Episode 3: Identity; Information; Illegal
Kurohi was exhausted. Not physically, but mentally. It had been a week since they had fought whatever that thing was, and no one had seen hide nor hair of it since. But that didn't stop Linkmon from wanting to keep looking. It was like he was on a crusaderly cause to try and defeat it. His constant interjections and arguments were what was keeping him from his normal level of mischievous adolescence.
"I think I'm coming down with a case of narcolepsy."
Nobu looked up from his bento and gave Kurohi a confused look. "You can't develop narcolepsy. It's a condition you're predisposed with. It comes from your chromo-"
A napkin slapped into the side of his face from over Kurohi's shoulder. "We get it, med-student. You're smart. Now eat your lunch." Riko obviously didn't want to listen to his medical jargon.
The three of them were sitting outside the main building on campus, having a quiet break before their next classes start.
Nobu pulled the napkin off his face. "Narcolepsy is also sudden. You wouldn't feel tired. I would diagnose you as having sleep deprivation." He picked up a deviled egg with his chopsticks.
"Not getting enough sleep?" She looked Kurohi up and down while popping a cucumber roll in her mouth. "Partying too much?"
"No."
She gave him a twisted little smile. "Late night web cam chats?"
"No."
"Perhaps you have been studying too late." Both Kurohi and Riko burst out laughing at Nobu's suggestion.
Kurohi stirred his cup of instant noodles. "I've been having Digimon trouble." They both gave him the look. The 'oh you're gonna talk about that again' look. They turned away, hoping avoiding eye-contact would help to avoid the conversation. "Y'see, this is why I didn't just come out and say it."
"Kurohi-san, if you keep arguing with your Digimon why don't you just leave it at ho-"
Another napkin smacked Nobu in the face. "Shut up, Nobu! Don't get him started!"
"Relax." Kurohi drank some of the broth from his cup. "I'm not gonna put you through that again. You get bored to tears every time I tell that story."
"Thank you."
"I'm a good friend, aren't I?"
"Yea. I guess you are."
"And good friends share their cucumber rolls."
The last of Riko's napkins hit Kurohi this time. The three of them finished their lunches in a very unquiet fashion, and headed to their separate classes, each a bit happier than when they met up.
The first thing Kurohi did after he got home was fall face-first on his tiny mattress. He wanted to sleep. It was much preferred to Linkmon's constant nag...
"Kurohi."
"I'm trying to sleep, Link."
"It's 5:30."
"And I feel like sleeping."
"If you're not going to do your homework, we could at least-"
"I don't feel like looking for it. If you want, I can write up a schedule or something for days we can-"
"Kurohi, don't take this matter so lightly. This isn't a game."
Kurohi turned his head to his desk, where Linkmon's newly uploaded visage could be seen through his computer screen. "But it's supposed to be." He turned away from him. "According to literally everyone I know, I'm the only person who thinks there's more to it."
"And it is because you feel that way that we are the only people who may be able to do something about it. Surely there is some way to convince you to take up arms with me."
"Y'know, Duke and Zwart didn't talk nearly as much as you."
"I am not them."
"Oh yes you are. Makes me wonder where all that talkative data came from." Despite trying to keep a straight a face as he could, despite the fact that Linkmon could not see his face, he couldn't help letting out a small chuckle. "But you're a lot more fun now than you were then." He paused for a moment. "I love you, Link."
"I am utterly disturbed." He was smiling, despite his comeback.
"Which is why I don't want you rushing in recklessly against an unknown enemy. I don't want to lose you too."
Linkmon waited a minute before responding. "How long did it take you to come up with that little speech?"
"Like it? Three whole days."
"It took you three days to come up with that?"
Kurohi propped himself up and bounced out of bed. "Shut up, and let's start the hunt."
"Let's stop the hunt." Kurohi massaged his temples. "We've been at it for 2 hours, and what've we found? Nothin'. Nadda. Zip. Zilch. No comprende español."
"What language was that?"
"It's the only sentence I know in Spanish. Wait, don't change the subject. You know you're never gonna find anything by just randomly flyin' around."
"I don't hear you giving any other suggestions."
"I am. It's called: Let's stop. Seriously, we're not gonna get anywhere like this." Kurohi was steadily losing his cool. "It's been a week, and no one has seen exoskeleton nor carapace of that thing. The chances of us seeing it again are probably close to 1000/1."
Kurohi had barely finished speaking when a several screaming Digimon barreled down the path behind him.
Linkmon looked past the flat screen with Kurohi's face on it. "That looks suspicious. Should we see what caused the commotion? Kurohi?"
Kurohi had his face in his hands.
"Kurohi, are you alright?"
"Can I have a minute? I am lamenting the fact that I'm gonna have another sleepless night."
"You can have 10 seconds."
"Fine, let's go mood killer."
They rounded the corner only to find the entrance to a community server. On normal occasions, it was a no-entry zone for Illegals, but it seemed like now would be best a time as any to check and see what kind of mess was going on inside. Only pausing for a moment, the two of them fazed through the portal.
As they entered the server, nothing seemed out of place. There was no sign of a fight, no Digitama, no creepy wide-eyed data-corpses, no nothing. The data screens, the reception counter, the jokingly placed cafe tables; nothing seemed out of place. In fact, everything looked painstakingly clean. In fact the room seemed oddly...
"Something feels off."
"I agree. I can't quite put my claw on it, but something about this room is definitely...strange. It's like someone's put..."
"A mirror up against your face?"
"Basically."
The room was perfectly symmetrical. If you stared straight ahead, you could see that the left and right sides of the room matched up perfectly to the pixel. Upon closer inspection, one of the tables had been sliced perfectly down the middle, and one side was placed on either end of the room.
"I know it's been a while since I've been in one of these, but I'm pretty sure that they aren't normally like this."
Linkmon caught a shadow out of the corner of his eye. "Kurohi!" He jumped at it to get a better view. The creature that stood before him could only be described as bizarre. It had a scrunched canine face, a gorilla arm, inverted knees, and a single bat-like wing. It was covered in a mess of green and pink fur, except for its stomach, which was bright yellow. The thing looked at the newcomers with confusion. "Another one!"
"Wait, Link-!" Before Kurohi could call him back, Linkmon had again jumped at the creature, which narrowly dodged his claw attack. The creature, in turn, swung at Linkmon with its gorilla fist, knocking him sideways. Link steadied himself in midair and rebounded off the wall, again narrowly missing his intended target. Fortunately, his momentum carried him past the creature and to a distance safe from a counterattack.
Kurohi suddenly received an obnoxious ping from his speakers, alerting him that he had just received a new e-mail, but chose to ignore it. Assisting Linkmon was more important.
The creature went on the offensive, throwing a veritable display of one-two punches, which Linkmon had difficulty dodging, due to the difference in its arms' length. Taking a chance, he caught its ape fist in both clawed hands and proceeded to throw it across the room. It looked like it was going to hit the opposite wall, but with a few twitches of its wing, it managed to right itself and land on its feet.
As all this was happening, Kurohi had received another three e-mails. Getting fed up with his computer's high pitched whine, he quickly turned away from the match to see what was so goddamned important. All four of them were from the same sender; someone named Melor Lukyanenko.
Linkmon was sent flying by another swift punch from his attacker, landing near a small cluster of ornamental tables. In his frustration at losing the fight, he picked up one of the nearby tables and...
"Eeep!" The creature let out a high-pitched girly shriek, leaving Link paralyzed in a state of pure astonishment. "Ah, no, put it back please, yes? I 'ave only jyust feeneeshed alighning them perfectly."
Linkmon's jaw dropped. "Excuse me?"
"Please, could you jyust return eet to eets proper place, then we can continue our fight."
"You can talk?"
His opponent looked confused. "Of course I can talk. I am fluent in Russian, Japanese, and English."
"No, that's not what I meant!" Linkmon was getting flustered now. "You're like that thing, right!? That thing that's been killing Digimon! How is it that you can talk!?"
"Because he's a Digimon." Kurohi had reentered the conversation. "Isn't that right, Melor?" His call seemed to echo out to nowhere, but was answered by the appearance of another vid-screen.
Depicted on it was the face of a teenager with sandy brown hair. His brown eyes seemed to echo a deep melancholy, and weren't focused on anything in particular. Kurohi recognized the sound of tapping on a keyboard before an electronic voice answered his question. "You are correct. This is my Digimon partner, Misceomon."
Kurohi was the next one to join the cue of 'mildly confused faces'. "Uh...What's with the robot voice?"
"I cannot speak Japanese, so I am using a program I created to translate my text as speech."
"Melor ees an amazing programmer." Misceomon beamed proudly. "He'd have to be to create sometheeng as amazeeng as me." He patted his chest with his big fist.
Ignoring the boastfully mismatched Digimon, Kuruohi continued his questioning. "But how can you understand me then?"
"Another program. It works the same way, but converts speech to speech."
"Then why don't you use that, instead of typing?"
There was a drawn out silence, punctuated by the fidgety movements of a very confused and disgruntled Linkmon. "It's just easier."
"I'll take your word for that then."
"Can we get back to the matter at hand!?" Linkmon had obviously had enough of their seemingly calm post-battle banter. "So you're not like it, fine; then why was everyone running away from here?"
Misceomon pondered this for a moment. "Perhaps...Eet could be the same reason as you. You attacked me because you thought I was a...What deed you call eet? A Deegeemon eater? They may have thought the same."
"And the table? What was the thing about the table?"
Misceomon looked somewhat embarrassed. "Well, everytheeng was so deesorganized, and I had jyust feeneeshed tidyeeng up the place when you came een and we had our little...skirmish?"
Linkmon was still not convinced.
"Misceomon has obsessive-compulsive disorder." Both Linkmon and Kurohi were a little taken aback by the sudden comment; half due to the brashness at its delivery and half due to its unlikeliness. "He likes things symmetrical."
Misceomon scratched the back of his head. "Nobody is perfect."
The sudden rush of superfluous information make Linkmon feel like his data-brain was going to short out. "Kurohi?"
"Yea?"
"Why are we here again? We should be out hunting. If he's not like the other one, then we should go looking for it, not stand here idly chatting." It was very apparent that he was confused and frustrated.
"You're right." Kurohi turned his attention to the bizarre couple before them. "I'm sorry for all the trouble we've caused you, but we have to be going. Things to do; you know how it is."
"Ah before you go." Misceomon seemed to have something to add. "Would you mind exchanging e-mails? Not often you meet another eellegal runneeng around."
Kurohi hadn't honestly considered that. Misceomon was an Illegal, just like Linkmon. That label meant that they weren't necessarily the most popular team either. Finding another exile might seem like a godsend to some. He smiled. "Sure, but I think your Tamer already has mine, somehow."
After a few minutes of exchanging goodbyes, the two set off on their hunt again.
It was late. Really late. So late that Kurohi was considering ditching his classes the next day.
"Today was a waste. We didn't manage to accomplish anything at all, and that creature is still out there, somewhere."
Kurohi peered over at his monitor from his bed and pondered Linkmon's words. "Actually, I think we accomplished something pretty important today."
"Oh, and what might that be? Meeting that bizarre team and wasting precious time when we should have been searching?"
"Gaining allies."
Linkmon was silent. Whether he thought that Melor and Misceomon could be potential allies or not, Kurohi didn't know. He didn't even know himself, but the thought was a perusable one. Maybe he'd try contacting Melor tomorrow.
"Goodnight, Link."
"Goodnight, Kurohi."