Chapter 16:

New frontiers are best explored so thoroughly that you're more familiar with the frontier than the place you called home. Even if it doesn't serve any practical purpose, it makes a swell irony joke.

The Little Teenaged Geek (not that he would know anything)

GAZRIITOR:

Nickname: Slagster (Kajidoragu)

Real Name: Urbo-tor-jorna

Caste: Var'ka

Speacial Attacks: Dra jalnor

Modes: One

The slagster was the first menace machine ever seen on Earth. It throws lava out its arms at by-standing humans and digimon. It main purpose is to preclude earth's inhabitants' safety in the streets of the cities. In the form of slagster, the slagster is incapable of digesting biomass and is restricted to ground combat scenarios. It has a large turning circle, and its programming is flawed in that it will intimidate, but will not attack nonmoving targets.

Brock decided he could not sit still while weird, blue monsters were attacking people. He reached down and plucked Onix's, Vulpix's, and Geodude's pokéballs from his pocket. "Onix, Vulpix, Geodude! Do everything you can to protect these people!" There was something very wrong, though: it wasn't an Onix and a Geodude that were taking his orders: they were Steelix and Graveler. "What?" he stammered. "But…how…did they evolve?" Brock noticed a slagster hurling lava at a clustered family. "Steelix! Use Iron Tail to stop that attack! Graveler, Vulpix, fight back with Rock Throw and Fire Spin!" It didn't take much to destroy the slagster. Between the fairy-like creature, the red snake, "Suezo", "Tiger", and Brock's three pokémon, the slagsters were made into scrap metal in a hurry.

All seven creatures and Brock were breathing heavily, staring at the piles of metal that had once been their opponents. After a moment, Brock pulled out his pokéballs, and called Steelix, Graveler, and Vulpix back. Everyone was staring at him as the three pokémon were sucked into those tiny devices in a flash of red light. Seeing that he had an audience, he asked, "What?"

"What did you just do?" one girl asked as the fairy suddenly turned into a small, radish-sized creature.

"I could ask the same question to that one," he answered, pointing to the radish-sized thing.

"She just reverse-digivolved."

"Evolved in reverse! Is that even possible?"

"It is for her."

"Ah…I've never seen a pokémon like her before."

"Pokémon? I'm not a pokémon, I'm Tanemon!" the radish spat.

"Tanemon? Man, the number of new creatures I've seen---"

Suezo cut in, "One question…what were those blue-wheelie things that were just shooting lava at us? Does anybody know?" No one answered his question.

The scene suddenly became more interesting when the huge snake turned into a small, football-sized creature.

"…And a snake three times the height of a house can become that small that fast!" Suezo cried. "This is getting too weird for me!"

"Aren't you a digimon? Shouldn't you know about the Digidestined?" the girl asked.

"A what! First, that guy calls me a pokémon, now you call me a digimon? I don't even know what those are!"

The girl didn't even take him seriously when he said that. "Yeah…right… There is no actual way a person on this planet can not know what a digimon is!"

It was at this point that Brock noticed how pretty that girl who had picked up "Tanemon" was. It was also at this point that he noticed that there was a boy who, like her, had picked up the football-sized thing that had once been a snake. Disappointingly, he seemed to know her very well, and he said, "Mimi, let's think about this situation. We were adults yesterday and aren't today. The Digiworld gets destroyed. The city is practically deserted."

"Your point?"

"A lot of weird stuff is going on, here. Is it that unrealistic to believe that another weird thing can happen, like a handful of people who don't know what a digimon is?"

Mimi thought about it for a minute, swallowed hard, and answered, "You have a point, there."

Brock was still flush as a tomato, but he walked up to them and asked, "I'm getting the feeling that this is a stupid question, but what exactly is a digimon?"

"…I'm not sure exactly how to explain it," the boy admitted. "I mean, this planet has been crawling with them for the past thirty years. You see, they're these creatures---Tanemon and Koromon are examples---and they have special attacks and everything, but they---well---they can speak and think and act like us humans, but they aren't like us in that they don't stay the way they are forever, physically. They digivolve---that is, they grow and turn into new types of digimon."

"Sound just like pokémon, so far…except for the talking part; pokémon usually can't speak. Those three creatures I called back into these pokéballs are a few examples of pokémon. Pokémon---well, some pokémon, anyway---can evolve, too, and they become new pokémon when they evolve."

"Are you a Digidestined to your pokémon, then?"

"Ah---I don't even know what that is."

"Digidestined are special: they're humans that are linked to the digimon with these things," she explained. She held out her digivice. "Michael and I are both Digidestined, and we're connected to Tanemon and Koromon. We can make them digivolve using these digivices."

"Huh. There's nothing like that with pokémon. Well…actually, I'm lying, there is." Brock pulled a transparent, glassy, red stone out of his pocket. "These things are called evolution stones. You touch them to some pokémon, and they'll evolve, but it doesn't work on all of them, and anybody can use it on a pokémon; you don't need to be special to use one. I've been saving it, in case I want to evolve my Vulpix."

"Hmm. I've never heard of an evolution stone."

"You think it'd work on us?" Tanemon asked.

"I don't know. Are you willing to try it?"

Tanemon shrugged. "Okay." Brock touched the stone to her, and nothing at all happened.

"Like I said, it doesn't work on all pokémon."

"Huh."

Tiger and Suezo, who had been listening to the entire conversation, butted in. "You're telling us that pokémon and digimon are supposed to be all over the place?"

"Yeah."

"Then how come we've never heard of them?" Tiger asked.

"…Good question. But if you're not pokémon, and you're not digimon, then what are you?"

"We're Monsters!"

"Monsters, huh? And…do Monsters evolve?"

"Not the same way your pokémon or digimon do. We can adapt new features, like wings and horns and stuff, but we stay the same monster."

Michael cut in, "But one question: how come you don't know about digimon if they're supposed to be everywhere? And…how come we're kids again?"

"That was two questions," Suezo pointed out.

"Again?" Brock asked. "What do you mean, again?"

"Right now, on our calendar, it's the year 2028. And I was born in the year 1983."

"That would make you 45 years old, but you look more like 15, to me."

"Yeah, I noticed that, too. And this happened overnight, whatever it was."

"That is weird. What do you think did it?"

"We have no clue whatsoever. And, of course, there's the Digiworld being destroyed---"

"Digiworld? What's that?"

"Are you even from this planet?" Mimi had meant to say that as sarcasm, but it quickly dawned on her that that question was far more significant than sarcasm…

AUTHOR'S NOTES:

So…here we are again: I'm writing, and you're reading. Hey, reading is good for you. Enjoy it.

I bet you're wondering where this is going. You already know about the fact that other space aliens are involved, but I purposely tried to keep quiet most of what's really going on to keep the suspense up.

Anyway…I bet you've been wondering, "If the Digidestined, the tamers, the pokémon trainers, and the Monster Rancher crew aren't fighting each other, then what are they fighting?" Let's just say that I had to come up with a whole new batch of creatures; ones whose mission is to destroy, desecrate, and demolish. Slagster is only the tip of the iceberg. Some are man-eaters, which is part of what I meant when I said this might get a little gory. Like I say, viewer discretion is advised. And if you're a young, impressionable child, then you really shouldn't be reading this: it's not something you'd like, anyway! It just about turns into a soap opera halfway through! …though not totally. Anyway, there are quite a few of those creatures: as of right now, I have designed over forty creatures. They have special attacks and names in alien languages, but they have easier-to-understand nicknames, like slagster, black box, saberstrike, Miss Gnomer…there are a few bad puns in there, you can tell.

Anyhow, I hope you've been enjoying this. I know I am.