Chapter 34:  Guess Who's Back For More

            It had never occurred to Yolei that the messing up of time would allow her to see her dead mother and father.  It was weird that some good would come out of all this temporal evil.  Yolei had her face buried in her mother's belly, and both were squeezing each other half to death in a hug.

            Somehow, Davis was aware of this emotional reunion without turning his head, and he turned up the volume on the television set for the impending emotional conversation.  He couldn't understand the words that Yolei and her mother were saying; what entered his ears was a bunch of incoherent squealing.  He rolled his eyes at the thought that he might have to share the bathroom with someone who made such squealing noises:  in the bathroom, that squealing would echo until his ears exploded.

            He turned up the television set a little more and waited for the two to be done, expecting to have to wait a long while.

            "Mom, who is that?" Tina asked, interrupting the conversation.

            "This is your grandma, Tina!"

            Tina's face grew a little pale, but it made sense that a few people would be back from the dead if time was so messed up.  Tina didn't remember much about her grandmother, and time had erased her grandmother's memory, so she remembered nothing whatsoever about Tina.

            "I…I can't believe that all this is happening," Mrs. Inoue said as she collapsed on the couch, next to a chip-munching Davis---who, as usual, did not take his eyes off the television set.

            "Well, it is," Davis answered.

            She was breathing heavily.  "Davis?"

            "Yep?"

            "Is that really you?"

            "Who else would it be?  Fabio?"

            "I don't think so."

            "Rats."  There was a short pause.  Then Davis added, "Relax.  Everyone's out of place, here…you're not the only one who can't remember anything.  We have a few thirty-year-olds who don't remember how to speak!"

            "Ouch."

            "I've seen them, and I was just thinking...it's hard to say what those people think when they see digimon."

            "I know what you mean…and I know what I think when I see a digimon!"

            "Can't remember past 1998?  That was before digimon first came to live on Earth.  So…you're not used to people that aren't human walking around, are you?"

            "No, I'm not."

            "Don't worry. You'll live."

            "You're sure?"

            "No."

            She sighed.  "So…what am I supposed to do now?"

            "Sit tight in the shelter and let the professionals handle it."

            "I take it that's what you're doing?" Mrs. Inoue asked.

            "Nope.  I am a professional."

            She looked him over…a professional couch potato, maybe?

            "Don't look at me like that!  I don't spend all my time in front of the television set, you know."

            "What do you do?"

            "You saw Agumon digivolve to Greymon?"

            "Yeah…"

            "Tai has the ability to make Agumon digivolve.  I have the ability to make Veemon digivolve."

            "Is that him over there, in the helmet?" she asked, pointed to Veemon…who lay asleep on the couch, as usual.

            "Yep."

            "Great…this planet's doomed!"

            "Oh, shut up."

            Behind their backs, Tiger was walking into Yolei's office to ask for a reassignment.  He didn't want to come out and say it, but he wanted to be with Renamon, on duty or off-duty.  He said to Yolei, "I'd like to switch jobs from Takato's accompaniment to lookout duty."

            "Oh?"

            "Uh, yeah.  I heard you're looking for digimon who can dispense a lot of firepower in a little time.  I know from a test we did earlier that the digi-egg of friendship works on me, and Davis is off duty---uh, on the shift I could be on, so you can give the digi-egg to Rufu...I mean, whoever my partner ends up being."

            "Hmm…I'll think about it.  What do you turn into when you module-evolve?"

            "Thunderdog.  My special attacks are Jacob's Ladder and Thunder Claw."

            "I see…"

            "In this form, I have Lightning, Blizzard, and Snow Bomb, and Snow Bomb is a pretty rapid-fire attack."

            "Hmm…I'll check what's open and keep you posted."

            Tiger passed Hare on the way out of the office, and Hare shot Tiger a dirty look.

            "What?" Tiger asked.  He didn't get an answer.

            Hare walked into the office, and saw that Yolei was working at the schedule.  "Any openings?" Hare asked.

            "A few."

            "Any in lookout duty?"

            "Funny you should ask…now that you've asked, there are a pair of transfer requests here…and that opens up a new shift, and it's during Davis's off-hours, so you'll be able to module-evolve if there's a problem.  Can you start tomorrow at noon?"

            "Absolutely."

            Hare walked away with an unsure look on his face.  This was to get close to Renamon, and maybe get to know her better…maybe their relationship wasn't totally unsalvageable…

******

            Pixie sipped the broth Matt had made.  "Hmm…tastes a whole lot better than anything I made."

            "I was living with my dad without a mother, so I learned a lot about how to cook," Matt said.

            "I see…how did she die?"

            "She didn't.  My mom and dad had a divorce."

            "They did what?!  You…you can end marriages on this planet?"

            "Well…yeah.  Can't they on your world?"

            "Not at all---not even before they have children, let alone afterwards."

            "Well, they can on this planet---in fact, I've heard that, in some places, more than half of all marriages end up in divorce."

            Pixie's head swam with a combination of pain form her wounds and surprise that such a vile society could exist.  "On my world, marriages last beyond death; even a widower can't marry another woman.  And if you end a marriage, sometimes the other villagers will hang you and your wife, even if your wife hasn't had any say in it!"

            "Whoa…that's not like things are around here.  Here, you can do just about anything, and everybody will treat it like it doesn't mean anything---like it's your business.  I don't think it's always been that way, but that's how it was---before they attacked."

            "Who?"

            "I don't know…Gabumon and I saw a whole bunch of them.  They looked like these little gremlins.  They had huge ears, they were about ten centimeters high, and they spoke a weird language I couldn't understand."

            "What did they do once they captured you?"

            "I don't know.  They shot me with a weapon of some kind, and then I woke up hanging from those chains.  What they did in between is anybody's guess."

            "I see.  But what if---"

            "Here they are!"  There was a loud shout coming from a man standing in the door of the pharmacy.  He wore a blue shirt and had his brown hair slicked back.  "You thought you could live after the Linonian Empire decided you were to die, Mr. Ishida?  You have no idea what you're up against!"

            Matt gripped his digivice, hoping that this wasn't as bad as it looked---although he knew that, if this man was with whatever digimon those gremlins were, then Gabumon would have to get into action---fast.

            The man was making a move:  he was raising his arm, which was holding the same weapon that he'd seen the gremlins use on him before he went out in the lab.  Before his arm made it to a firing position…

            "Gabumon, digivolve to…Garurumon!"  Garurumon knocked over the man and sent the weapon skidding across the floor.  "You're not putting Matt back in those chains!  Who are you, and who are you with?!"

            The man touched Garurumon with his knee, and Garurumon felt an odd sensation in his chest, and he blacked out…