A/N: My playlist for writing this chapter was chapter is basically The Logical Song, I'm Raving, and Nessaja (Mindcontrolaz Remix), all by Scooter.
"AAARRRGGGHHH!!!"
The scream of pain echoed through the halls, but they reached deaf ears. The torturer drove the poker in further, and the molten tip seared into Flame's side. He was tied to the wall with solid iron bars, and all he could do was squrim.
The torturer held the bar there for a few more seconds, then withdrew it. Flame was breathing heavily through clenched teeth.
"Come now, Flame," Cindy said. She was the only other person in the room. "You can end this very quickly."
He glared at her, through eyes half-shut from the pain. "Never."
Cindy shrugged. "As you wish," she said, then she nodded at the torturer, who drove the poker back in to the same spot. Flame's tough skin was resisting penetration, but the pain was intense.
He screamed again.
"Flame..." Kaida whispered. She was crouched on the floor, eyes closed, as much in mourning as trying to locate him. But her efforts proved fruitless. He was either deeply unconscious, in intense pain, or purposefully blocking her out. Kaida had the feeling it was the second.
She shook her head as she stood. "Nothing," she said. The others in the room sighed. It was a dejected moment - not only had they lost their leader - and in Kaida case, her closest friend - but they had also lost all means to contact Gennai with this news, as well as any other forces that might aid them.
They were completely on their own. Not even Jet could help - he knew nothing outside the current circumstances that could assist.
Kaida looked back at the bank of screens. It showed a trace program, desperately trying to pick up any of Flame's signals. So far, it had had no luck, and Kaida had little faith that it would find anything at all.
The door to the room slid open, and Jorcy entered. "Nothing," he said. He had tried asking local Digimon villagers in a 150 mile radius of Cindy's castle, if they had seen a blue Flamedramon. Most of the villagers were Northern Kingdom servants, but Jorcy looked like a neutral to them, and they told him all they knew - which amounted to nothing.
"So there's no way of telling where he is," Kaida said, looking back at the screens. "And there's no way of telling how he is."
"Yeah," Jorcy said, letting his voice trail off, and the room fell silent again.
Flame had screamed until his voice was hoarse and his lungs were tired, but the torturer would not let up. After being burned in four key places with the poker, the torturer had switched to other methods.
An electrical current was running through Flame's restraints - from his wrists through to his ankles. The torturer had a stout, black tube, which was basically an electromagnet. The currents flowing through Flame had a mildly numbing effect, until the torturer touched the tube to his body...
Flame's world exploded into pain again. The disrupted currents around his left knee were triggering every neuron in the area, and the pain was prodigious. He tried to scream again, but ended up coughing up small droplets of blood.
The torturer withdrew the tube, noting the small flecks of blood around Flame's lips. Then he reached over to a control panel and flicked a switch. The currents stopped flowing, and Flame's body slumped in the restraints. It was only a few seconds later that the pain from all the wounds returned, and he started writhing uncomfortably.
The torturer pulled out a cellphone.
"Yes ... He's showing signs of internal damage ... Understood."
He put the cellphone away, then reached for a prepared syringe on the table. Unceremoniously, he jabbed it into Flame's side, and depressed the plunger.
The clear solution flowed through Flame's veins, concentrating around the wounds, which were rapidly healed. The neural damage remained, however, and it did nothing to dull the pain. About thirty seconds later, his side was completely healed from the poker burns, and his lungs were restored to normal functioning. They still hurt like hell, though.
They could keep his body alive, and they could constantly increase the pain. Flame realized this all at once, and the knowledge filled him with almost as much horror as the next torture method.
The torturer was grinning as he held it up, and Flame looked away, eyes closed, awaiting the pain...
"What is that thing doing?" Edan asked, gesturing at the screens. Kaida looked from his claw to the monitors.
"Pattern scans. They're trying to find any traces of Flame."
"This might not be the appropriate time," Edan began, "but I've always been curious as to how that worked."
Kaida considered his request. She knew the answers well enough, and she decided that it might be a good idea to answer anyway. Take her mind off things.
"Well, it all comes down to a few listening posts," she began. "There are two kinds. Earth-based, and Digital World based. The Digital World ones resemble little glass spheres, embedded at random points across a particular landscape. Each listening post gathers as much data about the world around it, and transmits it back to a central computer, where it's sifted for useful information."
"Okay," Edan nodded. "What about the Earth-based ones?"
"Well, they are basically computers plugged into the Internet. They monitor traffic across several routers, and transmit their findings back for analysis, just like the glass spheres."
"What's the range of one of these things?"
"Well, for the Digital World ones, it depends on the physical size. The bigger, the better. Most of our listening posts are the size of tennis balls, and have an effective range of 25 miles, diameter."
"Cool. And the Earth ones?"
"Considerably more. The range is dependent on the amount of connection points the computer has into the Digital World - and most computers are capable of thousands. Of the three we have, the smallest is 100 miles, and the largest 1500 miles."
"Impressive," Edan said.
Kaida nodded. "We have most of this continent covered," she said, pressing a few keys to bring up a world map. Edan got up off his chair and stood next to her.
"These are the Digital World listening posts," she said, waving her claw at the screen. About half the continent was covered with small green circles - several hundred of them.
"And here are the Earth-based ones," she said, punching a key.
Two listening posts were active. They covered most of the Southern Kingdom, and extended about a quarter way into the north.
"That's really impressive," Edan said, but Kaida was shaking her head.
"No wonder," she whispered, then started typing furiously.
The map disappeared, and was replaced with a command prompt. Edan looked on as she typed at a hellish rate, growing more and more excited with each passing keystroke.
He didn't know what was going on, but he sensed it was going to be good.