In the end it took three days (working nights), about a dozen pizza deliveries and many, many chocolate HobNobs. But the children were adamant, or at least, three of them were. Ursula seemed relatively indifferent, and Eleanor was distinctly verbal about the whole thing, although to be fair she never outright disagreed. Callum figured she was secretly looking forward to it, though he didn’t dare confront her about it.

The three days of preparation turned out to be a bit of a bonus as well, allowing the kids to get more used to moving around with their current individual predicaments; after all, if they were going to be couriers it would help if they were at least somewhat proficient in such advanced manoeuvres as walking.

Still, the building anticipation was beginning to get to them. The more Aardmon talked about, and the more they heard of technological disasters happening further and further afield, the greater the weight they felt on their shoulders.

Eventually the day came. The five of them stood in one of the warehouses, as Perez handed out little memory sticks to each of them, suspended on ribbons.

“Hold onto these with your lives. They’ve each got the reboot software, as well as a program that allows us to keep track of you. If you lose one, stay with the others and at least we’ll know where you are.”

Eleanor looked up as she tied hers around her wrist. “What if we lose all of them?”

The others gave her a look congratulating her incredible unhelpfulness. Eleanor pouted. “What? It could happen?”

“A lot could happen.” Keble stuck his hands in his pockets. “If anything goes wrong, anything at all, you need to get in contact with us. Don’t do anything reckless.”

He shot a glance over at Aardmon, who straightened immediately, pulling her arm up in a salute. “Yes?”

“You know where you’re going, right?”

“I...I know where the core is. If it’s moved, I...I can find it.”

“Good. Get them there quickly, and get them out as soon as you can. I’m counting on you.”

Aardmon swallowed. “Yes sir.”

Skelton opened the door to the warehouse, and five adults walked in; Callum’s and Ursula’s parents, and Martin’s father. They went to their children, putting their arms around them and saying goodbye. Callum looked up at his own parents, feeling too under pressure to be emotional. “I won’t be long. Even less time for you, by the sound of it.”

Kane smiled, and patted his son’s head. “No fights, alright?”

“Dad...”

“I know you.”

“Alright. No promises.”

Father and son laughed, but the laughter died away unnaturally. Callum glanced to the side, seeing Lorelie clutching her hands together, and Eleanor looking the other way, as both of them waited alone. Callum turned back to his own parents. He’d ask later.

Jessie sighed, and she gently reached out and held her stepson’s shoulder. Callum could feel her fingers shaking.

“I wish you didn’t have to go. Not you. It’s not right.”

“Nothing’s right in the world, Jess.” The boy smiled. “Maybe we can help with that.”

He held her hand briefly, then pulled away, stepping into the circle that had been marked out. Eleanor and Lorelie were already there, and beside him, Martin and Ursula were joining them, their concerned parents staying where they were.

Aardmon joined them, taking her place between Lorelie and Martin. “Whenever you’re ready. Be warned though; it’s a bumpy ride.”

The children stood in the circle, facing inwards. For a moment they felt a little silly, half not expecting anything to happen.

Then Lorelie’s screen lit up, and she held her head, trying to keep the device facing forwards. Callum, Eleanor, Ursula and Martin all felt their devices activate as well, with the familiar rush of energy and the hellishly annoying whistle. Callum reached out; he could already see the window opening, although now it was bigger. More open. More menacing.

Behind the lines, Keble was keeping everyone back while Dominic tapped furiously away on the computer, energy readings erupting in real time all over the multiple screens. Keble gritted his teeth, only for Skelton to tap him on the shoulder from behind. “We have guests.”

“Who?”

“Lorelie’s parents.”

“Now? They’re late, aren’t they?”

“That’s the thing! They said they didn’t know; they thought she was going home!”

“What?” Keble whirled round. “Didn’t you tell them? You were supposed to tell them!”

“Lorelie said she had told them! She said she wanted privacy!”

Keble looked back at the portal, then at Skelton. “Get them out of here! It’s too dangerous; they can’t-“

They were. A well-dressed woman and a furious, far skinnier man barrelled through the door and skittered across the hard floor, their eyes wide. The woman reached the barrier, where Skelton stopped her.

“STOP THIS RIGHT NOW! GET MY DAUGHTER OUT OF THERE!”

Callum noticed the commotion, and he noticed Lorelie flinching. She didn’t look back though; just stared ahead as the portal expanded.

“Aren’t you-“

For a brief moment, the children were disorientated. For a brief moment they looked amongst themselves in confusion, as unearthly screams came from just a few yards away.

It was due to their disorientation that, rather than carefully entering the portal in a controlled manner, as had been the plan, they all pretty much fell in at once, dragging the surprised Aardmon with them.

There was a flash, a bang, and a few choice arcs of lightning for good measure. Then, the remaining adults were left looking at absolutely nothing, save for a nasty scorch mark on the floor. The sprinkler system went off again. Lorelie’s mother fell to her knees and began to howl like a demented gibbon.

All in all, it was a mixed send-off.

The landscape all around was dotted with a patchwork of terrains; canyons reaching down towards the centre of the earth, snow-covered dunes and sand-laden ice-sheets, arcs of robotic cities doing battle with oncoming foliage from every side, and here and there, what looked like roots of some vast tree that stuck out of the ground, glowing many colours and running freely with liquid data, as well as occasionally moving and pulling apart the warring habitats like the world’s most ineffective nursery teacher. The moment they fixed something wrong with the landscape another thing would pop right up, like a sudden volcano or a meteorite or just a city getting up on five legs (which was so much more irritating than four) and running away at full speed.

If it was at all possible for the lower parts of a gargantuan tree-deity to look so completely and utterly done with everything, that is exactly what Yggdrasil looked like at this moment in time. World-threatening tyrants and eldritch abominations were one thing. But this was just seriously annoying.

Luckily, the world tree’s saviours had arrived, ready for action; a fact of which it was somewhat aware.

And quietly dreading.

There was a burst of sound and light, and Callum landed on his face, then his behind, then his face again. He stood up, fell back over, muttered something about punching an aardvark in the face, stood up again, rushed to the nearest solid surface and promptly threw up what looked (and felt) like a half-gallon of rainbow glitter. He groaned, and spent several seconds just staring at the wall in front of him, all the while dimly aware of the others around him, all in various states of digital nausea.

Something felt distinctly off. He looked up, and saw Martin sitting down, gazing across at him. He adjusted his glasses. “What are you...doing there...?”

Ursula pulled herself to her feet, whacked her head on an opposite wall, and swore in German.This was followed by more swearing as Eleanor and Aardmon were positioned flat out not three yards away from Callum, clutching onto a rail, with their lower bodies hovering a few centimetres off the ground.

Callum looked straight up, and half-realised the current predicament. Up in the sky was a city, facing him. Or rather, it was the same city which they had appeared to have landed in, only one half of it was currently folded up and facing the other. Objects, and mixed among them, strange creatures, were flying in many different directions depending on the part of the city they were in.

There was a jolt, and Callum planted himself face first into the wall in front of him. There were two yelps as Eleanor and Aardmon crashed to the floor(?), a muffled bang and a “schieße” as Ursula rapidly switched the walls she was standing up on, a metallic crash as Lorelie rolled out of a nearby alley in what appeared to be a dustbin, and a horrendous scream of imminent death as a creature that might have been a bird and might have been a mammal shot past the lot of them, crashed off the corner of a building and went flying off into space.

It was at this point that, in a miraculous simultaneous decision, the six new arrivals decided to mark their touchdown in a brand new world – a world where it appeared even the gravity was going out of its way to kill you after two fucking seconds - in the most memorable and dignified of ways.

That is to say, screaming in absolute terror.

The city shifted again, and Aardmon took advantage of being the right way up to drag Eleanor forwards and into the alleyway, the girl hopping angrily behind her. The aardvark was glancing nervously around, muttering panicked syllables under her breath.

“Oh damn, oh...oh this is...very different...”

Martin was busy trying to shuffle himself around, a task which was encumbered slightly by the almost magnetic attraction he was having to the current wall. He gave up with shuffling, swallowed his dignity and resorted to rolling, which at least enabled him to join the others.

“Well this is inconvenient.”

Eleanor shot the boy a glare. “You think?”

Another wave of gravity, and another quick rearrangement of sitting positions. By now Lorelie had freed herself from the dustbin’s clutches and was crawling towards them as best she could, avoiding the debris now coming her way. Callum helped her the last few feet, pulling her into the relative safety of the gap between the buildings. She took a second to catch her breath, before fumbling in her jacket pocket and pulling out the keypad.

“Thanks”

“Don’t mention it.”

“What do we do now?”

I...uh...” Callum faltered, looking around at the others. “I hadn’t got that far.”

Eleanor pushed herself up against the nearest wall, glaring at Aardmon. “I thought we were supposed to have a guide.”

The Digimon felt the gaze of the others on her, and floundered quite severely. “I-I-I-I-I-I don’t know where we are either!”

Eleanor blinked. “You LITERALLY just said you did!”

“I did, but it’s all...you know...things happen and things have changed and I need to get my bearings...”

“You live here!”

“Do you realise how much time has passed since I left this place?”

There was a muffled ‘ow’ as Ursula’s body fell across the entrance to the alley, her disgruntled face looking inwards and glaring at everybody in turn. “Thank you for the help.”

Martin and Lorelie helped her inside, as Aardmon continued.

“I’ve been gone longer than you think. Time runs faster here; I’ve been gone about a week and a half by your standards.”

“So basically, the whole map has changed, we don’t know where we’re going, and we can’t get there even if we did.”

Callum stuck out his thumb. “Nice job, everyone. We did it. Mission successful.”

The other three weren’t really listening; instead helping Ursula to get into a semi-upright position on her knees. She leant back against the wall, catching her breath. Martin glanced further inwards, and pointed. “I’m guessing they had the same idea we did.”

Further inside were more figures, huddled up against the walls and trying to keep their feet in the right direction. There were five of them, all different shapes and sizes, and all looking somewhat nervous.

For a moment the children gawped. Then Callum pumped his fist into his hand. “Of course! We can ask for help.”

Martin turned to Aardmon. “You said something about us having partners, didn’t you?”

“I...uh...I’m not sure-“

Callum puffed, and waved a hand at the aardvark. “It’s worth a shot.”

He shuffled forwards towards the nearest of them; a Gomamon and a Bukamon, who both stared up with wide eyes. Callum grinned, and held his free hand out.

“Hi, I believe you’re expecting us? We need your help to save the world.”

The Bukamon promptly burst into tears, and the Gomamon turned his head around. “MUUUUM!”

The largest of the Digimon – a huge, fur-covered beast with huge hands and feet, turned round, and got to her feet, staring down at Callum, who was looking a little bemused and a lot terrified for his life. The Mojyamon stared down at him with her round, golden eyes.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING SCARING MY KIDS?”

Erp.

Aardmon rushed forwards, and placed her hands around Callum’s shoulders, grinning and nodding profusely. “I’m so sorry, so sorry, they’re new here, they don’t understand-“

There was another gravity shift, and everyone made a large slide to the right, ending up leaning against the rightmost wall.

“Are you humans?”

One of the other figures, a Floramon, wandered forward and stared up at Callum, whose complexion had paled somewhat. He blinked, and nodded.

The flower-beast grinned. “My friends told me about you people. Are you gonna save us now?”

“I, uh...I was under the impression we needed your help.”

“Mine?”

Eleanor and Martin shuffled forwards, and the girl reached out her hand. “What my dumb friend is trying to say is that I believe we’re waiting for partners or some shit so we can actually do something. Are you them?”

The Floramon looked blank for a second.

“What can you do?”

“I can make soup. Does that help?”

Eleanor turned towards Aardmon, putting her hands on her hips. “I’m having more and more doubts over everything you’ve told us.”

The aardvark stepped back, causing Callum to fall sideways into the wall. The Digimon waved her hands profusely, shaking her head. “I didn’t lie to you! You have partners! You wouldn’t have the digivices if you didn’t.”

“Well where are they then?”

“I don’t know.”

“Fine, then who are they?”

“I don’t-“

“You don’t know?” Eleanor ground her teeth, and thrust her fist out into the nearest wall. “How can you not know; you’re all we’ve got!”

The aardvark looked at the floor. “It’s all...happened so fast-“

“Give it a rest with that bollocks! You came round begging us to help you but you don’t even know what you’re doing!”

Lorelie shuffled forwards and put her arm out, facing up to Eleanor, who stood back, seething. Aardmon glanced sideways, and noticed both Callum and Ursula giving her deeply frustrated looks. She cleared her throat. “Well...you have the digivices...maybe they could help you?”

Eleanor placed a splayed hand in the centre of her chest. “Oh so it’smy responsibility now?” she mimed sarcastically, “Should I be the one to get myself out of this predicament?”

“That...that’s not what I-“

“What a wonderful idea. Maybe I will.”

Eleanor pushed herself away from the wall and stomped off down the alley, giving a dirty look to Mojyamon and her family as she passed. Aardmon’s eyes widened. “Where are you going? It’s dangerous out there!”

“And it’s boring and annoying in here.”

“We need to stick together!”

The girl turned. “Why? You said it yourself; s’not as if you can do anything to help.”

The aardvark’s mouth fell open, and she turned to the others. “Someone stop her!”

Nobody moved.

“Guys?”

Martin stood up, brushed himself off and hobbled forwards as fast as he could. Callum watched after him. “Martin? Not you too...”

The boy turned. “She has a point. Not much we can do here. And at least if I go she’ll have someone with her.” He shrugged, his face showing a deeply apologetic expression. “Sorry.”

He too ran off before anyone could stop him. Well, to be honest, he didn’t run off. He managed to catch up with Eleanor fairly quickly, and the two of them hobbled down the alleyway for a good few minutes before they were finally out of sight. Callum stared after them, and considered whether to join them. He glanced back, and noticed Ursula, still kneeling up against the wall, and Lorelie, the sad emoticon on her screen betraying enough.

The boy sighed. “Maybe we can figure something out here?”

Ursula tsked, and turned away. “Don’t look at me. If I could walk properly I’d have ditched you all long ago.”

“Thanks for the encouraging words.”

“No problem. It’s what I do best.”

Despite having the use of both of his legs, Martin was still finding it hard work catching up to Eleanor, who was marching ahead angrily, her right leg cracking the pavement at times.

“Hey, slow down!”

Eleanor didn’t, but when another wave of gravity hit them they both rolled sideways into the wall anyway. They both righted themselves, giving Martin a little time to catch his breath. “Oh god...they never said there’d be running...”

“What the hell are you doing?” Eleanor stood up, and brushed herself off, glaring down at him. “Go back; I don’t need fat fucks like you running around after me.”

Martin raised a finger, and coughed a couple of times. “Okay, first off, I find that offensive.”

“Good. That means it worked.”

“Wait, wait, wait!” Martin got to his feet, wobbled a bit, and ran after her, eventually keeping pace by her side. “We really shouldn’t be splitting up like this. You saw how dangerous this world is.”

“Yes I did. And I also saw that our ‘guide’...” and here the girl curled her fingers into air-quotes “...is completely useless, and that if we want to actually find this core thingy, we’re gonna have to find it ourselves. Or at least find these partners to give us a hand.”

The two stopped on the edge of the wall, and Eleanor looked left and right, trying to find a way down. Martin exhaled heavily. “I actually agree with you. If we’re meant to have Digimon partners it makes sense to look for them.”

“We’re not ‘meant’ to do anything. I just wanna get out of here.”

“But wouldn’t it be cool? You know, running around with giant monsters saving the world?” Martin folded his arms as best he could. “Isn’t anything cool to you?”

Eleanor let out a groan, and spun round, shaking her head. “God, do you know how annoying you are? This isn’t a game! This isn’t some bullshit self-insert anime fanfic; this is just a right pain in my hole and I genuinely couldn’t give a flying fuck about being a hero or running around with some massive dinosaur angel crab thing or whatever the hell kind of thing lives here!”

Martin blinked. “Wait, you read fanfiction?”

Eleanor’s cheeks went scarlet, and she faced the other way. “Shut up!”

“What kind of-“

“I swear I’ll push you off the building!”

Gravity came to her defense before she had a chance, sending them both careening down the wall and into the nearest alleyway again. Eleanor got up without a word and stormed off, muttering under her breath. Martin wondered about teasing her some more, but decided he valued his body parts, and ran off after her.

“Wait up!”

Callum sat with his back against the wall, the fingers on his digital arm twitching and generally being unhelpful. Nothing was being helpful. His brain wasn’t being helpful. The communicators weren’t being helpful due to the lack of any communication (typical dodgy wi-fi). The world was being less than helpful in its frequent attempts to throw them off the ground. And the others were being about half as helpful as anything else.

Lorelie was bunched up in the corner, rocking back and forth with the visage of a screaming face on her flickering screen. The PDA was to one side of her, but she hadn’t reached for it; it was already clear that any words she might have said would have consisted of gibberish blubbering. Ursula had slumped further down her own wall, the hood of her jacket running up over her head. Callum couldn’t see her eyes but her lips were firmly closed, and she just stood, still as a statue.

Aardmon was being more helpful by view of being proactive, at least. Though that proactivity was somewhat limited to her standing, head to the wall, doing nothing but banging it back and forth with regular and painful thumps. Occasionally the word ‘stupid’ and ‘moron’ and ‘bloody typical’ would emerge from her lips.

Callum sidled over to Lorelie, his arm twitching all the more. She peered up at him, but her face did little to betray her innermost thoughts aside from utter panic and rage and...to be honest, he couldn’t really tell. His eyes went down to her hands, which were gripping against her knees. Something crossed his mind, and he gently cleared his throat.

“So...uh...what happened earlier?”

Lorelie gently looked up at him, her face turning blank. He smiled awkwardly.

“With...you know...your parents...”

Lorelie stared down at the keypad to the side of her. For a moment she stayed still. Then she reached out, and tapped a message one letter at a time.

“They’d never have let me come.”

“Did you talk to them?”

“They wouldn’t understand. They just wanted me to come home.

Another bout of tapping.

“They think this’ll all go away if they just ignore it.”

Callum pulled his knees up, and rested his free arm on them, stretching one side of his mouth up in a half-smile. “You do have it worse than all of us. You didn’t have to come.”

He stared ahead, breathing deeply. There was a little pop of static beside him, and he looked up again. Lorelie was showing a stern face, holding her keypad right up into his face.

“I need to be here.”

Callum blinked. The girl typed again.

“Even if I had to come on my own.”

As the boy looked at the slight girl next to him, he had to admit she had an air of determination about her, despite her spare hand still shaking in her lap. He shrugged, and nodded. “That works for me.”

He glanced up, and nodded at Aardmon, who had stopped knocking herself on the head for five seconds and was gazing forlornly over at the pair. Callum gave a small nod.

“We must all look a right picture to you.”

“Stop stealing my lines.” The aardvark sighed, and brought up her forearm, staring at her palm. “Eleanor’s right. I’ve got no fucking clue what I’m doing here.”

There was a thump and a screech, followed by a rough scraping sound as they all gently slid over to the opposite wall(floor?) as the gravity shifted again. They quickly adjusted to their new positions, having gotten somewhat used to the movement by now. Callum shrugged. “Look on the bright side.”

“What bright side?”

“Nobody else has a fucking clue what they’re doing here either.”

Aardmon twisted around. “You’re too nice. Especially considering the crappy hand you’ve been dealt.”

Ba-dum-tsh.

“Well then, what do you know?”

“I’ve figured out a little where I am now. Honestly I know vaguely where the core is.”

“That’s a start.”

“It’s on the other side of this layer.”

“Oh.”

“I know you have partners, but I don’t know who or where they are, or even if they know they’re supposed to be waiting for you.”

Callum furrowed his brow, and looked aside. ”Could you be one of our partners? I mean...you do know more about us than anyone else so far.”

Aardmon’s eyes widened, and she shook her hands back and forth. “I’m not a fighter!” She coughed. “I wouldn’t do you any good. I can barely even work as a guide for crying out loud. Seriously, our best option is to wait on your friends. They can at least see whereabouts we are.”

“I hope so...”

B-ding!

“You’ve got mail.”

Callum blinked, and stared down at his own arm, then over at Ursula. The taller girl wasn’t paying attention to him, but instead was watching as Lorelie got to her knees. She scratched the side of her head a little sheepishly, as the remarkable vision of a bouncing envelope graced her screen.

Callum looked at Ursula again, who shrugged. “I guess we’re supposed to answer it...?”

Eleanor and Martin had managed to get themselves well and truly embedded in a different part of the city. For the longest time Eleanor had been marching ahead, but after several minutes of Martin’s continued persistence (and the fact that her leg was getting rather uppity with the constant running) she had slowed down and the two had wound their way through the back streets together. The area was beginning to get quite dark by the time they stopped, somewhat out of breath, at a junction of paths. Eleanor put her hands on her hips, “Which way now, brainiac?”

Martin looked up, and from the corner of his eye noticed a little gadget wiggling on the right shoulder of his digivice. He pointed. “Maybe that way?”

“Are you really following the dumb metal thing?”

Martin adjusted his glasses. “It’s not like we have any other leads. Maybe they’re supposed to be more helpful here. Being like, digital and all”

“Maybe they will. Alright then.” Eleanor smiled, and went walking in the complete opposite direction. Martin stared after her. “Uh...I said-”

“And I said I know. Fuck logic.”

Martin sighed, and jogged after her. “You know, you really are quite contrary.”

“Oh goodie, you’ve noticed.”

“Can I persuade you to change your mind?”

Eleanor sighed, grunted, and grabbed Martin by the rim beneath his neck, curling her fingers. “You can persuade me to remove my fist from your throat if you don’t shut up soon.”

“Ssh!”

“Don’t ssh me! I’m the one threatening you!”

“No, seriously!” Martin put a finger to his lips, and pointed back down the path which he’d initially suggested. “I hear voices.”

Eleanor put the shorter boy down, and backed herself up against a wall, peering down the path. There certainly were voices. Not just voices, in fact. People. Digimon. A whole posse, marching down the pathway towards them, laughing and jeering. They were an eclectic group, consisting of Rookies and small Champions; Impmon, Goblimon, Liolmon, Ponchomon, Vilemon and Opossomon, among others. The kids noted that many of them seemed to be holding things; what appeared to be pieces of metal at a distance. As they got closer, and the jeers got louder, the two discovered that they were not just metal, but in fact seemed to be arms, legs, weapons and various other body parts, all adorning the group’s members like makeshift knights’ armour.

One of the group, a Nohemon, yelled and thrust an arm out, and in a trice the group rushed forwards down an unseen alleyway, brandishing blades, guns and various big metal fists. Eleanor tried to peer forward, but she couldn’t see what they were running towards. She could certainly hear it though, as there was a loud shout, several grinding noises, metallic screeches, and from nowhere, a puff of data. Eleanor glanced up and noted a cloud of red dust erupting into the sky, quickly followed by a series of bloodthirsty cheers.

Eleanor’s hand went to her right leg, caressing the metal. This did not bode well.

“I think we’re in the wrong part of town.”

Martin bit his lip. “Maybe they’re just really enthusiastic litter pickers?”

Eleanor shot him a look, but before she could say anything one of the Digimon left behind – a Vilemon with a set of clawed gauntlets on both hands and both legs (and one on his head like a silly crown) tripped over his own feet, hovered back up, and saw them.

“Look guys! More data!”

Eleanor snapped a look at him, and stepped out, cracking her knuckles. “Call us data once more, you little shit!”

Vilemon blinked, and raised a hand. “Are you humans?” He grinned, in as much as it was possible for a gremlin with no lower jaw to grin. “Awesome! Special data!”

“Come and get it! I’ll take you on.”

From his ‘hiding place’ (read: standing very conspicuously against one wall) Martin raised a finger. “Um, are you sure we should be provoking them?”

“What are you yelling about?”

A group of about five other Digimon poked their heads out, and saw the two children standing exposed. Eleanor’s brave stance faltered a bit, but she didn’t move. Instead she leaned back a little, whispering to Martin. “Any advice from the big dumb metal things about these guys?”

Martin was already way ahead of her, busy swiping across his chest screen and trying to read the upside-down information. He’d managed to get to the vitals of Vilemon’s attack powers when the gravity shifted again, sending both him and Eleanor into the opposite wall. From his squashed position, Martin shook his head.

“I think we’re on our own here.”

“Lemme get at them!”

“Me first!”

“Outta my way; it’s my turn!”

From the front of the group, a tiny winged humanoid stepped out, looking like a souped-up fairy in warpaint and carrying a massive go-away bazooka on one shoulder, which appeared to have been ripped clean out of something’s chest. She grinned maniacally, and pressed three buttons at once.

“Giga Blaster!”

Eleanor and Martin yelped as the cannon exploded, sending a vast fish-shaped rocket straight over their heads, through the alleyway, up towards the nearest building and exploding in a mass of light and fire. Martin stared blankly at the sky as the fireballs rained down. Or up, in some cases.

An Impmon stepped forwards, and decked the fairy across the back of the head. “Tinkermon, you knob! We only had one of those!”

“Whoops.”

“Move outta the way.” The Impmon kicked the fairy aside and pointed at the humans, swinging a cable around in his free arm. “I dunno why there are humans here, or what those metal things are, but you know our policy with shiny metal shit! Scrap ‘em! Scrap ‘em both!”

Martin shook his head, and grabbed Eleanor by the arm, shaking her out of her stupor. “I think your way’s best! Let’s go!”

The two ran, and with a cacophonous clanging of metal and shout of rage and the thrill of the hunt (and thankfully a good deal of falling over their own ridiculous armaments), the scrappers followed them.

Eleanor was a fast runner, but she didn’t know where she was, and she was being forever slowed down by one great dead weight on one leg and another on one arm, as Martin was not such a fast runner. He had an eye for hiding places, but with every turn they knew it was only a temporary thing as the rioters were never far behind. Martin was breathing like a horse after only a few minutes, constantly glancing back at the newest explosion or piece of shrapnel flying their way. “What the hell do they want?”

“Us, Martin. Definitely us.” Eleanor gritted her teeth. “I don’t think this is what Aardmon meant when she mentioned somebody to take these stupid things off of us.”

“Well, at least it can’t get any-“

“Don’t say it!”

There was a scream, and a shard of something sharp and metallic bounced off of Martin’s device, rebounding and running over Eleanor’s arm. She yelled, and held the scrape, the attack already having drawn blood, but it was too late to worry about that now as she turned to see the front runners of the group nearly having caught up with them, killer ecstasy in their eyes.

A sudden shockwave rushed through the street as the sky suddenly darkened, knocking the scrappers to one side, and the children out of their line-of-sight. Martin turned his head around to keep an eye on their attackers, when something caught his eyes. A pair of bright blue eyes, poking out of a trapdoor in the street and looking at the commotion.

The creature noticed him looking, and reached up for the door above, but stopped when he caught Martin’s pained expression. It appeared very much to be a bird of some kind. Specifically a penguin. In a bobble hat.

Martin pulled Eleanor to a halt, causing her to whirl round, yelling in his face.

“Aargh, what?”

Martin pointed, and she looked down at the little creature who was staring up at them. From behind them the sounds of anarchy chimed again, as the bloodthirsty scrappers got to their feet.

“Where are they?”

“Find them, you morons!”

The penguin rolled its eyes, and beckoned with one clawed flipper. Martin rushed over immediately, disappearing down the large open hole as soon as he could manage. Eleanor blinked.

“Sure. Why not? Let’s all follow the penguin.”

By the time the scrappers had rushed out onto the street, she too had disappeared into the trapdoor.

Perez groaned inwardly, and took a swig of whatever neon-sparkling energy drink she had in the label-less plastic bottle by her station, really not caring anymore about its effect on her general health.

“Come on, please, give me something here...”

The computer did give her something, namely a string of error messages and a very helpful not-responding message. She rolled downwards, burying her face in the desk.

“Why did I take this jooooob?”

A similar unhelpful noise from her colleague’s desk prompted him to act in much the same way that she did. The door slid open, and Keble walked in, looking somewhat the worse for wear. “Can we swap? I can’t take it anymore.”

Both scientists glared up in unison. “JOIN THE CLUB!”

“Where’s Skelton?” Keble sighed, his perpetual smile looking distinctly strained. “More importantly, where are the kids? Have you found-“

Dominic sat up in his chair, throwing his hands up. “We’ve found Digimon left, right and centre, three roots of Yggdrasil, two more portals to the real world, a trapped Digimon deity, some information that I’m pretty sure belongs to the Pentagon, and somehow we’ve found some random geezer’s answering machine. But no kids. Of course no effin’ kids.”

“What about the communicators?”

“What about them?” Perez leaned back, pointing towards five blinking dots on one of her screens. “I’ve found them, but I can’t pinpoint them to any sort of spatial plain that we can use as a reference to the real world.”

Keble blinked.

“I have no idea where they are.”

Keble clenched his fists. “I can’t just go back and tell Sir Lord High St. Jean that we don’t know where his daughter is. We don’t have enough money to deal with that much lawsuiting.”

Perez sighed, and pressed the Compile button once again. “We’re carrying on. I promise. But I can’t promise anything beyond that. The Digital World looks to be so fucked up that there’s no telling where any of them are gonna-“

“We have contact!”

“Really?” Perez swivelled round, and adjusted her glasses, typing at an insane speed. “Now? Seriously now?”

Dominic’s face fell. “Wait, no...no, it’s...yes it is! It’s them! It has to be them!”

The man fumbled with his mouse with one hand and wrenched a webcam off his monitor with the other, speaking into the microphone. “Hello? Anyone, make contact? Roger, roger, one, two, three.”

“Dominic, what the hell are you doing?”

“It has to work, it has to.”

The two other crouched around Dominic’s chair, listening intently for any sign of a response. There was a flicker of static, the sound of screaming, then, thankfully, a familiar voice.

“...Hello...?”

“Callum! Is that you?”

On his end of the conversation, Callum nodded. “Finally. Some help.”

“Where are you?” Perez leaned over, staring at the screen. “We can see all five of the devices but can’t actually contact them.”

“They don’t seem to be doing anything.”

Then how are you talking to us?”

There was a pause.

“Lorelie got an e-mail. I think I’m speaking into her ear, but I’m not sure.”

From out of nowhere, Skelton leaned in over Perez’s shoulder. “I think I caught the wrong end of this conversation.”

“Please don’t question it. Right now we’ll take what we can get.”

Dominic swallowed. “Where are you? Are you safe? Can you all get to the core of Yggdrasil?”

“Uuuuuh...”

“Uuuuh what?”

“We’re...uh...we may be missing some people. And some partners.”

“How the hell did that-“

“They buggered off.”

Beat.

“Can you give us a few pointers?”

Dominic sat at his station, his mouth hanging open quite unattractively.

“Uuuuh...”

It was too late. The connection terminated, and the blinking dots vanished once again. Dominic looked up at the other three, who were all giving him looks so dark they could have passed for sunglasses. He let out a whine, and shrank back into his seat.

“I panicked.”

“Anything? ANYTHING?” Perez leaned forward, grabbing her colleague by the scruff of the neck. “ WASN’T THERE ANYTHING USEFUL YOU COULD HAVE TOLD THEM?”

She became aware of the other two walking off, and swung round in her seat. “And where do you two think you’re going?”

Keble sat down, and searched in the drawers of the desk, pulling out an old logbook and a few pens. “Mind if I borrow this?”

“What is that-“

“Look, Perez, you need to calm the hell down.” Keble sat up straight, giving her and Dominic a stern look. “Callum’s alive. They’re all alive. And they’re smart enough to figure something out. So rather than freaking out, the best thing we can do is do as they say. Focus on stabilising the connection or something, and when we talk to them next,” here he held up the logbook and batted the blank pages, “we should have figured out some more concrete way of how to guide them. Alright?”

Perez shut her mouth, and nodded. “We’ll get on it.”

Keble pulled himself forward and began writing at a frantic speed; all possibilities he could think of. Skelton leaned over his shoulder; despite his calm exterior, she knew him well enough to recognise how stressed he was. She cleared her throat. “You need a hand?”

“Can you go and reassure his royal high Lorelie’s dad that we haven’t kidnapped his daughter and that she made her own choice and that she’s actually fine?”

Skelton went pale. “He’s gonna want a proper explanation.”

“Tell him she doesn’t feel like talking right now.”

Skelton narrowed her eyes, causing Keble to sit up, shrugging. Dominic gave a nervous laugh.

“Well...technically you’re not wrong.”

Callum was pacing, holding his free hand up to his chin. Deep thought was never his strong suit, and no matter what he tried to think of as a solution, he kept coming back to a feeling of dread about the fate of the other two. Aardmon sat on the outskirts of the shroud, watching his every move.

“I’m sorry. If I could think of anything-“

She was interrupted by Ursula, who was knelt down, her arms folded. “If anyone could think of anything we’d be better off.” She scowled. “Callum, will you shut your bloody arm up?”

Callum looked over at his shoulder, and noticed she had a point; the arm was acting up more than usual, sending great streams of gibberish across the screen. The fingers were waggling every which way, and the whole device seemed odder than usual. Like there was a compass or a magnet inside, pulling him in a certain direction. He looked out at the greying city, unable to see much through the dust.

“I do hope they’re okay...”

Aardmon let out a nervous laugh. “It’s a big city. They must be...somewhere...”

Callum sighed, and patted his cheeks. “We have a mission, don’t we? What am I waiting around for...?”

He glanced up; at Ursula, who was looking at him, her eyes firm, and at Lorelie, who was shaking her head. The boy’s free hand went to his metal shoulder, feeling the warmth of the metal. Whatever it was, this direction was making it stronger. There was a crack, and the skies opened, the high pressure causing huge drops of rain to fall down on the grey streets.

“Look after the girls, Aardmon. Keep them safe. We’ll all be back soon.”

Aardmon looked up at him, and her eyes were desperate. “Don’t be stupid...”

The boy smiled, and pulled himself away, backing up before she could grab him again.

“I’m already stupid. This isn’t gonna change much.”

He turned and rushed off into the gathering rain, with the aardvark staring helplessly after him.

The penguin stuck his head out and, infuriatingly slowly, looked left and right. He nodded, and pulled himself back in, locking the trapdoor. “There’s a bunch of them. But they’re dumb. They won’t bother looking for you here.”

Eleanor leant against the wall, having to crane her neck due to the low ceiling. She mumbled. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.”

“Cool. I won’t.”

“Eleanor, please...” Martin scratched his head, and looked around the little hut. He didn’t know what he’d expected; it was relatively homely, with places to sit, to lie and to do things. Aside from, you know, the talking penguin in the doorway, everything seemed normal. Something caught his eye; a glint of metal from a straight saxophone, propped up against one wall. Curious, he reached out towards it, holding a knuckle against the metal.

“Ah, no, please!”

The penguin rushed over and hoisted Martin’s arm away. The boy frowned, and looked at his knuckle, which was looking decidedly crimson. “Is that yours?” He stuck his finger in his mouth. “It’s cold. Really cold.”

“Well that was your fault. Don’t touch her, please; you’ll mark her.”

Eleanor raised an eyebrow. “Her? Seriously?”

The penguin breathed on his instrument, and gave it a quick rub with the back of one flipper. “What about it? A musician cares for his instrument above his own life. Why shouldn’t she be given a life of her own?”

Eleanor was unconvinced, but she let it slide. Martin shrugged. “I guess. They’re expensive.”

“This one’s priceless. One of a kind.” The bird straightened up, and adjusted his hat, before sidling to the other wall. “Sorry, it’s a little dark.”

He held up one wing, which in turn revealed what appeared to be a claw, and pressed it against the wall. There was a small click, and the little room lit up, revealing their host in full. He smiled (as much as he could, given the beak) and leant back against the wall.

“Call me Empermon.”

Empermon was quite short, with a fluffy white barrel body and long arms, which ended in sharp claws. His shoulders, back and legs were dark blue, with the short wings he’d seemed to have merely draping over his forearms like a poncho. His feet were webbed, magenta, and thicker than the rest of his legs, giving him the appearance of wearing wellington boots. That itself was weird enough without the fact that he was unashamedly wearing a pink bobble-hat to match them. He had little golden markings over his body, and his tail stuck straight upwards, tapering away at the end like the top of a musical quaver. His eyes were large, blue and innately curious.

“You’re humans, aren’t you?”

Martin put his hands behind his back, looking around. “Who’s asking?”

“Come on, you don’t need to be shy. We’ve all seen you by now. Or heard of you, at least.”

Eleanor shrugged. “Yeah, sure. Whatever. We’re humans.”

“About time. Have you seen what’s been going on with this place?” Empermon sighed, and pulled open a cupboard door, revealing what looked like a warzone inside. “I had this all sorted and then the gravity went screwy.” He shut the door. “You two had better get a move on fixing this.”

Eleanor smiled. “I, uh, don’t know if you noticed, but...”

She didn’t finish, but merely gestured at her leg, which picked this moment to let off a high pitched whine. Empermon looked down in a puzzled fashion, and put a claw to his chin. “Well that’s unfortunate.”

“It certainly is,” said Martin. “We’re supposed to be fixing something here but...we have no idea where we are.” He coughed, and looked away. “And someone else might have gotten us lost.”

“No-one asked you to follow me, Watson.”

Martin ignored her, placing a hand on the table. “You don’t know anything, do you? Anything that might help us?”

Empermon cooed. “I don’t get involved in politics or world disasters or anything like that. Things come, they go, they sort themselves out, I go out and occasionally the world’s on fire or there are four moons instead of three.”

“Meaning?”

“If you’re looking for the digital core, I wouldn’t know where to start. Sorry.”

“Oh. That’s alright.”

Eleanor sighed. “It’s not alright. None of it’s alright.” She turned to Martin. “I know you’re trying to see the bright side but there’s nothing there. We’re lost, we can’t do anything, can’t find anyone and already someone’s tried to kill us. Why aren’t you more...you know...crapping your pants over this? We’ve got nothing.”

Martin shrugged, and looked at Empermon, who echoed his movement. The boy pointed. “We have a penguin.”

Eleanor’s face cracked, and she let out a genuine snort of laughter. “Okay, fair point. Having a penguin on our side is better than nothing.”

Empermon looked between the two as they laughed, his face twisting slightly. “Have I just been volunteered for something?”

Callum had felt quite confident with himself when he’d initially walked out into the rain, ready to locate the two wayward children and bring them all together once again. The gathering storm and ominous darkness hadn’t bothered him a great deal, and although his arm was making it awkward to move around, he felt he’d gotten the hang of it at this point.

But it wasn’t long before reality began to settle in. After gravity had shifted three times (though thankfully all pointing vaguely downwards), and the rain had hardened into a driving sleet, he had been forced to slow down and take proper bearings of his surroundings.

It turns out that marching off into an unknown city on one’s own is not always the most sensible course of action, as Callum was now completely and utterly lost.

He wandered through empty streets, the back of his metal hand dragging along on the stone behind him. It didn’t hurt, per se, but it was distinctly annoying, particularly when it came to turning. But that was the kind of thing you could get used to. The city, on the other hand, was completely alien; bulbous buildings, weird gates to who-knows-where just scattered around, and odd widgets blowing in the wind, from phones to sunglasses to completely unrecognisable gadgets. The city was strange enough, but as Callum travelled further into its depths, he noted that there were far less Digimon hanging around. In fact, the streets were almost empty. There weren’t even any voices nearby.

Left alone with his thoughts, Callum found himself in the inevitable position of trying to justify his recent mistakes. No, not mistakes. ‘Executive decisions’. That sounded like a good phrase to go with at this point. He smiled to himself, and pressed on. Nothing was a mistake if it yielded good results, and so long as he made sure he came across Eleanor and Martin, the results would be...acceptable. ‘Good’ was always a touchy subject when Eleanor was concerned.

Darn. He was thinking too hard about it again.

The sound of voices nearby made him jump, and he slowed down slightly. He could see silhouettes up ahead, and hear the distinct sound of laughter. He stopped, and pulled his arm in front of him holding the shoulder as he watched a gaggle of Digimon come into his field of vision. They were an eclectic group; imps, demons, scarecrows, a fairy in combat gear; all laughing amongst each other and jostling around. Callum noted that a few of them were holding rather dangerous looking devices.

He twiddled his fingers, watching them as they slowly made their way towards him, their conversations slowing as they too noticed him. His legs were being quite adamant that he should run, but his mind stopped him. Perhaps they knew where the other two had gotten to. Or at the very least, they could lead him through the labyrinthine streets.

One of them – a bizarre cactus-ghost creature draped in vaguely offensive Mexican garb – floated around in front of him. “Look...that’s another one.”

“I can see that, genius. We know what humans look like.”

The Tinkermon folded her arms. “Another one? How many of these morons are there?”

Beside her, the Impmon shoved her with a sharp elbow. “You don’t get to have an opinion; you wasted our only good bazooka.”

Callum swallowed. The good news was that either Eleanor or Martin or perhaps both of them had definitely come this way.

The bad news was the presence of the not-at-all friendly people standing in front of him.

He decided to chance it regardless, holding out his free hand and stepping forwards, “Hi, uh, I’m sorry but you haven’t seen two other people pass this way, have you?”

There was a murmer of laughter among the gang, but Impmon raised his hand, stepping forwards himself. As the two got close, Callum could see that his eyes were wild, and he was licking his lips and looking rather disconcertingly down at his beeping hand.

“We might ‘ave.”

“Can you tell me where they went?”

“I can.”

“Please?” Callum smiled weakly. “I don’t wanna get into a thing, you know? It’s not good for any of us.”

The Impmon shrugged. “Makes no difference. S’all gone to shit around here. You’re humans, aint’cha? Everything changes when you’re around, and you always seem to get the best stuff.” Impmon held his arms out. “We live here. We actually have a chance to get decent stuff now. Human stuff is awesome; you can evolve us and make us turn into gods and the like. I think it’s our turn to give it a go.”

Callum considered his options. On the one hand, it sounded intriguing. Particularly the stuff about evolving and turning them into gods. He had to admit; the whole deal about what exactly being a ‘partner’ entailed had rather gone over his head, and it would be very useful to get some concrete answers. On the other hand, he had a feeling he wasn’t going to get very many from the motley group in front of him.

Impmon grinned, and flexed his right hand, twisted wires sticking out from between his fingers like bizarre malformed claws. He pointed at the hunk of metal on Callum’s arm.

“Hand it over, buster.”

Callum settled on a course of action, and handed the metal appendage over to Impmon. Well...handed was an understatement. ‘Swung wildly in an uncontrolled arc’ would be a more appropriate description.

This had two immediate reactions. First, the arm swung around with such ferocity (bear in mind, Callum was quite a strong and athletic young boy) that it clocked Impmon sharply in the side of the head, causing him to let out a hiss and fall to the ground almost instantly.

The second thing – and the thing which Callum felt he should probably have seen coming – was that the arm kept going, twisting his torso round and causing him to fall earthwards as well.

He lay there, his arm pinned across his chest, as he listened to the rumblings behind him. Impmon was out cold, so that was one down at least. It left about eight, standing behind him, and very quickly making it clear that they weren’t too happy with him.

“Gut him!”

“Rip it off!”

“I want the fist!”

This had been a good plan.

In fairness, Callum managed to scramble to his feet and had walked about three steps before he was bundled once again, and within seconds he was on his back, pinned down by several angry mobsters. He looked sideways, watching as his arm stretched out by Vilemon and Tinkermon. They yanked, twisted and scratched at the metal, but all they did was succeed in making it make more of those weird noises. Vilemon swore, and kicked it, causing a spasm of pain up Callum’s shoulder.

“Come on guys, do we have to do this? I’m sorry, alright?”

“Can it, you.” A shadow fell over Callum’s face as the Nohemon stood over him, wielding what looked like the blade from a circular saw, and pointed it down at his shoulder, prodding about.

“It ain’t comin’ apart, Nohemon.”

“I can see that. Bloody human tech.” Nohemon let out a squawk, and Callum noted for the first time that the scarecrow wasn’t actually the one talking, but rather the plush crow that sat permanently attached to its raised hand. Still, the pile of rags looked plenty strong enough the take an arm or two should he see fit.

Callum winced as the serrated blade punctured his chest, just at the point where the flesh gave way to metal. The crow chuckled. “Gotcha.”

“Help!”

“Sing Sing Squall!”

Callum closed his eyes as a blast of freezing wind rushed over him, causing the gaggle of wannabe surgeons to back away, the blast blocking their vision temporarily. Callum heard a thud and a couple of surprised ‘oof’s, before finding himself being dragged to his feet by Martin (albeit slowly).

There was a whack, another ‘owch’, a small explosion, and Empermon ran out of the fog, holding his mini-saxophone in one hand as he pointed behind him. “Time to go!”

Callum watched as the bird ran off, and pointed after him. “That’s a penguin.”

“Well done, genius. Now come on!”

Eleanor grabbed his wrist and yanked him forwards as the first of the stragglers began to battle their way out of the icy fog, yelling obscenities and threats.

“Get back here!”

“Tinkermon, that was my foot!”

“I’ll do your foot in a minute!”

The three children rushed after Empermon, who led them expertly through the alleyway. They didn’t get far before their heavy appendages slowed them down, but the rough sounds of the arm rustlers had begun to fade away. Empermon led them out towards the street, where they stood, catching their breath. Callum looked at the other two, smiling. “Where’ve you been? I was getting worried.”

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

Eleanor marched over towards him and flicked him in the forehead, scowling. “You’re supposed to be back with the others! You’re supposed to be watching them!”

Callum glared back, rubbing his forehead. “They’re fine. They’ve got Aardmon with them; she can look after...”

Even Martin was looking incredulous by this point, so Callum stopped, holding his punctured shoulder. “I thought you needed my help.”

“Oh, yeah. Very helpful you were.”

“Can you give me a break? I’ve just nearly had my arm pulled off!” The boy turned to Empermon, nodding. “Thanks for the help by the way.”

“I swear, I’m gonna kill you!” Eleanor tried to stamp her foot, but in her anger she went for the wrong one, and just ended up bucking her body up and down. “What’s your fucking problem? Are you trying to get everyone around you killed?”

“I wasn’t the one who marched off in the first place!”

“Yeah, and I didn’t ask either of you to come after me!”

“We’re in the Digital World now; you can’t be that selfish.”

“Look who’s talking, you fucking hypocrite!”

Martin timidly raised a hand. “Uh...guys? Now might not be the best time.”

The two warring children turned mid-spar, in time to see a group of seven mobsters standing all around them, venom in their eyes. They were surrounded.

Callum’s shoulders sagged, and he glared at Eleanor. “Now look what you did...”

“Bite me.”

Empermon sighed, and tapped his saxophone against his shoulder. “I knew this was a bad idea...”

Nohemon stood at the head of the pack, and he pointed with the circular blade in his puppet’s hand. “You’re all goin’ down now. We’ll have enough scrap to-“

He paused, and the bird seemed to frown, staring upwards at the sky. Come to think of it, the other scrappers were as well. Some of them dropped the junk they were holding, simply gawping at something up above them.

Martin, Callum, Eleanor and Empermon followed their gaze, staring up at the increasingly dark sky.

“Ah...shit.”

The darkness rolling in was not, as it turned out, due to the night. Rather, it was a shadow.

For the floating city – true to its current status – had floated far into the vicinity of another floating city, with which it seemed like it was going to get rather intimate very quickly. They saw citizens rushing back and forth along the roads like ants, and already the first lot of debris was flying between the two surfaces, crashing into buildings and roofs like meteorites. And still the second city floated closer, ready to crush anything and everything between their surfaces.

The children stared in horror, unable to do a thing, as the furthest corners of the floating cities touched.

There was a rumble.

Silence.

Then the tremors began.

TO BE CONTINUED...