Chapter 2: Digital Monsters!

The pounding in your head pulled you out of your restful unconsciousness and you rubbed at your forehead, a futile effort. The rest of you ached too, as if some mighty giant had tied you in knots. Seriously, what had just happened to you?

You had a second of panic that quickly turned to relief when you reached up and felt your glasses in place. Your mom would have skinned you alive if you had lost them.

Then you suddenly heard something rustling to your left. Your eyes popped open for the first time and you rolled over, expecting to come face-to-face with a squirrel or a crow. You know, something cute with big eyes.

Instead it was a soccer-ball-sized pink hamster. It sat watching you with what appeared to be a smile.

"Yay! Charlotte is awake!" it cheered in a squeaky voice.

"AAAAAHHHHHH!" you screamed. You flailed wildly and tried to scramble away from the strange creature but you just ended up smacking the back of your head against a tree. "What are you?!"

"I'm Tokomon!" it squealed. "Welcome to File Island!"

It hopped closer and you involuntarily cringed back. Your big brother had taught you when you were just a little kid not to approach wild animals. And, he had said, you should run if they ever approached you and were acting funny. Talking may not have been what he meant at the time but that was pretty funny behavior for an animal.

Tokomon noticed your anxiety and stopped, still out of reach. "Don't be afraid, Charlotte. I'm not going to hurt you, I want to be your friend."

"Friend. Right." You weren't going to fall for that one. "And I suppose those teeth of yours aren't for biting?"

"What, these?" Tokomon opened its mouth and to your horror you saw that behind the pair of tiny teeth you had noticed were rows and rows of dagger-like fangs. "I only use them for smiling!"

"I've got it, that meteor hit me on the head and gave me a concussion. I'm just imagining all this while I'm in the hospital," you babbled to yourself.

You reached up with one hand and started feeling all around the top of your head. Maybe you would be able to feel the lump even in your concussion-dream. But that had the effect of bringing your vision up out of the dirt to scan the surrounding forest. It was so surreal, you froze in disbelief.

There were all different kinds of trees around you, trees you had never seen before. They were layered so thickly overhead that the forest floor was practically in night. And the forest floor wasn't empty either - strange bushes with leaves covered in polka dots pressed in on you, some of them sporting bright flowers so big that you could have crawled inside them. The bushes too were like nothing you had ever seen before, not even on TV.

Gingerly you reached out to touch the nearest bush. Its leaves felt like a fern's.

"How strange," you murmured.

You looked around again to take it all in: the strange trees and bushes, the vines dangling down from the canopy. And the air was completely different from camp - it was so humid you could hardly breathe and the smells and sounds were all amplified and foreign to you.

"This is no hospital," you reasoned, "and it's not camp either." Then you remembered something that Tokomon had said. "Where did you say we are?"

"File Island!"

"Where's that?"

"It's in the Digital World!"

"And where's that?"

Clearly Tokomon didn't understand the question. "Ummm…"

"Never mind." To your surprise you were already getting used to talking to a little pink hamster. "I think I'm confused too."

Tokomon hopped right up next to you and balanced with its front paws on your leg. "It's okay, Charlotte. As long as we're together we can figure anything out!"

You blinked. That feeling of deja-vu was back again. Something about Tokomon's big black eyes staring at you reminded you of something from when you were very little…

Slowly you reached out and rested your hand gently on Tokomon's head. In response, he - you now knew unequivocally that he was a he - giggled and rubbed against it like a cat.

"Hey, Tokomon? How did you know my name?"

"Because I'm your Digimon! I've been waiting for you forever."

"For me?" Something - someone - had been waiting for you?

"Yes! And now you're finally here!"

"But why am I here?" It was more of a question for yourself than for Tokomon. After all, if he had been waiting for you then he had known you would be coming. But who had brought you here? That was the million dollar question.

Then you suddenly had bigger things to worry about. The forest around you had been shadowy to begin with but without warning almost all the light faded away completely. Your first thought was that maybe it was nighttime now but you quickly dismissed that when you heard a great roar overhead, like a jet engine, and saw two bright balls of light falling to the ground.

You braced yourself for an explosion or an earthquake. But there was nothing. The loud noise as the lights fell through the sky simply died away.

"What the heck was that?"

You had just been talking to yourself, not expecting an answer. But apparently that wasn't how Tokomon understood it.

"Let's go see!" He bounded off through the dense underbrush and was gone in an instant.

"Hey, wait up!"

~Kari POV~

When I woke up I knew right away that I was in DigiWorld. After all, there aren't many jungles in Tokyo. But it wasn't a part of the DigiWorld that I had ever been to.

"Tai, we're back!" I cheered. I looked around, expecting him to be nearby just like when we had left for DigiWorld. But I didn't see him anywhere. "Tai? Tai!"

"Kari?"

The voice was distant but it didn't sound like my brother. "T.K.?"

"Yeah!" He sounded closer and then he suddenly popped out of some rustling bushes. "Boy, am I glad to see you!"

"Me too. Have you seen my brother around?"

"No. Have you seen mine?"

"No." I was starting to feel worried. "I hope they're okay."

"I bet they're fine! They're probably waiting for us someplace nearby." He looked around, maybe to see if he could figure out where we were. "Ummm…"

"We should go this way," I said and pointed into the jungle.

"Huh? Why that way?"

"I'm not sure. I just feel something that way."

It wasn't my brother, I was pretty sure of that. Maybe it was one of the others? But deep down I felt like it was something new. And I just had the urge to go and find it, whatever it was.

"Hm, okay." Maybe T.K. felt it too. "Let's go see. But stay close, it's dangerous."

"Okay."

We began walking through the jungle in the direction I had picked, but luckily we didn't encounter any wild Digimon. Unfortunately we didn't find Gatomon or Patamon either. I had been hoping they were what I sensed.

But then as we were walking along a narrow path surrounded by lots of bushes, one of the bushes suddenly started to rustle. T.K. and I froze and waited for whatever it was to show itself.

"Or maybe we should run," I said after a moment.

It was too late though and the Digimon jumped out. It was Tokomon!

"Hi, Tokomon!" I said. I was so happy for T.K. - we had found his partner.

But T.K. didn't seem so excited. "Huh? Who are you?"

I was baffled. "Huh? T.K., that's Tokomon. Isn't it?"

"Well, yeah. But he's not my Tokomon."

"Oh!" said Tokomon. "More humans!"

"Hello there," I said nicely.

Then there was more rustling in the bushes and to our amazement a girl appeared!