Digital Cowboy: Chapter 1 - Bring it On
Title: Digital Cowboy: Chapter 1 - Bring it On
What: Digimon Tamers (and Digimon Adventure 02, Digimon Adventure: Anode/Cathode Tamer, Digimon Adventure 02: Tag Tamers, Digimon Adventure 02: D-1 Tamers, and Digimon: Brave Tamers) fanfiction - the prologue of a longer work that was, alas, never completed
Rating: R for sexual themes, never mind the cartoon violence and bad language
Words: 2001
Summary: Largely AU - in a digital world where the digignomes have made the would-be after effects of dreams come true, Akiyama Ryo gets a little tired of being stuck with a feral beast for a partner, constantly battling for his life, and saving the world over and over again. (No, I don't know where I was going with this either.) Japanese names, abuse of formatting, and an absolute refusal to capitalize words like "digital world", "digimon", and "tamer" out of laziness and how silly a fic looks with so many capital letters; one-sided Ryo/Ruki and vague one-sided Milleniumon/Ryo; and a whip.
Previously: Prologue - Again
Notes: The beginning of my love affair with the present tense. Written in November 2003 but never posted; barely edited since.
Sample: When did I get into this 'lonely destiny' stuff, anyway?
Empty blue eyes stare at the distant sunset, watching the huge star slowly sink below the horizon. The last rays of sunlight dance across the ocean towards the teenager, but no light reaches his eyes. His eyes: so blue, so many limitless shades of blue, so empty, so devoid of even the slightest hint of emotion. Always giving off the impression that he really doesn’t give a damn.
Brown hair wafts in the wind that a digital nighttime brings. Other than the constant rise and fall of his chest, the occasional blinking of those empty eyes, and the wind teasing at his hair, the boy is completely still. He betrays no movement, no emotion. He makes no sound.
[I am alone... Eternally alone. As I was evidently destined to be.]
Behind him, a masked blue dragon digimon emerges from the shadows. He makes as little noise as his tamer, but the boy immediately locks onto his presence.
[Okay, maybe not completely alone. When did I get into this 'lonely destiny' stuff, anyway? I’m beginning to sound like a stereotypical angsty anime guy.]
“Hello, Cyberdramon,” the tamer acknowledges.
“Ryo,” the digimon greets him, voice a low, feral growl.
Cyberdramon joins Ryo in sitting on the edge of the seaside cliff and watching the endless onset of nighttime. The obvious danger in dangling one’s legs off the edge of a fifty-foot cliff is ignored.
The sunset blends into darkest blue, a blue reflected in Ryo’s now narrowed eyes. Eyes that are trying to pinpoint the first digital star in the simulated sky. A childish preoccupation, he knows, but one that he engages in every night all the same.
Cyberdramon glances over at his tamer, noting the searching eyes. Getting Ryo’s attention by way of a gentle kick in the leg, he lazily points out the first star, then returns his gaze to the descending sun.
Not bothering to thank him for the familiar routine, Ryo draws his legs back onto the cliff top, lies back, and stares at the darkening sky. He has no desire to sleep; after all, it’s not like he needs it, it’s a simulated world. The same reasoning applies to food and drink. In this world, where he is nothing but another bit of data, another mass of zeroes and ones, data doesn’t need food, drink, or sleep.
[Although data does seem to like it sometimes…]
A quick flicker of eyes from one spot to another reveals that Cyberdramon has vanished again. [Probably off for a midnight data load.]
With a last sweeping glance off the cliff, Ryo stands, and strides off into the darkness.
Not particularly noticing (or caring), Ryo walks into a distinctly seedier part of the digital world. It is even darker here than on the seaside cliff, and the place reeks of danger. Whispers surround the tamer and they grow in number and volume in a communal attempt to unnerve him. Faltering somewhat at his apparent calm, the digimon decide to take his calm for cockiness and continue their hushed talks.
Unnoticed, Ryo shifts his right hand to cover something on his belt.
A foolish Sand Yanmamon tries to take its chance at stardom and hurtles out of the shadows, claws extended, straight at the boy. Ryo rolls his eyes, almost as if he finds the situation unworthy of his time, and his right hand jolts upwards, taking the D-Arc with it. The blue energy whip shooting out of the digivice lashes out at the digimon, twisting around its neck and effectively halting it in mid air.
Still holding his D-Arc to keep the Sand Yanmamon stuck in the air, the tamer calmly raises and lowers one eyebrow. [This all you've got?]
Fully aware of all eyes on him, Ryo shortens the whip, putting further strain around the Champion's neck. With an extremely bored look, he snaps it downward. The Sand Yanmamon screeches a final, agonized death cry, then disappears in a shower of pixels. [Alright, so maybe that was a tad unnecessary.
[Wait. It was trying to kill me. It was necessary.]
The awaiting digimon growl in shock and antagonism, forgetting to load the left over data. That Sand Yanmamon had been one of their most promising looking Champions, and that a human, a human of all things, would come along and just effortlessly destroy him? Preposterous!
The digimon shoot uneasy glances at each other, then, by unspoken agreement, all lunge for Ryo, thirsty for revenge.
He shakes his head [bring it on], and spins the whip in a full circle, slamming the pure digital energy against almost all of the surrounding digimon. The tamer flicks the whip to one side, then snaps it to whirl around several digimon necks. Ryo looks at the remaining, un-strangled digimon. "Do you really want me to kill them?"
They growl in reply. The tamer sighs, jerking the whip and idly watching the resulting data explosion. The remaining digimon glare at him, but now take the time to quickly formulate a battle plan before leaping into action.
Ryo has the grace to look decently worried before giving his attackers a good butt whipping. However, one of them has obviously had the brains to call for help, as they seem to be coming on in a continuous onslaught. As soon as one digimon is killed, its data is absorbed by the next, who then tries for a shot at the legendary tamer.
He begins to tire. Across a few moments of peace, he flips over his D-Arc and speaks into it, direct to his partner: "Being attacked by gang of digimon set on destroying me, as I kinda had to *ahem*, kill off one of them who tried to kill the 'legendary tamer'. Big data probably involved, help would be appreciated."
"Where?" comes the reply, a few seconds later.
Ryo looks around as he picks off a couple more close shots. "Uh, where are we?" he asks his general attackers. [Now hopefully someone will actually answer me before trying to kill me.]
"Amaterasu," a digimon has the courtesy to reply, before trying to sink its claws into him.
[What a lovely digimon. Such a shame I'll probably have to kill it.] Ryo parries the attack with his whip, then speaks into his D-Arc again. "Amaterasu." he repeats, hoping he got the pronunciation right.
A pause follows, then Cyberdramon's short answer: "I'll be there."
The tamer whips a rookie digimon out of his way, then hits the communicate button. "Need a speed boost?"
Cyberdramon takes a moment to consider, then agrees. "That would be helpful."
Ducking an attack, Ryo slips a card from his card holster. "Speed percentage up! Hyper Speed - CARD SLASH!"
Sure enough, Cyberdramon makes his grand entrance two minutes later, roaring as he annihilates several digimon at once with Desolation Claw. The rest of the digimon are disposed of group by group in a similar manner.
Ryo turns to lash out at what he thinks is the last digimon. A Gatomon behind him smiles, and takes the opportunity to cast Cat's Eye Hypnotism on him. The tamer passes out, but Cyberdramon gets rid of the remaining digimon before any threats are made on his partner's life.
"Ryo?" Cyberdramon asks, then sees his tamer unconscious on the ground. Sighing, he carefully picks up Ryo and stalks out of the area of devastation, head down.
[...dream a little dream…]
I lean, oddly shirtless, on a stone wall [obviously one in the digital world]. Almost that casual lean I always try so hard to pull off, except that I hurt [too bloody much!] to bother with 'casual'.
And she stands, in front of me, violet eyes gleaming, ['drop dead, coz I'm sexy'] smirk on her face, her perfect, toothpaste ad teeth showing. And her D-Arc's in her hand [exact inverse of mine], dark blue energy whip [so similar to my own] dangling loosely from it.
And the whip is blood-streaked.
With my blood.
And she raises the whip [as I do so frequently] and snaps it [as I do to survive] against my chest [goddamnit that hurts!] and draws blood and loosens her grip on the D-Arc whip and steps forward and her eyes meet mine and she looks [oh-so] innocent as she licks the blood [my blood] from my chest.
And her eyes rise to mine and I just about want to kiss her except I hurt too much to even move and for a moment it looks like she'll do it for me but instead she just lays her head on my chest, making a game of tracing my stomach muscles with her fingers and watching for my reactions at her [delicious] closeness...
And then she just pulls back and assumes the smirk again and starts the rain of abuse all over again.
[But by god, even if this is the way she treats me in my dreams, I still love her to pieces.]
[...wanna be the biggest dreamer...]
"...bloody hell..."
"Language, young man!" chirps an annoyingly cheerful old voice that sounds somewhat familiar.
The tamer opens one eye, forces open the other, moans in pain, and promptly shuts them both.
"And what happened to you?" a kind voice inquires.
"..."
"Speak up a little, we can't hear you," the first voice urges.
"..."
"Your friend said you were attacked in Amaterasu, is this were all the wounds came from?"
"...no..."
[Damned digignomes, I can understand why they'd like to make wishes come true, I can even understand why they'd like to make dreams come true, but damnit, did they have to make the nightmares come true too?]
"What happened, then?"
"WE WEREN'T ATTACKED ON THE WAY; IF WE WERE, THE FOOL WOULD HAVE PAID." comes a yell Ryo instantly recognizes as Cyberdramon's.
Someone sighs.
"We had to make your friend stay outside, he was a little too big to fit in the house." the second voice informs him.
"'LITTLE TOO BIG' MY ASS!" Cyberdramon hollers. Ryo notes with interest that he doesn't protest the label.
"Okay, he was just about trashing the place, better?"
"SLIGHTLY."
A moment of silence, in which Ryo assumes the two friendly digimon exchange a look, passes.
"...So, Ryo, why don't you open your eyes?"
"...too tired...hurt too bloody much..."
"What did we say about language?"
"...nothing, actually..."
A snort greets his ears.
"Really, now, what happened?"
"HE GOT HIT BY A GATOMON'S CAT'S EYE HYPNOTISM AND FELL ASLEEP. ON THE WAY HERE, HE STARTED TWITCHING AND SHUDDERING AND THEN SUDDENLY HE WAS BLEEDING." Cyberdramon announces.
"...ah, the digignomes' 'dreams come true' concept?"
At the words 'dreams come true', Ryo forces his eyes half open and tries to sit up. "It's not just a concept. It's for real." he whispers, flopping back down onto the bed and clutching his stomach. [Ruki...]
"Where am I, by the way...?" he adds, as an afterthought.
"ISN'T IT OBVIOUS?" shouts his partner. "BABAMON AND JIJIMON'S HOUSE. WHERE ELSE WILL YOU FIND A BED AND FRIENDLY DIGIMON?"
"...Shogun Gekomon's palace." the tamer deadpans.
"ER, YEAH, IF YOU CAN SING, WHICH LAST TIME I CHECKED YOU COULDN'T DO." Cyberdramon shoots back.
"Do us a favor, and stop it with the other-world in-jokes." Babamon remarks.
"Anyway. So how did this happen?" puts in Jijimon.
Ryo leaned back. "Well, it all started with a Sand Yanmamon trying to kill me..."
"AND ENDED WITH YOU GETTING KNOCKED OUT AND FALLING ASLEEP. CUT TO THE CHASE ALREADY." Cyberdramon finishes.
"Okay, okay!" [Now, how can I tell them this with out pointing out my morbid fantasy?]
"WE'RE WAITING." grumbles Cyberdramon.
"...to make a long story short, I had a nightmare and there was someone whipping me."
"I'd be interested in hearing what this long story is." Babamon says gently.
"AND WHO THIS 'SOMEONE' IS," Cyberdramon remarks, with something of a leer.
"I don't want to tell the long story." he replies shortly. "And it was just someone, okay?"
Outside, Cyberdramon smirks knowingly. "JUST SOMEONE. RIIIIIGHT."
"Shut up out there," Jijimon calls cheerfully.
alas, this WIP was never completed, and as I have very little idea where I was going with this, it likely never will be.
What: Digimon Tamers (and Digimon Adventure 02, Digimon Adventure: Anode/Cathode Tamer, Digimon Adventure 02: Tag Tamers, Digimon Adventure 02: D-1 Tamers, and Digimon: Brave Tamers) fanfiction - the prologue of a longer work that was, alas, never completed
Rating: R for sexual themes, never mind the cartoon violence and bad language
Words: 2001
Summary: Largely AU - in a digital world where the digignomes have made the would-be after effects of dreams come true, Akiyama Ryo gets a little tired of being stuck with a feral beast for a partner, constantly battling for his life, and saving the world over and over again. (No, I don't know where I was going with this either.) Japanese names, abuse of formatting, and an absolute refusal to capitalize words like "digital world", "digimon", and "tamer" out of laziness and how silly a fic looks with so many capital letters; one-sided Ryo/Ruki and vague one-sided Milleniumon/Ryo; and a whip.
Previously: Prologue - Again
Notes: The beginning of my love affair with the present tense. Written in November 2003 but never posted; barely edited since.
Sample: When did I get into this 'lonely destiny' stuff, anyway?
Empty blue eyes stare at the distant sunset, watching the huge star slowly sink below the horizon. The last rays of sunlight dance across the ocean towards the teenager, but no light reaches his eyes. His eyes: so blue, so many limitless shades of blue, so empty, so devoid of even the slightest hint of emotion. Always giving off the impression that he really doesn’t give a damn.
Brown hair wafts in the wind that a digital nighttime brings. Other than the constant rise and fall of his chest, the occasional blinking of those empty eyes, and the wind teasing at his hair, the boy is completely still. He betrays no movement, no emotion. He makes no sound.
[I am alone... Eternally alone. As I was evidently destined to be.]
Behind him, a masked blue dragon digimon emerges from the shadows. He makes as little noise as his tamer, but the boy immediately locks onto his presence.
[Okay, maybe not completely alone. When did I get into this 'lonely destiny' stuff, anyway? I’m beginning to sound like a stereotypical angsty anime guy.]
“Hello, Cyberdramon,” the tamer acknowledges.
“Ryo,” the digimon greets him, voice a low, feral growl.
Cyberdramon joins Ryo in sitting on the edge of the seaside cliff and watching the endless onset of nighttime. The obvious danger in dangling one’s legs off the edge of a fifty-foot cliff is ignored.
The sunset blends into darkest blue, a blue reflected in Ryo’s now narrowed eyes. Eyes that are trying to pinpoint the first digital star in the simulated sky. A childish preoccupation, he knows, but one that he engages in every night all the same.
Cyberdramon glances over at his tamer, noting the searching eyes. Getting Ryo’s attention by way of a gentle kick in the leg, he lazily points out the first star, then returns his gaze to the descending sun.
Not bothering to thank him for the familiar routine, Ryo draws his legs back onto the cliff top, lies back, and stares at the darkening sky. He has no desire to sleep; after all, it’s not like he needs it, it’s a simulated world. The same reasoning applies to food and drink. In this world, where he is nothing but another bit of data, another mass of zeroes and ones, data doesn’t need food, drink, or sleep.
[Although data does seem to like it sometimes…]
A quick flicker of eyes from one spot to another reveals that Cyberdramon has vanished again. [Probably off for a midnight data load.]
With a last sweeping glance off the cliff, Ryo stands, and strides off into the darkness.
Not particularly noticing (or caring), Ryo walks into a distinctly seedier part of the digital world. It is even darker here than on the seaside cliff, and the place reeks of danger. Whispers surround the tamer and they grow in number and volume in a communal attempt to unnerve him. Faltering somewhat at his apparent calm, the digimon decide to take his calm for cockiness and continue their hushed talks.
Unnoticed, Ryo shifts his right hand to cover something on his belt.
A foolish Sand Yanmamon tries to take its chance at stardom and hurtles out of the shadows, claws extended, straight at the boy. Ryo rolls his eyes, almost as if he finds the situation unworthy of his time, and his right hand jolts upwards, taking the D-Arc with it. The blue energy whip shooting out of the digivice lashes out at the digimon, twisting around its neck and effectively halting it in mid air.
Still holding his D-Arc to keep the Sand Yanmamon stuck in the air, the tamer calmly raises and lowers one eyebrow. [This all you've got?]
Fully aware of all eyes on him, Ryo shortens the whip, putting further strain around the Champion's neck. With an extremely bored look, he snaps it downward. The Sand Yanmamon screeches a final, agonized death cry, then disappears in a shower of pixels. [Alright, so maybe that was a tad unnecessary.
[Wait. It was trying to kill me. It was necessary.]
The awaiting digimon growl in shock and antagonism, forgetting to load the left over data. That Sand Yanmamon had been one of their most promising looking Champions, and that a human, a human of all things, would come along and just effortlessly destroy him? Preposterous!
The digimon shoot uneasy glances at each other, then, by unspoken agreement, all lunge for Ryo, thirsty for revenge.
He shakes his head [bring it on], and spins the whip in a full circle, slamming the pure digital energy against almost all of the surrounding digimon. The tamer flicks the whip to one side, then snaps it to whirl around several digimon necks. Ryo looks at the remaining, un-strangled digimon. "Do you really want me to kill them?"
They growl in reply. The tamer sighs, jerking the whip and idly watching the resulting data explosion. The remaining digimon glare at him, but now take the time to quickly formulate a battle plan before leaping into action.
Ryo has the grace to look decently worried before giving his attackers a good butt whipping. However, one of them has obviously had the brains to call for help, as they seem to be coming on in a continuous onslaught. As soon as one digimon is killed, its data is absorbed by the next, who then tries for a shot at the legendary tamer.
He begins to tire. Across a few moments of peace, he flips over his D-Arc and speaks into it, direct to his partner: "Being attacked by gang of digimon set on destroying me, as I kinda had to *ahem*, kill off one of them who tried to kill the 'legendary tamer'. Big data probably involved, help would be appreciated."
"Where?" comes the reply, a few seconds later.
Ryo looks around as he picks off a couple more close shots. "Uh, where are we?" he asks his general attackers. [Now hopefully someone will actually answer me before trying to kill me.]
"Amaterasu," a digimon has the courtesy to reply, before trying to sink its claws into him.
[What a lovely digimon. Such a shame I'll probably have to kill it.] Ryo parries the attack with his whip, then speaks into his D-Arc again. "Amaterasu." he repeats, hoping he got the pronunciation right.
A pause follows, then Cyberdramon's short answer: "I'll be there."
The tamer whips a rookie digimon out of his way, then hits the communicate button. "Need a speed boost?"
Cyberdramon takes a moment to consider, then agrees. "That would be helpful."
Ducking an attack, Ryo slips a card from his card holster. "Speed percentage up! Hyper Speed - CARD SLASH!"
Sure enough, Cyberdramon makes his grand entrance two minutes later, roaring as he annihilates several digimon at once with Desolation Claw. The rest of the digimon are disposed of group by group in a similar manner.
Ryo turns to lash out at what he thinks is the last digimon. A Gatomon behind him smiles, and takes the opportunity to cast Cat's Eye Hypnotism on him. The tamer passes out, but Cyberdramon gets rid of the remaining digimon before any threats are made on his partner's life.
"Ryo?" Cyberdramon asks, then sees his tamer unconscious on the ground. Sighing, he carefully picks up Ryo and stalks out of the area of devastation, head down.
[...dream a little dream…]
I lean, oddly shirtless, on a stone wall [obviously one in the digital world]. Almost that casual lean I always try so hard to pull off, except that I hurt [too bloody much!] to bother with 'casual'.
And she stands, in front of me, violet eyes gleaming, ['drop dead, coz I'm sexy'] smirk on her face, her perfect, toothpaste ad teeth showing. And her D-Arc's in her hand [exact inverse of mine], dark blue energy whip [so similar to my own] dangling loosely from it.
And the whip is blood-streaked.
With my blood.
And she raises the whip [as I do so frequently] and snaps it [as I do to survive] against my chest [goddamnit that hurts!] and draws blood and loosens her grip on the D-Arc whip and steps forward and her eyes meet mine and she looks [oh-so] innocent as she licks the blood [my blood] from my chest.
And her eyes rise to mine and I just about want to kiss her except I hurt too much to even move and for a moment it looks like she'll do it for me but instead she just lays her head on my chest, making a game of tracing my stomach muscles with her fingers and watching for my reactions at her [delicious] closeness...
And then she just pulls back and assumes the smirk again and starts the rain of abuse all over again.
[But by god, even if this is the way she treats me in my dreams, I still love her to pieces.]
[...wanna be the biggest dreamer...]
"...bloody hell..."
"Language, young man!" chirps an annoyingly cheerful old voice that sounds somewhat familiar.
The tamer opens one eye, forces open the other, moans in pain, and promptly shuts them both.
"And what happened to you?" a kind voice inquires.
"..."
"Speak up a little, we can't hear you," the first voice urges.
"..."
"Your friend said you were attacked in Amaterasu, is this were all the wounds came from?"
"...no..."
[Damned digignomes, I can understand why they'd like to make wishes come true, I can even understand why they'd like to make dreams come true, but damnit, did they have to make the nightmares come true too?]
"What happened, then?"
"WE WEREN'T ATTACKED ON THE WAY; IF WE WERE, THE FOOL WOULD HAVE PAID." comes a yell Ryo instantly recognizes as Cyberdramon's.
Someone sighs.
"We had to make your friend stay outside, he was a little too big to fit in the house." the second voice informs him.
"'LITTLE TOO BIG' MY ASS!" Cyberdramon hollers. Ryo notes with interest that he doesn't protest the label.
"Okay, he was just about trashing the place, better?"
"SLIGHTLY."
A moment of silence, in which Ryo assumes the two friendly digimon exchange a look, passes.
"...So, Ryo, why don't you open your eyes?"
"...too tired...hurt too bloody much..."
"What did we say about language?"
"...nothing, actually..."
A snort greets his ears.
"Really, now, what happened?"
"HE GOT HIT BY A GATOMON'S CAT'S EYE HYPNOTISM AND FELL ASLEEP. ON THE WAY HERE, HE STARTED TWITCHING AND SHUDDERING AND THEN SUDDENLY HE WAS BLEEDING." Cyberdramon announces.
"...ah, the digignomes' 'dreams come true' concept?"
At the words 'dreams come true', Ryo forces his eyes half open and tries to sit up. "It's not just a concept. It's for real." he whispers, flopping back down onto the bed and clutching his stomach. [Ruki...]
"Where am I, by the way...?" he adds, as an afterthought.
"ISN'T IT OBVIOUS?" shouts his partner. "BABAMON AND JIJIMON'S HOUSE. WHERE ELSE WILL YOU FIND A BED AND FRIENDLY DIGIMON?"
"...Shogun Gekomon's palace." the tamer deadpans.
"ER, YEAH, IF YOU CAN SING, WHICH LAST TIME I CHECKED YOU COULDN'T DO." Cyberdramon shoots back.
"Do us a favor, and stop it with the other-world in-jokes." Babamon remarks.
"Anyway. So how did this happen?" puts in Jijimon.
Ryo leaned back. "Well, it all started with a Sand Yanmamon trying to kill me..."
"AND ENDED WITH YOU GETTING KNOCKED OUT AND FALLING ASLEEP. CUT TO THE CHASE ALREADY." Cyberdramon finishes.
"Okay, okay!" [Now, how can I tell them this with out pointing out my morbid fantasy?]
"WE'RE WAITING." grumbles Cyberdramon.
"...to make a long story short, I had a nightmare and there was someone whipping me."
"I'd be interested in hearing what this long story is." Babamon says gently.
"AND WHO THIS 'SOMEONE' IS," Cyberdramon remarks, with something of a leer.
"I don't want to tell the long story." he replies shortly. "And it was just someone, okay?"
Outside, Cyberdramon smirks knowingly. "JUST SOMEONE. RIIIIIGHT."
"Shut up out there," Jijimon calls cheerfully.
alas, this WIP was never completed, and as I have very little idea where I was going with this, it likely never will be.