Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon.
Author's note: I'm taking a little break from Brace Face 'cause I'm kinda stuck. But until my writer's block clears up, here's a little Digimon story! It takes place during the Dark Master Story Arc right after they defeat Metal Seadramon and before everyone splits up. Enjoy!
A Little Bit Of Faith
I awoke to the sounds of our leader, Tai, getting things ready for the long day we had ahead of us. I yawned, stretched, tried to get Joe up. "C'mon Joe!" I said, nudging his shoulder with my flipper. Joe slowly open his eyes and sat up. He rubbed his eyes and put his glasses on. "Hey, Joe, Gomamon, could you guys do me a favor and go get some water?" Tai asked, seeing that we were both awake. Joe stood up and stretched. "Yeah, sure." Joe said with a yawn. He reached into his bag and pulled out the sandwich bags that he took from the restaurant that he and Matt worked at, then we went on our task.
Once we were a ways away from the campsite, I closed my eyes and sniffed the air. I could smell something, but I couldn't identify it. "Do you smell anything, Gomamon?" Joe asked me. I titled my head upward a bit to try to get a better whiff at whatever I was smelling. It did smell familiar, but, "Well, what do you smell?" Joe asked me, getting a bit impatient.
"Just hang on a minute, Joe." I said.
"If it's not water you're smelling, just forget about it. I want to get this job over as soon as possible, I'm hungry and I don't want to get into any unnecessary trouble!"
"Hold on! It smells like water, but different. Maybe we're just too far away for me to identify it."
After I convinced Joe that we should at least check it out, we continued following the scent to see just what was making it. When we got there, we saw a river, but it wasn't any ordinary river. The water, well, I don't know if you could really call it water, but it was bright slimy green. Floating on top of the 'water' were patches of black liquid. The river flowed very slowly and the 'water' was as thick as lava. Probably as hot, too. Needless to say, it was one stream where I'd think twice before jumping in. "Okay, I don't see any water! Let's go!" Joe said, obviously scared of the whatever it was. I didn't blame him, though. It kinda freaked me out too. I looked up at him and nodded silently, then we left.
Eventually, we did find a stream of actual cool, clear water. I immediately jumped in upon seeing it. Swimming is the best thing in the world. I'm never faster than when I am swimming under water at top speed. Anyway, I floated on the water while Joe filled up the bags. I looked over at him. 'He looks pretty hot,' I thought to myself, grinning evilly. I slipped under water and slowly made my way over to where Joe was filling the bags. When I got close enough, I pushed my back flippers against the river bed and drew my right flipper back. When I reached the surface, I threw my flipper forward, making a huge wave. "AH!" I heard Joe gasp. I quickly propelled myself back, laughing the whole time. "Gomamon!" I heard Joe say through gritted teeth.
"I'm sorry, Joe. You just looked so hot, I thought you'd like to be cooled off." I said, with laughter in my voice. He leered at me through his dripping glasses and though he tried hard to fight it, I could see him smiling.
We finally made it back to camp just in time for breakfast. Everyone was awake and Tai and Agumon had prepared a meal of watermelons, bananas, and oranges. I was surprised that they were able to find such exotic fruit in the forest, but when you're hungry, things like that just don't matter. Joe handed Tai the bags of water and I gratefully took a piece of the water melon. While eating, I glanced over a Gatomon, who was eating a banana. She was pretty cute, for a Gatomon. I'd like to become really good friends with her, but not to start a relationship or anything. That'd be kinda weird between two different species of digimon, don't you think?
I glanced over at Tai, he wasn't eating a thing. He just stared at the ground drawing things in the dirt with a stick. He looked pretty depressed and worried about something. It was probably because his little sister was with us now and he didn't want her to get hurt. I looked at Agumon to see if he noticed Tai's behavior, but he was too busy scarffing food down. I figured I'd tell him about it later. If there's one digimon who can get to the bottom of this, it's Agumon.
After breakfast, Tai ushered us to our feet and lead us through the thick forest. "What exactly are we looking for, Tai?" Matt asked. Tai stopped and turned towards him. He opened his mouth as if he were about to say something, then closed it again. He put his hands in his pockets and looked around briefly, then turned his gaze back to Matt. "We need to find the location of Puppetmon's hide out. If we play our cards right, we'll be able to stage a surprise attack." The expression on Matt's face abruptly changed from his usual cool expression to an enraged one. We could all sense that a fight was about to happen, but Tai's facial expression did not change.
"That's a stupid idea, Tai! We could all be killed! He's a mega digimon! A MEGA!! Do you even have the slightest clue what we're up against?!" Matt yelled at him. Even though Matt was practically screaming in his face, Tai kept his hands in his pockets and a calm look on his face. This was really weird. Matt stopped yelling when he noticed Tai made no attempts to fight back. "Matt," he said calmly. He knelt on the ground and picked up a stick, then he signaled for the rest of us to gather around. He started drawing figures in the dirt. "This is suppose to represent Puppetmon's hide out," he said, pointing to a square he had drawn. He then drew a series of 'x's. "this is me and WarGreymon" he said, pointing to an x. He pointed to all the other 'x's telling everyone where they were to stand on the battle field.
"First, WarGreymon and MetalGarurumon will get Puppetmon's attention, then Garudamon and Lilymon will attack from the sides. Zudomon and MegaKabuterimon will attack from behind while Angemon and Angewomon make an aerial attack. When all the digimon are in their places, they will attack simultaneously with their strongest attacks."
"Oh, that's original and cunning! You stay awake all night thinking that one up, Tai?" Matt said, unimpressed.
Tai looked at him and narrowed his eyes. He opened his mouth and at first, his words were calm and gentle. "I'm not FINISHED!!!" The 'finished' equoed through the trees and silenced everything within a two mile radius. Our fearless leader was obviously on the brink of a nervous breakdown. Everyone stared at him with wide eyes. After a few deep breaths, Tai continued in the same calm voice.
"Immediately after you digimon launch your strongest attacks, I want you to scatter. Don't even check to see if you attack hit him, the very second your attack is launched, move as quickly as possible. Except for you, Patamon. I want you to stay where you are to confuse Puppetmon and be as a location reference to the other digimon. Agumon, you move to the left of Angemon and Gabumon, you head south a bit. Palmon, you fly over here and Biyomon, you fly over here to where you're facing Angemon."
Tai continued with his plan. I paid close attention to every detail. Sure, it wasn't the easiest plan to understand, but it seemed like it would work. Besides, this is Tai, we're talking about. He had actually sat down and constructed a plan, putting every scenario he could think of into consideration. The kid had put his blood and sweat into this plan, so the least we could do was try it out. When he finished hours later, Sora spoke up. "It's a good plan, Tai, but it's a little confusing."
"Well, what's confusing about it?" he asked.
"The whole moving around constantly and pausing only to attack."
"But that's the whole point of the plan, Sora. We need to confuse Puppetmon so he won't know what digimon is where or who is going to attack and when."
"I guess you have a point there. Maybe we could revise it a bit so that it wouldn't lose it's purpose, but it'd be less confusing."
"That'd probably be easier. Together we can make a better plan, just like a game play! We can do it guys, and nothing's gonna stop us!"
That small little speech received a cheer from everyone, including me. Tai stood up in triumph and I had a whole new respect for him, and I could sense that the others did too, even Matt. But our small little celebration was abruptly interrupted when Tai's stomach growled loudly. Sora gave him a strange look and Tai simply shrugged it off. "So I missed breakfast. It's getting close to lunch time anyway. Take five, everyone." He said as he walked off with Agumon by his side. Sora folded her arms and sighed.
After we all had lunch, Tai and Sora made some changes to his plan and we all got to input what we thought would be the best coarse of action. For some reason, Joe didn't say anything, he just stared into space. "What's wrong, Joe? Don't you have any input?" I asked him. It took a while for him to realize that he was being adressed. "What?! Oh, um, I was just thinking." He said.
"About what?"
"That weird water we saw. You think we should tell Tai about it? Could be trouble."
"Maybe."
We waited for Tai to finish his little presentation. When he was finished, he said that we'd go over it all day tomorrow. Everyone had to know their part before heading off to battle. "Hey, Tai," Joe said when everyone left to find clues about Puppetmon's hide out. Tai was still sitting on a log and drawing little pictures in the dirt. When he looked up at Joe, he had a slightly annoyed look on his face and Joe was kind of sorry he bothered him. "What?" he said in that same calm voice he had mastered by then. It was like he was trying to hide his frustration. I really wish he hadn't, because it eventually blew up inside of him when Matt wondered off after TK escaped from Puppetmon's house, but that's another story.
"When me and Gomamon went looking for water this morning, we found this stream that had this really weird slime in it. It looked radioactive, so we thought we should tell you." Joe said, nervously. He really didn't want to get on Tai's bad side, no one did. No one except for Matt, who seemed to have a talent in pissing Tai off. Tai stood up and closed his eyes tightly. He clenched his fist and tried to contain the pressure building up inside of him. "Why didn't you tell me sooner!" he hissed in frustration with a hint of anger in his voice. Joe slowly backed up. Tai gasped and opened his eyes. He unclenched his fist and turned to Joe. The anger and frustration just seemed to melt away. "I'm sorry, Joe. I didn't mean to snap at you. I'll get Izzy, then you and Gomamon can show me where this stream is." Tai stood up straight and breathed heavily through his nose. He straightened his shirt and combed his hair with his hand, as if he was trying to brush off every sign of stress. He exhaled heavily through the mouth, then went off the find Izzy. Joe gave me a worried glance and I simply shrugged.
When Tai returned with Izzy and, Joe and I lead them to where I first smelled that strange oder. I picked up the trail and quickly lead them to the river. For some reason, Tai really wanted to see it. I heard a gasp from Izzy and Tentomon when we got there. "Izzy, can you get a reading on this?" Tai asked. With out a word, Izzy took out his laptop and started typing furiously. As he was typing, the river started bubbling up. "Um, Tai," Joe said, tapping Tai on the shoulder. Tai looked at the river and his jaw dropped open. I didn't like the look on Tai's face, but despite that, I turned to look at whatever it was myself. My eyes got big and my mouth dropped open when I saw what was rising out of the slime.
Tornimon. Tornimon is an evil digimon with sharp black claws stained with blood from it's victims. It's fur was a dark shade of gray and it's teeth were five feet long. It stood sixty feet tall and looked down at us with bright, blood red eyes. "Izzy, go get the others. We're gonna need help fighting this thing." Tai said with out a hint of fear in his voice. Izzy tried to explain to Tai that there was no use in fighting it and that we should just run. Tai narrowed his eyes and quickly turned towards Izzy. "DO IT!" he snapped. Izzy nodded, jumped on the digivolved Tentomon and took off.
"Tai, Izzy was right! We should be running! What are you thinking?" Joe said, trying to budge Tai from his well planted position. Sometimes, I wish I was Tai's digimon. It's not that I don't like Joe, quite the contrary. Joe's a great guy! It's just that I like Tai's determination. He never gives up. "Joe, look at that thing! There's no way that we can out run it!" he said. "Look out!" Agumon yelled as Tornimon launched a massive blast at us. I turned to get out of the way as fast as I could. I just bearly escaped. The blast sent me flying and when I landed, I turned to see if the others escaped too. "Agumon, digivolve!" I heard Tai say. Agumon digivolved to WarGreymon and I looked around for Joe.
"Joe!" I yelled as WarGreymon and Tornimon battled behind me. I saw Joe laying next to a tree. He had his hands to his face and he wasn't moving. I ran towards him as fast as I could. "Joe! Joe! Talk to me!" I said when I skidded to a stop beside him. He slowly stood up and smiled at me. "I'm okay." He said, then his smile vanished when he saw Tai and WarGreymon locked in combat with Tornimon. "I can't believe he's actually fighting that thing. If you ask me, Tai's completely lost his mind, in more ways than one."
"He does have a point, you know. There's no way we could out run Tornimon. He is way too fast for us. It's best if we just stand and fight." I said.
"Are you nuts too? Look at that thing! I can't believe Tai actually chooses fighting over running."
"Tai's just not the type to give up with out a fight. Speaking of which, I'd better help WarGreymon."
"Wait, maybe we should think about this."
"There's no time, Joe. They need our help. Have some faith in your abilities. Tai does, and look how far it got him. A little bit of faith can go a long way."
Without another word, Joe took out his digivice and instructed me to digivolve. I ran as fast as I could towards the battle, then at the last moment, I jumped into the air. "Gomamon digivolve to….Ikkakumon!" I shouted as I flew through the air. I launched a series of harpoon torpedos at Tornimon. He look at me and prepared to attack. This gave WarGreymon a chance to hit him. "Terra Force!" he yelled as he launched his attack. This completely caught Tornimon off guard and I quickly digivolved again.
When I was done digivolving, I lifted my Vulcan's Hammer and attacked Tornimon with everything I had, as did WarGreymon. It wasn't enough, though, and Tornimon attacked us with his Tornado Blade. I stumbled back a bit, but I was still ready for any other attacks that he'd launch. He launched a Wind Blade at me, but I blocked that with my hammer. I then launched a Vulcan's Hammer blast at him, but it had little affect. WarGreymon launched another Terra Force at him, but it also had little affect. Still, some damage is better than none, and I wasn't about to give up. I charged at him and swung my hammer straight at his head. I missed the first few times, but I got hhim good in the left cheek. Blood was trickling out of his mouth and he was pretty mad. He grabbed my weapon and head-butted me, but I head-butted hhim back. After we exchanged a few skull bashes, he fired a ray at me and it got me right in the chest. I stumbled back, but before I could recover, he began pummeling me into a bloody pulp. I tried to hang on, but I could feel my strength diminishing. Before I knew it, I was flying through the air and I had changed back to Gomamon. I hit the ground head first with a sickening thud. I was on my back and I tried to get back up, but I couldn't. Everything started to bet blurry. I could see Joe running towards me and a horrified expression on Tai's face when he saw me, but that was the last thing I remember before passing out.
When I came to, it was night time. I found myself on a bed of leaves and Joe was sitting next to me. I tried to get up, but the disornantation in my head told me that I should probably stay on my back for a while. That was when Joe looked up from the fire and at me. His facial expression went from deep and worried, to a wide grin when he saw me. "Gomamon, you're awake!" he exclaimed. I smiled back lightly and Joe carefully picked me up and cradled me in his arms. "How do you feel?" he asked.
"My head really hurts and I feel kinda dizzy, but other than that I'm okay. What happened?"
"After you lost consciousness, Izzy returned with the others. WarGreymon was still struggling against Tornimon, but he was no match for the combined power of MetalGarurumon, Garudamon, and Angewomon. I'm sorry, Gomamon."
"For what?"
"You were right. A little bit of faith does go a long way. WarGreymon lasted in the battle longer than you, but not because he was a mega. It was because Tai believed in his own abilities and you probably wouldn't have gotten so badly injured if I had believed in mine."
"No one blames you, Joe. Tai's an adventurer, you're not. Tai's willing to test his abilites, even if it means sacraficing his life. You may not be as brave as Tai is, but you should know that you're a lot stronger than when you first came to the digital world, and I'm not just saying that."
"You….really mean that?"
"Would I lie?"
Joe didn't say anything for a while. He just held my closer and gave me a light hug. I rested my head on his arm and looked around camp. Everyone was asleep except for Tai, Kari, Agumon, and Gatomon. Gatomon looked at me and mouthed 'Way to go, Gomamon.' And Tai gave my a thumbs up. I really hope Joe learned something from all this. It's not easy being a downer's digimon, ya know.
The End