[tri OOM] Barry, Cisco, and File Island

[angry_friendship_wolf]

Yamato brings Barry and Cisco out through the same hilltop telephone booth he used to bring Autor through a few weeks back, out onto a cliff with a pretty good view of the island.

The island's central point is a mountain that looks more like a sheer spike of rock, and radiating outwards from it are a lot of very different places: Closest to the mountain, there's a pastel-coloured village of some kind that looks like it might be made of cushions; a tropical jungle with a ruined temple of black and brown stone jutting out of it; and a desert with gear markings carved into the ground and a single, leafy mountain in the centre.

Spreading out further than that, there are forests; some kind of icy tundra; a large town with a glittering white castle; a small village covered by a dark cloud; some kind of factory belching smoke into the air; and a plain covered in railroad tracks and ruined trains. Just down from the cliff, there's a lake with a camp set up next to it.

"All right, File Island," Yamato says, shutting the door. "Oldest part of the Digital World."

Comments

[run_barry]

"That's so interesting," Barry says, nodding to Yamato's explanation.

[makes_the_toys]

"It's like the Matrix, but not," Cisco muses, taking a couple of pictures of Tsunomon, then turning to snap a selfie with the mon in the background.

[angry_friendship_wolf]

Wryly: "I'm pretty sure The Matrix came out a few months before our first visit here, actually."

He pauses, shaking his head.

"Anyway, you guys have the pick of where you want to go. Over near Mount Infinity there's the Village of Beginnings, where Digimon are born and reincarnated, and the Temple, where a bunch of prophecies are carved into the walls. That desert place is the Gear Desert, and there are hot springs and fridges next to it. There's Andromon's factory which just kind of builds and takes things apart endlessly, and Toy Town where Monzaemon lives. We can even visit the Bakemon village, if you really want."

[makes_the_toys]

"Boom, life imitating film, imitating life, creating mad weird dreamscapes," Cisco declares.

"My vote is for the Village of Beginnings," he says after hearing their options. "Collecting data from where these dudes start could be useful for what you need."

[run_barry]

Barry shrugs, then nods.

"That's good with me."

He gestures Yamato to lead, taking a moment to ask, "What's a Bakemon?"

[angry_friendship_wolf]

"All right, follow me. Tsunomon, if you head back to camp, tell the others that if they need me they can check the Village of Beginnings," Yamato says.

As Tsunomon bounces off, he gestures the other two along and starts heading down the hill.

"A Bakemon is, er -- hang on," he says, and fiddles about with his wrist computer as he walks, eventually projecting an image of what looks very much like a white blanket with holes for eyes cut in it, save that it also has a fleshy mouth lined with sharp teeth. "Ghost Digimon. They're pretty hostile, but they're also easily the weakest things on the island."

[makes_the_toys]

"Nope!" Cisco declares loudly. "I have a solid rule against ghosts and bees, ain't nobody got time for either."

Seriously, Cisco don't do bees, and he certainly don't do ghosts.

[run_barry]

Barry laughs at Cisco, then cants his head towards Yamato.

"But... if Digimon reincarnate, how can you have ghosts?"

[angry_friendship_wolf]

Giving Cisco a sidelong glance: "Would it help if I said that there are bee Digimon on this island, and they're the size of trucks?"

Yamato feels this might help!

"Bakemon are Ghost Digimon, but not Digimon ghosts," he says, flicking off the display. "They're based off data about ghosts, but they're not actually the spirits of anything. They're just angry blankets with teeth."

As they reach the bottom of the hill, Yamato leads them into a forest -- composed around seventy percent of dense, deciduous trees, and about thirty percent of battered, bent out of shape road signs.

[makes_the_toys]

"Oh yeah, definitely helps," Cisco confirms. "If we run into a truck-sized bee I am peacing the hell out."

With literally no hesitation or shame.

[run_barry]

"That is a pretty big bee," Barry notes, amused.

"And all this data is coming from where, your world?" he asks, tilting his head at the road signs mixed in among the trees.

[angry_friendship_wolf]

"Relax, all the giant bees are sapient and friendly," Yamato laughs, shaking his head.

He gives a quick nod. "Yeah, it's all drawn from my world."

As they walk, a few bright green slug things the size of cats pause to watch them from deeper in the forest, then continue cheerfully on their way.

[makes_the_toys]

"Oh, well that's great, they can literally plot our demise," Cisco responds, wishing he'd thought to bring a can of Raid along with the rest of the things he's packing.

There's no immediate threat though, so he settles down and enjoys the scenery, odd as it all may be.

[run_barry]

Deciding to err on the side of most things in this world being some kind of aware, and politeness, Barry raises a hand and waves at the slug things as they pass.

"So where will you and your friends go from here?"

[angry_friendship_wolf]

"They're not plotting your demise, Cisco. Probably. For now."

It doesn't take too long to emerge from the other end of the forest, onto a grassy plain with a single train track stretching across it. Yamato ambles forward, stopping at the train track.

"Once we've checked the last few places on this island, we'll build a raft and make the week or so's journey over to Server Continent. Make landfall in the Server Desert and work our way from town to town, heading north."

As he talks, a train bell starts ringing, followed by the sound of a train fast approaching. The train itself never actually comes, though: There's the noise of it rushing by them, but if there's anything there, it can't be seen.

[run_barry]

"Need any help with looking?" Barry offers, stopping when Yamato does.

When the bells sound he glances up and down the track, looking for the train, then draws back a step when the rush goes by with no vehicle.

"Huh."

[makes_the_toys]

"What was that, Casey Jones?" Cisco says, leaning forward to look down the track after the wind and noise have passed.

[angry_friendship_wolf]

"Nah, there's only a couple more places to check, and it doesn't seem like anyone on the island has heard anything about them. It makes sense they're not here -- the eight of us are always pulled back towards File Island by our Crests, but Daisuke's group has always been able to land anywhere in the world they wanted."

Once the train has passed, the scenery beyond it starts to change, slowly, as if a mirage is clearing, revealing the Village of Beginnings. From this distance, it looks like some kind of strange playpen-town, built from towering stacks of pastel coloured, cushiony blocks with stars, hearts, or cartoon animals on them.

"Who's Casey Jones?" Yamato asks. "That's just the invisible train-thing. It runs in a circle twenty-four hours a day, enclosing Mount Infinity, the Village of Beginnings, the Temple, and some of the Gear Desert. I don't think anyone actually rides it or anything."

[makes_the_toys]

"Heroic train conductor killed in a tragic accident, turned scary ghost," Cisco replies, cautiously stepping out onto the track.

"What happens if I stand in front of it? Do I get invincibly mowed down?"

[run_barry]

"Let's not find out," Barry says, nodding Cisco to keep up as he walks on with Yamato.

"How do they get here?" he asks Yamato, going back to Daisuke's group.

The town is... weird, like the rest of this world, but the colors and appearance of everything still make Barry smile.

[angry_friendship_wolf]

"Yeah, maybe just don't stand in front of the invisible train. Nobody's ever really tried it before, but I doubt you'd enjoy pioneering that scientific discovery."

He crosses the tracks, sticking his hands in his pockets.

"It's -- complicated, but it mostly comes down to the four of them having more advanced digivices than we do -- the ones we use are the original designs left behind by the Crests, while the ones they use are modeled after Ken's corrupted version," he says. "It lets them open temporary gates between two points, whereas we have to use pre-existing ones."

[run_barry]

"Any chance your devices could be upgraded?" he suggests.

[makes_the_toys]

"I bet I could hook it up with an upgrade," Cisco says, abandoning his train dodge contemplating.

"If they're using tech there might also be a way to lock onto a signal or code from the device they're using and maybe at least track them by it."

[angry_friendship_wolf]

"It's possible. An upgrade is essentially what happened to Ken's, after all -- he had the same model as ours, and when it was corrupted it was reassembled into a new form," Yamato says. "As far as tracking goes -- all our digivices can track everyone else's in a limited range, but they stopped working when our Crests did."

To demonstrate, he pulls his digivice -- a pale blue, cross-shaped object with three buttons and a small screen with an inscription around it -- from his belt, pressing a few of the buttons. The screen remains completely dark.

He keeps heading into the Village, where the landscape changes drastically as soon as they step into it. The grassy plains stop dead, to be replaced by a landscape of -- not quite hills so much as intersecting, slightly curved and slightly angled plains of some kind of hard felt-like material, lined with inscriptions.

Scattered across the Village are brightly coloured eggs the size of a person's head, and cribs that seem to be carved from rock, with tiny puffball Digimon within them.

As the three enter the village, a small procession of bright purple penguin like creatures start waddling through, stopping as they catch sight of them.

"Salutations," says the penguin at the lead of the group, in a voice that is far too deep and gravelly for his face. "If you are looking for Elecmon, he's left to get supplies."

[makes_the_toys]

Cisco holds out his hand, fingers curling in a 'gimme' gesture.

"Crest? What's that and how'd you break it?"