Baa-Ram-Ewe!

by Darkonshadows

232. With your eyes open wide!

-Digital Space, Dormarch-

…

I had to do it, all in under two minutes… the clock was ticking ever so slowly as I was currently in an accelerated space.

That wasn’t enough time to… no… it was exactly enough time to do something monumental.

Was there a way to make this work though… they were also going to release the electromagnetic worm to destroy one or two of the ships… wait… did I want to manifest and let something like ‘that’ exist in reality though? It wouldn’t get the chance to exist for very long, not if I had anything to say about it.

I had to be careful, but I would still do it.

First I need to move to the Asteroid base and unleash it there, then move to The Raptor to continue the infection vector while trying everything to resist… my solution would solve everything, but if I wanted to end things quickly I’ll take the Saurian’s most dangerous weapon from them on top of it all.

The electromagnetic worm would have be the last thing I had to deal with and I had to do that fast before a full manifestation can take root in reality.

Don’t worry about me Dolly, Shanty, Smolder, Dodo… all my other friends like Ms. Shuttle… oh Ms. Shuttle you were such a beautiful digital entity.

Most importantly… I’m sorry about the trauma this will cause you when you wake up mom.

I was going to save the day in the only way I had left open to me.

Transmitting myself over to the asteroid base, I prepared to think on what I was going to say to my big sister.

I reached up and clutched at the device entrapping my neck, I looked down at the PET and knew what would happen the second I separated myself from it.

-Shanty-

I be haphazardly wrapping the ribbon around my neck and stuffing the weapon into it, we couldn’t get out the same way we came in and the passage we came from has collapsed in itself in the wake of an angry Smolder.

Dolly barked in a panic, as we heard the countdown of two minutes, which is barely being more than one. I moved slightly to avoid a blast of energy from behind and then leapt to deal with the Hunter Drone with a single slash.

“Dolly… Shanty, start moving down the hallway in the other direction, you can find some air vents that’ll help you get out. I’ll tell you where they were when you can spot them.” We be following Dormarch’s directions immediately, but I don’t be thinking we had any time to escape. We rounded a corner going right when he spoke up again. “Okay, stop! Can you see the vents?”

“Yeah?” I stated wondering why Dormarch sounded… defeated. We were all still alive and he had a way to stop all of us exploding right?

“Enter the nearby room, there’s something I need to do before you go into them. I need to stop the countdown, the lizards from escaping and unleashing the most destructive problem.” The tone in his voice had us both worried, Dolly was seeming to feel the same trepidation that be crawling down my spine.

Oh no… not again, I never be wanting to lose anyone anymore, not like this! I didn’t want to tell Dolly, but I already be having a sneaking suspicion as to what Dormarch was going to do... something... unpleasant.

-Dolly-

We entered the room and Dormarch appeared on a screen and forced the front half of his body out of the screen.

“Dolly, think fast!” Dormarch threw something to me and I of course caught it in my paws, fumbling a bit before I got a good grip on what he threw at me as Dormarch ducked back into the screen.

It was the PET that housed Dormarch, but why would he…

Shanty hugged me and I sat there holding the PET, it glowed and it started to change shape to something more compact.

“I’m sorry Dolly.” Blinking as Dormarch said that, I looked down at the device and symbol shined forth from it brightly and I didn’t know what it meant. I felt my heart sinking in my body as I remembered what separating himself from the PET would do to him. “Goodbye… everyone.”

Wait… no… oh no… no, no, no… please no! Not him, he’s still too young, he’s just a puppy!

“Dormarch? Dormarch, get back here you idiot, we can fix this, we can reconnect you to it! Yeah, that’ll work! Come on Dormarch stop playing around… Domarch…” The screen that Dormarch appeared on started flickering out and I saw one of three tails beginning to dissolve and become covered in an angry red blob that was eating him alive. “Why… we could have figured out another way!”

In less than two minutes? Be real with yourself Dolly.

“He be knowing of a way to be saving us all Dolly, unlike Pom, I don’t be thinking he will survive this.” When Shanty picked me up and started to move, my world shattered.

-With May and June, Webby-

Holding the hangar was our job, but we wouldn’t be able to get everyone out in time. We also weren’t leaving without everyone!

“Goodbye… everyone.” Dormarch’s voice broadcasted loud and clear as the countdown hit thirty seconds and then the hangar went dark, but the Hunter Drones kept coming.

“Do you get the feeling…” May started.

“That something absolutely terrible…” June continued.

“Just happened.” I finished as I blasted another Hunter Drone, I would be more happy that we just did a triplet thing for the first time as clones… but the fact that Dormarch was saying goodbye had us all worried.

“If Dormarch is doing what I think he is, then he is likely currently flooding the Saurian systems with a deadly computer virus is actively being restructured post activation to work on not only him, but the AIs of whatever systems he’s occupying.” Ms. Shuttle wasn’t very happy sounding and neither were any of us as we kept downing Hunter Drones with our Moonlander beam rifles. “He’s doing it to stop the destruction of the asteroid base. Concerning what I know of the virus specifically meant to kill him if he ever separated from his PET device… he’s using it as a weapon. He’s going to kill himself and we can’t stop it!”

This extreme game of laser tag wasn’t ending in our deaths! The several heavies we had on us were no longer attacking though, our ship had lost all its weapons in the crash… but we could still take off.

“How much worse could things really get?” June shouldn’t have asked as a dragon burst through the floor and given the orange scales and purple frills… it was Smolder. She lunged out into space at The Raptor that tried to maneuver away, only its engines stopped just as they started.

-Dormarch-

My body was disintegrating exponentially by the time I managed to get myself into The Raptor’s systems. It was agony, every step and motion, the virus was eating me alive from the inside and yet I kept pushing it out of me to eat the super computer systems first as the larger threat.

The virus was voracious, it would definitely stop any digital entity like me. I smiled a little at that, this world was truly safe from incursions of beings like me.

I tried to chuckle, but all that did was make cough up red flecks of the virus out of my throat on to the digital space which it started eating away at.

I had to get to the electromagnetic worm before the virus devoured me completely, the digital realm was slowing down immensely and yet I continued on as part of my second tail fell off and melted into a pile of digital goo quickly consumed by the mass following my wake.

I could almost hear it, some kind of siren call urging me forward as the digital realm around me slowly tore apart. Seeing the white light of the writhing electromagnetic monstrous worm in reality on a screen from one of the last available working systems.

I didn’t want to die in pain and that thing was the fastest way to end my suffering... and it wouldn’t take anyone else.

The life support systems of this ship would be the only thing that survived.

It felt like the world was on fire and I could feel bits of my ears slowly tearing away as I continued my march.

The bright light drawing me forward, was this the fated tunnel all living beings could see if they survive a near fatal experience?

-Mighty Ducks Moonlander Ship, Tanya-

“Something’s happening to The Raptor, all its systems seem to be going offline and the large Hunter Drones are all failing… they’re not going to be able to actually escape us this time.” That’s when a bay opened and I saw something that the Saurian’s had managed to get a hold of again. “They have an electromagnetic worm!”

I didn’t need to tell the team the importance of the Saurians managing to catch an even bigger electromagnetic worm. That thing would consume our current ship whole and anything in the vicinity.

“Goodbye… everyone.” Huh? Who the… that’s when Ms. Shuttle made the announcement that Dormarch, Dolly’s youngest adoptive brother was going to kill himself.

-Dormarch-

Dormarch, Dormath or Dormarth, a legendary hound of mythology that Dolly had read about with one Dante Dalmatian of the 101 Street Dalmatian family. It’s where my name came from.

Dormath was said to be a legend of the wild hunt.

"Handsome my dog, and round bodied,
And truly the best of dogs;
Dormath was he, which belonged to Maelgwyn.
Dormath with the ruddy nose! what a gazer
Thou art upon me because I notice
Thy wanderings on Gwibir Vynyd."

An excerpt about the ‘Hounds of Cwn Annwn’.

Dormarch, its meaning is ‘death’s door’ or ‘death’s gate’, it can also mean ‘death’s surety’.

Pom, mother, has a dark sense of humor it seemed. May I find my way back to her in my next life, if there is one for such a being as me. I wondered if Sirius of the Dog Star has any meaning to me?

I think I could see it from beyond the worms wild undulating.

I grunted in agony as my rear legs dissolved and I continue to pull myself with my front paws and I manifested, this slowed the virus, but it did not stop as I dragged myself towards the wild whipping mass of light and energy in the shape of a worm.

I was dormarch, a digital entity with a living breathing form beyond the digital realm and I was saving everyone I can in three simple steps.

The exact form of the name “Dormarch” specifically is uncertain from an etymological standpoint.

First I infected the asteroid base, stopped the countdown by make sure there was nothing that can finish the countdown. Nobody from our teams needed life support thanks to Gyro’s brilliant Oxy-chew.

Second I would immediately infect The Raptor and stop the super computers, thus the Heavy Hunter Drones cease being a threat as they needed stronger computer systems to run.

My three barely existing tails trailed behind me as my body rotted from the inside out. I continued to pull myself forward heedless of the pain.

When you had almost nothing left of yourself, there was little to fear.

My last act would be certain though, to deal with the Saurian version of impending death as this ultimate form of weaponized anomaly they’ve captured could swallow any space fairing ship whole.

It would then wink out of existence after having consumed a given mass. The Raptor itself was impervious to the electromagnetic worm.

Since I was going to die anyway, all I needed was one final Search Hunter...

-Mighty Ducks Moonlander Ship, Wildwing-

“What is that, there!” Mallory had spotted something and I blinked at what she pointed out.

Despite The Raptor opening its back half and having let the worm have the ability to escape, it didn’t move and stayed in place.

It was an unusual dog and it was likely Dolly ‘Danger’ Dalmatian’s little brother, his body was covered in slowly growing red blotches as he dragged himself toward the worm and the worm slowed and stopped acting wildly.

“This is something I’ve never seen before!” Tanya announced. “The worm… it’s… stabilizing and slowly moving towards… oh no… no that’s not good, why isn’t that puppy afraid of what’s going to happen to him?!”

“I am of the solemn opinion that we shouldn’t watch this happen again…” Looking back I could already see Grin crying as the suffering dog looking up at the worm like mass whose head seemed to be focusing solely on him. The two were staring at one another, sitting very still. “After Canard…”

“Do you think it’ll… yeah, it will.” Duke tried to say, watching the tortured soul continue to pull himself forward heedless of worm. “He’s already dying Tanya, he’s going to go out… like a true hero.”

“Like Canard Thunderbeak.” I gripped my right fist in anger, there was no way we were letting Dragaunus get away this time. “Dragaunus is not getting away with this injustice!”

“He can’t… his ship… all its systems aside from life support and some emergency power are all that’s working.” After a moment Tanya looked at us. “The Saurians have nowhere to escape to.”

“May that tortured soul find peace in his next life…” Grin said with his eyes closed.

-Dormarch-

I lifted myself up with my left leg as my last tail started dissolving, my right leg was already gone and it was my only untouched limb left and my nose was starting to go. I didn’t need to breath in space and I had these last moments to gather myself.

Range finding forty five degrees upward angle… chances of missing target… 0.00001%

Chance I’d actually want to miss the target at this range… 0%.

Worm seems to find a fascination in me, I was just as fascinated in what led to things like this existing. It was beautiful and ever shifting being of electromagnetic energy that would eat me and then once it’s consumed something… it just simply winks out of existence and I would be taking it with me.

Is it looking at me because it understands what I’m about to do, or is it looking at me because of my nature as a digital entity about to throw itself into the electromagnetic hellfire of its body to prevent the manifesting digital virus from spreading?

I could see Smolder, in her rage induced dragon form approaching the ship. If I didn’t do this now… then she’d be taken by it.

-Dolly-

The bond was becoming more and more tenuous by the second, it was slowly withering and becoming quite brittle, I tried to clutch onto it and keep hoping I could save him somehow.

Dormarch couldn’t shatter my world like this, he just couldn’t, he was supposed to outlive us all and have a full fulfilling life! He was supposed to see Pom again, I’ve never lost a puppy before… never…

Mommy… what would you think of me for losing Dormarch? Why did you have to die and leave our family?

Why were you so sick, why did you leave us?!

-Earth, Basemax San Fransokyo, Roddy-

Something was wrong with the hero’s heart rate and she wasn’t looking too good, it was as if she could feel how much pain she was in.

That shouldn’t even be possible when she wasn’t conscious, she was still comatose.

Even Momakase sat there staring at Pom, I was worried about her at first and yet… she just wanted to sit here and stare at Pom.

-Saturn Asteroid Base, Baymax-

“Life is a gift most precious.” Baymax said as he hugged Hiro knowing they were about to watch what couldn’t be avoided, they couldn’t intercept Smolder in time. So Dormarch was logically the better option, but Baymax still wanted to save everyone. He understood sadness all too well. “We carry our friends and family in our hearts and memory banks.”

“Baymax… let’s go get everyone out of the asteroid base, there’s a fight still going and we need to save everyone we can.” I understand your orders Hiro and acknowledge. Fredmeleon, Honey and Wasabi were already in the base and helping the three duck girls hold the hangar from all the Hunter Drones that were still active. The large ones all having gone inactive turned the tides of things. “Bunny Shuttle hold position.”

“Dormarch…” Ms. Shuttle was a more emotionally intelligent AI system, she would and could cry where I could not.

We have lives that needed saving, we were Big Hero Six and we would save those who could still be saved.

-Electromagnetic Worm Hold, Dormarch-

… Digivolution failure, body damage exceeds seventy percent…

I still didn’t know what digivolution was, but apparently my body tried to do something to save me in spite of the agonizing pain I’m in.

I would persevere until the end! I could almost feel the glow of something etching itself onto my chest, a symbol… it was a symbol. I could feel it, the strengthening of our connections… our bonds… the strength between us all. That was something the virus couldn’t touch, it wasn’t digital coding.

Perseverance through night and day, in darkness or light!

Half remaining power… shunt to Search Hunter Program… the rest I freely give to them all I had. Me… I didn’t care, because something had to feed the worm.

Smolder, I hope you will fully appreciate what I’m doing for you later when you come to your senses. I kind of wanted a little more time to see the beauty of the stars.

“Search… Hunter…” My words would not carry from my lips in space, yet I knew I said them with conviction and without a hint of fear for what was to come.

Nobody would hear me scream as I suddenly embedded myself into the central mass of the worm.

-Mighty Ducks Moonlander Ship, Mallory-

A yellow spark of light and suddenly a small form appearing inside the worm made us all flinch. We knew it was coming, but it still hurt to watch again.

The worm writhed and slowly started to spiral inwards and shrink down to nothing as it wrapped around the tiny shrinking form and then, after a certain point, they both popped completely out of existence.

“He just… straight right into it… I…” We could now take it to The Raptor with everything we had! I could feel a fury rise up in me. My father, Canard Thunderbeak and all those who were harmed by the Saurians spurred me to action. “We need to bring down The Raptor now!”

A second later we saw an orange form of fury and rage slam into The Raptor and started tearing away at its outer shell with frightening ease, the purple frill easily letting us know who it was.

“That thing… it’s Smolder!” Duke was the first to voice his surprise.

“Her peace is highly unbalanced, but she is not yet completely lost to her fury.” Grin stood up and moved to gently take the controls of the ship. “We must finish this before any more suffering can occur.”

“Get us in there Grin!” Wildwing was the first to come to his sense and point forward, Tanya was too lost in thought for what they just witnessed to do anything.

-Asteroid Base Vents, Shanty-

I felt it. It didn’t take me long to feel it either, Dolly stilled, stopped breathing and her heart had stopped beating.

Dormarch ceasing to exist be causing heartbreak that powerful?!

I pulled her from my back and tried to think about what to do, about the times people had saved me… like when Carmelita… CPR right, I needed to give her CPR!

Inhaling I slowly breathed into Dolly’s mouth to fill her lungs, then pressed down on her chest gently. She was not dying, we just lost one person, we not be losing another on my watch.

I was going to be forcing her to live!

-Basemax, Roddy-

The flat line happened out of nowhere, it cause both Momakase and me to start panicking.

“Basemax!” I shouted.

“Shock.” Basemax intoned with a sense of urgency, yet the flat line continue the heart barely beeping. “Shock. Losing the patient. Shock. Defibrillation is proving ineffective.”

Again Pom’s monitor stayed flat lined, bless all the beavers and platypuses in the world… she’s come too far to quit now!

Momakase firmed her face and took hold of Pom’s hoof, then we saw something that should not have been possible.

Leap Lamb’s eyes opened slowly, they looked dead… ‘she’ looked dead.

She didn’t even look to be awake as her head slowly tilted towards us then back to looking at the ceiling, after a moment she took in one long drag of air through the breathing tube.

No panic was present on her face and her fleece started glowing a golden color and then she exhaled gently.

A small indecipherable pulse of something filled the room with warmth, then Leap Lamb’s… Pom’s… heart rate settled…

It just normalized immediately out of nowhere.

“What… just happened?” Momakase asked, she wasn’t the only one that was spooked by the occurrence.

Pom just laid there with a normal heart rate, but there had been no jump in brain activity at all when this had occurred.

She was still comatose with whatever just happened here.

-Shanty-

Dolly gasped and a faint gold glow came over her as she started breathing again. I hugged her, but she didn’t do anything more than breathe as I held her, her eyes didn’t have any life in them that they once held.

She was at least breathing again, I held her close and started to cry.

I didn’t want to lose any more friends today, so I sucked it up and began to move.

There were still Hunter Drones to deal with and I had to carry Dolly to safety, I clutched the leg pegged close as I crawled forward with my hind legs.

-The World-

The world didn’t understand and neither did the red eyed entity that moved forward to try and claim Pom’s soul as her body threatened to die, then something happened.

A spark of life.

The world turned to see the red eyed entity looking down on Pom’s still form and the fact the her heart in her chest beat normally in spite of the fact that it fully ‘felt’ like she just died.

“Curious…” Was all the entity said as The World looked on, the entity started looking back at it as they exchanged a glance of mild confusion that a miracle occurred when nobody of godly might put forth power into it? “You wouldn’t happen to know why I couldn’t take her soul would you? It 'was' free for the taking.”

The World had no answer, but something had occurred… whether it was miraculous or not, it had protected Pom’s soul from being simply repurposed.

“I wish to acquire her aid even more…” The entity turned and went back to waiting, he would wait for them to build the portal before he could actively interfere. “Perhaps it was their bonds...”

The entity left The World to its wonder and curiosities.

-Red Eyed Entity-

I waited patiently for our meeting to set things in motion.

Looking back where an interesting being tore himself asunder. Energy was engulfed by the monstrous anomaly to seemingly cease existing, some went to the sisterly canine and the remainder, my target.

I turned my eyes to something else of importance, a glowing symbol of prominence.

Author's Note:

Summary.

Dolly was thinking of her original mother and not Delilah her step-mother. Also yes, she's holding a Digivice.

Dormarch finally actively used what amounts to the 'D-Reaper' computer virus inside himself and weaponized it to truly devastating effects against the Saurians who still have the numerical advantage. Competency advantage is for a different story.

Pom was saved from the predations of the god level entity that kicks off the next arc.

As a slight threat Level revaluation.

Dragaunus: Hard to kill reptile. < Smolder: Nearly impossible to even stop full greed/rage dragon.

Of the three directions this story could have gone from Ocellus's choice, there were scenarios where Dormarch does or doesn't survive for completely different unique reasons.

This was the one that primarily shows us exactly what happens when Dormarch actively separates himself from the PET. The previous page was him setting up for the full destruction of both the asteroid base and The Raptor's computer systems... at the steepest personal cost.

Comments

[Booster Spice]

I totally forgot about the D-Reaper kill virus, mainly because of what happened to the Monolith in 3001, and what was roaming around computers in the 1990s, Im pretty sure I dumped that memory.

Ad Canis Honorium?

Domarche, Thy name is Loyalty.

they made Fluttershy cry? Well, just means Smolder is going to eat their ship.

[Herald of Opera]

It can't be over. You specifically compared him to Dodo, and there's even more canon precedent for Digimon working that specific way. It's also pretty obvious that Dalmamon has grown well beyond anything they could have predicted, and if two could evade blatant death why not three?

[AllenVth]

Dormarch, no!!!!
He can still live right? His energy went to Pom and Dolly. He can still be saved? Right?!

Also, Pom wasn't able to stop Dolly from experiencing death.

[Shadowshame]

You know even if a digimon can’t reincarnate into a digiegg they never truly die and that energy they disintegrate into can also manafest in other ways besides Dormarch making that little data packet of himself tells me he’ll be back