Series: Division of Destiny||Story: Reign of the Undead King||Chapter: The Questions
Characters: Piemon, Vamdemon, Chosen Children, others||Pairings: Ken x Daisuke/Daisuke x Ken, Mimi x Sora/Sora x Mimi
Chapters: 8-40||Words: 2,667||Total: 21,433
Genre: Romance, Drama||Rated: PG-13
Summary: Vamdemon and Piemon rule supreme. Only now, ten years after their victory, are things about to change. For good or for ill.
She couldn't be bored. Being bored required having interests in the first place, and after all this time, hers had faded away. She remembered complaining about being bored when she was younger, and being given bright colors to play with. She missed those days, just a little.
She stared up into the murky rafters overhead and wondered what was going on in the world outside. What was it like now? Were any of her friends still around? She couldn't remember their faces, but she hoped they had it better than she did.
It was sometime in between lunch and dinner. She knew that much of what time it was no more. That didn't mean it was afternoon, since she had no real way to judge what a clock would've said. But it was all she had to look forward to.
She tilted her head a fraction to see LadyDevimon seated outside of the bars. As happened now and then, the dark Digimon held a look of sorrow turned toward her. It wasn't one marked by tears or even a frown, but she knew the other didn't like her being here. Or liked being here herself.
She had no idea of how she knew that. But she'd always been able to read the other's emotions, just as she had those of the cute cat who'd been here before. Maybe it came from only having them to interact with for so long?
Slowly she shifted herself so their eyes met a little more openly. She swallowed once or twice, trying to force her lips and throat to work the way that she should. Talking was so hard now. She had to fight to remember how to do it.
"You…look sad." Her heart, shriveled and weak from long years of disuse, still reached out to someone who needed her.
LadyDevimon didn't flinch, but the sorrow vanished from her features at once. Not from her, though. The prisoner knew that just as well. "What would you know of that?" There was distance in her tone. She didn't want anyone knowing how she felt. That wasn't surprising, not with the way Vamdemon treated his people.
"I know about being sad." Her words held hesitance and confusion, but also truth. She knew what it was to be sad. She thought she knew it better than being happy. "Why are you?"
She wasn't sure if she expected an answer or not. She didn't even know how long she could keep this up. Once she'd shouted and screamed in rage, until her voice broke and she could do so no longer. Then once she'd healed, she'd done it all over again, repeating it until the lack of answer and echoes bouncing back drained away her desire to even try. But now, that faint urge to speak, to communicate with someone else, the only person who ever saw her or gave even the vaguest hint that she cared, took deep root and lifted its head.
"Because…I have to be here. With you." Her voice dropped low, as if to keep this from being heard by anyone. "And I don't want to be."
The captive's voice wavered briefly as she dredged up words again. "Is it really that bad?" She knew it was for her; she'd had a normal child's life before ending up in here. She'd had a mother and a father and a…she'd had a …she'd had people who cared about her and who she missed even now. She'd never really thought too much that LadyDevimon might also lose something by being her eternal guard.
"Yes, and no." Something that might've been a smile tapped briefly at the pale Digimon's lips. "It's not a hardship punishment. Guarding you is meant to be an honor for my years of loyal service." She hesitated, as if forming her thoughts. "But I wish you didn't need to be guarded."
"So do I." She dropped her gaze, fingers tracing ever so lightly across the thin blankets beneath her. "I wish I knew why I was."
She didn't know. She'd never known. She knew that …he came back home one day and held something in his hand that…glowed? She thought? The memories were vague about what happened then. The names that Vamdemon called her didn't make any sense to her. She hadn't been clear-headed enough to understand any of it until after she ended up here in the first place, and after that, most real information stopped cold, at least about her.
LadyDevimon's scarlet eyes turned toward her, and there was a sudden stillness, as if the world held its breath, waiting for something. "I could tell you."
Today perhaps was a day for awakenings. She shifted more, rising up. "You can?" A tiny nod, little more than the merest inclination of her head. "Will you?"
No answer. Not for a period of time that stretched out forever between them. "I shouldn't. Vamdemon-sama doesn't think you need to know."
The prisoner drooped her head. Of course. Anything that would make her more than a prize kept locked away from the world would be denied to her. He could've done anything with her, even to killing her, and he chose instead to keep her here. A spark waved briefly to life in her deepest soul.
I'm going to kill him one day. She knew how unlikely it was. She'd had dreams as a child that she thought would come true long before this one did. But it sparked an image that she held onto with strength she'd forgotten she had.
She looked at LadyDevimon again. If she couldn't know the reasons for being here, maybe she could know something else instead. "What can you tell me? About anything?"
She didn't hunger for news of the outside. It wouldn't mean anything to her. She ached to hear someone else's voice, telling her things that she didn't know, whether they were true or not. She would've settled for bedtime stories, in all honesty.
"I would take you flying, if I could." LadyDevimon spoke after more long silent moments. "There's another world with blue skies and air unlike this world's. My home: the Digital World."
She'd heard of it, from some of the other Digimon who worked here. They never spoke to her, but they spoke among themselves, and she'd listened, and remembered. "What's it like there?"
"I don't know anymore. I haven't been there in years, and I've heard of many changes. Vamdemon-sama's partner, Piemon-sama, rules there now. He didn't when I was there before." LadyDevimon trailed the tips of her claws across the stone wall. "Some of the o…the Chosen Children serve him now."
Those words flickered in the depths of her mind, trying to find something to connect to, something she recalled in a voice she hated. His voice. Vamdemon's voice. "What else?" She didn't want to press. She thought if she did, LadyDevimon would cease to speak at all, and she didn't think she could handle the silence right now.
"I wandered across it many years ago, before I met Vamdemon-sama. I was alone then. Waiting for someone who never came." LadyDevimon did not look at her, but the captive's heart twisted at the pain in her words anyway.
"I wish you were waiting for me. I would've come for you." The idea of waiting all that time and not finding the one person you looked for…what could happen to someone like that? What had happened?
LadyDevimon's lips curved for a heartbeat or two. "I wish that too." She leaned her head back and stared up at the ceiling as well. "But that was a long time ago. You don't have to worry about it anymore. I don't."
"What else would you do, if we could do it?" She didn't say 'together', though the very idea of seeing someone who wasn't LadyDevimon sent a chill all through her. What would it be like, talking to other humans? Or even other Digimon? Surely they couldn't all be like Vamdemon. LadyDevimon wasn't. The little cat hadn't been.
Again moments passed before there was an answer. "I would take you somewhere to eat. I know of a restaurant run by a Veggiemon. He serves some of the most delicious food ever."
Her stomach didn't rumble. She couldn't imagine better food than what she had now being given to her. She knew it existed, but the thought of eating it again, eating something more than the tolerable slop that filled her plates wasn't one she could easily think of. She smiled, though. Flying. Eating good food. She liked how LadyDevimon thought.
Slowly she curled around herself, the sudden strength that led her to speak draining out of her. She had good images in her mind, and memories that would sustain her for a while longer.
Then something else occurred to her, and she twisted around once more. "LadyDevimon…do you know my name?"
The silence that descended this time rang of tension and pain. LadyDevimon drew in a breath that didn't break any of it.
She knew that she had a name. Sometimes she thought she even remembered it. But not having heard it directed toward her in all these years made it little more than a wisp of memory that she could never hold onto. It wasn't something that mattered, because she never could do anything. Names were for people who did things, not someone who sat in a cell day in and day out.
"No. Vamdemon-sama never told it to me." LadyDevimon didn't look at her at all, and the prisoner wondered for a moment if she were being told the truth.
It didn't matter. Her name wasn't that important.
Hikari. Your name is Hikari. Yagami Hikari, the Child of Light. LadyDevimon wanted to tell her that with all of what remained of her heart, to sweep her out of here and do everything that she'd just talked about. Yet if she so much as made a move to do it, Vamdemon would be aware, and they would both suffer for it. She would be destroyed in such a fashion that her egg couldn't regenerate and Hikari would be given a new guard, one who would not care to give her the small moments of hope, few and far between as they were, that LadyDevimon managed to worm in there.
Why, after all this time, had the child chosen to ask about what they might do? Why had she wanted to know these things? She'd gone months without speaking, and her voice showed it, a dry, cracking, dusty thing, swallowed up by the silence of the cells. LadyDevimon couldn't help but be surprised she'd even been able to speak in the first place.
I should report this to Vamdemon-sama. She knew she should . She made no movements to do so, and knew that she would not. Despite his demand to know everything that happened with the imprisoned Child of Light, this didn't seem important enough. A few vague questions, from someone who only exited the prison for display purposes? It wasn't worth mentioning and the last time she'd seen him, he'd had far more important matters on his mind.
"…LadyDevimon?" As always, that voice calling her name was unexpected, as well as hesitant, as if he wasn't certain this was what he wanted to call her.
That didn't surprise her. Some days she wondered if it was what she should be called at all. But she never knew what else she should be.
"Wizarmon."
He stood in the shadows of the doorway, where Hikari couldn't see him. If she heard him, she didn't make any movements to indicate that. He wasn't forbidden to come here, but very few had permission to interact in any way with Vamdemon's prized prisoner. LadyDevimon would gladly report that he hadn't spoken to the human at all. He never did, anyway.
"It's been a long time." She hadn't counted the days, but she thought it had to have been at least a few weeks. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"
He shrugged, his green eyes cautious as he watched her. "I've little else to do at the moment. My experiments are all at a point where I don't need to watch them, and I've completed my duties for the evening."
She envied him now and then. Unlike her, he spent at least some portion of his time outside of the castle. It was only on meaningless patrols, but at least he could leave. She would never say anything of the sort, though. This was a prized position and she wanted no one else to have it.
"What sort of experiments have you been doing?" LadyDevimon found it difficult to speak to others on occasion, but she'd never had that lack when it came to Wizarmon. There were moments she felt as if she knew him on a different level from everyone else. It made no sense, but it happened, nevertheless.
"Metal transmutation, more than anything else." He shrugged as if it meant nothing to him. "I've managed to master transforming iron and steel, but changing what I turn it into back isn't easy."
She wished that she knew more of magic, if only to understand what he worked with better. She didn't know why he worked the spells that he did, but it would likely come in handy if they needed to fight humans again at some point.
"It might not be necessary if you can do it. Humans had armor plated weapons when we first fought them."
"You're quite right." Wizarmon nodded, though she couldn't believe he hadn't thought of this himself. He was probably humoring her. "How have your days been?"
The dark Digimon shrugged, her attention flickering back to where Hikari rested. "The same as always. There aren't many changes here."
"So I've heard. But that's what's wanted, isn't it?" Wizarmon tilted his head a fraction so he could see around the corner. LadyDevimon tensed at that, but he made no further moves.
"It is." Her claws scraped briefly across the stone of the wall. "Is there any other news from above?" She wanted to believe Vamdemon-sama would tell her if there were anything truly important going on, but if she couldn't do anything about it, he might keep it from her, to keep her from worrying.
Wizarmon said nothing for a few moments, and she had the definite impression he was choosing his words with the greatest of care when he did speak. "Nothing that would interest you."
"Try me anyway." LadyDevimon ached to find out what was going on. She knew their conquest had been successful; she'd attended enough celebrations to know that. But what else was going on? What happened in the Digital World? The last she'd heard Piemon and his Dark Masters still searched for Gennai, even as they tightened their own grip on the world.
Wizarmon still took his time before he said anything. "I was told about some human attacking one of the pack. But very little has come of it that I know of. Some of the humans must still think they can fight back."
LadyDevimon stirred a trifle; people challenging Vamdemon's rule? Hadn't all of the rebellion been crushed out of them? Perhaps humans were stronger than she'd thought.
It would explain a great deal about Hikari and her sudden, if brief, revival. Even after a decade, she understood little about humans.
"Vamdemon-sama will finish them." Wizarmon added, and LadyDevimon nodded; there would likely be a great many hunts, and possibly another celebration, one that Hikari would be trotted out and displayed for. All the Digimon knew she was the Child of Light and supposedly one of those who would've fought Vamdemon, if he hadn't defeated them all before she'd ever heard of the Digital World.
"I'm certain he will." He'd done it before, and to opponents far stronger than anything this world could currently produce. If the Chosen couldn't win against him, who could?
To Be Continued