Title: Summons of the Dark Side
Characters: Taichi, Yamato, Ken, Daisuke||Romance: Taichi x Yamato
Chapter Word Count: 2,187||Story Word Count: 2,187||Chapter Count: 1/30
Genre: Romance, Drama||Rated: PG-13
Challenge: Diversity Writing Challenge, K5, multichap with 20+ chapters; Include The Word Boot Camp, #8, famous; What-If: What if any of the 02 cast was Kaiser's slave & What-if the Kaiser captured Yamato in early 02?; February Secret Multichap Advent Exchange, written for Tomoe Mami, prompt #9, falling; Character Diversity Boot Camp, #31, experiment (Yamato)
Notes: This takes place in a sparkling new iteration of my breed-verse. Those of the Chosen who participated in the first adventure know of their nature as part Digimon (Yamato, Koushirou, Sora, and Jou). The others will be unfolded during this tale. There will also be Taichi x Yamato/Yamato x Taichi and mind control. If anything else worthy of a warning comes up, I'll state said warning.
Summary: All Digimon are to serve the Digimon Kaiser: including those who are part human. Whether they want to or not. Especially when they're the most powerful Digimon or half-Digimon known. But when that most powerful one has ideas of his own, it could start up a war that no one can win.
He prowled the innermost reaches of what tiny domain could be called his – not that he did, he would never claim such a tiny place as his own – disturbed and unsure of why. Something was wrong Out There. The greater world, the wider world, the place where he got to roam around as he pleased.
Something was wrong and he didn't know what it was, and that disturbed him far more than he wanted to think about. He didn't get disturbed. He disturbed other people – usually to the point of running, screaming, and things being on fire.
Everything being on fire.
Let it never be said that Anbumon, Dark Prince of the Digital World, ever did anything half-way.
Shadowy flames danced over his fingertips as he stared into the enfolding shadows around himself. To other eyes, the flames wouldn't have revealed anything, but his flames revealed things to him and him alone. At least they usually did. Right now he saw nothing, and that just made that creeping sensation of dread even worse.
He ground his teeth. He couldn't often see anything anyway, locked up here in the innermost depths of his ridiculously good other half, but that dread bespoke of unpleasantness to come.
He much preferred to be the one who caused the dread, not the one feeling it.
Well. If whatever it was wouldn't reveal itself, then he had ways to find it on his own. If his other would co operate enough to let him know what was going on.
He reached out. He could feel the other's presence, and expected at any moment that awareness would turn towards him, snap at him, demand he get back and not bother him.
Yamato could be so rude when it came to himself. If it wouldn't have hurt him, Anbumon would've gladly taught his 'good' side a few lessons on how to treat a prince with respect. Especially Anbumon.
But now it seemed that the other's attention was focused outward, without a hint of being aware that Anbumon stretched even the tiniest bit out of his confinement.
That was a trifle interesting. Normally the moment Anbumon set the ghost of a toe outside of that small area, Yamato's attention flickered to him without fail. The blond was, after all, very determined to never let Anbumon have a moment's breath of air, let alone any actual fun.
"What is going on?" Anbumon murmured, mostly to himself, since he had no one else to truly communicate with. "What has your attention?"
Perhaps something about his voice did turn Yamato toward him a little. At any rate, the shadows parted for a single heartbeat and he saw two figures, one of which he recognized, one he didn't.
One was Takaishi Takeru. Yamato considered them brothers and they shared blood through their mother. Anbumon didn't claim any relatives of his own save his father – and he wasn't always thrilled about that, but if it weren't for Piemon, he wouldn't exist at all.
Of course the dried-up old clown was gone now, and good riddance to him.
Then Anbumon took another look and a spark of low-burning rage lit in his shadow-blue eyes.
Someone had taken the liberty of chaining Takeru up. Anbumon didn't consider them kin, but because Yamato did, Anbumon considered Takeru his. If anyone were to raise a hand to the younger boy, they would answer to him!
Now he saw who else stood there. It wasn't any face he recognized, but there was something vaguely akin to recognition in the back of his mind. He couldn't pin it down just yet, but there it hung in his mind.
Whoever this was, they didn't dress like the average human or even in any fashion that could be found in the Digital World. Some sort of uniform, blue and white for the most part, and a long cape, their face covered by a visor.
"Now who is this?" He leaned forward, trying to leech what information that he could from Yamato.
The first bit he got was that someone had a firm grip on his arms, keeping him from using any of his attacks or weapons. That all by itself put Anbumon in a bad mood. He much preferred being free to unleash havoc at a moment's notice.
He knew Yamato wasn't as bloodthirsty as he was – quite a pity, especially now – but he could tell some of what his other half felt and right now, Yamato's rage bordered on letting him out.
Oh, now that was interesting. Anbumon could count on the fingers of one hand how many times that had happened. Yamato valued his freedom far too much to let his dark side take control willingly too many times, if at all.
Anbumon could understand that. After all, if he had control, he'd never let Yamato back out himself.
He focused his thoughts more, searching for information. Bit by bit he scraped up what he wanted. This stranger was the Digimon Kaiser. Yamato knew little more than that; there was another name that hovered there, but Anbumon cared little for that. This boy thought he could rule the Digital World. Anbumon's lip curled at that. He was the rightful ruler of the Digital World, inherited from Piemon.
Some might argue about that, but he cared little for the opinions of others. He focused now on learning what this whole situation was about.
He pieced together the little bits he could. There wasn't much. The Digimon Kaiser somehow abducted Takeru and then lured Yamato here. The fury that boiled up at that, and the wariness that matched it, had been what caught Anbumon's attention.
The Digimon Kaiser could control Digimon through devices. While no one of Ultimate level had yet been controlled, it seemed that the Kaiser wanted to test those waters, and his target was Yamato.
That made sense, in Anbumon's mind. If this method of control worked on the most powerful Ultimate who existed in the Digital World – him – then it could work on any of the others as well. The problem, it seemed, would be keeping the Chosen Children from finding out how to destroy the new control device. He couldn't get a sense of what it was, though images of the known type – a Ring and a Spiral – flickered through Yamato's thoughts.
He could only see what Yamato had seen, though, so it could well be that this Kaiser had only spoken of his plans and hadn't displayed the device yet. It was in Anbumon's best interests to see to it that his brighter half didn't get controlled at all. He could always persuade Yamato to let him out. He did not know this Digimon Kaiser and any being who sought to control him wasn't to be trusted at all.
Nor was Anbumon, but that was neither here nor there at the moment.
The problem was that Yamato couldn't fight back very well, not with Takaishi being held against him. He would try to resist, of course, that was in his nature. But there would be no violence against the Kaiser or his minions, not when the Muysamon Anbumon now saw looking up near Takaishi could slit the boy's throat in a heartbeat.
Something was off about that Muysamon as well. Tanisha's eyes kept cutting to him, and he looked upset, not afraid. Upset and angry.
Anbumon considered that for a moment, then tucked it away to deal with later, if he got a chance to deal with anything at all. For all that he watched, it was Yamato would have to act, unless he could persuade his bright half to hand over control.
For all that they were one being at the core of themselves, only one facet of their personality could dominate at any given moment. Anbumon spent the overwhelming majority of his existence curled up in the deepest, darkest depths of their soul, only mildly aware of what was going on around, and caring even less.
Which made those moments when he could get out that much more destructive. When he got to get out, he wanted to do all those things that so often remained denied to him.
If the Kaiser somehow managed to control him, then he would only destroy at someone else's command, and Anbumon didn't take orders from others. Especially not children who were younger than he was.
He turned his attention once more to this 'Kaiser', considering him carefully. Certainly around Takaishi's age and no one that he'd known before. Did this mean there were new Chosen? That made him more than a little curious. Since he cleaved to his Viral roots far more than Yamato did, the sudden return of the Digital World to their life hadn't gone unnoticed. But he'd dismissed it for now as merely the gateway opening again, something he'd known could happen sooner or later.
Knowing how the Chosen were pushed this way and that to satisfy the whims of those greater than themselves, he supposed he should've guessed that some sort of 'problem' had turned up, likely this Kaiser here.
He'd gathered all of that in a handful of moments, during which little more than a few barbed words flew between Yamato and Kaiser, with Takaishi throwing a few in when he wasn't staring at Muysamon. Where had Kaiser picked up one of those, they didn't appear very often. Even Piemon hadn't had one, but would've found one useful.
Now Kaiser held something in his hands, a goblet of fine workmanship, filled to the brim with some liquid as black as night, smoking ever so slightly. There wasn't any odor to it, but Anbumon didn't trust it at all.
"Drink this." Kaiser's voice held the faintest echo of something Anbumon hadn't heard in years, and hadn't thought to hear again unless it was in his own voice. Was this possible? Most things were possible, once one got down to it, but probable? Perhaps not all that much.
Yamato shook his head roughly. The side of Kaiser's mouth quirked. He spoke without looking over his shoulder to where Takaishi hung in his chains.
"Muysamon."
The ninja held a blade to the younger blond's throat, a thin line of red appearing there a heartbeat later. Yamato straightened as much as possible.
"Stop that!"
"Drink this, then." Kaiser was nearly as relentless as Anbumon himself could be.
If I'm right, there's a reason for that. But right or not, Anbumon didn't like what was going on. He liked even less the sight of Yamato's hands reaching for the goblet.
He would've stopped it if he could. He didn't care enough about Takaishi to suffer if Muysamon cut his throat or not. He would avenge it, without a doubt, for no one harmed what was his, but sometimes death happened.
Yamato thought differently, and he still held full control of his own actions. He took the goblet into his hands and threw the contents down his throat, swallowing it without another bit of hesitation.
"Yamato!" Takaishi ignored the blade so close to him and threw himself harder at his restraints, using language that Anbumon hadn't known he'd known. How someone could grow in just a handful of years.
Anbumon couldn't feel everything that Yamato did. But he did get the backwash of emotions, filtered and pale as they were. Only in rare cases could he detect the full strength version, such as the rage and worry that caught his attention the first time.
But as the foul liquid coursed through Yamato's system, he realized he could feel something: he could feel himself. He could feel his entire body slowly waking up, which happened only in one situation: when he held full control of their form.
He began to smile. He could sense Yamato's own awareness dwindling, a sort of mental cage of shadows forming around him, much like where Anbumon himself 'lived' the majority of his existence.
He moved his hands, flexing them, not trying any of his attacks or weapons as of yet. But he would, soon enough. He wanted to get himself settled in before he took advantage of his new freedom.
A throat cleared nearby. Anbumon ignored it in favor of stretching his arms up and out and moving a little, enjoying the sensation of being able to move in his body. Yamato had grown since the last time he'd done this, and while his mental image of himself matched the growth, this was the first time he could genuinely feel it. He'd clearly kept up his practices as well; muscle lurked underneath this green jacket. He would have to put himself through his paces to see what he could do now.
Again the throat cleared and now he turned to look the Digimon Kaiser dead in the face.
"Whatever do you want?" Anbumon sneered. The Kaiser's eyes flashed with a recognizable rage, but he kept his voice more or less calm.
"I am the Digimon Kaiser. But you can call me master."
Anbumon's lips twitched. "Oh, really. I can?" The twitch turned into a slow smile. "I don't think so."
To Be Continued
Notes: So, a new story begins. This is Anbumon, who is effectively everything evil and viral about my breed-verse!Yamato. He is very much Piemon's son. You'll learn more about him as the story progresses. I'm going to try for regular Tuesday updates, but don't hold me to that. Things always come up.