Another Life
Title: Another Life
Category: Anime/Manga » Digimon
Author: Overlord Mordax
Language: English, Rating: Rated: K+
Genre: Mystery/Adventure
Published: 07-13-06, Updated: 07-14-06
Chapters: 2, Words: 4,453
Chapter 1: Life as we Know it
Another Life
By Overlord Mordax
A/N: This isn’t exactly a traditional Digimon fic; like the summary mentioned, it is based on a true story, names and specifics have been changed but the important things are portrayed accurately. That being said, please bare with me through this first chapter, I promise the traditional Digimon characters figure into the story more as it progresses, and strange and bizarre things begin to happen.
Disclaimer: Digimon 02 is copyrighted to Bandai. No copyright violation is intended, and this story is entirely non-profit. Many of the other characters are based on real people; their names have been changed as a courtesy.
Chapter One: Life as We Know it
There were some demons that you could only face alone. Ken knew his friends, Davis especially would say otherwise. But in the end it was he, not they, who would bear the mark of Cain to his grave. No matter how much forgiveness Ken received, he could still never forgive himself; the guilt and shame, though he tried not to show it, were burdens he thought he would always bear.
The lights were out, and his parents were asleep, and Ken sat there, bathed in the strange glow of his computer monitor; just staring. He was sixteen, nearly a man, and a student at the best high school in the country. He had the world at his feet, so why couldn’t he be happy?
The light of the computer danced before his tired eyes like an eerie fire and in his mind he was reliving the triumphs and failures of his past
He was on his knees in the sand. He had made a mistake, a terrible mistake, worse than any mistake .He’d hurt and enslaved and…and…
And now he hand Wormmon in his arms, and now…
Now he didn’t now he was gone.
No.
NO!
000
He opened his eyes… no, wait…
Hilde rubbed her eyes as she grasped around the window ledge for her glasses. She’d had that dream again. It was always so intense when she was asleep, like she was actually there, but it seemed to flee before the light of day. Hilde rubbed her eyes again and adjusted her nightshirt; the way it was tangled and twisted around her told the tale of tossing and turning.
She peered up at the alarm clock; she’d woken up almost half an hour before normal. She flopped back down on her pillow, the rim of her glasses pinching her temple. She wished that she knew what the dream meant. It felt important, and so real, but at the same time, so out there. Not to mention that it always left her feeling so sad.
Hilde lay there, her chestnut brown hair spread haphazard over the pillow as he mind drifted in that place between waking
Eventually the alarm sounded, jolting her out of her reverie, as she swatted at the buttons to silence the machine. Still she lay there a moment more until heard the voice of her preternaturally unsleepy mother in the doorway.
“Time to get up dear. You didn’t sleep in your glasses, did you?”
Hilde sighed and opened her eyes. “No mom, I woke up a little while ago. Kinda.”
“Alright, well, its time for you to get ready for school, so get dressed and brush your teeth, alright?”
“Yes, mom.”
She hefted herself out from under the heavy covers as her mother retreated into the hallway. She stood and stretched, trying to work out the kinks and cramps in her muscles that were a constant plague. Couldn’t she find a position to sleep in that didn’t hurt?
Hilde glanced into the mirror that was perched on her dresser as she pulled out her day’s attire. Her brown hair ended somewhere below her chin, and couldn’t quite decide if it wanted to be straight or curly. She was short, but not diminutive, and there was no hiding that she was a bit pudgy, especially around the chest area. She supposed she should be pleased about that at least, but mostly her appearance was just frustrating.
She did like her eyes though, big and deep and dark, and just slightly almond shaped. Peering out behind her thick lenses they were more than a bit mysterious, or so Hilde liked to believe.
She shed her nightshirt and pulled on her clothes, navy blue slacks and a white oxford blouse, the uniform of her parochial high school. She still wasn’t used to the uniform, it hardly being the end of September of her ninth grade year, but at least she no longer had to pick out what to wear in the morning. Fashion, the brunette reflected, was not one of her talents.
She ran a brush through her hair, but her bangs still hung in front of her face, and along with her glasses seemed to make up a barrier with which to hold the world at bay. She picked up her school bag from where it lay beside the computer and headed downstairs, careful not to make any noise that would wake her still sleeping father and older sister.
Her mom was sitting on the couch watching music videos, she was an accomplished lawyer, but still didn’t seem to be able to let go of her teenage years.
“I’m ready, mom,” Hilde said, leaning against the living room doorframe.
“Do you want some breakfast before we head out?”
Hilde shook her head. “No thanks.”
Her mother gave a concerned look. “Are you alright sweetie? You seem upset this morning.”
“I’m fine mom; I just had a weird dream.”
“Well, alright, but you know I’m here if you need to talk.”
“Okay.”
000
Hilde sat alone at the long tables in the dimly lit cafeteria. There were five or so other students haunting the place with her at this early hour, but none she knew well enough yet to sit with.
If Hilde had been allowed to continue with public school she’d have been able to just take the bus to school. As it was, her mom had to drive her half an hour early so she could get to work on time. But, after years of public education her parents had decided they wanted her to go to the best school available, taking away the few school friends that she had been able to make. If she hadn’t been so proud she might have deliberately flunked the entrance exam. Students never got to know their official score beyond pass or fail, but Hilde had heard a rumor that she had gotten an impressive hundred percent correct.
She sat at the table with her feet propped up on one of the unused plastic chairs across the way, in front of her, her binder was splayed open to reveal pages of computer printouts columns of text in tiny size five font that Hilde was reading avidly.
“Daaaaaamn, how do you read that?”
Hilde nearly jumped out of her skin and had a heart attack when the voice spoke about two inches from her ear. She recovered to find a seemingly a redheaded girl standing beside her, seemingly equally startled by her reaction.
“With my eyes,” she snarked , leveling a cool gaze at the other girl “I find it keeps people from reading over my shoulder.”
The redhead held up hr hands defensively, “Hey, I didn’t mean anything by it.”
Hilde sighed, “Sorry, its just everyone asks me that.”
“Well, it’s really small.”
“It saves on paper, granted I’ll probably go blind from reading it,” she smirked.
“My mom says you’ll go blind from, uh, never mind,” she grinned sheepishly. “Anyway, what is it you’re reading?”
She shrugged. “Harry Potter fanfic.”
“Ooh, shiny!”
Hilde was taken aback, “You know fanfiction?”
“‘Course I do,” she replied, sitting down backwards on one of the empty chairs. “You’re Hildegard Marshall, right?”
She nodded. “Sorry, I don’t know your name.”
“Natalie,” she said, making a face of disgust, “Just call me Tally, kay?”
“Sure.”
“Its nice to see I’m not the only fangirl here, finally. I was here for middle school too, and no dice.”
“I went to a public school, but there weren’t a lot of fans there, really. Not that I met at least.” Hilde wasn’t used to people randomly coming up to talk to her, she wondered if the girl, Tally, normally pounced on strangers, and was more than a little suspicious of her motives.
While the two of them had been chatting, the cafeteria was filling up with students and the first bell rang while they were talking about Harry Potter (Hilde had deftly steered the conversation away from more personal topics).
Hilde zipped up her binder and shoved it into her book bag. “I’d better get to class,” she said.
“Okay! See you in English class!” Tally picked up her own bag, and Hilde watched bemused as she headed over for another tight knot of students. Hilde could just barely hear them asking her where she had been that morning.
000
Hilde was sitting through a rather dull history class; discussing colonization of the Americas for the nth day, she was bored stiff. She had finished the fic she had been reading the class before and didn’t have anything else printed out. As such she sat with her chin on her palm staring blankly at the chalkboard. Why do I even bother coming to class, she wondered. I already know all this, more to the point; you already had us read the chapter for homework last night.
The brunette sighed, she wasn’t one to brag, but sometimes being as intelligent as she was could be a burden. It had been suggested several years ago that she skip a grade or two but her parents had objected, saying it would impinge on her social life.
As if I have a social life, she pouted. Nice call, mom and dad. I’m bored academically, surrounded by stupid people, and I have no friends.
Granted, maybe having no friends was partially her own fault, but who could blame her for not wanting to play the sick popularity game? She had the time to change that, she supposed, being in a new school and all, but didn’t have the inclination.
‘This is stupid,’ she thought, ‘I miss my old friends.’
Her next thought was one of those thoughts that are gone almost before you can realize that you’ve had it. It was just a fleeting image, one of smiling familiar faces, people she thought she knew, as if from childhood, but creatures too.
Hilde struggled to hold onto the thought, to see it clearly, but it was gone as quick as it hd come. She shook her head. ‘What was that?’ she muttered. Then she realized that everyone in the room was staring at her, and that she was on the floor.
“Are you alright Miss Hilde?” the teacher asked.
She got up off the floor quickly, flushing with embarrassment, and glaring back at the class. “Fine, sorry. I had vertigo,” she explained gruffly getting back in her chair and dusting off her slacks.
“Do you want to go to the nurse?”
“I’m fine,” she stressed.
“Alright then, let’s continue….”
Great, now everyone thinks I some kind of fool. She tapped her pencil on her notebook. So much for being popular even if I wanted to be, making an ass out of myself like that. What the hell was that anyway? Some kind of vision? I hate it when I can’t figure out what my own thoughts are about. Its stupid.
The bell rang soon enough, and Hilde jostled herself through the push of the hallway throng, her classmates up ahead were whispering, and Hilde couldn’t help but feel they must be talking about her. She clenched the strap of her book bag. What did they know, anyway?
In the English classroom Hilde found her seat, the one in the front, closest to the door, and took out her things. Soon enough that redheaded girl, Tally, from earlier ambled into the room and sat down in the seat beside her.
I guess I am oblivious sometimes, Hilde thought. She sits right next to me and I didn’t even know who the heck she is.
“Hi!” Tally greeted with a smile, thwacking her books down on the desk.
“Hey,” Hilde replied.
“How was class?”
‘Terrible,’ Hilde didn’t say. She shrugged. “Passable.”
“You don’t look so good, ya know?”
“I didn’t have breakfast,” Hilde dodged.
Tally cocked an eyebrow. “You’re planning on having lunch, right?”
“As if I could go without lunch,” she rolled her eyes and leaned on hand.
“Smile or I will poke you,” Tally threatened.
Hilde stared at her. “I don’t mean to be mean or anything, but why are you talking to me anyway? It’s obvious you already have friends.”
Tally looked a little hurt. “You looked lonely,” she explained. “And I’m early in the morning sometimes, and you like fanfiction. So that makes you cool in my book.”
Hilde chuckled. “Cool, huh? I’m not sure I can live up to that epithet.”
“Sure you can! You’re doing it already!”
The brunette rolled her eyes, but laughed just the same.
“Alright class,” the matronly English teacher proclaimed, “Let’s get started.”
To be continued…
Chapter 2: The Crazies
Another Life
By Overlord Mordax
Disclaimer: Digimon 02 is copyrighted to Bandai. No copyright violation is intended, and this story is entirely non-profit. Many of the other characters are based on real people; their names have been changed as a courtesy.
Chapter Two The Crazies
The Kaizer was by nature, capricious; sometimes fiery and mad and passionate, and sometimes he was as cold and distant as a snowy mountain peak. He was brooding now now, sitting in his throne of steel, his icy blue eyes fixed on the huge display before him. He watched without visible emotion as his digital slaves toiled at his projects. He had been in the digital world for days now. What was there to go back to? His parents? School? Soccer? What was the point?
Here the world bent to his whim, and bowed at his command, and for a boy who had never felt quite in control of his own life, that feeling of power was a potent drug. There was simply one flaw in his otherwise perfect Empire, well, five if you counted each of them separately, ten if you counted their Digimon. The Kaizer’s fists clenched almost imperceptibly. It was no matter, though, they could not resist him forever. Soon he would crush them, and there would be no one left to stand in his way.
A disturbing smile twisted the Kaizer’s lips.
“Master,” a timid voice asked.
His gaze traveled down to the small form of his most pathetic servant, Wormmon. “What do you want?” the Kaizer snapped.
“It’s the Digimon master, you’re working them too hard,” the bug cajoled.
A sneer replaced the Kaizer’s smile. “So what? They’re mine and I’ll do with them as I like.”
“But Master, if they keep going at this pace, some of them are going to die!”
“Do you really think I care?”
000
Hilde sat awkwardly at the lunch table with Tally and her chatty group of friends whose names Hilde wasn’t about to remember. She tried to look interested as she picked at her sandwich and they talked about who was dating who, and who could afford what expensive trinket.
Hilde had lost her appetite, she couldn’t eat in front of these people, they were making her too self-conscious. And being self-conscious made her angry. Finally, she picked up here things, “I have to go, sorry,” she hastily apologized to Tally, without looking at anyone else.
“What’s her problem?” she heard someone ask behind hr back.
The bespectacled brunette slumped down in an empty corner of the cafeteria and spread out her books.
‘That was stupid,’ she grumbled, taking a bite out of her sandwich. She gleaned for a moment across the room at the other table, but looked hastily down when she saw Tally looking back at her.
She only wanted to be your friend because she pitied you, she told herself. Who needs pity? Not you.
I don’t want her stupid pity.
If it was possibly to eat ones lunch vengefully then that is what Hilde did. She finished several minutes before everyone had to head to class and she spent a moment leafing through her papers. Her teacher had assigned an essay project to them, due at the end of the grading period, and the instructions for it were about five pages long. The assignment itself had to be ten.
Hilde sighed, wondering if she should start on it when she got home, or just wait until it was almost due. It sure as heck wasn’t going to take her a month to write the thing. A day for research, a day for writing was all she would need.
I’ll do it over the weekend I guess, she decided. Its not as if I have other plans.
She pulled out her schedule to see what class she had next. She smirked, feeling a little pick lucky, despite the lunch fiasco; she had a free.
Why did Tally think Hilde would want to sit with her preppy little friends anyway? How stupid. If Hilde was going to make friends they would certainly be a better class, in her opinion at least, than a bunch of teenyboppers.
The bell rang, and Hilde shoved her books in her bag and hurried off out of the wide cafeteria into the narrow and rather dim corridors of the first floor of the school. It was annoying, but to get to the library you had to go through the Senior hallway. It was ridiculous, the sense of entitlement that was fostered in Seniors. Being in your final year of high school did not make you better than anyone else, or smarter. Just older.
Being fifteen often annoyed Hilde. It was such a frustratingly in-between age, not old enough to gain the privileges and credibility of age, but not young enough to be given the simplicity and moral freedom of childhood.
The seniors didn’t move out of her way as she walked through the hall, so she had to make do by jostling her way through the mob, and glaring harshly at anyone who wanted to take their grievance further than ‘Hey! Watch it!’
At the end of the hall was a short staircase and the glass double doors of the library, or as the administration called it, the media center. She pushed the door open and walked into the only spacious well lit and air conditioned room in the building. It was a new addition, or so she had been told.
“Good morning Miss Smith,” she greeted the young librarian as she walked up to the large check out desk near the door,
“Hey, what’s up Hilde?” the dark haired woman replied with a smile.
“Meh,” Hilde shrugged. “I can deal. Hey, have they gotten the internet working again, yet?”
“Yeah, Mr. Jones was in here this morning, he says everything’s working now.”
“Oh good,” Hilde nodded. The library computers had been offline for almost a week; it had gotten pretty annoying.
“Well, I gotta get some filing done,” Miss Smith said.
“Okay. Heh, have fun with that.”
“Yeah, right,” she grinned.
Hilde turned and walked forward into the bulk of the library, it was roughly circular, with high shelves forming a protective wall around the center floor where the copters and reading couches were. The other die was lit by tall, wide widows looking out on the school courtyard.
She slumped down at one of the computers with her back to the shelves, so that the glare of the sunlight wouldn’t fall on her monitor. She mentally chided their internet tech guy for allowing having the school computers run Internet Explorer instead of Firefox, which was her own preference. The net was one of the few things that Hilde would admit to feeling strongly about. It was freeing and empowering, a place where you were judged by what you said and did instead of what you looked like, and what people expected of you. There were times when Hilde longed for the internet to just open up and swallow her.
Hilde looked up from her monitor and gazed coolly out the window where a soft breeze blew the leaves of the oak trees. The glass was clear, but the sun was quite bright, and so her view was partially blocked by a reflection of the library behind her, and his own reflection, his raven-dark hair, and sharp, handsome features. He smiled easily ,and looked back down at her computer. Him? Her?
‘Who am I? I’m falling, I’m nauseous.’
The wave of vertigo passed and Hilde found herself hugging her own shoulders for support. She took a deep, ragged breath. Her hands were shaking like leaves. She looked behind her, to see if Miss Smith had noticed her, but the librarian was busy stamping cards.
‘What the hell is wrong with me? There has got to be something wrong with me. Was it something I ate? ‘
Just calm down, she told herself, you’ll be alright.
But I’m hallucinating or something!
Do you want to go to the nurse and lie down?
And I’m also talking to myself.
But not out loud.
Thank goodness for small favors.
Hilde took a few more deep breaths and cradled her chin in her hands. Maybe she should just go home and rest, and wait for whatever this was to pass. This had happened to her before, she remembered suddenly, the last time she had had that weir dream. It hadn’t been this bad, but she’d gotten dizzy a few times, and lost track of where she was. And after that she hadn’t had the dream for months and months.
I’ll just go to the nurse, call mom and tell her I need to come home. Today’s Friday, so I can just sleep this, whatever it is, off over the weekend. She sighed and picked up her bag. Who is that boy anyway? A ghost? No that isn’t right. When I dream, its like I’m living his life. Except I can never remember the details!
“Bye Miss Smith,” she said distractedly as she stalked out of the library, she didn’t wait for an answer.
She avoided the senior hall this time by taking the other staircase up to the second floor where the nurse’s office was located.. The nurse, a jolly lady, Carol Polanski was sitting behind her desk reading a romance novel from the library; she looked up as Hilde entered.
“What’s up?” she chirruped.
Hilde sat down heavily in the chair beside the desk, and put on her best ‘have sympathy for me for I am ill’ look. “I’m feeling really dizzy, Ms. P. I fell down in class about an hour ago.”
“Hmmm,” the nurse nodded, “You want to call your mom.”
“Yeah.”
Miss Polanski handed her the phone.
000
Hildegard lay on her back on the soft plastic cot in the darkness waiting for her mother to arrive. On the other side of the small room a boy turned over fitfully on another cot. Hilde was surprised when he addressed her.
“Hey, whatcha in for?”
Hilde considered ignoring him, but she had been in the room to short a time to convincingly pretend to be asleep. “I was attacked by a crazed piano wielding janitor.,” she replied sarcastically.
“Wha? Really? That’s horrible!”
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Some people… “No, not really. It was a joke. I’m just not feeling well, okay?”
“Oh, I get it.”
Hilde could make out him grinning stupidly in the dim light.
“I got hit in the head with a soccer ball,” he offered.
“I suppose you must not play very often.”
He laughed. “I don’t play at all. I was, er, watching the girls Phys Ed class on my free…”
Hilde rolled her eyes. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Um… that’s a good question. Haha.”
“Miss Hilde,” the nurse called from the other room. “Your mother is here.”
Hilde stood up and grabbed her bag from the end of her bed. “Bye.”
“Hey, I’m Roland,” the boy called after her as she left the room.
This time she did ignore him.
“Hi sweetie,” her mother greeted. “You feeling any better?”
Hilde shrugged. “Dizzy.”
Her mom sighed. “I told you, you didn’t look well this morning. You should try listening to our mom more often.”
“Sorry mom.”
“Well, lets get you home then. I have to get back to work one of our clients is making a big stink about some possible copyright infringement.”
000
Hilde lay on her stomach on top of her covers, flipping TV channels and wondering why nothing was on. Well, nothing she wanted to watch anyway, Dragon Ball Z was on Cartoon Network, but it was a rerun anyway. She flipped past a Spanish soap opera, a documentary on echidnas, a Lfetime movie, and an brief ad for the new season of Digimon starting tomorrow. She left it on Fox Kids since Power Rangers was coming on anyway.
She sighed and looked up at the ceiling as the annoying Fox announcer chattered on. She’d slept for maybe an hour and a half after her mom brought her home, mercifully, it had been dreamless.
“Hallucinating isn’t as much fun as they say it is on TV,” she muttered with an edge of irony. She rolled over onto her stomach and grabbed one of her plushies, an oversize and shaggy tan dog, using at as a pillow for her arms and chin.
“And I miss the old Power Rangers,” she complained sullenly to no one in particular.
“I’m sorry,” came a small voice.
“What?” Hilde looked around; expecting to see her father, but no one was there. She clenched her teeth. “I am not hearing voices,” she told herself, “I just misinterpreted noise from the TV. It happens to everyone.”
To be continued…
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