Digimon Fan Fiction ❯ Sent ❯ The Captive Chosen ( Chapter 10 )
[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]
By: Dephs 
Anime/Manga: Digimon Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Hentai / Adventure / Action | Type: Continuation | Uploaded On: 02.16.2010 | Pages: 3 | Words: 3.0K | Visits: 289 | Status: Work In Progress
Anime/Manga: Digimon Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Hentai / Adventure / Action | Type: Continuation | Uploaded On: 02.16.2010 | Pages: 3 | Words: 3.0K | Visits: 289 | Status: Work In Progress
Why? Why had Daisuke said that back in the hall? I banged my head against the pillow again. Once Dai had run and hid from me under the guise of sleeping I had tried to do the same. So far all I had gotten was a nasty headache from banging my head.
"Miyako? Are you going to keep banging your head, or are you going to actually sleep?" Hawkmon said, obviously annoyed with my self abuse.
"I think I'm going to keep banging my head," I said sarcastically. He rolled his eyes at me.
"Is something wrong with you and Daisuke?" he asked, concerned about me, even if I was being a bitch.
"Sort of," I replied, trying not to take out my frustration of him. It wasn't his fault that Daisuke and I had feelings for each other.
"Are you fighting? Is there anything Vmon or I can do to help?"
I gave him a smile. "No, I'm sure it'll all work out on its own. Don't worry about it. Let's go grab some food and worry about this later?"
Hawkmon gave me a nod and we went to the kitchen. I hated to lie to my partner like that, but I couldn't exactly make him understand what was going on in my head. Sure, our partners got the concept of dating and marriage and mating, but they didn't quite get things like cheating. Sometimes I wished humans reproduced by just falling out of the sky as an egg, but then I remembered sex.
After a minute of scrounging in the kitchen I came up with some chips and salsa and we sat down to eat.
When I didn't say anything for a few minutes Hawkmon nudged me.
"Are you sure everything is ok?" he asked me.
"Yes, Dai and I had a bit of a falling out, but nothing serious. You know how him and I are."
"Of course, of course," he said, still not completely convinced, "If there's anything
I can do, let me know. I'm going to bed. I didn't get anymore sleep during the day today than I got last night with Iori's sleep talking. I'll see you tomorrow."
With that the bird digimon left the room, leaving me to clean up the mess. I ate a bit more and did so, then went to find Iori. It was already eleven. Gennai was probably asleep, and even if he wasn't than it was doubtful that he'd notice is gone. Dai and I disappeared for the whole day and he didn't notice.
Iori was in the living room, playing snake on his new digivice.
"Hey, you ready to go?" I asked him. He looked up at me, then down at his watch.
"Sure, let me go get the whiskey, you go wake up Dai," he said before stretching and crawling off of the couch.
"Uh, maybe you should get Dai. He might be a little mad at me."
Iori looked at me. "Does this have anything to do with you storming off after him earlier?"
"Is it any of your business?"
"Touche, but seeing as I don't want two raging drunks beating each other during my peaceful drinking time, it is."
I sighed and glared. Damn eleven year olds. There was no way in hell we were this annoying when we were his age.
"Yes, it does. There won't be any raging drunks beating each other though." If anything he'd have two raging drunks making out all over the place.
Iori shrugged, but turned to get Daisuke and the booze.
---
"Woohoo!" Dai yelled, stripping his clothes as he ran for the water. He dove in with another whoop and his head poked up a second later. "You guys have got to get in here. Its warm as hell."
Iori and just stared at him.
"I think I need some whiskey in me before I take off any clothes," I told him. Iori
agreed grabbed the bottle, taking a long pull before he handed it to me. I checked the bottle, there was a large amount missing, larger than I would expect Tai to drink on his first swig. To say I didn't approved would have been an understatement, but Dai was right. Iori was going to get drunk either way; something told me this wasn't his only bottle.
Not wanting to be out done by the kid, I took a giant gulp of the amber liquid. I sputtered and coughed, trying to breathe. I felt like I had had liquid fire poured down my throat.
"First time with the hard stuff Miyako?" Dai said, patting me on the back with his
sopping wet hand. I glared at him, then blushed as I realized that he was naked and I had a very clear view of everything.
"Yes, thank you, it is. I prefer my alcohol more on the gentle side," I said when I could finally breathe.
"Yeah, but I don't. Pass it here." I handed the bottle to Dai and he drank a fair amount before handing it back to Iori. He offered it to me and I gratefully took it. I was not going to make it easy for Daisuke to make fun of me. I drank the alcohol more slowly this time and managed not to choke. Iori took another draft from the bottle and capped it. It was already a third gone.
I looked at the two boys and smirked. "Let's go get in the water!"
With that the three of us took off and dove in, Iori and I struggling to get our clothes off as we jumped in head first. Iori took off swimming, leaving the two of us alone to do what we wanted.
"Want to race?" Daisuke asked, a mischievous look on his face. I couldn't turn down a challenge like that.
"Sure."
"To that tree?" He pointed to a tree not far from where we were. I nodded and he held up his fingers. Three. Two. One. And off swimming we went.
---
"Hey, where'd Iori go? I haven't seen him for a while," I said, trying to ignore Daisuke's bare chest gleaming in the moonlight.
"Uh, I think he's still on the shore. That's where I last saw him." Daisuke on the other hand had no such issue with staring at me. He had drunk a lot more than I had though.
We stood there for a few minutes awkwardly and I cursed my body for betraying me. Seeing Dai naked was turning me on, and I knew from when we crashed while on our third race (and roughly five shots for me and eight for him) that he too was turned on.
Finally Daisuke stopped staring at my chest long enough to look up at me and see that I was doing the same with his. I blushed and turned away, but he grabbed my wrist and pulled me towards him, tilting my head up and kissing me softly. I’d like to say that I broke it off and walked away, but with how inebriated I was and how my body reacted I turned Daisuke’s chaste kiss into a deep passionate (dare I say loving?) kiss.
As our tongues mingled I pressed closer to him, as close as I could with his erection. He placed his hand on my chest and slowly massaged my breasts, rolling the hardened nipples between his fingers and making my breathe catch. When he got the reaction he wanted he broke off the kiss and instead put his mouth on my left breast, the other still being toyed with by his hand. After a moment he pulled back and softly blew on the nipple, before switching. I moaned loudly. Ken had never made me feel this good, hell, I had never even made myself feel this good. Daisuke’s free hand moved lower and lower, but eventually I had to stop him. I couldn’t move this fast with him. It was bad enough that I was cheating on Ken, I couldn’t be easy too. Instead I managed to maneuver myself around so I was at his back, my hands all over his cock and balls. I pumped him in a fairly fast, but steady rhythm and massaged his balls.
“Oh god, Miyako,” he moaned, “Don’t stop. This feels so damn good… so good.” I obliged and began kissing, sucking and biting on his neck to help edge him along. My arm was beginning to burn, but no matter what I wasn’t going to stop until Dai came.
“Miyako, Miyako, you’re so good. I’m almost there, I’m almost there. Oh god, oh god, I’m cumming! I’m cumming!” With his final shout he shot his seed into the water and his penis went limp. When his orgasm subsided he turned around and hugged me, then kissed me on the lips. It made me melt, until we were interrupted.
“So this is what you two were fighting about.” We turned around to see that Iori had woken up and was currently looking at us with a know all smirk. I started to sink into the water and Daisuke shoved me behind him.
“What are you doing up?” he asked, “I thought you had passed out from too much booze.”
Iori rolled his eyes, “I’m not a lightweight, I just fell asleep. Hearing your yells of ‘I’m cumming!’ tends to wake a man up Daisuke, which by the way, I’m not happy about. Next time you guys decide to have sex or whatever, please do it when I‘m not close enough to hear you.”
“Wait a second, we did not have sex! I am not that easy!” I was furious. “Just because I’m a cheater doesn’t mean I just give it up like that! I happen to have standards you know!”
Iori just snorted, then threw the bottle in his hands to Daisuke. “I think you’re going to need that, Dai.”
With that the boy walked off. I tried to go after him, but Daisuke held me back. “Don’t worry about him. He’s just entering the mouthy portion of the teenage years early. That and he’s drunk. I’ll talk to him about it tomorrow, but fighting with him now isn’t going to solve anything. Let’s just finish off the bottle and go inside and enjoy the rest of our evening.”
Dai unscrewed the bottle and handed it to me. I graciously accepted and took a long draft. Dai took it back and finished it off and we headed in, following in Iori’s wake. We looked in the window, making sure it was ok to come in and slowly opened the door.
“Don’t bother trying to be sneaky,” a voice called from the room over, “I know you guys snuck out and I already caught Iori.”
I groaned. I just wanted to go to bed. I was ready to be done for the day.
Dai and I walked into the living room, staring at the floor. We were more ashamed that we got caught then the fact we snuck out.
To say Gennai was unhappy would have been an understatement. He was livid. Our digimon were all there too in a similar state of displeasement. Iori was sitting on the couch in full angst mode, which is where we ended up. Gennai stared at us for a moment.
“So? What do you have to say for yourselves?” None of us answered. “I guess you have nothing. Seeing as you don’t I will speak instead. What in the name of Azulongmon do you think you were doing? Let’s count the issues with this situation. First, you snuck out. Second, it was at night. Third, you had no digimon. The fourth and final mistake being that you stole contraband from me. Now, all of you know better than this. You’re Chosen and need to act like it.”
At this Iori looked up. “Yes, we’re Chosen. And? Its not like there are generations upon generations before us that we can look to and follow their example. We’re kids. We act like kids and do the same things all kids do, especially kids with the weight of the fucking world on their shoulders.”
I spoke up next, “That’s true. We act like we’re years ahead of other kids our age, but we still don’t have the rights. We’ve fought horrific monsters, but we aren’t allowed to go out and have a little fun. I’d expect this conversation coming from our parents, but you Gennai? I would have expected you to have a little more faith in us.”
Finally Daisuke took a shot, “And so what if we left the house. It’s not like we don’t know what to do in case of danger. We’ve done it many a time before when we’ve been separated from our partners. We’re used to being outside, not locked in. If we have to stay in here constantly than I know that I’ll get cabin fever and kill all of us. If we’re locked in here we’re like your captives.
Gennai looked at us flabbergasted, but Vmon, Armadillomon and Hawkmon weren’t so easily deterred.
“Why didn’t you bring us?” Hawkmon asked, “We could have protected you had anything gone awry.”
“Yeah, what he said,” Vmon chimed in.
“Because you guys would have stopped us?” Daisuke said, confused as to why this was even being asked. They knew why they weren’t brought.
“Only because it would keep you safe!” Vmon yelled.
“Vmon, you’re proving their point,” Armadillomon told him, rolling his eyes.
“Oh, no, we never would have told Gennai!” Vmon said, trying to fix the situation. The other two digimon laughed at this, their anger forgotten. Iori stood up.
“Well, if that’s all, I’m going to bed. I personally want to sleep off all of this alcohol. I’ll see you in the morning.”
Dai did the same, pulling me up with him. It was time for all of us to make our grand escape. “Us too, good night.” With that we sped towards our room. I sat down on my sleeping bag and Dai headed straight for the bathroom.
I changed and Daisuke came back into the room carrying two glasses of water. He handed one to me and said, “Drink this.”
“Um, why?” I asked.
“If you drink a few cups then you won’t have as bad of a hangover tomorrow. Iori’s in the bathroom drinking a bunch of it right now.”
I nodded and downed the cup. As soon as it was gone Dai handed me the other one.
“What about you? Don’t you need some?” I asked.
“I had some in the bathroom. Now, finish that up so we can go to bed.” I did as he said, then got into my sleeping bag, which I had snuggled up next to Dai’s.
“Goodnight Miyako.”
“Goodnight Daisuke.”
A/n: Is anyone else enjoying how much Dai has grown up since 02? I know I am. I always thought that given a few years he’d be a very different person with a more grown up personality. So this chapter has almost been complete for about two months now. Why didn’t I post it? Because chapter nine was kicking my ass up one side of the street and down the other. It just wasn’t working, and then today I just said screw it and typed it out. So, yay! New chapters!
Another thing is that I have a whole series set in the RTS Universe (RTS stands for Return to Sender, which was actually thought up before Sent). So far there are three sequels, the aforementioned Return to Sender, XTC and a yet The Chosen Five, which is subject to change.
XTC: This is Iori centric and deals with what happens after his grandfather dies and how he makes money for the family. This is more of a companion to Sent than a sequel.
Return to Sender: This is a direct sequel to Sent and deals with what happens in the Chosen’s lives and with a new set of chosen.
The Chosen Five: The five original chosen. This is obviously a prequel, but part of it is set during RTS. At some point it will become imperative to read it to understand parts of RTS, but not in the beginning.
None of these are going to start popping up anytime soon (with the exception of XTC. I’m about halfway done with it.) but I thought you might like to know where this is headed. I hope you enjoyed this chapter.
Dephs
"Miyako? Are you going to keep banging your head, or are you going to actually sleep?" Hawkmon said, obviously annoyed with my self abuse.
"I think I'm going to keep banging my head," I said sarcastically. He rolled his eyes at me.
"Is something wrong with you and Daisuke?" he asked, concerned about me, even if I was being a bitch.
"Sort of," I replied, trying not to take out my frustration of him. It wasn't his fault that Daisuke and I had feelings for each other.
"Are you fighting? Is there anything Vmon or I can do to help?"
I gave him a smile. "No, I'm sure it'll all work out on its own. Don't worry about it. Let's go grab some food and worry about this later?"
Hawkmon gave me a nod and we went to the kitchen. I hated to lie to my partner like that, but I couldn't exactly make him understand what was going on in my head. Sure, our partners got the concept of dating and marriage and mating, but they didn't quite get things like cheating. Sometimes I wished humans reproduced by just falling out of the sky as an egg, but then I remembered sex.
After a minute of scrounging in the kitchen I came up with some chips and salsa and we sat down to eat.
When I didn't say anything for a few minutes Hawkmon nudged me.
"Are you sure everything is ok?" he asked me.
"Yes, Dai and I had a bit of a falling out, but nothing serious. You know how him and I are."
"Of course, of course," he said, still not completely convinced, "If there's anything
I can do, let me know. I'm going to bed. I didn't get anymore sleep during the day today than I got last night with Iori's sleep talking. I'll see you tomorrow."
With that the bird digimon left the room, leaving me to clean up the mess. I ate a bit more and did so, then went to find Iori. It was already eleven. Gennai was probably asleep, and even if he wasn't than it was doubtful that he'd notice is gone. Dai and I disappeared for the whole day and he didn't notice.
Iori was in the living room, playing snake on his new digivice.
"Hey, you ready to go?" I asked him. He looked up at me, then down at his watch.
"Sure, let me go get the whiskey, you go wake up Dai," he said before stretching and crawling off of the couch.
"Uh, maybe you should get Dai. He might be a little mad at me."
Iori looked at me. "Does this have anything to do with you storming off after him earlier?"
"Is it any of your business?"
"Touche, but seeing as I don't want two raging drunks beating each other during my peaceful drinking time, it is."
I sighed and glared. Damn eleven year olds. There was no way in hell we were this annoying when we were his age.
"Yes, it does. There won't be any raging drunks beating each other though." If anything he'd have two raging drunks making out all over the place.
Iori shrugged, but turned to get Daisuke and the booze.
---
"Woohoo!" Dai yelled, stripping his clothes as he ran for the water. He dove in with another whoop and his head poked up a second later. "You guys have got to get in here. Its warm as hell."
Iori and just stared at him.
"I think I need some whiskey in me before I take off any clothes," I told him. Iori
agreed grabbed the bottle, taking a long pull before he handed it to me. I checked the bottle, there was a large amount missing, larger than I would expect Tai to drink on his first swig. To say I didn't approved would have been an understatement, but Dai was right. Iori was going to get drunk either way; something told me this wasn't his only bottle.
Not wanting to be out done by the kid, I took a giant gulp of the amber liquid. I sputtered and coughed, trying to breathe. I felt like I had had liquid fire poured down my throat.
"First time with the hard stuff Miyako?" Dai said, patting me on the back with his
sopping wet hand. I glared at him, then blushed as I realized that he was naked and I had a very clear view of everything.
"Yes, thank you, it is. I prefer my alcohol more on the gentle side," I said when I could finally breathe.
"Yeah, but I don't. Pass it here." I handed the bottle to Dai and he drank a fair amount before handing it back to Iori. He offered it to me and I gratefully took it. I was not going to make it easy for Daisuke to make fun of me. I drank the alcohol more slowly this time and managed not to choke. Iori took another draft from the bottle and capped it. It was already a third gone.
I looked at the two boys and smirked. "Let's go get in the water!"
With that the three of us took off and dove in, Iori and I struggling to get our clothes off as we jumped in head first. Iori took off swimming, leaving the two of us alone to do what we wanted.
"Want to race?" Daisuke asked, a mischievous look on his face. I couldn't turn down a challenge like that.
"Sure."
"To that tree?" He pointed to a tree not far from where we were. I nodded and he held up his fingers. Three. Two. One. And off swimming we went.
---
"Hey, where'd Iori go? I haven't seen him for a while," I said, trying to ignore Daisuke's bare chest gleaming in the moonlight.
"Uh, I think he's still on the shore. That's where I last saw him." Daisuke on the other hand had no such issue with staring at me. He had drunk a lot more than I had though.
We stood there for a few minutes awkwardly and I cursed my body for betraying me. Seeing Dai naked was turning me on, and I knew from when we crashed while on our third race (and roughly five shots for me and eight for him) that he too was turned on.
Finally Daisuke stopped staring at my chest long enough to look up at me and see that I was doing the same with his. I blushed and turned away, but he grabbed my wrist and pulled me towards him, tilting my head up and kissing me softly. I’d like to say that I broke it off and walked away, but with how inebriated I was and how my body reacted I turned Daisuke’s chaste kiss into a deep passionate (dare I say loving?) kiss.
As our tongues mingled I pressed closer to him, as close as I could with his erection. He placed his hand on my chest and slowly massaged my breasts, rolling the hardened nipples between his fingers and making my breathe catch. When he got the reaction he wanted he broke off the kiss and instead put his mouth on my left breast, the other still being toyed with by his hand. After a moment he pulled back and softly blew on the nipple, before switching. I moaned loudly. Ken had never made me feel this good, hell, I had never even made myself feel this good. Daisuke’s free hand moved lower and lower, but eventually I had to stop him. I couldn’t move this fast with him. It was bad enough that I was cheating on Ken, I couldn’t be easy too. Instead I managed to maneuver myself around so I was at his back, my hands all over his cock and balls. I pumped him in a fairly fast, but steady rhythm and massaged his balls.
“Oh god, Miyako,” he moaned, “Don’t stop. This feels so damn good… so good.” I obliged and began kissing, sucking and biting on his neck to help edge him along. My arm was beginning to burn, but no matter what I wasn’t going to stop until Dai came.
“Miyako, Miyako, you’re so good. I’m almost there, I’m almost there. Oh god, oh god, I’m cumming! I’m cumming!” With his final shout he shot his seed into the water and his penis went limp. When his orgasm subsided he turned around and hugged me, then kissed me on the lips. It made me melt, until we were interrupted.
“So this is what you two were fighting about.” We turned around to see that Iori had woken up and was currently looking at us with a know all smirk. I started to sink into the water and Daisuke shoved me behind him.
“What are you doing up?” he asked, “I thought you had passed out from too much booze.”
Iori rolled his eyes, “I’m not a lightweight, I just fell asleep. Hearing your yells of ‘I’m cumming!’ tends to wake a man up Daisuke, which by the way, I’m not happy about. Next time you guys decide to have sex or whatever, please do it when I‘m not close enough to hear you.”
“Wait a second, we did not have sex! I am not that easy!” I was furious. “Just because I’m a cheater doesn’t mean I just give it up like that! I happen to have standards you know!”
Iori just snorted, then threw the bottle in his hands to Daisuke. “I think you’re going to need that, Dai.”
With that the boy walked off. I tried to go after him, but Daisuke held me back. “Don’t worry about him. He’s just entering the mouthy portion of the teenage years early. That and he’s drunk. I’ll talk to him about it tomorrow, but fighting with him now isn’t going to solve anything. Let’s just finish off the bottle and go inside and enjoy the rest of our evening.”
Dai unscrewed the bottle and handed it to me. I graciously accepted and took a long draft. Dai took it back and finished it off and we headed in, following in Iori’s wake. We looked in the window, making sure it was ok to come in and slowly opened the door.
“Don’t bother trying to be sneaky,” a voice called from the room over, “I know you guys snuck out and I already caught Iori.”
I groaned. I just wanted to go to bed. I was ready to be done for the day.
Dai and I walked into the living room, staring at the floor. We were more ashamed that we got caught then the fact we snuck out.
To say Gennai was unhappy would have been an understatement. He was livid. Our digimon were all there too in a similar state of displeasement. Iori was sitting on the couch in full angst mode, which is where we ended up. Gennai stared at us for a moment.
“So? What do you have to say for yourselves?” None of us answered. “I guess you have nothing. Seeing as you don’t I will speak instead. What in the name of Azulongmon do you think you were doing? Let’s count the issues with this situation. First, you snuck out. Second, it was at night. Third, you had no digimon. The fourth and final mistake being that you stole contraband from me. Now, all of you know better than this. You’re Chosen and need to act like it.”
At this Iori looked up. “Yes, we’re Chosen. And? Its not like there are generations upon generations before us that we can look to and follow their example. We’re kids. We act like kids and do the same things all kids do, especially kids with the weight of the fucking world on their shoulders.”
I spoke up next, “That’s true. We act like we’re years ahead of other kids our age, but we still don’t have the rights. We’ve fought horrific monsters, but we aren’t allowed to go out and have a little fun. I’d expect this conversation coming from our parents, but you Gennai? I would have expected you to have a little more faith in us.”
Finally Daisuke took a shot, “And so what if we left the house. It’s not like we don’t know what to do in case of danger. We’ve done it many a time before when we’ve been separated from our partners. We’re used to being outside, not locked in. If we have to stay in here constantly than I know that I’ll get cabin fever and kill all of us. If we’re locked in here we’re like your captives.
Gennai looked at us flabbergasted, but Vmon, Armadillomon and Hawkmon weren’t so easily deterred.
“Why didn’t you bring us?” Hawkmon asked, “We could have protected you had anything gone awry.”
“Yeah, what he said,” Vmon chimed in.
“Because you guys would have stopped us?” Daisuke said, confused as to why this was even being asked. They knew why they weren’t brought.
“Only because it would keep you safe!” Vmon yelled.
“Vmon, you’re proving their point,” Armadillomon told him, rolling his eyes.
“Oh, no, we never would have told Gennai!” Vmon said, trying to fix the situation. The other two digimon laughed at this, their anger forgotten. Iori stood up.
“Well, if that’s all, I’m going to bed. I personally want to sleep off all of this alcohol. I’ll see you in the morning.”
Dai did the same, pulling me up with him. It was time for all of us to make our grand escape. “Us too, good night.” With that we sped towards our room. I sat down on my sleeping bag and Dai headed straight for the bathroom.
I changed and Daisuke came back into the room carrying two glasses of water. He handed one to me and said, “Drink this.”
“Um, why?” I asked.
“If you drink a few cups then you won’t have as bad of a hangover tomorrow. Iori’s in the bathroom drinking a bunch of it right now.”
I nodded and downed the cup. As soon as it was gone Dai handed me the other one.
“What about you? Don’t you need some?” I asked.
“I had some in the bathroom. Now, finish that up so we can go to bed.” I did as he said, then got into my sleeping bag, which I had snuggled up next to Dai’s.
“Goodnight Miyako.”
“Goodnight Daisuke.”
A/n: Is anyone else enjoying how much Dai has grown up since 02? I know I am. I always thought that given a few years he’d be a very different person with a more grown up personality. So this chapter has almost been complete for about two months now. Why didn’t I post it? Because chapter nine was kicking my ass up one side of the street and down the other. It just wasn’t working, and then today I just said screw it and typed it out. So, yay! New chapters!
Another thing is that I have a whole series set in the RTS Universe (RTS stands for Return to Sender, which was actually thought up before Sent). So far there are three sequels, the aforementioned Return to Sender, XTC and a yet The Chosen Five, which is subject to change.
XTC: This is Iori centric and deals with what happens after his grandfather dies and how he makes money for the family. This is more of a companion to Sent than a sequel.
Return to Sender: This is a direct sequel to Sent and deals with what happens in the Chosen’s lives and with a new set of chosen.
The Chosen Five: The five original chosen. This is obviously a prequel, but part of it is set during RTS. At some point it will become imperative to read it to understand parts of RTS, but not in the beginning.
None of these are going to start popping up anytime soon (with the exception of XTC. I’m about halfway done with it.) but I thought you might like to know where this is headed. I hope you enjoyed this chapter.
Dephs