Digital Gate : Beginning

The trees at the edge of the clearing swayed slightly in the soft breeze that rushed through the leaf-covered branches, swirling around the two teenagers standing on the grassy ground in the middle of the clearing, facing each other. The smaller of the two looked away for a second, resignation clear in her gaze when she looked back up, the large white winged snake digimon that was her partner loosely coiled around her, his head resting on her shoulder.

"You don't have to do this, Amy." She spoke, her voice breaking the silence between them as she studied her companion from behind bronze-rimmed glasses. She, unlike Amy, who stood opposite her, was wearing a simple black t-shirt and black jeans over black leather boots, a gray checked coat and teal gloves, hat and scarf, which was wrapped round her neck, with a dark green digivice clipped to the waist of her jeans. Amy, on the other hand, was wearing a white t-shirt covered by a green plaid shirt, baggy stonewashed jeans and gray converse shoes.

A low growl was the only answer that was given in response to the brown-haired girl on the other side of the clearing, issued from Amy's partner, a bipedal blue and white skinned digimon with black armor and a yellow-silver lightning bolt shaped horn on its face, protruding from the armor. Flicking her gaze sideways to the Raidramon for a second, Rai seemed to sigh, her gaze moving back over to Amy.

"You're making a mistake. You know what we're supposed to do, He told all of us. We're meant to watch, remember? Nothing else….until the others appear. He won't be happy that you're doing this." Whatever response had been expected was not the one that was received. Instead of choosing to answer, Amy silently lifted her hand off her partner's head, and the armored biped sprang forward instantly, the lightning bolt on his forehead glowing before a bolt of lightning shot out from the horn, aiming at Rai and her partner, narrowly missing the two of them as Quetzalmon let out a hiss, flapping his wings to lift himself and his partner into the air and backwards, avoiding the attack that had been fired at them.

Once her feet were safely back on the ground, Quetzalmon released his partner, uncoiling from around her to shoot forward towards Raidramon, pausing a short distance from him and unleashing a burst of wind from his wings, sending the other digimon skidding backwards with an angry-sounding snarl. The two digimon carried on fighting, being watched by their partners, although the expressions they wore were vastly different. Rai's showed only concern for the welfare of her partner, while Amy's, which had seemed blank at the beginning of the confrontation, now seemed to be grinning cruelly at the fight, as if amused by the two digimon that were fighting.

"Call him off, Amy!" Rai's concerned shout echoed across the clearing, barely audible against the sound of the fighting taking place. "This isn't the time to fight! The others are due to arrive soon, we should be getting ready for them, not fighting!" This time, Amy seemed to agree, raising two fingers to her lips, letting out a whistle, causing Raidramon to pause mid-attack, leaping backwards before he turned round, dashing back to his partner's side, He paused long enough to let her climb on before both of them disappeared back through the trees the way they had come.

Rai stared after them with a mixture of confusion and disbelief on her face, which soon faded as she felt the familiar weight of Quetzalmon's head resting on her shoulder again as the white snake digimon coiled around her again.

"I guess we'd better get to the area they're supposed to appear." She sighed, partially to herself turning round to leave the clearing as well, taking one last glance around the now somewhat destroyed clearing. "He won't be happy to hear about this, that's for sure." She added, turning her head to glance up at Quetzalmon with a sigh. "That doesn't matter now, though. It's our responsibility to watch over the others and make sure nothing happens."

Quetzalmon hissed an agreement, though it went unheard for the moment, his partner lost in thought. Her thoughts, however, were not on the task that lay ahead of her, rather they were on the moment of her arrival in the Digital World. It had been several months since then; long enough for her and those who had come to join up, and for their partners to digivolve to Ultimate, and then to Mega. Most of the time, though, their partner digimon stayed at the rookie or champion stage, for the stronger pairs. There was no regret in her mind, at least for being brought here, but there was the occasional moment when she wondered how things on Earth might be progressing. Everything had been explained to them about why they had been chosen and what they would be doing, by one of the digimon who served under the one who had brought them here.

During the transfer from here to Earth, though something had gone wrong. They had been attacked by a virus that targeted them, managing to corrupt one of the group and causing another to crash land away from where they would eventually land. She could only hope that the others who had been dispatched to that area would be able to locate the missing person and bring them back. Amy, on the other hand, seemed to be getting more and more active as the time the new group would arrive got closer and closer. This was the second time in three days that she'd had to drive the corrupted Watcher away from the arrival site. Right now, however there were other things to do. Shaking herself out of the reverie she'd been in, she turned, heading away from the clearing. It was time to meet up with Mandy and her partner and from there, to head for the arrival site and wait.

The sound of screaming was the first sound that he heard as he slowly woke up, finding himself sprawled out on the ground, instead of being flat out on his bed with a book over his face from where he'd semi-dozed off from reading it. Wherever he was, it was evident that the book hadn't made it as well, despite being used to cover his face. Biting back a groan, he pushed himself into a sitting position, taking the chance to glance around him and see exactly where he was. The area that he appeared to be in was nothing like he'd seen, and the sound of the screaming in the distance was enough to make him struggle to his feet, wondering whether he should go and investigate the sound, or turn around and run in the other direction.

As he stood up shakily, brushing himself off and getting another glance around him, he spotted something gleaming at his feet. Bending over to examine it, he picked it up warily, flipping the device around in his hands as he tried to figure out what it was. By now the screaming had stopped, something which was slightly worrying for him, as he was still unsure exactly where he was or how he'd come to be here, and whatever had made the screaming stop was not necessarily likely to be friendly. Examining the odd device again for a few seconds, the teen shoved into one of his pockets, turning round to look towards where the screaming had been, barely managing to avoid tripping over the odd creature resembling a plant bulb with red-brown eyes and four small feet that was standing a short distance in front of him.

"You must be Erik! I've been waiting for you!" The green plant-bulb monster exclaimed after staring at him for a few seconds, looking excited as it jumped up and down happily. "I'm glad to meet you. I'm Tanemon, and I hope we can be friends!" The now identified Tanemon finished bouncing up and down, and it rustled the leafy tuft on top of its head. "This way, Erik. There are others I want you to meet!" Erik just stared at the so-called Tanemon, as if still stunned by the fact a plant bulb with eyes and a mouth seemed to be talking to him.

"Uh.. of course we can be friends, what.. just what are you? I've never heard of a 'Tanemon' before..? Is this on Earth?" He questioned as he followed the small monster, feeling as if he had no other choice but to follow. Tanemon only laughed in response. "No, silly! This is the Digital World, and I'm a Digimon, short for Digital Monster. There are all kinds of us here.. some not as good as others." He added, an odd expression crossing over what face was visible. "My friends and I.. have been waiting. Waiting for you, and others like you." It added, looking back at him for a second.

"The others are just ahead." Tanemon finished, leading him through a gap in the trees, the sound of voices suddenly becoming clearer as he stepped into the clearing after Tanemon, his eyes widening at who he saw, recognising most of them instantly. Kickbox, Shy, Hannah, Saffi, Gysti, or those he knew by those names, each with their own 'Digimon', although each was different depending on the person. Kickbox had a puffball with a short red stub- tail and long floppy reddish ears, while Shy had what looked like a marshmallow with large black eyes. The white rabbit dog with two small horns on his head and large ears that brushed the ground, with green fur on the ends of his ears, and paws, and under his head was happily pretending to be a tornado by swivelling around on one paw in front of Hannah, his ears flying out on either side of him as he did so.

Sitting next to Gysti was her partner, an odd skinny looking yellow rabbit in red pants that looked too big for it to be wearing, and the monster bouncing up and down on the ground next to Saffi looked like a yellow and blue cat's head, complete with ears and a tail with blue bands.

Seeing Erik appear from the trees with Tanemon, Gysti, who had been sitting in the middle stood up, crossing the distance between Erik and herself with a relieved smile. "You're Erik, right? And this must be Tanemon." She added, glancing down at the small digimon for a second, before spinning round on one heel, barely managing to avoid falling over as she did so, gaining a snicker from Kickbox, who wiped the amused expression off his face when Gysti glanced in his direction.

"Don't mind her." Hannah murmured quietly as Gysti led the way back to where she'd been sitting. "All of us feel out of place here, despite having met friends like your Tanemon or Gysti's Neemon." She indicated the two digimon as she named them. "We have no idea how any of us got here, only that we were suddenly here, and they found us and brought us to this clearing." She stroked the cat-head in her arms, gaining a soft purr from it. "I think our best bet is to try and find someone who can help us get home."

-

"Yes, I know, I know." She glanced up at Quetzalmon from behind her glasses, her eyes showing how tired she was. "I don't care if I'm tired or not. I need to report back and then track the others down, remember?" She finished, then slowly sank down into a sitting position, reaching into one pocket of her coat, pulling out something that resembled a PDA, placing it into position against a large enough rock before she switched it on, waiting for a response from the other end. As a picture suddenly appeared on the small screen, Rai tensed up, dipping her head into a bow as she waited for the shadow-hidden figure on the other end to allow her to make her report.

"You may speak." The figure on the other end spoke in a deep voice, yellow-golden eyes staring up at her. Relaxing slightly at this, Rai bowed her head again.
"I have bad news." She began. "It's about Amy. Something seems to have happened to her, she started a fight and had Raidramon attack Quetzalmon before she fled. I think that something must have happened to her.. she's not usually like this.." Falling silent, she waited for a reply, feeling Quetzalmon tightening his coils as he usually did when he was trying to reassure her, and she smiled softly at this, rubbing the digimon's side behind his head gently in thanks. He hissed softly in response before the digimon on the other end of the communication spoke again.

"Leave her be for the time being. Focus on the others, as you were ordered before. Only deal with her if the situation requires it. It may be that she will try and recruit some of the others if she gets the chance, so I want you to keep an eye on them as much as possible." Yellow-golden eyes regarded her with concern for a second before the connection ended and left her sitting there alone. She slumped with relief once the connection was gone before scrambling to her feet, retrieving the PDA from its position by the stone.
"Onwards then, Quetzalmon. We should find these 'others' and watch over them, as needed."