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THE GUARDIANS SHADOW

CH 12

The trip back to the base was a long and slow one, as I thought over he events of the previous fight, and deletion of the Dokugumon. Even though Renamon had blown the plan that I'd come up with to kill the spider, she'd come up with an equal one that'd gotten the job done. Looking over my shoulder I could see her smile at me as she squeezed my sides a bit as we road along on my slightly battered up motercycle.

'Had she actually blown my plan to show me just how good of a job that she could come up with?' I turned back to face the road we were still traveling to the base. I had to give her credit though, the plan had gone off with little ill effect. One lost jacket of mine, a little poison to her body but had had been removed from her when she'd absorbed the other Digimon's data, and a slightly battered up bike. "All added up." I looked over my shoulder at the Renamon. "And I'd say that that hunt was very successful."

The Renamon's eyes went wide then she started to laugh. After her little laughing fit she smiled. "What's this? A compliment from a Hunter to a Digital Monster? Stop and let me scream this from the treetops." She began to laugh again.

"Ya, yuck it up Renamon." I faced back forward and could see the gates to the base coming closer. "Nobody's going to believe you. Let alone, I said that the mission was successful. No compliment there." This caused her to stop laughing and sneer at me. "Now shut your mouth, unless you want to have these gate guards pepper you with their guns." I said to her as the base came into view and saw two guards at the gate house.

She squeezed my sides a bit hard and dug her nails into my sides drawing a little blood. "And just when I thought we were becoming friends." She said in an obvious angry/pissy tone.

I slowed the bike to a halt as one of the guards stepped out of the gate house stood in the middle of the road and held up his left hand. Though what my eyes were a little more focused on was his right hand as it tightened around the gun at his right hip. "HALT! THIS BASE IS OFF LIMITS TO....Hunter?" Said the guard.

I fished out my Hunters badge out of the saddle bag and showed it to the two of them. "That's right boys. The hunter has returned from another successful hunt." I said as I put away the badge and watched as the second guard came out of the booth in front of the gate.

"That must mean that he's..." Said the second one.

"Killed the Dokugumon. Now all you little boys can relax and sweep the area up of everything that that spider had caught up in it's web." But under my breath. "And it would've been all done by myself too if that Renamon hadn't screwed up my plan, only to come up with one of her own that worked even better than my own."

"Huh? Did you say something Hunter?" The first guard asked as he looked at me with a confused look on his face.

"Ya I did." I scowled at him as I revved the engine of my bike and nearly running over his toes as I pulled the bike a little closer to the gate. "I said open the gate so that I can report to your superiors that you're holding me up from my next mission." I said in an obvious pissed off tone.

This got them the quickly jump back into action as the second guard returned to the gatehouse and open the large razor wired tipped gate, that I could now hear the buzz of electricity running through it. With that done, I kicked the bike back into gear and rode onto the base. I didn't see Renamon smile at my comment about her plan, or see her salute the two guardsman with a very sly smile as we passed.

Unfortunately when I got onto the base proper and stopped at the hanger that we'd last seen our transport plane, we found it nowhere to be found. With a scowl and a sneer, I kicked my bike into gear and headed for the control tower. Once there, I practically stomped my whole way up and grabbed the first person I saw and demanded an explanation. "What the fuck is going on here!? Where is my transport! I need to get back to Washington!" I yell at an air traffic controller as I have him lifted up by his shirt.

"Please...Hunter. It's out of our hands." I drop him on his ass then stare down at him as I started to squeeze my fist which made my knuckles pop with a very audible sound.

"You'd better start explaining, and fast, if you know what's good for you." I scowl down at him.

"It's become to dangerous. Many of our transports have been damaged by flying Digimon. It's going to take at least three days to get the birds repaired, and even then we are not sure about the pilots. Not many of them are crazy enough to go up against some of those odds up there." He said as I looked down at him and gave him a very hard snear.

"Are all of your fighters so pathetic!" I yelled at him. "If they're that unable to do something about it, then I'll just go and look around for some children/tamers that can do the job for you. Better yet, I'll just make a phone call and get the Hunters to come over here and take things over." Unfortunately my ranting did little to change the fact that we were indeed stuck here until the planes could be repaired.

Just then a furry three fingered paw was placed on my shoulder and I turned to see that it was Renamon. "Hunter. If he says that there is nothing he can do about it, then there is nothing he can do about it. Though, I fail to see the problem with taking it easy for the next three days." She said in a calming voice. To which I shook off her paw and turned to give her a hard stare.

I was about to give her a stern lecture about Hunter protocol; (Which stated that no Hunter would bow to a condition brought upon by that of a Digimon), but when I saw the hurt/puppy-dog look in her eyes I couldn't do it. Something in those soft ice blue Doe eyes of hers made me forget for an instant what I was so upset about, and just like that my legs started to go a little weak in the knee but I refrained from showing it. 'What the heck? How can she give me those kind of eyes that make my knees go weak.' I turned away from her, 'Must be a female thing' I thought. "Fine then, we'll wait." I turned and looked towards the man that was still sitting on his backside. "But I'll only wait those three days, and if you don't have any birds or pilots for those birds..." I pulled out a knife and slowly licked it from bottom to tip. "Then I'll come looking, especially for...you!" I then took the knife, flipped it around, and chucked it into the ground right in-between his legs where it stuck an inch away from his manhood.

While I walked down the stares to the my bike, I was continuously mumbling about how stupid all this was, and how yellow bellied their fighters were. Once I got back to the ground level of the tower, I looked over to my bike and started thinking of what I was going to do for the next three days here. 'My bike is a bit beaten up. I think I'll see if I can find a decent mechanics shop and get my bike fixed up.' Walking over to my bike, I threw my leg over and kicked it over and the engine began to rumble with a bit of a rattle that had started to develop on our ride on over here.

I kicked the bike into gear and started to look around the base for the mechanics area. It was only a moment after I started looking around that I noticed that Renamon wasn't with me, so started looking around. "Renamon?" I asked, and just like that I felt a weight land on the bike behind me.

"You called?" She said in a non-caring tone as she wrapped her paws around my sides and lay her head on my shoulder.

"Next time you'd better stick with me." I said as I continued to look around for the maintenance bay. "I don't want to have to start chasing you down while the whole base goes on alert again about a rogue Digimon on it's grounds again." With that I laughed a little at the memory of our first little incident together.

Renamon smacked me across the head and scowled at me when I looked over my shoulder at her. "Ya, very funny. Next time, I'll take you to my village and let my tribe have a go at you, while I sit back and watch the spectacle." I was about to think a bit more about facing a whole tribe of her kind, but I spotted an open hanger that had some mechanics working on a plane inside. So turning my bike towards the hanger, I revved up my engine leaving a decent skid mark right outside the door to the control tower and headed for the hanger.

"Sure you can barrow some of our tools, Hunter. As long as if we don't need the tool right away and you do the repairs here in the hanger." One of the mechanics said as he had his head inside the cockpit of the jet that he was currently working on. So giving the man a thumbs up, I walked over to the tool box and pulled out a few box end wrenches, some pliers, a few other miscellaneous tools that I thought that I'd need, and got to work on finding that rattle.

The whole time I worked my mind would often slip onto other thoughts, but mostly those of the last few months. 'The attacks from stray Digimon that have crossed over from their world have steadily increased in the last few moths. Though that is all well and good for us Hunters, as it provides us with plenty to keep us busy, I can't shake the fact that that is making the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end.' I looked over the seat of my bike to see Renamon leaning up against the wall of the hanger with her hands crossed over her front, head lowered with her eyes shut, and her foot tapping to some kind of music that only she could hear.

'Maybe she knows something about that.' I thought, but just then she turned and looked back at me with sort of a quizzical look and I turned back to the stubborn bolt that seemed to have been bent inside it's casing.

"Damn. Another bent bolt. That stupid spider really messed up my bike." I complained as I tried to get another bolt out of the cylinder head, only to have it bend on me, like the last three. "If we hadn't killed that stupid spider, I'd go back there and see how many more holes I'd be able to fill it with." Renamon just giggled at my whole ranting over such a simple matter, and looked out to stare at the scenery again. "Renamon." I said as I finally got the bolt out enough that I was able to get it out without any more cursing.

"Yes, Hunter?" She said as her foot stopped tapping the floor and turned to look towards me.

"Maybe you can answer a few questions for me." She didn't say anything as she just nodded for me to ask away. "Lately I've been thinking about how we met and a few other things. And I wanted to know, why you chose me as your tamer." I looked over the bike as I lay my arm over it and wiped my hand across my cheek, leaving a greasy smear across it. "I mean, come on, I'm a hunter and you're a Digimon. We are practically sworn enemies of each other."

She didn't say a word for a while, but turned to look out the hanger doors that were still open and allowing the setting sun to shine in. The setting sun catching her dark fur in just such a way that made the whole scene look surreal. "It's not all that hard to understand," She said in a non-caring kind of tone. "I was fitting that Digimon, and lost. Along comes you, and you kill it, which should have been my kill." She turned to look back at me. "My pride was hurt and there is no Renamon alive that will live with that."

"So it's just a pride issue?" I asked as I pulled out a rag and wiped my hands.

"It's more than that!" She sneered. "You didn't just kill that Digimon, you also saved me in the process. Next you insulted me again when we fought that Dokugumon." She pushed away from the hanger wall and clenched her fist to such an extent that I could see the knuckles turn white and a small drip of blood fall to the floor. "That's is three times Hunter. Three times my honor has been damaged by you!" She yelled.

I just shrugged and went back to work. "Is that all."

"IS THAT ALL? IS THAT ALL! IS THAT NOT ENOUGH!" She yelled as she came up to my bike and slammed both her open paws down on the handlebars. "I have to get you back for all that and knew that the only way that I'd be able to stay near you was for you to be my tamer.

I stopped cleaning my hands and looked up to her. "Alright then. Let me ask you something." I said as she gave me a deathly glare, saying that if my explanation wasn't good enough that I was going to be in some serious trouble. "What would insult your honor more? Somebody who's weaker than you that'd killed that overly large Graymon by accident, or somebody who has taken on multiple Digimon in the past, not to mention, killed dozens upon dozens of them." I slowly raised up an eyebrow and awaited an answer.

Slowly but surely, the tense look in her eyes slowly softened and almost relaxed as she thought over what I'd just said in depth. Obviously she'd concentrated more on the fact that her honor was hurt, rather than who had hurt her honor. "Well....when you put it like that."

I gave her a nod and picked up a bolt off a rag that was laying on the ground next to me and compared it to the current bent bolt that I'd just removed from my bike. "I know that you Renamon types are very prideful, but you have missed on one other crucial fact." She nodded and seemed to take on a more relaxed state as she stood up and looked down at me. "That particular Graymon and I have a bit of history together." For another few hours, I worked on my bike and told her the story of the history between the Graymon and I.

Replacing different bolts that were either bent or stripped, I then reassembling my bike to kick it over. It took a few tries for the engine to finally turn over but when it finally did it idled was with little to no rattle sound. Though there were still a few problems that were a bit beyond my mechanical skill to fix, the bike would have to be taken into a specialist and have a keen eye look at and fix any remaining problems. After my rags were placed/thrown into the proper containers and my work area looking like nothing had ever happen there, I thanked the fellow mechanics for use of their tools and turned to Renamon.

"Man, I'm starving." I said as my stomach finally let out a decent grumble as I hadn't eaten since slightly before our flight out here (It was an old Hunters trick that was called fasting and allowed us to keep on our toes and not be sluggish by having a full belly). So, asking the mechanics where the nearest mess hall was, I kicked over my bike and quickly sped off in search of fulfillment for my stomach.

After riding around for the better part of 15 minutes asking around I finally ended up at the mess hall. Delicious smells drifted into my nose as I lifted my head and took in a deep breath. 'After fasting for so long. I'm ready to gorge myself on something other than bread and that canned cheese.' Licking my lips I started for the mess, but stopped when a thought crossed my mind. "And where do you think your going?" I asked as I stopped and looked over my shoulder at Renamon as she stood just behind me.

"Where else. I am going to get something to eat as well." She said which really surprised me. I knew that Digimon would regain their health as they'd absorb the other losing opponents data as it dissolved back to who knows where the other part of the defeated Digimons data would go to, though this was something very different.

'Could it be possible that when they cross over from their world to ours that they gain some kind of ability that allows them to become more bio than mecha/data?' That thought would have to be put on hold as I stopped and looked at the double doors to the mess-hall. "I don't think that that is such a good idea Renamon. You remember the last time that you surprised everybody with your presence." Renamon shivered as she grabbed both her arms and I could visible see the shiver run up from her furry foot pads all the way up to the tips of her black ears. "Plus. How do you know about eating? Normally, Digimon only get their energy from their opponents data." I said as I leaned my back up against the building, awaiting her answer.

She finally uncrossed her arms and looked at me. "If you really must know. I have been here in this world longer than you realize." She said as she rubbed her arms once more in her self-hug, then let her arms fall back to her sides. "To say the least, it was quite a surprise when it all happened." She lowered her head and looked at the ground as if the memory was unpleasant to remember. "I had been watching humans ever since arriving here. Hoping that by coming here that I would be able to find my tamer. The only problem was that everybody that I hoped would be my tamer always turned away from me or shunned me because my code's been corrupted by a virus." She said as she took a breath and continued to look down at the ground.

"One day as I was traveling in the city, I began to hear a strange noise coming from my mid section. At first, I thought that it was another side effect due to the virus's corruption, so ignored it. But over time ignoring it stopped helping and a small pain was starting to grow as well as my energy level continued to drop even after defeating a few smaller oppenents." She looked up at me to see that I had a bit of a half smile on my face and nodded for her to continue.

"It was about that time that I noticed that a human was having the same problem from under the lamppost that I was standing on. Being curious, I decided to follow him and hoped by remaining out of sight that I'd see how he solved our shared problem. He walked around for a short while until he stopped at someplace that smelled very interesting. After getting something from this place, he proceeded to eat it and the funny noises that his midsection was making stopped and he finally seemed satisfied."

"The only problem was that when I went down to get something, I was met with a human who was blocking the entrance to the place. He looked very big around the middle and smelled like he had cleaned himself up in a few days. I quickly leapt away in fear that I would not get whatever made him smell so bad on me." She looked over at me again and could see that this time, I was chuckling, but I finally stopped and nodded for her to continued with her story. "It was at that moment, that I smelt the same interesting smell again and followed it to it's source. I was lead around the small building to a large green metal bin with two large black plastic lids. For some reason the smell seemed to be coming from within the strange thing but not caring much more abut what this thing was, I lifted the plastic lids and started searching within."

I couldn't hold back my laughter any further and let out a booming laugh. 'I can't believe my ears. Her first experience with food was when she went dumpster diving. Now that would really hurt her pride. Got to remember to explain all this to her, later.' I could see that my laughter had stopped her story, so rolled my hand to indicate that she should continue again.

"After a few minutes of searching, I found something similar to what the boy had put in his mouth. Taking it out of the bin, I mimicked what the boy had done and proceeded to...eat. The relief was almost instantaneous. I ate more and more of the thing as well as many other things that I found within that smelt similar to the thing that I had just eaten. From that point on that in order to avoid...hunger, that I would have to...eat."

So I finally gave her a nod at when she finally finished her tale and understood it all. "Well, it seems like you understand that pretty well. Though I'm still reluctant to actually let you come inside and get something to eat." I said as I brought a hand up to my chin. 'If I let her in there, all the other marines will surely freak and there no doubt will be a fire fight.' "Alright then. How's about his then? Why don't I just go inside and get you something to eat. That way, we avoid them peppering you with bullets and I safely get you something even better than what you got out of that, green metal bin last time, and you can have it all to yourself."

She looked like she was thinking over the idea for a bit as she rubbed her paw under her muzzle, then slowly raised her head to slowly nod to me. "I guess that would be alright, though that still leaves one...small...problem." She said as she held up a single finger.

"And that would, be?"

"What am I supposed to do while your in there getting us something to eat?"