Episode 20 - Hollow Victory

Chibi-Koushiro walks up. "The characters are properties of Toei
Animation Inc., Saban Entertainment and others. They are used without
consent. Archive is only borrowing them for an indefinite amount of time.

"Strict Japanese spelling for all names when possible. If an English
name for a digimon or his attack is used and you know what the name
is supposed to be in Japanese-- please tell Archive so it can be corrected."

_________________

"Skull Satamon led us into a trap," Yamato stated, but his voice
wavered slightly. "He used his staff to cause the ground to open
up and swallow us whole. Now stuck underground and separated in
the oppressive darkness, we desperately try to regroup.

"Skull Satamon is after the smallest Chosen, and didn't bother to
waste time dealing with the older Chosen. However, when he came
across Koushiro, Skull Satamon attacked."

_________________

"There's a light up ahead," Taichi pointed out.

"It's probably Skull Satamon," Yamato commented.

"Should we go after him now?" Miyako questioned.

Explosions echoed through the air.

"That answers that question," Holsmon replied.

They all rushed toward the light and saw Skull Satamon looming over
Koushiro. The evil digimon's staff pointed right at the scared boy who was curled up into a ball.

Taichi took off running.

"Scratch one Chosen," Skull Satamon gloated. "Nail Bone!" Lethal
energy spikes shot out from the top of the staff.

Sora's eyes widened in fright as she realized just what Taichi was
going to do. She couldn't even scream as he leapt between Koushiro
and the oncoming attack. Time seemed to freeze as she watched in
horror as two spikes sank into his flesh before exploding. His scream
of pain echoed everywhere. Then, as he fell to the ground, she too
fell to her knees. Only then did she find her voice, as she yelled, "TAICHI!!"

Hikari had arrived just as her brother fell to the ground. She also
cried out her brothers name in horror.

Yamato yelled out his friend's name as well. He wanted Skull Satamon to pay for this.

Skull Satamon merely laughed haughtily, aiming his staff to attack Koushiro and Taichi again.

"MEGA FLAME!!!" Greymon howled in rage, unleashing a gigantic fireball from his mouth.

Skull Satamon stopped the attack by cutting the fireball in half with his staff.

Daisuke clenched his D-3 tightly, seething in anger. "Kill him!"

Stingmon and XV-mon nodded at the same time. Their foe had to die, and it was there job to do it.

Daisuke's D-3 flared.

"XV-mon!" yelled the draconian digimon.

"Stingmon!" added the insectoid.

"Jogress evolve!" They chorused. They flew upward into a spiral
and seemed to collide in a massive explosion of energy. Everyone
turned to look, even Skull Satamon, as a giant half-dragon, half-insect
hovered in the air. He flashed his metallic claws threateningly
and called out with two voices, "Paildramon!"

Sora looked at Piyomon, who nodded back to her.

"Piyomon evolve!" A pillar of light erupted where the pink bird
stood. Suddenly a gigantic pair of fiery reddish-orange wings stretched
forth, and the light subsided to reveal a couple stories tall bird
that had a flat beak with crocked teeth growing out it. "Birdramon!"
The large bird grimaced in pain as she flapped her wings.

"Palmon evolve!" A pillar of light formed briefly, and when it finished
a two story cactus with boxing gloves stood there. "Togemon!"

Skull Satamon didn't seem very concerned about his new opponents. "This is a joke," he spat.

"Desperado Blaster!" Paildramon cried out as two cannons on appeared
on his hips and fired streams of energy.

Skull Satamon almost seemed to disappear as he not only dodged the
attack, but moved behind Paildramon. "Much too slow," he mocked
before slamming his staff into the back of the jogress fighter.

Mimi stepped back toward the darkness as she watched Skull Satamon
zoom from digimon to digimon, hurting each one before they even
had a chance to react. The worst was seeing how easy it was for
that devil digimon to send Greymon flying into a Black Gear pillar,
causing it to collapse. When the debris and deleting data cleared,
they couldn't see Greymon anywhere.

Hikari had run to her brother to see if he was all right. Tears
leaked out of her eyes as he wouldn't wake up.

"He'll be all right," Koushiro tried to assure her. "I'm sure of it."

If Hikari heard him, she didn't show any sign of it. Instead she
glared angrily at Skull Satamon and her D-3 glowed.

"Gomamon evolve!" A pillar flared around the white seal digimon
and when it subsided a white woolly walrus like digimon stood in
his place. "Ikkakumon! Harpoon Thunder!"

Skull Satamon turned to late and was hit by the missile in his shoulder.
"How dare you?!" he howled, before flying in to attack.

"Now!" Daisuke called out.

"Cable Captor!" Paildramon's claws launched from his hands, each
connected by strong metal wires.

"WHAT?!" Skull Satamon cried out, bound by the attack.

"Everyone, fire everything you've got!" Daisuke ordered.

"Meteor Wing!" Showers of flame launched from Birdramon.
"Desperado Blaster!" Paildramon added his energy attack.
"Fox Fire!" Garurumon sent out his fiery breath.
"Harpoon Thunder!" Ikkakumon fired off a volley of missiles.
"Prickly Bang Bang!" Togemon sent a shower of cactus needles.
"Red Sun!" Holsmon's angry glare unleashed his energy attack.
"Mega Blaster!" Kabuterimon electrified his target.
"Baby Flame!" Agumon weakly sent out a small fireball from where he had ended up.
"Heaven's Knuckle!" Angemon arrived just in time to add his attack to the mix.

Skull Satamon screamed in pain. He struggled as his body tried to
break apart. "I won't be defeated! I won't!" Then all at once he
broke apart, his body disappearing as he deleted.

Silence hung over them as the darkness engulfed them once more with
Skull Satamon's staff no longer providing light.

"How's Taichi?" Yamato questioned.

"I... I don't know," Koushiro replied.

"We've got to get him help," Hikari pleaded almost hysterically.

"How do we get out of here?" Miyako questioned.

Paildramon nodded to himself. "I'll handle that." He flew up into
the air and called out, "Desperado Blaster!" He fired his attack
at the ceiling of the enormous cavern, causing part of it to collapse.

The Chosen were rather happy to see the ray of light from the morning
sun cast some light into the gloomy cave.

Paildramon flew back down. "Let's get out of this hole."

_________________

Daisuke watched as Leafmon and Chikomon, Wormmon and V-mon's respective
baby forms, played with a bunch of other baby digimon at Primary
Village. Apparently his digimon partners used up so much energy
as Paildramon, they reverted to their youngest forms when they de-evolved.

Miyako cleared her voice as she approached him.

"Report," Daisuke remarked sarcastically.

Miyako gave a sad smirk as she played along and stood stiffly as
she told him, "Of Unimon's troops, only Monzaemon and Ganimon are
uninjured. Andromon and one Drimogemon are still injured from the battle at Overdell."

Daisuke's eyes widened. "None of the other's survived?"

Miyako nodded her head slowly. "I'm afraid so."

"What about our troops?" Daisuke questioned.

"Piyomon and Agumon are seriously hurt. Neither should go into battle
for several days at least. Tentomon and Takeru are also injured,
but not nearly as bad," Miyako replied.

"What about Taichi?" Daisuke pressed.

"He still hasn't woken up," Miyako answered.

Daisuke sagged. "Now what about the baby digimon? Who will take
care of them with Elecmon dead?"

"Monzaemon, Drimogemon and Ganimon volunteered for that already,"
Miyako replied. "I'm sure the babies will be in good hands with them."

"I guess." Daisuke sighed.

"Come on. Let's get some lunch. You haven't eaten since dinner last night," Miyako commented.

"I'm not hungry," Daisuke replied shortly before going back to looking
at his digimon partners being carefree and having fun.

Miyako looked at the babies with a tinge of jealousy. She should
be out having fun with her friends, or at least griping about being
at work in her parent's store. It was hard for her to believe that
only twelve days ago she was perfectly carefree and without any
real worries. Now she had met and lost friends to war and she had
killed. In the eleven days she had been in this dimension, she was
already someone completely different than the girl she had been.
She didn't know if she liked who she was now.

_________________

"Mimi?" Palmon called out, searching for her partner. It wasn't
until she left the village and entered Railroad Field she found
her. "Mimi, what are you doing out here? I was looking everywhere for you."

"Why?" Mimi questioned simply, sitting with her knees pulled up
to her chest several meters away from the hole that Paildramon had
made for their escape earlier that morning.

"Lunch is ready. Don't you want to eat?" Palmon questioned.

"No... I don't," Mimi replied.

Palmon blinked. "Why not? You need to eat something."

"I'm not hungry," Mimi said shortly.

Palmon folded her leafy arms. "Are you humans ill?"

Mimi looked at Palmon with a confused expression. "Why do you say that?"

"Because Hikari and Daisuke also haven't eaten anything today."
Palmon huffed. "If you don't keep your strength up, we can't keep ours up either."

"Why should we help you get strong? So we can help you kill again?" Mimi questioned harshly.

"MIMI?!" Palmon cried out. "What are you talking about?"

"We all helped kill Skull Satamon, didn't we?" Mimi snapped. "If
you didn't add your attack to the group's, he'd still be alive."

"If he lived, ALL of us would be dead!" Palmon yelled back. "Hundreds
of digimon that used to live on this island are all dead because
of him. Can't forget that Taichi might die." She waved her arm toward
the village. "You can't tell me Skull Satamon didn't deserve to
die. I lost count on the number of friends he took from me, and
you know he did all of that. He wasn't a soldier. He wasn't forced
to do a damn thing. He chose to do all those evil things. If you
want to regret helping to kill that bastard, go right ahead. You
can just sit out the rest of this fucking war and forget thousands
of innocent digimon are dying because you won't do a damn thing
to kill the digimon that's doing it."

Mimi could only stare at her partner blankly.

Palmon tried to stop her tears from flowing. "Mimi, you have to
understand sometimes you have to take a life in order to save lives!"
She then ran back into the village.

Mimi gazed in the direction Palmon had gone for several moments,
before turning back and looking at the hole. "I'm no use to anyone
here. So why am I here? I don't want to fight. I don't want to kill.
I can't heal anyone. I can't even help my own partner. Why am I
here?" Takenouchi broke down and began to sob.

_________________

Koushiro typed into his computer, trying to track down Gennai. The
old goat had hacked into his computer, he should be able to find
a trace route back. However, despite his skill as a hacker, he could
see no means of how Gennai had gotten total access to his computer.

Koushiro groaned in frustration and stretched his tired muscles.
He had been focused on this task all day. He didn't want to know
what condition Taichi was in, but last he heard Yagami was still
asleep. Hikari had kept constant vigil over her brother since Skull
Satamon's demise early in the morning. Sora and Yamato were taking
turns looking over both of the Yagami siblings. If it wasn't for
Andromon, they wouldn't even be sure that Taichi was alive. The
android was now with Taichi monitoring his health through his sensors.

Koushiro blinked as something popped up on his computer.

----------
From: Gennai@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
To: Koushiro@prodigious.net

Message:
Please gather all Chosen and their digimon. Inform me when you've
done that so I can speak to all of you.

----------

Koushiro frowned and immediately sent one back that Taichi was in a coma.

----------
From: Gennai@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
To: Koushiro@prodigious.net

Message:
That is not good. Even if Taichi has not awakened by tomorrow, have
everyone meet tomorrow at high noon. You can inform Taichi of what
I have to tell you all when he wakes up.

----------

Koushiro nodded to himself as he read the email. He got up and went
to tell Daisuke. He paused briefly as he passed the building that housed Taichi.

Why did that coward do that? Came unbidden to Koushiro's mind. What
did Taichi hope to accomplish by doing something so recklessly stupid?
Getting himself killed wouldn't change anything. Because of Yagami,
Izumi would never walk normally ever again. Taichi was probably
still being a coward, and would rather be dead than live with the guilt of what he had done.

_________________

"How's your wound?" Yamato questioned.

Takeru forced a smile. His hand reflexively rubbed his bandaged
chest. "Fine. It hardly hurts."

"Oh, really," Patamon replied sarcastically and poked Takeru in
the chest, causing him to seize up in pain.

Yamato shook his head. "I should be thankful you're still alive.
I'd have thought an attack like that would kill us."

Takeru frowned, looking in the direction of Taichi's hut. "I got lucky."

Yamato nodded. "I guess so."

Patamon sighed. "I hope Taichi has some luck, too."

"Is he going to be all right?" Takeru questioned.

"Probably. He's made it this far, so he should pull through," Yamato answered.

"Good," Takeru and Patamon replied.

"Be sure to get some rest, and be careful with your chest," Yamato
ordered. "You probably have a few broken ribs."

Takeru nodded. He didn't need the warning. He already feared falling
down and having a broken rib pierce his lungs or heart. He might
already be living on borrowed time if a bone fragment lodged itself
in the right place. However, he wasn't about to tell Yamato that.
It'd worry his brother too much.

"Have you seen Gabumon?" Yamato questioned.

"Last I saw him, he was being buried under baby digimon," Patamon replied.

Yamato gave a short laugh. "Thanks." He then left to find his partner.

Takeru sighed as he watched Yamato go. He then glanced over at Patamon.
"Do you think you have any ability to heal injuries as Angemon or Pegasmon?"

Patamon shook his head. "I don't think so. But I'm relatively new
at evolving to those levels. I'd need more practice before I'd know
for certain." He then looked closely at his partner. "Why? Are your ribs hurting?"

Takeru shook his head. "No. I was hoping you could heal Taichi. It'd be awful if he died."

"For all of us or Hikari?" Patamon insinuated.

Takeru scratched the back of his head. "Well, both."

_________________

Sora sighed with a heavy heart as she watched the sun set through
the window. She then turned and looked at Taichi resting on his
stomach on the makeshift bed that had been made for him. He looked
so different like this. He was so lifeless it hurt to look at him.
She remembered Taichi to be overactive, always getting into things.

Hikari sat next to Taichi, never wavering from that spot. Sora couldn't
remember if Hikari had even gone the bathroom since they had placed
her brother here. It had been a fight just to get Hikari to eat
something that day, claiming she wasn't hungry.

Agumon lay curled up at the foot of Taichi's bed, snoring softly.

Andromon had propped himself against the wall next to Taichi. He
had placed some wires onto the boy to keep reading's on Yagami's
life signs. While the robot had dozed off, he had assured everyone
earlier that an alarm would sound if Taichi began to die.

Sora wrapped a blanket around herself as she continued to gaze across the room.

Some time later, sudden movement jerked Sora awake. She barely caught
sight of Hikari running out of the room. She then cast a questioning
glance at Agumon and Andromon, both looked cluelessly back at her.

"There has been no change in Taichi," Andromon informed her.

Sora got up and quickly tried to track down where Hikari had run
off to. She only went a few meters before she heard the sounds of
someone retching violently. Takenouchi looked around the corner
of the building and saw Hikari hunched over and vomiting.

"Oh, God...." Hikari moaned weakly. "I think I was better off not remembering."

"Hikari-chan?" Sora questioned. "What's wrong?"

Hikari looked at Sora with frightened eyes. "It's nothing. Really!"

Sora folded her arms. "You remember your last nightmare." It wasn't a question.

"Don't be silly. I've never been able to remember them," Hikari tried to brush it off.

"You also never threw up either," Sora retorted.

"Forget about it, Sora-san. There's nothing for me to tell you,"
Hikari said harshly before walking off.

"Hikari-chan," Sora called out, following the younger Yagami back
to where Taichi was resting. She then grabbed the girl's arm. "Hikari-chan!"

Hikari glared. "Right now we should be worried about Taichi, not
me." She pulled her arm free and went back to where she had spent
the entire day, at her brother's side.

Sora let out a frustrated cry. "Fine, but you WILL tell me about this later."

"Fine. Later," Hikari clipped.

_________________

"Any change?" Daisuke asked as he entered Taichi's room.

"Negative," Andromon replied.

Yamato nodded sadly.

Agumon was asleep, stretched out and laying to Taichi's right.

Daisuke blinked as he looked around. "Where is everyone?"

"Hikari's out taking a dump," Yamato replied. "And Sora made some
bitchy comment about needing to find something absorbent soon. Think it's her time of the month."

"A little more than I wanted to know," Daisuke replied.

"You asked," Yamato replied.

"Whatever." Daisuke shook his head. "There's a meeting at noon.
Gennai wants to talk to all of us."

"What if Taichi doesn't wake up before then?" Yamato questioned.

"We'll tell Taichi the important stuff when he wakes up," Daisuke
replied. "I just wished he'd wake up. I really need his help with everything."

A moment of silence passed before a faint moan of "Did we win?" echoed in the room.

"Taichi?!" Daisuke and Yamato called out, immediately rushing to his sides.

Taichi glanced at the two boys. "Not exactly who I'd want to wake up to."

Yamato gave a short laugh. "Damn, you had us all worried there, Taichi."

"Who's Taichi?" the brown-haired boy questioned.

"WHAT?!" Daisuke called out in shock.

Taichi laughed weakly. "Fooled you, Daisuke."

Daisuke growled. "Don't do that!"

"So, did we win?" Taichi asked again.

"Sure did," Yamato replied. "After Daisuke jogressed his partners
to the Perfection form of Paildramon, we all combined our attacks into one and killed him."

Daisuke smirked. "So much for his so called prophecy of getting
killed by the smallest. It was a great group effort to kill him."

A cry of, "Taichi!" was all the warning the wounded boy had before
finding himself fiercely hugged by his sobbing sister.

"Ouch. You're... hurting me," Taichi wheezed out.

Hikari looked abashed as she pulled away quickly. "Sorry. It's just
you've been asleep since yesterday. You had us all worried!"

"Yeah!" Agumon cried out, finally awake as well. "I haven't left your side at all!"

Taichi smiled weakly. "How is everyone else?"

Daisuke forced his smile. "Well, we have a few injuries. But nothing for you to worry about."

Taichi scowled slightly. "What aren't you telling me?"

Hikari frowned. "We'll tell you later. Now just focus on getting better. Okay?"

"Fine." Taichi let out a yawn before falling back asleep.

Hikari looked nervous.

"He's just asleep," Andromon answered her unvoiced question. "His
consciousness is not as low as it was before he woke up."

"He'll be tired for several days while his injuries heal. This is normal," Yamato assured her.

Hikari nodded, hoping what they said was true.

_________________

"OMAKE! OMAKE! OMAKE! OMAKE! OMAKE! OMAKE! OMAKE! OMAKE! OMAKE!"
shouts the entire chibi-Chosen as they prance around File Island.

Chibi-Daisuke tries to sneak a skirt peak of what's under chibi-Mimi's
school dress. A tail whips out from her skirt, wraps around his
neck, and draws him in. Chibi-Mimi makes a strange face and chibi-Daisuke
is suddenly thrown out of her skirt by the tail. He looks like he
had been beaten into a bloody pulp.

The remaining chibi-Chosen continue the mantra until they start
climbing up Infinity Mountain. Chibi-Hikari falls off and her skirt
lifts up showing a picture of a broken heart on her white panties.

"Now for a little extra," chibi-Hikari moans.

------------------

"Welcome back to 'Whose Line is it Anyway' - Digimon style," Referee
announced. "To recap our guests, we have Bobby from Lord Archive's Diaries series."

Bobby waved, a blond America boy of fourteen who was dressed in
torn jeans and a new T-shirt with 'Shameless Plug: Read Red Digivice Diaries' written on it.

"Hirokazu, or 'Kazu' to you North American viewer, to represent
the Digimon Tamers," Referee continued. "Also we have Armadimon
for Adventures Zero-Two, and...." Referee frown at the two digimon
fighting over the forth seat. "Along with Gomamon AND Tentomon jointly representing Zero-One.

Gomamon and Tentomon stopped fighting and looked rather sheepish.

"Now for the final game, which is for all contestants. Armadimon
will be interviewing the others as potential dates, per the old
game show, 'The Dating Game.' However, each of the other contestants
have each been given a personality quirk which they are reading
now," Referee informed in monotone fashion.

Gomamon and Tentomon compared cards they were given and then looked at each other strangely.

Armadimon was now sitting on one edge of the stage, while the others
were lined up toward the other side. Gomamon and Tentomon pushed
their chairs together before moving on top of them, and Bobby kept bouncing on his seat.

Armadimon fluttered his eyebrows. "Bachelor number one, what would you consider a romantic date?"

Hirokazu scratched the back of his head. "Um, well, I wouldn't really
know. I'd protect you from anything that might attack you during
the date, like cows or exploding food. That's romantic, right?"
He then looked at Referee. "If I win, I get that all-you-can-eat
dinner package, right? Pops ate all the food again."

Armadimon eyed Hirokazu warily before moving along. "Ahem, bachelor
number two...." He stared as Bobby was bouncing on his chair.

"Yes?" Bobby questioned.

"Erm... I so love swimming. Do you know of any good places you could
take me swimming?" Armadimon questioned.

"Oh, si. I know of good place. Nice sandy beaches," Bobby replied with a fake accent.

Armadimon blinked. "Okay. Bachelor number three-"

"Yes?" Gomamon and Tentomon replied simultaneously and then glared at each other.

"You're bachelor four," Tentomon said angrily.

"How can we be separate bachelors?" Gomamon returned tersely.

Tentomon mimed holding something. "I can fix that."

"Oh, yeah. And you'd kill us," Gomamon retorted. "Is that what you want? Both of us dead."

"Only one of us has to go," Tentomon replied evilly.

Armadimon coughed loudly. "BACHELOR number one, if I was a sundae,
what toppings would you cover me with?"

Hirokazu imitated up-ending a bucket over his head. He then fluttered
his eyes and said in a feminine voice, "Well, lot's chocolate, sprinkles,
and whip cream. Best to act cute when the guy is adding the toppings
so he doesn't pay any attention to how much he puts on it."

Armadimon compared his own 'looks' to Hirokazu's. He then huffed
before looking over at Bobby, who was still bouncing. "Bachelor
number two, I love going on romantic walks. What are your favorite foods?"

"Oh, tacos and burritos are good." Bobby nodded.

"Bachelor-" Armadimon was interrupted again.

"Keep your mouth shut or we'll both lose," Tentomon shot at Gomamon.

"Me? You're the one with the psychotic attitude!" Gomamon returned.

BUZZ "Name your guesses," Referee told Armadimon.

"Well, bachelor number one is a not for me. Sex changing with water
is one thing, his suitors are another!" Armadimon huffed. "Ranma, you can go back to Akane."

"Of all the uncute things you could say," Hirokazu pouted.

"Bachelor three and four would be too much trouble of being joined
twins who can't agree," Armadimon said with mock regretfulness.

"Oh, we can agree," Gomamon said.

"We just hate each other's guts," Tentomon replied.

"We share the same guts, moron," Gomamon snapped.

"Ahem," Armadimon cleared his throat, but then pouted. "I'll have
to chose bachelor two if I must. Though I don't know how a poor
Mexican full of jumping beans could afford me."

"Good enough," Referee commented. He then threw his cue cards away.
"Since points are meaningless, it has been decided to leave the
overall winner or winners of 'Who's Line is it Anyway?' to you,
the readers. The winner has been decided and shall be revealed in
the next part."