Digimon Fan Fiction ❯ War Diaries: Adventures Zero-Three ❯ Dreams and Laments ( Chapter 16 )
[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]
By: Lord Archive 
A mother's concern for her daughter's safety may spell the end of another child's life when the new threat starts to move.
Anime/Manga: Digimon Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Adventure / Action | Type: Divergence | Uploaded On: 12.24.2002 | Updated On: 11.03.2006 | Pages: 5 | Words: 5.0K | Visits: 1.3K | Status: Completed
A mother's concern for her daughter's safety may spell the end of another child's life when the new threat starts to move.
Anime/Manga: Digimon Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Drama / Adventure / Action | Type: Divergence | Uploaded On: 12.24.2002 | Updated On: 11.03.2006 | Pages: 5 | Words: 5.0K | Visits: 1.3K | Status: Completed
War Diaries
Entry 16 - Dreams and Laments
By Lord Archive
Digimon and most characters in this series belong to Toei Animation Inc. and others. They are used without consent.
This story is rated PG-13 for language, adult situations and violence. If you, or your parents, find swearing, children talking about sex or descriptions of fighting objectionable, do not read this.
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"Hello. Mrs. Wataru?" Taichi questioned, standing outside Sayuri's apartment.
"Yes. Can I help you?" Mrs. Wataru wondered.
"Well, I need to talk to you about Sayuri," Taichi replied uncertainly.
"What about her?" Mrs. Wataru asked nervously.
"It's about her role as a Chosen," Taichi answered.
"Chosen?" Mrs. Wataru glared. "What kind of responsibility does she have putting herself in danger? She's only eleven years old."
"When I was eleven, I spent a year in another dimension fighting threats worse than Sayuri will probably ever face that would've either conquered Earth, or destroyed it," Taichi retorted.
"Why don't you keep doing that and leave my daughter out of it," Mrs. Wataru said angrily.
"If it was a matter of me being able to do the job, she would've never been activated. However, when one becomes a Chosen, there's a specific task that only they can perform," Taichi explained while trying to keep his own temper.
"And what kind of task could possibly require my daughter?" Mrs. Wataru demanded.
"If I could answer that question, then we could get someone else to do it," Taichi answered in a smart-ass tone.
"Let me ask you a few questions," Mrs. Wataru told him. "Are Digimon living, thinking creatures?"
"Yes." Taichi nodded.
"Will my daughter have to kill any?" Mrs. Wataru pressed.
"Well, she already has and probably would have to do it again," Taichi answered.
Mrs. Wataru looked at Taichi as if he was the worst thing on the planet. "Has any of you Chosen ever died?"
Taichi frowned. "Yes. Two of us out of hundreds."
"So, you're asking me to let my daughter go out and fight and kill living creatures, when she could possibly die doing it. What do you think my answer to that is?!" Mrs. Wataru yelled.
Taichi flinched as the door slammed into his face. "Diplomat, I am not." He sighed. At least he had faired better than Iori. Mrs. Wataru hadn't even talked to him.
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The true art of fighting is not in the ability to beat the shit out of people. The art was about pushing oneself to physical perfection, to harness one's spirit and gain a certain sense of harmony with the world. However, there was always someone that constantly failed to look beyond martial arts as a means to beat people up.
Shiro had always been a strong boy. After failing to knock over a pencil-neck geek and getting kicked out of a mall by a little twerp half his size, he wanted to become even stronger. He joined kendo to gain that strength and discovered he had a knack for it. In a month he quickly rose in the ranks and was top of the introductory class. Now he was waiting impatiently for his first test in order to advance to the next level, something which students who had been there for several months had yet to accomplish.
Shiro snickered as he noticed a young boy enter the dojo with a girl in a wheelchair, who stopped at the door. He pranced across the room like he owned it. "What do you want here?"
"I came to see how good the students are," Iori replied in a flat tone.
Shiro laughed. "We don't let runts into our dojo."
"Oh, really," Iori replied. "Can you tell me what this dojo stands for?"
"It stands for power. Something you don't have," Shiro boasted.
Yume giggled.
Shiro glared. "Something funny, retard?"
"Retard?!" Yume shrieked.
Iori's expression flattened. "I think you need to be taught a lesson."
"Who's going to teach me? You?" Shiro laughed.
"Yes," Iori dead-panned.
The kendo students all began to laugh, but not all for the same reason.
"I bet a hundred yen the runt lasts less than ten seconds," one of them called out.
"I'll take all bets for Shiro to win," replied one of the older students.
"You think that kid could possibly win?" Shiro snarled.
"Anything can happen," the older student replied with a smirk.
"It's your money." Shiro laughed as he walked across the room and grabbed his shinnai. He then turned towards Iori. "Where's your weapon?"
Iori calmly walked over to a closest, pulled out a key and unlocked it. He then pulled his own bamboo sword. "Right here."
Shiro blinked as Iori moved to face against him.
The older student grinned. "Top student, Sakimori Shiro, verses Hida Iori-sensei. Begin!"
"Sensei?" Shiro laughed. "So what if he's related to Hida-Sensei? Sensei is a title undeserving of a runt." He then attacked, raining blow after blow down upon Iori. The storm lasted for a full minute. "Had enough yet?"
"That was weak," Iori replied. His shinnai blurred as he stabbed Shiro with the tip repeatedly.
"How?" Shiro wheezed out as he bonelessly fell backwards.
"How many times did he hit him?" questioned a student.
Various numbers came up ranging from six to twelve.
"Seventeen. One hit for each year he has lived in ignorance," Iori corrected them.
"Perhaps Shiro isn't the only one who needs a lesson," an elderly voice intoned.
"Grandfather?" Iori questioned.
"A teacher can not act with anger as you just have. Even though Shiro needed to be put in his place, beating him up is not the answer," Grandpa Hida said disapprovingly.
"I'm sorry, Grandfather," Iori apologized with his head bowed.
Shiro groaned as he woke up.
Grandpa Hida then smirked. "Perhaps I should test your control. Hida school."
Iori swallowed nervously. "This isn't for the dojo, is it?"
"Not yet," Grandpa Hida replied simply as if his words were a threat to his grandson. "Let's begin." He drew his shinnai and attacked.
While the novice students weren't well versed in kendo, they knew the battle before them did not follow the forms or style of swordsmenship that they were being taught. The combatants danced all over the dojo floor, even bounced off the walls a couple times as they dueled. The graceful arcs the weapons made as they cut through the air held all the power of kendo, but were far more offensive, more lethal.
Even though Shiro was upset at being humiliated by a little kid, he had to admit that the twerp was way above him as skills went. It'd take him years of training just to get to where Iori's skill was today.
None of the students could blink as they tried to absorb every detail of the match, watching as their teacher and his grandson leapt at each other with seemingly murderous intent. The shinnai practice swords tried to inflict grievous injury, only to repeatedly miss as the target dodged or blocked. Over and over again the shinnai connected with each other until the sound of a thunderous explosion filled the room as the durable practice swords both broke from the powerful hit and the previous abuse inflicted during that match and other battles.
Grandpa Hida looked at the half of a shinnai still in his hands, then at Iori's sword, which had the top half bent over and flopped around a bit, still connected by a few stands of bamboo. The elderly Hida then chuckled. "Never had that happen before. Guess this is a draw."
"Guess so," Iori replied.
"What was that?" Shiro questioned. "That was NOT kendo."
Grandpa Hida smirked. "That is a school of sword-fighting that has existed for a thousand years. It was considered a manslayer style and has been passed down secretly through the Hida family line for many generations. Though I may consider training others in this style, but only if they understand what this dojo and the Hida school of sword-fighting represents. Power has NOTHING to do with it."
Iori knew that wasn't exactly true. The power of love and friendship and the desire to have the strength to protect them was behind the dojo and the school, but it was not the power to be the best like Shiro believed. Patience also played a factor, as Iori now had to wait for class to finish before asking his grandfather for a little favor.
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Sayuri woke up with a jolt. Her heart beating fast. She had a strange and disturbingly vivid dream, but was quickly having a hard time remembering it. In the dream she was watching the television showing a digimon battle, but she was sure she wasn't part of it. In fact, she doubted many of the Odaiba Chosen were involved in it though the fight seemed to be at a library or possibly a museum in downtown Tokyo. She was sure something went wrong during it. She strained her brain trying to remember what it was, but was coming up blank.
Sayuri shook her head and looked at the alarm clock, shutting it off a full minute before its alarm would sound. She pulled herself from bed, got ready for the day, and helped prepare her little sister for another day of preschool.
Mrs. Wataru looked at both her daughters carefully as they were about to leave. "Hitomi, have a nice day. Sayuri, you are to come home right after school and no talking to... them."
"Yes, Mother," Sayuri replied bitterly before leaving with her sister. She had never felt that her mother was overprotective before, but now believed very differently. Her mother had even gone as far as considered pulling her from school to keep her away from Iori and the others. Thankfully her father had talked her mother out of doing that. She was afraid her mother would get the idea to inform the school about Iori, Taichi and Yume owning digimon.
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Goggleboy2: School sucks.
Redemption: It's not that bad.
Goggleboy2: Says you, Ken. You're going to a museum today. I've got two quizzes.
SwordMastuh!: Got you beat, Daisuke. I've got a major test tomorrow and thanks to my last adventure, I haven't opened my school books for a whole year! I'm going to flunk this test BIG time!
Goggleboy2: Eric, there's always summer school. ;)
SwordMastuh!: And be in class in July?! No thanks!
Goggleboy2: If I've got to be in school in July, so should everyone else.
SwordMastuh!: Not my fault Japanese school year actually lasts all year.
Redemption: Eric, how are the girls?
SwordMastuh!: They're going through a bit of culture shock, but Hikaru is helping them with that and English lessons.
Goggleboy2: Is 'Eris' going to school yet?
SwordMastuh!: She can't. She's still rather clueless on how to speak English.
OriginalGoggleboy: So is the original.
Firebird: I read that!
OriginalGoggleboy: Oops.
Goggleboy2: :lol Taichi's back in the dog house.
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"And this painting is called 'World of the Dreamer.' The artist was supposedly quite insane, but we can not deny the talent he possessed where we have an unusual blend of realism and surrealism. It has the impossible Escher-like quality of what is viewable through the mirror depicted in the painting, but far more grounded in reality with the mirror existing in a seemingly ordinary room...." the museum tour guide continued to drone on.
Ken fought the urge to yawn. Daisuke would've preferred his quizzes over this field trip. This was the worst way to expose children to art, as it was extremely boring and was anything but interesting. Ichijouji could see that the painting was brilliantly done and was a powerful piece, but the guy explaining it was putting everyone to sleep. The only time the guy shut up was when they moved to the next piece of art, to further bore them to tears.
It took Ken's group a half hour just to go down the hall. Had they been in school, he would've been going home now but they'd be at the museum for another couple hours. He couldn't think how it could get any worse.
The museum's alarms blaring provided Ichijouji the answer of just how it could get worse.
Ken looked back down the hallway to see a rather startling sight. A Black Agumon was pulling down the 'World of the Dreamer' painting while a Plotmon, Candmon and Tsukaimon were positioned to protect him.
"I got it," Black Agumon announced.
"We also have a Chosen," Plotmon replied evilly. "We'll have to kill him."
The Candmon tried to use his fiery attack, but fell far short of his target.
Ken took a step back, trying to figure out what to do. If he ran with his classmates, they would likely be hurt by these digimon.
Tsukaimon barreled down the hallway trying to ram Ken, but he too came up short as he crashed into a silken web that hadn't been there seconds before.
"Wormmon?" Ken called out in surprise.
"No time for pleasantries," Wormmon commented, thankful for having a good excuse not to explain why he had tagged along.
"Our thoughts exactly," Sakura added. "Let's see what you boys can do. But ladies first!"
"Plotmon evolve!" the puppy called out, only to be replaced with a cat with gun-smoke gray fur with jet black stripes. "Black Tailmon!"
Hiroshi held out his digivice.
"Candmon evolve!" The living candle shimmered in a pillar of light that quickly faded to reveal a western looking wizard with yellow, purple and red clothes. "Wizarmon!"
Black Agumon handed the painting over to Hitochi before calling out, "Agumon evolve!" Light engulfed the dark dinosaur and then subsided to reveal a large blue Tyrannosaurus Rex with black stripes and black skull over his face. "Greymon!"
Takeshi shook his digivice. "Evolve, damn it!"
Tsukaimon could only shrug as he failed to evolve.
Ken was thankful that the museum had high ceilings, and not just because the Greymon would've put a hole through it had it been any shorter. "Wormmon, hold them off while I call for help."
Ken's digimon nodded. "Wormmon evolve!" A brilliant white pillar flashed around the green caterpillar which heralded the appearance of the giant humanoid green and black armored insect, "Stingmon!"
"Oh, I'm scared," Black Tailmon dead-panned. "Three on one aren't good odds."
"For you!" Stingmon shot back and then leapt at them.
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Sayuri pouted as she walked slowly to the front gate of her school with Yume and Iori.
"Your mother will understand," Iori tried to assure her.
"I doubt it. She won't let anyone explain why I'm needed," Sayuri replied bitterly.
"Acceptance takes time. I certainly know THAT," Yume offered, patting the arm of her wheelchair. "She's just upset now. She'll see the truth later."
Sayuri shook her head. Life wasn't that simple.
Iori's school bag began to beep.
"What is it?" the girls questioned as Iori fished his D-Terminal out of his bag.
Iori read the message and frowned. "The Dark Seed children have begun to act. At least four of them are at Tokyo Museum of Fine Arts stealing a painting."
"How are we going to get there?" Yume asked.
"It'll take us too long by subway," Iori replied. He looked at Sayuri. "You'd better go home before your mother gets upset."
Sayuri turned around to leave, but then remembered her dream from that morning. If she left now she was sure Ken's battle would end badly. Her face hardened with determination and looked Iori in the eye. "No. I'm going with you."
"But you don't have Psychemon or your D-3," Iori pointed out.
Sayuri reached into her bag and pulled out her D-3. "Hitomi fished it out of the trash after Mom threw it out."
"But Psychemon is in the Digital World," Yume reminded.
"We'll just port there and..." Sayuri blinked. "Port straight over to the museum! The Edmonton group has done it, why can't we?"
"Sounds like a plan to me," Armadimon commented from the nearby bush he was hiding in.
"What about your mother?" Iori questioned.
"She's going to have to accept this eventually, and Ken needs all of us," Sayuri insisted.
"If you're sure..." Iori trailed off.
Sayuri nodded curtly.
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"Is something troubling you, Miss?" Grandpa Hida questioned a woman as she paced in front of an apartment complex.
Mrs. Wataru frowned as she noticed some children walk home from school. "My daughter is running late coming home."
"I don't see how a few minutes should cause you to worry. She could still be helping to clean her classroom," Grandpa Hida pointed out.
"Her class has started to take turns cleaning, and it's not her turn," Mrs. Wataru retorted.
"Perhaps she stayed behind to help anyway," Grandpa Hida returned.
Mrs. Wataru frowned. "She might have done that."
"Excuse me if I'm prying too much, but is there some sort of problem?" Grandpa Hida questioned.
Mrs. Wataru folded her arms. "Let's just say I disapprove of her recent choice of friends."
"Oh." Grandpa Hida nodded. "Are they the type to skip school, beat up kids, vandalize, and cause all sorts of trouble?"
"No, but they might as well be," Mrs. Wataru replied bitterly.
"What kind of kids are they?" Grandpa Hida questioned.
Mrs. Wataru didn't immediately reply. "She met a few kids who have digimon and wants to join them."
"Is there anything wrong with that?" Grandpa Hida asked.
"Anything wrong?" Mrs. Wataru stared at him like he grew a second head. "I am NOT letting my daughter go off to fight alien creatures where she could get hurt or even killed!"
"I suppose that could happen. But I also suppose your daughter could be hit by a car walking home from school," Grandpa Hida said seriously.
"That's not likely to happen," Mrs. Wataru shot back.
"From what I understand, the car accident is more likely to happen. Even a spectator to a digimon battle is more likely to be killed than the children involved in it," Grandpa Hida pointed out calmly.
"And how would you know that?" Mrs. Wataru demanded hotly.
"Digimon have become a bit of a hobby of mine. I read about them as much as I can," Grandpa Hida replied. He wasn't exactly lying, he was just leaving out why it had become a hobby.
"Perhaps you can answer this question, why are some children chosen to get digimon and others are not?" Mrs. Wataru asked.
"Because destiny plays a role. A child is Chosen because he or she is needed. To deny a child to work with their digimon is to deny the child's destiny. If the child is not allowed to act, others may suffer for the inaction," Grandpa Hida answered.
"What about the destiny the child had withOUT digimon? What about living a normal life?" Mrs. Wataru questioned strongly. "I met a thirteen-year-old girl with a digimon, she's pregnant and has killed countless times!"
"When I was a child, a pregnant thirteen-year-old was not unheard of. I even knew a girl who became a mother at eleven. What the girl did is only considered 'abnormal' today because of the changes society has seen, not the people," Grandpa Hida retorted. "And who's to say that in another fifty years digimon will be commonplace and thirteen-year-olds are once again considered adults by our laws."
Mrs. Wataru glared daggers at the elderly man. "You don't know what you are talking about." She then stomped off to her apartment.
"No, my dear, you don't know the truth," Grandpa Hida said with a sigh before leaving for his dojo. He hadn't known that was Mrs. Wataru when he first greeted her, but it was rather easy to figure out who she was with her comments. At least he got to talk to her without her knowing who he was. While she may discount his words, he still gave her some things to think about.
Mrs. Wataru muttered unpleasant things as she stormed back into her home and fell into her favorite chair. She glanced over at her youngest daughter and then at what the little girl was watching intently. Her eyes bulged. "SAYURI?!"
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Ken frowned at the damage before him. Stingmon had done surprisingly well fighting three adult digimon at the same time. Unfortunately, a wing of the museum now had to be rebuilt and some of the art was destroyed. Thankfully, some of the museum's staff had cleared a path for Stingmon to retreat to the outside without destroying any more priceless treasures.
Now out in the open street, Stingmon struggled against his opponents. Black Tailmon and Wizarmon kept him off balance while Greymon would use his Mega Flame attack every time there was an opening. He didn't know how much longer he could hold out.
"Here comes the cavalry!" a voice called out from above. "Armadimon evolve!"
Greymon looked up to see a flash of light and then a large yellow ankylosaur emerge from the light, falling straight toward him. With a mighty crash, the two dinosaurs created a huge pot hole in the street.
The armored dinosaur chuckled as he stood up. "Ankylomon."
Yume watched from an open second story window as her digimon, currently Hanumon, bounced from various places she could grab a momentary hand hold until she was with in striking range. When she was, she pounced at Black Tailmon, but the cat leapt over the yellow ape and added a little push with her claws, sending the off balanced Hanumon head first into a wall.
Sayuri rushed out of the museum with her partner, quickly evolving the digimon from Psychemon to Shima Unimon. She had appeared with Iori and the others from a security computer on the second floor of the museum and opted for different routes to join the battle.
As the striped unicorn digimon moved to protect Stingmon, the giant insect digimon devolved.
"My, my. What good is a horse against a wizard?" Wizarmon taunted. "Are you up to a Magical Game?" The sorcery digimon suddenly multiplied, forming eight targets. "Which is the real me?" they chorused.
Shima Unimon whipped her head into arc while calling out, "Raster Shot!" The beam of energy the shot out washed over all the images, destroying them but only annoying the original as the wide dispersal of the attack didn't cause much damage.
"Black Tailmon!" Sakura called out, pointing at something near the gapping hole in the wall that had been made by Stingmon's retreat.
The cat nodded and went into a run. She then leapt into the air and reared a claw back. She swung hard and punched the wall, causing more of it to collapse.
Wormmon looked up in horror seeing parts of the wall were falling towards his partner. "Ken-chan, look out!"
Ken froze, unsure of where to run to avoid the wall's collapse. Sayuri barreled into him, causing both of them to fall but out of the way of the falling masonry.
The street was flooded with a fog of debris making it impossible to see for several seconds. When the dust settled, the Chosen could see that everyone was all right, but the Dark Seed Children and their digimon were gone.
"We'd better go before that news crew gets a good picture of us," Ken commented.
Sayuri frowned when she saw them. "Right." They all rushed back into the museum.
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Mrs. Wataru said nothing as her daughter entered the apartment an hour late and covered in dust.
Sayuri shifted uneasily under her mother's gaze.
"You went out and fought again," Mrs. Wataru stated coldly.
"I had to go. If I didn't, Ken would've been killed," Sayuri replied calmly.
Mrs. Wataru didn't say anything for a moment. "I... I know. I saw you save him on television."
Sayuri wasn't sure what to say.
"But do you know how worried, how AFRAID, I was watching you fight?" Mrs. Wataru questioned. "You could have been killed when you saved him!"
"I know. But I had to do it. I can't sit back and do nothing when I know they need me! What happens if on the next mission I'm not there and someone gets hurt or dies, when I know I could've been there to prevent it!" Sayuri defended.
"But what about YOU?! What if during the next battle, YOU are the one who gets hurt or dies? How do you think that would make me feel?" Mrs. Wataru demanded.
Sayuri closed her eyes. "I can't promise you that won't happen, but I will be careful. They need me, Mom. I'm part of their team. If I don't help them, who knows what will happen? I can't sit on the side and do nothing! I have to go out and help protect Hitomi, Dad, you, and the whole world from evil digimon! Please, Mom. Please understand."
Mrs. Wataru's body shook as she stood up. "Sayuri... invite your Chosen... friends and their digimon to Odaiba Park on Sunday afternoon for a picnic. I... I'd like to meet them.... You can bring your digimon as well." She went into her room.
Sayuri looked at the digivice in her hand and then at her mother's closed bedroom door. "Thanks, Mom."
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Author's notes:
Eric is from Shaun Garin's Diaries series. Just who 'Eris' is and where she comes from is being told by Shaun's series, D^3 : Digital Diaries Dimensions.
As for as I know, there is no painting named 'World of the Dreamer' though I have seen a few fantasy pictures that are like what I mentioned about it.
'Hida School' may be a bit 'Kenshin-esque,' but it not near the level of Kenshin's school depicted in the anime. The school of sword fighting that has been passed down in the Hida family had produced a few hitokiri, manslayers, but those swordsmen were not the best of the best, just very damn good at killing. Someone skilled in this style would not have lasted long against the abilities of someone like Jinnai, let alone the Hitokiri Bathousai.
Entry 16 - Dreams and Laments
By Lord Archive
Digimon and most characters in this series belong to Toei Animation Inc. and others. They are used without consent.
This story is rated PG-13 for language, adult situations and violence. If you, or your parents, find swearing, children talking about sex or descriptions of fighting objectionable, do not read this.
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"Hello. Mrs. Wataru?" Taichi questioned, standing outside Sayuri's apartment.
"Yes. Can I help you?" Mrs. Wataru wondered.
"Well, I need to talk to you about Sayuri," Taichi replied uncertainly.
"What about her?" Mrs. Wataru asked nervously.
"It's about her role as a Chosen," Taichi answered.
"Chosen?" Mrs. Wataru glared. "What kind of responsibility does she have putting herself in danger? She's only eleven years old."
"When I was eleven, I spent a year in another dimension fighting threats worse than Sayuri will probably ever face that would've either conquered Earth, or destroyed it," Taichi retorted.
"Why don't you keep doing that and leave my daughter out of it," Mrs. Wataru said angrily.
"If it was a matter of me being able to do the job, she would've never been activated. However, when one becomes a Chosen, there's a specific task that only they can perform," Taichi explained while trying to keep his own temper.
"And what kind of task could possibly require my daughter?" Mrs. Wataru demanded.
"If I could answer that question, then we could get someone else to do it," Taichi answered in a smart-ass tone.
"Let me ask you a few questions," Mrs. Wataru told him. "Are Digimon living, thinking creatures?"
"Yes." Taichi nodded.
"Will my daughter have to kill any?" Mrs. Wataru pressed.
"Well, she already has and probably would have to do it again," Taichi answered.
Mrs. Wataru looked at Taichi as if he was the worst thing on the planet. "Has any of you Chosen ever died?"
Taichi frowned. "Yes. Two of us out of hundreds."
"So, you're asking me to let my daughter go out and fight and kill living creatures, when she could possibly die doing it. What do you think my answer to that is?!" Mrs. Wataru yelled.
Taichi flinched as the door slammed into his face. "Diplomat, I am not." He sighed. At least he had faired better than Iori. Mrs. Wataru hadn't even talked to him.
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The true art of fighting is not in the ability to beat the shit out of people. The art was about pushing oneself to physical perfection, to harness one's spirit and gain a certain sense of harmony with the world. However, there was always someone that constantly failed to look beyond martial arts as a means to beat people up.
Shiro had always been a strong boy. After failing to knock over a pencil-neck geek and getting kicked out of a mall by a little twerp half his size, he wanted to become even stronger. He joined kendo to gain that strength and discovered he had a knack for it. In a month he quickly rose in the ranks and was top of the introductory class. Now he was waiting impatiently for his first test in order to advance to the next level, something which students who had been there for several months had yet to accomplish.
Shiro snickered as he noticed a young boy enter the dojo with a girl in a wheelchair, who stopped at the door. He pranced across the room like he owned it. "What do you want here?"
"I came to see how good the students are," Iori replied in a flat tone.
Shiro laughed. "We don't let runts into our dojo."
"Oh, really," Iori replied. "Can you tell me what this dojo stands for?"
"It stands for power. Something you don't have," Shiro boasted.
Yume giggled.
Shiro glared. "Something funny, retard?"
"Retard?!" Yume shrieked.
Iori's expression flattened. "I think you need to be taught a lesson."
"Who's going to teach me? You?" Shiro laughed.
"Yes," Iori dead-panned.
The kendo students all began to laugh, but not all for the same reason.
"I bet a hundred yen the runt lasts less than ten seconds," one of them called out.
"I'll take all bets for Shiro to win," replied one of the older students.
"You think that kid could possibly win?" Shiro snarled.
"Anything can happen," the older student replied with a smirk.
"It's your money." Shiro laughed as he walked across the room and grabbed his shinnai. He then turned towards Iori. "Where's your weapon?"
Iori calmly walked over to a closest, pulled out a key and unlocked it. He then pulled his own bamboo sword. "Right here."
Shiro blinked as Iori moved to face against him.
The older student grinned. "Top student, Sakimori Shiro, verses Hida Iori-sensei. Begin!"
"Sensei?" Shiro laughed. "So what if he's related to Hida-Sensei? Sensei is a title undeserving of a runt." He then attacked, raining blow after blow down upon Iori. The storm lasted for a full minute. "Had enough yet?"
"That was weak," Iori replied. His shinnai blurred as he stabbed Shiro with the tip repeatedly.
"How?" Shiro wheezed out as he bonelessly fell backwards.
"How many times did he hit him?" questioned a student.
Various numbers came up ranging from six to twelve.
"Seventeen. One hit for each year he has lived in ignorance," Iori corrected them.
"Perhaps Shiro isn't the only one who needs a lesson," an elderly voice intoned.
"Grandfather?" Iori questioned.
"A teacher can not act with anger as you just have. Even though Shiro needed to be put in his place, beating him up is not the answer," Grandpa Hida said disapprovingly.
"I'm sorry, Grandfather," Iori apologized with his head bowed.
Shiro groaned as he woke up.
Grandpa Hida then smirked. "Perhaps I should test your control. Hida school."
Iori swallowed nervously. "This isn't for the dojo, is it?"
"Not yet," Grandpa Hida replied simply as if his words were a threat to his grandson. "Let's begin." He drew his shinnai and attacked.
While the novice students weren't well versed in kendo, they knew the battle before them did not follow the forms or style of swordsmenship that they were being taught. The combatants danced all over the dojo floor, even bounced off the walls a couple times as they dueled. The graceful arcs the weapons made as they cut through the air held all the power of kendo, but were far more offensive, more lethal.
Even though Shiro was upset at being humiliated by a little kid, he had to admit that the twerp was way above him as skills went. It'd take him years of training just to get to where Iori's skill was today.
None of the students could blink as they tried to absorb every detail of the match, watching as their teacher and his grandson leapt at each other with seemingly murderous intent. The shinnai practice swords tried to inflict grievous injury, only to repeatedly miss as the target dodged or blocked. Over and over again the shinnai connected with each other until the sound of a thunderous explosion filled the room as the durable practice swords both broke from the powerful hit and the previous abuse inflicted during that match and other battles.
Grandpa Hida looked at the half of a shinnai still in his hands, then at Iori's sword, which had the top half bent over and flopped around a bit, still connected by a few stands of bamboo. The elderly Hida then chuckled. "Never had that happen before. Guess this is a draw."
"Guess so," Iori replied.
"What was that?" Shiro questioned. "That was NOT kendo."
Grandpa Hida smirked. "That is a school of sword-fighting that has existed for a thousand years. It was considered a manslayer style and has been passed down secretly through the Hida family line for many generations. Though I may consider training others in this style, but only if they understand what this dojo and the Hida school of sword-fighting represents. Power has NOTHING to do with it."
Iori knew that wasn't exactly true. The power of love and friendship and the desire to have the strength to protect them was behind the dojo and the school, but it was not the power to be the best like Shiro believed. Patience also played a factor, as Iori now had to wait for class to finish before asking his grandfather for a little favor.
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Sayuri woke up with a jolt. Her heart beating fast. She had a strange and disturbingly vivid dream, but was quickly having a hard time remembering it. In the dream she was watching the television showing a digimon battle, but she was sure she wasn't part of it. In fact, she doubted many of the Odaiba Chosen were involved in it though the fight seemed to be at a library or possibly a museum in downtown Tokyo. She was sure something went wrong during it. She strained her brain trying to remember what it was, but was coming up blank.
Sayuri shook her head and looked at the alarm clock, shutting it off a full minute before its alarm would sound. She pulled herself from bed, got ready for the day, and helped prepare her little sister for another day of preschool.
Mrs. Wataru looked at both her daughters carefully as they were about to leave. "Hitomi, have a nice day. Sayuri, you are to come home right after school and no talking to... them."
"Yes, Mother," Sayuri replied bitterly before leaving with her sister. She had never felt that her mother was overprotective before, but now believed very differently. Her mother had even gone as far as considered pulling her from school to keep her away from Iori and the others. Thankfully her father had talked her mother out of doing that. She was afraid her mother would get the idea to inform the school about Iori, Taichi and Yume owning digimon.
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Goggleboy2: School sucks.
Redemption: It's not that bad.
Goggleboy2: Says you, Ken. You're going to a museum today. I've got two quizzes.
SwordMastuh!: Got you beat, Daisuke. I've got a major test tomorrow and thanks to my last adventure, I haven't opened my school books for a whole year! I'm going to flunk this test BIG time!
Goggleboy2: Eric, there's always summer school. ;)
SwordMastuh!: And be in class in July?! No thanks!
Goggleboy2: If I've got to be in school in July, so should everyone else.
SwordMastuh!: Not my fault Japanese school year actually lasts all year.
Redemption: Eric, how are the girls?
SwordMastuh!: They're going through a bit of culture shock, but Hikaru is helping them with that and English lessons.
Goggleboy2: Is 'Eris' going to school yet?
SwordMastuh!: She can't. She's still rather clueless on how to speak English.
OriginalGoggleboy: So is the original.
Firebird: I read that!
OriginalGoggleboy: Oops.
Goggleboy2: :lol Taichi's back in the dog house.
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"And this painting is called 'World of the Dreamer.' The artist was supposedly quite insane, but we can not deny the talent he possessed where we have an unusual blend of realism and surrealism. It has the impossible Escher-like quality of what is viewable through the mirror depicted in the painting, but far more grounded in reality with the mirror existing in a seemingly ordinary room...." the museum tour guide continued to drone on.
Ken fought the urge to yawn. Daisuke would've preferred his quizzes over this field trip. This was the worst way to expose children to art, as it was extremely boring and was anything but interesting. Ichijouji could see that the painting was brilliantly done and was a powerful piece, but the guy explaining it was putting everyone to sleep. The only time the guy shut up was when they moved to the next piece of art, to further bore them to tears.
It took Ken's group a half hour just to go down the hall. Had they been in school, he would've been going home now but they'd be at the museum for another couple hours. He couldn't think how it could get any worse.
The museum's alarms blaring provided Ichijouji the answer of just how it could get worse.
Ken looked back down the hallway to see a rather startling sight. A Black Agumon was pulling down the 'World of the Dreamer' painting while a Plotmon, Candmon and Tsukaimon were positioned to protect him.
"I got it," Black Agumon announced.
"We also have a Chosen," Plotmon replied evilly. "We'll have to kill him."
The Candmon tried to use his fiery attack, but fell far short of his target.
Ken took a step back, trying to figure out what to do. If he ran with his classmates, they would likely be hurt by these digimon.
Tsukaimon barreled down the hallway trying to ram Ken, but he too came up short as he crashed into a silken web that hadn't been there seconds before.
"Wormmon?" Ken called out in surprise.
"No time for pleasantries," Wormmon commented, thankful for having a good excuse not to explain why he had tagged along.
"Our thoughts exactly," Sakura added. "Let's see what you boys can do. But ladies first!"
"Plotmon evolve!" the puppy called out, only to be replaced with a cat with gun-smoke gray fur with jet black stripes. "Black Tailmon!"
Hiroshi held out his digivice.
"Candmon evolve!" The living candle shimmered in a pillar of light that quickly faded to reveal a western looking wizard with yellow, purple and red clothes. "Wizarmon!"
Black Agumon handed the painting over to Hitochi before calling out, "Agumon evolve!" Light engulfed the dark dinosaur and then subsided to reveal a large blue Tyrannosaurus Rex with black stripes and black skull over his face. "Greymon!"
Takeshi shook his digivice. "Evolve, damn it!"
Tsukaimon could only shrug as he failed to evolve.
Ken was thankful that the museum had high ceilings, and not just because the Greymon would've put a hole through it had it been any shorter. "Wormmon, hold them off while I call for help."
Ken's digimon nodded. "Wormmon evolve!" A brilliant white pillar flashed around the green caterpillar which heralded the appearance of the giant humanoid green and black armored insect, "Stingmon!"
"Oh, I'm scared," Black Tailmon dead-panned. "Three on one aren't good odds."
"For you!" Stingmon shot back and then leapt at them.
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Sayuri pouted as she walked slowly to the front gate of her school with Yume and Iori.
"Your mother will understand," Iori tried to assure her.
"I doubt it. She won't let anyone explain why I'm needed," Sayuri replied bitterly.
"Acceptance takes time. I certainly know THAT," Yume offered, patting the arm of her wheelchair. "She's just upset now. She'll see the truth later."
Sayuri shook her head. Life wasn't that simple.
Iori's school bag began to beep.
"What is it?" the girls questioned as Iori fished his D-Terminal out of his bag.
Iori read the message and frowned. "The Dark Seed children have begun to act. At least four of them are at Tokyo Museum of Fine Arts stealing a painting."
"How are we going to get there?" Yume asked.
"It'll take us too long by subway," Iori replied. He looked at Sayuri. "You'd better go home before your mother gets upset."
Sayuri turned around to leave, but then remembered her dream from that morning. If she left now she was sure Ken's battle would end badly. Her face hardened with determination and looked Iori in the eye. "No. I'm going with you."
"But you don't have Psychemon or your D-3," Iori pointed out.
Sayuri reached into her bag and pulled out her D-3. "Hitomi fished it out of the trash after Mom threw it out."
"But Psychemon is in the Digital World," Yume reminded.
"We'll just port there and..." Sayuri blinked. "Port straight over to the museum! The Edmonton group has done it, why can't we?"
"Sounds like a plan to me," Armadimon commented from the nearby bush he was hiding in.
"What about your mother?" Iori questioned.
"She's going to have to accept this eventually, and Ken needs all of us," Sayuri insisted.
"If you're sure..." Iori trailed off.
Sayuri nodded curtly.
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"Is something troubling you, Miss?" Grandpa Hida questioned a woman as she paced in front of an apartment complex.
Mrs. Wataru frowned as she noticed some children walk home from school. "My daughter is running late coming home."
"I don't see how a few minutes should cause you to worry. She could still be helping to clean her classroom," Grandpa Hida pointed out.
"Her class has started to take turns cleaning, and it's not her turn," Mrs. Wataru retorted.
"Perhaps she stayed behind to help anyway," Grandpa Hida returned.
Mrs. Wataru frowned. "She might have done that."
"Excuse me if I'm prying too much, but is there some sort of problem?" Grandpa Hida questioned.
Mrs. Wataru folded her arms. "Let's just say I disapprove of her recent choice of friends."
"Oh." Grandpa Hida nodded. "Are they the type to skip school, beat up kids, vandalize, and cause all sorts of trouble?"
"No, but they might as well be," Mrs. Wataru replied bitterly.
"What kind of kids are they?" Grandpa Hida questioned.
Mrs. Wataru didn't immediately reply. "She met a few kids who have digimon and wants to join them."
"Is there anything wrong with that?" Grandpa Hida asked.
"Anything wrong?" Mrs. Wataru stared at him like he grew a second head. "I am NOT letting my daughter go off to fight alien creatures where she could get hurt or even killed!"
"I suppose that could happen. But I also suppose your daughter could be hit by a car walking home from school," Grandpa Hida said seriously.
"That's not likely to happen," Mrs. Wataru shot back.
"From what I understand, the car accident is more likely to happen. Even a spectator to a digimon battle is more likely to be killed than the children involved in it," Grandpa Hida pointed out calmly.
"And how would you know that?" Mrs. Wataru demanded hotly.
"Digimon have become a bit of a hobby of mine. I read about them as much as I can," Grandpa Hida replied. He wasn't exactly lying, he was just leaving out why it had become a hobby.
"Perhaps you can answer this question, why are some children chosen to get digimon and others are not?" Mrs. Wataru asked.
"Because destiny plays a role. A child is Chosen because he or she is needed. To deny a child to work with their digimon is to deny the child's destiny. If the child is not allowed to act, others may suffer for the inaction," Grandpa Hida answered.
"What about the destiny the child had withOUT digimon? What about living a normal life?" Mrs. Wataru questioned strongly. "I met a thirteen-year-old girl with a digimon, she's pregnant and has killed countless times!"
"When I was a child, a pregnant thirteen-year-old was not unheard of. I even knew a girl who became a mother at eleven. What the girl did is only considered 'abnormal' today because of the changes society has seen, not the people," Grandpa Hida retorted. "And who's to say that in another fifty years digimon will be commonplace and thirteen-year-olds are once again considered adults by our laws."
Mrs. Wataru glared daggers at the elderly man. "You don't know what you are talking about." She then stomped off to her apartment.
"No, my dear, you don't know the truth," Grandpa Hida said with a sigh before leaving for his dojo. He hadn't known that was Mrs. Wataru when he first greeted her, but it was rather easy to figure out who she was with her comments. At least he got to talk to her without her knowing who he was. While she may discount his words, he still gave her some things to think about.
Mrs. Wataru muttered unpleasant things as she stormed back into her home and fell into her favorite chair. She glanced over at her youngest daughter and then at what the little girl was watching intently. Her eyes bulged. "SAYURI?!"
----------------------
Ken frowned at the damage before him. Stingmon had done surprisingly well fighting three adult digimon at the same time. Unfortunately, a wing of the museum now had to be rebuilt and some of the art was destroyed. Thankfully, some of the museum's staff had cleared a path for Stingmon to retreat to the outside without destroying any more priceless treasures.
Now out in the open street, Stingmon struggled against his opponents. Black Tailmon and Wizarmon kept him off balance while Greymon would use his Mega Flame attack every time there was an opening. He didn't know how much longer he could hold out.
"Here comes the cavalry!" a voice called out from above. "Armadimon evolve!"
Greymon looked up to see a flash of light and then a large yellow ankylosaur emerge from the light, falling straight toward him. With a mighty crash, the two dinosaurs created a huge pot hole in the street.
The armored dinosaur chuckled as he stood up. "Ankylomon."
Yume watched from an open second story window as her digimon, currently Hanumon, bounced from various places she could grab a momentary hand hold until she was with in striking range. When she was, she pounced at Black Tailmon, but the cat leapt over the yellow ape and added a little push with her claws, sending the off balanced Hanumon head first into a wall.
Sayuri rushed out of the museum with her partner, quickly evolving the digimon from Psychemon to Shima Unimon. She had appeared with Iori and the others from a security computer on the second floor of the museum and opted for different routes to join the battle.
As the striped unicorn digimon moved to protect Stingmon, the giant insect digimon devolved.
"My, my. What good is a horse against a wizard?" Wizarmon taunted. "Are you up to a Magical Game?" The sorcery digimon suddenly multiplied, forming eight targets. "Which is the real me?" they chorused.
Shima Unimon whipped her head into arc while calling out, "Raster Shot!" The beam of energy the shot out washed over all the images, destroying them but only annoying the original as the wide dispersal of the attack didn't cause much damage.
"Black Tailmon!" Sakura called out, pointing at something near the gapping hole in the wall that had been made by Stingmon's retreat.
The cat nodded and went into a run. She then leapt into the air and reared a claw back. She swung hard and punched the wall, causing more of it to collapse.
Wormmon looked up in horror seeing parts of the wall were falling towards his partner. "Ken-chan, look out!"
Ken froze, unsure of where to run to avoid the wall's collapse. Sayuri barreled into him, causing both of them to fall but out of the way of the falling masonry.
The street was flooded with a fog of debris making it impossible to see for several seconds. When the dust settled, the Chosen could see that everyone was all right, but the Dark Seed Children and their digimon were gone.
"We'd better go before that news crew gets a good picture of us," Ken commented.
Sayuri frowned when she saw them. "Right." They all rushed back into the museum.
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Mrs. Wataru said nothing as her daughter entered the apartment an hour late and covered in dust.
Sayuri shifted uneasily under her mother's gaze.
"You went out and fought again," Mrs. Wataru stated coldly.
"I had to go. If I didn't, Ken would've been killed," Sayuri replied calmly.
Mrs. Wataru didn't say anything for a moment. "I... I know. I saw you save him on television."
Sayuri wasn't sure what to say.
"But do you know how worried, how AFRAID, I was watching you fight?" Mrs. Wataru questioned. "You could have been killed when you saved him!"
"I know. But I had to do it. I can't sit back and do nothing when I know they need me! What happens if on the next mission I'm not there and someone gets hurt or dies, when I know I could've been there to prevent it!" Sayuri defended.
"But what about YOU?! What if during the next battle, YOU are the one who gets hurt or dies? How do you think that would make me feel?" Mrs. Wataru demanded.
Sayuri closed her eyes. "I can't promise you that won't happen, but I will be careful. They need me, Mom. I'm part of their team. If I don't help them, who knows what will happen? I can't sit on the side and do nothing! I have to go out and help protect Hitomi, Dad, you, and the whole world from evil digimon! Please, Mom. Please understand."
Mrs. Wataru's body shook as she stood up. "Sayuri... invite your Chosen... friends and their digimon to Odaiba Park on Sunday afternoon for a picnic. I... I'd like to meet them.... You can bring your digimon as well." She went into her room.
Sayuri looked at the digivice in her hand and then at her mother's closed bedroom door. "Thanks, Mom."
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Author's notes:
Eric is from Shaun Garin's Diaries series. Just who 'Eris' is and where she comes from is being told by Shaun's series, D^3 : Digital Diaries Dimensions.
As for as I know, there is no painting named 'World of the Dreamer' though I have seen a few fantasy pictures that are like what I mentioned about it.
'Hida School' may be a bit 'Kenshin-esque,' but it not near the level of Kenshin's school depicted in the anime. The school of sword fighting that has been passed down in the Hida family had produced a few hitokiri, manslayers, but those swordsmen were not the best of the best, just very damn good at killing. Someone skilled in this style would not have lasted long against the abilities of someone like Jinnai, let alone the Hitokiri Bathousai.