Episode 1 - Trio

Part 2 – Trio

"That'll be all," Mr Lee said.
Sofi had not returned, much to Amy's disappointment. They usually had quite good conversations in Chemistry.
She packed up her things. The lesson had been a long one by Mr Lee's standards; not very inspiring, just grinding through equations. She had a free next, and decided it would be best spent in the library, attempting to study.
The corridor outside was cold; a testament to the winter, and the school's poor heating system. People hurried everywhere, first years eager to get to their next lessons, and teachers ushering children around, sixth years moving slowly, and fourth years even slower. It was a sight she had taken as normal for seven years now, but was only beginning to realize she was soon close to it all ending.
Her school life had been below-par to say the least. She had never been attentive, not until seventh year. She had scraped through by bare minimum, and almost regretted it. Sure, she wasn't the typical deviant either, but sometimes she wished she'd had better memories in this place; either doing well, or failing well. It was a reason she envied people like Sofi, who had done exceptionally by her standards, or Hannah, who seemed to just not care about it. Amy finally did care, but it was probably too late for her.
Her heart sank as she realized her time was almost up. It was almost time for her to take up a career, for the rest of her life. The freedom she never knew she had would be gone, and she would be forced into options and choices. Not for the first time in her life, she envied everything else around her. The first years didn't know what their lessons meant, or would mean, for years yet, they could just enjoy it. The sixth years were just starting to see the value of their education, and the fourth years were tearing themselves away as much as possible. It was the same every year; a repetitive cycle. She expected much of the seventh year thought the same as her, or she hoped they did.
The library was much warmer with the added heaters the librarian had placed around.
The quietness didn't help as her thoughts of leaving circled and circled in her mind. At this point, she didn't even want to leave school.
'No one is supposed to be this thoughtful', she thought.
She had no idea of what she wanted to do after school. The concept of choosing was more frightening than anything she'd done so far.
The book she was supposed to be studying from sat in front of her. Words going into her mind and coming straight back out.
"Would you like to talk about it?" asked a kindly warm voice next to her.
She looked up quickly to find the librarian smiling warmly down to her, "I've seen and heard of some problems in my time, but I've never seen anyone read from the same page for two hours straight without moving."
Amy looked at the clock, and sure enough, it had been two whole hours.
"I'm supposed to be in physics!" she cried out, grabbing as much as she could.
The librarian stopped her, putting a hand on her shoulder, "Do you honestly think you'll be able to concentrate?" she asked.
Taken aback, Amy slowly shook her head, "I guess not."
"Sit back down, let's talk."
And she did. She spoke for another hour, and the librarian, Mrs Teel, sat and listened. She even made Amy coffee. She spoke of her worries, her doubts, and her lack of plans and hopes.
"Do you have a boyfriend?" Mrs Teel asked.
"Yeah," she replied.
"Why don't you talk to him about this stuff?"
Amy hesitated, "He's… too busy studying. I don't want to bother him with all this, he wants to do well, and he doesn't need distractions."
"Too busy for his own girlfriend?" Mrs Teel raised an eyebrow.
"Well… I dunno; I don't see myself with someone like him. He's so much more… co-ordinated with everything. He knows what he wants to do; he's so serious all the time, if that makes sense?"
Mrs Teel smiled, "Yes, it does. You'll just have to figure out what you want to do yourself, you have plenty of time."
Amy smiled, "Everyone says that."
"Know this; it's not good to keep this stuff to yourself and let it play on your mind. Talk to people, regardless of what the issue is," Mrs Teel said "There's always someone to listen to you."
Amy nodded at her, the woman was right, she already felt better for getting it out of her system. Something caught her eye, and she turned to see Sofi and a boy, Talyn, if she remembered correctly, stroll past.
Sofi looked at her, and her eyes widened marginally, but she only smiled and continued as if nothing was strange at all.
"Those two," Mrs Teel started, "always end up leaving together. Sometimes they'll come in together, sometimes separately, but they always leave with each other. They think someone like me won't notice, but they always leave the same aisle too. Not very inconspicuous is it?"
"What do you mean?" Amy asked.
"There is something going on between them two. They disappear for… sometimes hours at a time!"
Amy thought about it, but couldn't see anything happening between Sofi and a guy like Talyn.
"No way, he's not her type," she explained.
Mrs Teel merely chuckled, "Not like that dear, why don't you investigate it? I must get back to work."
Before Amy could reply, Mrs Teel had gotten up and walked out of the library; despite her rounded features and greying hair, the Librarian could 'bustle' quickly away, and she didn't even look old enough to have grey hair yet.
Confused, Amy stood up and packed her bag. She moved to where Sofi had come out, from the second level, and looked around. It was in the advanced level section of the library. Big, fat tomes of books watched her every move. Words she knew she'd never fathom were contained within, it was almost intimidating. Sofi and Talyn had been walking normally, so they'd probably come from the back of the aisle. They certainly hadn't started off at that speed. She moved on, where another, longer shelf of books faced the aisles against the far wall.
She didn't even know what to look for, some book of some kind she assumed. Sighing, she started at the bottom of the shelf, and found exactly what she wasn't looking for.
It surprised her at first, until she moved and it was gone. Looking back, she saw the faintest of lights, almost invisible against even the low sunlight of the day.
It was coming from between two of the bookshelves; there was a gap between the planks that held to cases together. She looked around and found herself concealed from all eyes in the library, and contemplated how heavy the bookcase was. Her fingers pushed into the gap, and the whole unit moved fractionally. After applying more force, the bookshelf began moving sideways into the adjacent bookshelf.
Stunned, Amy looked at it, and sure enough, the books were just going into the side of the wood. She looked into the gap she had made, and saw a room beyond, containing a single desk and a computer.
'They must be working together on something', she thought, and quietly slipped in.
It was dark inside, the only light coming from the monitor. At first, she was dubious of her discovery, and left the bookcase open, not trusting it to open if she closed it. She'd only be five minutes anyway.
Moving forward into the light of the monitor, and looking into the screen, she saw it contained a screen saver of a forest; nothing strange at all.
"Hello," said a voice from the screen.

"I don't like it Talyn," Sofi exclaimed.
"Why not?" he replied.
"Why now? We've got mere months left, why should a third show up now? Does it not seem ominous to you?" she asked.
He remained quiet for a while.
They were stood outside in the school courtyard, braced against the cold. They had fared worse in the Digital World.
"It does seem a little strange. Our time's almost up; maybe it's the next cycle of Digidestined."
"But we're still here; they should show up after we've done, according to the legends."
"We're not Digidestined though are we?" he asked, "None of it points to the fact that we are, we're just… an interlude or something. Maybe there was a glitch and it took time to get it fixed."
It was a revelation they had discovered when Patamon and Lopmon took them to the ancient Digital World temples. Talyn and Sofi weren't true Digidestined, it wouldn't work with just two of them. It didn't bother them, because as the legends all said, Digidestined usually had to sacrifice something or face a near impossible task, and it wasn't something they wanted to face up to anyway. They were just… guardians. Temporary.
"I'm still not convinced," Sofi said.
"We'll probably never meet who it is anyway. It'll be a group of friends somewhere else, in a whole different country. Salamon will find them and we'll be done with it before we know it." Talyn said.
Sofi hesitated, "You sound… glad to be rid of it?"
He stiffened, "I didn't mean… never mind."
"Do you want it to end?" she asked. She couldn't bear the thought; it hung over her every day. Another thing the legends had said was that time in the Digital World was limited. She hoped with all her heart that it was purely for Digidestined, and that she'd never have to leave completely.
Talyn looked at her, into her eyes, and he gave up, "No, I never want it to end Sofi. I… want to be able to go there forever, and I don't…"
He paused.
"Don't what?" she asked gently.
He turned away, "Never mind."
It was a surprisingly emotional conversation from Talyn, and Sofi dared not press for more.
"I'd better get going, see you around," he said, and strolled away.
He was a cold person, but she knew there was warmth somewhere inside of him, 'Talyn,' she thought, 'it doesn't have to be this way; we could be friends outside of the Digital World… I want to be friends.'
Sighing, she wrapped her coat around herself and headed back to the music room to continue preparing.

Amy looked up and down the monitor.
She had overcome the initial shock. The voice had come from within the computer, a high-pitched sound that made her close the door to a tiny gap she could still definitely get out of.
"H-hello?" she whispered.
"Hi!" came the voice abruptly. It was a little feminine.
"I can't see you," she said.
"Down here!" said the voice.
Amy looked at the bottom of the screen again and saw nothing.
"I… still can't see you, what's your name?"
"I'm Salamon! I've been waiting ages for you!"
"Salamon? That's a strange name, are you from England? Is this a video chat or something?" she asked.
"What's a video chat? Why don't you come through? Then you'll see me," said the voice.
"Come through what?" Amy asked.
"The screen silly! That's what the other two did anyway."
The other two? Surely this Salamon couldn't mean Sofi and Talyn.
"I can't go through the screen! Do you live locally or something? It doesn't look like anywhere around here… Besides, I'm not about to go meeting up with some stranger," Amy said.
She heard whispering on the screen, and recognized there were other voices, but she couldn't understand what they were saying.
"Patamon says you should try reaching through."
"Patamon? Reaching through what?" she asked again.
"The screen," said a new voice. Amy assumed it belonged to this Patamon.
"But that's not possible," she complained.
"That's what Talyn and Sofi did the first time."
Amy stopped. They did mean Talyn and Sofi.
"What are you talking about?" she asked, and touched the glass. It was cool against her fingertips, "nothing's happening."
"Because you don't believe it will," a new voice said.
"How many of you are there? Do you all have microphones?" Amy asked.
"What's a microphone?" asked… she couldn't pick out whose voice it belonged to, they all sounded the same.
"Come on! Jump through!" shouted one of them eagerly.
"It won't work!" she hissed.
"Believe in it, and it will work."
"Come on! You're my best friend Amy!"
It took Amy a second to realize what just happened, "How do you know my name? Who are you?"
"It says it on this, here, catch!"
A bright light erupted around her and Amy felt something light crash against her stomach. Once her eyes had readjusted, she saw a small metal device on the floor. It was silver and red in colour. She picked it up and examined it.
"What's this?" she asked.
"Point it at the screen!" said one of them.
"Is this some sort of prank or something? It won't do anything!" Amy said.
"It'll transport you here! Just do it already!"
"Transport me where? What are you talking about?" Amy asked.
"To the Digital World."
"This makes no sense," Amy said. She pointed it directly in the middle, more to prove a point than anything, if she couldn't see them, the doubted they could see her, plus there was no obvious camera. But much to her surprise, the world flashed, and moments later she found herself in a forest.
She recognized it as the forest from the computer.
She panicked, crying out in alarm and spinning around to be faced with three… monsters.
The first looked like a puppy, the second a hamster with wings on its ears, and the third, a brown bunny with pink marks on it.
"Finally!" said the puppy as it jumped at her.
She screamed and fell to the floor, trying to evade the attacking dog.
She rolled and tried to get it off till she realized it wasn't attacking her, it was rubbing its head against her chin. She grabbed it, held it up and took a closer look.
"I'm Salamon, it's nice to finally meet you Amy!" it said, its mouth pulled into a large smile.
"What… are you?" she asked, her eyes wide, "What the hell just happened?!"
"I'm a Digimon," Salamon said.
"You're a talking dog!" she cried out.
"Calm down Amy, it's ok," the rabbit said.
"And a talking rabbit!?"
"And a talking hamster!" said the orange hamster happily.
"I'm dreaming," Amy said quickly, "There's no other… logical explanation for this."
"No, as unfortunate as it may feel to you, you are not dreaming. You are in the Digital World, if you'll calm down I'll explain," said the rabbit.
The three certainly didn't seem… evil, if that was the right word. Amy gathered her wits.
"Ok, what's going on?" she asked.
"Aw, I wanted to have some fun," said the hamster.
"My name's Lopmon, you know Salamon, and this 'enigmatic personality' is Patamon," Lopmon started.
"I know Salamon?" Amy asked quietly.
"You will do," Lopmon said, "The world around you is called the Digital World, as far as we know it's an alternate universe from your own, a sort of parallel that is connected via Digital streams of data. We are Digimon, also known as Digital Monsters, scraps of data organized into artificial intelligence."
"Hey! We're not data," Said Patamon.
"I'm explaining it in terms she'll understand!" Lopmon shouted back, "You now have in your possession what is called a Digivice, it is a tool that uniquely bonds you to a single Digimon partner, who happens to be Salamon; like always though, we do not know why you were chosen or for what purpose."
"Well said, guess how many time's she's rehearsed that speech," Patamon laughed.
"You sound like you've done this before? How do you know so much?" Amy asked. She moved into a more comfortable sitting position, and Salamon strolled up to her and rubbed her head on Amy's knee, making her jump.
"I haven't, but other Digimon have, and the legends have passed down from there. I just took the time to learn what we can learn. What matters is that you have been chosen to come here for some purpose along with Sofi and Talyn, it may have to do with protecting the Digital World, saving it, or just witnessing an event that triggers the next cycle."
"The next cycle?"
"Of Digidestined, children like yourself who come here, usually in larger groups than this time at least. Hence, we don't really think you are Digidestined, just a sort of catalyst," Patamon interjected.
"Well put," Lopmon said, sounding sarcastic.
"I sound almost as obnoxious as you!" Patamon joked.
"There's nothing obnoxious about knowledge!" Lopmon retorted, hitting Patamon across his head.
Amy tried to process this, but she didn't get far.
"Wait, so, I'm being used by Digimon to trigger or speed up something? I know what a catalyst is," Amy asked.
"We don't know," Lopmon replied.
"We have to discover it!" Salamon exclaimed happily.
"That's not helpful!" Amy complained, trying to nudge Salamon away from her, "Where'd Sofi and Talyn go?"
"They know there's another Digidestined around, they went to look for her, but you're here, so we'll have to wait for them to come back," Lopmon said.
"We could signal them," Patamon said, "But we thought you'd like to have a look around first."
"This is a whole different world then?" Amy asked. She got up and began walking around the small clearing in the forest, Salamon jumped along behind her heels, "I mean, you hear of stuff like other worlds in science-fiction books, but, I'd never expect it to be real. Is it small or big?" she asked.
"Is what small or big?" Lopmon replied.
"The Digital World? Is it just this forest?"
"It's bigger than this silly!" Patamon said, "There are caves, caverns, glaciers, mountains, deserts, other forests, even small settlements of Digimon."
"You're telling me, that crappy little old computer in there created an entire world that you can just… jump into?" Amy asked.
"We've never left here, so we wouldn't know," Lopmon replied.
"You can explore as much as you want," Patamon interjected.
"I don't want to, in fact, how do I get out?" Amy asked. She turned and walked to the computer.

Talyn's Digivice beeped as he walked down the corridor. It was a distress call from Patamon; he assumed Sofi had one too.
Wondering what it was about, he turned and strolled to the library, expecting to find Sofi along the way. School had a mere thirty minutes left, so he'd have to be quick. He then realized Sofi was probably just finishing her exam, he didn't know for sure when it had been.
The door to the library swung open, and the first thing he noticed was the lack of life. Even the ever-present Librarian wasn't in the room. Thanking his luck, he moved swiftly over to the stairs and ran up them. He noticed a larger gap between the bookcases; Sofi or he would never leave it that way.
He pulled it open, slid inside but found no one in the tiny room.

"You can't use that to get out, it works differently," Lopmon said.
Before trying, Amy placed the 'Digivice' in her pocket, "So how do I get out?"
"Why do you want to leave?" Salamon asked, looking upset.
"This is just too weird! This shouldn't happen! This doesn't happen!" she explained.
"But you're here, Talyn and Sofi adjusted well enough," Lopmon said.
"Well, I don't know about Talyn," Patamon smirked.
"But… the computer! How can I fit inside that computer?!" she asked, "And how do I get out!?"
"You can't, you're trapped here forever," Patamon said.
"You're quite the little joker aren't you?" Amy retorted sarcastically.
"Just point your Digivice at the screen," said a completely new voice.
Amy spun on the spot to find herself faced with a very formal looking man. He wore a suit and a longish black trench coat. She studied him more and recognized him as Talyn.
"Talyn?!"
"Amy, of all the people I'd never think of," he replied quietly.
"They told me it wouldn't work," she said, pointing at the three Digimon, "Get me out of here."
"Just point it and go through," he replied calmly.
"We were stalling you," Patamon said.
Amy glared the hamster to silence, and quickly ran back over to the screen. The world once again flashed and she found herself in darkness.
The bookcase was closed more than she could pull on, she was trapped.
For some reason it had a cover on the back of it, so she couldn't see beyond, but she could knock.
It wasn't long before it once again slid to the side and Sofi appeared.
"Amy!?"
"That is some messed up computer you've got there," Amy said, and pushed past her, running out of the library and not stopping to look back.

Talyn waited for Sofi to enter the Digiworld.
"I was just finishing off when I heard the signal, I came as fast as I could," she explained.
"Well, we've found her," Talyn mused.
"She's been in my Chemistry class all year! I'd never have put her as one of us. What do you think?" Sofi asked.
"She can't be the next cycle of Digidestined… she's too old, she'll be leaving this year as well. I think she's supposed to be one of us, but this close to finishing? Something's going on."
"Will she be back?" Salamon asked.
"She won't be able to keep away, you humans have a terrible weakness for curiosity," Lopmon replied.
"Come on, school's almost over, we'd better head back," Talyn said, "Keep safe guys."
"Salamon, stay with Lopmon and Patamon, they'll protect you," Sofi instructed the happy dog.
After that, they left. Their time in the Digiworld was limited to their school hours, so they could only travel there during free lessons, and had to leave when school finished.
"Should we catch up to her? She usually waits with her friends for their buses," Sofi exclaimed.
"Yes, I suppose we had better," Talyn said, and they jogged out of the library to begin searching for the third in their little team.