Man, and I thought the last chapter ran long. This ended up being 21 pages long! I wanted to post this last month, but I started a new job and this kept getting longer. But now the wait is over!

I hope you guys enjoy!

I DO NOT OWN DIGIMON ADVENTURE, 02, TAMERS, FRONTIER, OR SAVERS!

Chapter 23: The Digidestined Strike Back

Adventure Digital World: Location: The Forest North of Toy Town

Jun and Chizuru screamed, ducking behind trees again as they avoided another volley of ammunition from the strange gray digimon. The sun had just set and all they could see of the fight were the flashes of gunfire from the gray masked Digimon and the fireballs shot from the ToyAgumon and Greymon X, who was doing his best to shield the girls from the worst of the fight.

Mr. Yoshimura and Mr. Yoshi had been gone for a few hours and they were starting to worry now that more of those grey Digimon were starting to come out of the spire again.

"Do you think they've been captured?" Chizuru asked.

"I don't know," Jun said. "But something is wrong. They should have come back by now. We'd better go investigate for ourselves."

"But they told us to stay out here," Chizuru protested.

"Maybe, but that was hours ago. They could be in trouble and we'll never know by just staying here."

"I'm with you, Jun!" Bukamon cried, hovering by her partner's shoulder.

"And we are too, aren't we, Chizuru?" Koromon asked.

Chizuru bit her lip before nodding firmly. "I suppose you're right. We're DigiDestined too, and we won't always be able to rely on Mr. Yoshi and Mr. Yoshimura to always be there to help us. So what's the gameplan, Jun?"

"Ah…" Jun faltered a moment. What would Davis do? Probably something stupid like charge the tower and bust his way inside. But they really couldn't do that while there were still enemy Digimon pouring out. But how else were they supposed to get into the spire? Neither of their Digimon were strong enough for such an assault. Mr. Yoshi's partner had digivolved to Piddomon to clear the way, and Piddomon was a Champion level Digimon. Bukamon and Koromon were only at the InTraining Level.

"There has to be another way inside," Jun growled in frustration, eyeing the entrance to the Control Spire. "Maybe if we stick to the shadows we'll be able to find another entrance.

"In the dark?" Chizuru said skeptically.

"Do you have a better idea?" Jun snapped.

"Well, no," her friend muttered.

"Then let's go."

The two girls and their partners crouched low and snuck away from their spot while Greymon X let loose another scorching volley of Nova Blasts that incinerated a whole flank of enemy Digimon. In the brief flare of fire light, the girls saw that Monzaemon and Pandamon had joined the battle with more Toy Agumon at some point. But even so, more of those Digimon continued to pour out of the tower and reform the incinerated ranks.

"This is hopeless," Chizuru whispered. "There are too many of them. How are we ever going to get inside?"

"I could help," a new voice said.

Jun had to choke off a scream as she stared down at a softly glowing white Digimon that looked a lot like the Lopmon that Willace and Suzie had.

"This way," the glowing Lopmon said, floating ahead of them in the woods towards the spire.

Jun narrowed her eyes as the Lopmon's image started to fizzle in and out, like static.

"Hurry! I can't be here long. Your older companions only managed to open the way for a short time," the Lopmon said.

Jun wasn't sure what to make of that, but it gave her hope that Mr. Yoshimura and Mr. Yoshi had managed to do something inside the tower.

"Here!" the Lopmon said, pointing to a blank stretch of wall just out of sight of the battle and emerging enemy Digimon. "You have to… the door. Leads to… where your adult com… are. Be careful… Destroy… contact you again."

"Wait, what?" Chizuru said, both girls watching in panicked confusion as the Lopmon suddenly disappeared in a staticy haze.

"It was saying that a door of some kind is here," Jun muttered, running her hand along the wall. "Help me find it, Chi."

It took a few unnerving moments but they finally did find the seam of a door.

"Now how do we open it?" Chizuru asked.

They tried to pry it open, but they just couldn't wedge their fingers in enough to pop it open.

"We need a crowbar or something," Jun huffed.

"Great, I'll just go look for one in the woods," Chizuru growled.

"Will this do?" Koromon asked.

The girls looked down and saw that Bukamon and Koromon were holding up one of the enemy Digimon's rifles, which happened to have a long metal blade along the barrel, like the old fashioned muskets that you see in some American Revolutionary War films.

"Doesn't hurt to try," Jun muttered, picking up the heavy weapon and jamming the blade into the seam. "Chi, help me."

Together, Jun and Chizuru managed to pry the door open, nearly falling over when the slab of wall popped open on silent hinges and swung out.

"We did it!" the girl's cried, only to cover each other's mouths when they realized how loud they'd been.

Thankfully, the battle continued on and none of the emerging enemy Digimon appeared to have heard them. The girls and their partner Digimon hurried inside, shutting the wall/door behind them. The space was dimly lit, but they appeared to be inside a server room of some sort. Tall banks of servers provided the light as they flashed. Most had red lights, but there were a few towers with green lights on them as well.

"What do you suppose these are for?" Jun asked, watching as one of the green towers suddenly flashed yellow before fading to a steady red like many of the other towers.

"Desert Spire," Bukamon said, pointing to a label on the tower's side.

"Ah! I think these servers are for Control Spires!" Chizuru exclaimed, pointing to a tower of red lit servers a little ways from where Jun was. "This one is Vending Valley Spire. Mr. Yoshimura and I took that one out this afternoon!"

"And that one is labeled Eastern Toy Town Spire," Koromon spoke up, pointing to the server tower next to it.

"Then that must mean this one is…," Jun said, jogging over to the server by Chizuru. It had green lights on it, but half of the server had yellow too. "Yup. Northern Toy Town Forest Spire. The rest of these are red, meaning that Monzaemon and Pandamon must have destroyed the other Towers before coming here."

"I wonder what the other lit ones are?" Chizuru asked, moving over to another aisle of server towers and stopped before another green lit one. "This one is Western Primary Village Spire. Weren't Mr. Ishida and Jim supposed to be taking care of the control spires around Primary Village?"

"I think so," Jun mused as she approached a whole aisle of green server towers. "None of these have gone red yet. … Ocean Spire? Lake Spire? Frigi Village Spire?"

"Must be a sector that no one's managed to get to yet," Chizuru said.

"And they'll have to wait for now," Jun said, returning to the server tower for the Control Spire they were currently in. "How do we disable this?"

"Like this. Bubble Blast!" Bukamon cried, spitting out a stream of pink bubbles at the server tower.

The tower sparked and smoked, but ultimately continued blinking green and yellow.

"Maybe it needs a stronger blast?" Koromon suggested.

"Let's hold off on that for now," Jun said quickly, covering her partner's mouth, while Chizuru did the same with Koromon.

"They're computer servers for goodness sake," Chizuru muttered. "Let's just unplug them all."

"Right," Jun sighed, taking one end of the server, while Chizuru took the other.

The girls and Digimon began yanking wires out, causing many lights on the tower to turn yellow and red, but had only been doing it for a few minutes before they heard a door open with a loud CLANG! and a light stretched down the main aisle of the server room.

"Hide!" Jun hissed, grabbing Bukamon before ducking down another aisle of server towers.

She waited with baited breath for footsteps, but didn't hear any. She did hear a strange whirr of gears, however. Jun dared to take a peek around the tower she was hiding behind and saw a strange hovering Digmon that appeared to be made out of gears and cogs.

"What a mess!" the machine Digimon creaked. "It's no wonder our connections are going down! This'll take hours to fix."

The Digimon began muttering to himself as he tried to sort out the tangles of wires that littered the ground.

"What do we do?" Bukamon asked.

"We need to get out of here," Jun said softly, backing away from where the machine Digimon was. She nearly jumped out of her skin when she bumped into something, but was relieved that it turned out to be only Chizuru and Koromon.

"Can we please get out of here, Junnie?" Chizuru whimpered, clearly reaching high panic levels.

Jun only nodded, grabbing hold of her friend's hand to not only comfort Chizuru, but ground herself as well. Granted, the machine Digimon wasn't very scary or as dangerous looking as the grey suited Digimon fighting outside, but almost being caught had definitely been unnerving.

The four of them ducked past the aisles of computer server towers towards the door that the machine Digimon had come from and once they were sure that it was completely focused on the mess of wires, they peeked outside the door and were relieved to find no other Digimon in the vicinity. They hurried into the hall and then decided to just pick a random direction to head in. Once they were a good distance away from the server room they began to relax a bit.

"Where do we go now?" Chizuru asked.

"We have to find Mr. Yoshi and Mr. Yoshimura," Jun said.

"And how do we do that?"

"Still working on it," Jun admitted.

"We could go to the main control room," Bukamon suggested.

"What?" both girls asked, then stared at the floor plan map that Bukamon was hovering next to on the wall. It even had a very helpful YOU ARE HERE dot.

"That'll work," Chizuru said, examining the map.

Jun grinned. "I think I have a plan now, guys."

Frontier Digital World: Location: Collapsed Cave

Tetsukomon slowly got to his feet as quietly as he could even though he couldn't see a thing. It was pitch black now that the cave entrance had been collapsed. But he could hear the metal dragon growl and wheeze and his mechanisms hissed and whirred. Being as large as it was, Tetsukomon hoped that it had taken some damage during the cave in and that it's movements were limited now.

Taking a few measured breaths, Tetsukomon did his best to calm his mind. It wasn't easy. Inside the Warrior form, Yutaka was terrified to face this thing on his own. He could only hope that the others had managed to get out of the cave unharmed before the entrance had closed and were now making efforts to get him out.

The beast suddenly let out a loud roar and a blinding bright light from an energy attack lit up the cave. The attack missed him completely and collapsed another section of the cave. Now Tetsukomon knew where the metal dragon was. He was quick to move away from his current position though because if he'd seen the dragon there was every chance that the dragon had seen him too and that the attack was just a ploy to reveal his location.

He circled around to where he knew the beast was. He believed he'd gotten lucky and managed to find a blind spot the next time it launched another attack. It hit where he had been standing during the last attack. This time he was slightly behind the dragon. While Tetsukomon readied himself to make an attack of his own, he felt an instinctive urge to duck. Following his intuition, he did just before something swiped at where his head had been. He could feel the displaced air whoosh over him. His instincts flared up again and he dove left.

This continued on for a few more minutes before Tetsukomon realized that he was detecting the metal dragon's attacks. He could sense the metal that the beast was armored in. And, more importantly, where it was not.

After he let the dragon dictate the pace of the fight for a few moments more, Tetsukomon was finally presented with the opportunity he was waiting for and lunged with his sword extended and stabbed at the empty space he couldn't detect chrome digizoid, thrusting his blade in up to the hilt.

The dragon let out a wailing roar and hissed and clanked as it writhed. Tetsukomon jumped back, getting clear as the beast roared and thrashed about. It was in his good fortune that the dragon broke through the collapsed entrance and tumbled out of the cave and into the river below. Tetsukomon hurried to the newly reopened entrance and stared at the now still metal dragon lying in the river. Off to his right along the bank, he spotted Shinya, Rikuto and Umi standing with Bokomon, Neemon, and what appeared to be the entire Candlemon village.

Before anyone could say anything, the metal beast below them suddenly exploded into a mess of fractal code. Yutaka reverted from his Warrior form and pulled out his D-Tector, doing what Sorcermon had told him to do when a Digimon was defeated and presented its fractal code for purification.

"Fractal Code Digitize!" he said, swiping his digivice out in front of him towards the data.

The fractal code flew into his D-Tector and Yutaka was surprised to see an idol of some sort attached to the end of it. The shape of the dragon down in the river had shrank and revealed itself to be another Candlemon.

When Yutaka looked down at his D-Tector, his Warrior symbol for Steel was glowing brightly and the visage of the dragon was staring back at him.

"Is this… my Beast Spirit?" he asked.

"Yutaka!"

Yutaka looked up just in time to get knocked over by Shinya as the smaller boy ran up and tackle-hugged him.

"Are you alright?" Umi asked as she and her brother arrived.

"A bit bruised," Yutaka grunted, patting Shinya on the back, "but I'll live."

"What was that thing?" Rikuto asked.

"I think… it was my Beast Spirit," Yutaka told them. He then began to explain to them about how the fight went after he got trapped inside the cave with it and what happened when he scanned its fractal code.

"I believe you're right, my boy," Bokomon said after he saw Yutaka's D-Tector. "Candlemon don't normally Digivolve into that sort of thing. It actually reminds me of the time BurningGreymon possessed a Shamanmon before Takuya found and claimed the Beast Spirit of Fire. You too should try transforming into the Beast Spirit, Yutaka. Then, perchance, we'll know its name."

"You want him to turn into that thing?" Rikuto asked, massaging the shoulder the metal dragon had hit early in the fight.

"Why, yes," Bokomon said, looking surprised. "He'll need to if he's going to be able to fight in that form."

Yutaka looked at his D-Tector and then back at the cave that was pretty wrecked from the fight he'd just had against the Beast Spirit.

"Maybe later," he said, thinking back on what he'd heard about some of his brother's friends' experiences when they'd transformed into their Beast Spirit forms for the first time. If he was recalling some of Bokomon and Neemon's stories correctly, Takuya hadn't had any control over BurningGreymon when they'd first met. With that in mind… "I think the Candlemon have had enough destruction happening near their village and that we've all had enough excitement for one day."

"Good idea," Shinya said. "Besides, you've gotta be tired. You practically fought that thing all by yourself! You were amazing today Yutaka."

"Thanks, Shinya," Yutaka said, smiling wearily at the boy.

"Yeah, let's let him rest and get Riku patched up before we go anywhere," Umi chimed in.

The four new Warrior DigiDestined returned to the Candlemon Village and remained there for the rest of the morning.

Adventure Digital World: Location: Desert Spire

Momoe stared in amazement as the spire came toppling down. It had taken ages for them to destroy that thing. It had been a stroke of luck when the control spire took enough damage from Centarumon's surprise attack. The centaur Digimon had come out of nowhere to aid them. The damage he'd caused to the spire, however, had been enough to allow Mr. Hiroko's Tentomon to digivolve into Kuwagamon and destroy the tower. However, their work wasn't done yet. The area was still swarming with those strange grey suited Digimon.

"Momoe look out!" Minomon cried, jumping out of her arms and began to glow yellow. "MINOMON! DIGIVOLVE TOOO… WORMMON!"

Momoe dove to the side to avoid the gunshots aimed her way and quickly scrambled to her feet to see where her partner had ended up. Instead of the small larva digimon she'd had seconds ago, a caterpillar digimon now scurried in her place, spitting strings of some kind at the grey gun-toting Digimon that'd been shooting at Momoe. She looked a lot like Ken Ichijoji's partner, although her markings were more pink than purple.

"Momoe, we need to run!" Wormmon cried, moving surprisingly fast for a caterpillar.

Momoe didn't hesitate as she picked up her partner and raced towards where she'd last seen Mr. Hiroko. She spotted the tall lanky man a few minutes later and raced toward him, but before she could get within shouting distance, they were cut off by a fresh wave of the grey suited Digimon.

"I'm getting really sick of these guys," she cried, eyes tearing up as a line of guns were leveled at her. She heard the clicks of their barrels as they took aim and clenched her eyes shut. This was it.

"ICE PRISM!"

Or not.

Momoe opened her eyes in time to see the frozen forms of her would-be shooters before a blur of purple took them out and a large red bird flew overhead, raining down orange sparks onto the grey digimon still swarming out of the remains of the control spire.

"MOMOE!"

Momoe found herself suddenly engulfed in a hug from her older brother.

"Are you alright?!" Montarou demanded, stepping back and holding her at arm's length so that he could get a good look at her.

"Fine," Momoe stammered, readjusting her glasses. "Thanks for the save."

"Yes, thank you," Wormmon piped up.

Montarou startled, staring at her partner for a moment before shrugging. "Uh, no problem."

"Glad you're safe," a voice said in a very chipper tone.

Momoe looked over towards the voice and saw a purple penguin, which had to have been the Digimon that had taken out those enemy Digimon.

"Thanks… err…"

"His name is Penguinmon," Montarou said. "He digivolved from Chichimon."

"Oh! Cool. Thanks, Penguinmon," Momoe said, bowing towards the tubby bird.

"Aww, it was nothing!" the penguin said, rubbing the back of his head with a flipper in an embarrassed fashion.

"Are you kids alright?"

Momoe and Montarou looked up and saw Mr. Hiroko and Mrs. Yoshimura coming their way with Centarumon. Mrs. Yoshimura's partner and Kuwagamon were still fighting with the remains of the grey suited Digimon army.

"A bit shaken, but we're fine," Momoe said with a small smile. "Thanks to you and Mantarou getting here in the nick of time anyway, Mrs. Yoshimura."

"You can call me Yumi, dear," the woman said, smiling with relief. "You and Keisuke had a lot more of those things attacking you than we did. Thankfully these things don't appear to be too bright. I managed to trick them into blowing up our control spire. Unfortunately that didn't leave much for us to investigate, so we just had Hirotorimon burn out the rest of it like a bad ant hill."

"Let's see if we have any luck with this one," Mr. Hiroko said, turning to the remains of their Control Spire.

With that said, the four of them and their Digimon partners made their way over to where the base of the tower had been. It took Kuwagamon and Hirotorimon moving some of the debris, but they eventually found a set of spiraling stairs that led down. Kuwagamon and Hirotorimon were too big to travel down in their Champion levels, so they de-digivolved into Biyomon and Tentomon again.

Momoe stuck close to Montarou and Penguinmon, holding Wormmon tightly as they descended, but her partner didn't complain. There wasn't any light as they descended, so Tentomon took the lead and formed sparks between his wings to create illumination. When they made it to the bottom, Yumi picked up a piece of wood that had been dislodged in the crumbling structure and had Biyomon light it. They did this a few times until all the humans had a burning stick to hold.

They passed through several winding passages until they came to what Mr. Hiroko believed to be the main control room, which was in shambles. A large wall of monitors full of mostly cracked and some shattered screens lined one wall and there were a couple of metal gear Digimon lying about in a daze.

"Hagurumon," Keisuke said, frowning as he approached one. "Hey, gearhead. You've got some explaining to do."

The machine Digimon clanked in startled movement, creaking worriedly.

"E-e-explaining?! We've done nothing wrong!" it cried.

"You don't think running a control spire and unleashing armies of those grey monsters is wrong?" Mr. Hiroko snapped. Tentomon sparked angrily next to him, making the Hagurumon creak and wheeze nervously.

"I'm just doing as my master commanded," it cried. "He said that no one should interfere! The Troopmon were only defending the spire."

"Is that what those monsters are called? Troopmon?" Yumi asked. "And who is this master you serve?"

"Mustn't say! Mustn't say!" the Hagurumon wailed, it's companion wailing the same thing.

"The Master will be angry!" the second one cried. "All his plans… All his lovely Control Spires… gone!"

"All but a few if this is any indication," Montarou said.

Momoe jumped, having not realized that her brother had moved away and taken up a position besides one of the few intact monitors. She joined him, looking over his shoulder curiously. It showed a map of File Island. There were many red dots where she assumed control spires once stood, because she recognized some of the locations she knew that the others had gone to investigate. Only one in the forest she knew Chizuru and Jun were investigating was still green, but it flashed yellow on occasion. Then there were three other green dots along a section of coast on the island that no one was investigating yet.

"The master will be angry! The master will be angry!" wailed the Hagurumon. "His plan has failed. His plan has failed!"

"Who is your master?" Mr. Hiroko demanded.

"Mustn't say!"

"I don't think we're going to get much out of them, Keisuke," Yumi said softly. "Not in this state."

"You're probably right. We should bring them to Gennai," Mr. Hiroko sighed. "He'll have an idea what to do."

It was a bit of a struggle, but they managed to drag the Hagurumon out of the Control Spire. Momoe was surprised to see Gennai's base already waiting for them.

"Centarumon alerted me to the news," the digital man explained as several of his look-alikes headed down into the Control Spire's remains.

"Your timing couldn't be anymore perfect," Mr. Hiroko said before launching into his explanation for what they found and about the Hagurumon, who were whisked away into the base by more of Gennai's kind.

"A master, you say?" Gennai said, looking troubled. "And you say they called these Digimon Troopmon? I can honestly say that I've never heard of them."

"What does that mean?" Momoe asked, hugging Wormmon to her.

"It means," Gennai said grimly, "that forces outside of our world are working to seal us off from the other worlds and prevent us from getting help to your sister and her friends."

Momoe shared a concerned look with her brother. "Yolei…"

"We'll get there," Montarou said with sudden certainty, pulling her into a hug. "We're getting our baby sister back, Mo, no matter what it takes."

Tamers Digital World: Location: Level 5 - Forest Level

Alice looked around at the stretch of forest ahead of them. The door separating level 4 and 5 opened up in the middle of a meadow on the edge of a forest. She could see flocks of bird Digimon flying over the treetops and several different kinds of Digimon she didn't know the names of running around between the trunks. Level 3 had been a very lively community, but all the Digimon here felt wild.

In the distance, Kai was pointing out a group of tall long necked dinosaurs that Grapleomon called Brachiomon. There were a lot of other assorted dinosaur looking Digimon roaming the more open spaces of the level as well, while the forest seemed to shelter the smaller mammal-based looking Digimon.

"This is probably where those DarkTyrannomon came from," Alice mused as she spotted a pack of both the normal red Tyrannomon and the black DarkTyrannomon.

Minami shuddered beside her. "The ones here seem so peaceful, though."

"Yeah, well, how would you feel if you'd been stuck in that elevator lift thing for days on end?" Kai asked. "The lockdown's been in effect for a little over a week now. If those DarkTyrannomon were stuck in there that whole time… What?"

Alice and Minami stared at Kai.

"That was surprisingly insightful," Alice said, smiling. "Very good deductive reasoning, Kai."

Kai blushed, scratching the back of his head. "Yeah, well… it's been known to happen."

The girls giggled, moving on with the rest of their large group as they entered the forest.

It was hard to find a Digimon that was willing to stop and converse with them. Like Alice had thought, most of the Digimon on this level were wild and very few actually spoke any discernable language that wasn't grunts, roars, or wails. They eventually came across an Apemon, who seemed to be the leader of a small group of some civilized Digimon. If you could call a clan of Shamanmon and Goblimon civil, that is. From what Alice could tell, the Shamanmon and Goblimon idolized Apemon for his shiny golden red streaked fur, and the power he demonstrated with the use of his bone stick. For such a brightly colored Digimon, Apemon was stealthy. They hadn't seen him until he was already in their midst with his clan of goblin monsters.

"What you want?" Apemon asked, brandishing his bone club at them. "Why you here?"

It was Jijimon and Babamon who came forward to explain to the clan their purpose. Alice, Kai and Minami got a lot of oohs and aahs from the Goblimon, and a lot of the Shamanmon were saying that their predictions had been right. Apemon himself had been silent throughout the entire explanation, his intelligent eyes flickering from the humans to the large group of Digimon accompanying them.

When asked about a possible location for where the lock to their level was located, Apemon merely grunted, "This way," and took off into the trees, his clan scrambling to follow him, as well as everybody else.

"Nice guy," Kai commented sarcastically as they raced after the streak of yellow that glinted occasionally in the treetops.

"He doesn't seem to be a mon of many words," Minami mused.

"With only Shamanmon and Goblimon for company to converse with, is it any wonder?" Alice asked softly so that only her friends could hear, though if Monochromon's snicker and some chuffing laughter from some Dobermon were any indication, a few of the Digimon around her had heard.

Apemon led them back out of the forest to a large stretch of grassland, not unlike the level below. However, this grassland was pitted with stretches of pixelated water and mud.

"Beware spots," Apemon said, pointing to the strange ditches of water and mud. "Will catch you and suck you under to lower level."

"Must be how those DarkTyrannomon got down there and into the elevator to level 3," Alice mused. "The elevator was their only way to avoid getting swept away from the flash floods. Then the lockdown happened and they were stuck."

"How awful," Minami whispered.

"Now I feel pretty bad about destroying those guys," Monochromon grunted.

"What's done is done," Grapleomon said. "All we can do is move forward."

The humans nodded and followed Apemon across the plains. It took a few hours, but finally, on the horizon they could see a formation of rocks in the distance, though it was too far away to make out any particular shape they may have formed. Apemon insisted that they rest in a large swath of grassland next to the only pool of water that hadn't looked pixelated. It was the only good water for kilometers apparently, and safe for everyone drink.

While everyone settled down to camp for a short while, Alice noticed that the Shamanmon were building a fire. Where they'd gotten the materials, she had no idea, but once they got the fire started, they began to dance. Their Goblimon clansmen clapping and chanting with them. Then, to everyone's amazement, images began to appear in the fire's flames. It showed the DigiDestined in the other Digital World.

Images of Tai hurt and getting attended to by his medic friend - Joe? Jay? - while his sister and others hovered worriedly flashed in the flames. That Koji guy was seated, rubbing at a bruise on his shoulder while his larger friend in the blue jumpsuit inspected another spot with a strange crystal in hand, but his twin, Koichi, was nowhere in sight. The older blond from Tai's world also seemed to be missing his younger brother. Takato and Henry were looking worried as well as they talked with Rika, Ryo and a boy that looked a lot like Koji and Koichi, but was from Tai's world. Alice wanted to laugh though when she saw Kazu and Kenta playing cards on the ground with their Digimon, trying to teach Jeri, Suzie, Ai and Mako. Everyone had looked so serious and grim and were clearly missing two more members of their group, so the slightly cheerful scene of Kazu and Kenta clearly helping Jeri babysit the younger kids was amusing.

"I wonder where the other twin and that TK guy are?" Kai mused. "And what happened to Tai?"

"Captured," Apemon grunted, startling them. They hadn't even heard him approach. "Two moon shifts ago, Tai, TK and Kouichi were attacked by enemy. Zaigou knock out Koichi and TK. Tai try to protect. Tai get stabbed and left behind. Enemy leave with other two."

Alice, Kai and Minami shared startled looks.

"Are they dead?" Kai asked.

"According to Shamanmon, no," Apemon huffed. "Held captive. Know no more."

The three humans looked back at the Shamanmon's fire and watched more images of Takato and the others travel through underground tunnels.

Adventure World: Location: Plains West of Primary Village

"What the hell am I doing?" Jim thought to himself as he and Bukamon followed Ninjamon through the underground network of passageways under the Control Spire.

A little over two hours ago, Piximon, Elecmon, and Unimon had attacked the Control Spire, disabling it enough for Mr. Ishida's partner to digivolve into Houkomon. While the fight above ground was raging, Ninjamon had helped Jim, Bukamon, and a pair of Palmon sneak in down the stairs. They'd had to stop frequently to dart into the shadows to avoid being seen by more of those grey suited gasmask Digimon as they raced up to join the battle above.

Now they were in the main corridors of the base. Ninjamon had found a very helpful map of the entire compound. It even had a nice little YOU ARE HERE dot on it. They were currently making their way to the control center, but had on occasion snuck into side rooms to avoid machine Digimon the Palmon told him were called Hagurumon. Jim couldn't tell if there were many of them, or if it was just the same one patrolling the halls.

"Quick, in here," Ninjamon hissed, darting into another room along the hall. Jim did as he was told, darting inside. A minute later he could hear the creak and clank of the Hagurumon's gears as it floated by.

"Holy cow! What is this place?" Bukamon asked.

Jim shushed him, but looked behind him and realized that the room was full of mostly red computer server towers.

"Looks like something important," Ninjamon sneered, loosening his katana from its scabbard on his back. "Let's mess this up."

Jim watched as the short onion-shaped Digimon started slashing cables and cords to bits with a manically gleeful delight. While he was doing that, the Palmon were pulling cords out of the server towers, while Jim looked at the labels. He wasn't good with computers or electronics by any means, but it didn't take a computer wiz like that Izzi kid to realize that each server tower represented a Control Spire. When he pointed this out to the others, Ninjamon took great pleasure in cutting clean through the actual hardware to the control spire they were currently in, destroying it beyond repair.

That was when the alarms began to sound.

"So much for stealth," Jim sighed.

"Nah, this is just a distraction," Ninjamon said as if everything were going according to plan rather than improvisation. "With any luck everyone will be here and vacate the control room."

"We need to get out and away from here unseen first," Jim pointed out, following Ninjamon out of the server room and down the hallway again before ducking into another room at the sound of marching footsteps and whirring gears echoed down the hall. "And now we're trapped."

"Yee of little faith," Ninjamon tisked. "We'll be using the vents for a bit. Hope you're not claustrophobic, kid."

Jim grimaced. He wouldn't say he was claustrophobic, but he didn't like being enclosed in narrow spaces all the same. Regardless, he bit the proverbial bullet and followed Ninjamon, Bukamon and a Palmon through the vents with the second Palmon bringing up the rear. Jim was rather tall and had to crawl through on his belly, slowly so as not to make noise. He felt like he was a burden to the group in there. Ninjamon's compact frame slipped through the vents easily. Bukamon had no problem either, being the smallest in the party. The Palmon were rather flexible and moved rather easily too. Ninjamon and Bukamon would often traverse ahead to get a better fix on their location while Jim slowly crawled along.

Thankfully, they weren't in the vents too long. Ninjamon managed to navigate them to a room he claimed was only a couple down from the main control room. Jim was very grateful to the two Palmon that helped lower him back out of the vents. Without their help, he'd have probably have toppled out face first.

Despite his impulsive planning, Ninjamon was right about the control room practically being vacated by personnel in favor of investigating the server room. There was only one Hagurumon manning the control panel and eyeing the monitors that appeared to have cameras in various locations around the base and outside monitoring the fight.

Before Jim could ask what they were going to do next, Ninjamon darted in and knocked the Hagurumon out with a hard hit to the back of the machine's head with the butt of his katana handle. The Palmon were quick to tie him up and gag him. Jim and Bukamon decided to join Ninjamon by the monitors and began to see what they could find.

The server room appeared to have only one Hagurumon hovering frantically about bemoaning the mess they'd made earlier while a troop of those grey Digimon left the room. Jim nervously tracked their progress and was relieved to see them heading above ground to join the fight.

"Barracks are empty," Ninjamon reported. "So not too many of those goon-mon are left. We have a few still patrolling the halls, but there appear to only be two Hagurumon in this place. Systems are failing."

That last bit was said rather gleefully.

Jim wasn't sure what he was doing, but while tapping around randomly he came across a recording of some kind.

"Your orders are to finish construction on the Control Spires on File Island," a smooth, but monotone man's voice said. "Once preparations are complete, continue on to Server Continent. I want this world locked down. Do no fail, Hagurumon, or you will face Lord Iramon's rather personally."

"Iramon?" Jim repeated. "But isn't that one of the Zaigou from that other world? The one that carved up that JP kid's face?"

Ninjamon scowled, but nodded. "Sure is. We need to get out of here and wreck this place. Then we need to contact Gennai. He needs to know."

Jim nodded, turning to leave when they were suddenly face to face with the second Hagurumon.

"Stop right there!" the machine creaked. "So you're the meddlers! I'll destroy you!"

"JIM!"

Jim just barely dodged a thrown gear attack from the machine Digimon and saw in the corner of his eye, his partner glow yellow-gold.

"BUKAMON DIGIVOLVE TOOO… CRABMON!"

"Back off, bub!" a gravely voice snarled. There was a loud clang and Hagurumon let out a pained cry.

Jim looked up and saw that instead of his little hovering partner, there was a large blue-grey crab that nearly came up to Jim's knees with metal bladed pincers that were snapping menacingly at the flying gear Digimon.

"You alright, Jim?" the crab asked.

"Yeah… fine. Thanks," Jim stammered. "You sure grew into a big guy, Bukamon."

"I'm Crabmon now," the crustacean digimon said with a smirk. "Ninjamon, what say we take care of these clankers and get outta here?"

"Fine by me," Ninjamon said, with a smirk of his own, and darted foward, cleaving the one that had attacked Jim in two, turning him into bits of data while Crabmon lifted the one they'd knocked out and tied up earlier. It was awake now, and staring fearfully at them.

"Cooperate and we won't turn you into data bits like your friend," Crabmon growled, dragging the machine Digimon along as they made their way out of the base.

Jim didn't know how to feel about how Ninjamon had just cut down the attacking Hagurumon, or how his own partner had threatened to do the same to the other, but he knew for sure that with the way these enemy Digimon had come after them with the intent to kill… surely it could be considered self-defence, right? This was turning into a war. Kill or be killed and all that… But still, it didn't mean that Jim had to be comfortable about taking a Digimon's life, right? He was a doctor's son. He was raised to save lives, not take them.

"Jim! Quit dragging your feet and let's go!" Ninjamon snapped.

Setting the moral dilemma aside for now, Jim hurried to follow the others. He told himself that he'd talk with Mr. Ishida and Crabmon about it later.

Adventure Digital World: Location: Northern Forest Spire

Saito pressed his back against the wall waiting for the patrol of grey Digimon to pass by on the other side of the alcove he was hiding in. Once the sound of their marching was gone, he relaxed.

"Saito, this is taking too long," Haru said. "The girls are sure to be worried about us by now."

"Without a doubt," Saito sighed. "How's Piddomon holding up?"

"I'm fine," the angel Digimon said, despite the fact he was holding his right wing tucked in close to his body. He flexed it experimentally, but flinched when it was fully extended. It was more than he had been able to do with it recently, though. "I'll heal up soon enough."

One of those gasmask wearing freaks had taken a shot that clipped him good in the wing an hour ago.

"We need to get to back to that control room," Haru sighed. "We were able to make contact with someone outside of our world."

"I know, but to do that, we need to clear the room. We nearly got caught last time," Saito huffed. "What we need is a distraction."

No sooner had he said that, an alarm began to sound. The two men and Piddomon looked at each other, then pressed themselves tight against the wall as a Hagurumon followed by a troop of those grey Digimon marched past.

They waited a moment to make sure no more were coming.

"Now's our chance," Saito sighed. "Let's move."

The trio hurried out of their hiding place and darted down the corridor to where the control room was located. Just as they were reaching the right door, they heard hurrying footsteps towards their location. They darted into the control room, which was thankfully empty, and stood against the wall behind the door. The door opened again a few minutes later but before Saito and Haru jumped whoever came through it, they recognized who it was.

"Jun? Chizuru?"

The two teens squealed softly, whirling around on the spot to face them with wide eyes and startled expressions.

"Oh thank God!" Jun cried. "We thought you two had been captured!"

"This place is better guarded than we anticipated," Saito sighed, patting the two girls on the shoulder. "Sorry we worried you."

"How did you get in?" Haru asked. "Those grey mask wearing freaks are everywhere."

Jun and Chizuru then began to tell them a strange story about a white Lopmon who showed them how to get in through a backdoor in the tower, about the room full of servers they'd found, and how they'd found a supply room and rigged it to explode.

"So that's what all the fuss was about," Haru chuckled. "Looks like we've got a couple of pyromaniacs here, Sai."

"You two did good work," Saito said, amused by the girl's beaming grins. "Now let's see what we can learn about this place and level it to the ground."

With that the four of them looked over the computer console while Piddomon, Bukamon, and Koromon kept watch. Jun and Chizuru had done a good job with the distraction. The place was crawling with those grey Digimon and two Hagurumon. Haru found the server room, and reported that another of the server towers had turned red - the last one in the area Hiroaki and Jim were supposed to be checking out.

"We take this tower out, then all that'll be left are the three on the coast," Haru said, pointing out the three red dots on a map of File Island he'd found marked with Control Spire locations.

"There are plans for somewhere called Server," Jun reported, pulling up a larger map on her screen covered in grey dots. "But I don't think anything's been built yet."

"Why? They clearly have the manpower," Chizuru said, pulling up a screen. "And look what I found. I don't think those grey Digimon are naturally born. They look manufactured."

Saito joined the girl and scowled then he saw what was clearly a factory making more of those things.

"No wonder they keep coming," he snarled. "They keep making more of them."

"Can we shut it down from here?" Jun asked.

"I'm not a computer wiz, like Keisuke, but I sure can try," Haru said, pulling up what he could on the production facility. "I'm a pretty decent hacker."

Saito and the girls watched as Haru's fingers flew across the keys for minutes on end. His efforts must have led to something, however, because the footage of the Digimon making production line began to show red lights flashing and things were clearly going wrong. A few more minutes later and the two Hagurumon appeared on screen trying to fix things.

"Oh no you don't," Haru snarled. "Here's what you get for creating such abominations."

He tapped a few more keys and things began to explode on screen until the footage cut out. A few seconds later the ground shook.

"Okay, time to go," Saito decided when another larger tremor shook the place. "You ready to bust some heads, Piddomon?"

"Yes," Piddomon said, flapping his wings strongly. The right wing still seemed to be giving him some trouble, but if he said he was good to go, Saito wasn't going to question him.

They hurried out of the control spire, deciding to take the way Jun and Chizuru had used to sneak in. It was better than trying to battle a ton of those grey masked monsters. Just when they thought they were home free in the server room, the two Hagurumon came screaming out of nowhere, parts of their metal bodies melted.

"YOU! MEDDLERS!" they screeched, going right for the girls. "YOU SHALL PAY FOR INTERFERING WITH THE MASTER'S WORK!"

Saito grabbed hold of Chizuru, pulling her back, and Haru managed to push Jun out of the deranged pair's path, but Haru took a bad hit to the back.

Piddomon was there in an instant, blasting the berserk Digimon back, but they kept dodging the angle's attacks and went for the humans again.

"Jun!" "Chizuru!" the two In-Training partner Digimon cried before jumping at the Hagurumon, their bodies glowing with the light of Digivolution.

"KOROMON! DIGIVOLVE TOOO… SNOW AGUMON!"

"BUKAMON! DIGIVOLVE TOOO… SYAKOMON!"

Saito stared in amazement at the white Agumon standing before him and the others next to a pink shelled Digimon with a green blobby bunny body inside that had big yellow eyes.

"You guys need to cool off!" Snow Agumon cried before firing a white blast, "Ice Shot!"

"Water Pressure!" Syakomon squealed before sending a stream of water at the two Hagurumon.

The combined attacks froze the two Hagurumon solid. As they began to fall to the ground, Piddomon smashed them to bits with his staff.

"Now let's get out of here," Haru sighed, helping Jun up.

Together, Syakomon, Snow Agumon, and Piddomon managed to blast the door open and quickly exited the Control Spire.

"Greymon X! Monzaemon! Pandamon! Level this thing and let's be done with it!" Saito shouted as soon as they were clear.

The two Campion level and one Ultimate level Digimon reveled in cutting loose and utterly demolishing the tower. Greymon X even burned out all of the lower levels with his Mega Flame, nearly blowing himself up as the underground levels reacted and exploded.

Evacuation of the area was swift and hurried, but it was very satisfying to see that spire gone. Luckily in the battle surrounding the spire, a lot of the trees had been knocked down and the ground upturned so the fire didn't spread.

Piddomon healed Haru's back before returning to his Patamon form, exhausted, and fell asleep in an instant. Not long after, Gennai's base appeared to pick them up. They were the last team to be collected and Saito was greatly relieved to see his wife again. Jun and Chizuru were quick to join the other teens and after a brief reunion, a very serious looking Gennai called them all together for a meeting. It was time for a debrief.

Savers Human World: Location: DATS HQ

Masaru watched his father and the tech personnel scurry around as they triple checked that they had everything they thought that they would need, as well as backup supplies. It was a lot.

"It took a couple days, but I think we're ready," Thoma sighed as he took a seat next to Masaru.

"So who all's going?" Masaru asked.

"You, me, Yoshino, your dad, Chika, Ikuto, Mr. and Mrs. Noguchi, Director Satsuma, Commander Yushima, Miki, Megumi, and some of the tech staff."

Masaru sighed, looking over to where Ikuto and Chika were sitting together, playing with Ikuto's kid sister while the Noguchi parents were helping check equipment.

"Your mom is going to be taking care of Ruka while her family is away," Tohma said, seeing part of what was troubling Masaru.

"Do Chika and Ikuto really have to come?" Masaru asked softly.

"I'd give good money to see you try to stop them," Tohma chuckled. "Ikuto grew up in the Digital World, Masaru. He wants to go no matter what. As for your sister… I don't think she would forgive you or any of us for leaving her behind this time. Commander Yushima gave her a Digivice IC of her own a while ago. Piyomon is her partner and both she and Ikuto have every right to join us as DATS agents. Besides, they're as old as we were when you joined DATS. We have no right to tell them no."

"But we're going to war," Masaru argued. "That's no place for kids like them."

"Maybe you've forgotten in the last five years, but Ikuto has already been part of a war," Tohma said sternly. "You haven't been around to see him getting restless these last few weeks. He's been training and pulling moves in the gym that I haven't seen him do since he was that feral child we brought back from the Digital World. He's been teaching Chika too. Both are determined to go and will give you quite a fight if you try and stop them now. They're as prepared as they're ever going to be. It's more than we ever were when we started."

"And besides," Yoshino's voice piped in, "they'll have us watching their backs."

Masaru leveled an unimpressed glare at the both of them.

"And if it was Relena, Tohma?" Masaru asked. "What if she wanted to go?"

Tohma pursed his lips and glared unhappily right back at Masaru.

"As she is? No. But!" Tohma snapped. "If she had the experience and interaction with Digimon and the training that Chika's gone through these last few weeks with Ikuto? I wouldn't like it. I'd do my best to talk her out of it, but in the end I'd let her go if that is what she wanted."

"And it's what I want, big brother."

Masaru turned around and saw Chika standing behind him with Ikuto at her side. Both young teens were staring up at him in a determined fashion.

"We're going," Ikuto declared.

"We're heading for a war zone," Masaru said grimly. "We have no idea if we'll be able to get back once we're there. Some of us are more than likely to get hurt. We may even die over there."

Both youths looked at each other before returning their gaze to Masaru.

"We understand," they said.

"And you still want to go?" Masaru pressed.

"Yes."

"Even if we may never see our families again?"

"Yes."

Masaru sighed, glancing over at Tohma and Yoshino, both of whom only smiled sadly back at him as if to say, "You warned them. What else can you do?" Masaru shook his head, but nodded at Chika and Ikuto. They nodded back solemnly before stepping forward to hug him.

"Is it time to say our goodbyes already?"

Masaru looked up to see his mother smiling sadly at them. His heart ached. He'd missed her so much over the last five years and now after only being back home for a couple of days he was leaving her again. And worse, he was taking his dad and Chika with him, leaving her all alone on Earth. Sure, Suguru wasn't going further than their own Digital World, but he and Chika were essentially heading to war. They might never see her again.

"Mom…"

"I'm really proud of you, Masaru. You too, Chika," Sayuri Daimon said as she stepped forward to join the group hug. Ikuto was quick to slip out of it though and for that, Masaru was grateful as he held his mother and sister close.

"I'm sorry I have to leave you again so soon, Mom," he whispered.

"As am I," Sayuri sighed, tears in her eyes. "But I believe that the two of you'll come back to me again. Take care of your sister and Ikuto, Masaru."

"I will," Masaru said, his voice husky from holding back tears. Real men didn't break down and cry just because they were leaving. This wasn't goodbye. If his mom believed they'd come back, then he was going to do his damned best to make sure they did so that she didn't have a reason to cry again.

"Chika, listen to Masaru," Sayuri said, her voice watery as well as she ran her fingers through her daughter's hair. "He knows what he's doing when it comes to working with and fighting Digimon. But make sure he doesn't do anything too reckless."

"Yes, ma'am," Chika hiccupped as she leaned into her mother's touch.

"Take care," Sayuri said, pulling back out of the hug.

Chika and Masaru nodded.

"They'll be fine, Sayuri," Suguru said as he joined them and hugged his wife. "Masaru is a great man. He's defended our corresponding Digital World well over the last five years. Chika will be safe with him and they'll come back to us before we know it."

"Right," Sayuri said, smiling up at her husband.

Masaru and Chika looked away so that their parents could say their goodbyes, noting that Yoshino was standing just outside the lab doors now talking to three women who looked like her (her mother and older sisters no doubt). Tohma was at a computer skyping his father and sister goodbye as well. Ikuto was with his parents, saying goodbye to Ruka while she cried, clinging to as many of them as she could.

"It's time to go," Suguru said gently, placing a hand on Masaru's shoulder and the other on Chika's.

The Daimon children nodded, turning to give their mother one more hug and say goodbye one last time before joining the departure team on the platform that would transport them to the Digital World.

Masaru watched as his mom took a bawling Ruka from her parents while Ikuto hurried up the platform to stand beside him and Chika. Masaru tried to give the boy a reassuring smile and got a weak one back.

Gods, this hurt so much more than it had five years ago. Last time had been exciting. It'd been the start of an adventure. He'd been going alone and leaving everyone behind. Now, even though he was leaving with most of his friends and family, it hurt to leave the few that weren't coming with them behind. It hurt to see his mother smile brightly at them even though she was clearly holding back tears and her pain at watching the rest of her family leave. It hurt to see her holding tightly onto Ruka as the six year old girl squirmed and cried out, reaching for her family.

Yoshino's mother and older sisters had been allowed into the lab and he felt for his friend as she waved good bye with a painfully fake smile. Masaru couldn't even tell whether it hurt more or less for Tohma, whose family wasn't there, as he worked on activating the portal. Was it more or less painful that he hadn't been able to say goodbye to his father and little sister in person and had to settle for a call over the computer?

Then Kudamon was glowing and digivolving into Kentaurosmon as the portal activated.

"Mom! Chika and I are coming back, you hear?! That's my promise to you and a man always keeps his word!" Masaru shouted just before the portal zapped them away.

The last he saw of his mom was her tears and bright smile.

What does Iramon's involvement with building the Control Spires mean? What have the other new Adventure DigiDestined and Gennai found out about them? When will Yutaka decide to test his new Beast Spirit? Will he be able to control it? Will Alice, Minami, Kai and their group reach the next level safely? Can they trust Apemon? And what will the DATS team do once they reach the Digital World? I guess we'll just have to find out next time on Digimon Digital Monsters!

Man was this a long chapter. I think this more than makes up for no post in September and covers October.

So what did you guys think? All of the new teenage Adventure Digidestined have now been introduced to their partner's Rookie levels. Thoughts? I've definitely messed with their digivolution lines, so don't expect normal digivolutions from these partners, like Wormmon.

I know that the Tamers part of the chapter was slow again, but the focus was really on the Adventure teams this chapter. I promise more will happen with Tamers and Frontier next time. And DATS is back in things! They're going to be in the Digital World next chapter so we'll finally see some more action on their part too. I hope you enjoyed this chapter and are looking forward to the next one.

If your guys are wondering where this takes place on the Ultimate Gathering side of things, this takes place at the beginning of those 4 days TK and Koichi are trying to help Paressemon and Tai and the others are transversing the tunnels to Netsusa, so we're in a stretch that takes place between chapters 25 & 26 in UGotD. This is also roughly day 10-11 since everything's begun. Time works a bit differently in all worlds, so that's why it's day in some world and night in others, in case you guys are wondering, but they're all roughly on the same day.

Thanks for reading guys! I hope you liked it and look forward to the next chapter!