Questo fa schifo.
Zoe sighed. As much as she would have preferred a different phrasing, there really weren't any better words for it. She'd been powerless for what felt like weeks after Grumblemon stole her spirit, unable to do anything to meaningfully help the group during any of the dangerous situations they'd subsequently run up against. Unable to fight back against the Golemon, unable to help stop BurningGreymon when he went out of control, unable to prevent Seraphimon from being struck down by his own attack...
She glanced down sullenly at her D-Tector. And now, courtesy of JP, she finally had her spirit back... only to discover almost immediately thereafter that her beast spirit had been taken as well, found by one of the evil warriors before she'd even had a chance to see it.
So now, she was stuck with Ranamon's, which felt... unpleasant, at best.
Zoe's gaze dropped to her shoes. When the beast spirit had first emerged from that underwater shipwreck, seemingly unearthed from the sand-covered seafloor by the cyclone Ranamon had summoned directly above it, she had thought that she was saved — and in a way, she had been. While the five of them hadn't managed to conclusively beat Ranamon, they'd still driven her off in the end, not losing any spirits or taking any lasting damage between them beyond a few bad bruises and a headache. Yet the entire time she'd been Calmaramon, she'd felt subtly wrong, overly-bulky and strangely-shaped... not to mention ugly, given her friends' initial reactions to seeing her as such. They hadn't mentioned it since then, and Calmaramon wasn't even technically her, but that didn't entirely take the sting out of it.
Shame swept over her like a breaking wave. Why did this world so seem to revel in kicking her while she was down? Had she even once been the slightest help to anyone? Won a single battle she'd been involved in? She'd beaten that trio of Mushroomon back in Breezy Village, but then they'd collectively digivolved to Woodmon and beaten her right back, forcing Kouji to jump in and save her. She'd distracted the Goblimon at the Wind Factory, but there had been too many of them to actually fight, and they'd have shot her down if JP hadn't taken care of Snimon before they could. She'd tried to assist against Gigasmon, only to end up having her spirit stolen from her entirely. And now, even with a beast spirit of her own, Ranamon had still escaped with hers...
As quick as the shame had come, indignance surged up to swallow it. No, she'd definitely helped! Distracting the Goblimon was all she'd been meant to do at the Wind Factory, and she'd done her part just fine! She'd saved her friends back on the mountainside, not to mention freed all of Grumblemon's hostages! She'd kept Tommy from having his own spirit taken, rescued Seraphimon's egg before the ones that killed him could get their hands on it, and just now she'd managed to control a beast spirit on her first try, which was more than any of the boys could claim. Besides, even if Ranamon had her real beast spirit, Zoe had hers too. This wasn't anywhere near a loss!
She just... wished it felt more like an actual victory.
Trying to summon the optimism to put it all out of mind for the moment, Zoe turned and looked back down the beach. She'd moved away a few minutes ago, wanting a bit of time to get herself back together, but the rest of the group was still situated right where they'd de-digivolved, trying to figure out how to proceed.
"How would you know?"
...and evidently getting nowhere fast, if what she could hear from here was any indication.
Shaking her head, Zoe walked over to rejoin them. Takuya, Tommy, and JP were standing relatively close together, while Kouji had distanced himself slightly, leaning up against a nearby palm tree.
"Look, Whamon wouldn't have just stranded us here, right?" Takuya was saying, gesturing animatedly at the air. "So there has to be a way off this island."
"Yeah, well where is it then?" JP asked. "I don't know about you guys, but I'm not seeing a boat anywhere, and I don't think the Trailmon tracks run through the middle of the ocean."
"Well, uh..." Takuya mumbled, thinking it over for a moment before snapping his fingers. "Got it! Did anyone see where those Toucanmon went? Not sure how we'll make them tell us yet, but they should know how to get back to land."
JP shook his head. "Not me."
"Me neither." Tommy said.
"They weren't exactly our highest priority at the time." Kouji pointed out.
"Same here." Zoe chimed in, implicitly announcing her return. "I'm not sure what happened to the Gomamon either."
She assumed they'd fled while she was underwater, accidentally grabbing the wrong spirit.
"Hmmph, I don't really wanna know where those guys went." JP muttered, kicking at the sand and wrinkling his nose. "My face still smells like fish..."
"Yes, for a warrior on the side of evil, Ranamon certainly seemed to have a lot of additional help on hand." Bokomon remarked.
Takuya rolled his eyes. "Seriously though, did you hear her? 'Wasn't how it looked', my foot. I know bad guys aren't always the brightest, but did she seriously think we were gonna listen to her?"
"...maybe we should have."
The others turned to Kouji in surprise.
"Huh? What do you mean?" JP asked.
"I mean that we barely know anything about our enemy right now." Kouji said, crossing his arms. "All we really know is what's written in Bokomon's history book, which tells us nothing about how Cherubimon's warriors actually operate in the present day. We don't know where they're based out of, we don't know how they get around, and we don't know how they seem to keep finding us."
"Yeah, so?"
"So, if we'd let Ranamon keep talking, we might have been able to get some of that information directly from her." Kouji elaborated. "Even if she was lying about being on our side, we still could have leveraged that to learn more about how her group actually functions... but we didn't, and now we might never even know if she was telling the truth or not."
Takuya balked. "Wha- come on man, you don't seriously think she's got some kinda evil doppelganger, do ya?"
"I can confirm that there is only one copy of each legendary spirit in existence." Bokomon cut in, raising a finger in objection. "For instance, there is no possibility of a second Agunimon appearing elsewhere in the Digital World, as Takuya already possesses both legendary spirits of fire."
Takuya nodded. "See? It was just a dumb trick."
Zoe frowned. Had it been...? Takuya seemed sure, but Takuya was a bit of a hothead at the best of times. As much as Zoe agreed that Ranamon having an "evil twin" seemed pretty unlikely, if she had been faking, she'd been completely committed to the act.
"Bokomon says everything that comes out of my mouth is a dumb trick!" Neemon commented.
While Bokomon habitually snapped Neemon's waistband against his side, Tommy began fidgeting with his hands.
"She did sound kind of different..."
Zoe nodded in silent agreement. While she still wasn't exactly in any hurry to stand up for Ranamon, the obvious change in tone and cadence would have been hard not to notice.
"It wasn't just that." Kouji said. "Did you notice she only really started fighting back after those other Digimon showed up?"
Tommy nodded. "She was yelling that she didn't want them getting hurt."
Takuya rolled his eyes. "So she sounded a little different than last time and maybe isn't a total jerk. She still had Zoe's beast spirit, so it's not like we were wrong to strike first for once."
"And if we'd known that beforehand, I might have agreed." Kouji said pointedly. "What actually happened though is that you, knowing nothing, decided to attack on your own, and in doing so basically forced everyone to follow your lead."
"Wha- hey!"
"Do you ever think these things through? You didn't even remember that BurningGreymon could fly until Ranamon was already leaving-"
"Hey, I didn't see you tagging in! And I didn't forget, I just didn't want to risk-"
"Come on guys, let's not fight." Zoe interrupted, holding back another sigh. "Don't we have more important things to be doing?"
"Yeah, I thought we were trying to figure out a way off this island." JP pointed out, lifting a hand to his chin. "Maybe if we built a raft?"
"Well if we knew where the Toucanmon went..."
"They have wings Takuya, they probably already flew off-"
"Then why don't we just do the same thing? Half of us have wings too!"
"And half of us don't! And even if we did, do you seriously think flying out over the ocean in a random direction and just hoping we find land before exhaustion sets in is a-"
"Um, I have a question?"
The group quieted and turned to Tommy.
"Yeah? What's up?" JP asked.
"Well," Tommy said, "I was just thinking. If Zoe can use a beast spirit that isn't hers, then... does that mean any of us can use any spirit?"
...
"Ah... huh." Takuya rubbed the back of his head as he turned to Bokomon. "I dunno. Can we?"
Bokomon hummed thoughtfully, taking a moment to flip through the book that he always seemed to pull out of nowhere.
"Hmm... I'm not sure." he admitted after a moment, scratching the top of his head. "There's nothing in here that would say otherwise, so I suppose I don't see why not? You were all chosen by Lady Ophanimon, and Zoe has obviously already proved it possible."
"Wait, so-" Takuya fished his D-Tector out of his pocket and pushed a few buttons before turning the screen outward, allowing the group to see the Beast Spirit of Earth now displayed on the screen, "-you're saying I could become this guy if I wanted?"
"It appears so, yes."
"Aww, what good is that though?" JP sulked. "The only other spirit I have is Grumblemon's, and I don't wanna be him."
"Yeah, but... that means if one of us loses our spirits again..." Tommy started.
"...we'll have others to fall back on." Zoe finished for him, sharing an understanding glance with the youngest of the group.
Kouji nodded, seeming thoughtful. "It would give us more options as well, especially if we used them in tandem with the spirits we're already accustomed to."
"Well, let's try it then!" Takuya cheerfully exclaimed, fiddling with his D-Tector some more. "Just gotta..."
A code cocoon abruptly enveloped him, prompting everyone to take a sudden step back. A muffled scream was audible for a moment, before the cocoon dispersed to reveal Gigasmon in all his brutish glory, causing everyone to recoil even further. Zoe's hand instinctively flew to her own D-Tector, wary despite herself that this was somehow the real one, back for more-
"Oh man, my nose is huge!" Gigasmon exclaimed, raising one hand to rub the protruding appendage. "Just look at this thing!"
-then let her hand drop back to her side. Yep, that was Takuya alright, rougher voice or not.
"Hey, calm down guys, it's only me." Gigasmon laughed, turning to a still unsettled-looking JP and Tommy. "Watch!"
He immediately began making exaggerated muscle man poses, somehow only made more comical by the beachside setting and Gigasmon's legitimate musculature. JP and Tommy both quickly broke down laughing, and Zoe even found a small smile returning to her own face. A few seconds later, Gigasmon vanished, Takuya reappearing in his place.
"Sweet, that worked!" he grinned, punching a fist into his other palm. "I'd like to see those guys try to take us on again when I've got two beast spirits to-"
"Actually Takuya," Zoe cut in before Takuya could get too carried away, "maybe you should give that to Tommy? He doesn't even have a beast spirit yet, after all."
Kouji nodded in agreement.
"Things have only been getting more dangerous lately. Tommy needs it more than you do."
"I wouldn't mind..." Tommy mumbled, fidgeting again.
Takuya deflated a bit.
"Guess you've got a point there." he admitted, holding out his D-Tector just a little reluctantly. "Ready Tommy?"
Tommy nodded, raising his own device to face Takuya's.
A moment passed.
"Uhhh, how do I...?"
As Takuya began haplessly fiddling with the device's buttons, Kouji sighed and stepped forward to help. Roughly half a minute later, one of them finally seemed to figure it out, as the Beast Spirit of Earth abruptly ejected from Takuya's D-Tector, hovering in the air for just a second or two before siphoning down into Tommy's. The small boy held the screen up a moment later to showcase the spirit now displayed on the device.
"It worked!"
"So we can mix and match?" JP said, grinning widely and raising his hand. "Ooh, let's try out each others' spirits next! I call first dibs on BurningGreymon!"
Kouji shook his head. "No. Those of us that have our own beast spirits should stick with them for now. There's too much risk of one of us going out of control again if we start trading them around like toys."
While Zoe internally agreed, she wouldn't exactly have objected to trading the beast spirit currently in her possession for a different one — though, she supposed Calmaramon was still technically preferable to Gigasmon.
"Aww, come on!" JP pouted. "Zoe didn't have any trouble controlling Calmaramon."
"...come to think of it, yeah, you're right." Takuya said, turning to her with dawning surprise. "How'd you do that, Zoe?"
Doubtless he was thinking back to his disastrous first experience with his own beast spirit. While Zoe remained proud that she hadn't had a similar episode, she also wasn't really in the mood to tout her accomplishment given the reality overshadowing it, and so simply shrugged.
"Just luck, I guess."
...that, or an overabundance of righteous fury overriding any inherently beastly instincts, especially after Ranamon revealed what she'd taken.
Takuya shrugged, apparently dismissing it once Zoe refused to elaborate further, and turned to everyone with a smile.
"Alright then! We've got some new tricks, and we're back on track! Let's get moving you guys!"
The rest of the group just stared at him with identical flat expressions.
"...juuuuust as soon as we build that raft!"
