Chapter 2 is another chapter that got a major update, though not as much as the first one.
No one told me when I started writing that it would be this hard to think of original plot points and find a way to fit it into your story's universe in a way that makes sense! Sure something sounds like a nice idea, but execution? Ho boy!
Got it all figured out now, though.
Hope you enjoy the second chapter~
Disclaimer: If I didn't own it when I first started writing, I still don't. I only own Sophia, her Spirits and any other plot changes and characters that are not on the Wikia page.
Takuya stared ahead of him in a daze, the whole situation catching up to him. But, hey, what do you expect when you suddenly turn into an entirely different being.
"What just happened to me?" he asked, looking up at the group standing in front of him.
Zoe took a step forward. "You mean before or after you turned into a digimon?" she asked.
"Me? A digimon?" Takuya asked. I mean, yeah he remembered, but he'd kinda figured it was a weird dream or hallucination or something. He really turned into that?
"Yes." Bokomon said, walking passed him for no reason at all. "Through the process of digivolution."
"Digi-what?" he asked Bokomon, but checked his D-Tector before anyone could reply. "It had to be something I pressed." He pressed a random button. Nothing happened, so he pressed more buttons in random order. "Come on! Digivolution start! Operation turn me into a digimon, execute!" When Takuya pressed that last button a data stream emitted from his D-Tector.
"Fractal Code Render."
"Oh boy, I think I broke it." Takuya muttered loudly as he watched the Fractal Code fly away.
"I knew it! It's the Fractal Code." Bokomon exclaimed.
"Really?" Sophia asked the white digimon. "What gave you that idea? The voice that said 'Fractal Code render'?"
Still watching the Fractal Code, everyone saw it turn into a forest. That forest was connected to the Flame Terminal.
"There's no way this is happening." JP said in either confusion or awe, probably a bit of both.
Sophia crossed her arms. "Obviously there is."
"Whoa..." Takuya stepped a little closer to the group, not taking his eyes off the forest. "Did I do all that?" he asked.
Suddenly Bokomon and Neemon began running towards it, together with a bunch of other digimon.
"It's the dawn of regeneration!" Bokomon exclaimed happily.
"No more living in a train station." Neemon added also happy. "Trailmon will never do 'woo woo' in my ear again."
While Bokomon and Neemon introduced themselves, a movement in the corner of Sophia's eyes caught her attention. It was Koichi, turning his gaze everywhere around him as if to find someon- Oh right. Koichi was looking everywhere to find a glimpse of his brother. Meanwhile Bokomon was giving the others a history lesson.
Sophia rolled her eyes, having heard this story 4 times before. 'I think I can skip this.'
Instead she looked around her, at the digimon running around her. There were Pagumon and Poyomon...that was all? No Biyomon or Elecmon, or maybe even Gazimon? Bummer. She snapped back to reality when she noticed JP and Tommy leaving. She stopped walking to look at their retreating backs.
"They really should stay with the group." Koichi muttered, startling the brunette. Koichi noticed this. "Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you."
"It's okay." Sophia said, hand on her racing heart. Then she looked back at the runaway duo. "Maybe we should follow them."
Koichi nodded, it was better to stick together in this crazy place. At least neither of them was alone. They all were in groups of two, but still, safety in numbers. They followed after JP and Tommy. The walk was quiet, mostly because they hardly knew each other and didn't know what to say. It wasn't long before they lost the duo they were following and ended up at the Trailmon station.
"I think we missed them." Sophia noted.
"Maybe we should head back then." Koichi suggested.
They were about to leave when Angler Trailmon arrived at the station. Koichi gasped softly when he saw Koji coming through the door. The brunette couldn't help but smirk a little. There was her ulterior motive. Time to let the twins spend some time together.
"Should we maybe group up with him?" she asked Koichi. "JP and Tommy have each other at least, but he's alone. Safety in numbers, right?"
Koichi's eyes widened at the idea, but he couldn't argue that it might be safer. They waited until Koji was done talking to whoever called him on his D-Tector to approach. Koji spotted the duo and stopped in his tracks, surprise written on his face though it was quickly hidden by his usual scowl.
After a minute of staring the silence was finally broken by Sophia. "Well this is awkward... Are we just gonna keep staring or what?" she asked.
Koji rolled his eyes and turned away. "Whatever."
"Wait." Sophia called, swallowing a lump in her throat. She probably couldn't count on Koichi to do the talking here. "It might not be a good idea to go alone. There are weird creatures around here - digimon - and they could be dangerous."
"So? What do you want me to do about it?" Koji asked, not turning around or caring.
"It might be better to go in a group." Sophia said. "Mind if we join you?"
Koji turned around with a glare. "I don't even know who you are. Besides I can handle myself just fine."
Sophia shook her head. "Not against digimon. They can have pretty destructive powers." she said. "My name's Sophia, and this is Koichi." she made a gesture to the boy next to her. "What's your name?"
"If you must know, I'm Koji." Koji said, not having stopped glaring yet. "You talk too much, you know that?"
Sophia gave a nervous smile, nodding. But Koji didn't see it, having turned around already.
"Know what? Do what you want. I don't care." he said walking away.
The duo was soon to follow him. Koichi had been silent for a long while now. He just kept staring at Koji, thinking of ways to tell him the truth. He was snapped out of his thought by someone poking him on the shoulder. It was Sophia, staring at him with concern in her eyes. Koichi simply smiled and mouthed 'I'm fine'. They followed Koji around for a while till he stopped in the forest. Apparently the map had stopped showing him the way and he didn't know where to go now. The three looked around when something caught Sophia's eye.
"Hey look." she said, pointing to something between the trees. "There's a hole in the wall."
"I saw that already." Koji snapped, walking towards it. He went down the staircase into the darkness. "Hello anyone here?" he asked loudly. But not a single sound was heard except the footsteps of the group. "I suppose not." he muttered to himself.
He grabbed the D-Tector again, possibly waiting for the map to return, but it didn't appear, leaving him frustrated. After a while they reached the bottom of the stairs and looked around. There were several holes in the wall.
"Which one do you think we should take?" Koichi asked.
None answered him. Koji just headed towards one of them, leaving the duo in the dark. Koichi made a move to follow him, but Sophia held him back.
"I'm starting to think we should leave him alone…" she told him. "I know it was my idea, but he looked ready to bite my head off when suggested grouping up."
After a moment, Koichi nodded. "Maybe you're right, but-…"
"But…?" Sophia asked. "What is it?"
The dark haired boy sighed in defeat. "It's nothing… Nevermind."
Raising her eyebrow in disbelieve, Sophia spoke. "Does it have anything to do with your doppelganger and your constant staring at him?"
Koichi flinched. "You noticed?"
"Hard not to notice. You were staring at him as if he would disappear the second you'd blink." Sophia told him with a chuckle. "That and the fact that you've been doing that since the train ride…"
Oh right. He'd forgotten she noticed him doing that on the train. "It's a long story…"
Sophia shrugged, grabbing her D-Tector to hopefully light the room a little. "I think we have the time." she said, fiddling with the device.
Koichi hesitated. Would it be weird to tell someone who was practically a stranger about this? "Well… I guess." He might as well. Best to get it over with. "The thing is… He's my twin brother." There, he finally got that off his chest. He didn't realize how much it had been weighing on him to keep it all to himself for so long. "My grandmother told me about him a few months ago while she was on her deathbed. I'd been looking for him since then. I felt like I owed her that much at least for telling me." He gave a small sigh. "I found him weeks ago, but I was too afraid to go talk to him. Today was the day I decided I would tell him, but then this happened." The boy looked at his companion. "First you pull me away from trying to talk to him, then he runs away and disappears in the crowd and now this. I feel like the universe doesn't want me to tell him."
Okay, now Sophia felt guilty. In no way did she mean to make him feel bad. "Well, the universe can shove it." She grabbed his arm and ran toward the tunnel Koji took earlier.
Of course, to their luck, the tunnel had multiple branching paths. Koji could've taken any of the routes. After spending minutes wandering the tunnels, the duo had to admit it. They were lost. When they were ready to admit defeat, two familiar screams from the tunnel on their left caught their attention.
"Was that JP and Tommy?" Sophia asked.
Koichi nodded. "I think it was."
The two ran into the tunnel, following the sound of screams to find their way to a big dome with several holes and tunnels scattered everywhere on the walls. Luckily they ended up on ground level. Not so lucky were the duo in the middle of the dome. JP and Tommy were chased by an entire gang of Pagumon.
'Oh man! I can't believe I forgot that!' Sophia thought to herself, mentally scolding herself.
As they were being bit at by the Pagumon, a figure jumped from one of the holes on a higher...floor? I guess...? It was Koji. He'd taken down a huge stick in the process of falling. The Pagumon had temporarily stopped trying to eat the 2 human to look at their new arrival. Koji just looked at them with a grin of his face. Finally unfreezing, the small digimon decided to attack him instead of JP and Tommy. Everyone watched as Koji broke off a long piece of the stick by kicking it, and used it to fight the Pagumon. Unfortunately they were a little too small and fast to actually get hit. One of the Pagumon came straight for his head, which Koji didn't notice until last second. Luckily for him 2 rocks knocked it out of the way. Looking where those rocks came from, Koji saw Koichi and Sophia, still with outstretched arms.
Sophia smirked. "All yours, Pretty boy."
Choosing to ignore the 'Pretty Boy' comment, Koji began to fight the Pagumon again. All went well. He even managed to trick them in covering him, only to be whacked by the stick and slammed into the wall. One of them, one that was thrown into the air, came falling down right in front of Koji. Thinking he'd won, he stroke a pose, smirking down at the little digimon. But he thought wrong. Out of nowhere, the Pagumon was covered in a Fractal Code and changed. The blob on the ground moved and grew to at least 3 times the size it was as a Pagumon.
'Raremon…' Sophia thought, looking at the huge blob of a digimon while holding her breath. 'Man, he smells worse than I could've imagined.'
"ACID SLUDGE!" Raremon shouted out, as he spit a huge ball of green goop towards Tommy and JP.
JP had managed to run away before the attack, but Tommy tripped and fell just as Raremon attacked. Lucky for him Koji was there to get him out of the way just in time. Looking back from their spot on the ground, Koji and Tommy saw the holes that attack created. They didn't have much time to admire it though. The next thing they knew, Raremon used his acid sludge again. As Koji ran away with the 8-year-old in his arms, which couldn't have been easy, the rest of the gang finally appeared. Koichi and Sophia ran over to them, seeing the tunnel they came out of wasn't far away from theirs.
They were just in time to hear Takuya tell his Spirit to wake up. "Come on! I'm not kidding here." he said, pressing a few buttons.
He let out a frustrated groan when none of the buttons he pressed seemed to work. It probably didn't help either, with his comment about 'Spirit Evolving before his friends get turned into goop'.
Sophia crossed her arms, glaring at the bookworm digimon. "Yeah, no pressure there."
Takuya kept pressing buttons, almost willing the Spirit to wake up and aid him. Finally, as Koji almost fell into the hole in the middle of the cavern, the symbol of Flame glowed on Takuya's D-Tector. The group was more focused on the 2 trying to escape Raremon, though.
"SPIRIIIIIIIIIIIT!" Takuya yelled all of a sudden. That sure seemed to work, since the next thing they heard him shout was a familiar line. "EXECUTE! SPIRIT EVOLUTION! …AGUNIMON!"
Agunimon jumped out of the data cocoon, sprinting towards Koji and Tommy. Then he made the stupid mistake of slamming Raremon into the wall. It made the digimon spit his acid sludge everywhere! Ground, ceiling, towards the kids again. Luckily for them Agunimon could slice it before the acid actually hit them.
"Now is your chance. Run!" he told Koji and Tommy. But before anyone could make a move, another cocoon covered Agunimon, turning him back into Takuya. "Huh? What's going on? I turned back into me."
"Maybe you're still too tired from the last time." Sophia yelled from the sidelines.
In the confusion, they forgot to move. It was after Raremon began spitting more sludge, they remembered he was still there.
"Watch out!" Takuya exclaimed, pushing Tommy to the ground. The movement somehow got Koji to fall down the hole. "Oh no!" Takuya yelled, watching the blue haired boy falling deeper down the hole, screaming.
Koichi yelled out Koji's name in a blind panic, but all they could do was watch the spot where he'd fallen down. They just kept hearing him scream, until suddenly… It stopped. All of the lights from the holes in the ceiling moved to the hole. Then Koji's voice was heard again from deep down.
"SPIRIIIIT!" And not long after, that familiar phrase came again, only slightly different. "EXECUTE! SPIRIT EVOLUTION! …LOBOMON!"
As all the beams of light went back to their original position, a figure had made itself known. As you could've guessed, that figure was Lobomon, the Legendary Warrior of light.
"Wow..."
"Man! Did I look that cool?"
"Yeah, but different."
"That's the Legendary Warrior of light: Lobomon."
All those comments were said as Lobomon floated in front of Raremon. He got into fighting position.
"I've never seen anything more beautiful... In my whole life." Zoe said.
JP agreed. "Me neither."
"You can say that again!" Takuya also agreed.
"Go get him, Pretty boy!" Sophia cheered him on.
"ACID SLUDGE!" Raremon yelled, aiming his attack at the new warrior.
He was quick to react though. "LOBO KENDO!" Lobomon pulled out a light saber look-alike weapon, charging at Raremon.
He sliced through every glob of acid, finally making his way to the other digimon. When he got close enough, he jumped, landing on Raremon's head and immediately sticking his kendo stick in the digimon's head. As he screamed out in pain, his Fractal Code appeared, covering its entire body.
"Now you talking trash heap, prepare to be recycled." he said pulling out his white and blue D-Tector. "FRACTAL CODE DIGITIZE!"
And with that out of the way, the Fractal Code disappeared into the D-Tector, leaving only a small egg behind. The egg floated away as Lobomon turned back into Koji. Apparently that Spirit Evolving took a lot outta him. He was sitting on his knees, panting slightly. Takuya and Tommy went to him to try and help.
"Hey, you okay?" Takuya asked. "Let me help ya up."
But as Takuya bent to help him up, Koji shot him a cold glare. "Don't touch me!" he growled, making it very clear he didn't want to be touched. Takuya stepped back, shocked at the sound of his voice. "I don't need your help, or anyone else's!" After a moment he began to raise up. "But I guess I should thank you for saving me. I always repay my debts."
"I didn't do it so you could owe me, you know." Takuya commented, which was completely ignored by the bandanna wearing teen.
"My name's Koji Minamoto and you are?" After a moment of silence, he asked again. "So are you gonna tell me? I can't repay you if I don't know your name."
"I'm Takuya Kanbara." the goggle-head answered.
"Takuya, huh?" he turned around, walking away. "See ya."
The other teens arrived at Takuya's side as Koji left.
"What's his deal?" JP asked, putting his hands behind his head.
Zoe just walked by towards some random tunnel. "Come on you guys let's get out of here this place smells like dead fish."
Sophia looked as she went to the random tunnel. "Umm… Does anyone know which tunnel leads out of here?"
The group had momentarily forgotten that all of them, minus Koichi and Sophia, fell down here. From a height they couldn't easily climb back to… This was gonna be fun.
Luckily Bokomon's book seemed to have a map of the tunnel system, so they let him lead them outside. During the walk some of the kids decided to get to know each other a little, considering they seemed to be stuck here for the time being. Might as well get to know the people you're stuck with.
Even though Sophia already kinda knew them, she supposed she didn't really know them know them.
So she decided to try her luck with Zoe first. "Hey, that language you spoke back there. That was Italian, right?" Great opening line…
Zoe looked up, surprised but smiling. "Yeah. How'd you know? Do you speak Italian?"
"I kinda have to with my dad being half Italian." Sophia told her. "I'm not fluent, but I recognize some words."
"That's pretty neat. Maybe I can give you a few lessons." Zoe gave the other girl a playful wink. "So you're a quarter Italian then? I'm half Italian, half Japanese myself."
"Quarter Italian, a quarter Dutch and half Japanese." Sophia surmised. "My family is very mixed."
"That's cool!" a new voice joined in.
It was Tommy.
"You think so?" Sophia asked the small boy.
Tommy nodded eagerly. "Though, not as cool as Spirit Evolving."
The brunette girl shrugged. "Can't argue with you there."
"I wanna be just like Takuya and Spirit evolve!" Tommy then looked as the ground with sadness in his eyes. "But… JP says I won't get a Spirit. He says I'm too much a pipsqueak to get one."
"Of course you'll get a Spirit." Sophia said, feeling bad for the young kid. "2 of the kids who got here got one. It wouldn't surprise me if the same happened to you."
"You really think so?" Tommy asked hopefully.
The girl nodded. "Until then, we'll protect you, okay?"
Smiling, Tommy nodded. "You're just like a big sister." he commented.
That comment froze Sophia. She was a big sister. It didn't hit her until now that her mom and sister weren't home when the strange light hit.
Were they alright?
Did the light get them too?
What if they were still back in the other world where time flowed normally and they would arrive to an empty house?
Okay, okay. Breathe. This was no time to panic. Especially not with everyone else around. Right now there was nothing she could do about the situation. All she could do was hope her mom and Rose were teleported too.
This situation just got a whole new kind of messed up.
Why did I have to think that world-traveling was such a cool thing to write about? It's so messy...
Well, enough of my complaints at my past self. I hope you enjoyed the chapter and thanks for reading.
I still suck at end-notes.