Chapter Fourteen

New Recruits

After that incredibly awkward moment, wait what moment? Oh yeah, the moment when Caroline so dramatically put me on the spot. Hey here's Tonia she just had her house smashed to smithereens, oh, and by the way we're all special! Whoop dee doo. I just want to go home, oh wait I can't!

Anyway, moving on.

"So, Tonia, what's going on?" Brian asked, practically breathing down my neck, his little wizard companion trotting along beside him. Caroline led the way back the way we'd come. She and Lillymon had their heads together, speaking in quite tones.

"Tonia?"

"Hell if I know," I muttered.

"How did you end up with that girl anyway?"

I could just say 'long story,' but it really wasn't all that long of a story, so I told him in unenthusiastic tones.

"Whoa," was Brian's enlightening reply. And he went on to pronounce. "That sucks."

"Yep," I concurred. "Got a cell phone?"

"What? Yeah sure." He pulled a slide phone out of his pocket. It had one of those touch screens. Me, being unaccustomed to phone technology, took twice as long to dial my dad's number than it should have. Yep, I'm pretty sad. But, alas I got ahold of my distressed father.

"Tonia!" my father practically shouted into the phone causing me to involuntarily jerk the cell from my ear. "Thank god, you're alright. Where are you?"

"With some friends." It wasn't quite a lie. "Um, I guess you know about the house?"

"Yes, what happened? Are you alright?"

"Yeah, is mom…" It was suddenly difficult to speak. Wow, am I chocking up? Well… let's not get ahead of ourselves .Tonia, calm the fuck down.

"She's going to be fine," Dad said. "She had a few broken ribs and cuts but with a few stiches the doctor's say she'll be fine."

I let out a breath, not realizing that I'd been holding it. Guess I'm not quite as devoid of emotion as I thought. "That's good." I realized that I'd stopped walking. Brian stood next to me and Caroline waited a few feet ahead of us. She had her arms crossed and was gazing indifferently into the night. Of course she was…

"Where are you? I'll pick you up."

"Uh. It's okay." I found myself saying. "I just need to be with my friends right now. I'm alright, don't worry." And before he could say more I tried to press End, but I couldn't find the button so I just handed the phone back to Brian, who had far less trouble finding the End button.

"What happened?" Brian asked brows furrowed in concern.

I let my hair fall in front of my face and started walking again.

"Hey, come on. Look, would someone explain to me what's going on?" He chased after me.

"Now you ask," Caroline muttered, not loud enough for Brian to hear her.

Brian's phone rang, by he didn't answer it. "Tonia, is everything okay?"

"Yeah," I said. "Don't worry about it."

"Okay," Brian replied slowly, but his curiosity wasn't slated. He rounded on Caroline. "So what's going on?"

She let out a breath. "Look, I'll explain but not until I've gotten all of you together. I don't like repeating myself. Do you have the number of your other friend who saw the ghost? We need to find him before Myoticmon does."

"You mean Josh? Wait, who's uh, myo-whatsit?"

"You don't need to worry about him," Wizardmon interjected. "I was the one the bakamon first reported to. I took care of him before coming to find Brian."

"Huh," Caroline said and continued with heavy sarcasm "Now here I thought Digimon who'd received the calling didn't have to go asking around to find their partners. They know where they are."

Wizardmon narrowed his eyes. "I did know, but I wanted to make sure no one else had found him."

"Uh, huh."

"I don't have to convince you of anything," Wizarmon said and arched his head to look up at Brian. "I am your digimon and will protect you no matter what."

"Uh, thanks," Brian said. "I'll protect you too."

Wizardmon looked away. "Somehow, I don't think you'll be very effective."

Brian gawked. "What's that supposed to mean? Hey I thought you were on my side!"

"I meant that you are human so there really isn't much you can do to protect me. Of course I'm on your side."

Brian opened his mouth, looking angry, but Caroline cut him off.

"Do you have his number or not?"

Brian's anger quickly turned to confusion. "Who's number?"

Caroline gritted her teeth. "Your friend that saw the ghost."

"You mean Josh? Wait a moment," Brian said slowly his expression displaying a look that can only be described as one having an epiphany. "That Ghost! It was the Ghost that gave us our powers! That's it. From us seeing the ghost we-"

"Oh, for god's sake, no!" Caroline shouted. "And you don't have any powers, you twat. Look, just call your friend and ask him to meet us."

"We don't have any powers?" Brian's disappointment couldn't have been plainer. He looked as if all his dreams had been crushed. It wouldn't have come as a great shock to me if they really had been. "That sucks."

"Will you just call your friend?"

"Yeah, alright," Brian said after a few seconds. He still hadn't gotten over the loss of not having powers. Wait, what?

The sounds of a car approaching drew our attention from Brian. My eyes flickered from Lillymon, hovering a few feet above the ground to Wizardmon, and his ridiculous hat, and I wondered just what would the passing stranger make of us.

Apparently a lot, the car slowed and pulled up to the sidewalk. Caroline's eyes narrowed, her mouth growing taught. I almost felt sorry for the poor strangers gawking at us. Wait… is that?

The passenger's window rolled down and Jessie's wide eyes met mine.

"Tonia?" She asked, poking her head out the window. The car came to a stop. At the wheel was none other than Justin, Jessie's supposedly Ex-boyfriend, who apparently didn't like me. His expression could have given Caroline a run for her money.

"What's he doing here?" Justin nodded his head at Brian, or Wizardmon; not the first words I'd expect, but hey I should know better.

"Oh, Wizardmon?" Caroline said in far too sweet of a voice. "He's this dolts digimon." She jerked her thumb at Brian, who appeared relieved that he wasn't the one Justin was glaring daggers at.

"You shitting me?"

"Oh, I really wish I was."

Wait. What? Does Justin know Caroline and Wizardmon?

"Wizardmon!" a voice shouted from the back of the car and the next moment Jessie let out a yelp as something round and pink flew from the back onto her lap. "Let me at him I'll bite his head off!" The pink thing had the hugest mouth and despite not having legs, or any sort of limbs aside from two flimsy I-don't-know-what's sprouting from its head, it jump for the window. However, Justin caught it by its uh, antenna's? Ear's?

"Koromon, he's a friend now!" Justin yelled.

Jessie shrunk form the pink head, Koromon, hands poised protectively in front of her face. "Please get it away from me…"

"Rarg! Koromon smash!" the little pink head shouted.

"Can't guarantee that," Caroline said. "But we have no reason to attack him now. He's willing to join us if, uh," she glanced over her shoulder at Brian, clearly forgetting his name. "Peabrain is." She settled with that.

Well, that' an improvement from dumbass… sorta.

"Oh, he's a friend now?" Koromon said and immediately quit trying to escape out the window.

Caroline opened her mouth, but seemed to decide that Justin deserved an earful instead. "So, you ignore my calls, blow me off for a date with your ex-girlfriend, meanwhile I'm spending half the night running for my life while tracking down recruits… You better have a good explanation." The glare she mustered put her others to shame.

Justin opened his mouth, looking angry however, Jessie beat him to a retort.

"We are NOT dating!" she bellowed. "And GET THIS THING AWAY FROM ME!" she then proceeded to grab Koromon and throw him out the window.

Koromon rolled across some stranger's lawn, but didn't appear too bothered at just being thrown out a window. He bounded right up to Wizardmon, and despite being one tenth Wizardmon's size, bounced up to head level, laughing like a lunatic.

"Hi. I'm Koromon. I'm Justin's Digimon! And sense you're my friend I won't bite your head off!"

"That's very kind of you," Wizardmon said. He edged closer to Brian.

"Yeah, I know. Hey, what's your name?" he bounced over to Brian, who watched the pink head rise and fall, quite puzzled by the things capability to reach such height without the use of limbs.

"Uh, Brian…" Brian said. He still had his cellphone out.

"Did you get a hold of your friend?" Caroline asked.

"What?" Brian started.

"Josh," I supplied.

"Oh, uh right."

"Josh? Is he going to come with us? Hey!" Koromon said, bouncing towards me. I backed away… slowly. "Don't be afraid I'm Koromon. I'm your friend! You're part of the team now too aren't you?"

"Uh…" I considered running, the thing was getting close. Luckily, Lillymon caught it by its antenna's. "Leave her alone Koromon you're scaring her!"

"Ow! Let go of me! I'll bight your head off!"

"Someone's overly violent today…" Lillymon said, dropping Koromon to keep him from biting her.

"Sorry," Justin said, apologizing on the little heads behalf, who proceeded to throw itself at Wizardmon's face. It latched on, and I wasn't sure if it was eating Wizardmon or what.

"Ah! What is it doing?" Brian said attempting to grab Koromon but Wizardmon started running in circles trying to get the pink head off his face.

"Oh, don't worry he's probably just kissing him," Justin said and smiled apologetically. "I gave him two Monsters."

"You mean you fed him two digimon?" Lillymon asked, aghast.

"He means the energy drink." For the first time, Caroline sounded amused. "That really was a bad idea."

"I just wondered what would happen." Justin shrugged.

Brian finally managed to get ahold of Koromon and peeled him off Wizardmon's face.

"What you want a kiss too? Okay!" Koromon smiled and the next thing Brian was trying to keep the little pink monsters off his face.

"Well great job with the recruits! Two in one night! Wow!" Justin said and smiled at Caroline.

This seemed to remind Caroline that she wasn't supposed to be smirking at Brian's attempts to save his face. She scowled and threw a death glare at Brian. "Yes, three, actually, in one night. Whereas, you've only managed to find one person in what three years? Four? Stunning, just stunning, tell me what was it you've been doing? Cause apparently looking for help wasn't top on your list."

Justin matched Caroline's glare with one of his own. "I was a bit preoccupied with keeping Myotismon and his followers from the gate."

"Which, you failed at as well."

"Look I didn't have time to search around, hell I hardly had time to get two days a week in the human world. If I would have had help sooner maybe-"

"You might have had help sooner if you would have actually spent some amount of time looking! One night I find three, no, four! One night!" Caroline snapped.

"Look you don't know what it's like. You wouldn't have been able to find anyone if I wasn't guarding the border!"

"Guarding the border my ass! I spent half the night running from Myotismon! You were off somewhere smooching with your ex!"

"WE ARE NOT DATEING!" Jessie bellowed again. "And as far as I'm concerned you can have him."

Caroline couldn't have looked more disgusted.

"Come on you two, you shouldn't be fighting," Koromon said, no longer trying to latch onto anyone's face. "We have a team now. We should be celebrating."

Lillymon nodded. "You're not showing a good example to the new recruits."

I guess I'm a bit slow but… were they referring to Brian and I? Because, not to be cliché or anything but… I didn't sign up for this.