Striking it Rich [Mission] [3/3]

Morning on the Western Flatlands was always a quiet affair with this family, especially given they sometimes had business to attend to here. It was a relatively simple assignment--scope out a mine and clear it out if need be for the sake of utilization of natural resources. Normal stuff, really. The meeting point had not been unoccupied, thankfully.

For one, it was a chance to see her grandpa, and one that was regarded quite fondly, and for the other, it was a chance to say hello to her father in-law. "Grampa Owen, Grampa Owen, hi!" Omen chirped, the Wispmon's...hand-tail seeming to wave about as enthusiastically as her words had been! "I take it these folks are coming on the mission with us? Hi, I'm Omen, I'm Owen's granddaughter!"

As for who was accompanying Omen? Well, they were a Meicrackmon draped in robes that had the heraldry of Luminas...and a little seal with a symbol denoting Ys as well. There was a small smile on her face. "...I've done my part. Please, do take care of my daughter--as well as yourselves. It's lovely to see you, but...I've stuff to do."

And refusing to elaborate further, the Meicrackmon promptly ran off. "So, what's the overall...um...rundown on this? Get in, check everything, clear it out and get out?" Omen inquired, not seeming all that bothered by her mother's timely exit.

Not only the Trailmon, but others were arriving too. Rory saw the airship landing nearby, then braced himself as Gem came flying at him. Even then he was knocked off his feet.

“Hi, Gem…” Rory said, managing to get back up. Gem said that their parents permitted them to go along with this mission too. Rory was fine with Luneth coming along, but was a bit concerned about Gem. Owen chuckled as he approached them.

“Yes, after Skye questioned me about what this mission involves, I assured her that Gem would be safe here.” he said. “After all, we’re not likely to fight anything, and I’m capable of Mega evolution, so if it comes to it, I can keep you all safe.”

With that said, Rory relaxed a little. Yeah, it’d take some earth shattering force to get through Owen, so the Coronamon felt safe here.

Luneth then spoke up, asking if it was fine for Gem to be here. “Yeah, it’s fine. I’ll make sure to keep everyone safe, and hopefully this should be something of an adventure for the young ones.”

When Owen was Gem’s age, he remembered wanting nothing more than to go off and do something exciting. Exploring a mine (with someone strong to supervise) would have been something he would have greatly appreciated.

There was another digimon present in the airship, a digimon neither Owen or Rory had ever seen before. A large yellow and white yeti digimon that seemed to be stuck in the door.

“...how did he get in if he can’t get out?” Rory wondered out loud.

“Best not think about questions like that too much, mate.” Owen chuckled in reply. Thankfully he managed to get unstuck and introductions were made.

“Good to meet you.” Owen replied, and Rory said something similar. So, it would be Luneth, Gem and Arlo accompanying them. That brought their team up to five.

The next to arrive caught Owen’s attention quickly. His tail wagged as he saw her approaching. “Omen! So good to see you!” he said, offering her a hug.

Rory seemed rather surprised. “...you’re a grandpa, Mr. Owen?” he asked his superior, blinking.

“Yep, the family grows bigger.” Owen chuckled. Then there was the digimon that had accompanied her. Owen gave a respectful nod to her request. “Yes, I will. Nice to see you, Mae.” He didn’t take her quick departure as an insult, he was familiar with his daughter-in-law’s way of things.

Then the Trailmon arrived at the mine siding. And first to emerge from its carriages was a purple digimon that headed straight for Owen.

“Amper!” the Gaomon exclaimed, hugging him. “So good to see you, ya little spark of joy!”

By now Rory wasn’t feeling sheepish that his own family was coming along on this expedition. It seemed that Owen’s family now matched his own in numbers. Owen smiled as Vergil followed. He noted that Vee and Gummy were absent, but understood why. Gummy was with Bezil in Ys, while Vee was with Luke in the Eastern Timberlands as far as he knew. But, given that he felt he could keep everyone safe, he was glad to have Vergil and Amper accompany them.

“Well, mate, we’ve been asked here to scout out an abandoned mine that a bigshot from Rustport wants to reopen to get out some of the digizoid ore that might remain here.” Owen said in quick explanation to Vergil. “Thanks for coming along by the way, hope you’re doing fine.”

After the greetings were made, Owen and Rory turned to the Trailmon. There was activity coming from the second carriage. Several digimon emerged, namely small yet strong Rookie and Champion levels, all unloading equipment. Owen noted four of them hauling out what looked like a large generator, setting it on a trolley. Then a large Drimogemon emerged from the carriage, and hauled it toward the mine entrance.

Following him, there was a large digimon Owen and Rory had never seen before, resembling a monster made from stone. However, he matched the description that they had been given of their client – Gogmamon.



“Ah, excellent, you all seem to know each other.” Gogmamon observed, as the group showed their obvious familiarity. “Now then. To business.”

A Goblimon quickly set up a large board that appeared to be a cutaway map. Gogmamon addressed them by pointing one of his stone hands at it.

“These are the schematics of this mine here, the ‘Sunny Day’ mine as it was known when it was active.” he explained. “In its day, the ore extracted from it was firstly iron, then a deposit of gold was located nearby, so it was expanded to mine that too. And, in the very last year of its operation, a vein of chrome digizoid ore was discovered, as located here at its deepest point.”

Owen noted that the mine was about 200 meters deep. Not too far down, as far as mines went.

“The mystery here that I’d like you all to solve, is that operations in the Sunny Day mine were completely abandoned very quickly.” Gogmamon continued. “I have worked tirelessly to try and find anyone that knew what happened, but I have been unsuccessful. I have dismissed a tunnel collapse as a possibility, because that would have ordinarily been fixed and corrected for such a valuable ore deposit. As well as flooding, since it would only be a matter of installing pumps to drain excess water away. That is why I’ve hired you all to investigate. You do not need to go as far as attempt to bring the mine back into operation, I will handle that. I only need to know what’s down there. Do you understand so far?”

“I think so, it seems straightforward to me.” Owen replied. “So you’d like us to do some recon of the place?”

“Correct. Gather as much intelligence as you can. These should be of assistance to you.” he turned and waved to a Gotsumon near the Trailmon carriage. He briskly approached and distributed 4 digital cameras among them. “Be sure to take photos whenever possible of anything you think is significant. I would do it myself, but, I’m more of a business mon than an explorer, and this seems like work more suited for a team such as yourselves.”

“No worries, mister.” Rory said, accepting one of the cameras and pulled its carry strap over his head, wearing it on his neck. “We’re 7/71st Recon, this is our specialty.”

“I’m not aware of those numbers, but I’ll take your word on that.” Gogmamon said. “Also, these should be of assistance to you.” he motioned to another worker Goblimon, who pulled along a trolley full of other mining safety equipment, including helmets with lights and clear perspex visors, first aid kits, digging tools and other pieces of equipment that a miner would be expected to carry. Everyone was free to get what they needed.

Mae always figured her father-in-law to be an understanding sort. Such was why he was so highly trusted by the Meicoomon, after all! Either way, there was still people to arrive, like a human that Omen was fairly certain she had...heard of, yes, but not met, as well as a purple Pulsemon that called Owen-

"...Grandpa?" The Wispmon repeated, to herself in a mimicry of Amper's voice. She took a careful few steps closer to Amper, looking him over carefully. "...Are you my cousin? Owen's my grandpa too--my name's Omen, it's nice to meet you!" She chirped in her own voice. Then she looked to Gem, "Hi, look at my cousin! I have one of those!"

Now, the question towards Vergil was something Vergil himself could answer.

Wait oh gosh oh heck oh drat the big overseer Digimon got unstuck from the door oh gosh oh golly he was lumbering this way oh geez. In all seriousness, Gogmamon was very to-the-point in explaining the rundown of the mine, as well as the apparent history and mystery. "200 meters...That's...yeah, that's really not too deep..." So why was it abandoned so fast? Omen's tail yoinked her camera up, before she promptly realized something as she set the camera around her neck.

She only had one hand.

"...Would it be considered a waste to armor digivolve just to carry stuff? I'm a bit short on limbs..." Omen was at least able to get a first aid pack and a hat/visor.

Rory grinned at his younger brother, despite almost having the wind knocked out of him a moment ago. “Heh, thanks. Dad gave me the scarf himself.” he had pondered wearing it as a bandana like Owen, but that was impossible with the flame on his forehead. He was a little embarrassed to be overheard by Arlo, but would take note not to make remarks like that again.

Owen meanwhile was paying more attention to his grandchildren. He was delighted to see Amper and Omen get along so well. And felt a sense of pride that his own grandchildren seemed to be growing up so strong and healthy. Rory noticed too when Omen started talking about cousins.

“Uh… Mr. Owen, what’s a ‘cousin’?” Rory asked, quietly.

“Well, it’s someone who is the child of one of your parents’ siblings.” Owen answered. “So since Amper’s dad Bezil is the brother of Omen’s mum Hasenya, that means they’re cousins.”

“Ohh… okay!” Rory said, his face brightening with understanding. “So if, for example, I have a kid, and Luneth has a kid, then they’d be cousins too?”

“Yep, that’s right.” Owen confirmed. He turned back to Amper. “Well, even if it’s up to Gummy and Bezil in the end, you’d be most welcome to be in my class at Rosewood, mate.” he said. He had a mind to nudge Bezil to get his consent to that, but of course he didn’t want to dictate to his son when the right moment would be. Especially that Amper was born only a month ago, he’d probably need a bit of time to mature enough to prepare for combat and survival classes.

Vergil was then asked an odd question by Gem. Neither Owen or Rory really noticed that about the human. In their minds, someone who was not a digimon, was 5-6 feet in height, wore clothes, had fur only on their head, and carried a digivice was a human. The rest was as trivial as to why Owen had blue fur and why Rory had orange.

But Vergil mentioned another word – “race”. Owen noted that was probably important to humans, so he’d probably ask Vergil to explain it to him later. But he still listened to the rest of the explanation, as did Rory.

“Ohh, I think I get it.” the Coronamon said. “Yeah, we digimon have that too. I’m a Vaccine attribute, Luneth is a Data attribute, and Gem here is a Virus attribute, but they don’t seem to mean anything that separates us, we’re still all brothers.”

Once the introductions were done, Gogmamon would address their questions.

“A wild digimon being down there that would cease operations could be a possibility… if there was a large amount of them that threatened the work crew.” Gogmamon mused at Arlo’s question. “If that’s the case, and you encounter signs of occupation by wild digimon, do what you can to take photos of them and return to the surface at once, I don’t want you to be overwhelmed if that’s what we’re looking at here.”

Omen asked if it would be a waste to evolve to use her camera. Owen considered, then shrugged. “As long as you feel comfortable using it, Omen, even if you have to evolve to use it, that won’t be a waste. Any clue you pick up could be useful.”

Gogmamon then addressed Vergil's question. "That I'm unsure of as well. I'm hoping we can find clues early on though. There should be an operations floor with records of which miners were on shift in that last day, that's what we'll look for first."

Vergil seemed a bit hesitant about putting on a hard hat. Thankfully Amper talked him into it. That made Owen even more proud of his grandson.

Between the two of them, Owen and Rory put on some mining hats as well, ensuring the lights worked. Rory also took a pickaxe and shovel tool, thinking they might be handy to have in the mine.

When everyone was ready, Gogmamon would lead them into the mine entrance. It was large enough so that Gogmamon could fit relatively easily, and the main tunnel was short, but long enough so that the daylight from outside soon faded, and their only light sources were their helmets (and naturally glowing light from the digimon that produced them, like Rory's fires) Soon they would encounter the crew that had hauled the generator into the mine in the first place.

“Assuming all the wiring is still intact, this generator should power the systems of the mine.” Gogmamon explained. “We did some preliminary exploration earlier and of course the old generator is kaput. But hopefully this new one should be a sufficient substitute.”

Rory was rather excited to see what would happen. Owen a bit more hesitant. If it didn’t work, then that would make their task a little more hazardous, so he hoped for the best.

“Well then, moment of truth here…” Gogmamon said, and gave the signal to switch the generator on. There was the growl of its ignition, then an increasing mechanical whir as its functions sprang to life. Owen and Rory paid close attention to their surroundings, and, to their relief, everything so far was going as planned. The mine lights flashed before steadily glowing, filling the operations floor with illumination. Fans stirred to life, shaking off the accumulated dust and produced a light breeze around them as the ventilation systems activated. And, there was a loud clang as well as the sound of whirring machinery from the elevator shaft as the platform returned to its home level.

“Excellent!” Gogmamon exclaimed with delight. “Now that we have a bit of light down here we can get to work… now, this being the operations floor, we can look for clues as to why this place shut down in the first place. I imagine there would be some kind of record of what went on? Of interest being the last day.”

There was an excited call from what appeared to be the old foreman’s office. “Mr. Gogmamon! I’ve found some old records here!” called a Gotsumon. At once he brought them out and held them up for Gogmamon to read, flipping through the papers until he was told to stop.

“There it is, the final day of operations…” Gogmamon said, reading what was written carefully. He frowned as he finished. “All miners accounted for… immediate cessation of operations, Sunny Day mine closed indefinitely. Reason… well now, how uncouth.”

“What does it say?” Owen asked, curiously.

“Given the young ones you have present, you might not want to say it out loud.” Gogmamon said, and passed the paper to Owen. He and Rory read, and invited others who were mature enough to understand the nature of cussing.

’FUCK THIS PLACE!!’

“...charming.” Rory remarked.

“And unhelpful.” Gogmamon continued. “Well, the fact that all workers were accounted for in the last operational shift is good to know. That rules out a disaster occurring. But it raises other questions. If the mine foreman wrote something like that on an official document, that implies there may have been some sort of worker dispute, but to abandon a digizoid ore deposit like this? There’s more to it than that…”

While he was musing, Owen’s eyes were drawn to a symbol on another document that he recognized. He grew rather still, so much that Rory noticed.

“Mr. Owen? Is something the matter?” the Coronamon asked.

“That symbol…” Owen said, pointing to a starburst with ten sides, each a different color. “That’s the DWR’s insignia.”

“Oh…” was all Rory could say. He knew that Owen and his own mother Skye among others were originally soldiers that served the ‘Digital World Republic’. “Is that… bad?”

“It could be.” Owen frowned. “Toward the end, the DWR turned all its capacity from peace to war. Some kind of conflict might have occurred down here. But, still, it explains why everything seems to be working after all this time. They built things to last.”

“Well then. The way forward seems to be via that elevator.” Gogmamon said next. “It might be good to look around for further clues while my engineers ensure it’s safe for use.”

“Ah, yes, of course.” Owen said, but it was clear he was dwelling on something that bothered him. He’d be happy to talk if asked, though. Rory meanwhile immediately took the initiative and used his firelight to explore the dark areas of the operations floor for anything of note.

The floor was strewn with everything one would expect from an abandoned mine. Rusting machinery, old tools, trackworks for mining carts, mining carts themselves, and various other things.

Okay, good. She was able to effectively operate the camera with her one limb as it were, but evolving was also a safe bet if she needed it. Good to know.

"Well, yes. I guess I'm lucky--I don't have any influence over whether or not I get cousins so it's nice to have one." The Wispmon mused. She spared Vergil a once-over. "Oooh...your hair's interesting. It kind of reminds me of my wires at my perfect level a little bit. Very neat. Based, as my other grandfather says."

...Omen had been in her fair share of missions in the past, and...honestly, this seemed like the one time that everyone had seemed to gather under happy pretenses for the most part, even if the case of the mine was starting to become more and more mysterious by the minute as they proceeded into it. Omen waddled over to the logs. And witnessed what the final day's record was.

"Oh, that word. My mom usually yells that when she gets a vision of a bad future that she has to avert. I've also heard Aunt Miyako yell it at Uncle Hisato and Uncle Naoki too. Apparently it's a Power Word in the human world. A true spectacle of the human tongue if I do say so myself, very exquisite but liable to cause emotional damage when put in the wrong hands. Also, soap tastes awful, so never say it."

There was a quick pause. "The fact that the DWR was involved introduces an element of unpredictability into this, because from what I am given to understand thanks to family histories, the DWR's twilight years were basically able to be described as 'allover the place' due to the shift from peace towards war. It's basically a sign to be prepared for anything from here on out."

Given Omen was a source of light herself? She was peering all around to see if there was anything of note. Or if they needed to go deeper.

Gem asked Rory if him being a virus attribute was a bad thing. “Not at all, I know a few decent virus attributes”. Rory replied recalling classmates and acquaintances he had been fond of. “Impmon, Guilmon, Gazimon, Wormmon… and I’ve met vaccine attributes that are just jerks. Attribute doesn’t matter when it comes to the person.”

“Hm? Oh…” Gogmamon seemed a little taken aback by Gem’s questions, but supposed he had the time to answer the young digimon on their way into the mine. “Well, I suppose some tasks are more difficult for me than others, hence why I have hired help for matters like that. Other than that, I get my energy from the sunlight. I have no need of food. And I rather like it here in the Western Flatlands where sunlight is plentiful. But on the other hand, there’s always too much of a good thing, hence why I enjoy it in caves for when I’ve had enough.”

When they reached the operations floor and activated it, there was the matter of the operational records. Rory had to snicker at Omen’s anecdote about how she found out about that word. He might have had a similar source as to where he found it. And Amper’s reaction was funny too, Owen smiled at him fondly.

“You’ll find out about it in time, mate, like your cousin said, it’s a word of power that shouldn’t be used lightly.” the Gaomon said to his grandson, playfully.

As they scoured the room to search for things, Arlo had overheard Owen and approached to ask him about the DWR and its significance on their investigation. Owen hesitated as he found the words to reply, knowing that Amper was listening too. Amper asked what the symbol meant, and Owen was surprised to hear that he recognized it.

Omen provided a good introduction to the subject, and Owen didn't find the need to elaborate further from what she said. But he still wanted to say something to back it up.

“Yes, it's as your cousin said. It’s the symbol of the Digital World Republic, or DWR as it was known commonly.” Owen explained patiently. “In a time long ago, I was a soldier that was a part of it. It’s gone now, but some digimon have memories of it, and they were very dangerous in the end too.” Apparently Amper had encountered an Ogremon that wore a crossed out symbol that tried to kidnap him. The Gaomon had heard of that incident, and was glad that Amper and Vergil had got out of it fairly well. Next, he answered Arlo.

“I’m probably just being paranoid, just, that I know the DWR used to operate this mine makes me less comfortable about bringing my grandkids and Skye’s children down here to explore it.” the Gaomon admitted. After saying it out loud though, he felt a small weight lift off his shoulders somehow. “But it should all be fine. You’re a tough little guy aren’t you, Amper? And Omen’s held her own, so I’ve heard. Besides, it’s not like there’s a full assault squadron hiding behind every broom closet with a DWR symbol on it, is there?”

“Maybe Gogmamon might know what to do about it, Mr. Owen?” Rory suggested as he returned from his search, overhearing. “The DWR had a few mines in this area, right? He might know about it.”

“That’s a good idea, Rory.” Owen said, then walked over to Gogmamon to catch his attention. “Mr. Gogmamon, have you dealt with mines previously operated by the DWR before?” Owen asked their client.

“Hm… yes, one or two. No particular problems arose with bringing them back into operation though.” Gogmamon answered. “In fact they were easy to get back online now that I think about it, their technology was built to last, and they weren’t yet finished with their operations back then since it all seemed to stop abruptly, much like this one.”

“Yeah, that was probably down to the war they had in the end.” Rory remarked. Owen said nothing, his involvement with that was all in the past. “Oh yeah, Mr. Owen, I found a couple of things. This helmet for one thing. It still works.”

As Gogmamon turned to talk to another worker, Rory held up the hard plastic helmet and switched the light on at an empty spot on the floor. Owen was surprised that the light was a vivid blue.

“Built to last indeed.” Owen remarked as Rory turned it off. “Might be good to keep it around in case we need a backup. And what’s the other thing?”

“Over here, I found a notice board.” Rory said, leading them to a large corkboard with tatters of old paper attached to it. Most were too faded to read or had no useful information on them, but one paper stood out, written in bold black official looking text, accompanied by a DWR symbol.

“BY ORDER OF THE SUPREME COUNCIL, ALL EXPLOSIVES WITHIN DECOMISSIONED MINES SHALL BE IMMEDIATELY REQUISITIONED BY THE MILITARY. NON-COMPLIANCE SHALL BE DEALT WITH IN SEVERITY.”

Owen read the sign with a frown. He recognized that order and why it was given. As the war that tore the DWR apart went on, set piece battles turned to total war, and non-essential mines were stripped of their equipment. Even in the end, he himself was fighting with explosives sourced from mines not relevant to the war effort. That in itself was unusual, a digizoid mine full of vital material for arms and armor wouldn’t be given up easily.

“Well, at least that means we won’t find any unused dynamite down here, right, Mr. Owen?” Rory suggested, seeing it as a good thing.

“I suppose so.” Owen replied. He looked around to see if anyone had found anything else in the area. There would be a poster of note near the elevator shaft if anyone was looking there. A symbol of a crescent moon with an arrow pointing to a symbol of a sun, with no words to accompany it.

Speaking of the elevator, eventually it would start up again, bringing up the safety team tasked with ensuring it was safe to operate. It wouldn't be long before they'd be on their way further, it seemed.