A/N: Hello guys! Hope you liked the first chapter! ^^
In the second one, some of our characters will meet their Digimon, as well find out some new things about the Digital World, and why are they there at the first place.
Feel free to write me a review/comment! ^^
Sun was shining directly in Laura's eyes, she had to squint as she was looking up.
Why was there sun in the middle of the night?
She picked herself up as she let out a quiet gasp. She was sitting on cold, dewy grass. It could be noon, the sun was directly above her, cheerfully throwing his rays all over the huge meadow. Blades of grass were gently bending under the touch of light breeze. A couple of white, black-dotted butterflies flew above her head, dancing in circles in their seduction dance. The flowery smell of summer was lingering all around her. Ocean of green, dappled here an there with dots of purple, red or yellow, spreading as far as her eyes could see. Her jaw dropped at the sight of this beauty. Laura was still trying to come round from shock, how did she even appear here when she was running from an eathquake in those damn catacombs just few moments ago... when she noticed something in the tall grass just few metres away from herself, something black and huge.
"Daniel?"
She slowly tried to get up, her legs still tottering from the run. Realizing it's safer to stay down for a little more time, she started to crawl toward the big black shape, which was clearly starting to take shape of Daniel, as she was approaching it. "Buddy? You fine?"
"I'm fine, Amiga..." the shape mummbled. He slowly pushed himself up, with his hand on his head, as Laura crawled and kneeled next to him. "I think I fell on my head... But thanks God we escaped that chaos... What... What is this place?!" He suddenly sobered, as if he has just now seen their surroundings for the first time.
"Sure isn't the Fortress", Laura laughed. The Fortress was the part of the town, in the big park, where the catacombs finished... or at least were supposed to.
"For how long have we been in that tunnel?", she asked him. Daniel pulled up his sleeve and looked at his watch. "If my watch is right, and it has never betrayed me... For ten minutes." He looked up at her, eyes wide open in a shock. "It says here it isn't even 2 a.m. yet!" He showed her his watch. "How is this possible! It...it hasn't stopped!" He put his ear next to the watch. It was ticking normally. "But look at the sun, it's like the middle of the day here!"
"Maybe we went through the Earth to the other side, the opposite time zone." Daniel didn't find her joke even a little funny. "Something's definitely so damn wrong here", she said as she pulled out her mobile phone. The screen clearly said: 01:52 a.m. She unlocked the screen. There was something weird on it. "I don't remember installing this application...", she mummbled.
"Is something wrong?"
"No... yes... wait", she said, still focused on the phone. There was a red and black window opened, shaped like a rectangular gear, with some very weird symbols she couldn't understand, and only one button, with two big letters that clearly said - OK. "You understand any of this shit?" Daniel shook his head. Seeing no other option, Laura pressed it.
At first, it seemed like nothing happened. The window just closed and disappeared. But then there was a bright, blinding light from her phone, as it suddenly turned so hot Laura couldn't hold it no more, so she dropped it. It layed on the ground for a few moments, screen down, weird and creepy sounds they've never heard before coming from it. And then Laura felt a tap on her back. She turned around thinking it was Daniel, only to be faced with a little dog-like creature, staring directly at her with its big, warm, shiny black eyes. Unaware of it, she let out a scream.
The puppy was obviously really well fed. The shape of his body with cream-coloured fur was almost completely round. But something else was weird. His big floppy ears, small fat legs and curled little tail were pink. Gaudy, bright pink.
Next to her, Daniel was equally stunned, as he was facing a little weird creature, who was balancing on it's tail, grinning at him. He thought that he was going crazy. How else can he explain the sight of a brown creature looking like a cat's head with no legs or body, only a long tail and a yellow webbed-like mane, even balancing on it?!
"Wh...wha...who..."
"Did you swallow your tongue, Dan?" The cat-head teased in a squeaky voice, letting out a michevious titter. "Y...you can talk!" He finally managed to spit some words out.
"Of course, what were you thinking?!", the puppy added in an also squeaky, but female voice. "We've waited for you for so long, guys! Don't you have something nice to say?" It jumped into Laura's armful, making her fall on her butt again. On the right, Daniel was choking with his own words. "Wh...What the hell ARE you, anyway?" He was still stuttering.
"Oh, how rude! We haven't even introduced ourselves!", said the cat-head. "We are Digimon, of course!"
"What!", Daniel snorted. Oh, this couldn't be real. This is some sort of a wicked dream he's dreaming. Either that, or Laura has put him some baaad drugs in his drink. And he was almost certain that wasn't the case. He looked at her. On his left site, she was holding that puppy-creature, looking at him, but in her eyes there was no longer fear or denial, more like... disbelief, but with admiration?
"Oh my God... I can't believe...", she was mummbling to herself. "It really... No, no way... And you are...?"
"Xiaomon! On your service!" It took a little bow. "And your friend's here is..."
"Frimon! Nice to meet you!" It tried to jump into Daniel's lap, but he moved back. The cat-head looked sad. "I'm your partner, Dan! I waited for you! We are gonna be friends, and have such a great time together!"
"No we are not!", Daniel suddenly stood up, acceting every word. "This is insane! At first I agree to go with you to that weird and forbidden place, ever thought that there might be a reason why it is forbidden?! Then that earthquake, running through the darkness to escape the rockslides and save our own lives... and now this! I end up in a completely weird place, where time is fucked up, and there is a talking cat-head claiming to be my Digimon partner, and asking for my friendship! Well you've watched too much anime, Laura! And obviously filled my head up with the same, otherwise I wouldn't be having this fucking weird dream, I don't know why I'm even talking to you when it's not the real you, and right now I'm gonna go away, wake up, and the world is going to be a normal place with sense again!" He stormed away from the three, leaving Laura and those two on the ground, in kind of a shock.
"What the hell is wrong with this guy?", Xiaomon asked. "Not quite a partner you've got there, Frimon..."
"Did he... did he just called me a dream?" Frimon asked in disbelief. Now he was sad, truly sad.
"Oh come here, you" Laura stretched her hand to take the small Digimon into a hug. But he just lowered his tail and hopped the other way.
"Leave him alone for a little while. He sure didn't expect this... You know, when you wait for someone for so long, and know you're destined to him, and just him, was chosen to be truly yours... You don't really expect a welcome like this..." Xiaomon was concerned about her Digimon friend. "He is dissapointed. And hurt. Imagine your best friend saying he doesn't believe you exist..."
Laura thought about it for a moment. She imagined Tara saying her that she doesn't believe in her existence. Or Layla calling her just one of her worst dreams. It was funny. It was ridiculous. Laura giggled.
"It isn't funny!"
"If you knew my friends, you'd realize how actually fucking funny that is!" She was now rolling on the grass, laughing out of her lungs.
"Laura!"
"All right, all right!", she tried to cam herself a little bit, still snorting here and there when she remembered that idea about Tara and Layla. "So tell me more about this place. Where is this place anyway? How the hell did we get transported here? And why exactly are me and Dan ones who got sent here?"
"I thought that from all of them, you are the one who's supposed to know all the answers." Xiaomon looked at her mysteriously. "Why me?" Laura was confused. "Because... Oh well, I should better start from the beggining. This, all this place around you, is the Digiworld. It's a world completely made-up of data. This soft grass on which you're laying, the smell of those purple flowers back there, the butterflies, even you and me, are all pure data. The way you got transported... Remember some strange activity on your mobile phone, just before you got here?"
"Yeah... Like a call from hidden number or something..." Laura pulled her phone out of her pocket, and turned it in her hand, looking at it. "And then just before you appeared, there was this weird application I've never seen before, and I clicked 'OK' and then it flashed with this strong light... And then you came. The application is gone now, anyway..."
"Are you sure?" Xiaomon climbed onto her lap. "Why don't you check it?"
Laura unlocked her screen. There was no signal in this place. She entered the menu, scrolled to the very end... and there was a new icon she'd never noticed before. A small red gear which appeared to have drawn closed eyes and a grin. The name of the app said "Digitalization". "Wow! So... is this it?"
"Yep!" Xiaomon giggled. "Why don't you start it?"
Laura clicked on the small icon. The same red and black window from before appeared on the screen, with the same weird symbols. "Damn, still those stuff I can't understand..." But there was no longer the OK button. Now there was a lot of buttons, each in a different colors, with different symbols written on them. "Stupid thing. So, did you make that private number call?"
"It wasn't really a call. More like a sign that you're approaching Digital World soon. And no, I didn't send it. But this Digitalization definitely has something to do with it. I'm sorry... that's about all I know. To get more information, we would have to find Cherrymon."
"Who?"
"Cherrymon! He will tell us more about it. He didn't provide us with much detail really, he doesn't reveal his secrets to kids like us... And don't give me that look, you surely didn't think us two were the only Digimon that exist, did you?", Xiaomon answered to Laura's confused look at the mentioning of "Cherrymon".
"Well...no but... the word 'Cherrymon' sounded just so... weird. Anyway, why me and Daniel? Why exactly us, from 7 billion people?"
"Oh it sure isn't JUST you two...", Xiaomon giggled again. "You are two from the ones chosen. Why are you chosen... I don't know. I'm sorry. All I know is that we were supposed to wait for strange, non-digital beings with a weird device. It was like, my destiny. All except that is beyond my knowledge. More stuff to ask the old dude."
"Old dude?"
"Cherrymon."
"Errr, right. Where is this Cherrymon anyway?"
"I don't know that either. We'll probably have to search for him. He didn't reveal his location to us. Guess he has his own reasons."
"Cool, an adventure! This is getting more and more interesting!" Laura clapped her hands like an excited 10 year old. "We'll just have to bring that grumpy's ass back here", she said, reffering to Daniel. "Oh, one more thing, Xiaomon. You said that from all of us, by which I guessed you meant the humans who were send here, I am the one who should know the answers to all these questions about the Digital World. Why me?"
Xiaomon suddenly turned serious. She turned around in Laura's lap to look at her face. She sighed, deciding to be completely sincere and say it all. "Because..."
But she never managed to finish her settings. Because they were suddenly so startled by Daniel's shouting, that they both jumped, forgetting the question in a second.
"Somebody wake me up!" Laura could swear that she's never seen such a frightened look on Daniel's face. He was running towards them, and seemed to be in a bit of a panic. "This nightmare is getting worse and worse! Run, you fools!" Laura and Xiaomon couldn't at first see the reason of all that Daniel's panic. He was trying to catch his breath, panting with his hands on his knees. "Calm down, Dan. What did you see? Where?" But then an answer came right at them, in a shape of three fireballs, which seemed just to... have fallen from the sky?
A huge shadow covered the sun. Two friends and Xiaomon looked up in the sky. There, right above them, a giant bird was flying in circles. It looked like an offspring of a condor and a pterodactyl, it's whole body burning with flames. And the weirdest thing of all... the flames were black.
"What the HELL?!" Laura screamed as she dodged on of the flameballs. "What is that thing?!"
"Saberdramon! I have no idea what is he doing here... They oftenly live on the mountains, near the volcanos or hot springs... Never have seen anyone down here in the meadow..."
"Why is it attacking us! Is it evil? What have we ever done to it?"
"I don't know, but we better run!"
So the trio started running through the meadow. But all around them was just grass, flowers, nowhere even a trace of a tree or some other place to hide. "Shit!", Daniel said. "This would be a great time to wake up..."
"Will you stop with that shit already, Daniel?!", Laura said kinda furiously. "Face it, this is not a dream!"
"No! And giant flying burned birds are real!"
"In this world, yes, they are!"
"There is no 'this world'! Today when I woke up there was only one world, and it will be like that when I wake up again..."
"Down!" Xiaomon pushed Laura to the ground as they all fell down, escaping a huge flameball by a millimetre. "That was close, you could have got burned!"
"Thank you..." Laura looked at the little dog thankfully. She wagged it's tail, closed her eyes and smiled cheerfuly. "That's what partners are for!"
"And either you want it or not, we will have to protect you! Even if it includes fighting this giant freak!" They haven't noticed, but it seemed that Frimon snapped out of his gloomy mood and decided to join them after all. "Come on, Xiaomon!"
"You're right! We can't run like this forever, with no place to hide within miles!"
The two Digimon jumped in front of their partners, roaring and bristling. "Shall we?" Xiaomon looked at Frimon. Frimon looked at Daniel a little bit sadly, then he nodded. "Let's go!"
They jumped high in the air, while Saberdramon darted towards them.
"TAIL SLAP!" Frimon shouted, as he started turning his tail in circles so rapidly, creating a strong centrifugal force, and then hitting the big bird with it.
"TUMMO!" said Xiaomon, and she moved her muzzle as when barking. But no sound came out. At least no sound that a human could hear, since Ebidramon turned his head away from it, letting out an sound similar to bald eagle's call, obviously annoyed. Xiaomon's silent bark was a high-frequency wave.
"Wow... just like in a movie... Those little guys even have their attacks..." Laura was impressed, while watching their fighting from the ground. Next to her, Daniel didn't seem impressed at all. "This is getting out of hands..."
"Don't tell me you still think this is a dream, you stupid-head!" she slapped him. He held his cheek, which was turning red, as he looked at her in disbelief. Laura has never slapped him.
"Don't you see! They are fighting to protect us, they are troubling to save our lives! Xiaomon! Hang in there!" Laura stood up, as she saw Saberdramon throw few fireballs at those two little guys, tackling them to the ground. They seemed to be no match for the giant Digimon, despite their tail attacks and high-frequency waves. She went to Xiaomon, who was lying weakened on the ground. "Are you hurt?"
"I will be fine... But it's too dangerous for you... Go find a place to hide, we will keep this thing busy...", she said in a weakened voice.
"I won't leave you to die here, especially not for me!", Laura said angrily. "I don't care what Dan says about all this being a dream, I believe in you, and I can feel your commitment to me! Even thought you almost don't even know me!"
"Too bad your friend doesn't feel the same..." Xiaomon looked sadly at the wounded Frimon, who was lying helplessly on the ground, eyes closed. Few metres away, Dan was standing uncomfortably, not sure what to do. Seeing Laura and Xiaomon staring at him, he shook his head. What he didn't see was a flameball coming right behind him. "Watch out, Dan!", Laura screamed. But too late, it hit him from backwards, and he fell down. "Ouch...", he left a weak sound. He was hurt, his right sleeve completely burnt, and he had burns on his right arm. It hurt very much. Daniel moaned out of pain, holding his arm with the other one.
"Was this really necessary to make you believe that this is not a dream? Idiot", Laura said softly, as she crawled to him. "Aaagh! It hurts!", he moaned as she touched his wound. An evil chucle could be heard from above them. Saberdramon let out another bald eagle call. Laura wanted to take another look at the wound, but Daniel pushed her aside. Without a word, he crawled to the place where Frimon was lying, still unconscious.
"Well, guess you were real..." he picked him up with his unhurt hand. He opened his eyes and smiled weakly as an answer. "You okay little guy?"
"D-an..." His voice was so weak Daniel could barely hear him. "Y-ou finally believe..."
"We need to stand up and fight..." Xiaomon tried to get up, but then just fell again.
Saberdramon laughed again wickedly, and stormed from the sky right down to the group. "NO!", Laura and Daniel screamed in unison, as Laura noticed something in her pocket. On her mobile phone there was a brightly coloured star-shape on the screen, with a lot of weird symbols, and it was flashing brightly, like an alert. Seeing it as an only possible option, she pressed it. The very moment her finger touched the screen, something unbelievable started to happen. A bright light engulfed the two Digimon, pink one around Xiaomon, and grey one around Frimon. And then... their body shapes started to transform. They grew bigger and bigger, still surrounded by lights, until they reached the size of a big dog.
"Xiaomon digivolve to... Labramon!"
"Frimon digivolve to... Liollmon!"
Before them now stood two grown Digimon, one shaped like a big Labrador dog, with cream-coloured fur, but with huge floppy ears and big tail coloured in pink, and big claws on it's legs, and the other one shaped like a really muscular lion cub, with bright blue eyes, big claws, fur that had a gold shine, with a red tuft of hair on it's head. A collar with a huge green talisman was around the lion's neck. Laura and Daniel just stood there, stunned, with their mouth open, looking at their grown partners.
"I don't look so weak now, do I, Dan?", Liollmon winked at his partner before he looked at Labramon. "Let's get this over with, girl!"
"I'm with you! Hey, you big piece of meat! Come and fight now, if you dare!"
"Silly fools...", Saberdramon spoke for the first time. "You really think I'd back off now? BLACK SABER!" It shooted a saber-shaped flame towards them.
"Watch out!" Labramon and Liollmon jumped aside. "We are not scared of you! RETRIEVER BARK!" She let out a silent, high-frequency bark, similar to that Xiaomon did. Only it was much stronger this time. It hit Saberdramon, making it start to lose altitude.
"He's mine now!", Liollmon shouted. "LEO CLAW!" He jumped and scratched Saberdramon hardly while he was still in the air. Saberdramon growled wounded, and he fell to the ground. "Is it dead?", Laura asked cautiously.
"No... just really weakened... and disabled for fighting, at least for some time, I hope.", Labramon answered.
"So what should we do now?"
"Laura, your phone... It's beeping again!"
She took it out. Weird symbols and weird sentences on the screen, again. She sighed. "I still can't understand any of this shit! What should I do, what if it tells me something important to do?!"
"Let me take a look at that." Daniel took the phone from her hands, accidentally pressing something on the screen. Saberdramon's big body suddenly trembled, as something new appeared on the phone screen, like a new alert, with a tiny picture of something looking like a smiling little Digimon, and he opened his eyes.
"Wha... Where am I?", he looked really confused. "Who are you guys? You are not Digimon. How come are you here? And what happened to your arm?" He turned his huge head to Daniel. "Oh no... I hope I didn't do that to you? Oh I'm sorry, I'm so terribly sorry. I have no memory of what I've been doing for the last few days, or how I even got to this place. Will you ever forgive me?"
"I... I guess I'll try to.", Daniel said. The burning pain in his arm was getting stronger and worse every minute. He was starting to feel weak, very weak. "Were you like... enchanted by a bad charm, or something?", asked Liollmon.
"I don't think so... I don't know... All I remember is, I was bringing food to my nest, to feed my dear Birdramon, who is laying on our eggs - yes, we're gonna have little ones soon", he answered, seeing Laura's curious smile and wide open eyes. "Everything after that is just blur."
"I see...", Laura was trying to understand this tons of new information they just got in such a little time. But then, an idea was starting to form in her head. "Hey, do you happen to know who Cherrymon is?"
"I've heard of him."
"Do you know his whereabouts?"
"No, sorry..."
"And would you like to help us find him?"
"You see, that would be fair, since I've caused you so much pain. And he looks like he could use some urgent help really soon", he pointed his head towards Daniel, who was looking really bad, almost as he's going to faint every moment. "Come on, hop on!", Saberdramon stood up, and spread his wings wide.
"But... the flames..."
"Oh don't worry, they won't hurt you. They're not real." He laughed. "This is the least I can do for you, to repay you for my bad behaviour." The Digimon helped Laura and Daniel to climb onto Saberdramon's back, settling comfortably next to them afterwards. "You should take a rest and have some sleep, Daniel", Liollmon said to him. "Don't worry, I'll watch over you.", he added to himself. Saberdramon waved his wings for the few times, and then took off.
Daniel doze off shortly, his head comfortably resting on Liollmon's back. "First, let's find some water, and something or someone to take care of this wound!", he explained to Saberdramon. "Then, we try to find Cherrymon." Saberdramon cried happily as an answer. "Thank you.", Liollmon thought, looking at Daniel, who was breathing peacefully. "Thank you for accepting me as your friend."
A little bit behind Liollmon and Daniel, Laura was gently stroking Labramon's head. "This is so weird", she said. "Us... here... you guys... You, you were amazing back there!"
"It's what friends are for!", Labramon said happily, wagging her tail.
"Hey, you know what I just realized? Since now you're officialy my partner, I should give you a name. Every dog should have a name!"
"I'm no dog! But actually, I already have one.", Labramon giggled.
"You do?", Laura sounded a little bit confused.
"Yep. It's Liora."
"Liora...", Laura repeated. Why did it sound so damn familiar? "It's a beautiful name... But wait, who gave it to you? Your parents?"
"No, silly!", Liora laughed at the idea of parents. "Even I am not all sure about it, so let's save that for when we find Cherrymon, ok?"
"As you wish...", Laura replied a little bit tiredly, while letting out a yawn. She stretched her arms. Saberdramon's back suddenly felt very, very comfortable. "You know, I think I'm gonna take a little nap. Wake me up if you see something interesting down there, will you?", she curled up between the black flames, with her head resting on her arms.
"Count on me!"
And with two pairs of eyes widely opened for any sight of water or danger, the five continued their flying journey over the Digital World.