"Hm... well, what do we do now?"
"Have some patience, Mimi chan." Yamato said half turning his head to her. "We've only been at this a few days."
"Soo, but you guys have all found your Digimon. Me and Takeru kun are still high and dry, ne?" Mimi looked over to Takeru who had crooked his fingers on the brim of his hat and was barely trudging along. He'd figured he would feel better being in the Digital World, with the chance of finding Patamon. He'd missed him so much. He was wrong. He dreaded the moment when he saw the little flying furry again. With those kind, forgiving eyes.
"I'll survive." Takeru mumbled just loud enough to hear. Matt dropped back a step, to Tai's dismay and threw his arms around Takeru and Jyou, one on either side.
"Que. Pasa." He said arrogantly bobbing his head. Jyou looked down his glasses at him.
"Huh?"
"I dunno. You guys are acting funny, I thought I'd come back here and let Mimi chan annoy Tai kun and Iori kun for awhile."
"Ooh. Good idea." Mimi said grinning evilly back at them before she bounced forward and gave Tai a big hug.
"Thanks a lot, Yama chan." Taichi complained, wiping lipstick off his cheek. Jyou arched a brow.
"I maintain. Huh?"
"She looked bored." Matt shrugged. "What's up with you guys? You seem depressed."
"Just because I'm not slobbering all over someone doesn't mean I'm depressed, Yamato kun. Koushiro kun would die of blood loss if he were here." Jyou said, fighting a grin. "I'm just thinking."
"Bout what?"
"Lots of things, why we're here... other such matters."
"Yeah, that other stuff is kinda weirding me out too." Yamato looked away and finally released them. He looked over at his little brother, who was still trudging along. That conversation they'd had the night before hadn't really surprised him. Yamato prided himself on his Gaydar. "So, how's our Little Brightness?"
Takeru wrinkled his nose in disgust at the old reference. "Huge and black."
Yamato laughed. "So it seems. I bet Patamon is on his way. Actually..."
Yamato rubbed his nose thoughtfully. "I bet everyone in the Digiworld knows we're here by now."
"Including the enemies. Joy." Jyou said practically. Yamato shook him playfully.
"Probably. At least we won't have to hunt them out."
"They're hunting us right now. And we're split up." Jyou could feel the whapping fin of his Digimon on his shin.
"Cheer up, Jyou chan! We'll win. We always do."
"Yeah!" Yamato smirked. "We always manage somehow."
"Yeah," Takeru murmured thinking hard about what he was going to do when Patamon did meet up with him. I think I know now how Anikun and Ken kun felt! I never questioned my Crest before. How shallow of me. "Somehow."
Yamato stopped walking and crossed his arms firmly. Jyou looked back at them, but decided better of it and moved on.
"Cheer up, Take kun. There's nothing we can do about this right now, so just enjoy the time you get to spend with your friends before we're in the trenches against this new enemy." Yamato cocked his head. "And I thought I was the moody one."
"You are." Takeru replied saucily. He began walking again and looked over at his brother seriously. "Do you think I'm shallow?"
"No."
"I mean it. I've never put serious thought into anything before now!"
Yamato rolled his eyes. "That's not true at all. You think about a lot of serious things. Your understanding of evil probably saved Hikari chan's life a time or two."
"But I've never questioned, before now-"
"Accepting what you're taught doesn't make you an airhead. Refusing to believe that there's anything outside of what you're being taught makes you an airhead." Yamato sighed and looked up at the sky. "I'm more shallow than you Take kun. Though I've been questioning everything since the day I was born. About appearances anyway."
"You don't care what other people think."
"Yeah, I do. I just try not to let it get to me." Yamato fluffed the sides of his hair. "You like Tai kun, Take kun?"
"Huh??" Takeru blushed and put his hand behind his head laughing a bit. Yamato frowned and raised a hand as if to smack him.
"Not like that, you perv!" Yamato looked down at his feet. "I was wondering, how you'd feel, to be my best man."
"Really? Have you asked him?" Takeru asked, all at once the joyful brother Yamato remembered fondly. He shook his head.
"I'm gonna surprise him. I just don't know how yet." He put his hands in his pockets. "He thinks I've been sleeping around on him. Because of those damned tabloids. He just can't bring it up though. I think he's afraid I'll tell him it's true."
Yamato smiled softly. "Tai kun needs to know. He's been the only one since the day we met. I knew even then, though I don't think you could call our fights sexual tension, since Tai kun didn't know that much about himself. I think too damn much."
Takeru stifled a giggle, invoking a wrathful glare from his brother.
"Ishida Yamato, you're my hero!!" He yelled playfully. Yamato flipped his wrist down.
"I knew deep down you were a cross dresser, Take chan!!" He said in his best imitation of the American transie stereotype. Mimi giggled loudly.
"I'm surrounded by pretty men." She said clapping her hands together. Jyou took off his glasses and began polishing.
"I protest. I am not a pretty man."
"Nah." Mimi said, twirling some hair around her finger. "But yer cute. That's good enough."
"I think Mimi chan is trying to flatter us, Yama chan." Taichi said smiling at his lover. Yamato grinned.
"You're not getting a threesome, Mimi chan."
"Awwww." Mimi pretended to wilt at the thought.
"Yeah. Koushiro san would definitely bleed to death in our group." Jyou remarked, sliding his glasses back on his nose.
"Koushiro san's not so bad." Iori said. Jyou pursed his lips.
"I'm not saying he's bad. It's just, some of the members of our group, are as ah... sexually advanced as others." Jyou said diplomatically. Takeru snorted.
"You mean perverted."
"Anooo. Yes, I do mean perverted." Jyou rubbed some sweat off his brow. "So cut him some slack when he doesn't want to hear the dirty details. Eh, Mimi san?"
"Oh, if you want me to." Mimi relented crossing her arms. She looked up, having seen a shadow on the ground. "Is that Patamon up there?"
Takeru looked up, too, trying to pinpoint the little Digimon at some point on the horizon.
"I can't see anything." Takeru complained.
"Ano, Takeru kun." Yamato said tensely. Takeru looked back over to the group. His jaw slacked in surprise to see a young girl standing not too far from them. She gave them a cruel smile.
"Hello, Digidestine." She said calmly, careening her head to the left. She was tossing a small black ball up and down in her hand. "My name is Gally. And I shall be the deliverer of your doom."
"What?" Taichi ran up to her. Instantly her little bauble froze in the air and thrust her hand at him palm first. Taichi was blown past the other Digidestine with a might gust of wind.
"Taichi!" Yamato cried running after him. Taichi lay limply on the ground, having in questionable luck ended his flight by smacking into a tree.
"I'm not like my brother. Not nice. Not soft." The wind blew her dark hair around her little face. She couldn't have been more than seven or eight years old.
"Listen, kid!" Yamato yelled cradling Taichi's precious head in his arms. "We're not going to sit around while you do whatever you want!"
"No. You'll lie around. When you're dead, and the worms are picking at your bones."
The wind picked up again and dark clouds formed quickly over head, blocking out almost every tract of light until the day could not be told from midnight. Something black began to throb in front of the girl called Gally, oozing, throbbing. Taking shape.
"Black beast, do my bidding. Destroy the bearers of the Crests and their familiars." Gally cried coldly. The thing finally chose a shape, that of a large reptile of some kind.
"Tai chan!" Agumon called. But Taichi was still unconscious, limp as a rag doll in Yamato's strong arms.
"Gabumon!!" Yamato growled. No one hurts my Tai kun!
The black beast tossed Itakumon aside, with a wicked swipe of a claw. Snarling, a warp-digivolved Metalgarurumon launched an attack.
"KICK HIS ASS!!" Yamato screamed. Takeru looked at his brother in surprise. Metalgarurumon was obviously struggling against that creature, but absolutely refused to step aside.
"Get him!" Iori yelled to his Digimon. Takeru stood there helpless.
There's nothing I can do. They're LOSING!!
Mimi grabbed his arm and drug him back into the trees. She took him by the shoulders and forced him to face her.
"Are you crazy, Take chan? You could get hurt! How would Yama chan feel?"
"I... we have to do something!"
Mimi pressed her lips into a fine line, then took off.
"Stay here!" She cried. Speeding out onto the battlefield, where their Digimon were still struggling against the dark Rodan-like beast. A wave of blue fire from Metalgarurumon slammed past the creature towards Gally, who held her hand up. The fire split around her as if there were a shield there.
She laughed. And laughed.
Mimi was tugging on Jyou's sleeve, angrily. He eventually motioned for Iori to follow him towards the shelter of the tree.
"Weaklings. There's no match." Gally hissed. Takeru straightened himself, tossed his hat aside and ran back out into the battle.
"No!" Yamato cried, releasing one hand from his lover to grab after the boy. But Takeru was going too fast.
Slipping around the rampaging Digimon, Takeru ran around behind Gally and knocked her down.
"What?!" The girl gasped. Takeru held her fast to the ground.
"Call that thing off. NOW."
"No! The dark wind bids me destroy you!" The tone in her voice was eerily familiar.
"I'll destroy you, if you don't make that thing stop hurting my friends." Takeru warned. She glowered at him obstinately, and Takeru made a grab for her dark bauble.
His cry of pain echoed throughout the valley.
The monster vanished, the spell broken, and Gally grabbed the bauble that had dropped from Takeru's scorched hand. She winced at the doubled over young man, but ran backwards a few steps, flung the bauble upwards, and disappeared in a flash of red light.
"Takeru kun, are you alright?" Iori asked. Takeru remained on his knees, clutching his hand in pain. "Let me see."
Iori gingerly examined Takeru's wounded hand. There was a large black imprint, with black tendrils of burn marks creeping long past the actual point of contact.
"I don't think I have anything for that." Jyou remarked, pulling some gauze out of his medical bag and handing it to Iori. Iori placed Takeru's hat back on his head. "Gomamon, could you fetch us some water? I need to make sure everyone's wounds are clean. And Taichi kun will need to keep hydrated."
"Will he be okay?" Yamato asked hopefully, petting Taichi's hair.
"Eeeee?" Taichi murmured. Jyou shooed Yamato's hands off Taichi's head and pressed his fingers around the crown and back of his skull. Taking another roll of bandages out he began to wrap Taichi's head.
"You need to wake up, Taichi kun." Jyou ordered. "I think you have a concussion."
"A what now?"
Jyou smiled. "Keep him awake Yamato kun. I don't see any evidence of internal injuries, just bruises. He should be fine."
Gomamon came bounding back with a bucket of water. Dipping a cloth into it, Jyou carefully rubbed the water over Takeru's burned hand. The blackness wouldn't come off.
"I can't say this is good, Takeru kun. I've never seen a burn like this." He took the bandage and wrapped the hand up tightly. "Do you feel dizzy?"
Takeru shook his head. "No. It just... hurts. I feel... drained."
"What happened?" Iori asked. Takeru shrugged.
"I think I disrupted her spell." He sat down wearily.
"Let me know if you get lightheaded. You could go into shock with a burn like that." Jyou warned, putting a hand to his head. "I never imagined I'd be a field medic."
Mimi gave him a gentle hug. "I'm proud of you."
"This new enemy is terrible." Jyou lamented. "If Takeru kun hadn't intervened, she would have killed us."
"I'm sorry I wasn't more help, Jyou chan."
"That's not the point." Yamato said gravely. "Even when Ken kun was being controlled he didn't talk so happily about killing us. He just wanted us to get out of his way."
Taichi squeezed Yamato's hand. "We can handle this."
"Shh..." Yamato whispered, caressing his cheek.
"This is definitely something we should contact the others about." Jyou declared. "You guys just rest for now. Drink some water and prepare. I'm going to email the other group and see if they've contacted this new enemy."
"Take kun." Taichi called him quietly. Takeru walked over to Taichi and knelt down, nursing his hand. "What did you see?"
"Huh?"
"What did you see in her? Do you think she was being controlled?"
Takeru sighed. "No, I don't think so. I could be wrong, but she seemed different."
"And when you held her ball?"
Takeru looked up to the sky. It was no longer blackened by the clouds. "I never saw the Dark Ocean before. Not without Ken kun or Hika chan, anyway. When I touched that bauble, it was like I was right inside it. Part of the tidal waves."
He looked back to the others seriously. "That thing allows her to draw power from the dark forces. To summon dark creatures from another plane. That was not a Digimon."
"Then what was it?" Iori asked. Mimi sniffed.
"You heard the little squealer. She called it a 'Black Beast.'" Mimi began trying to straighten the tangles out of her hair.
"And it didn't stick around after she couldn't keep it here." Yamato pointed out. "You think maybe it wouldn't be harmful if we could get her to quit?"
"We need more information." Iori concluded. Takeru nodded.
"We need to find our Digimon and regroup. This new enemy is too strong to be taken lightly."
"Um, guys." Jyou came and sat down next to them. "I can't get through to the others."
"Then we'll just have to make sure we meet them back at the campsite." Taichi said firmly. "This was why Sora kun made that stipulation."
"Let's hope they make it back too." Jyou said meaningfully.
If you like, email me and let me know. I'm vain and like to know if yall like what I'm doing.