Dragon Ball/Z/GT Fan Fiction / Yu-Gi-Oh! Fan Fiction / Digimon Fan Fiction / Final Fantasy - All Series Fan Fiction / Gundam Wing Fan Fiction / Sonic Series Fan Fiction / Fan Fiction ❯ Ultimatum 3: Trance Trauma ❯ Aggression? The Secret of the Unity ( Chapter 3 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Raynor (VO)

Last time on Trance Trauma, Ultimanium got everyone together for the main briefing, but it was still a bunch of garbage if you ask me. Seems some moron calling himself the Prospector abdicated from Magnus' world government and has possession of the J, the very first prototype dimensionsplitter, as Ulty calls it, which is a highly unstable version of the J probes that he uses now in his missions. The Prospector dude locked himself away on some island somewhere, surrounded himself with a private army and demanded 50 billion dollars for the release of the J - otherwise, in two weeks, he would activate it and the sixth dimension would collapse, and that somehow is supposed to destroy all of creation as we know it. Hey, don't ask me, I'm just here for the room and board.

What's WORSE, with the little time we have, the guy insists that we HANG OUT aboard the Argetlahm and get to know our "bunkmates"! Let me tell you, I don't need any assistance to finish this job, let alone sensitivity lessons. I say we just barge right in there and kill the bastard, but it seems our "leader" has some special plan in mind. Whatever, he's the guy who signs my paychecks, so I'd better shut up now...












**** ****


A gentle, seaside breeze swept into the room. The man sat in direct range of the gust of wind, and shivered slightly as it hit him head on. With no response, he swiveled his chair around slowly, until it faced the desk again. He picked up a watch that lied sprawled on the desk surface and dangled it in his hand, before clenching his fist. His head pivoted as a door opening could be heard from the other side of the office. Standing there was a man in a dark-beige flightsuit. He quickly came to attention, shattering the morbid silence with his heavy boot crashing against the polished floor.

"We await further orders."

The man dropped the watch down back onto the table, and faced the soldier. "When was the last time we changed the island's trajectory?"

"I believe 2 hours ago, sir."

"I don't want estimates, Trooper. I want the cold hard facts. When you leave this room, I want you to head down to Engineering and get the statistics. Even if you're confident in what you get, I want you to tell them to change everything - velocity, angle, every last piece of information - I want NO one finding us."

The soldier bowed. "Aye, sir."

The chair squeaked as it turned back to the window. "Tell me, how is Project Trance doing?"

"Relatively quickly, sir. We should be able to go Trance in a week and a half from now."

"Appleton, did I hear a 'we'? There is no 'we' here. There's a me, an I, but no 'we'. Just do as you're told."

Appleton nodded. He knew exactly what Project Trance meant to the man he only knew as the Prospector, and that was a terrible lot. His office, which he occupied now, was only on the sixth floor of the gargantuan tower that sat on Gaia's Isle. Every other sector of the tower that wasn't a broom closet, bedroom or security office was dotted with mysterious machinery, dedicated to finding the secret of going Trance. Every one of the 80 floors above him was a progressive level of Trance research. Once a coworker of the Prospector had the gall to ask the man directly what 'Trancing' exactly was, and if it were related to 'that FFIX game', as he worded it. He was given an abrupt "no". Well, he had a shell from a sniper rifle in his head by the end of the day. No one even attempted to speak to the Prospector on the matter, so at this point Appleton knew that he was in too deep.

"Yes, sir." he quickly found the urge to leave the office quickly.

The Prospector watched with ravenous eyes as the doors closed with a distasteful thud. Slowly, his thoughts drifted away.



"Soon, the hybrid will exist...."







********


Ma ny people aboard the Argetlahm were simply walking the halls, though some had confined themselves to their rooms to inspect their bunkmate's belongings, and just indulge in normal conversation.

But Raynor attempted to avoid either situation.

He sat at his desk, stabbing between his fingers with a large dagger he had dug out of his bag. MP3s were continually playing from the computer next to him, ones that had been downloaded during the first tour by Davis. When Takato and Raynor first moved into the room, the old bunk listing was still taped to the door. The bunk had previously been used by both Davis and Conker. Takato was lying on Davis' old top bunk, examining scratches in the wall apparently made by the bored Digidestined several years ago.

"D.M+K.K... whoa, this is Davis alright."

"Who the hell is this Davis kid?" Raynor growled, narrowly missing his pinky with the long knife. "All I've been hearing out of you since we got on this piece of junk is Davis Davis Davis."

"One of the second gen of Digidestined. He left his goggles behind so Ulty let me have them."

"Digi digi digi. God, this place is so goddamn weird." He turned away for his computer for a second, his averagely-po'ed face turning into an extremely po'ed face. "I'm letting you be my bunk buddy, for God sakes could you get that... THING off my bed?"

Takato swung his head down from the top bunk, only to see Guilmon sat down on the bed helplessly trying to grasp a book that he had dug out of Takato's bag. Next to him sat Raynor's suitcase. Guilmon tore his attention away from opening the novel to Raynor's complaint. "What, this thing?" he kicked the suitcase, making it land and popping open, spilling its contents all over the floor.

Takato smiled half-amused, at least until he saw Raynor's expression. "...not THAT thing."

"One LAST chance!" Raynor snarled to himself, scooping up toiletries and pairs of socks from the ground. "After that, Ultimanium gets a word from me..." Raynor reached for a pair of underwear he had seen on the ground before, but stopped when he realized it wasn't there. Slowly he peered up... and saw them on Guilmon's head.

"This is a neat hat! Can I have it?"


********


Raynor went stomping into a turbolift. "God damn stupid kid and his fricking idiot dinosaur lizard thingy and his..." his ranting was quickly cut out by the turbolift doors as they slid shut behind him. Meanwhile, Gohan and V2 strided into the turbolift next to it, where Eric sat leaning against the wall next to the control panel.

"Hey," Gohan quiped. "You headed to the rec room?"

Eric blinked. "Rec room? This place has a rec room?"

V2 nodded. "Yeah, I'm not sure if the computers work anymore though. Ulty's headed down there right now, he said something about getting Tribes 2 in the mail, and he was going to install it right away."

"I'm not the biggest computer gamer in the world... but... ah, hell, sure."

By the time Gohan and V2 slipped into the turbolift, the other had come down already with Raynor already on his way to the bridge. Shaun slipped out of the shadows, and, checking around him, into the turbolift. He turned quickly and examined the computer panel ahead of him. "...5, bridge, 4, male/misc bunks, 3, female bunks, 2, training floor, 1, ship defenses, B1, engine room. Leeeeeet's try.... 2." Shaun reached out and tapped the large block 2, and immediately felt his heart leap as the turbolift plunged down the shaft. Less than two seconds after the elevator started moving, it had already come to a halt. Regaining his composure, Shaun stepped out of the turbolift car and gazed down the hall in front of him. It was the last part of the ship that looked like it hadn't been touched in eons. Apparently no one had even looked at training themselves yet.

"Well, these people must be pretty confident in themselves." Shaun huffed. He began to slide cautiously down the hall, until coming to a pair of double doors at the far end of the hall on his left. With some effort he pushed open the doors. What he saw startled him somewhat.

The gym in front of him certainly hadn't been repaired since it was last used. The wood floor had the prerequisite layer of dust, and the polish had faded. But more significant was the massive burns and the hundreds of wood chips covering the grounds, and the center of the gym, where the wood was completely stripped away. It appeared as if something had impacted the floor extremely hard to do that sort of damage. In the corner lied the two pieces of the Buster Sword.

"...The Buster Sword?" Shaun half-jogged across the gym to the corner where the two large plates of metal lied, one with the handle still attached. He leant down to the wreckage and examined the handiwork. "...this is it, alright. Cloud Strife himself was here with the crew, like the reports said..." His eyes caught on to a pair of decapitated/dismembered corpses against the wall nearby. Shaun went over to inspect them next. "Funny, these aren't people at all! They're cyborgs..." he lifted up the remaining arm of the left one, exposing a shield logo. "They were Ultramagnus', alright. Ulty's not making this up. This must be where they kept some of the ones seized onboard for testing."

"...seized..." a voice crackled, a short distance away from him.

Shaun jumped, one hand on the yo-yo clamped to his belt. He quickly threw himself around - and stared straight into the face of a half-functioning cyborg, sat down against the far wall. With a loud squeal, it's eyes flared a neon green, that flickered a bit before finally settling in. "...we were seized...Ultramagnus... forgive us..."

"Ultramagnus is long gone," Shaun growled. "but, anyways, I still never anticipated to see another cyborg operational as long as I'd live."

"I am still op-op-op-operational. I must establish communications with Epoch Rock... and tell them I am still alive to defeat the Argetlahm crew."

*I've seen this model before,* Shaun ran through his mind. *this is one of the grunt cyborgs that were Ultramagnus' shock troops. Some of the weakest kind he had, but they came in numbers. If he tries anything, I should be able to beat him...*

"I said, Ultramagnus has been destroyed. He's been dead for nine years now. Now, you're extremely damaged there, I suggest you just put yourself out of your misery while you still can."

"I must de-de-defeat... all... Davis... Conker... Goku... these are just some of my targets..."

*That must be the deal, he hasn't been on for nine years so he still thinks Ulty's old crew is running the show. The guy's stuck in a time warp.*

"Whatever. Anyways, if you really want to get to the Argetlahm you have to get through me first."

With little warning, the cyborg leapt to his feet. "That can be arranged!" Before Shaun had a chance to say anything else, the robot was headed in a mad charge toward him, leaving a trail of sparks in his wake.

"He's really going for it..." Shaun began to back away, but quickly found himself up against the back wall of the gym. "Well, THIS is just nice!" Shaun ripped the yo-yo off his belt and flipped it at the rapidly approaching menace. The projectile hit the cyborg with a loud clunk, slowing it down somewhat, but leaving little damage other than a scrape on the metal surface of its chest. "Oh, this is just gr..." Shaun lost some air as the cyborg launched a fist into his gut, making him fly back a short distance and land sideways on the ground. He quickly rolled out of the way of the fist that plowed straight into the ground, and stumbled to his feet.

"Damn it, this is going to be a bit harder than I thought. If I had the Mega Launcher I could... let's see, what else can I work with?..." as the android began lumbering towards Shaun, he quickly glanced around himself. "Man, this place is useless!" he picked up the bottom half of the Buster Sword and threw it spinning vertically at the cyborg, which impacted with another discouraging deflection. As the blade hilt clattered against the ground, the android stumbled back, before regaining its ground and beginning its advance once again.

Shaun began to brace himself. "Oh, so THAT'S how you want to play it..." he lunged headon at the android, ready to deliver back the cheap shot that he had received. As he brought his hand forward, it was intercepted easily by a mechanical elbow. As he quickly brought his left fist up in a backhand aimed at the head, it cocked back, narrowly dodging the attack. The android's head flung back, striking his opponent's forehead with full force. Shaun shoved himself back from the fight, and evaded a pair of clenched fists that slammed into the ground where he once stood. As the android quickly regained his stance and dove straight at Shaun, he hopped into the air to dodge the sack, and brought his fists, interwined, down on the back of the android's cranium, sending him facefirst down into the floor with a crash. As the droid struggled to get up, Shaun had begun his backpedal again.

"DIE or something!" Shaun held his fists to his side and back, as a minor, white aura began to surround his hands. Once again, he flung himself at the robot. "Sonic...Fist!!" he threw his hand straight at the android's chest, barely visible save for the rippling air that surrounded it.

THWANG

"OW OW OW OW OW!!!" Shaun immediately lurched back, hopping on one foot. He stopped a good 8 feet away, before examining his knuckles, which were a painful beet red. "Okay, maybe THAT isn't going to work."

"YOU are with this accursed Argetlahm! You must die!"

"Maaaaaaan..." he glanced over to his side. A door labeled FIRING RANGE was within sprint's reach. Shaun whipped the yo-yo again at an arc so it twisted around the android's feet, catching it by surprise. Shaun ripped upward with the cord with aggravated force, flipping the android up, over and onto his back with a thud. He quickly reeled the cord in again and dove in a kneeling position on top of the robot, delivering several hard punches to it's vulnerable face. When the android was visiablly stunned, Shaun leapt and made a run for the range, and threw open the door, diving in. He flicked on the lights, showing the ancient shooting range, you guessed it, covered in dust. Several old handguns lined a table in the back. Having no time for a decision, Shaun grabbed a Desert Eagle and made a run back for the door. It flung open in front of him as he reached for the handle, exposing his assailant again. He ducked a punch and gradually began backing away as the robot launched attack after attack. Shaun finally backpedalled away from the android and finished loading the gun. The laser sighting clicked on as the attacker began his last rush.

"Burning Force!"

A marroon aura flashed on the barrel of the pistol for a brief second before it fired the ball of fire, with a red-white corkscrew trailing the shot. The attack hit with a ripple of flame, sending the android back into the wall, its front armor partially shattered from the lash of the blow. As the android struggled to push itself forward, Shaun fired several more normal rounds into the fracture, blasting a small section of the breastplate apart and mortally damaging the electronic instruments inside the casing. The green eyes began to pulse again.

"Ultramagnus! I have... fai.." the eyes blanked out.

Shaun kept the pistol held with both hands for several seconds, keeping a constant eye on the robot before placing the gun back on the table. "...whoa...these guys sure take a beating! You seriously can't tell me the guys hanging around the Argetlahm before could take an ARMY of these things... I've SERIOUSLY got to talk to Ultimanium now." He gave one last look to the targeting range, and the group of targeting posters lined up at the far edge of the room, before turning and leaving.


********


The rec room had been radically changed since its last use. Nearly all the devices in the room had been updated - more powerful computers, a larger TV, and a different couch. But the FF tapes were still there. (A/N - If that's not foreshadowing, then I don't know what is. ^_- Hint: I'm better at it now.) Crono, Locke, and Trunks were sitting around the couch watching TV. Rika occupied a newly-placed recliner by the door, deep into a book she'd dug out of her bag. Gohan was explaining to Goten the intricacies of Windows XP. Armadillomon was attempting to be cool and noticable and failing miserably. Takato and Guilmon were hiding Raynor's articles of clothing. Raynor was trying to find Takato and Guilmon.

There were some sections of the ship that were still off limits.

See, the Argetlahm was just like any other capship that housed people. There were several hundred bunk rooms hidden all over the ship, they were simply on the floors above the bridge and behind it. And every single ship had to have its observation domes. They were most often referred to as "pleasure domes", since their reduced gravity often meant that people just floated around and that generally disrupted other people trying to enjoy the silence of space. No one actually knew about them save for Ultimanium, but he himself had to bridge to use for his brooding purposes. (Think the low-grav domes in Supernova and you get the idea.)

Renamon simply hovered clean in the air and stared out into the emptyness before her. She would've thought, bu...

"Hey!"

...well, you get the picture.

Renamon sighed to herself as she turned to she who her intruder was. *It's that other digimon that was aboard this ship. Hmm... I don't know, but something about him makes me feel uneasy.* "Yes, what do you want?"

The halls outside of the pleasure dome were completely pitch black, the darkness only being broken by the light from the sun pouring in through the pleasure dome windowing. V2 stepped out of the shadows. "This part of the ship is off limits."

"I honestly do not know what harm is to come of simply being here. I wish only to be left alone, to think." With that, Renamon turned her back again to the other Rookie.

"Do I need to force you?"

Renamon never moved. "I simply wish to be left here, alone, to my thoughts. I do not wish to fight. And besides, though we are both Rookies, I would conclude that I have a bit more battle experience than you do."

V2 snickered, waving both hands disagreeingly. "Whoa, whoa, whoa. Rookie? Listen here, I've been in more of a society-threatening fight than all yours combined. Rookie isn't generally the term for a Veedramon, either."

That got Renamon's attention. Turning back, she beared eyes down into the hall behind her - with a Veedramon nearly taking up the full height of it. "Dare I ask when you digivolved?"

"Just a little special ability of mine. I AM the offspring of Veemon and Gatomon, you know. Veemon was given special shots to nullify his digivolution restraints during the Argetlahm's first tour, and that combined with Gatomon's 'features' has made that trait permanent in me. The digivice that Gohan has is an absolute hoax. I digivolve, by myself, where I want to, when I want to. And getting enough power to go Ultimate is something I, I as in V2, have to do."

"You seem to want to get me out of here awfully badly."

"Ultimanium's rules, you know."

"That's Ultimanium's responsibility, you mean."

V2 threw his clawed fist into an open hand. "Do I need to make you move, or are you going to do it peacefully? I'm going to remind you, this section of the ship is OFF LIMITS. Do you understand?!"

"Well, aren't YOU pushy. Fine, I'll leave, but only on the account that you're threatening me. If worse comes to worse, I won't be afraid to talk this up with Ultimanium. Toodles." Rika flickered in the air momentarily before teleporting into thin air.

V2 muttered to himself. "Gotta keep an eye on these new digimon. Some of them apparently have no idea of discipline, and their attitude should be going in the crapper any time now."

"I'd say yours is pretty low already."

V2 flung himself around. "Who's there?"

Eric stepped into the sunlight, stopping to pop a coin into a vintage pop machine that had been placed in the abandoned hall, seemingly years ago. "YOU'RE the one here that needs a little attitude adjustment, Veemon, or whatever your name is. I seriously don't know how Renamon's habitation of the pleasure dome relates to the downfall of Ulty's leadership here."

"Well, well. Looks like one of our OTHER newb friends, here. When'd you show up?"

"I kind of got 'lost' from Gohan, and I see you did too. If you want to stick around here very long, I insist that you stop putting your nose into other peoples' business."

Eric shuddered slightly as V2 began approaching him. "You seem to forget, head-in-the-Clouds, that I am the senior Argetlahm member talking here. I know what's best for my comrades."

Ultimanium was next to slide into the corridor. "Seniority is none of your concern, V2. I saw what you did to Renamon, now I insist that you leave and hand this area back over to her."

V2 bowed. "I'm sorry, Ultimanium. It's just that.."

"You wanted Renamon to follow the rules. Well, listen, I don't really have any specific rules. I never stated fully that anyone was NOT to enter here, and besides, I want nothing handicapping my fighters' abilities or enjoyment of their stay here. Is that understood? I know you're the "senior" member, but let's meet end to end, you probably used your attacks about once or twice throughout the remaining campaign against Ultramagnus. So just be quiet. Well, I have to get going, I have a Tribes 2 deathmatch to attend to."

Both Eric and V2 watched silently as Ultimanium hid himself back in the darkness, his boots clicking as he made his way further down the corridor.

Eric leant over to V2. "I'm kind of lost here, maybe we should follow him?"

"I'm kind of wondering how I got here in the first place. Anyways, what was the guilt trip for? Oh, yeah, I remember, you were trying to get on Rika's good side."

"What?!"

V2 rolled his eyes. "You make it sound like I hear NOTHING that goes on aboard this ship. Well, see ya round, newb. I gotta head back to my bunks."

As V2 lumbered away, Super Saiyan Eric could be heard growling, shortly followed by the sound of an empty pop can being crushed into atoms.


********


While people were deep in conversation around them, given that it was beginning to get late and many people had chosen to return to their bunks; save for Raynor, who was still searching for his undergarments, Takato, Guilmon, Locke and Crono were holed up in Takato/Raynor's bunk. Takato summoned the random crew members on what was labelled "urgent business", which was responded to with surprise by the other two male crewmen. As Locke and Crono invited themselves in, Takato slipped the door shut behind them.

Locke set himself down on Raynor's bunk, but shuffled himself away against the wall when he noticed Guilmon conked out and snoring somewhat LOUDLY next to him. "Hey, kid, what's the big deal? What are we down here for?"

Crono shot Takato a similarly questioning glance.

"I'd just dug up some info that Ultimanium might find useful. I was bored and surfing the Web here a little while ago, and when I checked Conker's bookmarks, he had a link to globalworld.gov. I took a look at it, and I found it to be the World State Government's main page. I heard a while ago that Conker was third in command of the Argetlahm next to Ulty and his two second men, Magnus and Raul, so Conker had to have some idea of his mission objectives and the theories of the third dimension itself, right?"

Crono looked over to Locke. Locke turned the stare back to Takato. "Alright, but, anyways, what does this have to do with what's going on with the Prospector?"

"The guy states that the only shred of info we have on the Prospector is that he abdicated from the World State Government a couple of days ago. What I found on here was a hack that Ultimanium personally installed to bypass the general populace main page and get right into the good stuff, which Conker needed to know." Takato rolled the chair he was in over to the computer and double-clicked on a button on the page. "...profiles of all the major leaders. They don't provide actual photos, or even actual names, only management titles, because that would probably make assassinations way too easy, but they do provide background profiles... the vice-leader of the third dimension, right below Magnus, has a pretty screwed up history..."

Locke leaned over. "Go on." Crono nodded encouragingly.

"The guy nearly lost his election of vice-president due to a rumor that was flying around the place that he was once involved with a freaky cult called 'The Unity'. What exactly this has to do with his motives can be found at the Unity's main site, which is just a short Yahoo away..." Takato reached down and punched the keys in, and hit enter. "The Unity has three sites going. Two are Lord of the Rings fansites, one is for the meetings of the organization The Unity. I took a look at this a little while ago, and the rest was as weird as I thought it would be.

The Unity's only objective isn't worship, self-praise or even happiness - no, all these people are trying to do is establish the 'Unity', which is described here as a melding of a person's six possible identities that pushes them to the threshold of demigodliness, as it says here. This situation is called, word for word, Trancelestial Astral-hybrid Power Formation, or Trance for short."

"So what are you saying?"

Takato kicked the chair around so he faced the group. "If the guy we're dealing with is this one, than we have a wacko on our hands."

Locke shrugged. "But what does this have to do with the J?"

"I don't know.. maybe activating the J has some part in doing that... but still, I'm not entirely sure what this entire situation means."

Locke tilted his head to the side. "So this has basically been one giant useless fact?"

"Well.. um..."

"Well, it was entertaining nonetheless. C'mon, Crono, Ulty's going to bitch us out if we get to our bunks after lights out." Crono nodded, and sat up, following Locke out of the room. As Takato shut down the computer and started climbing onto the top bunk, Raynor burst back through the doors. "Where the hell is my underwear? I've been looking for it all damn night!"

____All personnel, return to your bunks. Lights out will be in 5 minutes.____

"Crono took them. Talk to him after."

"Oooh.. swear to god, when I get my hands on that little punk... DAMN IT!! Get that damn THING off my bed!"

Guilmon groggily opened an eye. "Takato, am I the thing?"

"I'm afraid so."

"I've always wanted to be an object! What kind of thing am I?"

"MOOOOOOOOOVE!!!" Raynor bellowed. He flipped Guilmon onto the floor as he buried himself under the covers, leaving Guilmon on the floor.

"...eh... here, buddy." Takato lifted up his covers and tossed them onto the floor so it sheeted the digimon.

"Thanks, Takato."

The lights blinked out, and the Argetlahm went into darkness once again. Takato rolled over on to his side. The bed was actually pretty comfortable, even without blankets. The room temperature was absolutely perfect, which aided the inhabitants of the ship in shutting their eyes.


********


Even Ultimanium had opened his chair back and was lying in a generally uncomfortable position on it. Minonim stared distastefully at the small puddle of slobber that had accumulated on the floor during Ultimanium's short sleep.

"You seem to be enjoying yourself, Master." Minonim buzzed. "I hope we can expect things to stay that way... I really don't know how this mission could possibly turn out, but I'm getting a very bad feeling about this... well... good night." Minonim's eyes dimmed out as he lowered himself to the floor. The soft clunk of Minonim's probe against the catwalk floor was the last sound heard aboard the Argetlahm for the rest of the night.










What awaits the Argetlahm and its crew during the planetfall? How exactly has Magnopolis changed over the last nine years? I'll give you a hint, the silence isn't going to last much longer... and what does the Unity have to do with all this? Find out next time, on Trance Trauma!