Author's Note: I've been a bit busy with some other stuff lately, so that's why there's been a slight delay with this chapter. Plus I want to take my time with some of the stuff in this story. Anyway, this story is in the Drama genre, and that drama starts at the end of this chapter.
Disclaimer: I do no own Digimon.
Chapter 3: Spell of Rage
Ken and Yolei were at their apartment meeting with Izzy, Ryo, and Rika about the Seven Lords. Also present were their friends and fellow Digidestined Davis Motomiya and Cody Hida; as were Davis and Cody's respective Digimon, the small blue-green dragon-like creature that was Veemon, and the gold armadillo-like creature that was Armadillomon. It was during this meeting that Izzy revealed to Davis and Cody Ryo's theory that the reason that Kari had vanished was because the Seven Lords had captured her. Davis was to say the least both shocked and outraged.
"You mean all this time Kari has been a prisoner of those freaks?" Davis asked furiously.
"We don't know that for certain," Izzy answered calmly. "But it is a possibility that's worth investigating."
"Well just let me at Daemon, or Beelzemon, or even that bitch Lilithmon!" Davis responded as he clenched his fists. "I'll make them tell me what they've done with Kari!"
"Davis, I doubt Daemon or Lilithmon would be intimidated by you, even with Wormmon and I helping," Ken told his friend. "Plus you're forgetting that WarGreymon killed Beelzemon yesterday."
"Well then what the hell are we supposed to do?"
"Our only option is to conduct another search for Kari," Izzy answered.
"But where else can we look?" Cody asked. "We checked everywhere for Kari during our last search."
"Not necessarily," Izzy replied as he stood up and started pacing the room. "I suspect we didn't cover every place in the Dark Ocean. It's become clear that we don't know as much as we think we do. For example we didn't know that Daemon was a member of the Seven Lords. We also didn't know that the Dark Ocean could be used to travel to an alternate version of Earth. This leads me to suspect that we do not know everything we think we do about the Dark Ocean and did not search the entire realm like we think we did."
"So T.K. could've been right all along," Ken noted with a slightly sad expression.
"Precisely. T.K. always did have a greater capacity for hope, which might not necessarily have been misplaced. I believe that our only course of action now is for us to conduct another more thorough search of the Dark Ocean."
"Are you serious?" Yolei asked sounding a little outraged. "The last search took days, and it seemed like we checked everywhere!"
"But if I'm correct, the Dark Ocean is far more vast than we first thought," Izzy pointed out. "I did map the areas that we've already searched, so it will save us some trouble. Unfortunately we'll still be in for a long search."
"But we can't go back there! It would be too hard on Ken."
"We don't have any choice," Ken told her. "If there really is any hope of finding Kari, then it's in the Dark Ocean. Besides, we'd have to go back there later anyway to send Ryo and Rika home."
At this Yolei sighed. "I guess you're right."
"Alright, then it's settled," Izzy decided. "Tomorrow is the weekend, so I suggest we use it to conduct our search. Are there any questions?"
"Actually I do have one," Yolei replied. "Why the heck do we always have to have these meetings at our apartment?"
"Well…to put it simply Yolei, you and Ken have the nicest apartment."
"He's right," Rika agreed. "I mean Cody's place is nice, but it's a shoebox compared to this place."
"Yeah, I'm actually surprised that Rika and I weren't invited to stay here instead," Ryo remarked. "I mean it's not like you don't have the room."
"Well I wanted you guys to stay here, but Yolei wouldn't have it." Ken responded.
"I've had my fill of houseguests with Davis," Yolei grumbled to herself.
In an old junkyard in the Digital World, two Digimon were standing guard in front of the door to a warehouse. The top halves of their bodies were humanoid, though they had machine guns for hands and long cannon barrels for noses. The bottom halves of their bodies were tank treads. These were Tankmon, and they were very devoted to guarding what was in the warehouse. Suddenly the two Tankmon were alerted to the sound of approaching footsteps. They trained their cannons on the sound of the intruder.
"Halt! Who goes there?" one of the Tankmon asked.
The intruder in question who was approaching was Daemon.
"If you gentleman would be so kind as to step aside I will allow you to live," Daemon told the two Tankmon.
"Not a chance pal! Now leave or we'll blow you away!" the other Tankmon warned.
"Don't say that I didn't warn you," Daemon responded before vaporizing the two Digimon with a stream of hellfire shot from his claws.
"You must be in a good mood today," Lilithmon remarked as she suddenly appeared behind Daemon. "Otherwise you would've just killed them without giving them a chance to leave."
"What are you doing here Lilithmon?" Daemon asked without turning to face the Goddess of Darkness.
"I was bored and thought I'd tag along on your little errand. Not that I have to explain myself to you. What are we doing here anyway?"
"Follow me in and you shall find out," Daemon replied as he proceeded to the warehouse door.
A moment later the two demon lords were inside the warehouse. Inside was a giant brown and green mechanical dragon that looked as if it was made of construction equipment. Its neck looked like it had been made with from a backhoe, and it had a drill on the end of its shout. The scoop of a bulldozer was on the front of its torso, and two large drills protruded from its back. Though it had four legs, it also had two small arms with shovels instead of claws. It also had two long tails with drills on the ends, and was wrapped and bound in chains.
"What is this thing?" Lilithmon asked as her eyes adjusted to the dark warehouse.
"That is Brakedramon," Daemon answered. "From what I've learned, this creature was created by those fools the Dark Masters by enhancing a dragon Digimon. But they couldn't control it and it went on a rampage. But instead of destroying this creature they merely sealed it away here."
"So you're going to awaken this creature and have it attack Matt and Tai. I'm sure this creature is powerful, but I doubt it would stand a chance against WarGreymon or MetalGarurumon."
"I do not need Breakedramon to destroy those two Digimon, only to fight them. If Brakedramon is destroyed, then so be it. It is merely a pawn in the grand scheme of my plan."
With that, Daemon began chanting a spell in a foul evil sounding language. Suddenly Brakedramon's eyes flashed red and broke free from its chains with a roar.
Daemon chuckled. "Now the third phase of my plan can begin."
A few hours later in the human world, Matt and Sora had arrived at a small diner with Gabumon and Biyomon. During the trip over Matt noticed that Sora had not said a word, and also seemed a little on edge. When they finally sat at down at a booth, Matt decided to find out what was going on.
"Are you okay Sora?" Matt asked in a concerned tone. "You seem a little on edge, and you haven't said a word since we left the apartment."
"I'm fine," Sora answered nervously before checking her watch.
A moment later Tai showed up with Agumon, surprising both Matt and Gabumon.
"What the hell is he doing here?" Matt asked Sora angrily.
"I could ask the same thing about you! Sora, you told me that you wanted to see me here alone! Why is Matt here?" Tai asked in an equally furious tone.
"Look, I wanted you guys to patch things up. But I knew you wouldn't do it on your own, so I…tricked you both here," Sora explained, sounding a little ashamed. "Maybe I was wrong to do it, but you're both here now, so you might as well sit down and talk things out."
"I'm not sitting at the same table with this jerk!" Tai said defiantly.
"Well I wouldn't want to sit with you either!" Matt shot back.
"Will you both just grow up and sit down?" Sora shouted in a frustrated tone, causing the other patrons at the diner to look in the group's direction.
At the same time, Agumon and Gabumon were glaring at each other, causing Biyomon to sigh heavily. Matt and Tai's argument was suddenly interrupted by a series of short tremors that sounded as if a massive creature was stomping towards them. Immediately the group ran outside to check. What the found was Brakedramon rampaging through the city. Several of the people in the area were running away as quickly as they could.
"What the hell is that?" Tai asked. "It looks like one of those mechanical dinosaurs they have in those American monster truck shows!"
"That's a Brakedramon!" Agumon answered. "It's a dragon Digimon that tried getting more power too fast by replacing most of its body with machinery, and in the process it lost its heart. Now it only lives to destroy."
"Then I guess we better take it down! Go get him Agumon!" Tai commanded, causing the reptile Digimon to nod in response and glow with an orange light.
"Agumon warp digivolve to…WarGreymon!" Agumon cried as he transformed into the dragon warrior, his voice changing with the utterance of his other name.
"You help out too Biyomon!" Sora commanded, to which Biyomon nodded before glowing with a red light.
"Biyomon digivolve to…Birdramon!" Biyomon cried as she transformed into the large fiery bird, though her transformation was not yet complete. "Birdramon digivolve to…Garudamon!"
With her transformation complete, the giant birdman Digimon joined WarGreymon on the battlefield. Already Brakedramon was swinging at the two with its shovel claws. WarGreymon was able to dodge the attacks because of his relatively small size, but Garudamon was having a harder time. Meanwhile Daemon and Liltimon were watching from atop a nearby building.
"I still don't get what you're trying to accomplish with this," Lilithmon told her cohort. "That behemoth of yours is powerful, but WarGreymon alone can destroy it."
"Patience Lilithmon," Daemon responded. "You will see what I am trying to accomplish very soon."
Back on the ground, the battle continued to rage.
"I guess we better help out too. Gabumon, get it there!" Matt commanded.
"You got it!" Gabumon replied as he began glowing with a blue light. "Gabumon warp digivolve to…MetalGarurumon!"
In an instant Gabumon transformed into that giant metal wolf and entered the battlefield. At the same time Brakedramon hit Garudamon in the stomach, causing her to fall to the ground and revert to Biyomon. Immediately Sora ran over to tend to her.
"Let's finish this quick MetalGarurumon!" Matt called to the wolf.
MetalGarurumon nodded and fired several missiles. Unfortunately WarGreymon flew into the path of one of the missiles and was hit in the back. Drills that were fired from Brakedramon's back intercepted the rest of the projectiles.
"Hey! Watch where you fire those things!" WarGreymon shouted at MetalGarurumon.
"Why don't you stay the hell out of my way?" MetalGarurumon growled.
"What the hell were you thinking Matt? WarGreymon almost got blown up!" Tai shouted. "This is just like that stupid stunt you pulled when you were chasing Beelzemon!"
"Hey! I'm just trying to help finish that monster off before it destroys anything else!" Matt shot back.
"WarGreymon and I don't need your help!" Tai argued.
At that moment atop the building, Daemon said a word in his foul hate-filled and raised his right claw. Four red balls of energy appeared right above the claw. Daemon threw the balls and each one went into Tai, Matt, WarGreymon, and MetalGarurumon. When the four were hit, their arguing suddenly began to get worse.
"What did you just do?" Lilithmon asked with a very confused expression.
"I have cast a spell of rage on those four," Daemon answered. "Now the anger they have towards each other will grow until they decide to destroy one another. Of course I had to wait until their anger was at a good enough level to cast the spell, which is the reason for all these attacks. Now all we need to do is watch."
"Wow! I didn't know you could do that."
Daemon chuckled. "How do you think I caused all those civil wars in the southern hemisphere of the Digital World during our rebellion against the gods?"
"Oh yeah. Those were good times." Lilithmon declared with an evil smile.
Back on the ground, Brakedramon fired several more drills at WarGreymon and MetalGarurumon. The two Digimon were hit, but relatively unharmed. WarGreymon in fact became more enraged by the attack.
"I've had enough of you!" WarGreymon shouted as he suddenly charged at Brakedramon.
With one slash from the claw blades on his armor, WarGreymon cut Brakedramon to ribbons in a manner similar to how he destroyed the Dark Master Machinedramon many years ago. The parts of Brakedramon shattered into particles of data and evaporated into the air. With the enemy in front of them gone, WarGreymon and MetalGarurumon reverted to Agumon and Gabumon. At that point, Matt and Tai began punching each other.
"Stop, both of you!" Sora cried as she jumped in between the two while holding an unconscious Biyomon. "I don't know what's gotten into you two, but I don't want to see you hurt each other! What would T.K. and Kari say if they could see you now?"
After a moment, Matt and Tai backed down. Though they both kept glaring at each other.
"This isn't over," Tai warned before storming off with Agumon.
Some time later Matt and Sora returned to the apartment. Neither of them spoke to each other during the entire trip back. The one thing that happened during that trip was that Biyomon regained consciousness. As soon as they entered, Gabumon stormed off to another room with a very angry expression on his face, mumbling some very unkind things about Agumon. Matt's expression meanwhile was very cold, and it worried Sora very much.
"…Are you okay Matt?" Sora asked, breaking the awkward silence. "You haven't spoken since the battle."
Matt did not respond at all to Sora's question. He did not even turn to face her.
"I honestly don't know what's gotten into you and Tai," Sora continued, trying to ignore how Matt was acting. "You and he have always been such good friends. I mean sure, Tai has been a real jerk lately, but remember everything he's been through these past couple of months."
"…There you go again, defending Tai just like always," Matt suddenly spoke in a low and very cold voice. "Why don't you just admit that you're still in love with him?"
"What? Matt, that's crazy!" Sora insisted sounding shocked. "I did have feelings for Tai once, but now I just think of him as a good friend! You're the one I love most!"
"LAIR!" Matt shouted as he turned to face Sora. "Oh sure, when he started treating you like dirt you wanted nothing to do with him! So you settled for me because I was the nearest shoulder to cry on! But now that that idiot is mellowing a little, you're starting to want him back! You were just using me as a seat filler!"
"That's just not true!" Sora insisted, at which point Matt slapped her in the face.
"Get out of here you lying bitch!" Matt shouted. "I don't ever want to see you again!"
Sora gave Matt a very shocked and hurt expression before running out of the apartment sobbing. Biyomon immediately flew off after her. After a few minutes Sora and Biyomon exited the apartment building, unaware that Daemon was atop a nearby building watching them. The demon lord let out an evil laugh; he was delighted that his plan was working perfectly.
Author's Note: Yep, Daemon has really screwed things up for Sora. I don't think I really need to say anything else about this chapter.
Please review and let me know what you think.
