"Doppelgangland"
4. 'Control'
"No one knows what it's like
To be the bad man,
To be the sad man
Behind blue eyes.
And no one knows
What it's like to be hated
To be faded, to telling only lies.
No one knows what it's like to feel these feelings
Like I do, and I blame you!
No one bites back as hard
On their anger
None of my pain woe
Can show through."
~ 'Behind blue eyes' Limp Bizkit.
Yolei clutched Ken in her arms as his head lolled feebly to one side. "Ken!" she cried hopelessly and then looked up at the burning eyes of Osamu. He was hovering above the group of resistance fighters on his Airdramon. But she noticed he was not looking at her or Ken in her arms, but his gaze was some two feet away.
They rested on the other Ken, standing firm next to a crumbling pillar, clutching a sword in front of him and staring up at his brother with an intense dislike. Yolei watched as Osamu's eyes seemed to widen under their glasses and then they flickered back to the Ken in her arms. His eyes narrowed this time and with a sneer, made a gesture to the Snipers around him to leave the scene. As one the men all hurried away back to the base, while the Kaiser gave one more look of utter hatred to both Kens and retreated on his Airdramon.
The group glanced around themselves and then heard Ken yell, "Lets get the hell out of here!"
They did not need telling twice and so retreated in the opposite direction.
~~~~****~~~~
Within the base Osamu stormed down a long brightly-lit corridor. He winced as his wound reminded him that he was not as strong as he once was, thanks to his little brother.
He stopped and clutched at his chest, and a Sniper next to him asked if he could help. Osamu looked up at him and nodded, "Tell Jyou the pain killers he gave me are not working, I need something stronger."
The Sniper nodded his head and took off in the direction of the stairs.
After a few more steps, Osamu stopped outside of a black door with no handle. He looked to the Sniper on his left and growled, "I wish to be alone, now go."
This Sniper too, nodded and left.
The Kaiser punched in a number code on a little panel on the side of the door and with a whoosh sound, the door slid open. He stepped into the dimly lit room and the door slid shut again behind him. He walked a bit forward and looked around the room. He stopped at the site of a figure sitting with her back to him looking out a window. Then he marched forward.
The girl was around the age of fifteen, with piercing pale blue eyes and long black hair. She had pale pink lips in which she smiled dolefully at the Kaiser.
"That boy was telling the truth! There are many doubles here! What does this mean?" he demanded of her.
She continued to stare out the window at the night sky, "I do not know."
"You don't know?" he yelled, "Then have a vision, find out! You're an Oracle for God's sake!"
Her voice was very soft and very calm, "That is not how the visions work Master. I have told you this before."
"I am tired of this! I want to know why they are here and-"
He cut himself off, as the girl suddenly closed her eyes. A white light came from the palm of her hands forming a kind of crystal ball of energy and light. It illuminated her face in a stunning, yet frightening way and her hair started to lift and fly about her. Her eyes opened again and stared at Osamu.
"What is it?" he asked desperately.
Her voice was a monotone and much more powerful than it had been only seconds before, "Destiny cannot be changed, fate may try to intervene, but it always comes out in the end. They are here for a reason, to learn and to teach. They will be your demise."
The light faded and her hair rested on her back again. She returned her gaze back to the sky when Osamu turned away from her. He growled and stormed out of the room, leaving the girl alone once more.
He marched back down the corridor and stepped into the monitor room, where several Snipers waited for his instruction or to help him sit down in his throne. He glanced around himself and asked the nearest Sniper, a young teenager with red hair where Kouen was.
The Sniper shrugged, "I don't know Sir. She was in the arena with you before you left but I haven't seen her since."
Osamu sighed, "She must be wondering around the base again."
Osamu was right, Kouen was walking through the base, quite unnoticed by the passing Snipers, as they never dared look at her or ask her questions of what she was doing. She stopped outside the black door Osamu had just been to and glanced around herself, then she punched in the keys and the door slid open. Silently, her bare feet stepped over the threshold and again the door slid shut.
She walked over to the girl within the room, who was now standing by the window.
"I knew you would come." Her soft voice said.
Kouen stood in front of the girl and looked down at her wrist. The Black Ring glinted in the moonlight, then she looked back up at the girl with her eyes only and the young girl nodded.
~~~~****~~~~
Yolei bent over Ken while trying to hold back the tears in her eyes. Yamato had helped her place him on top of one of the crates so he was lying flat on his back.
"What's wrong with him?" she asked, though her voice was choked due to the lump in her throat.
"Well, he's wearing a Black Ring for one thing." Daisuke stated grimly.
Yolei rounded on him, "I know that you idiot! But why is he so…so vacant?"
Yolei stared down at him again with a concerned mask on her face. Ken had been unconscious for about twenty minutes now and only a few minutes ago had he startled them by opening his eyes with such sharpness, it made them jump. However, he had not done anything else since. He hadn't even blinked and his eyes looked unfocused and empty.
Cody came closer; "He looks like a robot or something."
"Don't get too close to him." A voice from the shadows called. They all turned to Ken, who was placing his sword back into its cupboard.
"Why, he won't hurt us-" Davis broke off when Ken suddenly sat up and swung his legs over the side of the crate, but again he was still and made no more movements for a long while.
Daisuke moved over towards the desk where Ken was sitting. He spotted the blood on his hand and Ken made to place his hand in his pocket but Daisuke pulled his wrist towards him, to inspect his hand. "God, Ken, you didn't."
The indigo-haired youth yanked back his hand and averted his eyes from his best friend, "No, I failed at that too."
Daisuke sighed deeply, opened his mouth to say something but couldn't think of anything and so closed it again.
He stared at the doubles in the room, from Davis to Yolei and Ken to Cody, TK and Kari. "So they are from another dimension?"
"A parallel universe. Apparently similar to ours, the only difference is that Osamu is dead there and Ken was the Kaiser." Ken stated bluntly.
"I see. Do you think they'll help us in the battle?" Daisuke asked in a low voice.
"I think they will."
"Hey! You two come over here!" Yamato called out to them and they made their way towards the group at the crate. "He blinked."
"And how is that a big deal?" Gatomon asked as she leapt up onto the crate to get a better look at Ken.
"Well, it shows he is awake at least." Hikari shrugged.
"I've never seen a person react to a Black Ring like this before." Ken muttered.
"That's because it's different." A smooth female voice announced from behind them.
As one, they all turned to see a tall young woman, dressed in a white Vietnamese dress with a long copper red braid down her back standing in the door way. They also noticed that a young teenage girl was standing behind her. This girl was dressed in a deep violet, velvet dress that reached all the way to her toes and draped over her palms. Her hair was a long sheet of black, which seemed a bit unkempt. Her eyes were an intense pale blue and the black pupil in the middle of them seemed to pierce into a person's mind.
"Kouen!" Yamato breathed and made to make his way over to her, but she closed the distance between them, with the girl closely at her heels.
"Hello Yamato." Kouen said, trying not to look into his eyes. Suddenly very aware of everyone's gaze on her, Kouen turned to the rest of the group. She took in all the doubles around her and then Ken with his collar. "He wasn't lying when he said he was from another world." She mumbled.
"Kouen," Hikari asked desperately, "what do you mean this ring is different?"
"Hello Hikari," Kouen said flatly, slightly offended that she did not ask how Kouen was after being kept at the base for months. "Well," she continued, "He's been working on it for some time now and I have my guess that he was planning on using it on Ken, though of course, not this Ken here." She indicated to Ken sitting on the crate, blinking unseeingly. "How did Osamu manage to get it on to him?"
"Well," Yamato began, "we were storming the base when him and Daisuke came to a halt at the old freeway and when Ken was about to jump onto Yolei's digimon, Osamu sent the ring out and it caught him around the neck. Though Osamu noticed his mistake when he saw all of us." He added with a laugh.
Kouen's eyes went wide and finally met Yamato's large blue ones, "Osamu saw you?"
"Well, I don't think he noticed me, no, but-"
"Yamato, how many times have I asked you to stay out of his line of vision? I have one death on my conscience, I don't need yours too!"
"Kouen, I-" but Yamato never got to say what he was because Ken had interrupted him to step in front of Kouen.
"How did you escape?" He asked her without so much as a 'hello'.
Kouen glanced at the mirror image of Ken on the crate and back to the one in front of her, "He showed me how. When he was fighting Daisuke in the arena, I watched him break Daisuke's Black Ring. After the attack by the freeway, I went back to the base and wandered to the monitor room to see the plans to the Black Rings, which, consequently is how I found out about that ring on his neck, but I'll get back to that. Anyway, I noticed a weak spot on it and so deciding that I was going to escape, I went to get Shinsei and then I broke the ring myself."
"I'm sorry," TK interrupted, "but how come you are free to wander around the base?"
Kouen rested her green eyes on the blond, she stared at him for a while before starting and saying, "I'm sorry, you're just so much like him. What's your name?"
"TK Takaishi."
"Well, you see, Osamu has a fault when it comes to me, he's a fool. He lets me wonder freely about the base and no one is allowed to look at me let alone talk to me. So no one asks what I am doing or where I am going. Aside from that, the Black Ring that I was wearing was designed to keep me in the base and do, as Osamu wanted me to do. I was in a way, programmed to how he wanted me to be. Over the past few months I have been learning to fight the control of the ring. That is how I got into Shinsei's room and how I managed to break the ring and walk out of the Base."
As if seeing her for the first time since they arrived, Hikari, Ken, Mike and Yamato turned to the dark haired girl behind Kouen. The red head sidestepped and looked at the new faces, "This is Shinsei. She's rather quiet and prefers to keep her own company, so don't take it personally if she doesn't talk to you."
Kari smiled at the girl, but felt the intense gaze of Shinsei to be too much and so turned back to Kouen.
"Anyway," Kouen went on, "this new Ring is very different from the others. I think it is a way of Osamu using Ken to hear and see what we say and do."
"So he's using spies again is he?" Ken said darkly with his eyes on Kouen.
She lifted her head and looked down on Ken.
There was a long uncomfortable pause where no one said anything and then Kouen went on, "Well, at any rate, I suggest we tie him up, just encase." She turned on her heel and indicated for Shinsei to follow her.
"Where are you going?" Yamato asked her.
"To take a shower and change." She called behind her. The group watched her disappear into a room on the side of the warehouse and turned back to Ken sitting on the crate.
"I'm gonna go take a shower too." Ken muttered and began walking in the opposite direction.
"What should we do with Ken here?" Mike yelled to the retreating teen.
"Tie him up like Kouen said!"
~~~~****~~~~
Osamu seemed to be completely absorbed in what he was working on, because he was not at all concerned that he hadn't seen Kouen in over half an hour. He was now busily typing away on a keyboard that was invisible to everyone except him. The bright screen showed the designs of the ring Ken was wearing and Osamu was busy typing in commands for it. He paused from typing long enough to place a pair of purple visors on in place of his glasses. A sadistic smile spread over his features and he began typing again.
~~~~****~~~~
Ken's eyes suddenly came into focus. He stared straight ahead of him and found he was in a large factory or warehouse. He also felt that his legs and arms were bound so he tried to look down, but a small electric shock licked his neck. He tried to frown but came out with the same results.
'What's going on?' he asked mentally and suddenly the knowledge came to him. 'I'm wearing a Dark Ring? But this is not how they are supposed to work. The digimon is not supposed to be able to think, just act on command.' A sick sensation of guilt weighed down in his stomach as he remembered designing and fitting the Dark Rings. He tried to push the feeling away.
Suddenly Davis' face came into view in front of him and he began waving his hand in front of Ken's eyes. "This is so frustrating! Why won't he do anything?"
"I thought we told you to not get too close to him, Davis." Cody said from somewhere near Ken's left.
Ken felt slightly better, knowing that his friends were all around him.
However, that feeling vanished as Davis began shaking Ken by the shoulders and caused his neck to crick. Yolei rushed over to her boyfriend and smacked Davis upside the head, "Are you trying to give him whiplash? He's hurt enough as it is without you adding to his injuries."
Ken made to open his mouth to thank Yolei but the ring gave him another shock, this time slightly bigger than the last one.
'Every time you try to do something against my wishes, you will receive an electric shock. The bigger the action, the stronger the shock. Understand Ototo-chan?'
Ken's stomach squirmed and he pictured his eyes go wide. 'Sam?' he questioned mentally, but no, he corrected himself, 'No, he's not my brother, in this world he's a monster.'
'The same monster you were once.' Another voice told him. This one though was far more familiar as it was the one that plagued him every other day, reminding him of his destructive days as the Emperor.
Ken pushed the voice aside.
'So this is a new kind of Dark Ring? But okay, how come I have control of my thoughts?'
'Because, fool, I designed the ring to let you be fully aware of everything around you while I have complete control of your motor functions. You see, I could make you rip Daisuke's heart out and have you eat it, all the while you know exactly what you are doing, but are powerless to stop yourself.'
Ken felt his stomach disappear. 'You wouldn't-?'
'Of course I would! I wouldn't make you rip out his heart because that is revolting and I don't think I could stomach that, but yes, I would make you do horrible things similar to that. You see I had originally made this ring for my real brother, but I suppose I will have to use you instead. It will still affect him and that's all I want.'
Ken noticed that Yolei was standing in front of him now and she had cautiously placed her soft palms onto his cheeks and was staring into his crystal blue eyes.
"Ken-chan? Can you hear me?"
Ken made to nod his head, the shear effort of it was draining and the slight movement he did make caused the ring to protest and send a pulse of electricity to his throat, giving him an instant headache.
The lavender haired girl closed her eyes and sighed. Then angrily turned around and screamed, "What kind of a monster is this!?" In the all the years that Ken had known her, she hadn't lost a single shred of determination that he so admired her for, and right now, she paced the room, looking determined to take down someone for doing this to him.
'It's a good thing I'm tied up,' Ken thought smartly, 'now you can't make me hurt them.'
'Don't be so sure of that.' He heard Osamu's voice echo in his mind.
'How is it that you can hear my thoughts?'
'Wouldn't you love to know.' Osamu teased, 'It's a complicated program, but this ring around your neck, not only lets me have complete control of you, but also allows me to communicate with you through your thoughts, by reading your brain-waves, as well as making itself apart of you. Which means I see what you see and hear what you hear. I don't want to bore you with the facts, I'm sure I would just confuse the hell out of you anyway. I often forget that you are a fool, just like the rest of these mindless insects in this world.
'Now lets show them how this ring works.'
'NO!' Ken screamed mentally, 'Please-!'
But before Ken could complete the thought, Osamu had forced Ken's hand out of the ropes that held them and in a second, his fingers gripped around Cody's throat. The young teenager had been leaning over to look closely at Ken and now severely regretted it.
Everyone present rushed to Cody's aid as the choking boy struggled to tear Ken's surprisingly strong grip away from his neck, while the others tried to pull Ken off him.
'NO! Stop it! You're killing him!' Ken screamed at Osamu.
'Correction, Ken, YOU are killing him.'
'Stop! Please stop!'
'Alright, but just remember I have other things in mind for you.'
As abruptly as it had happened, it stopped. Ken's grip on Cody, went slack and his arm fell to his side. Cody stepped back and took in a deep breath, rubbing his bruised neck.
Furious at what had just happened, TK rushed forwards and began re-tying Ken's wrist behind his back. Kari noticed how rough he was being and saw how the rope cut into Ken's already raw wrist. When Yolei gasped, Kari rested her hand on TK's shoulder, "TK, it wasn't him, he was being controlled."
TK sighed and shaking slightly said, "I'm sorry, I just got angry that's all."
"Yeah, well, just keep that temper in tact TP!" Davis growled.
TK shot the goggle warring boy glares inviting a fight between the two.
Gatomon stormed up to the both of them and hissed, "Now is not the time boys!"
"Gatomon is right." Said Ken suddenly as he paced in front of the group. Most of them started because they had not noticed him returning from the showers. "We have to prepare for what my brother is planning next and what he is planning for your Ken."
He sat down and found himself staring at Yolei. Feeling his gaze on her, she turned to look at him with a soft expression.
"I'm sorry." He said hastily, "I didn't mean to-it's just that you look so much like her."
Yolei blinked, "Miyako right? Hikari had the same reaction. How long has she being a prisoner?"
Ken shook his head, "Too long. I tried to save her tonight, but judging by the fact that she is not here, she must have been recaptured. It should be me in that cell, not her."
"This isn't your fault you know." Yolei tried to console him.
He gave a bitter laugh, "You don't know what you're talking about."
"Maybe, but I do know that she doesn't blame you."
Ken watched the two talk and felt a deep pity for the Ken sitting next to his girlfriend, 'This must be so hard for him. I can't imagine being away from Yolei for a day, let alone months. I nearly went crazy seeing Miyako in that prison thinking it was Yolei. I can't imagine what this must be like for him-" Ken cut himself off and felt himself groan, he had just handed Osamu a weapon against him.
'So you care deeply for Yolei do you? Well then you should show her how you feel.' The voice was full of sadistic bitterness.
'No! You leave her the hell alone!'
'Oh, I will, but you won't.'
'Oh, God, no, please don't make me do this.'
----~~~~----
Nic: Finally another chapter done.
Ken: Some things are still confusing in this chapter I think.
Kaiser: You only think that 'cause Nic hasn't explained everything yet. Like why there is bitterness between Ken and Kouen and Yamato and who Shinsei is and stuff like that.
Osamu: Now see if she went and explained everything in the first few chapters, what would be the point in reading further?
Wormmon: It's all about intrigue.
Nic: Yup. I can't wait to have finally moved past re-writing and go onto writing I have so many ideas for this story!
All: *groan*
Nic: Ah, it's not that bad!
Nic: (Updated AN). Okay, one thing I refuse to do is give Ken another name, his name is Ken in both the Japanese and English episodes for a reason and so therefore I am not going to give him another name. I'm sorry if this confuses any of you but I tried my hardest to explain about which Ken I was talking about. And if you think logically most of the time you can tell exactly which Ken is which.