(Alpha is sitting on a sofa in a luxurious study with a fireplace in front of her)
Authoristic Note: SO SORRY for being so slow to update (cos Alpha's a loser) I have two perfectly legitimate reasons for not updating. The first is that everything's been so busy this summer. What with going into High School and all, shopping for school supplies, my cousins came to visit from California as well, so I haven't been able to touch the computer in some time. So that's my first excuse.
(points to her lap where Yamato has fallen asleep) And that's the second reason.
Disclaimer: Roses are red, violets are blue, I don't own Digimon, and neither do you!
Digimon Unlimited
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Chapter Two: Bitterness
Reikadramon attacks Nivormon – the road to the City of Light
Also known as:
Riley attacks Nivormon
"What has happened? Why have we stopped!" Nivormon growled at his nearest officer. The BlackWarGreymon shivered. The master was in a bad mood.
"The slaves can no longer take the pace," BlackWarGreymon said in the least panicked voice he could muster (which, by the way, was not very convincing.)
"Tell them their rations will be cut if they do not move!" Nivormon roared.
Just as BlackWarGreymon was about to tell the slaves his Master's orders, a voice yelled, "NIVORMON, LET THEM GO!"
Momentarily shaken, Nivormon yelled, "Who dares to defy me?"
A young girl stepped out of the woods and tossed her megaphone to the side. "Me. Got a problem?"
"Ootori Reika," Nivormon scowled.
"Riley," she corrected the evil Digimon, morphing into Sigmamon as she went. The slaves, various small Rookie and Champion Digimon with a few Ultimates here and there, cheered as they recognized her.
"Shut up!" Nivormon snarled. "Why do you not run?"
"Oh, as to that," Sigmamon smirked. "I intend to destroy you."
"Whatever," Nivormon sneered. "How? Using that megaphone on me?"
"That's actually the most sense I've ever heard out of you," Sigmamon taunted. "Recognize this?" She waved a small pebble at him.
"A fragment of the Dramon Stone," Nivormon scoffed. "What good can that do? It's only a small piece!"
"Watch me," Sigmamon smiled benevolently, but it was a smile that shook Nivormon deeply. Sigmamon's crest began to glow fiercely, and so did her D-Force, D- Terminal, and the Dramon Stone.
"Oh, no," Nivormon realized what she was doing.
"Sigmamon, Hyper Warp Digivolution to..."
A flash of light temporarily blinded the dark warrior.
"... Raldramon!"
"Hah! Do you think I am amused by your little light show? I can take whatever you throw at me!"
The Warrior of Stone drew a massive boomerang from her back. "Then bring it on."
OOO
"Gah!" Zoe said as she skidded on the banks of the stream. She had been walking along for about an hour and a half. Since it was still dark, she kept tripping over several tree roots and falling into the stream. Her legs and skirt were splattered with mud. She had long since stopped trying to stay clean. To do so would be to step into the freezing mountain stream. With nothing to do but think and talk to herself, the young blonde daydreamed as she went along. Unfortunately, the bad side effects included falling in the mud every two second, which was not pleasant.
"I don't know why I keep getting these visions... if that's what you call them..." A splash of water greeted her as she tripped into the stream. "Yecch... Mud all over my face... "
Staggering on, she held a long stick she'd found. Twirling it occasionally, she walked unsteadily, not entirely seeing the edge. As she went on, the rushing of the water became more pronounced and she shivered as the water lapped at her feet violently. Still, she was unquestionably persistent, pressing on because she was afraid to lose the 'path'.
Suddenly, the warrior of wind stepped on something slippery, and she went toppling over into the stream. She reached for the edges of the banks, but the wet soil crumbled under her hand. Mind clouded by panic, she screamed. Logic returned and she gripped her staff tightly, intending to stop herself by ramming it into the sides of the stream. "Hyah!" Zoe yelled for dramatic effect as she pushed the edge of her staff into the mud.
The staff held, and she managed to get a much-needed breath of air, and she checked her surroundings. She couldn't recognize the landscape; apparently she'd gone farther downstream than she'd thought. Only a few meters away, rushing water roared as she saw the beginning of some rapids. She felt her staff begin to loosen.
"No... please, no..." But her protest was swept away as the long stick gave way and she was dragged along into the rapids.
The warrior of wind instinctively reached for her D-Tector, but she didn't feel it there! "Oh, no!" Zoe groaned. The young blonde had no time to think about it further, though, as she saw a rock coming up. She reached out a hand and touched it for one brief second, but she slipped and was swept along.
"Is that... a waterfall?" Zoe screamed, clutching desperately for any hold. All she could find was her staff, and she felt herself launched into the air which had once helped her, her hat flying off...
...And a hand grabbed the blonde by the back of her jacket, stopping her from falling. But she still slammed hard against the rocky wall to the side of the waterfall. She watched her hat try to resist the inexorable pull of gravitation, but it eventually fell into the lake.
The lake 100 meters down.
Izumi looked up for the first time. She saw a shadowy figure with eagle wings and two long spikes sticking out of its head. "W-who are you?"
"Hello to you, too," the Digimon replied in a distinctly feminine voice, grunting as she flew to the edge of the cliff-for it was indeed, a cliff.
"Whoever you are, thanks!" Zoe said gratefully.
"Anytime; but if you intend on being swept off cliffs often, I'm never doing that again!"
She laughed at the sarcastic Digimon. "No thanks, once is enough for me! But who are you?"
The female Digimon stepped into the light that was peeking over the treetops. Zoe saw the metallic face of an eagle mask, but there was a face. It had a smaller metal band over its eyes, much like Kazemon. Two metal spikes stuck out of her mask. However, it could not hide her expression; her wide grin was too obvious. "I am Midorimon, but I am more commonly known as-" A glow surrounded Midorimon, and a more diminutive figure appeared, but it was still tall. "Dragan. Sara Dragan. Digidestined of Ice." Sara was silver-haired, and she still had a metal band across her face, hiding her eyes.
"You're Digidestined?" Zoe asked unbelievingly.
"Yes... And you are too. Warrior of wind, I believe. I also believe this is yours." And she handed Zoe her D-Tector. "An interesting little device, this. I have a different model, of course."
"Yeah, thanks!" But as Zoe's D-Tector touched her hand, a small device at Sara's waist glowed brightly and beeped repeatedly.
"The Daughter of Time..." Sara murmured.
"What?" The younger girl asked.
"Come with me," Sara said abruptly, stalking away. "I have much to teach you."
"Well..." Zoe hesitated.
"What?" Sara asked gently.
"I'm running away," Zoe said quietly. "You won't take me back, will you?"
Sara smiled. "Not a chance, not unless you wanted me to."
"Okay... Where are we going?"
The silver haired girl smiled. "My place."
OOO
"Good morning, y'all!" Tomoki said brightly, waking up first. He walked over to Takuya first, shaking the older boy awake. "Get any sleep, Talky?"
"Meh, go away and bother Kouji instead!" Takuya groaned.
"Okay!" Tommy cheerfully grinned and skipped over to Kouji. "Kouji, good morning!"
Kouji grudgingly got up and stretched tiredly. "Takuya, awake yet?"
"Yes, thanks to ice-boy over there!" Takuya yawned.
Kouichi and Junpei moaned as they too woke. "And it's another morning in the middle of nowhere, a perfect day for fighting the Royal Knights and an insane power-hungry angel! Temperatures today are predicted to be in the high 28s, lows in the 25s."
"Zoe! Good morning!" Tommy laughed happily and shook the girl awake.
Or would have, if she was there.
"What's wrong?" Takuya asked the younger boy, whose face was now deathly pale.
"Izumi's gone."
OOO
The silver-haired woman splashed water on her face as Zoe watched her. The two had stopped by a small pool, on their way to wherever Sara was taking her.
Izumi absentmindedly kicked a small rock into the small pool, spreading ripples in the water. "So... You're Digidestined?"
"Yes, I am." Sara said, offering no further elaboration.
"Oh." For a moment, tense silence hovered in the air. Sara broke it as she asked, "I know you're Digidestined, but no Digidestined has ever been here on their own- they've always come here in groups."
"You're right," Zoe sighed. "I was running away."
"Why?" Sara asked, feigning ignorance.
Zoe lay back on the ground, feeling the grass crumble beneath her. "I don't know... Have you ever felt that other people were inside you, controlling every motion, while you just huddle in the corner, helplessly, until it decides to give back control?"
Sara looked at her, a serious look on her face. "All the time, that I do."
"Yeah... Basically, that was the reason."
Sara seemed to think, then whipped out a dagger and scratched something on a nearby rock. "Tell, me, Izumi, have you ever seen this symbol before?" It was a circle with several slash marks made on it, and a triangle piece cut out of the circle, like a pie chart.
"Not that I recall... But it does look mildly familiar."
"Hmm..." was all Sara would say in response. "Are you tired?" She asked after a few seconds.
"Yes," Zoe responded.
"Then get some sleep," the silverblonde said, stating the obvious. Izumi then lay on the grass, trying to sleep. In the dim light, out of the corner of her eye, she saw her older companion run a hand over the stone she had carved on earlier. "The Broken Circle of Time," Sara murmured, right before sleep claimed her.
OOO
Takuya wasn't looking where he was running. He knew that he couldn't trust his eyes. Instinctively, he reached out and felt the rough bark of the tree where he and Izumi had been last night. Takuya's slightly blurry vision didn't help matters. The Warrior of Fire staggered along blindly holding aggressively to each tree until he collapsed in the center of the small clearing and let out an agonized yell.
"Zoe- Warrior of Wind- we need her- I need her-" He kept muttering to himself.
And then he heard it.
It was morning, so the dew was still on the grass, so Takuya's pants were starting to get wet. And he paid no heed to the seeping wetness; he was transfixed. The wind whispered through the trees, but not aimlessly as it might have done any other day. It, too, seemed like it was mourning.
"What is it?" He said quietly, unheard by all except the fresh morning breeze. "Why do you cry?"
"The Lady of the winds is gone, gone, turned her back has she, she looks to the future, she looks to the past, no longer to the skies-"
"What is it? What are you talking about!" Takuya yelled, frustrated beyond belief.
"She has given it up, given it up... The circle is nearly complete..."
"What?" Takuya asked, but the wind no longer spoke to him. It would only obey its master. The boy turned and began to head back, but not before he heard the wind sing just one more time:
"The beginning of the end is near, the beginning of the end is near..."
OOO
A young woman scrambled over the hot desert sand, her white winter clothes (or what was left of them) not suited at all for the hot atmosphere. Dust flew around wildly- apparently a large blast had just struck the girl, which explained the raggedy condition of her apparel. Her shoulder appeared to be bleeding, and her hand flew to her shoulder to stop the bleeding. Her wild silver hair flew in the hot desert breeze as a figure walked through the smoke behind her.
The young woman (she couldn't have been more than twenty years old) looked up, revealing the metal eyemask that covered her face. "You bitch!" She screamed with rage. "It isn't enough that you murdered Stephanie, you've killed my friends and had to finish the job with me!"
The figure, humanoid in appearance -except for two massive bat wings – laughed. It was harsh, evil laughter that held no joy.
"What is it, Saravelda? Feeling a bit lonely since I killed your little pals?" The figure stepped from the mist; it was an evil demon woman Digimon. A mask that resembled Myotismon's covered her face, and her red eyes were fully visible. She raised the silverblonde's head up with her hand so the woman could feel the Digimon's breath on her face. "Oh, don't look so sad," Belial Arcanimon said mockingly. "You'll be joining them soon enough."
"Like hell, you ho!" Sara slapped her hard across the face. Belial Arcanimon's eyes flashed.
"I see... so you want to play the hard way?" Belial Aracnimon's leg moved in a blur, delivering a swift kick to the woman's abdomen. Sara flew and landed hard on her back, momentarily out of breath.
"I never gave you permission to take a nap! YOUKAI RAGE!" The Demoness Digimon conjured a dark ball of light between her hands, which grew in size until it was about the same size as WarGreymon's Terra Force. Just before she flung it at the young woman, she smiled evilly at her.
"Die."
Sara's white eyes widened in terror.
OOO
Elsewhere, there was a bright, bright forest.
And in that bright, bright forest, it was a bright, bright morning.
And on this bright, bright morning, there was something stirring on the bright, bright ground.
And on the bright, bright ground it stands straight up like a bright, bright monster.
And, just like a bright, bright monster, it has bright, bright hair.
And in accordance with that bright, bright hair, the bright, bright monster turns and-
Snores.
Whoops, that's just Zoe with a bad, bad case of bright, bright bed head.
But you still might want to run away.
Anyways, the young girl stretched and yawned. Her bleary eyes made out the outline of a figure standing straight up. She blinked a few times and recognized Sara, the bright, bright (I like this phrase a bit too much) sunlight reflecting off her metal eyemask.
Now that Izumi thought about it, she realized that her mask looked a lot like Kazemon's. It had no eyeholes, but there was something strange about it. Kazemon's mask was just meant as a shield from the wind. And the wind spoke to her, telling her directions. But Sara's mask seemed colder, more metallic. No life. She could see her eyebrows, since the mask covered her eyes and her eyes only. But since Sara barely showed emotion, it didn't help too much.
"Good morning," Sara said without a single sign that she had even noticed her.
"Um, good morning," Zoe said shiftily.
There was a brief, tense silence in which Sara knelt and sat in the Lotus position, facing the rising sun. Then-
"'Tis not healthy to keep your suspicions to yourself, that it is not."
Zoe blinked. "Why do you talk so politely?"
Sara considered this. "There is a tale of a Meiji Swordsman, one Hitokiri Battousai. It is said he used the polite version of words to all and anybody he met, partially to make up for his transgressions. That is my reason as well."
Izumi crossed her legs absentmindedly, considering her response. Then she decided to give another question a voice.
"Is there a reason you wear that mask?"
Sara was meditating, not even paying attention.
"Hey! Why won't you look at me when I'm talking to you?"
The older woman bowed her head and considered lying to her, then decided against it.
"Because I can't look at you."
"Oh... you're-"
"Tall? Blonde? Incredibly sexy?"
Izumi's mouth twitched at this last one. "I was going to say blind."
Sara's eyebrow creased slightly. "I always forget that one," She said with a bit more than a hint of bitterness. "Now come on, it's dawn and we better make some headway before it's noon."
OOO
Pulling back into the security of the shadows of the small balcony, the bat-winged figure peered through the hard driven rain and waited. Ignoring her black, soaked clothing hanging heavily on her frame, clinging wetly to her clammy skin, she hunched her shoulders and blinked rain out of her eyes, reaching up slowly to brush her dripping silver hair away from his face. Shifting from one foot to another, silently increasing circulation into her cold extremities, she watched her prey vigilantly, red eyes narrowed against the nearly impenetrable shield the torrential rain placed in the distance between hunter and hunted.
"Is he there?" A figure spoke. The white-clad ice queen glared with anger.
"Of course, Saravelda. Would your ryo- youkai lie?" As much as Belial Arcanimon resented that girl, she still couldn't resist morally poking her.
Sara growled and turned away. She allowed her mind to wander down a familiar path, the same bittersweet pain now almost pleasurable in comparison to the emptiness that followed her from day to day. Her lips moved slowly, mouthing the familiar words silently, her breath puffing out gently, condensing in the cooler air surrounding her. "Rain, like snow, is a beautiful thing..."
She shifted her weight once again, cold fingers fiddling with the handle of the girl's katana. "Always cold...always damp...so pure." A soft sigh escaped her parted lips, narrowed eyes never leaving the object of his perusal a short distance away from her stealthy location. Briefly she closed his eyes, images flitting through her mind, sharpening the pleasure pain jolting through her at the memories assailing her. Rather than running from the intensity, she embraced it and used it to fuel her sense of purpose.
White eyes snapping open, she focused again on her self-imposed task and tilted her head to the side in consideration.
"Only the purest things enjoy the rain and snow...the cleansing it offers." A fleeting smile played about Belial Arcanimon's lips when Sara's resentment grew. Belial Arcanimon knew how much she hated her talking about purity. "No matter how hard it rains or snows, it cleanses the soul."
"But not dirty souls."
Her expression hardened. Belial Arcanimeon grinned evilly. Sara's eyes narrowed as her hands closed into white-knuckled fists at her sides.
"Never filthy souls that change it. Dirty souls will never be clean... no amount of pure rain or snow will ever wash away the foulness... the stench... of corruption clinging to it." Sara said scornfully.
Sara slowly raised a hand to brush her hair off her face, features twisting with hatred.
"Oh yes... there are men like that... oh yes indeed.. .filthy... disgusting... unclean..." Sara growled with contempt.
Belial Arcanimon drew in a deep breath through her nose, imagining that she could almost smell the fragrance of death. Next to her, she could taste Sara's anger growing.
"There was a man once...a short time ago...yes, there once was a man who did away purity with his baseness...oh yes...he spread his filth upon the cleanliness of perfection..."
A scowl crossing her shadowed features, white eyes going slightly out of focus, she lowered her hand to rest against the hilt of a katana hidden beneath the concealing material of her trenchcoat. Her hands closed into fists, knuckles turning white as rage threatened to consume her.
"Unacceptable!" The word emerged through clenched teeth to echo hollowly in her ears, barely covered by the pounding rain. She drew in several deep breaths in an effort to calm herself. She'd waited too long for this day to come to be thwarted by her own carelessness. She couldn't afford to be discovered... not yet at least.
"But still...a man who has taken someone's purity..." She muttered bitterly. "He doesn't deserve this...this life! A killer should be punished for the blood he has spilled, the crimes he has committed. For the sin of stealing away such innocence... He shouldn't be allowed to walk the streets... Nor should he be allowed to experience joy and sorrow, tenderness and kindness... Love..." The concept left a bitter taste in her mouth...that one such as that man would experience something as beautiful and wonderful as love, when, because of him, she could not... After all that he had done, all that he had stolen, and all that he had corrupted with the filth of his existence...it was unacceptable.
"It is time," Belial Arcanimon said, bringing her creator out of her reverie.
"Yes... it is finally time for revenge," Sara smirked evilly, and the two set off to murder the one formerly known as Sara's father.
OOO