Chapter 33: Alpha and Omega
"No, it can't be… you can't be here… not now…" Armageddamon shook with rage as I stood up straight.
"We have a fight to finish Armageddamon." I stood a full eight feet tall, a little shorter than Armageddamon. A red, metal headband came across my forehead, covering it completely as my hair fell over it a little. My face had aged so that I looked more like I was thirty years old than fifteen. A plate mail covered my upper body, but left my arms bare. I noticed that I was buff and wielded a long broadsword that curved out a bit at the end. A chain mail skirt-like piece of armor hung from my upper armor, covering the top of a baggy pair of blue jeans, which seemed out of place, which ended up going into a pair of heavy, steel-soled boots. Over my shoulder like a sash, was a heavy chain, which had a thick book attached to the bottom of it. Four pairs of wings had sprouted from my back, white and feathery. To top it all off, the Crest of Miracles still hung around my neck, in its tag.
"I don't care who you are, you are still nothing compared to me. You had to kill yourself to stop me back then, and I'm more than I was before."
"Whatever, I'm here to defeat you, and that is all." I dashed forward, whipped my sword up, and brought it down on Armageddamon. He sidestepped the blow and punched me in the chest. My armor let out a loud clank and I was knocked back a short ways, but quickly regained my footing. I swung again, from the side this time. Instead of dodging the sword like I had hoped, Armageddamon produced two long, one-handed axes. The handle was at least at yard or two long on each. The blade curved down from the end of it, out and then back into the handle about halfway down. The blades were black and charred looking, but were just as hard as my own sword as he blocked me with one and swung at me with the other. I jumped into the air and with a flap of my wings, took off. Armageddamon followed, unfurling his black, leathery, pair of wings.
"Running already?" Armageddamon taunted as he chased me into the sky.
"You wish." I kept flying forward, taking as deep a breath as I could as I began to leave Earth's atmosphere. We quickly passed through a field of data and were in space in a matter of moments. Armageddamon laughed as he watched me slowly letting out my air.
"The fool holds his breath. Inexperienced weakling." To my right I saw the moon, just as I had hoped.
"Lunar Crush!" I shouted and aimed my sword at the moon. A beam of light shot from it to the moon, impacted the surface, and drove deep into it. I stopped and spun around to the left until the moon finally moved out of place; it was the spiked ball at the end of my flail, the beam of light was the chain. I finally stopped and looked at Armageddamon, who was still a few miles away; I was significantly faster than he was with three more pairs of wings. I looked him in the face as he turned in time to see the moon slam into him. I stopped swinging my sword to the left and pulled right, slowing the moon down as it came back into orbit. If it was too fast it would have just floated away from the planet. I didn't see Armageddamon anywhere.
"Alright… where are you?"
"Twisting Nether!" Suddenly, the space around me turned into what seemed like black molasses. It collapsed in on me, becoming incredibly dense and pressured. I shook in pain, but held my screams as the dark energy squeezed against me. I pressed against it, trying to break free until I finally found my sword and slashed against the dark mass, ripping it in two. I broke free quickly and it dissipated behind me, but Armageddamon tackled me from the side before I could reorient myself. He grabbed hold of me, flapped his wings, and began to dive towards the planet, fire burning around us intensely as we re-entered the atmosphere. I tried to break free of Armageddamon's grip, but he was too strong. He held on until we were a few feet away from the surface, where he let go and stopped in midair instantly. Without enough time to even be surprised, I slammed into the ground, sending a huge cloud of dust and debris into the air. I lied on my back for a moment before recovering from my meteorite impression, the crater just under a half-mile wide. Smoke, dirt, ash, and rock stretched into the sky like a gargantuan volcano had erupted and the entire planet felt the same way.
"Ohhh… that hurt." I climbed to my feet and looked around, breathing a little heavier than before. "Okay, now it's my turn. Where are you?"
"Sorry, but I'm not done yet." I turned around and saw Armageddamon dive down from behind me, swinging down his axes. I brought up my sword in time to stop them, but was knocked back down, struggling to hold him back.
"You just made a big mistake…" The smoking blades inched closer and Armageddamon leaned forward, burning hatred bursting in his eyes.
"Give it up little angel. This world is already mine. Everything in it, all life and after-life, is in me, against you. Nothing can stop me—I've won." Armageddamon let out a low, contemptuous snort and laughed darkly. "You know, as soon as I'm done with you, I'm going to make sure that those digi-ghost friends of yours suffer long and hard, especially that Jennifer bitch."
"Well, there is one per…"
"Your eyes… they're… brown…"
"I love you, too."
"Kick his ass James so we can go home…"
It was all at once, blazing through my mind instantly, over and over. My broadsword glowed and I kicked Armageddamon in the chest. He stumbled away, the wind knocked out of him. I jumped up and slung my sword horizontally, slashing across his chest, clear through his black armor to his red skin. A deep cut was left and he roared. "You will never hurt them, Armageddamon, or any other being ever again." Armageddamon laughed darkly and took a deep breath. The wound healed before my eyes. "Damn."
"Now do you understand? I am invincible." He slung his axes back at me, back and forth. I continued blocking them as he attacked continuously from various angles in front of me. My sword clanged with each block, my armor rattled. My iron boots dug heavily into the ground as I steadily shifted footing, moving slowly backwards as the swordfight went on. "Just… give… up…" Armageddamon huffed as he continued his non-stop onslaught.
"If death didn't stop me," I blocked another attack, flapped my wings so that I quickly moved back, and flew a short ways into the air, "what makes you think you can? Malachi Blade!" Light charged through my broadsword and I swung down from above. Armageddamon swung his axe to block, but the broadsword cleaved through it as if it weren't even there. My sword slashed through the black armor over Armageddamon's shoulder and drove into his arm. He let out a loud roar and his arm fell away, amputated by my attack. I lifted my blade to swing at his head, but as I let fly, he ducked, opening his wings and knocking me away with them.
"You will pay for this atrocity." Armageddamon shook in pain from his lost limb as he ran up to me. "Demon Storm!" The fiery red blast came out of the palm of his open hand, racing towards me. I crouched down somewhat and held up my sword. The blast split upon it, forcing the attack around me. The attack ended and I stood back up, dashing forward towards Armageddamon.
"Malachi Blade!" I swung up, but he fell back a little. I still cut deep into his face, cleaving off one of his curled horns. He fell down and grimaced. Rage and anger flared from him as the ground began to wave from the energy he could no longer control. Black bolts shot from the dark clouds, scarring the ground around Armageddamon.
"You can't beat me… I am invincible!"
"No longer." My voice echoed. I flapped my wings and rose into the air as Armageddamon climbed to his feet. "You have caused more pain and suffering than any to have ever existed, and now you must pay the price." I pulled back my arm and flung my sword into the sky. It flew out of sight.
"So what, you're going to kill me with your hands?"
"No." I saw a spark in the distance, like a star glowing brighter. "JUDGEMENT OF THE TRINITY!!!" My sword came down and landed in Armageddamon's chest, pierced clear through him, and pinned him to the ground.
"ARGH!" A moment later the sky began to rumble. The dark clouds split wide open, revealing a starry night sky. Three blasts of light shot down from the sky, slamming into the ground around Armageddamon. The columns seemed like they held the sky, space, heaven itself up—their size dwarfed the remaining skyscraper ruins. They sat driving into the dirt for a few moments before shifting and converging on top of Armageddamon. Rock and dirt flew everywhere as light flooded across the face of the planet, dissipating the clouds overhead. The blast reached on into infinity, as heaven's fury slammed into Armageddamon. I flew down into the blast, unaffected, and looked down at Armageddamon, who writhed in pain. "This isn't right!" Armageddamon raged, trying to get up, but to no avail. "You aren't supposed to be here! You were never supposed to come! This wasn't supposed to happen!!!" Armageddamon screamed and roared.
"Good things aren't supposed to happen." I dived down and grabbed hold of my sword, still in Armageddamon's chest. "They happen when things go wrong." Armageddamon began to break up.
"I don't believe you…"
"Believe it or not." I gripped onto my sword. "For those who were, who are, who will be, for those above watching over me, be gone!" I charged one last pulse of energy down my sword and into Armageddamon, making him become unstable. Roars and screams erupted from his shaking mouth as his data drew up my sword. Wind blew out about us, kicking up more dirt and rocks as the dark deity broke apart. A final flash of light shot out from where we were as the blast from heaven peaked and finally ended. The light cleared, and Armageddamon was gone, the last trace of his data, the data of billions of people and digimon, crawled up my sword. I pulled up my sword and sheathed it.
"It's over." I looked around. The planet was a dead rock. Winds blew charred dust across the landscape of the flattened New York. Not even ruins remained. "Heaven help me in this one last thing." I focused lightly and a moment later I could feel every remaining computer on the planet click on. "I hope I survive this. System Restore!" Data poured out of me across the landscape as it quickly reconfigured to where it was before it was absorbed. Data blocked out the sky as it flooded across the planet, billions of people being instantaneously restored to where they had been. I felt their consciousness all leave me as their data went. I shook and fell to the ground, feeling my power quickly leave me, but I had to hold myself together at least long enough to finish. The data stopped flowing, and I passed out as people ran up to me.
I was lying on a bed. Exhaustion weighed on me like a sack of cinder blocks and slowly, I opened my eyes. Sunlight flowed through a window.
"Where am I?"
"You're home." Jennifer answered and I rolled my head to the side. She was standing beside the bed, looking down on me.
"You're… alive?"
"When you restored the data, you restored ours as well." Kristen spoke softly from across the room, but I didn't turn to look at her. I moved my arms a little and felt my t-shirt, but stopped checking myself when I noticed the visor on Jennifer's head.
"Hey Jen, why… how are you wearing Kazemon's visor?" She touched it lightly and gave a weak shrug.
"It's a long story. Let's just say that it's stuck, ok?" I nodded and thought back to my t-shirt.
"I devolved?" Jennifer nodded. "Heh, and Gennai said that I would never be human again."
"Well James, unless you walked around with guns, a metal headband, and had wings sprouting out your back before, I'm afraid you're wrong." I rolled my head over and saw a woman standing in front of Kristen. She wore a robe just like Gennai had and was the same height. Her face seemed tanned and her hair was in a ponytail, hanging behind her.
"Are you… a Digi-Agent?" I blinked a few times. She sighed.
"Well at least our new guardian knows a little about the Digital World." She spoke sarcastically. I thought back to what she had said a few moments before. I sat up and reached up to my head. I felt the same red, steel headband that I had when I was Archangemon… well, I sort of felt it. I was wearing a pair of large, black, ski gloves similar to my old ones, except they were made of some fabric or material that I had never seen or felt before—it was both soft and tough at the same time. Behind me, I could flap three pairs of white, feathery wings. To top it all off, the Crest of Hope was set in its tag, hanging around my neck. Other than that, my clothes were normal: blue jeans and a white t-shirt—although there were two large holes in the back of it for my wings to stick out.
"What… what's going on?" I looked up and down myself. The woman sighed again.
"James, when Gennai said you could never be human again, he wasn't kidding. You aren't and you never will be."
"But… I devolved!"
"To a weaker digimon: Humangemon. You still retain many of your human aspects, but believe me, you are a digimon." She saw the disappointment in my face. "Don't worry, it's not bad. By the way," she held out her hand to shake mine, "you can call me Angela."