Back at the camp, the main power is out with only a few emergency lights on. The digidestined are able to use their digi-vices as flashlights. Gatomon sneaks into the administrate building, removing her gloves to pass for a more normal cat. Nobody suspects a thing from this "ordinary" cat. Some even sweet talk her and try to pat her, or grab and hug her, much to the digimon's dismay. Despite her best efforts, she discovers nothing about the where a bouts of Agumon and Katherine.
The others search the area where the flute sounds came from but come up empty. Tai's been having trouble keeping up with everybody due to his injured ankle, and it's hurting more now than ever. Sternly ordered by the others to sit down and rest it, Tai reluctantly does so, all accept Rico continuing with the search. As Rico does his best to treat and set the ankle, Tai's amazed at Rico's first aid skills, forgetting that his teammate's actually the unofficial first aid provider for the team. As usual, Rico tries to shove it off.
"It's nothing."
"Quick acting like that Rico. You obviously care enough to stick with us and keep working on my ankle when you don't even have too, and you're obviously worried about Agumon and Katherine. You've got a bigger heart then most of us realize."
Rico shrugs his shoulders, then feels something warm and wet licking his leg. "You again?" he says to Oscar; "You've been following me all night."
Tai giggles. "Looks like you've got a new pet."
For once, Rico drops his façade and actually gives a little smile, admitting that Oscar reminds him of his previous dog, also a dachshund, who died 6 months ago.
Suddenly, Oscar starts barking furiously and gets into a full defensive mode. A flash of light comes from behind them and a crash is heard. The boys look and notice a knocked-out plant. It had been right behind them!
"I thought you could sense danger from miles away Tai!" The boys look up and see Davis and Ex-Veemon landing.
"Davis;" says a surprised Tai; "You're here!"
"Of course I'm here;" Davis rolls his eyes; "Why does everybody always say that?"
"What am I chopped liver?" says Ex-Veemon.
Oscar keeps barking at the plant, which is getting up again.
"Looks like that thing's not quite dead yet!" yells Rico.
"Veemon, switch;" orders Davis.
"Again;" says Ex-Veemon exasperated; "Ok." Shirking down into Veemon, the dragon-like digimon armor-evolves into Flamedramon. "Fire Rocket;" it takes a few attempts before one of the rockets finally gets into the plant's mouth, and Flamedramon hits it twice more to speed up the burning process. Then he shrinks again back into Veemon and collapses.
"Make-up your mind Davis, that's twice now I've switched digivolved. I'm going to run our gas soon at this rate."
"Just what are supposed to be, a freakish lizard?" asks Rico sternly.
Veemon freaks and hides behind his partner. "Yikes, he sees me."
"Hey pal, what's the big idea…" Davis starts; "Hey, you're Rico Hosoda. Your soccer skills rival Tai's."
"Can't argue with that;" agrees Tai.
Rico's not flattered. "And you are?"
"What do you mean who am I?"
"Davis is Shinagawa Middle School's best soccer player!" exclaims Veemon.
"Never heard of you."
"What? Hey, that was rude."
"Get used to it;" says Tai. He then turns to Rico; "They're exaggerating. Davis is mostly a bench warmer these days. "
"I hear that!" yells Davis; "That's only because I'm still recovering from that torn ACL! Anyway, where's the others, we need help."
Tai's surprised. "You need help? We need help! Agumon and Katherine have been captured!"
"Agumon captured?" asked a shocked Veemon; "How, when, why, who?"
"Agumon captured?" repeats Davis; "Great! Now we've got 4 missing guys to find, Kaburterimon and Izzy are missing too. Who's Kathy?"
"That's Katherine;" then it's Tai's turn to be shocked. "Hold on, did you say Izzy and Kaburterimon are missing?"
"They were shot down;" Veemon burst out; "All we found was Izzy's laptop."
Davis shows them the laptop. Tai can't believe what he's hearing. "Shot down? How?"
"By those crazed military canons!" Davis cringes his fists; "While Ex-Veemon was protecting citizens. Didn't they notice that?"
"It's all my fault;" says Veemon; "I should have been paying more attention. Kaburterimon was protecting me."
"Calm down guys;" says Tai; "The others are this way. Come on."
Tai's practically moving with a limp, and Davis notices. "Well well, I knew you'd get hurt sooner or later, Mr. Soccer Awesome."
"It's not that bad;" replies Tai; "How about all those injuries you've had, Mr. Klutz."
"Hey, I resent that."
"Can it and come on!" shouts Rico. As they move on, Veemon gets next to him.
"Hey there, I believe we haven't meet yet;" the digimon grabs Rico's hand and shakes it vigorously. "Please to meet ya Rico, I'm Veemon, how ya doing, let's be friends."
Rico jerks his hand away. "Stop that! A simple I'm Veemon will do."
"We're moving too slow;" says Davis holding up his digi-vice; "Come on Veemon, let's speed this up."
Veemon's agitated. "If I'm going to keep re-digivolving, at least give me some of the kaki-pi to keep my energy up."
Davis pulls out a large bag of homemade kaki-pi (small crescent-shaped fragments of senbei (soy-flavored rice crisps) with peanuts, coded with their own special spicy mustard) from his pocket and tosses it to his partner.
"May I have some?" asks Tai.
"Why?" ask Davis jokily, "You and Agumon never share."
"Sure;" replies Veemon allowing Tai to get a handful.
"Really you guys!" says Rico; "We don't have time for a snack."
Veemon offers some to Rico. "Digimon always have time for a snack. Here."
Rico refuses. "No thank you. Too spicy. Hey! Don't give any to that dog! It'll upset his stomach."
Tai smiles with his mouth full. "You really do care, don't you?"
"Shut up."
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Katherine moves along, the egg tucked underneath her left arm, Agumon leaning on her right side. She looks at the egg, which is cream colored with waves on it. It hasn't really hit her yet that inside is 'her' digimon. What will she be like? Will she be the cream-colored seahorse with blue eyes and the pestle pink dragon/angelic wings, with the Parasaurolophus crest and little pink heart on her right check? Well, she probably won't look like that at first, as Agumon informed her that the new digimon will be in her fresh baby form when she hatches, then in-training, then rookie, which would be her default form (usually).
As they try to climb a small hill, Agumon collapses and slides back down, bringing Katherine down with him. The digi-egg rolls down hill and gets close to the edge of a cliff. Agumon recovers enough to grab it, barely missing the edge of the cliff himself. Katherine drags them both back to safety and breathes a siege of relief.
"Thank you Agumon."
A sad look appears on the dino's face. "I sorry Kat, it's my fault. I'm running on empty. I'll try harder to keep up."
Katherine rubs his cheek and kisses him. "Don't feel bad."
"But I do;" replies Agumon; "It's all my fault that you're even in this mess."
"If I wasn't in this mess, would this egg be here now?"
Agumon has no idea, but maybe she did have a point. When the egg appeared; Agumon had been so mesmerized that he almost forgot about food. He'd never seen or heard of a digi-egg forming that way.
As Agumon struggles to sit up, Katherine tells him to rest again while she checks the road. They've yet to see any signs, so there must be one soon. Using her new digivice for light, Katherine goes a little way up the road, until she finally spots a sign. The town is 1 mile away. She rushes back towards Agumon's location. If they can only make it to the edge of town, maybe finding refugee and a phone before even hitting the town limits. She then hears something, sounding like a strange voice yelling for help.
She makes her way to the river and is surprised at her discovery. Tangled up in the vines is a strange, dark pink bug-like creature.
"Izzy, help!"
"Hang on!" Katherine gets to the riverbank. The bug's severely tangled and seems stuck in both the mud and between some rocks. Tentomon sees the unfamiliar girl and panics. "You're not Izzy!"
Katherine finds a sturdy stick and carefully walks through the sticky mud. "It's alright, I'm a friend of Agumon."
Tentomon's surprised. "How do you know Agumon?"
"I met him yesterday," she checks the vines, they're very tight. Also, Tentomon's foot is embedded between two rocks. "If you could loosen these vines just a little, I can use my Super Shocker to free myself."
Katherine and Tentomon sink deeper in the mud as she works on the vines with the stick and a rock. After a few attempts, the right one loosens enough and Tentomon does the rest. It's then his turn to pull the girl out of the mud.
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Agumon chews on sticks and grass attempting to appease his hunger to no avail. He's tries to distract himself from his hunger by looking at the egg, wondering about the digimon inside. Maybe it'll even hatch tonight, considering their situation. Digi-eggs could hatch anywhere from minutes after creation (or reincarnation) to several weeks. He crawls next to the egg and taps on it.
"Hello in there. I'm Agumon, Tai's partner. You know you're a partner, right? Kat's your partner. Are you a newly created digimon? What kind of digimon are you? What kind of foods will you like I'll introduce you to all the great foods and all my friends. This is the human world you're going to see. There's another world, the digi-world. I'll take you there someday, but we can't get there right now. I miss it sometimes, but I feel quite at home in this world, especially since I get to be with Tai all the time. Are you a girl? We need more girl digimon."
His stomach growls, more painful than ever. The next hunger pang is even louder, yet Agumon thinks he hears another growl in sync with his own.
"Man, sounds like my belly is double growling."
He hears the growl again, only this time realizing that it's not coming from him. He listens again, that growl, which sounds more like a grunt, seems to be coming from the bushes.
"Hello, is somebody there?"
Suddenly, a boar emerges and heads straight for the egg, attempting to bite into it. "Hey, that egg's not food!" Trying to conger his Pepper Breath, the weakened digimon only manages a few sparks, hitting the boar and making him angry. The boar charges towards Agumon and knocks him out of the way, then turns his attention back towards the egg, attempting to roll it away. Agumon recovers and charges at the boar, biting its leg. The wild boar charges again, sending the digimon rolling towards the river edge. Somehow, the egg also rolls down the hill. As the enraged boar makes one last charge, Agumon quickly grabs the egg before being knocked into the river.
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Tentomon and Katherine wash the mud off themselves in the river. Tentomon quickly explains that he landed in the muddy bank when he was shot down and got tangled in the vines. Izzy landed somewhere else. Katherine offers to help but informs the insect digimon that they must retrieve Agumon and the egg first. Tentomon quickly figured the girl out as a digi-destined by her digi-vice, although he's never seen that model before. He's even more blown-away when she said that the digi-egg formed from a light in her heart; nothing Tentomon's ever heard of. Izzy will surely be interested about this.
"Why is Augmon all the way out here, and not at the camp with Tai?" asks Tentomon.
"Long story;" replies Katherine.
They suddenly hear a cry for help, it's Agumon, floating down the river, clinging to the egg. Tentomon quickly flies out.
"Agumon, grab hold."
Agumon can't believe he's actually seeing his fellow digimon. He grabs Tentomon's hands and holds on tightly to the egg. They make it to safety, Katherine embraces the dino and the egg in relief.
"Agumon;" says Tentomon catching his breath; "You really need to cut back on the junk food."
Agumon hugs him. "I can't believe you're here. Where's Izzy?"
"He fell into the woods, back that way;" replies Tentomon; "He can't be far, but I don't hear him. He may be hurt. Wait, Katherine your digi-vice. If Izzy's nearby, your digi-vice will pick up on his, if it works the same way."
Katherine takes out her digi-vice and points it in the direction Tentomon pointing, there's nothing.
"Let's get closer;" suggest Agumon, but he doesn't get far before collapsing again, breathing heavily. "Tentomon, I need a left please pal."
Tentomon's eyes would be rolling if they could move. "Really Agumon, how did you manage to get so weak, and can't that stomach of yours rumble a little quieter?"
"Your one to talk;" replies Agumon.
"Don't remind me."
"Guys, shooooo;" says Katherine; "Listen." They hear voices and dash behind some bushes to peak. They can't believe what they're seeing, two young men in camp shirts, pulling large wagons full of small Audrey plants inside pots. Agumon recognizes them as the two guys who were with the plant lady.
"Is this the last of them, I hope;" says the taller and skinnier of the two.
"It is;" replies the other; "178 specimen and seedlings. You got the notes and keys?"
The taller one stops in his tracks; "Oh, I ah…."
"You didn't get the keys? Or the notes! You dimwit."
"But I thought she told you to retrieve them. Why would she need them anyway? She knows all those notes by heart. Besides, why does she insist on setting Generation 1 loose anyway? They're so humongous and deadly! Isn't it bad enough that Generation 2 is already on the loose. Why don't they just destroy them all?"
"Because;" answers the shorter one rather rudely; "They're her and her father's babies and she views it as murder. Now that her old man's out of the way, she wants to see what they can really do."
"Even her old man isn't that crazy! He'd never let those things loose."
"You know what will happen if we don't corporate! At least she isn't letting the "It" out."
"Are you sure…..OUCH!" One of the mini plants grabs his hand; "Hey, let go 88!"
"That's 84."
"How can you tell? Give me back my figures you little devil!" He hits 84 on the head and she lets go, his fingers bleeding. "OUCH! THIS HURTS! I've already lost both of my pinkies and the tops of two other fingers to these nasty things."
"Just set those fingers with your handkerchief and let's get going.
"How did ever get involved with this mess? We don't even get paid."
"We get rations and benefits, so stop complaining. Yoshi's waiting for us so hop to it. I'll finish loading these girls, you go back and get those things. And in case you forgot, the notes should still be in the filing cabinet inside the trailer, bottom file. We'll come back later and burn everything else."
The tall one gets frightened. "The trailer? But but, the python's inside the trailer."
"So. It's docile."
"Not recently! Sally's been injecting hormones and who knows what else into her. She's become very aggressive. And she hasn't eaten in weeks."
"So, you're a grown man. Stop being such a baby. NOW GO!"
They part ways, the tall one heads back the other way reluctantly. While Katherine's curious to follow find out more, she knows they must find Izzy first. Tentomon's reluctant to carry the weakened Agumon, mostly because he's running low on flumes himself, but agrees.
Several minutes pass when Katherine's digi-vice finally picks up a signal. It must be Izzy, and Tentomon picks up his pace considerably. They are heading the same direction that the young men had come from, and soon enter a clearing, with a run downed trailer and what looks like an equally run downed barn. According to the signal, Izzy's nearby.
Suddenly the door to the trailer flies open, the tall young man runs out in a panic, holding a set of keys. "I don't care about those notes. I'm not coming back!"
Coming out of the door appears to be about a 25ft, "hairy" Burmese python on steroids. It slithers into the overgrown. This isn't good. While wondering what to do next, the digi-vice signal beeps again. They cautiously move into the clearing and follow the signal, it's coming from behind the barn. Tentomon drops Agumon and flies towards a large hole. Inside the hole is none other than Izzy.
"IZZY!" Tentomon flies into his partner's arms.
"Tentomon, I knew you'd find me."
"I've brought help."
"Hey Izzy, how's it going?" asks Agumon looking into the hole.
"Agumon! Thank goodness. Tell Tai to get some rope."
"Kat's already on it."
"AGUMON!" yells Katherine; "LOOK OUT!"
The python's heading straight for him. Grabbing a bushy stick, Katherine tries to detour the snake away from the digimon. Agumon grabs the tail, but has no strength left to hold on and is easily flipped away. Before the girl can react, snake starts to strangle her. Tentomon attacks, but his Super Shocker is weak and only stings the snake.
Just then, the egg actually leaps from Katherine's arms and lands in front of the snake. It glows very, very brightly, not only blinding the python, but the warmth also causes the snake's body temperature to rise to an uncomfortable level. The snake let's Katherine go and retreats.
From inside the hole, Izzy hears the commotion and sees the sudden flash of light. "What's going on up there?"
"A python problem and a new digi-egg;" answers Tentomon flying down.
"Huh?" Izzy, who's usually quick on the uptake, doesn't know what to make of that answer. Tentomon quickly explains in more detail, which has Izzy both curious and baffled.
"A new digi-destined named Katherine, her own digi-egg created from herself, and an over-muscled python you say? The snake kind, am I right?"
"Right;" answers Tentomon, "not the language programming."
A rope is thrown down. Izzy checks it for security, then climbs up. "So, Agumon's separated from Tai because he got captured with this girl, who's now a digi-destined with a new type of digi-vice and digi-egg forming from herself? That's interesting. I've got a ton of questions to ask her."
"Maybe we should concrete on getting out of here first;" says Tentomon.
Izzy reaches the top; "And we must find my laptop. I'm lost without it."
"I told you to put it away while we were being attacked."
Izzy climbs out of the hole. He sees the girl in question standing next to a passed out Agumon, clinching the egg and holding a large stick, completely on guard. The python went to the river to cool off, but it's only a matter of time before she comes back.
"Hello there;" greets Izzy, causing her to jump; "You must be Katherine. I'm Izzy Izumi. Welcome to the digi-destined. Is that the egg Tentomon told me about?"
Katherine just stands there frozen, staring at Izzy, reverting to her usual shy state and immediately starts fidgeting.
"May I see your egg and digi-vice? I've heard of digi-vices forming from digital data light, but I've never heard of a digi-egg just forming from light, much less a light shining from a person. That's very prodigious."
Katherine stands there in stunned silence until Agumon's stomach growls again. "Please, help Agumon."
"Oh, yes of course;" Izzy picks him up. "Geez, what happened to Agumon? He's awfully banged up, and his stomach sounds like he hasn't eaten in like a few hours, maybe longer."
"He needs food and medical care;" says Katherine; "and we need to get out of here. That python's hungry and bound to return soon."
"What about you?" asks Tentomon; "You're pretty banged up yourself, and I can tell you're exhausted."
"What about that trailer over there?" ask Izzy, "I was headed towards it when I fell into that trap. Should've seen that one coming."
Katherine remembers about the notes that may be important, but the python also came out of the trailer. Tentomon's thinking the same thing. "I hope there aren't any more terrifying creatures in there."
"Then I guess you'll have to make sure it's safe to go inside;" suggest Izzy.
"Me?" replies Tentomon; "That's more of Agumon's thing." Agumon, however, is still passed out. Katherine starts to volunteer, but Tentomon won't allow that. "Never mind, I'll go."
Izzy snickers under his breath. The group carefully but quickly walk the path to the trailer. The door's wide open, Tentomon shakes a little but forces his way inside. While he's in there, Agumon comes too and begs Izzy for food, who gets a sheepish look on his face. "I've got some Oolong tea."
Katherine makes a yuck face and Agumon nearly faints. "Of course you do."
"Funny how he often forgets to bring snacks;" say Tentomon returning, "yet he never forgets Oolong tea nor his laptop, which he's never once lost until today."
"Izzy lost his laptop?" asks a surprised Agumon; "That's new."
Izzy just rolls his eyes. "Well, Tentomon?"
"Well, there's no, at least I don't think anything's alive, but a, it's still awfully creepy in there. You sure you guys want to go in?"
"Is there food?" asks Agumon, hopefully.
Katherine nods. "I believe there's notes on the plants in there."
"That's perfect!" exclaims Izzy; "We can finally get some decent information on them. I can't believe I haven't found anything about those plants on the computer other than some brief news articles. They weren't much help. I still can't believe these aren't digimon we're fighting. Dr. Yutaka Yoshida is a paleobotanist who used to be a respected scientist for Tokyo University, and his daughter was following in his footsteps, but both of them were expelled from the university for 'lethal experiments' and 'physiologic issues'.
"Like creating giant plants that eat humans, and perhaps digimon too?" adds Tentomon.
Katherine feels that's only the beginning.
Entering the trailer is literally like entering the horror movie genre garbage dump. There are creepy items everywhere, mostly dolls and cheap memorabilia, including Pennywise and other demon-looking clowns, Halloween, Child's Play, Friday the Thirteenth, Walking Dead, Japanese horror, even several things of Audrey II from "Little Shop of Horrors". In addition, the place looks like a dumpster exploded. Izzy is nearly as freaked out as he was when he first woke-up in the digital world and meet Motymon (Tentomon).
"Who are these people?"
Katherine starts coughing really badly tries really hard not to breathe in too much of this contaminated air while also trying to pretend it's a bunch of cute stuffed animals looking at her. She and Izzy check all windows and doors and to make sure the python can't reenter.
Agumon pushes past the smell to look for food. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be much in the way of leftovers. He eats whatever crumbs he can find.
"Who is Steven King?" ask Tentomon looking at row of books on a shelf.
"Nobody you'd want to read;" answers Izzy.
"I don't like horror stories;" adds Katherine. "Little Shops of Horrors is scary but it's not really a horror story. I think they said the notes are in the bottom draw of the filing cabinet."
"Which one?" ask Izzy. There's about a dozen filing cabinets, at least that they can see. They will have to search them all.
Tentomon notices that Agumon's about to open the refrigerator.
"Ah, I wouldn't open that if I were you, there's no food in there."
Agumon ignores him and opens the fridge. There's an awful, horrible smell and he's starting to feel nauseous. Before he can slam the door, Agumon nearly passes out (again) from the smell. Katherine and Izzy quickly slam the door shut while Tentomon holds his breath, both getting a glimpse of the fridge's content before closing it. What it looked like was a decomposing body of a giant tarantula, about the size of a medium dog.
"Let's find those notes and get out of here;" says Katherine.
"Find a box and we'll dump all the contents in it;" adds Izzy, but then he rules out the first set of files as they are just horror comics. The second cabinet looks like past due bills and other mail, which he by passes as well. When Katherine opens her first draw, a Chucky doll jumps out with a knife threating her, causing her to scream and to almost have a heart attack. Fortunately, it's a fake. She speeds up her search.
Despite the smell, Agumon's far too famished to not check the freezer, but its only contents are mold and jars of what looks like frozen animal(?) parts. They check the covers, which contain nothing but empty boxes and roaches, that Tentomon attacks. They keep looking, removing a dirty sheet from what look like a big, filthy, glass cage. "Ah, guys, come look at this;" calls Tentomon. Old, giant, shredded snake skins confirmed this was the python's home, but it's the label on the cage that's the most interesting thing.
"Fluffy?" asks Tentomon.
"What's a Fluffy?" asks Agumon; "I hope it's tasty."
"I think that may be the snake's name;" says Izzy.
"Fluffy?" repeats a bewilder Tentomon. "Why would anybody name a snake Fluffy?"
"Your guess is as good as mine;" replies Izzy.
"Guys, look!" calls Katherine pointing at the window. The python is looking in on them, only to turn its head and charges the opposite direction. They hear yelling and dash for the windows. Outside are the same two young men from before, the shorter one holding what appears to be tranquilizer gun. Izzy and Katherine slightly crack open the windows to hear as the python charges for the taller, more nervous man.
"Why do I always have the dangerous work?" he shouts.
"Because I'm your superior that's way;" says his un-sympathetic brother.
"Hey, I'm older and I've been here as long as...YIKES!" Shaking nervously, he wiggles a dead, still frozen goat towards the snake. "Now Fluffy, be a good girl, look what I've got for you." He throws the goat at Fluffy; "Shot her already!"
"Ok hold your horses;" the shorter guy seems to be taking his time. "Too bad those plants don't eat cold-blooded animals. I still don't understand why they bred them like that."
"HURRY!"
Fluffy has no interest in the dead, frozen goat and now charges for the shorter guy. "HEY! Not me stupid, the goat!" He shots, but misses, drops the gun, and runs behind his brother.
"What are you doing?"
Shorter Guy pushes his brother towards the snake.
"OH DEAR!" gasps Katherine.
"I've got to save him." Tentomon tries, but he can't digivolve and collapses.
"Your energy's too low!" says Izzy, feeling guilty; "I shouldn't have rushed you out like that without supper."
While all this is going on, Agumon had sniffed out and found a jar of peanut butter, unopened and still fresh! He's about to devour it when he hears Izzy. Against his stomach's protests, he tosses it.
"Tentomon, here."
The other digmon's surprised. "Agumon, are you sure."
"I'm sure, go rescue that guy."