65
EMPTY
"He only felt that he was looking upon a cosmic tragedy, and he shrank with shame, as if the guilt of a whole race were laid upon him." – Robert E. Howard, "The Tower of the Elephant"
Ken stared at the back of the cylindrical generator, feeling miserably stupid. His face kept twitching, and he felt drops of chilly sweat on his forehead. Thinking got him nowhere. The Digimon Kaiser might have been able to figure out what all the valves and pipes and controls meant – he had designed enough complicated machinery in his time, though thankfully Ken had nothing this monstrous weighing on his conscience. But now Ichijouji Ken, bright though he was, was no genius, and he had to admit to himself at last that he had no clue how to shut the machine down without killing its occupant. The shuddering sobs of the ravaged Mushmon came to him through the thin metal wall of the cylinder.
"Have you got it, Ken-chan?" Wormmon asked, clinging tightly to the boy's ankle.
Ken shook his head with a grunt of frustration.
"Could he really have been telling the truth?" Iori asked. "There's no way to get them out?"
There was a moment's silence. Every hatch on every generator was open, so the Chosen Children and their partners mostly directed their gaze at each other. It was more pleasant than looking at the mangled Digimon, but still discouraging to see their own worry mirrored on every friend's face.
"There's got to be something we can do," Daisuke said. "Couldn't we just try messing with those controls until we find out how to let them go?"
"W-Well…" Ken began, but it was Takeru who answered.
"We can't. If we don't know what we're doing it might just make things worse."
Daisuke didn't have any reply to that, though even Takeru had to admit that something worse was hard to imagine. Ken was looking once more at the control panel, racking his brain again for an answer. As far as he could tell, there were only a few possibilities resulting from tampering with the machines. The Digimon could be freed, their rate of dissolution might slow or quicken, or they might be destroyed completely. The odds of helping weren't good, but they had to do something. It wasn't good for anyone's sanity to be staying in the room too long.
"Please…"
The Chosen all turned to one of the nearby generators, whence the unfamiliar voice had spoken. There was a Bakumon within it. While warped and fractured like the others, it was more intact than most of the imprisoned Digimon they had seen. There were cracks in both its helmet and the skin beneath. Tailmon noticed that the Holy Ring which members of the species typically wore had been removed, and that the left foreleg where it had been was perforated and withered.
"Don't leave…us here…children," it continued, seeing that it had their attention.
"We won't," Hikari assured it, sounding a little hurt that the Bakumon could believe them capable of such a thing.
"How can we help you?" Miyako asked, then realized that the question seemed a stupid thing to ask someone in the Bakumon's position, and hurried on. "I mean, well, you probably don't know, I guess, but…"
"No," Ken said. "Anything you could tell us would help." The Bakumon didn't reply immediately – perhaps it was gathering strength for what it had to say.
"…He told…the truth…" it said at last, then added, when their expressions pleaded with it in the hope that they had misunderstood its meaning, "We can't…get out." There was a long silence. Most of the Digimon in the generators had stopped their moaning to listen to the conversation, though from somewhere the sound of someone softly crying could be heard – a bleak, lonely sound.
"Are you sure?" Daisuke asked at last.
"…He would…come…watch us…hurt… He's…a monster… He wouldn't…leave…a way…out."
"But we have to try!" V-mon said. The other Digimon nodded their agreement.
"But…" Ken said, "what can we do?"
"Don't leave me!" the Bakumon rasped in sudden terror. The twelve of them didn't move, and when the Bakumon spoke again it was again with sad resignation. "Do something…anything… But don't leave…us… Don't…make us live…like this."
As its voice faded, a low susurration swept through the room. The Digimon were sighing – now their fate was out in the open.
"No…" Hikari whispered.
"You mean kill you!?" Daisuke asked.
"W-We can't do that!" Miyako protested.
"This is awful," said Iori, half to himself. "This is wrong… it's too wrong!"
But it's the truth, Ken thought. We have to do something, even if it means killing them. There's no other way. And if that was what it boiled down to, he would be the one to step forward. It was the same decision he had come to in the Giga House, when the time came to determine what to do with Archnemon. He was already weighted with unforgiveable sins. The others shouldn't have to take that on themselves, even as an act of mercy.
Gently slipping out of Wormmon's grasp, he slowly approached the Bakumon's generator, looking again at the indecipherable control panel. For a moment he simply stared at it, when he felt a hand on his arm. Looking over, he saw that it belonged to Takeru.
"Wait," Takeru said. "Do we really have to do this? Think."
Ken didn't answer immediately. He felt the eyes of the others on him. "I don't want to. We…we shouldn't have to. But…what else can we do?"
"I don't know," Takeru answered. "But this isn't like destroying an enemy. I'm not sure if I could live with myself after doing this."
Ken looked at him, his expression speaking for him. Takeru took a step back and removed his hand. His face became sad, resigned. "I'm sorry," he said.
Ken next turned his eyes towards Iori, perhaps looking for scorn or reproach, but the boy just looked miserable. He didn't look at Ken – not pointedly, but because his thoughts were turned inward. Maybe he was just trying to keep from crying again.
"There's still a chance, right?" Daisuke asked softly. Ken's nod was barely perceptible. He turned back to the machine and reached for the control panel. The others steeled themselves. Miyako covered her eyes.
I'm sorry, Ken thought. He turned the large valve. The clear liquid the Bakumon was floating in began to darken, getting murkier as the strange substance of the pipes began to leak from the fissures in the Bakumon's Digi-Core. Bakumon itself began to moan in increased pain, and Ken quickly turned the valve back to its original position. The transparent tube cleared, and Bakumon went limp. Ken looked at it, clearly having second thoughts, but the Digimon grated out the single word, "Try…"
So, after a glance at his friends, Ken turned back to the panel. He was relieved to see no judgment in their eyes. Instead, those who had the courage to watch the process looked as if they might be sick.
He next pressed a button to the side of a small screen, and watched as it lit up in response. It wasn't booby-trapped, then, as he thought it might be. What the screen presented him with were two options: Output and Empty. Bracing himself for whatever might come next, he chose the first, but all it gave him was a technical readout. Going back to the first menu, his finger hovered over that second option, Empty.
The moments dragged on as he hesitated. The others knew what Ken was suffering, but they couldn't bring themselves to volunteer in his place. The entire room was in a hush – with whatever sensory organs were left to them the Digimon in the generators had turned all their attention towards what was about to happen. The Bakumon broke the silence.
"If I die…it would be…very kind."
Ken closed his eyes and let out his breath. He knew it was the truth. He pressed the button. The result was quick and un-theatrical. With a whir from the machine, the Bakumon dissolved away entirely without another sound. The liquid in the cylinder began to drain out of it through apertures at the base, and the hose that had been embedded in the Bakumon's Digicore sank with it.
That was all. Ken had killed it. It may have been the right thing to do, but that wasn't much comfort. Not quite willing to look at his fellow Chosen yet, he cast his gaze around the generator room, taking in the rows of machines, and a wave of nausea swept over him. Would they have to do that to every Digimon here?
"I can't believe it's come to this," Hikari murmured.
"We'll have to delete the others in the same way," Tailmon said, not so much matter-of-fact as bitter. "They shouldn't have to suffer like this. Until we set them free they can't be reborn."
"That guy…" Daisuke said, his voice smoldering. "When we catch him…!"
Takeru said nothing. He felt Daisuke was entitled to his anger – certainly Takeru himself was equally angry – but Daisuke's last sentence would be a hard one to finish. What if they did catch up to Sato? The man seemed too monstrous to repent of his crimes. Was he being manipulated, as Ken and Oikawa had been, or was his evil his own? In Takeru's opinion, Sato Katsu was already beyond forgiveness. If he was beyond even seeking forgiveness, what then? Involuntarily he thought of one of his dreams. He was sure it had been Sato in the doorway of Pinocchimon's toy room, his face in shadow as the gun trembled in Takeru's grip…
"This is like a nightmare," said Miyako.
"I just want to get out of here," Iori said. "I want to go home." But then mentioning home made him think of poor Chiho, and he had to fight back a sob. Armadimon looked up at his partner in commiseration, more concerned for the boy's emotional wellbeing than the pain that still remained from the beating the Pipismon had given him.
"I know we can't leave them," V-mon said, "but if we stay here too long that guy'll get away!"
Deep in his negative emotions, Ken had barely been listening to what was being said, but he heard V-mon. Daisuke's partner was right; it would take a long time to "empty" the generators one by one. Wouldn't Sato have a system installed somewhere that would allow more than one to be emptied at once? How disgusting that the best they could hope for in this situation was a faster way to delete innocent Digimon.
Again he looked around the room, checking for any machinery besides the cylindrical generators. He saw something against one wall, and started towards it, looking straight ahead to avoid seeing the broken forms of the beings whose lives he would be forced to take. The others followed after him, a couple asking what he was doing but not getting an answer. The Digimon in the generators murmured uneasily, but Ken couldn't tell if was their approaching deletion that they feared, or that the Chosen Children were about to leave them here to their agonies.
"There may be a way to empty all of the generators at once," he began to explain to the others as they walked through that surreal hellscape. As they approached their destination Ken saw that it was a terminal of some kind. As he began looking at the options it provided, his friends stood around him, glad to have their backs to the generators, but many feeling strangely guilty for not looking at those they had to delete.
For a long time there was quiet, no motion except for Ken's hands on the controls, and every second was an eternity of horror. Then Ken had found it, the single option which would delete every imprisoned Digimon in the room. His resolve wavered. The hand poised over the fatal button was shaking violently.
Do it without thinking. Get it over with. Set them free. Do it. Hurry. Do it! We need out!
Ken screamed as his hand fell forward, onto the button, and after he screamed, he began to cry. There was a huge, low whirring sound behind them, and the Chosen knew that the tortured Digimon were gone. And as if Ken's cry had broken all remaining restraints on their own emotions, the others broke down with him, some crying, or moaning, or collapsing to the floor as the empty room at their backs filled up with an awesome silence.