Chapter 4: The Price of Fun
Tina was passing the lounge with her jacket tied around her waist, when she spotted June, Ash, and Pikachu sitting on the couch next to Davis. Pikachu, being a small, furry creature, attracted Tina's attention and made her immediately switch into cute-mode. She plopped down on the couch next to Ash and asked, "Is that your digimon?"
"Sort of…I like to think that Pikachu is more my friend than my pokémon---"
"Isn't he the most adorable thing you've ever seen?"
"Uh…"
Pikachu gulped. He was afraid of what this girl was thinking. He could tell from her scent that she'd been around a lot of young children and other creatures…ones that he'd never smelled before. He wondered what her job was… "Pika, pika pi-chu pi Pikachu!"
Tina's eyebrow went up. "Uh, I can't speak much Japanese, just English…"
"That wasn't Japanese! Pikachu doesn't talk at all; he can only say his own name. He's like any other pokémon."
"Can I hold him?"
"Uh…"
"You can hold my digimon if you let me hold Pikachu!" she said, motioning to the alligator-sized Youngdramon.
"No thanks on that one."
Pikachu wasn't any keener on the idea of being held than Ash had been on the idea of holding Youngdramon. But then Pikachu noticed something move inside Tina's overalls pocket. He made the mistake of crawling closer to investigate. Immediately, Tina scooped him up in her arms and cuddled him. He tried to give her an electric shock to get her to stop, but it did no good: her green gloves were made of rubber. "Aw, aren't you the sweetest widdle yellow cotton ball there is?!" Tina asked him.
Pikachu snorted in anger.
"Gasundheit!"
Pikachu rolled his eyes in disgust. He saw Tina's pocket move again, so he stuck his face into one side of the pocket.
Joey let out an inquisitive squeak and stuck his head out the other side of Tina's pocket. Out of sheer surprise, Pikachu lost his balance and fell to the floor. Tina caught him just before he hit, and she caught him in a position that he found very uncomfortable. Pikachu tried to give her another shock to no avail. "You don't need to be scared of Joey! He's okay!"
"Joey good boy!" Joey chimed in. "What wake Joey up?"
"Pikachu!" Pikachu answered.
"Pi-ka-chu?"
"That is Pikachu," Ash answered. Sensing his friend was not where he wanted to be, Ash took Pikachu from Tina and said, "Pikachu doesn't like it when strangers hold him."
Pikachu cut in, "Pika, pika pi-KA chu pi piiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiIIIIIIIII!!!"
"---And he doesn't like being surprised by digimon in people's pockets."
Pikachu let out another angry snort of agreement.
"Aawwww!" Tina wasn't scared at all by this display. In fact, she thought it was just more cuteness.
"What were you doing anyway?" Davis asked. "It's not cold in here, you never even get cold, and yet you have your raincoat with you."
"I'm going off to the electronics store. My shift just ended in the orphanage, and I figured I should go to the store and get some toys and games for the orphans. They have nothing to do in the orphanage."
"Sounds like a good plan on paper, but you're in Tokyo, a city where you've never been before, and you don't know where the toy stores are. And then there are swarms of man-eating automatons outside this building. You'll have a tough time finishing your little store-quest."
Tina sighed and rolled her eyes. "Okay, could somebody show me where to find the electronics store?"
Davis patted June on the shoulder. "I volunteer June for that job."
June frowned. "Thanks, Davis," she spat with irony.
"Hey, you volunteered me to watch those baby digimon earlier today and change their diapers! This isn't going to be as bad as what you volunteered me for! …On second thought, considering that this is Tina that we're talking about---"
"I owe you one wisecrack now, too, Doofus," Tina shot back.
"I didn't know we were keeping score."
June sighed. "Well…off we go, then…" She got up off the couch and stretched. "C'mon, Tibemon. We have a job to do."
As the two of them were walking out the door, Tina commented, "You know…you sure have an easier time taking your eyes off the television set than Davis does."
June shrugged. "I don't watch that much TV, anyhow."
After a few minutes of walking, it started to rain. Youngdramon and Tibemon, being water digimon, didn't mind the rain. June didn't find the rain so benign; she opened her umbrella and put on her sweater, muttering something angrily under her breath.
"Not enjoying this?" Tina asked.
"Hmph," June muttered. "I hate the rain, I hate the cold…"
"Cold?! It's not cold out here."
"It is so, too!"
"---Oh, yeah, that's right! I forgot that I never feel cold. Something to do with my blood." Tina untied her raincoat from around her waist and offered it to June. "After all, your umbrella is big enough for two, and I won't need my coat to keep warm."
"Uh…thanks."
They walked along undisturbed for a while---partly because the rain masked their scent, any noise they were making, and kept them from being seen from a distance. Despite the noise masking, they were very quiet, knowing that any noise might get the attention of a menace machine. They continued to walk until they reached a mall. They walked inside, and found that the floor was dotted with broken-to-bits skeletons. "Okay, not good!" Tina commented. "Who ever heard of skeletons in a shopping mall? With this blend of fantasy and reality, I feel like we're in the middle of an anime cartoon! But wait a sec…these bones are dry! Like they've been here a long time…what gives?"
June sighed. "It's what happens when time gets messed up. Davis told me that he saw the same thing in Minnesota."
"He never told me about that."
"He thought you were too young to handle it."
Tina sighed. " 'Too young, too young,' that's all I hear from anyone! Yet, somehow, I'm not too young to look after little kids, am I?"
"Sounds ironic to me," Tibemon cut in. "I mean, the others are all about the same age as you, right?"
"Exactly! And Davis, the alleged leader of the Digidestined, acts less mature than I do!"
"Tell me about it!" June answered. "I'm his sister; I should know!"
They sighed and looked back at the skeletons. "Do you think we should give them a proper burial?"
"That would take too long," June answered. "Besides, we came here to get---what all?"
"Depends on what they have. I think we should start by going to one of the bigger stores, like a carpet or a mattress store, and get a forklift. I had in mind a wide screen TV and a Playstation Four system."
"Yikes," June muttered.
"You haven't seen what the orphanage is like. The only thing that makes it better than out here is the fact that it's safe. Those children have nothing, and one of the things they don't have is fun. With a big TV set or a few Nintendo Tsunamis or Sega Quantums or Z-boxes, we can give them something."
"Nice speech!" Youngdramon quipped. "Ever consider a career in politics?"
June sighed. "We might as well get all that stuff. But I think that a bunch of smaller TV sets would be better than one big one. That way, there can be more than one game system for them."
"You're probably right."
******
"I wonder what the general population of refugees looks like," Brock said as he and Misty left for their first seek patrol shift. Misty could tell which way the gears were turning in Brock's head, and she didn't like it. "I mean, the civilization this planet is a little more technologically advanced than ours, so they've got to have really good clothes…and cosmetics…"
Misty shivered.
"What? Did you hear something?"
"No. Did you?"
"No, I asked if you heard something because you shuddered like that."
"Sorry."
They walked on silently for a few more minutes, and then Misty shivered again.
"Did you hear something?" Brock asked again.
"No. Did you?" Misty asked back again.
"No, but I asked because you shivered again."
"…Sorry again."
After another few uneventful minutes, Misty shivered a third time. While Brock was still inhaling, Misty said, "I didn't hear anything."
"Then would you please stop that?!" Brock spat.
"I can't help it! It's freezing cold out here! I have my sweatshirt on, and even that isn't enough!"
"…Well, I don't think it's that cold out."
"I do!!"
"Of course you would! Look at your clothes; I've seen bathing suits with longer legs than those shorts you have on."
Misty sighed. "What do I do? I feel like I'm going to turn into an ice cube!"
Brock thought about the question for a moment. "A clothes store is the obvious place to go for clothes, and so---"
"Hold on, Brock…if the city is deserted, who do we pay for the clothes?"
"Nobody."
"That's stealing, Brock!"
"Who from?"
Misty couldn't come up with an answer to that question. She sighed. "I don't know who from. But if I were any warmer, I wouldn't be doing this."
They walked into a store nearby and found an unpleasant surprise waiting for them: "E-gull ambush!" Misty shouted as she dodged a blast of lightning. She and Brock ducked into a changing room to hide, where they found that they weren't the only ones hiding in there from the trio of e-gulls: there were four humans and a mushroommon staring back at them. The five refugees were definitely former employees of the store.
"Who would've guessed it'd be this easy to find refugees?" Misty asked.
"You call that easy?" Brock asked, pointing at the circling e-gulls.
"Ilto-tor-agnei, noh kreshnaiona djom…Ilto-tor-cavatu!"
"What was that?" Misty asked.
"The e-gulls combined into an underbird!" Brock answered. "Graveler, use Rock Throw!"
The underbird drilled through the thin door of the dressing room, and Graveler immediately pounded at the underbird with a barrage of stones.
The underbird wasn't damaged badly enough. It lurched at Graveler with its drill whirring, and Graveler caught the underbird. The underbirds didn't stop flapping its wings to try to fly at Graveler, and Graveler didn't stop holding it at bay. The stalemate was nerve-wracking, especially since Brock didn't have much along the line of other pokémon that would be able to fight this underbird in this close of quarters.
It was at this exact moment that Togepi decided to jump out of Misty's backpack. "Togepi, no!" Misty shouted as Togepi ran up to the stalemate fight. Togepi began his Metronome attack, waving his arms back and forth. Then he suddenly jumped up, grabbed the wing of the underbird, and tore it off.
"Tuck-ee-tuck-ee-prrrrrriii!" he shouted with joy as Graveler took the upper hand in the fight and smashed the underbird to bits.
Misty scooped up Togepi and scolded, "Don't you ever scare me like that again!!"
"…ckee???" Togepi asked, not know what he'd done wrong.
"What is going on, here?" one of the employees chimed in.
"More than you really want to know," Brock answered. "Let's just say that business just took a turn for the worse."
"Why?"
"Because there's nobody left to shop at your store!"
"Why what happened to everyone?"
Misty, Brock, and Graveler pointed at the wreckage of the underbird. "Those things happened," Misty answered.
The employees gulped loudly.
Misty nodded in agreement. "No kidding. There is one place that's safe from them, though."
"Where?!"
"We don't know why, but these robots won't go within a half-kilometer of the nuclear power plant," Brock answered.
"But there's something I need to do, first," Misty cut in.
A few minutes later, she came out from a different, intact dressing room with a pair of silvery, vinyl pants. "Do you think they're me?" she asked Brock.
"Yeah, they're you, but…"
"But what?"
"They're a little reflective, but it'll just take some getting used to, that's all. …And sunglasses! Those pants look like a disco ball!"
"Thanks, Brock!" Misty muttered.
"So…how far away is the nuclear plant?" the mushroommon asked.
"A half-hour's walk, or so. C'mon."
There was a problem with that half-hour: it was enough time for a clutch of saberstrikes to find them.
Misty gulped. "A few too many for our pokémon to take, aren't they?"
"A fast getaway is the obvious choice, but we're surrounded! There's nowhere to run…!"
******
"Uh, how exactly do you drive one of these things?" June asked.
"Try that lever." June pushed the lever forward, and the forklift's fork moved upwards.
"Okay, not that one. Try…that one."
The forklift began moving in a circle. "Tina, that's the last time I'm taking your advice!"
"Try pushing the one just like it on the other side!"
The forklift began moving in a straight line. "That's better," June said.
"I thought you said you'd never take my advice!"
"I lied."
They drove the forklift to the electronics department and loaded the forklift's cargo pallet with television sets and game systems and toys of every kind imaginable. They draped a sheet of babble wrap over the pile to keep it dry, and began driving the forklift back to the nuke plant.
"One question," Tina asked. "How come we haven't been attacked, yet? Is the mall within a half-kilometer of the plant?"
At this moment, there was the roar of the throttle of a few slagsters racing up to meet them.
"Looks like action is called for!" Tina thought aloud as she switched hats. "Digi armor, energize!"
"Youngdramon, armor digivolve to…Gryllotamon, the tunnel of adventure!"
"Shall we?" Tibemon asked.
"Go for it!" June held up a digi-egg that looked like a small rodent, curled up around a pair of boxing gloves. "Digi armor, energize!"
"Tibemon, armor digivolve to…Kangamon, the ice of persistence!" Kangamon looked kind of like Flamedramon, with blue armor covered in designs of jagged ice crystals instead of licks of flame. "Time to show these things what they're dealing with! Keep driving, June! We'll handle them!"
"Right!"
Gryllotamon and Kangamon jumped back to face the slagsters..
"Okay, what's the move?" Gryllotamon asked.
"Their attacks are strong, but short-range," Kangamon answered. "We should try to shoot them down while they're still far-off."
"Gotcha. Laser Mandible!"
"Sleet UZI!" A small machine came up out of Kangamon's pocket and sprayed the slagsters with ice.
A few of the slagsters were getting picked off, but the rest weren't so easy: they moved so that they were back-to-back, and then they combined: "Urbo-tor-jorna, noh kreshnaiona djom…Urbo-tor-andib!"
GAZRIITOR:
Nickname: Superslagster (Atsuidoragu)
Real Name: Urbo-tor-andib
Caste: Yon Var'ka
Modes: Massacre, ski, jaws
Special Attacks:
Yon Dra Jalnor
Kiro Tarr
Comments:
The superslagster is
roughly equivalent to an ultimate level digimon. Similar to the slagster,
it fires hot lava out its arms, but is capable of dispensing lava at twice
the rate of a slagster. It is capable of digesting biomass in jaws mode and
also of traveling over the surface of the water in ski mode.
"Did they just digivolve?" Gryllotamon asked.
"Looks like it. But their digivolutions take time; if we can hit them while they're still combining, we can take them out!"
"Right!" Gryllotamon began shooting at the combining robots, and kept firing until one of them got within lava-throwing range.
"Yon Dra Jalnor!" Gryllotamon took off and flew above the spurt of lava. "Laser Mandible!" She shot at the superslagster, but the shot didn't take it out immediately.
"Arctic Roundhouse!" Kangamon shouted as she gave a wind-up punch to the superslagster's chest. The superslagster turned into a block of ice and shattered. "I guess they're sensitive to the cold, since their element is fire!"
"Maybe," Gryllotamon agreed. "I have another attack that might be useful." She flew in a low bombing run and shouted, "Acid Bombardier!" A spray of green fluid hit the superslagsters and immediately they were rusted to the point where they couldn't move their arms. Gryllotamon and Kangamon concentrated their attacks on the disabled superslagsters one-by-one, and one-by-one they exploded.
"Personally, I think that went very well," Gryllotamon said as she and Kangamon walked back to the forklift.
Kangamon shrugged. "If they hadn't digivolved, it would've been better, but coming out of that fight without taking a hit is good." She regressed to Tibemon, and her digi-egg landed in June's lap. Tibemon jumped on the back of the forklift, next to Tina.
Gryllotamon didn't go back to Youngdramon; she began walking alongside the moving forklift. She asked, "You know, isn't this a bit slow?"
"A little."
"Well, there's a way to fix that." Gryllotamon flew on top of the lift and picked it up. "Welcome to Flight 13, please return your seatbelts to the upright position and keep in mind that the "no tray-tables" light is on. Please keep your oxygen masks securely fastened until we come to a complete stop."
As they picked up speed, June felt the wind resistance blow more cold wind and rain onto her. She shrank back in her seat---which was uncomfortable, since her seat belt was pinching her---and she made her position even more uncomfortable when she opened her umbrella and stuck it in front of herself. She muttered under her breath, "This is freezing!" She wondered how close they were to the nuke plant, but she had a tough time figuring out the distance: her umbrella was disappointingly difficult to see through. "Are we there yet?" June asked, eager to get out of the cold, wet weather.
"Cool it," Gryllotamon shot back.
June rolled her eyes. "I don't want to cool it! It's cool enough, as is!"
"Thanks for the compliment."
"Oh, shut up!"