In the beginning, it is always dark.

And when the light comes, and it must come, it is searing and blinding. It is something where there was nothing. And it is pain.

This is the pain that burned in the eyes of Taichi Kamiya as he blinked them open.

It’s still the Digiworld, was the first thought that permeated. And it looks—familiar. “Sora?” he said aloud. “Mimi? Koushiro? Jou?” He pulled himself upright, ignoring the wave of dizziness that caused, and looked around. “Agumon? Where are ya, buddy?”

“Here, Taichi,” said a voice by his left sneaker. It was Koromon.

“Why’d you de-Digivolve?”

“I don’t know, Taichi, but I do know that this place smells awfully familiar to me.”

“Yeah, I was thinking the same thing.” Taichi got up and dusted off his shorts. “I wonder where the others are?”

As if in answer, Koushiro appeared from behind a tree. “Taichi? What happened?”

“I was just about to ask you the same thing. If you don’t know, I sure don’t.”

“Then we should—” The computer savant broke off in mid-sentence at a sound that stopped both of their hearts.

“Hey Taichi, Koushiro, over here!”

“It can’t—it can’t be,” whispered Taichi. “It isn’t possible.” The two of them turned as one, towards the trees behind them, shock and disbelief written across both of their white faces.

It was her.

Jesanae.

She strode up to them, looking just as she had looked before her death, carrying a micro-Digimon under one arm, a puzzled expression on her lovely face. She waved a hand in front of their faces.

“Are you guys okay? You look kinda upset about something.” She turned to Koushiro. “I’d expect this kind of randomness from Taichi, but not from you. What’s going on?”

Koushiro didn’t answer. Instead, he slowly and quietly fainted.

“Koushiro? Wake up, Koushiro! Earth to computer nerd! All right, Taichi, what’s wrong with you two?”

Taichi gulped, trying to find something to say. “Um—you—you’re—”

“Um—I—I’m what?”

“You’re—you’re dead!” the boy blurted.

“Really? Well, next time, I hope somebody has the good grace to inform me. I don’t feel dead, and I certainly hope I don’t look dead.”

Taichi floundered. I can’t be seeing this. This can’t be real. I’m dreaming. He shook his head violently and began to smack himself in the temple. Jesanae made an exasperated noise and gave him a good, hard whack upside the head.

“I hope that has satisfied today’s need for cranial discomfort, so you can get around to telling why you’re acting like you have rabies!”

“Well, you see, it’s like this—”

“Hey, Taichi! What happened to—AAAAH!” In less than five seconds, Jou had gone the way of Koushiro. Jesanae grabbed Taichi’s collar.

“Stop waffling and TELL ME!”

“Let him up, Jesanae, he’s scared stiff. Hi, Taichi.”

Yamato walked up to take a place next to Jesanae. The two of them standing there together was too much even for Taichi, and he blacked out.

* * *

When he came to, it was late afternoon. He groaned and sat up. That was such a vivid dream. They never used to be that real. My subconscious is trying to torment me, and it’s working . . .

“Finally awake?”

Oh, no, it’s still there . . .

“Honestly, you guys, what is with you?” said Jesanae in tones of deep disgust. “Practically all of you passed clean out when you saw Yamato and me. Takeru, I know you’re glad to see me, but let go of my hair, please. Would someone—” and the look in her eye suggested that ‘someone’ meant ‘Taichi’ “—please tell us what is going on?”

“I dunno,” Yamato said. “I don’t think I really wanna know.”

“We were not including you in that statement, foolish mortal. Just because we choose to affect the Royal We, does not mean that you are of any more significance than you were a moment ago.”

Yamato laughed. “I’ll remember that.”

Well, it sounds like Jesanae, but I don’t think that’s really Yamato . . .

“I’m waiting, O Fearless Leader.”

Taichi took a deep breath. “This is really gonna take some explaining. Here goes.”

He followed that statement with a few questions, from which he determined that Yamato and Jesanae remembered everything up until the moment Cholimon had appeared in the giant hall. So he explained, surreptitiously leaving out the kiss. He figured not being beaten up was probably a good thing. As he went into details of the fight, the two of them looked very confused, and when he reached the part where they had ‘died’ their expressions got downright freaked-out.

There was a long silence after he finished recounting the appearance of Gennai and being sent ‘back to the beginning’. They could hear the howling of the wind around the treetops, and the chatter of some digital squirrels in the leaves.

“We what?” Yamato and Jesanae squeaked simultaneously. Tsunomon and Sephithmon (Lyeernmon’s micro-form) let loose noises of sheer disbelief as well.

“Um, yeah,” Taichi replied nervously. “That’s why everyone was so shocked to see you two.”

“Well,” said Yamato, “that would explain why Takeru was almost incoherent. I’m sorry, little bro,” he said, gathering his brother up into a hug.

“That’s okay, now that you’re back,” Takeru said brightly.

“I know what’s familiar about this place!” Jou blurted abruptly into the momentary quiet. Everyone looked at him, and he squirmed uncomfortably. “Um, er, that is, I think so,” he amended.

“So tell us, Jou,” Mimi said.

He hrmphed. “This place looks an awful lot like the place where we spent the night Jesanae first showed up, I think . . .?”

“Come to think of it, it kind of does,” Taichi said thoughtfully. “So much has happened since then, I didn’t recognize it.”

“But that doesn’t make any sense,” put in Yamato. “You said that Gennai said he was sending you back to ‘the beginning’. We were here only a week ago.”

“You’re right,” Koushiro remarked. “I wonder if he was speaking figuratively, or if ‘the beginning’ is meant to indicate the arrival of our ninth member.”

“Maybe, but that wasn’t the beginning. That was more of an addition.”

“So I’m just an addition, hm?” Jesanae remarked playfully. “The icing on the cake, am I?”

“Only not as sweet,” Taichi muttered, before realizing. She’s doing it to me again! She’s making me into a sarcastic idiot, and I fell for it!

“Oh yes, Taichi, you fell headfirst.”

As Taichi jumped and tried to figure out just how much of that he’d said out loud, she continued. “I don’t know what exactly is going on here. If what you all say is true, then I’m back from the dead, and I don’t really know how to deal with that.” A wry smile crept around her jaw and down her cheekbones until it reached her mouth. “It’s never happened to me before. I guess you guys are worse off than me this time around, but try to understand my position too.”

“I agree with Jesanae,” Yamato put in. “This is like the weirdest thing that’s ever happened to me, and I still don’t get it.”

There was a short interim as this was assimilated. Taichi felt rather indignant, for a reason that wasn’t clear to him. He decided to put that feeling on a back burner until he figured it out, and said, “I get what you two are trying to say. We all need to take some time out to deal with this in our own separate ways. I suggest we sleep on it.”

An assenting consensus was reached, and they all retreated to a less-than-peaceful sleep.

It was the sleep of the just.

* * *

The night was still and quiet. Yamato and Jesanae sat up a long time, talking of nothing and everything. Everything but their return from death; by unspoken consent, they left that subject untouched, to sort its confusion another day. The air was misty and cool, a blessing after the heated emotions of the day, and each new breath of the scent of the flowers was liquid glory.

“I miss my violin,” Jesanae said quietly. “It was my aunt’s. I don’t know who it belonged to before that.”

“I know what you mean; I had that harmonica since I was little. It was a present from my mother. I never let it out of my sight.”

They both sighed heavily, and then Jesanae turned to him. “You sing, don’t you?”

“I can. I never do, though.”

“Do you know ‘The Old Ways’? It’s one of my favorites.”

He was startled. “Yeah, mine too. My mother used to sing that song.”

She smiled faintly. “I guess that’s one more thing in common,” she said, and began the haunting, lyrical introduction to the beautiful piece. He joined her on cue, and it was like the night he had first met her, singing this same song, all alone in the glade.

As the song ended, they both eyed each other with open admiration.

“You know, you sing really beautifully,” he said.

“You aren’t half bad yourself,” she teased. “You should be in a rock band, with a voice like that.”

“Never happen.”

She laughed and socked his shoulder. “You can’t blame me for trying. Remember me when you’re rich and famous. And never forget it was my idea.”

“Yeah, I’ll put in a good word for you. One of the little people, who—Oof!”

“Little, am I? I’ll give you little!”

It degenerated from there into a socking contest with no clear winner, and they both had to struggle to laugh quietly enough not to wake any of the others around them. Yamato got in his share of punches, although it was hard to work around her martial arts training, and she pummeled him good, until they both fell right to sleep in the same instant as they paused in their game.

* * *

“What the heck happened to you guys?” Taichi inquired snidely as Yamato and Jesanae stretched, wincing as each movement activated a new bruise. “Roll around on rocks or what?”

“You have no idea,” Jesanae groaned. She unhinged her severely kinked spine and wished she hadn’t been so energetic, Yamato silently echoing her sentiment nearby, even as something occurred to her.

Taichi was acting too normal.

He shouldn’t act like that. He hadn’t been, the day before, and people didn’t recover that fast from what he said had happened. I mean, if what he says is true, Yamato and I were dead. That had to have had some effect on him. He was acting a lot older yesterday, almost jaded. That doesn’t just go away.

She thought for a moment, then pinned it down to the most likely hypothesis: built-in defense mechanism. If he can’t deal with it yet, he’ll knock it down to size, trivialize it. I just hope he’s not repressing or anything; that could be bad later on.

The next day, the Digidestined once again . . . were walking.

“If you guys die again, could you please bring one of those winged chariots back with ya?”

SMACK!

“That’s not funny, Kamiya,” Jesanae said, her heel tingling where it had caught Taichi under the chin with her spinkick.

“Well, excuse me for trying to . . .”

“. . . make an asshole out of yourself again? You did a great job.”

Taichi growled, pulled himself to his feet in a very dignified way, tripped over a tree root, therefore destroying any dignity he had, and started walking again.

And thus, the Digidestined . . . started walking.

Again.

* * *

Suddenly, just as they were all going to set up camp for the night, a light exploded in the middle of the clearing they were in. Gennai stood there, looking very troubled.

“Greetings, Digidestined. How are you this evening?”

Lyeernmon, newly re-digivolved, smiled kindly at the image of the little old man. “We’re fine, Gennai.”

Gennai frowned, “Then what I’m about to tell you won’t be very good. Myself and my spies have discovered that Piedmon is holding two humans adults prisoner in his lair. They apparently fell through a wormhole from Earth during Myotismon’s siege of Odaiba.”

“WHAT!?!?!”

“It’s true. We don’t know any names yet; however, one of my spies, an Ultimate level Digimon named Jackalmon, managed to capture an image of the two humans. Jackalmon is dead now, killed bringing the image to me. Do you know them?”

The old man suddenly disappeared to be replaced by a frozen image of two humans, a man and woman, huddled in a cell of some kind.

No one made a sound, examining the two, not having a clue as to who they were until . . .

“Argh!” Jesanae screamed as she suddenly went berserk, scooping up sticks and rocks, hurling them at the images of the people. She ran up to it, trying to punch them through the image.

“YES! That’s it! How do you two like to be hurt and trapped! I hope you two rot and die and go to Hell in there!” Jesanae seemed to lose energy, falling to the ground in a wet, sobbing mess.

“JESANAE!” Yamato yelled, running up to her and holding her up. “What’s wrong? Do you know them?”

“Yes . . .” Jesanae sobbed, holding on to Yamato tightly for support. “I do . . . and I hate them.”

“Why?”

“Because . . .” she said, looking Yamato right in the eye, her beautiful eyes red from crying. “Because . . . they’re my parents.”