Chapter seven: The Phantom of the Digiworld
First there was just darkness all around him, then there was light and he found himself in a circled room. It's walls were mirrors, in every of them he saw himself, no trace of 'the phantom' to be found. Angemon turned round several times, suddenly he saw a red shadow in one of the mirrors and whirled around hitting the air with his scepter. But no one was there, he tried to calm himself but it seemed to get choky in this room. He gasped for air, when he saw that red shadow in one of the mirrors again, realizing that it was no shadow, but Angewomon's angel of death. He turned round as fast as he could and shot his Thunder Justice, but again there was no one… And then, a hand grabbed for his shoulder and dragged him out of this mirror trap. Angemon tried to defend himself but then realized it was a female hand, LadyDevimon…He did not know how she did it, but she brought him back to the theatre…
"LadyDevimon, wait…" She wanted to sent him back to Angewomon, but he had questions only she could respond to. "Please, Angemon! I know no more than anyone else!" She walked very fast, trying to depend of him somehow. "That's not true! You've seen something, haven't you?" He shouted at her thinking that female viruses were really infuriating. "I don't know what I've seen… Please, don't ask!" She said rushing away, but he kept on following her. "Please LadyDevimon, for all our sakes!" His voice was full of irony and disbelief. He took her hand and she sighed reluctantly. "Very well…" They walked into her dressing room, she still had one though she was no active dancer anymore, but she used it to repair the girls' dresses. It was dusty and stuffy and barely enlightened by the weak lamp. "It was years ago, many years ago…There was a traveling fair in the city… Gypsymons… I was very young, had just digivolved onto ultra level…Studying to be a ballerina, one of many… Living in the dormitories of the digimon-theatre…
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-Flashback
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It is late evening when some of the young girls sneak out of the theatre to visit the fair. They had waited until their trainer went to bed, as this was an oddity fair, a freak show and nothing that should be seen by girlish digimon. This was the reason why it was only to be visited at night. But now a young LadyDevimon walks together with some Floramon across the site. "They have very strange digimon here." Is all that Deramon says seeing a Digitamamon whose shell had been broken in a fight, now one could see his innards and it was still living… They walk over to the next digimon, a Meramon that is not burning, it is currently taking a bath. The girls start to giggle and blush, then they continue their tour. They have to cover their noses when they come to see a giant Raremon, its foul breath makes one of them faint. They are amazed when they find a Gazimon with two heads, until they discover that one head is faked. And suddenly they hear an Ogremon shouting something into the crowd. "COME! COME! Come inside! Come and see the real virus' child!" Of course the girls are excited and enter the tall black pavilion. It is quite dark inside and first they see nothing, but then lights are lit. And they look onto a cage, something cowers in it, something small with a sack on its head, two holes for its eyes had been cut out. "Isn't that an Elecmon?" Asks the young LadyDevimon the stinking Ogremon. He shakes his head and grunts. "No tis no digimon! It's the spawn of a deleted virus!" He chuckles and unlocks the rusty cage door, then he stomps into it. The cowering thing shivers in fear. Ogremon grabs the sack, but the thing tries to keep it on its head. "Ah ya nasty little brat! Y' audience is waitin!" All the girls chuckle in amusement all but LadyDevimon… Suddenly there is a voice sounding through the tent, a young voice ,young but wonderful and fearful. "Please! I beg you! I don't want them to see me!" The girls listen up, then they realize that this voice belongs to the creature in the cage. Their curiosity is blazed. "I dun care what ya want or not! They do pay to see ya, do they! And not to see a sack! Ya dim mutt!" Ogremon swings his bludgeon and hits the creature onto the head, it twitches and collapses long enough for Ogremon to take off the sack…The girls scream in fun and fear. "Hey LadyDevimon you were right! It is an Elecmon… or better sort of." Says Floramon giggling, but LadyDevimon looks at it sympathetic. "The poor thing…" Elecmon's crystal blue eyes are widened in fear and shame. The girls point at it and shout, he tries to hide his face but Ogremon beats him with the club again and Elecmon can't withhold to shoot a Static Elect at him. Ogremon grows furious and finally he binds Elecmon with the back onto his cage's iron bars. With thick ropes he ties Elecmon's paws and the iron together, it almost looks like a crucifixion, then he slings one of the ropes around his neck and pulls it tight to the rods. Now Elecmon can't move his head an inch, while everyone stares onto his face. He closes his eyes but he knows the rubbernecks are still there. They stare onto the crimson digimon, with the long pointy ears, the blue pattern on its soft but now grimy fur, the former white belly and the fan-like tail… And they stare onto his face, the thing for which they have paid a lot of money… His mouth with the pointy teeth is quite normal, but above his nose, all around his eyes gapes a terrific wound, more a yawning hole in his torn skin as if there never had been data or if it had been deleted inaccurately. One can see the purplish-blue and maroon veins throbbing and his blood red flesh through a pale blue grotesque membrane that could be skin…The misshapen gash leads from one side of the head across the face to the other interrupted only by these startlingly blue eyes, so full of grief. Near his temples where only a few copper colored muscles jerk, the drab cranial bone is visible… Hot, salty tears stream from his eyes over the revolting ash-blue parchment skin down his cheeks and Ogremon smashes his bludgeon against Elecmon's legs. "Hey stop that blubberin ya wimp! Crowd wants ta be scared not stirred!" He whacks him several times more, while Elecmon howls in agony. LadyDevimon cannot bear this any longer, she runs away, back to the theatre…
The whole night she has to think of that Elecmon, she still sees his face in front of her, the blood vessels pulsating under his translucent skin, that bit of data around his wonderful eyes, she remembers the sallow tendons that she saw contracting when he closed his eyes, she remembers the reddish muscles stretching and contracting when he contorted his face in pain…She shivers on this…When her friends come back. "Uh LadyDevimon you should have stayed! It was so scary! That thing started to wince and then Ogremon took his bludgeon and hit it directly into the face…or whatever this is…"Kiwimon cheers as she tells of their wonderful experience. "Yeah and then it bled like hell and all the blood streamed down its head and ran into its eyes and it could see nothing… Uh that was weird!" LadyDevimon feels sick as she hears them talking. How can one be so heartless?
The next day, when there is no rehearsal, LadyDevimon decides to walk to the fairground again. In the beaming light of sun it is not even half as frightening as it had been at night. Ogremon is not in his tent so she pussyfoots into the black pavilion. There it is again, the filthy cage and the cowering heap… Elecmon lays on the ground which is barely thatched with grubby straws. His paws pressed upon his head in the sack. LadyDevimon can see fresh stains of glossy crimson blood all around him, obviously he was just smacked by Ogremon before she came. She does not know what to do so she decides to sit down for a moment and kneels into the straw around the cage, it crackles silently and Elecmon startles. "Oh no… Does he even let you stare at me at day…?"LadyDevimon wonders how he was able to hear her, she had been very carefully. "It's ok…There's no one here, just me…" She whispers to him and he moves away from the direction of her voice. "So you want an unpaid extra unveiling! Chorus girls are the worst kind of curious digimon…"He sighs and falls back onto the ground. She shakes her head, though he can't see it. "No… I don't want… Why do you know that I'm a…" She looks at him with big eyes and bewilderment. There is resignation in his voice when he answers. "A ballerina? I may be etched but I'm not blind. I saw you yesterday among those giggling hens. You called me a poor thing…"She listens up, his voice is wonderful though full of anguish. "Oh… you heard that?" She hears him grumbling in agreement. "I don't need your commiseration!---Ouch…"He had tried to stand up, but his paws are too sore. She looks at him worried. "Can't I help you somehow?" He listens up and cynically snarls at her. "Only if you can open the cage!" LadyDevimon sighs and nods, maybe he really doesn't want her help. She gets onto her feet and walks out of the tent, when…"Wait…please…" She turns around and finds him standing behind of the iron bars, holding himself upright by clasping them with his claws. "Could you… Give me some water?… It's so stifling in here…" She realizes that it must be really hard for him to talk to people, obviously Ogremon must be hitting him, whenever he asks for something. "Yes, wait here… I'm sorry…I'll be back, soon." She thinks she could slap herself. How could she say 'wait here' that was thoughtless, it must have hurt him…Some minutes later she returns with a water bottle and a clay bowl. She needs to push the bowl into the cage upright, or it would not fit between the rods. She pours the water in it and Elecmon lifts his bag slightly and begins to drink. "I …I brought you some bread too… that's all I could find…" He thankfully takes the loaf and gobbles it as if he had not eaten for days. Actually he really hadn't. "I have to go, now… Would you mind if I'll return tomorrow?" Elecmon does not answer, he listens attentive. "Ogremon is coming… Hurry, if he finds you… Take the bowl, or he will grow suspicious." He reaches it through the rods and twitches as she touches his paw unintentionally. She feels a lot of scars upon it, those were from Ogremon… Then she rushes out of the tent, just before Ogremon stamps in. Elecmon cowers back into one corner of his cage…
LadyDevimon returns the next day, she finds Elecmon in a puddle of blood. He sobs silently but stops when he hears her. "What happened to you?" She sounds really worried and rips off a strip of her suit, she bandages his arm through the iron bars. "I dared to challenge my master, last night… when he tried to…" Elecmon quakes at the thought, LadyDevimon does not even want to think about what Ogremon did to him. She brought the bowl and bread, she had nabbed from the theatre's kitchen, with her. She sits next to his cage, while he eats it. He does not talk very much and never takes down his sack. But it doesn't matter for her, she never asks him to, and she likes to hear his voice. She had never thought that a rookie could have such a sonorous voice. "LadyDevimon…The Gypsymons will stay here for longer…" He suddenly tells her, she listens up. Normally a freak fair stays in a town for only a few days. "Why that?" She looks directly at him, trying to catch a glimpse of his blue eyes. "One of their leading artists broke his leg…They won't leave until he's fully recovered…" There is some sort of glee in his voice, but happiness too.
LadyDevimon visits Elecmon every day since nearly a week, slowly he begins to trust her. She is very careful to leave nothing in the tent that could make Ogremon suspicious.
It is raining out of the theatre, but LadyDevimon runs out onto the gray streets, she's totally soaked when she arrives at the dry tent. "Hello, uh I'm dripping wet… Sorry I think your bread is a bit mushy, too." Elecmon crouches in his cage's corner, showing her his back. She wonders why he hides himself. "Please go…"His voice is desperately begging her to leave, but she does not go. "Please, LadyDevimon, go… Do not… Don't look at me…" She sits down and wrings out her wet hair. "What happened to you?" He slightly turns his head to her and covers his face with his paws. She can't see his face, but she can see that he's wearing the sack anymore. "Ogremon meant I would have been to jolly in the last time. He says the customers don't want to see a happy deformed digimon…"LadyDevimon knows it is her fault too, she also notices that his fur is sticking together with gore. There is a new deep red wale on his back, not just one many more, but they are hidden under his fur. "Did Ogremon do that to you?" Immediately she knows it was a stupid question, and Elecmon hides in his cynicism. "No I did it myself… I don't… I don't care for those…It's the humiliation that hurts more than anything else…"LadyDevimon nods sympathetically, she wishes she could help him. "I don't care for your face… You have such a wonderful voice, and your mind…You are really smart, and you have a charming character for someone imprisoned in a cage…" She can't find the right words to express how much she likes him, she would not call it love, but a deep friendship… "It's very easily said, for a digimon with your beauty! Did even one ever called you disgusting and you knew he was right? I don't think so!" She feels slightly flattered, these words and his voice make her blush. Though she knows very well, he does not want to flirt. "I often dreamed I would be such a beautiful digimon… as you, a humanoid digimon… this must be great…But now… I'm quite realistic, I'll never be like all the other digimon… Now my only dream… is to hide my face forever…somehow…Maybe Ogremon will give me my sack back…" He sighs deeply and gasps. Though she cannot see his face, LadyDevimon is pretty sure that she hears him crying. "That can't be a solution! You shan't hide your face in a bag for all your life!" She sounds even more desperate than him and Elecmon begins laughing maniacally. "Yeah… not for all my life! I should exasperate Ogremon until he beats me to death!" His tone is serious as if he was playing with this thought for some time already. "NO! That's nor a solution either! ELECMON!" He notices how worried she is about him and smiles, no one ever cared for him… "It's ok…Well I'll hope that I will find something to cover my face… Argh---" He winces and writhes on the straw, his wounds start to bleed again. LadyDevimon clasps the iron bars as if she could bend them asunder. "Elecmon, Elecmon! What's wrong with you!" He doesn't answer, he howls in pain and coughs blood, a faint crimson shimmer enfolds his whole body… Then it turns into a beaming white light, that blinds LadyDevimon, she has to turn her head away. And then it's dim in the tent again, he cowers on the straw breathing fitfully. "I'm…I'm digivolved, right? What am I… be honest! Something even more nauseating, right!" LadyDevimon stares at him with widened eyes, an indication for him that he must be right. "You… You've got… You've got a helmet! Oh my God! You are an Angemon!" He startles and gazes at her, she does not look as if she would be joking. He feels long hair flowing down his maltreated back, he feels three pairs of pure white wings, he is clad in a white combat suit, a cerulean sash winds around his right leg and his left arm. He touches his head with his hands and feels the cold platinum that embraces the upper part of his head veiling his face, but translucent for him. His hands touch his head…"I'm… I'm really humanoid… I'm an Angemon…" Tears of joy and relief stream down his cheeks, now he looks like a normal digimon, he may not be one of them, but no one will ever know it! "LadyDevimon! You have to come and see tonight's show! Ogremon is on the road, he'll return just before the show begins! We will give him a heart attack and then I will leave this damned fair forever!" She nods, he is so full of enthusiasm. LadyDevimon looks really forward to it.
Night had fallen when she returns to the fair, it is still raining, only a few people come to see the 'real virus' child'. LadyDevimon giggles happily. –They will be astonished!- She walks into the tent with them, Angemon cowers in a corner of the cage, as if he would have something to hide from them. Ogremon enters the tent, unlocks the rusty cage door like always, not suspecting anything abnormal. But then he sees Angemon sitting there looking up to him. "What d'hell!" The audience awes in view of such a handsome digimon. Angemon stands up and spreads his wings. "Ya think I'm impressed now! Ya wait, damn lil' bastard!" He swings his mace and Angemon tries to recoil, but he had not taken his own size into account. He is much taller now than he had been as Elecmon, and the cage was never very large. He bounces against the iron bars and Ogremon's mace hurtles against his chest, making him cough and shiver. LadyDevimon winces. –Oh no! He has not enough energy to fight!- Ogremon smashes his bludgeon with full power at Angemon's abdomen. He hollers in pain and falls onto his knees. The people around begin to murmur. LadyDevimon is petrified in shock. Ogremon walks around Angemon, it looks as if he wants to sit on his shoulders, but he clamps Angemon's head between his green troll legs and pounds onto the silvery helmet. Angemon tries to get up, but his torturer is too bulky, he hits him with his wings, he scratches him, he rams him. "NO! NO! DON'T DO THAT! DON'T!" But as LadyDevimon had feared, he is not strong enough… Suddenly a loud crunch resounds through the tent and everyone can see the large crack in the helmet. Angemon is like turned into stone. "No…" He whispers desperately, but Ogremon begins to prize his helmet open. Angemon clenches his head with his arms, but nothing helps. There's a muffled clonk when the metal hits the thatched floor. Ogremon steps down from his prisoner and grunts, while Angemon watches in horror how his helmet is being deleted. "No… please, no…" He reaches his hand out for the last glowing bit of data but it melts away between his fingers. He feels despair rising up inside him, when Ogremon grabs his blond hair and draws his head back to make the people stare at him. "See here! An angel with the face of a demon!" The people baulk and LadyDevimon buries her face in her hands, she feels as if this was her guilt. "Get off from me!" Angemon suddenly bellows at Ogremon, the people are stunned by his voice but they cannot look away from his face, this distortion of every normality. Ogremon laughs gleeful. "Now ya'll bring even more money! Lil' jerk!" Angemon smashes his fist against Ogremon's jaw and makes him stagger backwards. He irritates him and Ogremon begins to brandish with his club again. Angemon is really exhausted, the digivolution had robbed almost everything of the meager energy he had gotten from LadyDevimon's care. Ogremon is in a terrific rage now, he slams his weapon against Angemon's head… The morning star like mace strikes him directly between the eyes, where his skin is so thin that every blood vessel cracks open at once. The force of the impact throws him backwards and his head thuds against the iron bars, he slump down. While his face is spilled with blood, a crimson rivulet gushes forth from under his hairline. He grinds his teeth in twinge, his formerly white suit his soaked in his own blood. He can hardly see something, his eyes burn due to the blood that streams into them perennially, no matter how often he wipes it away. He gasps for air, but blood is running into his mouth, making him bend over and vomit. The people are disgusted and one after the other leaves the tent but LadyDevimon, she is shaken by fear. She is frightened that Angemon will die. Ogremon laughs vicious and tramples Angemon's head onto the floor. He kicks him into the face with his soiled feet. "Stop it! You gonna kill him!" A female voice echoes through the tent. Ogremon looks out of the cage and perceives LadyDevimon. "What? Perhaps I should slay ya before I kill ya lil' lova!" He stamps out of the cage, leaving Angemon on the floor, LadyDevimon recedes in fear. Angemon leans onto his elbows breathing irregularly, coughing blood. He smashes his fist onto the thatch, his sapphire eyes fill with tears, he spits out and groans in pain. "Why…Why am I doomed! Why me? What have I done wrong!"
Ogremon locks the iron door of the cage and stamps over to LadyDevimon, she shivers and looks around for a way to escape…
Searing, salty tears drop down from Angemon's battered face and intermingle with his blood. "Why am I not allowed to hide my face! Why am I a monstrosity!" He feels despairing and frantic… He feels rage flowing up inside him, rage onto Ogremon, rage onto the whole Digiworld…
Ogremon raises his club above his head and grins maliciously. LadyDevimon tries to screen her head with her arms.
Angemon clenches his fists, his heart throbs against his chest in ire.
The mace whizzes down through the air, LadyDevimon screams aloud in mortal fear…"No please, no. AAAAAHHHHHHHH!" The tent is soaked in a ruby shimmer, that spreads into every corner… "CRIMSON LIGHTNING!" Unexpectedly Ogremon is dragged backwards, he grabs with his claws onto his neck, but he cannot defy himself, he is dragged to the iron bars… The crimson beam around his throat is drawn tighter by its user. Ogremon cough and chokes, his body writhes and twitches, his eyes pop out and his skin discolors. The ray cuts into his flesh causing blood to stream down his filthy body. A hand reaches through the iron bars and grabs Ogremon's head. It links into his maxilla and tugs his head up. Ogremon's head is turned to the left in one sharp jerky move. There is a nasty cracking noise and the skull is unhanded. Ogremon's chin slumps onto his chest. And then slumps Ogremon's corpse down to the ground and reveals his executioner. LadyDevimon gazes at a tall, gasping digimon. This one is thinner than Angemon, but with a broad back… He is clad in a medieval-aristocratic suit, cerulean like Elecmon's pattern had been. It is lined with pure gold, a magenta bat tableau on each sleeve. A pitch black cape flows gently down from his shoulders, its interior as red as Elecmon's fur had been, a golden bat brooch clasps it onto the suit. There is white in his clothes anymore, his leather belts and boots are jet-black, a silver skull and a bat on his boots, silvery like Angemon's helmet had been. The ashen gloves are covered in Ogremon's and his own blood. His pallid blue skin imparts an impression of nobility though sweat drops from his virile chin, that completes his well-shaped face. His short blond hair is neatly combed back, beside of three fair strands falling down in front of his enthralling azure blue eyes, which look like sparkling diamonds in the moonlight. He bares his pearly white fangs in a gratified smile of his smooth amethyst lips. He is perfect, a humanoid digimon, cruel murderer…"A demon with the face of an angel…" Are the first words that LadyDevimon is able to speak again. He smiles and reaches out for the cage's keys the only thing that remained of Ogremon, he had been deleted. This angelic demon unlocks the rusty door and paces to LadyDevimon. He gallantly helps her up, she regards him and his narrow crimson mask that covers just his gash, nothing more, nothing less. It conforms perfectly to his face, following every contour and facial expressions like a second skin and bestowing him with a more ominous appearance as its tips are shaped like a bat's wing. "How is this possible… You were Angemon, now you're a virus type…?" He looks back at his former prison and destroys it with his Grisly Wing before he answers her. "I could imagine when Ogremon obliterated my helmet he offered me the opportunity to dark digivolve into this by far more exquisite form…"
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Back in the theatre.
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LadyDevimon sighed while Angemon gazed at her in disbelief. "Of course the Gypsymons noticed Ogremon's and Elecmon's disappearance, they saw thecarnage and knew very fast who had killed Ogremon… I took him with me to this theatre…I hid him from the world and its cruelties…It was his training ground, but then… There were so many chorus girls sneaking around… He could not stay, he knew it… And when I came to visit him in his hideout one night… it was abandoned…" She looked into the candles and shivered slightly but was told to continue. "I don't know exactly where he had been in all these years, but when he returned…"
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Flashback
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LadyDevimon sits in her room and sews, her daughter Palmon is already sleeping peacefully in her bed. A wild storm romps outside, the wind his howling like a pack of starving Wolfmon. Lightning flashes down and thunder rumbles through the sky. LadyDevimon has a strange feeling, she looks out of the window and regards the black thunderclouds, suddenly she startles as a bat flaps directly in front of her window. She is not quite sure what she should think about this but she as a certain unconscious impulse to leave the building and feel the cold air on her skin…She walks down the creaking wooden steps and into the high lobby, which looks slightly spooky in its darkness that is torn by the lightings out there. The candle in her lantern is flickering and finally expires when she opens the great door and the icy wind rushes against her. She nearly dies of a heart-attack when she finds herself facing a tall black figure. The next lightning illuminates a familiar shape. She enlightens her lantern again and hears him hissing. She looks at him in uncertainty. He is soaked to the bone, in rain, sweat and blood. The water drops down from his chin, nose and hair strands. His eyes are blank and there is a deep cut from which blood runs, on his right cheek. "My…Myotismon…?" He smiles faintly and her lantern bursts on the marble floor as he topples down into her arms falling unconscious.
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Back in the theatre.
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"He told me he had gone to File Island, but there had been some incidents. I knew very well what he meant. He came back and found a place to live, his castle of eternal darkness…This theatre had been his training ground and now… it is his artistic domain…He's a genius…" LadyDevimon said with tears in her eyes, Angemon listened to her closely. "He may be on ultra level but his stats are those of a mega level digimon… He does not want to digivolve because he became to accustomed to his mask…" Angemon is not very pleased about this revelation, it shows how hard it will be to defeat him. "He's an architect and designer… He's composer and magician…A genius, Angemon!" She sobbed and buried her face in her hands. "Clearly, LadyDevimon, genius has turned to madness." Angemon was very sympathetic with her, he was slightly shaken by the fact that this 'Phantom' had once been somehow like him…
