Benum'd And Wish to Be No More
888
Taichi pushed out of the classroom. The bell was still tolling, Mr. Fujiwata was trying and failing to get the first day's assignment assigned before the tumult of teenagers flooded out of the classroom. Taichi ran to his homeroom and quickly rushed to his cubby where he found his duffle and claimed it. He turned and started to walk from the homeroom.
"Ah, Mr. Yagami!" Taichi froze and grimaced. Sitting at the desk was Mr. Nishijima.
Taichi turned and bowed quickly. "Good afternoon Mr. Nishijima, I hope you had a nice first day, I would like to stay and talk -"
"Not to worry, not to worry." Mr. Nishijima leapt to his feet and grabbed a file from his desk and walked towards Taichi. "We'll walk together."
"I, it's just, I have to get going coach doesn't like it when I'm-" Taichi fumbled.
"Oh, don't worry I'll take the blame." Mr. Nishijima said as he opened the door and walked out of the room. The calligraphy teacher walked steadily aside of Taichi his arm crooked where he was holding his file. "You see, Taichi, I may call you Taichi?"
"I err, I guess…Mr. Nishiji-"
"Daigo, when we aren't in class." Mr. Nishijima said. "You remind me a heck of a lot of myself when I was well, your age. You still wear the goggles right?"
"Not so much anymore." Taichi said slightly uncomfortable. "How did you know I-?"
"Oh just a guess." Mr. Nishijima said waving his free hand. "You seem the type. I see you hang out with Mr. Ishida and Ms. Takenouchi. You're close aren't you?"
Tai blushed brightly. "I- they are my friends of course we're, I guess…"
"You know Mr. Izumi? Correct?" Mr. Nishijima. "I have him in one of my lower level classes. As well as Ms. Tachikawa."
"Yes, we're all friends." Taichi furrowed his brows. "I really don't see what that has to do with anything…"
"This last, what has it been, two years since the last digital world event started…" Mr. Nishijima continued, ignoring Taichi. "It must be incredibly exciting."
"Mr. Nishijima, I'm sorry but I feel this conversation is very uncomfortable." Taichi said, stopping and letting Mr. Nishijima proceed a few steps. He clenched his fists lightly. "I don't know what you are asking, or why you are talking to me, or taking an interest in me. If it is about the Digital World, all I can say is that I have many good friends, people and digimon I would trust with my life, and I would only have met them via the affects that the Digital World has had on this world." Taichi looked up to see Mr. Nishijima looking at him in confusion. Taichi gulped slightly and realized that his face was moist. He reached up and felt a tear. He closed his eyes, and wished he hadn't. He shook his head to get the images and the sounds out of his mind. "I was chosen, I had no choice in the matter, I don't regret the results of being a child chosen to destiny, the friends I made, the ultimate saving of the world, but if you think that what me or my friends did, was in any way out of some kind of sense of fun, or excitement…I can only tell you that you are wrong. It was hard, and dangerous and I-we all saw things we should have never had to have seen, I lost people, friends, that I should never have lost." Taichi could feel the red in his face, not red of embarrassment but red of anger. Taichi grabbed the tail of that anger and wrestled it back and pushed it down, he took a deep breath and swallowed. "Now, Mr. Nishijima, I have a game to go to…and I would very much appreciate to be left to go to the game on my own."
"Of course, Mr. Yagami." Mr. Nishijima said, a stunned look still on his face. "I'm sorry, I didn-"
Taichi didn't even let him finish as he pushed by. He winced as he his memories flew immediately to the preceding year. The fire, the rage, the screams of terror and pain. He reached the corner and pushed himself around it and instantly leaned back against the cold wall, taking deep breaths. Only a year ago, in this very building he was huddled with the others, listening to the bombardment of Odaiba. Only a year ago, he and Hikari had sat on the streets outside their destroyed apartment building, wondering if their parents had died in the hell that had been unleashed from the other world. Taichi slid down the wall and hugged his knees. He didn't talk about it, not with anyone, not even with the other Chosen Children. Those memories however, would wake him from his sleep. They'd intrude in the middle of a normal day, at the movies, playing video games, and slowly they had been getting more intrusive more easily leaping out of the shadows to scream at him. He was the bedrock, he was the core, the strength of the entire team. He couldn't afford to show weakness, not even now, not even in peace. Taichi took a final, deep breath and pushed himself up onto his feet and then ran to the school exit.
888
Murmuxmon looked over to the sprite, formerly named Gennai, as they walked the forest path towards the lake. The sprite led in silence. His dark eyes flitting from tree to tree following the butterflies and the leaves. The wind blew cold around him ruffling his robes and jostling his hair. Finally they came to the edge of the lakeshore, the water gently stroking the sandy edge. The sprite knelt down and touched the water and the ripples flourished outwards. He stood up and looked at his still wet hand.
"Quite amazing, the last time I was here, none of this was here." The man said, slightly turning his head back to Murmuxmon.
"It must have been ages since you were last here, this forest has always been here, since the Dark Masters, before that even…." Murmuxmon said in shock. "It's ancient, this lake-"
"Not the forest, not the lake." The man said looking down at the water. "This world…when I was last here this was all nothing…." The man outstretched his hand and snapped his fingers. The lake split, not so much as if it was commanded, but cowed. The man turned his head to Murmuxmon. "It is ever so much noisier now." The man turned and started down the staircase that was revealed by the retreating lake. "That will have to be fixed I suspect."
"Fixed?" Murmuxmon said in surprise as he clanked down the steps.
"Mm, many things will need fixing." the man said as he continued down the stairs. "This world like so many have become quite noisome. Each independently splintering off into their own destinies, into their own causalities, so much noise, so much tumult, so much disorder. Each one struggling to continue in their unabated bleats of survival." He came to a stop at the house that sat at the bottom of the lake. "I expect you already started the work then?"
"All that I could without your assistance…master?" Murmuxmon said, joining the man. "By the by, you never told me who you were…"
"I was under the impression that you understood fully when I talked to you in your sleep?" the man said furrowing a brow. "When I whispered into the dark recesses of your mind, you seemed most eager, I assumed you understood who I am."
"No, I mean, what do I call you?" Murmuxmon replied, swallowing slightly. "Do you have a name?"
"A name?" The man smirked and turned opening the house's door. "A most ephemeral concept…"
"But none the less important!" Murmuxmon tried, following tentatively behind the man.
The man ignored the call. He walked across the room, to a closet, opening the door and then to the back of the closet and opening another door. Murmuxmon followed quickly. The man continued down some stairs into a basement. The man swept past the shrine of weapons and articles of destruction to a massive mainframe. He sat and swept his fingers across the panels and the terminal came to life.
"I thought you said you had started the work-" the man said, narrowing his eyes.
"I-I did what I could but…but…" Murmuxmon started. "What you're looking for has been destroyed." Murmuxmon gulped as the man glared at him. "It was the digi-destined, they and Beelzemon they destroyed Megidramon, he can't even be reborn, he's simply dead!"
"Then we will get what I need, from the other source-" the man said tersely. "Where is it?"
"Well, here's the thing about that-" Murmuxmon started, taking a slow step backwards. "My previous employer…kinda…might've…well…you know how it is, unintended consequences and all that…Daemon may have eaten him, a little bit. And then the digi-destined destroyed Daemon…again, without hopes of rebirth-"
"I see-" the man said, as he sat at the terminal.
"Is there no other source then?" Murmuxmon asked more afraid than hopeful.
The man didn't respond he simply looked around him. "They were involved. Shakamon and the other one, always interfering. They felt my power, felt my approach and shut down my actions. Even now, they are watching us. Waiting for us to act…and we shall." The man turned to Murmuxmon. "You mention these digi-destined. They are the spear holders of destiny in this world?"
"Yes, they come from the Human World of this reality, children-"
"Ah, yes, I have encountered them across many realities, they are a frustration." The man said smirking to himself. "But not infallible. I find them almost entertaining. However, even they succumb, in the end, as do all things."
"But Shakamon is on their side, she's-"
"Difficult, but not perfect." the man said. "We will have to use Shakamon against herself…it will take a little longer but in many ways this will be far more amusing."
"What will you do?" Murmuxmon asked cautiously moving towards the man.
"Bring silence." the man said. "Force Shakamon to do something vast and horrible and in the doing, she will give me all the tools I need to fulfill my greatest goal. But first, we eliminate these pesky champions of destiny…" The man closed his eyes. "This creature's mind speaks of a virus that nearly destroyed the children in the past." He opened his eyes. "I will use that!"
"You don't mean…" Murmuxmon started. "But that, it's dead, they killed it. It was the first step towards the triumph of Shakamon's design!"
"Viruses don't die." The man said sharply. Murmuxmon retreated. The man then swiveled in his chair and quickly flicked switches and typed. The field on the screen swept around slicing through data fields. "How can something that was never alive die?" The screen came to a halt, zoomed in and there in the middle of a vast swirling network of data there was one plump, gray blob. It was the tiniest little squidling with short, stubby proto-tentacles and a single eye that dominated its entire body. "Viruses simply go dormant, waiting, waiting for that briefest moment of mutation - like this!" The man jabbed his fingers at the terminal. Murmuxmon looked up in shock. The little squidling doubled quickly in the data field, then quadrupled. The man turned to Murmuxmon. "It has its instructions, and soon it will destroy Shakamon's destiny."
"But it can't win, not like that!" Murmuxmon gasped. "Even if there were a-"
"I find your lack of faith in me, disheartening, Murmuxmon." the man said, a glare flicked towards the demon. "In fact I find you to be a noisy little creature."
"Please, I didn't mean to insult you!" Murmuxmon yelped holding up his two limbs, one with a clawed hand another with a hook. "I just-I want to see you succeed!"
"My success is not in question, Murmuxmon, I've been at this in many realities across many universes. I may be slowed down, I may be diverted, I may be many things, but unsuccessful is not one of them." The man stood up, walking towards the retreating Murmuxmon. He caught up to the retreating demon and gently placed his hand on Murmuxmon's stomach. "I am an inevitable fact of all things that exist." Murmuxmon gulped and looked down into the bottomless black pits of the man's eyes. "Even you-"
Murmuxmon felt it, a very simple feeling. His head got quite giddy. He smirked and guffawed as he staggered backward. He fell against a group of stands knocking some ancient horrible weapons to the ground as he struggled quite vainly to stay standing.
"If you can do this why waste time-" Murmuxmon said gasping slightly as he felt his very physical matrix degrade.
"An individual is easy, a world, a universe, a reality, however, that requires much more power than can be channeled through this meager beach head." The man said, turning away from Murmuxmon. "This world must be opened to receive my gift, the only way to open it is via the hazard's blow, but when opened, all this fleeting reality will once again, be one with me, in perfect, silent nirvana."
"I-I was going to stand at your - right - hand…" Murmuxmon gasped, wincing as he felt his prosthetics simply melt away. His real leg and arm slowly started dissolving as well. A sense of terror overwhelmed the giddiness of before. "Please, mercy…."
"Dear, little, noisy thing, you never did understand any of it, did you?" The man said kneeling down to the slowly melting Murmuxmon. "You will always be at my right hand, you will be part of me, an inseparable part of the primordial nothing from whence you and everything else once was. This is a mercy, take solace; you are going to nirvana, the first in this reality, but worry not for you won't long be alone."
There was a creeping seeping to it, the general loss of all form. Terrifying to simply see one's torso simply fail to hold together. Cohesiveness losing its interminable war with the forces of nature. Murmuxmon took a pointless gasp as the last of him simply melted into the nothing and despite Murmuxmon's fear, there was a feeling that surprised him, a deep sense of relief, of joy, of relaxation, of oneness with something far greater than he could imagine.
888
"Mr. Kido," the semi-gruff voice of the teacher at the head of the cram class called as the others stood to leave.
Jyou stopped, feeling the icy hand of death gently but powerfully grip his arm. He slowly gathered his books and walked slowly to the desk.
"Ye-yes, Mr. Wada?" Jyou asked, more nervous now he was in proximity of the older man than when the man had called out his name.
"Mr. Kido, I have been overseeing your work since this summer's session, and of course the recent assessment we just completed." Mr. Wada continued in a mild, droning tone that didn't quite elucidate a sense of direction this comment was going towards. "I accepted your inclusion into this class, because I knew your father in college, and because I had heard amazing things from my colleagues…"
"Thank you, Mr-"
"I'm not finished, Mr. Kido." Mr. Wada said, his gray eyes glancing over his spectacles.
"I'm sorry-"
"I called you up here, after class to say, that I am not particularly impressed with the work I'm seeing here." Mr. Wada continued, ignoring Jyou as he looked down at the pile of graded work in front of him. "C's and low B's simply will not cut it, if you really wish to continue forward towards a pre-medical and medical school career. I was told you were an exemplary student, very reliable in your conduct, and work. I have found, instead that your work is very hastily done, and often times not finished. I have gone further back into your records and found the claimed exemplary work, but it seems after last year that something has changed. May I inquire as to the nature of this change?"
"You were here for that, right?" Jyou asked swallowing as he instantly regretted the unveiled sarcasm.
"That crisis is over, the schools are rebuilt, power returned to the city, and nary a threat to be seen on the horizon, Mr. Kido." The older man adjusted his glasses. "It is early in the semester, this can be turned around." Mr. Wada took out a pen and started grading papers. "I expect to see you turn in better papers. Now, go along…"
Jyou gulped and turned and solemnly walked out of the class room. He leaned against the door. His teeth gritted. He had worked exceptionally hard. He spent every waking hour and many hours that he should've been sleeping working on homework. He had no outside life, even his new girlfriend he'd met at a short summer internship he'd worked at between cram classes over the summer, was increasingly distant. He clenched his fist and slammed it against the wall. How can he concentrate when the memories kept flooding him, when the fear of it all happening again terrified him, when Gomamon constantly sends him messages asking to see him?
Jyou took a deep breath. He had to get his grades up, he had to keep going forward. He lifted his D-3 and looked at it. He narrowed his eyes at the device. He lifted his arm preparing to hurl the device away when his the cell phone in his pocket vibrated.
888
Mimi was walking down the sidewalk towards home. She'd forgotten how nice Odaiba was in the fall. Her parents had moved into one of the new apartments built in the reconstruction. She carried her books with her as she looked across the park. The soccer game was today. She could hear the crowds cheering.
"Mimi!" she heard someone shout from behind her. She turned around to see Jun Motomiya running towards her. Mimi internally frowned.
"Hello, Jun," Mimi said, in a not very convincing polite tone.
"Aren't you going to the game?" Jun asked, huffing and puffing a little as she caught her breath. "Isn't Tai playing?"
"No, I'm not going to the game." Mimi said sharply. Her eyes narrowing. "And, I most certainly don't know what Tai is doing! It isn't my place, apparently, to know!"
"Oh, is, is something wrong?" Jun asked.
Mimi frowned. "I couldn't possibly say."
"I understand, Mimi, it's 'complicated'." Jun said as she put two fingers up and waggled them at 'complicated'.
"It isn't complicated, it isn't complicated at all!" Mimi said, in a sniping churlish fashion. "You either want to be with someone or you don't. Tai apparently doesn't. So that's that then!"
"Mimi-" Jun started but Mimi was already walking away, her books digging deep into her sternum as she hugged them tightly.
Mimi walked away faster as she felt the heat pulsing through her face and collect in the corners of her eyes. She breathed through her nose sharply as she closed her eyes tightly trying to will the tears from forming. She kept speed walking until the sidewalk curved and she ducked behind a set of bushes and cried, again.
"Idiot!" Mimi growled through the gasps. "He acts like he's the only one that's hurting. Like he's the only one that had to make horrible choices. All I wanted was him to talk to me…and he won't even do that!"
She sniffed loudly and rubbed her eyes. She coughed as she composed herself and stood up and walked out from the bushes. She continued to walk home. She was still angry. Maybe she should get a hold of Palmon. She swallowed and smiled, that always cheered her up. And that's when her cell phone rang.
888
"Wow, look at the lighting on this one." Hikari said as she ran up to the framed photo.
Daisuke walked behind her, his hands entwined behind his head. He was still wearing his green suit jacket. They'd come over straight from school. Mrs. Yagami had driven them.
"Ah yes, I took that one just outside of Perth." An older woman said from behind the two of them. Daisuke looked back. The woman looked just like Mimi, if Mimi had graying hair and more lines on her face and wore a tightly knitted stocking hat. "I had an aboriginal guide lead me for three days out in the outback. Apparently this rock formation is such that precisely dawn on the summer solstice the sun rises straight between these two rocks. The entire valley was flooded with this most extravagant hue of orange as it glanced off of the sandstones."
"Wow!" Hikari said as she wrote in a little notepad she took out of her bag.
Daisuke scanned the room. Most of the photos were of stones, and people and trees and flowers. One caught his eyes though a massive fish that simply dwarfed the human swimming in diving gear next to it.
"That one there!" Daisuke said as he hopped towards the picture. "So cool!"
"Ah, yes, have to admit this one was never published." the older woman said smiling coyly. "Bit of a private collection, got it on vacation off of the Yucatan, a whale shark on migration. Beautiful creatures, and incredibly harmless, well harmless to us anyways."
"How did you get the colors to come out on this one." Hikari said pointing to a photo of an orchid.
Daisuke continued to browse the photos as Hikari and the older woman chatted about light composition and apertures and focal lensing. In truth, Daisuke had little interest in any of this photography stuff, but Hikari was absolutely enamored with it. He wanted to go see Taichi's soccer game, but Hikari had been so worried about coming here alone, and Miyako had to work at her parents' new store and Takeru had a date, again. Daisuke stopped and looked at a photo of a tiger half concealed in tall grass, staring out of the picture as if it were about ready to pounce through the glass of the frame and tackle him there in the gallery. He may not know much about photography but he had to admit many of the photos were awesome. He turned to see Hikari alone looking at a series of photos and taking notes. He walked back over to her.
"Enjoying yourself?" Daisuke asked.
"Oh, immensely, Ms. Tachikawa is amazing, I mean she has a whole life's worth of experience to learn from." Hikari said almost beaming. She then caught herself. "Are you sure you're ok, you know, sitting here with me."
"Oh, yes, of course!" Daisuke said shocked at the question. "You really think I'd be annoyed about spending an afternoon with you?"
Hikari blushed and shook her head. "I wonder how Taichi is doing?"
"I'm sure it's going fine." Daisuke said. "I mean, it's Taichi's team."
"Ken's been busy too, I've heard." Hikari said, as she returned her attention to the series of pictures.
"Yeah, I guess, him and Iori have been hanging out a lot now that Iori's moved over to Tamachi." Daisuke said. "I haven't talked to either of them much since, well, all that business. I suppose we've all been too busy."
"We should all get together, some time." Hikari said as she clapped shut her notepad. "I mean it's a bit past Odaiba day but, with everything we had a hard time getting anything sorted. We could try and get the digimon over and stuff…it'd be nice…"
"Yeah, it would, I would love to see Veemon, I mean I talk to him pretty much every day but it's not the same." Daisuke said lighting up as he smiled.
"We should get a hold of Koushiro and see if we can't set something up." Hikari said smiling.
"Hikari, Daisuke, would like some tea?" Ms. Tachikawa asked from somewhere on the other side of the gallery.
"Umm, I suppose it wouldn't be a problem." Hikari said as she looked over to Daisuke. "We wouldn't wish to impose!"
"Oh, no imposition. I have some on brew as it is." the older woman said from the back. "Come back and I can show you some stuff that I'm working on for my next magazine run…"
Hikari was about to turn to move when her phone started ringing. She stopped and took it from her pocket. The number on the screen was weird.
"Who is it?" asked Daisuke.
"I don't know." Hikari said.
888
Sora sat in the bleachers. The rest of the audience were filing in. Yamato and the rest of his band were setting up instruments. Production assistants and TV people were rushing about. She looked out the window, the set was in a corner with a large window to the outside. In the plaza a little boy was bouncing a soccer ball on his knee. Sora sighed loudly. People kept filing in, soon she was in a sea of cheering swaying teenage girls most of them a little younger than she was.
She didn't need to be here. Yamato won't even notice if she was gone. She felt some weight next to her and looked up to see Takeru sitting down next to her. He was wearing a green t-shirt with a short-brimmed hat. He smiled to Sora.
"Hey, I thought you had a-" Sora started.
"Eh, she dipped." Takeru said waving his hand limply. "Actually she's up there somewhere…" He pointed up into the sea of female faces. "I guess she was only interested because my brother was Yamato Ishida."
"Sorry-" Sora said, looking at the blonde boy sympathetically.
Takeru shrugged his shoulders. "So, this is their big premiere as Knife of Day. Pretty impressive even got TV time."
"Yeah, I guess." Sora said as one of the adjacent girls jostled her with an elbow. She frowned.
"Not exactly your kind of crowd is it?" Takeru said as he ducked and weaved around arms and elbows.
"Not really, I've never been super comfortable with all of this-" Sora said, as she looked down to Yamato who was waving to the crowd and smiling broadly, "but he adores it completely." Sora sighed slightly as she looked back to the window, the little boy was still bouncing his soccer ball. "Still, I would love to go see Taichi play soccer, than get all bumped and bruised…"
"You can go, my brother would understand." Takeru said, smiling.
"No, this is what you do when you love someone." Sora said as she frowned as a knee from someone behind her found its home in the middle of her spine. Sora was about to spin around to yell at whoever had kicked her in the back when the entire audience and the stage erupted in varying ringtones, vibrations and dings. Even Sora's phone went off and she was fairly certain she'd shut it off.
888
"As we all know, long durations in this world have an adverse affect on electrophasic matter." Koushiro said as he clicked and images behind him shifted. "Without regular returns to a digital plane of existence digimon will mutate and eventually degrade."
"So you are telling us all that hullabaloo with the dragons was unnecessary?" one of the men out in the audience called.
"Well, no, the dragons had access to open digital portals, they could easily resupply and circulate troops in and out without much problem…" Koushiro said. "Plus the ultimate goal of the dragons' was our extinction, and destruction…territory was less their concern." Koushiro coughed gently into his hand. "But anyways my point is that with a global digi-destined, and the strong emotional connection between digi-destined and their digimon partner, the likelihood of the collapse of electrophasic matter in the Human World could be quite likely. I have derived what I think is an answer to this problem, without resorting to regular transmission to the Digital World using the digital port system."
"Is the digital portal system that fragile still?" Another man asked.
"Well, it's not so much fragility, more along the line, of the kind of modeled traffic needed greatly exceeds the system's designed function." Koushiro said as he turned and looked up. "We really shouldn't put more stress on the system than necessary." He looked around and then pulled at his collar and then turned to the screen. He clicked a button and the screen blazed a bright white. A brown bunny was standing in the middle of the white. "This is my friend Lopmon, who is a digimon partner for an American digi-destined who I am collaborating with, whose name is Wallace."
"Izzy don't forget about me!" chimed another buzzing voice. A large, red lady bug buzzed next to the bunny.
"And of course this is my partner Tentomon." Koushiro said with a smile. "And they are in the Digimon Storage Server, or DSS. An invention of my own, with some assistance from Dr. Schmidt. I have basically created in miniature a mini-Digital World. Right now digital plane you see now is fairly small and exceedingly sparse, but I believe with full funding from UNIT I can create a worldwide cloud-like server for the purposes of storing the partner digimon of the world's digi-destined. This would facilitate both easy access to partner digimon in case of some extreme emergency, and would also promote psychological and physical health in both digimon and digi-destined by reducing the risk of electrophasic degradation and regular trips of humans to the Digital World."
"What kind of access are we talking about?" A woman asked, she was blonde, and unlike the others wore a long, dark jacket over a hoody.
"Any digital device with internet access could be used to create a port between the server space and the Human world." Koushiro said as he lifted his D-3. The screen blurred and Tentomon buzzed out into the conference room, flying a loop over the heads of the accumulated delegates.
"And this server completely negates the electrophasic degradation?" a man with angry eyebrows and short gray hair wildly placed on his head asked.
"As far as I can tell." Koushiro said nodding. "We had some issues with server stability in the first trial runs, but I think I've sorted that out. Not to mention the fact that I've installed an emergency save point within the server in case of some sort of catastrophic failure. But since the server will be global, for the server to fail from the digimon's point of view every server bank would have to go down to cause such a catastrophic failure."
"And can humans go there?" another man asked, he was thin, with quaffed brown hair and was wearing a pin-striped suit.
"No, the server has a bio-filter program, only Digital World beings can access the server base directly via the method I showed." Koushiro said, as he walked around. "And the server world is only accessible by digivice. The physical interface will not function without a digivice command signal." he smiled broadly as the group of scientists conversed in hushed whispered, and then his computer dinged. He frowned as a window box showed up on the big screen in front of Lopmon's face. Koushiro's pocket vibrated as he phone rang.
"Uh, Izzy-" Tentomon said as he pointed at the screen.
"What?" Koushiro said as he turned around.
"How did you get in here!?" yelped Lopmon as a giant eyeball with stubby squid like protuberances hopped towards it, calling out Kura Kura as it tried to catch up to Lopmon.
The phone in Koushiro's hand vibrated again. Koushiro opened it, sliding the screen from the tiny keyboard. The screen lit up and before he could do anything another one of the tiny eyeballs squeezed out of the phone.
"What's going on!?" shouted one of the men in the audience.
"Not sure, nothing like this has happened before!" Koushiro said as he jumped to his computer. He looked up at the screen and saw the tiny squid latch onto Lopmon. The bunny digimon yelped loudly as if it was shocked and then pulled the little creature from its body. Lopmon opened its mouth and fired a blast of ice pellets at the little creature. The creature for all its minimal attributes only fizzled slightly before dividing into two.
"Lopmon get out of there, it's trying to eat the data in the server! Kuramon, but that can't be!" Koushiro said, loudly. He turned to another terminal. "Wallace open a port on your end I'll send Lopmon through!"
The group could see a hole on the screen. Lopmon ran towards it, leapt at it and proceeded to bounce off of it a red fizzle hissing as the little bunny ricocheted off of some invisible barrier.
"Non-digital entity?" Koushiro yelped. "That doesn't make any sense!"
"Umm, Izzy…what do we do with this one?" Tentomon asked as the little squid hovered towards the lady bug.
"Zap it!" Koushiro yelped.
Tentomon obliged and a burst of electricity fizzled at the little squid. The one-eyed creature squealed loudly fizzled but much like the one in the server space, simply split in two.
"Izzy, help!" yelped Lopmon as the creatures had split another two times now there were eight of them and they were closing in on Lopmon.
"I'm trying, I don't know what's going on, the bio-filter isn't recognizing you as a digimon, it doesn't recognize you from the Digital World!" Koushiro yelped loudly. "It worked perfectly only a few minutes ago!? I don't get it!?"
Klaxons started going off. Koushiro looked up as military personnel came through the doors of the conference room.
"Brigadier Bambera!" Koushiro yelped.
The dark skinned woman looked at Koushiro and then the group of scientists in the room. "What is going on in here?"
"I don't know, I got this email and phone call and these creatures popped out of them." Koushiro said.
"So it's even happening here." Brigadier Bambera said. "Reports are that, globally, children who are digi-destined are being emailed, called, or some other way digitally contacted. These creatures are contacting them, and emerging when the children open their phones or the emails. UNIT has localized the source of the creatures though."
The brigadier walked up to one of the terminals that Koushiro was sitting at. Tentomon was still buzzing around trying to stay away from the squids. The brigadier opened a new server window. Koushiro gasped.
"The dark network?" Koushiro asked looking at the screen.
"More than that, a cache site." Bambera said. "It holds a repository of old viruses."
"No…" Koushiro whispered as he looked at a copy of an old email that had an attachment.
"Hello" was all that was written on the email.
"Is it really?" Bambera asked.
"It looks like it, but it never acted like this before!" Koushiro said. "We have to find the original one, that's the only way, and depending on how long this thing has been going on it could already be Diaboromon!"
"I'll alert the nuclear powers to disconnect all nuclear materials from the net." Bambera said sharply.
"I'll get a hold of Taichi and Yamato, we'll need Omegamon!" Koushiro started.
"I've already done that." Bambera said. "I've got people on the way, you will go and be moved to a meeting place with the other Chosen Children."
"Izzy, but what about these guys!?" Tentomon asked sharply, as the two Kuramon followed him everywhere. "I zapped the one and it just doubled."
"Maybe-" Koushiro twisted and pointed his D-3 at the computer screen. A port opened. "Zap them in there!"
"Super Shocker!" Tentomon called as a bolt of lightning struck both Kuramon and sent them flipping and spinning into the port. The screen glowed and then the light faded.
"Where did you send them?" Bambera asked.
"Secure recycle bin on my network." Koushiro said, rubbing his nose.
888
Taichi tripped as he heard the scream. His entire team was standing staring out into the crowd. The bleachers were swarming with little creatures. Taichi focused, narrowing his eyes. His hand curled into the grass.
"Kuramon-" Taichi whispered as the little creatures swirled around.
They all then suddenly turned each one of their eyes staring straight at him. He narrowed his brown eyes. The Kuramon then turn and streamed away into the city.
"TAI!" he heard a familiar if not completely unwanted shout. He turned to see Daisuke's sister running towards him. "Those were digimon!"
"Yeah I know." Taichi said as he stood up.
"Aren't you going to do something?" Jun asked.
"I'd have to go to a place to access a digi-port and get Agumon." Taichi said.
"Mr. Yagami!" Taichi winced as he heard another unwanted voice. He looked up to see Mr. Nishijima walking towards him. "I think I can help you on that front." The man took Taichi's hand. "Come with me-"
"But, Mr. Nishijima-" Taichi struggled but Mr. Nishijima's grip was surprisingly strong.
"I told you, when we aren't on school time, it's Daigo!" Mr. Nishijima said, smiling. "I have a car, I'll take you to your friends. You'll get this all sorted, in no time!"
888
The man stood looking at the screen. He watched the Human World slowly be consumed in a sea of red. A smile played slowly across his lips. He swiveled his chair and walked over to a small puddle of black water that had once been Murmuxmon. He leaned down and gently touched it. The water drew up into his fingers.
"Soon, we'll all be together again in sweet, silent oblivion." The man said as the last of the water disappeared into his hand.
888
A/N: One hopes this didn't come off as dire as it may seem. I hope this goes down well. As for the title it is a quote from Lord Byron….Questions comments...I'll gladly take them.