Arc 5 Finale, Part 1 of 5
- Corrupt Fragmentation -
"Distorted areas are going to be our next major threat," A-0 explained with the fully utilized array of monitors filled with what honestly looked like junk data displayed by mistake. "Which looks to be a whole thing the more we go over the details Refactor can provide us. The standard responses to these formations we have been using so far isn't enough."
"Once past 40% of the total digital world in that state full scale effects can occur with minor alterations to the pattern," Metagross mechanically elaborated. "Effect is similar to high complexity mystical ritual sites."
"You can barely walk through an ancient magical center like that without risk of blowing the whole place up," Jane responded to that idea with dull anger at what she clearly interpreted as an exaggeration. The Champion had asked the core Troubleshooter team for this meeting to go over the threats they would face after they dealt with the Skeletal Fragment.
"Yes, exactly," A-0 confirmed unhappily as it shifted the screens. The new pattern was slightly less unpleasant looking. "We will need to be actively stabilizing the worlds around us just to avoid exactly that sort of thing. Not to mention the high end issues like avoiding getting caught in copy formations and duplicated by accident."
"There's a horrible thought," Gazimon grumbled as Jane's expression rapidly shifted as she realized the extent of the issue. "One of me is already enough. I'd hate to have somebody else that has to deal with everything I've done to myself over the years." He focused on one of the six images and pointed at it. "That one there looks a bit worse than even that outcome though."
"Well, not for me, but I can handle being made out of molten me," Serperior unhappily joked. "Although it would be a bit of a trick to break that formation like that."
The screen in question zoomed out, and the snake pokemon paled. "Not with the setup Refactor decided to show me as an example of a research world," A-0 grimly corrected.
"Please tell me it didn't include anything about the victims of that-" Serperior was simply unable to finish the sentence and instead ended it with a horrified ripple.
"We need the ADDWARE dead," Janice bluntly said at this news while A-0 and Metagross both looked uncomfortable about the snake pokemon's unfinished question. "In fact, we now officially have too many reasons to need it dead."
"We had too many reasons by the time we got a name for it," Shawn darkly muttered.
"DSS, the production site has come under attack," Mystic-1 said suddenly as the image of the Golden Guard Knight appeared on one of the monitors suddenly. "So far forces are light, but that might be to try and draw your forces here before they attempt to shatter another world."
"I reinforced that place enough to handle a pair of Megas just so we can get enough damage out," Gazimon dully replied as the rest of the room rushed to get ready to move out. "Worst case I can push it up a bit more, maybe even ask Refactor for some of its stuff to help." The rabbit digimon quickly picked up a slightly tar filled Dark Network Node from a pile of them next to his desk and moved to join his team.
The world consisted of just a few mines and a single tower full of advanced crystal and metal structures that took resources from those mines, steadily grew more crystals, forged metal around the gems, then placed them carefully into the shape of the desired devices, and then after running a brief test about half the time took apart the resulting structure and sent the parts back to be reprocessed.
The facility had lost a significant amount of the possible rate to produce the blockers as a consequence of complete automation, but DSS had insisted on a minimal number of entities present at the site in case of attack. The reduction had actually been extreme enough to make it so local resource production could keep up with the rate indefinitely, which was able to free supplies to instead aid in Refactor's recovery.
Mystic-1's small force was there mostly to fix it when it broke down, which had happened often enough to more than justify the presence of experts over the past few days. Those Squires, Knights, and even a couple of Kobolds were quickly and orderly retreating to the Golden Guard transport system as the DSS teams arrived.
"Some of those parts will take a long time to replace if they are destroyed," the Knight cautioned them as they passed by each other. "If this does not work we won't be able to quickly move back to the passive method."
"Those are fully manifested," Shawn darkly noted about the far more solid looking bones that had already appeared at the other side of the world. "I think they aren't going to back down this time." The force was a mix of unevolved pokemon and Rookie stage digimon.
"Gazi?" Serperior questioned their remaining teammate as the rabbit digimon tossed the Node next to the automated facility.
"The only thing holding their code together is the ADDWARE's corruption," Gazimon replied somberly as a black polygonal barrier formed around the structure. "Which is fairly absent right now compared to earlier encounters."
"That sounds bad on all fronts," Jane grumbled as the Charizard inspected the enemy lines and their own forces prepared themselves next to the main facility now that it was mostly protected. Jack and Quagsire's teams moved to the other side of the structure, and a small force of Ichor Dragons set up a tar pool that would serve as an emergency exit just behind their small line. "Any idea why it's still starting out with small stuff if we can actually hurt it like this?"
"Unevolved pokemon can still hit hard, although the same isn't typically true of Rookie digimon," Shawn cautioned the Champion as he transformed into Basirablemon along with Serperior. The resulting second pool of tar had a couple of reptilian heads pop up for a moment and then vanish back down as the Dragons worked out which of them was appropriate to use in this world. "Which means there must be some sort of a plan."
It wasn't clear what that plan was from the first attacks. The pokemon bones managed a number of moderate attacks, but the digimon skeletons were clearly being tested for capability as they made their own attempts. They managed to force Jack and Jane to reposition, but didn't cause any real damage to the two conventional trainers' teams, while the two Troubleshooter teams with Ultimate digimon were able to simply clear out a large swath of the constructs.
"Those are hitting closer to Champions than Rookies," Gazimon cautioned the group from where he was focused on the defense of the assembly tower, and that was a strangely needed bit of context given how many strong digital life forms the group was more used to fighting. "I think they are trying to make genuine variant digimon with a bit of a boost."
"It might be extending that idea to the pokemon," Smog added before the digital Salazzle spat a blob of less corruptive but still quite corrosive tar at a pair of metallic bone monsters that were ignoring her brothers' tar. "They aren't registering quite properly."
"They feel real," Jack said unhappily.
"I mean that they are altered compared to the typical-" the owl pokemon's starter began to correct him.
"They didn't before," Smile the Gourgeist cut her off grimly. "These aren't typical constructs. I think it is drawing on spiritual power, although not true spirits."
"I still don't like being able to tell that kind of thing," Vibration the Flygon noted as he blasted some of them with dragonfire. "But. This feels weak. We might be able to do something about it."
"Bone digimon get an entire stage upgrade as far as I know from what happened to the Digidestined," Crusher informed them as she fell back to the Troubleshooter line from a charge into the enemies that had scattered a large number of their foes.
"Quality and power can influence it as well," MasterTyranomon added as Quagsire's team shifted forward to take over for the Investigator's group now that they had attacked.
"There isn't much that doesn't apply to," Jane complained as her team was forced behind Basirablemon by a surprise force of Water typed bones. "How badly it is hurting the Fragment so far?"
"Well, I think I've found the plan with small ones," Gazimon answered. "They are more of an unknown power, presumably that 'spiritual' stuff Jack's team are talking about, instead of their own strength. They are saving energy in the short term, but it also seems to be disrupting control. If they aren't careful this might cause some infighting with a bit more power."
The fight did not really get any more intense for a few more minutes, which concerned the defenders greatly. Quagsire took a strong hit and retreated entirely from the battle, and Dugtrio followed to avoid losing track of them due to their support combat style. Jane's Stonescale similarly was returned before any major change in the battle occurred. Finally Jack's team managed to work out a method of disrupting the energies.
"We're going to be out after this," Smile warned everyone before they implemented this new plan. "Giratina could probably do this better, but we shouldn't wait to grab him if what we're starting to feel is accurate."
"Which is the nice way of not saying that angry spirits taking over a corruption might be a problem if we don't do this now," Jack quickly cut in. "The thing they're doing feels off to us because they are basically poking every spirit they can right now to grab some power."
"Yes, deal with that issue right now!" Basirablemon half shouted at their sister's teammates. A wave of unease that was actually visible flowed through the area, and about half of each of the bone constructs collapsed into powder instead of tar for once.
"No more. You or us Protector," the Fragment declared to the serpentine Great Corruption in a strangely clear voice as the remainder of the bones began to float in the air. "We are not going to be just retired to take the pressure off of the Distorted Fragment."
The bones collected together and reshaped into larger forms, generating a creature at least the size typical of an Ultimate digimon. The body formed into the skeletal shape of a Blastioise's shell, and above that was a hollow chitin shell that formed the head of a Kabuterimon. An arm appeared from a SkullGreymon and then another from a Charizard, but it continued with a fossil Kabutops arm as well, and then a set of bones that might have been an Angemon's arm or possibly some other human-like digimon. A bone wing that could have been from any number of avians but seemed digimon in nature was next, followed by another that had the metallic tint of a Skarmory, then a fossilized insect wing of a pokemon and another more draconic digimon wing brought their numbers up to four to match the arms. Finally a long bony tail from a Megadramon, a useless looking pair of bone legs from a Monochromon and an Ivysaur.
"I've got three things on this guy," Gazimon said with clear fear as he inspected a pair of black panes. "First he's a Mega, so that sucks," the rabbit monster understated. "Second making this guy just did some really terrible things to the Skeletal Fragment, so that probably just took them out." Large black cables began to burst from the ground across the world and Gazimon formed three more panes rapidly. "Third I've got a name for this mess: 'SkullKimeramon'."
The mixed part digimon then cut off any reaction with a hollow sounding roar, and quickly built up a spherical attack made out of a number of different elements. Electricity, fire, plant matter, water, dirt, and a mess of other things shot towards their group rapidly as Jack's team vanished in their planned retreat and the others braced, and then with a ripple suddenly went from in front of SkullKimeramon to directly behind him. His second roar was one of moderate pain as the mass slammed into the back of his dried out shell, and the skeletal monster quickly turned around and began to swipe at various terrain features that had been behind him, clearly confused as to what had attacked him. When SkullKimeramon tried again a moment later it was redirected to come from the farthest mine entrance instead of directly behind the digimon, and the Mega quickly gave chase.
"How long can you keep that up?" Basirablemon's red eyed head asked Gazimon quickly.
"Longer than the Architect could," their teammate replied with a slight frown, and then shifted into his Youkomon form with the now nine tailed fox shaped digimon's panes also altered into dragonfire. "I am a proper Administrator, and reinforcing this place just in case this sort of thing happened was more than enough to get me that level of control over it."
"The rest of us need to fall back," Jane noted uneasily. "MasterTyranomon has been taking a lot of hits for his team, and mine is spent. Do we have any good options here?"
"Well, I have three. First I can sabotage the reinforcement and get us all out before this place collapses," Youkomon unhappily offered. "But that would destroy the factory, and might actually let the Skeletal Fragment survive this whole mess. Second option is we call the Digidestined now for help and I keep him distracted until they get here."
"We need them ready to go in case the ADDWARE has a backup plan just behind the barrier," Basirablemon's blue eyed head noted equally unhappily. "With what the Skeletal Fragment said before it pulled this stunt I think that just became a bigger concern."
"Option three is we try and fix this ourselves, but I'm going to need to hear a solid idea before we consider that one," the fox digimon complained. "There is a reason I have to make sure those blasts hit it instead of the terrain, and I don't want to wait so long it figures out the trick."
"We have been working on using our two digital powers together," the red eyed head noted with a frown. "If it is simpleminded enough to keep falling for that we might be able to pull that same stunt Salamence did with the factory drones."
"I want to get rid of those parts of the Dark Network," Youkomon said grimly as another roar of pain echoed from the now destroyed mine.
"We want to do that for our tar too, but sometimes it can be useful if applied carefully," the blue eyed head agreed more than argued. "As long as that will actually work to take out the Skeletal Fragment it will let us have the actual Mega digimon ready to go in case that makes the ADDWARE react badly."
"Okay, give me a minute to get that ready," the fox monster unhappily allowed. "Jane, head back and make sure the Digidestined aren't already on their way."
SkullKimeramon had at least lowered the power of its strikes by the time they were ready, and it was clear he had shifted from trying to find what had attacked him to what was causing his own attacks to be redirected.
"It might be too smart for this plan," Youkomon cautioned Basirablemon as the latest redirected blast was dodged. Once at least, as the ball of mixed elements once again vanished and slammed into the back of the enraged bone digimon.
"It isn't handling that trick as well as MaloMyotismon," both heads noted as they sat with their heads just out of the ground, with a nod towards the few cracks on the back of the creature's Blastioise shell and a couple of shards that were just knocked loose. "We have a plan B now of the three of us drawing those attacks and you sending them right back."
Plan A then triggered as if the Mega was distracted by that conversation, as was somewhat typical of the serpent pair. The massive mined out hole full of tar, cables, and poison gas that had resulted as a side effect of attempts to use both at once exploded outward right under where that latest redirection had moved SkullKimeramon. The many-winged skeleton fell for only a brief moment, and the blast turned out to be too strong for the specific cables to survive this time.
"That one's my fault," Youkomon said as their target shook tar off its body with a degree of success. "The blast was a bit much there for the cables I used. Probably side effects of that gas."
"Or you could just be stronger than you think," the red eyed head said as that half of Basirablemon tried to sling a large glob of tar at the skeletal monster.
SkullKimeramon turned to face the Ultimate and just managed to avoid the first pass of the sludge, but the same effect that had been disrupting his attempts to attack the world also worked to redirect it back into the Mega. He roared at the three of them with rage, and took a moment to strip most of it off the metal wing bones it unfortunately hit more than anywhere else. He responded with a more widespread attack, this time a number of separate elemental blasts from the various matching body parts.
Basirablemon and Youkomon both vanished under the ground before the strikes could hit, but this meant the attacks instead carved out holes in the terrain without the Administration efforts. Then in a moment of realization the fox monster extended cables from the distortions in space he had been using. They converged on the still partially tar coated metal bones quickly, and latched on just as the trio reemerged behind SkullKimeramon.
"I'm getting a connection?" the nine tailed fox questioned uneasily as the Mega tried to pull away.
"It looks like it is doing some actual damage," the blue eyed head cautiously noted. The metal bones seemed to be staying in place while the main body of SkullKimeramon moved away, first slowly and then very rapidly as the Skarmory wing tore free from the central shell. "Uh, wait I can feel it now too."
The lost wing did not break down, or even just remain inert, but instead grew outward. The tar and cables that were connected also went out of their creators' control to fill out the body of the resulting Skarmory skeleton, creating a mass of wire, tar, and metal that more resembled a living pokemon than a dead one. "Masters, I live!" the new creature declared proudly, and then unprompted began to swoop to attack SkullKimeramon.
"This was not plan A," the three Troubleshooters sighed together. "But in a pinch it might work," the red eyed head continued while Youkomon fell back to analyze what was happening. "Tarmory, go for the claw arm!"
"We are not calling her 'Tarmory'," the blue eyed head complained. "If this turns into a bunch of them we give all of them one name, and we take the time to make a proper one." Serperior's side of Basirablemon moved under the now distracted SkullKimeramon to attempt a repeat strike of that kind on his Charizard arm.
"SkullKimeramon can't take us doing that too many times," Youkomon specified as the Kabutops and Charizard limbs were both latched onto, and in response the digimon's other two arms attempted to hold them on the body. "Go for the digimon wings next, those will be our best bet." They saw the rest of the bodies for the two now corrupted limbs begin to grow at the connection to the Blastioise shell.
The Mega clearly wanted to stop them, but with its arms occupied with that it could only bring to bear its remaining wings and lower limbs. Basirablemon hissed as two of those strikes forced the serpentine Great Corruption back underground again. Youkomon quickly threw up another barrier of panes just in case a follow up attack occurred after that one.
Tarmory, unhindered by that strike, managed to attack one of the two specified limbs, and as she struck those it became clear that the tar and cables from the two other growing pokemon based bone creatures were actually impacting the core component of SkullKimeramon. As a result instead of a slower pulling apart as they got the targeted pairs of arms and wings free, the single targeted wing was hit barely in time to survive as an independent creature when a corrupted Blastioise formed at the center of the creature with a horrible cracking sound from the untargeted limbs as those untainted bones shattered.
"I think my redirection 'attacks' hit harder than I thought it had," Youkomon admitted as the four pokemon derived mixtures of bone, tar, and cable landed hard. The struck digimon wing expanded out with a series of serpentine bones, and a large eastern dragon head with thick antler-like horns. The tar and cable coated Airdramon looked just as dedicated as the others, and Youkomon sighed at this new issue.
"Youko, what is the status of the Skeletal Fragment?" Shawn asked tiredly from a pool of tar, revealing that Basirablemon had changed back since the attack had hit them. Serperior tiredly slopped over their trainer's shoulder, with a thick mix of tar in his typical liquid self.
"I w0n't die l1ke th&t," a wispy voice cut them off. "I d0n't car3 wh&t the fu(king ADDWARE th1nks, 1 will no+ t3ar my2elf a?art slowly ju2t to 6uy it a bi+ m0re time." A faint ghostly presence formed between them. "I have a target for you Protector. Destroy just one place for me to break my barrier, and free me from the ADDWARE," the Spiritual Fragment added in a clear voice similar to how the Skeletal Fragment had spoken just a short time before.