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THE GUARDIANS SHADOW

CH 14

I could tell now that their were several splinters in both cheeks of my face as blood trickled down and pooled there at the edge of my shirts collar. Though I didn't think upon it much as my life was more important than a few drops of blood that were ruining my shirt. That thought too was quick to pass as I'd dodge around a few more trees to keep out of range of my opponent, though cursing all the time.

"Where the **** is she! She should be backing me up!" I yelled to the air. 'I thought that I could trust that flea bitten fox bitch, but she's just upped and abandoned me,' Another shot came out of nowhere and clipped me in the shoulder which stung like a bitch and made me turn my bike in a new direction. 'When I find out where she is....' And that's when I remember my training back at the Hunters base.

Quickly pulling out a gas grenade from within my jacket that I'd saved for just such an emergency, I pulled the pin with my teeth and threw it just a little ways ahead of me. Just as my bike passed the grenade, both ends exploded out either end and filled the area with smoke. 'I don't know why I didn't use that sooner.' I thought as I knew that that smoke grenade would only last for a few more minutes before dispersing. So reaching into my jacket I pulled out my Digivice and clicked through the functions.

A normal D3 Digivice has many features and one of which is that of a compass to find your Digimon incase it gets separated from you. It looked much like an egg timer that had a spinning arrow that would point towards your Digimon, and a single pulsing white circle would start from the middle and looked like a ripple that would increase it's frequency when you approached your Digimon. When I looked down upon it I could see that the arrow was pointing behind me, but was pulsating quite rapidly.

'That must mean that she's very close, but why hasn't she shown up yet to help me?' A snarl appeared on my face as I looked over my shoulder and cursed at my stupidity as I could now see that their was a decent amount of space between me and my pursuers to allow me to pull over and stop. "I'm a freaken Hunter for crying out loud. Why should I rely on a worthless, flea infested, shabby coated Digimon to be my partner in battle when I'm just as capable of displacing this Digimon on my own." As if almost on queue I heard a snarl from behind me.

"Who are you calling Flea Infested!" The voice growled deep in a very menacing way.

"About time you showed up." I said in a harsh tone as she growled back at me.

She scowled at me and was about to say something as her mouth started to open until a shot rang out that went right between us. "It would seem that we have some uninvited guest that wishes to interrupt our little conversation," She turned to me and gave me a scowl. "We shall finish our little chat once we have dealt with that...interruption." With that she seemed to fade into the shadow of a tree that was next to me, then disappeared.

I didn't have time to think about where she'd disappeared to as I looked back to the fog and could see that it was slowly beginning to thin. Out of the mist I could see that the Digimon that I'd faced earlier had now sprouted wings upon it's back and could see them raised up high. Then with a almighty pull downward he rose a few feet into the air and all the rest of the fog from the canister was dispersed with the wind that he caused with his wings.

'I didn't think that trick would stick anyhow,' I thought as I ducked behind a tree and took a quick mental inventory of the things I had. I hadn't thought that I'd be taking on a Digimon on the road back up to the base and had only outfitted myself with a few magazines of ammo and a few other odds and ends. 'And here I am out facing a veteran Digimon that wants nothing more than to take my head as a trophy.'

"Come out...come out...wherever you are little Hunter. I have a double helping of Double Impact that would just love to say hello to your head." The Beelzemon said with a chuckle as I could hear him land on the ground with his steal toed boots then start walking towards where I was hiding.

Pulling out two duel pistols I checked the action and chambered a round into each. 'As they say, 'Do what you can with that you've got.' I thought as I slowed my breathing until I heard someone shout out from somewhere in the forest. Quickly looking around the tree to where I'd hear the yell I saw that the girl that'd been ridding behind the Beelzemon was now being grabbed behind by Renamon. Somehow she'd moved in behind the Beelzemon, grabbed up his tamer, and was now placing her claws at her neck in a manner that said that if she even made the slightest move that she'd puncture her own neck on her claws.

"Lucy!" The Beelzemon shouted and made a small lung forward but stopped when the tamer gasped in pain as Renamon's claws pressed a little deeper into her skin.

"I would not advise taking another step Beelzemon. Otherwise this tamer of yours might just end up with a new whole in her neck to breath out of." Renamon said in dominatrix kind of tone.

Ever so slowly the Beelzemon slowly straitened up, tapped his shoulder with the double barreled shotgun in his right hand, and smiled to Renamon. "As if I'd care what would happen to that...weak...and pa...pathetic human."

I stepped out from behind the tree, walked silently up to him, tapped him in the back of the head with both ends of my guns which made him jump slightly, and look over his shoulder at me with wide eyes. "Nice try, but that farce isn't going to work. We all heard you call out to her by name and that means that the two of you are close." Ever so slowly he turned back to look forward at his partner and slowly lowered both his guns in defeat.

It was out of the corner of my eye that I caught the glint of sunlight on metal and looked towards where it'd come from. A bit of adrenaline pumped through my system as I raised up the gun in my left arm so that it was aiming around the Beelzemon's body, leveled it on the other pair, and fired off a shot. I could see Renamon's eyes go wide in shock as she quickly tilted her head in preparation to dodge the bullet, but the only thing that happened was there was a loud clanking sound as if something metal had collided with something else that was metal.

Renamon was confused as to why her tamer had just shot at her and quickly used her short range teleporting abilities to move to a safer area, and when she looked back down at the surrounding area as she'd teleported up into the trees did she see the remains of a knife that now lay on the ground near where her captive stood. Quickly looking back at her tamer she saw him quickly dive out of area and press himself against the back of a tree as the Beelzemon tracked him with his guns and shot out a few rounds that barely missed him. 'That other tamer must have had a knife handy and was about to stab me. Seeing that knife, Hunter shot it out of her hand, and sacrificed his own leverage against the Beelzemon in order to save me.' She looked back at the Beelzemon as it was now leveling both it's guns on the tree that the Hunter was taking cover behind, then looked back at the Hunt...no, her tamer and saw him checking his guns.

'Damn it. Why do I have to have a conscious moment at a time like that. I could've just killed that Beelzemon, let the girl kill that damn fox, and the world would've been free of two more pests.' I thought as I checked the action of both my guns and counted the rounds still left in each magazine. Cursing under my breath at the count of only a few more shots left in each gun, I remembered that the other magazines that I'd had for these guns were back in the saddlebags on the bike, which now lay to far away to get to without sacrificing my safety that the tree was temporarily providing me.

"This is almost to easy. I feel like I'm trying to shoot a fish that's hiding under a rock." The Beelzemon said as it fired off a few more shots to turn more and more of the tree that the Hunter was hiding behind into splinters.

"Though it wont take as long to shoot through that tree that your hiding behind." He said as a large chunk of the tree fell away and the whole tree seemed to shudder under it's own top weight.

'I hate to admit it, but he's right. This isn't a really good place to take cover from his barrage and their's no telling how much ammunition he's got stored up in that gun of his. I'd better think of something fast before this tree finally gives way and I'm left standing out in the open.' I began to look around for somewhere else to try and take cover that would at least get me an upper hand to either get in a good shot at the Beelzemon or over to my bike to grab some more magazines.

It was at that moment that I realized that the sound of gunfire had stopped and that the forest had once again become quiet. "Game over Hunter." Came the voice from my right and when I looked over to it, my eyes were lined up almost perfectly with both the barrels of his guns. "I must say that you put up a decent fight for a human, but all fun aside, this is your end. Any last words before I send you to your maker for all the Digimon that you've killed?"

I didn't really have anything that I could say, other than my mind screaming at me to move. But looking at how far he had his finger squeezed upon the trigger of his double barreled shotgun I knew that even if I even twitched he'd finish squeezing that trigger and take my head.

"YA, POWER PAW!" Then out of practically nowhere, Renamon appeared and with her right arm pulled back, she delivered a dark glowing paw to the side of the Beelzemon's mask and sent him sprawling. After he'd stumbled for a few moments did I see him regain his footing only to see that Renamon was pressing on her attack. "And how about a RAPID KICK." She said as she pivoted on her left foot paw she delivered her first kick with her right foot to his lower stomach, then sternum, finally just above the middle of his rib cage, but all the rest were lost to the naked eye as she was delivering them way to fast. It was like looking at an old Street Fighters game when Chung Li would start kicking her opponent with blazing fast kick of hers.

Beelzemon was thrown back by the last kick and only stopped stumbling when his back hit a tree and he slowly slid to the ground. A small bit of green blood leaked out of the corner of his mouth, seeming to have been caused by Renamon hitting/breaking something within the Fallen Angel. "Damn, fox face, I didn't know that you still had that much fight left in ya," He said as he turned, spat out a glob of green blood onto the ground, and let out a weak laugh that he quickly stopped as he groaned and grabbed for his stomach. "But don't think that I'm out of the fight just yet." He slowly lifted his right arm to level his gun on her, only to have her delivering another kick to the gun which sent it flying into the forest somewhere.

"If anyone is going to be delivering any punishment to that Hunter, it's going to me." She said as she leaned down and scowled at the obviously defeated Digimon.

It was at that moment that I turned and decided to see what was going on with the girl/other-tamer and saw that she had her Digivice in hand and was pulling a card through it. "Just like he said, "Don't think that he's out of the game just yet. CARD SLASH, RE-ENERGIZE ACTIVATE!" She yelled as she pulled the card through. I quickly looked over my shoulder to the previously defeated Beelzemon only to see his wounds quickly begin to heal and a wicked looking smile slowly spread across his face. "And for his next trick..."

"NOT going to happen!" I yelled too as I pulled out a small knife out of my belt and threw it. The knife flew true through the air and embedded itself into her right hand which was holding her Digivice, making her drop it.

"AH! MY HAND!" She yelled as she held it aloft and she started to scream.

"Black Diamond Storm." I heard Renamon call out her signature attack.

I didn't want to look back at the fight that she and the Fallen Angel because I knew that she was capable of taking care of herself. So running forward I snatched up her Digivice and backhanded the girl. The girl fell like a sack of bricks and was unconscious a moment or two after she'd hit the ground.

It was at that moment that I heard the Beelzemon let out a yell and turned to see that what I'd just done to his tamer had really upset him. His normally deep green irises began to swirl but what really had a freaky effect was it looked like someone had added a small drop of red to them that was quickly starting to engulf the green. When his irises had stopped spinning his eyes were now a deep red color and I could tell that he was now out for blood.

With lightning fast moments he holstered his guns and in the same moment brought his left across his body to swing it out and caught Renamon in the side of her heck, as if trying to chop off her head like that of a martial artist trying to chop through a piece of wood. The blow was so fast that Renamon didn't have even the slightest of a chance to counter, or for that matter dodge, and was quickly flung several feet away to where she skidded along the ground and right into a tree.

Slamming his fists down into the ground, which seemed to shoot him up onto his feet, he cracked his neck as if the previous fight had just been a warm up then followed with his knuckles. "I wish that she'd used that card sooner. Now the real fight begins." He then started off towards Renamon with an obviously sense of superiority and overconfidence as he started to laugh in an evil manner.

Looking back over to where Renamon lay I could see that the blow had knocked her out and if I didn't do something fast that she'd be deleted for sure. It was at that moment that something shifted within my pocket and I realized that she still did have a fighting chance. 'Do I really have to stoop to that kind of a level?' I asked myself, but simply shook it off as I pulled the small device from my own pocket as well as a few cards from another.

Quickly shifting through the cards I eventually came to one that looked promising. Throwing up the Digivice I allowed it to spin horizontally along it's side like a top until it reached just below my eyes where it seemed to hover in mid air without spinning, then with a quick slash of my arm I swiped the card through the reader. "CARD SLASH! BACK TO ACTION, ATIVATE!" And just like that I looked over the Digivice to where Renamon lay to see her eyes snap open and glow for a brief second.

She didn't waist any time as she leapt to her feet and shook her head. I could see that she was a bit shaken by the event but when we both saw the Beelzemon pull out both his guns and train them both on her, she quickly leapt back into the shadows of the trees and seemed to vanish from sight. This seemed to upset the Beelzemon quite a bit as he began to fire randomly into the woods at any shadow or any twig/leaf that even dared to move.

Taking advantage of his confusion I quickly snatched my Digivice out of the air and ran back to my bike to get some more ammo for my pistols. As I reached my bike and was crouching over the saddlebag that was on it's upturned side, I heard the unmistakable sound of a gun cocking somewhere not three feet behind me. "Now don't think that I've forgotten about you...human. You need to pay for what you've done to my tamer and I plan on taking out that payment, right here and right...now!"

It was almost as time slowed down to a crawl as I slowly turned my head to see him pull the trigger of one of his guns, the explosion of gunpowder that moved the two rounds out of the gun, the gun jerking back from the recoil, and the rounds spinning as they approached my head. I was half expecting my life to flash before my eyes, like it is said that happens to all people just before they die, but nothing came other than a dark form that appeared before me and took both rounds.

Remembering my physics and inertia from when I was still a lad, I knew that it would take a lot of force to move something by being shot and when I saw Renamon fly over my head and land somewhere on her back a few feet behind me I knew that the rounds had to of caused a lot of damage to her. Forgetting about the ammo I quickly ran on over to her and picked her head up to lay it down in my lap.

"Damn it you stupid fox, now why'd you have to go and do a stupid thing like getting yourself shot up on my account?" I asked in a concerned tone that surprised not only her as her eyes went a little wide, but myself as well.

"Don't blame me..." Cough cough. "This damn body moved on it's own." It was at that moment that we both heard the sound of the Beelzemon cock his guns back and ready another round to end us both. "Now get out of here before he..." The last of her words were lost to me as she'd couched up some blood then her eyes slowly began to glaze over.

"DAMN IT RENAMON, DON'T YOU GO AND GIVE UP ON ME NOW. WE HUNTERS NEVER GIVE UP ON A COMRAD AND I'M NOT ABOUT TO LOOSE ONE NOW. !!RENAMON!!"

It was at that moment that my Digivice began to vibrate heavily and when I pulled it out to look down to see what was causing it to do such, I noticed that the screen had turned dark and slowly text began to appear on the screen. DIGIVOLUTION Then watched as the screen started showing strange kinds of calculations that hardly made any sense but out of those calculation came what looked to be some kind of geometric egg that stared to spin.

"What the heck? Is this..." I didn't get a chance to finish what I was going to say when section of the geometric egg shot out of my Digivice and rejoined around Renamon, encasing her within this strange kind of egg. With that done, the egg began to spin, then once it reached a certain speed the egg started to spit into horizontal sections that separated from each other by a foot so that I could see within, and I watched as Renamon began her DIGIVOLUTION process.

Instantly jumping up so that she was standing once again she slashed the air in front of her and a fierce look crossed her muzzle. "Dark Renamon Digivolve tooooo..." Just then she raised her head up to the sky and I watched as the very front of her muzzle began to peal away like that of some kind of wet tissue paper to reveal some kind of blue skin that had light blue lines crossing each other like some kind of grid. I watched in amazement as at the tips of each end of her body began to peal away as well, until she no longer had the soft black fur but blue like skin with that weird grid all over her body.

Just then her body contorted and her blue body took on a whole new form. Her arms turned into paws as she was forced into a quadruped like form, her tail split into several more tails, the scruff of fur that was around her neck grew to cover all around her neck, and some kind of striped ribbon tied itself around her neck and the ends ended at two teardrop like pieces of metal. With her form now changed into it's new form, a reverse pealing started to happen and her body started to get back it's fur.

Once the whole thing was done the egg solidified once again, but only remained like that for a moment until it exploded outwards and a new Digimon stood where Renamon had once stood. "Youkomon!"

Both our (Beelzemon and my) mouths dropped open as we stared at the newly Digivolved Digimon that stood between the two of us. Unlike a normal Kyubimon, she didn't have the small paper talismans that seemed to be attached to the twirled red and white ribbon/rope that was under her neck and her coloring matched more to her virus like corruption that she had as a Renamon than the typical yellow and white fur coloring of a regular Renamon/Kyubimon. Plus, instead of her paws and tail tips that would normally look like White flames, she had Orange flames at those points.

Though there were a few other smaller differences that differed her from a normal Kyubimon, I waited with baited breath to see what her eyes would look like after her change. Ever so slowly she opened her eyes and looking over her shoulder I took in a sigh of relief. Even in her corrupted state she still had those beautiful ice blue eyes. 'Wait a minute...did I just think of her eyes as beautiful?'