Incredible summary was written by "Akino Ame"...Thank you! Images prepared by Me,Julie.
We start off at the Ichijouji apartment (which is 303 in the Tamachi T.M. complex if anyone wants to know) and Mrs. Ichijouji is checking up on her son. Remember how he fell asleep after "The Crest of Kindness"? He hasn't woken up yet. We begin to look into Ken's past.
Though he's asleep, Ken is still able to think, and he ponders the loss of his heart. His mind drifts back to when he was about five years old, blowing bubbles on the terrace with his older brother Sam (It's at the same apartment-around the same time as when Kari and Tai first saw a Digimon. Sam and Ken did not live at Highton View Terrace). His brother taught him everything, including how to blow the bubbles "...At first I couldn't do it, but he kept encouraging me. Soon I was blowing bubbles bigger than he was. Sam was the real genius of the family, and I was so proud of him."
Unfortunately, Kenny-boy, so was everyone else in the neighborhood. "Neighbor ladies" always came up to Mrs. Ichijouji, bragging about her older son. One even offered to clone him! In Ken's own words, "Those kind of comments went straight to my mom's head." And they sure did. She goes up to Sam, talking about how many neighbors kept talking about him. Ken keeps trying to ask a question, and she turns around and says, "Oh, I'm sorry, Ken. Did you say something?" And you wonder where Ken got all the Wormmon neglect from?
Luck struck the Ichijouji brothers a little later, when Sam was about eleven and Ken was about eight. Ken's on the floor reading manga or something, and Sam's at his computer. All of a sudden, a digivice flies out of the monitor, and the two boys get on the floor to see it:
Ken: "Sam, what is that?"
Sam: "I'm not sure, Kenny-boy. Maybe the computer blew a fuse or something? Let's take a look." He reaches down to pick it up.
Ken: "Be careful, it might still be hot!"
Sam: "Huh?" It isn't. He shakes it to see if anything's broken inside.
Ken: "Is there something inside?"
Sam: "Uh-uh." He gets up and takes it to his drawer. "I don't know what this thing is, but I'm going to find out. Now listen to me, Kenny-boy, whatever you do, don't touch it." He places it in the drawer and walks out of the room.
Older Ken: "I know Sam told me to stay away from it, but I couldn't help myself. It felt like I was being drawn to it somehow, like something was telling me that it belonged to me. I just wanted to look at it. What harm could that do?" The chibier Ken picks up the digivice from the drawer and is pulled into the computer. You know what that means.
Not too much time later, the sky is all red & evil-looking, & Sam walks back into his room.
Sam: "Ken, are you still in my room? You'd better not be touching my stuff."
A bright light flashes out of the computer, and Ken lands on his butt in front of the computer.
Ken: "Wow, cool!" Sam: "Ken!"
Ken: "Uh oh." (He turns around to see none other than...the Digimon Emperor? Now, I normally don't mention the animation, but I have to say this was excellent. A glare is placed in Sam's glasses, giving him the look of the Digimon Emperor. Now, if anyone hadn't figured it out beforehand, it's official: Ken designed the Emperor's look off of Sam.)
Sam: "Just what do you think you're doing?"
Ken: "I didn't break it."
Sam: "I said don't touch it!" He smacks Ken's hand, knocking the digivice away. Ken looks up in fear to see that his brother's eyes are back to normal, but they're filled with rage. "Don't touch my things ever again!"
Ken: "I..I'm sorry."
Sam: (calmer voice) "You have to have respect for people's property, Ken."
Ken: "I will."
Sam: "It's too late for that. I already told you once not to go in my drawer and you broke my trust. Now I'll never be able to trust you again."
Ken: "But I...I...I..."
Sam: "What if you'd gotten hurt? Mom and Dad would be looking to blame someone, it would be me, not you."
Ken: "I said sorry."
Sam: (Digimon Emperor tone) "Now get out. I have to study."
Ken leaves his brother's room, convinced the older kid hates him. But there's nothing he can do about it because his parents would never believe that Sam hit him. In a final act of defiance, he shouts out, "I wish Sam would just disappear!"
Older Ken: "And then, he did."
Though we don't see all the details, we know that at this point, Sam has been run over by that car. Ken is looking at his picture, crying. He believes it all to be his fault, and he decides it's his job to make up for Sam's loss. But on one fateful day, he's playing on Sam's old computer and he finds an e-mail addressed to him. Enter the freaky villain that will show up later.
Freaky voice: "I'm sorry for the loss of your brother. It must have been hard to take."
Older Ken: "I was scared, and yet I was compelled to keep reading. It was as if I'd been waiting for this letter my whole life." Freaky voice (I'll just call him Jamieson Price. I know that's who voices him): "But don't worry. Your brother is in a better place than this world. He is finally at rest. But when his soul became free, yours became trapped. You bear the burden of both his destiny and your own. Now that your parents have lost their hopes for their perfect child, you will be expected to carry out the dreams that Sam can no longer fulfill. This world will become unbearable for you. Pressure to succeed will be too great. But let me tell you about another world that is much more appropriate."
Ken: "What does he mean by another world?"
Jamieson Price: "A world where your soul can finally be free, where you answer to no one but yourself. Open the drawer."
Ken: *gasp* "The drawer!" He's about to reach inside, but hesitates.
Jamieson Price: "Use Sam's digivice!"
Ken: "I'm sorry, Sam."
He reaches in and is pulled into a strange world which we'll call the Dark Ocean because its name will be revealed a bit later in the season.
Older Ken: "I'll never forget the first time I saw the Digital World. It was enormous! I stood there all alone in this huge empty world." Ken: "Where am I?"
[Older Ken: And yet, for the first time in my life, I finally felt like I truly had a home.]
Younger Ken wades into the water, and you can hear jumbled up quotes from the Digimon Emperor. "And I'm afraid that if you can't play by my rules...
[Older Ken: Suddenly, everything made sense to me]
He places his digivice in the water, and it becomes the infamous Dark Digivice. The voices continue talking. Digimon Emperor: "I've been waiting for you to get here; now let the games begin... I'm your worst nightmare come to life... This world and everything in it belong to me now all of you get out... I am the Digimon Emperor... Soon I will have control over the entire Digital World!" Ken pulls the D-3 out of the water as he starts going completely nuts. Watch carefully, and you can see the light in his eyes fading. In fact, Ken's eyes have been without that reflection throughout the entire series before he became good.
Ken: "This is mine now! Nobody can ever take it away from me, or hide it in a drawer!" He clutches it. "I'm in control now."
Well, while all of this is going on, Ken's parents finally see the folly of their ways. They realize that they pushed both of their sons too far with the whole genius thing and now they're paying for it dearly: Sam's dead and Ken's in a coma. But as they try to plead with Ken to wake up, he knows he can't. He still hasn't found his heart.
Older Ken: "I'm still trying to get back to that little kid who used to blow bubbles on his terrace. I'd stand there for hours, blowing them bigger and bigger each time. Each one was completely empty inside, but none of them was as empty inside as I was. Maybe I was trying to show Sam that I could blow bubbles bigger than he could, and that I was better at something than he was. But then again, who was it that taught me to blow the bubbles? Who made the soapy water for me and cut the straws? It wasn't my parents; it was Sam."
Chibi Sam: "Ken, it's all ready to go." Chibi Ken takes the cup of soapy water and the straw.
Chibi Ken: "Thanks, Sam." He begins blowing bubbles while Sam cheers.
Chibi Sam: "That a boy! Wow! Great!" But his little brother hands him the cup.
Chibi Ken: "You try to do it now."
Chibi Sam: "Uh, well, I'm not very good at blowing bubbles."
Chibi Ken: "Come on, Sam, there's nothing in this world that you can't do."
Chibi Sam: "I can do it okay, but my technique isn't quite as good as yours is. Your bubbles come out perfect because you're gentle. I blow too hard and mine pop right away." He demonstrates and a bubble pops. Ken blinks and sees that his brother is gone.
Chibi Ken: "Huh? Sam, where'd you go? Sam, please come back!"
Older Ken: "But Sam won't come back; he's gone forever. Maybe I am too."
Ken finally wakes up, but he doesn't recognize his parents or remember his name. His parents say they'll get the best doctors to help him, and they apologize for the way they've treated him and Sam. Ken notices their tears and is entirely confused. Whenever he gets sad, he goes numb. But there are tears in his own eyes too, and that confuses him even more. Is it possible that his heart isn't lost?
Some time later, he's staring into space, only able to recognize Sam in the pictures. Trying to figure out things, he heads to his room, where his digivice and Crest are waiting on the keyboard. Upon seeing them, he begins to remember someone from his past: a little green bug that was always by his side. He knows where he needs to go now. His mother comes in to check on him, carrying a tray with a cup of tea and four cookies to see that he's gone.
As Ken keeps walking on File Island, he finds that he recognizes the area from somewhere. He knows that his heart lies somewhere around here. But as he ends his journey, he finds a strange town with...
Ken: "Digieggs, hundreds of them. What is this place?"
To his surprise, he gets an answer. He turns to see a Poyomon in a cradle.
Poyomon: "This is the Primary Village." Ken: "Primary Village?"
Poyomon: "That's right. This is the place where all Digimon are reborn and come back as digieggs." Ken: "Reborn? Wormmon too?"
Poyomon: "That's right; Digimon never die; they just get reconfigured."
Excited, Ken runs in search of Wormmon's digiegg only to remember he never actually saw it. As he keeps searching, a Punimon, a Botamon, and a Yuramon attack him verbally and physically, recognizing him. They insist that Wormmon would never return to someone as cruel as Ken, and he remembers his past as the Digimon Emperor. He realizes that his hands are covered in blood. Ken: *thinking* "These hands. These hands have caused so much pain. Sure, put a textbook in them, and I'm a genius. But put a whip in them and I'm the evil Digimon Emperor. How could I have allowed this to go so far?" *speaking* "If I only had the chance, I'd say 'Sorry, Sam.' I'm sorry, Wormmon!"
But the Punimon informs him that it's too late for him to change what he's done. His mistakes will haunt him forever. Ken: "Can't I start over? I know I've caused you all a lot of pain as the Digimon Emperor, but I'm truly sorry now. Please forgive me. The cruel things I've done in the past won't ever leave me, but I've got to move on with my life. I'll use my memories of Sam and of Wormmon to make me stronger. But I can't seem to remember any of the good memories; only the bad ones keep playing in my head over and over again. I've blocked out the good ones. I must force myself to remember the beginning. I must think back to the first time I used Sam's digivice to go to the Digital World!"
He has a flashback to what was actually the first time. He, Wormmon, and some kid by the name of Ryo Akiyama are walking through a desert. A Gazimon leaps out and attacks Ken, but Wormmon hits it instead. Ken's worried about his friend, but Wormmon assures him that he's okay. He says that he likes Ken for his kindness, which reminds him of what Sam said about his gentleness. Ken promises Wormmon that he'll never let the forces of evil corrupt his innocence. The older Ken realizes how fast he broke his promise and swears that for the rest of his life he'll be the way Wormmon wanted him to be. With this new promise, his Crest begins to glow.
Ken: "What's this?"
Poyomon: "That's your Crest of Kindness."
Ken: "Are you sure it's mine?"
But the Crest's glowing causes a digiegg to start glowing. The digiegg hatches to Leafmon, Wormmon's baby form. He thanks Ken for keeping his promise about being kind and gentle, and Ken thanks him for giving him a second chance. Ken: *thinking* "I wonder. If I was the one who was gone instead of Sam, would Wormmon be the only one who would miss me? Hmm. No, I don't think so."
Sure enough, back home his parents are crying their eyes out with worry. He finally appears and understands that they really do love him. He calls his mother Mama and more hugging and crying happens. But the episode ends on a single photograph on the table: one of Sam Ichijouji. Ken: "Now I can finally say it: Thank you, Sam, for helping me to find my heart."
