Well, it's time for yet another chapter of the Fall! Get excited! Or not, depending on how much you're enjoying this story so far. On the plus side, this is the longest chapter yet, and it has a few brief moments of action for the action junkies who have been bored with the last couple chapters. Well, on with the chapter!
Disclaimer: I do not own digimon, still, don't, own. Period.
Last Time: Tai got a trans dimensional distress call from the Tamers, and decided to go and help out those who had assisted him in the past. When he informed the Digidestined about this, they all decided to tag along, which may or may not be a good thing, since they're all leaving now…
Chapter 3: To Another Dimension
Ten people and their digimon partners sat around Kari Kamiya's room, waiting there for their last four arrivals.
"Seriously, how can the two of them take that long?" Joe Kido asked, as the others sat around along with their bags.
It was several days after the meeting where the Digidestined had elected to accompany Tai in his journey to assist his friends. They'd spent the last few days putting their affairs in order for what could be a long trip, and saying goodbye to their families. The Kamiya's especially had a rather rough time, despite the fact that both Mr. and Mrs. Kamiya were in other parts of the country for work.
They'd just gotten their son back, and now he and their daughter were going off into danger once more. It was more than enough to upset the most detached of parents, and despite their attempts to detach themselves, the Kamiya's still loved their children very much.
That's not to say that any of the other Digidestined's parents had been any less emotional or less willing to let their children go. The Kamiya's just had the most experience with what their children were actually talking about.
"Man Joe, you must really be forgetting who you're talking about." Davis said with a laugh from where he was leaning back against Kari's bed. "This is Matt we're talking about. He's probably trying to fit all of his hair care products into a few dozen bags at this point."
Several of the people in the room broke out into laughter at Davis's comment, while all of the digimon looked a little confused.
"Did Matt get picked to carry all of the hair whatsits?" Palmon asked after the humans stopped laughing. "Because if he did, he missed all of Mimi's!" Palmon held up one of Mimi's bags at this point, causing everyone to burst out laughing again.
Before anyone could reply to Palmon, the door to Kari's room opened, revealing Matt, T.K., Gabumon, and Patamon, along with several bags.
"Man, if Matt brought three bags for hair stuff, he and T.K. aren't going to have any clothes!" Gomamon burst out as the four stepped into the room. Everyone in the room, minus the new arrivals, burst out in laughter, especially at the confused looks on Matt and T.K.'s faces.
After a few moments Tai, who had simply been smiling in the corner, rather than joining in with everyone else's laughter, cleared his throat, gaining everyone's attention. They all turned to him, their smiles disappearing, replaced by looks of determination.
"Alright, let's get moving." Tai said, standing up, and lifting his bag onto his shoulder. The others also picked up their gear, and gathered around the computer, which already had a Digiport program on it.
"Alright, let's get this thing started!" Davis exclaimed loudly, holding up his digivice. "Digiport OPEN!"
The computer glowed, as did all of the digivices that were pointed at it, and then everyone in the room was pulled into the computer.
~The Digital World~
A television in the digital world suddenly came to life, lighting up the relatively dim forest with an intense light. The light lasted for several seconds before it disappeared, return the forest to a twilight.
"Ohh…I forgot how not fun this was…" Yolei groaned as all of the Digidestined had landed in a giant pile with their partners and their luggage.
"Try…being…on…the…bottom…" A voice that sounded suspiciously like Izzy's said from the bottom of the pile, resulting in everyone quickly getting out of the pile. Everyone took a minute to sort themselves out, getting their bags from the pile, and preparing to move out.
"Ok, where to from here Tai?" Davis asked as everyone seemed ready to go. Tai brought his arm up, and activated the map feature installed on his digivice. A holographic map appeared over it, showing the area that they were currently in, with a flashing red X at the very edge of the right part of the map.
"This way." Tai said, turning so that the X was at the very top of the map. He started walking forward, with the others following him.
The Digidestined didn't exactly have a method of travelling to other dimensions readily accessible to them in the real world, so they'd had to come to the digital world. Travelling the dimensions wasn't the easiest thing to do, in fact there were only two confirmed ways to do so.
The first was to find a digimon, like say Parallelmon, and have him transport you to another dimension. There were several problems with this. The first is the fact that those digimon were extremely rare and only one had ever been sighted in this dimension. The second was the fact that the Parallelmon was more likely to try and destroy or absorb you than transport you to another dimension.
The second method was to use a portal. Each dimension had its own trans-dimensional portal, which would lead one to assume that travelling between dimensions was simple. That of course was anything but true. Not only were the portals very hard to find, since they were usually hidden or disguised to prevent people from using them, but they were also very difficult to operate. Only a limited number of people could ever use them at all, let alone effectively.
Luckily for the Digidestined, Tai not only knew how to use one, but knew where theirs was. Of course, when they found out exactly what it was, they'd probably freak out.
"So why is there a portal in a place like this?" Matt asked, catching up to Tai at the head of the group.
"I'm not sure." Tai replied, looking over his shoulder at his friend. "These things are usually pretty well hidden, so maybe for safety reasons?"
Matt cocked his head as Tai finished that statement. It almost sounded like he knew more than he was telling. Matt was about to say something about that, when he walked into a motionless Tai.
"Hey, what the hell man…" Matt started to say, looking at Tai, who was glaring straight ahead of him. Matt looked past Tai, and noticed that there was someone standing there under one of the trees ahead of them.
Matt couldn't make out any of the person's features, but here in the digital world he knew that caution was the best option right now.
"Hey, what's going o…" Ken started to ask, but stopped when he and the others caught up to Tai and Matt. All of the Digidestined had pretty much the same reaction, one of caution, while their partners all tensed up.
The person looked at them for a minute, before stepping forward, into one of the few patches of light. Tai's eyes narrowed even more as the person was revealed, though the rest of the Digidestined relaxed when they saw who it was.
"Gennai!" Izzy exclaimed as everyone recognized the Digidestined's guide.
"Greetings Digidestined." Gennai replied, walking forward, only to stop at a growl from Agumon. That growl stopped him in his tracks, as he took in Tai and Agumon, neither of whom looked pleased to see Gennai in the least. "Bearer of Courage." Gennai said in greeting.
Tai didn't say anything in response, causing the Digidestined all to become a little concerned. Even the changed Tai who was with them now hadn't acted that way towards anyone who wasn't their enemy, which Gennai certainly wasn't.
"Tai, what's the matter?" Kari asked, reaching out a hand for her brother's arm. The rest of the Digidestined were just as concerned.
"That bastard is here." Tai replied, with more venom in his voice than any of the times he'd talked about the Demon Lords. In fact the only time that the Digidestined had heard Tai sound like that was when he was referring to Jane.
Gennai held his ground in front of Tai, meeting his glare without looking away as all of the Digidestined did a double take at Tai's tone and words.
"Tai…?" Sora asked.
"None of you know what he did." Tai replied, looking at Gennai, his voice a growl now. "He appeared while I was in another dimension, and told me that it would be impossible for me to return here. He obviously didn't bother to tell any of you that I was in fact still alive."
Tai's words cut through the Digidestined like wildfire, each of them going through a slightly confused state, then one of understanding, and finally to one of matching anger.
"Is this true Gennai?" Izzy asked, shocked as the rest were. Gennai finally looked down at Izzy's question.
"Yes, it is true." Gennai replied after a minute. "I appeared before the Bearer of Courage as a hologram, on orders from the Harmonious Ones, in order to prevent him from attempting to break the barrier into our world. If he'd persisted, he would have only met with death."
"And why didn't you tell us he was still alive?" Kari asked after another minute of silence, as the Digidestined digested Gennai's words.
"He was as good as dead to all of you." Gennai replied, finally looking up. "The Harmonious Ones did not think that it would be proper to put any ideas into your minds about him ever making it back, since they would never have come true."
"Oh yea, they never came true." Tai replied, shaking his head. "Now get out of the way Gennai, or I'll help Agumon rip you into tiny specs of data."
"I did not come here to stop you, only to give you something." Gennai replied, stepping forward. In his hands were a four small, squares, which looked similar to Crests. All of them had an X across the front of them, right where a Crest would have had its symbol. "These are gifts for you Digidestined. They will allow you to use X-Digivolution, just like the Bearer of Friendship."
That statement shut Tai right up, as MetalGarurumon X had been a key factor in defeating Belphemon when they had battled him.
"Any four of you can use this, but you must first install it to your digivice." Gennai said, looking at Izzy as he said that. He then stepped up to Tai. "I had hoped more of these would be ready, but this all I can do for you now." He handed the four chips to Tai. "I wish you every success in your battle Digidestined, farewell."
Gennai stepped back, and was soon lost in the darkness surrounding the forest.
"Well, things seem to be looking up now." T.K. said, looking over to Tai as Davis ran forward.
"Let me see one of those things! I want to see what Magnamon X looks like!" Davis exclaimed, reaching for Tai's hand, only to have Tai move his hand out of the way, resulting in Davis falling to the ground.
"Figures they would give us as little help as possible." Tai said, glaring after Gennai. "We'll figure out who gets these later, right now we need to keep moving." Tai put the four squares into his pocket, and then resumed walking forward. The other Digidestined waited for a second, and then went after him.
Sora went faster than the others, concerned for Tai after that meeting. She'd hoped his big demons had only been Jane and her cohorts, but it seemed like that wasn't true. If those things had happened, she could certainly understand why he was pissed off.
She walked next to him as he walked through the forest, avoiding most of the big roots and branches that would get in his way. After a few minutes of walking in silence, Sora had enough, and decided to just come right out and ask him about it.
"So, you want to talk about what just happened?" Sora asked, looking over at Tai as they walked. Biyomon and Agumon were moving behind them, giving the two humans a bit of privacy as they usually did.
"There's nothing to talk about." Tai replied, not looking back at Sora. "Gennai showed up while I was gone. I actually was beyond relieved to see him, since he was the first one I'd seen from home in over a year. But then he told me that I could never go back, and I'm ashamed to admit that I believed him."
"What?" Sora asked, surprised that Tai could be convinced just by a few words, even if they were from Gennai.
"Well, it was Gennai." Tai replied, finally looking over at Sora with a smile. "I mean, I always use to believe everything that bastard told us. Add that on top of the fact that I hadn't been able to get back after a year of travelling, and well, I just gave up." Tai paused at this point, looking down at his feet once more. "It's the reason I stayed in the dimension that I met Jane in."
That surprised Sora, and she knew instantly that was a big part of the reason that Tai had such strong feelings of hatred towards Gennai now. He'd helped convince Tai to stay in that dimension.
"Tai, i…" Sora started to say, but was cut off as she tripped on a root that was on the path she wasn't paying attention to anymore. She fell, heading face first for the ground, only to stop before she came near it. Tai had caught her arm, and pulled her up into a standing position. Of course, she wasn't expecting that, and ended up falling into him, but he caught her.
He held onto her for a second, both of them beyond content to be in each other's embrace, when they were rather rudely interrupted.
"Wow you two, at least stay ahead of us if you're going to be acting like that." Matt said with a laugh as the rest of the Digidestined caught up with them. Tai and Sora split apart as the others joined in with a chuckle, and both of their faces were a rather bright shade of red. That only caused the others to enjoy themselves more, until Mimi looked past the others, and saw the rather large structure they'd just arrived at.
"What the hell are we doing here?" Mimi asked, cutting through the torment of Tai and Sora, and pointing past them. Everyone turned to see what Mimi was pointing at and the other original seven Digidestined, other than Tai, were just as shocked as Mimi.
Before them was a large castle, one that they'd visited in the past. It was the castle used by Myotismon when they'd first come to the digital world, and it happened to be their destination.
"Oh, I see. The portal is here, isn't it Tai?" Izzy asked, rather than anyone answering Mimi. Tai nodded, having gained back some of his composure after the earlier incident.
"Yes. Myotismon only used a fraction of that portal's potential when he used it to get to the real world." Tai replied, looking up at the castle. The others seemed to finally get what Izzy and Tai were talking about, and Mimi looked less than pleased about returning to the castle.
"No way, that place is way too creepy and filled with things…" Mimi said, looking at the other Digidestined. "I mean, don't you guys remember this place?"
"Of course we do Mimi, but that was in the past." Joe said, stepping forward.
"And we're loads stronger now than we were then." Izzy added, and Mimi nodded.
"I guess…" She said, and then smiled. "Oh, and it's probably deserted now!"
"Hey, what's that down there?" A voice suddenly asked through the area.
"I don't know, it looks like maybe some digimon…" Another voice replied.
"Well, is it an attack then?" The first voice asked, and the Digidestined finally looked up to the castle to see several shapes on the top of the wall.
"It must be, go get the master, and everyone else!" A third voice said, and all of the Digidestined looked at each other, slightly confused.
"Come on." Tai said, leading the way around to the front gate. The other Digidestined followed behind him, wondering about the shapes on the wall.
All of them arrived at the main gate of the castle, which was closed in front of them. Before they could even start trying to get through the gate, several shapes appeared above it. The lighting was better here, so the Digidestined were actually able to make out the digimon this time.
They were rather short, pink, monkey like digimon, with sneakers on their hands, and a visor of some sort covering their eyes.
"What type of digimon are they?" Cody asked, as the Digidestined all looked up at the digimon on the wall.
"They're called Targetmon." Tai replied, and all of the Digidestined turned to see that he had his digivice out, and its digimon analyzer function was on. "They're a virus type digimon, named for the targeting visor worn on their faces which allow them to lock on to any desired target with perfect accuracy. Their attacks are…" Tai paused for a minute, looking at his digivice, before laughing a bit.
"What is it Tai?" Davis asked, stepping forward.
"Their attack is called Shocking Hug-Hug Sneaker." Tai replied, getting himself under control. Davis however completely lost it. He had to bend over as he started laughing, along with Veemon.
"Hey!" One of the Targetmon on the wall shouted. "What are you laughing at?"
"Your attack!" Davis replied, still laughing.
"Why you…" The Targetmon replied, but was interrupted by a shout from the castle. Seconds later the gate opened, and several more Targetmon came out the gate, accompanied by a larger, green, black and purple digimon, with what looked like feathers growing out of its shoulders, and tentacles growing from its back.
"That's Argomon." Tai said, shifting the focus of his digivice from the Targetmon to the other digimon. "He's an Ultimate level virus type digimon that was developed from a bug in an algorithm. He uses his tentacles to gain control over a large battlefield. His attack is Elimination Line."
"So you've heard of me, good." Argomon said when Tai finished talking. He looked all of them over, and then seemed to realize something. "Ah, you're the Digidestined aren't you? I can finally get some credit, by destroying you! I will be the most famous dark digimon ever, succeeding where all others have failed!"
The Digidestined all looked at Argomon as he started talking about how he would finally get the respect he deserved, all of them more than a little confused.
"So, this guy thinks he can take all of us on?" Davis asked loudly after a few seconds.
"Of course I can!" Argomon replied, stopping his monologue. "All of your partners are only rookies, while I am an Ultimate digimon!"
"I don't have time for this." Tai said suddenly, stepping forward.
"Ah, the first one to be destroyed!" Argomon exclaimed as Agumon stepped forwards as well. "Good of you to make things simple and not run away!"
Tai didn't reply to him, and all of the Digidestined backed up a little ways. Tai was certain to still be pissed from the encounter with Gennai, and this Argomon wasn't really helping things out.
Hopefully he doesn't make Agumon dark digivolve… Matt thought to himself as Tai snapped his finger, activating his D.N.A. Charge. His hand glowed with white data that lit up the area around him.
"What's this?" Argomon asked, looking at Tai's glowing hand.
"A neat little trick of mine." Tai replied, before the data spread to cover his entire body. "D.N.A. FULL CHARGE!" Tai swiped his hand in front of his digivice, which shot a beam of light right at Agumon.
"Agumon Warp Digivolve to! BurningGreymon!" Agumon was replaced by his Ultimate form, looking more than ready to trash Argomon.
"What the…" Argomon said simply as BurningGreymon appeared, towering over him.
"Digi-modify!" Tai exclaimed, having drawn one of his modify cards after digivolving Agumon. "Power Boost activate!"
BurningGreymon glowed as the extra power unlocked from the Digi-modify flowed through him.
"Alright BurningGreymon, we've got somewhere to be." Tai said, taking a step back as Argomon finally seemed to get over his shock.
"It doesn't matter what digimon you have, I will destroy it!" He shouted, and then dashed forward, heading for BurningGreymon.
"Pyro Barrage!" Burning Greymon swung out his Rudri Tarpana, took aim, and started firing in less than a second. Argomon however, managed to avoid most of the blasts, and got up close to BurningGreymon.
"Ha! You missed!" Argomon shouted, before jumping into the air, with all of the tentacles on his back ready to hit BurningGreymon.
"Who said he was aiming for you?" Tai asked, just before BurningGreymon hit Argomon with a swift punch that sent the Ultimate level digimon flying back to where he had started. All around him the Targetmon that had been BurningGreymon's actual targets were disappearing into data.
"What? How is this possible?" Argomon asked as he looked around him. All of his servants were gone, destroyed in less than twenty seconds of fighting.
"Easy." BurningGreymon said, as he stepped towards Argomon.
"You picked the wrong people to mess with." Tai finished for his partner, who then proceeded to finish Argomon off with a few blasts of his Pyro Barrage.
Seconds later BurningGreymon had reverted to Agumon, and Tai turned back to see the Digidestined all looking on from a distance. They all came forward after Tai looked back at them, and Mimi was the first to say something.
"Tai was that really necessary?" She asked, looking around to where all the Targetmon and Argomon had been.
"Yes." Tai replied, and then looked over all of the Digidestined. "You should all hear this, because you're going to have to get used to this. Do not hesitate to destroy any digimon who threatens you, or any of us."
All of the Digidestined, especially the younger generation, looked at Tai in surprise, both from his words, and the tone he had.
"No digimon will hesitate to kill you, and if you hesitate, you or someone you care about could be killed instead." Tai said, looking at all of them.
"But Tai, how can we have our partners kill another digimon?" Cody asked, not backing down from his person position.
"Easy. Digimon cannot die." Tai replied. "When a digimon is destroyed it isn't killed, it's simply broken up and reconfigured. It is then reborn in Primary Village, they do not die in the same way that we do." Tai turned at that point, and started to walk into the castle. "You have to choose between the digimon, who will be reborn, or the person next to you, who won't have another chance at life."
All of the Digidestined paused once more at Tai's words, deep in thought over them.
"HEY! You guys coming?" Agumon shouted back, startling all of the Digidestined out of their thoughts. They hurried after Tai and Agumon.
All of them travelled through the castle, which had lost most of the confusing illusions that had made travel through it so difficult the last time the Digidestined had ventured there. Before long they arrived in the giant chamber which contained the portal they had come for.
"So this is it?" Ken asked as the Digidestined spread out around the pedestal not far from the portal.
"Yes." Izzy replied, looking between the giant portal and the pedestal they now stood around. "This is the portal we used to return to the real world the first time." Izzy and Ken both stopped talking as Tai walked up to the pedestal, pulling out a card from his pocket.
"It still uses cards?" Izzy asked, instantly drawn into finding out more about the trans-dimensional gate.
"Sort of." Tai replied, placing the card into the center of the pedestal. "The best way to use the gate is to use the cards, but they are very hard to find, and you must break their combination to access where you want to go. In addition, you may not find the cards to get you to the destination you want to go to."
Tai place the card into the center card spot on the pedestal, and then his digivice activated.
"That's why some of my friends came up with this system." Tai said, gesturing to his digivice and the card. "It uses that card as an interface, and that allows me to select a destination to travel to, without needing to find cards for that particular dimension, as long as I know the proper combination for that dimension."
"Prodigious…" Izzy said as Tai manipulated his digivice to send them to the right dimension. After several seconds of this manipulation, the digivice's screen disappeared, and the gate in front of them started to open up.
Tai looked over at all of the Digidestined, and took a deep breath.
"Ok guys, this is it." He said looking at everyone. "After this there isn't any going back. So if you don't really want to go… "
"Tai?" Matt asked, cutting him off. "Shut up. We're going."
All of the Digidestined nodded as well, and turned to head for the portal.
"Sora, Davis." Tai said suddenly, stopping the two of them. They turned towards him, and he held out his hands. There was one of the X chips in each of them. "You two hold onto these for now. I don't want to lose all four of these if something happens to me, and I'm sure the two of you would be chosen to have these anyways."
"Are you sure Tai?" Davis asked, serious for once as Tai dropped the chip into his hand.
"Yes. Absolutely." Tai replied, and then picked up the card from the pedestal. He then looked towards the gate. "Well, let's get going."
~Chapter End~
Well, there you go, a bit of action, and as TheOmegaman put it, the calm before the storm…hope you enjoyed the chapter. Until next week!
Review Replies:
TheOmegaMan: As I said before, I still think you were a little out of it with most of your review…lol. I do have to say, that greed is the most awesome, so that's fine. Hey, normal Tai probably wouldn't have seen it either, or he would have expected it and it wouldn't have happened lol. Also, good point. And Amen to that. FMA did not screw everything up like digimon did.
/End Reply to rant.
10th Squad 3rd Seat: So, I do have a question, where you hopelessly confused in these first few chapters, since you read this before the Return? And yea, he is in this story at least.
PrincessOfDestiny14: Yea, sometimes I wish I'd watched frontier before I planned this out/started writing, but then I wouldn't get to use EmperorGreymon as Agumon's mega form, which would have been less awesome then…
Dark Anbu Knight: hope you enjoyed it, and thanks!
TaioraWarrior: yep! And yea, plus I think Matt got short changed on talks in the Return, so he got the first one here. And mostly time. Of course, this could be playing right into someone's plans…*cough* *cough*
Supershooter: I'm almost always a good fan of humor (don't listen to anything TheOtherGuy4544 says, it's all lies)
Phantomgirl96: I'm not certain how to reply to a smile, so I'll just go with this =).
Appealtoreason: Oh he will be, slightly older/had some of the softness beat out of him by Rika, but I can't get rid of all of it without completely destroying his character. However, it will be much less than in the show.
Elite Beauty: Thanks! And I'll be experimenting with it. I've only ever really been a Taiora writer, so I'm not that great at the other couples, but I'll try. And maybe, I have to see how the story develops. And thanks! And that should be coming soon.
TheOtherGuy4544: yea, sorry, my paycheck is way too low, and your cheap method of paying isn't helping. And Tai didn't interact with Davis and Yolei, ever, just Davis. That's something you have to take into account. And hey, they don't use them that often, and Tai's computer didn't have any set up, because he never needed to go to the digital world. And since he grew up, so right after Adventure, pay attention. He was the loner on Adventure. He was a super popular rock star in 02, not your typical loner! Well, Matt got over his guilt, somewhat. Wait for the rest of the story. Seriously, it's only the second chapter and you're already writing off plot points…seriously. And sorry, I wanted the shock to be with the rest of the DD. And Agumon was on his side, as Agumon saw it. He's trying to help Tai get over his new antisocial/old Matt channelingness. It doesn't mean he's going to defend him. Sometimes he has to kick his ass. And good guess again (you're actually getting good at this) The DD think all of the Demon Lords forces are in the Tamerverse, so they think things will be fine. And mostly complain/be cannon fodder. Get over the recapping. IT only happens when there is actually stuff to recap.