A Lost Factor

Chapter 12-An Unwindy Night

Jasmine continued to wander around the old neighborhood for a while, until she noticed that it was going to get dark in about an hour or so. She quickly went to the bus stop, and waited a while for it to finally arrive. It was dark by the time she got off, near the dark area on the way to the tower.

Using the little light available (most lampposts were burned out, missing or destroyed), she tried to find her way past the dark area, back to the tower. The path she had found earlier was nowhere in sight, and the few remaining landmarks that might have been in the bus book were useless in finding her way through.

After about an hour of wandering, she soon saw some light. Hopeful, she walked towards it, cautious in case it might be a trap. It turned out to one of many lampposts inside the perimeter of a large, fenced off area, surrounding a tall black tower. The area between the tower and the side of the fence Jasmine was near was about a block wide, with the same rumble and old tree terrain on her side of the fence. Staying away from the fence, typically with a tree in between her and the fence, Jasmine followed it, glad to be able to see, and know more about the general area.

Near a corner of the fence, Jasmine stopped, and tried to figure out her general location. There were still no useful landmarks, and no way to really try to figure out the location. The moon was of no help-there was no moon tonight. She did notice a small breeze, but doubted it was coming from the ocean. She couldn't really remember if the wind should be going to or from the ocean; that was one part of her science class she could never keep straight. Ignoring the increasing wind the best she could in a dress, she started walking straight away from the corner.

The wind, now directly opposite her direction, hit her straight on in an alarming force. Nervous, Jasmine ran for cover under a nearby tree. Sitting in the v-shaped nook near the base of the tree, she tied the scarf she still had in her hair in front of her face to block any debris that might be flying in the air.

A sudden strong change of direction caused the wind to ram Jasmine in the back, pushing her to the ground. The wind changed direction again, and out of nowhere, sent Jasmine flying into the fence. She found herself unable to move against the wind. Trying to see through the scarf, for a moment she thought she saw a lack of movement around her. If the wind was strong enough to hold her in place against the fence, why wasn't it moving the leaves of the tree?

"If you think such things, you should learn to think of reasons much quicker than you realize the problem." a voice said. Squinting through the scarf, and mentally yelling at herself for blinding herself in a dangerous place like this, she noticed someone in front of her, in dark clothing.

"This is annoying, and rather demeaning. Gather yourself together," the person said, as Jasmine found herself floating in the air, with no wind around her. Able to move, she quickly pushed the scarf back on top of her head, and looked down at the person. She almost couldn't recognize the girl in a midnight blue shirt, with excessively long sleeves, going over her hands, and the end of the shirt being a couple inches above her knees. Under that she wore pale violet leggings, and short black boots. Her short, dark brown hair was in two pigtails tucked under her ears, and her eyes had an unnatural paleness, covering the natural pretty blue that Jasmine's dresses typically were.

"Sit," the girl said, and Jasmine fell from the air. If not for a puff of air above the ground, she would have landed hard after a 7 foot drop. As the puff of air under her disappeared, Jasmine stood up, facing the girl. The moment she was able to see past the paleness in her eyes, which occasionally flickered, she could see that the girl was really almost like a distorted, bad version of herself. In reality, she knew the girl was really just Jenni. Her parallel self.

"What'd they do to you?" Jasmine asked, stepping towards Jenni, forgetting the fact that Realemon's illusions not only change reality, but could change the mental reality of the illusioned people also. She just focused on the fact that her best friend was right in front of her again after so long.

"They?" Jenni asked, annoyed. "There's no 'they', not in the sense that you are thinking. Brandy, Wazumi, they're useless in this aspect, they can't do anything in helping to change things to the way they should be. Realemon can though, and she's helping us, helping the world. Why are you so resistance? Clinging to a imagined truth that the digidestined are good and since we fought her, she's bad? The truth that Lunamon claimed that Realemon was bad, illusions were bad, and if Hidimon saw the truth, we had to believe it? What if Hidimon had known the truth, and then we made her change her mind? What if we were all just resisting the truth, and only she knew it?"

Jasmine was speechless. Jenni had predicted almost everything she was about to say. She refused to believe what Jenni said, almost didn't want to believe those words had come out of her mouth. Something had to be possessing her, something able to make her able to do magical things.

"Magical?" Jenni said, forcing Jasmine back up against the fence without touching her. "It's not magic, it's not real. It's all part of your imagination, what you think is real. Think about that, and why this is a perfect fit."

"You're not you..." Jasmine whispered, trying to ignore Jenni. She couldn't be imagining all this, why would she imagine horrible things happening to her best friend?

"Best friends don't abandon each other," Jenni interrupted her thoughts.

"Anyone there knows I didn't leave of my own free will, and I tried to come back sooner," Jasmine replied, looking at Jenni. "What happened to you, why are you acting like this? The real Jenni I know, even if she had to fight her friends, she wouldn't be mean, or yell at them, or not even let them say things before they even know what they're...saying..." Jasmine stopped. How was Jenni predicting everything she said, everything she thought, or thought to think?

<If you’re really as smart as everyone thinks you are, you’d have figured it out by now.> Jenni’s voice appeared in her head. Watching Jenni’s face, she saw that she hadn’t said that. It was all in her mind, as if psychic.

<I know you tend to be useless> Jenni continued. <I know you tend to just be there, watching our adventures, wanting to be part of our fun, part of our dimensional journeys that seem so wonderful. Yet you aren’t able to help when it gets troublesome with fighting. You have no digimon, you have no protection. Even Hidimon was more useful than you. Which is why, with her being missing, she doesn’t need to be here, since this current outfit assists in replicating her abilities. Another project is copying Canamon’s ability to teleport. But what could we copy off you? Nothing but a dimensional obsession.>

“Wrong,” Jasmine said, trying to move. “Do you guys have the same sense of friendship we had, two years ago? You did in the past. We all were friends, yet I don’t think you have that now. Why would you try to replace your own digimon, your true friends? What if one day, Realemon found a way to replace you?”

Jenni released Jasmine from the fence, as she walked up to her. “Then I’d have to stop her, show how useful I really am. They say I’m helpful in practicing things. I find it true. They won’t find another…” Jenni stopped. She stepped away from Jasmine. “I see what you’re trying to do, you want to divide our group. It won’t work, we’re too strong…” Jasmine noticed the paleness of Jenni’s eyes growing dimmer and dimmer. She desperately hoped this was the key to saving her, breaking free of the illusion.

“GO AWAY!” Jenni screamed at her, and pushed at Jasmine. A force of air pushed Jasmine away from Jenni, as she turned and ran through the fence. Jasmine watched, as the air kept pushing her, further and further away from the fence, and soon, she found herself on the beach. The air only stopped when Jasmine fell into the ocean. Looking up at the sky as she got out of the water and headed to the bridge to Kertermus Island, she saw the wind blow.