Disclaimer: I do not own Digimon. Or Heroes of Olympus. That includes both Adventure and Tamers, just fyi.
Author's Note: Written for the Novel with Prompts challenge found on the Digimon Fanfiction Challenges forum. The prompt for the chapter is "squirrel".
Also participating in April's Camp Nano. This chapter brings me to 5,777/25,000. Getting there! Slowly but surely. This chapter has more of me messing and interweaving my story with canon. Fingers crossed that it's all working out as seamlessly as I am hoping that it is.
Enjoy!
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Yolei and Gatomon cornered Kari as the boys were led into the clothes department.
"Kari, what did she mean by that?" Gatomon asked.
"What haven't you told us?" Yolei continued.
Kari dropped her head into her hands. "I don't… I don't know."
"Kari!" Yolei snapped.
Gatomon put a paw on Kari's leg. "Kari, we just want to help, but we can't if we don't know what's going on. This has something to do with the nightmares you've been having, doesn't it? I thought they were just about TK, but now I know it has to be something more!"
Kari peeked out from behind her hands. Her bottom lip trembled. Her throat closed. "Pl-please… I can't say…"
"Then you do know what's going on!" Yolei threw her hands in the air. "Unbelievable! You're keeping secrets from me – me! – your best friend!"
Kari's heart sank. She was feeling worse and worse by the minute. Tears welled up in her eyes that she really did not feel like crying at the moment. "I'm sorry, Yolei… Gatomon… I just don't know what to do…"
Yolei's expression immediately softened. "Kari, whatever's going on, we'll figure it out together. You just have to let us in."
"When you're ready," Gatomon piped up. "I know you've never kept secrets from me before, Kari, so I know if you are now… it's for a good reason, and I'll be here when you're ready to talk about it. Until then, I want to help in any way that I can. And the first thing I think we can do is try to make sure that Davis and the others don't get themselves killed by Princess Pretty Face."
Kari stared down at her partner gratefully before she rubbed her eyes. "How do we do that? She's so powerful. The longer we're around her, the harder it's getting to ignore her words."
Gatomon frowned. "I noticed that, but as long as we keep our wits about us, we can do it. I know we can."
Yolei punched her hand into her fist. "Right. First thing's first… we need more information on this Sea Witch. C'mon!"
"Wait." Kari grabbed Yolei's arm. "Are you mad at me?"
Yolei looked back at her. "Not mad, just… sad. But Gatomon's right. Whatever secret you have, I know it's got to be eating you up inside, and me being… me probably isn't helping."
Kari threw her arms around Yolei. "You're the greatest best friend anyone could ever have, Yolei. I don't want you to stop being you."
"And don't you forget it." Yolei pulled away with a bright smile. "Time for a little information."
They caught up with the rest of the group in front of a rack filled with exotic furs. The boys were too lost in their daze to even notice as the girls and Gatomon cornered Sirenmon for their interrogation.
"Get to talking, Lady!" Yolei snapped. "Who are you and what do you want?"
"And why do you want the boys shopping for their deaths?" Gatomon demanded.
"I told you," Sirenmon said, sounding unconcerned. "I am Sirenmon. I want to sell my wares and have an entrance above ground. As for your last question… I have my sources. I know the Child of Light's little secret. But do we really want to dwell on that? The boys are having such fun."
Guilmon laughed as he tried on a hat that was shaped like a squirrel – and squirmed and wiggled like one as well, except that it had been shaped and sewn into a coonskin cap. Its bushy tail twitched, and its little legs ran in place as Guilmon walked. Veemon and Armadillomon watched and applauded in awe. Hawkmon tried on a feathered headband, and Wormmon checked himself out in the mirror while wearing a pair of rose-tinted sunglasses. Ken and Davis were ogling the men's sportswear while Takato tried on an oversized blue sweatshirt. Cody seemed very interested in a pair of snow boots.
"Fun?" Yolei scoffed. "They look practically ecstatic to be shopping for clothes. Now we know they're definitely under some sort of evil spell!"
"Evil?" Sirenmon repeated. "That's almost hurtful."
"I've never heard of you," Gatomon accused.
Her Majesty's expression turned sour. "Of course you haven't. I was created eons ago by corrupt data that I happened across when I was a mere rookie. The data gave me these powers, and I was destined for great things… Until the Dark Masters found me."
Kari's eyes widened. "The Dark Masters?"
"This was before they reshaped the Digital World… even before the first humans stepped foot into the Digital World… They had plans even then, and they were patient, ready to wait as long as they needed to for their plans to come to fruition. I wanted to join them, you know. Help them control the Digital World. I would have been a far better ruler over the seas than that MetalSeadramon, but they saw me as a threat, not an ally. They ganged up on me. Destroyed me. Tossed my data to the Dark World, never to be seen again… But my patron found my lost data, pulled me back together, brought me back to life. He made all of this possible." Sirenmon made a grand sweeping gesture, as if to encompass not just the entire underground castle but everything beyond that as well.
Kari mouth went dry. "I… I don't understand…"
She gave a chilling smile. "My patron knows everything that goes on in the Digital World, no matter how much you try to hide it for he is the Digital World…"
"Your… patron…" Gatomon repeated, her eyes widening with realization.
"Oh, yes. He's been asleep for so long, you see, and he's so very bored of that. He wants to wake up; he wants to come to the surface. And he's brought me back to help fulfill that. Unlike the Dark Masters, he sees my potential, what I can do for him. All I have to do is help him escape from his prison, just a few favors now and then… All in exchange for a new chance at life. Really, it's the best bargain I've made in centuries."
Huang, Kari thought. We have to get out of here.
But before she could even turn her thoughts into words, Davis called, "Hey, check it out!"
From a rack labeled human clothing replicas, he held up a dark blue jacket with a red and yellow flame pattern along the bottom and a fur collar – just like the one he'd worn while in the Digital World four years ago.
"What the—!?" Yolei spluttered. "Oh god, don't remind me of how terrible my fashion sense was back then! I'm lucky Mimi didn't disown me as a fellow digidestined. How embarrassing."
"Yolei…" Kari said bracingly. "I don't think that's the point."
Takato picked up a white bucket hat that made Kari's heart sink down to the pit of her stomach. Next to that was a pair of plastic-rimmed sunglasses with yellow frames and purple lenses. Ken reached over and picked them up, a disturbed look on his face. "Why do these look so familiar?"
Yolei balked. "It's because they're… they're…"
"Digimon Emperor," Gatomon whispered.
"Ken, put those down!" Yolei slapped the glasses out of his hand.
"We really have to leave, guys," Kari begged, but she wasn't sure any of them could even hear her anymore through the digimon's enchantment.
"Nonsense," Sirenmon said. "The boys aren't done, are they? And yes, dears – that rack is very popular. Many digimon like to dress up dummies with those replicas and use them for target practice, but I assume you all would like them for more traditional means. Go ahead, try it on. It suits you."
"Why do you have all this stuff?" Gatomon demanded. "What's it used for? What do you want? And what does it have to do with Huang?"
Her words didn't seem to phase Sirenmon, but the boys turned, suddenly interested.
"Huang?" Davis repeated.
"Is it story time?" Guilmon asked.
"I must admit, I too am curious as to where you accumulated such a marvelous assortment of items," Hawkmon said.
Sirenmon flashed Gatomon an irritated look. "I told you, I'm a fan, and a collector. Haven't you ever heard the saying that once you put something on the internet, it's there forever? Well, so it is true with the Digital World. Everything can be copied and replicated. Nothing is unique, no digimon, no place, no thing." She picked up a pink backpack that was identical to the one that Kari used to own before she set it aside. "And as a fan, the one thing I love to collect the most is memorabilia from all of you. My patron tells me so many wonderful stories… I know everything about all of you… Even more than you know about yourselves… Including the secrets you so long to keep."
Her Majesty didn't look at Kari, but her tone made it clear: Especially yours.
"And your patron," Kari said, unwilling to back down despite the threat hanging in the air, "it's Huang, isn't it?"
"What?" Davis stirred. For a moment, he looked almost like himself. "You work with Huang—?"
"Yes, but Huang's just misunderstood," Sirenmon said quickly. "Everything you think you know about him is just the misinterpretation of a young child. You were just scared, my dear Davis. It's understandable, but Huang was offering you gifts unlike any you could ever imagine. He was getting you prepared for greatness. He didn't mean to frighten you. In fact, he still really wants to be your friend."
Davis still looked uncomfortable. "Really?"
"Absolutely."
"Don't listen to her, Davis!" Kari said. "Huang is not your friend. He tried to kill you!"
"Not to mention that Her Majesty is probably as twisted in the head as he is," Yolei added. "That's why the digimon of Circuit don't want you having an above ground entrance, isn't it? Because they know you're completely insane!"
"Certainly, I've made mistakes. I will not deny it. I have done things that the digimon of Circuit deem worthy of exile. I embraced the darkness, have been called a traitor, a manipulator, a liar, a bringer of destruction… But I acted out of loneliness. I just wanted a friend, and now I've found one in Huang, and I'd do it all over again for him, because he's that good of a friend." She turned to the boys and gave them a pitiful look, batting her eyelashes. Kari could practically see the sorcery washing over them, taking control more firmly than ever.
"Wouldn't you do anything for your friends, my dears?"
"Of course," Davis said.
"No question," Armadillomon said.
"Okay," Guilmon added.
"Guys, she's tricking you!" Gatomon cried. "Can't you feel it!? It's a spell—!"
"Let's continue, shall we?" Sirenmon said with an unconcerned smile. "I believe you wanted to talk about a price for the digimon nursemaid – and the digicores."
x X x
Takato got distracted on the second floor with the machinery.
"Wait," he said. "What is that?"
Before anyone could stop him, he leapt down the last three stairs and ran over to a large spaceship-looking thing that looked like his D-Power on steroids.
When they caught up with him, Sirenmon said, "You have good taste. This design is quite exotic, not of this world at all. They say in another world, this ark was actually able to gain sentient life. It theoretically has the ability to pass between worlds."
Guilmon walked up the ark and put a paw against the haul. "Grani?"
Takato flinched as if he recognized the term. "G-Grani?"
Sirenmon gave them both a curious look. "I'm not sure about Grani, but this is an extremely complex piece of machinery. Designed by humans, I believe, but like all things created by humans, limited." She smiled pleasantly. "Would you like to see the inside of it?"
Takato apparently took this as an order. He began to walking under it, as if looking for an entrance hatch.
"Takato, don't!" Gatomon warned.
He blinked. "How much?"
Sirenmon adopted a thoughtful expression as she tried to come up with a price.
Kari grabbed Yolei's arm. "I need to speak with Davis without Sirenmon around."
"How do you plan to do that?" Gatomon whispered.
"Go with Takato and the others, check out the ark."
"Are you serious?" Yolei hissed.
"Yolei, if her plan was to lead us down here just to destroy us with the ark, wouldn't she have led us here first thing?" Kari asked. "Please, this might be our only chance."
Yolei looked reluctant, but she nodded. She took a deep breath before marching over to Takato. "What do you think you're doing?" she snapped. "You can't ask "how much" without even seeing the interior! What if it looks cheap!?"
"Cheap!?" Sirenmon didn't seem to know whether to look affronted or suspicious.
"We'd like to see the inside, please!" Yolei announced.
"More tour?" Wormmon asked.
Sirenmon smiled. "Well, if you insist… Right this way…"
Kari didn't want to leave Yolei and the boys alone with her, but she had to try reasoning with Davis. She pulled him aside before he could follow the others and – taking a page out of her best friend's book – slapped him hard across the face.
"Ow," he muttered sleepily. "What was that for?"
"I'll apologize later," she promised, "but right now I need you to wake up!"
"What do you mean?"
"You're under a spell, Davis," Gatomon said. "Can't you feel it?"
He knitted his eyebrows together. "She seems okay."
"Davis, she's not okay!" Kari said desperately. "She's working with Huang… Huang is not your friend. He tried to kill you, remember? You told us all about it, about how you think he's connected to everything going on… Gennai… TK… She's got all of our friends under a spell, Davis!"
Davis shook his head uneasily. "She's a witch?"
"Yes, something like that. She's—"
"Children." Sirenmon was back with the others in tow. Yolei sent Kari an apologetic look. "If you please, we will now see what you came for. Your friend, Elecmon. That is what you want, yes?"
Kari choked back a scream as Davis dutifully moved to follow her. Tears of despair prickled at her eyes.
"Yolei, what happened?" Gatomon asked.
"She noticed you and Davis weren't following, and she turned right around," Yolei explained. "And, of course, boys being boys – they all suddenly decided they didn't need to see the inside of that weird ark-thing anymore after all."
"Kari, maybe I should just digivolve," Gatomon said. "It's worth a try. At this rate, she's going to have the boys playing fetch and drinking out of dog bowls within the hour!"
"We can't," Kari whispered.
"I don't know, Kari," Yolei said. "Gatomon kind of has a point. We have to do something."
Kari sniffled and wiped her eyes. "We can't," she repeated. "If we fight… there's no guarantee that the boys will be on our side."
Yolei and Gatomon stared at her with the horrified realization that she was right.
They took the final staircase down to the first floor. The floor squelched under their feet from the thin layer of water that was settled here. For the first time, Kari noticed a tunnel entrance along the east wall, four stories below the elevator they had first come in at. The tunnel was barred off with golden prison bars, and it looked a bit like the entrance to a drainage system. All of the water splattering onto the floor from the upper levels was flowing toward that wall and disappearing down the dark tunnel. The pattern on the floor led up to the platform that held the gilded cage at the north end of the room.
"Hey," Cody said, "Elecmon looks okay!"
They ran up to the canary cage. The dog-like digimon seemed to have been petrified at the moment he was sucked into the sky above Primary Village, if Takato's description was accurate. He was frozen mid-shout, his hindquarters raised in the air like he was about to Super Thunder Strike somebody. His fur stood on end all over his body.
"Of course," Sirenmon said. "I always keep my merchandise pristine for my customers. I'm sure we can come to an agreement on a price for your digimon nursemaid and the digicores. A package deal. If we come to terms, I'll even throw in whichever pretty necklace your little heart desires, and you can go in peace." She gave Kari a narrowed look. "That's better than starting any sort of unnecessary dramatics, isn't it, dear?"
Don't trust her, warned a voice in Kari's head.
"A deal too good to be true," Gatomon muttered, on her same wavelength. "Don't listen to her, Kari."
The boys were looking at her, nodding urgently and mouthing, Say yes! Kari looked over at Yolei desperately, but her best friend looked just as conflicted as her. She needed more time to think.
"We can negotiate," she said slowly.
"Sure we can!" Armadillomon agreed.
"Yeah! Name your price!" Veemon said.
"Veemon!" Gatomon snapped.
Sirenmon chuckled. "Name my price? Perhaps not the best start to your negotiations, my dear Veemon, but at least you know a good deal when you hear one. Freedom is very valuable indeed. You would ask me to release this digimon, who attacked one of my armor digimon—"
"Who attacked Takato first," Kari interjected.
Her Majesty shrugged. "As I said, my patron asks me for small favors from time to time. Sending some of my precious armor digimon creations to abduct sweet Takato and adorable Guilmon – that was one. I assure you it was nothing personal. And no harm done, as they both came here in the end of their own free will, and brought so many interesting friends with them. At any rate, you want your nursemaid freed, and you want the digicores – which are necessary to ensure that the poor rookies that I helped digivolve stay digivolved as, unfortunately, digivolution is a lot less stable without a human partner. The side effects of not getting exposed to the digicore's light to keep the digivolution stable can be quite… painful. So you're essentially asking several digimon to give up all of their strength just because you want the source of their power. Doesn't seem quite fair, does it? The price will be high."
Kari could see that the boys were ready to offer anything, promise anything. She wished that she knew what to say, where to start to get them not to say a word. Yolei beat her to the punch.
"You're sick!" Yolei snapped. "You've given false promises of digivolutions to unsuspecting digimon and are now forcing them to serve you to keep them from pain! You make them feel powerful when really they are nothing more than minions to you! You're manipulating them! You're the worst kind of evil – the evil that does horrific things just because their own amusement!"
Yolei's voice shook with the passion behind every single word. She was utterly sincere, and her D-3 could sense it. The device started to glow with the power behind her words. It seemed to have some effect. Ken stepped away from Sirenmon, looking dazed and confused.
Hawkmon scratched his head and looked around like he was coming out of a dream. "…What are we doing, again?"
"Boys!" Her Majesty spread her hands in a welcoming gesture. Her treasure headdress glittered, and her painted fingers curled like blood-tipped claws. "It's true. The digimon did not know of the side effects that a false digivolution straight from the digicore and without an empowered digiegg to act as a conduit would bring – but neither did I! How was I to know that the Holy Beasts were so selfish as to gate digivolution behind even further restrictions? Why, I am as much of a victim as them! I hate to see my creations suffer so, which is why I give all of them free access to the digicores, once a day, to bathe in its power – all for a few favors for me from time to time. I serve my patron, and they serve me. A fair deal."
Davis scowled. "Then… you really do work with Huang? But… he tried to kill me…"
"Death means nothing to Huang, young digidestined," Sirenmon said. "In the world that he sees for us, digimon would not get destroyed or reborn – they would simply exist."
"But… that's the way of life…" Wormmon blinked. "The way things are supposed to be…"
Sirenmon hissed at the idea, as if the very thought of reconfiguration made her sick. "You have no idea what's happening, do you, dears? It is so much worse than a few annoying digimon reforming instead of being reborn. Huang knows that his greatest servants have already come and gone – and he knows how to bring them back. I was destroyed, but I refused to be reborn. Huang found me in the darkness. He has returned me to the Digital World, and I will not be cheated again. Now, here is my price for what you ask."
"Guys," Kari said, knowing that the tentative moment of clarity that the boys were trying to grasp was weakening by the moment. Yolei's D-3 was already starting to dim. "Sirenmon wanted to join forces with the Dark Masters. She wanted to help be responsible for the deaths of hundreds of innocent digimon!"
"Lies!" Sirenmon said.
"She wanted to take MetalSeadramon's place. She wanted to completely rewrite and destroy the entire Digital World!"
"Rewrite, yes! Destroy, no!" Sirenmon said. "The Dark Masters had a plan to warp the Digital World into our own image, to bring prosperity, and to finally set things as they should be! Now, I ask you, does that sound so wrong?"
The boys dutifully shook their heads, but Gatomon spoke up, not ready to give up.
"The Digital World is a beautiful place all its own," she said, "it didn't need to be rewritten. Hundreds of innocent digimon were slaughtered by the Dark Masters in their effort to turn it into their own personal playground – and hundreds more were turned into slaves!"
Sirenmon snarled. "I never got the chance to show what kind of ruler I could be! The beings of the ocean realm would have welcomed my rule. Nobody would question anything I did. There wouldn't have been any slaughter necessary. The oceans would have been mine, and the digimon of the sea would have loved me!"
"Because you would have told them to love you," Yolei snapped.
"You're insane," Kari said.
"I was a victim!" Sirenmon screeched. "Now I am scorned in the ruins of what my palace could have been, and I will not let my dreams be crushed again! Especially not by a bunch of measly humans!"
Kari grabbed her D-3, but her hand was shaking almost too badly to hold it. "Guys – it's time to go. Now."
"You heard her, boys!" Gatomon said.
"Before you've closed the deal?" Sirenmon asked. "What of your quest, children? And my price is so easy. Did you know my underwater palace here has a concentrated amount of data? If a digimon or human were to be destroyed down here, even if said little human was chopped into many tiny pieces, he would pop right back together again – stronger than ever."
"Seriously?" Takato asked.
"Takato, she's lying," Kari said. "Izzy once explained it to us that that's not the way it works. We are not invulnerable in the Digital World. Not here, not anywhere! If we die, we die for real!"
"Ridiculous," Sirenmon said, and Kari could feel the ripples of magic in every power charged syllable. "Boys – my price is so simple. I want you to fight to the death. The victor gets to save Elecmon and reclaim the digicores; losers will just pop right back up, better than ever. What do you say?"