Digimon Adventure Tri: Echo

54) Suspended in Time

When Meiko arrived back at the Mochizuki apartment, she let out a sigh as she pushed the door open. Sora, Mimi, and Miyako were still standing behind her, and while none of them had said much of anything, too exhausted to bother with speaking in the aftermath of the last battle, Meiko was glad that they were there. She didn't think that she wanted to be left alone after everything that had happened that day involving Omegamon not being able to appear. Meiko had only ever heard of Omegamon in stories from the other Chosen Children, but it was still concerning that he could not manifest despite all of the times that he had been able to do that and more in the past. 

Meiko shuffled into her bedroom, glad that neither of her parents were home. She sat down on her bed, and Mimi and Sora settled down on either side of her. Miyako, meanwhile, elected to sit in the desk chair, and the group's members looked to one another awkwardly. Their partners were all silent and agitated, not sure of what could be said to make this situation better. Meiko didn't think that anything would be able to fix this, as much as she hated to admit it. 

"What are we going to do?" Meiko whispered under her breath. "I don't know how we're supposed to defeat Piemon if he was able to do that much damage to us in such a short period of time. Plus... Taichi and Yamato..."

"They're going to work out their issues soon enough. I'll make sure of it myself if I have to," Sora assured her. Pyocomon nodded as well from her place in Sora's arms, but she said nothing. "I don't know what could have happened between them for this to be an issue all of a sudden, but that doesn't mean that we're going to stop fighting. We're going to keep going, and we'll find a way to defeat Piemon too."

"He's stronger than he was the last time that we fought against him," Mimi said hesitantly. "I know that we're going to find a way to succeed against him the same way that we did last time, but... He's so much more powerful than I remember him being. That isn't just me, right?"

"No, it isn't just you," Sora murmured. "He is stronger than he was the last time that we fought against him, but we're going to have to keep pushing back against him. He can't be allowed to run rampant through the Digital World and hurt the people within it. I'm not going to let any of that happen. None of us are."

"I just wish that I knew what to do about it," Miyako sighed. "Those fiery creatures are a bit more challenging than Deep Ones because those things can pop up out of the ground and could do significant damage if they just touch us. That means that we're going to have to divide our forces to fight against them no matter what."

"And Piemon was able to fend off four of our Digimon so easily... Even if HolyAngemon is only at the Perfect level, it's impressive that he was able to fight through all of them without even batting an eye," Meiko said under her breath. "I didn't realize that it was possible for a Digimon to get any stronger than what we saw from Daemon and Dagomon, but I guess that I don't have anywhere near as much experience as the rest of you do when it comes to handling these sorts of things."

"I didn't think that we could anticipate going up against someone that strong either, but we're going to find a way through it," Mimi declared, determination in her voice. "Even if Piemon's stronger than he was before, we are too. We've gotten five more members added to the group, and I think that has to count for something. As soon as we're able to pull apart his defenses, we're going to defeat him. It's just a matter of time before he loses the power to fight back against us, and when he does start to fall apart, we'll come in and show him everything that we've figured out how to do over these last few years."

"I'm glad that you're so confident in this," Meiko confessed with a light laugh. "If I'm being honest, I'm still a bit nervous... I think that I would feel better if we had a bit more firepower on our sides in terms of Digimon fighting strength, but it isn't as if we can just force everyone to evolve beyond what they've already accomplished."