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Chapter 4: The Other Digidestined
On board Anthrax's mothership, Anthrax was busy caressing all of the coal he managed to take from Earth. "Oh yes, sweet sweet coal," Anthrax was saying, "The more I collect, the closer I am to my goal." But his moments of happiness were cut short as a guard came into his quarters to tell bad news. "Sire, I have some bad news," said the guard, "reports say that King Kaliente has met his maker." "WHAT," Anthrax yelled in heavy disappointment, "HE WAS ONE OF MY LESSER YET POWERFUL MINIONS! WHO COULD HAVE THE GUTS TO COOK HIS GOOSE!" "We don't know the identity of the culprit other than he broke into one of our miniships," the guard continued, "but I managed to recover an artist's impression of him." Anthrax took the picture and scanned it. "So, it was that boy," Anthrax said as he calmed down, "I'll bet he's still after Sora. Speaking of which, I can't believe she could approach me and yet flee at the sight of my men. Must be strength in numbers." Anthrax continued to caress his pile of coal which, unlike him, was inanimate but very similar in appearance. Sora has not left the room; she kept spying on Anthrax and waiting for the right time to strike. "I don't care how powerful this guy is," she thought, "but he's bound to have a weakness. When I find it, I may not need Biyomon, or maybe I do."
Meanwhile on the Hubble, Corey was standing outside the eye area. "Oh shoot, the first minute he was enthusiastic, the next minute he's bawling his eyes out," said Corey, "I hope something cheers him up soon. I don't care what it is." "Tai is depressed that his family is gone," said Rosalina who was standing behind him. Corey turned around to face the queen of the stars and asked, "Then how do you explain his cheerful behaviour from before?" "He hid his depression just so he could focus on his mission," Rosalina added, "now he has the free time to let it all go." Corey was suddenly hit with a foul memory and said, "It was just like when I lost my father to Anthrax and the intense warming of my planet, Ignaria. My mum and siblings escaped with me but my dad stayed behind to fight Anthrax. Half an Ignarian year later, I moved out to live near Pekopon because it was beautiful to look at but to avoid a mass freak-out with its inhabitants, I stayed behind its moon to avoid detection. The Good Egg Galaxy was created for this reason and to hold my father's ashes once salvagers managed to bring them back up."
After several hours of endless crying, Tai finally came out a bit teary. "Tai, you're not alone," said Rosalina in a sympathetic mood, "Corey knows exactly how you feel but you must feel worse to be an orphan when Corey just has no father." "It's okay, I'm over it now," said Tai having calmed down, "at least I met some cool people, won a few power stars and turned King Kaliente into burnt sushi." As soon as Tai reverted to his old enthusiastic self he asked, "So, what's next on the agenda?" "Well since you collected another 3 power stars," Rosalina replied, "you may enter another world." "All right! Time for some action," Tai said with glee, "can I take Corey with me?" When Rosalina nodded in response, Edward escorted Tai and Corey to the portal to the other dimension that looks like a terrace. "Now Tai and Corey," Edward made his speech, "the Good Egg Galaxy was only a practice run compared to what you may encounter. There are other places that are much farther away and can only be reached with enough power stars as well as tougher." Edward then pointed at the door that was just unlocked; it was clear that there were power stars in there. "Good luck," was the last words Edward said before Tai and Corey disappeared into the door.
When they both reappeared, there was a new environment; it was a small forest with a big beehive at the rear and there were bees everywhere. One of the security bees approached Tai and Corey and said, "What are you doing here? What do you want?" There was no response from the two visitors until Tai said breaking the silence, "It's a long story but were only here for some power stars and, don't worry, they're not for evil purposes. I'm not like Anthrax." The bee responded, "Well I know of only two: her majesty will tell you where one of them is but the other is at the top of the observatory tower. I'll leave you alone now. Good day." With that the bee flew off then Tai told Corey his new plans, "I'll go and see the queen bee while you go the tower." "Fair enough," Corey said and the two went their separate ways.
Tai was heading to the hole in the cliff where he can see the beehive when he thought, "The queen must live there. I must go." There was one problem; the hole was too high to reach. "Okay Luma," said Tai clearly stuck, "what do I do now?" "Find a yellow striped mushroom," Luma answered, "and eat it." "How do you know it will help me," Tai asked worried, "as far as I know it may be poisonous?" But Luma did not answer and, despite his worries, looked for the mushroom. When he did find it, Tai picked it up and ate it expecting any effects. What did happen was he grew two antennae, four veined wings and two extra arms; he had practically become a bee. "Wow, this is awesome," exclaimed Tai in excitement, "but seriously, tell which mushrooms are safe to eat and which ones are not." "I know what you shouldn't eat," Luma said, "blue-capped mushrooms. They're trouble. Anyway, in your bee form, you can hover to greater heights than a normal jump. You can even cross large gaps but hover too long and you will lose power. Also, don't try using the sting under any circumstance, it's a death sentence." When Luma finally stopped talking, Tai tried his hovering skill to get in the otherwise elusive hole.
Meanwhile, Corey was side-tracked by collecting star bits when a piranha plant grabbed his basket without warning. "Oh, no you don't," Corey shouted trying to fight back the plant, "you're not having my lunch! Get your own when you have observation skills like… Oh dear, I forgot! The power star!" Remembering his objective, Corey dashed towards the cliff to find a way up it when he met the midget from the Good Egg Galaxy. "Who the heck are you," Corey asked the small figure. "None of your beeswax," the midget rudely responded. Then Corey realized something. "Wait a minute. You're that guy from the Yoshi Egg planet," he said, "What are you doing here?" The midget answered, "ever since King Kaliente got fried, some idiots from the small ships poached my food supply and my chances of survival were hard boiled. But I hatched a plan and scrambled over here to exploit a renewable source of food called honey." "Oh ha ha," said Corey sarcastically, "make egg references in front of a dinosaur why don't ya? Anyway how do I climb the observatory?" "Well I can open a bridge for you if you give me all of your star bits," the midget said, "the bees here don't like when they catch me taking honey." So Corey gave the small guy all of his star bits so the bridge would open. When it opened, Corey continued his venture up the observatory.
While Corey was climbing to the tower, Tai in his bee form managed to reach the bottom of the beehive but he needed to get to the top to see the queen. "Okay I have to get all the way up there," said Tai, "but it's too far to simply hover up there. Any ideas Luma?" "Do you see some honeycombs," replied Luma, "if you do, you can climb them in your bee form." With this knowledge, Tai climbed the honey comb all the way to the queen's throne room where she greeted him, "Good day visitor. I am the Queen Bee." "Hi, my name is Tai Kamiya of Earth," Tai greeted the queen back, "and I'm here for a power star." The queen responded in discovery, "There are more of you. Anyway, to find the power star, to have to relieve my itches. Especially get the bits with orange triangles." Realizing there is a launch star to be made; Tai began to approach the queen (which would have been slower if he walked in the honey) and began to pick out the star chips. When the launch star was formed, Tai asked the queen in curiosity, "before I go, what do you mean by 'more of me'?" "You'll see," said the queen, "it's where the power star is past the launch star. Now go." So Tai used the launch star to find the power star and something very surprising.
When Corey was at the tower, he began to admire the view. "Wow, the whole place looks nice from up here," he said, "I'll bet I can see more as well as the power star at the top. Hey wait a minute." Corey looked down to the platform at the top of the big tree below him. There were 5 figures, all the same species as Tai. One was a blonde with a green tank top, jeans, brown boots and gloves; another was rather short with red hair, orange shirt, purple shoes, green shorts, yellow gloves and a laptop; a third had long brown hair, a big pink hat, a necklace, red dress with brown belt, white and brown shoes and orange gloves; a fourth was tall with blue hair, glasses, a watch, a white shirt with cream vest, grey pants and red and white shoes with blue socks; the last was the smallest, with blonde hair, a green hat, a green long sleeved shirt, brown shorts and green shoes. They all surrounded a power star. "Those must be Tai's friends," Corey said before continuing up the observatory.
As he climbed, Corey came across some rather hostile bugs called mandibugs. They were easy enough for Corey to stomp on them but at the top (at last), there was a slightly larger one with a baby on its back. Corey kicked the baby ticking of the mother then stomped here for the power star. When he got down, he found Tai was already there. "What are you doing down here," Corey asked, "Did you call it quits?" "No dude," replied Tai as he revealed a power star in his hand, "I already found my star and my friends." So Tai began introducing his friends to Corey: the one with glasses was Joe Kido (he's the oldest), the one holding the laptop was Koushiro 'Izzy' Izumi, the one in the dress was Mimi Tachikawa, the small one was Takeru 'T.K.' Takaishi and the last one was Yamato 'Matt' Ishida who said, "This place is boring." Then it was Corey's turn to introduce himself, "Hello. My name is Corey and I come from the now inhospitable planet of Ignaria. Now I live near your planet with my father's ashes because…" "Oh, shut up Mr Dinosaur," Matt rudely interrupted, "I just want to go home." "We all do pal," Tai intervened, "but we can't. We'll find out the whole story once we go see Rosalina." But before anyone could ask who Rosalina is, the entire Honeyhive Galaxy got overrun with mandibugs.
The queen bee showed up in the chaos to announce the bad news, "I'm afraid we are under attack! What started as a minor pest has become a huge problem. I can only blame Bugaboom, the king of the mandibugs, living next door. He must be stopped! This is a three man mission." The queen, not a discriminating type, did not specify who would be regarded as 'men', especially since Corey was the only adult other than her, the midget or the other bees and he is not even human and Mimi was a girl. This left Tai with many options. "Is there a power star in this," Tai asked while the queen nodded in response, "Then I volunteer myself, Corey and Matt." "Oh no," said Matt in a disapproving tone, "I'm not doing this without Gabumon." "But, Matt, you don't need him. I got several power stars without Agumon and besides we're in this together." "Okay, but only because I want to get out of here ASAP." So the two boys plus Corey set off to defeat Bugaboom.
When they got to Bugaboom's tree-shaped planet, Matt brought something up, "Tai, why do you look like a bee?" "Because I ate a special mushroom," replied Tai, "and don't worry, my Luma guardian knows it's safe. All will be explained later." "Will you two shut up," shouted Corey annoyed by non-stop conversation, "It's driving me nuts! I'm sorry if there are acorns above me but…" Before Corey could finish, a giant beetle fell out of the tree crushing the feathered dinosaur. The beetle began its speech, "I am Bugaboom, king of the mandibugs. My brethren have travelled far and wide to expand our territory and we may have arrived at the right place." "No way sir," said Tai in valour and attempt of reason, "There are bee people living here. You can't just take what's theirs." "I take what I find; no excuses," said Bugaboom as he charged at the boys. Matt jumped out of the way but Tai hovered over Bugaboom and landed on him. "Stomp his back," was Luma's only advice but Tai did it anyway and Bugaboom collapsed as a result.
"So you have found my weakness eh," said Bugaboom clearly not defeated, "Let's see if you could get back on!" Bugaboom flung Tai off and began flying. This made trying to land on him more difficult. And the worst part is, he's dropping bombs. That's when Corey woke up from his K.O. and kicked away a bomb rolling towards Tai. "Thanks man," Tai thanked the injured Corey. "You are welcome," Corey said, "I'm a little worn so I'll just kick some bombs away." Tai got back up and kept trying to land on Bugaboom's back while Corey kicked bombs off the planet. When Tai did stomp on Bugaboom again, the beetle king fell again. "What, again," Bugaboom said who was clearly not happy, "You are starting to tick me off!" Bugaboom threw Tai onto some water, stripping the boy of his bee powers and rendering him unconscious. Bugaboom was now dropping bombs at a faster rate and he's flying faster. Matt, who was watching the battle has had enough, "Tai cannot fight anymore and the dinosaur is too busy with the bombs. Time for me to take action!" So Matt found the nearest stripy mushroom, figuring it would give him bee powers, to turn into bee form. With a hovering and a stomp, Matt has defeated Bugaboom. "You may have squashed me like any other bug," said Bugaboom, "but you will pay for it later!" And with that, Bugaboom fainted.
After bringing Tai back to the now mandibug free forest, Matt gave Tai a 1 up mushroom to revive him and a coin to Corey, who walked back by himself, to heal him. "Thanks Matt," said Tai, "you're a good friend." "It's what I do," Matt responded, "I collected these green capped mushrooms in case they were needed. I also took this power star from Bugaboom as I knocked him out. Now let's get out of here; it's boring." And so with 3 more power stars, Tai, Matt, the other kids and Corey say goodbye to the bee people and headed off to the Hubble.
Where will Matt and the kids stay on the Hubble? Where are the Pioneers? Who is the midget? Where did Bugaboom and the mandibugs come from? Find out on the next thrilling episode of Super Tai Galaxy.
Special mentions go to Mine Yoshizaki for the Sgt. Frog references.
