Archnemon=Arukenimon
Chapter 35: Digital World: Dark Evolution VI
Piyomon hovered around Sora nervously. Once again she brushed the tip of a wing over her partner's face, worried.
Piyomon didn't know all that much about humans and their needs, but Sora was red in a way that she usually wasn't. Still, she calmed herself with the thought that Takuya had said Sora would get better and he would know such things.
...or actually, would he? His smell -not that Piymon was that good at smelling; but some things, digimon just knew- was more digimon now than ever. So what would he know about treating a human? And, more importantly, Piyomon's partner? However on the other hand Piyomon didn't exactly know anything else to do either.
Thinking about him, Piyomon listened to the forest. Some time ago, there had been noise of a fight and she had smelled a scary amount of smoke in the air, however it had faded and she knew the fighting had been moved out of her range. The wind had shifted too, blowing in the wrong direction to tell Piyomon anything.
Sora and her were all alone now, though, as Takuya had done that part well, drawing all the digimon alway from them. Some part of Piyomon guessed it would be best to evolve and carry Sora away from here now, not knowing how long their solitude would last with their location already discovered. Takuya had said something about that as well, about meeting up somewhere else.
Piyomon knew it would be best to move too, but if it was best for Sora to rest and not be disturbed, then Piyomon thought it couldn't be that bad to wait a bit longer. As long as possible.
Not even wanting to wake Sora, Piyomon wasn't sure she actually could do so either, because usually Sora would have woken up from Piyomon tickling her face with feathers.
This right now, this red face, sweating, and sleeping during the day, not waking up, not mumbling, not tossing around in her sleep, was not like Sora. It made Piyomon feel very, very helpless and chilly in her bones.
Piyomon breathed fire; she should not feel cold.
But she couldn't help it when she thought of how Sora should be sitting next to her under this tree and chatting and smiling and laughing.
Piyomon was worried, so much that she actually preferred fighting -with Sora by her side- to...this.
This...Piyomon felt tears prickling at her eyes. This was so much worse than fighting.
Sora was in pain all alone.
Terribly worried, anxious, fretting and building up nervous energy that wouldn't help her make Sora better, Piyomon didn't think nicely towards the presences coming closer. Not at all. Still far away, they were, only at the rim of her perception, but Piyomon rarely felt more ready to fight.
Her feathers rustled as she gathered energy for an evolution without Sora's aid. The digivice started glowing nonetheless.
As Piyomon's body changed and rebuild into a greater, more powerful form, her mind changed along with it. Great emotionality was edited into a drive to protect and awareness was focused towards how to that. Piyomon's thoughts changed into Birdramon's, completing the transformation.
With the high given to her by her new body and one powerful swing of her wings, she was above the tree-line. Her sharp eyes enabled her to catch bodies crawling under the cover of leaves and identify the figures.
Spiders.
Dokugumon.
She spared half a thought to wonder if Takuya's distraction had failed or if this were others; how he was fearing. But that was the only thought she spared him before her programming to protect Sora overtook her. Battering her wings a few times, she gained height. Then, glancing once more at Sora, she angled her wings in preparation. Opening her jaw, she let out a call of battle.
Trying to sway it her favor, Birdramon opened the fight.
In a sharp dive, her body scratched against the tree tops as her hard, bony claws dug underneath the cover of leaves. She carved through the air, through twigs and logy, but only gazed a couple of bodies. She hadn't expected much better, but it was still a disappointment. The trees were in the way, highlighting what she already knew; Bridramon was too big for a fight in narrow territory like a forest. She was only making herself a target by drifting over the trees, which also happened to be the perfect and natural hiding places of her foes. Most importantly, however, Sora was too far away for her peace of mind. Even if it was to draw the fight away from her.
Her battle-turned mind decided after two failed trial runs against keeping to the strategy. She had to avoid attacks now too, and it was just too risky and ineffective. The next best option she came up with was far from ideal too, but she pushed down on a swell of guilt and hesitation.
Birdramon changed course quickly, anxious as she returned to Sora's side and her absence from her partner was suddenly pushed to the forefront of her mind. Sora hadn't been in danger, she told herself. She had stayed close to Sora, always within close sight, attacking the enemy and only gone for a minute; not long enough for the Dokugumon to get to Sora. And Birdramon had held their attention anyway. No danger to Sora. All this flashed through her mind in the span of a second.
In that one second of distraction, a threat shot up in front of her with no warning. Birdramon threw her weight to the side, but her fiery wing gazed it, burning through it, however she felt the contact eat into her flaming feathers to the skin beneath. A hiss escaped her as she beat her wings, gaining a bit more distance, again within the span of a second, before she once more set into a dive, her claws extend like a hawk picking its prey.
Wind caught in her feathers, slowing her down and with as much care as she could, she curled her claws around her partner's fragile body.
Birdramon wished she didn't have to do this, but the ground wasn't save and in Birdrmon's mind it would always be life before comfort. Sora couldn't heal from being sick if she was in danger.
The ground, the earth wasn't save, so Birdramon would retreat to the sky.
They couldn't catch her there, they couldn't attack her there, they couldn't harm Sora if she was out of their reach.
Though Birdramon couldn't counter attack either -not without setting the forest on fire-, but it was a small price to pay. With powerful beats of her wings she even lost her opponents from sight as she ascended; another price she was willing to pay.
It wasn't right, she thought guiltily, leaving Takuya behind. However Birdramon had to protect Sora and Takuya was able to take care of himself. Still, Birdramon couldn't help him and she regretted that, seeing a dot of grayness, ashes, in the green sea far beneath her, his location shoved in her face.
A faint noise caught her ear and all thoughts of Takuya were pushed from her mind.
Sora was waking up. A stab of worry had her wondering if that was good. Shouldn't she be resting?
"Mmm," moaned Birdramon's partner faintly, trying to move. When she couldn't Sora's eyes flew open, widening with panic.
"Sora!" Birdramon exclaimed.
Sora coughed, at her voice she stopping to struggle and she glanced up at Birdramon. Birdramon couldn't describe the relief taking hold of her. It was like the world was lifted of her shoulders. Given taht Birdramon was carring Sora with her claws while flying, it was a bit difficult seeing the girl, but Birdramon craned her neck not caring about the difficulty. She would even smile if she could. Sora.
"Wha..."stuttered Sora, before once again convulsing with coughs -an invisible weight crushed down on Birdramon again. "What's going on? Wh-Where are we?" The girl's voice was full of fear and panic and Birdramon felt terrible even before she reluctantly started to explain.
As Birdramon circled in the air, talking, Sora twisted till she was more comfortably held by Birdramon's claws, waving Birdramon's concerns for her safety aside, saying she was feeling fine. Birdramon didn't know better, so she couldn't protest, but she had the suspicion that Sora wasn't feeling as healthy as she claimed. Still, she pushed her worry aside when Sora asked where Takuya was- a glossed over topic.
Birdramon squirmed as much as she was able to while flying.
Predictably Sora caught on to her hesitation fast. Her eyes got suspicious, and Birdramon felt even worse than before. But she didn't regret it, even as her conscience, strengthened by Sora's disapproval, screamed at her. Protecting Sora was more important, always, and she had known from the very beginning that Sora wouldn't like what Birdramon had elected to do. Or rather not do - helping Takuya.
"Where is he, Birdramon?" Her partner asked again, and Birdramon surrendered to the mildly stern tone faster than melting ice.
"You were sick...and he offered to distract the digimon," Birdramon confessed hesitantly and guiltily, "I don't know..."
Sora drew her head back as if slapped, her flushed face paling. "And you just left him?" She demanded. Her eyes narrowed in anger; anger directed at Birdramon and it hurt more than any attack ever could, but she still didn't regret it. She couldn't just not worry about Sora. She couldn't just not try her best to protect her. Even if that made Sora angry at Birdramon. Wishing that Sora would understand that, she was at the same time glad Sora didn't.
Sora loved Birdramon very much, so if she knew of Birdramon's conflict she'd be hurting too, trying to help Birdramon even as her heart was pulled in a different direction. Sora was so kind; she wanted to help everyone, but she loved Birdramon and she'd try everything to keep Birdramon from hurting even if that hurt her for being unable to help others. And then she wouldn't be Sora anymore.
Just that thought felt like someone squeezed Birdramon's heart in a fist, making her want to cry.
"We are looking for him," Sora announced determinately.
Birdramon didn't protest, relieved almost.
Flying lower towards the danger wasn't what Birdamon wanted, but Sora was awake and alive and Birdramon wasn't alone anymore and Sora surely knew what best to do. She always did know what to do better than Birdramon, since Birdramon wasn't good at prioritizing and strategy - beyond protecting Sora, that was.
As Birdramon descended, Sora patted herself down as best as she could, being held in a difficult position. She swallowed. "...I don't have my digvice, Birdramon..."
Birdramon remembered; having been focused only on getting Sora away, the digivice had been forgotten. "I'm going to land."
Nodding, Sora placed a hand reassuringly on Birdramon's claw. It made Birdramon worry more and at the same time took away some of her anxiety. With Sora, Birdramon could do everything. For Sora she would do anything; protecting her and the digital world.
Soon individual trees became distinct again and Birdramon's gaze drifted over it, looking and searching for digimon. She didn't see any, but didn't trust it. A few miles away trees crashed, drawing Birdramon's attention for a moment before it came clear that she couldn't see anything helpful from the distance. But at least they knew in which direction they needed to look. Birdramon told Sora about it and while her partner bit her lip in concern, hestiant, loath to let her friend fend for himself, she needed the digivice. Especially if Takuya was still fighting now. How long has it been since they separated? An hour? More?
"I think I see our stuff," Sora said, pointing.
There were some claw marks in the ground from where Birdramon had picked Sora up and the tree she had been resting under was broken almost in half. Its roots were digging out of the earth from when Birdramon's body had crashed into it at the same time. A couple of backpacks and their content were scattered around it.
Birdramon circled over the clearing, descending, until she opened her claws carefully a few feet above the ground. Sora landed clumsily on all fours with Birdramon setting down behind her. Her eyes flickering about with practice, Sora found her digivice quickly, but instead of leaving immediately, she hurried to gather everything within arm's reach and stuffed it into a bag -the pots were all broken, the pinkish jelly splattered, to no one's regret- as Birdramon's kept alert eyes on the surroundings.
Birdramon was still almost too late.
She hadn't seen it. She hadn't seen it because she hadn't expected it. Birdramon had only thought about the digimon she had had a short skirmish with and seen earlier. She had expected digimon at least twice as big as Sora and much bulkier.
Archnemon in human form wasn't that much different from Sora.
Small.
Birdramon hadn't seen how she had been hiding, waiting for her prey to walk right into her trap, like the hunter she was. In the wreckage and broken logs, covered by leaves and twigs and so very close, Archnemon had hid, only now moving to attack with eyes set on Sora.
Birdramon screeched, in fear and terror, moving without a second thought in the only way she could. To protect.
Sora jumped on the spot, her head colliding with the warm body of Birdramon leaning over her. The next scream was from Sora when she noticed the greenish mist being blown in her partner's face -fully aware that it had been aimed at her. Shielding Sora with her body from a poisonous attack, Birdramon took the full blow of it into her face.
Sora screamed her partner's name, her heart beating in her ears, hurting with every beat as Birdramon's body started to convulse. Birdramon hacked, shuddering and only just managing to tumble to the side instead of collapsing right on top of Sora. "Birdramon!" She yelled again, scrambling to her feet and almost stumbling over her feet in an effort to reach her partner's side, her face. Only at the rim of her mind she was aware that she turned her back to the enemy. She couldn't even bring herself to care.
Birdramon!
Birdamon's eyes were wide, unnaturally so and her entire body shook with hawing breath. She was in pain, obviously so, and Sora's mind blanked with fear and panic. It sounded terrible, so horrible, it hurt to listen. Sora didn't know what to do. there wasn't anything she could do.
Her heart clenched to a tight knot and she started feeling lightheaded as her eyes landed on her partner's wound.
It wasn't very obvious damage, Birdramon's beak and face being made of hard bone, but that only made it all the worse. The digimon's usually smooth and even jaw was uneven and riddled with craters.. But the worst thing, the worst thing Sora saw through swimming eyes was the clear trail the poison -no, acid!- had left behind at Birdramon's nostril. Rims eaten away, a clear track of liquid having eaten into the bony skin.
Desperation , growing with every strained breath of her giant bird, strangled Sora at the throat.
Birdramon.
She couldn't lose Birdramon!
Not Birdramon!
This wasn't so bad.
This couldn't be so bad.
They had been through worse!
Birdramon had only protected her.
There was no way she wasn't going to be fine.
The denials racing through her head refused to let her even consider what it meant that the worst damage of poison fumes -acid mist, not solid; like air- was centered around a part of her partner's vital organ. Just thinking about it was beyond her comprehension as every part of her being was focused around her precious companion. Everythign else ceased to exist.
She didn't notice the Archnemon behind her climbing out of a hiding spot and changing from, she didn't notice a dozen of Dokugumon emerge from the shadows and she definitely didn't notice how they circled around her, about to pounce.
Even as her body was out of her control and on instinct trying to clear itself from the danger that had infiltrated her body and was attacking her from the inside, at the verge of passing out, Birdramon did notice, her unfocused eyes catching on to the threat sneaking up on her partner. But her body didn't cooperate. She couldn't warn Sora!
That couldn't be.
Birdramon saw danger and she had to protect Sora from it. She had to protect Sora and she had to move. Sora was so worried about her. Sora needed her. Sora didn't see the danger. Birdramon needed to protect Sora.
Sora loved Birdarmon so much and Birdramon wanted to be there for Sora.
Even of all the people and digimon Birdramon had ever met, Sora was unique. Special. And Birdramon was chosen to protect her. Sora was so kind, so nice to everyone, she loved so freely, not only Birdramon, she cared so deeply for people she never met.
As long as she still had breath in her, how could she possibly fail to protect Sora?
She couldn't. Never.
Ever.
Behind Sora's tear smeared face, Archnemon, wide mouth poking with fangs, attacked. The hissing and snapping of Dokugumon had never been closer too.
It was now that Sora noticed the danger from the corner of her eye, but instead of running as she should, it was her this time, who tried to shield with her body.
Birdramon would never allow it.
In response, throughout the whole digital world, from the air, the oceans, the land, a wave gathered within the blink of an eye. It was energy coming together to fulfill its purpose as it poured into a small rectangular device formed by love.
Deep below the ground, an ancient orb pulsed and resonated and a fading presence was strengthened and carried along that very wave, marking a blank slate in its own form as it arrived.
Sora's digivice, forgotten, exploded in a show of crimson brighter than it had ever done before.
"Birdramon..."
Pure and bright energy filled her body, tinting her in a faint glow of red and carrying an intensity that swallowed her, threatened to drown and suffocate her very being with its power.
But Sora never faded from her mind, her smiling, laughing, living, happy face imprinted in a stark contrast to the paleness, fear, determination and pain of the last expression the digimon had seen. Sora. Sora. Sora. The thought of Sora was what kept her from losing herself. It anchored her as power overwhelmed and entered deep inside her, into her very core.
"...warp evolution..."
Data was broken apart, reconfigured and build upon, fit together in a being that was no longer the same. In sync, bones grew, were filled, muscle mass was enlarged, multiplied and knit together in a long forgotten pattern. But more than anything, within every bit of her data, something, new, foreign was built in, becoming a part of her. This new something hummed, a strange sensation and the melody that might only be part of her imagination quickly changed into something familiar, achingly so, until even that faded, settling with the light of evolution, becoming simply part of her as if it has always been there before.
As if it had always been there...from the edge of her being...
"..."
The being formerly known as Birdramon emerged from the burst of evolution with a powerful swing of her wings, sending shaking tress and blowing earth of the ground. Her feathers, warm, blood red, light, ready to spark into a bright flame at the smallest contact of dust, remained glowing with a reddish tinge that was not an effect of her evolution.
She beat more wings, powerful claws dug into the earth, feeling as if the world itself was nothing beneath her power.
Earth, water, wind, lighting; nothing posed a threat to her might, not even the great Qinglongmon. Power poured from every ounce of her body, even her breath having more of it than most digimon reached within their lives. If she so willed it, the world would burn to ashes.
Yet, as a great red eye fell on the forms gathered in the shadow of her being, she knew she didn't desire any such thing.
Sora lay on the ground, her face pale, dirt sticking to the wet lines of tears on her cheeks, eyes closed, but expression twisted in pain even in unconsciousness.
Vermin, spiders – Archnemon and her Dokugumon pets stared up at her, not even their caged and blanked minds able to counter the instinctive terror her new form instilled in them. Only a glance form her had them screeching high pitched in fear as they fled blindly into the forest. She squashed one with her tail almost absently.
How dare they?
How dare they hurt her Sora?
Worms, ants, in face of her power dared to harm her partner.
With her targets scatted and running -but not hidden, not even from her eyes-, she didn't have a single target for the energy building up aggressively inside her and instead she threw her head back, letting out a cry.
It vibrated, grinding even against her own bones, carrying far and it was laden with her power, her anger, her rage. Sometimes harmless, it phased through leaves, trees, the earth, yet as it caught up to the digimon fleeing for their lives from her, it pressed down on them. The spider digimon let out incomprehensible noises of pain before their minds were overwhelmed, crushed. Everything inside them was erased, blunted and pushed out, not even their own elements retraining a hold over them. They collapsed on the spot.
Yet, the wave of her call traveled farther still, engulfing a pair of very different digimon. It passed through one of it -the tired, struggling, wounded and defeated one- with no effect other than to make him startle and shudder, while the other, much more malicious in thought, lost the one thing that gave it power over the other. Nothing but a toy, a black sphere, empty of energy and waiting to be filled, evaporated out of existence, its impure nature unable to withstand the cleansing.
The cry carried farther still, through empty land and abandoned forest until it eventually faded more and more, dispersing into the air.
The originator herself was unable to endure for a single second after she caused it, damage catching up with her as her next breath came with countless stabs of pain. Collapsing, the great form previously towering over trees by far, glowed shortly as it melted down. In its wake was left Pyokomon, who struggled fruitlessly to take a single step towards her partner.
Sora was not moving other than the flat moving of her chest.
Tears stung in Pyokomon's eyes, seeping into the earth as they rolled down her small body. She sniffed, immobilized and unable to get closer to Sora despite wishing for nothing else in her final moments.
Final moments.
The knowledge clawed with cold certainty at Pyomon's heart. Sora. Sora.
Pyokomon had protected Sora. Did what she had to do, what she was made to do.
Was it so bad to wish nothing but to forever be able to do the same? She wanted to protect Sora more. Wanted to be by her side, watch over her, make her laugh.
Wanted to be needed.
By Sora.
She wanted that.
She wanted that for herself, for herself alone. Didn't want to share.
Sora would be save, even when Pyokomon was gone.
There would be someone else to take Pyokomon's place.
Some other Piyomon would take her place and protect Sora in her stead.
Some other digimon would get to Sora's special smiles and hear her laughter. Some other Piyomon would get baked cake from Sora and some other would get patted to sleep by Sora.
Didn't want that. Didn't want that. Didn'twantthat-
Her heart ached and hurt much more than the acid eating away at her lungs like countless needles stabbing her with every breath.
Desperation and finality clashed in the small digimon's body and tears burst forward with a wave of anguished sobs that no one was there to hear.
Sora.
The forest was still for only a small body in its last moments as she wailed out her grief and sorrow, buried days and futures that she would never get to see and watched her partner, hoping against hope that she would get to look into her eyes one last time and get to be hugged by her one last time.
Before someone else took her place.
...
...Yeah, um, I am in fact aware that Christmas is a celebration of love and that this chapter is really not fitting for the mood... But I don't really care... However on the other hand, this chapter was devoted to the Chosen(s) of Love. In any case, that is that and this chapter couldn't really be pushed to the back. Depressing as it is, I don't regret it.
Hope you drop me a note of your opinion.
TBC.