Digital Demons - Part 3
by Nopporn Wongrassamee
Summary - A Digimon Tamers/Jackie Chan Adventures/Gatekeepers Crossover.
Disclaimer - None of these characters are mine, nor am I
making a profit here.
Above an anonymous watertower in San Francisco, a digital field
formed and quickly dissipated. It happened fast enough that almost
no one noticed it had ever been there. And the dark, winged form
that emerged from it was missed entirely.
He had been to this city before. He had been banished from this
plane here before also. But not this time. His new form would not
be so vulnerable to ancient spells. Revenge would be sweet.
But business would have to come before pleasure. He had a task to
perform and his brother had been generous to loan him his troops.
True, they were old-style demon fodder, but for his purposes, they
would be more than adequate.
He sent out the call.
***
"Okay," Jade said quietly to the Digimon in her arms. "I think we
lost it."
"Are you sure?" Calumon asked skeptically. It wasn't normally in
his nature to be so, but he could learn. "That's what you said the
last few times. Right before Mr. Red Suit started shooting at us
again."
"Yeah, but this time, I have a plan," Jade said confidently. She
raised a hand and called out at the top of her lungs, "TAXI!"
A few minutes later, their red suited persuer rounded a corner and
watched the rear end of Jade's taxi disappear into the traffic. It
would have had the little Digimon had it been just a minute
faster. The being had an immobile face, incapable of truly
expressing any emotion it might feel. But if it could have, it
would have smiled.
***
Walking into Section 13, Jackie Chan found the place in total
chaos. However, his long association with the group let him pick
out patterns in the confusion. Technicians hovered over monitors
or pulling quick maintenance checks on everything. Field agents
rushed to and fro, either suited up or were suiting up with body
armor and weapons. It looked like the place was going to war.
And it had started out as such a nice day.
Since Section 13 was mostly one huge chamber, Jackie quickly
located Captain Black in the middle of the place where all the new
equipment had been placed. Black had been close mouthed about what
all that stuff was for, but now it appeared to be the center of
all the hubbub.
With Black was another secret agent type. Jackie wouldn't have
noticed him except that he was wearing his shades indoors and
seemed to be flipping a lighter open and closed. Also, the
stranger was just standing there with Black, perhaps a sign of
high rank?
"...another bioemergence signature, this time in the warehouse
district," a technician was telling them as Jackie walked up.
"Mr. Yamaki?" Black asked, turning to the guy with the lighter
fetish.
"Hmm, three bioemergences in just a couple of hours time," the
stranger said thoughtfully. Presumably his name was Yamaki.
"Before the D-Reaper, we'd register an emergence once, maybe
twice a week. This is all happening too...who are you?"
Jackie realized the question was directed at his own self.
"Oh, this is Jackie Chan, Mr. Yamaki," Black interceded. "I called
him when things started getting exciting. Jackie, this is Mr.
Yamaki. He's been wanting to meet you."
"Uh, hello," Jackie said cautiously.
"Mr. Chan, a pleasure to finally meet you," Yamaki said, taking
his hand. "I've been wanting to talk you."
"You have?" Jackie asked, somewhat bemused.
"Yes, I represent an international task force whose mission is to
protect humanity from paranormal threats," Yamaki told him. "I'm
looking for people with your particular expertise."
"But...but I'm just an archaeologist!" blurted Jackie.
"Not just..." Yamaki began. Whatever he was going to say was lost
under whooping alarms. It was shut off a moment later.
"Sirs! Change in status!" Miles exclaimed. "Invader signal
strength is increasing and we're picking up echoes from other
sources."
"What does that mean?" Black asked.
"Damn," Yamaki muttered. He turned to Miles. "You were sure we
were just dealing with a single Invader before, right?"
"Invader?" Jackie echoed questioningly as Miles nodded.
"Looks like he's calling for reinforcements," Yamaki anounced.
Jackie's cell phone twittered.
"Heh, excuse me," Jackie said as he answered the call. "This is
Jackie Ch...Jade?...Wait, slow down...what?...a digimon?...and a
creep in a red suit?"
Suddenly, Jackie found himself the center of attention.
***
"Jackie, really, he's a Digimon," Jade insisted.
"Yeah! I'm a Digimon!" Calumon beamed from her lap. The two were
riding in the back seat of a taxi.
"That was him," Jade told Jackie. "Anyway, we're being chased by
some grey guy in a red suit who has ray guns where his hands...
yes, Jackie, I'm already headed home..."
"Jade Chan?"
"What? Who's this?" Jade demanded, surprised at the new voice on
the phone.
"My name is Mr. Yamaki," the guy said. "I'm an associate of
Captain Black's. Your uncle Jackie has been gracious enough to
loan me the use of his cell phone." Almost inaudible, Jade could
hear Jackie's upraised and outraged voice in the background. And
it sounded like Captain Black was trying to calm him down.
"Hi, Mr. Yamaki!" Calumon exclaimed before Jade could reply.
There was a pause at the other end, then, "Calumon?"
"You know this little marshmallow?" Jade asked suspiciously.
"We've met," Yamaki replied drily. "It certainly answers one
question. Now this is important, Jade, what were you saying about
a 'red suited creep'?"
"Oh, there was this guy in red with ray guns chasing Calumon,"
Jade told him. "I think he might have been a Digimon."
"He's not a Digimon," Calumon insisted.
"Can you describe this not-Digimon exactly, Jade?" Yamaki asked.
"Um, lessee," Jade said, pulling up the recent memory. "Grey skin,
red business suit and fedora, sunglasses, talks like a 50's
B-movie robot..."
"Yes, that squares with my suspicions exactly," Yamaki mused.
"Jade, you need to come to Section 13 right away. And bring
Calumon with you."
"Hey, no prob," Jade replied nonchalantly, looking out the window,
"we're already on our way to China...town..."
"Jade, is something wrong?" Yamaki asked.
"Hey, driver!" Jade called, ignoring Yamaki. "You're going the
wrong way. Chinatown's in the other...direction. What the hell?"
Turning half around, the driver reached back, grabbed the cell
phone from Jade's slack grip, and crushed it with a single
squeeze. Problem was, this wasn't the same driver Jade had started
out with. Instead, the new driver was a being simlar to Calumon's
persuer. Only this one wore a black suit.
"New destination ordered," the new driver said mechanically.
***
"Are you sure you don't want to tell your mother, Rika?" Ruriko
asked her granddaughter. "She deserves to know."
Ruriko was supervising the offloading of the family's luggage from
their taxi in front of the San Francisco Hilton. Her daughter,
Rika's mother, had gone inside to register and get their rooms. Ruriko decided to take this moment to talk to Rika in private.
"I don't want to freak her out about Renamon, Grandma," Rika told
her.
"Hmm," Ruriko said noncommitedly. Back when she had been an AEGIS
agent, Ruriko hadn't told her parents that she regularly put her
life on the line either. So she didnt have any ground stand on if
her own granddaughter decided the same. On the other hand, Ruriko
had been a tad older when she started playing superhero.
"Besides, it's not like I'm in any immediate danger," Rika added.
"Except for whatever Renamon wanted to talk to you about," Ruriko
pointed out,
Rika shrugged. "Well obviously it can wait until we get some
privacy," Rika said dismissively. "What? You think some digimon's
gonna attack in the next few minutes?"
As if on cue, another taxi appeared, zig zagging wildly through
traffic with complete disregard for lane markers, other vehicles,
and even the street boundary. It leapt the curb and tore across
the Hilton's front lawn barely missing several pedestrians. It hit
pavement again just in time to slam head on into their taxi and
crunch to a complete stop.
The rear driver's side door opened and out tumbled a girl that was
maybe Rika's age. She had a little white bundle tucked under one
arm that looked like...
"Is that Calumon?" Rika asked, surprised.
"Yes," Renamon whispered. Ruriko wasn't exactly sure if Rika's
digimon was outright invisible or just extremely well camoflaged.
Either way, it was a neat trick.
Then her breath caught as the taxi's driver got out. Ruriko hadn't
seen one in over thirty years, but she still recognized it. It was
an Invader!
***
"Jade's in trouble! I have to go to her!" Jackie insisted.
"We don't even know where she is," Yamaki said irritably. "I know
you're concerned, Mr. Chan, but just rushing off with no idea how
to find her would be worse than a waste of time."
"Can't you track her cell phone?" Jackie asked, frustrated.
"Captain Black?" Yamaki inquired. "The equipment my people sent
you should be able to do that."
"We're still unpacking and installing all the AEGIS stuff," Black
turned to the technician. "Miles?"
"Uh, that would require accessing the satelite uplinks," Miles
began hesitantly.
"Finally, some good news, today." Black smiled.
"The gear's in crates 21 and 22," Miles concluded.
"That's bad," Jackie said.
"But if Jade and, um, the digimon are the Invader's focus," Miles
mused out loud, "we should be able to track Jade by following the
Invaders."
"But that's good?" Black asked.
"Well, all the Invader signals appear to be heading towards a
single location."
"That's bad," Yamaki declared.
***
"Grandma? What's wrong?" Something about that maniac taxi driver
scared Rika's grandmother. That was unsettling. Not even the
D-Reaper got this reaction out of Rika's grandmother. Then again,
Grandma hadn't been the one going toe to toe with it. Looking at
the driver, Rika realized there was an unnatural stiffness to his
movements as he turned toward his erstwhile passenger. "Is that a
Digimon?" Rika asked under her breath.
"No..." Renamon whispered in her ear. "I...don't know what it is."
As they watched, the strange man reached for the girl with
Calumon. The girl smoothly ducked the man's grasp and lashed out
with a foot. The foot struck the cab's passenger door and knocked
it into the guy. As the man took a step back off balance, the girl
switched to sweeping kick that knocked him off his feet. All this
and she managed to keep Calumon neatly tucked at her side.
This girl's better than Henry, Rika realized. Maybe even better
than Renamon in terms of sheer skill.
A hand settled on Rika's shoulder. "Rika," Grandma whispered. "We
need to get Calumon and that girl away from the...that man. Now.
It's... I mean, he's dangerous."
They watched as the girl drove the man's head through the driver
side window.
"Uh huh," Rika replied skeptically. "Sure he is."
"Kids these days!" Grandma sighed exasperated. She turned to the
fight. "Hey, kid! You need to get away from that guy! He's
dangerous!"
The man in black was apparently down for the count. With Calumon
still under her arm, the girl sprang lightly to their side. "I'll
say he's dangerous," she replied. "You ought to see what he did to
my cell phone! And my name's Jade by the way."
"Rika!" Calumon squealed joyfully. Squirming out of Jade's grasp,
he leapt into Rika's arm. "I've been looking for you."
"Hi, Calumon," Rika greeted with a smile.
Jade Studied Rika's face. "Hey, you're one of those kids who saved
the world from the D-Reaper aren't you? I saw you on TV."
"Uh, yeah," Rika replied. It had been a while since anyone called
her on that. "It was nothing."
"I'll say," Jade agreed. She seemed a bit peeved. "I saved the
world lots of times and I never got on TV."
"Huh?" Rika was now confused. "Get outta here!"
"This mutual non-admiration is nice and all," Grandma broke in,
but that...guy is still dangerous. We need to get out of here." As
she spoke, the "guy" picked himself off the ground as if Jade had
never hit him at all. He didn't seem the least bit injured.
"Oh, him? I can take him again," Jade said confidently. "He's not
all that dangerous. Not like the one in red."
"Red?" Grandma groaned. "Oh no..."
"Hey, there's only one of him, lady," Jade pointed out as the guy
turned toward them. Suddenly, alot of black disks appeared on the
ground. Duplicates of the taxi driver appeared in them, rising out
of the disks like they were on their own personal elevators. Each
had a briefcase out of which unfolded gun muzzles. They were all
pointed in Rika and Jade's direction. They held their fire. "Me
and my big mouth," Jade mumbled.
Another "guy" like the rest, except in red, began to rise out of
the top of the wreck of Jade's taxi. Rika guessed that this was
the leader and the peons were just waiting for him. With all the
guns pointed at them, Rika was grateful for the reprieve. She
doubted that Renamon could protect Rika from all of them,
nevermind Grandma or even Jade.
"Running would be good now," Rika said as she began backing away.
"Oh, yeah," Jade agreed as she did the same.
"That could be dificult," Grandma put in as the girls backed into
her.
Looking over her shoulder, Rika saw that their retreat was cut off
by...ninjas? There was a crowd of them, dressed all in black like
any good movie ninja. But through the gaps of their hoods, Rika
saw that they had blue skin and glowing red eyes. They were armed
with a disturbing variety of sharp bladed weaponry.
"Shadowkhan?" Rika heard Jade whisper. "Where did they come from?"
"Stand down!" Red Suit ordered mechanically. "The Digimon must be
destroyed!"
The Shadowkhan said nothing, but they did lift their weapons
suggestively. Some had throwing stars at the ready. Glance back
at the suits, Rika saw that their guns were now pointed at the
Shadowkhan. Great, she thought gloomily. Now instead of death by
intent, it's gonna be death by crossfire.
"The Digimon must be destroyed," Red Suit repeated.
"I beg to differ," a new, gravelly voice said from above. "We want
that digimon alive." A shadow passed over all of them.
"Oh no," Calumon moaned, trying to hide in Rika's arm.
"That voice," Jade said slowly. "I know that voice..."
Everyone, human, suits and Shadowkhan, looked up. A winged, bat
like figure swooped down and settled on a lamp post.
***
"The Sovereigns have been overthrown?" Henry repeated in wonder.
"Who could do that?"
"Mmm, thank you Takato-mon," Guilmon said as he polished off his
meal. "Got anymore bread?"
"Sure, boy," Takato replied, grabbing another loaf fromhis pack.
"Here you go!"
"Takato!" Henry cried. "This is important!"
"Oh, right, sorry," Takato said sheepishly. "So who beat the
Sovereigns?"
"Not sure exactly." Munch. "Came from nowhere." Munch. "Bunch of
strange Digimon." Munch. "Zhuqiaomon said..." Munch. "...get help
from Tamers."
"Zhuquiaomon?" Ryo asked. "I thought you guys said he hated us."
"Must be really bad," Henry mumured.
"What else, boy?" Takato prodded.
"Gotta keep catalyst from bad Digimon." Munch. "Gave catalyst back
to Calumon." Gulp! "But we got seperated. I don't know where
Calumon is now." Guilmon was dejected now, his ears sagging.
"Don't worry, Guilmon," Takato reassured the Digimon, hugging him
close. "We'll find him. Then we'll go kick these new guys' butts!
Whoever they are!"
"Henry!" Kenta cried as he and Kazu ran back inside the shack.
They had left earlier to scrounge up some more food.
"Kenta? What is it?" Henry asked.
"Your dad's outside," Kenta said breathlessly.
"And he's brought the Hypnos crowd and the what looks like the
whole army with him, too!" Kazu added.
***
"Hsi Wu!" Jade snarled.
"Jade, I was hoping to see you again," the Demon Sorcerer of the
Sky replied gaily. "Oh, and it's not 'Hsi Wu' anymore. It's
HyperHsiWuMon!"
by Nopporn Wongrassamee
Summary - A Digimon Tamers/Jackie Chan Adventures/Gatekeepers Crossover.
Disclaimer - None of these characters are mine, nor am I
making a profit here.
Above an anonymous watertower in San Francisco, a digital field
formed and quickly dissipated. It happened fast enough that almost
no one noticed it had ever been there. And the dark, winged form
that emerged from it was missed entirely.
He had been to this city before. He had been banished from this
plane here before also. But not this time. His new form would not
be so vulnerable to ancient spells. Revenge would be sweet.
But business would have to come before pleasure. He had a task to
perform and his brother had been generous to loan him his troops.
True, they were old-style demon fodder, but for his purposes, they
would be more than adequate.
He sent out the call.
***
"Okay," Jade said quietly to the Digimon in her arms. "I think we
lost it."
"Are you sure?" Calumon asked skeptically. It wasn't normally in
his nature to be so, but he could learn. "That's what you said the
last few times. Right before Mr. Red Suit started shooting at us
again."
"Yeah, but this time, I have a plan," Jade said confidently. She
raised a hand and called out at the top of her lungs, "TAXI!"
A few minutes later, their red suited persuer rounded a corner and
watched the rear end of Jade's taxi disappear into the traffic. It
would have had the little Digimon had it been just a minute
faster. The being had an immobile face, incapable of truly
expressing any emotion it might feel. But if it could have, it
would have smiled.
***
Walking into Section 13, Jackie Chan found the place in total
chaos. However, his long association with the group let him pick
out patterns in the confusion. Technicians hovered over monitors
or pulling quick maintenance checks on everything. Field agents
rushed to and fro, either suited up or were suiting up with body
armor and weapons. It looked like the place was going to war.
And it had started out as such a nice day.
Since Section 13 was mostly one huge chamber, Jackie quickly
located Captain Black in the middle of the place where all the new
equipment had been placed. Black had been close mouthed about what
all that stuff was for, but now it appeared to be the center of
all the hubbub.
With Black was another secret agent type. Jackie wouldn't have
noticed him except that he was wearing his shades indoors and
seemed to be flipping a lighter open and closed. Also, the
stranger was just standing there with Black, perhaps a sign of
high rank?
"...another bioemergence signature, this time in the warehouse
district," a technician was telling them as Jackie walked up.
"Mr. Yamaki?" Black asked, turning to the guy with the lighter
fetish.
"Hmm, three bioemergences in just a couple of hours time," the
stranger said thoughtfully. Presumably his name was Yamaki.
"Before the D-Reaper, we'd register an emergence once, maybe
twice a week. This is all happening too...who are you?"
Jackie realized the question was directed at his own self.
"Oh, this is Jackie Chan, Mr. Yamaki," Black interceded. "I called
him when things started getting exciting. Jackie, this is Mr.
Yamaki. He's been wanting to meet you."
"Uh, hello," Jackie said cautiously.
"Mr. Chan, a pleasure to finally meet you," Yamaki said, taking
his hand. "I've been wanting to talk you."
"You have?" Jackie asked, somewhat bemused.
"Yes, I represent an international task force whose mission is to
protect humanity from paranormal threats," Yamaki told him. "I'm
looking for people with your particular expertise."
"But...but I'm just an archaeologist!" blurted Jackie.
"Not just..." Yamaki began. Whatever he was going to say was lost
under whooping alarms. It was shut off a moment later.
"Sirs! Change in status!" Miles exclaimed. "Invader signal
strength is increasing and we're picking up echoes from other
sources."
"What does that mean?" Black asked.
"Damn," Yamaki muttered. He turned to Miles. "You were sure we
were just dealing with a single Invader before, right?"
"Invader?" Jackie echoed questioningly as Miles nodded.
"Looks like he's calling for reinforcements," Yamaki anounced.
Jackie's cell phone twittered.
"Heh, excuse me," Jackie said as he answered the call. "This is
Jackie Ch...Jade?...Wait, slow down...what?...a digimon?...and a
creep in a red suit?"
Suddenly, Jackie found himself the center of attention.
***
"Jackie, really, he's a Digimon," Jade insisted.
"Yeah! I'm a Digimon!" Calumon beamed from her lap. The two were
riding in the back seat of a taxi.
"That was him," Jade told Jackie. "Anyway, we're being chased by
some grey guy in a red suit who has ray guns where his hands...
yes, Jackie, I'm already headed home..."
"Jade Chan?"
"What? Who's this?" Jade demanded, surprised at the new voice on
the phone.
"My name is Mr. Yamaki," the guy said. "I'm an associate of
Captain Black's. Your uncle Jackie has been gracious enough to
loan me the use of his cell phone." Almost inaudible, Jade could
hear Jackie's upraised and outraged voice in the background. And
it sounded like Captain Black was trying to calm him down.
"Hi, Mr. Yamaki!" Calumon exclaimed before Jade could reply.
There was a pause at the other end, then, "Calumon?"
"You know this little marshmallow?" Jade asked suspiciously.
"We've met," Yamaki replied drily. "It certainly answers one
question. Now this is important, Jade, what were you saying about
a 'red suited creep'?"
"Oh, there was this guy in red with ray guns chasing Calumon,"
Jade told him. "I think he might have been a Digimon."
"He's not a Digimon," Calumon insisted.
"Can you describe this not-Digimon exactly, Jade?" Yamaki asked.
"Um, lessee," Jade said, pulling up the recent memory. "Grey skin,
red business suit and fedora, sunglasses, talks like a 50's
B-movie robot..."
"Yes, that squares with my suspicions exactly," Yamaki mused.
"Jade, you need to come to Section 13 right away. And bring
Calumon with you."
"Hey, no prob," Jade replied nonchalantly, looking out the window,
"we're already on our way to China...town..."
"Jade, is something wrong?" Yamaki asked.
"Hey, driver!" Jade called, ignoring Yamaki. "You're going the
wrong way. Chinatown's in the other...direction. What the hell?"
Turning half around, the driver reached back, grabbed the cell
phone from Jade's slack grip, and crushed it with a single
squeeze. Problem was, this wasn't the same driver Jade had started
out with. Instead, the new driver was a being simlar to Calumon's
persuer. Only this one wore a black suit.
"New destination ordered," the new driver said mechanically.
***
"Are you sure you don't want to tell your mother, Rika?" Ruriko
asked her granddaughter. "She deserves to know."
Ruriko was supervising the offloading of the family's luggage from
their taxi in front of the San Francisco Hilton. Her daughter,
Rika's mother, had gone inside to register and get their rooms. Ruriko decided to take this moment to talk to Rika in private.
"I don't want to freak her out about Renamon, Grandma," Rika told
her.
"Hmm," Ruriko said noncommitedly. Back when she had been an AEGIS
agent, Ruriko hadn't told her parents that she regularly put her
life on the line either. So she didnt have any ground stand on if
her own granddaughter decided the same. On the other hand, Ruriko
had been a tad older when she started playing superhero.
"Besides, it's not like I'm in any immediate danger," Rika added.
"Except for whatever Renamon wanted to talk to you about," Ruriko
pointed out,
Rika shrugged. "Well obviously it can wait until we get some
privacy," Rika said dismissively. "What? You think some digimon's
gonna attack in the next few minutes?"
As if on cue, another taxi appeared, zig zagging wildly through
traffic with complete disregard for lane markers, other vehicles,
and even the street boundary. It leapt the curb and tore across
the Hilton's front lawn barely missing several pedestrians. It hit
pavement again just in time to slam head on into their taxi and
crunch to a complete stop.
The rear driver's side door opened and out tumbled a girl that was
maybe Rika's age. She had a little white bundle tucked under one
arm that looked like...
"Is that Calumon?" Rika asked, surprised.
"Yes," Renamon whispered. Ruriko wasn't exactly sure if Rika's
digimon was outright invisible or just extremely well camoflaged.
Either way, it was a neat trick.
Then her breath caught as the taxi's driver got out. Ruriko hadn't
seen one in over thirty years, but she still recognized it. It was
an Invader!
***
"Jade's in trouble! I have to go to her!" Jackie insisted.
"We don't even know where she is," Yamaki said irritably. "I know
you're concerned, Mr. Chan, but just rushing off with no idea how
to find her would be worse than a waste of time."
"Can't you track her cell phone?" Jackie asked, frustrated.
"Captain Black?" Yamaki inquired. "The equipment my people sent
you should be able to do that."
"We're still unpacking and installing all the AEGIS stuff," Black
turned to the technician. "Miles?"
"Uh, that would require accessing the satelite uplinks," Miles
began hesitantly.
"Finally, some good news, today." Black smiled.
"The gear's in crates 21 and 22," Miles concluded.
"That's bad," Jackie said.
"But if Jade and, um, the digimon are the Invader's focus," Miles
mused out loud, "we should be able to track Jade by following the
Invaders."
"But that's good?" Black asked.
"Well, all the Invader signals appear to be heading towards a
single location."
"That's bad," Yamaki declared.
***
"Grandma? What's wrong?" Something about that maniac taxi driver
scared Rika's grandmother. That was unsettling. Not even the
D-Reaper got this reaction out of Rika's grandmother. Then again,
Grandma hadn't been the one going toe to toe with it. Looking at
the driver, Rika realized there was an unnatural stiffness to his
movements as he turned toward his erstwhile passenger. "Is that a
Digimon?" Rika asked under her breath.
"No..." Renamon whispered in her ear. "I...don't know what it is."
As they watched, the strange man reached for the girl with
Calumon. The girl smoothly ducked the man's grasp and lashed out
with a foot. The foot struck the cab's passenger door and knocked
it into the guy. As the man took a step back off balance, the girl
switched to sweeping kick that knocked him off his feet. All this
and she managed to keep Calumon neatly tucked at her side.
This girl's better than Henry, Rika realized. Maybe even better
than Renamon in terms of sheer skill.
A hand settled on Rika's shoulder. "Rika," Grandma whispered. "We
need to get Calumon and that girl away from the...that man. Now.
It's... I mean, he's dangerous."
They watched as the girl drove the man's head through the driver
side window.
"Uh huh," Rika replied skeptically. "Sure he is."
"Kids these days!" Grandma sighed exasperated. She turned to the
fight. "Hey, kid! You need to get away from that guy! He's
dangerous!"
The man in black was apparently down for the count. With Calumon
still under her arm, the girl sprang lightly to their side. "I'll
say he's dangerous," she replied. "You ought to see what he did to
my cell phone! And my name's Jade by the way."
"Rika!" Calumon squealed joyfully. Squirming out of Jade's grasp,
he leapt into Rika's arm. "I've been looking for you."
"Hi, Calumon," Rika greeted with a smile.
Jade Studied Rika's face. "Hey, you're one of those kids who saved
the world from the D-Reaper aren't you? I saw you on TV."
"Uh, yeah," Rika replied. It had been a while since anyone called
her on that. "It was nothing."
"I'll say," Jade agreed. She seemed a bit peeved. "I saved the
world lots of times and I never got on TV."
"Huh?" Rika was now confused. "Get outta here!"
"This mutual non-admiration is nice and all," Grandma broke in,
but that...guy is still dangerous. We need to get out of here." As
she spoke, the "guy" picked himself off the ground as if Jade had
never hit him at all. He didn't seem the least bit injured.
"Oh, him? I can take him again," Jade said confidently. "He's not
all that dangerous. Not like the one in red."
"Red?" Grandma groaned. "Oh no..."
"Hey, there's only one of him, lady," Jade pointed out as the guy
turned toward them. Suddenly, alot of black disks appeared on the
ground. Duplicates of the taxi driver appeared in them, rising out
of the disks like they were on their own personal elevators. Each
had a briefcase out of which unfolded gun muzzles. They were all
pointed in Rika and Jade's direction. They held their fire. "Me
and my big mouth," Jade mumbled.
Another "guy" like the rest, except in red, began to rise out of
the top of the wreck of Jade's taxi. Rika guessed that this was
the leader and the peons were just waiting for him. With all the
guns pointed at them, Rika was grateful for the reprieve. She
doubted that Renamon could protect Rika from all of them,
nevermind Grandma or even Jade.
"Running would be good now," Rika said as she began backing away.
"Oh, yeah," Jade agreed as she did the same.
"That could be dificult," Grandma put in as the girls backed into
her.
Looking over her shoulder, Rika saw that their retreat was cut off
by...ninjas? There was a crowd of them, dressed all in black like
any good movie ninja. But through the gaps of their hoods, Rika
saw that they had blue skin and glowing red eyes. They were armed
with a disturbing variety of sharp bladed weaponry.
"Shadowkhan?" Rika heard Jade whisper. "Where did they come from?"
"Stand down!" Red Suit ordered mechanically. "The Digimon must be
destroyed!"
The Shadowkhan said nothing, but they did lift their weapons
suggestively. Some had throwing stars at the ready. Glance back
at the suits, Rika saw that their guns were now pointed at the
Shadowkhan. Great, she thought gloomily. Now instead of death by
intent, it's gonna be death by crossfire.
"The Digimon must be destroyed," Red Suit repeated.
"I beg to differ," a new, gravelly voice said from above. "We want
that digimon alive." A shadow passed over all of them.
"Oh no," Calumon moaned, trying to hide in Rika's arm.
"That voice," Jade said slowly. "I know that voice..."
Everyone, human, suits and Shadowkhan, looked up. A winged, bat
like figure swooped down and settled on a lamp post.
***
"The Sovereigns have been overthrown?" Henry repeated in wonder.
"Who could do that?"
"Mmm, thank you Takato-mon," Guilmon said as he polished off his
meal. "Got anymore bread?"
"Sure, boy," Takato replied, grabbing another loaf fromhis pack.
"Here you go!"
"Takato!" Henry cried. "This is important!"
"Oh, right, sorry," Takato said sheepishly. "So who beat the
Sovereigns?"
"Not sure exactly." Munch. "Came from nowhere." Munch. "Bunch of
strange Digimon." Munch. "Zhuqiaomon said..." Munch. "...get help
from Tamers."
"Zhuquiaomon?" Ryo asked. "I thought you guys said he hated us."
"Must be really bad," Henry mumured.
"What else, boy?" Takato prodded.
"Gotta keep catalyst from bad Digimon." Munch. "Gave catalyst back
to Calumon." Gulp! "But we got seperated. I don't know where
Calumon is now." Guilmon was dejected now, his ears sagging.
"Don't worry, Guilmon," Takato reassured the Digimon, hugging him
close. "We'll find him. Then we'll go kick these new guys' butts!
Whoever they are!"
"Henry!" Kenta cried as he and Kazu ran back inside the shack.
They had left earlier to scrounge up some more food.
"Kenta? What is it?" Henry asked.
"Your dad's outside," Kenta said breathlessly.
"And he's brought the Hypnos crowd and the what looks like the
whole army with him, too!" Kazu added.
***
"Hsi Wu!" Jade snarled.
"Jade, I was hoping to see you again," the Demon Sorcerer of the
Sky replied gaily. "Oh, and it's not 'Hsi Wu' anymore. It's
HyperHsiWuMon!"
