60
The Generators
"What the thing was, he would never tell. It was like some of the carvings on the hellish altar, but it was alive. Nature had never made it in this form, for it was too palpably unfinished. The deficiencies were of the most surprising sort, and the abnormalities of proportion could not be described." – H. P. Lovecraft, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward
Takeru had stopped when a backward glance showed him that Iori was behind him, rushing to catch up as the Hanumon gained on him. Takeru couldn't see Armadimon at first, but—
"Rolling Stone!"
Iori's partner came shooting up the hallway, knocking one of the Hanumon out of his way, causing it to fall into another and upset its balance. But a third leapt forward, determined to get its paws on Iori. Patamon intercepted it, smacking it in the face with his wings. It was enough to stop the Hanumon's forward momentum, but with a fluid motion it snatched the bone from its back and whipped it into its opponent, knocking the little Digimon to the floor.
"Patamon!"
Takeru knelt to examine the damage. Iori had come up with him by that time, and stopped running, looking back at the Hanumon. The simian Digimon were advancing more slowly now, on their hind legs, either because they were wary of being attacked again or, more likely, were confident now that their targets didn't have the agility to escape. But whatever the reason, the decision would cost them.
"Digimental Up!"
"Armadimon, Armor Evolve! … Steel Knowledge, Digmon!"
"Get back, dagyaa. Big Crack!"
Takeru scooped up Patamon and together he and Iori retreated farther along the hallway. Behind them Digmon slammed his drills into the floor with force enough to send fissures shooting across the stone. The foremost Hanumon had readied its bone to strike, but the floor gave out beneath it, and it tumbled into a crevasse that left a two-meter gap in the center of the hall.
"Come on, Digmon!"
Iori's partner turned to heed the call, but behind him one of the Hanumon began to glow. Red light played over its body. It started to tremble and clench its fists. Then in one rapid motion it leaned backward and thrust its upper body forward. Hundreds of stiffened hairs were flung into Digmon's back, some bouncing off while others embedded themselves in the hard shell like needles.
Digmon gave a cry of surprise and turned around in time to see the rest of the Hanumon follow the example of the first. He staggered back under the bombardment of the hairs, but was more inconvenienced than hurt. Shaking off the pain, he raised his drills again.
"Gold Rush!"
The barrage of rocket-propelled drills slammed into the walls and ceiling of the tunnel, exploding on impact. Large chunks of rubble were blasted loose, choking the way. There were still no sounds from the Hanumon beyond the pile of debris and great pit, but the Chosen Children had a feeling that their pursuers would not be able to overcome both obstacles.
"Let's go," Takeru said. "We need to find the others." He looked down at the fuzzy Digimon in his arms. "Are you okay, Patamon?"
"Yeah… I'll be fine." Even so, he made no effort to get out of Takeru's embrace, and was carried down the hall as the group started moving again.
"Be more careful, Digmon," Iori said, jogging as his partner kept pace with him. "You could have brought the whole ceiling down."
"Sorry, Iori. But at least it worked."
"Even if you say that…"
He left the sentence unfinished as he and Takeru put their focus on what was in front of them. It wasn't long before they had come to a place where another hallway branched off from the one they were in, and they stopped in momentary indecision. Takeru didn't have a good idea of where the rest of their friends had wound up. He remembered that Hikari had been to his left, but right now their choices were between straight on or right.
"We shouldn't split up any more," Iori said.
"Right…" Takeru looked from one tunnel to the other, noticing that the one they were following was wider than the new option. He made an angry grunt in his throat. "We'll go straight," he said at last. "This may lead to somewhere important." No one gave a dissenting opinion, and the four of them continued on.
Turning a corner, they saw that the hall had come to an end, terminating at what seemed to be an immense room. The exact size was difficult to judge because of the large machines that filled it, arranged in rows. Takeru had never seen anything like them before. In shape they were close to being cylindrical, made of a dark-tinted metal. Black pipes ran out of them and into the floor. Dimly the Chosen Children and their Digimon could remember walking over similar pipes on their way in.
They didn't take time to make a minute study of the machines, however; instead they were focused on listening. The sounds had first reached them as they turned the corner. They were sounds that demanded pity, but when the Chosen heard them, tense as they were, and in such menacing surroundings, their first reaction was horror. The sounds were varied – whines and groans, and muted screams that went on forever – but their power to shock lay not in what they were but in what could be felt behind them. "Despair" was the most succinct way to describe it – sounds made in the agony of knowing that they were all that was left to the beings making them.
"What… what is it, Takeru-san?" Iori asked, his eyes wide.
"I don't know," Takeru answered. He hesitated for a moment, then stepped cautiously forward. "Who's there?"
He hadn't meant to yell, but fear raised the volume of his voice, and it echoed in the vast chamber. Immediately the other sounds ceased, to be replaced by a silence that listened.
"Takeru, you're hurting me," Patamon said. Takeru relaxed his grip; he hadn't realized that he was squeezing so tightly.
"Be careful, Iori," Digmon said, stepping in front of his partner, drills at the ready.
"Hello?" Takeru moved forward again, cautiously. The stillness was preferable to the sounds, but still unsettling, especially in their wake. It occurred to him that they might be walking into a trap. He had no idea why what they had heard would have been a part of such a trap, but if the goal was to scare them, as the nightmares scared them, then it had certainly been successful.
His steps had soon taken him up to the nearest of the cylindrical machines. He started violently when it emitted a sudden pneumatic hiss, part of its metal surface popping outwards and sliding upwards to reveal a transparent tube beneath it. Patamon jumped out of Takeru's arms and began flapping, as surprised by his partner's movement as that of the machine. He didn't get a good look at what was now exposed because something above him drew his attention.
But as for Takeru, all his focus was on the contents of the machine. There was an object floating near eye level in some kind of clear liquid. For the most part it was a tangled mess of red and blue, but he could tell that it had once been an Elecmon. Large chunks of its body were missing, and he could see to its center where a syringe-like attachment at the end of a hose was embedded in the Digimon's cracked, spherical core. In many places the parts of its body that were left were twisted or discolored. The flesh bubbled where it was thickest, and its edges seemed eaten away as if by acid. The entirety quivered, and while the right eye was an empty hole, the left was fixed on Takeru. The mouth moved, ragged in places like a chipped glass.
"Please…"
Takeru's hands clenched spasmodically. He wanted to close his eyes but they were too busy widening, taking in details that they didn't want to. And out from the back of his mind came creeping one of his recent dreams, his partner in pain, unending pain. The Elecmon groaned loudly, and the sound was answered from many of the other machines in a multitude of agonized voices.
"Takeru!"
"Patamon!" he yelled back, looking around for his Digimon.
"Takeru!" "Patamon!"
It took Takeru a while to realize that Patamon hadn't spoken again, because at first he didn't register hearing his own voice being used by something else. He spotted Patamon above him, body inflated with air as he readied his attack, but higher up he could see the dark shapes descending from the ceiling, wings flapping. They were bats, made monstrous by their immense size and the sickles that terminated their several appendages.
"Air Shot!"
One of the things was blown back a bit, but was otherwise unharmed, and its fellows kept still came forward, repeating, "Air Shot, Air Shot!"
"Gold Rush!"
One of Digmon's drills found its target, the creature dropping out of the air and caroming off the top of one of the machines, but the others managed to avoid his attack entirely. "Gold Rush!" they cried in his voice, tittering maniacally at their imitation. One of them dove directly towards Iori's partner, screeching in its own voice.
"Crazy Sonic!"
The thing screamed, a sound so intense that it could be seen, shooting towards Digmon like rings of light. He managed to jump back out of the way, but even so the echoes when the attack hit the floor nearly deafened him and Iori.
Aloft, another of the creatures sliced at Patamon with a sickle claw, missing its target by inches.
"Takeru, I have to evolve!"
"Have to evolve, evolve!" They tittered hysterically.
Takeru reached for his Digivice, and had trouble getting a hold on it, he was shaking so badly after the sight of the Elecmon. And even once he had it, it wouldn't light up. "Patamon—! Patamon, evolve!" Was normal evolution not possible here? There were no Dark Towers in this place, but there was Darkness everywhere, he felt as though he were choking on it.
One of the giant bats buffeted Patamon with its wing, and one of his own wings, which had been clipped by the Hanumon's bone, gave out. Takeru was about to call upon the power of the Digimental when it happened, but the sight of Patamon falling made him break off and run to be there to catch his partner. On either side of him as he ran he could hear the hissing of the machines, their motion detectors sensing him, leading them to reveal their grisly contents, the tortured forms of Digimon crying out for mercy.
A balcony overlooked the generator room at one end, and Sato Katsu stood there in shadow, watching the battle below with intensity. This was the worst place for a confrontation of this kind; the fighting might damage the generators. He wondered where Yagami and the others were. It would be best for his artificial Digimon to intercept them before they reached this point. So far, at least, no damage had been done, and Takaishi's Digimon was wounded. If things continued as they were, it would be a very fruitful day indeed.