Chapter 18: Courage and Restoration
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Disclaimer: I don't own Digimon, just the OCs in this fic.
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Gunter made his way to the door, turning the handle and walking out onto the second-story balcony of that trashy hotel to see a whirlpool in the sky. He knew what he had to do even if he didn't know how. Somehow, some of his old memories were leaking through.
"Gunter, what are you doing?" Prokyomon called out; running after him on all fours and standing on his hind legs once he stopped, using his furry tail for balance.
"Ich brauche ihnen zu helfen." I need to help them, the large German responded to the raccoon, understanding him since when digimon talk, the brain translates their speech into human language somehow.
"Yeah, but you can't!" the digimon objected. "Now, get back in the hotel."
"Nein, ich will nicht das tun." No, I don't want to do that, the large teen responded, frowning.
Then the memory of his partner emerging from his computer went through his mind. His memories were coming back and this was somehow triggering them.
"Wo is mein Partner?" he asked, walking back into the hotel.
"Listen, you need to wait here!" Prokyomon exclaimed, shutting the door behind him and getting Gunter's attention. "My partner told me to watch over you and that's what I'll do!"
The muscular German gave him a blank expression. "Ich will nicht warten." I don't want to wait,he said.
"Don't worry, they'll take on this enemy. And then Ed and Ayaka will be back to help you out "Du weisst es nicht. Sie werden sie töten." You don't know that. They will kill them.
"No they won't. I have faith in my partner as well as in Ayaka and her partner. Just wait a few minutes. That digimon will be deleted and gone." Prokyomon held Gunter's hands with a pleading expression. "Please."
Gunter glanced at the digimon, his expression still blank.
###
"Salamon digivolve to… D'Arcmon!" the angel yelled out, flying upwards toward the large dragon, Megadramon. "Dancing Sword!" she yelled, using La Pucelle to perform a magnificent sword technique, aiming straight at the dark spiral on the dragon's arm and shattering it.
Unfortunately, that didn't end the battle, since Megadramon was actually quite feral. "Dark Side Attack!" he yelled out, shooting a pair of missiles toward the ground. D'Arcmon proceeded to move forward and deflect one toward the other, but the blast from the explosion knocked her back, causing her to hit a nearby building. After a few seconds she regained her composure and headed straight at the dragon.
On the ground, the crowds were frantically running away from the sight of the battle, heading straight for the lockers to grab their clothes and leaving the park. Abby and Ed, on the other hand, stayed, despite knowing that they couldn't really help in the battle.
And from the look on Ayaka's face, she needed the encouragement.
"Abby, what are you doing?" one of her friends, Elizabeth asked.
"I'm waiting here. Just go on without me, I'll be fine!" she told the red-head.
"You better be. Don't tell me this has something to do with whatever happened to your friends," Jahara responded.
"I'll tell you everything later," Abby promised. Maybe then they'd believe her.
"Come on, Liz, let's go," the black girl told the red-head before they walked off.
Ed was somewhat concerned for the girl. "Are you sure? You don't even have your partner with you."
"Neither do you," the brunette responded with a smirk.
The black-haired boy grinned back before turning serious and looking toward Ayaka. "Hey, you alright?"
"I'll be fine," the blonde lied. She was afraid of failure and afraid of letting the others down. Tadashi, Miki, Yuji and Taizou were all probably captured or worse and there was nothing that she could do about it.
She had to maintain her courage.
"Ayaka, remember you have us here. Worse comes to worse and I can call Prokyomon," Ed assured her.
"No, Prokyomon needs to stay where he is," the blonde ordered.
"What's your partner doing?" Abby asked, putting on her shirt since she had it with the rest of her stuff.
Ed spoke to her in a tone of regret. "He's keeping an eye on the other guy we're stuck here with. He was brainwashed by a rogue Tamer and attacked us. When he lost, she scrambled his brain."
Abigail gave him a look that was a cross between shock and disgust. "That's absolutely horrible. How could anybody do that?"
"We've been trying to figure that out ourselves," Ayaka responded, taking her eyes off the battle momentarily. She didn't have any of her cards with her so there was only so much she could do to help her partner. The angel digimon was dodging Megadramon's attacks easily, but there was only so long until he caught up with her.
She couldn't fail.
And yet she worried that she would.
"Ayaka! Don't be afraid!" Ed exclaimed, hoping to encourage her. "Your fear is only holding you back. Don't let it."
The girl looked at the chubby boy. "Thanks. Give him all you got, D'Arcmon!"
She reminded herself that her friends were there. She needed their courage as well as her own and the fact that they were both relying on her helped.
That was when she noticed her digivice glow with the orange crest.
SUPER DIGIVOLUTION_
"D'Arcmon digivolve to…" The new digimon that was formed, floating in the sky, was something that none of the Tamers ever even heard of. Abby even thought that D'Arcmon digivolved into something else, namely Hippogriffomon, but that wasn't the case here. Instead, the digimon was humanoid and D'Arcmon's wings disappeared, turning her into a busty monk with a golden crown on her head, a white robe, a necklace with numerous red beads on it, and a number of scrolls. The digimon had blue eyes but her mouth was covered by a red cloth.
"… Sanzomon!"
"Sanzomon, wow? She's pretty," Abby commented upon seeing the monk float in front of the dragon.
Ed immediately checked his digivice. "Sanzomon, Ultimate Level, Vaccine Attribute, Monk Digimon. This digimon is said to travel the digital world enduring many ordeals in order to achieve enlightenment. The name Sanzo comes from the name of a character in the work of Chinese literature, Journey to the West." Ed looked impressed from that. "Interesting."
"I wasn't expecting her Ultimate form to look like this," Ayaka said in amazement at her partner's new form.
"Neither was I," Abigail agreed.
Up in the air, Sanzomon was facing down Megadramon. "Your attempted destruction of innocent life won't go unpunished. As you are not controlled by the Dark Spiral, you are responsible for your actions."
"Yeah, lady? I don't think that matters. I'm going to do what I want!" the dragon shouted at her. "Dark Side Attack!" Megadramon launched a series of missiles at Sanzomon, who deflected them with her powers, causing them to head off into the air before exploding.
"My turn. Kochou Mu-kyou!" she shouted, causing the dragon to experience each of her ordeals.
"Now, for my final attack, Mugen Danmaku Shin-kyou!" she shouted, causing the illusion that Megadramon was being hit by each of her beads, crushing his spirit and causing him to destabilize before disintegrating into Data.
She did it. Ayaka felt a wave of relief flow through her as Sanzomon glided down to her and the others. "You were awesome," the timid girl told her partner.
"Thank you," Sanzomon replied.
"So, I guess we're going to have to leave," Ed commented nervously. "The cops are headed this way and I still haven't grabbed our stuff from the locker."
"That shouldn't be a problem," the monk said, doing a twirl with her scrolls, teleporting the group to the lockers which were being emptied by everyone.
"So much for a nice, quiet day at Water World," Abby commented, folding her arms. She was already dressed, unlike the other two. Ed emptied the locker and pulled out his stuff before giving Ayaka hers. Then Sanzomon teleported them once again, but to the apartment.
###
The Emperor's eyes twitched as he finished going over the video of the battle that had just occurred. He saw what happened: a third member of his enemy team had just reached the Ultimate level. And if he hadn't sent Megadramon, this wouldn't have happened.
So, he wasn't going to do anything else to these other Tamers. In fact, it would be best to just leave them alone unless he came up with a new strategy.
He saw the patterns, so he decided to act, typing his commands to all the Ultimate levels based at each of the exits to the real world. He figured that if he just left them alone while he consolidated his power even further, they wouldn't be a match for him when it was finally time for them to go after him.
He grimaced at the thought. This wasn't going to be fun, but practicality outweighs his ego in benefits.
###
When Sanzomon arrived at the apartment with Ed and the others, Gunter showed up immediately and gave the chubby boy a big hug, lifting him off the ground. "Du lebst!" he exclaimed.
"So, this is the guy you were talking about, huh?" Abby asked the blonde.
"Yeah. We have no idea how to undo what the Digimon Queen did to her," Ayaka responded.
"Digimon Queen? Wait, does this mean that some Rika-wannabe was behind this?" the brunette inquired.
"Actually, no, she just stole the title from Rika," Ed exclaimed, getting out of the large German's grip just barely.
"I may be able to help," Sanzomon said, gliding over to Gunter and putting her right hand against his forehead and her left against his chest.
###
Sanzomon found herself in a dark area. There were numerous doors around her, all but one with locks on them. So, she walked to each of them, unlocking them one at a time and peering in. Sometimes she would see old memories on video. Other times, she would find bookshelves full of information.
Then she looked into one of them, finding something that wasn't there but was obviously added. It was a chest. She walked up to the chest and opened it with her powers. It contained vast knowledge that the Digimon Queen gave him while he was her servant.
The monk looked around before almost getting attacked by something coming from one of the other rooms, a large, grey raccoon. She couldn't recognize the species but she could tell that it was a larger version of Prokyomon, only far more feral. The digimon charged her.
"Rabid Bite!" it yelled. The monk had to block the attack by holding Mapachemon's mouth open despite the rancid breath and the digimon's foaming mouth.
However, she was strong enough to take this enemy on. She was, after all, on the way to enlightenment.
She ripped the monster in half with her strength, causing it to be deleted, his data disappearing into the rest of Gunter's mind.
She inspected the rest, finding a room that was almost destroyed. However, she was able to repair it, causing the parts of the room to get put back together.
###
Sanzomon opened her eyes and looked at Gunter. His eyes were filled with understanding and he had a grin. The large German fell backwards onto the ground, adjusting to everything around him.
"Wow, now that was something!" the guy exclaimed in a deep voice. "So, what's going on?" The brown-haired guy got up and looked at the others. "Uh, hi, I'm Gunter Kaufmann."
"Ed. We met at the orphanage, remember?" the black-haired boy asked, grinning uneasily.
"Oh, of course! How could I forget that? So, you still want to go back home to Chile? Wait, where are we, anyway?" Then the large German patted his right butt cheek. "And where's my wallet?"
Ed walked over to the dresser and grabbed it. "Sorry, we had to borrow some money to survive. We're kind of trapped in a parallel world where Ayaka and I don't exist."
The German was taken aback. "Okie dokie, how do we get back?" he asked goofily.
"We're going to need to use something called the Dimensional Corridor in the Digital World," Ayaka explained. "Unfortunately, this world has a Digimon Emperor."
Gunter rolled his eyes and shook his head. "Ha! Figures."
"And as far as your answers from earlier, we're in Denver, Colorado," Ed explained. "We traveled to this world on the way to finding Takato's team from Japan. Unfortunately, we haven't gotten to them yet."
The German nodded. "The Tamers of Shinjuku, huh? You know, I've always wanted to meet them." He chuckled a bit. "So… What am I doing here?"
"What do you remember from in between the time you talked to me and now?" Ed asked.
"Let's see… I ran out of the place as fast as I could as soon as I realized that those guys were all a bunch of Anti-Digimon freaks, but they caught up to me and Keramon," the German then came to a realization. "Oh, crap, they tortured me. I'm just a kid." Then he wondered something else. "How old are you guys all, anyway?"
"I'll be fourteen in a couple weeks," Ed replied.
"Thirteen," both Ayaka and Abby responded.
"Wow, I feel old. I'm fifteen," Gunter told them with a grin and a chuckle. "So, after that, I fell asleep and started getting this weird voice in my head and this chick with a giant raccoon broke me out of that place. After that, I lost complete control." He realized what had happened since then. "She made me do things that I didn't want to…" His face contorted to one of rage. "That horrible, horrible…"
"It's alright, Gunter, you're safe now," Ed reassured him.
"If you knew what she did to me and what she had me do to other people…" The German got up and whispered into Ed's ear. The black-haired boy was now pale. "She deserves to be punished."
"I agree," Ed responded. "That's just sick."
"I know! Exactly!" Gunter exclaimed loudly.
"So, anything else you remember?" Ayaka asked.
"I guess…" the German thought for a few minutes, scratching his chin. "I remember you guys having to take care of me. Thank you for that. Also, sorry about that time I fought you guys with Infermon."
"Can you still access that digivolution?" Ed inquired, getting a nod from Gunter.
"I achieved that back in Germany. Of course I can!" the large teen exclaimed with a smile.
"So, why were you in Paris in the first place?" the black-haired boy inquired.
"I was there for a class trip. We were supposed to be there for about a week, but when the Parisian Tamers all started disappearing and Ed was detected, they sent me after him to verify who he was." Gunter grinned. "It was a fun trip. You didn't spend all two hundred of my Euros, did you?"
"No, we just cashed it for American dollars since we were here. You had the most out of all of us," Ed explained.
"Ach! Well, that works." Gunter lied back on the bed just as Sanzomon was done with Keramon.
"Here you go, your partner should be back to normal," the monk said before reverting back to her in-training form of Nyaromon.
"Well, at least that's over with," Ayaka commented, picking up the cat head.
Gunter grinned at his partner, who smiled widely back. "Gunter! How glad I am to see you! It felt like I was in some sort of prison or something!"
"Good to see you too, buddy!" the larger German greeted back enthusiastically.
Everyone smiled at the sight of their new teammate, even though in their view he seemed a little eccentric.
###
In the digital world, Yuji woke up from his sleep, feeling the bump on his head. He heard Taizou and someone else talking through the bars, so he went over to investigate. Taizou was speaking to another prisoner in English. The other prisoner was European, though he had darker complexion than usual and was somewhat robust, but not quite as much as Tadashi or even Ed. He also had an aquiline nose, brown eyes and shaggy, black hair.
"Oh, so this is Yuji," Taizou introduced his long-haired friend. The other boy waved his hand in salutation.
"The name's Robert," the other guy responded in a deep voice for someone of his age. "Robert Battaglia."
"Good to meet you," Yuji responded in English, surprising even him. "Whoa, since when did I know English?" he asked, smiling widely. "This is awesome and I didn't even have to take any boring classes, either!"
"Yuji, the Digimon Emperor just had a Sorcerymon transfer his language skills to you so he could interrogate you later on," Taizou explained, bursting the long-haired guy's bubble.
"What? Are you serious?" Yuji exclaimed. "Man, that sucks!"
"Yeah? I've been stuck here for about three weeks," Robert told the Japanese duo.
"Tell Yuji what happened to your team," Taizou requested.
"So, anyway, we came here to take on the Emperor when he least expected: in the middle of the night. First we took out as many control spires around here as possible and then we ransacked his base. It took maybe two, three hours, no biggie. Then he showed up… with his partner."
"What is his partner? Wormmon?" Yuji asked.
"No, it was Koemon. And he had a dark spiral around him," Robert continued to explain.
###
The group of Digidestined confronted the Emperor, who was wearing a smiling theater mask. "Well, if it isn't the kids that have been ruining plans ever since I've come to the digital world. Abby, you should know better than to hang out with strange men."
"And who are you to tell me who I should hang out with? I met him in the digital world." The brainy brunette responded.
"Oh, really. How do you know he's not evil?" the mysterious, rogue digidestined asked, causing all five of them, four girls and one boy, to get into a battle stance.
"Believe me, I would totally know if he was evil," one of Abby's friends, a black girl responded.
"Yeah!" another one, a girl with short, blond hair agreed.
The man chuckled. "I'm only here to watch out for my little sister." That sentence shocked the group.
"Your brother?" Robert asked Abby.
"No, it can't be. My brother's in the real world," she objected.
Then he took off his mask, revealing the visage of none other than David Symanski. "You may know me as Emperor Damien." Then he pulled out his grey and black D-3. "Come on, Koemon, it's time to teach these trouble-makers a lesson."
Abby still couldn't believe it. He couldn't be… There was no way that David would do this!
"Koemon digivolve to… Gokuwmon!" the digimon yelled, becoming a large, white-furred ape with a staff.
###
"He let Abby go because he was his sister but he's kept us all in captivity ever since." Robert looked angrily. "Once I get out of here, I'm going to strangle that guy."
"On the contrary, my Italian friend, we're going to go on a nice, little trip," the Emperor said, walking into the cell area, grinning maliciously. "In fact, we are all going."
###
After finishing with everything at the run-down hotel, the group decided to grab dinner at Panda Express. "You know, it's been forever since I've eaten here. I used to eat here all the time in Vegas," Ed explained to the group.
"Wow, I don't even know what to eat," Ayaka commented, deciding to follow Ed's lead and eat Chow Mein and orange chicken.
"So, they don't have Panda Express in Chile, huh?" Abby asked Ed.
"Nope, at least not yet," the black-haired teen responded. "You know, just before getting kidnapped, I wanted desperately to get back to the US, but then, after I got kidnapped, I wanted to head back to Chile more than anything, mainly to be with my dad."
"He sounds like a really nice guy," Abigail responded. "I feel that way about my brother."
After picking up and paying for his food, Ed walked to their seating area and sat down. He also had another package that was for Prokyomon once they headed back. It was then that he remembered something. Once all four were at the table, he pulled out his drawing pad to show them the mysterious message that he copied from the digital world.
"Do either of you know Latin?" he asked Gunter and Abigail.
"Nope," the brunette responded, shaking her head. "They don't start teaching foreign languages in earnest until High School. And I don't even see a reason to learn Latin in the first place."
"Well, what do you know, I'm in my second year of the language. Maybe I could take a look at it," Gunter suggested with a smile. The group looked at the message.
IMPERATORSYMANSKICLAVISDIMENSIONALISEST.
EISVNTSORORCVIVSEMBLEMALVCISESTFRATERQVECVIVSEMBLE FATIEST.
EVERSORMVNDORVUMCLAVEMDIMENSIONALISFVRABITVR.
"Whoa," Gunter said, narrowing his eyes in shock. "I can barely read this. I know the ancient Romans bunched their words together but this is ridiculous."
"Yeah, I was able to decipher the first line, but once I saw the second one, I was, like, forget it," Ed said. "The first line says 'Emperor Symanski is the Dimension Key'. I take that to mean Abby's brother."
"Emperor Symanski fits him, though he likes going by Damien for some reason," she explained. "But what the heck is a dimension key?"
"Maybe he's a doorway to another dimension," Gunter guessed. "I give up. What we need, though, is a dictionary and we need to separate all these words. Let's see…" The brown-haired german started to write down the words in the second sentence. "Ei sunt soror."
"You just wrote the 'V' as a 'U'," Ed told him, overcorrecting the large German.
"Yeah, that's because the letter 'V' signified both a vowel and a consonant. Same with the letter I. Heck, the letter V didn't even make a V sound back then. It was actually pronounced like a W." Gunter grimaced at the sight of the first few words, which now made some sense in a headache-inducing way. "I know what's going on. That's the Dative of Possession. He has a sister whose crest is of light and a brother whose crest is of fate or destiny."
"What?" Abby asked, really confused. "It's just the two of us. We don't have a brother."
"Were either of your parents married before?" Ayaka inquired.
"No," the brunette responded, wondering why she would ask that. "Plus, my brother David's sixteen and my parents were married for five years before having him." Then she thought about it for a second. "Maybe he's from another dimension like you guys," she suggested with a smile.
"That's an idea," Ed said, grimacing slightly. "But I'm not sure how much sense it makes."
"Yeah, since the prophecy or whatever is in this world, he's got to be here to," Gunter shot back, poking his chin with his pen before grabbing a bite of orange chicken.
"But if I remember right, the first line was on some ruins in our digital world," Ayaka objected. "I know, neither of you were there to see it, but I remember this Agumon Hatase saying some random phrase that sounded like that."
"I do have to wonder: why Latin?" Ed asked in confusion. "I mean, why, if they decided to encode this, did they use Latin and not something else like Ancient Greek, Hebrew or Sanskrit. Heck, why isn't it in Old Japanese or something?"
"Maybe whoever wrote it on the wall wanted us to find it. It's obvious that this person traveled across a few different worlds," Gunter suggested energetically.
"Well, whatever's going on, this just gives us more questions," Ayaka grumbled.
###
The group flew on a corrupted Ultimate form of Taizou's partner and headed toward an unknown part of the digital world. Taizou was at least glad to have quarters again instead of living in that horrible jail, but he still couldn't walk around on this thing freely.
The teen had a female guard just inside his door that was going to prevent him from going out. It was a shame that the Latina was on the other side. She was kind of hot. Plus, that busty uniform that the Emperor put her in didn't help any.
She just stood there, stoic. The teen wished he could at least ask her out and get rejected, but that wasn't going to happen. As it was, whenever he considered doing that, he felt a twinge of guilt and remembered Mizuki.
He missed that girl and wondered what she was up to with that crazy Doctor clone of hers.
That red hair. Those eyes. He missed her and wished that he could hang out with her more.
But he had to live with that.
Eventually, the digimon landed and the brown-haired boy was led out with everyone else. The group walked into a small building, looking around at all the digi-code on the walls.
Robert glanced around, worried about what might happen.
And Yuji just looked bored out of his skull.
The group wandered inside. "This is what I detected before: the Crest of Destiny." The teen held up his digivice to it. "It's definitely not mine."
He pushed Taizou forward. "It's definitely not mine either. Mine is Friendship," he told him.
"Just hold up the digivice to the crest, okay?" the Emperor ordered and Taizou did so. Nothing happened. Then Yuji followed with an annoyed expression on his face. The long-haired boy just held it up without being asked and, like with his best friend, nothing happened.
"Okay, now for you," the Emperor ordered Robert. The boy held up the digivice and it glowed brightly along with the wall. Before he knew it, the wall shrunk and floated toward his neck. A tag then formed around his neck and the crest inserted itself into the tag.
"Robert Battaglia, bearer of the Crest of Destiny," the Emperor said with a chuckle. "Let's see what's further into these ruins."
They were led along, not knowing what to expect. "You know, Mister Emperor, sir, I think we should have our partners with us," Yuji told him.
"They already are with you," the Emperor said, indicating a Sealsdramon and a BlackGargomon. "Of course, Zeppelinmon couldn't fit in here so he won't be coming down. That was the exception, though, not the rule."
They continued along, not knowing what else to do. They hated being helpless.
###
Abigail Symanski got hope just after dinner. "Abby, where were you?" her father asked as soon as she entered.
"Just with some friends, that's all," she said.
"Abby, there was a monster attack and you were with friends?" her mother asked, sitting down in the next room.
"I heard from Jahara's father that you stayed without them and went with strangers," her father added.
"Just because you don't know them doesn't mean I don't," she replied angrily.
Her mother looked up at her father before turning to her. "Abby, your brother disappeared three weeks ago and so did three of your closest friends. We can't have that happen again."
The girl took a deep breath. "Mom, dad, listen," she said. "About David…" The duo listened intently. "These friends of mine are my only ticket to rescuing David, to saving him. He's… He's gotten into trouble."
"What is he doing?" her father asked, now knowing that his daughter knew more than she was letting on.
"He… You won't believe me."
After a slight pause, her mother spoke. "Abby, we'll believe you, no matter how crazy it is."
The brunette girl looked at her mother through fogged glasses. "You remember that Digimon show David and I liked?"
"Yeah, I remember even taking you to the Movie," Mr. Symanski responded.
"Well, it's not just a show, it's real," she told them. She knew from their shocked looks that they couldn't possibly believe her. "And now David's a Digimon Emperor and he's enslaved a large part of the Digital World. Those friends of mine are Tamers that have their own partner digimon like I do. I know you don't believe me, but…"
She ran off to her room. The couple was about to head after her but she came back after a few seconds with a pink rabbit. "This is Cutemon, my partner." She let the rabbit down and she walked toward the girl's parents.
"It's a pleasure to meet you, Mister and Missus Symanski," the rabbit said, smiling and holding out her hand.
The next thing Abby knew, her father had fainted and her mother had to run over to him.
###
"So, there are now four of us," Ayaka commented. The group sans Abby was currently in the old, beat-up hotel room, talking as the sun went down.
"What's the next move?" Ed asked her, hoping for a reply.
The blonde thought about it for a second. "Wait, you want me to decide?"
"Well, you have seniority over me," he responded.
"Plus, you know Ed and I don't," Gunter said while balancing himself on the bed with his feet on the wall. "And there's the case of how you're the only one here that can reach Ultimate other than me."
"Well, we'll have to check the digital world for any of the others that may have escaped and then we'll use the Dimensional Corridor to go to the Dark Ocean and end the threat of the Digimon Emperor once and for all. And we'll have to do all that without attracting David Symanski's attention." The girl took a deep breath. This was going to be difficult.
The two guys nodded. "Okay, that sounds like a plan," Ed said, smiling at her. "Then we'll have to figure out where Dagomon's base is in the Dark Ocean."
"Dagomon's basically a copy of the HP Lovecraft character Cthulhu, right? So, maybe he lives in a giant city beneath the ocean," Gunter suggested.
"Who is HP Lovecraft?" the black-haired teen asked, confused.
"A horror author," the brown-haired teen explained, surprising Ed. The black-haired boy had no idea that Gunter would even be interested in that kind of stuff. "So, to get underwater, we'll need a digimon that can go underwater."
"Funny, I met a girl named Mizuki who had an Armadillomon for a partner," Ayaka commented. "If that digimon was here, then we could at least get one of us down there."
"Yeah, only one," Ed said, scratching his chin. "What about Miki. Maybe if she wasn't captured, she could take us there. After all, Ranamon can control water, can't she?"
"Well, I guess I should take a shower," Gunter told the group, for some reason being reminded by the mention of all this water. That didn't make his abrupt change of subject matter any less jarring to the others.
"Uh, the water doesn't work in there," Ed told him. "And I thought we were talking about the Dark Ocean!"
"What? Okay, what are we going to do about cleanliness, then?" the muscular German asked, grimacing.
"Well, last night, I went to a 24-hour fitness and showered in the locker room. All it cost was about five bucks to get in," Ed explained, realizing that Gunter wanted to continue talking about this.
"Then there are public pools," Ayaka suggested.
"You know, this whole living in a world where you don't exist is harder than it looked on television," Ed told the others. "Imagine having to permanently live here. Then we'd probably have to steal identities to do anything."
"So, you willing to go with me to the gym?" Gunter asked.
"Might as well," Ed responded. "Just don't expect me to use the shower next to yours."
"Hey, I was just thinking of going there to work out, that's all. At least, along with the shower thing," the large German responded.
Ayaka smiled. At least the two of them were getting along as friends. She also looked at her green partner, smiling at the fact that she reached the Ultimate level.
She looked forward to getting all of this worked out.
###
A/N: Yeah, Sanzomon. I swear, in every single fic that features a D'Arcmon, she digivolves into Hippogriffomon. Yeah, I know, she becomes one in the Digimon Frontier movie, however, that wasn't a true digivolution since both digimon were just a Mega-level in disguise (I can't remember the name of the digimon at the moment). In my opinion, Sanzomon just fits a lot more.
Also, hopefully Gunter's an entertaining character. If anybody's got any comments, let me know in a review.