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Story Themes: "O Death" by Jen Titus
(-'010102000'-)
"I close my eyes, then I drift away, into the magic night I softly say. A silent prayer, like dreamers do, then I fall asleep to dream my dreams of you."
—Roy Orbison
The Lighthouse
Saga I Session XIV
... The Endless Ones ...
The King of the Endless Ones was dreaming.
In his dreams, he saw many things. Most of them flashes of a past he no longer believed in. He saw an elderly male digimon coil like a serpent around Gennai, then dissipate in a flash of brilliant, blinding white light, riding on the tailcoat of many royal attacks. He saw a massive red reptilian digimon vanish in a sea of gray water. He saw his black-leathered, gun-slinging companion vanish as a cone-shaped blade shattered his ribs in one fell-swoop. He saw the great slumbering giant chained and sealed and dropped into a world where he had no mind, no consciousness of his own, no spirit or rage but that of other humans; the great slumbering giant, made a puppet. He saw the blond-haired, blue-eyed angel-demon king descend into a madness most great, and die against the bludgeon of dragon and crusader. He saw one final smile of his great angel, the once-blond beauty now blackened by hate and lust, as the final alphabet letter blew the both of them to hell. Then the blue dragon grabbed the Endless King, his great, magnificent wings billowing against the winds, and the vortex surrounding them pulsated and gravitated, and next thing he knew, he was somewhere he did not recognize.
The only thing he knew was that he was all alone.
In his dream, a hierarchy of angels fell from the stars, burning and smoldering as they descended through the atmosphere, the faces they carved into those great scorching spheres of gas and flame and crust fading into dust. Lucemon, fallen ruler of the fallen angels, leading his fallen comrades to their untimely end. Seraphimon, Cherubimon, Ophanimon, tainted by the vampire's fangs. Dominimon, jolted awake. ClavisAngemon, unable to unlock the Zenith so needed to end the misery. GuardiAngemon, unable to protect.
And a rush filled the King of the Endless Ones then; he was standing beside his General Angemon, and Ophanimon and her General MagnaAngemon, the four of them staring up at the cosmos and admiring the silver twinkling of the stars; he sat at a dinner table with his fellow lords, accompanied by Piemon, Machinedramon, Puppetmon, MetalSeadramon, and Etemon, as well as Angemon and MagnaAngemon. Twelve Olympic Gods sat themselves down nearby. Back then, he hadn't much humor, but the combined efforts of Ophanimon, Piemon, and MagnaAngemon always managed to make him crack a smile. Etemon and Puppetmon would make many attempts that failed miserably, but their utter failure usually produced amusement for their companions at least. Gennai with his children, the Vampire King, and their five partners joined them at the last moment, bearing gifts from the other side of the planet, laughing and singing and joking and dancing.
And then the King of the Endless Ones dreamed of her. The human child with hair made of gold and eyes like a hawk's. Her cheeks were dotted with freckles, her rosy lips pulled back in a nervous, unsure smile, her hands clenching and unclenching with a frantic jitter. Her gentle but dithery voice called his name, almond-shaped eyes blinking with their soft amber hue that blared like the bronze stars, before she, too, disappeared, like all the others.
"Seraphimon," she said once. And then he watched her fling herself off that cliff, her hand reaching toward the sky, flying, soaring. She could see the lighthouse stooped over the edge of the rock, its light bold and beautiful. But the hawk-eyed girl did not have hawk wings so she couldn't fly, so she fell, like the hierarchy of angels fell, and also like the hierarchy of angels, she died.
Seraphimon was there that day when they discovered her body. He was the first one to see it. He thought it the oddest thing, that she hadn't turned into data and fluttered to the sky like all digimon do. That she could not simply be reformatted and reborn in Primary Village. He thought it the oddest thing, and the cruelest. Could those who did not die understand those who did? At first, forever ending seemed an incomprehensible thought. Sometimes digimon took years, decades, even centuries to be reborn in Primary Village. Sometimes an error occurred in the reformatting process so they were transferred to a new server – or another world – and could not be reborn in their original Digital World. But to forever die?
Seraphimon glided to the lighthouse above her corpse. He stared out over the ocean waves. He'd gone numb, almost blank. It was Lucemon's wails that brought him back to reality. To the crashing waves. The squealing hinges of the lighthouse. The coos of the creatures in the forest beneath him.
Lucemon and Piemon did not know Seraphimon was there, watching them. As Piemon reached forward with tender hands to comfort Lucemon, Seraphimon thought to look away. Piemon was Lucemon's friend and Seraphimon had appreciated what little time he'd had alone to mourn her passing away, so he thought he should give the same to Lucemon.
But then he heard Piemon's words. Piemon, a servant of Apocalymon? Piemon, who they had let into their lives, their homes, their hearts? Piemon, sewn into their souls and spirits like the human child beneath them, dead?
And that was why Seraphimon laughed. He didn't laugh in that lighthouse as he listened to Lucemon and Piemon scour the details of Piemon's allegiance; he didn't laugh a day after that as they held the dead child's funeral; he didn't laugh years after that as he gobbled up entire villages and nations, yum yum. But he did laugh now.
"Seraphimon," called a voice. At first, he thought it was the dead carcass calling out for him again.
In the dream, he descended from the lighthouse and approached the bloody sheet-strewn corpse. He admired the way the gray clouds reflected off her golden curls of hair, how even dead she had the ability to mesmerize whoever laid eyes on her. Then he pulled down the covers over her face and stared into the half-chunk that was the only thing remaining of her head. It had bits of her chin and nose, and even an eye that was rolled-up and staring up at the lighthouse with a veined, dull look. Talons of hair protruded from the chunk, just enough to splay over the sand outside of the sheet, but beyond that chunk lied a mess of splattered blood and fleshy clumps and splintered organ.
In the dream, he stared down at the corpse. His chest tightened again. How could he have allowed this to happen? She was his responsibility. All of them were his – their – responsibility. He had failed her. He had failed them. He had failed the entire Digital World.
In the dream, he heard a crack and a snap beneath him. He crouched to better view the body. Crkcrk. The sound grew louder. A sound whispered to Seraphimon, light and gentle. "Seraphimon," the voice rasped, louder and louder. Crkcrk.
In the dream, her only remaining eye flickered away from the lighthouse and landed on Seraphimon. He stumbled back, but her hand – severed from her wrist by the impact – grabbed onto his ankle, tripping him.
In the dream, Seraphimon screamed.
In the dream, the golden-haired hawk-eyed prophecy girl screamed with him. She screamed his name. His true, real name, the name she had never known him by but the name everyone else now called him. She screamed it to the skies, to the lighthouse, to the world. DEMON.
"Demon?" the voice called again, stronger this time. "Demon, it's time to wake up."
Then the dream faded away, and the King of the Endless Ones – The Wrathful Demon – Demon – was staring into the six eyes of his fellow brethren, his fellow Endless Ones.
The Dreamless Dreamer, lord of R'lyeh, captor of light, Dagomon.
The Goddess of the Moons, Dianamon, the left-hand general of the fallen Ophanimon.
The Soul Sucker, Bagramon, jackal and demon lord and seducer of souls.
"Demon," Dianamon continued, her fingers tightly entwined with his, stiff from his slumber. "You'll want to see this, my sweet peach."
"How can he even sleep at a moment like this?" Bagramon said with a snicker. Dianamon, too, giggled, then cleared her throat and frowned.
In the Depths of Nowhere, there was a great white mirror suspended over the awnings of a black plaque. The Depths of Nowhere themselves stirred in the core of the Dark World, churning like the belly of a volcano, with windows that saw into the heart of all people. Billions – trillions – of double-pane glass windows stretched into every direction, feeding into the world, into the universe, into the universes.
The mirror was the soul of these windows. Through this mirror, the Endless Ones saw all things.
And in particular, they saw Piemon descend from the Odaiba ferris wheel, reaching for the heavens like that one child had reached for the lighthouse before she hit the ground and splattered. His data was dissolving. The once-white ferris wheel was now scorched and charred, falling to searing and smoking bits and pieces. Cinders and ash swept away the winds, the bedim, following him as he fell.
For a moment – just a moment – Demon, the Lord of Wrath, felt a wave of catharsis.
The death of Piemon, of the Apocalymon who never was, had finally come into being.
And that was why Demon laughed.
(-1020101-)
"Birdramon!" Mimi cried, reaching out for the bird-type digimon as Mara sucked them back inside the flat using her tentacles of sand. Her arms had literally morphed into gliding pillars of sizzling, gritty grains that whipped them through the air. Mimi flung against a nearby wall, her skull crunching against the wood. She heard Izzy and Joe call out her name, then grabbed her temple where she felt a hot, sticky substance.
Her sight wasn't blurry, though. She didn't feel dizzy.
Birdramon screeched and sent a bombardment of flame up Mara's arms to her face. She entrenched her fingers into the flames and tossed them up to the ceiling, where she smothered them with more sand that spiraled out of her shoulders.
"What is she?" Matt said through clenched teeth.
Sora winced, feeling along her arm where the hunk of glass had split skin. "Maybe a Destined?"
"But then where's her partner?" Izzy asked, helping Mimi to her feet.
"In here," the woman responded. The Destined's brows furrowed as they watched her pat her belly. "I swallowed it whole. Yuuuummmm! Tasted like martinis and Spam! ...Now you'll get to join my partner, in here. You'll melt from the acid and be digested through my intestines. I'll absorb your nutrients and you'll energize me. You know how it goes— foodchain and everything. I'm just one link higher than you."
Sora grit her teeth and peered at Matt, who had clasped her hand tightly in his own. "Sora," he whispered, "I know you don't want your mother to see you this way, but..."
"It's okay," she said, glancing to her mother who stood behind her, paralyzed by shock. "You know what Tai would say if he was here. He'd have us use everything in our arsenal. No holding back."
"No holding back," he repeated.
"Sora, wait," her mother whispered, her voice breaking. She reached out and grabbed Sora by the shoulder. Unfortunately, her mother grabbed her injured arm and it made Sora bite back a hiss. Mrs. Takenouchi quickly apologized and let go. Silence fell between them for a few seconds. In the background, Garurumon and Togemon let off a blistering combo of needles and ice that shattered beams of sand. As Ikkakumon fired off a brigade of missiles, Sora's mother finally spoke. "I know what you'll have to do. I know I can't hold you back. Ever since you were little, when these adventures first started, I had to learn to let you go and watch your back as you face these horrors all on your own, knowing there was nothing I could do to help you.
"I'm sorry," she whispered, looking down at the ground. "I'm sorry, and I love you, and please, please be careful. He might still be out there, Sora... You might be able to find him, if you really try... But if you go searching, please, please, return to me someday."
"Mom, why does it feel like you're saying goodbye?" Sora grabbed her mom's hand as well. She'd felt something familiar to this. It was a little less than a decade ago, but the wound was still fresh in her mind. She'd had a similar conversation with her mother then, as Sora departed Earth for a second time, this time to face the Dark Masters and Apocalymon. Her mother had been watching over her during her journey, but the fact still remained that she was useless in saving her daughter's life, in keeping her safe.
At that moment, neither of them knew whether or not Sora would survive. And this moment, this time, it was the same.
But Sora was not departing for the Digital World.
"Just in case," Mrs. Takenouchi said with a small smile, leaning forward to plant a light kiss on her daughter's forehead. "I never know when you're going to be in mortal danger and when you're going to come out fine. So for now, just in case— I have you in my thoughts." She kissed Sora's forehead. "I love you." She kissed Sora's cheeks. "I'll miss you." She hugged her. "And even if I have to wait forever, I know you'll come back to me."
Sora's eyes widened.
To think... when her mother first arrived and the world went to Hell, she had been furious with Mrs. Takenouchi, demanding to know the real identity of her father, careless of her mother's true feelings. But here her mother was, at the end of the world, kissing her, hugging her, telling her how much she cared and how much she believed in her daughter's strength.
Truth be told, Sora did not feel strong. But maybe that was what made her strong, that moment of feeling unsure, of hesitation; perhaps it was what made her human that also made her a Destined. She was not a god, not some cosmic entity from beyond the stars. Maybe that was what made her such a powerful asset to the Digital World— that she was not all-powerful, that she was not an event but a catalyst.
But this time, she thought, leaning forward to lightly plant a kiss on her mother's own forehead, this time, I do have power. I have been given this gift so that I may help the world.
Just as I did when I was a little girl, I will do again as an adult.
I'm not all-powerful, but there's no way I'll let that stop me from protecting my mother, and my real father— the father who raised me— the father who was there for me regardless of genetics— Haruhiko.
Sora felt a warmth fill her chest. The emblem of her Crest of Love softly glowed over skin and bone. She held out her hand toward Mara, who was dancing between a charging Birdramon and Ikkakumon. Garurumon howled and hurdled toward the human-shaped conundrum. Sora felt the power of Enigma Evolution sizzle inside of her.
Mara's shadow twitched. Mara hesitated and took a second to glance away from her opponents and toward it. It twitched again, echoing movements that weren't her own. With another flick of Sora's wrist, the shadows split into three.
"Oh, great," Mara huffed, just in time as one of the shadows launched at her as well, cackling. They converged on her, claws ripping at her face; but every time she made swipes for them, her hands simply fell through as if they did not exist. "Ahhh, Yggdrasil damn you!"
She pointed her palm at Sora, her lips widening into a skeletal smirk. "Looks like I'll just have to aim for the puppeteer."
"You'll do that," said Matt, stepping in front of Sora, his Crest of Friendship gleaming blue on his chest, "And I'll do this."
Metal screws twisted out of their hinges and pierced Mara in the face. She flipped back, feeling along her flesh, wincing. "That's not very nice..." she whispered. Sand flopped out of her face and slopped over the floor. Her face caved in, forming a new face, healing the wounds. "I could have been killed, sweetheart... And careful, you wouldn't want that to happen. Not to me."
"And why not?"
"Because there's more than one soul inside that body," Izzy calculated. Realizing it was his turn to tap into that infinite well of time and space, he nodded toward Sora and Matt and motioned toward Mara.
Matt's brow furrowed. "And how do you figure that?"
"From little comments by her and Gatomon." Izzy gave a speculative glance. "Either that, or she just likes poetry. She very well could just be delusional, in which case I'd recommend medication. Joe's a doctor, but a therapist would be the best kind of doctor to figure out what type of pills you'd need."
Mara laughed. "There's a difference between nuts and just evil, kid! In your opinion, I may be both— perhaps a bit more evil than insane— but to me, I'm righteous, I'm sane, I'm logical! I'm the good guy, my ethics just don't match yours! Now shush... let the sandwoman put you to sleep."
Izzy motioned his hand. Sora and Matt's computer whirred. The television crackled. Mimi's iPod flickered on. She blinked and took it out of her pocket.
Sora and Matt grinned. Joe shoved his glasses up the bridge of his nose, frowning. "It's technopathy."
Izzy thought about Gennai... how far the old man had come, how differently he'd been acting lately. As if the past was finally catching up to him, as if he were witnessing the ghosts of dead friends.
The computer surged to life. The television and a nearby radio combined together, the radio forming a head and the television forming a base. Izzy opened a digiport. A vortex whirled around the screen, sucking inward, hands reaching for Mara, for her unflawed face, for her legs, her arms, her body. It wanted to consume her whole.
She bit down on her lip and ripped the floor up from underneath her, forming a barricade. Swiftly, she punched a hole into the wall and grabbed hold of a pipe, then flicked her hand in Izzy's direction.
"No you don't!" Sora called. Both she and Birdramon fired at the same time: fire and shadow whirling together in a surge of energy that struck Mara's arm before she could fire her own attack at Izzy. The radio-head television stirred, then stood on legs made of stereos. A nearby electric fan wrenched its chord out of a socket and formed an arm, while a video game platform and controller remote formed the other arm. It moved in Mara's direction, each step heavy and weighted, reaching outward with its video game arm.
The television screen flickered on. There was a smile in the belly of the electric beast.
The sound of static filled her ears as the radio buzzed at the head.
Mara laughed. "Marvelous... just marvelous... hahahah... hahahah!" Stretching out both arms, she twirled in a circle. Twin beams of purple molten energy shot out in a barrage of heated magnetic pulse. They shot in every direction, destroying the electric beast, the computer, striking Izzy and Sora with hard force and knocking Matt against a wall. Mimi grabbed Joe by the back of his neck and pushed him down to the ground before ducking herself, barely managing to dodge the attack.
"Mimi, what are you— oh, thanks," Joe said, clearing his throat.
She gave a small, nervous laugh. "That was close!"
"Not close enough!" Mara screeched, pointing the beams for each of the humans.
"NEEDLE SPRAY," Togemon cried.
"HARPOON TORPEDO," Ikkakumon called out.
"ELECTRO SHOCKER," shouted Kabuterimon.
Simultaneously, Mimi and Joe's faces snapped in Mara's direction. They held out both hands. A torrent of water burst from the ground underneath Mara's feet while a tree stood on its roots and burst into the room with its branches, aiming a bough for the center of her face. Joe's water and Mimi's nature hurled toward her simultaneously, all five attacks hitting, knocking the woman off her feet.
She stammered something beneath her breath, something about Gatomon, and smacked her palms against the walls to catch herself. Her heels slamming into the paint, she ran along the side of the apartment and made a great leap in Togemon's direction. Her fist screamed as purple energy crackled around it. CRACK. Togemon flung into Ikkakumon and Kabuterimon.
She turned in Mimi and Joe's direction.
"It'll take more than silly little games to harm me," Mara said. Her voice was low. Rumbling like thunder. Like the lightning which traversed the vortex stirring above them and delivered her from on high. "You are but two souls in two bodies. Inside me stirs a cauldron, and the power which transcends Enigma flows from within it. You know Phase One— it allows you throw around attacks like some sort of digimon. But you know nothing of what ungodly horrors await you beyond that. You don't know what you're doing, what you're becoming by welcoming this power into your body."
"Is it you?" Joe asked, crouched against the floor, Mimi holding him down. "Are you the horror?"
Mara stared at him. The fire and ash of the incoming battle flecked the glaze of her eyes with a fierce smile. Her expression then reflected her eyes. "The horror you'll become will be far worse than me. The horror you'll become will be enough to rewrite the future, rewrite destiny, to change the very boundaries of the world and reality."
"Then let's get to it," Joe said, sitting up and taking off his glasses. He shined them against his grimy shirt, which in turn only smudged them more. "Anything to change this... to stop this from happening again..."
"To save the ones we love..." Mimi echoed, standing, offering her hand to Joe. "To save the worlds we've devoted our lives to protecting..."
Joe took her offered hand. "We are destined to save them. That is one thing that won't be rewritten."
Mara pointed to the window. Entire blocks of the city had collapsed. They could see beyond their wary city to broken roads and fallen bridges, an ocean in disarray; armies of digimon, mechanical and beast and anthropomorphic and angelic and molten and filth and toy, marched through the streets. Part of the city was eclipsed in ice, another part in fire. Mammoth digimon taller and wider than any skyscraper battled within the core, toppling towers and bombarding brigades. The white ferris wheel crumbled in a brilliant deluge of flame and smoke. Odaiba was devastated.
The Battle For Odaiba had only begun, and already it was a city no longer theirs. Even if the humans won this war, Odaiba would never be the same. It would not be the hometown they grew up in, the hometown which contained the memories of so many powerful moments. Battling Myotismon and VenomMyotismon... Discovering Gatomon and Angewomon... Agumon and Gabumon digivolving into WarGreymon and MetalGarurumon... Wizardmon... Sora making amends with her mother... Mimi bidding her doting parents goodbye, showing them how much she'd grown... Joe taking responsibility as the oldest Destined... Matt and Sora trying to stop Phantomon from taking Kari, Matt witnessing the murders of Gotsumon and Pumpkinmon who just wanted to have fun... Izzy confronting his parents over his adoption...
A city of memories. Gone.
"And what will you save?" Mara lifted a lip. "A scrapheap? Wreckage? Debris? Corpses?"
"We'll save that, too," Mimi said, trembling.
Joe was trembling as well. But it wasn't out of fear or astonishment. "And we'll save everything else."
Sora and Matt, grumbling, bruised and scraped and damaged by Mara's earlier attack, began emerging from the wreckage. Sora shook off bits of rock and walling from her shoulder. She'd shielded her mother from the attack, but at the cost of her own skin. Her arm – the same one that'd been damaged by the glass – was roasted. Her skin was black and flayed. The edges of it that weren't charred instantaneously popped with pus-filled blisters that stung as they burst.
Sora bit back a hiss. Her mother screamed and reached out for her, but Sora pushed her away. "I'm okay," she said in a hoarse voice. "It doesn't hurt."
"The nerves were damaged," Joe muttered, his brow furrowing. "Sora—"
"I know," she whispered, rising from her place. She stumbled. Matt helped her; he'd managed to block most of the attack with a jet-stream of metal beams that took most of the brunt, but his singed hair sent trails of smoke toward the ceiling. Sora almost laughed. Almost.
She knew what Joe would tell her. If she couldn't feel the pain of the burn, her nerves were most likely destroyed. Her arm was completely useless— if she got to a hospital in time, would they have to amputate it? Or would she die? She could feel the blisters popping. The heat which radiated off her raw, red skin on the edge of the charred part was enough to make her head feel hazy and heavy. As she stood at full height, her vision blurred and turned white then black for a second.
Adrenaline. Enigma Evolution.
They were the only two explanations as to why she hadn't fainted yet.
"Mimi."
"Go, Joe."
Without another word, Joe rushed toward Sora.
With a shriek, metal slid through the floorboards in-between Joe and Sora. Joe skidded to a halt and tore his eyes up to see Mara standing above him, hands still arched from where she threw a metal beam Matt chucked at her... separating Joe from Sora.
Sora winced, trying to grit her teeth to stop herself from fading out. She didn't think there was much left in her to keep going.
Who is this girl...? Sora thought again, bending over and holding back the impulse to hurl. There were moments of time scattered throughout her mind; moments of throwing herself in front of Biyomon to protect her, moments of feeling worthless and weak, moments where she could do nothing as those she cared about most were taken from her. Her mother. Digimon fallen at the hands of the Dark Masters. Sacrificing herself to save TK and Kari from Piemon, and would her sacrifice had been for nothing if not for MagnaAngemon?
It felt like that right now. Her charred arm was a weight that held her down, an anchor that stopped her from sailing forward. A weakness. Something human.
But I'm not quite human anymore... The Enigma Evolution pulsed through her. Generations of power – generations she did not even think existed – coursed through her veins. Generations of Destined who did not even exist in her realm, Destined whose experience now fled through her and made her move... move... move... MOVE.
Mara launched at Joe. "GOOD DOCTOR, BAD DOCTOR!" she howled, swiping claws made of sand and purple energy at Joe's throat.
MOVE
The impulse grew.
MOVE
Sora's legs bolted without her realizing it.
THERE ARE NO LIMITATIONS ANYMORE
It was screaming in her mind.
DON'T STAND BACK
She was more than human, she was Destined— her humanity had given her this gift. She couldn't let it be for nothing. She couldn't let Biyomon suffer. She couldn't let her mother lose her. She couldn't let Joe get hurt.
Flashes of the blue-haired boy with glasses, standing beside a blue-eyed boy with blond hair, shot jolts through her limbs.
Joe hadn't let her fall.
NO CAVE CAN CONSUME YOU
She couldn't let Joe fall either.
MOVE, GODDAMMIT!
It happened in a split second. She didn't feel it, but blood splattered her face. Mara's claws sliced through Sora's bad shoulder, pinning her to the wall behind her. At the same time, Sora twisted on her heel, redirecting Mara away from Joe. Using the force of Mara's hand through her shoulder, Sora swung the woman into the wall and flattened her palm against Mara's face.
Digging fingernails into skin, Sora sent a beam of black energy surging into Mara's face.
Mara screamed, smacking Sora's hand away as her skin turned black and oozed with mildew gray fluids. (I'm not worthless.) Sora bit back a growl as Mara's hand shredded her bad shoulder. (I'M NOT WORTHLESS.)A red glow burst from Sora's charred appendage and burst down her hand. (I CAN'T FINISH YOU WHILE I'M PINNED.) She heard the others moving toward her, but they would be too late. Knowing there was no other way, Sora yanked her shoulder in the opposite direction of Mara's claws.
There was a pop. A snap. The skin was already tender, like well-cooked meat, and it wasn't difficult to pull it off.
Giving Mara her useless limb, Sora dodged Mara's incoming attack and rolled on the ground, coming up behind the woman to hurl a pulse of red light in her direction. Immediately, following the light, the shadows created by the silhouette flickered into view and – dozens at once – lunged at her, surrounding her before forming black blades with their arms and plunging them deep inside Mara's chest.
Both Mara and Sora slumped to their knees at the same time, panting.
Sora, now with one arm.
Mara, whose face caved in like her chest.
"Sora!" Matt called, reaching to touch Sora's face.
The world flashed black and white. Her eyelids drooped. The heaviness in her head intensified and, losing what adrenaline might have kept her going, she felt herself fall, fall into Matt's arms.
If she lived or died, it didn't matter— all that mattered was sending a message.
Mara was obviously not normal. Did not have normal weaknesses, or a normal mindset. But Sora wanted her to know— her, and her superiors, her masters and comrades— that the Destined were strong, too. That they would give anything for each other. That it was their friendship, their love for each other which made them strong, and they would not go down easily.
No matter what happened, they would not lose hope and sink into that darkness, that hate, that void which had at one point consumed Sora. They would sacrifice everything to keep each other afloat. To cut the anchor free and sail forward. To soar high, and never come back down.
Mara fumbled to a stand. As Sora's vision slipped in and out of focus, she saw Garurumon and Birdramon pelt attacks at Mara. Joe, Matt, Mimi, and Izzy were crowded around Sora, trying to help stem the flow of blood. But it wasn't this that Sora saw last.
It was Mara spitting blood, but alive.
Breathing.
Glaring at Sora through the corner of her eye as she built a Trojan Wall of sand to protect her from the champion digimon's assault.
Then stepping to the hole in the wall and gripping it with her fingers. They elongated in the air, her nails scratching along the jagged frame, her face peeling in a smile. She leaned forward, looking over the city.
Sora felt Joe working furiously over her wound. She wouldn't be surprised if she went into shock any second now.
"This world is ours now," Mara said, letting go of the wall to reach out in the air, the bare wind, the dark wind. "Fight it all you want... You won't win."
Sora gave a breathy chuckle. With her remaining arm, she flicked Mara's shadow upward. It clawed at Mara's heels. At the same time, Matt and Joe reacted; metal beams jutted out of the walls while water surged out of a pipe in a kitchen sink. Mimi and Izzy struck simultaneously, electricity hurdling out of the sockets and a tree branch whipping in Mara's direction. Garurumon, Birdramon, Kabuterimon, Ikkakumon, and Togemon each fired their own attacks.
They all hit Mara at once.
She buckled for a moment in thin air, one arm still clinging to the wall. Her eyes peered up at them, her head tilting to the side. But the most unnerving part was that her smile hadn't wavered. Smoke billowed around her flailing body, needles and ice chunks protruded from her cheeks and shoulders, her hair was smoldering and her face looked like black ash. But she was still smiling.
"Time to find them," she whispered, her fingers loosening on the wall. "Gatomon..." An inch more. "Kari..." Her nails scraped against the pane. "Cody.
"This is nothing... compared to what's coming..."
And she fell down the side of the building to the ground beneath.
Then Sora blacked out.
(-'010201'-)
Chapter Preview:
-"She'll be okay," Darkdramon echoed with his gruff voice, though he could barely hear it. Cody didn't seem to believe them either; but that was okay, he and Cody shared something, something all the others here couldn't.
-"I think I love you."
-"You must not die yet... Reality is at your feet, ready to be bent. Time to DigiVolve."
-"Ker-thump. Ker-thump, ker-thump, ker-thump..."
Next Chapter: Saga I Session XV- Dreams of You