During the travel towards Backup Pyramid, Suzie is informed about their mission to defeat the Dark Ones, however, Henry also requests that Suzie stays in the train, as she is not experienced to fight alongside her Digimon yet. But in reality, he just wanted to make sure she didn't get hurt, Suzie is of course reluctant to do this as she wants to help and puts up a fuss. Rika and Takato debate quietly about whether Suzie should come along or not, with very little results.

Backup Pyramid comes into view, but the moment it does, another lightning bolt strikes the tracks destroying it, leaving Thomas to stop the train abruptly again. After a quick debate by both Thomas and DemiDevimon, informing the others, Kazu, Kenta, Jessica and Suzie are all to stay behind. Kazu and Suzie argue with Thomas saying they're still inexperienced with their Digimon, and while Kenta claims he's learned how to compare the Floppies this time, no one believed him and agreed to have him stay behind. Jessica puts up no argument.

Takato, Guilmon, Rika, Viximon, Henry, Terriermon, Jeri, Leomon, Ryo, Monodramon and Thomas and DemiDevimon begin their trek towards Backup Pyramid, aside from Thomas and DemiDevimon, everyone was impressed by the idea that Backup Pyramid was not only floating but was upside down. More lightning strikes happen, but thankfully they were nowhere near them. But as they got close to the Pyramid, they see an elevator heading towards the upside-down tip, implying this was the entrance.

Just as they were about to enter, they get interrupted by three familiar faces. Shina Kei with her Agumon, Benjiro Sabin with his Tapirmon and Juro Dai with his Tentomon. Three of the Grand Tamers, Thomas' old team from seven years ago. Rika and Takato remembered them from the poster, though they were seven years older, especially Shina whom they had met before. What could've been a happy reunion was not as Benjiro threatened all of them to cease their attacks on the Dark Ones, Juro accusing Thomas of being insane for what he was doing, and Shina asking him as to why he would do something so reckless.

But before Rika could ask what they were talking about. Thomas requests that they get to the Pyramid and to find Etemon, Rika was reluctant, but Thomas' sudden change made her think otherwise. The others ran into the elevator with Thomas stepping forward with DemiDevimon, rather than answering their questions, he threatened them to leave him and his team alone or else he'll resort to violence. A fight soon happened with Agumon, Tapirmon and Tentomon Digivolving into Greymon, Seasarmon and Kabuterimon. DemiDevimon Digivolves into Devimon and both he and Thomas began to fight.

Sen Validus and Kamemon were suddenly seen by the train. Sen broke into the front engine of the train and began to dismantle it. Kazu and Suzie with Kapurimon and Lopmon stepped in to try and fight him, with Kapurimon becoming Hagurumon. But both Hagurumon and Lopmon were overpowered by Kamemon, Kazu tried to make Hagurumon Digivolve but he couldn't get it to work. Soulmon appears and tries to convince Sen to not do what he's doing, reminding him that she's Belle's Digimon, but Sen refused to listen, claiming that Thomas is out of line and has to be stopped, no matter what.

In Backup Pyramid, the others made it to two separate hallways, Takato, Guilmon, Rika, Viximon and Ryo and Monodramon went one way, with Henry, Terriermon, Jeri and Leomon going the other way. Rika's mind was clouded, she couldn't believe that Thomas' old friends would try to stop him from doing what she thought was good, but she began to question why they would try to stop him, and what did they meant by he's insane or doing something so reckless. A motion trigger suddenly activates raising the alarms, and an army of Gazimon began to flood the hallways, forcing them to run due to the numbers.

Back to just outside Backup Pyramid, Devimon got the other three distracted long enough for Thomas to get in close to Shina, Benjiro and Juro and surprised them all by recoding their Digivices, forcing Greymon, Seasarmon and Kabuterimon to Degenerate into their In-Training forms. Thomas then uses his recoding powers to create a large wall forcing the and their Digimon to keep their distance from Thomas and Devimon. Devimon then flown up to the Pyramid with Thomas catching a ride on his back. As they flew up, Thomas felt sick as a result from using his Recoding powers for some unknown reason.

Rika and Viximon got separated from Takato, Ryo and their Digimon. But they got away from the Gizamon for now. Rika enters a room with a bunch of security monitors but no staff, assuming all of them were the Gizamon that attacked them. Rika checks out one of the monitors to discover a center room where Etemon is, but another individual is there too.

The individual was a Centaur-like being, half man half horse, but the upper half was a skeletal being with bull horns and purple and black gothic armour with a few purple clouds coming out of the cracks between his bones, the lower horse-like half was pure black with purple veins growing all over it and has six legs as opposed to just four.

Rika could see Etemon and this new Digimon talking, but no sound could be heard, but after they spoke, the new Digimon generated a black cloud in his left hand and threw it to the ground, suddenly spawning about twenty Skullmon, the same Skullmon that attacked the city. Then Etemon walks up to a machine and pulls a lever, in a black circle next to them and the Skullmon – who had just started patrolling away – there was a sudden bolt of lightning hitting the center and out appeared several Gazimon.

Rika became surprised to see that they were creating more Digimon servants and immediately contacted Thomas on her Digivice, hoping to get a response, thankfully there was one, she told Thomas of what she saw, and Thomas came to the conclusion that Etemon was using the recycled data of deceased Digimon to create more with the coding to serve the Dark Ones. He also stated that the other Dark Ones might be doing the same in each regions respective Data Recycle Zones, trying to amass a giant army. But when Rika mentioned the Centaur-like Digimon spawning the Skullmon, Thomas was left confused, as he had no records on anything relating to the Skullmon, as they were new and possibly artificially created by the centaur Digimon.

Suddenly the alarms go off again and all the monitors point to Takato, Guilmon, Ryo and Monodramon fighting off the Skullmon and Gizamon in the main courtyard. So, Rika immediately sets off for there right as Viximon Digivolves into Renamon.

Thomas and Devimon rushed through the corridors as the alarms were going off. Before they could continue, Kazu contacts him via Digivice and tells him of Sen Valadus sabotaging the train, an aggravated Thomas quickly tells Devimon to get back to the train and to stop Sen no matter what, with Devimon flying back. Thomas than proceeded to rush forward preparing his shotgun.

Takato and Ryo tried to fight off the Gazimon and Skullmon, with Growlmon and Strikedramon helping. Thomas suddenly arrives on scene and began firing at the Skullmon, while warning the others that other Tamers are going to try and stop them, but rather than giving more information, he went his own direction to fight off more of the enemy.

Rika and Renamon arrive in what appears to be a gigantic courtyard, they took a little time to view the scenery but moved on, without looking, Rika stepped onto a white circle with tribal markings on it. The moment she did, she heard thousands upon thousands of screams, seeing thousands of faces all around, the noise and vision was driving her insane, until Renamon suddenly grabbed Rika and moved her off the circle where it suddenly stopped. A semi-paralyzed Rika looked around wondering what just happened, Renamon claimed that she was just standing around, holding her head in fear, unable to see or hear what Rika witnessed.

Soon Henry, Gargomon, Jeri and Leomon arrived after fending off some of the Skullmon and Gazimon too. Asking Rika where Takato and Ryo was, with Renamon responding as Rika was still in a state of shock. But before they could do anything else, they hear someone mock them from a distance, there they saw Etemon on top of a pillar, he jumped down complimenting them for making it this far, soon the Centaur-like Digimon appeared behind Etemon before walking alongside him. Henry takes out his Digivice to examine the new Digimon.

ViralSkullmon, a Mega Level Digimon and the final stage of Skullmon. But that was all the Digivice could tell him.

ViralSkullmon – for fun – decides to inform them that every Skullmon they've fought was his creation, although he is a Mega Level Digimon, he chooses to serve an Ultimate Level Digimon like NeoDevimon and the Dark Ones. Rika gets her composure back and asks why he would serve them, with ViralSkullmon responding that they both share similar goals, and he's not interested in leading them.

Etemon tells ViralSkullmon to make his way to Backup Temple to help Vademon, he agrees, sprouts large wings and flies off. Glad they didn't have to fight a Mega, but now they had to fight Etemon who began to attack them.

Meanwhile, Sen continues to tear apart pieces of the train while Kamemon kept Hagurumon and Lopmon at bay, Kazu tried to fight as well but Kamemon dealt with his just as easily as the rest of the Digimon. Suddenly Devimon shows up, he asks Sen to stop otherwise he'll take action, with Sen trying to convince that what Thomas is doing is wrong. Devimon was merely quiet as he began to attack Sen and Kamemon. Sen Digivolves Kamemon into Gwappamon and tries to fight Devimon, but Devimon easily overpowers both of them and throws them away from the train, he gives them one last warning to leave before Devimon takes this further, a possible implication that he might kill them. Sen accuses Devimon for being just as twisted as his Tamer before running off.

Devimon asks if Kazu, Suzie, Lopmon and Hagurumon are ok, he then tells Kazu to tell Thomas that he'll be staying behind to protect the remains of the train, with Kazu quickly doing so.

Takato was finally able to Matrix Digivolve Growlmon into WarGrowlmon and was able to wipe out the Skullmon and Gazimon with ease, but they quickly notice an explosion from the distance and discover that it's the others fighting Etemon, so they quickly dash over to help. Kyubimon, Gargomon and Leomon try to fight Etemon but are losing spectacularly, WarGrowlmon steps in and manages to get the upper hand against Etemon, but unlike the fight against Phantomon, Etemon stood a chance and began to fight back, but WarGrowlmon was winning.

Jeri tries to make Leomon Digivolve, but it doesn't work, Thomas steps in and began to fire at Etemon, telling the others to retreat for the time being, so they don't get into the crossfire, which they do. But just as they were leaving, Etemon quickly fires a Dark Network attack towards them, Thomas tries to shoot it, but he misses, and the attack causes an explosion by the team sending them flying and scattering, as they landed, Henry tried to get up only to discover Arukenimon at the top of another pillar, before she said anything, she suddenly threw a purple energy spear which impaled Henry in the stomach. Jeri notices this from a distance and screams getting everyone's attention, Gargomon spots Arukenimon and tries to fire at her but she disappears.

Thomas notices this and quickly retreats from the fight, the others surround Henry who was struggling to breathe, but before they could do anything, Thomas steps in, yanks out the spear and tries to use his healing powers. But to his shock, the healing power was only slowing down his death, the particular spear used on him has some kind of deadly virus. Thomas deduces that the only way to save him is to get him back to the train, so he quickly picks up Henry, runs towards Takato who cups his hands together, he then launched them far over the edge of the pyramid. Everyone's morals dropped seeing this, but Rika quickly reassures them, knowing that Thomas will save him and Etemon needs to be stopped.

Henry wakes up back at the train on the same bed Rika was on to heal. He saw Thomas and asked what happened. Thomas explained that the spear he was impaled with had a strange decoding virus that was slowly deleting his body from the inside out. Thomas was able to save him by using the machine to slow down the process, use his recoding to undo the process but there was one more extreme action he had to take. Henry took notice of his stomach with several scars and stitches that were slowly disappearing, Thomas lifted his own shirt revealing the same scars, and explained that in order for Henry to fully heal, he literally had to transfer some of his organs with his healing code to replace what got deleted and or corrupted, Thomas was able to survive by using his own healing powers to keep himself alive. The thought of Thomas opening Henry, and himself, taking out his own organs and transferring them to him, made Henry feel the urge to vomit which he was thankfully able to suppress.

Thomas asks Henry to remain here for the time being, but Henry insists on going back there to help the others, despite what he had been through, he honestly felt like new and knew he had to get back. Thomas accepts this and they both leave the train for Devimon to give them a lift back.

WarGrowlmon began to weaken against Etemon, but thankfully, Kyubimon, Gargomon, Strikedramon and Leomon tried to help with some form of success, Etemon was able to fend off the Champion Level Digimon easily, but they were able to let WarGrowlmon get a few good shots in. Unfortunately, WarGrowlmon lost all of his energy and Degenerated back into Guilmon, with that, Etemon was able to defeat the Digimon much easier, though he was somewhat injured.

Takato runs in preparing his super strength, Etemon doesn't realise his power and merely mocks him until Takato's punch sent him flying over to the other side of the pyramid, but instead of following him to finish off the job, they use this opportunity to retreat so they can recover, before they do however, Thomas, Henry and Devimon arrived with news that Henry is just fine, unsurprisingly, Jeri runs up and hugs Henry surprising him. Thomas asks about Etemon with Takato saying he sent him flying.

Thomas then decides that they should try to shut down the pyramid until they destroy Etemon, so long as Etemon is using it to create more artificial Digimon, it'll just give them and the Digital World more trouble. He insists that he and Devimon will try to hold Etemon off while they try to find the center control room to shut down the pyramid, Ryo asks how they can shut it down without knowledge on how, with Thomas just implying that they should just try to destroy it and he'll repair it later. Takato insists that he helps fight him, but Thomas refuses, saying that he should save his power for emergencies, he then provides them directions to the control room. With that, the gang run off with their Digimon, still sore, while Thomas and Devimon make their way to where Etemon landed.

Back at the train, Suzie, Kazu, Kenta, Jessica, Lopmon and Kapurimon were talking about what had happened, they weren't expecting another human to just try to stop them from defeating the Dark Ones, Kenta claims that he might be an evil Tamer who's working for the Dark Ones, but Jessica asks them why he would call Thomas twisted. Kazu then claims that other Tamers trying to stop them might be in the pyramid, ignoring what Jessica said, so he tries to call Thomas on his Digivice, but no response, so he decides to head to the pyramid to try and help, with Suzie and Kenta following, Jessica stays behind believing she can't do anything. Kapurimon Digivolves into Hagurumon again and the five run towards the pyramid.

Deeper inside the pyramid, the gang have been travelling across it and dealing with any Gazimon and Skullmon who got in the way, although the Digimon have been weakened from battling Etemon, they were still able to defend their Tamers, and even so, Rika, Takato and Ryo had been helping out however they can. Soon they made it to the control room and Ryo began to work at the computer to try and find a way to turn it off without damaging it yet. During the time Ryo was trying to access it, Henry took notice of the security monitors and feels his heart sink for a second the moment he spotted Kazu, Kenta, Suzie, Lopmon and Hagurumon in the pyramid. Henry immediately runs for the exit with everyone else confused until they noticed what Henry saw, Terriermon, Jeri and Leomon immediately run after Henry with the others staying behind.

Back at the courtyard, Thomas and Devimon continued to fight Etemon, despite Etemon's injuries, he was still winning. Until Thomas noticed the same circle Rika had stepped on, he then stepped into it and created a powerful healing aura that spread throughout the pyramid, it healed the Tamers and their Digimon, while not touching the evil Digimon, Thomas then began to amplify his recoding powers and threatened to recode Etemon into a pile of dust, but it suddenly stopped and the circle turned to a much duller colour. Back at the control room, Takato punched the computers to pieces, this was why the circle lost power. This proved troublesome but at least Thomas was able to heal everyone, but he became shocked to see Etemon take out a Remedy Floppy and recover his injures, leaving Thomas concerned and very annoyed.

Kazu, Kenta, Suzie, Lopmon and Hagurumon continued to run around the pyramid trying to find the others, but a group of Gazimon and Skullmon began to attack them, Kenta throws what he thought was a Blast Floppy but it turned out to be a Jump Floppy and the spring knocks one of the Skullmon away, but it didn't stop the rest from attacking them, at the moment, Lopmon Digivolved into Turuiemon and began to fend off the Skullmon and Gazimon easier, with Hagurumon also Digivolving into Guardromon to fight as well. Learning that they can have an easier time Digivolving their Digimon under stress.

However, an explosion happened, WarGrowlmon was sent flying and changed back into Guilmon, Devimon was changed back to DemiDevimon and fell unconscious, and Thomas was seen flying to them landing on the ground hurt, semi-conscious, Kazu and Kenta tried to get Thomas up, Kenta got a Floppy, hoping it was a Remedy Floppy, but it turned out to be another Party Floppy, which whilst it got Etemon's attention, it also got Henry's attention as he and Terriermon ran to them.

Etemon jumped towards them and grinned, feeling pleased to fight more Tamers. Henry quickly tells the others to run and he and Terriermon will try to hold him off, the others were reluctant but agreed, the others grabbed Thomas and ran off. Etemon smirked, until he took notice of something from Thomas, dangling out of his pocket was three stones, red, blue and yellow, Etemon freaks out and tries to attack the others, but Terriermon Digivolves into Gargomon and uses Etemon's distraction to attack him, Henry doing the same by grabbing a metal pole from a pile of debris and tries to fight him.

Etemon continues to ignore them to try and run for the others, desperate to get the stones, but their continued attacks on him stopped him from doing so, for some reason, Henry's attacks were getting stronger, and was having strange traces of green light. Henry does one last attack, sending Etemon into a wall, furious, he decided to aim at both Henry and Gargomon first. A split second however, Etemon started to glitch slightly and during that split second, Henry saw Etemon get replaced with a silhouette of himself but replaced by white screaming faces before changing back to normal.

As the battle against Etemon continued, Henry and Gargomon were losing badly. Gargomon changes back into Terriermon and Etemon decides to prioritize killing Henry. Grabbing his neck and threw Henry at a giant pile of debris far from where he was and threw a Dark Network attack at him making a large explosion, but to Etemon's shock, two large floating pillars blocked the attack, the pillars had green binary lights around them, and so did Henry's hands and eyes, somehow controlling the pillars with telekinesis and he began to fight Etemon from a distance, using pillars and debris to attack him. The fight continued for a bit until Henry realised the telekinetic energy was depleting, realising this energy was similar to Takato, he transferred the power into his Digivice and sent the energy to Terriermon.

In a blast of light, Terriermon quickly Digivolved into Gargomon and suddenly Matrix Digivolved into Rapidmon, fully rejuvenated and powered up, he fights Etemon, taking full advantage of his speed and power to easily overpower Etemon, then with one Tri Beam attack, completely destroys Etemon, with his death, the Gazimon and Skullmon were signaled of this and suddenly disappear into a binary of light.

Some time passed, and a reawakened Thomas uses his Recoding powers to repair the computers and bring Backup Pyramid back online. Rika asks about those circles that made her see those visions, Thomas explains that the circles are Streamer Amplifiers, old relics that increase the powers of Data Streamers by over 500%, Rika's telepathy powers were enhanced to the point where she was able to read the thoughts of the dead, which naturally disturbed her, Thomas also explains to Henry that when he transferred his organs to Henry during the operation, his DNA began to recode Henry's DNA and somehow transformed him into a Data Streamer with Telekinesis. How this was even possible was unknown, even to Thomas as even he had not expected this outcome, but he claims that they should, take full advantage of this as they now have four Data Streamers.

They knew their next destination as well, Backup Temple, which resided deep within Chip Forest, Thomas concludes that they are creating more artificial Digimon out of the excess data to take over the Digital World. So, they return to the train and set off for their next target.

During their travel, Rika visits Thomas and asks him why his old team mates would try to stop him. Thomas claims it's because that unlike the artificial Digimon the Dark Ones are creating, the Dark Ones themselves are real Digimon and can redeem themselves, they claim that they should be restrained and trialed as opposed to killed. Rika asks if they really should be capturing them and not killing them, with Thomas claiming that he knows without a doubt that they are beyond redemption and should be killed so they never take another life ever again. Thomas then says that his old teammates no longer trust him due to complicated issues, Rika asks why but Thomas refused to answer, claiming it's not relevant to their mission, and he really hates to discuss it.

With that, Rika returns to her carriage, with suspicion that Thomas is hiding something, but hoped it wasn't anything serious.

One thing I've learned about writing fan-fictions is having too many characters in one scene can make things more difficult, this is kind of one of the reasons why working on Rika's AU got more difficult to do when I was trying to include scenes for everyone.

Which really makes me dread when I get to the later parts of Grim Adventures TTYD, but it should be more manageable since I'm following an already made story. But that's not relevant to this.

Being honest, I'm not sure how much is left in terms of chapters like these, while I have the major plot points still memorized, trying to write them down is the hard part, it also doesn't help that I'm in such a huge Final Fantasy mood right now. But regardless I hope your patient enough for this.