Butter-Fly Effect

"Do you know what happened to them?" You ask. It feels like sort of an important question, particularly when the partner to one of the Sovereigns is in the room with you. "We've been... trying to figure it out for a while, but..." You hadn't even realized the Dark Masters were loose until you were retreating from this world with a trio of keychains.

Elecmon gives a heavy sigh. "That... Yes and no. The thing is, the Sovereigns have never been the easiest Digimon to reach. For a while, they had twelve Devas to act as messengers, and you could reach them through them, but around eight hundred of our years ago, the Devas started to die out. I don't know if it was old age, or if the Dark Masters attacked them, or what, but they haven't been replaced since then."

"Eight hundred years ago..." Rikuto furrows his brow, clearly thinking about something. "That would be about when Azulongmon stopped replying to my messages."

If that's the case, then... that would also be when Maki was captured by the Dark Masters. "Do you think the Dark Masters attacked the Devas?" You ask him.

"The timing fits... but you don't know how they died?" He asks Elecmon.

"If they've been reborn, they don't carry any memories of their old lives, or at least haven't chosen to share them. But there were places where you could meet with them, and there would normally be at least one there. The last Deva, Sinduramon, vanished almost fifty years ago, and with him, all knowledge of the Sovereigns whereabouts."

"And it started eight hundred years ago." Rikuto looks sort of confused now. "If it was the Dark Masters, I... wonder why it took them so long."

"Maybe they were trying not to be noticed," You suggest. "Though... with how long they've been free for... there's not a lot of Digimon who realized they were. There might have been Datamon, but..." You aren't entirely sure you can trust that when Datamon's sanity was clearly... questionable.

"They didn't need a lot to stay hidden, though," Impmon points out. "Just to deal with any witnesses. As long as nobody who saw them remembered their previous lives... they could get away with anything."

The Dark Masters would have needed to kill a lot of Digimon for that to work. You can't help but wonder if this was why they attacked Primary Village. It would make a lot of sense, if that were the case.

"Remember... past lives?" Chibimon tips his head to the side. "What's that?"

"...It doesn't matter," Elecmon says. "Unless something big changes... it's not going to happen any more."

Right... there's no eggs in the village, except for the ones you took back from Kiwimon.

Elecmon sounds hopeless, and honestly... you don't know what to do next, either. But you have to do something, even if it's just sitting around here trying to figure out what to do next.

You'd like to do something a bit more than that, though. Just a little.


[ ] You could stay and help take care of the younger Digimon for a few days. Even if it doesn't accomplish much, it will be kind of relaxing, and it'd probably make Elecmon happy.

[ ] Rikuto still feels that odd pull to somewhere else. You really don't have anything better to do than to follow it.

[ ] With how things are... you may as well try and attack Puppetmon. You can't guarantee it'd go well, but at least you'd be doing something.

As the DigiDestined who knew of their purpose left to return to the Digital World, the Analog World initially went by without noticing.

However, things could not stay hidden forever, and eventually the two worlds became imposed on each other's skies.

This, naturally, had an effect on many people... some of them moreso than others.

---

Far away from where the other experienced DigiDestined lived, a small boy played in a field with his two partners when the world lit up. The three of them paused, turning to see the sky emblazoned with many colors.

"Willis...?" The pink Digimon started, staring upwards with wide eyes. "What's that?"

"I- I don't know...." His hand slipped into his pocket, fingers closing tightly around an odd device, which he'd carried for the past four years, ever since that day in March when an egg had appeared from the family computer.

...Or, that was what his mother had told him had happened. At the time, he'd been too young to really remember. All that he knew was that Gummymon and Kokomon had been his constant companions ever since.

"It feels... familiar," Gummymon almost whispered.

Kokomon nodded. "Yeah. It's like... we've been there before."

"But... you hatched here." It was the one thing they could all agree on. The two Digimon had no idea where they came from, or why they'd originally been in the shapes of Zerimon and Conomon, or even why they were called Digimon, but they definitely knew that this was the place where they were meant to be. Not that they remembered anywhere else.

But there was this sky, and they were calling it familiar.

"Maybe we'd find out more if we went there!" Gummymon suggested.

Kokomon gave his brother a look. "A-are you sure? That place looks dangerous..."

"I dunno how we'd even get up there," Willis agreed. Sometimes, staticky shapes would come down, but... "We can't just... fly, or anything. Unless you have wings?" The twin blobs shook their heads.

On their way back home, the three of them were attacked by some living statues that faded from existence as quickly as they appeared, but not before Willis' friends took on new shapes in order to fight them.

Somehow, this just brought up even more questions.

---

A bit closer to the place where everything could have conceivably been said to be happening, there were people who were just as confused.

Today, Luche had said that she wanted to play in the park with her friend Ken, and Shoma hadn't seen that much reason to say no. Not that he'd ever been able to say no to her. Someone needed to be nice to her, with how the teachers at her school were. It wasn't her fault that her father was missing, presumed dead.

He was carrying Viximon like a stuffed toy today, and Kapurimon, as far as he could tell, had not left his usual spot inside Luche's bag. They'd been able to keep the existence of the Digimon a complete secret for four years, now, ever since the April when Uncle Sakuya had gone missing without a trace, and they weren't about to let that streak break now.

Sure, it could be hard to keep them fed, sometimes, but... they were managing.

Ken's brother had made some bubble mix for the kids to play with, so they were blowing bubbles, while Viximon's eyes darted after them, a look on her face that said quite clearly that she wanted to chase the pretty, fragile things, despite being in the presence of someone who wasn't Shoma or Luche.

The bubbles floated into the sky, and when one of them popped, suddenly another world appeared above their own.

"W-what's happening?" Shoma asked, looking up.

Luche glanced up as well, unable to take her gaze off of the sky. "It's... have we been there before?"

"I... don't think so." They'd never left Tamachi, had they? Luche's existence was one of those things that was really awkward to explain... especially when one of her parents had vanished long ago, and the other, as far as he could tell, might never have existed. "We've always been here."

"...Oh."

"I think it's familiar, too!" Kapurimon spoke up, leaping out of Luche's bag.

Shoma froze. Ken was right there. There was no way that this could possibly end well...

Ken looked at the little Digimon. "You can talk?"

He nodded, a grin on his face. "I'm Kapurimon! It's nice to finally meet you properly!" He offered his tail to Ken, who hesitantly shook it.

"It's... nice to meet you, too..." He just sounded really confused by the whole thing, and it was hard to blame him.

"Kapurimon..." Viximon groaned. "You know we're not supposed to talk to people."

"But Viximon..."

Shoma wasn't sure what he'd been expecting. The end of the world, maybe, if someone were to find out about the Digimon. The last thing Uncle Sakuya had ever told him was that it was important to keep the contents of the eggs they'd been given a secret.

But... the two of them were talking to Ken. And the world hadn't ended, the Digimon hadn't disappeared... if something bad was happening- and it probably was- it was going on completely independent of them.

Seeing the odd lines of land displayed across the sky, forests, seas, cities and mountains... he wondered if Uncle Sakuya had ever known about this.

And if he had... then why had he never said anything?

When you volunteer to stick around the ruins of Primary Village for a few days, you have multiple reasons for it. It'll make Elecmon happy, it'll give you a chance to see things on the ground before charging straight into battle, it's generally healthier than wandering aimlessly through the wilderness...

There's one thing, however, that you hadn't considered as a possibility, but is now a very obvious bonus- adorable Baby Digimon.

"Some of 'em really should have Digivolved sooner..." Impmon sighs, casting a particular glance at Ketomon. "But there's only so much food and light, and even if they don't technically photosynthesize..."

Thinking about it, your partner wasn't Nyokimon for very long at all. You aren't sure if that's supposed to normally be the case, but from what your hearing right now, it could have taken longer than it did. "I guess we can't just arrange playdates outside, then?"

Elecmon shakes his head. "Too much attention. We might be able to get this place functioning again if all of these little ones can survive to Rookie form, but... reaching Rookie in this world isn't easy." You aren't sure if he means the world under the Dark Masters, or the Digital World in general. "Might be better, if we have extra hands out searching for food." You're assuming that he's very, very glad Impmon didn't just leave after reaching Rookie.

"I... might be able to handle that," Rikuto says. "You just need to describe what you want me to find- I don't actually remember what anything's called, and I haven't had to survive on my own in years." You suppose that going half a decade without being in constant fear for his life would make him a bit rusty. "Not that I was... ever that great at it to begin with..."

"I suppose you wouldn't be in a position to identify mushrooms by scent?" When he shakes his head, Elecmon sighed. "I used to know a Boarmon who could do that kind of thing, but it turns out that fire Digimon really aren't stealthy at all."

You're hoping that he realized this beforehand, and that it isn't some kind of huge new revelation.

"What should I do?" You ask.

"You should stay here. You and Biyomon are the best potential guards we have. ...Only potential guards, actually, but maybe try not to think about that too much."

It's too late. You're already thinking about it.

---

But back to the topic at hand. Adorable Baby Digimon, and some In-Trainings, too. There's Chibimon and Minomon, Upamon and Poromon, Ketomon, Punimon, Botamon and YukimiBotamon... so many tiny lives that the Dark Masters would love to snuff out.

And they are tiny. You can only understand half of them when they speak, the other four being limited to softly squeaking out their own names and requiring a translator. Most of the time, this is Biyomon.

"Hey, Sora?" Chibimon speaks with a slight lisp, which gets more pronounced the more excited he is. "Could you tell us a story?"

"Um... what kind of story do you want?" You aren't sure you'd be all that good of a storyteller...

Minomon hops up to you as well. "Um... maybe you could tell us about what you do? DigiDestined... they have adventures, right?"

"Ooh, yeah! Tell us about your adventures!" This doesn't narrow things down a whole lot! Still, they want a story, so you might as well tell them one...



[ ] You'll tell them about the Parrotmon incident and the time leading up to it.

[ ] You'll tell them about the Black Gears and the last Digimon to use them.

[ ] You'll tell them about Datamon, and the trap that he set for you.

[ ] You'll tell them about a castle on the hill, and what the Dark Masters did to it.

[ ] You'll tell them about a friendship gone sour, and the fight that resulted from it.