Yo, so I still exist, huh? I even still have an account here, which I was worried about for a minute there. Guess you haven't seen the last of me after all.
So, a lot to say about this, before getting into it. I've been wanting to write something like this for awhile now--something Digimon related, broadly speaking, but I was waiting for an idea that actually stuck with me. It's been awhile since anything like that came along, but most of what's come out of Digimon lately hasn't really gripped me.
And then Konaka came along and just choke-slammed me into a block of inspiration. For those who don't know, which included me until a month or two ago, Konaka released an Audio drama that he lovingly refers to as Digimon Tamers 2018. Unlike most CD dramas, which tend to be small, self-contained events or commedic side-stories, this was a full on opening to a new plotline and Konaka not only made a website for it with a letter in multiple languages, but flat-out went around to various producers and said he'd be interested in making a sequel to Tamers.
That, I must say, got the juices flowing. I don't know if this story will go very far, or if it'll go anywhere, but if Konaka is determined to continue Tamers, it feels to early to go throwing in the towel myself. What's more, the CD drama introduces a lot of neat concepts; instead of going with the 'a few years later' plotline of Digimon tri., the story was going to bring back the whole original cast and just age everyone up as if in real time, which is an awesome idea few series are willing to do. The one exception to this was meant to be Takato, because Takato's voice actor is a woman and having her voice a ten year old is one thing, but having her voice a thirty year old man is another.
Being Konaka, he came up with the obvious solution. The adult Takato is missing and since Nyx--Yamaki's new take on Hypnos, which was originally the Office Affiliated with Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, until Yamaki said fuck that the moment he took command for explicitly chuuni reasons--wants the whole crew back together, they create a machine to basically copy-paste a version of him from the Digital World's memory and create a young clone of him in the present. Things go wrong, of course, to they may have accidentally dragged a version of him from across time and space instead.
While broadly speaking just hilarious, this idea also struck me as absurd fanfic fodder, and of all the series that it could work with, Fate/Grand Order seemed like one of the best. I mean, all the pieces are there, right? Machines that beam versions of a person across space and time to fight world-ending threats, heroes called across the ages, etc.; it's easy to apply it, just a matter of whether you want to connect it with the Servant system, Magic that has been achieved by technology, or Rayshifting. Either way, it struck me as a natural crossover and as a particularly interesting one, given the idea of Mankind with the ability to summon a specific set of heroes as needed; just the implications of that, in the long enough run, struck me as fun.
So, well, here we are, with a short beginning. Forgive me, but it's been awhile.
Fate/Analog
Prologue: When the Moon Dies
Digimon Tamers
Blutgang clattered against the stone floor as it fell limply from my fingers, the sound echoing through the nearly empty castle as the first piece of me fell away.
It wasn’t the last.
I managed to hold myself ready for nearly half a minute, putting up at least the act that I would be able to respond if there was one last tick ready, one last blade prepared to emerge from the darkness, but I could go no further. I collapsed in on myself, falling to my knees as Crimson Mode shattered and fell away. I held on for just a moment longer as Dukemon, before that shell also broke, armor sloughing off in an almost solid mass of data. Guilmon—Gigimon now—fell to the ground, his eyes already closed, and I had neither the strength nor desire to keep myself from following suit.
Yet as I began to fall forward, an arm reached out to catch me. Its owner didn’t say a word and I was too numb to feel anything now, but there was only one person it really could be now. Just lifting my head felt like trying to lift a mountain now, but I at least managed met his eyes through the gaps of his helmet for a moment before giving up and leaning my head against his chest piece. It was cold. Rough. Uncomfortable.
That’s death for you.
I smiled.
“That’s it,” I said. Were my ribs broken? It didn’t matter now; I didn’t need my ribs or lungs to speak and having them wouldn’t help me besides. “There’s only one left now…we managed to clear the way for you.”
“Takato, you can’t be…” The murmur came. It was hopeless and we both knew it—had both known it before the fight even began—but his fingers tightened so much I actually felt flashes of sensation from them.
“Dying? Haha…don’t be sad, I died a long time ago. They just kept needing me to come back.”
“We still need you,” he replied. “Takato, you can’t die now—the Re-Animator, it’s gone; we don’t know how to fix it and we don’t have any other way to summon you! If you die here, it’ll be like…like…”
“…It’s always been like that, for me. Every time I die, it feels like the last. This time, it just will be.”
“The Sisters, they can—”
“I don’t know if they’ll help any of us after this,” I said quietly, a part of me wondering what tomorrow might bring, even though I’d never see it. “But, they wouldn’t help me regardless. I’ve done too much to them…I don’t even deserve to ask.”
I closed my eyes, still resting against him. I wanted to go to sleep, but I knew that if I did, I’d never wake up. Still, it took me a moment to find the words.
It was always hard, saying goodbye.
“And it’s okay. I knew…that this would be the end, and it’s okay,” I continued. “You don’t need to cling to the past anymore, because you have a bright future ahead of you.”
“Bright…? The world’s dead. Everyone’s dead. Even the four of you…you’re the last, and you’re…” he stopped there, voice breaking. “How can you call this bright? How can you still believe any of it mattered at all?”
“Because you have to,” I told him. “You have to believe that, no matter how hard it gets. So much was lost, so many people died, all just to get us here, so we have to believe it mattered. We have to believe it was enough. Because worth…is something that people give to things. The universe will never tell us it was all worth it in the end. The whole planet flat-out told us it wasn’t. But it doesn’t matter, because this is something we have to decide for ourselves. That we do deserve to exist.”
He held onto me tighter, then, as if the grip of his armies might keep me in this world for just a little while longer. Maybe it would; for his sake, I tried my best to hold on a bit longer, too.
“And it looks like we do. Because we slayed the monsters,” I said. “We saved the world. All of us, working together. The world ended, and we kept going. It ended again and we still survived. It’s proof, that this isn’t over…that there’s a tomorrow waiting for us, something all of us are dreaming of. Whatever it is, it’s just a matter of striving and reaching for it until we find a way. And this time…I know we will.”
“Takato…”
“It doesn’t hurt this time. I’m not afraid this time. Every time they pulled me out of that machine, I saw things getting worse and worse. I was there in…2018. 2030. 2054, and I…I was there to watch the world end. I could never stop it, not really; even if I fixed the problem in front of me, things always came back worse. No matter how many people I saved, no matter how many monsters I destroyed, no matter how hard I fought, I was always worried about tomorrow. But now, the fighting’s over and the monsters are all gone. The world is safe. Everyone will manage…I know it. I can almost see it…all of you, in starlight. The war’s over. We put it all aside and fought alongside one another, instead of against each other. That meant something. That’ll last, no matter what the Sisters say. All you have to do is take out the last one, and it’s done. And I know you can do it. You always do it. That’s why we could trust this to you. I’m glad I lived this long. Even if it hurt sometimes, I’m glad I got to meet you, that you’re here right now. I don’t need to be afraid, because of you.”
He held me for a long moment, silent the whole while, before slowly laying me against the wall. One thing I did feel, then, was something wet hitting my face. We both knew the truth of what it was, but neither of us said a word about it.
“You’re right…we can’t keep bothering you with our problems, old man. Rest. I’ll take it from here,” he said, standing and turning away from me, his steps shaky but his footsteps strong. He paused for a moment at the doorway, but didn’t turn back. “Thank you. For everything.”
I managed to hold until he left the room before closing my eyes.
“Go be the hero, A—"
I came apart for the last time.
XxXXxX
—Or, it should been. And yet, what felt like only moments later, I opened my eyes, seeing nothing but deep, thick fog. I recognized a Digital Field when I saw one, even if it had been a long time, but I couldn’t make any sense out of that observation; why would there be a Digital Field here? Where would it even come from, with the network so devastated?
No, more than that—where was the Re-Animator? Yamaki’s machine and the improved versions made in later years were, as far as he knew, the only way I could be summoned. But there was no one here—and I was alone. At the very least, Guilmon wasn’t here; forget the mist, I’d know if he was nearby even if my eyes and ears were taken away. But I had never been alone when I was called before; there was always summon there to do the summoning and oftentimes, he wasn’t summoned alone.
Then—
“Ruki?” I said, raising my voice as if the mist might try to hide it. “Jen? Are you there?”
There was no reply.
Feeling worried and confused, I began to walk, keeping my eyes and ears open for sign of…well, I wasn’t even sure what to expect now. I wasn’t sure what to expect or what I would see, past the edge of the Digital Field. A scene from the far future, maybe, with towering cities and flying cars and spaceships—something beyond everything I knew, for how else was this possible? How long would it take for the world, for what was left of Mankind to recover? For them to be able to dig up an old relic again? And, even if they could—what had made them try? In all my past summonings, I’d only been called on because something had gone horribly, horribly wrong.
Carrying that mixture of curiosity and trepidation, I slowly reached the edge of the Digital Field, still not encountering anyone, but knowing that if anyone was there, it would be right passed the edge. I took a deep breath, preparing myself as best I could for whatever I might find, whether it was a scene of destruction or a scene from the future. Whatever awaited me, I’d been called. What could I do but answer?
But nothing I’d done could prepare me for what I found when I stepped out of the mist. Not a scene of devastation, but of peace. Not of the future, but of the past. Something I hadn’t seen in…it must have been at least a century. And something I’d never expected to see again.
Tokyo, as it had been in the early twenty-first century. My home, before…well, before.
“What the hell…?” I couldn’t help but ask.
XxXXxX
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