EPISODE 19 - SLEEPING WITH THE LIGHT ON
Dawn broke coldly and slowly, the sun doing very little to warm the atmosphere even as it slid up into view. It was always cold these days; there were no trees or hills to block the temperature or wind, and it was windy, gusts howling across the landscape and sometimes almost knocking the group right off their feet. Shelter was hard to find, but they dealt with it the best they could. It wasn’t like they had any other choice, after all.
They’d traded comfort for being one step closer to their destination. They were making progress.
They had made it to the ocean.
They’d reached the coast the day after they’d first seen it up on the top of the mountain, the valley sprawling out before them and the sea in the distance shining so brightly it almost seemed like it was waiting for them. It had felt so close - it had been close - but the next day’s travels had been… difficult. For a multitude of reasons.
But they were here now, and even through the cold and wind and salt that stung at Miguel’s eyes, he couldn’t help but feel like a huge weight had been lifted off of him.
…He felt it again, suddenly, pressing down on his shoulders, and he shook his head, trying to shrug it off. What was -?
“Miguel,” he heard a voice say, and he snapped awake, sucking a deep breath in and sitting dead upright.
He blinked, rubbing his forehead and looking around until he caught Flip’s gaze. His partner was sitting in front of him, one paw placed on his shoulder.
“You awake?” Flip asked, tilting his head. Miguel nodded slowly, and Flip retracted his paw. “Sorry,” he continued. “I wanted to let you sleep, but we’re going to have to wake the others up soon, and I -”
“I fell asleep?” Miguel asked with a yawn, still dazed. He blinked again, letting the world around him come into focus before he looked down at Flip again.
Flip nodded. “Maybe half an hour ago. I figured you needed it.”
Miguel grimaced, feeling his cheeks heat up. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled, wiping his eyes with his sleeve. “I haven’t… been…”
“It’s okay,” Flip said, smiling out of what Miguel hoped was reassurance. “I get it.”
He hadn’t been sleeping well, was what he’d tried to say.
It made sense, really, but Miguel still felt a little bad about it. Nobody had been sleeping well recently, but everyone else was able to stay awake long enough to keep watch for a couple of hours. Why couldn’t he?
He sighed. He’d… do better next time.
“Nothing happened while you were out,” Flip said, pulling his attention back. “But you know that already, because if something had happened, I would’ve woken you up.” He smiled again. “Just a lot of sitting and waiting. And watching the ocean. I counted five hundred and twenty seven waves before I started to lose track and gave up.”
“You what?” Miguel said.
“There was nothing else to do,” Flip said with a shrug, as if what he’d just said wasn’t the most insane thing Miguel had ever heard from him. “Not very many Digimon coming around to count. Although I think I might have seen a Whamon way far out a while ago.”
Miguel frowned. Flip had seen a Digimon and hadn’t said anything? “Why didn’t you wake me up for that?”
“It was really far away,” Flip said. “It didn’t notice us, or if it did it definitely didn’t care about us.”
Miguel must not have looked very convinced, because Flip tilted his head up at him and stepped closer. “Don’t worry,” he said, softer. “If it had come closer, I would have said something.”
Don’t worry, huh. Don’t worry. No worries. Nothing to worry about.
There was a lot to worry about, actually, but Miguel just sighed.
They hadn’t had many issues in the two days they’d been here at the ocean, or at least not many issues overnight while they were sleeping. After the whole thing with Baalmon (and, additionally, Matadormon and Phelesmon and WarGrowlmon and -), the group had decided it was in their best interest to start keeping watch at night. They weren’t really expecting anything to happen - Damien had been right about the coast having less Digimon - but it couldn’t hurt, right?
And with how MarineDevimon had been following them since they got here…
Yeah. It couldn’t hurt.
It gave Miguel at least a little bit of comfort whenever he could get himself to sleep. Knowing that someone was awake and watching for danger helped him feel… safe. It made sleeping easier altogether.
He sighed, stretching his arms out in front of him. The sun was up now, and Flip was right; they needed to wake the group up so they could get a move on. Even if he was still tired and even if he really just wanted to fall back asleep, they had to get going. They could rest when they got to the north coast properly - hopefully within the next few days, or so Damien had said.
“Let’s get everyone up,” he said down to Flip as he stood, who perked up and got to his own feet. “And you’re sure you didn’t see or hear anything else?”
“I’m certain,” he said, nodding vigorously. “Promise.”
He looked honest. Miguel didn’t think he would lie to him about anything, but with Flip, it was hard to tell.
Well, at least nothing attacked us.
Miguel smiled faintly, mustering all the good will he had in him. “Alright.”
The good thing about being at the ocean was that the group could see surprise attacks coming from Digimon on land from a mile away.
With not much in the way of hills or trees in any direction, they could see far up and down the beach, and even further inland, extremely well. It simply wasn’t possible for them to be ambushed, with very little cover for any Digimon who wanted to take them by surprise, and this fact eased many (though of course not all) of their worries.
They fortunately hadn’t had many run-ins with Digimon on land, giving the group a much-needed break after the Dobermon situation and, before that, the incessant attacks in Starwoods. They felt like they could actually relax when they walked, knowing that, for the most part, they didn’t have anything to worry about.
Most of their difficulties with battling were due to them being taken by surprise and the partner Digimon having to evolve mid-battle. The few times they had had to fight someone on the coast, they had seen their attackers coming far before they were actually under attack - and the Digimon had swiftly evolved to greet their enemies.
It made a lot of things a lot easier.
The bad thing about being at the ocean, though, was that surprise attacks from Digimon who were actually in the ocean were nearly impossible to see coming.
Key word being nearly, but nearly wasn’t good enough.
More times than they’d like to admit had they been startled by a Digimon in the ocean swimming too close for comfort - not always an attacker, but always out of nowhere and always sudden enough to put the group on edge.
And the times where it was an attacker? Well, it felt much the same as it always had back when they were being ambushed left and right in Starwoods. They were usually able to fight back, albeit having to deal with the evolving mid-battle thing that was, again, the majority of their difficulties, but there was another, bigger problem.
There was one Digimon in particular who was both very interested in the group and very difficult to fight.
Miguel’s digivice had identified it as a MarineDevimon the first time they’d encountered it, only a few hours into their first day at the coast. An ultimate level, and of course manic.
It had been their first encounter with an aggressive Digimon since reaching the ocean. Their first encounter since the previous night’s Baalmon.
It wasn’t difficult to imagine that MarineDevimon could easily be as much of a threat and struggle as Baalmon had been.
They’d fought it off, but hadn’t been able to defeat it. It was too strong for them, and knew the ocean too well. Even Flip, the one most suited for aquatic combat, was no match for it. They let it go - they couldn’t exactly follow it, and even if they could, it wouldn’t be any use. If they couldn’t fight it while they had the land to their advantage, what made them think they could fight it in the water?
Nothing. So they let it retreat, watching it sink below the surface a few dozen meters out, watching them all the while. They’d all known that that wouldn’t be the end of it.
And, of course, it came back.
Later that night. The next morning. That day’s afternoon. Again at night. The next morning again. That evening. It kept coming back. Each time, they drove it away, and each time, they knew that it would just come back again.
It was following them.
Miguel was doing his very best to not let it bother him, or at the very least not let it show that it was bothering him. He knew that they could handle MarineDevimon - fortunately injuries had been minimal in their encounters with it - but the fact it was very obviously following them, waiting for the perfect moment to strike, clearly trying to kill them just as every manic Digimon was…
It didn’t exactly put his mind at ease. He supposed that was what it was intending, trying to unsettle them as much as possible, but that honestly just made things worse.
MarineDevimon was toying with them, and they just had to deal with it.
It also didn’t help that he kept seizing up in fear whenever it appeared, unable to do even so much as call out encouragement to Flip.
They just had to hope that it would leave them alone once they reached Northern Pier. Whenever that would be.
“Maybe three days,” Damien said, snapping Miguel out of his thoughts. He looked towards him, at the front of the group where he was speaking to Harmony and Ren - answering a question they’d had.
They’d gotten to walking shortly after Miguel and Flip had woken them all up. Nobody had been too excited about another day of walking, but after so many, it was starting to become routine. No one complained about it, at least.
They just had to keep going.
Damien continued. “If we pushed ourselves, we could probably get there in two, but I don’t think it’s worth it to sacrifice multiple hours of sleep and rest just to get there quicker.”
“Never thought I’d hear you say that,” Moxie said from next to him, and Damien rolled his eyes.
“I think we’ve been dealing with enough shit lately where it’s important for us to be well-rested while we’re dealing with the shit.” He looked back to Harmony and Ren. “There isn’t anything between us and the pier, aside from the distance and a lot of sand.” He paused, looking off in the distance for a moment. “Maybe some Digimon.”
Miguel frowned. If it was a joke, it was very poorly timed, and if it wasn’t, it was just stating the obvious.
“We’ll be okay,” Damien continued, more quietly, surprising Miguel. “It’s not that far off. We’ll make it.”
“Okay,” Harmony said, her voice sounding distant. She’d been sounding like that a lot lately. “Thank you.”
“Of course,” Damien said.
Huh. Miguel didn’t think he’d ever heard Damien react that way to a thank you. He hadn’t ever heard Damien react to much of anything, honestly.
The past few days had really taken a toll on everyone.
Miguel wasn’t exempt. Even aside from all the sleeping issues and the never-ending anxiety that was only exacerbated by what had happened with Baalmon, everything was just… It was a lot. He was finally understanding why Harmony had felt the way she had, about having to do all of this, even if she now seemed to be feeling a bit better.
He didn’t understand why she was feeling better after the Baalmon incident, but he hadn’t seen fit to press. It was good that she was feeling better, of course, but…
Dollie had only been with the group for a couple of days, and yet it still felt so weird to not see her walking alongside Azure or Ren, or hanging to the back of the group to make sure they were all in order, or…
Well, it had shaken everyone. This was the first time an ally of theirs had died, and it was all because they had been in the way of an enemy. Dollie hadn’t been more than a nuisance to Baalmon, but a nuisance was all she’d needed to be for him to -
Miguel didn’t like thinking about it.
The mood had been somber ever since. Nobody had wanted to stray too far from each other; they’d made a silent agreement to stop heading off on their own into the darkness at night, which Miguel personally thought was long overdue but had not said aloud. It would hopefully cut out some of the worst things that could happen to them. So long as they stuck together, they would be okay, right?
…Right.
“You doing okay?”
Miguel sighed, pulling his shoulders forward to adjust the position of his backpack, and looked down at Flip.
“I’m fine,” he said, lying like he always did whenever someone asked him that question. “Just tired.” Always tired.
“I don’t think you’re fine,” Flip said, and Miguel closed his eyes. Flip went on, though, either ignoring or oblivious to Miguel’s growing dismay. “You can talk about it, you know.”
Miguel looked up at the front of the line, where Damien, Bumble, Alex, and Castor were leading. He hadn’t noticed that he and Flip had fallen to the back of the group while he had been lost in his thoughts; Damien was too far away to hear now, even as Miguel tried to listen in on whatever he was discussing with the others.
…If no one was around… and if Flip was asking him…
“I’m worried,” he admitted under his breath, just loud enough for Flip to hear. “About everything. But that’s just normal for me.”
“What exactly is ‘everything’?” Flip asked.
Miguel hummed to himself, slightly surprised by the question. He… hadn’t really thought about that, honestly. To him, “everything” was just “everything”. But the specifics?
“Um,” he said, speaking without thinking, but he pressed on. “Well. MarineDevimon, mostly, I think.” Flip nodded. “I don’t know - well, I know why it’s following us, it’s just… I don’t like that it is. I know that it’s going to show up again, and I know that usually we can fight it off, but I’m worried that… eventually, we won’t be able to.”
“Yeah,” Flip said, more as a prompt for Miguel to continue than actual agreement.
“I’m worried that it won’t give up when we get to Northern Pier and we’re going to end up leading a really dangerous Digimon into a really populated area.” He raised a hand to his face, cupping his fingers around his mouth as he thought. “And aside from MarineDevimon, I’m worried that once we get to File Island we won’t be able to find the Catalyst or who we’re missing. I wish Piximon had known more about them.” He sighed, slumping forward slightly. “I wish things could be easy.”
“If that ain’t the truth,” Flip said, sighing as well. “I’m worried too. I think we stand a shot at defeating MarineDevimon eventually, but if that time doesn’t come sooner rather than later, it is possible it’ll follow us to Northern Pier. And that scares me. We could drag things out longer so that we can fight MarineDevimon before we get there, but something tells me not everyone in the group will be happy with that.”
“Yeah,” Miguel said, opting not to comment on how he didn’t really want to fight MarineDevimon at all. Flip would probably - “Wait.”
He stopped in his tracks, looking down at Flip, who met his gaze evenly. “What do you mean that you’re worried too? That you’re scared?”
“What else do those things mean?” Flip asked, and Miguel rolled his eyes.
He started walking again, Flip following him. “You’ve never been worried about these things before. You’ve definitely never been scared of anything. What happened?”
“You think I’m always this calm?” Flip asked. The grin on his face betrayed any genuine confusion he may have had, but even so.
“Yeah,” Miguel said. “You’re one of the only ones in the group who never questions things and never says anything bad. You’re really… optimistic. Maybe you’re kind of annoying about it at times -” Flip snorted “- but you’re always…” He trailed off, pushing his cheek up with a finger as he searched for the words. “You take things as they come, no matter what they are.”
“Doesn’t mean I’m not worried about them.”
“Hm.” Miguel tilted his head down at him. “Then why do you never show it?”
It was Flip’s turn to go quiet while he thought of what to say. “Because of exactly what you just said,” he finally settled on. “Everyone knows me as the guy who takes things as they come, no matter what they are, and doesn’t worry about them. They’ve never known me as anyone else, so then what happens when I finally am worried about something?”
“…That would mean it was something really bad, right?” Miguel asked. He felt like he was starting to get a grasp of what Flip was trying to say, but it was hard to wrap his head around.
“Exactly,” Flip said, nodding.
“So then why tell me now,” Miguel said. “Why is it now that you’re finally telling me you’re worried about something, even if you don’t want anyone to know that you’re worried?”
“You’re not just anyone,” Flip said quietly.
He looked like he was about to say something more, but he snapped his mouth shut and looked down at his flippers, kicking up sand with each step he took. Miguel breathed deeply, casting his gaze out over the ocean to his left.
The sun was still on the opposite side of the sky; they hadn’t been walking for very long, even if it felt like hours. That had been happening a lot lately. They would walk for ages, and then find out it had only been maybe an hour or two.
Time was always weird in this world, but it had been even more so over the past couple days.
“You’re not just anyone,” Flip said again, and Miguel looked down at him. “You’re my partner. If there’s one person I can tell about these things, it’s you, right?” He smiled, looking decidedly less convincing than he had earlier, but Miguel smiled back anyways.
“I don’t know what you expect me to be able to help you with, though,” Miguel said, and Flip shook his head.
“That’s not why I’m telling you,” Flip said. “I just… want you to know that you’re not alone. I mean, you’re the reason I’ve even realized that my whole ‘go with the flow’ mentality isn’t very useful.”
“Not useful?”
“Sure. Remember Nohemon?”
Miguel groaned, one hand absentmindedly reaching down to brush against the fading wound in his side. “I wish I didn’t.”
Flip laughed. “The only reason I was so adamant about chasing him was because I knew that if I didn’t, it would end badly. I’d seen you with the Gizamon and Cyclomon and the whole factory incident. You’re cautious about things. You second-guess a lot of things that I would just accept, and most of the time your second-guessing is right.”
Miguel felt something… not unpleasant, but unfamiliar. His constant worrying and endless anxiety had actually helped someone? That couldn’t be right.
“You’re right to worry about things,” Flip went on. “I know that you’re upset that you’re always so anxious about things, which I get. But there’s a lot of things that you’re right to worry about, and I care more about being right than being cool, so I’m going to try to be a bit more like you.”
“…Thanks,” Miguel said, and he meant it.
He didn’t understand how this was supposed to make him feel less anxious. If anything, Flip had just confirmed his fears and worries. MarineDevimon was an issue, Northern Pier was an issue, File Island and the Catalyst and their missing piece were all issues. He wasn’t any less worried about them than he was before the conversation.
But… but Flip actually understood him. Flip was worried about those things too. Flip was worried. That was something Miguel never expected to say. He wasn’t as calm and collected as he seemed to be, he was just as worried as Miguel was.
And that was sort of comforting, knowing that he wasn’t just being paranoid and that these were valid worries. Maybe the problem wasn’t solved, but at least he wasn’t alone in these feelings. At least he had a friend who understood.
That was nice.
“No problem,” Flip said, and Miguel smiled down at him.
The sun kept climbing higher, leaving the embrace of the earth in favor of the cloud-spotted sky, and the group kept walking. They’d reached the point of the day where they couldn’t bring themselves to talk to each other, having exhausted all their social energy already and not really having anything to talk about anyways. In a way, it was nice to just be able to walk in silence, with no pressure of having to continue conversation and just the waves and wind as background noise.
They stopped for a snack break a little past noon, speaking no more than they had to as they passed around food and water and tended to the few injuries they had. Both of Harmony’s leg wounds had been healing, slowly but surely, even if it was still difficult for her to walk. She was powering through it. Miguel had a feeling she was struggling with it a lot more than she was letting on, but he didn’t say anything about it.
He knew how it felt. He was sure at least some of the others did too.
When they got walking again, they found conversation coming a little easier, but still not easy enough. They didn’t want to push it too hard - tensions were running high enough as it was, they didn’t need to add “forced socialization” onto their list of reasons why they were so tired and stressed.
Miguel was finding it easier and easier, with each passing day, to be comfortable in silence with the group. He no longer felt the need to fill it, to worry about what everyone else was thinking and if they were thinking about him. They were just… together, and that was enough.
He hadn’t really realized until recently that he’d come to think of everyone as friends. There were still some he wasn’t super close to - specifically Ryan and Damien and Ren - but he felt like he could call them friends and have that be true. Maybe they didn’t feel the same way (he didn’t want to know if that was the case, actually), but “friends” was an easier word than “the group of people and Digimon I’m traveling with to try to save the world”.
They were a strange group, but they were making do with what they had. Maybe some of them were still a little standoffish, maybe others were overly sociable, but they were doing their best.
Yeah. They were his friends. He felt good about that.
He was too lost in his thoughts to participate in any of the idle chatter that the others had managed to pick up again. He was half-listening in - he nodded and smiled faintly whenever he felt the need for it - but for the most part he wasn’t paying attention.
Which meant he also wasn’t paying attention to anything else around him.
A loud series of splashes sounded from out over the ocean, distant but not distant enough. Instantly Miguel perked up, already feeling his heart rate increase, and stopped to turn and see what it was.
It couldn’t be MarineDevimon. Right? It was always so much louder when it showed up, and that was only once it had gotten close enough to the group. Usually it would sneak up on them and then take them by surprise, leaving barely enough time to register that something was attacking them - but maybe it had slipped up this time? Damien had said that the ocean would slowly get shallower as they approached Northern Pier. Maybe it wasn’t able to get close enough underwater? Maybe -
“What is it?” Alex asked. Miguel looked over at him, seeing he’d stepped closer to the water, shielding his face with one hand while Castor stood between him and the waves proper.
Miguel looked out again. He didn’t see anything. Had it retreated? Maybe it was going to wait until later to try to sneak up again. Or maybe it was waiting until they took their eyes off of it.
He heard the splashes again, coming from a slightly different direction, and then he saw a flash of blue. He leaned forward, cupping his own hand over his eyes as he focused in on it.
It wasn’t one Digimon, it was several, and they were much too small to be MarineDevimon even if they had been the same shade of blue. They looked like… dolphins.
Not MarineDevimon at all.
“Oh!” Miguel heard Flip exclaim, and he looked down at him. His partner’s eyes were practically sparkling, one of the biggest grins Miguel had ever seen spread across his face as he stared out at the Digimon. “That’s a pod of Dolphmon! Wow, I never thought I’d see any!”
“They look harmless,” Ezra said cautiously, folding his arms. “I don’t think they’ve seen us.”
Flip nodded. “Even if they have, they won’t be interested in us. They usually stick further out in the ocean and don’t come close to shore.”
“Unless they’re manic,” Miguel mumbled, unable to resist. Flip looked up at him, his expression falling slightly, but he picked it back up.
“Nah, I don’t think so,” he said with a shrug. “Have you ever seen a manic Digimon actually enjoying itself? They all have a mission. They wouldn’t be swimming and jumping like that if they were manic.”
Miguel frowned, scratching his neck. He had a point. Most if not all of the manic Digimon they’d run into had been specifically after the group. Even the ones like Gizamon and Cyclomon, who hadn’t been specifically focused on the group, had turned their attention to the humans and partners when they’d been faced with them.
If the Dolphmon were far enough out, and if they weren’t focused on the group… if they hadn’t even seen them…
“So this isn’t a case like with Dollie then, right?” Ryan said, and Miguel winced.
Flip paused for a moment, looking off into space, then sighed quietly. “No. We’ll be fine.” He turned around to face the whole group, smiling widely, even though it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Just be glad it wasn’t MarineDevimon, yeah?”
Castor groaned, shaking his head. “Yeah. I’ve had enough of him for a while.”
Miguel forced a smile as the rest of the group murmured their assent. They were all tired of MarineDevimon. Tired even of the rare few Digimon who had attacked them on land.
Miguel looked back out to the Dolphmon, watching them disappear into the distance as they jumped in and out of the water. He was familiar enough with the concept of wild Digimon minding their own business, but it was still so uncommon to see Digimon who didn’t want to attack them and hadn’t even noticed them. He felt, more than ever, like a spectator in this world, watching its inhabitants go about their lives without a care to be had, with no idea what was going on.
Hopefully one day all of the Digimon in the Digital World could live their lives that way.
“Hey,” Flip said, and Miguel blinked, looking down at him - and then noticed the group had started walking again, leaving him and Flip to the back of the line.
“Sorry,” he said, turning to jog to catch up, Flip scampering behind him.
“It’s fine,” Flip said. They slowed down, falling into step together a ways behind the group but close enough where they were still walking together. “Well, again, just be glad that that wasn’t MarineDevimon.”
“Ha,” Miguel said, folding his arms in on himself. He bit his lip. He still wasn’t able to shake the feeling of unease he’d gathered - once again he felt that creeping sensation down his spine, like something bad was still about to happen.
He knew he was just being paranoid. It just sucked that that knowledge couldn’t make it stop.
“I kind of thought it was, at first,” he said, not knowing why he was still talking, but Flip tilted his head toward him and he continued. “Like, I know by now when a sound from the ocean is a MarineDevimon sound, and I knew that that wasn’t it, but it - I still thought it was. I don’t know why.”
Flip nodded. “It’s fine. I was kind of nervous when I heard it first too.” He looked out to the ocean, and Miguel followed his gaze, watching the waves break up on shore over and over. “But Dolphmon really are harmless. Unless you attack them first, but we wouldn’t do that, and they were too far away to -”
“It wasn’t that,” Miguel said, shaking his head. Flip looked back up at him and Miguel felt that pit in his stomach again. “It’s going to come back again. I know it will. Everyone knows it. Maybe that wasn’t it this time, but it will be eventually. We -” He cut himself off, snapping his jaw shut and blinking rapidly. He faltered in his step slightly but picked his pace back up, keeping his gaze forward, focused on the backs of the others ahead of him.
Why is this so difficult?
“We just have to wait,” he said, choosing his words carefully and speaking slowly. He couldn’t bring himself to look down at Flip just yet. “And I hate that. Every time we’ve had to wait for something like this I’ve hated it. Cyclomon. Kuwagamon. Matadormon. It’s like…” He looked down at his hands for a moment, clenching and unclenching his fingers. “It’s like the longer it takes for something to happen, the worse it feels while we are waiting. It gives my brain more time to think of all the ways things could go wrong.”
Flip remained silent, but Miguel still didn’t look at him. “And what if it doesn’t end? What if MarineDevimon just keeps following us until we have to give up, or it overpowers us, or we get to Northern Pier and it hurts other people? We can’t keep going on like this forever. I don’t even know if the fights have been doing anything to it.” He sighed, shaking his head. “You guys still can’t even evolve to ultimate on command. How long until MarineDevimon wears us down before we can wear it down?”
“We’re going to defeat it,” Flip said, and Miguel sighed again. Flip harrumphed, and Miguel finally faced him, seeing a defiant frown on his face. “I’m serious.”
“I’m sure you are,” Miguel mumbled, and Flip’s expression grew even more intense.
“I’m not being thoughtlessly optimistic,” he said. “I really do mean it. It might take us a couple of tries, but we are going to defeat it.”
I don’t want to think he’s just trying to cheer me up, but… Miguel tilted his head. “And how are you so sure of that?”
It was Flip’s turn to go quiet, looking down at his claws and the sand he kicked up as he waddled along. Miguel watched him, seeing the way his brow furrowed and relaxed, the way his tail swished back and forth, the way his eyes narrowed whenever he started to open his mouth, only to close it again, apparently deciding against whatever it was he was going to say.
Eventually he scoffed, looking back up at Miguel. “Because we’ve defeated everything else that’s stood in our way. Every Digimon that’s tried to fight us, no matter how strong they may be, we’ve either defeated or driven away. Sometimes it takes a couple attempts, but we always manage.”
That… well, maybe it was true. All the Digimon they’d been faced with, they had fought back against, and a majority of the time they’d won. And when they didn’t win, at least they escaped alive, and at least the Digimon in question hadn’t continued to pursue them.
But even so.
“So if I walk across the street without looking and don’t get hit by a car,” Miguel said under his breath, “that means I won’t ever get hit by one?”
“I literally don’t know what that means,” Flip said, and Miguel couldn’t help but giggle. Flip gave him a deadpan stare, which only made Miguel laugh harder, and then Flip snorted, joining in.
Miguel knew he was pushing back against him only to justify his own anxiety. Having someone tell him he was wrong had never come easy to him, even if it was true, and it wasn’t any different when they were trying to tell him that his anxiety was wrong, even if he also knew it was.
Flip was trying to help him, he knew this, but it was hard to actually take what he was saying to heart when his brain was telling him the exact opposite. Especially since, for all he knew, Flip was just trying to reassure him, cheer him up so he stopped worrying about it.
But Flip said earlier that he doesn’t want to be wrong, so if he’s saying this, then that means…
He’d said it wasn’t thoughtless optimism, and Miguel wanted to believe him. If only his brain did as well.
“Sorry,” he groaned, rubbing the back of his head. “I’m sure you’re right. It’s just -”
“I get it,” Flip said. “But I do mean it. Trust me, next time we see MarineDevimon, I’m going to beat it into a pulp!”
“Are you now,” came a new voice, and Miguel yelped, practically jumping into the air away from the speaker.
When he calmed down, still trying to slow his heartbeat back down to normal, he looked directly into the eyes of Damien, expression unreadable as always. Or, not directly, because he had his sunglasses on - and that was probably making it harder to read his face, too -
“Yes,” Flip said, and Miguel blinked, mentally shaking away the billion new thoughts and worries that had piled up in his head (how much had Damien heard, did he think Miguel was being unreasonable, so on and so forth). “Just you wait and see. It won’t even think about coming back once I’m done with it!”
“I love the enthusiasm,” Damien said, falling into stride next to Miguel, Bumble hovering next to him. Miguel caught his eye and waved subtly; Bumble blinked and lifted a claw in return. “If I could, I’d join you, but. Human body and all that.”
“I think you could do it if you really tried,” Bumble said, and Damien smiled crookedly.
“Nah, I’d rather not break all my bones trying to land a hit. Besides, I can’t swim very well.” He looked over at Miguel, tipping his head slightly. “What about you?”
“Me?” Miguel asked, stupidly. He sucked a breath in, tugging on his backpack straps nervously. “Um. I don’t think I could.”
“Really?” Damien leaned back. “If we baited MarineDevimon onto land I think you would stand a good chance. You could probably get a few good hits in if we kept it distracted.”
“Oh,” Miguel said, suddenly very flustered. “Maybe. I’m not very… I’ve never fought anything before.”
“Neither have I,” Damien said, shrugging. “I still think you stand a good chance.”
Miguel smiled faintly. “Thanks?”
“Don’t mention it.” Damien looked out ahead, at the rest of the group, for a moment, before exhaling slowly. “I think we’re going to keep going for a few more hours and then stop for the day. Everyone’s tired. Like I said earlier, it’s not worth it to sacrifice sleep just to get there sooner, especially with such a loyal fan following us around.”
Miguel nodded, and Damien must have taken it as a sign that they were done talking. He signaled for Bumble to follow, then picked up his pace until he reached Moxie, further ahead with the others, leaving Miguel and Flip at the back once more.
Miguel frowned slightly, then shook his head. At his feet, Flip looked up at him, but he paid him no mind.
Hm.
Sure enough, when the sun was just starting to set, going to hide behind the ocean for another night’s rest, the group stopped to set up camp. They managed to find a small hill they could stay behind, away from the open air directly along the shoreline. It was a small victory, certainly nothing amazing, but it was one that they hadn’t had for the past few days, and so it was celebrated anyways.
Supplies were running low; they were rationing their food the best they could, having no forests to forage through anymore and none of the humans wanting to try to eat the stray seaweed they could only sometimes find strewn across the beach. The Digimon insisted that it was edible, but did relent that it was a very unpleasant salty flavor, and they all decided they were better off trying to live off what they already had.
In fact, Miguel was in the middle of figuring out what they were going to eat that night, rifling through Ezra and Moxie’s bags to see what they had. It wasn’t much. The last town they’d been in was Hallowed Streets, which at this point was well over two weeks ago.
He had no idea how they’d managed to make it this far.
They’d have to make do. He could deal with it; there were only a few more days until they could stock up on supplies again in Northern Pier, not to mention they’d be able to eat at a real restaurant for the first time in ages as well.
Moxie and Pop had also said the other night that towns and cities were a lot more common on File Island. Something about it being a more modern continent, where the buildings and cities were upgraded to fit with current technology more often than they were on Server. Honestly, he couldn’t wait to get to File Island if it meant they wouldn’t have to ration their food for weeks at a time until they stumbled across the next settlement.
He sat back, having made his decision on what to cook for the night - cube meat and rice, something Castor had taught him to make about a week ago. Miguel had never been so relieved in his life as he had when Castor had reassured him, a few nights after leaving Hallowed Streets when Miguel was trying to figure out what to make for dinner, that food did not decompose in the Digital World and the meat did not need to be refrigerated.
To this day Miguel still had no idea where the meat in the Digital World came from, but he’d never bothered to ask. The partners had insisted that it was not from other Digimon, but hadn’t explained where it did come from, leaving the humans (aside from Moxie and Damien, who also did not elaborate) to make their best guess.
Miguel’s own theory was that it grew in the ground like a crop, but none of the Digimon had confirmed this, and he was fine with that.
“Hey, I figured it out,” he called out as he turned around and stood up, walking to the center of camp where some of the group were standing. “I hope everyone’s okay with steak and rice again.”
“Yeah, that’s great,” Damien said, pocketing his phone and lifting his glasses off his face. Next to him, Moxie and Pop both lifted a hand (or wing) in greeting, and Miguel waved back subtly. “Better than a handful of mushrooms and apples.”
“Those apples are good, actually,” Moxie said, placing her hands on her hips in mock anger.
Damien snorted. “Maybe the first three dozen times. Anyways.” He craned his neck around, and Miguel followed his gaze to see he was looking at Bumble, sitting away from most of the group and staring out at the water. “Bumble and I’ll go get firewood.”
“What?” came Ren’s voice, and Miguel turned back around to see her crouched next to where Ryan was tending to Harmony’s wounds. She pinned her ears back, pushing herself to her feet and taking a few steps towards them. “You can’t go off on your own. It’s going to be dark soon. You -”
She cut herself off, raising a paw to her mouth and looking down at her feet. Miguel’s shoulders fell slightly, watching how her tail swept back and forth, kicking up clouds of sand in her nervousness.
It was… disconcerting to see Ren so anxious about something as simple as looking for firewood. He knew why she was, of course. What if something happened while they were gone? What if MarineDevimon showed up again? Or another Digimon?
So many things could go wrong, and for perhaps the first time during this whole journey, someone other than Miguel was having their brain run at a hundred miles an hour coming up with exactly all the things that could go wrong.
It made him a little sick to his stomach when he thought about it too hard.
“That’s fine,” Damien said, and Miguel shook himself out. Damien looked down at Miguel and smiled, and Miguel suddenly felt that sick feeling again. “We can take Miguel and Flip. Always travel in pairs, yeah?”
“What?” Miguel said, clenching his fists. “I can’t go. I have to cook.”
Damien shrugged. “Can’t cook anything if there’s no fire.” He looked back at Ren, tilting his head. “Is that okay?”
Ren paused, opening her mouth as if to say something - and then she breathed out, shaking her head slowly. “Yeah,” she mumbled, turning around to head back to Harmony, who was staring at her worriedly from around Ryan’s shoulder. “Stay safe.”
“Will do,” Damien said. He stuck his hands in his pockets, nodding at Miguel. “Shall we?”
“Oh,” Miguel said, but Damien was already turning to leave, heading towards Bumble and motioning for him to come with. Miguel looked around the clearing and, fortunately, caught Flip’s eye; he himself motioned for his own partner to follow, and he did, the two of them scrambling to catch up to Damien.
They headed back the way they’d come. They’d seen some driftwood scattered along the beach earlier, which Miguel had made a mental note of in case someone needed to know where it was, so it was easy enough to locate it and pick it up as they walked.
But he had a feeling that collecting firewood wasn’t the reason Damien had dragged him out here. He knew that Damien would be much more likely to choose Moxie or even Azure to come with him, and that was if he was open to the idea of someone tagging along at all. So why him? Why Miguel?
Well, why don’t you ask?
“Uh,” Miguel said, drawing Damien’s attention to him with the single syllable, and he winced under his gaze, but didn’t shut down completely (by some miracle). “Why did you pick me?”
Damien didn’t reply immediately, instead leaning down to scoop up a branch he was moments away from tripping over. When he straightened up, his glasses fell back down over his eyes with the motion, and he made no move to push them up again. Miguel bit the inside of his mouth, trying to focus on the sand beneath his own feet as he walked.
“We don’t talk a lot,” Damien finally said, stating the obvious. “Well, I don’t talk a lot with most of the group, but especially you.”
“And you’re really keen on getting to know people and becoming better friends with them, yeah?” Flip chimed in, startling Miguel. The little sea lion was only a few steps ahead of them, unable to carry any wood of his own but doing his part by pointing out where any lay ahead of them (which, again, Miguel didn’t need, but he didn’t say anything). Flip tilted his head back so he could somewhat look at Damien, the faintest of smirks on his face.
Damien huffed a laugh, placing his unoccupied hand in his pocket. “You know me.” He looked over at Miguel; the sun reflected off his sunglasses in a way where Miguel couldn’t see his eyes. “It’s been a rough few days for everyone. I wanted to see where you’re standing.”
“Ah.” Miguel fidgeted with his hands the best he could, making sure not to lose his grip on his sticks. “Um. That’s difficult to answer.”
Damien didn’t respond, but kept staring at Miguel, which he took as a prompt to keep talking - but he didn’t want to. He didn’t know how. It was really difficult to tell someone that you were seriously considering something that they’d been very outspoken against just a few days ago.
And that was under the assumption that he actually was considering it. He didn’t know where he stood on the matter, really, even with having had the past few days to turn it over in his head. He’d very deliberately not said anything about it in the moment, knowing even without hearing everyone else’s thoughts that if he said anything in support, he’d quickly be shut down too.
Even with a little more time to consider it, he still didn’t know how he truly felt.
“I’m just -” He cut himself off, shrugging weakly. He snuck a glance over at Damien, who caught his eye and raised a brow. “Nevermind.”
“I’m not going to judge you for whatever it is,” Damien said. “If that’s what you’re worried about.”
“We’re all friends here,” Flip said with a nod, apparently still listening in. “Judgment-free zone. Right, Bumble?”
At the sound of his name, Bumble looked over at the three of them, his antennae twitching. He was hovering off to the side, closer to the shore, watching the ocean intently. After a brief pause, he nodded too, then resumed his attention on the waves.
Flip stuck his tongue out at him, so subtly and briefly that had Miguel not known to look for it, he wouldn’t have even noticed. The little sea lion was particularly skilled at pulling facial expressions and then immediately wiping them off, and Miguel had grown quite fond of the habit over the weeks.
His mouth formed into a smile all on its own. “It’s not really a big deal,” he said, still trying to get out of it, but with Flip, he knew he wasn’t going to let it go so easily.
And he was right. “You can’t just start talking and then stop midway through with no explanation,” his partner complained, flicking an ear. “It’s just going to make me more curious.”
“I don’t really care either way,” Damien said, which Miguel had no real reason to doubt - he’d known Damien for long enough to know that he didn’t pay much mind to others’ personal matters, but there was a certain glint in his eye, even hidden as it was behind his glasses, which betrayed both his words and his reputation.
Miguel wished he really didn’t care. Maybe that would make it easier.
He sighed, shaking his head slowly. “I’m just thinking about what Harmony said the other day,” he mumbled, reaching up to rub the back of his neck. “About the option of staying here. And not going on.”
“What about it specifically?”
There was no malice in Damien’s voice - in fact, there wasn’t much of anything in it. Miguel peeked over at him, and saw an expression on his face which he couldn’t say he’d ever seen from him before.
He hadn’t really been expecting this. He’d been expecting the same immediate shutdown he’d given Harmony, not… whatever this was.
“Um,” he started, rolling his hands around together. “Just. What would happen if I did stay. And what that would mean for me. I mean… I don’t know if I could ever really call this place home.”
“It’s not that big a deal,” Damien said with a shrug. “Just gotta adjust to living in a world full of monsters.”
“That isn’t what I’m talking about,” Miguel said quietly. “I have a family. Who are probably really worried about me right now.”
Damien fell silent, his jaw clenching shut, and Miguel did not press him further.
Flip, however, did not get the memo, and barreled on without a second regard, frowning deeply at Damien. “Miguel was pulled from his world without the chance to say goodbye to his family. Belittling him for being worried about them isn’t going to do any good.”
“I wasn’t belittling him at all,” Damien said, a sharp edge to his words, but his face still maintained that unreadable expression. “I just wanted to know his thoughts on the situation and try to offer him reassurances. You know, like normal people do.”
“‘Normal people’ are not currently trapped in a parallel world with no way back home,” Bumble cut in, and Miguel blinked in surprise.
He’s… going against Damien?
“That’s entirely beside the point,” Damien said, waving a hand around, and Miguel could swear he saw the corners of his mouth pull up into a ghost of a smile. He looked over at Miguel, the grin slipping off his face easily. “Well? Do you know what you’re going to do?”
“…I don’t know,” Miguel admitted after a moment, shuffling his feet together and kicking up sand. “It’s a lot to think about. If I didn’t have to worry about my family, then I think I’d be a bit more open to the possibility… but I can’t just stay here and leave them behind.”
And even if he could, there was still the issue of not being equipped to survive in this world. He was a human who didn’t belong here.
There was no way he could ever make this world his home, even if he wanted to and even if he tried.
Damien nodded, but his eyes were distant, focused on the skyline ahead of them. “Yeah. I get that.”
“What about you?”
Miguel blinked down at Flip, who was staring up at Damien. The taller boy placed his hand on his hip and drummed his fingers along his waist, not answering Flip’s question.
“What are you going to do?” Flip continued when no one said anything. He ducked his head, looking down at his claws. “If you’ve made up your mind, that is.”
Damien pursed his lips. “Well, for me…” He chuckled, pulling his glasses up off of his face. “I couldn’t go back home even if I wanted to. Might as well keep going, yeah?”
“But the Digital World is your home, right?” Flip said, scrunching his nose up. “Isn’t that what you always say?”
Damien nodded. “It is. That’s why I’m going to keep going.”
Miguel’s brow furrowed for a moment, choosing not to press on Damien’s definition of “home”. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to,” he eventually settled on. “Just because you don’t want to go back to the real world doesn’t mean that you should feel obligated to do this.”
“No,” Damien said, shaking his head out. “I do want to do this. As weird as it is to say, I want to see this through. I need to -” He snapped his mouth shut, turning away and sighing before speaking again. “I need to do something.”
Miguel cocked his head, watching the way Damien took shaky breaths in, his hands hovering at his sides. “But you don’t have to do anything.”
“No, that’s the thing,” Damien spat, spinning on his heel to face Miguel, who instinctively threw his hands up in front of him in a defensive gesture, dropping his firewood. Flip was immediately at Miguel’s side, his ears pinned back and mane standing on end, but Damien paid him absolutely no mind.
Damien took a step forward, reaching a hand up and out towards Miguel as if to push him, but it came to a janky halt midair and Damien’s eyes fluttered shut. “I am going to do this to prove to this shithole world that I am just as worthy of saving it as any of you.”
It hit Miguel at much the same time it seemed to hit Damien - what this was all about, why Damien was still with the group even after leading them to Central Forest, why he was so determined to keep going. Miguel took a step back, placing a hand over his mouth, while Damien winced and once again looked off to the side, not offering any follow-up.
Miguel’s shoulders slumped.
“So that’s what this is?” Flip said, his voice almost startling to Miguel after such a long silence. “Spite? You’re doing this because somebody told you not to?”
“Almost,” Damien muttered, rubbing his arm. “I’m doing this because nobody told me to.”
He paused, tilting his face up towards the ever-darkening sky, the first early stars just beginning to flicker into vision. Miguel followed his gaze, veering off course slightly and looking out over the ocean. The endless blue hue was shifting to parallel the early evening, taking on more of an indigo-gray tone, though the white foam spraying up onto the shore remained impossibly bright.
Eventually Damien shook his head out, dragging Miguel’s attention back toward him. He swallowed and sucked his bottom lip in, his eyes narrowed as he pointedly avoided Miguel and Flip’s gazes.
He reached down to pick up his firewood that he’d dropped, and Miguel mirrored the action, the group setting off again once they’d collected themselves. Damien still didn’t look over at Miguel, but he sighed and shook his head. On the other side, Bumble looked at him for a moment, something like concern - or maybe sympathy - on his face.
“This world,” Damien started, his voice gentle but carrying such a heavy weight that Miguel could practically feel it, “for whatever reason, decided that I’m not good enough for it. Not good enough to save it. And I am nothing if not a stubborn motherfucker, so I am going to take its destiny and shove it in its stupid fucking face and show it that I am good enough. I can do this because I am good enough.”
“But,” Miguel said almost before Damien had finished speaking, the words falling out of his mouth before he could think them over and decide against saying anything, “but - the first time we talked, the day after we met - you said that this world did decide that you were good enough - and that that was why you were doing this -?”
“I didn’t know jack shit about this destiny thing back then,” Damien said, his eyes lidded. “I thought that it did think I could do it. Why else would I have the digivice? Why else would I have Bumble?” He rolled his shoulders back, casting a cursory glance towards his partner, who was still several yards ahead of them, his wings buzzing incessantly.
“But then,” he continued, quieter this time, “the whole Aegiochusmon thing happened. It turned out that Bumble and Moxie and Pop and I really aren’t a part of your group. And I was fine with that at first.” His expression darkened. “But I’ve been waiting for five years to be able to do something. And just when I thought that it was finally time…” He shrugged, clenching his empty fist. “Turns out this isn’t it.”
Miguel nodded, not knowing exactly what to say. Was there anything he could say? Damien wasn’t normally one to open up about these things. What was there that he could do?
“You didn’t really answer my question earlier,” Damien suddenly said, stopping in his tracks and rounding on Miguel, his glasses falling down and bumping against his nose with the movement. He pushed them back up on his forehead and let his arm fall to his side, taking a step toward Miguel.
“What?” Miguel asked, genuinely confused. He asked me if I wanted to stay. I told him I didn’t know. That’s what he wanted, right?
“What about you?”
Damien’s eyes were unreadable, digging into Miguel’s skin and sifting around as if they could taste the blood coursing through his veins, feel his ever-quickening pulse as the two of them stared each other down.
When Miguel spoke again, his voice was so much softer than he had ever heard from himself. “What are you talking about?”
“What about you,” Damien repeated, his gaze unwavering. “What do you want? Do you want to do this, take up this task given you to by a world you didn’t know existed a month ago? Or do you want to run back home and abandon the only chance you’ll ever have of doing something good?”
“This isn’t the only chance I’ll get,” Miguel said slowly, shifting backward slightly, but Damien was on him in an instant, reaching out and grabbing his forearm to hold him in place, both of them dropping their firewood again. Miguel frowned but stilled himself, though he did not meet Damien’s gaze.
“I’d say saving the world is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”
“But there’s other things I can do back home,” Miguel protested, growing increasingly uncomfortable in Damien’s grasp. “Other good things -“
“I am not asking about things you can do at home,” Damien said, practically spitting out the last word. “I am asking about the thing you can do here, the thing you were brought here for, the thing you are destined for.”
“Leave him alone,” Flip said, the warning evident in his voice as he edged toward Damien.
Damien rolled his eyes. “I’m asking him a simple question.”
“This isn’t simple at all!” Miguel cried, wrestling himself free of Damien’s hold and jumping backward.
“Isn’t it?” Damien said, one eyebrow raised. “It’s a yes or no. Stay or leave. Do or die. Save the world -” he gestured all around himself “- or don’t.”
His arms fell to his side again, and then he crossed them, cocking his head and staring straight into Miguel’s eyes, waiting for an answer, any answer.
“What are you going to do?”
“I -” Miguel grabbed at his arms, shying away and staring off towards the ocean. The pounding waves had been a soothing white noise in the back of his brain for the past few days, but now they were unimaginably loud, each rush of seawater crashing against his ears and ricocheting around his head. He blinked a few times, shaking his head out, before hesitantly looking back over at Damien.
“I want to,” he whispered, and Damien’s piercing gaze softened almost imperceptibly. “I want to. And I know that I need to at least try. But I don’t know if I can do it.”
“You can.”
Miguel inhaled slowly, unable to tear his gaze off of Damien’s. “How?” he mumbled.
How?
How can I do it? How can I try?
How are you so sure of me?
“It’s not going to be easy,” Damien said. He took a step forward, placing a hand on Miguel’s arm. “But you can do it.”
Miguel let go of the breath he’d been holding, nodding slowly. If Damien believes in me…
It’s like he said. If this world thinks I can save it, then surely I can, right?
“Hey,” Damien said then, his voice almost frantic (or about as frantic as Damien’s voice could possibly get), and Miguel immediately shook himself out, focusing back on the present. But Damien wasn’t looking at him - he was looking over his head, out at the ocean.
“What?” Miguel said.
And then he heard it.
The sound of something breaking through the water’s surface, something very large and still, followed by that deep, guttural growling that he’d come to loathe. All the sounds he’d heard many more times than he would ever like to over the past few days.
He knew what it was instantly, but he still whipped around to look at the ocean, watching as MarineDevimon rose from the depths, all three white eyes locked on the group and tentacles thrashing.
Each time Miguel saw MarineDevimon, he noticed something new about it. The first, most obvious thing was that it was ginormous, easily over twenty feet tall, and largely humanoid. It looked like a sort of deep blue squid, but the skin on its forearms and calves seemed to be ripped off, revealing white flesh underneath. From its back sprouted a long cape and two long white squid tentacles, which Miguel hadn’t realized until the third time were tipped in black claws just as its hands were. This time, Miguel also noticed that it had a white octopus tentacle for a tail, along with a scuba diver gauge strapped across its chest.
MarineDevimon roared, and Miguel’s heart sped up, pounding against his ribs like it was trying to run away, just as Miguel himself wished he could.
Flip bounded forward, ears pinned back and tail lashing, barely giving Miguel time to register what was happening. He stumbled forward, instinctively following him, and then he locked eyes with MarineDevimon again and froze in his tracks.
MarineDevimon was going to be at the shore any moment now. It was still advancing through the water, its tentacles flailing about as if they had a mind of their own.
Miguel didn’t know what to do.
Did he ever, really, but that wasn’t something he could focus on right now. MarineDevimon was here again, as he knew it would eventually be, and just as he’d expected, he was rooted to the spot, unable to move or speak or even think.
He knew, logically, that they had to fight it - but logic was not a strong suit of his. He knew he had to do something, he knew he couldn’t just stand here and do nothing, but he also knew that he was absolutely dead terrified of MarineDevimon.
Every working brain cell he had was screaming at him to turn around and run away, or grab his digivice and call for help, or look to Damien for advice. Those were all smart things to do.
But something else in his brain - something almost unfamiliar to him - was telling him not to back down.
He didn’t know why.
“Miguel!” Flip called from ahead, his voice strained. MarineDevimon roared, its tentacles rising out of the water and curling back, poised to strike at any moment.
Miguel hesitated for a moment, his eyes darting between the Digimon slowly approaching the shore and his partner, his claws digging into the sand and his eyes wide, filled with a wild determination that Miguel knew well.
He looked back at Damien, standing with his hands in his pockets and glasses perched on his forehead.
Damien tilted his head, a crooked smile forming on his lips. “What’s it gonna be?”
Miguel closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and nodded.
“Flip!” he called out, cupping his hands around his mouth to help it carry. “You said you were going to beat it into a pulp, right? Now’s your chance!”
Flip grinned, swiping his claws across the sand in front of him. “Hell yeah,” he said, and went up in green light as Miguel’s digivice gave its spiel.
From behind, Miguel heard a similar sound, and then a rush of air slammed into his back as Bumble, now evolved, rushed forward to hover beside Flip. Miguel steeled himself, planting his feet firmly in the ground and doing his best not to fall down.
When Flip emerged from the light, he immediately fired an attack at MarineDevimon, even though it hadn’t quite reached the shore yet - but there was no time to waste. “
It stumbled backward for a moment, but righted itself quickly enough. “Bothersome,” it growled, its sentences short and to the point as always. Miguel clenched his fists, looking to Flip, who was preparing for another attack.
“
“
Miguel took a step back, then stopped himself.
MarineDevimon smacked Bumble out of the air, sending him tumbling to the ground, then rounded on Flip. “
“
Bumble zipped backward, out of MarineDevimon’s range, and circled around to its side. “
“
“
Miguel winced as the ink hit Bumble, but relaxed slightly as Flip launched another missile at it, knocking it and the stream of its attack off to the side and leaving Bumble mostly unharmed. MarineDevimon growled and backed up into the water, a tentacle reaching forward to slap Flip away as he tried to follow it. Bumble, too, tried to approach, but MarineDevimon shot another stream of ink and he fell to the sand a few feet away from the ocean.
“
MarineDevimon let go, dropping him into the shallows of the ocean, and Miguel’s fingernails dug into his palms as he landed with a splash. MarineDevimon kicked him away, back up on the beach, and then turned to focus on Bumble again, tentacles already reaching down to grab him too.
They were losing. Just as they always did.
Miguel reached an arm up to wipe across his eyes, and when he let it drop to his side, he was jumpscared by Damien, who had stepped up to him, watching the fight in front of him. His eyes were narrowed, focused intently on every one of Bumble’s moves as he struggled to escape MarineDevimon’s hold.
“We’re losing,” Miguel said, clutching a hand to his chest.
“Not yet,” Damien mumbled, and Miguel shook his head.
“No, Damien,” he said, “we’re losing.”
Damien turned to look at him, expression no different. “No we are not.”
“We are, though,” Miguel exclaimed, and as if to prove his point, MarineDevimon called out another attack, hitting both Flip and Bumble with the stream of ink before following up with more slaps and strikes from its tentacles. “We haven’t fought it off before when we’ve been with the rest of the group. We can’t do it now. We need to leave before -”
Damien moved to stand in front of him, grabbing both of his shoulders and shaking him slightly. “We are not going to leave. We aren’t going to give up or back down or run away. We see this through to the end.”
“But we can’t!” Miguel cried, reaching up to wrap his own hands around Damien’s arms. “They’re -” He swept an arm out to gesture at Flip and Bumble, the former struggling against MarineDevimon’s grasp and the latter trying to push himself up out of the water. “MarineDevimon is too strong for them! It’s too strong for all of us!”
“Maybe so,” Damien said, gritting his teeth, “but we aren’t going to give up.” He squeezed Miguel’s shoulders, drawing a whimper out of him. “We haven’t run away from MarineDevimon yet. We have always managed to drive it away, no matter how long or how much it takes. This isn’t going to be any different.” He finally let go, taking a single step back and crossing his arms. “I’m not going to let you give up.”
Miguel sucked a breath in, balling his hands into fists, his eyes flicking between Damien and MarineDevimon and the two partner Digimon and back again. He squeezed his eyes shut, reaching a hand up to wipe at them, and then he felt Damien’s hand on his again.
He opened his eyes to see Damien looking at him, and something in his gaze was so catastrophically different than anything Miguel had ever seen in it that he choked on a cough.
“We’re going to get through this together,” Damien said, his fingers tightening around Miguel’s own. “I’m not going to give up on you and I sure as hell am not going to let you give up on yourself.” He smiled. “It’s like I said earlier. You can do this. You just have to face your fears.”
“Will you face your fears?”
Something sparked, deep within Miguel’s chest - the beginnings of a flame, pulsing in tandem with his heart, drawing the breath out of him with a gasp. He stumbled forward, into Damien’s arms - he didn’t have time to apologize before he collapsed, sinking onto his knees, digging his fingers into the sand and closing his eyes as tight as he could.
He had heard that question before.
(…Well, he hadn’t heard it, exactly, so much as read it.)
Only a couple days before this whole thing had started - before he and the others had been pulled in through a school computer - he had gotten a text message from an unknown number with that exact question.
He hadn’t known what to make of it. It was a question he’d heard people ask him all his life, a question he had asked himself more than once, and he’d never had an answer for it. He always wanted to say yes, but more often than not, it was a lie.
But it was a lie he told people often, and it was one he’d told the anonymous sender.
He felt bad about it, yes, but he would have felt worse if he’d left it unanswered. A lie was better than nothing, right? And they were a stranger. He didn’t know who they were, and they didn’t know him. There wouldn’t be any consequences if he lied to them, aside from the regret that churned in his chest whenever he thought about it for too long.
Damien wasn’t any different from anyone else who had ever asked him that question. Miguel could so easily just lie to him, say yes without meaning it, and Damien wouldn’t have any way of knowing the difference. Miguel could lie and say yes and not mean it at all and everything would be fine.
But right now, he kind of felt like it wasn’t a lie.
Sure. He was still scared shitless of a lot of things in this godforsaken world, most imminently being MarineDevimon (and also, to an extent, Damien’s unwavering confidence in him). He didn’t think he would ever not be. But that only mattered if he let those fears win. If he let his fears win, that would be the end for him.
And if he pushed through them, then maybe he would win.
So. Yes, he was going to face his fears. Maybe he wouldn’t be good at it, but he would at least try, and he was not going to give up.
“Yes,” he said, looking up at Damien, who looked incredibly confused, and then Miguel remembered he hadn’t actually asked him a question. “Um. Yes, you’re right.”
Damien nodded and reached a hand down to help him up. “There you go. See? I told you so.”
Of course he couldn’t resist that. Miguel rolled his eyes and Damien laughed, then looked back out at the fight. “You better figure something out quick,” he said, but Miguel was already heading towards Flip, watching as MarineDevimon pulled a tentacle back to strike him again.
“Flip!” he shouted, distracting MarineDevimon for a moment - but just a moment was all Flip needed to roll out of the way, jumping out of the water and out of the range of his attack. Miguel narrowed his eyes, breaking into a run as he rushed toward the water’s edge, toward his partner, toward MarineDevimon. “Give it all you’ve got! We’re not going to back down!”
“That’s the spirit,” Flip said, lifting his head toward MarineDevimon, and Miguel smiled.
It felt pretty good to not give up.
In his pocket, Miguel’s digivice beeped and vibrated.
“Ultimate evolution engaged. Please do not turn off the digivice while evolution is in progress.”
As Miguel reached the shoreline, coming up to stand next to Flip, carried by adrenaline and fear both (and the knowledge that his partner was about to evolve), his vision was flooded with white light as Flip began to glow.
MarineDevimon growled, raising its tentacles, but its voice was drowned out by a roar as the light flashed and disappeared, revealing Flip in his ultimate form.
“
He towered over MarineDevimon now, and was much more solidly built, making him appear even larger. Like his champion form, he was covered in white fur - but it did not cover his entire body, leaving dark gray skin exposed on his lower jaw, torso, upper arms and legs, and entire right arm. His horn had grown longer and barbed at the tip, and his tusks had also lengthened, peeking out from under the tufts of fur that grew above his lip. A large, dark green tortoise shell was strapped across his back, huge spikes and silver bolts sprouting from it, and from underneath draped a long furry tail.
In his right hand, he gripped a massive metal hammer, and it was this hammer that he slammed into the ocean, sending waves cascading out from all around him as he roared again.
“Zudomon,” Miguel’s digivice read out as he stepped back to take in the entirety of Flip’s new form. “Ultimate level sea beast Digimon. It guards its well-tempered muscles with protectors it made from the pelt and shell that it stole from its opponents, and the horn on its head is now impossible to regrow, so it processed it into a saw shape.”
Flip jumped right back into battle, giving MarineDevimon no time to get in an attack. He charged towards it, meeting its tentacles with his hands, grabbing them and pulling them apart. MarineDevimon growled again and managed to wrest one out from his hold, wrapping it around his neck and burying the claws into his fur. Flip bared his teeth and yanked back hard, dislodging MarineDevimon’s hold and sending it stumbling forward as it found it had no balance.
Flip took the opportunity and raised his hammer as MarineDevimon toppled over. “
Miguel held out against the force, planting his feet in the ground and holding his arms up to his face. When the shockwave subsided, he lowered his arms to see Flip holding MarineDevimon by the neck up to his face, his hammer pressed against its side. MarineDevimon hissed, squirming, and Flip tightened his grip.
“Who’s the archangel you work for?” Flip grumbled, pushing his hammer against it harder. “Why have you been following us? What did he tell you to do?”
“You’d be wise,” it snarled, reaching a tentacle around to the back of Flip’s neck, “not to call him that.
“
As MarineDevimon wrapped its tentacles around Flip’s neck, Bumble - having finally pushed himself up out of the water and came to his own senses - fired his laser beam at it, knocking it aside just before it could begin to strangle Flip. Immediately Flip was after it, reaching down into the ocean and grabbing it before it could slip away.
“
MarineDevimon was up again quicker than it was last time, already rearing back. “
He lowered his head, staring at MarineDevimon and baring his teeth. “
Miguel grit his teeth, but held his ground.
MarineDevimon lifted its head, glowering at Flip for a split second before turning to look at Bumble. “
“
Flip struck it before it could even finish its attack, moving to stand between it and Bumble when the shockwave faded. He narrowed his eyes, pressing his hammer down into its chest, making it gasp.
“I’m going to ask you again,” he said, and MarineDevimon sneered beneath him. “Who is the archangel you work for?”
“Not an archangel,” MarineDevimon spat. “I don’t work for him.”
Flip frowned, putting more pressure on its chest. “But you know him. He sent you to follow us, did he not?”
“Doesn’t matter,” MarineDevimon said. It shifted slightly and Flip placed a hand on its tentacles, trapping them beneath his palm. It snapped its teeth up at him and he growled back, pushing harder against it.
“Did he send you to follow us?”
MarineDevimon glared. “I do not need to waste my time on you. This is not my only purpose.
“
Flip lifted his hammer to block the stream of ink, and MarineDevimon, freed of its prison, finally managed to slip loose, pulling its tentacles out from under his hand. It took a few steps back, still facing Flip, then turned around and dove below the water.
Flip roared, rushing forward and plunging his fists into the water, hammer abandoned - and pulled out one of MarineDevimon’s tentacles. Seconds later, MarineDevimon surfaced, hissing and spitting and trying its best to snatch its tentacle away from Flip.
“
“Tell me what you know about him,” Flip said, “or I will end you.”
Miguel blinked, stepping towards Flip, hoping he would look over and catch his eye or something. It wasn’t that he was super opposed to Flip… “ending” MarineDevimon, but…
It’s weird seeing him like this.
“Flip!” he called out, waving an arm to catch his attention. Flip finally looked over at him, tilting his head slightly, and MarineDevimon followed his gaze.
But only for a moment.
MarineDevimon grinned, looking back at Flip. “It’s not worth following you anymore when you’re this close,” it said in a hiss. “Goodbye for now. Maybe next time I see you, you will not be so hesitant. I certainly won’t.”
Flip reached for his hammer, but his attention diverted gave MarineDevimon enough room to wriggle free. It yanked its tentacles backward, not giving him enough time to grab it again before it turned and slipped beneath the water’s surface, swimming away too fast for Flip to follow.
“
Miguel could have sworn he saw MarineDevimon falter slightly, but the now fully-set sun made it hard to tell. He hoped it had, for whatever good that would do them.
In a flash of light, Zudomon disappeared, leaving Gomamon in his place in the sky, diving down towards the water as he fell. Bumble devolved as well, retreating to shore as Flip’s head popped up above the surface.
Miguel stepped toward the water’s edge, watching Flip paddle towards him. When he reached land, Miguel knelt down, reaching forward to pull Flip into a hug. He was sopping wet, but Miguel didn’t care. He squeezed him tight, and Flip wrapped his own arms around Miguel’s back.
Footsteps sounded from beside him, and Miguel looked up to see Damien, standing next to where Bumble was hovering over the sand. He’d pulled his glasses back down over his face, and his head was turned toward the ocean, but Miguel could tell he was looking at him.
“It’s not going to come back, is it?” Miguel said, fingers curling into fists resting against Flip’s shoulders.
Damien didn’t move. “Don’t think so. But hey.” He tipped his head down toward Miguel, crossing his arms. “Even if it does, I think we can handle it just as well as we did this time.”
Miguel smiled faintly, adjusting his hold on Flip and standing up. He looked at the water, watching the waves subside and calm down finally. The sky was studded with stars now, the sun fully obscured by the sea receding into the distance. Hanging high in the sky was the moon, cut into a perfect crescent and just barely illuminating the waves below it.
Miguel bit his lip. Even despite the relief washing over him, he couldn’t resist the inkling of anxiety building in his chest. MarineDevimon was gone, and had said it would only be back later, but that didn’t mean all their troubles were over. There was no way to tell what else stood (or swam) between them and Northern Pier - and even when they eventually reached File Island, he knew there would just be more waiting for them.
But that was okay.
For now, at least, they’d dealt with one problem. It didn’t make anything else any easier, but it was enough to make Miguel feel like they’d managed to do something good. They had.
Things would be okay for at least a little while.