After the Darkness Zone is reinforced thanks to the Digidestined, peace does settle over the Digiworld like an ill-fitting blanket. Everyone, everything seems aware that it's temporary, as if holding their breath in anticipation of the next bad thing to happen. Luke isn't exempt from this, his eyes closed as he feels the air, monitors the noise around him. Everything seems peaceful, but he can't trust it. Not yet.
-x
Dean wanders the arena, rotating his shoulders to loosen them up. Things've been quiet from the digiworld for the last few days, and he almost misses it. Although that last mission was a little much for him, he'd kind of enjoyed the battles, helping his partner reach new levels of power. But now, he supposes, things will return to normal and, considering Wrestlemania is only a couple of weeks away, it's just as well. He buries his hands in his jeans pockets and pauses as his fingers brush against the cool material that comprises his digivice.
Not the first time he'd forgotten it was in his pants pockets, he'd even had it in there during matches sometimes, which had made him a little uncomfortable when he'd realized later on. He sighs and looks around, finding Zack and Ziggler nearby. "Hey, guys, I gotta match, you mind watchin' this for a bit?" He thrusts his digivice into Zack's hands before turning and jogging out to the ring.
Zack's eyebrows lift up as he looks over at Dolph. "... great. Guess we're gonna have to wait to go to Cracker Barrel, bro." Dolph rolls his eyes and reaches for his phone, Zack rubbing a thumb over the screen of Ambrose's digivice. "Ugh, doesn't he ever clean this thing? It's nasty..."
They're still standing there, listing to the crowd outside, when all three digivices light up at once, rattling around in Zack's hand or in Dolph's pocket. "What the hell?" Dolph mumbles, looking up as Alberto joins them with a displeased look on his face. "You too?"
"Si, I thought we were supposed to be left alone now," he grits out. "It has barely been a week."
"Luke did say that we would still be needed," Zack says. "Just not as often. Come on, bros. We need to wait for Dean, but his match should be over soon."
"Well, that perro better win or we will be at a distinct disadvantage if we have to defend him," Alberto sniffs.
Zack and Dolph exchange glances, releasing a breath when the bell rings to cheers, Dean stumbling through the curtain a few minutes later. Zack immediately hands him his digivice. "We gotta go, bro. There's something going on."
Dean grimaces, runs his fingers through his hair. "Fine. Let's go." He's still sweaty from the match, but he doesn't bother to shower or change, finding the nearest laptop and setting up the digiport.
They appear quickly in the digiworld and Luke greets them. "Thank you for coming. The digiport is ready for you, please hurry."
The four of them nod briskly and walk over to where Ophanimon is guarding it, all half-nodding at her before holding their digivices up, activating the portal. They arrive in the virus zone, Alberto grunting and stumbling forward before Gabumon supports him. "Alright?"
"Si," he mumbles. He steps forward and glances around. "Fine. We're here. What are we looking for?" He stares down at his digivice and sighs, walking straight ahead towards the village indicated on the screen.
Dolph and Zack exchange a glance before following him, Ambrose following along at his leisure. All ease fades away, however, when they see what's going on- a massive, evil looking creature flying around overhead, flames licking at gates and house walls before he swoops down and stabs his claw through a small digimon trying to escape. Data explodes everywhere as something glowing is pulled from his midsection, a scream of pain fading into nothing as the Digidestined look on in horror. "What is that?" Zack mumbles.
"Death-X-Dorugamon," Patamon says, slumping against Zack's head as he watches on worriedly. "He's a warped digimon that was experimented on while evolving... very evil. That thing you saw a minute ago? The bright glowing thing? It's a digimon's digicore... it's what keeps us alive, helps us to reform if we've been deleted... Zack, that digimon is dead forever now..."
Zack stares up at him, resting his hand on Patamon's shaking body. "It's ok, we'll take care of him," he says confidentally. They lose whatever cover they had with the digivolution sequence starting, Death-X-Dorugamon swooping away from the village and heading their way.
Darcmon, Wizardmon, WaruSeadramon and Vajiramon meets him halfway, however, their attacks combining and cracking against his armored body, only sending him off course for a moment. He roars angrily before throwing his arm forward and throwing iron balls at them, causing the humans to scatter and the digimon to retreat a few steps, WaruSeadramon throwing lightning at the balls, electrifying them... before Wizardmon uses his power to send it back towards Death-X-Dorugamon.
Snarling, he rocks backwards as one hits him right in the chest, his wings fluttering hard as he rushes forward, claws outstretched in an attempt to grab at WaruSeadramon, clearly eager to tear his digicore out. "Oh nah you don't," Dean yells, running forward and holding his digivice out, trying to shield his partner... somehow. "Do somethin', you damn device!"
It doesn't activate like Mike's had in the darkness zone and Dean grits his teeth, refusing to move and subject his partner to this horrible death... but he also doesn't want to stay standing here with this massive beast bearing down on them. Even so, he plants his feet and waits to see what happens, ignoring WaruSeadramon's yells and attempts to stop the evil creature. Dean can just feel Death-X-Dorugamon's breath on his face, rancid and horrible, when his digivice starts to shake, an impressive amount of power exploding from it. It doesn't hit the warped digimon, though. Instead it flies backwards and washes WaruSeadramon in power, sending him back to Otamamon before a new evolution cycle begins.
"Otamamon warp digivolve to...!" HIs mega form is impressive, large and magestic, soft dark eyes peering down at Dean as he flops onto the ground and waves his fins around. "Plesiomon," he says in a notably deeper voice. Death-X-Dorugamon is still approaching so the massive water beast turns towards him, opens his mouth and a mournful cry escapes his lips, causing the creature to stop short just inches from Dean.
All of the digidestined can do is stand there and watch, jaw dropping as Death-X-Dorugamon drops to the ground, all fight leaving him at Plesiomon's sound based attack. This leaves him vulnerable to Wizardmon, Vajiramon and Darcmon's combined attacks, slicing through his armor and into the vulnerable flesh below before deleting him. "Too good for him," Dean says, wondering how many digicores were taken from innocent digimon before they'd arrived.
As he watches, more of the awkward dinosaur type digimon come from the wreckage of their village, chittering and making weird clicking noises. "Your village is safe now," he calls out to them. "IF you need help rebuilding, just let us know."
"What is he doing?" Alberto hisses, wanting nothing more than to go home, leave the creatures to taking care of their own issues.
The digimon stare at them a moment before turning their back on them and slowly starting to push at a wall nearby, reforming it.
"I guess that was a no," Dean sighs, almost relieved for it. When he turns to walk back to the portal, the others follow him quietly.
