Chapter 42:
Corporate Trap
At 10 am sharp the next morning, the kids arrived in front of ITI’s main headquarters, with Takashi and Kyoko at the head of the group. The Digimon were nowhere to be seen.
“Everyone ready?” Takashi asked.
“Ready!”
“Then let’s get this over with,” Kyoko said with an aggrieved sigh.
They entered the building, and Takashi approached the front desk to register them and ask permission to access the higher floors.
As the group walked around the building lobby, pretending to be excited at the displays, Akira glanced around. If she looked just beyond the corner of her eye, she could see a faint shimmering spot beside her.
“You okay, Kodamon?” she whispered.
“Yeah,” the shimmering spot whispered back.
“Okay, remember, stay quiet and keep on walking! And don’t bump into anything!”
Akira looked around again, pulled out her phone, and tapped on the screen a few times. She smiled to herself, knowing that to others, she just looked like a typical girl playing on her phone.
An image of Naoko appeared on the phone.
“We’re in,” Akira murmured.
So far, so good.
According to Naoko’s plan, Takashi and Kyoko would lead the kids into the ITI building, posing as a school group, while the Digimon would be equipped with holographic emitters set to invisible. As they moved through the first floor, Souichi and Taira would enter the building. Posing as electricians, they would go to each camera and install a small wifi chip that Naoko had specially programmed in advance. Then, Nami, seated at a picnic table outside, would hack the cameras through the wifi chips and replace the videos with footage of blank hallways, leaving everyone else free to explore.
It seemed like an airtight plan.
“Much better than what we might have come up with ourselves,” Akira had said, grinning.
“Nothing less from the Digital World’s resident wizard!” Mana exclaimed.
Takashi returned from the front desk and put a hand on Akira’s shoulder, startling her out of her thoughts.
“We have our permission,” he said. He looked over at Kyoko and she nodded. As they both ushered the kids past the guards and into the elevator, he noticed the serious expression on her face.
“I’m surprised you’re going along with all this,” Takashi said.
“I’m doing it all under duress,” Kyoko said, gritting her teeth. “When all your crazy games are over, I want you all out.”
As the group entered the second floor, Takashi put a hand up to his ear and listened for a moment through his earbuds. He nodded, then looked over at everyone. “Okay, cameras are ready. We can drop the holographics now.”
The hallway suddenly shimmered, and seven Digimon suddenly appeared, while Renamon emerged from the air on her own.
“Remember, guys,” Takashi continued, “we only have an hour. Any longer, and someone might catch on to the camera hack and call in security!”
“Research and Development is on Floors 2 and 3,” Ryou said quickly, “And Special Projects is on the fourth floor. The CEO’s office is on the fifth floor.”
“Special Projects has the most security,” Rion added, “Only Dad and the head scientists are allowed in there!”
“Then that’s where we’ll need to go,” Naoko’s voice chimed in from Akira’s phone.
“That’ll be difficult,” Ryou said, scratching his head. “The doors unlock with biometrics – eye pattern, fingerprint, facial recognition – that sort of thing.”
“Then we’ll just have to hack the doors!” Yuu spoke up, a feral smile appearing on his face. “Let’s go! Let me at ‘em!”
“A little overeager, isn’t he?” Mana whispered, as they made their way toward the fourth floor.
“Don’t mind him,” Cai-lin answered, “He’s finally feeling useful.”
When they reached the fourth floor, they were confronted with a sealed security door, equipped with a camera at eye-level, a palm-sized pad, and an immaculate-looking keypad.
“So where do we start?” Akira asked.
“We’d have to find a backdoor password,” Jun answered, “And before that, we’d need to hack the firewall…”
“Oh, yeah?” Yuu cracked his knuckles and attacked the keypad with his fingers. “Just watch the master at work – firewalls and passwords are nothing!”
Mana rolled her eyes, while Jun stared at Yuu’s hacking efforts in awe.
After a few minutes, the door beeped and slid open.
“Piece of cake!” Yuu said proudly.
They entered the door to find themselves in a massive cavern-like room crammed with machinery and computers, like a production shop floor. Cables were strewn everywhere, and cubicle walls separated parts of the room into sections like mini-laboratories.
“How can we find anything in this rat’s nest?” Mana’s voice echoed through the room.
“It’ll be faster if we split up,” Akira said, glancing around. “Kodamon and I will start on this side-”
“Terriermon and I are coming with!” Kei piped up.
“Kei-”
“Come on, Mom!”
Takashi sighed. “Kyoko, just drop it.”
The rest of the group fanned out across the room, beginning their search.
Tian and Renamon sifted through piles and piles of computer equipment with no luck. Nothing around them looked as if it were a special project. It wasn’t until Renamon pointed out the sign above them reading “Spare Parts” that Tian scowled, backed away from the equipment piles, and looked around for something else.
As Tian looked, she heard whispering from around the corner and saw Rion and Guilmon talking to an agitated Ryou. Curious, she walked toward them.
“What’s wrong?”
“We might need to check Dad’s office,” Ryou said in a strained voice. “To get the information you need. It might be faster than searching here. But…”
“You’re not feeling it,” Tian answered.
“I feel like I’m breaking his trust,” Ryou replied, frowning.
“You won’t,” Rion said, “If we get caught, I’ll just say I left my sketchbook in there and I really wanted it back!”
“Joking aside,” Tian added, “Why don’t we just go? Just the five of us. Leave the searching to me and Rion. You won’t even need to go in.”
“No,” Ryou said firmly, “I’ll search too. I need to know if Dad’s really hiding something.” He looked out at everyone else, preoccupied with searching the area. “Let’s go. Before anyone else notices.”
“Hey! I think I found something!”
Jun looked over at Mana, staring at a pile of machinery. “What?”
“Aren’t these the machines that were in Akira’s memories?” Mana asked, “The ones that erased them?”
“Projection machines!” Jun exclaimed, getting excited. “Those would be pretty useful.” He looked around, and spied a couple of small briefcases lying on a nearby worktable. He opened one of them and grinned. “Neat! Portables!” He closed the briefcase and picked both of them up.
“I thought we were looking for information!” Mana said.
“Information, equipment, it’s all the same really!” Jun replied, carrying the briefcases.
Mana sighed. “I hope we don’t get caught and get arrested for burglary or something…”
“I think it’s way too late for just that, Mana,” Salamon said softly.
“True,” Mana replied testily.
Yuka stood in front of a long worktable and picked up a small, handheld device from a nearby pile. “What are these?”
“They almost look like D-Coders,” Seita mused, “But they’re all black!”
“Code generators,” Yuka read off the screen on a nearby computer, “Whatever that means.”
“Hmm. Maybe there’s a readme file somewhere,” Seita murmured, typing a few commands. The screen refreshed, and a file named “readme.txt” appeared.
“A device designed to convert digital commands to real-world functions,” Yuka read, “best used in situations where the line between the Digital World and Real World has weakened.”
“They’re talking about the Edge!” Gazimon spoke up.
“So…” Seita’s eyebrows furrowed. “these things would act like Digivices whenever the Edge breaks down and the fog shows up!”
“Digivices for humans who don’t have one?” Lopmon asked.
“Definitely useful, then!” Gazimon said, picking up a couple of devices. “Let’s take a few of them. You never know…”
Seita nodded. He grabbed a nearby bag and stuffed them inside.
Ryou led the way to the fifth floor and the CEO’s office, where they were met with a locked security door.
“Another locked door,” Tian said.
“But this time we just need a passcode to get in,” Ryou said, “As far as I know, anyway. Dad’s never used the biometrics to get in here whenever I’ve been with him.”
“The Dragon and the Lion play together,” Rion read from the keypad’s screen. He looked up at Tian, puzzled. Tian shrugged.
Ryou sighed. “Really, Dad?” He quickly tapped on the keypad.
“You know the answer?” Tian asked.
“It’s so easy,” Ryou replied. “A play on words. Swap the ‘o’ for ‘u’ in ‘Ryou’ to get ‘Ryuu’, which is Japanese for dragon. And swapping the ‘R’ for ‘L’ in ‘Rion’ gets you ‘Lion’.”
“So the passcode is our names?” Rion asked.
In answer, the keypad beeped and the door slowly slid open.
Akira and Kodamon were fruitlessly looking through a pile of software manuals when a slight movement in the shadows caught the corner of her eye. She blinked, looking in that direction as she patted Kodamon’s shoulder to get her attention.
“Did you see that?” Akira asked.
“See what?”
“Someone else is in here with us…” Akira peered into the shadows again and saw the outline of a person dressed in white. “There it is again!” She grabbed Kodamon’s paw and pulled her along. “Come on, let’s follow them!”
“But what about Kei?”
Akira stopped, hearing Kei and Terriermon’s chatter and laughter some distance away. “Don’t worry,” Akira said reassuringly, “Terriermon’s with her, and Mom won’t let her out of her sight.” She tugged on Kodamon’s paw again. “Let’s go! What if this person saw all of us and is going to get security?”
The two of them followed the mysterious person to a shadowy corner of the shop floor, which led to a security door similar to the one Yuu had hacked through. Instead of giving a facial scan or a handprint, the man typed several lines of code on the keypad. The door beeped and slid open.
Akira and Kodamon crept closer to the man as he entered the security door and walked down an ominous empty hallway. He reached a single elevator door at the end of the hallway and pushed a button. Akira and Kodamon sneaked up closer to him and scrambled behind a corner, just in time for the man to miss seeing them when he turned his head, and giving Akira a clear view of his face.
Akira did a double take, and her eyes widened.
“Touma…?”