Well, I woulda updated this yesterday, but then my RPing buddy just HAD to make Grell from Kuroshitsuji meet Hotaru/Sailor Saturn from Sailor Moon with hilarious and cute results.

Plus this chapter was a pain in the butt to name.
As usual, drop a review if it's not too much trouble and I don't own a single thing no matter how much I'd love to.
And yes, Lec DOES get more torture, because I love making him suffer.
Lec: Thanks...
Me: You're welcome!

Chapter 18: Learning the Rules

Once the group was back on the surface, Noah made Labramon Digivolve so he and Lec could ride on Dobermon's back to shore.

"Hey, why'd we stay behind?" Kuzuhamon asked, puzzled.

Beelzemon just smirked and shifted into his Blast Mode, eyes turning a brilliant green and raven wings unfurling from his back.

"So…that was your plan all along, was it?" Kuzuha asked with a small grin on her face.

"Are you complaining?" Beelzemon asked his girlfriend.

"No, not really," she said.

Beelzemon laughed and picked her up, flying into the air and swooping over the lake. It was an almost picturesque sight, really – the Demon Lord and his girlfriend, flying and laughing in the air.

"Well, it looks like they're having fun," Noah said.

"Yeah…it does…" Lec said, looking up at them as the two were beginning to land. Unfortunately, due to the wind kicked up by the flapping of Beelzemon's wings, Kuzuhamon's skirt drifted up just enough for a certain electric Digimon to accidentally see up as he lifted his head to look at the couple. It took all his willpower not to turn beet red at the sight of it – though he did turn red a little, and earned a slight scowl from a Demon Lord once it was realized what Lec saw.

Beelzemon suddenly stopped and dropped the last couple of inches to the ground, earning a surprised yelp from Kuzuha. She wasn't hurt though – being significantly shorter than her boyfriend and having her arms wrapped around his neck while he was carrying her (and his around her waist) kept her from harm – Kuzuhamon was just shocked by the sudden landing.

"A little warning next time?" Kuzuha asked.

"Sorry, Kuzuha," Beelzemon said before going over to Lec and smacking him in the head.

"What the frikin' heck was that about?" Lec growled at the Demon Lord.

Beelzemon didn't respond at first, opting instead for pulling Elecmon into a chokehold. The younger Rookie Digimon could only just barely keep the Mega's forearm from crushing his windpipe.

"What is your issue?" Lec snarled.

Beelzemon lowered his voice to a deadly whisper as he spoke into Elecmon's ear, "Look up my girlfriend's skirt again, and I'll skin you while you scream."

"Digimon don't really have skin, ya do realize this, right?" Lec said in a jovial manner, hoping his humor would be enough to save him.

One could almost hear the smirk on Beelzemon's face. "I know."

"I'm not scared of you," Elecmon growled. "You think that because you're a Mega, you're the toughest being around, dont'cha?"

"Oh…I know I'm tougher than you," Beelzemon said. "After all…you're just a runt."

"So what – you're gonna pick on a Rookie just to prove your strength? Real tough, man. Tch, more like pathetic as all heck!"

Kuzuhamon walked over to Noah and the now-degenerated Labramon and asked them, "Should we do something about this?"

"Are you kidding? I'm not gonna get in their way! That's suicide!" Labramon said.

"I agree with Labramon on this, Kuzuhamon," Noah said.

"I don't want Beelzemon to hurt Elecmon, though…"

"Hey, Kuzuha!" Beelzemon said. "You wanna help me with this?"

"Help you with what? All he did was look up at me when…we…were landing…" Kuzuhamon trailed off as she realized what had happened when they landed. And she began growling.

Lec stared at the ground, refusing to look up at the others.

"Okay, that's more than just staring. Lec, what happened?" Noah asked.

"Um…"

Labramon and Noah regarded the Rookie's statement for a minute, thinking about what Elecmon could have seen. Then they slowly began backing away, not wanting to get involved in what could possibly be the end of the young Digimon.

"I can't believe that you saw up her skirt," Labramon said. "Well, it was nice knowin' ya, Lec."

"Come on, one of you should help me!" Lec snarled.

"Again, suicidal," Labramon said.

"Sorry, Elecmon."

Meanwhile, Kuzuhamon had summoned her staff from its disguise as her necklace. Slowly, she walked over to Elecmon and lifted the weapon. "Beelzemon, let him go."

"All right," the Demon Lord said, letting go of Elecmon and walking over to stand behind her. "What are you gonna do?"

Elecmon took a small step back when he saw the fury in her face. He knew that look of intense anger. Oh crud.

Kuzuhamon didn't even call out an attack. Instead, she just brought the staff down on top of Elecmon's head as hard as she could, causing the Rookie Digimon to scream in pain as he collapsed to his knees. With a glimmer of satisfaction in her eyes, she turned the staff back into her pendant and hooked it around her neck again. "Next time, keep your eyes to yourself," Kuzuhamon said firmly.

"It was an accident! It's not like I plan for this stuff to happen!" Lec growled, standing back up and wincing as he touched the small lump on his head.

"Well, try and plan for it to not happen!" Kuzuhamon snapped back.

"I'm so proud of you," Beelzemon said, hugging her from behind. "I trained you very well."

Kuzuhamon smiled and leaned into him. "Thank you," she said.

Elecmon just scowled at the couple, irritated that, once again, he was used as someone's punching bag.

However, a rumbling sound brought the trio out of their seething hatred.

"What the heck…?" Beelzemon said, turning to see Behemoth rumbling at Noah and looking like it was getting ready to charge.

"Okay…someone wanna fill me in here?" Elecmon asked.

"That motorcycle is Behemoth. He's a sentient machine who belongs to Beelzemon. Behemoth…isn't a big fan of Noah's," Labramon said. "Last time they met…well, I didn't see what happened, but Noah was owned."

"Remind me to respect the machinery, then," the teenaged Digimon said.

"Wise choice," the canine Digimon said.

"Beelzemon, call off your motorcycle," Noah said.

"Behemoth, leave him alone," Beelzemon ordered the motorcycle.

Behemoth still continued its advance on Noah, rumbling and inching forward on the 'preteen'.

"Please, Behemoth, just leave Noah alone. He hasn't done anything to you," Kuzuhamon said to the demon bike.

And then, slowly, Behemoth began backing off from the digitized human and going back to running around the lake.

"Nice work," Beelzemon said to Kuzuha. "Though…it's a bit sad that my motorcycle listens to my girlfriend more than it listens to me."

"Thank you. And Behemoth listens to me more because I'm more lovable."

"Are we gonna go into town or not?" Lec said, standing up.

Behemoth raced over to its master and his girlfriend, rumbling hopefully.

"Sorry, Behemoth, but we're kinda gonna be in a big group, so you'll have to wait here," Beelzemon told his motorcycle.

Behemoth's sagged a bit on its tires, obviously sad that it couldn't go with its master on their trip.

Beelzemon patted the handlebars of the motorcycle, and Behemoth raced off, doing laps around the lake to keep from being bored.

"Let's get goin'," Lec said, starting out of the woods.

"Oh, who says we hafta follow you?" Beelzemon said, shifting back into his 'flawed' form.

"Since I've been around here in the daytime a lot more than you recently, I'd say it was a safe bet. Plus, food's on me," Lec said.

"Fine," Beelzemon said with a smirk.

"And if you try to go all 'Demon Lord of Gluttony' on me, I've still got a few attacks I haven't used yet."

"Like I'm scared of that, Rookie runt."

"Guys, stop it," Noah said, opting to walk between the two so they wouldn't kill each other. "We don't want to draw too much attention, do we?"

"Aren't we going to already, though?" Kuzuha asked. "I mean…a biker, obviously a rich boy and his dog, what looks like a teenage delinquent, and –"

"Two bikers, Kuzuha," Beelzemon said. "You're dressed as a biker, too."

"Fine. Two bikers, a rich boy and his dog, and a teenage delinquent are all hanging out together. Wouldn't that already draw attention?"

"Does that really matter, though? We're all odd enough to draw attention, anyway," Lec said.

"You're the crayon-head," Beelzemon pointed out.

"Guys," Kuzuha said.

"Sorry," Beelzemon told her.

"So…where are we gonna go first?" Noah asked. "Anyone have any ideas that include Labramon?"

"Well, the arcades are out," Elecmon said. "And the movies. Now I'm bored."

"You've adapted fairly well to the human world," Noah said wryly.

"Hey, it's interesting."

"What's that place?" Kuzuhamon asked, pointing up to a large building complex with a bunch of people going in and out. "It looks pretty cool."

Elecmon turned around and, being the only one who could tell that look slowly going distant, walked behind Kuzuhamon and quickly began shoving her away from the mall. He managed to get her all the way to the next block before Beelzemon, Noah, and Labramon all finally caught up to the two.

"What the heck are you thinking, you idiot?" Beelzemon shouted at the Rookie as Kuzuha finally realized she'd been taken down the street.

Elecmon crooked a finger at Beelzemon, motioning for the older Digimon to talk to him privately. The Rookie placed an arm on the Mega's shoulder as he began to explain. "You need to thank me."

"And why's that?"

"I live in a house pretty much filled with girls. One of them in particular enjoys malls. I saw the same look on Kuzuha's face, and knew that she'd find trouble in there. The malls have stores, and the females are drawn to stores because of some strange, unknown reason. And then…they buy things," Elecmon explained to the Mega. "You wanna have to carry these things? Or buy them?"

"Why would I –"

"You're her boyfriend. It's your 'job'."

"Kuzuhamon's not really that into normal human girly things, though."

"So? I've seen the same look on Lady Magnadramon's face when she gets close to an electronics store. Particularly the ones that specialize in computers. And bookstores. The point is that the place lures you in and basically brainwashes you into spending all of your money," Lec said. "See my point?"

"Your right…that is a bit scary…" Beelzemon said to the younger Digimon. As the Demon Lord of Gluttony turned around to go back to Kuzuha's side, he said with a smile to the Rookie level, "Oh, and I'm the only one allowed to call her Kuzuha. Call her that again, and I'll flay your tongue, got it?"

"Like you scare me," Lec sneered. "I'll just use Sparking Thunder on your miserable butt."

Mega and Rookie glared at each other for a minute before rejoining the others.

"What were the two of you talking about anyway?" Kuzuha asked.

"It's not really important," Beelzemon replied.

"Really?" Kuzuhamon said, clearly unconvinced.

"Would I lie to you?"

"Maybe," she told him.

Beelzemon sighed. "Listen, it was just nothing, okay?"

"All right," Kuzuhamon said. "So, where are we gonna go from here?"
"Well, since we have a dog in our midst…we're left with only one place – the park," Lec said.

"And if we run into the other Tamers, it'll be on you," Beelzemon said.

"Big place like that? They'll never find us," Lec assured them.

"Uh-huh…"

"Fine. Have fun wandering around Tokyo by yourselves…" Lec waved them off, beginning to walk away.

"Guys…" Labramon whispered. "What choice do we really have here? Noah hasn't really been in actual Tokyo in years, I've never been here – plus, I'm a dog. And the two of you are only here at night!"

"Labramon's got a point," Kuzuhamon mused.

"Yeah…all right, he's right," Beelzemon admitted. "And I didn't want to admit it, too…"

"He does seem like the type to rub it in…" Noah said.

"Seems?" Kuzuha asked. "He is. I just know it. He reminds me of Gazimon in that sense," she said before quieting down. The mention of her friend's name – even by her – still sent her into a small depression.

"Why don't we go talk to Elecmon again?" Noah suggested.

"I'm not admitting I was wrong to him," Beelzemon said firmly.

"I know. And you won't have to," the digitized human told the Demon Lord.

"Well, there's only one way to find out," Kuzuha told her friends and boyfriend. "Let's go."

"All right," Beelzemon sighed, allowing his girlfriend to lead him over to the Rookie Digimon who was already well into the park.

Well, here we are at the end of another chapter. Originally, I was going to post more than this because this wasn't a great place to stop, but I think the next part deserves its own chapter and altogether, it was ten pages in MS Word, and I won't do that to you all.
So yeah, review?