[Last updated August 2, 2016]

VII

The Longest Night

The clouds were heavy one day, and Ross never saw the sun. Most of the children were off playing with the baby 'mons somewhere, and he couldn't help but feel anxious about that. He had been standoffish lately, no matter how hard he tried to act normal. Or perhaps the problem was that he was acting normal, and couldn't act like he was still feeling content, safe, and happy.

In any case, he was finding it very hard to smile, and that made it difficult to be fair to the children. So he started avoiding them, and spent more time walking around the perimeter of the Homestead. When that one afternoon drew close to evening, he made his way back to the hovel with heavy shoulders. When he reached the door, he paused. The wind had picked up, and it set his neck-hairs on end. He turned around, and took a brief survey. Six children including Tatiana and Michael were playing with the babies in the field to the east. He could hear Biyomon and Joanie talking in the room behind him. There were two children unaccounted for—Rebecca and Krissy, he was pretty sure. He looked all around, and though he knew they were probably fine he had to worry.

Then came the scream. He heard a girl's voice coming from the west. Immediately he grabbed his spear from where it leaned on the wall and ran for the bridge. The two girls were running at him from the other side with tears in their eyes. "Gazimon!"

Ross looked out and saw a whole pack of them running from the north. He waved the girls on past him, and then ran behind them. He shouted at the hovel as loud as he could, "Joanie! They're here!"

The children who were playing past the house almost fell into confusion, but Biyomon and Joanie came quickly—Joanie with her bow and arrows—and ordered them all toward the door in the ground in the east field. Ross turned around and saw that the Gazimon had already passed the bridge. The two girls who were with him ran on to where the others were, which left Ross alone in the clearing by the fire pit, where he had one chance to stall the enemy.

He spaced his feet apart, held his spear at ready, and shouted at the mass of Gazimon. There must have been a dozen of them, but they slowed down at the sight of a larger being who appeared ready to fight. Not that they were scared in the least; just that none of them saw why they should be the one to take the hit while the others tore Ross to shreds. They laughed and kept closing in until Ross yelled, "Stay back!" and gestured with his weapon. Then they began to move out in a circle to surround him, but Joanie made herself heard from a fair distance behind Ross.

"Hold it!"

She was aiming for one of the ends of their extending arc, and just to keep them honest she moved her aim to the other end and back again quickly. This made the Gazimon hold their positions, but it didn't stop them from laughing.

The oldest and meanest-looking of them said to the two with a cackle, "We're not looking for a hard time here. You two just walk away, leave the food, and we'll call it even."

It was the most Ross could ask for, but it felt too good to be true, just like everything else lately. "And the little ones?"

They laughed harder. "I said leave the food!"

Ross hadn't trusted them to keep their word anyway. Still, he had to do something to keep them talking, as a fight here would spell death for him and Joanie, and if they ran for the underground shelter they would be stuck until they would inevitably have to fight again. He could tell now that the enemy wouldn't leave a chance to slaughter the baby Data and Vaccine while they were stuck in a corner.

With no real leverage to speak of, Ross knew he had to bluff. "Do you even know who you're talking to?"

The Gazimon howled with laughter. Ross continued. "We're Humans sent from the World of Creators! Just like your precious Commander!" The enemy hadn't put two and two together yet, so this gave them pause. "Even worms like you must have heard about the Commander and his powers! I'll warn you just once: no one who sees a Human's powers ever lives to see them twice!"

Despite his fear and desperation, Ross's voice and eyes held a fire that affected the Gazimon deeply. No one moved or said anything for what felt like a solid minute. The enemy's resolve was not getting stronger, but they still weren't about to leave.

And then something happened that blew out whatever fire Ross had to hold them at bay. The wind from the west picked up sharply, and it brought words.

'Leave none alive!'

It was the Commander's voice, and though it was miles away its hatred and anger were palpable and hit Ross right in the gut. The Gazimon quaked where they stood, and their eyes were filling with a red cast. Nothing would hold them back now, so Ross turned and sprinted. "Shit! Run!"

He got two seconds' head start before the Gazimon's eyes glowed bright red and they began to run after him. Joanie shot the closest one in the head before turning to run as well.

They passed the house and were getting close to the open doorway in the ground, where Biyomon still stood. They wouldn't have made it before the next closest one got them, but Biyomon flapped her wings hard and conjured a green fire that danced forward haphazardly before honing in on its target. The Gazimon was engulfed and then stumbled, which gave Ross and Joanie just enough time to half-fall through the entrance. When Biyomon dropped in behind them, Ross pulled the door shut, which left them in complete darkness.

Ross and Joanie fumbled for the latch, and while they did the Gazimon clawed at the door and hammered against it with their arms and feet. In this sense at least there was some luck: the Gazimon's rage was too primal to allow them to pull the door open as it was designed. But even with the latch tightly secured the force applied to the door was great, and they could hear it cracking. It was then that Biyomon shouted, "Get away from the door! Down here!"

Ross and Joanie obeyed, feeling their way down the stairs to the base of the tunnel. Biyomon pushed them behind her, and said, "Stay back."

Biyomon then brought forth more of her green flame, and it flew up in a rough spiral until it reached the door and seemed to spread into every crack of the thing. Suddenly the Gazimon on the other side cried out in fierce pain.

The door burned with an intense, green glow, but it was not consumed. Ross just stared, but Joanie managed to ask, "How?"

Biyomon slumped to the floor, gasping for air. "I call it the Magical Fire. It won't hurt anything it doesn't want to. It also has a way of messing with your head, kind of like your little spark-stones. The Gazimons' rage won't go away, but they won't hit the door much till the Fire goes down."

"How long will that be?" asked Ross.

Biyomon took a moment before answering. "Twelve hours, maybe. We can only hope that they'll go back to normal before then, and then decide that it's not worth the trouble of waiting."

"How likely is that?"

Biyomon didn't answer. She didn't need to answer, and Ross hadn't needed to ask. He was right in guessing that there was almost no chance at all.

Biyomon needed a minute to catch her breath. Even when she finally stood up with Joanie's help, she held her head and groaned. "What's the matter?" asked Joanie.

"It's the Gazimon. I can feel them like they're right next to me. No, even closer than that. Can't you feel those red eyes?"

Joanie shook her head.

"Of course you can't, sorry," said Biyomon. "Don't worry about me. I'll be fine."

Ross changed the subject. "Did everyone else make it down?"

"Yes. I sent them further down the tunnel."

At the moment they could see decently well because of the Magical Fire, but after they passed a few turns of the pathway all was pitch black again. Joanie then took one of the PPTRs and a piece of iron from her pocket. After every twist in the tunnel she would rub them together to get a sustained glow, just enough to see what was ahead for a little ways. At these points they would call some names, but not too loudly just because of the dread the crowded walls and ceiling instilled.

Eventually they got a reply from Tatiana. "We're in here."

Her voice came from the right path in a fork in the passageway. The three followed the voice, and found themselves in a small room where the eight children and the babies were crowded together. Some of them squinted from the light of the stone, and they were all too frightened to greet them. Joanie dropped to her knees among them, and in the darkness she touched and reassured everyone she could. "It's going to be okay. We just have to sleep down here tonight."

There were some tears and sobs. Ross sat with his back to the wall and pressed his head into his hands. He could barely admit it to himself, so how could he admit to these kids that this was going to be their last night alive? And so he said nothing. After all the work, weeks, and narrow escapes, he knew he had failed them. For the next hour he cursed his decisions, his weakness, and more than anything the Commander's existence. If the bastard had been here right now Ross felt he could have broken his neck.


The hour ended when Ross heard Joanie say something to the others besides her futile attempts at consolation. "Ross and I are going to look around for a while. Biyomon's right here, okay?"

There were some feeble, scattered replies of 'okay.' Joanie stood up and so did Ross. Before they left, Joanie made some light so the children could see her smile. The sadness in her eyes made Ross doubt that it would fool them. He didn't say anything as they left their charges and took the other path in the fork deeper into the shelter.

After they had gone a few dozen yards, Ross asked her, "What do you think we'll find? Another way out?"

"Maybe. Biyomon told me she was pretty sure there was only one entrance, though. We might also find something we can use to barricade the door."

And so they kept checking for signs of hope with the shining stone as they went along, until finally they reached a dead end. The tunnel ended abruptly at an uneven dirt wall that suggested whoever started building the shelter had never finished. Perhaps it was supposed to reach another entrance or at least a larger storeroom with emergency food and water, but they would never know.

When the light went out, the two stood and stared into nothing. Ross could hear Joanie breathing, and it wasn't encouraging. "Should we head back?" he asked.

"Let's take a break first."

So Ross sat against the end of the tunnel and closed his eyes. Even if everything looked the same with them open, he was tired. To his surprise, however, Joanie sat right next to him and found his hand. They closed their fingers together and sat still for a time. Ross wanted to be happy about it, but what did holding hands with a pretty girl mean in the face of certain and painful failure and death?

"What do we tell them?" he finally asked.

"I don't know. We'll think of something."

Ross couldn't keep it in. "How about, 'Sorry, that's all we've got.'"

"Don't say that."

"I'm just sick of lying to these kids. Can't we just tell them that we blew it and that it'll all be over soon?"

"Ross…"

"You do know this is the end, right? There are too many of them for us to kill, they'll never stop, and we can't even slow them down for a whole day."

"I get it. I really do. But we can't let them spend their last hours despairing. It's not right."

Ross started breathing harder. "But what about us? We know better. What are we supposed to do?"

Joanie didn't answer. In the meantime, Ross's head kept spinning. It was all a mix of anger, sadness, and longing for what should have been. Finally, out of nowhere, something made it from his head to his mouth that never would have under most circumstances. "I just don't want to die without having…you know…"

"What?"

"…I don't want to die a virgin."

There it was. It hung right there in the air between them. Joanie was still for a moment before she sighed in consternation. She didn't let go of his hand, though. "I know what you're getting at, Ross, and you already know what my answer to that is."

Ross's instincts were to apologize immediately and then drop the whole thing, but something compelled him to try a different approach. "Joanie, will you marry me?"

Joanie snorted, then laughed.

"Hey, I'm serious! I swear to you right now that if we get married I'll never love another woman for the rest of my life."

Joanie laughed on. "Stop it!"

"We can get Biyomon to be the witness, and then we'll tell the kids they're officially adopted till we get them back home. We'll be a real family with eight darling children! How much more Catholic can you get? And what better way is there to go out without despair?"

Joanie slowly regained her composure. "Okay, there were actually two reasons why I'm not going to sleep with you. I know you think what you're asking for is hopeful, but it's just not. You wouldn't have asked me this if the end weren't in sight, and if we both say 'yes' we're both admitting that we're all goners and that what we do now doesn't matter.

"That's not hope.

"That's despair.

"Hope means doing the right thing even if you can't see what difference it makes. I'm not going to let you act as if everything's pointless. I know you don't believe in Heaven, but can you at least understand that we owe it to these kids to believe that we can save them? If you can't believe it in your thoughts, believe it in your actions.

"That's hope."

Ross was stumped. Even in the face of certain death—the one thing that was supposed to reduce all rational people to a more basic, instinctual kind of humanity—here was Joanie. Of all the people Ross could be stuck here with, it was Joanie, who it seemed would never stop being Joanie. "Tell you what," she said. "As for your Proposal, the one with a capital 'P,' if we pull through and get the kids out alive, I'll give it a few months and then I'll think about it, okay?"

Ross sighed. "Alright, you win." He felt no consolation, though.

They weren't smiling now. Joanie said, "Come here," and they held each other close.

"I'd have been so lost without you," said Ross. "We'd all have been."

"That's why I'm here, and it's why you're here, too. I couldn't have done it alone, either."

They sat together a while longer before they started to make their way back.


When they got back to the small room they heard some snoring, so Joanie didn't use the light. Instead she got close enough to the little ones that those who were still awake could tell she was there. Soon one of them said, "I'm thirsty."

Ross knew it broke Joanie's heart to whisper, "We'll get water in the morning. Try to sleep, now."

This got Ross thinking of all the other things they wouldn't have a chance to do again: eating a meal, watching the sky, and sitting around a fire among them. None of those seemed more important than drinking water, though. It made his throat feel parched, so he took Joanie's advice. Knowing that he'd never manage to stay asleep for more than a few hours, he closed his eyes. Only a few minutes later his ears followed suit and he lost track of his senses.

When he was awake, he could hear Joanie whispering a prayer to Mary, and when she said 'amen,' she started over again. Ross wanted to tell her that getting some sleep would be much more useful than praying the Rosary, but he decided against it. 'Praying makes sense to her, I guess,' he thought. 'We're about to join the Dead Virgins Club so she might as well appeal to the president.' He probably would not have thought this if he could see the tears rolling down her cheeks. He soon nodded off again.

When Ross awoke the second time, Joanie was asleep sitting up against the wall near him, which he could tell by the steady breathing. He didn't know how much time had passed, so he didn't feel like falling asleep again. He got up and walked near the entrance to the room. He whispered to no direction in particular, "Biyomon?"

There was a rustle nearby and soon he was tapped on the arm by a dull claw. They stepped into the hallway and he asked, "How long do you think we've been down here?"

Biyomon clicked her beak a few times. "I guess around ten hours, give or take one."

"Hmm."

"It's probably about time to keep watch at the entrance."

"Yeah. Are you good to help?"

"I'm afraid I used too much of the Fire earlier. I won't be able to use it again for a few days, and that's only if I take it easy. I don't know how much help I can be, but I'll—"

"Forget it. Just stay with the little ones and do all you can when the enemy gets past us."

"…Very well."

With that they went back in the room, and Ross carefully made his way to where Joanie was sleeping and tapped her on the shoulder. "It's time," he whispered.

Joanie stretched. "Got it," she whispered back.

Their weapons were just outside the room. Ross grabbed his spear and Joanie took up her bow and quiver. Ross didn't ask how many arrows the quiver held. They then both knelt down and gave Biyomon a hug. "Thanks for everything," said Joanie.

"No, thank you two for everything. We had so little hope before you came."

It broke Ross's heart. In Biyomon's eyes they were still saviors sent from a higher plane. After they stood up and Joanie began walking to the entrance, Ross lingered. "I'm so sorry," he said.

"You can be sorry when you break your promise to protect these children," said Biyomon. "But before then I won't hear it. Even if you die keeping that promise I won't hear it."

Ross shook his head. "I won't disappoint, then."

He followed Joanie down the path again. Every little while she would give them some light, and they found they would each look at the other's face more than the twists and turns ahead of them. At last they came to the stairs, and the door above was still glowing enough that they could see each other reasonably well. They heard a pound followed by a muffled scream. They knew that soon the door would not be painful to touch, and then their work would be cut out for them.

They didn't need to consult on tactics. They pulled as far back as they could to give Joanie an advantage with the bow. And then they sat and waited.

Already they could see that the door was losing its glow. It was a slow, seamless way that the Magical Fire died down, and every so often they would realize that it was not as bright as it had been some minutes prior. Ross looked over at one point and could just barely make out Joanie's face: beautiful and sad, but not beaten—not yet.

When the door was barely visible, and the two sat in complete darkness again, Joanie spoke at last. "Remember what hope is."

When the Magical Fire was dead, and there was no light to be seen, Ross replied. "I'll try."

The pounding began again. At first it was hesitant, but in no time it was relentless. Ross stood up, reached out, and touched Joanie's shoulder so that he would remember the last time. He then took a good number of paces forward and readied himself. He stamped the ground a few times so Joanie would know where he was.

The pounding grew louder, and so did the cracking noise. When it reached its loudest point it was punctuated by a terrible slam, and a pale light poured into the tunnel. The first Gazimon tumbled down the stairs, and he was met with an arrow to the head. The others ran down behind him with perfect balance, and before Joanie could get another shot ready one of them was upon Ross.

He swept his spear and iron met skull. With one Gazimon dazed against the wall, Ross's weapon was still ready to use. The next foe got close too quickly, though, and Ross could only stab it. Even impaled, the creature snapped its foaming jaws and swung wildly for Ross's throat. This was what he had been afraid of: with two more enemies charging at him he had no room to act. Another arrow whizzed by, and Ross saw the beasts dive at him.

Just as he braced for impact, he was blinded, deafened, and tossed back by a different force entirely. Everything spun for a moment, and then he found that the tunnel was glowing white and his ears were ringing. He staggered to his feet, pulling his spear out of the now limp Gazimon. In front of him were a crowd of the creatures lying dead and seared. The two that had dived at him had landed behind him, and though their backs were burned they were starting to get up. One of them ran toward him again but was interrupted by an arrow. The other ran past him at a new figure running down the stairs. This newcomer stabbed with a sword and made short order of the last Gazimon.

The glow subsided quickly, but Ross's head kept spinning. He stared at the young man before him, who stared back in turn before breaking out in gleeful laughter.

"Jacob!" shouted Joanie, who ran up and gave their rescuer a big hug.

Ross had nothing to say yet. The reality of the matter hadn't set in. "Ha ha! Here comes the cavalry, right?" he heard the newcomer say, and then, "Let's get you out of here, man!" before the other two helped him up the stairs and into the early morning light.

It was then that everything clicked, and Ross saw Jacob at his left side and Unimon before them, whose mouth was letting off what looked like steam. "What…How on…" He never finished the sentence. He just grabbed hold of Jacob and for the first time since far too long ago he laughed loud and long.

"You didn't know we were here, did you?" asked Joanie, still laughing herself.

"No! We couldn't miss a dozen Viruses standing around red-eyed, though! Unimon smelled them from four miles away during our morning patrol!"

Ross kept laughing. Even if it wasn't as big a coincidence as he had thought, he still considered the whole thing wonderfully, wonderfully stupid.

"Hey, you've got some burns," said Jacob. Indeed Ross had a few light burns on his forehead and hands, but he could barely even feel them.

"Forget about it!"

"Done!" Jacob then turned to Joanie. "Are the kids all here too?"

"Yes! We're all here safe, sound, and accounted for!"

"Ha ha, oh man. I can sleep at night again!"

"They're all in the shelter—let's bring them out! They're going to be so thrilled to see you!"

Ross motioned for them to go on ahead without him. The other two went down into the earth again, calling out for the little ones to meet them half-way. As they did, Ross approached Unimon and found himself at a loss for words. Unimon was not offended, and simply made a shallow bow. Ross responded in kind but bowed lower, and smiled.

In short order the entire throng was out in the open, and Ross found himself mobbed. Tatiana sat on Jacob's shoulders and Biyomon walked over to Unimon, but all the other children and 'mons seemed to want to tackle him. It was a better feeling than he could ever remember, and he only half-listened as Jacob described to Joanie the hideout deep in the mountains where Garurumon, Agumon, and Angemon had regrouped.

It would be a tough effort to bring them all there safely—especially because Unimon would have to scout all around to make sure no enemies found the road they were taking. It made no difference to Ross, though: the sun was out, and his promise was still going strong.