Disclaimer: I do not own Digimon, Sonic, or anything used in this story, except Gear and Frost.

Chapter 9: A Wolf's Cry

Knuckles put his hands up directly in front of his face, as a mean of protection. He put all his weight to his toes and lightly jumped in place. Frost was laughing as he saw this stance. To him it looked like he was trying to avoid a bed of hot coals.

"What's the matter, hothead?" Frost laughed, trying to taunt him. "Got ants in your pants?"

Knuckles smirked at the comment, easily keeping his cool. "You could say that, you frostbitten mutt." Knuckles taunted as a rebuttal, easily making Frost burn up from his icy demeanor.

"I'm not a mutt, you muskrat!" The wolf yelled as he charged at the echidna, his fist curled tightly into a ball. His fist collided with Knuckles' face, as his face was thrown back a bit from the punch, but his body stood its ground. A smirk appeared on the echidna's face as he whipped it back at him, head-butting Frost in the process.

The wolf was forced back a few feet as he was hit by the seemingly weak attack. "So, you are as strong as Lord Metallic said."

"So you work for Lord Metallic, eh? Well then, I'll just have to take you down."

Knuckles rushed at Frost and gave him a great punch in his stomach. The wolf coughed up some blood from the force that came from the punch itself.

"Damn you! You've done it now." Frost managed to groan out as he inhaled greatly. A small blue light appeared in the wolf's mouth as he released a giant blast of ice coming straight towards Knuckles.

As arrogant as he was, Knuckles decided to keep his ground with a smirk. He was hit by the ice and froze into the ice pillar. Frost laughed as he successfully defeated his enemies.

"Yes! I did it! Now I can…" before he could finish, he noticed steam coming from the pillar. It was melting, due to the echidna's intense body heat. Cracks started to form from the inside of the pillar and were weakening at a rapid pace. Knuckles broke free from his icy prison in a matter of seconds, now with a sly grin. Fire started to form in his left hand as he dashed towards the icy wolf and held his flaming fist high aiming straight for the wolf's head. Frost panicked and blew a field of ice, surrounding him like a shield.

"That won't stop me. Flare Grenade!" Knuckles punched through the wall of ice with the flaming fist and gave a direct hit into Frost's jaw. The direct contact of the fist and his jaw, cause the punch to be explosive, engulfing both him and Knuckles in the fiery blast.

Knuckles was unharmed since it was his own attack, but Frost was nowhere in sight. He then heard someone howl in pain. He looked at the forest and saw Frost. His face was bloody and his left eye was closed, blood covering it. His chest had a burn on it and a couple of ice shards were stabbed into his body.

"This isn't the end. I'll be back." He howled as he jumped into the forest, consumed into the darkness, letting him vanish from Knuckles' view.

The Echidna looked at the ice forms of his current team. He decided that they shouldn't be in there and will break them free. He started with Emerl first. He made his fist do a couple of circles before he started punching them rapidly. Each second, more than 20 punches hit the ice, slowly crumbling it. As he got Emerl's head free, the robot managed to get the rest of him free.

"Koji…Or should I say Master Knuckles." The robot started. "Well, it seams you defeated that wolf. Wonder what he wanted?"

"His name was Frost. He said he was working for Lord Metallic. Probably to get the spirits for his little dirty work." Emerl was surprised at the outlook of this now. He already knew it would be hard looking for the rest f the spirits, but now that Lord Metallic brought in non-machines to help, it was going to be close to impossible now if they don't do anything fast.

"Right. Well, we might as well unfreeze the others." Knuckles nodded as he and Emerl started to break everyone free of their icy prisons. Within about 20 minutes, all of them were free. They were all freezing and their bodies shook to prove it. Knuckles decided to warm them up by using his heat on some firewood. The D-Tectors started to beep.

As Knuckles looked at it, a white glow surrounded him, Sonic, Amy, and Tails. When the glow faded, they were back to their normal selves. Koji looked around and noticed Roki still passed out on the roof of the center of the village. The raven-haired teen placed his hands against the solid mud and wood hut and started to climb it. His arm muscles began to strain with each foot he surpassed. Sweat began to drip down his forehead and his hands were getting heavy. He got to the top of the building and noticed that Roki was still on the floor, passed out. He ran over to her and check if she was hurt. Lucky enough, she only had a small scratch on her leg from Frost's claw. Roki started to moan and her eyes slowly opened.

"Koji…" she muttered. "Is that you?"

"Yeah. Its me." The raven-haired teen said with a smile on his face, which was unusual. "Come on we've got to get out of here."

He got Roki up and they both slid down the building onto the ground. They looked at everyone else to see if they were okay. Tommy and J.P were okay in a matter of minutes, but Izumi and Takuya were still freezing. They had to huddle close to each other to keep warm, but they looked away from each other.

"Those two are too embarrassed." Roki giggled. "They are practically made for each other."

"Seems like it." Koji went back to his cold and emotionless demeanor, only to show the Spirit Evolution didn't change his attitude, but it actually did. He felt not only the strength Takuya and Tommy were talking about back at Hang Castle, but he also felt something else. He felt himself being incredibly hot and loved it. He was lost in thoughts until Emerl snapped him out of it.

"Okay. The closest place we can go to now is Metal City." The robot stated as he was reading his book. "The birthplace of both Gear and I."

"Hooray! We get to go home!" Gear screamed, and Emerl bashed her in the back of her head to make her be quiet.

"Will you shut up? Last time you did that, we had a robotic wolf coming at us. Lord Metallic could've sent more of his non-machine army at us." Emerl sighed and looked at Takuya and Izumi. "Come on you lovebirds. Best we be going."

"We are not lovebirds!" Both Takuya and Izumi yelled simultaneously making them both blush and look away from each other. Emerl sighed as they both got up and they got ready to leave for Metal City.

Hours have passed since they got away from their previous spot. They were stuck at a fork in the road. No one had a choice on what side to choose. The path on the left led to a forest area, while the path on the right led to a fairly large hill. Takuya walked to the middle of the fork and turned to face the group.

"I say we go the path on the right." Takuya stated. "It's a much more open space, so no sneak attacks." There was some nodding between the group but Izumi walked forward and pointed to the path going left.

"Well, I say we go left. If we go through the right path, it would take longer than we have to go. Also, if we do have to camp out, we already have shelter." Even more nodding and clamoring was heard.

"Why the hell should we do that? I mean, what if there is a sneak attack while we are there like that last five times already."

"We are prepared as it is, so we can be ready for it."

Takuya started to get angry and it started an argument between the two. Everyone sighed, but they knew it was inevitable.

"Those two are an old fashioned couple. Always fighting, but they do make up. In more than one way." Roki said with a slightly sultry tone. Koji looked at her with his eyebrow raised.

"What the fuck are you getting at Roki?" Koji asked as she walked towards the bickering teens and got between them, stopping their argument.

"Now listen here. I don't care how long it would take to get to Metal City," the blue-haired girl stated. "But I can tell that either way, we will get to our destination. As for my decision, I choose the path on the right. Not because it would take longer, but its clear, so there must be at least a town we can stay there for."

Everyone but Emerl and Izumi agreed and they all set off to the right path. Izumi felt rather sad knowing that no one wanted to use her idea, but this wasn't the first time this happened before. To her at least.

Flashback

A younger version of Izumi sat onto the floor, crying. Her knees hugged her chest. Her school uniform was ripped and tattered as a swarm of girls surrounded her. They wore the same school uniform as her consisting of a red vest with a white dress shirt and short red skirts that went down to their thighs. Various girls either wore high heels or a pair of the school dress shoes. Their faces were covered by shadows, but their eyes were glowing white and they all had sadistic smirks attached to their faces. It was one of her worst memories she had since she was in Italy and also the worst in her life so far.

"Well, girls. She tried to steal one of our boys to make hers. Typical for an Asian girl to steal men like they are nothing but candy." One girl said. Kicking the blond in the face. She was face down on the floor and blood dripped from her mouth. Another kick was sent towards her stomach. She grunted as a response to the force of the kick.

"We should call her as she really is." Another girl stated with some venom in her voice. "A 'puttana'."

That word made Izumi feel like she just got shot point blank in the head. Tears started to form even more as every girl in the mob kept repeating that word and continued kicking her. She was battered and bruised with every hit. All she thought now was for this all to stop.

The girls eventually got bored of beating her and went home, now proud of their work. The blond got up, still sobbing. The tears weren't going to stop just because they stopped beating her. They ruined her self-esteem. She got up and ran to her house, which was on the other side of Città delle luci, the city she lived in at the time. She ran home and opened the door. Her mother and father weren't going to be home by this time, which was bad for her, as she wanted her parents at this moment. She walked up to her room. The room was rather large with pink and white wallpaper. On the walls were posters of various anime she liked and a scroll with the words 'Love is everything' in Kanji. She ripped up all the posters and scrolls as her way of venting her depression, but to no avail.

She then stripped off her clothes and walked to the bathroom. It was a normal bathroom with white tiles and the floor being of the same color. She looked at herself in the mirror. The blood that was coming from her mouth had dried and coagulated. She looked lower. There were bruises all over her body. The more serious ones being the heel mark on her left breast. It was red and looked like it was starting to bleed internally. There were also massive bruises on her stomach as well as her back and legs. She looked at herself in the mirror. She despised herself for what she did. Right then and there, she had the thought of killing herself. However, she didn't have the guts to do it. Not yet at least.

Flashback end

Izumi was lost in her train of thought, when she collided with Takuya, who apparently stopped. She looked back at Takuya and started getting mad for abruptly stopping, but also glad now that it knocked her out of her bad thoughts.

"What the hell, Takuya?" she asked angrily. She noticed the others stop and stare at something. She was really confused at what they were looking at. She moved away from Takuya to get a better look. It was a tavern. Just a regular tavern at one of the most godforsaken places on Mobius so far. Behind the tavern was a small village, much like the one they were in, but it wasn't ransacked.

"Do you think we should go in?" J.P asked curiously as he held his stomach. After an hour of picking berries and vomiting them up again, he was still hungry.

"Well, we don't have any money." Emerl replied. "But, we may be able to do work for the money around town, and possibly spend the night."

Everyone nodded, except Koji, who started having second thoughts on this idea. He felt like something was terribly wrong in this town. He felt this in his gut. But, he had to keep his cool and try to keep on watch while they were in the town. With the unanimous vote, the group decided to walk into the tavern, unaware that in the last tree of the forest area was three figures staring at them from the distance.

How do you like this chapter. Some of Izumi's past is revealed and yet again, the group found a place in the middle of nowhere and are stalked by a group of people. Is it Lord Metallic's personal non-machine army, or just some pedestrians watching over the town. Find out next chapter of What Time Will Tell. Please R&R. Also, 'puttana' means 'whore' in Italian, since Izumi went to school there. Its good to know some new words in a different language.