Tamers Unlimited
Chapter Three: Midnight Twilight
"Stop!" The voice echoed.
And indeed they stopped. Kyuubimon even somehow managed to avoid hitting Impmon despite being in midair. Takato looked at the source.
"It's you…?"
It was the boy with the Terriermon. Terriermon himself was already running down the hill.
As for Renamon's Tamer, well, she looked more annoyed than anything else.
"What do you want, Jenrya?" She shouted.
"You were going to kill them Ruki!" He shouted back.
She frowned at him, which made him do a double take.
"And you're not supposed to!" He added, sounding exasperated.
"I know that!" Ruki nearly snarled. "If you look closely, you'll notice he isn't dead!"
"Only because we got here in time!"
"Hey, it's not my fault he didn't want to back down!"
"But it is your fault that you didn't!"
Ruki sighed in disgust and irritation.
"Renamon, let's go." She said as she turned and walked away.
Kyuubimon glanced at her Tamer once before leaping towards her. She reverted to Renamon in mid-leap. She silently followed Ruki.
It was only after they left sight that Takato released a breath he hadn't know he'd been holding. He quickly rushed to Impmon's side; just in time, as it turned out, to catch his partner before he fell.
"Use this." Jenrya's voice said. Takato glanced up at him and noticed he was holding a card in his hands.
A 'Seed of Health' card.
Takato quickly took it and swiped it through his Digivice. He held his breath as he watched Impmon intently; he was quickly getting better. When the healing stopped, he wasn't in particularly good condition, but even so, he didn't look like he was close to death, either.
Takato breathed a sigh of relief before looking at Jenrya again.
"Thanks. You're…" Takato's brow furrowed in thought as he tried to remember if he'd heard the name Jenrya before. He went to the same school, so he must have at least heard of him. "…Lee-kun, right? Lee Jenrya-kun from Class One?"
"That's me. And you're Matsuda Takato-kun from Class Two, aren't you?"
"That's me." Takato repeated.
"Though," Lee continued. "My name's actually Lee Jianliang."
Takato lifted an eyebrow.
"Chinese?" He wondered.
"From my father's side, yeah."
"So," Takato said, remember there were more important things to worry about then pleasantries. "You're Terriermon's Tamer, right?"
He was a hundred percent sure he was, but he needed a place to start the conversation.
"Yes, I am. And you're Impmon's Tamer, aren't you?"
"Uh-huh." Takato replied. "And that girl was…?"
"Makino Ruki, Renamon's Tamer."
"Makino?" Takato asked. The name sounded vaguely familiar. "I think I know that name."
"Yeah, her mom's kind of famous."
Takato thought about pursuing that line of questioning before he realized that he honestly didn't care about Ruki's Mom.
"You said something about Ruki nearly killing Impmon when she wasn't supposed to, right?"
Lee sighed, before he turned to leave and beckoned for Takato to follow.
"Let's take this somewhere a little more private. This is an important topic, and has a lot to do with why I'm here."
They ended up moving to a somewhat more secluded area of the park. Takato's partner was still unconscious; something that came as no surprise to Takato, considering the beating he'd been given. Takato quietly hoped this wouldn't take too long; he wanted to get Impmon somewhere that he could rest in peace.
"You've probably realized that since Digimon exist, there is probably a Digital World." Lee stated.
"Uh-huh."
"You've probably also realized that Digimon can cross between their world and ours, at least some of the time. This is proven by the presence of our partners."
"Yeah."
"And has Impmon told you what their world is like?"
"A little bit; he made it sound pretty bad."
"What you probably haven't thought about is the inherent consequences of these three things. Basically, their world sucks and they can escape it by coming here."
Takato nodded to show that he was following.
"Now this would be, at the very least, theoretically okay if they were all peaceful creatures. Unfortunately, the Digital World is not a place that favors either peace or compassion. The weak die and the strong feed off the weak. This is the one and only constant of the Digital World. Most of the Digimon that end up coming here aren't the types that are very nice to humans; most of the time they just come here looking for easier prey. In other words, for us humans."
Takato thought about the implications of that.
"That doesn't sound good." He said aloud.
"It's not. And it's made even worse by the extreme power of the Digimon; even at Child and Adult levels, the only types of weapons that work well are the types of weapons that generally aren't good to employ in the middle of Tokyo. As a Digimon evolves, the list of effective modern weapons steadily approaches zero."
Takato thought about his Digimon cards; especially the Perfect and Ultimate level Digimon. He thought about what could happen if one of them entered the Real World. He didn't like the thought, mainly because it quickly devolved into apocalyptic scenarios.
But at the same time…
Lee continued.
"But that's not to say the situation is hopeless. A number of Digimon have, for whatever reason, bonded with human beings; with Tamers. And while modern weapons can only work in theory, since we can't really bomb downtown every time a Child shows up, the effectiveness of Digimon on other Digimon has proven to work quite well in practice."
"…Proven? It's been done before? By who?" Takato asked after a moment of silent surprise.
"By Hypnos." Lee said.
If anything, that just made Takato even more confused.
"Who's Hypnos?"
"We are." A new voice cut in.
Takato managed to keep from leaping out of his own skin, but it was a near thing. It was only just then that he realized that he was really jumpy.
It probably had something to do with the number of people that seem to pop out of nowhere.
Takato looked behind him at the voice. It was a blond haired man in a black suit. He also wore a pair of black shades. His expression could have been carved out of stone. In his hand, he held a lighter, but Takato couldn't see any cigarettes.
Behind him were several other men in suits, but Takato could tell just by looking at them that the blonde was the leader. He wasn't sure how he knew; maybe the way the stood, or where they were positioned, or maybe just some part of body language that he just subconsciously recognized as difference. But however he knew, he did know; the blonde with the shades was in charge, the rest of them were here for show more than anything else.
"And who are you?" Takato asked a bit roughly. Partially because he was getting annoyed at being surprised, and partially because his heart had leapt into his throat and was currently pounding.
Lee cut in.
"This is Yamaki Mitsuo. He's in charge at Hypnos."
Takato filled that away; it revealed several things. Hypnos wasn't a person; it was an organization of some sort. It had some relation the Digimon and the Tamers, probably an important one since the boss himself came down to say hello to the newest Tamer. And finally, whatever it was, whatever it did, it was related to Lee, and, based off the comments Lee had exchanged with Ruki before she'd left, probably with her, as well. Based off the comments, it seemed like 'Hypnos employed the Tamers for some reason' was a possible and probably likely option.
Keeping in mind that he was a Tamer, and this was the leader of a group that probably employed Tamers, the obvious conclusion would seem to be…
"Are you offering me a job?" Takato asked.
To the side, Jenrya looked surprised, but Yamaki didn't seem to care.
"You catch on quick." He said.
"I've had, like, half an hour to think about this." Takato said dismissively.
"Regardless, yes, I am offering you a job."
"I'm only sixteen; I'm not legally allowed to work on dangerous or harmful jobs." Takato repeated what he'd heard in class in a dull tone. He didn't really care; he just wanted to know if this job was going to be something legal or illegal before he went any further. He wasn't sure how the answer would affect his opinion until after he learnt what the job was, but he figured this was the type of thing he should know about from the very beginning.
"That won't be a problem." Yamaki dismissed the question.
Takato frowned.
"So it's illegal?"
"No, we just have really good connections." Yamaki said with a definite smirk.
Takato blinked a few times at that. Several things came to mind at that statement, including rich people and government conspiracies.
He thought about asking but decided against; he still had bigger questions to ask.
"And what is the job you're offering, Yamaki-san?"
Yamaki didn't seem to be put off by the sudden change in questioning. He seemed like a guy who could roll with the punches.
"Simply put, I want you to police an invasion from another reality." He said, totally serious.
Takato took it seriously, as well.
"You want me to deal with the Digimon that break through."
"Yes."
"What exactly is considered 'dealing with them.'" Takato asked; though, based off how Ruki acted, he had a pretty good idea.
"Kill them." Yamaki said bluntly, not beating around the bush. "Or at least, kill the Wild Ones."
Takato blinked at the term.
"Wild Ones."
This time, Lee, who Takato had nearly forgotten about, cut in.
"A Wild One is a Digimon that breaks through to this world and then goes on a Rampage. Which, sadly, is nearly all of them."
Yamaki looked vaguely annoyed that he'd been cut off, but nodded nonetheless.
"Indeed. And when they go on a rampage, people get hurt. We want you to help make sure that doesn't happen."
Takato glanced down at his wounded partner.
"How strong are the things that get through? If they're all as strong as Renamon was, then I'm not sure how much I'll be able to help."
Yamaki chuckled, looking amused.
"I believe you'll find that not to be a problem."
"Besides which," Lee cut in again. "A Tamers Digimon is very different from a Wild One."
Yamaki nodded at that.
"The bond between a Tamer and his Digimon has proven to be a massive advantage over Wild Ones. The most obvious example of this is in the usage of Digimon Cards in order to adapt to and change the course of a battle."
"And to unleash a can of whoop-ass; that deserves to be mentioned, too." Terriermon giggled.
Takato thought about it, before looking down at Impmon again.
"Can I have some time to think about it? It's really not just my choice." He gestured at his partner. "Let me at least wait until he wakes up so that I can talk it over with him."
Yamaki looked at him from behind those shades for a long moment before nodding.
"Of course. On one condition."
Takato had expected that.
"I won't tell anyone about you or the Digimon. I hadn't intended to, even before all of this."
"Good." Yamaki turned and walked away. "Lee, come on. I need to talk to you about something."
Lee and the other men followed Yamaki, and in a few minutes Takato was alone with his thoughts.
XxXXxX
"How did he do?" Yamaki asked Jenrya as soon as he was out of Takato's ear shot.
"What?"
"How did he do in the fight against Ruki and Renamon?" He clarified.
"Oh." Jenrya said in realization. "He did…surprisingly well, actually. Especially when you consider that he's had his partner for maybe a day."
"How so?" Yamaki asked. 'He did surprisingly well' was good and all, but told him absolutely nothing about the fight or Tamer in question.
"Well," Jenrya looked for the words. "He adapted to the combat situation much faster than most people would. He stood by his partner even when things seemed to be hopeless. He figured out how to use the cards after seeing Ruki use them despite obviously having no prior experience. He managed to use the few cards he had on hand effectively, despite the fact that it wasn't a combat deck, nor was it heavily built around aiding a Child level Digimon in a fight, much less this particular Child level; it might not have even been a Virus type deck. He was probably working with a mostly useless deck."
Jenrya took a breath before continuing.
"But even with those disadvantages, he managed to turn the mainly one-sided battle into an actual fight. He even managed to impress Ruki enough that she had Renamon go Adult on him. And even in the face of a higher level Digimon he didn't back down."
Yamaki nodded slowly, filing all of that away.
"So do you think he has what it takes?" He asked after a moment.
Lee exhaled slowly, considering the question.
"That's one of those things that's hard to judge, but I'd say yes. I'm nearly sure he has what it takes to be a Combat Tamer."
XxXXxX
Takato was startled from his sleep by a loud groan. He was in his bed; he'd taken Impmon back to his house after Lee and Yamaki had left.
He sat up quickly and looked for his source. He realized he was getting paranoid; one day as a Tamer and several people had come out of nowhere. But he relaxed when he noticed the source of the noise, only to tense again when he realized what he was seeing.
Impmon was groaning, which was why he relaxed. However, he was groaning because he was trying to get up in his heavily wounded condition.
Takato scrabbled out of the bed so fast that he literally fell out of it. He got up without even pausing and rushed to his friend.
"Easy there, Impmon." He said, trying to gently push his partner back down. "You're still hurt."
He stopped trying to get up, though he still groaned.
"What happened?" He asked.
Takato quickly explained everything; Lee's arrival, Ruki's departure, and, most importantly, Yamaki's proposal.
"What do you think?" Takato asked.
"About the offer?" Impmon asked, just to make sure.
"Yeah." Takato said with a nod. "I'm not sure. I mean, if we're to believe everything they say, they appear to be legit. But…"
Impmon picked up on his partner's doubts.
"But that requires us to believe everything they say." Impmon finished.
Takato nodded at the voicing of his thoughts.
Impmon thought about it.
"Honestly, I don't trust them. Killing Digimon by using other Digimon?" He shook his head. "Sounds a bit funny to me."
Takato didn't say anything, but he agreed.
"And this is apparently a powerful organization…that no one's ever heard of?"
"And they seem to use Tamers as soldiers. Speaking of which; Ruki is a part of Hypnos. Not sure what that says about them." The Takato sighed, as he reached the source of his dilemma. "Having said that, if they're being honest, accepting could save a lot of lives."
"Not to mention get us into a lot of fights." Impmon said, making it sound like a good thing.
"And I have to admit, I'm curious now; I want to know what these guys are up to."
"And the easiest way to find out would be from the inside." Impmon realized.
"But if we go in, and found out something really bad was going on, what would we do?"
"Get out, obviously." Impmon said, as though it was a stupid question.
"Well, yeah, but I don't think they'd appreciate that. In all those movies, the evil organization tries to kill the guys who know too much. And if they try to do that, then…"
Impmon winced.
"They might send Ruki and Renamon to do the job."
"But, if we accept that they could be evil, we should probably consider that they might not like us refusing, either." Takato continued.
Impmon exhaled.
"Suddenly, the 'become parts of the organization' option is looking better and better."
Takato was silent, lost in his thoughts.
"As we are now, we can't really refuse; too much risk, not to mention to possibility of missing something that could be important. On the other hand, if we find that something, what would we do with it?"
Suddenly, Takato realized something.
"Not as we are now…" He focused on Impmon. "You said you came here to get stronger, right?"
Impmon quickly caught on.
"Kyuubimon's a Data Type. If you get me to Adult level, I bet I can take her."
"But, if she has Ruki there to back her up with cards, this will end the same way as before." Takato countered.
Impmon's smile faded a bit around the edges. He didn't want to admit it, but it was true. But his smile only faded a little, because he realized something else, too.
"Unless you're there to back me up, as well."
Takato smiled.
"We lost this fight for two reasons. First of all, Ruki had a better deck for what she was doing; I bet it was built specifically for Renamon. And second of all, she could evolve Renamon, making the difference in power to great for us to overcome. But if we can get strong enough to evolve, as well, then all we have to worry about is Ruki herself."
Takato looked at Impmon and his injuries and winced.
"Though granted, that is a pretty big thing to worry about." After a moment he looked away and smiled. "But I think it's one we can work around right now."
Impmon looked confused at his Tamers state before he looked at what had caught Takato's eye. He smiled as well; a smile that only became bigger in response to Takato's words.
"Hey, Impmon. You said you wanted to be stronger, right? Do me a favor."
Takato looked over the hundreds of Digimon cards he had amassed over the years.
"Help me build a deck."
XxXXxX
The next day, Takato found himself holding his breath. He was walking through the streets of the city, which generally wasn't something to get worked up over. Today, however, things were a little bit different.
First of all, he had Impmon with him. He was carrying him in one arm, trying to pass him off as a stuffed animal. One of the purposes of this trip was to find out if it was possible to do so.
So far, there hadn't been any trouble; a few glances and laughs at a sixteen year old boy carrying a toy around with him, but nothing more. He was hoping it stayed that way, but he also felt fairly sure that it would so long as Impmon didn't do anything.
But it was the other reason for this trip that was making the Tamer so nervous. Yesterday, while they were putting together their new deck, Impmon had told him that he was able to sense the presence of other Digimon. When Takato learnt that, he suddenly had an idea; before he committed to joining Hypnos, which he intended to do later today, he wanted to check one last thing.
How could he fair on the job with this new deck?
And so Impmon and Takato found themselves strolling through the streets after school, looking for any signs of Digital activity.
Suddenly, Takato felt his partner tense, before Impmon tapped his side several times in quick succession. He'd sensed something.
Takato was about to start searching for an out-of-the-way place to converse with Impmon when he heard a beeping sound. He quickly reach into his pocket and drew out his Digivice; its screen flashed red a few times, before changing into compass mode. It seemed to be tracking the Digimon Impmon had sensed.
Takato blinked. He hadn't known it could do that.
He wondered about what else he might not know, but only for a brief moment. Then he shook himself; this is what he had gone looking for, wasn't it? So why was he standing around?
He quickly followed the devices directs, which took him to the western exit of a parking garage. As soon as he was in front of it, Impmon squirmed from his arms and leapt in, leaving Takato behind with his surprisingly superior speed. Takato quickly followed, wondering why something with such small legs could move so fast.
"Wait, Impmon!" Takato called, but his partner paid no heed. He'd apparently noticed something that had grasped his full attention.
When Takato up after his partner stopped moving, he realized exactly what had done so, and understood the reaction.
In front to the duo stood Renamon, and after a moment Ruki walked out from behind a pillar.
She smiled.
"Hey, rookie. Ready for round two?"
Takato didn't reply; the moment he'd seen Renamon he'd reached for his deck.
Since this wasn't the card game and didn't have any of its rules, Takato had done the obvious thing and put the cards that he had figured he'd want the most on the top of his deck. As such, the cards he drew came as no surprise to him and he only glanced at the briefly before slashing them. He'd swept four cards before Ruki had even finished talking. These four cards were holdovers from his first battle where they had proven themselves to be extremely useful in a fight.
"High Speed Plug-in B, Offense Plug-in A, Defense Plug-in C, Black Gear," Takato swept all four cards in quick succession. "Activate!"
Impmon didn't say anything to Ruki or Renamon either. He just attacked. He did so even before he felt or heard his Tamers actions; he trusted that Takato would go through with the plan they'd come up with.
And he was right.
This time, their roles were reversed.
This time he hit Renamon like a speeding train.
Ruki's eyes widened in shock, though too her credit, she immediately began reaching for her deck as well.
But given the speed at which Impmon now moved; the force with which he now struck…
To Renamon, help was still a long way away.
The first plan Takato and Impmon had come up with to deal with partnered Digimon that were capable of reaching Adult level; don't let them reach Adult level in the first place. End the fight before they can even start.
Impmon's first blow had hit hard enough to lift Renamon off of her feet and throw her into the concrete wall four meters behind her. Not only that; it had done so with enough force to break the concrete of the wall itself.
Impmon didn't let up there, though. The ass kicking he'd gotten last time when he had given Renamon the time she'd needed to Evolve firmly in mind, Impmon followed Renamon to the wall and hit her again. A chocking sound tore itself from Renamon's throat and the wall behind her broke even more.
Impmon refused to let up, because he knew that would only end badly. He highly doubted that Renamon would be too forgiving of those blows, so the only real option was to keep hammered on her until she was down and it didn't matter.
However, if he kept hitting her while she was pinned to the wall like that, it was going to collapse. Which, according to Takato, was bad.
So Impmon grabbed his opponent by the throat and literally threw her to the ground. Following after her again, he landed on top of her and hit her, again and again. His blows had no style to them, he was just punching; this was brawling at its most primitive. He also wasn't using any Special Attacks, because he was afraid that given the time needed, Renamon would recover. As it was, Renamon could do little but shield herself with her arms; a defense that proved to be of limited effectiveness.
Until Ruki slashed the card she'd drawn.
"Evolution plug-in E, Activate!" Ruki cried with a bit of desperation tinting her voice.
Impmon was forced to jump away as Renamon was engulfed in a ball of blue flames again. He silently cursed himself; she'd managed to Evolve again, and in a few moments she would no doubt be on her feet and extremely pissed off.
Well, at least he'd gotten in quite a bit of damage.
Time for the second plan the Digimon and his partner had come up with. Behind him, Takato drew another card from his deck.
Kyuubimon emerged from the sphere of flames with a ferocious snarl; a sound Takato wouldn't have expected from her. He glanced at her eyes before quickly looking away; last time she had wanted to toy with us, to test us, at least on some level. This time, Takato was pretty sure she just wanted to kick our asses.
That was to be expected. When Takato and Impmon had come up with their first plan, they quickly noticed the flaws in it. Namely, the fact that if their opponent weathered the assault long enough to Evolve, then it was pretty likely that they were going to be extremely upset. Which, considering they would be Adult level Digimon at that point in time, was likely to hurt Impmon's chances of, well, survival.
Of course, as soon as this flaw was noticed, they quickly worked on ways to deal with it.
The first step of their backup strategy was pretty obvious; get out of the way before you die. Preferably by reaching some place they can't, for whatever reason, and which also gives an advantage. This step had been easily solved.
"White Wings, activate!"
Glowing white wings emerged from Impmon's back and he quickly moved vertically into the air. The space in the parking garage was limited, so it wasn't as effective as it would have been in a more open area, but even so, the addition of another dimension to move freely in would give Impmon an advantage, hopefully enough to be some time.
For you see, the second part of the plan required several variables. With the right cards, a Child could defeat an Adult, but it had to be the right cards. And the right cards for one opponent were not necessarily the right cards for another.
As such, in order to fulfill the second part of the plan, which was to give Impmon as many unfair advantages as possible, Takato had to include a number of cards to adapt to changing situations, and thus couldn't arrange things so that he could just pull the needed card off the top of his deck. Luckily, the second plan built off of the first in order to sidestep this problem. The four cards used in the duos first strategy, when used together with White Wings, should, at least in theory, buy enough time for Takato to search his deck.
Fortunately, one of the first cards he looked at was useful in this situation.
As Kyuubimon attacked the airborne Impmon, Takato slashed another card. Kyuubimon apparently was in no mood to show mercy; she'd already used Ko En Ryuu, and the Dragon of Blue Flames barreled towards Impmon again; a painful reminder of how the fight ended last time.
But that was last time.
"Data Torrent, Activate!" Takato shouted.
Data Torrent was a fairly simple card. In the game, it reduced the Damage of Data Types by Three Hundred. As such, it came as no surprise to Takato when Impmon said nothing as the Dragon hit him. The thunderous explosion forced Takato to cover his eyes again.
When he opened them, the room was full of smoke. It was thick enough that Takato couldn't see anything through it for a moment. But only for a moment.
Suddenly, as if being carried on the breath of something big, the smoke was blown away. Takato quickly noticed where it was blowing away from. Impmon was standing in the center of a large scorch mark. His skin seemed to be steaming, but he himself was completely unharmed.
Takato looked him over twice to make sure, before turning back to his cards. Impmon trusted him to handle the cards, and he would trust Impmon to handle the battle.
Takato wasn't paying attention to the expressions on his opponents faces, as busy looking at his cards as he was. But Impmon saw and he had to laugh at the expressions of shock that he saw there. His laughter only increased in volume when he heard his partner slash another card.
"Data Killer, Activate!"
Impmon smirked at his opponents.
"Hey, Takato, are we gonna get in trouble for picking on little girls?" He asked mockingly.
"What did you just say?" Ruki demanded, obviously getting pissed off. Neither of them noticed, however.
Data Killer was a card that was basically the opposite of Data Torrent. Instead of reducing damage from Data Type Digimon, it increased the damaged to them.
Impmon disappeared from Takato's vision, due to the effects of the White Wings and High Speed cards acting in concerto. It wasn't that he was a blur; Takato literally could not see Impmon move at all. That's not to say he didn't see anything, though; the effects of Impmon's actions were such that one would have to be blind not to notice them.
Kyuubimon had been slammed into the wall opposite the one Renamon had hit, and had left a large crater where she hit the wall. Takato felt like he'd skipped a scene again; he had no memory of Kyuubimon getting hit, of her crossing the distance between where she had once stood and the wall, or of her actually hitting the wall itself. All he knew was that Impmon had disappeared and Kyuubimon was in a crater.
Ruki's expression twisted with rage as she drew a card.
"Okay; that's it! No more games!"
Takato expressed his agreement as he slashed another card.
"Adult Level Killer, Activate!" He cried, slashing the card.
At the same time Ruki slashed hers.
Takato winced as the wall basically exploded. Not because of the wall itself, but because of what he saw.
Impmon stood by the wall.
But Kyuubimon was nowhere to be seen.
What's worse, Takato knew why. He didn't hear Ruki say anything over the sounds of destruction, but he recognized the effects.
"She used Alias!" The boy shouted to his partner, who immediately disappeared. Takato tried to turn around as quickly as he could, but something he heard stopped him.
"High Speed Pulg-in H, Activate!" Ruki shouted. Takato looked at her, and noticed her face had gone serious and blank; she was focused completely on her cards.
Takato knew what that meant. Ruki had officially gotten over her shock, and was quickly going to even the playing field. That meant there was really only one thing to do.
"Impmon, finish this!" He said as he finished his turn.
"Virus Killer, Activate!" Ruki's voice made him wince. That was the Virus version of Data Killer. Since Impmon was currently reducing Kyuubimon's damage by three hundred, and Kyuubimon was doing an extra three hundred damage, Impmon was going to take all of Kyuubimon's attacks at their normal strength, minus the Defense Plug-in.
It would only get worse, Takato knew. Ruki had versions of all those plug-in cards, and he knew that there was a Child Level Killer; he even had one in his deck. He was willing to bet she had one, too.
He had to end this quickly.
He looked at the battle, and couldn't see anything, they were both moving so fast. But he saw the damage their attacks were having on the surroundings; claw marks, craters, and scorch marks littered the area. Before his very eyes, a crater appeared, seemingly caused by nothing at all. A moment later, a car was on fire, and another, and then another.
But he didn't see either of the Digimon, and he didn't hear any cries of pain. That meant they were equal in power, at the moment.
This meant that, since Ruki was just going to keep buffing Kyuubimon up, they actually weren't very equal at all. That was one of the major drawbacks of their second strategy; it went through good cards so damn quickly. He only had a few left.
"High Speed Attack, Activate!" He said, slashing one of them. Supposedly, it would make Impmon faster, but since he was already invisible to the naked human eye, he couldn't really see the difference. He could only hope that Impmon and, more importantly, Kyuubimon noticed a difference.
Behind him, Ruki slashed another card.
"Child Level Killer, Activate!"
Takato winced, but only a little. He expected it, after all.
Besides, it didn't increase Kyuubimon's speed, so hopefully it wouldn't change things. Still, Impmon better finish this before she finds a speed boosting card.
The sound of something breaking made Takato wince again. He looked and couldn't hold back a sigh of relief. It was Kyuubimon; she'd been slammed into a car.
Just a little more…
Naturally, Ruki promptly crushed that hope.
"First Aid Kit, Activate!"
Kyuubimon's wounds began to close before Takato's very eyes, and apparently Impmon saw it too, because it was followed by a thunderous impact, that made the car explode. That was the good news.
The bad news was that Takato had somehow heard what Ruki said over the explosion.
"Brave Shield, Activate!"
Takato grit his teeth, suddenly frustrated. Another card he was familiar with and had in his deck. Quite possibly one of the most powerful defensive cards in the game, reducing damage by five hundred.
In other words, Impmon's attack probably did nothing.
There was a sudden explosion of blue flames; Kyuubimon was using Ko En Ryuu again. But why? There was no way that attack was going to hit Impmon.
Which was why it wasn't intended to, he realized. She was using it as a means to travel safely; if Impmon wanted to attack, he'd need to do so though the raging inferno of Kyuubimon's heavily boosted attack, which would have been a really stupid idea.
She traveled towards her Tamer with deliberate slowness, giving Ruki time to slash another card.
"Defense Plug-in C, Activate!"
Takato looked at the pair and the room was silent for a brief moment. Then Takato nodded to himself and drew out one more card. His best card.
Impmon flickered into existence at his side, looking at his Tamer with wide eyes. He recognized the card.
"Let's end this, Ruki."
"Gladly." She said, pulling out a card of her own.
"Impmon."
"Kyuubimon."
The partnered Digimon braced themselves, ready for the end. The Tamers opened their mouths to give the order, and-
"STOP!" Jenrya screamed.
Everyone stopped.
Nobody had noticed his arrival; a side effect of fighting for what could quite possibly be your life. As such, they were understandably surprised by his sudden outburst.
"What do you want now, Lee?" Ruki asked, more than a little annoyed.
"Didn't we already go over this, Ruki? Hypnos doesn't-"
"This has nothing to do with Hypnos, Lee. So get lost." Ruki interrupted. Lee blinked in surprise at her interruption before changing tactics.
"Takato-"
"Like she said; this has nothing to do with you." Takato didn't even glance at his fellow Tamer; he had eyes only for Ruki. He watched her as closely as he possibly could, waiting for her to either make a move or give him an opening.
"Then what is this about?" He demanded.
Takato and Ruki shrugged as one.
"Victory, defeat, pride, revenge, and maybe a few other things?" Takato suggested. He didn't really know why he was fighting, but he knew he had no intention of backing down. He also knew that Impmon felt the same way. Or maybe that was why he felt the way he did.
Ruki just nodded at what Takato said. She didn't really know why victory meant so much to her, she just knew it did.
"Impmon, do it." Takato ordered, back to business.
"Kyuubimon." Ruki pick up from where she left off.
Both Digimon lunged towards each other, vanishing from sight yet again. Their Tamers where about to slash their cards, when Jenrya's voice interrupted them yet again.
"Terriermon!"
Both Tamers immediately tried to find the Digimon in question, expecting him to try to interfere. The both looked at Lee, but his Digimon wasn't by his side.
It was Rika who noticed his location first.
Takato's attention was drawn by a gasp, and what he saw made his eyes widen. Terriermon stood between the two attacking Digimon looking surprised. Apparently he'd wandered from his Tamer, and wasn't expecting to be attacked.
Both Impmon and Kyuubimon were moving too fast to even notice Terriermon had gotten in the way. Given the sheer amount of power being thrown around, the simultaneous impact of Kyuubimon and Impmon was probably going to delete him.
Takato didn't have time to even say anything.
But then, he didn't need too.
"Terriermon evolve to…"
A bright green light momentarily blinded everyone.
But when they could see again, they weren't looking at Terriermon.
"Galgomon!"