Operation: Salvage Earth Chapter 19: Falterings to Reconciliation, a digimon fanfic

NOTE: There is some Christian content in this chapter, near the end.

Chapter 19: Steps Falterings to Reconciliation

"Sir, it seems that there is no corpse for us to examine. It was our original purpose to examine the remains, but no remains are to be found."

"Have the individual responsible terminated."

"Understood, sir; we shall begin an investigation immediately."

"But what was the nature of the disappearance? Did a tor consume them?"

"We doubt it, sir. The ator are programmed to defend the position, not consume the remains. There may be a programming flaw; protocol tells us to await your orders before beginning an investigation."

"Have you no idea what happened?"

"Only that there is relatively little fluid where we expected the remains to be. We aren't sure what that would mean; a storm system might have washed away the fluids. There are a number of possibilities---"

"Be careful what you do, lieutenant: I will not have our experiments delayed, and I am holding you accountable with your life---the same as all servants of the Linonian Empire."

"Understood, sir."

******

"So…what exactly are we planning to do to get them on talking terms, again?" Youngdramon asked.

"First we assess the situation."

"Easy enough: they aren't talking to each other at all." Youngdramon motioned to Rika and Renamon, who were both cleaning silently.

"Okay, now we need to come up with ideas on how to get them back together…"

"Hmm…" Youngdramon thought.

"Hmm…" Tina thought back.

"Hmm…"

"...Uh, whose turn is it?" Youngdramon asked that question a little louder than she should have, and she got both Rika's and Renamon's attentions. They both stared at them.

"Uh…What?" Tina asked.

Renamon and Rika looked at each other and then continued working.

Tina and Youngdramon quickly began walking away from the room. "Boy, we'd better keep quiet, otherwise they'll catch on!"

Youngdramon nodded. "Sorry for almost giving us away."

"Well, you didn't give us away."

"Now…what do you think set them apart in the first place?"

After thinking about it for a minute, Tina snapped her fingers. "I bet that it was them getting demoted that started this!"

"So…what're you saying, that we should get them promoted again?"

"Well, if we can talk Mom into putting Rika back on seek patrol…"

"How would we do that? You heard what Rika did to that girl!"

"But what if someone would teach her how to handle young children?"

"Where on earth would we get someone who would know how to handle kids?"

"Hmm…I know! Kari was a kindergarten teacher; she had to have had some training! Maybe she can show Rika a thing or two."

"It's worth a shot. I just hope Yolei will like the idea."

******

"Golem, module-evolve to…Moleg!" Golem didn't seem a great deal different, except that he had golden armor on his forearms, legs, and head. He had energy drills on his arms that he would probably be able to use for digging if necessary, but right then, they looked more like formidable weapons.

The gorillouts kept firing at them: "YoNon Gazrii!"

Moleg's drills glowed a bright purple. "Heat Coil!" he shouted. Using his drills, he reflected the shots back into the gorillouts.

The gorillouts switched tactics: they decided to try close-quarter combat instead of long-range. They began running towards Moleg to mob him and pound him into gravel with their fists.

"Energy wedge!" he shouted, firing beams of purple energy through the gorillouts. He succeeded in taking down a few gorillouts, but there were just too many to take out that way.

Archaeopteryxmon shook off the blow and came to his senses. "Wha?" He jumped to his feet and began slashing through the gorillouts with his mace: "Bludgeon Smite!" Metal went flying everywhere. He mixed in his other attacks, and before long, the only ones standing were the two Digidestined, Moleg, and Archaeopteryxmon.

"Well…that went well," T.K. thought aloud.

"So…what now? Do we go back inside and look for more people?"

"I doubt it: if we keep going, Golem and our digimon will end up worn out and we won't be able to fight again if we run into more menace machines."

"So…we turn back?"

"It looks like we should, yeah."

Moleg became Golem again and the egg of knowledge flew back into Cody's pocket.

They began moving back to the nuke plant at a quick pace. "One question, Cody…why did you become a priest?"

"God was calling me in that direction."

"Do you have any idea why?"

"Soft of. I mean, I enjoyed my office as Archbishop of Server while I had it, and they needed me there. But now…" Cody sighed. "I feel like I'm the only clergyman left. Someone has to give mass and baptize children."

T.K. shrugged. "I'd be surprised if you really were the only one left, Cody," he thought aloud. "I mean, we've found how many people?"

"Last I checked, the number was around 300. Why?"

"Well…what percentage of the people in the world are priests or pastors?"

"I don't know exactly, but I see what you're getting at. But I haven't met anyone who is a practicing reverend yet, so I'm sticking to my job."

"How many children have you baptized?"

"I don't know…four or five. Not everyone asks to be baptized."

"Hmm." There wasn't much conversation after this; they didn't want to make unnecessary noise and attract menace machines. But there was something interesting to talk about when they made it to within 500 meters of the nuke plant: "Say, isn't that the girl who got demoted a week ago?" T.K. asked. Rika and Renamon were walking out form the nuke plant, along with Takato and Guilmon. They were on seek patrol, but how Rika managed to get on seek patrol was a mystery.

Takato waved to them. "You've been gone for three days!" he shouted.

Cody shook his head. "I wish there were some way we could avoid all this messing-up of time!"

"I don't know if there is, Cody," Golem admitted. "I guess a lot can happen in three days, so we're missing a lot."

"At least the weather didn't get all weird on us."

"Hmm."

AUTHOR'S NOTES:

I didn't like Shakkoumon. Don't get me wrong; he was powerful and a good fighter, and I'll even admit that he looked aesthetic fighting next to Imperialdramon and Silphymon, but I just didn't like him. For one thing, he doesn't look like the combination of Angemon and Ankylomon: I can see something of Angemon in the wings and in the color scheme, but I can't see any of Ankylomon in anything except in Shakkoumon's stocky build...maybe something in the head. Shakkoumon wasn't like Paildramon and Silphymon; they looked like the combinations of their lower forms. Paildramon had a few definite parts of Exveemon, such as the blue skin and tail, and he had some definite characteristics of Stingmon, too, in the gauntlets and black armor. Paildramon kind of looked like Exveemon wearing Stingmon. Silphymon was basically Gatomon's top half and Aquilamon's bottom half, so he was the combination of his constituents, too. Shakkoumon was different. I'll admit that he looked good alongside Paildramon and Silphymon in battle, and he complemented their sizes, too: he was huge while the other two ultimates weren't all that big. But Swampangemon takes the niche of the large ultimate in MON: 2028, and Archaeopteryxmon is taking a different role: even though he's smaller, his specialty is still handling his opponent's attacks. He has an attack that I never mentioned in this chapter: Data Siphon. (It's the one he uses in the animation to keep the lava bombs from touching him.) Basically, he sucks up his enemies' attack energy into his hand and then throws it right back at them. That's an improvement on Shakkoumon's ability to suck up his opponent's attacks, and then not do anything with that energy. His mace also reflects attacks, so his enemies had better beware!