Time to start Kiyoko's Story.

Disclaimer: I am writing a story concerning Digimon. This does not inherently mean that I have any share in Toei's ownership of this franchise.

LAST TIME:
DAICHI: With Apollomon out of the way, we all decided to rest for the night. However, we were all woken up by a nightmare: the same nightmare. We all figured out it was a hint to our next move, so we made the trek to Mt. Snowcap. Since crossing the mountain on foot would have been disastrous, we decided to take the train across: make that Locomon. With more than two hours before we reach the other side, I figured we should have plenty of time to hear Kiyoko's story.

Chapter 22
Destiny

A young girl sat on a park bench just as the sun was setting. The summer heat was a little bit unpleasant, but considering what she had been going through until recently, it was the better alternative. But one thing she needed right now was a way to take her mind off a dream she recently had and had been thinking about all day.

She reached into the pack on her waist that had been packed almost a week before. The items inside included essential traveling gear, a wallet, and a deck of cards she had recently found. She plucked one of the cards from the pack and looked at it. The image was of a blue, canine-like creature that stood on its hind legs and wore a headband and two boxing gloves. The title on the card read, "Gaomon."

"Look at you," Kiyoko said to it, "all strong and confident. You probably wouldn't take any nonsense from anyone. Wish I could feel that way."

"You could if you'd just let yourself," a voice said. Kiyoko nearly dropped the card in surprise and turned toward the source of the voice. An old man stood next to the bench. There was nothing out of the ordinary about him; he wore a large trench coat and had no hair, save for a white ponytail and mustache.

Kiyoko quickly put the card away and said, "You probably think I'm stupid, talking to a soulless object."

"Well, they might not be as soulless as you think, Kiyoko," the old man said.

"Great, a philosopher," Kiyoko sighed. Then she realized something. "Wait, how did you know my name? Did Hayato send you to find me?"

"Relax, Kiyoko," the old man said. "I'm a friend." He reached into his pocket. "Here, I want to give you this." He pulled his hand out, and resting in it was a strange looking device. It could fit into Kiyoko's hand and had an LED screen in the center, surrounded by a pink ring, and a waist strap on the top to match the ring's color.

"What's that?" Kiyoko asked. "A new kind of cell phone?"

The old man chuckled. "It's called a D-Power, or a Digivice, whichever suits you." He placed it on the bench, near Kiyoko's hand. Kiyoko looked at it.

"What does it do?" Kiyoko asked.

"It allows you to use Digi-Modification."

"Digi-What?"

"Don't worry, you figure it out. Also, I would suggest using it near a computer, if you have the chance. And make sure you're alone."

Kiyoko continued to stare at the D-Power until she realized the old man had left. Digi-Modification? What the heck does that mean? She picked up the device and studied it. She noticed the right side had a slot that looked like it was used for cards. Out of curiosity, Kiyoko took out one of the cards she found. The card's picture was of something called "Gatomon," a cat-like creature with a pair of paw-shaped gloves and a long tail with a golden ring. She slowly brought the card to the slot and slid it across just as slowly. She looked at the screen to see what might happen, but it was what happened in her other hand that caught her attention; the Gatomon card had disappeared.

"Oh, great," she whispered. "Thanks to that guy, I'm short one card." After sitting in bitterness for a few minutes, she realized it was pointless since the old man was no longer there. Reasoning she had nothing better to do, she went down to the library, which was thirty minutes from closing. She went into one of the independent study rooms that somebody had carelessly left open and locked the door. She then waited until she was sure no one remained.

When Kiyoko unlocked the door and opened it, the building was pitch black, meaning that night had fallen. She went to one of the computers and turned it on. As she waited for the screen to load, she pulled out the D-Power. When the library's home page appeared, she searched the device for any connector ports. She found none, but the computer screen, she noticed, was growing brighter, as was the screen on the D-Power. Instinctively, almost as though she knew what to do, she held the device in front of her so that the screens faced each other. What happened next was so fast, she barely had time to register it all; the brightness increased and then vanished, but there was no evidence of her existence in that building; even the computer was turned off.

Kiyoko found herself lying on the ground. Wherever she was, she was back outside and the sun was scorching, as it usually did this time of year. Hey, wait, she realized. It was night when that thing with the computer happened. Did I fall asleep or something? She got up and looked around; she fought back the urge to say that she was no longer in Kansas. She was now in what appeared to be a town that resembled most old western films. She dusted herself off and started to walk around.

"Where is everyone?" she whispered to herself. The streets were empty and all the businesses in town were marked "Closed," even though it was clearly midday, wherever she was.

Suddenly, she heard a clicking sound. "Now stop right there, li'l missy," a male voice with a stereotypical western accent said. Whoever said it came from behind her. Kiyoko turned and saw something very peculiar; it looked like a human, almost as tall as her, with thin arms and legs and dressed in typical western garb. However, its body looked like a revolver, with the barrel pointing forward, and it held two more revolvers in its hands. Its face could not be seen under its large hat and red bandana aside from two yellow eyes.

"Now that I have your attention," he said, pointing one of the guns at her, "just give me any money you have, and perhaps I'll think twice about shootin' something as pretty as you."

Kiyoko wasn't sure what to make of this. Part of her wanted to talk back at him, but she realized that, even if the gun on his body was just a fake attachment, the ones in his hands certainly worked. "All right," she said, almost nervously. "Just don't hurt me."

"Give me the goods," he said, "and you have my word." Kiyoko reached into her pack and pulled out her wallet. There was only more than twenty dollars worth of cash in it, but she figured it might keep her breathing. She threw it in front of the man and he picked it up to examine the contents. Even though he lacked a visible face, Kiyoko could tell that, for some reason, he wasn't pleased.

"What are you tryin' to pull?" he asked suddenly. "You call this money: slips of paper and small, metal emblems? Even the dirt you're standin' on has more value than this junk." He threw the wallet back towards her, but he threw it hard, as though he was going to hit her. Kiyoko moved to the side to avoid it, but she had a feeling her luck was running out.

"I'll have you know," she said, trying to stall him, "that 'junk,' as you put it, is money where I come from."

"Then remind me to never pay a visit," he said. He held his guns up to her. "If you're so lucky enough. Russian Roulette!" He fired two bullets and all Kiyoko could do was brace herself and wait for the end.

But she felt nothing. At first, she thought he had fired blanks to startle her. But when she looked up, she saw two bullets on the ground just a little more than halfway between them. Next to them stood a white cat, standing on its hind legs, that wore gloves shaped like claws and had a long tail adorned with a golden ring. The ring in question was glowing when Kiyoko saw it, and she realized that it must have deflected the bullets.

"Are you all right?" it asked her in a female voice. Even though seeing a man with a gun for a body was surprising enough, Kiyoko never expected the cat to talk.

"Uh, yeah, I'm fine," she said hesitantly.

"I can remedy that," the gun-man said.

"Just who is this guy?" Kiyoko asked the cat, now that she found someone she could trust.

"Deputymon," the cat answered, "a gun-toting Digimon that normally likes to gamble. You've already seen his Russian Roulette attack, but it's his Justice Bullet you should watch out for."

"Funny," Kiyoko said, "with words like 'deputy' and 'justice,' you'd think he'd spend more time helping girls than robbing them."

Deputymon sneered at her. "Words don't always make the 'mon, missy. Now, li'l kitty, if you'll just stand aside…"

"Why do you think I got in the way in the first place?" the cat asked rhetorically. "You're not going to hurt her." Kiyoko hadn't seen anyone care this much about her in a long time, and this time it was a total stranger. (Very strange, she added to herself.)

"I don't get it," Deputymon said. "What exactly is in it for you with this young lady?"

"You tried to attack her," the cat said smugly. "Do I need another reason?"

Deputymon just growled. "Russian Roulette!" He started firing again, this time at the cat. She jumped away and landed behind him, hoping to keep him away from Kiyoko. When the cat landed, her face was now visible to Kiyoko. She realized she had seen that face before, and she wondered why she didn't recognize the cat sooner. It was on the card that disappeared moments, if not hours, as she did not know exactly how long, ago. "Gatomon," she whispered.

"Lighting Paw!" Gatomon jumped toward Deputymon with her hand ready to punch. Deputymon turned to the side and let her punch the gun barrel that made up his body, lessening the damage.

"Gatomon's not going to last long against that guy," Kiyoko said to herself. "There's got to be something I can do." Just then, an idea came to her. "Wait. Gatomon probably came from that card I used. If I use another, maybe…" He reached into her pack and pulled out her deck and the D-Power. She looked through them and saw something she thought was good; it looked like a praying mantis with scythes on its arms. "Snimon," she read the card's title aloud. "Perfect." She took the card and swiped it across the card reader.

The card didn't disappear. Instead, it glowed for a second and then stopped. This was followed by the D-Power's screen glowing, which also stopped. She looked over to Gatomon, to see if Snimon had appeared. It didn't. However, Gatomon's arms glowed and her hands were replaced by large scythes. Kiyoko was amazed. Is this Digi-Modification?

Deputymon stepped back in shock at what happened. "Holy—! Since when do Gatomon have Snimon blades?"

Gatomon, who was as shocked as everyone else, looked at her new arms and then to Kiyoko. She held her D-Power and card as though to indicate the cause, but she also shrugged her shoulders.

"Can't say I know," Gatomon answered Deputymon. "But I can say this, no matter how much I never believed I would: Twin Sickle!" She waved her hands in a crossing motion and energy in the shape of an X flew toward Deputymon, who was still in shock and didn't dodge in time. Kiyoko took this time to look at the Snimon card; she had never noticed before, but there was a list of what appeared to be attack names on the bottom of the card, with the attack name Gatomon called, Twin Sickle, among them.

"That does it," he said as he got up. "Time to feel my full an' righteous fury. Justice Bullet!" The barrel of his body-gun started to pulse with energy.

Kiyoko quickly looked through her cards while Deputymon was charging up. She found a picture of what the card called WarGreymon. One of the attacks was called "Brave Shield." "Hope this works. Digi-Modify! Wargreymon Brave Shield, activate!" She slid the card across the reader and hoped her gambit would be successful.

Gatomon's arms returned to normal, and a large, gold hexagon appeared in front of her with a design that appeared to resemble a sun. Deputymon fired and the blast hit the shield. Gatomon stood her ground and the blast reflected off the shield back to Deputymon, straight into the barrel.

"Oh," Deputymon said, "that's not go—" But he never finished his sentence; an explosion occurred where he stood. When the smoke lifted, they could only see a small piece of his body left, quickly dissolving into nothingness.

Kiyoko fell down to her knees after the adrenaline left her system. Gatomon rushed over to her. "Are you okay?"

"You asked me that already," Kiyoko answered. "But seriously, though, yeah, I'm fine." She went to pick up her wallet.

"'Scuse me, ma'am," another voice said. For a second, Kiyoko thought Deputymon was back. She turned and found, not Deputymon, but a large yellow star with human limbs. She had a hard time deciding if it was supposed to be just another western movie character rip-off or a country music star, since neither his dress nor voice was entirely focused on either. She saw no eyes on it but a pair of black sunglasses, leaning her slightly toward her music star assumption. He also wore a red headband on the top point.

"I'm the sheriff of this 'ere town," the star said. "Call me SuperStarmon. I'd just like t' ask you t' come with me t' the station." Kiyoko didn't know what was going on, but followed anyway. Gatomon, oddly, was not far behind.

When they reached the sheriff's office, SuperStarmon sat behind what appeared to be his desk. Kiyoko decided to break the silence that was maintained since she started following. "So, officer, did I do something wrong?"

"Hardly," SuperStarmon said. "That Deputymon had been givin' even me trouble for the past few weeks now. Weren't you wonderin' why no one was out and about? I's just comin' up with a plan to take 'im down m'self when you showed up."

"So you called me here to congratulate me?" Kiyoko asked.

"That, and t' give you the reward for makin' sure he won't do nothin' 'round 'ere again."

"Reward?" Kiyoko asked.

"Definitely not from around here, are ya'?" SuperStarmon said. "Look at that poster." He pointed to a bulletin board on the side wall. Kiyoko had no trouble finding Deputymon's picture from the rest. It was a wanted poster he was on, and the bottom read, "D1000."

Kiyoko looked back at SuperStarmon. "I don't suppose this means some form of money?"

"You'd be correct," SuperStarmon answered. "Besides, from what Deputymon said, you've got no money t' speak of, 'm I right?"

"Well, no money he'd accept," Kiyoko admitted.

"Then take it," he said. He pulled out a device that looked like a jump drive and threw it to Kiyoko. "With the gratitude a' this town."

Kiyoko looked at the device in her hands. No wonder Deputymon didn't want what I have. She thanked SuperStarmon and left the office. Gatomon followed her out as well.

"I guess I should thank you," Kiyoko said to Gatomon. "Without you, I wouldn't be standing here now."

"Hey, I don't want all the credit," Gatomon said. "I mean, it was your… thing… that helped us win."

"I guess," Kiyoko said. "Oh, I guess we never introduced ourselves. I'm Kiyoko."

"Call me Gatomon," Gatomon said. Kiyoko didn't want her to catch on to the fact that she already knew her name.

"If you don't mind my asking," Kiyoko said, "what are you?"

"Well, technically my species is called 'Gatomon,' but if you're asking about the creatures here, we're called Digimon, short for Digital Monsters."

This answer took Kiyoko by surprise. "Digital? So I'm in some kind of digital world?"

"Not 'some kind,'" Gatomon said. "The Digital World." There was a pause between them. "So," Gatomon asked, "where are you going now?"

"I don't know," Kiyoko said. "To find a way home I guess."

"I'd better come with you then," Gatomon said. Kiyoko looked in surprise. "Let's face it: you're all alone and there are more Digimon out there, more vicious than Deputymon. And with that thing you did, I can ensure nothing will happen to you." Gatomon's offer, at this point, was hard to pass up.

Sounds like Kiyoko had quite an interesting start. We can only assume it'll get more interesting on Digimon: Digital Monsters!

This is CF signing out.