New Soul Reborn
Chapter 3: Relapse
Deserts can be a fascinating natural phenomenon. They are formed when rain clouds from the ocean are unable to reach an area either because there is too great a distance or mountains stand in the way. Though conditions in the desert tend to be unmerciful, life has learned to adapt to the harsh terrain.
Of course, that mostly applies to the real world. In the Digital World, the Desert Plain stretches on forever, with no clouds except dust clouds and sandstorms and only a few sheltered spots are able to support life.
BlackGreymon was finding himself in a difficult position. He had been wandering for hours without finding anything except rock formations. "There has to be more to this," said BlackGreymon as he walked into a circle of stone pillars. "My purpose cannot be to be a nomad in this endless wasteland. I must find a way to escape this digital sandtrap."
"Lost your way?" BlackGreymon spun around to locate the source of the voice. "Up here." BlackGreymon looked up to see a Digimon squatting on top of a pillar. His form basically resembled that of a human skeleton. His jaw bone, the bat symbol on his forehead, and the bones that made up his arms and torso were red wile the rest was black. His lower body was covered by black pants with two brown loincloth-like flaps on his front and back. His hands and feet had grey gloves and boots on them. In the middle of his ribcage was a large black Digicore. He had bat-like wings coming from his back and similar protrusions coming from his skull. He held a staff in one hand that had a yellow orb gripped by three claws on one end and a hook on the other end.
BlackGreymon growled and said, "SkullSatamon."
SkullSatamon looked surprised. "You head of me?" he asked.
"Just enough to know that talking to you would be a bad idea," said BlackGreymon, "Good day." He turned around and started to leave.
Faster than BlackGreymon's eyes could follow, SkullSatamon sprang to the pillar in front of where BlackGreymon was going. "Now wait a minute," said the Ghost Digimon, "I heard you want to get out of this desert. I can arrange that."
"I think I can manage on my own," said the Dinosaur Digimon as he turned away.
SkullSatamon jumped onto the pillar in front of BlackGreymon. "Not likely," he said, "You'd never be able to get to any other plain, let alone the real world." This time, BlackGreymon did not turn away. "Ah, finally caught your interest, have I?" said SkullSatamon, "I can transport you to the real world faster than you can say 'keep your hands feet inside at all times'. There is just one small token fee."
"And that is?" asked BlackGreymon.
"There is a group of kids in the real world and some traitorous Digimon who partnered with them."
BlackGreymon's eyes widened slightly. "The Digidestined?"
"Yeah, sure, the Digidestined, let's go with that," said SkullSatamon, "Anyways, you don't have to pay here, but when you get to the real world, you have to destroy the Digidestined. What do you say?" SkullSatamon was grinning widely, as skulls could easily do.
"No thank you," said BlackGreymon.
SkullSatamon's expression changed to that of complete puzzlement. "What was that?" he asked.
"I have no quarrels with he Digidestined and no reason to destroy them," said BlackGreymon, "And I know that anyone who wants to destroy them has less than pure intentions."
"Listen, I don't think you understand," said SkullSatamon, "I'm offering a virtually free trip to the real world. Lots of Digimon would kill for that chance."
"Then offer it to them, I'm not interested," said BlackGreymon as he turned to leave.
SkullSatamon scowled and said, "No one says 'no' to me!" He swung the hook end of his staff towards BlackGreymon and a stream of black energy shot out and wrapped his left leg. BlackGreymon roared in pain as the energy solidified into a Dark Ring and shocked him. "Thos kids' Digimon are tough," said SkullSatamon, "Better give him a power boost."
SkullSatamon pointed the orb end of his staff and shot a red beam at the Dark Ring which glowed the same color. The glow spread over BlackGreymon and his form grew and changed. When the light faded, the Dark Ring was now a Dark Spiral and BlackGreymon had digivolved. But this wasn't natural digivolution, his body was now completely skeletal with six spines growing from his back. An orange missile with a toothy mouth on the end was in his ribcage and protruded out behind his neck. His head had only one horn now and it was in the middle of his cranium and his eyes glowed bright red.
"Love the new look," commented SkullSatamon, "Now let's see how you fare in the real world." He tapped the pillar he was standing on with his staff and all the pillars began glowing green. SkullGreymon was surrounded by an orb of light of the same color which shot up into the sky towards the sphere which represented the real world. "The master will be real pleased if this works," said SkullSatamon before flying away.
In Tokyo, Japan…
There are several different business buildings in Japan. But one in particular stood out among them. It was a normal building for the first few floors, but then it branched into two towers parallel of each other. But the building's design wasn't all that separated it from other buildings. It was the headquarters of Hypnos, an organization that was originally intended to monitor electronic communications, but now acting as a sort of police force to deal with rogue Digimon. At the moment, two women were busy monitoring using their high-tech supercomputer. They were both in two seats of a cherry picker-like machine in the middle of a room with holographic walls.
Suddenly one of them, named Tally, looked at her monitor and said, "There's a Wild One trying to breach through the net."
"Activate the firewall," said the other, whose name was Riley.
"I'm trying, but it's passing through as if it were just mist," said Tally.
Riley tried to reinforce the firewall through her monitor, but that met with no success either. "I can't stop it, it's going to enter the real world."
A man with blond hair and a black business suit was watching the two women work. Yamaki looked up through his dark sunglasses and said, "Do we know what it is?"
"It's an Ultimate level," said Riley, "Which is odd. I thought we could repel Ultimate levels."
"Some are stronger than others," said Yamaki, "Try to see where it will bio-emerge." He reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone. It was time to call those who can handle Digimon who break through.
The Tamers were currently hanging out at Takato's house. They were eating popcorn while watching a movie on the TV. Things had gotten very quiet after Kurata had been arrested. Veemon and Gabumon had returned to the Digital World and Mark and Robomon decided to head over to America to deal with Digimon that could appear. And since Hypnos had upgraded their firewall system, not that many Digimon have gotten into the real world. In a way, it was nice to be able to relax. Yet at the same time, it was dreadfully boring.
Suddenly Takato's cell phone rang. He answered it, "Hello? Yamaki? An Ultimate level? It's going to appear at Highton View Terrace? Okay, we'll right over." He hung up and said, "Guys, we've got work to do."
Not much longer afterwards, Takato, Henry, and Rika were heading towards Highton View Terrace. They had digivolved their partners to Ultimate level and were riding them. As they approached the fogbank, the group kept their eyes out for the rogue Digimon. They didn't have to look long. The large dinosaur skeleton was very hard to miss, especially with it roaring at the top of its lungs. Rika checked his digivice, "It's SkullGreymon, an Undead Digimon, his personality's-"
"We know," said Takato.
"What?"
"SkullGreymon appeared on Digimon Adventures," said Henry, "I didn't think we'd be meeting one ourselves."
"Ok then," said Rika, sounding annoyed, "Then what did the SkullGreymon on that show do?"
"DARK SHOT!" shouted SkullGreymon and fired the missile out of his ribcage. The missile flew straight at WarGrowlmon, who just managed to deflect it upward with a swipe from his claws. The missile headed upwards and created a large explosion. "Exactly that," said Takato.
"This Digimon is too violent," said Taomon.
"She's right," said Rapidmon, "you kids better get off. We don't want you getting hit with us."
The Tamers were put on a rooftop and watched their Digimon attack SkullGreymon. Taomon used her Talisman Spell while Rapidmon used Tri Beam. Both attacks hit SkullGreymon but they didn't seem to do anything. SkullGreymon responded by swatting them out of the air and into the sides of buildings. WarGrowlmon went for the more physical route and started to grapple with SkullGreymon. They seemed to be about evenly matched, but SkullGreymon's rage was giving him extra strength. He slowly managed to push WarGrowlmon back and then to shove him onto the ground.
"Guys! You can't stay down!" called Rika.
"You have to get up!" called Henry.
"Don't let him win!" called Takato.
The three Digimon attempted to remove themselves from their individual craters. But suddenly SkullGreymon called out, "CURSE BREATH!" A purple cloud of gas came out of SkullGreymon's mouth and spread across the area. As soon as the gas enveloped the Tamers' Digimon, they became paralyzed. Then SkullGreymon shouted, "DOUBLE DARK SHOT!" and shot two missiles into the air.
"DOUBLE IMPACT!" Two bullets shot up and hit the missiles, causing them to explode. SkullGreymon turned to look at the source of the bullets. He saw four figures on another rooftop. One was another human, a girl with brown hair and brown eyes. She wore a green dress over a yellow shirt and large shoes. The others were Digimon. One was small, white, had purple feet, green eyes, large ears that seemingly allowed it to fly, and a red and black triangular mark on its forehead. The second Digimon resembled a tall humanoid lion with black pants and a sword at his belt. The third Digimon resembled a biker wearing black leather with a metallic tail and a dark blue helmet that covered the top of his head with three holes to allow his three red eyes to see through. In his hand was the shotgun that had fired the bullets.
"Jeri, what are you doing here?" called Takato.
"Leomon sensed a Digimon coming into the real world," Jeri called back. "We came here as soon as we could and we met Impmon along the way."
"Always glad to be of service," said the biker Digimon.
Meanwhile, Henry had been studying SkullGreymon. He was only an Ultimate level so it should have been weakened by the others' attacks. He also noticed that his eyes were red instead of blue. He was pretty sure that when SkullGreymon appeared on Digimon Adventures, he had blue eyes. No, wait, there was one time he had red eyes. And that was when…
Henry looked down and noticed the black object coiled around SkullGreymon's left leg. "Beelzemon!" he cried, "I figured it out. He has a Dark Spiral on him. You have to break it!"
"No problem," said Beelzemon as he aimed his gun again, "DOUBLE IMPACT!" Two bullets whizzed out and hit the Dark Spiral. It cracked on impact and dissolved into data. SkullGreymon let out a loud roar as its eyes changed to blue.
"Great," said Takato, "now let's finish him off while he's-" Suddenly SkullGreymon's data shimmered. Then he became covered in yellow light. His body's shape shifted before the light dimmed away. Now he was covered in flesh again. He looked a lot like Greymon now, only he had cybernetic implants on his tail and chest. His left arm was completely mechanical as well as his helmet. Red hair poked out from underneath the helmet and purple tattered wings extended from his back. Most noticeably, his skin was blue with darker blue strips and his eyes were yellow with black slits for pupils.
"That's not good," said Jeri, "He shifted to BlackMetalGreymon."
Leomon turned to the white Digimon and said, "Calumon, you must give enough strength to digivolve."
"You got it," said Calumon and the mark on his head began to glow.
"Leomon digivolve to… IceLeomon!" Leomon briefly vanished in a flash of light before reappeared, his orange fur now a frosty white.
"We better stop him now before he does anymore-" started Rika and stopped when BlackMetalGreymon started glowing too.
"Oh no," said Henry, "He must have been affected by Calumon's power." BlackMetalGreymon was covered in white light as he shouted out, "BlackMetalGreymon digivolve to… BlackWarGreymon!" The light faded to reveal a smaller Digimon that resembled a warrior dressed in draconic armor. The group tensed as they waited for the Mega Digimon to attack them. Instead, he turned his head, examining his surroundings. Then he stared down at himself and said, "At last, I have my original form again." He turned to the Tamers and said, "Thank you for releasing me and restoring my full power." He turned around to leave.
"Uh, wait," called Takato, "Are you going to fight us?"
"I have no quarrels with any of the humans of this world, let alone the Digidestined. All I wish is to be left in peace." With that, BlackWarGreymon walked off, the rapidly fading fog allowing him to disappear from sight.
The Tamers and their Digimon just stared a few seconds. Then Calumon broke the confusing silence, "What did he just call us?"
And there's another chapter. I've worked on the part involving SkullSatamon during my vacation in Baltimore. The part in the real world was more recent. So now BlackWarGreymon's back to his original form and he's in the real world now. Could his purpose be somewhere there? And who is the master that SkullSatamon serves? Find out more on the next update. Please review.