Digimon: Digital Monsters

Mirror, Mirror-Part Two

By 7 of 11

Hikari slowly drifted awake. It had all been a dream. Taichi hadn’t attacked them, destroyed their home. When she opened her eyes, if she looked around, she would be in bed with her husband, Takeru. And then the unmistakable sensation of flying kicked in.

She turned to see Angewomon smiling wanly down at her. "We’re almost there," the seraph whispered. "And then, we’ll explain everything. Just a few more minutes."

Hikari looked into the darkness that was surrounding them. Apparently, it was night already. If Angewomon was tired from carrying a 10-year-old girl and a fully-grown woman for the better part of a day, she didn’t show it. "I can’t believe Taichi would do that."

"He didn’t," Angewomon responded. "Trust me, in a few minutes, you will understand. And then, we’ll go save Takeru." She didn’t say it out loud, but Hikari heard the unspoken ‘If he’s alive’ in her voice.

Hikari could slowly make out the outline of a warehouse through the night. She pointed. "There?" Angewomon nodded.

Several minutes later, they had landed. With some difficulty, the duo managed to rouse Kana from her slumber, and they approached the doorway. A voice spoke from the shadows. "Who’s there?"

Angewomon held up a gloved hand. "It’s just me. I have Kana and Hikari."

Koushiro stepped out into the moonlight. "Kana and Hikari? But what about Takeru? Where’s he?"

"He’s gone. He stayed behind to give us some time to escape…but I think they got him." Hikari started to sob.

"It’s okay, Hikari." Another figure stepped out of the shadows and held her. It was Taichi. "I’m sure we’ll find him." When she started to pull away in fright, he looked puzzled, but then an expression of understanding grew on his face. "Ah. Well, come inside, the both of you, and we’ll explain everything."

"Our world is merely one of many possible realms," Koushiro’s brilliant wife, Mata, explained. "As is evidenced by your travels to the Digital world. However, both of those worlds lie on the same plane of reality. The people who are attacking us, I believe that they are from a parallel dimension, which is exactly the same as ours, only inverted. In this reality, you, the Digidestined, are evil. Instead of bringing peace to the world, and destroying evil, the Alternate-Destined are supposed to spread evil, to conquer their realm."

Angewomon continued from where Mata left off. "However, once they had done that, your counterparts decided that one plane of existence was not enough. They had to conquer all the possible universes. So they gathered their forces and attacked. Knowing that you had the power to defeat them, they naturally attacked you first." The angel shook once with a sob, and then tried to pretend it was nothing. Hikari was confused. Angewomon had been acting like this ever since she had gotten news that Angemon had disappeared about the same time as Takeru had been taken by the Alternate-Destined. Why this troubled her so, Hikari didn’t know.

"So what do we do?" Kana asked.

"Right now, nothing." An unidentified speaker proclaimed from somewhere in the shadows of the warehouse ceiling. Slowly, whoever it was who had spoken floated downwards into the visible light. She looked much like Angewomon, down to the gloves on her hands, yet in one of these white-coated hands she held a platinum staff, with a strange looping circle emblem emblazoned at the top. Also, she wore no faceplate, allowing her strikingly beautiful features to shine through. The young girl—no, it was a Digimon—looked at the group with intense sapphire eyes. "We can’t do anything, anyway. Not until the other Digimon get back from where they’ve been scouting the surrounding area."

Angewomon got to her feet. "I thought I told you to go to sleep with the other children, Aphroditemon."

The younger Digimon looked at the older one in dismay. "Mother, I need to…"

"You don’t need to do anything. Now get to bed, you need your rest." Angewomon admonished.

Hikari looked at her own daughter, who was yawning. "And the same to you, Kana. Get to bed, try and rest."

Pouting, Aphroditemon turned and winged her way deep into the darkness. "Follow me, Kana."

After the two of them were gone, all of the adults looked at each other. "This is bad." Jyou said, sitting close to Mimi. "I don’t think we’ve ever encountered anyone as powerful as the Alt-Destined are."

Yamato nodded. "We could always defeat any of our other foes back in the Digital World because we kept on getting stronger. But it won’t work with these, because they ARE us."

Two large bangs echoed through the warehouse. "What’s that?" Hissed Hikari.

Taichi leaned closer to his sister. "That’s the door. Someone’s there."

"I’ll go check it out." Jyou volunteered, and he walked off into the shadows.

Sora looked nervous. "I suppose it COULD be the Digimon…but we didn’t expect them back so early."

There was a shuffling of feet, and the group spun around to see three children, accompanied by three Digimon, enter the brightness, blinking. "What was that?" Masayoshi, a boy of 9, and Jyou and Mimi’s son, asked. "We heard a loud noise!"

His mother went over to him. "Oh, it’s nothing, Masa-chan."

Yamato stood up. "Jun!" He called to his precocious son—in fact, Mata, Jyou, and Taichi had a habit of calling him ‘Little Koushiro’. "Go back to sleep, you need your rest!"

A Digimon, who looked almost exactly like Gomamon, aside from a greenish tint to his fur, and where Gomamon had had the orange Mohawk, this Digimon possessed a mane of what appeared to be seaweed running down his back. "Do you blame them for not being able to sleep? It’s not their fault. Think about what they’ve seen today!"

Hikari leaned over to Koushiro. "I know Aphroditemon, but who are those other Digimon with Kana, Jun, and Masayoshi?"

Koushiro’s fingers flew over his keyboard. "The Gomamon one is called Marshmon. He’s Gomamon and Palmon’s son, and he’s equally at home in both of their environments! And this one," his screen displayed a picture of a little fox, with glossy white fur, and wings sprouting from the small of its back. "Is Sikamon. He’s the child of Gabumon and Biyomon. He may not look like much, but his mental powers are formidable!"

Hikari nodded. "Thank you, Koushiro."

It was at that moment that Joe returned. "It’s…Alternate-Yamato…and Alternate-Hikari…"

Taichi got to his feet. "What! Could they have had time to send a message off?" Jyou shook his head. "Then we’ve got to get them before they can! All you kids, stay here. And if anything goes wrong, run!"

Yamato, Sora, and Hikari all crept along the outer wall of the warehouse, following Taichi. They had sneaked out through a back door, and were splitting up, with Jyou, Koushiro, Mata, and Mimi going around the other side of the warehouse. Hopefully, they would be able to surround the Alternates.

Taichi peeked around the corner of the warehouse, and saw the Alternates, with Alt-Gabumon and Alt-Gatomon, standing at the solid steel door, looking slightly miffed. Both of the Alternate-Destined had wicked-looking swords hanging at their belts, and Alt-Yamato was armed even more than that, with a steel javelin strapped to his back. Hikari was behind him, and she looked also. "This is so weird, like looking into a living mirror…" she breathed.

"Yeah," Yamato agreed. "I’d never thought I’d live to see two of us. Two of anyone, as a matter of fact."

It was then that Taichi caught Jyou’s eye from the other side of the warehouse, and they walked out, trying not to make a sound. "Put down your Digivices and Crests, and raise your hands over your head."

Startled, the Alternate-Destined and Digimon jumped, but they did as they were told. Koushiro approached them warily. "What are you doing here? Were you sent to attack us?" he interrogated.

Alt-Yamato shook his head. "No! We’re here because we want to join up with you!"

Sora looked at them. "And why do you expect us to believe that story?"

Alt-Hikari took a deep breath. "There is no reason that we can prove that we are telling the truth. However, there is a reason why we want to join you. You see, our Taichi, like yours, is also the leader with us. But he uses fear, force, and pain, to keep everyone in line." She turned, causing everyone to tense, but she did not act, instead she displayed a horrific sword scar underneath her arm. "We want to be free. So, we decided the best way to be free and the best way to get revenge on our Taichi is to join up with you guys."

Taichi shook his head. "I still don’t believe you."

"Here’s a proof." Alt-Gabumon reached under his fur coat and removed three pendants. They were tags and Crests. The first one had a looping circle—exactly the same as the markings on Aphroditemon’s staff! The second was engraved with an asterisk inside a square, and the final one was two six-pointed stars overlaid upon each other. "These are the Crests of Mind, Faith, and Spirit. These are for the three newest Digidestined."

All of the adults looked at each other in disbelief. "You mean…our children? Jun, Masayoshi, and Kana?" Mimi burst out. "But, who are their Digimon?"

It was Alt-Gatomon’s turn to speak, now. "The Digimon are the progeny of the protectors of the Digidestineds’ parents."

Taichi thought. "Very well, you can come inside. But if you try anything…" he walked over to them and disarmed them, as well as retrieving their Digivice and Crest.

Alt-Hikari nodded. "We know."

The next morning, everyone—including the Digimon, who had been breifed on the situation later the previous night—was maintaining an uneasy peace with the Alternates, who at this moment were presenting a battle plan. "When we first arrived," Alt-Gatomon spoke, and as she did, holographic images appeared illustrating her speech. "We took over the airport, and now it functions as our main command center. The major building in the complex, the terminal, is what we are using for a headquarters. The hangars have been converted into barracks for the slaves that we gather."

Kana looked at the cat. "What did you do with my Dad?"

Alt-Hikari stood up. "We don’t know. Taichi said he had something planned, and he wanted to take your family himself. We aren’t privy to our leader’s private schemes. Probably, though, he’s being held as a slave at the airport, so if we beat them there, we can free Takeru."

"So then what are we waiting for? Let’s go! We’ll free all of the slaves!" Aphroditemon literally bounded off the floor into the air.

She was shortly followed by her mother, who pushed her back down again. "WE are not going to do anything. You, and the other children, will stay out of any fighting, and will not go on the rescue mission." She silenced the protests from everyone else before they even had a chance to occur. "No buts! Now lets go!"

Alt-Yamato looked at Taichi. "If we are going to help you, we need our equipment."

Taichi waved it off. "You will get what you need when we get there, IF your information is accurate. Let’s move out, people!"

In a darkened room, a lone figure stood watching over thousands of slaves do useless busywork, designed more to break their spirits than to get anything material done. After a long time, Alt-Taichi spoke. "Jyou. Sora."

There was a flicker of movement, and two people stepped into the light cast by the windows. Alt-Jyou knelt at his master’s feet, Alt-Sora at his side. "What do you wish, master?"

Alt-Taichi thought. "If our two agents have done as they said they would, and infiltrated the Digidestined, then this will indeed be a glorious day. You two," he snapped. "Set up along Runway 041…prepare for an ambush! You two are dismissed."

The duo nodded, stood up, bowed again, and exited without saying a word. "And you…" he began, and the lone remaining figure in the room moved into the light.

This shrouded man was indeed a horrid sight. An ebony cloak covered his shoulders, and he wore spiked armguards and gauntlets. A horned helmet covered his face, and his voice sounded thick, distorted, through the speakers. "What is thy bidding?"

"After Jyou, Sora, Yamato, and Hikari defeat the Digidestined, bring them to me. I have…plans…for them." Alt-Taichi smirked.

"It shall be done." The man rumbled.

"Oh, it had better be, Shade. You are my best commando, I would hate to lose you on such an…EASY…task. So don’t mess up."

To Be Continued…