Only One [MPC 80A+80B Complete]

Dirty hands, and a clean soul.

That’s what the mission advertisement had said, anyways. Desdemona didn’t buy into religious fanaticism herself, but the potential payout looked promising. Instead she believed that there would only ever be one savior in her life, and that person was herself. Maybe that was why she was one of the lucky ones.

‘Lucky ones.’

The thought made the witchmon sputter a wheezing chuckle as she stared up at the ominous sphere in the sky. Heavy looking chains of digi-chromazoid kept it anchored to the Cliffs of Chaos, but she had to wonder if the rounded obelisk would even bother moving if it could. It somehow looked bigger than before, or maybe her mild concussion was playing tricks on her. Just barely, she was aware of the fact that she was laying on her back.

‘My hat.. Where?’

In a groggy haze she turned her head to look to her left. There was a baluchimon laying on its side nearby with bad burn marks marring its once pristine body. Its eyes were closed but she could still see the steady rhythm of its chest heaving for air. Unable to recall the digimon’s name Des sighed and closed her eyes hoping it would relieve her headache. Of course that didn’t work, and after several long seconds she irritably blinked her eyes open. She turned her head to the right this time. To her pleasant surprise she found her pointy hat, although she internally growled at the stains the cliff’s red dirt would no doubt leave upon it. The witchmon closed her eyes again as she reached out a hand towards her precious hat. After she picked it up she gave it a gentle shake before sitting it atop her forehead. Its presence was calming and familiar. Like the hand of an old friend clapped on your shoulder in reassurance. Clarity was starting to return to her mind and senses, and with that the reality of her current predicament.

She had joined an expedition. No, that was too generous of a thought. The truth was she had signed up for an execution. However, with all the spouting of self-righteous drivel from the employer you wouldn’t have guessed it unless you were already a scheming scoundrel like herself. She had to admit that on paper ‘stopping an irredeemable evil’ was a good hook for netting brainless and painfully straightforward brutes. It had certainly attracted a couple holier than thou digimon like the baluchimon dying beside her. Somewhere off in the distance she could hear the darcmon shouting promises of vengeance; there was another do-gooder. Where the other members of the group had gone was anyone’s guess. They could all have died even, but she wouldn’t have batted an eye.

After all, they had tried to kill her, first.

The witchmon forced herself to sit upright as she opened her eyes with a groan. Yes, things were starting to come back to her now. The person who had organized this farce, the harpymon, had refused to identify this great evil that needed to be purged until they arrived in the Cliffs of Chaos. That stipulation alone had warded off all but the most resolute champions of justice.

“Justice.” Des turned her head to the side to spit at the ground as the word left a bad feeling in her mind and a bad taste on her tongue. The mockery those idiots blindly called justice. Honor and peace, peace and honor. What honor was there in making a group of thugs and seeking out someone in order to delete them? What peace was to be had when you traveled with war in your heart regardless of the reason why? The willfully ignorant hypocrisy was enough to make her nauseated. They were all winners worthy of Darwin Awards, to Des. Best culled from the data pool of the Digital World so that more valuable information could be passed forward. Speaking of which. Her eyes slowly gravitated to the baluchimon with a cold, indignant stare.

It took a couple tries to stand, but Desdemona would not be robbed of her own justice. For all the blustering the baluchimon had made about ‘the cleansing of holy fire,’ the witchmon felt it was appropriate to burn out the last breaths of life from the holy beast with a fire of her own. As pathetic as the baluchimon’s data was, she would ensure that it did not go to waste healing her own injuries.

Now that her immediate concerns were dealt with Des turned her attention to the bigger picture: finding the harpymon that had started this all. While she was completely decided on loading the other digimon she still wanted answers first. Once the group had reached the Cliffs of Chaos all chaos did break loose as the harpymon called out Desdemona as the force of evil that needed to be destroyed. The witchmon had made it no secret that she was only here for the reward money, but it still surprised her a little when the rest of the holy digimon turned on her so easily. The harpymon had riled them all up, boasting that Des had fallen for her trap of selfish wealth. To be fair Des had taken the bait, yes, but she still did not know why she was the target of such a prolonged charade.

The tables had been turned however after Des had decided that there was no talking sense into the others. While the harpymon had gotten into another preachy rant Desdemona had cut her off with a fireball to the face. A first strike approach would be her only way out of this mess, but it worked towards her favor in an unexpected way. The harpymon’s appearance had flickered like static before vanishing completely, revealing their employer to be another witchmon. Despite the resulting standoff Des had sneered and chuckled at the ridiculousness of the whole situation. Herself, having fallen victim to her self serving needs. The others, having fallen victim to their shallow hatred of ambition. This other witchmon, who had planned everything so carefully up until the last moment. Personal vanity was certainly the biggest sin of everyone here today.

In the end both witchmons were chased after and hunted down as the group fell into a rage fueled fury. However, Desdemona was determined to see things through. She would get her answers, and she would get her payment for all this trouble. One way, or another.

---

The sounds of fighting weren’t hard to track along the cliffs. Flashes of light lit up the shadows of a gorge carved into the land. Standing at its edge Desdemona peered into its depths. It reached further down than she had initially anticipated. Down all the way to the coastline of the Sea of Blood. She could see two combatants dueling amidst the rocks and the sand. The darcmon swung her sword viciously as her opponent kept trying to create distance between them. The opposing witchmon parried with her broom and stalled for time with spells.

The sight of the two digimon renewed the malevolent indignation within Des’s psyche. There was neither a brave call of challenge, nor a roar of defiance from her. That was not her way. With her eyes trained on the two aggressors below she held out a hand to her side. Seconds later her broom flew comfortably into her grasp, and she then stepped off of the edge of the cliff. Easily sliding her broom beneath herself she slowed her descent into a lazy spiral, circling lower and lower like a vulture as she allowed her enemies to tire each other out.

Sword and spell continued to clash, lighting up the gorge with brilliant flashes. It wasn’t until the two combatants became locked into a power struggle with their weapons did Des make her move. Swooping down like a predator she held an open hand above her head and conjured a fireball almost as wide as she herself was tall. An adrogynous face formed within the flames as she chose her target: the charading witchmon. The fireball then erupted with its signature crazed laughter as she came within striking distance. The noise certainly drew the attention of the other two digimon, but it also had Des looking up at the radiant projectile in momentary confusion. It was laughing using her voice.

Her delay had cost her. As she hurled the fireball at the other witchmon she already knew she was too late. The witchmon managed to scramble out of the way, but not the darcmon. The fireball impacted heavily with one of her wings as she tried to get out of the way, and sent the angelic digimon sprawling onto the sand, shouting in pain.

“What’s the matter?” chided the hostile witchmon to Des, “You’re not usually one to hesitate like that.”

Desdemona narrowed her eyes at the other witchmon. How was this stranger talking with Des’ voice? If her fireball spell had laughed in her voice too, there could be no illusion. This stranger wasn’t someone to write off and snuff out without further investigation, much to Des’ annoyance. The darcmon, however… Des floated down to the angel and stepped onto the sand beside her. With her broom she unceremoniously flicked the holy digimon’s fallen sword off to the side for safety.

“Hesitating really isn’t like me at all,” said Des softly and thoughtfully as she stared down at the darcmon impassively. “Do the two of us a favor please, and stay down.” She waved her hand over the darcmon before retreating a safe distance away. As she stepped back a thick purple fog manifested over and on the angel. The cloud created painful burning sensations upon contact, and as it blanketed the darcmon Des finally smiled patiently at the other witchmon as the angel’s howls of pain echoed throughout the gorge.

“A witchmon with my voice, and familiarity with my demeanor… Now, I can make clones, but this is just eerily absurd. I am flattered that you went through this whole deception and journey over me, however; Terminus was getting boring.” Des took a seat on her floating broom and regarded the other witchmon with a thoughtful expression. “There can be only one ending to whatever feud you have with me, though.”

“Talk, talk, talk,” mocked the other witchmon as she shook her head and cackled. “That’s all you ever do, Des! And I’m getting really sick of hearing our voice outside of my head! Clone or not I am me, not you. So just shut up and disappear!” With an open palm the witchmon drew a large circle in the air in front of herself. The motions transcribed a runic circle onto the space composed of glowing red lines. The witchmon then pushed her palm through its center towards Des, shattering the symbol like glass. The lines of the glowing shards warped and stretched to form the silhouette of a massive serpent that raced off towards Des.

What had been said gave Des a lot to chew on. Was this a clone of hers that had somehow manifested its own awareness? She was not familiar with the spell this other witchmon had used, too. Thinking that caution was the better path to tread for now she put up a shield of purple light with a wave of her own hand. As the serpent impacted against the shield with its jaws wide open it bit through the barrier with little effort.

Surprise marked Desdemona’s expression before the snake silhouette collided with her and slammed her down into the sand before disappearing. The violent hit against the ground stole the breath from her as she almost blacked out a second time that day. Before she could recover completely she realized her clone had already closed the distance. Des managed to get her hands in the way of the heeled boot dropping towards her neck, but she struggled just to keep the pressure off of her throat.

“Winded and on your back again. Des, you’re really making us look bad,” cooed the clone with a grin as she pressed down harder with her boot.

“You really know how to get under my skin,” gasped Desdemona as she glared up at the clone through blur impaired vision. “Maybe.. Maybe you should stay there!” All too glad to have caught the clone’s boot with the palms of her hands Des cast her fireball spell again at point blank range. The five foot wide sphere manifested right over the clone, and had little time to laugh in its mocking manner before it exploded.

Darkness did take Des that time.

When she woke up her body ached and her ears still rang. The blast had made a small crater in the sand leaving her half buried in the still warm particle grains. The warmth would have felt nice if she also didn’t feel like she had severe burns on her body already. Fighting the urge to pass out again the witchmon slowly crawled out from her shallow grave. Her clone laid next to the crater face down and badly burnt. For several long seconds Des stared at the unmoving digimon, lost in her own thoughts. When she found the will to move again she knelt beside her clone and placed a hand on her back.

“Time to be whole again.”