Remember me, remember you, I do...

[Observer]

A week has passed since that fateful day, when Larry found out about what was pulled off behind his back. He was raging, he was furious, he was angry, and he was ... scared of what might have happened if his superiors find out. It would mean the end, for him, for digimon, for his group. The end of everything. And it was all because of Renee. Why didn't she tell him in the first place? He didn't know, but something was needed to be done, and fast...

Renee remembered that day as if it happened yesterday, but a week is not that much of a time to forget... She would be happy to forget though, but she couldn't. She remembered her commanders hairs turning gray, every single one of them, despite the fact he was so young. He was afraid. Very afraid. And there was nothing she could do - all of this was because of her. He muttered something about her endangering all of them, and herself, saying she'd be dead if THEY find out. And then he said that THEY will fnd out eventually, and then ... a proposition came. A way to escape all this, to save herself, and the others...

Renee kept strolling across the dark city. She wasn't going to the safe house, no, way there was now forbidden for her. But there was another place... Before leaving, Larry told her what really happened to wizardmon, her lost friend. She did not believe it at first, but then ... Now she was going there, to make sure...

There it was, the house, only a few blocks away from the place where the encounter with fangmon was marked... Larry gave her the coordinates, the only thing she had to do now was to find the apartment, the window. Getting up was not a problem, not to her... A soft knock at the window followed, but there was no one there. Seemingly. All she needed was an opening, to get in...

[Mistral]

"zzz ... zz ... aww ... it's too early ...."

Half asleep, Mirel moved next to the window leading to the balcony and opened it.

"Hmm .... just a silver humanoid fox ...."

She looked inside her wardrobe and found the lunamon peacefully sleeping on an improvised bed made within the wardrobe just in case somebody arrived while they were sleeping.

"Miiir, one of your friends is here ... zz ... here"

She pushed and moved the lunamon until he woke up and then she returned to her bed to continue sleeping. The lunamon was kinda tired after having spent most of his day babysitting the human and trying to save lost digimon who happened to appear within the area. Oh, and he also delivered his custom map off-screen along one of the digimon he saved and not only that, he also sent to the bar a letter saying that he was still alive, but due unexpected circumstances he wasn't going to be able to go to the bar for a long time, surely anyone who visited the bar by now knew about that.

"Could it be her?"

The now awakened lunamon went towards the window and looked through it and indeed, there was one silver renamon nearby, although she was knocking the wrong windows, precisely knocking at the window of the bedroom where Mistral's parents slept. Fortunately for them, they were as usual away due business and no one was inside.

"Come here, that is the wrong room"

He called at the silver renamon and wondered what brought her to this place, probably not a fight because his partner while close minded at least knew about his priorities and neither was he a danger for his organization. He guessed that most likely she simply wanted to talk with him, having realized about his real identity.

"Are you feeling well, miss? I assume you already discovered who I am given how much information your partner has access to"

[Observer]

- Yeah, I recognize the speech pattern. It really is you. I believed you to be dead. - the renamon sighed out, after being allowed inside. It was indeed a big relief, so all this was worth something, she was not simply following a false lead. Unfortunately, the price for knowing the truth ended up far too high. She was amazed he'd even want to talk to her, now that her secret was compromised. But oh well.

The kid was sleeping, which was good, they did not need any of her tantrums to interrupt. And indeed, Renee had much to say. She didn't even know where to start, so many things happened. A part of her was happy to know her friend was alive, and the other wanted to beat the living hell out of him for making all this happen. But one thing at a time...

- I warned you to stay away from the city at night, didn't I? I did. And you did not listen. Why? Look what happened to you... - she said, shaking her head and face-palming. Indeed, all of this would have been avoided if he had just listened to her advice. But you can't turn back time to fix everything, can you?

- I looked for you after you disappeared. I made inquiries in the bar, I searched the city, I hacked into Hypnos database, all this to find you. And now I found you, you bastard. You're here. Couldn't you have sent at least some sort of a sign you were alive sooner? I almost gone nuts... And set off a pattern of events I can no longer control... - the last sentence was more of a suffocated hysterical chuckle - she did not want to be noisy. She turned away, facing the window, and the dim light of the moon that came through t, reflecting at her silvery fur. She really chose her words carefully, not wishing to yell she was worried sick and that she underwent on a roaring rampage of revenge for him. Not yet however.

- I'm surprised you even allowed me to enter, given the fact you now know who I really worked for... And that pretty much everything I said was a big lie. I imagine some explanations are in order. If you have questions, any questions at all - ask. I will not tell a lie. Pointless now, they are... - she sighed out sadly, still looking out of the window. There, somewhere, there was their safehouse, the team she left, all of the smaller things in life she appreciated... Her ... home. She did not have it now. Not anymore...

[Mistral]

The silver renamon indeed recognized him and realized that the lunamon once was the wizard she met in the bar. Under other circumstances it would've been an emotive and heartwarming event, but after all that was revealed a week ago, things weren't as nice as they could've been.

"I knew about the dangers of the night, but I still had to leave. At exchange for my previous life I managed to save a small biyomon from dying, and that alone made my sacrifice worth it."

He wondered what happened to the biyomon he saved before and hoped that she somehow managed to reach the numemon bar or found a tamer to take care of her. She simply couldn't have died, she was too young and full of life to die after being rescued. The renamon continued criticizing him for what he did as he wondered about the biyomon.

"I sent my custom map and a letter telling everybody in the numemon bar that I was alive around nine days ago. I could've done it earlier, but I had to carefully choose what to say first and needed some time of my own to adapt to this new lifestyle, after all I simply can't tell them yet that I found a partner and reverted to rookie, also I need to take care of my partner, owe her my life for saving me from deletion."

He looked at the sleeping Mistral and despite what one would think, he actually got attached to her despite all her insanity and lack of common sense, she was too innocent, naive and could get herself killed if nobody was near to prevent her from commuting mistakes that cannot be undone. The lunamon simply decided to help her until she recovered her sanity as a payment for her saving him from deletion.

As for why he let the renamon enter in the house despite all that he knew about her now, the lunamon strongly believed that everybody deserved a second chance, and the silver fox actually seemed to be a nice digimon deep down, and as he said a week ago to her partner, it was their duty to do what their superiors ordered them to do.

"Everybody deserves a second chance and be forgiven if they realize about their errors, I know that both you and your partner had reasons to try to infiltrate in the numemon bar and deceive everybody, and despite all the lies, I'm sure that between all those lies some truth existed, after all you are not a mindless digimon but a silver renamon who should feel proud for having tried to do the right thing."

The proof of the silver renamon's true good nature was in the fact that despite the lies, she actually helped the numemon bar by bringing good, and that she cared enough for the wizardmon to even do things behind her very allies.

"We all commit mistakes once a while, but as long we learn from them we can always improve. I never expected that for me you would get into problems with your own partner and companions and I apologize and regret for causing you pain ... but if there's something I do not regret is the act of having met you. It is bad to lose the ones you love, but it even worse to close your heart and refuse to find new people to care for only to avoid reliving the pain again. Since gatomon's death I refused to find new friends and as much have acquaintances to be in good terms with, but the few encounters we had and your devotion to your task with me made me consider you .. a friend"

He then touched the silver renamon's right hand and looked firmly at her eyes, even the one with the eyepatch.

"I cannot ask you to forgive me, because I too caused you needless problems, so all I can do is to beg you to change the methods you and your partner uses against other digimon. Some cannot be saved, but many of them deserve to live and killing them would bring sorrow to those who cared for them just like the sorrow you felt when I disappeared"

[Observer]

Renee smirked when she heard words of forgiveness from the lunamon. She was not used to such acceptance - he had all the right to be angry at her, she did leave him in lies all that time, fooled, deceived. And yet he wasn't. Why? Because of that foolish creed again? She shook her head. Even after all this time, she still did not understand.

- Don't waste words of goodness honor and whatever on me, Lun. I know myself better than you do... We located the bar quite some time ago - it happened to be located in a blind spot of Hypnos radar they use to track digimon. Initially I was supposed to go inside and get a summary of how many troops are required to purge the place clean... But then they changed the directive, considering it would be more fruitful to leave the place intact, just under supervision, in order to get possible information on more hostile groups of digimon. I were to infiltrate the place for this reason. - she said and made a pause in order for the lunamon to process the information. She said she won't lie - she didn't. And she would show there was little noble in her this whole time. The fox didn't looked at the smaller digimon, avoided eye contact, and just stared in the window, and talked. It was a confession, of sorts.

- The additional supplies I brought around though, weren't ... part of the plan. Everything would have been kept a secret, but during my incursions I was not careful, so they started digging... And the whole chain was made obvious... In Hypnos sympathizing the enemy is treason. Something they did not expect ... from their own creation... - she said and suddenly stopped, not sure if any more details on this should be given...

[Mistral]

"If the organization hoped to find any information about hostile digimon in the bar, it was a waste of time. As you know already, pretty much everybody there was merely a refugee simply trying to continue living on in this foreign world. It would've been some extremely coward and dirty even for such organization to attempt to destroy a place where only civilians lived"

The way humans thought about digimon was twisted and sick, did they really think that all of them were nothing but creatures born only to battle? It is true that many of them were more than capable of totaling a small building without effort, but the same could be said about humans who could destroy entire cities with just a single bomb born from their technology. Many digimon regardless of their power were just civilians who kept themselves away from battles and killing them would be a war crime.

To make things worse, according to the silver renamon's words, this organization which now she referred with the name of "hypnos" indeed considered ALL the digimon regardless if they were good or bad as enemies to be destroyed and "hypnos" showed no mercy nor trust not even to their own agents, digging for secrets they might conceal and monitoring all their activities. Just exactly what was this "hypnos" and why it is so hell bent in destroying digimon that would even kill its own agents both human and digimon for the great "sin" of befriending digimon that weren't part of their special forces?

"That organization, Hypnos, is terrible ... the methods they use are not unlike the ones used by whoever was the tyrant who ordered the destruction of my hometown back in the digital world."

He already said before, both humans and digimon alike were capable of great evil and the enigmatic army who killed all his friends could easily be compared with this Hypnos organization. Now he knew he did the right thing when he rebelled against them, because a lifetime of slavery and cruel usage as tools was far worse than dying for their freedom. In that very moment the lunamon felt he was free from one of the burdens he always carried on his shoulders.

"Leave Hypnos and find a new home, you deserve a better life than the one they impose on you. Fight for your freedom and do what you truly want to no, not what your superiors tells you to do. It is better to die fighting for what you truly believe than to live as an unhappy slave. If the man you call Larry truly cares for you, he will let you make your own choice, and he too shall follow a path he choose by himself."

[Observer]

- Leave Larry out of this. - a rather sharp reply and a glare were sent after Renee heard a remark about former ... no, not former, current tamer. Her reaction mirrored the one young man had when Lunamon asked him about her, perfectly. She figured the two weren't on good terms, but she was not going to allow one to talk bad about another when said one wasn't around to defend himself. - He's a much better person most give him credit for... - she sighed out. And indeed, Lunamon did not know the whole story, not even a small part of it. Leave the organization, die for freedom - much easier said then done.

- As for Hypnos ... I kinda already did... The whole collaboration stuff, supplies, information, hacking into database... Commander Laurence found out... - she made a pause, the events of that day coming in front of her eyes. - It was horrible ... I did not think a man could lose 20 years of life in a matter of moments. It appeared that my actions, unintentionally, put the whole digiops group in risk. If the high-ups would have found out about my infractions, the group would have been disbanded, and us clones - undergone complete behavioral reconfiguration, and a memory wipe. Or deleted. And there was only one way out of this... - grim silence was held for a few moments.

- Larry and I faked my deletion during a mission, so now in all Hypnos databases I am marked as "lost in service", while in reality, I'm here... - she explained the situation. They did agree with Larry that they will still fight for the common goal, together, like before, but she had to remain hidden from Hypnos's all-seeing eye. It was a necessity, to save both her and the group. And there was no other way.

She barely held another chuckle when she was called an unhappy slave. Well, the lunamon didn't say that directly, but he heavily implied that. No, she was not a slave. Or maybe she was. The meaning of the word was vague - Hypnos did install many behavioral patterns that actually made her want to do what they wanted. Was it considered slavery? Mayhaps, but there was more to it than simple coding...

- And no Lun, I am not an unhappy slave, I don't think I ever was. Everything I did I did willingly, was not forced. I follow my commander because of genuine respect towards him, and I fought spawns that came here to destroy things with genuine hatred I felt for them. I was made here, this is my home. As flawed as it is, but still my home. And I will kill anyone who will try wrecking it...

[Mistral]

"Larry ... maybe I misjudged him, beyond his professional cold exterior he must have some deeper thoughts and feelings. He really cares for you more than I thought, maybe he sees in you more than just a partner, he must see you as an important friend and part of his family, like a sister"

There were many ways to show appreciation and love for other living beings, and from what the silver renamon said, it was more than obvious than Larry was sick worried about the vixen's fate and went as far as faking her death to make sure no harm fell on her.

He continued listening to her words and found rather interesting that she referred to herself and the other digimon working for Hypnos as "clones", so she really was a clone after all, and the mental conditioning and brainwashing that served as punishment for the rebellious digimon further lowered the lunamon's opinion regarding hypnos, not only they played to be gods and created their own digimon, they also manipulated them into believing what they believed, into hating what they hated, and more importantly, made them to be completely obedient to their tamers. However, it seemed like they failed to realize that free will cannot be completely erased, and the silver renamon was proof that even brainwashed clones can find their own path in life.

"It doesn't matter if you were artificially created or if all your believed were fake memories and personality programmed within you by Hypnos, you are you and if you really think you were happy working with Larry, is because you and him are destined to be together even if both of you need to physically separate for now, that is real and no brainwashing can remove your memories of the time you spent with him. Your hatred might be misguided, but everything else was real."

He reminded about the old digital world, his true home, and wished he could someday return there to stop whoever was interrupting the hard earned peace obtained after the great battle against the D-reaper and understood well the silver renamon's feelings, the human world was her home, and his home was the digital world.

"Just like you consider the human world as your home, I consider mine to be the digital world and someday I want to return there. I have my own battle to fight there and this time I will no longer hesitate to use anything, even violence, against those who defiled my home and disrupted the peace of the digital world"

[Observer]

- I don't know if he views me as that... I really don't. Never asked, or had any idea... - she shrugged. - All I know his own family is in a far away country. Rarely spoke about it. If not, at all... - she added. There wasn't really much to say. She did not like talking about relationship with her tamer, at all actually. It always felt a bit awkward, something was always telling it shouldn't be that way. Why? Who knows, go figure.

And then came words about being a clone and all. Renee didn't even notice she mentioned it a couple of times, and now she actually regretted she did. The clone issue again. Everybody who found out about this started acting ... differently around her. Declaring memories and feelings fake, even if they were programmed. Is a child also "programmed", when raised? Or what is the difference?

- Let's forget I called myself a clone for a while, alright? - she half-pleaded. It was still a rather touchy subject. She had already too many things to deal with at the time to think about being that and the fact that the superior original was still running around somewhere. - Hnh, I think I'm getting whiny again. Why every time around you I feel the unexplainable urge to indulge in self-pity? - the fox sounded ironic, to herself. No, really, every time they got around she insisted on spewing all that trash on him. Now she felt guilty for doing so.

- That should not be happening. Maybe you could tell me what kind of misfortune fell upon your home? You mentioned some tyrant... - she said, obviously trying to change the subject...

[Mistral]

It seemed like the lunamon touched some themes that were better left aside given the reaction of the silver renamon, so he did and insisted no longer with talking about Larry or about clones. He was thinking about what to talk about to pass time, but the fox digimon went ahead and requested to hear about the tyrant he mentioned before.

"I know not the identity of the warmonger who ordered the destruction of my town, but I know for sure that whoever he is, must be ruthless like no other ever was; the squadron sent to capture the town spared no one and even newborn digimon were slain while still unhatched digi-eggs were captured to most likely use them as future troops."

Being created in the human world, there was no way the silver renamon knew about the current affairs of the digital world. It used to be such a peaceful world, but now it was engulfed by the flames of war. The lunamon wondered how those who were left behind fared while he way away in the human world and was determined to find a way to return to his homeland and defeat the perpetrator of such atrocities.

"I already mentioned it before what happened after their attack, I spearheaded a rebellion against the invader but in the middle of our greatest battle I was summoned to the human world. I know that such phenomena saved me from death in the battlefield, but it still hurts to know that I could've done more for the people who depended of me"