. When nothing did, he just sighed and turned his attention back to the bathtub to make sure that it didn't overflow, but his thoughts never strove far from the subject of the mysterious device for the rest of the evening. Something strange was going on here, and Motomiya Daisuke wanted to know what it was.

Author's Note: Hello again, dear reader! If you are reading this, congratulations! You made it through the prologue! In accordance with my own dislike of some other authors' (and my younger self's) habit of putting 2k words of blabbering before the actual chapters begin, I will try to stick to interacting with you readers in the Author's Note here at the end of the chapter from here on out.

Before I bring up anything else, if you feel like the name of this story looks familiar, it is because I have two other stories up with very similar names, and Flareix has also posted a similar story a while back which follow the same naming pattern. And even if it may not be obvious from this prologue, this story is meant to be the spiritual successor to my original stories "Those Linked by Darkness" and "Those Connected by Darkness". I say spiritual successor and not remake/rewrite because it won't really follow the plot I had originally planned for this story idea. 6 years have passed since I posted the original story, and I am a very different person now to who I was back then, so this will be the current me's version of an idea I had when I was 16 years old (for reference, I'll turn 24 in October). If you are a returning reader, then this may not be the story you were hoping for, but it will be the best that you can get from me as I am now.

Moving on to less solemn things to talk about, if you are at all familiar with some other franchises you may have noticed some familiar words scattered throughout this chapter. This is just my inner geek coming out to play, but kudos to anyone who can name all of the references and where they come from! I will present the full list in the next chapter. And before you ask, I have in fact started working on the next chapter already, so hopefully, it won't take too long but I won't make any promises. Life is unpredictable, and my posting schedule will be thereafter.

About the chapter itself, if you are as old as me or older and have a particularly good memory, then you are absolutely correct. April 2nd, 2005 was, in fact, a Saturday. I went back and checked in my calendar. And while we are at it, I guess I should address the thing that I am sure some of you are thinking about: the character names. While I don't have anything against the English names for these characters, I wanted to make this story feel as organic to Japan as I could make it, and unfortunately, the character names were a victim of this. I will still be using the English names for the Digimon, so, for example, Gatomon will still be named "Gatomon" instead of her Japanese name "Tailmon", but all of the Japanese Digidestined will have their Japanese names.

On a completely unrelated note, I have a big folder on my laptop that contains notes regarding this story, including profiles for most of the characters that I am kind of tempted to share with you guys. Obviously, they would have to be run through a spoiler filter first, but if enough people think it would be fun I will start posting a character profile in the Author's Note at the end of every chapter. I will put up a poll on my own profile here on the site about whether or not this should be a thing so if you feel particularly strongly about this one way or the other, then go over there and vote!

As usual, I will respond to reviews through Private Messages, even if it is just a simple "Thank you for reading". But if something is brought up by multiple people, I will address it in one of these Author's Notes just for other readers' benefit. I would also like to clarify that I am not averse to constructive criticism, so don't be shy about bringing up things that bothered you or you felt could've been handled better.

So with all of that said, we have reached the end of the prologue of Those Touched by Darkness! This was actually the longest chapter I have ever posted on this site, so cheers for that! Hopefully, that is an indication that I will have enough gas in the tank to keep this thing going this time. Please let me know your thoughts on the chapter! And with that, I bid you farewell!