I have far to many stories right now but I like this one. Even though I haven't worked on it for a good while.
You might be asking where the other kids are. I don't know where until they enter the story and I write them. Also this chapter will deal with some back history of this digital world.
Standard disclaimer: I don't own digimon - wish I did. I am writing this for fun and peer recognition, not for profit! There I said it.
-I didn't believe in destiny-
-------- C2) Lessons --------
----narration----
I have trouble remembering things from back then. I hated it all and didn't believe most of what I saw. Most of what is wrote here is from what others remember, most of them are long gone from here…
----Brent----
Brent found himself standing; he didn't know where he was or how he got there. All around him was a gray fog full of shifting shadows. Growls and inhuman howls echoed across the hard barren ground.
Brent stood there shaking his head as he tried to remember what happened. The last thing he could recall was reading the plaque on the statue. The statue that wore the same gauntlets he now wore. His eyes roamed over them seeing the clear crystal and the blanked iron.
Turning his hands over he saw the eyes of the gauntlets. He stumbled back and fell on his behind from shear shock. The eyes where no longer brass but living flesh and he could see his face as he stared at his hands. The eyes blinked once and returned to being a brass imprint.
Brent tried to pull the gauntlets from his hands but found them stuck as though they where his hands. He pulled as hard as he could, tears coming from his eyes as blood began to flow from under the gauntlets. His hands wouldn't come free.
The fogs begin to come closer as Brent pulled harder. Blood and tears began to pool under him, seaming to draw the dark shadows. With a tormented roar a great shape leapt from the fog. It swatted Brent away and bent down to lap at the spit blood like it was water.
Brent pulled himself up and stared at the monster that was drinking his blood. It was larger than most cars and covered in striped fir. All four of its legs ended in large paws with rending claws. A long tail lashed back and forth and a long main guarded its neck. Large teeth stained red as it drank, teeth dwarfed by two large tusk-like fangs. The eyes glowed a red filled with nothing but hate, rage and hunger.
Brent was frightened of this creature before him. It looked like SaberLeomon but it wasn't. It was as if someone had given a shadow the form and life of SaberLeomon. The shadow creature looked real in every way but one, it was nothing but a shade. It had no color but for its red eyes.
Brent tried not to breath loud as the creature razed it head and looked at the blood still dripping from Brent's arms. It begins to circle around him, a low growl rumbling in its chest. Brent turned with it, scooting around on his behind so he wouldn't lose sight of this shadowy creature.
The giant shadow cat crouched low, its powerful legs curling for a leap. Brent could only raze is gauntleted hands in an almost pathetic appearance of defense. As he braced himself for the attack and his eminent demise he could only think one thing, 'I hate my luck.'
Another roar broke the eerie silence that that descended around the area. A second shadowy creature came charging from the fog. This one looking like a great shadowed dinosaur, a Darktyrannomon shadow beast. It slammed into the side of the catlike shadow, knocking it to the ground. Brent didn't see anything else because the moment the creature's eyes left him he scrambled to his feet and ran.
Brent admitted to himself that he had been putting on a bit of a tough act around Fay. He knew he could out fight anyone he knew, even five against himself. Problem was that he didn't know anybody who could smash down walls if they sneezed, or crush a car if they tripped. His mind kept coming back to wondering why the heck he was here.
He was getting tired and his arms wouldn't stop bleeding under the cursed gauntlets. His feet caught a stone and he tripped landing face first, the iron hard ground bruising his cheek. He rolled over onto his back and stared up at the gray covered sky, and let his eyes close. Exhaustion and blood loss sending him into a dark slumber…
----Fay----
Fay awoke in her bed. She stared at the ceiling and thought to herself, 'that was some dream. First a human drops from the sky then he gets the gauntlets of Fate. Maybe I should tell this to Alex.' She began to sit up only to wince and lay back again. She tossed off the covers and looked down at bandages covering her torso. 'Dang why couldn't it be a dream.'
Fay sat up slower this time and checked herself over. She knew by the pain and from her practice of healer that her had two broken ribs and a bruised lung. She climbed out of bed and began limping across the floor to the door. She paused as she reached for the door, noticing that her gloves where gone. She blushed before turning back and getting them from the stand beside her bed.
She was just leaving the door of her house when Vincent came around the corner. Fay was more than a little upset with him; after all it was his foot that broke her ribs. He saw her and dashed toward her. Fay decided she could deal with a little more pain. When Vincent got within a foot of her she leapt up and back-flipped in the air. Her tail whipped out with its golden ring and caught him under the chin. He stumbled back, stomped on his own tail and then fell back landing on his wings.
Fay landed and put her paw to her side where pain thumped in a dull beat. She felt her ribs, making sure that her broken ribs hadn't shifted, before giving Vincent her worst glare as he got up. His tail was swelling and his wings where bent at a painful angle. She looked him over once, seeing his wings move and how he winced away from her glare, she was sure he would be fine latter. If he told her what was happing.
Vincent rubbed his tail and tried to avoid her eyes, "hi Fay. How are you doing?"
She glared at him a moment longer, "ill be fine as long as you tell me why you gave me the boot like that. In fact I wouldn't mind knowing what was going on with every thing."
He let go of his tail and looked at the ground, he looked embarrassed, "I don't know. Alex explained it to me but it didn't make any sense. I'm sorry for hurting you Fay." Fay smiled before she remembered that Alex and Brent where hurt. She started running toward the large building that was town hall. Vincent's heavy steps following right behind her.
She ran down the main hall checking in doors for Alex and Brent. Vincent grabbed her and held her while he went down the hall and knocked on the door where Brent was before. Fay scratched Vincent's finger, making him put her down, and pushed the door open and rushed in.
She saw Brent lying in bed bandages covering his arms from fingertips to elbows. She went toward him ready to check his condition. "Don't bother Fay, you cant do anything", Alex was sitting in a chair beside the window. His staff was cracked and sat by what was left of his helmet on the floor by his feet. His head had several layers of wrappings around it and his eyes where slightly crossed.
Fay stopped and looked between Brent and Alex trying to decide who was hurt worse. She decided to help Alex, simply because he wasn't often wrong about much. She began to check him over despite his protests. Soon she was convinced he would be fine in a day or so. She sat down in one of the chairs that Vincent had gotten, Vincent sitting in another.
They all just sat there for a moment before Fay asked, "so Alex, would you mind telling us what is happening?" Alex looked over at Brent and then at Fay and Vincent.
He shook his lone hair back from his eyes, "you both know about the holy kings. About how they once ruled with peace and happiness. Something drew them into madness and they began to care only for themselves."
Alex reached down and took up his helmet, running his hands over the crack and making Vincent squirm because he cased it. "The kings began their path to evil with small things. Higher taxes, stiffer laws, but when they began ordering tributes built to themselves digimon became upset. The digimon began forming militias and small armies. The kings saw this and sent the royal army after the, as they called them, ungrateful peasants. But I'm getting ahead of myself. The royal army came from another world ages ago. Nobody understood where or why but they served the kings loyally."
Alex pulled his helmet on so that his right eye shone through the crack, "The army was not made of digimon but small frail creatures that could barley lift their own weight, humans. Many of these humans knew magic and could shape steel and iron into marvels, incredible weapons and armor. They made sets of armor for every human, man and woman, old and young."
Alex looked at his hand and began tracing the scars from the guardian door, "the weapons and armor helped but the humans where still week against most digimon above champion. To help this digimon craftsmen and mages began to help enchant the armors and weapons. It took decades of work enchanting them all. Some got increased strength, others better speed or defenses. Many where giving small touches of the elements so they could fight digimon who where immune to cold steel."
Alex stopped for a long time, gathering his thoughts and the rest of the story, "there where a dozen magic users with the humans. Mostly they where ignored because their magic was nothing compared to even rookies. But as they stayed in the digital world they grew stronger and more powerful. Soon they learned how to shape digicode, something only the most powerful digimon where able to do. However, what they did with it was something no diriment could ever recreate. They bound the full power of the elements into highly incanted armors. Every suit of armor was given two elements and the strength and speed of ultimate level digimon."
Alex looked up at Fay seeming to ignore Vincent, "there was something else done to the armor, something that wasn't intended. Everyone who wore the armor left a part of there sprit behind in it. The sprits within the suit melted together, giving the suits life. That wasn't all the sprits did. When the person who once wore the suit dies their sprit is drawn into the suit taking their memories with it. After a few centuries the armors became the leaders of men, not the men who wore the armors but the armors themselves. These suits where called the Sprit Knights"
Alex's face turned sour, "soon after the armors gained life digimon began joining the army. But men never let them fight or even train for battle. The digimon became servants for men. Many swore themselves and their descendants to serve the sprit knights, my ancestors where one of those." Alex's face returned to its usual stoic state, "With the royal army fighting with these new powers soon the entire digital world was under the rule of the holy kings. Few really cared who ruled over them but some thought it was good to be protected by kind rulers."
Fay was twisting her tail ring around her tail as she listened. She had heard parts of this before, but never from someone who knew the entire story. She looked up at Alex as he was lost to his thoughts, "what lead to the kings turning evil?" she didn't want to interrupt Alex but she wanted him to continue.
Alex looked up at Fay like he had forgotten she was there, "I don't know. No one knows why or how the Kings turned evil. However it started the kings began to spout unfair laws and demanding tributes from even the lowliest family. The royal army did as they where told because they had been raised for generations to obey. The digimon began rebelling, refusing to pay taxes or tearing down statues. The royal army went out as commanded, crushing all who defied them and burning entire towns to the ground."
Alex started rubbing the scars on his hand again, "the Sprit Knights became more withdrawn as the kings orders became more gruesome. Soon the sprit knights refused to give any more orders to the royal army if it was something they believed wrong. But the kings had prepared for this; they commanded the wearers of the suits to give them over to different men. Men who listened only to the kings' orders and acted without question or regret. The kings knew the armors where powerful but they also knew that they couldn't do anything themselves. The armors needed to be worn or they were nothing move than a suit of armor. And the men who did were them could do whatever they wished with the powers of the armor, despite what the sprits within the armors wanted."
Anger welled up within Alex, "that was how the kings kept the sprit knights contained. They put them on brain washed humans who did whatever the kings said and only what the kings said. This is what turned the humans against the kings. The sprit knights always chose their bearers. The humans turned to rebel but it was to late the welders had been slain by poison and the new wearers where already controlling the sprit knights."
Alex's voice had been bare of emotions though much of the story but now his voice rose, "the kings knew this might happen so they had been slowly corrupting all the digimon who served the humans. The digimons powers where increased and they fought with a determination surprising the humans. War between the humans, the rebel digimon and the corrupt digimon fought on for over two centuries. The kings had won. They fought the rebels back into submission and trapped the remains of the humans under a spell of control. Villages like this one are what became of the rebel digimon. Generation after generation the humans became little more than guard dogs. And the sprit knights where trapped within themselves by mindless wielders."
Vincent wasn't overly bright at most times, "if they are trapped how did Brent get one?"
Fay came forward with another question before Alex could answer the first, "and why did Vincent attack us?" Vincent hung his head with remorse.
Alex nodded at the questions, "Vincent attacked because he was corrupted in the same way the digimon from the past once were. He had no control of what he did. Chances are he was corrupted for a long time but only recently did he begin to show the signs. How Brent came to posses a part of the spirit armor is another story in itself. As time passed the armors began to gather power because of the sprits they where absorbing. But at the same time they were becoming unstable from those same sprits. They once absorbed only the sprits of the good, but now they where forced to take sprits of evil. It was a matter of balance and the balance began to tip for evil. As they grew unstable they had to be used less because a simple act could go horribly wrong. Three of the armors where locked away so that they could balance themselves. The forth armor was never entirely good and now it became an evil sprit. The fifth armor, The Deliverer of Fate, was different from all the others." Alex stopped and looked over at Brent.
After a long silence he stood and went over to Brent. He kneeled beside the bed and began to unwrap the bandages from Brent arms. Underneath was the gauntlets, they glowed and pulsed with every breath Brent took. Alex rested his hand over one of the gauntlets, "the other sprits all had combining elements, elements that made the other stronger. The Deliverer of Fate is different because it uses opposing elements. Light grows stronger as it fights darkness, and darkness grows deeper because of light, one growing and feeding of the other. One couldn't become stronger than the other as both grew together. It is this balance that made it different, because of this it could never be good or evil."
Alex stayed by the bed holding Brent's hand within the gauntlets, "Fate grew stronger and stronger without becoming unstable. Soon the armor was strong enough to move and fight on its own. It slew hundreds of humans and digimon trying to get to the kings. It almost made it when it was confronted by the now evil forth sprit armor. The battle raged weeks on end but Fate fell at last. Fate realized he could never match the strength of another armor with a host. The kings scatted the peaces of Fate, weakening them until they couldn't draw on the strength of the other. And as if to add insult they bound the peaces to statues that only corrupt servants could touch without vanishing from this world."
Alex shuddered, "that is a world of fog and darkness. To be there from touching a statue is to become a shadow of what you once where." he looked at Brent's face, "I'm afraid that is where he is. I don't know if he can come back from there on his own."
---Brent---
Brent found himself inside a small crevice in the side of a hill. He looked around seeing only fog and gray landscapes. He curled deeper into the crevice as a lumbering shadow passed. He wanted nothing more than to leave this place.
He may have had no life back home but at least he didn't have to worry about dieing. His gauntlets had started to glow softly; he looked at them and felt himself calming. He brushed the drying blood from them and stared at the crystal as it sparkled and the iron glowing softly.
He traced the curve and flow of the mystical gauntlets with his eyes. The sight calmed him for some reason. His eyes began to travel back to wards his palms and he couldn't stop them. He began to panic but he couldn't look away as he looked eyes with the mismatched eyes in his palms.
One eye was sharp and dark while the other was dreamy and bright. Roamed over him, studying him, judging him. They blinked but didn't return to a brass design rather they lashed out with beams of light and dark, spearing his mind and stealing his secrets. Brent slipped away from his body, carried by those beams of energy…
---Narration---
Yes the shadow land was harsh but I would have rather stayed there. Life was going to become worse than shadowed eternity.
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There you go, chapter 2. I wager this will get rewrote at least once before chapter 3.