Yay! There's a big Ken flashback in this chapter! Woot! And... um... no Miyako & Hawkmon. They'll be in the following chapter with thier new allies.
"Iori? Iori, wait up!" Armadimon pleaded with his partner as they ran across the hills. Such a heavy katana would normally have slowed the boy down, but his adrenaline was running rapidly. "Iori, please wait for a minute!"
The boy stopped abruptly, enough to startle the digimon, who had to grabbed the dirt tightly to keep himself from running into him. Armadimon looked up at his face curiously, and saw him biting his lip and his eyes welling up in tears. "A-Are you alright?"
"I-I'm sorry, Armadimon. I've been waiting for this opportunity for years… ever since that night grandpa was killed."
"Iori," the digimon felt a pang in his stomach as he looked back at him. That night, the two of them watched the chaos from afar, and discovered his grandfather's body after he was already slain. It was nearly pitch black that night, but they could still make out the figure of a young swordsmen, and his partner, Stingmon. The two figures had their swords drawn, and Stingmon was saying, 'Let's get out of here before they discover us, Ken.'
But they had already been discovered by the small boy and his digimon, and Iori never forget what they looked like.
"I know you wish I could just forget what happened… but I can't do that. If Ken is nearby, then I have to take this chance."
"You could get hurt," Armadimon offered weakly, in an vain attempt to change his mind.
"I know," the boy replied. "But you know how long I've been waiting to do justice to my grandfather… I might not get this chance again." He looked down at Armadimon, with a feirce, but also fearful look in his eyes. "Please don't try to stop me."
He still knew he should stop him, but instead took his trembling hand. "Please be careful, Iori."
Iori smiled at his support. "Thank you, Armadimon." With that, the two continued searching quickly.
At the outskirts of the city once again, Hikari and Tailmon hid in the back of the cart with Patamon as Takeru pushed it along. Patamon had forgiven how curiously they had poked him earlier, and was filling them in on his life story. How he was so happy to meet Takeru, and how the only time he was ever able to protect Takeru was when he lead him out of the burning house the night his family was killed. How they had been scraping for food since then, and how he had to hide from everyone's angry gazes because he was a digimon.
Tailmon had always suspected that the world beyond their castle walls might be very different from what they knew, but the feeling of having so many people hating her was settling in fairly well. She looked to Hikari, who was hugging her legs to her chest tightly as she faced reality. "It's so hurtful that that should happen to you all," she finally said. "How can people be so… so… I don't know. It's just so hard to imagine everything that you've been through."
"I can't imagine how you've lived without it," Patamon replied.
"It was all really exciting, at first," she leaned her cheek on her shoulder as she remembered what happened years and years before. "Daisuke was playing with the computer, and opened some kind of gate for V-mon to come through. I loved playing with him, and then a few years later, Tailmon came. I've had her company ever since, and everyone in the castle has taken care of us…"
"It must be nice," Patamon sighed, a little jealous. "When I first met Takeru, his parents were just as thrilled, and were always feeding me little cakes… and I haven't worked off the extra pudge since!" he laughed and poked himself. "It didn't last long, though."
"I'm sorry to hear that," Tailmon said, but had a sudden craving for cakes because he mentioned it. "I'm sorry to hear about all of this."
"I wonder what kind of situation Miyako must be in right now with Hawkmon," Hikari pondered, and then poked her head out of the cart to face Takeru. "Where do you last see them, anyway?"
"Um… on the end of the cart, actually," he laughed nervously. "They sure aren't there anymore. Iori and Armadimon are missing, too."
"Maybe they got sucked into a digi-port or something?" Tailmon poked her head out as well.
"Wouldn't that be nice," Takeru replied, trying to hide how worried he was. After all, it was as if they vanished into thin air. "I hope they aren't getting themselves into trouble… or rather, I hope Miyako isn't. Iori probably won't run into anything he can't handle."
Ken and Wormmon trudged along as usual, and the hot sunshine suddenly disappeared behind a cloud. "Well, that's a bit of a relief," Wormmon commented on the cooler temperature. His pleasant thoughts were disrupted, though, when a big rain drop hit his forehead.
"Do you feel that, Wormmon?" Ken asked, in all seriousness.
"The rain? Yes?" he blinked as another one hit him. The rain was slow, but steady.
"No… I've got this bad feeling," Ken swiped out his katana and held it ready, "Someone's coming."
"Are you sure?" Wormmon got a sinking feeling. "Should I digivolve into Stingmon?"
"I wouldn't do that just yet," the boy stood completely still, but looked around cautiously with his eyes. "There!"
He spun around just in time to deflect a younger boy's sword, as Iori had just jumped at him from one of the hilltops. Wormmon was startled and jumped backwards, just as Armadimon was catching up to the action. Ken used his sword to push Iori back to the ground, were he caught his breath and took a close look at the boy he had just attacked. "I'm sure of it… you're Ken."
"I see you know who I am," Ken looked down at him, still brandishing his sword. "So who are you to attack me?"
"Only someone you didn't kill before when you had the chance!" he yelled and swung his katana forward again. Ken caught it against his own, and slid it away, only giving Iori a chance to rebound at his other side. Ken was just barely able to deflect that one as well, but could tell this boy was going to keep him on his toes. He was obviously well-trained in his swordsmanship… but where could he have learned this style?
"The kendo dojo!" Ken thought aloud, and then pressed his sword against Iori's. The pressure they both were putting against each other made them stand still, with their blades edging towards each other's faces. Ken took that opportunity to look him in the eyes. "You were part of the Hida dojo, weren't you?"
"You would know my Grandpa's style, wouldn't you?" he accused him, and then slid his katana downwards against Ken's to split out of the hold they made together.
"The old man there? I only fought him once--"
"I know!" Iori yelled furiously and struck at Ken's fist, giving his fingers a thin cut. It was still enough to startle Ken and make him yelp in pain, and Iori drew back for another swing. "It was all you needed to slaughter him!"
Wormmon flinched as he watched. "Ken, look out!"
It was awkward, but Ken was able to swing around to barely catch the blade with the tip of his own. He looked cautiously at how close it was, and thrust Iori backwards again. Wormmon was only relieved for a moment though, until Iori charged again, verbally confirming that today he would take revenge.
"I'll kill you and avenge him, Ken!"
The blades continued to clash against each other, and Wormmon weakly looked over to Armadimon, who he hardly noticed before. The yellow digimon had a pained expression, both worried for his partner's life in this fight, and worried about his innocence coming to a startling conclusion. "Are you that boy's partner?" Wormmon asked, hoping he would stop him. Obviously, Ken didn't want to hurt his opponent, but wouldn't be able to get away with just defending himself forever.
Armadimon nodded slowly, but didn't look back. Wormmon gulped, and looked back towards the fight.
"You must be mistaken!" Ken pressed Iori's sword against the ground with his own, and was positioned close enough to nearly breath down the younger boy's neck. "Just what did you see that night?"
Iori sweated, struggling to pull his sword back up. "I saw enough."
"But you're wrong! I didn't kill him!"
"Then who did? Who else was there that night?"
"I…" Ken trailed off, and grew a little less confident. "I don't know…"
"I don't want to hear any excuses!" Iori yelled and used his own body to shove Ken out of the way and pull his sword back upward. "I know you killed him!"
Catching his footing again, the older boy stood his ground again to deflect Iori's attacks. His minded drifted out of the moment and back to the past, though. That night at the dojo, he was ducking out from the cold, and trying to hide Wormmon as always. He had been living by himself for as long as he could remember, except for Wormmon's company.
In that time, he heard a rumor that a respected kendo master was inviting to digimon for some reason or another, and thought that perhaps they could seek refuge in the dojo. In the evening, the old man met him in private.
"What's your name, son?"
"I'm Ken Ichijoji," he said, in his younger age. "And this," he motioned behind himself to a shy digimon, "is Wormmon."
"You say that you want to stay here?" he had asked in a firm voice. "This isn't a hotel or an orphanage, you know."
"I heard that you already were letting one orphan live here, though," Ken said meekly.
"You should know better than to listen to rumors, Ken," he scolded. "He's staying with me because he's my grandson, and he trains in the dojo."
"If he were to train under you, would you let us stay?" Wormmon offered.
The old man raised an eyebrow, amused. "Train with me? Have you ever even held a sword before?"
Ken shook his head. "I can try, though."
"Ha ha ha! That's a good attitude. How about you take a shot at it?" he handed him a katana, while arming himself with another. Ken was flustered to hold a real weapon, but did his best to attack the old man- who easily beat him without even unsheathing his own katana. With a final bop on Ken's head, he laughed again, and said, "You tried hard, but I don't know."
"Please, sir! If you teach me, I won't even have to stay here… Wormmon and I will be able to take care of ourselves!" he bowed at his feet, and Wormmon followed his lead.
"You can sleep in small room by the dojo for tonight, and I'll tell you my decision tomorrow," he said. Ken and his digimon were grateful that they would sleep in a warm place that night, but awoke in the middle of the night to some unusual noises.
"Are those footsteps?" Wormmon asked. "Do you think that old man always runs around the dojo at night?"
"Let's go check it out, Wormmon," Ken replied, and edged his way towards the door. "I-I think I better take a sword, just in case…"
"Yeah… just in case," the digimon nodded. He had only just grabbed it, though, when a few people he couldn't make out the shapes of stormed through the door. Ken was startled and felt to the floor, unable to move in fright. One of the figures raised a bloody sword over him, letting a few drops splatter on Ken's horrified face, and Wormmon felt in his bones what he needed to do. Before the figure would thrust his weapon down against his partner, he digivolved into Stingmon, and with one mighty movement, sent the figures flying through the door. "This way, Ken!" he helped the scared boy up, and they ran into the dojo.
There, though, they only found the old man's body, and were too frightened to stick around as they heard more footsteps. "Let's get out of here before they discover us, Ken."
They ran outside, Ken still clentching the sword and not having wiped the blood off his face, only to be discovered by the surrounding people who heard the commotion. "It was him! That boy and his vile digimon killed the dojo master!"
"W-wait! You've got it all wrong!" Ken tried to yell, but the people were all throwing stones at him. Stingmon knew he needed to protect Ken, but wasn't sure what to do against innocent people. He held his small, scared partner against him as the rocks hit his back.
It stopped, however, when a young, fair-haired drifter stepped in between the two parties. "This many people, all gaining up on one digimon? And he's not even fighting back?"
"Get out of the way, kid!"
Stingmon used that chance to dedigivolve to Wormmon, and he and Ken huddled together as they listened to the swift clanging of blades, and then the people escaping in different directions. When they were sure it was safe, they looked back up at their savior.
"So you were a big, powerful Stingmon, huh?" drifter brushed his hair out of his face and smirked at them. "Didn't seem like you knew what you were doing."
"Well… yeah…" the battered little Wormmon's eyes searched the ground, a little embarrassed.
"I'm Yamato. Who are you two?" he knelt down by them.
"This is Wormmon, and I'm Ken… Ken Ichijoji. Thank you very much for saving us, Mr. Yamato."
"Ichijoji?" Yamato raised his eyebrows, having heard the name before. "Say… are you two alone? And do you have to put up with that all the time?"
Ken nodded. "It's not normally this bad, though."
"I'll come right out and ask… would you two like me to train you? I think it would be good for you… and I hate seeing a digimon get treated like that."
The years that followed were filled with training, and living along Yamato's side amongst the hills. Every so often, he would disappear for a while on his own little mission, and Ken might run into people who still knew him as the person who killed the dojo master. But he and Wormmon grew confident in their abilities, and settled into the lives of drifters, protecting the countryside. Yamato eventually left them on their own, and life was fairly quiet- until today.
Ken snapped back into the present as the tip of Iori's katana brushed his chin. He groaned and jumped backwards a few steps to hold his chin with the hand that was still bleeding. This boy had a serious intent to kill him, so dodging was going to get him no where. He took a deep breath as Iori charged at him again, but this time he didn't wait for the younger boy to strike first.
Armadimon and Wormmon both cringed on the sidelines as they heard Iori yelp and drop his katana, and hold his arm in pain. Ken had freshly cut the skin on his left forearm.
"Are you ready to back down, now?" Ken panted a little. The rain was still falling slowly and steadily, but not enough that they were soaked. Iori glared back up at him and dashed for his sword.
"It'll take more than that to stop me now," he replied firmly, and they clashed swords together again, neither one giving up soon.
