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A Fun Night Out On The Town [V-Day 2020 - Sophie]
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Post by Kenny O'Hara and Skadi on Feb 1, 2020 10:11:16 GMT
To be honest, Kenny wasn't exactly a huge fan of Valentine's Day himself. The last time he found himself with a possible girlfriend to call his own, it ended with him being humiliated on stage in front of the entire school, all because the girl in question took advantage of his own trust and gullibility. Since then, he was reluctant to participate in anything relatively romantic, lest he put his own dignity on the line once more.
At least, until tonight.
With Valentine's Day just around the corner, and with a little bit of persuasion from both Skadi and his own dad to jump onto Tamernet for a random possible date with a fellow tamer or spirit user, only for Sophie James, sister of the same Colin James, who he and his own Digimon saved his life after the Arkadimon attack when he and Skadi were still newbie Tamers, happened to respond, he was determined not to let any of them down.
And so, on this very night, Kenny had now found himself standing in the heart of the Shibuya Entertainment District in the afternoon, near an arcade, holding a bouquet of flowers in his hand, and taking a few good deep breaths to stay calm, all by himself as he waited for Sophie to come here. It was clear that this young man was nervous for the night out ahead, and he was gonna have to go solo.
Well, not exactly; Skadi was safely snug inside the D-Nexus, acting as a sort of 'guide' to Kenny. Hearing her tamer trying to stay calm, she quietly whispered into the communication device, "Don't worry, Kenny. You'll be fine! I heard Sophie's a good person. I'm sure you guys will get along well."
"Easy for you to say." Kenny muttered a little, "What if I screw up and Sophie ends up hating me, man? I don't wanna let down the leader of AEGIS, of all things. What if I end up saying or doing something extremely dumb-"
"You won't!" Skadi quickly butted in, "Everyone knows you're clever, Kenny. Remember, Ryouta and Valt didn't just let us, and especially you, into KIZNA for no reason whatsoever. Just remember what Ryouta told you: panicking won't solve anything. Just relax, and breath in and out. If you need any reassurance, you know who to call."
Despite his nerves already starting to eat him alive, he breathed in for a moment and breathed out, before a small smile came back to his face, already starting to feel a little calmer, "Thank you, Skadi. I know." It was good to know that he himself had a few friends in high places. He started to write a Tamernet DM into his D-Nexus, before sending it off to his date:
DrMothman: Hi Sophie. I'm here at the arcade. Where are you?
Current/Total WC: 469
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Post by Sophie & Lantis on Feb 2, 2020 11:52:07 GMT
When Colin had told Sophie that he had recently made a friend with a tamer about her age that she might like to meet up with, she could hardly believe it at first. But as he insisted he was telling the truth, she became somewhat intrigued. But... would it be appropriate though for the leader of AEGIS to go out dating?
"Eh, go for it, Sophie." her Leomon partner Lantis encouraged her. "It's just for a day after all. And besides, you need a life outside of work. It's bad for your health if you focus everything on AEGIS."
What her partner said was logical. And even though he never raised it much, he knew that she was a little lonely sometimes and would like to make friends with chosen outside of work.
"But... what if there's digimon activity and I'm not there?" Sophie asked. She hardly wanted to be caught out in an event as big as Golden Week last year, not only unprepared but without her digimon, as Lantis planned some time with his own romantic partner for the night.
"Colin's got the fort held down." Lantis assured her. "And Enkidu can be at your side, right?" he turned to their BlackGaomon companion. "You don't mind it in the digivice do you, Enky?"
"Eh... it's decent enough." Enkidu admitted. While Sophie never knew what a digimon experienced inside the V-Pet system, Lantis assured her that it was pretty much a simulated world with all the comforts a digimon needed until they were prepared to "realize" from it. It only took her a few moments to agree to this setup. Enkidu could evolve to Ultimate after all, and Ultimate was the maximum level reachable in the human world.
"Alright, so, the plan is for me to hang out with this... 'Kenny' guy?" Sophie summarized. From what Colin had said of him, he was genuinely nice. A little bit inexperienced, but eh, by now, Sophie wasn't expecting Prince Casanova to sweep her off her feet. If he was pleasant company, that was fine by her. "Alright then. I'll never know what he's like until I meet him, so, let's do this."
Sophie spent much of the morning preparing herself. She surprised her own mother Wendy by asking her to help with makeup, then sighed as the story of the valentine's date was drawn out.
"Please don't tell dad?" Sophie begged of her. She only wanted to deal with one parent about this.
"Don't worry, I know what he's like, so I'll leave you to tell him yourself if you think this one's the one." Wendy said, smiling as she bonded with her daughter. She applied enough makeup to bring out Sophie's beauty and features delightfully, finishing off with some coral-colored lipstick. "You look beautiful, Sophie." she said as she finished. Sophie looked in the mirror and was surprised at how much it seemed to transform her. She hugged her mother.
"Thanks so much, mom." she said. "And I'll be home by midnight..."
"Sophie, you're nearly 21 now, you're legally an adult here anyway." Wendy replied. "Just a phone call or a text is all I'm asking."
After she put on a nice casual outfit that would keep her warm in the chilly February air (consisting of grey trousers, a dark green coat, comfortable boots and a light blue scarf), it was the reaction from Enkidu as he saw her from the window of her digivice that settled the matter.
"What's your opinion, Enkidu?" she asked her digimon 'partner' for the night.
"Good thing Bellamy's not here, you look almost enough to turn him straight." Enkidu replied. Sophie laughed, already she was brimming with confidence about this.
"I doubt I'm that good." she said. Well then. Time to meet Kenny.
After a light lunch, Sophie made her way to the Entertainment District. She kept an eye out for the young man as Colin described him. He had light brown hair, glasses, blue eyes and a caucasian appearance, apparently. Before she started to look, she felt her D-Terminal vibrate with a message notification. She took it out and read it, then replied.
SophieAEGIS: "Hi, Kenny. I'm just arriving in the district. I'm wearing a green coat and a blue scarf. See you there."
With that, Sophie made her way to the arcade, and sure enough, she saw a young man matching the description she was told, looking though he was waiting for someone and... oh gosh, he had brought flowers! 'That was sweet of him.' she thought, then approached. She realized that he matched her height exactly, both 1.7m.
"Hiya..." she said, walking up to him. "Is your name Kenny?" she asked, hoping she'd got the right guy here.
(WC: 788)
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Post by Kenny O'Hara and Skadi on Feb 3, 2020 8:02:54 GMT
Now it was pretty clear to the average bystander that Kenny was trying his hardest to put his best foot forward for Sophie, especially since she was Colin's sister. A fair bit of time had passed since the Arkadimon battle and the subsequent consequences that followed that same night. To make a long story short, Kenny and Skadi managing to join KIZNA and helping them to save the Entertainment District during Golden Week last year wasn't just a couple of glorified flukes. What would Colin, Luke and Bellamy think of them now?
As he glanced around to try and find Sophie somewhere a little after sending his message, lightly tapping his foot to redirect his nerves, he could feel a light buzz coming from his D-Nexus, to which he instinctively opened it to see Sophie's reply; so she was 'just arriving in the district', as she put it? He took another deep breath to calm his nerves. It was clear that he would do pretty much damn near everything to ensure this date was gonna go as swimmingly as possible.
And all the while his mind constantly shifted between repeating the words 'stay calm' over and over again, and praying to God, Buddha and Arceus he would not just up and fuck everything up in the span of a few seconds.
Even through the hustling and bustling crowd of Shibuya swarming the place like a giant school of sardines, Sophie, clad in her aforementioned green coat and blue scarf, pretty much stuck out like a sore thumb. Despite his underlying nerves, he still kept a brave face as he saw Sophie approaching him, his fingers lightly drumming on the bouquet. God, why did he decide to leave his fidget cube at home for this. He didn't want to come off as rude, but of all the times he decided to leave it at home, why now?
Even then, as the equally tall Sophie addressed him, he gave her a kindly smile, "Um... yes it is. You got the right guy right here." He said as he gently handed her the bouquet, "The name's Kenny O'Hara. Tamer, budding software developer, member of KIZNA, local dork... guy who helped save the Entertainment District last year with the help of KIZNA, nothing much."
He took a moment to breathe as he rubbed his arm to calm his nerves, "Sorry if this isn't exactly the most... romantic place out there, I've never honestly been good with romance myself. I just picked something that we'd both probably find enjoyable ourselves."
...oh God, that was a little too awkward, wasn't it!?
He was never one for standard romantic staples, including candlelike dinners or fancy picnics. But sadly, he wasn't psychic. He at least took pleasure that Sophie wasn't mocking him to hell and back for choosing this place. As they walked in, into the loud, colourful sounds and lights of the arcade, they were greeted with plenty of options, from crane games, to modern arcade games, ranging from dancing, to driving, and everything in between, a fair few even supporting multiplayer play as well.
He took in another breath as he glanced back to Sophie, "So, which game do you wanna play first? Ladies first, after all." He winked.
Was he trying too hard to be a gentleman? Yeah, probably. Hopefully Sophie would cut him some slack on that front.
Current WC: 564 Total WC: 1,033
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Post by Sophie & Lantis on Feb 9, 2020 9:35:34 GMT
Sophie was glad that she got the right guy on the first attempt. For a moment she was speechless as he gave her the bouquet of flowers, then he introduced himself with all the formalities. He seemed to be so determined to make a good impression that Sophie simply couldn't bring herself to bring up one of the most obvious questions, namely where she was expected to store the bouquet of flowers for the rest of the evening. Eh, she decided to be pragmatic about it for now and take the gesture in the best way.
"Well then, nice to meet you, Kenny, and thank you so much for the flowers." Sophie replied, smiling. "I'm Sophie James. I gather that my little brother Colin gave you the overall picture of me, the same as he told me about you. Still though, I think I'd like to get to know you personally than from hearsay."
For one thing, she was glad that Kenny was speaking in English. Even though Sophie was reasonably able to speak Japanese, there was still so much complexities to the language that she was not yet familiar with. So she communicated to Kenny in the American English she had been raised to speak with. She also recognized his accent as Australian. Somehow that endeared him to her a little more. Probably because she had met a few digimon in the digital world that talked like that - namely Owen the Gaomon and his son Bezil, and they were just delightful little digimon to get to know.
She noted that he mentioned he was a part of KIZNA. That was fine with her. "That's excellent. I like to think of AEGIS and KIZNA as allies in these troubling times. Shame we can't merge formally since KIZNA deals with digital world stuff while AEGIS keeps to Earth, still, it's nice to have friendly team alliances."
Sophie also noted that Kenny mentioned he was a part of the Golden Week event she had heard so much about. Well, that was nice, but, she'd much rather keep business aside for now.
Kenny seemed apologetic that they weren't exactly at the most romantic place here. Sophie smiled and waved her hand to indicate it was no problem. "It's fine. In fact I'm glad you chose this place. I'm in the mood to just... let loose, you know? Just have fun for an afternoon. And... oh my god, I've just realized I've been living in Japan for nearly six years and I haven't been to an arcade yet. So... hell yes, let's do this!" she cheered with enthusiasm.
Sophie accompanied him into the arcade, and he politely invited her to pick the first game. "Let's do this one!" she exclaimed, pointing toward a two-player fighting game nearby. "I love this game. My little brother used to be all smug about beating me all the time, but I learned how to get better all the time, now I've beaten him more often than not!"
"Hey, can I watch too?" Enkidu asked from Sophie's V-pet digivice.
"Ah, sure." Sophie said, drawing her digivice from her pocket so Enkidu could watch. She then decided it would be nice to introduce them. "By the way, Kenny, this is Enkidu. He's not my main partner, but he's close enough to be the next best thing. He's a good and trusted friend."
"Uhh, hiya..." Enkidu said, awkwardly. Still though, he looked forward to observing this video game that humans seemed to enjoy so much. Following that, Sophie positioned her digivice so that Enkidu could have a good view of the game they were playing.
(Post WC: 606) (Total WC: 1394)
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Post by Kenny O'Hara and Skadi on Feb 10, 2020 11:10:16 GMT
Admittedly, Kenny was starting to think that maybe asking his own dad for good dating advice wasn't exactly the best idea in the world. While Kenny wanted to get something nice for Sophie, the bouquet was his dad's idea. After all, he did it on his own first date with his own dear wife Eleanor, and it worked well with her. And besides, it was a thematically appropriate gift for a young woman like Sophie. Women liked flowers, and they loved a nice, polite gentleman.
Or at least, that's what he told his own son.
Thankfully, things had clearly gone off on the right foot, if Sophie's reaction was anything to go by. Kenny's own smile was a mixture of both gratefulness and relief. He found himself willingly nodding in agreement to the AEGIS leader's statement about them and KIZNA as allies being a good thing. It was a good idea they had their bases covered after all. If his partnership with Skadi taught him anything, it was that one could easily cover up the other's glaring weaknesses.
Wait, so Sophie, in her 6 years of living in Japan, never went to a single arcade? That made Kenny's eyes widen a little in surprise, which curled into another smile and chuckle. Who could blame her for being excited, especially after possibly a long, stressful job? "Yeah! Let's go, Sophie!" He replied. It looked like it was gonna be not only a fun, but a wholly rewarding night for the both of them, in more ways than one.
It was just a few moments later that Kenny's initially good idea of letting Sophie pick the first game was just setting himself up for possible humiliation. And he knew he couldn't take those words back.now. You see, Sophie picked a fighting game, of all things. And, outside of Smash Bros. (and to be fair, he mained a pretty mean Greninja), he was shit at fighting games, mainly just mashing buttons and praying to God, Buddha and Arceus that they would let him win.
Still, he swallowed his pride, and played along, following Sophie to the machine and taking a seat himself, "Yeah, that game looks fun. To be honest with you, I've never really played it before." He awkwardly admitted, rubbing the back of his head with a meek chuckle, "Sooooooo, I'm fully expecting you to just up and kick my ass. Badly. Like, really badly here." He relaxed himself into his seat and pulled out his IC card, ready to tap in and take on Sophie.
Internally, he was screaming louder than a banshee that just stubbed it's toe against the bed.
But just before he could tap in, a loud voice could be heard coming from Sophie, and quickly he turned his head towards the source. Turned out, it was just one of Sophie's friends, Enkidu - who just so happened to be a Digimon himself - inside her own Digivice. Was he nervous himself? At least he wasn't up and potentially tripping over his own 2 feet in the open. He was nice and snug inside Sophie's Digivice.
"Oh, hey Enkidu. Nice to meet you." He said to him with a smile, before turning to Sophie, "Hey, uh, speaking of which, where's your partner, anyways, Sophie? Mine's right here." Kenny pulled out his own, soon-to-be-retired D-Nexus. He didn't even have the chance to put it onto the table before Skadi's voice was already crying out from within it.
"Hi, Sophie! Hi, Enkidu!" Skadi's optimistic, happy-go-lucky cries could be heard from within. Even from within the D-Nexus, Skadi couldn't stay quiet around new and existing friends. Kenny sighed happily and chuckled a little; she was always a sweet girl, no matter what.
"That's Skadi. My own partner. She's a Valaismon, and Valt's apprentice, to boot. He's the reason we actually got to join KIZNA in the first place nearly a year ago. It's a funny story, honestly. I'll tell you about it later, maybe during dinner, perhaps?" He added as he tapped in his card onto the machine, readying himself to let Sophie kick his sorry ass from here to Antartica play against Sophie.
WC: 693 Total WC: 1726
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Post by Sophie & Lantis on Feb 15, 2020 11:05:07 GMT
Sophie's bragging about being good at fighting games was hollow to say the least. Namely, she was good at games she practised, but, she saw no games she had played before at the arcade. And she realized this when she saw none of her familiar machines nearby, not even the one she had managed to get a top 10 high score in a few years ago when she was with some high school friends. So, in reality, she was on the same level as Kenny here.
"Alright, let's see how we go then!" Sophie said, as Kenny accepted her challenge. As expected, they were about evenly matched. Sophie might have her bragging rights, but she was by no means a pro of the arcade. And any relatively skilled opponent would have drawn the same amount of matches as her. Still, she was having fun. And more importantly, she was becoming fond of Kenny.
Namely in that he wasn't overbearing or smug, which was the kind of man that Sophie disliked the most, but, he just was pleasant to be around. He seemed to be aware of her feelings, and most importantly to her, he showed empathy in how she was feeling during their time together. For that, Sophie lowered her initial guard a little.
"Hm? My partner?" Sophie asked when Kenny raised the point. "Ah, that's Lantis. He's a Leomon, but he's got a valentine's date of his own. So we've made an arrangement where my mercenary Enkidu will be taking care of digimon security for now. He's quite good, so I don't think a problem will arise."
Sophie and Enkidu smiled as Kenny showed his own partner. "Heya, Skadi. Nice to meet you too." Enkidu spoke to the sheep digimon. Sophie waved a 'hello' to her as well.
"Ooh, there's a story about you joining KIZNA? I'd love to hear that..." Sophie said as she prepared to play. "Tell you what. Whoever gets the lowest score between us has to talk about them joining KIZNA or AEGIS first. That sound fine to you?" she asked with a grin. "Of course, the winner would tell their story afterward." Then with the challenge made, she'd play her best against Kenny. She noted he was older than Colin, so was reasonably expecting a strong challenge from him, especially if he had experience with these games before.
(Post WC: 394) (Total WC: 1788)
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Post by Kenny O'Hara and Skadi on Feb 17, 2020 9:09:41 GMT
Admittedly, Kenny wasn't exactly the most appealing bachelor out there, considering that his social skills were still a little rough around the edges, to be real honest, plus he didn't consider himself much of a looker himself (unless that special someone had a thing for geeks like him). Not to mention, even before he stepped foot out the door, and even now, his mind was locked in conflict between admitting to Sophie that he was autistic, and staying quiet about it, lest he risk the possible mockery he might get from it.
It wasn't fun. And the fact this had happened quite a few times to him made him all the more worried if a mere mention would derail all the goodwill he built up so far.
Thankfully for him at least, he had plenty of other things to focus on as of right now. And that didn't just include the fighting game. As he was selecting his character (mainly on the basis on who looked the coolest and the most fun to play to him, at least), he listened to Sophie explain about her partner briefly, and just why Endiku was accompanying her that night.
Of particular note for Kenny was that Sophie mentioned that her partner, Lantis, was a Leomon, a powerful muscular lion Digimon that could pack quite the punch. More importantly, he was a Champion level. The mere mention of Lantis' species made his eyes widen a little bit in surprise. Leomon was certainly an impressive Digimon, for one. And the fact Sophie had partnered with one was quite the feat in it of itself.
Before Kenny could even get the chance to utter literally anything, Skadi had suddenly spoke up from the D-Nexus, "Hey, Soph, Endiku, who's the lucky Digimon dating Lantis tonight?"
...yeah, not exactly the best question to ask right now. He leaned over the table and pulled away the D-Nexus a little bit away from Sophie and her Digivice, a blush starting to show up on his face, "Uh, sorry about that, Sophie." He muttered a little, just enough so she could still hear him over the noise, "Skadi can be a little bit... nosy at times. Often at the worst possible times, too."
Even under his arms, Skadi could still be heard giggling at her tamer's embarrassment. That wasn't helping.
As he rearranged himself, and straightened himself back up on the table, Sophie's words brought him back to reality. Oh, right, the fighting game. He turned to her as she proposed a little bet with him; loser had to tell how they joined their respective team. W e l p.
He was screwed.
He gave a little grin at Sophie, as his hands laid on the controller, "You got yourself a deal, Sophie." He winked at her, as he readied himself to play, "Best 2 out of 3?"
As soon as he started, however... well... it would be very charitable to call Kenny's playing 'playing'. Rather, he was wildly mashing every single damn button on his side of the cabinet, constantly trying to keep a good distance away from Sophie, and mainly spamming projectiles to try and ensure she couldn't hit him. That;s how those guys did it, right? Mashing every button and doing all those fancy moves? Fighting games like this were just not his bread and butter. But still, he was having fun with it.
And all the while, the screaming refused to die out. And from the look of things, it wouldn't be dying out anytime soon.
WC: 590 Total WC: 2316
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Post by Sophie & Lantis on Feb 26, 2020 10:28:37 GMT
Skadi's question took Sophie by surprise. However, she wanted to sound smooth here, and protect Lantis's reputation, so she answered in a roundabout way. "He wouldn't tell me." she replied. "Lan's... had some bad luck in the dating department. And he's dated both digimon and humans. He's open like that. But if his date tonight's successful, he said he'll tell me."Indeed, Lantis seemed to be rather hurt in the previous year when his boyfriend Leith cut off contact. Sophie didn't want to bring up wounds like that to people she had just met. Sophie smiled at Kenny and was grateful that he didn't share his partner's nosiness. "Heh, that's fine. Lan's just as nosy when he's around. I understand." she finished with a chuckle. Following that, they would begin their match together on the arcade machine. Sophie positioned her digivice so Enkidu could watch, then she grasped her side of the controls. "Let's alternate pay, yeah? I'll pay up first." she said, and inserted a 100 yen coin into the machine, beginning play. The first game was a real mess as both of them got to grips with the controls. Eventually Kenny came out best from that melee. The next game, Sophie found a pattern that she could use to exploit, and she won. Then the final match, it was very close, but Sophie just lost in the final score. "Aww... dammit!" she cried as she lost the 2 out of 3. But then she laughed, throwing off her disappointment to show her sportsmanship. "Well done, Kenny, you play well!" she offered to shake hands and bow to Kenny for defeating her, then, with that energy, was eager to move on. "How about we have a drink for a bit while I tell you about AEGIS?"If this was fine, she would lead Kenny over to the kiosk where they could buy non-alcoholic beverages, then Sophie would lead him to a corner of the cafe area where they could talk in private. "So, when I started AEGIS..." Sophie began, glad the noise of the arcade could mean they wouldn't be overheard by eavesdroppers. "It started when I found out that the old DATS had disbanded, and Tokyo was relatively unprotected from digimon."Sophie then would tell Kenny of what she and Lantis had found back when the Entertainment District had been in ruins, when she decided to use the resources they had found to put together an organization that could counteract a digimon threat. She had talked to her socialite grandmother to gather the resources necessary, they were provided, and they had cobbled together at least a rudimentary organization that could defend the city at short notice, so she hoped. "We went a bit short of the mark in our first real test though." Sophie admitted with melancholy. "New year's, 2019, a big incursion happened that we were powerless to prevent. Did you hear what happened at Scramble Crossing?"
WC: 490 Total Words: 2278
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Post by Kenny O'Hara and Skadi on Feb 29, 2020 2:56:58 GMT
Well, who knew? According to Sophie, her partner Lantis was just as bad as Skadi herself when it came to sticking their noses in places where they just didn't belong. And thank God, Buddha and Arceus that she could relate with Kenny on that front; in more lax moments like this (well, lax for Skadi, at least), the Valaismon could afford to muck around with others, often times much to her own tamer's embarrassment.
While Kenny just gave a quick nod to Sophie's alternate pay idea, his eyes were focused much upon the game - and the feeling of every single bone in his body, especially his own legs, turning into jelly from sheer nervousness, along with a sudden, unexpected, feeling of competitiveness just emerging from God-knows-where within him, and his heart pumping like if his own life flat out depended on it . Even in a wild, blind mashing of buttons, just hoping, nay, praying that his efforts would at least be able to stand toe-to-toe with Sophie, considering what she told him.
...God, why couldn't his internal screaming just die out already?
But by some miracle, Kenny found himself winning the first match. How? This had to be a joke, right? He felt the screaming die out slowly but surely. All he was doing here was just mashing the buttons and hoping to God he could win. Certainly, come round 2, his brief bit of euphoria allowed Sophie to use it to her advantage, giving her the win for that round. All the more reason that weird, dormant feeling of competitiveness was practically egging him on to win the entire thing at this point.
By what could only be described by sheer good luck, Kenny just managed to barely pull through, and as he saw the results, he felt himself flat out collapse onto his side of the table in relief, chuckling weakly and happily muttering incoherently. He managed to pull himself up as he turned to Sophie, his bones still wobbling a little bit, as he saw her congratulating him; as well as the sounds of Skadi clapping enthusiastically.
Still recovering from his little competitive high as he rubbed his slightly aching head, he smiled gratefully and willingly shook her hand, "Thank you. I have to admit, I really didn't think I had it in me; I was just mashing all the buttons like an enraged baboon. You're really good yourself." One-on-one fighting games just wasn't exactly his bread and butter.
It was nothing short of a miracle that he won.
Upon being offered the chance to grab a drink, Kenny nodded eagerly, "Yeah, sounds good, honestly. I do think kinda need something to calm us down after an intense match like that, honestly." Making sure he left nothing behind (especially his D-Nexus and Skadi, for obvious reasons), he ordered himself a nice hot chocolate for himself.
He didn't even like alcohol, anyways.
Now comfortably seated alongside Sophie in a more relaxing, private area in the cafe, slightly leaning back and allowing him to relax himself, warm cup of hot chocolate in his hands, he, along with Skadi, listened to Sophie explain everything, including the formation of AEGIS, the reason why it was formed, the remains of the Entertainment District, and most importantly, the New Year's 2019 Scramble Crossing incident.
Upon hearing that being mentioned, Kenny pulled himself up, and Skadi's ears twitched a little, "Um, yeah, I did hear about that from another tamer. They told me that some Digimon attacked the area, and caused a fair bit of damage there. They described it as a sort of a 'terrorist attack', if I can remember correctly." He made sure to at least remain quiet, lest some other nosy people accidentally overhear what both of them had to say.
WC: 630 Total WC: 2946
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Post by Sophie & Lantis on Mar 5, 2020 12:10:08 GMT
Sophie gave a slightly steely grin at Kenny as he replied that he was really only mashing buttons. "I was doing the same, seeing as I've never played this before, but woe betide you if we play a game I've practiced~" she replied, indicating her competitive streak. Her intentions were not nasty here, but now, twice defeated, she felt the want to defeat Kenny in turn. Sophie was honourable enough to accept defeat, but still, she wanted to make comebacks against those that defeated her. But she wouldn't hold it as a prime objective, for now, she liked Kenny's temperament enough for her to just put it aside for now.
Sophie ordered a mango smoothie and sipped it in between the sentences she said about the founding of AEGIS. She noted that Kenny rarely interrupted her, but still listened, and she liked that. Very few other boys she had tried to date did the same.
She took a long sip from her drink as Kenny asked his question about Scramble Crossing, then when he finished, she nodded and put her drink down.
"That's right. It was an attempt by an unknown force of the digital world that wanted to stop humans coming into it." she said. "And they had the technology to thwart us. They raised a Control Spire, which prevents all digimon in its perimeter from evolving beyond Rookie. Only armor evolution was possible within it. And since I hadn't obtained any digimentals then, I was powerless. Thankfully enough allies showed up to beat back the digimon in time, then... DATS showed up."
Sophie took another drink to prepare the talk of that, but continued on in a quiet, serious voice.
"DATS were able to immediately subjugate the enemy digimon and destroy the Control Spire. And... all I could do was watch as they did so." she said. "In that moment, I knew I'd failed as the commander of AEGIS. Our organization's very existence depends on our ability to defend the human world from digital world threats. But we couldn't. So DATS barged in and planted their flag, and, that's where we are now, pretty much relegated to second line defense while they handle everything."
There was a few moments of silence after this where Sophie expected an answer from Kenny, but instead, Enkidu spoke.
"Uh, Sophie, this is a date, remember?" the BlackGaomon said. "Not a pity party. Come on, let's change the subject."
Sophie only then realized what was happening, then her cheeks flushed pink. "Oh, god, sorry, Kenny, I didn't mean to go on about this for so long..." she said, reaching out to pat Kenny's hands. "I mean... it happened last year, so, it doesn't matter as much... so, if you want to, do you want to share how you joined KIZNA?" she offered if Kenny wanted to move on from this moment.
Post WC: 478 Total WC: 2756
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Post by Kenny O'Hara and Skadi on Mar 9, 2020 12:23:22 GMT
Internally, a flood of questions had started to swamp Kenny's mind during Sophie's explanation. But he knew it polite to at least let her explain herself, just taking small sips in between. After all, he knew that first impressions were important, and so far, things had actually gone quite swimmingly, if not a little heart pounding, no thanks to the intense arcade match just a few minutes ago.
But then, Sophie just so happened to get into specific detail on what happened on that faithful day, including the motivations of the attackers, their weapon of choice being a raised control spire, the reason why neither she nor Lantis could fight back, and, what really made Kenny raise an eyebrow, what happened when DATS came over. And at this moment, a flood of conficting thoughts hit him.
DATS... Kenny and Skadi had been in contact with them twice. The first time being the aforementioned Golden Week incident, where they ended up getting a front seat to what boiled down to a vengeful woman nearly doling out revenge onto a certain Digimon claiming to be her son's murderer, then the discussion that took place within a specialised GranLocomon, delving into more detail to what and why were they carrying out their goal. For a moment, he thought whenever to tell Sophie about his own experiences with DATS.
...yeah, if he just casually blabbed about how DATS wasn't that bad and here's why, nobody would be happy. Yuuki did say that the conversation was private for good reason.
Besides, what didn't escape the tamer's attention was that Sophie had taken on a more stiff tone, and how she and her group essentially got shafted by the appearance of DATS because of everything that had happened. And as a wave of silence came awash over everyone, Kenny was practically stumped into silence. Even the normally talkative Skadi had no idea what to say here. As much as Kenny wanted to say anything to reassure Sophie, his mind kept drawing a blank, leaving him to just twiddle his fingers a little awkwardly, looking down...
...right before he suddenly felt Sophie's hands touch his with a soft pat as she apologised to him. His entire body started to freeze up as he felt his face grow a bright red once more, his eyes quickly darting over to her, Skadi lightly chuckling all the while.
...awkward.
"N-no, no, it's fine, Sophie. I tend to ramble quite a bit myself about... pretty much everything under the sun, when I get the chance." He stuttered, laughing a little weakly, and his hands slowly eking away from his date, and near to his lap in embarrassment.
Thankfully, he wasn't embarrased enough to stay silent on the next matter; how he ended up joining KIZNA, "It's a funny story, really. Me and Skadi were training at the Spartan Training Camp one day, and we ended up meeting up with these two people; Ryouta Noguchi and his Digimon partner, Valt, the really muscular Veemon, who was looking for a spar. Skadi, ever being the thrillseeker, just threw her hat into the ring."
"...It just gets weirder from here."
WC: 526 Total WC: 3472
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Post by Sophie & Lantis on Mar 12, 2020 11:56:09 GMT
While Sophie had dumped all this information on Kenny, even though she realized that it was probably not a good idea to do so, she was somewhat glad that he seemed to just... sit there and listen. Sophie hadn't been able to just let loose like that about her digimon related problems for over a year, and, yet, tonight, she had encountered a fellow tamer that, while not yet experienced enough to help her with her problems, he at least understood, and was willing to just... stay quiet and empathize with her. Sophie was glad of that. Not even her little brother Colin had done that for her.
When she apologized, Kenny replied a little awkwardly, stuttering. Sophie didn't want to burden him further with any inference that he had done anything wrong. She withdrew her own hands, hoping she hadn't spoiled everything, simply remaining silent, giving him space.
Then he spoke of how he joined KIZNA, training at the Spartan training grounds, then encountering Ryouta and Valt. Hearing that, her face lit up with familiarity.
"Oh, hey, that's so cool! That's what happened to my little brother Colin on his first day in the digital world. Ryouta and his partner put him and his partners through a little boot camp and managed to evolve them to Rookie on that very day." she explained.
She sensed that there was more to this story however. "So, if it's not too embarrassing, can I ask what happened next?" she asked curiously.
WC: 249 Total: 3005
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Post by Kenny O'Hara and Skadi on Mar 14, 2020 5:45:20 GMT
Maybe it was just in Kenny's nature that he could allow himself to be empathetic; growing up, he didn't exactly have much people to essentially spill his own guts to outside of his own dad and mum (while she was still alive, that is), considering what felt like 99% of the adults he had to deal with growing up would often treat him with contempt, if not outright scorn him, for his own disability. If anything, over time it taught him more of a lesson on how not to treat his fellow man.
Much to the young man's pleasant surprise, and sheer coincidence, upon the mention of Ryouta, Sophie had pointed out that the exact same tamer had helped her own brother's Digimon to get them to digivolve with a quick boot camp. Just hearing this sweetened his and Skadi's respect with Ryouta and Valt all the more; both of them looked up to their respective senpais like they would a big brother.
Oh... right. The story. For a moment, Kenny twiddled his thumbs a little; if there was a good, loving God out there, Sophie wouldn't be calling him and Skadi losers by the time he finished this part of the story, "Well, having first received her armour form for the first time, and willing to train to fight better to protect others, especially me, we decided to have our partners fight with our armour forms, but then Skadi, in her infinite wisdom, out of nowhere, mind, proposed a bet to Valt just before we started..."
Beat. "The winner got to toss the loser into the lake."
Another beat. "And Valt was wielding an Armour Perfect-level ancient wind dragon thing when Skadi was using Armour Champion. You can quickly guess how that played out." He tilted his head a bit away from Sophie's sight. If only Skadi decided to keep her maw shut that day.
"It was amazing!" Skadi's voice suddenly emerged from the D-Nexus, quickly catching Kenny off guard. Even as he tried to cover his Digivice with both of his hands, this did not stop the Valaismon from blabbering on, "I managed to grab his bellowing winds with my orb and when he was chasing me I blasted him directly in the face and he was all loud and happy and he was all like 'you clever girl, you passed you passed!'" She clapped enthusiastically, akin to how Valt was clapping that day, "And he called me smart and said I passed with flying colours and-"
"Alright, alright, Skadi. I think Sophie gets the idea." Kenny chuckled, before turning back to Sophie, "Anyways, as it was expected, we lost, and Ryouta and Valt tossed us into the lake, then they just jumped in ourselves. Then Valt had offered us to take Skadi under his wing as a disciple. And needless to say, she was quite excited, and didn't hesitate to say yes."
"But believe it or not, that wasn't when we joined KIZNA, at least not yet..." Pause for questions and/or hopefully non-mocking comments that Sophie may or may not have kept up her sleeve during Kenny's tale so far. If Sophie suddenly burst out laughing, God knowing he wouldn't exactly be surprised in the slightest.
WC: 540 Total WC: 4012
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Post by Sophie & Lantis on Mar 23, 2020 13:55:17 GMT
Sophie listened to the remainder of the story with patience. Enkidu picked up the tale as well, while he was pretty much a solo digimon in sworn service to a human-run organization, he at least could empathize with what he heard.
Both Sophie and Enkidu took Kenny and Skadi's story eagerly, both of them learning much from this exchange. On her part, Sophie felt... somewhat thrilled at the story that was being told here. That Kenny and Skadi had faced their first trial of the digital world and embraced it with zeal, well, that was more than she could say of her own attempt, and even the experience of her brother. That little tidbit inspired awe within her.
"Well, I can imagine, but, I've heard a lot about Ryouta and Valt. Even if you didn't manage to beat them, the fact that you befriended them, well... from what I've heard about them from my brother, they know their stuff, and that you managed to forge that friendship, that makes you fine in my view." Sophie admitted.
Then she and Enkidu heard the rest of the tale in silence, and at the end, Sophie giggled. She hadn't done that in years, but she found this story absolutely delightful. Even though it was meant to be a simply private tale between chosen digimon tamers, that tale just sounded so human and relatable, it almost made her jealous that her own journey into becoming a part of the chosen humans with digimon partners so basic in comparison. But she wouldn't let such feelings spoil this moment.
"This is an awesome story so far, Kenny." Sophie said in response. And she felt it was a bonus that there was more in store. "Please tell me how it concluded? I don't think I could focus on anything else until I hear this."
Enkidu chose to remain silent, but agreed with her. Such a tale needed a conclusion, and neither of them wanted to interfere with it.
This post: 331 words. Total Thread: 3336 words.
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Post by Kenny O'Hara and Skadi on Mar 24, 2020 9:16:37 GMT
There was something that just felt so nice about Sophie just shrugging off that particularly embarrassing detail, at least to Kenny. Internally, he breathed a sigh of relief that at least Sophie wasn't laughing her ass off at him. That, to him at least, was proof that there was a God out there and He was good.
But, as he went on telling his story, it was clear he and Skadi had quite the winner on their hands with this odd tale of weird coincidences rearing it's ugly head, putting the young man onto a path of much needed improvement he didn't know he needed for years. It just made him wonder, what would his life be like if he never moved to Japan, if he never decided to check out the 'plushie' behind the Hachiko Statue that very day?
If anything, it made him all the more grateful for Skadi's positive influence her presence had upon throughout his life.
At first, Kenny felt himself raise an eyebrow at Sophie's giggling, but again, her compliments made him breath a sigh of relief inside, and a grateful smile could be seen on his face, "Heh. Thank you, Sophie. Like I said, we didn't exactly join KIZNA yet that day, but Valt was all too happy to take her under her wing after that battle. But at the time, I really didn't know that he and Ryouta were actually part of KIZNA. They were actually kinda mum about it back at the Spartan Training Grounds, to be honest."
"We actually didn't find out about it until we set up a training session, like, about a week or so later, when we were taking the blue Trailmon to Ys and met them at the station. And we were told we could join if Skadi could actually reach her proper Champion form for the first time. And to do this, Valt brought in one of his older apprentices, Ophelia, a very friendly, but also very unpredictable and wild Spadamon, with her calmer, but way too strong Gomamon-X sister, Cassie."
...understatement of the freaking millennium.
Skadi was all too happy to chip in once more though, "They're my amazing big sisters!"
"Yeah, what she said." Kenny lightly chuckled, "Anyways, Valt pitted Ophelia and Skadi against each other to help tap into my partner's true potential, and in the middle of the battle, Skadi actually managed to digivolve to her true Champion form, Canandemon, for the very first time to stand toe-to-toe with Ophelia's. Then after a bit, they had to tag team against Valt in his Magnamon form next."
He took a moment to take another sip of his hot choc before continuing, "And according to him, they actually did a pretty good job, quickly co-ordinating with one another to take him on, despite their widely different power levels between 2 Champions and a Perfect. And together, they actually managed to lay a good amount of hurt on them with a good amount of teamwork and skill. That was more than enough for Valt and Ryouta to put us into KIZNA."
Beat. "And we got some really good cakes out of it too. No prizes for guessing who we decided to share them with once Ophelia and Cassie accompanied us to the relaxation room to wind down. ...Jesus Christ, those cakes were delicious, man." He chuckled once more.
Still, as he slumped down back into his seat, he let out a happy sigh, "Honestly, I couldn't have been more happier that we ended up joining KIZNA. I mean, I know Valt kinda told us off for initially overpraising Cassie to Hell and back because he claimed it was kinda 'unprofessional', but honestly, I couldn't have been more grateful for the shit she and the rest of KIZNA did doing Golden Week and averting disaster in the Entertainment District, especially since my dad nearly got caught up in the crossfire. I don't think he'd be here today if it wasn't for them, if you ask me."
Something just felt good about saying that, you know?
WC: 679 Total WC: 4691
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