s/k: I didn't post the fourth chapter and not this one... of course I didn't... my memory is fool-proof...
Ch. 3
Ryo and Takato sat under a large shady tree in the schools field at lunch that day, Ryo completely lost in thought about Rika and Jeri both being absent on the same day. He knew it was something that he was probably overanalyzing, and that he shouldn't have to worry; but 'shouldn't' was a word he'd come to despise while wandering the digital world, anything that 'shouldn't' happen, always did. To him, the word resembled a huge, lumbering oxymoron.
"I guess I just don't like it." He finally stated, "I mean, she seemed healthy enough yesterday, and it's not like she randomly skips school – anymore - and. . . " Ryo continued muttering to himself quietly, Takato staring at him like he was a lunatic.
"You are so paranoid!" He finally said, effectively cutting the other boy off. "I'm willing to bet she slept in and her grandma just let her take the day off. Jeri, well I'll admit I have not idea where she is, but it's not like some evil digimon has regenerated itself and ate them while we weren't looking." Takato grinned. "Relax."
"You're crazy Matsuda."
Takato looked at him again, Ryo's normally a little protective of the tamers, but why so much focus on Rika? Okey, well, other then the obvious wild-ness she has over the rest of us, but still . . . Then it dawned on him. "Oh! I get it!"
"What? What?!"
"Well, I think I get it, Jeri's been saying it for ages, I can't believe I didn't figure anything out until now - ."
"TAKATO!" Ryo glared.
He sounded so triumphant when he finally declared his thoughts that it would have been funny to any one else listening. "You like Rika!"
"Nani! How'd you get that?!" Ryo cried, it's not that obvious, is it? Uh oh. . .
"It's pretty apparent Ryo, you're like an open book."
"Uh. . ." He turned a bright red, very tomato like. "It's not, you know, that obvious is it?"
"Yeah."
"Oh"
"So, when were you planning to tell Rika all of this?" Takato just couldn't resist.
"Well, that's one of the reasons it's a little, what's the word? Inconvenient that she's not here at this - " Poor Ryo didn't even get to finish his sentence.
"You're kidding! Today!" He started laughing all over again.
"Matsuda Takato!" Ryo shouted exasperatedly, "You're not helping!"
"Sorry, but it's funny!" The brown haired boy grinned, trying to suppress another outburst.
Ryo gave up, seeing that he just couldn't win in this situation. His sandwich lay untouched, and his stomach was talking to him. Before he could get any in his mouth, both boys' D-arcs began to beep. They glanced at each other before Ryo dove for his pack and Takato's hand plunged into his pocket.
Henry, who was sitting a little ways away looked at his D-arc like he'd just been slapped. Uemari was for real?! Slowly, he stood up and started towards Takato and Ryo.
"Henry?" Suzi asked as she broke off from another group to follow him. "What's going on? Why are the D-arcs beeping?"
"Suzi? Could you go get Kenta and Kazu please?" Suzi just nodded and ran to find the other two boys, she was very confused.
A minute later, they were all sitting beneath the tree, only Henry seemed to have any idea what was going on. "You might want to sit down," Henry mumbled, "this could take a while. . ."
"I still don't get it." Suzi muttered rebelliously, after Henry had explained their current situation to the best of his knowledge two or three times already.
"Basically," Kazu started slowly "there were tamers a.k.a. digidestined before us. There were eleven of them, and when they sealed away the last enemy they were fighting, something connected to it was also sealed. This evil thing was part of a plan set up by the Digimon Emperor; it was a back up thing so that if he was somehow de- crowned it would come back after the next batch of digidestined and finish his take over job." Kazu sucked in a breath of air, taking a second to think out what he was going to say next.
"It would steel the three most vulnerable of the group and keep them locked away in its home/dungeon place, but the dungeon thing is in this world called the Dark Ocean, we've never been there and we don't know how to get there."
Kenta nodded. "The creature would keep them locked up in there until one of them or one of the others cracked and told him who the Creator had taken form as. After all of that, he would kill the three he had, capture the rest of the tamers and use them to kill the Creator. Once the Creator was gone, he would be in the clear, as soon as he let one drop of innocent blood hit the grass, or dirt, or what ever, three worlds would collide into one that he would rule. The three worlds colliding would be the digital world, our world, and this Dark Ocean place."
"Yeah, right." Henry said, "That's what we're looking at, but he doesn't need the Creator dead to merge the worlds, it doesn't matter if he's dead or not, he just needs innocent blood to touch the ground by his hand. He could murder half the city on the school roof and not let one single drop hit the ground. That's the kind of power e holds over us."
"Well," muttered Takato, "that's a nice image. Anything else we need to know?"
"I have a question." Kazu spoke up from his position near the edge of their little group, leaning against the tree. "What makes the Creator so important? What did he do? Why's this thing after him?"
Henry shrugged one of his shoulders. "As far as I understand, the Creator had a major role to play with the D-reaper, the creation of digimon, and what their true purpose is. I mean, they can't have actually been made simply to fight amongst themselves. There has to be a reason, and the evil digimon seems to know what it is."
Takato started to play with his D-arc. "Any idea what their true purpose is then? I mean, I really like having a digimon partner, any kid would."
"I think I know." Ryo joined the conversation again. "When I was wandering around, before I met you guys in the digital world, my friend and I stumbled on this little oasis on the fringe of the badlands we were passing through. You know how the most random things happen in that world? Well, the water fall was coming out of thin air, for one, and the rocks all around it seemed to go from opaque, to translucent, to transparent or at least invisible. At the entrance, there was a huge boulder with some weird word carved into it, I can't remember it now, but I think it must have been the name of the place. Anyway, when you went through the waterfall though, there was this huge tablet; it reminded me of the Rosetta stone. On it in about 4-5 different languages, it started talking about digimon serving humanity, and 'the true purpose for which the monsters were created' if I remember correctly."
Henry looked at him. "I think I may have heard a myth about that place from Terriermon, it's called Wellen Gehen. I don't know what it actually means, it sounds German, but it's supposed to be this place or origins, not a lot of people have ever seen it. In fact, you and this friend of yours were probably the first, maybe the second group, max, of people to find it."
Ryo's eyes seemed to seemed to darken for a second, casting his azure gaze to the grass for a moment and bowing his head slightly. "Yeah, sounds about right." Suzi and Takato picked up on the change of mood in their friend instantly, either none of the others did or they ignored it as something insignificant.
"Alright, any other bits of important information?" Kazu asked, completely oblivious.
"Yeah, two things, one is that there's a poem about reversing innocent blood or something, here." He pulled out a piece of crumpled paper to read out loud. . .
"Sometimes things happen, all falls to disarray / Sometimes people die, that's the way of the game
But when innocent blood, has dampened the soil / Beware of the two, who reverse winners spoil
In the time of great darkness, when the worlds have merged / Uninvited they come, a boy and a girl
They will beat all the odds, until at journey's end / One is taken from other, may the sacrifice mend
The worlds split and peace can reign, only one shall stay alive / With the help of the others, she left may survive
Only true hearts can conquer, the pain yet to come / Beware to the Tamers, name's meaning is sung."
Ryo glanced at Takato, who simply shrugged, pretending politely that he hadn't noticed Ryo's moment of. . . almost mourning, intending to ask him about it later.
"Well," said Suzi, "we can figure that out later, what was the other thing you wanted to tell us?"
Henry looked sick, "The Creator, you know, he's. . ." He trailed off, then tried again. "He's my dad."
Suzi's normally healthy tan face paled. "That's, that's not possible. Dad didn't have a huge contribution to digimon, not that big. . . did he? I mean, that's not right, you'r wrong Henry; the bad guys can always target the good guys, but it's against the rules to go after family and friends. It isn't done, it's mean, it's not right. . ." She trailed on, as if she could change it by rationalizing everything. She'd matured a whole lot in three years.
Henry took a second, and truly only a second, to regain his composure. He'd obviously found a way to deal with his shock before-hand, "I know this because of a lady named Meiko Uemari. She told me all about this forgotten bit of writing - possibly from your stone, Ryo - and the things we could do with our D-arcs. The idea here is something like when we faced the Deva's, but a little more personal. I wouldn't be surprised if the reason Rika ans Jeri aren't here is because we didn't get our information fast enough."
Kazu smirked his happy smirk. "You know, I've been getting kinda bored with all this 'nothing happening' business, despite the obvious problems, it's good to know we're needed again."
Despite himself, and his logical way of thinking, Kenta nodded too. "Admit it guys, even though this is so bad, and so horrible, and so dangerous on so many levels, it's almost. . . nice at the same time."
Ryo nodded only slightly. "It's nice to be wanted. Now, when do we leave?"
"Well, we have to get Rika and Jeri back right?" Henry asked rhetorically. "So we go to them."
. . . .
s/k: Actually, I think I may have indeed updated this before, but it's lots better now, so meep. Anyway, you know how I've been ignoring ff.n lately? Well, Tapestry of Lies is due to be posted within the next month. So there's that to look forward too, and I was thinking of doing a story on Ryo and his fictitious friend Raine. They'd be a little older then 8, the fic would probably cover from when they met at 8 to her death at about. . . 13/14. Yes? No? Good idea? Bad idea? Review even though it's a re-post?
