Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Something shines down on my face from above, gently coaxing me from slumber.

Mmm... morning already...?

Slowly opening my eyes, I find myself gazing up at a distant circle of soft, sparkling blue light. Its rays fall upon me like the gentlest of feathers, yet it ripples like the surface of a struck pond, casting hypnotic-looking patterns on all that lies below.

Thinking it rather beautiful, I smile, feeling as though everything is right with the world.

I don't think I've ever been so comfortable before. It's as though I'm floating on air, cushioned on all sides by a miniature cloud. However I fell asleep last night, I want to make sure I'm positioned exactly like this every night from here on out.

Far too relaxed to even think about getting up right now, I shut my eyes again and sigh lightly in contentment, feeling a few small bubbles escape my mouth as I do.

...wait. Bubbles?

A tinge of confusion breaks past my blissful drowsiness, whereupon I realize I don't usually wake up to this much light. Also, I can't actually be floating on air right now. Even were that not impossible, whatever is truly supporting me at the moment is too dense, and all-encompassing, and... wet.

Am I underwater?!

My eyes fly back open as I snap into full awareness, my belated recognition and confusion at not being in my bed nigh-instantly shoved aside by my panic at the thought of drowning in the crystal clear liquid all around me. How in the hell-?!

Spurring my limbs into half-hysteric motion, I swim up towards the circle of light above, which I now realize is actually the water's semi-reticulated underside. A few seconds that feel like a few minutes later, my head breaks the surface, and I gasp in relief, my breaths coming fast and heavy for want of air.

...or, not? My breathing is pretty even, actually. The only strain I can feel on my lungs right now is fairly minor, seeming more like it's from the sudden frenzy I just sent myself into than from any genuine lack of oxygen. Huh...?

Blinking the water from my eyes, I look around, and realize that I'm in a pool. A tiny, perfectly circular swimming pool, barely large enough for one to even swim in. Its walls are made of smooth, near-white stone, and are illuminated from below by some unknown light source, strong enough to make the surface of the water literally glow.

...oh, and it's somehow been carved directly into the floor of a cave.

My mouth falls open of its own accord, my surroundings only growing stranger the longer I stare at them. I can't actually see the entirety of the cavern, as the only apparent source of light in here is the tinted teal glow being emitted by the pool — or maybe that's actually the water itself, given the several independently-glowing puddles of it pooling on the floor nearby — but it's still enough to make out the numerous huge, pitch-black holes scattered across the ceiling, each more than large enough for a person to fall through, and uncomfortably reminiscent of the hollows of a skull. They're clustered around tree-trunk-like columns of rock dispersed all throughout the cavern's interior, connecting the floor to the roof like a hundred stalagmites and stalactites grown together.

What... is this...?

My perplexment at my apparent location lasts up until my eyes happen to drift south, at which point I realize I have bigger questions to answer. Namely, why it is my fingers currently appear to be a rather fetching shade of green, and are poking out of a pair of bulky, oddly-shaped gauntlets, which extend all the way up to my similarly green elbows. There's also something on top of my head that definitely isn't hair, and I can feel several tiny trickles of water slowly dripping from the tips of my ears... nearly half a foot further from my head than they should be.

Teetering on the verge of complete mental disarray, I whirl around, only to spot a computer of all things sitting near the edge of the pool. Like everything else I've woken up to, it's fairly bizarre-looking, featuring a pair of fin-like decorations jutting from the sides of the casing, a snorkel-like antenna sprouting from the top of the monitor, and a keyboard in possession of way too few keys to be functional, none of which seem to bear any actual letters — but at the moment, I don't care about any of that.

All I care about are the large, slit-pupil red eyes looking back at me from my reflection in the computer's darkened screen, set within a familiar, yet equally unfamiliar face.

Ranamon...?

Glancing down at myself proper for the first time since I awoke, I find myself staring at a considerably sleeker, curvier body than the one I normally possess, clothed in a form-fitting sky blue swimsuit. Despite technically going down past my knees, the suit is actually rather revealing, large panels of fabric having been cut away to expose teardop-shaped stretches of aquamarine skin, as well as to leave room for the literal fins sticking out of me just above my hips. Which, glancing back at the computer screen, appear quite similar to the ones now growing out of my head, having seemingly replaced my ears entirely.

Reaching up with one gauntlet-covered hand, I gingerly pinch the tip of one of my ear... fins between my fingers. It twitches beneath my touch, sensory input coming through clearly from both ends. I continue my brief inspection with the pair positioned over my hips, finding them just as tangible and attached to me as the ones on my head, then let my hands drop back down.

...I'm not dreaming, am I. I thought for a moment there that I might be, but with how real everything feels... no.

Somehow, some way, some why, I'm Ranamon now.

And this is the lair of the five evil Legendary Warriors, from Digimon Frontier.

...oh HELL no.

I clutch at the sides of my head, fingers pressing into what I now recognize as Ranamon's helmet-like swim cap. Setting aside all questions as to why I'm both here and her for the moment (not that doing so is particularly easy, because just... what?!), if this truly is the world of Digimon Frontier, then this is really, really bad. The last time I watched the show was probably a solid decade ago, if not longer, so my memories of it are more than a little vague, but I definitely still remember that this is the season where the primary villain isn't just a literal fallen angel, but one whose overall goal unexaggeratedly entails tearing the planet apart. Cherubimon is almost stereotypically evil in both appearance and methodology, but given that the Digital World in Frontier had continent-sized chunks of itself missing before the series proper even started, I'd say he was doing a pretty good job of it regardless.

My grip on my swim cap tightens further, a continuous stream of curses running through my mind. Just suddenly finding myself in a world undergoing an active, if gradual apocalypse would be bad enough on its own, but no — Ranamon, AKA me, somehow, is under Cherubimon's direct command, being one of the “legendary spirit” Digimon that he subverted into working for him after said fall. They're his primary attendants; the five highest underlings through which the tainted angel carries out his will, and each one is, or at least acts fanatically loyal to him, so devoted to their lord and master's cause are they.

...and as such, they will almost certainly have no compunctions about killing me, should they find out that “Ranamon” suddenly isn't.

My breath quickens. I- I can't stay here. I need to leave, and leave now, before anyone realizes that something's wrong-!

Panic flowing through me anew, I hoist myself out of the water, stepping up and into the cavern proper — only to immediately cringe at the sensation of cold, unforgiving stone floor beneath my utterly bare feet.

“Ugh...” I wince, glancing down again, “couldn't I have at least woken up as something with shoes-”

I pause for a moment upon hearing my own voice. Yeah, that's Ranamon alright, albeit without the ridiculous 'Southern Belle' accent the English version of the show gave her. I suppose I should be thankful I'm at least not stuck embodying that aspect of her being as well... small mercies.

Shoving that subject to the mental back-burner, I resume frantically looking around for an exit. Unfortunately, beyond the tiny portion of the cavern within the pool's immediate vicinity, I can barely see any of it. Why are there no lights in here?!

“Gotta calm down...” I whisper to myself, desperately trying to regain some measure of composure. “I don't actually know this is Frontier... maybe it's some other continuity...?”

While it's a nice thought for all of the moment it lasts, I can't really bring myself to believe it. My surroundings seem like fairly damning evidence on their own, and if this isn't Frontier, then why would I have woken up as Ranamon of all Digimon, who pretty much only exists for the purpose of fulfilling her role as a mid-tier villain in said season's plot? Even if she was ever featured anywhere else, I'll bet she didn't sound like this.

Unable to find any openings in the portion of the cave I can actually see, I suck in a breath, place my hand on the nearest wall, and carefully walk into the darkness, praying that there aren't any holes in the floor like the ones in the ceiling, lest I end up falling even deeper into this cavern. To my surprise however, as I leave the light of the pool behind, the seven large red gems scattered across my “outfit” begin to brighten, illuminating the blackness in my immediate vicinity with a dim, crimson incandescence.

Apparently I now glow in the dark. Lucky me — and all for the low, low price of changing bodies, species, and universes with zero apparent warning or reason.

I shake my head. Still, while it's not much, and the almost blood-red coloration of the light is honestly pretty creepy in the darkness, at least I can see where I'm stepping now.

“There has to be a way out of here...” I mutter under my breath, still trying to reassure myself as I carefully continue forward. “There has to be...”

God I hope so at least, because the more I think about this situation as I'm assuming it to be, the worse it somehow gets. Ranamon is the owner of the Human Spirit of Water, which is supposed to eventually be taken by Zoe, the sole female member of Digimon Frontier's five main characters. That would be fine, since all that normally does is let someone turn into Ranamon, and it's not like I have any particular aspirations of staying like this for any longer than I absolutely have to — except, unlike the show's human protagonists, Ranamon doesn't have anything “underneath” her outward appearance. When one of the kids uses a spirit, they essentially just become armored in it, gaining all its power while remaining human at their core. Ranamon, however, was never human, being more akin to the spirit itself made flesh... which, I suspect, I now am too. Meaning, having said spirit taken from me and “purified” would likely just equate to straight-up death.

I pause. Well, maybe not? I suppose it is technically possible that my human body still exists beneath my presently fishy, feminine exterior. That is the central conceit of this season after all, what with the main characters — the “Digidestined”, even if I don't think these ones ever actually call themselves that — not having partner Digimon, but instead turning into Digimon themselves to fight.

And if so, then perhaps...

Stopping for a moment to lean against the nearest wall, I close my eyes and concentrate, attempting to forcibly “de-digivolve” myself. If I'm capable of doing so at all, then this should be fairly simple — so far as I recall, it was never really a problem for anyone in this season, even the normally human kids, who wouldn't have naturally had any idea how to do so. Just need to find and flip that mental switch...

Come on... come ON...!

…

...nothing.

I can't form a proper fist with these gauntlets on, but my fingers still do their best to curl into something roughly approximating such as I reopen my eyes and scowl into the darkness.

“Figures.”

Guess that's not happening then. Not that I didn't already kind of assume as much, given all evidence at the moment seems to point to this being the original Ranamon's body, with the only real difference being who's driving it. My own body most likely isn't part of this equation at all. Might be for the best that didn't work anyways — I don't remember exactly how this lair was constructed, but I'm fairly certain Ranamon wasn't the only one living in it, and like hell would I have wanted to find out I can become human again in a place where merely existing as one would likely be tantamount to suicide.

Sighing, I resume making my way around the cave, doing my best to avoid any errant rocks.

Seriously, what could even cause this, and why like this? Digimon as a franchise isn't exactly a stranger to the idea of tossing people into other worlds, but this definitely isn't the norm in any way, shape, or form. Even in this season, the kids still arrived in the Digital World as themselves; they weren't just shoved into Digimon bodies on arrival, especially not ones that were already in use. Which isn't even addressing how Digimon just in general is supposed to be, you know, fictitious. Granted, just being where I am right now makes for some pretty strong evidence that isn't entirely the case, but that really only makes this even more-

My train of thought slows to a halt as I abruptly realize that the light from my gems is fading away, their luster rapidly dimming back down to normal — because the floor in front of me is already lit up, bathed in the bright blue glow of the water.

...I'm back at the pool. I just circumnavigated this entire cavern, and somehow, in spite of all logic, there's no exit to this place.

I'm trapped.

“Damn it,” I snarl, forgetting myself for a moment, “this isn't fair! I don't know what's responsible for this, but you could at least give me a chance of making it out of this alive-”

“Wilt thou kindly quiet down?”

I stiffen in place as a resonant, metallic-sounding voice sounds out from above me — one that I unfortunately recognize.

Turning towards one of the nearby pillars, I watch in semi-resigned horror as a green, almost robotic-looking being drops through one of the holes in the ceiling, slowly floating downwards as though descending in an invisible elevator. His upper half is shaped like an upside-down crossguard, and a pair of rounded mirrors are attached to each of his arms, contrasting with the stadium-shaped one set into his stomach. Where his head should be, there's nothing but yet another small, rounded mirror, bearing no indication of facial features beyond a pair of lip-like markings painted onto its polished surface.

Mercurymon. The Warrior of Steel... and possibly the worst of the bunch to have gotten caught by.

“Tis awfully noisy down here.” he says as his feet come to rest on the floor. “Pray tell, what has our precipitous princess in such a snit?”

My heart — or whatever Ranamon has in place of one — skips a beat. He could hear me?! Ugh, I knew I might not be alone in here, why the hell was I talking to myself?! Not to mention that since he's talking like a renaissance fair reject, he's probably wondering why “Ranamon” doesn't exactly sound like herself right now... though, maybe he didn't hear anything I said particularly clearly? I mean, if he actually heard anything *immediately* incriminating then surely he'd have just led with that-

“Well?” Mercurymon speaks again.

Belatedly realizing that he's expecting an actual response, I frantically wrack my brain for something appropriate to say. Unfortunately, I don't exactly recall that much about how Ranamon typically interacted with the other evil warriors. All I really remember is that she was usually presented as excessively prideful and vain, thinking rather highly of herself in spite of never really accomplishing anything of note.

...I suppose I'll just have to aim for something in the general ballpark of that, and pray that my impression is somehow good enough.

“A- ah hardly see why it's any a' your business.” I say, now actually wishing Ranamon's accent was inherent as I hurriedly slap on my best approximation of it and cross my arms in faked irritation. “Ah'll talk to myself if ah want to.”

“Thy pacing and prattle can be heard from two floors up.” Mercurymon intones, thankfully seeming to buy my imitation for the moment. “Hence it hath become my business.”

A shiver runs down my spine. By all rights, the fact that Mercurymon speaks like this, on top of having no actual attacks of his own beyond reflecting those of others, should make him fairly unintimidating. Right now however, I'm finding those factors to be severely mitigated by how he quite literally stands head and shoulders above me. My eyes are only level with his torso mirror — though, I'm trying not to look at it, as seeing the fear undoubtedly resting in my gaze right now reflected back at me would likely only make it worse.

“That's not- ah ain't...”

I trail off without really saying anything, causing Mercurymon's painted lips to quirk up in apparent amusement.

“How rare to see milady so tongue-tied. Perhaps she hath finally admitted the truth of mine words?”

I blink. Words? What words? Damn it, I have no idea what the context of that statement is- though, maybe if I say it right...

“And what words might those be?” I testily reply, trying my best to both look and sound irritated.

Mercurymon frowns.

“Hast our prior conversation somehow slipped thy mind? I refer, of course, to the relative paltriness of thy capabilities, owing to thine interminable lack of a beast spirit.”

If I was actually Ranamon, that would probably greatly offend my pride. I'm not, but I'm still stuck playing the part for the moment, and thus plant my hands on my hips and glare.

“My 'lack of a beast spirit' ain't gonna stop me from kickin' you around this cave if ya don't take that back.”

An empty threat, and Mercurymon clearly knows it, as his fake lips curl upwards again.

“Such bold words from one so hesitant mere moments prior.” he chides, wagging a finger back and forth. “Didst thou not just freely admit thy chances of surviving against, let alone defeating those children remain slim to none at present?”

“A- ah said no such thing!” I sputter, genuinely unsure what Mercurymon is even referring to. Something Ranamon said before I got here...?

Mercurymon scoffs. “You fool none with such blatant lies. Regardless, I fear thy pleas for 'fairness' shall go unanswered.”

...oh. So, he did actually hear my complaint about “making it out of this alive”, but misinterpreted its meaning? I'll take it; that's way better than the alternative.

“Tis almost a pity.” the Warrior of Steel continues to mock me. “In truth, I had expected thy future efforts to prove at least slightly more skillful than Grumblemon's brutish bumblings, but if thou art truly this unsure underneath thy constant boasting, then it seems I thought too much of you.”

I growl in faux-offense, though internally I'm just growing increasingly desperate to end this conversation, before I go too far with this act and either slip up, or genuinely piss Mercurymon off.

“Don't you dare compare me to that oaf.” I snap, spinning on my heel as if in a huff and starting to walk away. “Now if ya don't mind, ah got better things to do than stand around here listenin' to 'prattle', as you ya'self put it.”

“Hmmph.” Mercurymon hums indifferently. “Very well. Continue to prance and parade thine imaginary competence to thy heart's content. Simply keep such errant tantrums somewhat quieter in the future, and we shan't have further issue.”

Mercurymon snaps his fingers, and I can't help but startle as he abruptly winks out of existence, gone in the blink of an eye.

Chapter Text

After taking a minute to calm down from the nail-biting performance I was just forced to put on, I find myself staring up apprehensively at the pitch-black holes in the ceiling. AKA, my way out.

...in theory.

I swallow. While Mercurymon's interruption thankfully at least demonstrated to me how one enters and exits this cavern, I don't particularly want to go up there and potentially run into him again. Unfortunately, escaping this place just became even more important, and this appears to be the bottom floor, making the ceiling shafts the only apparent way to go anywhere at all.

I think I'm just going to have to risk it.

Slowly, hesitantly, I make my way over to the shaft that Mercurymon descended from. Stepping underneath it, I brace myself and wait for it to lift me aloft.

Nothing happens.

I wait another ten seconds or so before disbelief begins to overtake my nerves. Oh come on, the effect surely can't only work one way, right? I'm pretty sure Mercurymon can't just float around at will, so that can't have been his doing. Is there some sort of secret evil password I'm not using? Do I need to swipe a membership card somewhere? Come on already, just LET ME UP-!

My body lifts off the ground, gravity abruptly seeming to simply fall away. I flounder in the air for a moment, caught off guard, before ceasing my flailing as I find myself being steadily carried towards the hole in the ceiling.

...okay, so the effect is thought-activated. Good to know.

Floating upwards under no power of my own, I'm tempted for a moment to question how or why this works. But this is the Digital World — an artificial dimension connected with, but separate from the human world, where the physics and logic governing any given location can sometimes be loose at best. I'll need to try and keep that in mind from here on out.

As my head passes through the hole in the roof, my vision is briefly obscured by an intangible fog of deepest black, causing my gems to flare with light. The murk vanishes just a scant moment later, and I find myself rising into a large, open cavern that's... really quite similar to the one I just came from, honestly. The only immediately obvious differences are that there's no similar pool of water present, yet I can now actually see the sanguine red shade of the rock all around me, as the space is considerably better lit.

...specifically by a large, wide open gap in the nearest wall, the light streaming in from outside all but blinding after my time in the dark.

Hope spiking at the prospect of escape, I hop out of the gravity effect and quickly make for the gap in question, raising an arm to shield my eyes as I step outside-

“Yeeeep-!!!”

-and barely manage to stifle the shriek that escapes my lips as my foot sets down on nothing at all. Luckily still close enough to the wall to catch myself on it, I throw myself backwards in sheer panic, just as my vision finally adjusts enough to the light to see what lies beyond it.

Turns out, I definitely wasn't wrong in thinking that I don't remember much about the evil warriors' lair. At the very least, I've forgotten some rather crucial bits of information, since I most certainly do not remember this structure being suspended what has to be more than a thousand feet off the ground, to the point that I'd wager it easily outsizes most skyscrapers. What the hell...

Exercising considerably more caution than before, I poke my head back through the yawning gap in the wall, gazing down at what lies below. The surrounding scenery is actually rather picturesque, particularly the dark green mountain rising in the distance, surrounded by a massive profusion of fluffy white clouds. A carpet of vibrant trees extends outwards from the mountain's base, the greenery spreading as far as the eye can see... at least, up until it reaches the enormous pseudo-canyon this structure seems to be situated in, at which point the green abruptly dies off in favor of yellowish-brown rock and a field of drifting mist.

All but digging my fingers into the edge of the wall to keep myself anchored in place, I carefully twist my neck around to look up at the lair's sloped, towering exterior. It's roughly the same color on the outside as it is inside, and is covered in numerous large holes, much like the one I'm currently peeking out of. With the way it narrows near the top, it almost looks like some sort of giant mushroom — an impression only helped along by the equally giant red “roots” that seem to be holding the structure aloft, the entwined tentacular growths cascading upwards into the sky like Jack's proverbial beanstalk.

Slowly backing away from the edge, I let out a small, quiet sigh of relief at having avoided walking to my doom — though it turns rather forlorn halfway through. Unless I want to risk what amounts to climbing down a near-vertical mountain without handholds, safety equipment, or shoes, this is not a viable way to leave. There has to be some other way to get down from here...

Guess it's time to go exploring, and simply pray that no one else is home.

As I walk around the rest of the cavern in search of literally anything else of interest, my thoughts turn inward again, concerns still running wild through my mind. Honestly, is escaping this place even a viable plan? All things considered, it seems rather unlikely that Cherubimon would let one of his valuable spirit warriors simply cut and run. At the very least, he'd presumably send the other four after me, and not only are all of them doubtless a lot more familiar with this world than I am, but as Mercurymon so recently reminded me, one of them can literally teleport. Realistically, the likelihood of my finding somewhere I can actually, permanently hide from them is slim to none.

My jaw clenches, but I force it to relax a moment later. No, stop that. Surely there are places in this world even Mercurymon can't reach — or, better yet, perhaps somewhere outside of it entirely? Pretty much every version of the Digital World I know of contains at least one naturally occurring method to cross over to the human one, after all. This season even has one of the easiest to access, since you can get to and from this world simply by boarding a Trailmon, which are practically everywhere on this side of things...

I scowl. But then again, if this really is the show, a Trailmon on that route would just ferry me to the version of Earth that the main characters came from, not my own. Plus, I'd still be Ranamon — maybe even a downgraded version of her, given what happened to Takuya when he tried something similar — so my appearance would undoubtedly draw massive unwanted attention at best, and get me shot on sight at worst. Not that it wouldn't potentially still be preferable to dealing with the situation here, but leaving the Digital World behind entirely would also mean giving up any chance of figuring out what brought me here, or of ever reversing the process — which, given I have relatively little desire to be stuck as a scantily-clad fish woman for the rest of my life, I very much do want to do.

Having determined this floor is somehow even emptier than the one below, I move beneath another ceiling hole and have it pull me up to the next level... which turns out to be just as spartan and barren as the last one, and nigh-identical in structure, beyond the specific position of the holes in the wall. Starting to sense a pattern here.

I glance around, fins twitching anxiously at my sides. Mercurymon implied he was on this floor earlier, and I was kind of expecting him to have returned to it when he left, but I don't see him anywhere. Maybe he went out? Given how little this place seems to have in way of amenities, I certainly wouldn't blame him.

Once I've determined to my satisfaction that I'm indeed still alone and begun my increasingly-cursory floor inspection, I sigh, suck in a breath, and firm my resolve.

Alright then. If I can't run, can't hide, and can't leave, then what exactly do I need to do to survive this world while I'm here?

...well, since Cherubimon never actually leaves the Continent of Darkness, I suppose in the short term I just need to not get myself killed by any of the other evil warriors. If I'm shelving my escape plans for the moment however, then my only real alternative is keeping up the charade of actually being Ranamon long enough for the chosen children to remove my various “coworkers” from the picture. Which doesn't really feel like an ideal plan itself, given it's dependent on my questionable acting skills managing to fool the other four warriors for an extended period of time.

I raise a teal-tinted finger to my cheek. Then again, two of those four aren't exactly all that bright. Mercurymon is arguably the savviest of the group, and if he didn't think anything was off enough to act on it even after overhearing me, I genuinely doubt the others will either — if I just keep my head down and make sure the accent doesn't slip, that might actually work. Ranamon isn't the last of her group to go down in canon though, so even assuming events proceed exactly as expected, I don't want to just move in lockstep with them... is there anything I can do to facilitate a more rapid removal of the other evil warriors from the picture? Besides trying to get on the heroes' good side at least, which would also be helpful in avoiding my own “scheduled” death at their hands...

I frown. Not that I have any guarantee I'll even have the chance to meet said heroes before then, given I have no idea where they currently are, or when in the timeline I even am. Mercurymon mentioned Grumblemon's “efforts” with respect to the kids, and I apparently don't have my beast spirit yet, so I suppose I have to be at least fairly early on in the plot? It's been so long since I watched Frontier that I'm not sure I'm even remembering events in the right order though, and from what I do remember, the progression of time wasn't always all that clear to begin with. I'm pretty sure that Ranamon's final moments occur inside of one of Sakkakumon's miniature worlds or something, and that won't happen until after the kids reach the Continent of Darkness, but that in turn could take place anywhere from days, to weeks, to months from now...

I shake myself. Whatever the case, I still need to find a way out of this place, because Mercurymon wasn't actually wrong — no matter what I do next, finding Ranamon's beast spirit almost certainly should be my highest priority. Not only is it the perfect excuse to not be around while not breaking cover, but obtaining a second spirit is likely the best precautionary measure I can currently take, since it means I won't necessarily just die if someone swipes the only one I have right now. I certainly wouldn't say no to the general power up it offers either, considering how outmatched Ranamon is by just about everyone who might want to kill me in the near or far future. Can't say I remember exactly where said spirit was, but I know it was somewhere near a tropical island where a group of Toucanmon live, which seems like a pretty solid starting point.

...though, with the entire Digital World to search, I might be overestimating how helpful that actually is.

Doubt begins to creep back in. This plan is seeming less and less feasible with every little detail I add to it. Wouldn't it be simpler to just, find the kids and flat out “defect” to their side, then rely on them to protect me from reprisals...?

I toss that thought around in my head for maybe half a minute, only to discard it as I float up to the fourth floor. As convenient as that concept sounds in theory, actually following through on it would be a terrible idea, because the protagonists of this season actually lose with a startling degree of regularity. First they lose to Grumblemon just on his own, then to four of the evil warriors working together, and then especially to-

I round a pillar, and abruptly freeze as I find myself staring at the back of a figure dressed in black, skull-like armor. Staring out of one of the structure's exterior holes, he silently looks out at the cloud-filled sky, his long blonde hair swaying in a passing breeze.

Duskmon... or rather, Koichi Kimura. The only actual “human” among the five evil warriors, albeit an amnesiac one, and by far the most powerful of the group. Unlike me however, he was Duskmon from the very start, in that Cherubimon literally created him by corrupting the Human Spirit of Darkness and merging it with Koichi's lost, dying soul — which is perhaps why Duskmon is also the most loyal of Cherubimon's servants. And on a team where all five of its members are constantly clamoring to prove themselves to their master, or at least paying massive lip service to the idea, that's really saying something.

I immediately start to retreat- then pause. Come to think of it, if I could remind Koichi of his true, human self earlier than it would otherwise happen and get him out from under Cherubimon's thumb, he'd be an absolutely incredible ally to have. With a walking juggernaut like him on my side, I could probably ditch all this tenuous planning entirely... except that I don't have even the slightest idea how I'd pull that off without potentially getting a sword shoved through my throat in the process. Human at heart or not, this is still the guy who ultimately kills Arbormon, his ally, simply because he eventually decides that said ally is useless. I don't know if I even dare approach him.

...in fact, I don't think I do dare. From what I recall, Duskmon is essentially a walking mess of complexes, and is probably too volatile for me to even risk approaching, much less attempt un-subverting. This idea has no legs; I'll just have to let the heroes sort him out themselves.

Doing a quick about face, I quietly tiptoe away-

“Did you want something?”

I flinch worse than if someone just slid a full tray of ice down the back of my swimsuit. Slowly turning back around, I find that Duskmon doesn't actually seem to have moved, or even turned around himself — yet he still very clearly knows I'm here.

“N-no, not really...” I shakily reply, hastily throwing Ranamon's accent on again. “Ah was just headin' out, actually-”

“You were staring.”

The enormous eyeballs embedded in Duskmon's shoulder armor swivel around to face me, causing me to shudder even as I silently curse myself. Of course he noticed I was here, he's got eyes all over his body!

“Why?” he intones.

“Ah... suppose ah was just wonderin' what you were lookin' at?” I hazard, babbling out the first thing to come to mind. “There's nothin' to really see out there, so are ya just... cloud watchin'?”

Duskmon's head turns fractionally in my direction.

“I know not the answer to that myself.”

...what the heck is that supposed to- no, don't ask, don't engage, just leave.

“Ah see.” I hastily reply. “Well, ah'll uh... leave you to it then. Ah'm gonna go see if ah can't find my beast spirit-”

“Oh?” Duskmon interrupts, nearly monotone. “Remind me. How long have you now been searching for that spirit?”

It takes everything I have not to bolt, knowing that won't help me. This guy basically never talked to any of his teammates in the show proper, why has he suddenly decided he's feeling chatty?!

“A... a while. Ah've been tryin' my hardest-”

“Have you? Truly?”

As terrifying as that implicit accusation is given who it's coming from, a flash of irritation still runs through me upon hearing Duskmon dismiss me so completely.

“It's not as if ah'm not-”

“If so, I find myself forced to question your ability to follow through with anything else you claim to be capable of.”

...would it kill him to let me finish one sentence?

“Look, ah-”

“Cherubimon may tolerate the excessive time and resources you've spent on this endeavor...”

“Could ya just-”

“...but you are now falling behind human children.”

“Now wait a second-”

“Time and patience both wear thin. However elusive your beast spirit may be, I suggest that you obtain it soon, else-”

“Then MAYBE let me go find it already!” I snap. “It's not like you have your beast spirit yet either!”

The moment the words leave my throat, I regret them a thousandfold. What the hell is wrong with me?! Am I seriously that short-tempered?! I already know this guy will murder for less reason than I just gave him and has more than enough power to easily do so; why am I seemingly incapable of shutting my damn mouth?!

Before I can even attempt to hastily apologize, not that it would likely do me any good, Duskmon speaks again.

“...I suppose that much is true.”

Silence falls. I'm left waiting on tenterhooks, but Duskmon doesn't move, nor say anything further.

Am I... really going to get away with that...?

“R- right.” I stutter. “Well then... like ah said, ah'm headin' out.”

I start to turn back around-

“Would it not be easier to do so from your own quarters?”

I scream internally. Would you just let me LEAVE ALREA-

Wait, from my own quarters?

“Oh, ah... just thought ah might get some air first,” I reply, not daring to contradict him again, “but you're right. Ah'll be headin' back down now.”

To my relief, Duskmon just nods this time, finally allowing me to escape the conversation as I all but throw myself back down the nearest hole in the floor. The anti-gravity effect helpfully kicks in automatically to slow my descent, preventing me from snapping my legs on stone as I furiously berate myself.

Great job, me. Just stick around and “keep my head down” — that lasted all of, what, five minutes? Thank goodness Duskmon didn't take that as poorly as he could have; that was at least thrice as stressful as my chat with Mercurymon was before my mouth decided to play eyeball roulette.

I shudder. Note to self: do not approach, be seen by, or speak to the unstable ultra-powerful maniac ever again if at all possible. This may not be my body, but I'd still vastly prefer that it remain in a whole, un-skewered state whilst I'm stuck occupying it.

My gaze moves towards the floor. I've also been tacitly sent back to the “room” I just came from, but perhaps that's actually for the best. Even if I have no idea how leaving from there is even possible, given its previously noted lack of exits, Duskmon presumably had something in mind. Maybe I need to give Ranamon's living space a second look? I'm not sure what there even is to double check though, other than maybe her computer, and of course...

Hmm...

Chapter Text

Staring down once more at the pool I so recently climbed out of, I can't help but think to myself that it somehow looks even tinier than I initially thought. While I know from experience that it's quite deep, in terms of width, you couldn't even fit three of me stacked head to toe in this. Honestly, it's more of a bath than a pool, or even just an oversized fish tank... which I suppose would really only be appropriate.

I scowl. Not only the prettiest belle at the ball, but also the prettiest fish in the bowl. Joy.

Granted, it's at least a nice bowl. It wasn't exactly my focus earlier, but the edge of the pool is ringed by a stylish design of engraved bubbles, which feels like a surprisingly nice touch given how utterly rough and unadorned everything else around here is. There's also a faucet on one side of the pool that's continually pouring new water in, and is shaped like the head of some scaled, vaguely-humanoid fish man, but that's less nice, and more just... weird.

Regardless.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I hop into the water feet-first. As I slip beneath the surface, that same strangely right feeling from when I first woke up here returns, the pressure of the surrounding water enveloping me like an all-encompassing hug.

...yet I still find myself unconsciously holding my breath.

Tensing against my will, I try to make myself breathe in, but some part of me stubbornly continues to resist. Specifically the logical part, which hasn't yet fully adjusted to this rather illogical situation. In theory, I'm fully aware that Ranamon should be capable of breathing underwater, but in practice, it's hard to make myself believe that I can simply take in water like air, especially since I'm not exactly seeing any gills on me. Attempting to override that very basic survival knowledge is like trying to assure myself that I could claw my own eyes out and still be able to see — it just doesn't really compute.

My chest begins to burn, my body growing increasingly desperate for oxygen, or whatever this world's equivalent of that might be. Can't wait much longer...

Desperately trying to assure myself that I would have just drowned in my sleep if I couldn't breathe down here — and my isn't that a cheery thought — I forcibly pry my jaw open and suck in a small gulp of water. It instantly rushes in past my teeth, my tongue, pouring down my throat so fast that for a moment I'm certain I was wrong-

Until my lungs abruptly stop burning.

Relieved more than I probably should be, I take another strange, heavy-feeling breath of liquid, letting myself adjust for a few moments longer before sighing in relief and opening my eyes.

“Phew...” I sigh- before realizing that my voice came out sounding perfectly clear, despite my being underwater at the moment. “...huh. Neat.”

I look around. As before, the interior of Ranamon's pool both looks and feels startlingly peaceful for what it actually is. The water seems to almost dance around me, the sourceless light suffusing it creating a natural spectacle that could undoubtedly entrance me for ages if I let it. It's almost enough to make me forget that I'm essentially just floating in a giant hollow cylinder right now, empty aside from the water it contains.

...or is it?

Inverting my position, I begin kicking my feet, swimming down towards the bottom of the pool. At a glance, I'd guess it has to be at least fifty feet deep... and consequently, the water pressure begins rapidly rising around me as I go, first doubling, then tripling, then more than quadrupling before I lose the ability to accurately estimate it. Were I still human, my ears would undoubtedly be hurting like hell by now, and I'd likely be developing a pretty bad headache — but bizarrely, the extra pressure only seems to make me more comfortable now, rather than less.

At least this body comes with a few perks, I suppose.

Putting that out of mind for the moment, I keep my gaze on the pool's distant floor — but I don't even need to reach it before I can confirm that it isn't as featureless as I thought. Not completely at least, as a large, intricate, vaguely circuit-like symbol appears to have been carved into the exact center of the space, surrounded by three thin rings of unknown script. Promising...

Setting down above the floor proper, I lean over to inspect the odd symbol. Seeing no obvious way to interact with it, I slowly brush my fingers over the stone, searching for a hidden latch or the like-

The instant my fingertips meet the rune at the center of the carving, the entire thing lights up, as though empowered by my touch. As the crevices of the digital glyph flash with color, the portion of the floor it covers literally vanishes, revealing another water-filled chamber below.

...hah. Thank you, Duskmon.

Easily slipping through the newly-revealed trapdoor, I slowly sink down into a large, open, and surprisingly colorful nexus of underwater tunnels. Patches of technicolor sea grass decorate the sand-covered floor, while shattered seashell fragments and glistening pearls make the smooth stone walls seem to almost glitter. The tunnels stretch out in all different directions, their destinations a mystery — or would be, if not for the square metal plaques embedded in the wall over each one's entrance, inscribed with geographical designs that I'm heavily inclined to assume represent specific parts of the Digital World.

I smile. Seems I've found my exit... not that it makes any physical sense that this little secret hub can exist, since I already saw that there's nothing underneath this towering “treehouse” other than giant roots, but again, Digital World. No real sense in questioning these things.

Now I just need to figure out which of these will get me closest to that island with the Toucanmon...

Deciding to try and make use of one of my few available resources, I pull myself back up through the trapdoor, idly noting it revert to its original state as soon as I'm all the way out, and swim upward until I've breached the surface of the pool again. The switch back to regular, non-liquid “air” feels a bit strange, but only takes me a brief moment to readjust to as I paddle over to Ranamon's computer, shaking my hands off as best I can before setting my fingers on the keys.

Conveniently, the moment I do so the monitor lights up, and I find myself presented with exactly what I was hoping to find — a literal map of the Digital World. Somewhat less conveniently, the map in question appears to have had large swathes of itself cut out for some reason, which on a physical map I could maybe understand, but on a digital one seems utterly nonsensical. What kind of glitch-

My expression thins as I realize the answer before I've even finished formulating the question. Right, probably not a glitch, or even incorrect — those areas likely just literally don't exist anymore, thanks to Cherubimon.

...well. At least I know where I want to go should still be intact.

It takes me a couple of minutes to figure out how to work the computer's basic functions, as it isn't exactly a normal one. Lacking a mouse, the squid-shaped cursor is instead controlled by a quartet of keys, which in a show of flagrant disrespect for common sense aren't even situated next to each other on the keyboard — though, that admittedly may be due to Ranamon's gauntlets making a closer spacing slightly awkward for her fingers. Further experimentation leads me to discover another pair of keys used to zoom in and out, one that serves as the replacement for left click, several more that type mysterious red O, X, and Δ symbols into the top left of the screen — Digicode, presumably? —, and one that brings up innumerable semi-transparent colored ovals to overlay parts of the map.

My discovery of the latter function causes me to squint, a long-buried memory slowly dragging itself out of storage. I think Ranamon used this to mark the parts of the planet she had already searched for her beast spirit? In fact, I think that might be the entire point of this map, and possibly the computer in general. Which... wow, nearly every single landmass is covered; no kidding Ranamon has been looking for a while. I'm not entirely certain the spirit didn't ultimately turn out to be in an area she'd already searched though, so...

I turn the function back off and go back to scanning the map for my intended destination. The planet appears to be divided into ten continents and “areas” named after this world's ten elements, which is simple enough. Less simple are their extremely vague boundaries, which lack any concrete delineations, and the far more esoterically-named towns, cities, and presumed landmarks sprinkled about within them. Thankfully, I'm currently looking for an island completely separate from any of the larger land masses — which, after a little searching and a lot of zooming in, I'm eventually I'm able to find.

...I can't imagine the vaguely fish-shaped land mass in the middle-left corner of the map labeled “Toucan Paradise” to be anything else, at least.

I do my best to quickly commit the portions of the map near the island in question to memory. I don't really know how long or hard this trip is going to be, and I really would prefer I not make it longer by getting lost along the way. That would be just what I- ow!

Hurriedly opening my mouth, I prod my tongue against the spot where I unconsciously bit down on the inside of my lip. It's a nervous habit that I've never quite broken, but...

I draw my tongue back and carefully run it over the rest of my mouth. Yep, no real choice but to break it now — Ranamon's teeth don't feel too different from a human's on the whole, but her canines are quite sharp, to the point I'd bet they look almost shark-like when she smiles. Feeling them now, I'm surprised that they don't seem to inhibit my speech, or that I didn't notice them before I cut the inside of my mouth with one.

...although... for as deep as it feels like I just bit into myself, I don't seem to be tasting any blood...?

My eyes drift down to my fingers again — my smooth, completely nail-less fingers — as I process the ramifications of that. I haven't really thought about it much yet, but... what exactly does my now being “digital” imply? Other than the fact that my essence can be absorbed by another Digimon if I'm injured badly enough, what does this actually mean for me? Ranamon may be humanoid, but I have no idea how accurately her body reflects the needs and functions of a physical one. I don't bleed, yet I need to breathe? Why? I probably don't even have internal organs anymore; am likely just raw code beneath my surface appearance, so what's the point? Do I still need to eat? How about sleep? I'd assume those are still necessary, as I think they are for most Digimon, but Ranamon is also a normally-inanimate spirit made manifest, so how can I be sure? I guess the fact that I “woke up” like this does imply the latter is still at least possible, but-

I squeeze my eyes shut and clap my hands to my cheeks a few time, feeling the lure on the end of my swim cap bounce up and down a bit with the motion. No- stop, I'm getting distracted. I can worry about all this stuff later, once I'm hopefully in at least slightly less danger.

Shoving my assorted smaller concerns to the back of my mind for the moment, I plunge back down into the pool, vanishing the trap door with another touch and reentering the nexus below. Even after looking over the map in detail, some of the plaques look unfamiliar — but I do recognize one that shows what appears to be a finger-shaped peninsula, which I'm pretty sure is just to the east of Toucan Paradise. It's not in the island's immediate vicinity, but it's probably as good as I'm going to get.

Hoping I'm right about where this leads, I enter the tunnel in question and begin slowly making my way down its length. The passage isn't completely straight, twisting and turning several times along the way, sometimes even straight up or down, and the walls don't remain smooth for very long, becoming rough, gouged-out rock after only the first hundred feet or so. It's actually rather eerie, as even with the sourceless light of the water itself remaining constant, I can't help but keep in mind that I'm basically in an underground shaft right now, with no way out that isn't forward or back.

If this tunnel happened to collapse right now, with me inside of it, no one would ever know...

I wince, the thought speeding me forward until I finally come to an actual feature — namely, a dead end. Before I can be too crushed about that though, I notice another circuit-like symbol carved into the ceiling just above the end of the hall, identical to the one from my pool, save for being a bit smaller. Swimming upwards, I brush my fingers over it-

The ceiling around the glyph shines with light, then disappears just like the first one did, revealing open water above.

I smile thinly, then brace myself. Here goes...

Pushing my way out of the tunnel, I find myself rising up out of the center of a massive coral reef, perched upon the zenith of an underwater hill. Draped in scintillating rays of sunlight and all but exploding with vibrant color, the sight of it all briefly stuns me — especially when combined with all the other Digimon I suddenly find myself surrounded by. A small pod of Bukamon passes me by even as I watch, a number of wary Betamon following in their wake like some sort of amphibious protection detail. A massive school of small, sharp-toothed fish Digimon I don't personally recognize dances along the currents, several shadows cast upon them by the manta rays elegantly “flying” not far above. There's even a bunch of coral-like Digimon scattered about the area, having obviously made their habitat along the reef itself.

...a portion of which appears to be composed of the either abandoned or unmoving homes of some rather large Shellmon, now that I look.

Slightly unnerved by that last one given how aggressive the one I remember from the first season was, I manage to pull myself away from the sight, swimming upwards until I finally can poke my head back above the water. Just as hoped, the evil warriors' lair is no longer anywhere in sight, the tunnel having seemingly dumped me out smack dab into the middle of the ocean. The only thing that is in sight is a large chunk of land a ways in the distance that I'm pretty sure is the northern edge of the peninsula, a tiny island slightly less in the distance that I think I recognize from the map, and...

Well. Nothing.

Literally.

I can't help but stare, despite the quite non-figurative lack of anything to stare at. Beyond a certain point not far behind me, the water simply... ends, hovering on the edge of a desolate canyon that seems almost to stretch on for eternity. The walls of earth in the distance, presumably belonging to the next continent over, are only visible due to being of a size beyond imagination, so massive that I can scarcely even comprehend the scale of their existence. Every layer of the planet is fully exposed and visible, like the end of a freshly amputated limb, while a thick black fog boils up from the abyss below — a thin, obscuring curtain over a wound bored straight to the planet's heart.

The edge of the Digital World's destruction, as things stand.

I nervously paddle back a bit, despite being nowhere near it. I really shouldn't be so shocked, I suppose. I already knew that a good amount of this world had already been destroyed, the data that composed it forcibly torn away by beings that were once its heroes... but I don't think the sheer scope of that destruction fully sunk in until just now, seeing it in person. This void probably goes on for dozens, if not hundreds of miles, and it's only one of many...

Not wanting to linger any longer on the sight, I turn away, trying to look on the bright side — at least the water having a literal edge should help me navigate. However reduced it may be, there's no road signs out here in the ocean, and I couldn't exactly bring Ranamon's computer along with me. While the island I'm trying to get to isn't yet in sight, I know at least roughly which way it has to be.

...though, if I can't even see it yet...

I sigh.

Better get swimming.

Chapter Text

It doesn't take me more than a couple minutes of breaststroke to realize that there's something I should probably address sooner rather than later- well, actually there's many things that statement could potentially apply to right now, but the one I have in mind is likely the most immediately relevant.

Namely, I should really figure out how to use Ranamon's basic attacks and abilities, before I end up in a situation that might actually require them.

I skirt around another group of fish Digimon, the thought only growing stronger as I do. Much as I'd like to hope that I can avoid ever ending up in a serious fight, that doesn't seem particularly likely. Not all the inhabitants of this version of the Digital World are hostile — in fact, I'd wager the majority usually aren't — but some of them definitely are, and I've got something an inherent disadvantage in that regard, seeing as I'm now part of the group that's been going around ripping up continents. Thankfully, I don't think the average Digimon is aware of precisely who that group is composed of, but it still doesn't exactly behoove me to remain near-clueless about how to defend myself.

...though, if I'm perfectly honest, even were absolutely none of that true, I'd still want to take at least a little time to try this.

I shift my gaze to one side, feeling bizarrely guilty. For all that I don't really want to be Ranamon, she is still a Digimon, with all the fantastical abilities that entails, which is... well, cool. It's probably the biggest upside to all this that I'm currently seeing in fact, and given everything else that comes with it, I've really got to find the positives in my situation where I can.

I stop for a moment to glance up at the tiny island in the distance I noticed earlier. That'll probably work well enough as a practice ground, right? Not that I'm exactly flush for other options here, considering I'm presently out in the middle of the ocean, but-

Nevermind, yeah, that'll do.

Angling myself in the island's rough direction, I make for land.

~ ꕀ ꔛ ꕀ ~

~ ꕀ ꔛ ꕀ ~

...a rather significant length of time later, I've finally just about arrived at the island in question, and have also decided that I officially hate water. Sure, it did a lot of good for me back when I was in a world where biology still had a major say in things, and yeah, I'm technically the warrior of water right now, and am thus perhaps almost obligated to like it for that alone. However, I've discovered that when you wind up having to swim a distance that even triathlon competitors might balk at, for what feels like literal ages, you start rather rapidly despising the element as a whole anyways.

I huff, which exits my mouth as several small bubbles. Thankfully, Ranamon's body seems much less prone to tiring than an average human's — I've little doubt that if I had to swim this long or this far as my normal self, I'd have been exhausted before I even got halfway.

Setting aside my private complaints, I turn my attention back to the island. From above, the land mass at large appears rather empty, but as I approach it from just below the surface, I can see that there's another expansive coral shelf leading up to the shallows, and much like the last one I visited, it's teaming with all sorts of digital life. A good amount of the reef seems to essentially be serving as a hive for a bunch of little pink clam Digimon — Syakomon, or something like that? — along with still more of those coral-like Digimon from earlier. There's also a scattered bunch of Crabmon crawling on the sloping sand below, and a trio of Archelomon paddling around near the shore, though they swim away before I can get particularly close.

Trying not to bother too much of the surrounding sea life with my passing, I slowly swim up into the shallows before standing and making my way up onto shore, thin rivulets of water dripping off me as I walk. The sand is hot beneath my bare feet, but not so much as to burn, and there's a gentle breeze combating the heat of the sun overhead. By all appearances, it's a near perfect day to spend simply relaxing on the beach.

...shame I can't really afford to do that.

Approaching the treeline a little ways inland, I do a quick once over of the area, trying to make sure I won't be at risk of angering any other Digimon by practicing potentially destructive attacks in the equivalent of their backyard. I don't see anyone else up here, and they're not making themselves known, so I think I'm probably alright?

Hoping that's indeed the case, I turn back to the shore and slowly breathe in. Okay, I've got some space now. Let's start with...

...

Er. What attacks does Ranamon even have, again?

Belatedly realizing I hadn't actually thought about that, I wrack my brain for answers, only to come up embarrassingly short. The only one I can even vaguely recall from the show is that energy-sapping rain cloud she used a few times, which I guess is at least something? Though from what little I remember of it, it never really had all that much impact...

I sigh. Still, beggars can't be choosers.

Selecting a small nearby tree as my target, I raise my hands over my head, press my fingers together — which takes me a moment to properly line up, since I can't actually see them in that position — and speak the move's name.

"Draining Rain~"

A tiny gray cloud about six feet across instantly condenses over my fingertips, which swiftly drifts over to the tree in question and proceeds to dispense an equally tiny rainstorm over it. The leaves of the tree rapidly wilt as the water saps the life from them, until the cloud abruptly loses steam, dispersing just as quickly as it formed.

Slightly surprised, I look over the now rather-shriveled tree with an approving gaze. Huh, that was easier than I expected. I didn't even really have to direct the attack, it just sort of naturally went where I wanted it to.

I frown. Do I have to do that pose every time though, or say the name of the attack aloud to use it? Because both of those seem like they'd be more than a little inconvenient in an actual combat situation. I didn't even mean to do the latter, let alone with that lilt to my voice, it just felt... natural, I guess?

Figuring I might as well test it, I adjust my position, switching to holding my hands out in front of me with my fingers splayed apart. Keeping my mouth firmly clamped shut this time, I attempt to will another cloud into existence.

Nothing happens.

I click my tongue. Tch, okay, that's annoying. What about...?

I try once more, keeping my position much the same, but this time grudgingly allow myself to speak the attack's name again, albeit without the oddly airy tone that crept in the first time.

“Draining Rain.”

...still nothing.

My frown deepens. Ugh, seriously? Do I really have to do it the exact same way that Ranamon did, every single time? Even in the middle of a potentially fraught battle, I might actually be stuck repeatedly posing like I'm about to be photographed for a magazine spread?

Irritated by the mere idea of that, I press my fingers together just under my chin and all but snarl the attack's name this time- and miraculously, the rain cloud reappears.

And promptly envelops most of my head.

I cry out and fall backwards while frantically wiping at my face, not wanting to end up like the tree I previously targeted did. Ack-!!!

I continue frantically scrabbling for another moment or two, before abruptly realizing that I don't actually seem to be in any pain. Dropping my hands, I look around, and realize that despite the way the droplets are sizzling when they hit the sand, they don't seem to be doing anything to me, even with some having gotten directly in my eyes.

Watching as the rest of my own attack runs right off of me, I sigh in quiet relief. Evidently I'm fortunate enough to be immune to my own idiocy... thank goodness.

Grateful that no one was watching that, I stand back up and brush myself off as the cloud I summoned evaporates, having remained utterly stationary for the entire span of its existence. I suppose I forgot to actually think of a target that time — which might actually explain why it chose to simply stick itself to my face instead.

Shaking my head in embarrassed dismay, I refocus. Obvious mistake or not, I might actually be getting somewhere now...

Approximately ten minutes of testing and roughly the same number of desiccated trees later, I'm feeling much more comfortable with this attack, and have reached a few tentative conclusions about it. The most important one being that in order to summon a rain cloud at all, I need to first perform some sort of relatively rapid gesture. Said gesture can be nearly anything, but must ultimately result in at least two of my fingers touching in order for the cloud to form, as it will always do so directly over them, regardless of where my hands or arms are positioned at the time. It's a rather awkward requirement, but so far as I can tell, there's not a lot I can do about it. The restriction seems all but set in stone, likely built into the technique itself.

...thankfully, it also has a rather simple loophole.

I smirk. Turns out, the digits in question don't actually have to be on separate hands — meaning, this prerequisite is technically possible for me to fulfill by literally just snapping my fingers. Granted, that's a bit harder than it used to be, owing to the way these gauntlets all but force my fingers apart, but it's still considerably faster and easier than basically any other option.

I've also confirmed that while calling the attack's name seems to help me focus or spark it, it isn't an absolute requirement either. In fact, it's more just that it feels almost strange not to use it — despite the fact that I've been deliberately trying to stay silent, the words “Draining Rain~” keep threatening to bubble up past my lips anyways. It's a rather annoying compulsion, as calling my attacks would essentially just be giving any theoretical opponents advance notice of what I'm doing, but it at least seems fairly manageable so long as I stay mindful of it. And if I can't... well, I suppose most Digimon do it anyways, so I guess it's not really that big a deal.

That being said...

My smirk disappears, reverting to a more neutral expression. Even if I've figured this out, a single move isn't really enough to universally rely upon, and I still can't remember if Ranamon even has any others. She almost certainly must, since I'm pretty sure even baby Digimon have a bare minimum of two, but if she ever used them in the show, I have absolutely no recollection of what they were.

...I suppose that means I'll just have to work them out myself then. Or, failing that, go by simple trial and error — I assume I'll feel something if I'm on the right track.

Idly drumming my fingers on the surface of my gauntlets, I cross my arms beneath my chest and take a moment to think.

Let's see... Ranamon's teeth are quite sharp, as I've already discovered, so I suppose they could theoretically lend themselves to some manner of offensive use. I kind of doubt she ever bit anyone in the show though, and speaking from my new position as her, I don't feel like I'm really meant for physical, close-up combat. So, perhaps not.

I glance down at one of the gems built into my gauntlets. Do these maybe do anything other than glow in the dark? Based on general Digimon design principles, it seems plausible that they could maybe produce some sort of energy beam, or something along those lines. Though, given these gems are scattered across my entire “outfit”, I have no idea how I'd aim something like that, and I imagine if Ranamon actually had an attack that used them, I would remember it.

Frowning, I turn back to the beach, watching a small wave break upon the sand. Or maybe I'm overcomplicating this. On the most basic level, Ranamon is the Legendary Warrior of Water, right? Ergo, she should have a natural affinity for it, and is likely to have at least one or two attacks based around using or manipulating it.

...and, well, you can't get much better access to water than the ocean itself, now can you?

Stepping closer to the gently-lapping tide, I attempt to simply... feel for some sort of connection with it. Some sense, some link, some mental something-or-other that could signify I'm at least in the right mental ballpark. I can't be that far off with this, surely?

I stand there for a minute or two with my eyes closed, searching inwardly to the point that I almost feel I'm in a trance... yet once again, absolutely nothing happens. Other than being Ranamon, I feel perfectly normal right now. So far as I can tell, no additional senses seem to have been included in this package, beyond the ones inherent to my new appendages.

Scowling, I re-open my eyes. This is dumb — I'm essentially trying to exercise a muscle that I've never once used before, not knowing what it feels like or if it even technically exists, so of course I'm not going to be able to “find” it. Besides, the attack I've managed already didn't require me to know or feel out how it actually functioned, it just sort of... happened, once I fulfilled the physical requirements. Why would this one be any different?

Realizing I probably should have been working off this notion from the start, I reach an arm out towards the sea, splaying my fingers apart from each other. Then, as though clutching at the water, I close my hand into a fist and slowly pull it back-

The tide suddenly swells, washing thrice as far up the sand as the previous wave did. A surge of excitement washes through me along with it- only to quickly dissipate as I realize that wasn't nearly strong enough to be an actual attack.

I rest my other hand over my left hip fin, humming thoughtfully. Still, that was a good sign! While I couldn't feel the water itself just now, I could feel the semi-intangible “hold” that I very briefly had over it. I'd wager what I managed there wasn't nearly the extent of what it could have been either — not only was that a rather reserved first attempt, but something about my sway over the water felt strangely limited, restrained in a way that I can't quite articulate.

Maybe if I just...

Walking forward, I dip my feet back into the water proper, wading in until it's back up to my knees. Then, tugging hopefully on that same ethereal connection, I thrust my arms towards the sky.

The surface of the ocean in front of me promptly erupts. Surging upwards like a sudden tsunami, the hundreds of thousands of gallons of water I've inadvertently called upon tower over the shore as an oceanic monolith, looking like the impending wrath of an angry elemental god — at least until I process what I just did, and the resulting shock utterly wrecks my concentration, causing the entire thing to abruptly collapse.

...a large chunk of which proceeds to crash down onto the beach, centered right over where I'm standing.

I yelp in dismay as I once again end up as the first live target of my own move, the water easily knocking my feet out from under me and sweeping me back out to sea. I'm thankfully at no risk of drowning anymore, but the weight of the wave alone threatens to crush me, and by the time I manage to get my head back above the now heaving surface of the ocean, I've been dragged a considerable distance from the shore.

Trying to regain my bearings, I shake myself as I idly tread the suddenly-cloudy water. For as huge of a success as that was, it may have worked a little too well. Depending on how deep I pulled that up from, I may have just disturbed the entire local ecosystem.

I nervously look around at the numerous branches and oddly-shaped leaves now floating on the surface of the sea, forcibly torn from the trees of the tiny island behind me. There's even a humongous red leaf drifting around in the middle of them, and I don't see any red trees around here, meaning I must have somehow dredged that one up from below. Man, I really did overdo it-

The crimson leaf quivers, then suddenly vanishes back beneath the water, leaving me blinking at the now-empty space in confusion.

That... was way too quick to have sunk naturally. Did something just-

The surface of the sea abruptly explodes again, and this time not because of me. I scream and throw myself backwards as a Seadramon at least six stories tall and climbing rises up out of the ocean in front of me, wordlessly roaring at the sky. The motions of its towering body send ripples out through the surrounding water, throwing 10-foot-tall waves in every direction.

And behind it...

Dread overtakes me as I get a better look at the serpentine Digimon's whip-like tail — or, more accurately, the crimson decoration attached to the tip of it. That wasn't a leaf, it was a fin-

Before my thought process can proceed any further, the Seadramon lowers its head and narrows its gaze, glowering down at me with obvious fury.

“Uh-” I stutter. “S-sorry! My bad! No need for-”

The Seadramon screeches in uncaring rage, a massive jet of water already bursting forth from its maw.

Chapter Text

A sharp yelp escapes me as I dive back underwater and hurriedly swim to one side, leaving the sea serpent's attack to strike the surface of the ocean behind me — or rather, pierce it, as the pressurized water jet spears down through the water like a solid object, strong enough to agitate the ocean around it all the way down to the sand below.

I stare in shock for a moment, even as the local, smaller Digimon who weren't already driven off either leap into hiding or flee in all directions. Syakomon duck into their shells as Crabmon scuttle into tiny caves, and a school of the tropical fish Digimon speeds off into the distance.

Suspecting that I should perhaps do the same, I promptly put all I have into swimming away at top speed. The Seadramon slips back below and immediately gives chase, undulating from side to side to propel itself through the water. It's a surprisingly graceful method of motion for a creature whose fang-filled mouth is currently accelerating towards me like a giant mulcher, ready to crunch down on my legs the moment it gets close enough to do so.

A continual stream of curses runs through my mind as I watch the sea dragon steadily gain on me from the back of my vision, the feeling of its teeth ripping through my skin all too vivid in my mind. It's too big, and too fast, there's no way I can escape like this!

Unless-

There's no time for me to consider if it will work, so I just act. Grabbing hold of the water around me, then grabbing myself with it in turn, I force the liquid forward-

My speed, or at least the slowness thereof abruptly stops being my prime concern as I find myself shooting through the water like a particularly fish-shaped bullet. I scream, but the sound is left far behind as I rocket forward, moving so quickly that I can barely even keep track of my own surroundings.

...which might help to explain why I end up smashing into and through several large chunks of coral scarcely a few seconds later. Losing my grip on the water, I end up ingloriously thrown out of my own wake, spinning end over end until I crash down onto the shallow seafloor a couple dozen feet below, landing back-first with a surprisingly soft impact — at least when compared to the previous three I just experienced.

Dazed and in not a little pain, I groan, feeling like I just went several rounds in a tumble dryer. I suppose I can't really say that was my worst idea, as it at least kept me from becoming an oversized chew toy, but the execution could have used some work-

A bone-chilling screech reverberates through the water, leaving me scrambling to reorient myself. I manage to get the sky above me again, just in time to see the Seadramon winding towards me from my left. It's already caught back up?!

Before I can move, the sea serpent opens its jaws again, and this time vomits up what looks like a javelin made of pure ice. The projectile streaks towards me like frozen lightning, so cold that it's visibly flash-freezing the water around it... but that very property seems to slow its movement slightly as well.

Enough so that I have time to hastily grab the water around me again, and shove both it and myself straight upwards.

The javelin streaks by and decimates a portion of the local seabed, but misses me entirely as I break through the surface at top speed, my own frantic actions launching me into the sky like a cannon shot. I shriek as gravity promptly pulls the water I'd surrounded myself with away, and I begin to plummet from the air-

Instinct takes over as my fingers reach out, and I mentally yank at the surface of the ocean.

“Whipping Waves!”

The water below rushes upwards, pulling itself into a spiraling pillar that quite literally reaches up to catch me. My mind still playing catch up with my own actions, I land atop the construct with surprising grace, breathing hard from a combination of surprise and terror. Holy hell, I nearly did myself in there-

The Seadramon, evidently not willing to tolerate even a short lull in its current activities, lunges back out of the water and tackles the base of my pillar. As my construct's connection to the ocean breaks, so too does the rest of it, and I suddenly find myself falling again, not even having the time to cry out before-

*!-SPLASH-!*

I hit the water headfirst, but my swim cap takes the impact so unexpectedly well that I barely feel it, granting me a chance to try and tug myself away again — but in my haste, I just wind up sending myself spinning through the water like a top, with one ill-positioned arm left briefly feeling like it's being yanked out of its socket. Losing focus nigh-immediately, I'm left to dizzily bob back up and face the building-sized Digimon still glaring at me from scarcely thirty feet away. Damn it, I don't have enough control over this technique yet to not just hurt myself with it, but I don't think I have any other way to get away from this thing!

The Seadramon rears up again, its open mouth already leaking water as it readies another titanic jet of- wait, can I-

I seize my chance and quickly reach out, grabbing for control of the water that should be surging up the sea serpent's throat — and fail, only managing to latch onto the tiny streams still trickling from the side of its mouth. An instant later, those streams are blasted away as another rock-crushing rush of liquid erupts from the Seadramon's maw, at which point it's all I can do to yank a tiny rising geyser up beneath myself and let the pressurized torrent slice through the surface of the ocean behind me. Why didn't- do I need line of sight, or is that attack just still code until it's actually out in open air?!

I've no time to consider it further, as the Seadramon's already-extended body slams down into the water, sending a tidal wave that nearly matches the one I made earlier rushing towards me. Gritting my teeth, I manage to grab hold of the entire massive swell of water and force it to a halt, warring against its momentum for a moment before shoving it back down where it belongs... just in time to spot the flurry of icy arrows spat forth in its wake.

I fall back onto my geyser in reflexive panic, my watery construct nearly losing all cohesion as the projectiles pierce through the space my head occupied a brief moment ago, at which point my fear abruptly flips over to anger. Enough of this, I have to start actually fighting back!

Straightening up, I glare at the towering Seadramon and snap.

“Draining Rain!”

Nothing appears over my fingertips, causing me to immediately blanch. What did I do wrong?! I thought I'd figured this out, did I miss-

A shadow suddenly falls over me. I reflexively glance up to try and spot the source — and gasp as I see the huge, dark gray storm cloud now hovering overhead, nearly twenty times the size of the ones I managed previously.

A silent moment passes before a deluge promptly pours down from the heavens. With as large an area as the cloud I've summoned covers, the rain ends up pelting nearly every part of the Seadramon currently above water, the droplets hitting with such loud and audible impacts that I'd swear they also turned to hail at some point. The Seadramon screeches and reels back, trying to escape the rain's reach, but the sheer breadth of its body only means more surface area to impact, such that after only a few seconds, it collapses. Its body crashes down limply into the water, sending a multitude of tiny waves in every direction as it slowly sinks back into the sea.

I remain frozen in place, too shocked to move, even as the looming cloud slowly dissipates.

Did I... win? I don't know how I did that — maybe it's just because I'm over open water right now, or in actual combat? — but even so, that seemed almost too-

Before I can even complete the thought, I'm proven right as the Seadramon lunges back out of the ocean, moving significantly slower, but by no means down for the count. Thankful I didn't drop my guard, I manage to swerve my geyser to one side before it can impact, letting the serpent's giant head sail past-

An equally giant red tail fin whips around through the air and crashes into my back, forcibly lashing itself around my waist. Before I can even so much as process the impact, the Seadramon's continued forward momentum rips me off my perch, fast enough that the force would probably have broken my normal self's neck. Ahhhhh-!!!

As the Seadramon falls back onto the water, I'm flung down in turn onto the rest of its body, crashing down upon a thick plane of curving scales. Scrambling to my feet, I try to slip back to the water below, but don't make it more than two feet before those same scales start constricting themselves around me.

The serpent, finally ensnaring its prey.

I cry out in pain as the pressure of the Seadramon's coils rapidly begins to crush me. My hip fins are forced up against my sides, while my hands are trapped between two lengths of scaled muscle, the gauntlets encasing them likely the only thing keeping them from being crushed outright.

As I struggle, the Seadramon lowers its head, moving closer and closer. Its enormous eyes take a moment to leer at me, before its mouth suddenly opens, hissing out the only two words I've heard from it thus far.

“Mind Freezer.”

The surrounding temperature drops a solid sixty degrees in the span of an instant, chilling me to the bone. At the same time, tiny glimmers begin appearing in the air all around me, and my frantic thoughts begin to slow, as if now being dragged through sleet to reach the forefront of my mind.

Wha... what is... this...?!

The Seadramon slows and calms, seemingly no longer regarding me as a threat. Looming overhead, it languidly observes me, appearing to almost smile as its coils grow ever tighter.

My eyelids begin to drift shut, even as the life is slowly squeezed out of me. I'm fully aware of my current situation, and know that I need to do something about it before I end up as nothing but data, but my thoughts seem almost buried under ice, refusing to come to me any quicker.

Can't... lose...

Can't... die...

Can't...

Breathe...

A burst of panic breaks through my frozen thoughts, and with the last of my air, a slurred, stuttering scream makes its way past my lips.

“D- Dark Vapor...!”

I feel something change, an additional sense of pressure suddenly building up around my trapped hands. The Seadramon lets out a snarling hiss and abruptly rears back, its coiled body loosening slightly in the process — just enough to let me quickly suck in a dearly-needed breath, as well as release a slow-moving tide of boiling black fog, now flowing unceasingly from the center of my palms. Where it pools, the Seadramon's scales begin to bubble and warp, like a wall exposed to fast-acting paint stripper.

The Seadramon hisses again, louder, angrier, and with more than a little evident pain as it makes an effort to re-tighten its hold on me. While I'm still too slow to react however, or to even have withdrawn my arms while I had the chance, the fog has already begun to surround and spread over the rest my body. The snake-like Digimon's attempts to fortify its constriction thus only cause my attack to come into contact with even more of its skin, which continues to eat away at it like acid... even as I, now almost completely enveloped in the caustic mist, remain utterly unharmed.

The Seadramon begins thrashing in place, clearly unwilling to release its prize, but inevitably the blistering vapor becomes too much for it to contain. The glimmers vanish as the sea serpent screeches in agony, the temperature normalizing as it rapidly uncoils and plunges back down into the water, dragging me along with it. As my thoughts return to normal speed, I hastily pull away, slipping from its grasp and pushing myself back up to the surface proper.

With my faculties returned to me, I pull another watery pillar up underneath myself. As I do, the Seadramon bursts out of the sea once more, surging upwards with enough force to completely break free of the water this time. Scales are sloughing off of its body with every movement, but its head is still intact, its fang-filled mouth open wide in rage.

...just like mine as I scream in fury, geysers erupting all around me as more black, acidic fog boils up out of my palm, condensing into an almost-solid sphere. Raising it to the Seadramon's descending head, I force the sphere upwards like a shot put, directly into the serpent's gaping maw — before another geyser bursts forth from below, and forcibly slams its massive mouth shut.

The Seadramon chokes on its final roar of agony as it slows to a halt, all momentum somehow draining out of it in midair. As it comes to complete stop, its body turns black, like a three-dimensional silhouette, and a ring of code spills out of it, encircling and spinning around its middle.

I narrow my eyes at the sight, knowing that this marks the true end of the battle... and while I might otherwise be slightly torn about what now needs to be done, I know full well that if I don't, this thing might just recover and attack me again.

There's no time to overthink this.

Holding out one hand, I beckon the Seadramon's fractal code to myself. Obediently unwinding like a giant spool of thread, the code streams towards me, feeding itself into my palm. A buzzing, not-unpleasant tingling sensation washes over me as I absorb the data, leaving me feeling both soothed and slightly jittery... if not actually any less mentally fatigued for it.

I allow myself to fall back onto my geyser, my breathing finally starting to normalize again. Well... training complete, I guess? Trial by water dragon wasn't exactly my first choice, but I suppose I can't say it wasn't technically effective, even if that was way too damn stressful for what it actually was. However large, Seadramon are still only Champion level, and unless I somehow magically stumble upon the solution to all my problems within the next day or so, there's essentially no chance I won't end up facing far worse eventually. Not to mention I was quite literally in my element here, yet I still nearly got myself killed multiple times by a Digimon that I theoretically should have countered near-perfectly. Even if it was only because I barely knew what I was doing for most of the fight, that's not a great sign...

As the last of the Seadramon's code slips into me, its shadow begins to rapidly dissolve. The lingering remnants surge inwards, condensing together into an oversized blue and green egg with a wave-like design on the shell — which then promptly takes off towards the horizon like a miniature rocket.

I blink, watching on as the egg vanishes into the sky. Ah, right, those literally fly off to the Village of Beginnings in this season. Convenient, if absurd to actually see in action. I suppose the tangible reminder is nice all the same, as I'd probably be more freaked out about having just killed another presumably-sapient life form if I didn't know it was just going to be reborn eventually anyways.

...if possibly only after the data I just sucked up like spaghetti is released, going by how I seem to recall that working with Seraphimon.

Feeling a tiny bit guilty now, but unable to do anything about it, I drag my pillar over to land and allow it to collapse as I step back down onto the beach, letting myself simply lay back on the sand for a minute as the fizzy feeling beneath my skin gradually settles. What a strange sensation...

I idly glance down at my palm, still tingling where the stream of data entered it. Come to think of it, I wonder if I can use any of that Seadramon's attacks now? That's how this worked in Tamers, at least.

Sitting back up, I make a brief effort to replicate the attacks the Seadramon used earlier, just to test the theory, but my efforts ultimately end up being more comical than anything else. I can sort of replicate that water blast attack I didn't get the name of via my newfound abilities, but not with the same sort of laser-focused pressure that made the attack so dangerous, and certainly not from my mouth, so I chalk that up as a failure. My attempts at its ice javelin move go similarly, and I don't even bother with “Mind Freezer” beyond repeating the attack name aloud a few times — it doesn't work — before promptly giving up on that as well.

...strike that idea then. Seems if I want more options in that area, I'll need to get back to questing for Ranamon's beast spirit.

I look out over the ocean. Much as I'd like to take a little more time to recuperate, that battle was just business as usual for this world, and I have to treat it as such. Physically speaking, I didn't even actually come out of it in bad shape, so I should probably get moving again... I think I can just barely see a few isolated specks of land on the horizon now? Though at that distance, they're still essentially forever and a day away. There's seriously got to be a way to speed up my pace a bit-

Oh... right. Duh.

Chapter Text

While my first, initial uses of Whipping Waves did manage to get me out of the immediate danger I was in, they were also... less than controlled, to put it mildly. In the throes of my panic, I ultimately ended up slamming myself into a reef and catapulting myself over forty feet into the air, which definitely contributed to the stress of the overall situation.

Thankfully, without the pressure of being actively attacked all the while, this ability is turning out to be much easier to both use and limit to a reasonable speed. My initial method wasn't really the best, but pulling and pushing myself through the water, with the water is surprisingly simple now that I've got the hang of it, and still way, WAY faster than I was going before. Why I didn't think to try something like this sooner I don't know, because now that I have, I'm realizing just how stupid an idea it was to try and swim across an ocean by hand. Getting to that island wasn't exactly tiring, but it still took a sustained and constant effort, whereas now I'm barely exerting myself at all, Ranamon's inherent hydrokinesis only feeling increasingly natural the more that I use it.

I laugh as I launch myself out of the water like a dolphin, do a three-quarters front flip, and land back upon the surface feet-first, using a tiny plane of constantly-rising water to surf atop it for about ten seconds before letting myself slip smoothly back below.

...and on top of that, it's genuinely just quite fun. I've never really been that fond of swimming before, but assuming this counts, I think I may have just found myself a new favorite hobby.

With my newfound skill, the remainder of my trip to the islands on the horizon ends up being much more enjoyable than the first bit, if still fairly uneventful. I do spot an absolutely enormous silhouette way down in the deep at one point, looming out of the abyss below like the passing shadow of a titan, and a chittering pack of Dolphmon tries to follow me a few minutes later, seemingly wanting to play. Thankfully however, my current speed causes me to rather rapidly outpace both of them anyways, allowing me to avoid any unwanted interactions or distractions.

Soon enough, the island chain draws near, close enough that I can now distinguish individual trees and rocks. Doing my best to recall the location of the one I'm looking for with respect to the others around it, I adjust my trajectory, heading for the land mass at the center of the bunch. It doesn't look particularly different from its neighbors, and I can't tell what its overall shape is from here — but if I'm right, I think I'll be able to identify it pretty easily anyways.

Slowing to a stop roughly a hundred feet out from land, I rise out of the ocean atop a miniature wave and begin circumnavigating the island's perimeter, visually scanning the beach as I go. If I have the right place, there should be a rather noticeable landmark somewhere around here...

I end up having to go all the way around to the opposite shore to find it, but find it I do — set up on the beach, exactly as I'd hoped, is a small but well-built wooden building, situated next to a small stone hut. The sign built into the metal roof proclaims it to be “Toucan Paradise”, AKA, the Toucanmons' tropical cabana and shack.

...all four occupants of which are currently rushing outside, having evidently spotted me.

“Ranamon...? Lady Ranamon?!”

“Is that really her?!”

“Oh, look over here, please look over here!”

“We're your biggest fans!”

I blink at the quartet of large, cartoonish toucans now furiously waving at me from shore, the huge, bright red half-eggshells they wear standing out like sore thumbs against the sand.

Ah, right. These were those guys that had that... “fan club” for Ranamon. A very dedicated, passionate, and proud fan club... or, perhaps more realistically, an “obsessed to the point of it being slightly creepy” fan club. A “you could really use some other hobbies” fan club. An “I probably should have been a bit stealthier about this to prevent them from seeing me in the first place” fan club... but too little, too late for that.

As the group continues to all but beg me to come closer, I quite deliberately ignore them, not particularly wanting to deal with Ranamon's fanatical devotees right now. That being said, I also can't seem to make myself simply dive back underwater to escape their gaze, possibly because... well... they obviously want this more than anything. To meet Ranamon in person, I mean.

And even though I'm not really her, I'm not sure I have the heart to simply blow them off.

I struggle not to bite my lip again. I know they're hardly the nicest Digimon around, being highly judgmental at best and mostly just out for themselves, but do I really have it in me to simply ignore them? To take their dreams and snap them over my knee? From what I remember, to dismiss them as things stand would crush their hearts as assuredly as if I took them each in hand and squeezed until they popped...

I sigh.

I'll give them two minutes.

The Toucanmon cheer wildly as I pull myself to shore, running up as I alight on the beach in front of them, though not coming so close as to crowd me.

“Hiya...” I greet them, waving a little awkwardly.

“Lady Ranamon, this is such an honor!” one of them excitedly squawks.

“We had no idea you'd be passing by our island today!”

“We've wanted to meet you for so very long!”

I plaster on a smile.

“Well, it's nice to meet you all too.”

One of the Toucanmon tilts their head at me.

“Huh... you sound a bit different than I thought you did.”

“You idiot, don't be rude!” one of the others immediately scolds them. “A thousand apologies, Lady Ranamon!”

...what? Why would I sound any different from her when I literally am- oh, right. Ugh, fine.

“Ah'm afraid ah'm not quite sure what ya mean.”

The Toucanmon who spoke up blinks, then laughs. “Nevermind! I must've just been imagining it!”

“Of course you were!” another rebukes. “Lady Ranamon has the voice of an angel!”

“And she's even more beautiful up close!”

I try not to fidget at the overly-complimentary comments — not that they're really about me to begin with, but it's odd being treated like this by complete strangers, let alone enormous cartoon birds.

“So, um, what exactly brings you here, Lady Ranamon?” one of them asks.

“Yeah! Did we get selected from some sort of fan sweepstakes?”

How the heck do they know what a sweepstakes is- nevermind.

“Nothin' like that.” I reply with a small shrug. “Ah just happened to be in the area, and saw you boys wavin' at me. Pure coincidence.”

The Toucanmon preen for a moment at their good fortune, until one of them abruptly bolts upright.

“Oh, how ill-mannered of us to make you stand out here! Please, come inside!”

“Yes, yes! We have so much to show you!”

Before I can even respond, I'm ushered from the water and up into the large, open-walled cabin a little ways up the sand. The inside is actually more spacious than I realized from afar, including a small dining area, a combination bar and kitchen, a changing room, and even what looks like a small, sectioned off souvenir shop. I find myself seated at one of the tables in short order, while the Toucanmon... pose?

“Welcome to the Toucan Paradise Sea Shack!” they announce in obviously-practiced tandem.

“Service is of course free for you, Lady Ranamon!” one of them follows up as they drop out of their stance.

“After all...”

They pause, running behind the counter and huddling up for a moment, before abruptly springing back out — plus or minus a few accessories.

“...the chance to gaze upon you is payment enough!”

My smile grows slightly more brittle as I take in the headbands they've adorned themselves with, which have characters scrawled on them that I'm pretty sure are Japanese, despite the sign on the front of the shack having notably been in English. Though I can't read the text, the tiny hearts surrounding the words give me a pretty good idea of what they say anyways — especially in tandem with the large buttons sporting Ranamon's face that the Toucanmon have stuck to their eggshells, and the small paper hand fans now gripped between their feathers, which bear similar illustrations.

Slightly uncomfortable, I allow my gaze to drift elsewhere, landing on a nearby wind chime — which I then of course notice has a thin strip of paper attached to the bottom of it, from which Ranamon's image once again stares back.

My image.

“Well now, ain't ya'll sweet...” I say a bit weakly.

Even as I say it, I can't help but wonder... why do these guys like Ranamon so much, exactly? I mean, they're treating me like some sort of celebrity, which I'd assume isn't because they're just big fans of the planet being deleted piece by piece, but if the Toucanmon don't know about Ranamon's “job”, what do they know her for? Was it ever explained? What exactly does Ranamon do in her off time that would bring them to make merchandise of her in the first place?

“Just sit tight Lady Ranamon!” one of them says before I can dwell on it for too long, popping a chef's hat on and hurrying into the kitchen. “We'll fix you up the best meal you've ever had!”

“Yes, we've got the finest cuisine this side of the ocean!”

“We also happen to have a variety of beach and surf toys if you'd like to-”

“She doesn't need toys you birdbrain!” another one squawks. “What do you expect her to do with those? Tell her about the swimsuits!”

“Huh?! Hers is perfect as is, she doesn't need one of those either!”

Despite myself, I find myself laughing a little at their antics, relaxing slightly as I do. Off-putting as it is to have these four hanging on my every word and action, panicking at the mere thought of offending me, it's also... oddly flattering? Combined with how nice this place already smells, presumably from whatever they usually cook in here, it almost makes me want to stick around a little longer after all.

...but I really shouldn't. And two minutes is definitely up.

“Sorry boys,” I demur, standing back up, “but ah'm afraid ah'll have to decline your generous offers.”

The Toucanmon with the chef hat nearly throws the frying pan he's holding into the ceiling, while the rest comically rear back and spread their wings in shock.

“What?” the Toucanmon with the highest voice exclaims, looking utterly crestfallen.

“Did we do something wrong?!” the chef desperately pleads. “If our menu isn't to your liking, we can-”

“It ain't that!” I hurriedly reassure them, holding up a hand. “Ah'm sure your food and shop are wonderful, and ah'd gladly stick around if ah had the time. But ah really do need to get back to what ah actually came here for.”

“...what's that?”

Right, I suppose I didn't actually tell them. How to frame this...

I make a quick show of looking around, then beckon the Toucanmon closer.

“Can ya'll keep a secret?”

Their eyes collectively light up.

“Of course we can!”

“You can count on us!”

“Our beaks are sealed!”

I give them a quick, close-eyed smile. “Good. Ah'm lookin' for an... ancient artifact, of sorts. Ah'm afraid ah still can't tell ya all the details, but it's real important that ah find it before someone else does, and-”

“Ooh, wait! Do you mean the beast spirit?”

The other Toucanmon turn and glare at the one who interrupted, who shrinks back at their clear irritation — conveniently causing all four of them to miss how utterly taken aback I find myself in that moment.

“Yes...” I say, slowly. “That's actually it exactly... ya wouldn't happen to know where it is?”

“Ah- no.” the Toucanmon who spoke up mutters, still looking chastised by his fellows.

“We don't even know what it looks like, or what it does.” another one elaborates. “Just that you've been looking for it for a while now.”

'How?', I don't ask, held back only by the fact that I'm pretty sure Ranamon should already know that. Seriously, what...?

“Well, ah'm pretty sure it's hidden somewhere around this island,” I continue after a moment, “ah'm just not sure exactly where.”

The Toucanmon perk up in unison.

“Really? We can help you find it then!”

“Yeah, we're experts at finding stuff!”

“Or we can be experts at finding stuff!”

“Whatever the case, we're at your service!”

Though their enthusiasm is still a bit much, I do take a moment to actually mull it over, genuinely considering their offer. It would be nice to have some extra eyes on hand, and apparently they already even know what I'm looking for... but then again, keeping the Toucanmon around would require keeping up this act as well. Not to mention, I seem to recall them turning on Ranamon as soon as she actually found her beast spirit, owing to Calmaramon being comparatively “ugly” in their eyes? Granted, part of that might have just been down to how Ranamon also dropped any and all airs at that point (and gained a really grating voice in the process), but I'd still rather not have to deal with that myself.

...not to mention, with the way these four seem to look at me like I hung the stars in the sky, I'm actually kind of reluctant to ruin their image of me.

“Ah appreciate the offer,” I finally say, “but the spirit is most likely somewhere underwater. Ah don't think ya'd be much help there, so ah'd better stick to lookin' for it myself.”

Four equally despondent “Aww...”s ring out as the Toucanmon slump in place, all looking more than a little downcast.

“W-well, in that case,” one of them stutters, “we wish you the best of luck, Lady Ranamon!”

“Yes!” the high-voiced one rallies. “We have the utmost faith you'll succeed!”

“And please do come back if you change your mind! About our help or being hungry!”

“Will we ever see you again...?”

I turn away from them and lift my chin a little, tapping on it with a finger.

“Hmm... you might,” I say, vaguely, “and ah'll still be around for at least a little while longer. For now though...”

Walking back outside, I pull a small wave up over the shore and step onto it, letting it lift me into the air — then, on a lark, look back over my shoulder and wink.

“Seeya~!”

With that, I have the wave sweep me off the beach and smoothly deposit me back into the ocean, giggling to myself as I dive back down beneath the surf.

Heh, that was surprisingly fun once I relaxed a bit! I don't know how long I'd have been able to keep that up, but without the stress of potential discovery and subsequent deletion thrown into the mix, playing into Ranamon's role was actually almost enjoyable — even the Toucanmon's absolute adoration was strangely nice, once I got used to it. They were so incredibly eager to please that I almost couldn't help but want to strut a little at the end there.

...I sure hope I'm not turning into a tease.

Laughing a little at the absurdity of that thought, I turn my focus back to the vast, watery expanse before me. It's not like I was lying to the Toucanmon about needing to get moving — that spirit won't find itself, and while I know I've got the right area, I've still got a lot of potential ground, or rather, sea to cover, and who knows how much time to explore it.

I firm my expression.

Let's get to it!

Chapter Text

...so this isn't working at all.

My eyes, long since glazed over, continue to nonetheless scrutinize the barren seabed below. I kind of thought that once I came within a certain range of the Beast Spirit of Water, I'd be able to... I don't know, feel it? Even if I'm not the real Ranamon, I suppose I still assumed that embodying her would grant me some sort of link to the other spirit that shares her element; some manner of bond or inherent connection that would ultimately draw the two together.

Obviously this was a stupid idea based in nothing but vague hopes, because that's not what's happening at all. In fact, I'm starting to wonder if I somehow misremembered where the spirit in question was canonically found in the first place. I'm pretty sure I haven't, but you can only futilely search a given area for so long before you start doubting that what you're looking for isn't actually there.

I've primarily been concentrating my search around the southern side of the island, where the seafloor is shallow and relatively easy to survey. The area isn't nearly as populated as its equivalent on the last island I visited, as it lacks its own coral reef. Here, it's just a bunch of rocks and rotting wooden debris scattered along the sandy slopes leading up to the shore. There's a few bits and pieces that look like they could have once been part of something larger, but that's about it, and I'm not about to go digging down through ten million tons of sand in the vague hope of finding buried treasure when I'm fairly certain that shouldn't be necessary.

...unfortunately, the rest of the local undersea landscape is far, far harder to actually search. To the east, back the way I came, there's a steep drop off leading down into pitch dark depths. Given the kind of digital horrors that could undoubtedly be down there, paired with what I can only presume to be an utter lack of visibility even with my gems, I'd prefer to refrain from delving that abyss until I've at least run out all my other options first.

Meanwhile to the north, there's a vast kelp forest obscuring everything more than ten feet or so below the surface. Not only is it stupidly huge, but the kelp moves and flows so frenetically that I could barely tell up from down whilst inside it, making it nigh-on impossible to even move within, let alone systematically comb for hidden ancient artifacts.

And as for the west...

I wince. I've been doing my utmost to avoid that side of island since my very first probing pass, as I'm quite wary of the rather large school of exceedingly savage-looking fish Digimon I spotted there, which almost looked like nightmarish versions of the smaller, more tropical fish mons I saw earlier. Maybe I'm just unfairly judging a book by its cover, but literally every aspect of those things' appearance  screams  dangerous to me, and I don't particularly feel like risking that assessment being wrong.

So yeah, turns out it's pretty hard to find an extremely specific, relatively small item hidden in the middle of the ocean. Who'd have thought?

A long, frustrated sigh escapes my mouth. I don't remember canon Ranamon having this much trouble finding the spirit once she actually got here. Then again, I don't remember how she found it at all. Honestly, I'm probably going to have to just pick my poison at some point and-

I come to a sudden halt, sensing something strange in the water around me.

It's subtle, but... there's a gentle tug in the currents...

Hopeful, not to mention slightly desperate for any sort of sign at this point, I break from my somewhat aimless path in favor of following the elusive pull, which seems to be beckoning me further south. Not wanting to lose track of it, I deliberately leave Whipping Waves out of the equation, resigning myself to simply swimming at a normal speed again for the moment.

...a moment that stretches on for longer than expected, as by the time I feel the current I'm following grow even marginally stronger, I can see the trees of the next island over coming into view, a muddled profusion of greenery atop looming cliffs peering down through the surface of the water.

No, this can't be right. I'm way too far off-course, aren't I?

Starting to reconsider if there was any point to this, I glance to my left, where the current seems to be drawing me, and notice something odd. The water looks... agitated? Almost like someone stuck a giant straw into it and started swirling it around-

Wait.

Swimming upward, I poke my head above the surface of the water, confirming my suspicions as I see it from above — pressed up against the entrance to the island's bay are over two dozen large, violent whirlpools. Clustered so tightly together I'm surprised they haven't merged, the underwater twisters rage and gyre against each other, eternally battling for dominance. One particularly massive vortex sits at the center of the rest, gaping wide as the maw of Charybdis.

I duck back underwater, grimacing. Well, guess I should be glad I didn't just gormlessly follow the pull directly into those. Man, I really can't catch a break today-

My train of thought stutters halfway out of the station.

Hold on. Some of the spirits had tangible effects on their surroundings, didn't they? I don't think all of them did, and I can't remember if the Beast Spirit of Water was one of them, but... if it did, wouldn't a cluster of massive whirlpools make an awful lot of sense?

Deciding I need to investigate further, I swim forward, carefully approaching the outer edge of one of the vortexes. Even from outside the whirlpool itself, I can feel it trying to draw me in, the swirling currents a threat to nearly any water-dwelling Digimon foolish enough to encroach on their territory.

Thankfully, I am a rather clear exception.

Taking hold of the water in front of me, I forcibly part the whirling curtain and slip inside its eddies. As I do, I swear I hear something behind me, sounding almost like a distant voice — but by the time I look back, the whirlpool has already reformed, the distortion of the rushing water obscuring everything beyond it.

Shrugging internally, I swivel back around and continue, my burgeoning dominion over the water leaving my path to the center of each whirlpool clear and calm. It's not as easy as I'd like — while the water bends easily to my will, the speed and size of each vortex is such that I can't seem to stop any of them in their entirety, and what I do stop whips right back into its previous state as soon as I release it — but it's enough for me to keep moving forward, ensuring that I'm never truly at risk of being torn away.

After passing through more than half a dozen other whirlpools, I finally come to the central one, easily identified even from below for being more than twice the size of the rest. Deep within its core, I can see something giving off a bright, inviting glow, though any specific features it might have are impossible to see beyond the raging waters obscuring it.

I grin. At this point, I'm more than convinced. If this utterly unnatural phenomenon isn't being caused by a spirit, I'll eat my own swim cap.

Pushing my way into the vortex this time is a real struggle, the current of this one so fast and strong that it feels almost angry. It's like I'm battling a living force — one that's steadfastly determined to swallow up and spit out any who would intrude upon its underwater sanctuary, no matter who they might be.

With a gasp of effort, I manage to force the currents aside just long enough to squeeze inside, though they reform so fast that they catch against my trailing ankle and nearly drag me away anyways. I yank my foot in quickly, feeling like I just lost a couple layers of skin off the outside of it, and sigh in relief as I slowly look around.

Unlike the other whirlpools, the interior of this one is quite large, and unnaturally calm. The pull of the surrounding waters is almost completely absent, the only sign of it a gentle swirl at the very center, suffused with innumerable bright blue specks that almost look distant stars. The water itself is crystal clear all the way down to the seafloor, where an enormous pink clam shell sits, shining rays of light leaking from within its closed lips.

My smile threatens to split the sides of my face. This is it!

Seemingly reacting to either my presence or my emotions, the clam suddenly trembles. Slowly, dramatically, it pries itself open, revealing a statue I'm surprised to realize is at least as tall as I am — no, a fair bit taller, actually — made in the image of a harpy. Its lower legs are pressed flush to the hexagonal pedestal beneath it, while its wings are swept back, as though caught in mid-flight.

My joyful expression falters.

Is that... the Beast Spirit of Wind? Why would that be-

I groan aloud. Oh, damn it, that's right! Ranamon and Zoe's beast spirits were both hidden not only underwater, but in the same general area as each other. I'm pretty sure they were even discovered in successive episodes, if not the exact same one. I've no idea why a spirit of wind was concealed in such an antithetical location, but apparently it's the one causing these vortexes, not the one I'm actually looking for. Gah...

My eyelids droop in disappointment as I turn away from the now-apparent red herring. Just my luck... though I suppose that's at least some assurance I'm looking in the right general area, even if the only spirit I've found thus far turned out to be the exact wrong one.

Er, speaking of which. Do I just, leave this here, or...?

I glance back at the spirit again, uncertain.

My immediate thought is that I probably shouldn't mess with this thing, as it's definitely not meant for me. However, Zoe will eventually need her beast spirit, and if I think about it, I'm pretty sure the events that led to her finding it in the first place were ones that Ranamon herself was responsible for? I still don't recall the specifics, but I think she showed up and attacked the group while they were trying to get to the nearby island, which somehow resulted in Zoe getting dragged into this whirlpool. I certainly don't intend on doing that myself however, and even assuming the kids still end up coming this way, I doubt they'll ever find a spirit hidden this far underwater without outside intervention...

I waffle over it for another half a minute or so before ultimately deciding yes, I should probably take this thing, if only to act as its backup delivery system. For all that canon often wrote Zoe off, it's still important that everyone has their beast spirits going forward, so I can't really risk this one potentially being missed. If it was ever actually confirmed that the kids were explicitly drawn to their spirits or vice versa, I'd probably just leave this be, but it certainly doesn't seem to be working that way for me, so I can hardly trust that it does for them. With any luck, I'll be able to hand this thing off to its intended owner in fairly short order anyways.

This logic in mind, I start paddling down towards the center of the glimmering swirl.

-and promptly get sucked right back, the surrounding whirlpool surging and tugging at its own interior just long enough to pull me away.

Huh?

I try again, but despite already being beyond the dangerous part of the whirlpool, it apparently hasn't given up the fight just yet, managing to yank me around with near impunity despite my theoretical control over the water composing it. It's almost as though the spirit itself is pushing me away... which, given that it seems to be the source of the vortex, is actually entirely possible now that I think of it.

"Come on..." I grumble, trying to move down towards the idol again. "It's not like I'm trying to take you for myself-"

The whirlpool surges once more, sending me tumbling backwards through the water, flipping end over end. I right myself as quickly as I can, fighting to regain my equilibrium.

"Could you just let me-"

Bubbles batter at my chest.

"I'm only trying to-"

Liquid bursts against my legs.

"This really isn't-"

Ethereal whips of impossible wind lash out to strike at the sides of my face.

"Alright, alright, I GET it!" I snap.

Swiping the insubstantial tendrils away, I fix the glowing spirit with a terse, irritated glare... then sigh, my annoyance washing away with the current.

"I can take a hint." I mutter. "I was just worried you wouldn't be found at all if I didn't hand you over to who you're meant to be with, since you're kind of in an out of the way spot, especially for a spirit of wind. If you're really that confident though, then fine... I'll leave you alone."

If the ancient, apparently semi-sentient spirit code thing feels that it has things well enough in hand, who am I to protest? I've got to get back to looking for the spirit I actually came here for. Hopefully it'll be at least slightly more welcoming than this one has been.

I do a quick about face, preparing to part the vortex again- only to lose focus as the whirlpool's current abruptly reverses, this time shoving me back towards the shell at its center rather than away. Oh for-

"Alright, make up your mind," I growl as I swivel back around, now legitimately irritated, "do you want me to leave or no-"

I cut off upon realizing that formerly motionless spirit is no longer sitting where it was, having floated out of the shell it was housed in and begun moving upwards in a straight diagonal line, heading directly towards me.

...heading towards me kind of fast, actually. Wait, is it trying to-?!

Balking at the sight of the seven-foot-tall idol now bearing down on me like an underwater car, I yelp and quickly attempt to pull myself out of the way. The vortex again works against me however, and the spirit just speeds up even more to compensate, leaving me nigh-on helpless to actually evade it.

The Beast Spirit of Wind slams into me like a statue-sized bullet, with what feels like a roughly equivalent level of impact. I feel something surge through me like a live wire, and hear myself cry out in shock and pain before the world goes white-

.

.

.

[...I suppose you'll do. For now~]

.

.

.

-and I abruptly find myself erupting out of the water, droplets flying off extremities that didn't exist a moment ago as they automatically spread themselves wide.

It takes me a few seconds to get my bearings back, the sheer unexpectedness of what just happened preventing it from immediately sinking in. It's only once I realize that I didn't hit the water again that I glance down and notice I'm not only floating a solid thirty feet over its surface, but that my body looks rather thoroughly different than it did a minute ago.

I try not to gape, not that my mouth is even visible right now. Ooooo... kay, I guess the Beast Spirit of Wind decided my argument had merit after all?

I shake my head, feeling a pair of foreign extremities flapping around on either side of it as I do. Well, that's a relief at least. I didn't expect the spirit to activate on contact, so I honestly thought it was just trying to crush me. Was the process supposed to be that painful though? The beast spirit evolution sequences always did look kind of agonizing — I distinctly remember the kids all screaming pretty loudly during them — but I don't think they ever actually mentioned that if so.

Regardless... I'm Zephyrmon now, I guess?

I glance down at my newly clawed, three-fingered hands, examining the gleaming silver metal that now covers them. Truth be told, I'm kind of surprised I'm able to use this spirit at all, given it's not "mine". I suppose Shamanmon did briefly end up transformed by the Beast Spirit of Fire when it was first discovered? I just wasn't really expecting that principle to apply to me as well, given nothing of that nature ever happened again.

Twisting a little, I take a more complete stock of my current self. Even ignoring my changed body and outfit — which is annoyingly even skimpier than Ranamon's swimsuit, though inexplicably no less flexible — there's a pretty noticeable difference. Just hovering here, I feel powerful, like a giant bird of prey, and likely at least as fast. Something tells me that if I chose to, I could probably fly back to Toucan Paradise even more quickly than I could swim there before. My reflexes feel like they've been significantly dialed up as well, probably in order to keep up with said speed.

...and oh yeah, I'm literally flying, and it's not even hard.

A sudden giddiness overtakes me, and I do a few gleeful loops and twists in the air, reveling in the sensation. I don't even need to flap my newly-gained wings to stay in a seemingly eternal hover, which is pretty damn awesome on its own.

I frown, coming to a dead halt. That said, I also feel kind of... off? Despite everything I just listed off, I can't help but feel that this somehow just doesn't quite fit. It's like I'm wearing a set of clothes made out of really nice, high-quality fabric, but which very clearly weren't tailored for me, and are thus sort of uncomfortable anyways.

In retrospect, it's a little disconcerting that this same feeling has been completely absent from my Ranamon form. It's not like that body is any less foreign to me, after all.

I tense a little, before my muscles relax as if on their own. Still, I suppose I can't really complain. Even if I haven't located my own beast spirit yet, this is a pretty big find. Don't I maybe deserve a break?

Yeah... that sounds really nice, now that I think of it. What would I use it for though?

I tap a claw against my chin as a devilish thought slithers into my mind. Those Toucanmon... didn't they have something of an instant "admiration" for Zephyrmon when she first appeared? If I show back up like this, while Ranamon is seemingly nowhere to be found, I bet I could get them real wound up~ Spend a little while teasing them, make them worry about being disloyal to their "lady" and get them all torn up and anxious inside, then switch forms in front of them and watch them fall all over themselves in confusion and embarrassment. I can already imagine their expressions, it'd be great...!

Mirth begins to grow in my chest... then dies away as I shake myself, wings beating needlessly as I do so. No, no, I can't. Time is limited, and teasing the Toucanmon wouldn't pay off fast enough to be worth it anyways. At least, not if I wanted to do it right.

I sigh through the mask now covering my face, feeling more than a little reluctant to resume my incredibly boring and increasingly pointless-seeming task. Why couldn't this have just been easy? I don't want to go back to swimming around for hours on end. Honestly, I'd kind of like to fly off and chase the horizon for a while, or maybe just lie back on the beach and relax, like I didn't get to do earlier...

Something between a whine and a groan escapes my throat as I somehow find myself feeling put upon by my own priorities.

Ugh, fine, let's get back to it... I'll need to change back first, I suppose. However unintuitive the wind spirit's location was, I'm still fairly certain the Beast Spirit of Water is underwater, so searching from the air is basically pointless. Stupid thing.

Eh, how do I...?

I concentrate on changing back, doing much the same as when I attempted to de-digivolve myself back at the lair, and this time a cocoon of code successfully forms and envelops me, cutting off my view of the outside world. I can't see myself through the light, and there's no pain this time, but I can still feel as parts of my body rapidly compact, even as other areas stretch and swell. My wings recede and my talons vanish, replaced by uncovered flesh as fins and toes take their place. Metal flows backwards into nothing as my fingers shrink and thin, dividing themselves from three back into five. It at once lasts an age and takes no time at all, but when the cocoon finally vanishes what seems like an endless moment later, I'm Ranamon again.

...and am also now falling out of the air.

My second instinct is to scream. My first instinct thankfully overrides it however, as I immediately pull a pillar of water up from below to catch myself with. The construct reaches me before I can fall even half the distance, cradling me gently as I land within its clutches.

I glance down at my own hands, a little surprised at myself. Huh, I really am getting better at this... now I just need to get better at thinking things through ahead of time. I've had more than enough of plummeting from on high for one day, thanks.

I slowly lower myself back to sea level, made simpler by the fact that the whirlpools have now vanished, and the water has calmed. Once I'm only standing about two feet over it again rather than twenty, I release my mental grasp on the pillar, and allow myself to fall back below the gentle waves.

...where I immediately find myself smack dab in the center of an enormous pack of absolutely delighted Gomamon, many of them embracing each other with tears in their eyes that are somehow staying put underwater. What the-?

I swivel in place for a moment or two, exceedingly confused about where all these little not-quite-seals even came from, before a group of about half a dozen take notice of my presence in their midst and swim up to me.

"Are you the one who stopped the whirlpools?" one of them asks, eyes shining.

"Huh?" I intelligently reply.

"We saw you get sucked into the field, but were too late to warn you before you went in-" another one breathlessly elaborates. "We didn't even think you'd come back out, but then they- they stopped — all of them just, stopped, and you're still here, and-!"

"We've been separated from our friends and families by those vortexes for many years." a third, somewhat older-sounding Gomamon takes over when the second seemingly becomes too choked up to continue. "If you truly managed to get rid of them, then we cannot thank you enough, stranger."

Oh.

"Well... yes." I hesitantly admit. "I removed the item that was causing the whirlpools, so they shouldn't be coming back-"

I don't even make it all the way through my sentence before every Gomamon near enough to hear me cheers in tandem and begins thanking me profusely, swarming around me in an underwater hurricane of purple and white.

"Y- you're welcome?" I sputter, wishing I knew what to do with all this gratitude. I didn't even realize they were here, let alone that I was doing them such a huge favor, so this is really rather overwhelming.

Although... I could leverage this, couldn't I? At this point, I'll take all the help looking for the Beast Spirit of Water I can get, and if the Gomamon are truly this grateful, surely at least a few of them would be willing to help me in that regard? They even live in the area, so if I'm lucky they might even already know where-

"Hey, wait a second! That's Ranamon!"

The celebration dies down a little as a particularly loud voice makes itself known over the din, many of the Gomamon turning to the source. It's just another of their own, though this Gomamon looks quite mad.

"Who?" someone in the crowd asks.

"Don't you recognize her?!" the angry one yells. "She's one of Cherubimon's followers! The one responsible for deleting more than half the ocean!"

My eyes widen at the accusation, though less because I was just recognized by someone evidently not in Ranamon's fan club, and more because of the figure that the Gomamon just listed off. I guess it makes sense that of the five evil legendary warriors, Ranamon specifically would be the one tasked with stealing the fractal code of the Digital World's seas, but that she's actually succeeded to that degree? Even if that's an exaggeration — and I don't think it is, thinking back to the map on Ranamon's computer — where was that competence in the show proper?

"Is that what she looks like...?"

"I think it is-!"

"What's she doing here?!"

The cries of celebration turn to cries of fear as about three quarters of the Gomamon quickly turn and flee in all directions. The remainder... seem to be metaphorically reaching for the nearest knife block, glaring at me with such white-hot hate that I'm surprised the water isn't boiling around them.

"What do you want?" one of them demands. "If you're here for our home, you won't get it without a fight!"

"Yeah! We may not be strong, but there's a lot more of us than there are of you!"

"Why don't you run back to Cherubimon and-"

"Stop!"

Another small group of Gomamon suddenly interposes itself between me and the aggressive ones.

"Cut it out!" one of them cries. "Even if she is Ranamon, she got rid of the whirlpools for us! She can't be all bad!"

"Of course she's all bad! You can't get worse than working for Cherubimon!"

"Then why hasn't she attacked us yet?"

"Because-!"

As the squabbling begins in full, I stop paying attention, turning my gaze outward again.

I should... probably just be going, I think.

Silently excusing myself from the argument I accidentally caused, I propel myself away from the area before anyone can actually object. Once the Gomamon are no longer in sight, I allow myself to simply drift for a minute, pouting.

Well, so much for getting help. I suppose I should've known Ranamon's line of work couldn't possibly be unknown to everyone. Hell, even if it was, it's not like every Digimon was going to have the same sky-high opinion of me as the Toucanmon.

Speaking of which, maybe I should take up said Toucanmon on their offer of assistance after all? I really am getting a little desperate at this point, and while I still don't think searching by air will be of much use, they might at least be able to point me towards potential areas of interest. I haven't seen anything else quite like those whirlpools yet, but they've been around here a lot longer than I have, so they might still know something.

Figuring it can't hurt, I swim upwards until my torso breaks the surface, grabbing some water to help propel myself back over to the adjoining island.

...whereupon I spot a group of five human children and two shorter, bipedal Digimon disembarking from the back of a Whamon in the distance. Stepping down onto the rocky section of the island's left shore, they turn and wave goodbye as the massive cetacean slips back below. Huh?!

Panicking a little, I hurriedly shove myself back underwater, hoping that no one spotted me.

What's going on? The kids aren't supposed to be here yet, it's too early! My memory of the show may be spotty, but I'm pretty certain they only ended up here after Mercurymon killed Seraphimon, which...

Poking my head back above water just enough for my eyes to peek out, I pan my gaze around the beach until I manage to re-locate Bokomon's diminutive form. While he's not much more than a tiny white-and-pink outline from this distance, I can still see what looks like a large, egg-shaped bulge stuffed down the band he wears around his stomach.

...apparently has already happened.

Ducking back below, I curse internally. Damn it. I'd thought, or maybe just hoped that I was earlier in the timeline than this, but if Seraphimon is already dead and data... now what do I do? Is there anything I can do? I've already apparently missed what was, in retrospect, probably my best chance to change things for the better...

Grimacing, I lightly slap my face, or rather prod myself with my fingertips. No, stay positive. Encountering the heroes this early is technically still a good thing, so let's just make the best of this. Even if it now feels a little pointless for me to have picked up in the first place, Zoe still needs her beast spirit, and there's no one around right now to stop me from telling the group what they need to know in order to not fall victim to the same things they did in canon... not to mention perhaps more effectively take care of my unwanted "teammates" than they otherwise would. I don't know that I fully trust them to pull any of it off, since they weren't always the most capable or cohesive bunch, but it's a good first step.

Guess I'd better go introduce myself.

Chapter Text

By the time I make it back to the island's shore, the kids have made their way down off the rocks and onto the adjoining beach. I don't immediately surface to greet them, still trying to work out exactly what to say to them, and how to go about saying it.

This is going to be more difficult than I'd have liked. If I'd met the kids before they ever encountered Ranamon, they'd have relatively few preconceptions that I'd need to work past in order to reach a point of relative trust. However, Seraphimon is already an egg, and barring the possibility that happened within the past several hours where I've been conveniently absent, Ranamon was part of the group that participated in that event. Meaning the kids likely already know by this point that I'm nominally their enemy, and it may be a bit of an uphill battle to get them to believe that's not actually the case.

...still, I have to try, especially as this is probably the best chance I'm going to get to do so. At the point in the plot when the kids arrived on this island, I'm pretty sure most of them had lost the ability to spirit evolve — again, because that happened like four or five times in this season — such that when the *actual* Ranamon attacked, Zoe was the only one available to fight her. Hence why she was also the one that later got smacked into the whirlpool cluster, I imagine. If that holds true here, then even in the worst case scenario I should only have to deal with an angry fairy woman, and I think I can at least handle that much, especially since handing over her beast spirit should make for a pretty good olive branch.

Here goes...

Dragging a small pillar of water up around my feet, I let it gently rise from the depths, pushing myself up into open air.

Seven pairs of eyes turn to face me.

“Hi...” I say, raising a hand to nervously wave at the group. “If you all could spare a bit of time, I need to talk to you.”

“Ahhh!” JP yelps, stumbling backwards.

“It's her!” Tommy cries.

Takuya and Kouji say nothing, but their expressions harden into glares, and Zoe's isn't far behind. The only one who doesn't react negatively is Neemon, who just cluelessly tilts his head to one side.

“Her? Her who?”

Bokomon breaks from his wide-eyed panic for a moment to look over and comically glower at his companion.

“Ranamon, you nincompoop!”

“Who's Lanamon?”

Bokomon's glower intensifies. “The legendary warrior of water? One of the five ancient spirits that serve Cherubimon? We first met her yesterday, when she and her allies reduced Seraphimon to this?!”

He thrusts his stomach and the giant egg strapped to it forward for emphasis. I wince, despite having known this was likely how I'd be initially received.

“I know how it must have looked to you, but that's not quite true.” I say with as much audible sincerity as I can muster. “I promise, I'm not here to-”

“Looked?!” JP interrupts. “How could you attacking us have possibly only 'looked' bad?”

“...it's hard to explain, but it wasn't what it seemed.” I say, trying not to grate at being cut off. “Believe it or not, I'm on your side-”

“On our side?” Kouji repeats, crossing his arms. “Is that what you call helping your friend steal Seraphimon's fractal code?”

My eyes half-lid themselves as I try to suppress my irritation. Why does everyone feel the need to talk over me lately?

“I understand why you're angry, but I didn't actually play a part in that.”

“Oh?” Kouji asks, a speck of what I hope might be genuine curiosity lingering in his otherwise deadpan delivery. “Then who did?”

“I told you, it's- look, it'll take some time to explain.” I sigh. “If you'll stop interrupting me and hear me out though, I've got a little peace offering to-”

“Like we're gonna trust that!” Takuya shouts. “We've heard all we need to!”

My rebuttal dies in my mouth as a code cocoon envelops him, with the rest of the group following suit a moment later — bar Kouji, who takes an extra second to look annoyed with his own friends before sighing and doing the same. Huh?! They aren't supposed to be able to spirit evolve right now! I know I'm not wrong, I distinctly recall Zoe being the only one available to fight Ranamon at this point, because-

...because... in the show, she was the only one who still had her D-Tector after the Toucanmon stole the rest, hoping to curry favor with Ranamon. Which obviously hasn't happened yet, because not only did the group literally just arrive, but I didn't ask that of the Toucanmon in the first place. Why would I? I'm not Ranamon, and I didn't even know the kids would be here at the same time as me, not that I'd have ordered their transformation trinkets stolen even if I had. But that, in turn, means that of course they can all still...

Do that...

My heart leaps up into my throat as the cocoons dissipate, revealing five very armored, very angry-looking Digimon staring up at me.

“Be very careful!” Bokomon warns, rapidly flipping through his reference book. “At the beach, her power will be exponentially greater than what you witnessed before!”

“Yeah, but there's five of us and only one of her!” Beetlemon confidently replies. “She can't fight all of us at once!”

“I don't want to fight you!” I shout, panic welling up within me as the situation slips further and further out of my control. Of all the times to misremember the specifics-!

“Then maybe you and your buddies shouldn't have done what you did to Seraphimon!” Agunimon shouts back. “Come on guys, we can take her!”

“Slight problem with that,” Lobomon cuts in, eyes narrowing at his teammate, “have you forgotten that none of us can walk on water?”

At the reminder, I relax, if only slightly.

“That's right,” I reply with cautious relief, “you can't, so-”

Kazemon abruptly kicks off the ground, darting towards me at a speed only barely slow enough for me to react. I yelp, swerving my water pillar out of the way just in time to avoid a kick that would have otherwise smashed directly into my jaw.

“Doesn't really matter when you can fly.” she smirks.

“N-now wait a minute-”

Kazemon does not wait a minute, nor does Beetlemon, who I'm forced to frantically dodge around as he flies forward as well, both hands balled into fists and crackling with electrical energy. Kumamon starts freezing a path out into the water, while Agunimon and Lobomon begin taking pot shots, launching darts of fire and tiny lasers at me from their wrists. How has it all gone this wrong this quickly?!

I swoop under a howling gale of wind and past a literal lightning strike, straining to regain a moment to breathe, only to take a hit across the chest from a fire dart. It thankfully more just stings than burns, but it's enough to prompt me to quickly dive back underwater. A few more fire darts strike the surface moments later, but extinguish themselves almost immediately, though the lasers keep on coming. If I can just get a moment to breathe, maybe I can still salvage-

The sea around me suddenly darkens, and I look up just in time to see Beetlemon slam a ball of electricity down onto the surface of the water, causing a rather large amount of it to fountain upwards while the current is released into its surroundings. The majority of the voltage disperses in the surrounding liquid, which there's simply too much of to properly electrify, but that's not enough to stop at least part of the attack from running over me, drawing a small scream from my throat as I experience what feels like a full-body static shock.

I recover quickly enough to duck under another round of laser fire, only to realize Beetlemon didn't retreat. Instead, he dove underwater himself — and is now all of five feet away from me, one hand reaching out towards my exposed throat.

My mind flashes back to the Seadramon crushing the life out of me, and panic instantly takes over. Grabbing hold of the water around Beetlemon, I shift it into a small whirlpool, trapping him inside.

“...uh oh.”

I hear what sounds like a muffled realization of a bad idea a split second before I enlarge the whirlpool and have it spit Beetlemon back onto land like a bug-shaped missile. I then swim into the vortex myself and invert it, pulling it up into another small tower before spiraling up and out the top. By chance, this breaks Kumamon's growing ice bridge in the process, forcing him to retreat back to land.

“Would you all please calm down?!” I yell, struggling to retain any semblance of calm myself. “It wasn't me that attacked you before!”

“Then who was it? Your evil twin?” Agunimon sarcastically demands.

“Essentially, yes!”

“Oh, get real!” Beetlemon shouts as he pulls himself out of the sand I tossed him into.

“Yeah, you seriously expect us to believe that?” Kazemon follows up.

“We're not babies you know!” Kumamon adds.

I grit my shark-like teeth. Damn it, this isn't working! Seraphimon's death is obviously still too fresh in their minds... and if they won't believe I'm not out to get them, then they certainly won't believe anything else I have to say either.

I curse internally as I realize I truly can't fix this. Not here, and not now, at least. In which case, the best thing I can do right now is either just surrender, which I'm not sure they'd even accept with emotions still running this high, or...

Well. Skedaddle.

“Fine!” I call out as I shove myself away from a concentrated surge of wind flung from Kazemon's fingers. “You win! Hope to talk to you all again when you're ready to actually listen!”

I dip back down towards the water proper, drawing liquid up from my pillar and having it flow over me as I prepare to jet away-

“Beak Twister!”

-then startle as one of the Toucanmon suddenly leaps out of the trees behind the three ground-bound warriors, snapping his giant beak shut around Lobomon's torso. The wolf-like warrior cries out in shock as the bird Digimon barely half his size proceeds to pivot on one foot, tossing him into a nearby trunk with surprising strength.

“It's an ambush!” Kumamon yelps as the other three Toucanmon rush out of the treeline.

“Don't worry Lady Ranamon, we'll protect you!” one of them calls out, their crests seeming to swell as they lunge as well.

“No, DON'T!” I cry.

I watch on in horror as Agunimon, having had several seconds more warning than Lobomon did, swiftly kicks away the pair of Toucanmon that jump at him, sending them both sprawling. They weren't suppose to get involved-!

Distracted by the sudden melee, I fail to notice Beetlemon beelining towards me again until it's already too late to dodge. I watch as though in slow motion as his horn crackles with light-

“Marching Fishes!”

-which then blinks back out as upwards of ten separate voices simultaneously call out the same two words, and a small army of colorful fish begins leaping out of the water at high speed, smacking themselves against Beetlemon like living projectiles.

“Ah- ow, ow, hey, quit it!” Beetlemon yelps, reversing course as dozens, if not hundreds of tiny bodies launch themselves into his face. “Watch the eyes!”

As he retreats back to land, a dozen Gomamon suddenly surface in a rough circle around my now-stunted pillar.

“We're here too!” one of them calls to me. “No matter who you are, you helped us out, so we're returning the favor!”

If I still had any actual hair to rip out, this would undoubtedly be the moment. This isn't the kind of “help” I need right now!

“Crystal Breeze!” Kumamon cries at the same time Agunimon screams “Pyro Tornado!”, the former breathing out a gust of sparkling air that ices over the sand one of the Toucanmon is charging forward on, freezing his feet in place, while the latter becomes a tornado of flame that gyres over the frozen patch with ease. A moment before it can reach its target, the flames go out, just in time to reveal Agunimon as he roundhouse kicks the trapped Toucanmon in the side of the face. The ice around the Toucanmon's legs breaks as he screams in pain, the force of the kick nearly sending him straight into the sea, and my anger flares like wildfire.

“Don't you DARE hurt them!” I screech, my pillar surging upwards again. “They've got nothing to do with this!”

Seeing Kazemon about to unleash an attack on one of the downed Toucanmon, I raise one hand and furiously snap.

“Hurricane- ahhh!!!”

Kazemon fails to complete her attack as, instead of a rain cloud, a small cyclone abruptly whips up around her, instantly tearing her from the sky and sending her plummeting down into the water below.

“Zoe!” Beetlemon and Kumamon cry in tandem.

I freeze, my hand still outstretched as my attack continues to rage. What the- even when I was fighting the Seadramon it didn't do that, how the hell-

A painful blast of solid light strikes me across the side of the jaw, hard enough to nearly knock me off my feet. Damn it!

I draw myself back up just in time to see two of the Toucanmon leap and latch onto Agunimon and Lobomon's arms, seemingly trying to keep them from aiming at me.

“Man, you guys sure are persistent!” Agunimon complains as he struggles to throw off the oversized bird.

“We'd do anything to protect Lady Ranamon!” the Toucanmon cries. “You'll never-”

“That's ENOUGH!” I yell at the Toucanmon, as well as the Gomamon still trying to harass the warriors from the water with projectile fish. “All of you, get away from here, now!”

The Toucanmon clinging to Lobomon gets thrown off, flapping his wings to pause his fall as he looks up at me in shock. “But Lady Ranamon-!”

“I don't want you getting hurt on my behalf!”

Not to mention what you're doing right now is incredibly counterproductive!

“But-”

“GO!”

I shove a roughly eight-foot tall wave up over the beach, driving the warriors backwards while simultaneously catching the Gomamon that swam up near land to drag them back out to sea. Please take the hint this time!

Having bought myself a moment or two with that, I swivel back around, forcibly dispersing the still-raging cyclone I just caused as I make to dive down and save Zoe. She hasn't come up yet, and even with how poorly this has all gone I hardly want her to drown-

Something suddenly starts glowing beneath the surface, looking almost like an underwater sunrise. Before I can even fully take that in, the glow swells, and the water above it bursts outwards as a gigantic tentacle breaks through the surface and smacks out the lower third of my pillar.

My control over the watery construct experiences a hiccup as the liquid composing its base is suddenly flung over fifty feet away, leaving me to scream as it destabilizes completely and scatters in all directions, sending me careening down in an ungraceful freefall for the third or fourth time today. I try to pull myself together fast enough to catch myself with the ocean again, or at least enter a basic diving pose-

*!-SMACK-!*

-and fail. This time, my left shoulder ends up bearing the brunt of the impact, taking it much worse than my cap did earlier.

Owww... what the hell is it now...?

Planting my hands on a small square of water, I shakily push myself upright— and find myself staring up at a woman with bluish-white skin, a shark-like helmet, and an absolutely furious expression, paired with a lower body consisting of an huge, upside-down, multi-eyed cephalopod.

I balk.

That's... Calmaramon...

The Beast Spirit of Water...

“Who is that?!” Agunimon yells.

“Another enemy?”

“Aw, come on, weren't all these other ones enough already?”

The squid woman's glower intensifies, even as she turns half of it towards the beach.

“It's me, you guys.”

Her voice is considerably harsher than it was before, but not nearly as grating as the Calmaramon I remember — not that it stops the others from reeling back as realization strikes.

“Zoe?!”

“That's really her?”

“Guess so...”

“Uh- wow! That spirit sure is, er-”

“DON'T say it.” Calmaramon growls, shutting down Beetlemon's stuttering comments in an instant.

“That... that's mine!”

I barely even realize I was the one who spoke, even as everyone's attention turns back to me. Indignance and disbelief course through me in equal measure, combining to leave me feeling like I've just been beaten and robbed on the side of the road.

“That's MY beast spirit!” I all but shriek. “Give it back!”

Calmaramon smirks.

“Funny. Why don't you have it then?”

She abruptly surges forward, tentacles thicker than tree trunks reaching out to bind and grapple me. I dive below to evade, but Calmaramon simply follows, her many limbs pushing her forward at shockingly rapid speed. Seething, I grab at the ocean, certain I can at least still outpace her with Whipping Waves-

“Titanic Tempest!”

Calmaramon's voice reverberates clear as day through the water, and I look back just in time to see her upper body duck into her mantle, her larger tentacles extending outwards as she begins spinning like a giant propeller — an apt comparison in more than one way, as her already rapid speed immediately more than triples. I throw myself backwards, trying to halt her charge by holding the water around her in place, but if it has any effect whatsoever, it isn't obvious as Calmaramon continues to spiral towards me like a torpedo the size of a small building, smashing through everything on the seafloor in her way. Luckily, she can't seem to turn very well in her current state, allowing me to just barely avoid getting swiped by one of her massive tentacles as she careens past me — but the sheer force generated by the attack's passing still hits me through the water itself, evacuating most of the contents of my lungs as the shockwave washes over me like a miniature sonic boom.

Sucking in more water to regain my breath, I force myself upwards, riding a shallow wave back up through the surface. Calmaramon rises back up along with me, smirking confidently as she reemerges from her mantle.

“Ready to give up yet, sugar?”

Something snaps, and it isn't my fingers this time.

“Fine!” I spit. “If you really want to keep my beast spirit so badly...”

I burst out of the sea as it spikes beneath me, allowing the water to carry me high into the air-

[ S L I D E - E V O L U T I O N ]

-then let it fall back to the ocean below, no longer under my control as my suddenly-extant wings flare out behind me.

“...then I guess that I'll be keeping yours.” I finish, a smirk of my own forming behind my mask.

Just like a minute ago, everyone present cries out in alarm. This time though, I'm the exception, allowing me to savor the sight of Calmaramon's expression twisting into utter shock.

“Wha- where did you get-”

“Aww, not so fun when it's your spirit being dangled in front of you, is it?” I ask, possessed by a sudden impishness as I lie back on the air itself, Zephyrmon's innate connection to the wind keeping me aloft without any actual effort. “But you know, maybe this is for the best! I mean, you don't have this spirit, so I guess it just wasn't meant to be yours... that is what you just said, isn't it?”

Agunimon and Lobomon manage to collect themselves and send another wide spray of light and flame in my direction. I lazily float away from the barrage, deliberately making the movement look nigh-effortless, which it very nearly is already.

“Is it me, or did you guys just get a lot slower?” I say, moving a clawed hand to my face and pretending to yawn.

Kumamon suddenly comes flying off the front of an icy ramp he attached to a tree while I wasn't watching, shouting “Blizzard Blaster!” as a barrage of frigid snowballs erupts from his miniature missile launcher. I dash out of their path, moving at speeds far greater than I bothered to show before, and stop scarcely two feet in front of Calmaramon, causing her to flinch back in surprise as I casually perch atop her mantle.

“What's the matter?” I ask, half-lidding my eyes and teasingly running a claw down the side of my cheek. “Jealous, perhaps?”

Calmaramon's expression shifts from startled back to furious as she inhales and spits a concentrated stream of pitch black ink at me. My claws move to slash through it as I leap back into the air, dispersing the caustic fluid into naught but mist as the surrounding wind scatters the lingering droplets all but automatically.

“You know, I didn't really want this fight-”

Beetlemon attempts to lunge at me from behind, his horn glowing yellow with a chained electric charge. He gives himself away by yelling “Lightning Blitz!” a half-second beforehand however, and ends up passing just inches underneath me as I send myself into a midair flip — allowing me to lash as my rotation completes and land a vicious kick to the back of his head, drawing a strangled-sounding cry from the robotic bug man as he's sent careening down to the ocean below.

“-but I have to admit, this is kind of fun!”

Despite my words, a part of me still winces at Beetlemon's pained yelp. Huh, that seemed a bit... harsh... oh well!

“How about a quick fortune?” I almost giggle. “I predict...”

I move my clawed hands in a circle, and a funnel of slicing wind erupts from them, glowing purple feathers ripping themselves from my wings and adding themselves to the gale before it tears across the beach, sending my prey diving in every direction to dodge.

“...that you're all about to be scattered to the winds!”

My gleeful tone seems to almost grate against my own ears, but I've no time to wonder why as a sudden change in the wind draws my attention down and left, just in time to catch an enormous spinning drill directly on my palms — or try to, but the hardened tip of Calmaramon's mantle simply has too much weight and force behind it, the inverted Titanic Tempest nearly boring straight through my armor. It only takes a scant instant for her to completely overpower my efforts, drawing a piercing, hawk-like screech from my mouth as I'm slammed backwards through the air, dropping like a stone. I manage to regain my bearings and resume my interminable hover just in time to see Calmaramon fall back to sea, reentering the water in a dive far smoother than a being that large should be capable of.

My eyes narrow to furious slits. She dares try to strike me from the skies? My own territory?! I'll rip her from the ocean! I'll tear her from the air! I'll-

...I'll...

...what the HELL am I doing?!

Another barrage of fire and light comes surging up at me from below, which I notice too late to be ready to avoid — yet my body moves anyways, and I swoop around the projectiles just as effortlessly as before.

“Annoying...” I hear myself hiss.

My outstretched claws glow crimson red before tearing through the spot where Kumamon was lining up another shot a moment ago, neatly severing the top half of his improvised ski slope in his place as he tumbles wildly off the back of it. Which... I meant to do? But I also- no, what's going on?! I was angry, sure, but I was still just planning on using Zephyrmon to run away! Yet not only am I not doing that, it's like I'm not even in control of myself anymore! I've somehow gotten stuck on autopilot, as if everything I'm saying and doing is being guided solely by-

It hits me like a dropped anvil. Instinct... I didn't even consider it because I wasn't planning to actually use her, but Zephyrmon is still a beast spirit, which are nearly impossible to control at first! Pretty much every time someone found one in the show, the user got caught up in the spirit's wild nature at first, and had to figure out how to push back its instincts so as to not go totally berserk-

Beetlemon suddenly flies up at me from below, evidently having recovered from the kick to the head I gave him. I dart around behind him before he can react, wrapping my arms around his shoulders before shoving him straight into Agunimon and Lobomon's latest volley, eliciting an even louder cry of pain than before as he falls like a rock and crashes back down onto the beach.

"Oops~"

Hah, teach him to- wait, no, ahhHHH this is even worse than it should be though! When the kids found their beast spirits, they mostly just tunnel-visioned and started attacking things around them at random, they didn't also start taunting whoever they were fighting at the time! Not to mention Zephyrmon was the one beast spirit that didn't have this issue! Was that just because Zoe was the one using it then, or-

My body jerks to one side as an entire tree suddenly whirls past me, countless droplets of corrosive ink flying off its already-dissolving leaves. Down below, Calmaramon rips another pair from the ground and applies the same effect, then twirls in place and launches them up at me like oversized acid-tipped javelins, fast and on point enough that even my wind-sped reflexes struggle to evade.

...well, she certainly doesn't seem to be having any issues with a beast spirit she's not even meant to have, so yes, apparently Zoe is just really personally suited to reining these things in. Unfortunately, I quite apparently am not, and can really only imagine this going from bad to worse to worst the longer this continues. I need to regain control...!

“Frozen Tundra!” Kumamon yells, his lower body transmuting into an enormous icicle before accelerating towards me at an upward diagonal — but with nowhere near the speed or force of Calmaramon's similar effort not even a minute prior. My right hand reflexively lashes out and catches him, claws digging deep into the icicle's tip before I find myself tossing Kumamon back down at the others, laughter bubbling up in my throat again as he spins end over end, his cries fading in and out with each rotation.

“You guys really need to stop yelling out your-”

With a surge of effort, I manage to rein in my mirth and slam my mouth shut before I can finish the sentence, forcing my covered lips to stay sealed against my body's own impulse to loosen them. This is in stark contrast to Agunimon, who glares up at me and literally growls as Lobomon leaps ten feet up to catch Kumamon, setting down next to a still prone and groaning Beetlemon.

“We don't care how many spirits you have! We're not gonna lose!”

The response that leaps to mind for that nigh-instantly pries my mouth back open.

“And how exactly do you... plan...”

My hand twitches as I pour every bit of focus I'm not dedicating to preventing further snarky remarks into moving my arm. It's like trying to force aside sleep paralysis, some part of me screaming that we're not through here, but somehow I manage it, clumsily yanking the limb in a wide circle to forcibly spin myself around.

The moment I'm no longer facing the beach, my body actually seems to relax, my earlier, half-remembered urge to simply fly off into the sunset suddenly returning in force. Maybe I should've-

“...to keep me from just leaving?”

-damn it, lost focus on my mouth again!

Utterly furious with myself, yet feeling paradoxically satisfied, I flap my wings and force myself into motion. It starts more like a glide than actual flight, and my angle is such that I nearly shove myself straight into the water in the process, but after a couple of seconds I pick up speed, managing to pull up enough that my talons are just skimming the surface of the water rather than trailing through it. Come on-

“A little like THIS!”

My neck snaps around just in time to see a burnished-red bipedal dragon spread its fiery wings and kick off from the beach in pursuit. Guess Takuya finally remembered he could do that-!

Though I'm certain BurningGreymon's top speed can't match mine, the comparative force of his take off gains him enough ground to at least briefly get him into range. Growling in a low, guttural tone, his diamond-shaped arm attachments spin around to face me, revealing the miniature gun barrels hidden beneath.

“Pyro Barrage!”

Hundreds of small, red, and extremely hot energy beams fire across the distance between us, faster than even Zephyrmon can fly. I pull upwards, but a number of the searing lasers still end up grazing my lower torso, bouncing off my armored calves yet scorching my exposed stomach and thighs. I cry out in pain, the sound still shrill and bird-like-

“Wind of Pain!”

-and snarl through my mask, more feathers spilling from my wings and whipping themselves into a spiraling tempest that drives itself directly into the oncoming dragon's face.

BurningGreymon screeches, blinded by the scything wind as it pelts his eyes and extinguishes his flames, my glowing feathers tearing holes into his own. Damaged and bereft of their fiery coating, his wings briefly cease to beat... which, unlike mine, are apparently actually necessary to provide him lift, as he promptly drops into the water all of a few feet below.

Part of me exults, while the rest of me slows in concern as the dragon resurfaces with a sound somewhere between a roar and a sputter, suddenly seeming a lot less intimidating. The ocean steams around him as he furiously flaps his waterlogged wings — but as they are now, they'd no longer be capable of lifting him off the ground, much less out of the sea.

“Sorry about that~”

The lilting, sarcastic-sounding tone that my attempted apology comes out in would bring my hands to my face if I had full control over them right now. Instead, having completely given up on trying to smooth any of this over, I direct the entirety of my will into simply forcing myself, or rather, forcing Zephyrmon to just fly away already.

...and, to my everlasting relief, she finally does. I shoot off into the distance like one of the birds I now half-resemble, leaving the island, the beach, and the transformed kids still standing on it far behind. Soon, they're little more than tiny specks in the distance, already vanishing beyond the horizon.

...

Well.

That could have gone better.

Chapter Text

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!”

Chapter Text

This sucks.

Still gliding smoothly just over the surface of the ocean, I sigh heavily through my mask. Now that I'm no longer swept up in the heat of battle, that vaguely uncomfortable feeling I noticed even the first time I took this form is really starting to get to me. While I don't think it's actually grown any stronger, it feels more prominent in my awareness than before, which is only compounding my existing vexation at everything else. I almost have to wonder if it's the Beast Spirit of Wind subtly lashing out at me for letting things go like that.

...though, if it didn't want that to happen, you'd think that it just wouldn't have done a lot of that in the first place.

My wings sweep downward in frustration.

It doesn't help that I'm still finding it quite hard to control myself. Zephyrmon's instincts aren't separate from my thoughts, they're in them, contaminating my every mental process with foreign urges and impulses that I can't even easily identify as such. It feels normal, natural even, to think that I should probably find a place to both set down and calm down after that rather exhausting fight. I wouldn't even say that's unusual, in fact... if not for how I also feel like finding someone to prank would somehow aid me in that, which feels just as normal, even though I can't think of a single time I've so much as played a practical joke on someone before. That can't be coming from me.

Come to think of it, this is probably why I wanted to go tease the Toucanmon earlier, isn't it? If I'd noticed just how uncharacteristic that thought was then, maybe things wouldn't have turned out this way. Although I suppose at least now if Mercurymon gets smart with me again, I can just pick him up and dangle him out the side of the lair until he-

Groaning, I cut myself off and violently shake my head, wishing it was possible to physically force a thought out of mind.

Gah... out of all ten available beast spirits, I just had to wind up saddled with the only one that's neither feral nor destructive, yet somehow mischievous enough to cause even bigger problems. Why is Zephyrmon even like this?! She's the least visually beast-like of the entire lot; her design isn't exactly indicative of the fact that she apparently acts like Impmon if she's allowed free reign!

My flight slows. Actually, why am I even still Zephyrmon right now? I'm not being chased anymore, I'm not particularly comfortable, and this form has caused me basically nothing but trouble thus far. I should really just switch back already.

...that said, today really has been extraordinarily stressful, and I've not truly slowed down at any point for more than a few minutes. All instincts aside, maybe I should take some time to just go... I don't know, check out the coast of the Continent of Flame or something? I can see it from here, and it might at least help me unwind a little. I doubt it'd take me too long to find someone to have a little ~fun~ with once I-

I nearly scream. Re-readjusting my course, I force myself to focus-

[ S L I D E - E V O L U T I O N ]

-and dive back down into the water, magnitudes happier than I've been since waking up like this to simply be Ranamon again, no longer stuck wrestling with my own mind.

...which of course means I can now actually focus on just how badly I screwed up back there. I'm genuinely struggling to think of a single way that encounter could have possibly gone worse than it did. It was the wrong place, the wrong time, the wrong words...

A growl cuts past my teeth.

And the wrong spirit. A stupid, uncooperative, self-sabotaging-

Forcing myself to the surface, I slam my eyes shut and concentrate, feeling around in myself, or rather my data, for the offender in question. I can't really distinguish anything beyond the physical at first, my attention mostly just drawn to my various lingering injuries — both my jaw and shoulder are feeling more than a little bruised, and I guess I must still have actual hands beneath these gauntlets, because they ache like nothing else. As I focus in on the same internal trigger I just pulled to slide evolve however, something seems to enter my awareness, gathering itself from throughout my entirety to coalesce just behind my breastbone.

Placing a hand over my heart — or at least where my heart would be if Ranamon actually had one — I give the object a mental yank, and the Beast Spirit of Wind emerges, floating out of my chest like a ghost. It's a lot smaller than it was before for some reason, standing barely even six inches tall, but any curiosity I might have as to why is vastly overshadowed by my fury.

“You.” I snarl, glaring at the tiny figurine now floating over my outstretched hand. “Got anything to say for yourself?!”

…

“I know you can hear me! Why did you do that?! Just because things weren't going well didn't mean you had to actively antagonize them! I needed their help, and to help them, and Zoe was right there, but now you're probably stuck with me until I can figure out how to fix this!”

…

“...hello...?”

The surrounding air remains steadfastly silent. Not a single gust of wind blows by to indicate that the harpy-shaped idol is even aware I'm speaking to it, or has any desire to respond if so.

Sighing, I drop my arms and allow the spirit to slowly sink back into me. Here I am trying to chastise a mostly-inanimate statue, as if I don't own the lion's share of the blame for this regardless. Zephyrmon may have made things worse, but I fumbled the initial negotiations all on my own, not to mention stupidly flew off the handle upon seeing Zoe as Calmaramon. Hell, I'm not even sure the Beast Spirit of Wind has any real agency or influence over Zephyrmon beyond providing the template for her form, so maybe that part was entirely my fault too. I didn't even have a real plan to justify why I wasn't actually hostile to the kids, I sort of just expected handing over Zoe's beast spirit to do all the work of convincing them of that on its own, letting my assumption that they didn't pose a threat at the moment make me careless, and-

Well, look how that turned out.

Hanging my head, I start pulling myself through the water. About the only solace I can take in all this is that “stealing” Zoe's beast spirit means I now literally can't die the way Ranamon did in the show, since I'm all but certain that Zephyrmon was part of that scenario. That doesn't mean it can't still happen however, just that it might play out slightly different now, and in doing so I've potentially ruined my ability to even semi-accurately predict how events will proceed from here, making it cold comfort indeed.

The world around me silent save for gently lapping waves, I quietly glance up at the darkening sky. Evening has firmly set in, a profusion of stars greater than any I've ever seen before already partially visible. I'd probably be a bit more awed by the sight, if not for how sore and tired I currently am.

I blink. I'm tired...? Ah. Guess it's safe to assume I do in fact need sleep then, incarnated spirit or not.

In that case, I suppose I'd better hurry back to the hideout. I was already on my way, as I'm not sure how much time I can reasonably spend away from it without raising questions or starting a manhunt, and I might actually be safer sheltering there than I would be anywhere else anyways. Certainly more so than I'd be out here in open ocean, where any given sea-dwelling Digimon evidently stands at least some chance of recognizing me as the Digimon responsible for the ongoing destruction of their ecosystem. If I want to be sure I won't get figuratively shivved while I'm dead to the world, returning to the lair still makes the most sense, despite its other inhabitants.

...alternatively, since Zephyrmon isn't a known reverse eco-terrorist, I suppose I could just spend the night as her somewhere. Take the risk of missing my unknown, perhaps even nonexistent curfew, make myself a nice little nest up a tree or something, and simply “relax”, as I seem so perpetually inclined towards doing in that form.

I snort. Well, if my options come down to trusting I'll be safe in the evil warriors' lair for a night, unconscious in the midst of such charming figures as Duskmon and Mercurymon, or trusting that Zephyrmon won't end up getting me in further trouble in the time between now and morning, the choice seems pretty obvious. Where's that tunnel again?

I pan my gaze across the horizon. I'm pretty sure that island I passed a couple miles back was the one where the Seadramon attacked me, and the water's edge is off to my left, while the continent is to my right, so I must be at least relatively close. Just need to look around a little...

It takes me a bit in the fading light, nearly 20 minutes of which I accidentally spend searching the entirely wrong area, but eventually I manage to triangulate the reef I arrived here through, aided by the sheer size of the underwater hill it lies on. I then of course still have to find the actual entrance, but the number of Digimon in the vicinity seems to have died down significantly with the onset of evening, leaving me free to scan the hill's exterior at my leisure. The symbol that marks the portal turns out to be hidden under a metric ton of coral on this end, to the point I doubt I'd have ever found it had I not arrived here through it, but it still only takes a simple touch to activate.

Soon enough, I find myself slipping back down into the passageway, embraced on all sides by the same luminescent water I awoke in this morning.

As I propel myself past the rough stone walls of the literal digital shortcut, I find myself thinking back again, still a touch concerned about the Toucanmon and Gomamon. I really hope they got away safely... in the chaos of everything that went on back there, I didn't even see what happened to any of them. I didn't see any eggs fly off though, which I have to assume is a good sign. With any luck, they all managed to escape the beach without further incident or injury.

...unlike me.

Upon arriving back at the central hub, I wind up lingering in place for a minute or two, part of me wondering if I can't just stay down here all night. If I'm pretending to be Ranamon though, I need to at least put in the bare minimum effort to mimic her, and based on where I woke up initially, I'm inclined to believe she doesn't sleep down here.

Thus...

Tapping the ceiling, I pull myself through the hole that appears and back up into Ranamon's living pool. Despite my reservations, after spending so long out in the comparative frenzy of the ocean, it's surprisingly soothing to be back in a space that's mine and mine alone. Spartan or not, it's still comfortingly spacious, smooth as marble, and reassuringly empty. Even the hole leading up to the cavern above is-

Is... currently being loomed over by a rather bulky silhouette.

“Yo Ranamon, youse in there?”

...oh, joy. Seems the fourth member of this little group found his way back while I was out.

I swim upwards, and the silhouette comes into clearer view, revealing it to indeed be Arbormon, the Warrior of Wood. To my recollection, he's something of a brute, with additional tendencies towards both laziness and gluttony. As such, he's not exactly the brightest of the bunch, and while he's not really what I'd call an idiot either, he's the member of the group I'm honestly the least worried about.

Not that it means I can let my guard down around him any more than I can the others.

Breaching the surface of the pool, I pull myself up and out into the cavern. While Arbormon is shorter than Mercurymon, the top of my swim cap still only seems to come up to his torso-bound “mouth”. Great, another giant.

“Ey, there you are.” Arbormon says, his shoulder armor lifting up slightly in his version of a smile. “Where you been?”

“Out.” I say, casually but noncommittally. “Ah just got back. You?”

Arbormon shrugs. “Same 'ere. I caught up with them humans, but they dropped a cave on my head 'fore I could finish 'em off. Wasn' too tough ta dig my way out, but it took a while, and I lost 'em. Pretty sure theys went out over water, but I ain't as good at trackin' mon from underground as Grumblemon is... or uh, was.”

While I try my best to ignore it, I still can't help but find it hard to concentrate on what Arbormon is actually saying given how he's saying it. Between Mercurymon the ren faire enthusiast, Ranamon the southern belle, Grumblemon the high-pitched caveman, and Arbormon the presumed mafia stereotype, Duskmon is apparently the only one in this base allowed to not sound at least mildly ridiculous.

...wait, what was that last part?

“Was?” I repeat.

Arbormon nods, seeming to slump a little.

“Yeah... Grumblemon got done in by them kids.”

My eyes widen slightly. That's right — Grumblemon was defeated for good just after Seraphimon died, before the kids got to the island I just met them on. Meaning that's one of the other evil warriors already taken care of, and one less that I'll have to fool. I suppose this mess at least has a small silver lining to it.

“Ah'm sorry to hear that.” I say. “Ah'm sure he went down swingin'.”

Arbormon shifts. “Ey, that's real nice of ya to say, Ranamon. Didn't think youse cared.”

...seriously? Apparently Ranamon really was just that unconcerned about her nominal allies, or at least that's the impression she gave them... I already said otherwise though, so I'd better at least commit.

“Ah ain't that self-absorbed.” I insist, crossing my arms under my chest as though insulted. “Ah wasn't exactly fond of the little gnome, but it ain't like ah'm happy he's gone.”

Arbormon scratches his head. “Huh...”

He suddenly claps me on the back, hard enough that I nearly fall over. “Well, dontchu worry, we'll get them puny humans sooner or later. Revenge izza dish best served warm, amiright?”

Not... really, at least going by the traditional phrasing of that idiom, but I'm hardly going to correct you.

Arbormon suddenly smacks his fist into his palm, the wooden parts clacking against each other like rattles.

“Oh yeah! Almost forgot, Mercurymon said that if you was here, he wanted to talk to ya's real quick.”

...thrilling.

“Thanks.” I say, barely withholding my sarcasm. “Ah'll just go find him then, shall ah?”

Arbormon gives me a thumbs up as I make my way over to a ceiling hollow and allow myself to be lifted upwards.

With night having now fallen in full, the inside of the structure is quite dark, though the light of this world's trio of moons shining in through the gaps in the walls remains more than enough to navigate by. My gems flicker dimly as I progress to the third floor, where I find Mercurymon sitting with his back to a pillar, seemingly admiring one of his own arm mirrors. He looks up as I approach, lips quirking upward slightly as he stands.

“Our sodden siren rejoins us.” he greets me, if you can really call that a greeting. “How kind of her to grace us with her continued presence.”

I wrinkle my nose at his choice of epithet.

“And how kind of ya to notice.”

“But of course.” Mercurymon easily replies. “And how fared thy latest excursion? Doth the fair lady return from her quest triumphant, or in miserable failure, as she has so many times prior?”

I half-lid my eyes and scowl.

“Take a guess.”

I don't elaborate — I'm hardly going to tell him what actually happened, after all. I may not like Zephyrmon very much, but she's what I've got to work with right now, and as I don't see Duskmon anywhere, I think I can get away with keeping this particular card up my sleeve for the time being.

Mercurymon keeps his smile, even he shakes his head.

“How regrettably predictable. Thou hast my condolences, but I shall ask that thee attempt to keep the volume of thy grievances to a minimum this time, oh mistress of moping.”

...good lord, just pick a vaguely derogatory nickname for me and stick with it, will you?

“Ah'll keep that in mind.” I say flatly. “If that's all ya wanted, then if you'll excuse me, ah need my beauty sleep.”

I turn to walk away-

“Hmm... a small question, before we taketh our leave of one another.”

I pause, looking back from the corner of one eye. “What?”

“For a trip of no apparent remark, thou appear notably more damaged than expected.” Mercurymon muses.

He gestures to my lower body, prompting me to glance down at myself in minor confusion. Sure enough, my stomach, hip fin, and some additional bits of skin peeking out from the holes in my swimsuit are still visibly burned, BurningGreymon's parting shot having left a clear mark on me even in this form. I hadn't really noticed them around the background ache of everything else, but against the otherwise teal expanse of my skin, the purplish-blue brands still stand out like smoke upon the sky.

“Now what ever could have done such a thing to our drizzly damsel?”

I grimace. Great, now I have to tell him something. Could I maybe use the Seadramon as an excuse? No, none of its attacks were capable of burning me, and I can't afford to look so weak as to have had trouble with a Digimon that relatively minor in front of this guy anyways. I don't know what else I could fake having run into though...

Ugh, fine, truth it is — the extremely abbreviated, un-detailed version of it, at least.

“Ah ran into those kids.” I mutter with a distinct thread of petulance. “...they got in a couple lucky hits.”

He doesn't even have eyes, but I could swear that Mercurymon's brow somehow shoots up.

“Oh?” he remarks, clapping his hands together with a sound like colliding pots and pans. “Well then, I suppose congratulations for thee are in order for escaping such a scenario intact. As I recall, tis a better outcome than you yourself were expecting... as in part was I, for that matter.”

I glare where he can't see it, idly wondering how the hell the other evil warriors put up with this guy. Well, did; I guess Grumblemon technically doesn't have to anymore.

“Thanks ever so much for your vote of confidence.” I snap. “Now, unless you've got any more snide remarks, ah think we're done here.”

“Mmm, I'm certain I do, but perhaps I shall save them for the morrow.” Mercurymon says, turning back to his arm mirror. “Rest well, milady.”

It's only with a supreme effort of will that I don't tell him to shove his “miladys” where the sun doesn't shine as I drop back down to the previous floor.

Arbormon is gone when I return to my pool, despite the fact that I didn't see him on either of the floors above, which are too open for me to have realistically missed him. Maybe he stepped outside? Not that I know where he could possibly have done that and not walked straight out onto open air, but at the moment it's hardly my highest priority.

Stumbling over to the water, I slide back in, relaxing more than I'd like to admit as the liquid washes over me. Digimon thankfully heal quite quickly, to the point I already feel better than I did just an hour ago, but Mercurymon pointing out the most obvious of my assorted damage has only brought the rest of it back into focus. Even if I'm in less pain than I probably should be, I'm still more than glad to have an excuse to be unconscious for the next however-many hours.

Less unnerved by the prospect of sleeping here than I was this morning, I swim down to the bottom of the pool, settle myself in the water, and allow my eyes to drift shut, trying to remind myself that despite how today went, I don't think I actually ruined anything that would keep the kids from being able to take care of my “fellow” warriors.

So long as I still manage to avoid my own canon end, I should only have to deal with this in the short term.

...

...

...

...although...

...

...in the long term...

My eyes snap back open.

In the long term, that still won't actually save me, because this is the season of Digimon where the villain essentially wins.

I bolt back upright as my dim memories of Frontier's finale finally fit themselves back together. I've been so focused on my immediate situation that it didn't even occur to me, but... even after Cherubimon was defeated in canon, that wasn't the end of things. Because no one bothered to keep track of the giant mass of fractal code he'd accumulated, it ended up falling to Lucemon, the Digimon responsible for Cherubimon's corruption in the first place, in his prison within the partially-exposed core of the planet. That data in turn allowed Lucemon to release two more servants to finish what Cherubimon started, and Dynasmon and Crusadermon turned out to be much better at the job, utterly overpowering the kids and getting the better of them at essentially every turn. The pair rampaged through what remained of the Digital World nigh-unopposed, until literally nothing remained of the planet or its inhabitants, allowing Lucemon to break free of his age-old imprisonment... and proceed to absorb his own servants, along with all the code they'd collected, before going on to launch an assault on the human world, having gained more than enough power from subsuming the data of everything else on his plane of existence to make doing so a plausible feat.

The more I think about it, the more comes back to me, dropping my nonexistent heart ever deeper into my stomach. Lucemon was ultimately still defeated in the end, but by that point, there was nothing left of the Digital World to save. While the code of the planet itself was restored, every living Digimon was left reduced to an egg, their memories, culture, and history all completely wiped away. It was a factory reset in all but name, performed on a universal scale. I found it such a drawn out and depressing conclusion to the show, with multiple episodes largely just consisting of the same losing battle even before the downer ending, that I apparently all but scrubbed it from memory.

...and now, I almost wish that it had stayed that way. Because, if events play out that way here? Then even I manage to escape Ranamon's original fate of being killed off by the heroes... I'll ultimately just die anyways, when everyone else does.

I almost laugh. Hell, it goes even further than that! In order to finally stop Lucemon, the Digidestined ended up having to use all twenty legendary spirits in tandem to collectively become Susanoomon, the only entity in this continuity with enough power to pose any real threat to him. But if even one of those twenty spirits isn't available, Susanoomon won't be an option... and I'm currently the physical incarnation of one of them. Ranamon isn't just doomed by canon — she's doomed by the narrative stakes.

Surprisingly, the actual panic I feel at all this levels off in short order, perhaps because it somehow only seems natural after today that my already ludicrously bad situation is somehow even worse than I'd remembered. My thoughts briefly flash to the prospect of taking a Trailmon out of this world again, but no — Lucemon will still come for the human world eventually, so I'd just be exchanging short-term theoretical safety at best for a slightly-delayed apocalypse, and in the process essentially guarantee that apocalypse happens. Assuming it didn't just happen instantly if I tried that, given the time dilation effect that exists between the dimensions. Though I didn't know it at the time, fleeing this world was never an option.

But the alternative is...

I bite down on nothing. Damn it, there has to be a way around this! Maybe if I just jumped into Susanoomon alongside the kids...? Even if that worked though, I'm not sure I'd come back out without just reverting to an inanimate statue, same as all the other spirits when they're used by someone or something else. Could Susanoomon still form without me, and maybe just be a little weaker than normal? There's so many spirits to make up for a single one's absence, and surely Susanoomon at 19/20 ^ths strength would still be enough to defeat Lucemon... but do I have enough faith in that theory to bet both myself and the rest of this world on it?

Even as I pose the question to myself, I already know I don't. This is the season where essentially everything that could go wrong did go wrong, after all. If I prevent Susanoomon from forming at full strength, it's entirely possible that when Lucemon eats all the data of the world and everyone in it, it will ultimately stay that way.

Do I really have no choice but to die for the cause...?

I clench my fingers over my gauntlets. No- no, I refuse to accept that; refuse to simply offer myself up as a willing sacrifice! Like hell I'm going to let myself be doomed by the plot twice-over! If I literally can't live through the actual ending of this story, then... I'll just have to ensure that things never reach the point Susanoomon would even be needed, and make sure that Lucemon stays imprisoned.

Permanently.

Slowly, gradually, my thoughts begin to calm.

Yeah... this is fine. Well, not fine, but while terrifying in the abstract, the stakes were already in the upper atmosphere, so this hardly raises them much further. I already knew this world was being actively deleted, so the only real difference is that now, I'm aware that deletion will come to full fruition if I don't do anything about it.

Nothing about my situation has actually changed... I've just got a slightly bigger job to do than I realized.

Closing my eyes again, I settle back down and try to relax, however futile that now seems.

Better get some sleep. I get the feeling I'm going to need all the rest I can get...

Chapter Text

“Huh! Hah! Huh! Hah!”

My eyes slide open as the distant, annoyingly repetitive sounds rudely rouse me from sleep. Oh come on, who's- wait, why's it so bright in here-

Ah. Right.

So reminded of just who and where I am right now, I paddle into a roughly upright position, rubbing my eyes as I force myself to return to the realm of conscious thought. My fingers brush over my skin, searching for burns and bruises that happily seem to have vanished overnight, before my attention is inevitably pulled back to the still-ongoing noises that drew me from slumber in the first place. Who or what even is that...?

I swim up and poke my head out of the water, bringing the sounds into better clarity, allowing me to recognize them as simple grunts of exertion. Which... still doesn't actually explain why anyone would be making noises like that in here.

“Huh! Hah! The early bird gets the worm, the toughest wood's gotta be firm...”

Wondering if I even want to know, yet finding myself unable to just ignore it, I pull myself out of my pool and sleepily stagger over to a ceiling hollow. Thankfully, I only end up having to ascend a single floor before spotting the apparent source of the noise, which turns out to be Arbormon.

...doing reps with a pair of handheld dumbbells?

“Mornin' Ranamon!” he says, continuing to huff and puff as he greets me with far more boisterousness than I feel is warranted this early. “Ey, you want in on this?”

I squint at him, still hovering over the same hole I floated up through.

“Ah'll... pass, thanks.”

“You sure? You know what theys say, healthy body, healthy mind.”

I don't think that really applies here, given you don't have any actual muscles to exercise. For that matter, I'm not sure that would do anything even for Digimon that aren't elaborate mechanical puppets on the inside, so...

“Pretty sure.”

Arbormon shrugs. “A'ight, it's your loss.”

“Ah think ah'll live.” I mutter under my breath.

Where did he even get those from? I can't exactly imagine he just popped down to the local exercise equipment store, but I kind of doubt he made them himself either-

“♪ One, two, three, four, make sure youse save room for more... ♪”

An imaginary vein ticks on the side of my head as Arbormon not only continues his increasingly loud exercise, but begins running laps around the inside wall. The echoing clacking of his wooden feet against the stone structure's hollow interior becomes cacophonous within seconds, to say nothing of how his chanting adds to the noise.

“♪ Five, six, seven, eight, gonna-”

“Ya mind maybe keepin' it down a little?” I interrupt, just a little sharper than intended. “Ah can't hear myself think.”

“Eh?” Arbormon screeches to halt, glancing over at my irritated expression and scratching the back of his head with one dumbbell. “Oh, uh, sure thing... sorry 'bout that.”

I stare back at him with crossed arms and half-lidded eyes, then silently nod and allow gravity to take hold of me again, slowly falling back to my own quarters. Maybe that was a tad unfair of me, seeing as Arbormon does technically live here, but hey, so do I now, and I'm reasonably certain the actual Ranamon would have complained about that too. The horror of suddenly having roommates...

A yawn forces its way past my lips as I sit down at the edge of my pool, quite deliberately not dropping fully back in. I'm not sure I wouldn't just fall back asleep if I did, and given last night's rather unfortunate revelations, I dearly need to figure out a new plan of attack, meaning I can't really afford to spend much more of the morning unconscious.

...in fact, seen in that light, perhaps I should actually have thanked Arbormon for essentially playing the part of my alarm clock. Oh well.

Dismissing the thought for the moment, I do my best to focus. Okay. If I want to prevent Lucemon from breaking free of his seal, then... well, I suppose my main priority should just be to keep him from getting hold of that big ball of fractal code Cherubimon is currently sitting on, since that's what ultimately led to everything that came after. I can't exactly just walk up to the big evil bunny's castle and swipe it out from under him though, ironically in part because he's content to just wait around the place doing nothing until the kids come knocking on his door. Zephyrmon might actually allow me to sneak up on his castle from the skies — and in “disguise” to boot — but I don't remember where all that code was physically stored, nor am I certain I'd be able to get away from Cherubimon if he noticed me, given he could delete me in an instant and is prone to throwing around lightning. Given those obvious potential points of failure, I'd likely be better off sticking with my original plan of just laying low and surviving for now, then hide around the castle come the final battle so I can swoop in and grab the code when Cherubimon drops it, immediately after the kids defeat him.

...if. They even can? Come to think of it, the kids ended up needing Unified Spirit Evolution to do that in canon — an “upgrade” that was otherwise pointless, since it wasn't useful for anything else, but it was just as reliant on having Ranamon's spirit available as Susanoomon would be, and is therefore just as out of the question here. Which makes waiting around for the kids to beat Cherubimon absolutely futile, because as things stand, they can't even win against the fake final boss.

An ugly expression crawls its way across my face. Well, scratch all that then; apparently if I want to stop anything, I need to first figure out a way to take care of Cherubimon that doesn't necessitate throwing myself on a sacrificial pyre. Which is at least less of a problem than fighting Lucemon would be, but that still doesn't mean there's any obvious alternatives on hand. If Digimon strong enough to take on one of this world's archangels and win were in high supply, the planet presumably wouldn't be in this mess in the first place, and the only ones I know of, I have no actual access to.

...save perhaps one?

My gaze flickers up towards the distant ceiling. Mercurymon did kill Seraphimon, however cheaply, meaning he technically qualifies for this rather short list — and conveniently, despite the lip service he's paying for the moment, he's actually planning on betraying Cherubimon later down the line as well. Not that it mattered in the show, since the kids collectively removed him from circulation before he could make good on that claim, but things don't necessarily have to play out that way here. If I keep Mercurymon alive, could he potentially deal with Cherubimon for me? Hell, we might even be able to team up, if I played my cards right...

For several long moments, I consider that prospect — then I take it, crumple it up, and shove it back into the mental junk drawer it came from. Yeah, and what cards would those be, exactly? How would I possibly bring that up to Mercurymon without risking him either attacking me to preserve his own secrets, or turning me in to better establish his own loyalty? How would I effectively steer him away from the plan that gets him killed without explaining why I already know it will fail? I don't recall his motives for said betrayal being anything complex either — certainly nothing that made his deletion seem any less reasonable — so realistically he's going to end up being a problem one way or another. While I suppose I shouldn't count the idea completely out, outright colluding with Mercurymon probably isn't doable.

Someone else using his spirit, on the other hand...

I raise a hand to my chin. That... might work. Yesterday's events rather clearly demonstrated it's possible to use spirits you aren't naturally aligned with, and if the kids are eventually going to end up with Mercurymon's anyways, they'll naturally be in a position to exploit that. I kind of doubt they'll consider the idea without outside input though... I'd likely have to find them again and suggest it in person, but after yesterday's events they'll be even less likely to listen to me than they were before, and come to think of it I'm not even sure where they'll be anymore-

I clutch at my face and groan into my hands. This is getting so stupidly complicated, and it didn't have to be. If yesterday had gone even just a little less poorly, I would be in a SO much better position to-

“Didst I not request last night that thy moping be kept silent?”

“Yahhhh!!!” I shriek, frantically whirling around to face the very Digimon I was just considering. “What are- don't do that!”

“Apologies, milady.” Mercurymon smirks. “Thou simply presented too tempting a target to pass up, particularly given thy similar reprimanding of our mutual comrade mere minutes prior.”

I swallow the immediate response that rises to my lips at that back down, not wanting to encourage him.

“What do ya want?” I huff.

“Must I have some greater reason to greet thee in the morn?” Mercurymon tuts. “Perhaps twas simply passing curiosity regarding how thou shalt be spending thy time today.”

“...ah'm probably gonna head out again.” I say, vaguely. “There ain't any issue with that, right?”

“Oh?” Mercurymon replies. “How curious. Since when doth the self-proclaimed Queen of the Seas speak as though she requires another's permission to act? Hath her acid tongue somehow wandered astray? Perhaps pulled out by one of her half-rabid 'fans'?”

Though I suppose that's implicitly the “No, go ahead.” I was hoping for, I still somehow find myself annoyed by its phrasing.

“My bad, what ever was ah thinkin', askin' as though you'd care?” I sarcastically retort, which apparently is all he expects of me anyways. “Seriously now, did ya have anything useful to say, or are ya just down here to trade insults?”

Mercurymon hums. “I merely thought thou mayst desire to know that Lord Cherubimon shall be collecting our latest batch of fractal code quite soon.”

My composure cracks slightly.

He... will, will he?

“Of assuredly unrelated note, how much fractal code hath you gathered recently?”

My fingers tighten around my gauntlets.

“...that ain't any of your concern.”

Mercurymon makes a metallic noise that might be a snort.

“I suppose thou art technically correct. However, in the event that such were my concern, I would perhaps suggest that those who happen to be short on such code make an effort to obtain some within the near future, lest we end up a second member short.”

His lips quirk... downward?

“Twould be a tragedy to see another go the way of Grumblemon.”

He snaps his fingers and vanishes, leaving me blinking in minor bewilderment at the empty space he just occupied.

Huh... smugness aside, I'm surprised Mercurymon went out of his way to tell me that. Combined with that frown, and the fact that he warned me about this at all, I'm tempted to think he might even be genuinely worried for me. Which isn't exactly matching my mental model of him thus far? Again though, I don't really know how well the evil warriors got along with each other off-screen. Maybe I've been giving him less credit than he deserves, and that team-up idea is actually feasible after all.

...orrrrr maybe he just wanted to needle me with the looming threat of deletion-by-fallen-angel, like a jackass. But I guess I'd like to think otherwise.

Sliding back into the water proper, I reach over and wake Ranamon's computer back up, finding myself once more in need of a map.

Regardless of Mercurymon's reasons, this is... unfortunate. As if I didn't already have enough to concern myself with, I apparently now need to go do Ranamon's “job” and smash some small portion of the planet apart so I can have something to hand over to my nominal boss in the near future. Which isn't just actively antithetical to my larger goals, but I imagine may encounter some resistance from any Digimon in a given area opposed to wanton habitat deletion... and I had enough trouble dealing with a lone, pissed off Seadramon yesterday.

I slowly pan over what remains of the Digital World. Wherever I go for this, I'll want it to be at least minimally inhabited... Ranamon may be responsible for the seas, but the sea is presumably inhabited everywhere, so I think I'll stick to land for this. Obviously I'm not going anywhere near the Continent of Darkness... maybe somewhere near the poles?

I scratch my cheek as I zoom in. I'm not sure this planet even has poles in the technical sense, but the north and south axis of the planet seem to still be relatively intact, and I'd bet are likely my best shot at finding relatively “expendable” terrain. There can't be that many Digimon prone to making literal ice planes their habitat, right?

Helpfully, that would also let me multitask. The kids were supposed to be heading to the Autumn Leaf Fair next, which is where Tommy's beast spirit is, but I seem to now recall that the group only even went there because the Toucanmon had flown off to sell their D-tectors at the bazaar — something that obviously didn't happen here. Meaning, unless the kids somehow end up heading that way anyways, I may have actually ended up cheating them out of two beast spirits... in which case, I probably shouldn't leave that loose end twisting in the wind. If nothing else, picking it up will give me another apology present to use for when I inevitably come into contact with the group again.

I squint at the display. Although... while I distinctly recall said fair being snowbound, there don't appear to be any snowy areas remotely close to Toucan Paradise, which is notably tropical? Doesn't help that even though I actually remember the name of the place this time, it doesn't seem to be labeled anywhere I can find on this map. Presumably because the name of the market isn't actually the name of the town, which- okay, why would those be the same, but that doesn't mean it's not frustrating.

My fingers strike the computer keys with increasing force as the map's scattered labels continue to prove utterly unhelpful. Damn it, couldn't this at least go smoothly? It's going to be hard enough to see anything else I'm now planning to fruition, given Cherubimon undoubtedly already knows Mercurymon can technically match any foe he faces, and will thus be aware to not just blindly attack him, no matter who's wearing his form at the time. I fully acknowledge the idea is a long shot...

I scowl. What else can I even do though? It's not as if I can personally make up for the “loss” of Unified Spirit Evolution. Ranamon has no natural digivolution line to my knowledge, and as I've already grabbed my beast spirit — well, a beast spirit — I've kind of already run out my options for moving up in the world. Frontier didn't have any other convenient plot devices like crests or armor digi-eggs; the only additional power ups came directly from the angels, and Seraphimon is dead, Ophanimon is locked up in Cherubimon's castle, and Cherubimon is the problem I'm now trying to resolve in the first place, not to mention his idea of a boon is...

Well. Look at Duskmon.

I shake my head. The only way forward I can see right now is to hedge my bets and put my eggs in every basket I can. If I manage to come across the kids again, I'll try to make up with them and tell them their real enemies' strengths and weaknesses, and maybe with the warning they can somehow find a way to beat Cherubimon anyways. If Mercurymon happens to survive, I'll attempt to direct him towards Cherubimon first, and if not, I'll try to make sure that whoever ends up with his spirit makes use of it. And if it turns out there actually is a way I can grow strong enough to do something about Cherubimon directly, I'll certainly want to look into it... but in the meantime, I've got a spare beast spirit to pick up and mandated evil scut work to do, so I can worry about precisely how I'm going to go about any of that after I've dealt with the issues already right in front of me.

Backing away from my glorified map machine, I dive down, sinking into the hidden chamber below the pool. I take a quick moment to search for the plaque closest suiting my purposes, then immediately start jetting down the corresponding tunnel.

There's a continent supposedly known as the “Area of Ice” to the north of Toucanmon Paradise. It seems like an awfully long distance to travel without access to a nonsense shortcut method like mine, not to mention there's a massive gap in the ocean between the two locations, but it was the closest place on the map that was colored to indicate regular snow, so I'm guessing it's at least around where the kids were supposed to end up. Or possibly still will end up. Or even already could have ended up, seeing as I still don't have a great grasp of the time frame anything was originally supposed to take place in-

My stomach chooses that moment to suddenly grumble. I blink, holding a hand to my bare navel.

Wait, am I- oh, great. I guess it follows that if I still need sleep, then I still need food to function as well, but that's yet another item I now have to throw on this rapidly growing to-do list, and one that's going to be a real pain to keep up with. Even more so if this world works like Adventure, where attacks will eventually completely fail without fuel...

I wince as the grumble turns to a growl, my mental acknowledgment of my just-realized hunger seeming to only make it more pronounced. Guess I should've taken the Toucanmon up on their offer yesterday. Not only did they run a literal restaurant, they offered their food up to me completely for free, and I don't know where else to even get food in this world. What do I even eat? Heck, what can I eat? I've got no idea what Ranamon's normal diet consists of. Given my teeth and general aesthetic... fish, maybe? Do normal fish even exist in this world? Aside from the Gomamon throwing technicolor imitations around as projectiles, I haven't seen any, so I'd at least assume Ranamon isn't an obligate pescetarian...

My disgruntled musing is brought to an end by the tunnel's sudden termination, and I spot another exit symbol scrawled into the ceiling directly above me. If the map and plaque were accurate, this should spit me out right next to some place called “Wintervel”, which at least sounds like a town to me. It's also got a season in the name, so maybe the Autumn Leaf Fair is held here, and that's why it was named that way? It's probably at least worth checking, since I should be able to see it almost immediately.

Vanishing the ceiling with a touch, I push up into the unknown.

It quickly becomes apparent that this exit is stationed at a far lower depth than the last one was. The water around me is pitch-black, illuminated only by my now-shining gems and clusters of huge, bioluminescent sea anemones scattered around the nearby seafloor, one of which I just emerged from the center of. They're quite beautiful, almost like giant neon flowers, but the light they provide is too dim for me to really see much else, beyond what looks like a giant rock with some kelp stuck to it all of ten feet in front of my-

The light of my gems glints off something glassy red, and I freeze.

...not a rock. A head, or rather, the mask of an enormous lobster creature. Just barely visible behind it, the unknown Digimon's bulk looms, jutting from the gloom like a living monolith... and thankfully, just as still as one.

I hurriedly shove myself away, distancing myself from the sleeping(?) Digimon as quickly as I dare.

Maybe I should... find another tunnel to return through, later...

Chapter Text

I surge up into the darkness, relaxing slightly as I propel myself out of the abyss. The water parts around me easily, far colder than that of the tropics... though strangely, its frigid temperature isn't truly that discomfiting. I suppose, like with water pressure, Ranamon must have a fairly high tolerance for this sort of thing, presumably so she can survive essentially anywhere in the ocean? Convenient, that.

My appreciation of this newly-discovered trait only grows as black slowly gradates back to blue, and the temperature actually somehow drops even further — so much so in fact that when I finally reach what should be the surface, I find myself staring up not at the sky, but at a solid sheet of blue-white ice.

Confused, I glance in all directions, though with the sky completely blocked out, the water is still too dark for me to see much of anything. This... was definitely not on the map. I’m still in the ocean, right? It should be nearly impossible for seawater to end up like this, digital or not... though clearly that didn't stop this from existing. Ugh, it could take forever to find a way up through this, which way is even the edge of-

No, better idea.

“Dark Vapor.”

I press my acid-leaking palms up into the ice, and the frozen ceiling begins rapidly dissolving around them. It takes me almost a full minute of sustained effort, the ice multiple feet thicker than any I've ever encountered before, but eventually my technique successfully breaks through into open air, leaving behind a vertical tunnel nearly large enough to completely encapsulate me. Phew...

Pushing myself up on a tiny geyser, I slowly, carefully poke my head over the lip of the hole. Better to make sure I didn't just bore a giant hole into the floor of someone's house or something before fully committing-

Uh. Woah.

Caution all but forgotten, I pull more water into my geyser, and rise up out of the ice.

The frozen plain I just melted through is part of a roughly mile-wide ice shelf, joined almost seamlessly to the continent. From the snow-covered ground of the distant mainland, numerous strange, tentacular growths jut upwards, entwined together like spiraling tree trunks. Their top halves extend outward less like branches so much as pulled glass, bearing what appear to be hanging purple vines in place of more normal foliage. Beyond the strange polar forest stand two small but very steep mountains, so close that they’re almost touching — perhaps they even would be, if not for the large, icy castle built into the V-shaped crevice at their base. From the view atop my geyser, I can just barely see over the glassy spirals and glimpse the small town at the foot of the castle, its buildings the same pure white as the surrounding landscape, as though the snow simply rose up and formed civilization of its own accord.

...all of which feels entirely superfluous compared to the magnificent aurora currently spread across the heavens, twisting and turning like the fabric of the universe made tangible.

My eyes remain fixed on the cosmic kaleidoscope for what seems like ages, utterly absorbed by the coruscating colors as they dance across the somehow still-dark sky. By the time I finally manage to tear my gaze away, shaking my head as if dispelling a trance, there's only one thing I can even think to say.

“Well, this ain't right.”

My muttered words are swiftly blown away on the breeze, but despite all I've apparently forgotten, I'm pretty sure I'd remember a place like this if it was ever even briefly portrayed in the show, let alone given actual focus for an episode or two. The Autumn Leaf Fair didn't have anywhere near this many noticeable geographical features surrounding it, and the buildings were relatively normal, not what looks from here to be multi-story igloos.

...still, I'd rather stop in and ask for directions than try swimming along the entire continental coastline just hoping to spot the fair at some point. Not to mention, any given town is presumably going to have some form of food available, and if I'm lucky, maybe I can even ask around if there's anywhere nearby that... wouldn't be particularly missed if it happened to suddenly vanish. In as much as I can do that without sounding extremely suspicious, at least.

Shrinking my geyser, I step down onto the ice, flinching a little as I do so. While the frozen surface still isn't nearly as uncomfortable against my bare feet as I'd expect it to be, I'm not completely immune to the cold, and without any real traction to speak of, I already feel like I'm going to slip and fall at any moment.

Maybe if I…?

Beckoning to the hole I just made, I draw a portion of sea water up onto the ice, forming it into a tiny, semi-solid platform. Stepping onto it, I immediately find myself significantly more comfortable, but also rather unbalanced.

A little bigger then — or maybe a lot bigger.

I gesture again, drawing more water up into my construct, until it swells into a perpetually cresting wave, large enough that I can outright sit in its interior. Hopping into the curl of the water, I swing my arm down and point imperiously, forcing the wave into motion. It surges forward as though it were still in the ocean proper, a tiny tsunami heading towards the mainland at my will.

Grinning, I relax and lean back against my watery chariot. Now this is traveling in style.

With the aid of my unusually fluid transport, I speed across the ice shelf in no time at all, slowing only once I transition onto actual ground and snow, where the barricade of glassy trees proves a minor obstacle. Up close, I can now see the small, thorn-like protrusions jutting from their surfaces, which look like they'd be quite unpleasant to accidentally ram oneself into. What I thought were vines from afar are also more akin to crumbling mats of purplish-blue moss, hanging down in thick masses that make the tiny crystalline forest nigh-impossible to even see through.

I run my wave back and forth along the treeline, scanning for a clear path forward through the town's presumed wind guard, but find none — there surely must be one, but I guess I'm not in on the secret or something. Damn... I'd rather not accidentally impale myself blindly “driving” through here, especially if these things actually are made of glass. Guess I'll just have to go slow, or even on foot-

Hey, hang on. If I can ride on water, and can also control airborne water, can I maybe...?

Stepping out of my improvised transport, I reform my wave into a sort of large beanbag chair, forcing it to hover about a foot over the ground. Then, holding concentration, I turn, draw it forward, and oh-so-gently sit down.

-and fall right through, my construct collapsing as I in turn collapse into the snow.

Shaking my head, I brush myself off and stand, drawing the water back out of the snow to make another attempt. Sadly however, this proves futile. I can’t seem to keep the water free floating, put it in motion, and reinforce its surface tension enough to hold my weight all at the same time. If it was still connected to a larger source, I could probably just brute force it by constantly pushing myself upwards with new water, but that would largely defeat the purpose... seems I won't be flying without Zephyrmon’s assistance any time soon.

Pouting in minor disappointment, I discard the majority of my wave and settle for simply trudging through the trees the normal way, using multiple thin ribbons of water to part the sea of moss while carefully avoiding any protruding spikes. Thankfully, it only takes a minute or so for me to emerge from the tiny forest, and see the town beyond laid out before me proper.

As I suspected, Wintervel's buildings are indeed made of ice and snow, though there’s a few colorful signposts and decorations scattered about that lend the area a little more color than I spotted from afar. The surrounding mountains sparkle in the shadow of the aurora, frozen waterfalls reflecting the canvas of the sky onto that of the buildings below. The carved visage of a giant bird Digimon stares down from the crown of the castle, stern but thankfully sightless. I can already see a few Digimon hanging around the outermost buildings, though none have spotted me just yet.

I start forward- then stop.

Should… I perhaps be slightly concerned about being recognized again?

I hastily reverse my last few steps, weighing my options.

I... could go in as Zephyrmon, I suppose. No chance I'd be identified like that, at least. I'm still not sure I trust how I might act while in that form though, even outside of an active combat scenario. At best, I'd be liable to lose all focus on why I'm even here, and based on how I acted yesterday, I’d be lucky not to break something or mouth off to someone I shouldn't, and get myself in massive trouble as a result.

Alternatively, I could roll the dice and just walk in exactly as I am. I came across plenty of aquatic Digimon yesterday, but the Gomamon were the only ones who realized who I was, and all but one needed active prompting for that. This world also ironically doesn't seem to have an internet equivalent — at least, I didn't find one whilst messing around on Ranamon's computer — so news should be limited to traveling by word of mouth, and as long as the Digimon who live here aren't highly amphibious ones that spend half their time underwater, they should be pretty unlikely to identify me as Cherubimon's lackey on sight.

I frown. I am right on the coast though, so that's hardly any guarantee. Maybe if I just took a few hours elsewhere to get a better handle on Zephyrmon, learned to better sieve out her instincts and keep tighter control of myself while I'm her, then came back-

My stomach growls again, louder than ever, and rather painfully this time.

...screw it, I'll risk it. At the very least I can probably grab a bowl of soup or something before the angry mob comes down on my head.

Hiding as much water beneath the loose parts of my swim cap as I can (just to have some on hand in case of emergency), I quietly walk into town.

I only have to turn a couple of corners to realize this town is actually surprisingly busy. Even on the outskirts, there are numerous Penguinmon strolling about, as well as several Frigimon, a Garurumon accompanied by a very tall Moosemon, and a tiny blue dragon Digimon I don't remember ever seeing before. It’s not as much variety as I seem to recall some other towns having in the show, but it’s by no means a single Digimon village like some of the ones from Adventure were. Guess that would explain why the buildings are such different sizes...

Somewhat oddly, while most of the road is just paths of more and less driven snow, there are also lanes of cleanly-cut ice that look almost like sidewalks, with Digimon choosing which they prefer to use as they please. I pass by what looks for all the world like a viking-themed surplus store, immediately followed by a rectangular ice field, where a number of Digimon seem to be playing some variant of ice hockey, minus the sticks.

Despite doing my best to give off the vibe of any average Digimon that just happened to stroll into town, my nerves spike with every other Digimon that gives me even a passing glance. Penguinmon may not be literally amphibious, but I'd bet they spend a lot of time in the water, and they seem to be the most populous Digimon species around these parts...

Unnerved, I let a thin sheet of water drop down from my swim cap to form a sort of watery veil — only to hastily shove it right back up where I had it when I realize that will probably just make me more conspicuous. It’s not like covering my face would do much anyways, as it wouldn’t exactly hide my many other imminently identifiable features.

Starting to think this was an even worse idea than I already knew it was, I hastily duck around a corner- only to nearly smack face-first into a Lekismon coming the other way. I pull back, but too far, as I suddenly find myself sliding on an ice path, arms waving wildly as I try to rebalance. WaAaAaAahhh-!!!

Balance utterly lost, I end up flailing backwards for a solid five seconds, tripping over a different curb of snow before finally managing to catch myself on the inside of a nearby building's doorway.

“Welcome to the Chilling Grill!”

I whirl around at the shouted words, fingers instantly at the ready to snap — and freeze, as I find myself staring at roughly twenty different Digimon, nearly every single one them currently staring back at me.

Eheh...

My eyes flicker around the space. Most of the Digimon in question are seated at one of the various booths or stools scattered around the room, padded by mats of the same technicolor moss draped atop the glasstrees outside. The walls are decorated with a combination of maritime paraphernalia and objects I imagine you might bring on an expedition to the arctic, interspersed with picture frames hanging off of pegs embedded in the thick, almost purple walls of ice. Standing behind the wide counter at the back of the room is a BlueMeramon of all Digimon, surrounded by a variety of kitchen equipment, including a fridge made of thick carved ice, a rock slate “stove” and chopping board, and an industrial-sized sink.

…did I actually just stumble back-first into a restaurant?

“Come on stranger, don’t just stand there.” the Meramon palette swap calls from behind the bar, beckoning me over with one hand. “Grab a seat!”

I flinch at his volume, hurrying forward and sitting down on a moss-covered stool as unobtrusively as possible. Not that it really matters when my arrival was just announced to the entire room.

“Haven't seen you in town before.” the Meramon greets me with a friendly smile, or at least as friendly as a smile can get when your mouth is sewn half-shut. “Sticking around, or just passing through?”

“Passing through.” I reply after a moment, relaxing slightly when no cries of recognition sound out from any of the other patrons, who already seem to have lost interest. “I was... hoping to get some food?”

The Meramon laughs, sending little cerulean embers flittering into the air around him. “Well, you've come to the right place. What'll ya have?”

He gestures to his right at a tall sideboard attached to the wall, numerous options scrawled upon its surface.

Written in Japanese.

I stare at the foreign symbols in dawning consternation. Is that... the menu? Damn it, looks like the Toucanmon's exterior sign was the exception, not the rule. This could be a problem.

I cast my gaze around the rest of the restaurant, hoping I can maybe just ask to have what someone else is having. That plate over there looks like... some sort of vegetarian dish? Never seen such geometric plants though. And that crispy thing on a bone is... weirdly yellow meat? No, hang on, that's not meat, what is that made of?

I slowly turn back to the apparent proprietor/chef.

“I...” can neither read the menu nor identify anything I'm seeing, “...don't really know what's best here. What would you recommend?”

“Phantom Beast Bowl.” the Meramon instantly replies. “Best in town. If you're in the mood for something lighter, we've also got an Az and Essence Salad many of our regulars quite enjoy.”

...great, thank you, I definitely know what those are. Three for three on helpfulness.

“Ah-”

The Lekismon I just nearly ran into walks in before I can say more, prompting the Meramon to repeat his greeting over my shoulder as a sudden draft hits me from behind. It feels more akin to the breeze of a cool autumn day than the undoubtedly frigid gusts of the ice land we're actually in, but it's still enough to make me shiver and rub at my upper arms.

“-actually, I don't suppose you have anything that could warm me up a bit?”

The burning man grins knowingly.

“Traveler's Special, coming right up. Also, I'd recommend moving a couple seats to your right.”

I nod as he turns away, then promptly do as suggested — and quickly discover that the air two seats over is considerably warmer than the rest of the restaurant. I hadn't even noticed, but the ambient temperature felt no different while I was sitting right in front of the Meramon, despite the other Digimon being living flame, yet sitting here it's like I've just walked into a heated cabin. Did he somehow isolate his-

“Here you are.”

A smooth, wonderfully warm wooden bowl is deposited in front of me, steam wafting up from its contents.

Stunned at how quickly that was prepared, I stare down at my meal, which contrast to everyone else's both looks and smells fairly normal. Going solely by appearances, I would typically assume it to be a hot, cheese-based pasta dish, with... chunks of fish stirred through? Huh, maybe they do have normal fish here.

...and also dairy products, somehow?

I squint, a little confused as to how that's even possible — but then again, this might not really even be cheese or fish for all I know. This is the same season of Digimon with apples that can taste like every imaginable variety of meat, after all; who's to say they aren't just unerringly good substitutes, or won't taste like something else entirely?

I shake my head, pick up the accompanying spoon, and tuck in, deciding not to spend time questioning it over filling my too-empty stomach.

To my very pleasant surprise, the food tastes exactly as I'd hoped it would, if not truly expected it to. The pasta is creamy and rich, with nicely flaked meat, flavored with some sort of warming spice I can't identify. My too-sharp teeth pierce the flesh of the fish with relish, warmth filling me as the noodles slide down my throat. Ahh~

I'm already halfway through the bowl before I think to slow down and look back up at the BlueMeramon, who's currently side-eyeing me with an amused smile.

“Hey, you wouldn't happen to know where the Autumn Leaf Fair is, would you?”

The Meramon shifts to face me again. “What was that?”

“The Autumn Leaf Fair?” I repeat. “It's like... a bazaar? Or maybe a trade marketplace?”

“Shopping district's just a few streets over.”

“No, no.” I clarify, waving my free hand. “I'm looking for a specific place. I'm pretty sure it's on this continent, and it's... probably pretty well known?”

The Meramon shakes his head. “Sorry little miss, nothing's coming to mind. We don't have a lot of contact with other towns out here, and I've lived here since I hatched, so I'm probably not the best Digimon to ask.”

I grimace, both at his answer and chosen appellation for me. “Ah, alright... thanks anyways.”

Damn. Maybe someone else in here might know...? Or maybe this is the equivalent of walking into a bar in New York City and asking a passerby for directions to a shopping center in Los Angeles, which I'm expecting them to somehow know just because they're technically on the same continent. Assuming this even is the right continent. I know for sure that the fair was located somewhere with snow, but maybe it was further from Toucanmon Paradise than I thought? Distance is pretty malleable in this world, as I quite well know by now. Maybe it'd be easier to just ask if anyone's seen any-

“Finished already?”

I blink, looking up first at the Meramon, then down at my bowl, only to belatedly realize there's nothing left in it. Evidently I was even hungrier than I thought.

“Yes, it was wonderful.” I reply. “Thank you so much for the meal.”

The Meramon grins genially as he takes the dish away. “Glad you enjoyed it.”

I smile back, though it fades quickly.

“I... don't have anything to pay with, I'm afraid.” I admit, knowing full well I might have to bolt in a moment for admitting that. Unless he offers me the chance to wash dishes or something to make up the price, I suppose.

The Meramon... chuckles?

“Well, I'm certainly flattered you liked it so much you'd offer.”

I blink.

“I'm serious.”

“So am I.” The Meramon raises a flaming eyebrow at me. “I'm not running a luxury hostel here. Who'd charge for food?”

...is. He saying this place doesn't take money? Like, at all? In fact, he seems to be implying that food in general is typically just. Free. That can’t be right though, surely-

“I swear it's her.”

The quiet snippet of conversation worms its way into my ear fins from somewhere off to my left, derailing my train of thought.

“She doesn't usually sound like that though, does she?”

I turn fractionally in my seat, letting my eyes roam around the restaurant until they settle on a trio of Orcamon in the back corner. The three of them are giving me covert glances every couple seconds, and speaking to each other in hushed — though not quite hushed enough — whispers.

“Maybe it's just part of her public persona.”

“Should we just go up and ask?”

“Are you crazy- wait, is she looking at us?”

...damn, I've been had. Better get while the getting's good.

I stand as quickly as I dare, readying my emergency water in case this turns ugly. “Well, I'd better get going then. Thanks again for the food.”

“Sure thing.” the Meramon replies, ignorant to my sudden haste. “Need any other directions?”

“No, I think-”

“Excuse me?”

I curse internally and round on the trio of Orcamon, already out of their seats, and now standing barely a few feet away from me. Though mostly identical, the one on the right has larger patches of white around the back of their eyes, shaped in such a way that they look almost like flaming eyelashes, while the one on the left has a noticeable groove in their crown fin, as though something took a chunk out of it at some point. The one nearest me is physically average, but has a particularly decorated life jacket, covered with enough colorful patches that you could almost miss the little red cross at the bottom.

“Are you... Ranamon?” the central one asks, almost reverently.

I flinch- then pause.

That's... not the kind of tone I was expecting. Are these three...?

“Who wants to know?”

I watch as three separate sets of eyes widen at the slight lilt I added to my words.

“It is you!” the Orcamon with the eyelashes exclaims in a voice akin to an ecstatic teenage girl's, flippers waving about almost too fast to be seen. “I told you two it was!”

“Woah...” the one with the groove remarks, tone lower and smoother than either of her companions, though no less awed. “We never imagined we'd get to meet you in person.”

“Much less here!” the jacketed one — screw it, you three are Lashes, Groove, and Jacket now, no one has real names here anyways — finishes.

I flash the trio a pleasant smile. Ah, these three are like the Toucanmon then. That's a relief... still a bit unnerving, especially since I still have no idea why I'm apparently a celebrity to certain groups of Digimon while others rightfully hate me on sight, but it's certainly more manageable than the alternative.

“Well, ah wasn't really expectin' to be recognized,” I say, dropping fully into Ranamon's accent, “but it's a pleasure to meet ya'll.”

“I mean, of course we recognized you.” Groove says like it's the most obvious thing in the world.

“Yeah, you're a huge inspiration!” Lashes almost shouts, still practically vibrating. “We caught your latest Net show, and it was incredible!”

I keep the smile on my face, though internally that statement leaves me slightly concerned. Net? Does that mean this world actually does have an analogue for the-

Hang on. Run that back.

“My show?” I repeat.

“Mmhmm!” Lashes confirms. “We caught one of Sirenmon's the day after too, so we even got the chance to directly compare you two!”

“And we definitely preferred yours.” Groove adds, nudging her companion with a flipper. “Sirenmon's voice was just as incredible as everyone says it is, but her songs left us feeling kinda... numb?”

“While yours just left us feeling happy.” Jacket finishes with a nod. “That pretty much settled it for us. You're our favorite idol for sure!”

…wait a second.

Ranamon, in her spare time, is an idol?

As in singing, dancing, performing on stage in front of countless watching fans judging her each and every move, IDOL?!

“That's... quite kind of ya'll to say...” I all but squeak, barely managing to work the words out of my throat.

“Oh my gosh, are you here for a stealth street performance?” Lashes squeals. “Please say yes!”

“We'd love to see that!”

Dread so strong it's almost paradoxically thrilling races through my body. No, no, no!!! More than anything involving Cherubimon or Lucemon, this might be my actual worst nightmare! I enjoy singing enough, but not in front of other people, and I don't even try to dance when I'm alone! The mere concept of a poor performance, of potentially looking stupid or foolish in front of others, gets me so anxious that I've never been able to even bring myself to learn the simplest of steps, let alone the kind of choreography an idol would presumably use! If this is truly something that Ranamon did, does on the regular, then- well, she doesn't anymore! Unless- no, what am I thinking, there's no unless, I can't fill that role, I can't-

“Excuse me,” the Meramon abruptly breaks in, “but whatever you're asking the little miss here, could you kindly do it outside? You're getting rather loud, and my restaurant's not the place for this.”

The Orcamon briefly glance around to realize that they've drawn the attention of most of the other diners, causing them to look down at the floor in collective embarrassment. This thankfully gives me a moment to get my wits back, which I take full advantage of.

“No worries, it's not happening anyways.” I quickly apologize to the chef, before turning back to my 'fans'. “Sorry, but ah ain't feeling up to an off-the-cuff... performance... right now. Ah didn't come here for anything like that, and ah wouldn't... uh, wouldn't want to give ya a substandard show.”

Or any type of show. Ever. Ugh, they can't even actually force me to do anything, but I can just see myself tripping over my own tongue trying to sing a song I don't know, voice cracking on half the notes, knees shaking-

“Oooooh...”

I blink as I notice the Orcamon are now looking around me more than at me, only to realize why a moment later as a tiny jet of liquid whizzes past my face, my frantic thoughts having whipped my emergency water out from under my swim cap and into equally frantic tiny streams. They flit and dart around me like little dancing serpents, spilling glimmering droplets into the air around them as they go.

I take a deep breath and freeze them in midair, drawing the water back to me and settling it back in place.

“...well, it was nice meetin' ya'll, but ah'm afraid ah've gotta get goin'.” I say, hurriedly making my way to the entrance. “Be seein' ya.”

“Uh- wait-!”

I'm already out the door, power walking away from the building as fast as I can without slipping on the ice again, fully ready to leave town just to get away from this conversation. I think I'd have even almost preferred if those three had thought that I was-

“Wait, Miss Ranamon! Is it true? About Cherubimon?”

I freeze mid-stride, eyes darting wildly around the street. A couple of heads turn our way, but thankfully no more than that as I round on the trio that just followed me out of the restaurant.

A silent moment passes, before I spin and duck into the narrow alley behind the building, beckoning for the Orcamon to follow, which they do so all too eagerly. Once we're out of sight of the rest of the street, I let out a breath and look at them with newly narrowed eyes.

“What did ya mean by that, exactly?” I ask, voice taut as a wire.

“I- ah.” Jacket rubs the back of her head, suddenly looking sheepish. “We've... kind of heard a few rumors that you're supporting Cherubimon...?”

“We don't really believe them!” Lashes rushes to elaborate. “We're just not exactly sure where they're coming from? Or what to think of them?”

“Or if there's any truth to them.” Groove notes with slightly more steel, crossing her flippers over her chest. “We don't mean to offend, but it's... kind of been on our minds lately.”

...so I was right to be wary after all. No surprise that there's rumors going around when they're true, I suppose.

I inhale, fully ready to deny all affiliation with Cherubimon- except that's not what comes out, an idea springing to mind in the same moment it leaves my mouth.

“Technically, ah am.”

The Orcamon gasp as one, looking utterly betrayed-

“...but it's a ruse.” I smoothly continue. “Ah'm in Cherubimon 'employ' for the moment, but only so ah can make sure he ultimately fails.”

The Orcamon calm, their awestruck expressions returning in force.

“So you're like, a double agent...?”

I nod. “Ah can't take Cherubimon down on my own though. No matter what ah do, ah'll never be able to overpower him. Ah'm gonna need help from Digimon like you three-”

“Absolutely!” Jacket exclaims before I can even finish.

“We'll do anything we can to help you!”

I smile. Excellent. If I can get this counter rumor to spread, not only should it potentially help curb the real rumors that might otherwise get me lynched, it might actually net me some assistance with my assorted objectives from Ranamon's preexisting fanbase. In fact, I could probably do that regardless, assuming I can get in contact with more of its members... maybe I could send some Digimon in to help the kids directly? Have them carry in extra provisions? Or, hell, just act as intermediaries for me, which I'm probably going to need if I still want to steer the kids away from their remaining canon losses, not to mention plant that seed in their minds about using Mercurymon's spirit. Though, I'd first need to figure out where they even are right now.

“In that case, ah don't suppose you've seen or heard about any human kids comin' around here?” I ask, just on the off chance. “Probably would've stopped by either today, or earlier this morning?”

The Orcamon exchange glances.

“Humans...?”

“Those are real?”

I blink, a bit taken aback. “Er- yes, they are.”

Groove shrugs. “If you say so. Can't say we've encountered any ourselves though, no.”

“Espimon should be coming by soon though!” Lashes suddenly pipes up. “He always has the latest gossip. If you're still around tomorrow, he might know something!”

Well, I wasn't really planning to be, so that's not actually helpful, but...

“Thanks, ah'll keep that in mind.” I lie as graciously as I can manage. “If ya do happen to come across those kids, be sure to help them in whatever way ya can, and let other Digimon ya trust know to do the same. They're aimin' to take down Cherubimon as well, so they need all the help they can get.”

The Orcamon nod vigorously. Groove stops first, something seeming to occur to her.

“Hey, we kind of overheard you asking about the Autumn Leaf Fair earlier too?”

My eyes brighten.

“Ah was. Do you know where it is?”

“Sure do.” she confirms. “It's a bit of a trip from here, but if you just keep heading south, you should find it at the tip of the continent. It's right around where the water ends, so you can't miss it.”

“Perfect!” I clap my hands together. “Ah really appreciate that.”

Tip of the continent... that's about what I would have suspected, since it makes sense the kids wouldn't have made it that far up the coast in canon, but I'm still glad to have it confirmed. Wintervel is closer to the middle of the continent though, so I'm a ways away right now. I should probably head out immediately if I want to-

No, hold on. Better milk this information resource for all it's worth.

“One last thing. Do ya'll know if there's anywhere around here where no one lives, or ever really goes?”

Jacket tilts her head. “What for?”

...uh.

“Ah... need to practice something for my next show.” I improvise. “Ah want it to be a surprise though, so ah need somewhere I can do it in secret, where ah won't be seen or overheard.”

“Oooooh...” Lashes' eyes sparkle. “I can't wait to see what it is then!”

I laugh, not a little nervously.

"Hmmm, I don't- oh! What about that empty cave network just to the north?" Jacket says.

"Yeah, that'd probably work." Groove agrees, moving her flipper beneath her chin. "I'd be careful though, that place is no mon's land."

I frown. "Why's that?"

Groove shrugs. "Not sure? No one really talks about it. It's long abandoned though, everyone's fairly clear on that part."

"And the outside is really big and pretty!" Lashes adds. "You can't miss it!"

I consider that for a moment, then nod. That sounds a bit suspect if I'm honest, but with this world closing ever inward, it's not like I could reasonably expect to find a piece of land that's completely empty without some sort of reason. So long as whatever happened there isn't still happening there, I'll take what I can get.

“Thanks, you three.” I say, genuinely grateful. “Ah'll remember ya'll.”

I flash a wink at the trio, who giggle into their flippers in delight, then turn and quickly make my way back out of town. No one else on the street gives me a second glance, allowing me to stop as soon as I'm once again safely hidden in the midst of the glasstrees.

Well, that went surprisingly well! I got more out of it than I honestly expected to, even. Now that I've got a direction, it should be easy enough to find the Autumn Leaf Fair. It'll just take a while to get there... though first, I suppose I should go and... well. “Terraform” the place those Orcamon mentioned. Gotta get that out of the way at some point, and I'm already in the area, so it might as well be now.

And, seeing as I still need the practice...

Lines of code reach up and envelop me, changing me down to the bone. Spreading my wings, I leap from the forest and take to the skies, heading north.

Chapter Text

Well, I can see why no one lives here.

Squinting through the heavy veil of blustering snow, I survey the uneven slopes of rock rising out of the small, icy mountain below. Numerous peaks of coal-dark stone jut from its side, an army of jagged spears being thrust towards the heavens. The majority are lit from beneath by a strange, intense blue glow, bright enough that I can see it even through this truly awful weather. A deep-set crack winds through the structure's foundation, curling around the frozen monument and disappearing into the distance, making it seem as though the entire thing could fall into the abyss at any moment.

...yeah, this must be the place. I think Lashes and I might have slightly different definitions of “pretty”, since the Orcamon didn't exactly specify that it would look like nuclear warning architecture, but it fits the bill otherwise, especially in how I can't really imagine anyone posting up here long term. Obviously I'll still check first, but certainly no one should mind if this place suddenly vanishes off the face of the planet; I've been here less than a minute and it already feels actively hostile to life.

Damned sudden snowstorms...

Scarf lashing about in the wind, I dive towards the mountain's only obvious entrance — a towering torii gate set about halfway up its side. The rigid red archway stands nearly fifty feet high, framing the only slightly smaller mouth of the yawning cavern entrance beyond it. Maybe this is what Lashes was talking about? I'd agree that it's pretty impossible to miss given just how much it stands out against its surroundings, but I think I'd call it “imposing” more than-

I glide through the opening, and a soft thrum of energy audibly runs through the structure. In an instant, intricate characters not dissimilar to the one from the bottom of my pool have spread over most of the gate's surface, the geometric symbols shining like stars.

-ah.

I look back for a moment, giving the script now covering the gate a brief once over, but ultimately find the chaotic digital glyphs just as unintelligible as everything else I've tried to read around here of late. No surprise there, I suppose.

Shrugging, I turn away and set down in front of the opening in the mountain, protected from the weather just slightly by a high, rocky overhang. Beyond the now framed entrance, a wide, sculpted stairway of ice slopes down into the mountain. It's surprisingly well lit, owing to the glowing lines of energy embedded in the similarly icy walls, presumably fed by the same mysterious source as the rock spires. They branch through the frozen floor like roots, casting the cavern's interior in a vivid azure glow.

I raise an eyebrow. Almost feels like I'm being invited in... and I am going to have to go in. I don't have the brute force necessary to just wail on the outside of the mountain until it crumbles, leaving me little choice but to enter, find its weakest internal point, and excise its most critical fractal code from there, which should cause the rest to unwind along with it. Quite the task for someone so new to this “job”. Though, at this point I'll be glad just to get inside, if only to get away from the howling gales of-

A particularly large gust funnels through the gate behind me before I can even finish the thought, pummeling my exposed back and sending a violent shiver through my already frost-covered feathers. Turns out Zephyrmon is equipped for the atmosphere, not the cryosphere, and metal armor in freezing temperatures is not a great combo, especially not with a blizzard battering me from all-

Another gust hits, even stronger than the last, and I hastily collapse back down into Ranamon, my perception of the cold switching from bitter and biting to merely annoying in an instant.

Phew... probably makes more sense to go down like this anyways, given I'm essentially heading underground. My feet are going to be popsicles, but-

Wait, I already solved this issue.

“Draining Rain.”

The miniature cloud quickly condenses over my hand — emphasis on 'mini'. Strange... maybe it's just because the air around here is so frigid and dry? In the sense that all the water in it is currently snow at least. Does Draining Rain even work that way though? I kind of assumed I was creating the water ex nihilo...

Regardless, the cloud still functions as intended, dispensing its reserves over the ground directly in front of me. I have the resultant puddle swirl up over my feet, forming little watery booties to protect my bare feet from the icy floor. Heh, I can make myself shoes! Wonder if that means I could also-

The wind slams into me again, wailing like some world-eating beast, and I wince despite my current form. Right, I can mess around with my hydrokinesis later. Preferably whilst no longer standing out here in this horrid weather.

Here goes!

Hurrying to the stairs, I gratefully descend into the chambers below.

~ ꕀ ꔛ ꕀ ~

~ ꕀ ꔛ ꕀ ~

...okay. So. It's possible that in my haste to get out of that snowstorm, I may have failed to pick up on some, in hindsight, rather obvious context clues.

Specifically ones that could have tipped me off to what I was doing before I merrily strolled my way down onto the set of a horror movie.

My neck remains on a nervous swivel as I make my way forward, or perhaps more accurately “inward” through the enormous, frigid maze I now find myself in. I wasn't exactly expecting this place to be tiny, but it feels less like a cave network so much as a straight-up labyrinth. The ceiling still reaches more than thirty feet high at its lowest, while the lighting, so good near the entrance, has become much sparser higher up on the walls, leaving said ceiling in constant half-shadow at best. The sound of wind battering the outside of the mountain remains my ever-present companion, reverberating through its interior as a thumping, omnipresent drone.

I shiver as I push off the floor, using my watery footwear to slide along like I'm wearing ice skates. I suppose the sheer size of this place is at least keeping this impromptu spelunking trip from feeling too claustrophobic, but that's ultimately just making it unsettling in a different way.

The only logical reason to make tunnels this large is if something that size was regularly using them, after all.

My gaze drifts towards the walls. Whatever that something was, it also seems to have put up a few decorations, which are honestly only adding to the eerie, abandoned atmosphere. Here, a pair of tall, empty alcoves that look like they were simply gouged straight out of the ice. There, what looks almost like a carving of a fake window- or maybe a painting? I can't really tell, it's too high up to make out. I've even passed a few fairly detailed columns carved out of the walls, stretching all the way up into the darkness above... except, being part of the walls to begin with, I don't think any of them are actually doing anything to improve the cavern's stability.

I frown. It's strange... all these accents are solely form without function. Just ice, pretending to be things it isn't, which doesn't make any real sense? It's as though someone wanted this place to look fancy, maybe even regal, but didn't have the means to actually make something like that, nor the awareness to realize constructing it inside a giant network of ice caves ~maybe~ wasn't the right way to go. So instead of stately halls, we've got endless creepy tunnels, and instead of fancy lights, we've got weird glowing wall conduits, which I swear are actually pulsing now, as if to make me feel even more like I'm walking through the veins of some titanic frost monster-

*!-CRAK-TH-KTHUMP-!*

I startle and slide to a stop as a sharp, exceedingly loud noise suddenly echoes through the tunnels, the ice trembling slightly beneath my feet.

That was... probably just more wind on the outside of the mountain... right?

My fingers clench over my gauntlets. I imagine I'd be a lot less on edge if I could manipulate ice the same way I can water, which would make perfectly logical sense in most other worlds. However, since the two are considered entirely separate elements in this one — presumably even “coded” as such — I can't do literally anything with the actual gigatons of frozen liquid surrounding me right now. Not without melting it first at least, which I imagine would be rather difficult to do inside of this mountain-sized freezer. Stupid digital semantics...

Sighing, I continue on... then stop, as I hit a dead end.

Or. Almost a dead end?

Squinting, I cautiously move a little closer to the mysterious hole in the wall. While more than twice my height, it's rather small compared to its surroundings, not reaching even half way up to the ceiling. The walls of the tunnel beyond are also strangely curved, far smoother than the ones I've been walking through up until now. There aren't any energy streams running through it, the few that should be intersecting it having seemingly been severed by the tunnel itself, leaving its interior even darker than the rest of this place.

...this isn't exactly giving me a great feeling. However, it's also the only real feature of note I've seen in quite a while.

How badly do I need this mountain's code again...?

Reminding myself not to bite my lip, I step into the ominous passageway.

The tunnel winds and curves more than I'd expected, with a particularly slippery floor that seems oddly raised in places. Drips of bright blue something have pooled on the ice where the conduits were cut, lining the sides of the tunnel with little bio-luminescent puddles. The light they give off is just barely bright enough to keep my gems from brightening in turn — unfortunate, as I think they'd actually be more use than the ambient light for once.

Several snaking turns later, the walls widen again, and I find myself stepping into a dim, roughly cylindrical chamber of-

Huh?

I blink, but the contents of the cavern remains unchanged.

Unlike the towering empty halls I've been exploring thus far, it's actually rather cramped in here, as the relatively small space is stuffed to the gills with mechanical junk of all shapes and sizes. Snapped circuit boards and cracked monitors sit astride wrecked motorcycles and dented parking meters. Several doorless microwaves have been thrown onto a bisected fridge, itself propped up by a pair of beaten-up vending machines. There's a broken trolley car in one corner sticking halfway out of a wall, and I can see even more metal debris frozen further into the ice, so deeply embedded that it looks as though it somehow grew there.

A jagged pit that looks like nothing so much as the result of a bomb going off sits in the center of the chamber, an assortment of ragged-looking tarps and metal sheets having been strewn about the bottom. Some huge industrial machine I honestly can't even identify sits teetering on the edge, threatening to fall in at any moment, along with the rest of the overflowing junk pile.

I just stand there for a minute staring at the various refuse, utterly bewildered.

I'm... not exactly sure what I expected to find here, but it certainly wasn't this. Digital World or not, discovering what appears to be a miniature scrapyard buried deep in the bowels of an ice cavern still feels incredibly out of place. If anything, it's more in line with the Digital World from Adventure, where there was just a bunch of random dysfunctional technology scattered around the planet. Frontier has fairly complex technology too, as evidenced by Ranamon's computer and the Toucanmons' whole modern outdoor kitchen, but that stuff is more... usable? Purposeful? Whereas this stuff is clearly not, and honestly kind of looks like it never was.

In which case... why's it here...?

Completely unsure what to make of this visual non sequitur, but not seeing any way forward, I'm ultimately forced to abandon this line of inquiry. Turning on my heel, I head right back the way I came, grimacing as I return to the only marginally-better lit tunnel this one branched off of.

That was... weird. And somehow managed to make this place feel even creepier than it already did. I could be working myself up over nothing, but the longer I spend down here, the worse this whole idea is starting to feel — I keep finding myself looking over my shoulder, worried I'm going to get jumped from behind by some sort of digital phantom. While I do still need the code, I don't even know if I'm getting close to anything important, or simply burrowing ever deeper into a giant icy tomb.

Much as I hate the idea of leaving empty-handed, if I don't find something else of note soon? I think I may want to just cut my losses and get the hell out of here.

~ ꕀ ꔛ ꕀ ~

~ ꕀ ꔛ ꕀ ~

-Several minutes later-

...well, there goes that excuse.

I crane my neck upward, just trying to fully take in the massive pair of rust red stone doors barring my way forward. They're rough of make, but grand in scale, to the point I can't imagine how one would have even gotten them down here if they didn't pop into existence already embedded in the walls. It looks as though there may have once been carvings of some sort engraved into their surface, but they're heavily faded, too worn down for me to even guess at what the rock might once have depicted.

They're also both almost completely frozen over, immense creeping fingers of ice having grown over them from the floor and ceiling alike.

I sigh. I suppose I can hardly turn back now, but while these doors undoubtedly lead somewhere important, I don't think I'm going to be opening them any time soon. Maybe there's another way 'inside'?

Glancing at the tunnels to my left and right, I flip a mental coin and head right. The hallway curves so gradually that I almost don't notice it at first, leaving me slowly circling what I assume to be the chamber beyond. It must be rather large, given-

Hang on. Is that...?

Uncertain if I should bless my fortune or curse the contrivance, I slow to a halt in front of the second large, incredibly conspicuous hole in the wall I've come across in the past ten minutes. There's hardly even a tunnel to speak of this time, just a smooth-bored passage that looks barely 20 feet long, likely leading exactly where I wanted to go.

And yet...

I brush my hand over the edge of the wall. Seriously, who or what even made these? It obviously wasn't the same mon that constructed the rest of this place; these holes seem to treat the rest of the architecture like it's one big inconvenience. Which- well, it is, but in that case, why would whatever it was have even been here in the first place?

Warier than ever, but refusing to give up at what could be the final juncture, I carefully step into the tiny tunnel. Passing through it without issue, I venture into the space beyond — and freeze.

The cavern is far larger and far better lit than any I've seen up to this point. Roughly the size of a sports pitch, the energy veins pulse strong and numerous enough within its walls that I can even see the slightly domed ceiling again, despite it being at least twice as high as that of the surrounding halls. On one side of the room stand the towering stone doors, just as frozen over on the inside as they are on the outside, while on the other, a wide semi-circle of stairs leads up to a raised plateau, upon which an immense, sculpted throne of ice sized for a giant sits. It's framed from behind by a fan of jagged black spikes, smaller than the ones sprouting from the outside of the mountain, but glowing just as intensely, providing the larger construct a dramatic backlight.

...and yet, all of that might as well be an afterthought compared to the enormous, ultra-thick icicles sprouting out of every spare surface of the chamber, each one containing at its core the unmoving corpse of a Digimon.

My eyes rake over the room in horror. There's hundreds of the things. Growing from the floor, jutting from the walls, hanging from the ceiling... they're literally everywhere, completely impossible not to look at.

Countless moments of frozen agony, caught like flies in amber.

I take an involuntary step backwards, nearly tripping over my own feet. This- this is-! Icicle “graves” like these are a pretty unforgettable visual, pointing to exactly one Digimon, which means this can only be-

Confusion trickles through my horror. Wait... he was from Tamers though, wasn't he? Not Frontier, so that wouldn't make any- no, that's right, there was one in this season too. A much more powerful one — but he was dealt with long before the series even started, imprisoned under Cherubimon's castle on the Dark Continent, and didn't get free until the kids got involved.

Meaning, even if this is IceDevimon's handiwork? He's about as far away from here as he could possibly get.

I release a shaky breath, calming slightly.

Well, at least that answers why these caves both are and remain “No Mon's Land”. Disturbing as it is, I suppose I should be thankful all that's left of this place's former “owner” is the evidence of why he's no longer around. Not that, having seen all this, it really makes me feel any less like he could just come strolling around the corner at any-

*!-CRUNCH-!*

I whip my neck around just in time to see a large, clawed hand with a single red finger curl around the edge of the tunnel's entrance, ice cracking beneath its grip.

Stifling the scream that rises to my lips, I sprint into the cavern proper and scramble behind the nearest icy coffin, the stalagmite thankfully thick enough to be largely opaque from the other side. Not possible, shouldn't be possible, but I knew this place was practically a horror movie waiting to happen, why didn't I bail sooner?! Should've just trusted my gut and-

My self-chastisement is cut off by the low, guttural growl that issues from the opening in the wall. Slowly, almost leisurely, the hand's owner steps fully into view, and my heart nearly leaps into my throat.

That is not IceDevimon, but- what the hell?! A Kimeramon? How is that even possible?! Those don't come into existence naturally, they have to be deliberately created by someone, and the Digital World of this season is almost totally isolated from humanity, there shouldn't be any way or reason for someone to have-!

Something metallic clangs to the floor as another growl cuts through the air, accompanied by the sound of flaring nostrils. I hold as still and silent as I can manage, barely daring to breathe.

...I need. To get out of here. Now. Kimeramon are literal living weapons, and even if this one is smaller than the multi-story monster I remember from Adventure 02, I don't imagine that makes it much less dangerous. Hell, if this thing is somehow genuinely wild, it might even consider me food. This place was supposed to be easy code, and I am not fighting that thing for the right to it. Not that I have any idea how I'm going to escape it if it just stands there squatting in the entrance-

The growling abruptly intensifies, joined shortly after by the sound of thundering, rapidly approaching feet. I frantically break from my hiding spot, just a scant instant before the Kimeramon rams into it like the world's largest and most carnivorous battering ram. Never mind that then!

I sprint for the hole in the wall, nearly losing control of what little water I have in my haste. Ice audibly shatters behind me, followed by the sound of something hurtling through the air-

I throw myself to the floor as the stalagmite I was hiding behind spears through the space most of my upper body just occupied. It slams into the wall above the tunnel, hard enough to shake the floor beneath me — as well as open a giant vertical crack in the wall, which immediately spreads to several of the other enormous icy monuments sticking out of it.

I scramble back to my feet, but don't manage even a single step before the icicles' own weight dislodges them from their perch. A small avalanche of frozen rock comes tumbling down around the mouth of the tunnel, burying the only way out of the room in a giant pile of rubble.

No...

I slowly turn away from the Kimeramon's improvised blockade, forced to meet its hungry, awaiting gaze dead on.

Mouth gaping wide in a savage grin, it lets out an ear-splitting roar.

Chapter Text

“Dark Vapor!”

The stream of caustic mist hits the Kimeramon directly in the face. Its roar becomes a screech, then a snarl as it bites down and swipes the fog away, looking little worse for wear beneath its exoskeletal helmet.

Uh-

The Kimeramon bellows and charges, head down like a bull. I throw myself backwards, sliding away on thin ribbons of water, all too aware that if I run into literally anything I'm likely going to be left in ribbons myself. Bad, bad, bad bad BAD!!!

I frantically weave around more icy stalagmites as the Kimeramon dogs my every move, claws larger than my torso leaving glowing trails in the air as they gouge into every nearby surface. I snap repeatedly as I retreat, but the rain clouds that form in my wake are no larger than the one I managed at the entrance, and those that Kimeramon doesn't simply barrel through can't keep up with it anyways. That's not gonna work-!

A grasping hand slams down hard enough to crater the floor in front of me, sending shards of ice flying in all directions. A particularly large chunk glances off my swim cap and snaps my neck backwards, causing me to cry out at the impact, and then again a moment later, as the distraction in turn causes me to slam back-first into a wall.

The Kimeramon seizes on my moment of weakness, pouncing with every arm outstretched-

[ S L I D E - E V O L U T I O N ]

I spring into the air a split second before four enormous claws erase the spot where I just stood, turning both the nearby wall and floor to splintered fragments. The cavern shakes again, dislodging several more icy coffins that drop and shatter explosively nearby, spilling wisps of fragmented data into the air.

My wings flare out behind me as my eyes narrow, my focus on the threat before me sharpening to a knife's edge.

The Kimeramon whirls around and freezes for a moment, seeming to reassess, before screeching with renewed purpose and leaping into the air after me, its own wings beating hard.

"Wind of Pain!"

The funnel of forceful wind stalls the Kimeramon's ascent, the accompanying torrent of sharpened feathers tearing ragged holes into its top set of wings — but it's got a second set, and its leap did most of the work already. Not enough-!

I dart backwards as the monster's upper right arm snaps up at me, but not quickly enough to escape its absurd reach. Sharpened nails clip the side of my leg and claw at my armor, almost prying at it for a split second, before the impact itself hits me like a sledgehammer, sending me into an uncontrolled front flip as I'm thrown several dozen feet backwards.

Wind cushions my flight path, allowing me to avoid skewering myself on any of the giant sideways spikes growing out of the wall. Even as I recover, I throw myself aside... only to realize the Kimeramon strangely hasn't followed me. Instead, it's stopped dead and curled up into an almost fetal position, the air around it visibly shimmering. What is it-

The Kimeramon abruptly whips its arms outward, and a wave of violent red heat explodes out in every direction. The fiery pulse washes over the entire cavern, slamming into me like a physical force, and this time I do hit something.

Specifically, the towering back of the frozen throne I've ended up floating in front of.

A gasp of pain is forced from my lips as I'm forcibly driven into the chair, gravity causing me to slump down into the massive seat. The heat registers a moment later, traveling through my armor as though by intent, and I'm left screaming for a moment as the metal tries to brand the skin I apparently still have beneath it, even as the absolutely frigid throne I'm lying on nigh-instantly cools it back down.

Hissing through my teeth, I manage to wrench my clenched eyelids back open just as the Kimeramon drops into a dive, the claws of its upper left hand wreathed in a flickering red and black aura. Move!

Forcing my feet back under me, I leap upward and kick off the back of the chair, sending myself soaring over the Kimeramon's oncoming lunge. Too heavy to turn on a dime, the monster's momentum carries it onward-

*!-CRA-KS-TTR-!*

-leading its outstretched claw to crash straight through the back of the icy throne, burying it up to its elbow in the enormous piece of furniture.

The Kimeramon lets out another echoing roar, its fury resounding through the cavern as it attempts to tug its arm free. It fails, its own attack having trapped it in place within a structure evidently even sturdier than the walls.

Energy is flowing to my claws and talons before I've even processed it, and I dive in turn, a raptor seeking my foe's exposed back-

The patchwork monster's skeletal arm swings around behind it, slashing aimlessly at the air. Zephyrmon's reflexes save me, and I duck beneath the limb in the nick of time — only to get slammed by the insectoid one instead, which swings into my stomach like a solid iron bar. Gckt-!

My glowing claws scrape along the limb's length, tearing rents in the thick red carapace as the blow flings me back down at the floor. I manage to right myself in time to land on my feet, my attack sputtering out as my talons attempt to grind me to a halt, but sharp as they are, they still fail to find purchase on the slippery floor fast enough to keep me from slamming back-first into another icicle.

Ugh...

Aching from both impacts and with the wind knocked out of me, I barely react fast enough to dodge the two solid rays of heat that come screaming down at me a moment later, leaving me goggling at the still-trapped Kimeramon despite myself. Did it just blind fire those, backwards, with perfect aim?! How-

I trail off as the twisting tongues of fire begin curving impossibly through the air, already starting to double back on themselves. Oh come on, seriously?!

I take flight again, reaching and nearly skimming the ceiling as the apparently heat-seeking heat beams trail after me like guided missiles. I weave in and out of the bottom of the hanging graves, hoping the twin attacks will expend themselves on one, but they carry on through the ice in their way with nary a pause, sublimating all in their path.

Hoping I maybe just need something more solid, I speed towards the other end of the room, both beams still hot on my nonexistent tail. Seconds before I would slam face-first into the wall, I kick off the tip of a hanging stalactite, throwing myself downwards at a nearly 90-degree angle. The heat beams fail to turn sharply enough to match me, and instead slam into the iced-over entrance doors, sending up a giant spray of steam as they flash boil the frozen liquid before finally dispersing on the stone beneath.

I blanch as the cavern trembles for a third time, more violently than either instance prior. If this keeps up, the entire upper half of the mountain is going to come crashing down on us...!

Righting myself, I launch a vicious double kick at the doors, praying enough of the ice has melted to loosen them, but they fail to move even so much as an inch, still frozen over in too many other places. In the same moment, the Kimeramon finally rips its arm free, causing the back of the looming throne to crumble.

Revealing the solid wall of racing code within.

My eyes widen, but I've no chance to do anything about it, as a wave of toxic purple miasma pours from the now-freed monster's mouth. It flows out unnaturally quickly, filling the entire lower back half of the room before the Kimeramon flaps its ragged wings, sending the mist shooting towards me as a billowing cloud of poison. Just how many attacks does this thing have?!

Frustration coursing through me, I summon another funnel of wind and force the wall of fog back towards its source — and end up blindsided by the ball of lightning that erupts out of it a moment later, the colorful poison having screened the follow up attack. I screech in pain as the electricity courses across my limbs and armor, and feel myself start to fall from the air-

A massive bone-white hand surges out of the lingering miasma, catching me before I can hit the floor.

Then it raises me back up, and smashes me into the floor instead.

My scream intensifies as my back hits ice and the joints of my wings are pushed too far, feeling like they might snap off. The hand that just grabbed me comes back down, pinning my right arm to the floor with crushing weight and size.

A second one follows, engulfing my left arm.

A third, both of my legs.

I frantically send energy to my claws again, my talons scraping through the floor like it's not even there, but I can't move my arms enough to actually make use of them, can barely move just in general, I don't even have enough leverage to struggle-

The Kimeramon slowly raises its lone free arm — the Devimon one with the single red claw, digits once again shrouded in crimson and black energy.

Damn it, I need to do something!!! Anything!!!

[ S L I D E - E V O L U T I O N ]

My desperate idea leaves me in the exact same position as before, albeit without wings being bent in ways they weren't meant to be. The release from that particular pain does manage to bring me a single moment of clarity, and I pull, hoping to use the sudden change in limb size to escape the Kimeramon's grasp- but its grip doesn't change, hasn't changed, its hands are just too big, and there's too many, and I don't have any extras of my own to match them, I NEED-!

The devil's claw scythes down.

-and fails to connect, instead tearing through the gauntleted arm that just appeared in front of it, floating in the air.

Wha...?

The disembodied limb doesn't last long, destroyed in an instant by the Kimeramon's data-corroding touch. Undeterred, it draws back its arm to strike again, but words are already forcing themselves from my mouth.

"Show of Hands!"

Six more floating copies of my own limbs spring into being around me, grabbing the blackened arm as it descends and yanking on it as one. Even all working together, they aren't strong enough to completely overpower the Kimeramon.

...but they're enough to drag its aim off course, and cause the attack to instead rake over another of its own extremities.

The Kimeramon screeches as its lower right arm promptly dissolves, tiny blocks of data escaping from its newly-severed shoulder. My extra arms fade away as well, while my real one, freed from the multi-limbed monster's now-nonexistent grasp, swings upward.

"Dark Vapor!"

Mentally grabbing at the acid as it emerges from my palm, I combine it with a portion of the melted ice now spread across the floor, condense the liquid into a tiny stream, and guide it around the Kimeramon's remaining limbs like a serpent, shoving it straight through the holes of its helmet and directly into its eyes.

The Kimeramon howls louder than ever before and rears backwards, releasing my other arm and finally letting me scrabble away. Blinded and enraged, it starts lashing out at random, its now only trio of claws swiping wildly at everything in its vicinity. More icicle graves are smashed apart in its frenzy, clouds of long-trapped data sent flying into the air as it launches another pair of heat beams, which rocket straight upwards before redirecting and falling towards me like meteors-

[ S L I D E - E V O L U T I O N ]

-so I take to the air again, this time flying directly towards my rampaging enemy. The heat beams curve and follow as I spear like an arrow towards the Kimeramon's exposed back — only to flip 180 degrees, and instead kick off the back of its head with as much force as I can manage. My predator, now prey, whirls around at the impact in a fury, but my attack sent me flying backwards by design.

Quickly tucking in my wings, I thread between the twin heat beams that pass by on either side of me, and let them collide with their own creator.

The Kimeramon screeches as its indiscriminate attack sears into its flesh like a pair of giant brands. It stumbles in place, its right knee giving out beneath it, and I seize my chance, claws and talons coating themselves in glowing red annihilation energy as I dive, spinning like a bladed tornado-

“Plasma Claws!”

I surge past the mass of flailing limbs, my rotation knocking all of them aside, and thrust my arm forward with the speed of wind itself.

It passes through the Kimeramon's torso like there's nothing there at all.

The Kimeramon freezes, silent and still for the first time since it entered the cavern. Even with my hand buried most of the way into its chest, the act seems strangely non-visceral — beneath my armored claws, I feel no veins, no organs, no blood.

Just the same fizzing, tingling sensation I remember from the Seadramon, signifying data to be taken.

The Kimeramon finally fades to a shade, features disappearing into matte black as its fractal code spills out of it. Withdrawing my arm from the crumbling shadow, I step back and almost robotically absorb the ring of data, letting it pass into my palm without even really thinking about it. Even as the last of the code slips into me however, no egg rises or appears in the Kimeramon's place.

Beyond the wreckage of the battlefield, nothing remains of the unnatural entity at all.

Breathing hard through my mask, I settle on the floor and collapse to my knees, talons twitching against what ice still remains.

...I don't know why that thing was here, or where it came from. But that. Was terrifying. And confusing. And... honestly rather exhilarating? But mostly-

I hiss as the base of my wings throb, everything starting to come into sharper focus now that the battle is over.

-yeah, mostly just painful. Nothing's broken so far as I can tell, and I'm still alive, but that's about all I can say for myself. Despite Zephyrmon's undoubtedly better durability compared to my base form, I feel even more like one big, burned bruise than I did yesterday.

I could... really go for a-

“Hey...”

Chapter Text

I leap back into the air like a startled hummingbird. What the hell else is in here now-?!

“Over here...”

I whirl around.

The voice seems to be coming from... one of the icicles? Half-melted by the Kimeramon's various heat-based attacks, the right arm of the Digimon within is now hanging limply out of its thawing prison, along with half of its metal-masked face.

...from within which, a single, bright red eye is staring up at me.

“You're alive?!” I almost shriek.

The Digimon lets out a muffled chuckle, followed by a quiet groan.

“For now... little help, please?”

Shocked, I fly over and land next to the captive Digimon. Setting my claws alight with crimson energy, I start carefully excising what remains of the ice.

“Thanks...” he manages to sigh out the side of his mouth. “Appreciate you not just ignoring me.”

“I'd never just ignore someone in your position.” I quietly reply, frozen chunks falling to the floor as my digits easily carve through the melting monument. “Not while I can do something about it, at least.”

Looking closer, I don't actually recognize this Digimon at all. The mask looks vaguely familiar, but his body — what I can see of it past the ice, at least — just looks like a dark, bipedal lizard's, and an unusually skinny one at that. Frankly, he looks unhealthy, and in a way I'm not sure I can chalk up solely to being trapped as a frozen display piece for who knows how long.

As I slice away a particularly large piece of ice, the Digimon clears his throat.

“Think I can take it from here. Stand back?”

I give him a confused look, but do so. The Digimon squeezes his single revealed eye shut in apparent concentration.

“RaaaaaaaAAAAAGH!!!”

The remaining ice shatters and erupts into a thousand tiny pieces as the Digimon at its core abruptly lights on fire, the flames rapidly spreading outward to engulf him from head to toe.

“Freedom!” the being I now recognize as a Flarelizamon exclaims as he stretches, looking immensely grateful to be able to move again. “Thank the Celestials...”

With the icy muzzle encasing most of his mouth gone, his deep, raspy voice smooths out a bit, the crackle of his flames adding a perpetual ambiance to his words.

“Were you... awake in there, the entire time?” I ask, almost not wanting to know the answer.

To my relief, the fiery lizard shakes his head, tiny embers flying off to his sides as he does so. “Barely managed to pry an eye open in time to catch the tail end of your fight with that thing. Don't suppose you've got any idea how long I've been down here?”

“No... but I'm guessing it's been a while.” I reply. “Just to be sure, who or what even did this to you? I assume it wasn't the Kimeramon.”

“That the mon you were fighting?” the Flarelizamon asks, rolling an arm. “Nah, definitely wasn't that. This-” he gestures at the surrounding cavern, “-is all the sole handiwork of the self-proclaimed 'Emperor of Absolute Zero'.”

Though partially obscured by the flames, I can still see the snarl his face contorts into.

“That demon dragged me right out of my home, bragging all the while. Wanted to prove he could freeze fire itself if he wanted...”

His gaze sharpens. “He's not still around, is he?”

I shake my head.

"Assuming you mean IceDevimon, he's trapped down a deep hole on the other side of the world."

The focus leaves the Flarelizamon's eyes as fast as it appeared, and he wobbles briefly, as though only just refraining from collapsing in relief.

“Guess that's one advantage to getting frozen for... however long it's been.” he exhales, eyes closing briefly. “Still don't know who you are, but I can't thank you enough for your help.”

“Yeah, of cou-”

“Mind if I ask for some more?”

I blink.

“What, in getting to the nearest town? You're on fire, I'd have a hard time airlifting you.”

“No. With them.”

The Flarelizamon sweeps an arm over the room again, gesturing to the many, many icicle graves that still remain.

Oh.

“You really think any of them are still alive...?” I ask before I can think better of it.

The Flarelizamon shrugs. “I was. And even if they aren't, I'm sure they'd like to be again some day.”

He points at the floor some ways behind me, and I turn to see a digiegg, blue with orange stripes, laying on its side against a wall. There's more than one in fact, their data having presumably been set free in the wake of my fight with the Kimeramon and reformed midway through the battle.

I didn't even notice them until now. There wasn't time to notice them.

I sigh.

“Look, I'd love to help and all, but that fight took a lot out of me. Even if you're right, none of these Digimon are going to get any worse than they already are, so surely they can at least wait until...”

I trail off mid-sentence, glancing over at the cracked throne.

Until... what? I'm about to absorb this mountain's fractal code, after which this place literally won't exist anymore. Because it will be in me. Also, these Digimon are essentially part of the mountain's structure right now, meaning even if they aren't fully dead, I'll quite likely end up absorbing them along with the land itself should I do that. Which is almost the exact scenario I was trying to avoid by finding somewhere so isolated to steal the data of.

...and I literally just said I would never ignore anyone trapped in this position while I had the power to help, didn't I.

“Until?” the Flarelizamon repeats, sounding confused by my sudden silence.

I sigh again, harder this time.

“Nevermind. How are we doing this?”

~ ꕀ ꔛ ꕀ ~

~ ꕀ ꔛ ꕀ ~

Turns out Flarelizamon was right. He wasn't the only survivor.

...not to say years of icy imprisonment have exactly been healthy for any of them.

“You'll be okay.” I whisper to a freshly revived Bearmon, who shivers as I wrap them up in a stolen tarp and point them over to the small fire blazing over a beaten up barrel in the middle of the room. It's small, fueled only by what little burnable rubbish we could scavenge from the junk cavern after dismantling the blockade, but is at least doing its job of helping everyone stay a little warmer.

They need it, after what they've been through.

Flying over to the next frozen coffin, I sever the excess ice at the top and start carefully slicing apart the structure surrounding the Digimon within. Once the prison is sufficiently diminished, I drag my glowing claws through its base, flip it on its side, and pass it off to a recently-freed Lynxmon, who starts spraying fire over the much reduced ice block while I move on to the next one.

It took us a bit to work out a process, but on the whole, this is going considerably faster than I'd feared. The Kimeramon already jump-started the defrosting process for most of the cavern, and conveniently — for a given metric of the word — Flarelizamon apparently wasn't the only victim of IceDevimon's “freezer of fire” phase. Nor are they the only ones we've freed that have proved capable of helping out. Not everyone is in good enough shape to assist, nor is anyone who is exactly an expert at this, but that's fine. Compared to what humans would require to be revived from cryogenic storage, it's a far less delicate procedure anyways.

I frown. Granted, it's also a much more traumatic one, given how these Digimon ended up like this to begin with. Some of them are better off than others in that regard, feeling like they were just asleep the whole time, while others have proved anywhere from panicked to near-catatonic, many of them bursting into tears the moment they become aware again.

The rest...

I carefully crack open a smaller icicle, only for the frozen Veggiemon at its center to immediately fall apart, not even forming the typical ring of fractal code as its data simply wisps into the air. I leave it be, watching its fragments sluggishly coalesce back together over the course of nearly a full minute, before finally managing to reform into an egg. It hovers in place for a moment, then drops, finding my awaiting arms just below.

“Got another one.”

The Mojyamon to my right nods and takes the egg off my hands, walking away to add it to the growing pile. They aren't flying off on their own for some reason — maybe the cave network is too complex, or the “signal” that recalls them can't permeate the mountain? — so we've just been piling them up in a big metal box we found stuck under the now-melted ice blockading the entrance. I assume it's what I heard the Kimeramon drop when it first came in? What exactly what it was doing with it I have no idea, but I suppose it's not really a concern anymore.

I wince, feeling the ache in my arms.

“Taking a quick break.” I call out.

Tagging out with a nearby Rinkmon, I walk away and slide down into a seated position against the nearest wall, resting my head on the freezing surface. Flarelizamon makes his way over to join me a moment later, apparently taking a breather as well.

“Might want another one of these.”

He tosses something silvery at me, and I snatch it out of the air, quickly peeling the wrapping off of the energy bar. Being one of the few bits of food we managed to recover from the broken vending machines, our supply is quite limited, and it's probably just as stale as the last one I had... but at the moment, I can't bring myself to care.

“Thanks.”

Collapsing back down into Ranamon, I chomp down on the bar, my shark-like teeth helping cut through the barely-thawed mass.

Flarelizamon doesn't spare my change a second glance as he sits down next to me, having already witnessed it multiple times now. He seemed a bit surprised when I first unthinkingly reverted to this form, wanting to get all the water soaked into a Drimogemon's fur out before they froze to death a second time, but neither he nor any of the other survivors have actually questioned me on it yet. Presumably, they've all been trapped down here long enough that they simply have no reason to recognize Ranamon, too out of time to realize who she is or what she represents.

I suppose I'm grateful for that, if nothing else.

I swallow, already starting to feel a bit of energy come back. It's a little weird just how much food seems to speed up the healing process in this world — despite not really having had a break since fighting the Kimeramon, I actually feel better than I did at the tail end of it, and that's just off the back of a couple of ancient snack bars. Flarelizamon has been offering the rest to the Digimon in the worst shape upon being broken out of the ice, and while they're still not looking great, it seems to somehow almost stabilize them? Maybe I should stop in again at the Chill n' Grill after this.

...speaking of which.

“We need to start evacuating soon.” I say quietly, glancing over at the shivering masses. “This place isn't made for anyone that can't handle the cold, and it's not going to get any better.”

“No argument here.” Flarelizamon says with a small, rasping chuckle. “Pretty sure no one wants to stick around this place any longer than we absolutely have to, and I don't know that I even trust it to hold out forever with its code exposed like that. The eggs can't just be left to sit here either; someone needs to get them to the Village of Beginnings.”

I nod, idly summoning all the melted ice water pooling on the floor and tossing it in the makeshift basin the Drimogemon was kind enough to drill into a corner for us.

“There's a town called Wintervel not too far down the coast.” I note. “That's probably everyone's best bet for food and shelter for the time being.”

Flarelizamon nods. “I'm all for that, but... how fast can we even get through the rest?”

I glance up, letting my eyes roam across the innumerable icicles still untouched. We've made amazing progress for how long we've been at this, but I get the sense we're running out of steam. I may be weary, but most of the Digimon here are even worse off, and aside from a lone Buraimon, I'm the only one who can even reach the icy coffins stuck higher on the walls, not to mention the ones outright hanging from the ceiling.

Is there any way to do this more efficiently...?

I consider the question for a moment before standing up, slide evolving back into my stolen beast form, and taking to the air again.

“Hey!” I shout, letting my voice resound throughout the cavern. “In the interest of getting out of here sooner, anyone who can make fire, gather up over here!"

The flame users gradually stop what they were doing and make their way over to me, expressions a mix of steadfast determination and abject exhaustion.

“On the count of three, everyone throw as much fire into the air as you can.” I instruct. “One, two, three!”

A flurry of semi-anemic fire moves soar up into the air, meeting in the middle and combining into a decently impressive fireball — which proceeds to ignite into a roaring conflagration as I force feed it massive quantities of oxygen, quickly whipping the fireball into a giant flaming twister.

“Up you go!” I yell as I flare my wings and thrust the fiery tornado skywards.

The unnatural phenomenon roars as it slams into the ceiling. The top half all but explodes on impact, causing the flames to rush outward over the hanging ice in an undulating wave, while the bottom half remains intact, seeking out specific icicles at my invisible guidance. Droplets immediately begin falling from above as the heat eats through the ceiling, prompting several Digimon to cry out as a drizzling squall falls over portions of the cavern, though I'm largely able to direct it away from them.

I stop feeding the flames after a minute or so, quickly wicking away the excess air. A twinge in my thoughts notes how dangerous the way I did that was, Zephyrmon's influence undoubtedly feeding my hastier impulses, but it looks to have worked all the same. None of the icicles have melted so much as to actually fall, but my efforts have thinned them enough at both base and tip that it should now be far, far easier to cut them loose, carry them down, and safely crack them open.

“Think that'll help?” I ask the Flarelizamon, smirking beneath my mask.

“...yeah, I reckon so.”

Blessedly, both he and I are correct. After my impromptu pyrotechnics display, it doesn't take too much longer to get the remaining prisoners free, most of which I spend just cutting and ferrying them down from the ceiling as Zephyrmon and clearing away excess water as Ranamon.

It's a major group effort, but a few more back and forth slide evolutions, several dozen more shivering Digimon, and many, many more eggs later, the cavern is finally clear for evac.

“Alright,” I call out, hovering over the assembled crowd as Zephyrmon, “everyone ready to get out of here?”

My answer is a chorus of hurried nods and stuttering agreements.

“Then let's get moving!”

We exit the cavern in a huddling procession, most of the Digimon still clustered around the ones actively covered in fire. Some of them oddly even try to cluster around me, despite my not being close enough to the ground to truly do so at the moment. I don't know what heat they think they're going to absorb by doing so; I'm hardly any warmer than they are right now.

The tunnels are only barely less twisty on the way up than they were on the way down, but my memory thankfully holds true, and I eventually manage to guide everyone back to the mountain's entrance. I've honestly never seen a group of people, Digimon or otherwise, so happy to simply see stairs. It's a bit of a struggle to keep everything calm in fact, to the point a stampede very nearly occurs in everyone's wild rush to get out of here.

Deciding we probably need someone to play traffic control before the icy steps cause a Digimon avalanche, I land in front of them and slide back into Ranamon once more, summoning some extra hands to help manage the crowd. Before I can do anything else however, something wraps itself around my leg.

“Thank you...”

I look down in confusion to find the Bearmon I helped earlier clinging to me, sniffling. The sentiment is echoed by the majority of Digimon present a moment or two later, the words all but deafening as they resound throughout the entrance hall.

That's... huh. It's not like I helped everyone here personally, but I guess word got around that I started this, or something?

I didn't, really, but...

Unable to figure out what to say in response, I pat the Bearmon on the head and simply nod at the rest in silent acknowledgement. The tension breaks as the tiny mon releases my leg, and, at my direction, everyone starts filing out. One by one, they carefully make their way upward, slowly passing out of sight and onto the side of the mountain beyond.

Within a few minutes, the only ones still standing at the bottom are Flarelizamon and myself.

“You coming?” he asks, extending an arm.

I slowly shake my head, letting my floating limbs fade away.

“I'm not, actually.”

He squints at me in obvious disbelief.

“You're not planning on setting up shop here yourself, are you?”

“Absolutely not.” I quickly deny. “There's just... something I still need to do here.”

Flarelizamon's expression shifts.

“...come to think of it, I never did ask why you were down here to begin with. What reason could you possibly have to not just seek out, but linger in a place like this?”

I look away, shifting from foot to foot.

“You'll... know it when you see it.”

Flarelizamon continues staring at me for a long, silent moment, before finally shrugging and breaking eye contact.

“Private, huh? Well, we'd all still be popsicles if not for you, so I won't pry.”

I restrain my relief from showing as he moves forward, looking back over his shoulder one last time.

“I'm sure you've heard it plenty by now, but thanks... for everything.”

With that, he turns and trudges up the stairs as well, swiftly passing out of sight.

For the first time in hours, I'm alone again.

Pivoting on my heel, I turn and head back the way I came, slowly, silently making my way back to the heart of the mountain.

The throne room has seen better days. The rock of the mountain itself has been exposed, and the melted ice I didn't throw into the hole in the floor is already starting to refreeze, a giant puddle having hardened across the remaining ice in my absence. Even so, the enormous chair at the back of the space remains, data still flowing within the exposed, gaping hole in its structure. Static leaks out of it every so often, fuzzing around the edges like a bad TV connection.

Climbing the now mostly-melted stairs, I push myself up onto the seat of the oversized throne, standing before the wall of racing code.

I still don't truly understand this place. I don't know why the Kimeramon was here, nor what that cavern of seemingly literal junk data was about... but at least in the end, I found a place truly deserving of being wiped off the face of the planet. With its master gone and its prisoners freed, no one needs nor wants this macabre monument to murder around any longer.

Certainly not me.

Rearing back, I thrust my hand into the churning mass and pull.

A moment later, I realize I apparently needn't have been so aggressive, as the data proceeds to rush into me like a dam uncorked, seeming almost eager to feed itself into my palm.

The floors, walls, and ceiling alike rapidly lose texture, reverting to nothing but streaming lines of code. I gasp involuntarily, all weariness abruptly shoved aside as what seems like a truly endless font of data pours into me, leaving me feeling like I just plugged myself into the mainframe. The tingling previously isolated to my arm instantly spreads beyond it, suffusing me in my entirety as a mountain's worth of data drains down into my puny little body, somehow compacting itself enough to fit within a space magnitudes smaller.

It's like trying to drink the ocean and inhale the sky. Like looking to the stars, only to find yourself hurtling upwards into space, nothing in the way to ever stop or even slow you down. I'm suddenly, terrifyingly certain this is just too much — I'll never be able to absorb all this. If I don't simply explode, I'll still be trapped in place, stuck standing here forever, the information influx never stopping, never ceasing, never truly coming to an end-

And then it does.

A whisper of fresh air softly caresses my skin.

I reopen eyes that I didn't even realize I'd closed to find myself standing beneath open sky, clear of the storm that clouded it before. I'm standing atop a thin, isolated pillar of ice and rock, jutting hundreds of feet upwards from a truly enormous hole in the ground — an empty basin, bereft of water, life, or even snow.

The mountain is simply... gone.

Concern almost immediately overtakes my awe. From the look of things, I didn't just tear away the mountain itself, I got a fair amount of the surrounding land as well.

If the others weren't quick enough to make it away...

Sliding back into Zephyrmon again, I leap into the air, the fragile pillar I was perched upon crumbling behind me as I speed towards the edge of the basin. Snow-covered ground quickly comes back into view, and I narrow my eyes, scanning for any sign of life as I go.

Nothing, rock spires, small canyon, more rocks-

A small crowd of figures, several bundled in ragged gray tarps with a giant metal bin at the rear, moving in a group down the coast.

My panic subsides.

They made it. They're safe... not that they probably feel it, what with a major geographical feature having just evaporated behind them, but at least I didn't also rip the ground out from under their feet, and make everything I've been doing for the past however long completely pointless.

...I doubt it's much of a mystery to them just who did that though. They may not know of Cherubimon's crusade against the world just yet, but once they find out, they'll surely intuit what side I'm on.

I flap my wings, rising higher, until the distant figures are nothing but specks.

It's fine. Not like I was planning to stick around anyways.

I've got a spirit to retrieve.

~ ꕀ ꔛ ꕀ ~

~ ꕀ ꔛ ꕀ ~

-Later-

I stare down from on high at the crater-bound town of the Autumn Leaf Fair, where an entire row of what I'm guessing used to be shops lie in pieces. Assorted rubble and damaged merchandise is scattered all over the ground, while other, still standing buildings in the vicinity bear heavy dents and impossibly large slash marks across their sides. The area directly in front of the enormous central furnace is blasted and scorched, smoke still rising from the charred grass, and a couple dozen oddly-shaped holes have been gouged out of the lower half of the giant construct, Digimon swarming to patch them as gouts of fire leak from within.

...what the hell happened here?