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Within Dreams—Chapter 13
Joe sighed as he laid on the air mattress that was on the floor of his bedroom. He would be in his bed, but Nocuous had practically ripped it apart when he stabbed it, making a peaceful night's rest in that bed pretty much impossible.
He was very tired now. All the events of the day had made him extremely fatigued. He glanced at his bedside clock, squinting due to the fact that his glasses were not on and sighed. It was almost 11:30.
That was when he realized he'd left his cell phone on the roof. Part of him was insistently shouting: "go get it! Go get it!" but he was just too tired to climb up the fire escape, grab the cell phone and return to his bedroom.
I'll get it in the morning, he decided. He yawned widely and thought: yeah. In the morning.
At that moment, he didn't care where Nocuous was or what he was doing. All Joe cared about was going to sleep. He closed his heavy eyelids and slept, the exhaustion becoming too much for him to resist.
~*~
Meanwhile, halfway across town, Mrs. Kamiya was wide-awake. Part of this was due to the fact that her children were still in the hospital and still in critical condition, but the majority of the reason for Mrs. Kamiya's alertness was probably due to the fact that an enormous, burly man had just jumped into her daughter's room through the window. And not only that, he was glaring at Kari murderously.
"Who the hell are you!?" Mrs. Kamiya shrieked.
The man made no reply to the question, but rudely mimicked: "who the hell are you!?"
"Look I don't want any trouble. So either you just march right back out that window or I will call security," Mrs. Kamiya said, trying her best to sound at least partially calm.
"Security, security," the man repeated, voice growing louder and louder with each repetition. "Like security is supposed to scare me? Don't you know who I am, woman?"
Mrs. Kamiya bristled at the way the man spat the word woman as though it was a bad taste in his mouth and answered: "what gives you the idea that I would want to know a stupid pig like you?"
"Because I" the man paused for dramatic effect "am Nocuous. And I am here to take your children."
That was when Mrs. Kamiya snapped. After all she'd been through this was the straw that broke the camel's back. She shrieked: "get the hell out of here! I don't care who you are! You're not taking my children anywhere!"
"You don't seem to understand. So I'll repeat it nice a slowly. I. Am. Nocuous."
"No, you don't understand. I don't care if you're a three-legged bearded lady with lobsters crawling out your ears! You are not taking my children away from me!"
Nocuous smiled and said: "you have a volatile temper, do you know that? Maybe you'll be more submissive if I bring this into the debate." He whipped out his knife and savored the way Mrs. Kamiya's eyes widened in fear.
"Get out of here," she whispered.
"'Fraid not. Now if you'll excuse me…" Nocuous trailed
off and walked over to Kari's bedside. He raised the knife and was about to strike when the knife was knocked
out of his hand. It landed on the bed
only inches away from the young girl's right shoulder. Before he could react, Mrs. Kamiya had
grabbed the knife.
"Now we will talk," Mrs. Kamiya
evenly said as she held the knife level with the man's throat.
Nocuous stood held his arms open before
saying: "OK, lady. You talk, I'll
listen."
Mrs. Kamiya nodded, but did not lower the
knife from Nocuous' throat. "All I ask
is that you get out of here and leave my family alone. That's it. Just go."
Nocuous nodded and Mrs. Kamiya took the
knife away. It was a terrible
mistake. Faster than she could even
think to pull away Nocuous snatched the knife from her hands.
"You shoulda killed me when you had
the chance," he hissed. He shoved her
away, into the wall and readied himself to deliver the blow that would kill
Kari.
"NOOO!" Mrs. Kamiya wailed.
And then a miracle: Nocuous disappeared,
knife and all leaving the room quite empty.
~*~
Vitriol bit her lip as the boy's eyes
fluttered. True to his word, Malign had
healed him. Then he'd left the dungeon
to allow Vitriol to "teach him the ropes" as he had put it."
She didn't want to teach the boy to be a
slave. He certainly didn't look
accustomed to being a slave and she imagined he would not be happy about the
fact that he was indeed a slave now. She felt like running from the room, but feared to think what the
consequences would be both to her and her sister if she did anything awry of
what Malign instructed her.
"Whoa. What happened?" the boy muttered as he sat up. Then he looked around, noticing that he was
in a room made almost entirely of stone. His eyes rested on Vitriol. "Where am I?"
Vitriol smiled wryly and answered: "welcome
to the place you'll call home from now on."
The boy's eyes widened in surprise and he
opened his mouth to ask another question, but Vitriol continued: "Malign, my
master, saved your life." After he did his best to kill you, she secretly added. Aloud she said: "see, you were…hurt. Badly. And he saved you."
"That was real nice of him, but I've
got to go. I have to find my sister and
my friends," the boy answered.
"I already told you your sister is
dead!" Vitriol snapped. She knew it was
a lie, but it was the only thing she could think of in reply.
The boy gasped, as though
he'd touched a hot stove and been burned.
Vitriol quickly composed herself and
inquired: "what's your name?"
"Huh?" the boy said, totally
preoccupied with the thought of his sister dead.
"Your name, boy! What is it?"
"Oh. It's Taichi Kamiya. But
you can just call me Tai," he answered, though he still sounded somewhat
preoccupied. "So I'm in Malign's
house?"
Vitriol nodded. She was waiting for just the right moment to inform him that he
was not a guest, but a slave. Of course
the right moment would never come. She decided now was as good a time as any.
"Uh…Tai? Before you get too cozy with the idea that you're a guest here,
you should know something."
Tai shook his head, but Vitriol could still
see the tears in his eyes. "What?" he
demanded.
"You're well…ah…how can I put it
nicely?" She paused, but decided there wasn't any way to put it nicely and said: "you're a slave."
"Say what? A what?" Tai demanded.
"You heard me. You're a slave to Malign. And I advise you listen to the instruction I'm going to give you. Trust me, you don't want to make him mad. Come to think of it…you don't want to make me mad, either…."
~*~
"Well, this is the best I could do," Rea said. "It's about five miles away from Malign's castle. Just outside his first line of defenses but close enough to walk."
"Good job," Kari congratulated.
Rea shrugged and answered: "no biggie. OK, Malign's defenses are really tight, so we're going to have to be really care—"
She was cut off by a familiar voice inquired: "uh…where am I? And why aren't I in my bedroom anymore?"
The six other former Digidestined all simultaneously shouted: "JOE?!?"
"Kari? How did you get out of the hospital so fast? Matt, TK, why aren't you in the hospital anymore?"
"I'm in the hospital?" Kari inquired.
"Why would we be in the hospital?" TK inquired.
"Well, TK, you and Matt were practically in comatose and Kari, I don't know exactly what happened with you. And who're you?" he queried of Rea.
"I'm Rea," she answered. "Is this the other one you were talking about, Kari?"
Kari nodded.
Matt demanded of Joe: "you mean you couldn't wake TK or me up?"
"Wake you up? No. I tried," Joe answered. "So would anybody mind filling me in?"