The Troubleshooter
Story 1: Terrorist
The Vietcong of the Digiworld's Ho Chi Minh Trail
His name was Lucas Black; he was twenty years old and full of life with long white hair and black eyes. An ex-gangster, he was perhaps this world's most unsung hero. He was the Troubleshooter. An employee of the supposedly great Lord Baihumon, it was his responsibility to make sure everything in the digital world was running smoothly.
Lucas was given little help in these endeavors however. Baihumon's assistant Ben, a book of prophecies, his partner Lopmon, and his own cleverness. And sometimes not even that much was forthcoming. Lucas had been on his current case for nearly a month and all his investigations had turned up was that the culprit was a man known as Sirhan Bin Hakim; a French Canadian named Jean Meunier who had converted to Islam.
The mission had seemed straightforward at first. There was a terrorist in the real world using his digimon to blow up skyscrapers. That was where all the simplicity had ended. Lucas had called in a few favors from a bunch of people he'd never admit to knowing to get a name, and Ben had used his own skills to find an address. When Lucas had raided Bin Hakim's house he discovered that it didn't seem that anyone had lived there for over a year.
That was when Lucas had decided Bin Hakim was a dead man. Bereft of other clues Lucas had been forced to chase after each little bombing and snap up any evidence he could find, just like the police. And Lucas was in no way like the police.
One month of work had left Lucas sitting in a hotel in London with Ben, and Lopmon, and a single line out of a book as a lead. "'The Vietcong of the Digiworld's Ho Chi Minh Trail.' What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Lucas asked angrily.
"How should we know?" Lopmon said with a shrug, "It probably has something to do with the real world."
Ben was silent, staring out the window. "That's all we've been given to go on?" he asked. Lucas nodded once. "Give me a moment." Ben closed his eyes and slowly sighed; Lucas could tell that he was searching through cyberspace the way only a digital being could for everything he could come up with regarding the phrase. Lucas briefly wondered why he hadn't just done that from the beginning and saved them all a massive load of time.
"I've got it." Ben announced opening his eyes. He leaned forward to speak to them, "Ho Chi Minh was the head of North Vietnam during the Vietnam War and the Vietcong were the guerilla forces fighting against America and its allies in said war."
"How does this all go together already Obi-wan?" Lucas demanded, "I don't need a history lesson; just tell me about the trail already."
Ben sighed, Lucas could be painfully dense, impatient, and quick tempered most of the time. "The Ho Chi Minh Trail," Ben began, "was a trail through neutral nations such as Laos and Cambodia that was used by the Vietcong to transport supplies, material, and personnel with less threat to better attack their enemies. Happy now?" Ben asked, "It's a riddle of some sort, and a decently difficult one too."
"Not really." Lucas stated, Ben looked up at him surprised. "It's all out there as plain as day." Lucas continued, "Bin Hakim is using an uninvolved route to move from one place to another for his attacks, this 'Ho Chi Minh Trail' is located within the digital world thus negating most of the danger he'd face moving around here."
"How does that help us?" Ben asked.
"It doesn't really." Lucas admitted. "We still need to find where he's going to come out so we can confront him."
"And how are we going to do that?" Ben asked.
Lucas flipped on the computer they had borrowed from Bin Hakim's house. "It has occurred to me all of the sudden that a Muslim would be more apt to use Allah as a password than God." Ben opened his mouth to say something, but Lucas cut him off, "Smart people make stupid mistakes, and clever people use smart people's intelligence against them." Five keystrokes later Bin Hakim's computer was open to them.
"Here it is." Lucas announced a few minutes later. He was currently reading a simple word pad document with what appeared to be a list of dates, places, and times. "He'll be in Buenos Aries in three hours."
"We can't get there that quickly," Ben told him, "when's the next one?"
Lucas gave a Ben cold glance. "Sometimes you can be unbelievably slow Obi-wan." Lucas told him, Ben's eyes narrowed hearing that from Lucas. "He's moving through the digital world using the gates and this." He had subtracted the word pad document and was now pointing to a file on the desktop named simply as 'gate' wordlessly he used a USB cable he had bought to transfer pictures from his cell phone to a computer as a connection between Bin Hakim's computer and his digivice then double clicked the icon for 'gate.' A minute later an installation screen popped up, Lucas clicked a few things and then turned to them, "This'll be done in about half an hour. I'm getting something to eat."
The office was almost completely dark, a single glowing monitor throwing all the room's light. Lucas stood up slowly and walked over to the panel on the wall and through a switch. The monitor shut off as the building went dark. This was the security office which also happened to keep the breakers in it for safekeeping.
Bin Hakim was on the roof with his partner, a Giromon, setting the last of the explosives. Lucas had been watching them earlier. He walked confidently through the dark halls without so much as a stumble, and up the stairs to the roof. Bin Hakim looked up startled as Lucas opened the door and stepped out followed by Lopmon. "Sirhan Bin Hakim I presume?" Lucas said.
"I won't let anyone take me into custody." Bin Hakim told him. Giromon charged forward swinging its chainsaw at Lucas.
"Lopmon digivolve to Wendigomon digivolve to Antylamon!" The giant rabbit batted the small horned ball away with one sweep of his arms and took off after it.
"You seem to have me confused with the police." Lucas told Bin Hakim. "I have no intention of arresting you." Bin Hakim went for the pistol he had strapped to his hip, but Lucas was already too close. Before the terrorist was half done drawing Lucas had crossed the distance and given Bin Hakim a powerful punch to the face sending him back onto the ground and his gun skittering off across the roof.
In desperation Bin Hakim pulled a metal cylinder out of his coat, "Don't move," he threatened, "I'll blow this place."
Lucas began to laugh, he laughed loud and long. "Go ahead," Lucas told him, "all your bombs are connected to a timer that won't go off for another three minutes." Lucas smiled at Bin Hakim's open mouth, "I cracked your computer Mr. Meunier, and read everything on it."
Lucas used Bin Hakim's shock to his advantage and reached down and took the man's Digivice right off his belt. A moment later Bin Hakim threw himself at Lucas in an attempt to get it back. He was met by a sudden snap and then Lucas' switchblade plunged into his stomach. Lucas yanked it cruelly to the side and out spilling Bin Hakim's innards onto the roof. As the French-Canadian-Muslim-Terrorist fell to the ground the battle between the two digimon above their heads began to wrap itself up as well.
"Big Bang Boom!" Giromon shouted throwing a bomb at Antylamon.
"Meditation Cure." Antylamon declared the magical barrier protecting him from the blast.
"Chainsaw!" Giromon rushed at the rabbit his weapon at ready.
In midair Antylamon spun over the Giromon avoiding his attack. "Arm Bomber!" Antylamon continued spinning and slammed his arms into Giromon again sending him straight down through the roof behind Lucas and another twenty floors besides.
"Let's go." Lucas told Antylamon as the rabbit digimon landed beside him. He flipped open Bin Hakim's cell phone and tapped a few buttons to log into the internet. Lucas raised his digivice and the two vanished in a flash of light the phone dropping down where they had been.
Ben was waiting for them when they reached the digital world. "Mission successful." Lucas told him handing over Bin Hakim's digivice. Ben nodded before taking it and leaving.
Sirhan Bin Hakim's eyes were fixed on the clock in the corner of his cell phone. He realized he could vaguely hear sirens coming closer, but that didn't matter. As he watched the clock the world seemed to slow to a standstill 57…58…59. The world around him exploded into brilliant orange-white flames and smoke.
A quarter of the way around the world Melissa shivered in her sleep and pulled herself closer to a warmth on the other side of her bed a pair of tears flowing slowly, unnoticed, down her face.
I'm working on The Darklight Experiment, really I am. I've just come down with a bad case of writer's block so I decided to do some work on this instead. Never fear, the next Darklight chapter should be up soon. Not to make you all hope that I don't get rid of my block, but the next chapter of Troubleshooter will include TK and Kari and a look back at pointless details of the Venomyotismon episodes.
Some of you may be worried that all the chapters of this story will be like this. Don't, I felt like getting one of the worst out first. Lucas tends to be a bit more moral when he doesn't feel like he's being insulted. This was also very important to get out early on because the gate program is referenced rather often.