Standard Disclaimer: This work is a non-profit derivative work. I claim no ownership to Digimon or its characters.
Sparks Fly - First Part
So that was Hikari, this world's Warrior of Light. She was nothing at all like Kouji, either as a person or as a warrior. Kouji's light was just like him: exacting. Firm, keen, principled, steady, sometimes even harsh. His light was the light that flashed off of a swinging sword, the gleam you saw looking down the barrel of a gun. Hikari's light felt nothing like that, in that moment she had seemed so fragile...
Kouichi wanted to kick himself. Right now he hated being a Digimon. Those shadows were after her, she was running scared, and all he'd done was scare her even more!
The hell of it was he knew what he'd said was true, he just couldn't say what it meant. When he was a Digimon he was no different from the Digimon that had built that city. The words that fell out of his mouth proved it. He had said something he knew, absolutely knew in the fiber of his being, without being able to understand it. Or at least understand it well enough to put it into words.
It was the wrong thing to say, duh, obviously, and now that Kouichi had put his foot in his mouth everything was impossible again. For a moment he'd seriously thought his one-in-a-billion meeting with Hikari would turn things around. Now she thought he was a freak. She was right there, arms crossed, shivering, tear-stricken, begging for comfort. She needed someone to help her, not to say something like THAT. It was the right moment to tell the truth and he'd blown it.
No, it was worse than that, he'd failed her. What he should have done was reassure her, put a hand on her shoulder, tell her that he'd help, that Tailmon would help, that her friends would help, that it was going to be okay.
Kouichi clenched his fists. That day, THE day, the day they'd met, really met, he was where Hikari had been. He'd been sitting in a train car, unsure of anything, afraid of the dark, afraid of HIMSELF. That time it had been Patamon who'd come up to him to try and make him feel better. Why couldn't he have just been like Patamon?
Kouichi stood up.
This wasn't the end. No, not like this. Even if he screwed up, even if he couldn't be there in that moment he couldn't give up, he wouldn't give up. This wasn't it, even if Hikari would never speak to him again he was still a Digimon and there was still a lot he could do from the Digital World. And maybe there would be another chance to see Hikari. To apologize. Maybe even to be who she'd needed in that moment.
Kouichi grabbed his phone and started walking.
"What really happened last night?"
Tailmon hung from the front of Hikari's bag as the girl walked down the sidewalk. It was a brand-new messenger bag she carried slung over her shoulder. One side of the bag had a cute little harness with holes for arms and legs designed to fit a stuffed animal and which now comfortably carried Tailmon. The bag had been an early birthday gift from her brother, he'd even gone ahead measured her Digimon just to make sure Tailmon would fit. The idea was that Hikari could comfortably carry Tailmon out in the open by making the Digimon look to the rest of the world like she was just a cute toy. And it worked! Except when she talked.
"Nothing! I told you, it was just a bad dream," Hikari said quietly after quickly looking around.
"Then why did you talk about that world with that boy?"
"There's no reason, I just, I thought Kouichi was smart and interesting wanted to know what he would think about-"
"You can't expect me to believe that, Hikari. You would never talk about that place just for just for fun. I could tell something was wrong, last night, did they call you? Did that world…"
"NO!" Hikari shouted. She jumped at the sound her own voice and looked around. A few pedestrians had turned to her after her outburst, but after a few moments of there being nothing more exciting than a worried girl they all just as quickly went back to walking. Hikari hurried onward down the sidewalk. She cleared her throat, and continued with a restrained voice, "What I meant is that nothing like that happened. You're worrying too much, Tailmon. So... what did you think? I mean about Kouichi?"
"Hikari, how can I protect you if you aren't going to tell me anything?"
"It's fine. Nothing happened. Do you think Kouichi would get along with Ken? They both seem very kind, and Kouichi reminds me of him a little bit."
"Hikari…" Tailmon turned up to look at her partner. Hikari gave a practiced smile and kept walking. The cat Digimon looked down and sighed. If Hikari wanted to be she could be just as stubborn as her brother. If she said nothing was wrong there was nothing Tailmon could do, ESPECIALLY if something was wrong.
"He's a liar," Tailmon said flatly.
Hikari blinked. She had reached an intersection and was waiting for the light to turn green. The only person around was a haggard looking businessman urgently muttering into a cell phone. A couple of cars crossed back and forth down the road. She looked down.
"A liar? How do you mean? What was he lying about?"
"He was lying about Digimon," Tailmon said, Her voice calm and certain. "He said he didn't know about Digimon or the Digital World, but you can't fool my gut or my nose. He was there for long enough that I could definitely tell. That boy, Kouichi, he smells like a Digimon."
"But if he lives around here maybe he met a Digimon once when they came through, like last year?"
"No, I don't mean like that. The scent of a Digimon was fresh on Kouichi, like it is on you or like it would be on Daisuke or Takeru. And it's not just that," Tailmon went on, "he also understood we were partners. Most humans don't get that, they've never heard of a humans having a Digimon partner and don't know what it even means or how it works, but he didn't ask any questions at all. I think he didn't have to ask because he has his own partner Digimon."
"Really? I guess he must have been close to a Digimon recently if you're right about his scent," Hikari said gingerly.
"I am."
"But you think he's a Chosen Child? What if he just came across one of our Digimon partners?"
"He didn't. I know what V-mon and Agumon and all the rest of them smell like and I didn't recognize the scent on him."
"But that doesn't mean HE has a partner Digimon. Maybe the Digimon belongs to one of his friends? And wait, if there was a new Chosen Child wouldn't we already know about him? And if you're right why didn't Kouichi say anything?"
"I suppose it's possible that he isn't the one with a partner, maybe it could be his brother's, but I wouldn't bet on it. Call it a 'Digimon's intuition' if you like. And either way he could be brand new. None of us knew about Ken when he first met Wormmon, and we didn't know there were Chosen Children in America until Mimi met Michael. There are people like you all over the world now, Hikari, so why can't there be other Chosen Children in Japan none of us have met? And why didn't he say anything?" Tailmon shook her head, "I have no idea. Maybe he doesn't get along with his partner Digimon? He could just be surprised that you and I are friends."
"Not getting along with your own partner? That would be too sad..." Hikari said gazing downward. "But I don't know… I don't think he was surprised by the two of us getting along, it seemed like he was surprised just to see a Digimon at all…"
Cicadas chirped. A car horn honked from somewhere to the right. A rustle of wind carried the click-clack of a train going down the rails.
"Do you think I can trust him, Tailmon?" Hikari asked.
"What? To keep it secret that you're a Chosen Child? Probably. He didn't have any problem with me. And it's too late to worry about that anyways," Tailmon grimaced. "There's definitely something that feels weird about him. Something about that boy feels off and that makes me nervous. I wish I knew what he was lying about it, maybe then I could tell if he's an enemy..."
"An enemy? That's not right, Kouichi doesn't feel like an enemy at all," Hikari said with sudden certainty.
"He doesn't feel like an enemy? What did he feel like to you then?" Now Tailmon sounded curious, even eager.
"I... I don't know, but it felt," Hikari hesitated for a moment. Tailmon was looking up at her expectantly and nodded her on. Hikari took a deep breath, "I felt like Kouichi was a good person. He seemed scary for a moment when I first saw him, like I SHOULD be afraid of him for some reason, but when he started talking then I started to feel like... Like he was a friend and it felt like he was different but he still wanted to help me. And maybe he is lying, but maybe he has a reason for it? Maybe there's something he can't say even if he wants to?"
From off in the distance a ship's bell clanged and a foghorn sounded. The man on the phone grumbled something about the red light and started punching in a new number.
"You know," Tailmon said quietly, "he reminds me a little bit of you, Hikari."
"Huh? How?"
"It was just the way he felt. He reminds me of... Someone. Someone else. I know I've met someone that reminds me of that boy, who was it?" Tailmon paused, staring off into the distance chasing a thought. After a moment she shook her head. "Maybe it will come to me. As for Kouichi, I'll trust your judgment, and I always will Hikari. Still, even if he isn't an enemy you should be careful around him, I know he's lying and-"
The light turned green. Hikari started walking yanking Tailmon out of her reverie.
The shelves of the Inoue family's general store, Ai-Mart, creaked and groaned, fully laden with food and supplies. Out front, Takeru and Iori sighed and moaned from three full hours of moving boxes.
"Momoe! You said it would be EASY!" Miyako stood a few steps through the door, yelling at her older sister behind the counter.
"No I did not! I said it would be EASIER! Mom told you we got three shipments in at once! You should know what that means! And stop yelling when we have customers!" Momoe yelled back as she scanned and bagged goods for a boy and his mother at the counter, switching instantly to a cheerful smile, "that will be 3046 yen."
"It was bad enough you overworked ME, but you also got my friends involved! Even Takeru when he came by! How can I look them in the face after you used them as unpaid labor?"
"YOU invited them!" Momoe yelled as she angrily counted out change.
"Because I didn't know it would take so long or be this hard and I didn't know because YOU didn't tell me!" Miyako's shoulders were spread, legs wide, hands on her hips, leaning all the way in, the right posture to show she was ready for a good, proper, and protracted row.
"It's fine, Miyako, it wasn't that-" Iori began quietly, having taken a step into the store, but Miyako frantically waved him down with one arm to shush him.
"So what do you want me to do, Miyako?" Momoe hadn't noticed, being halfway through passing a shopping bag over the counter, she was trying her best to smile and nod to the handful of customers in the store in between shouting her lungs out.
"I want time and a half for my shift today," Miyako's eyes gleamed, her voice businesslike. "Even besides the TERRIBLE labor you put my friends through I already told you I was busy today so I want overtime pay for my unexpected working hours."
"Fine! Get out of here and stop yelling."
"So we have a deal! See you later sis!" Miyako turned practically skipped out of the store.
"Was that really all about money?" Takeru asked incredulously as he and Iori followed along behind Miyako out on the sidewalk.
"Mostly! Momoe was still a meanie for not telling me we got in all the heavy stuff today, but a girl's got to make money somehow right? How else am I going to afford a really nice present for Hikari?" Miyako turned left out of the store, shouldered her bag and began walking briskly. After a moment she turned back, "well? You do know what you're going to get Hikari for her birthday, right?"
"Well, it's not like I DON'T have an idea," Takeru said, sheepishly. "But, I mean, it's just that it's been a little hard for me to find exactly the right thing…"
"I'm afraid I'm still trying to come to a decision as well" Iori said.
Miyako rolled her eyes.
"Boys... It isn't that hard to buy a present for a girl you know. Get her something nice and pretty that you know she'll love."
"Well that's just the thing..." Takeru tried to begin.
"It's very impressive you've already decided on a gift though," Iori said, when Takeru couldn't find a way to end his sentence.
"Of course it's impressive," came a muffled voice from Miyako's bag, "you should expect nothing less from a person of Miyako's caliber."
"You said it, Poromon, I AM Hikari's best friend after all," Miyako's walk turned into a proud strut for a few steps, before she hit a rough patch of pavement and stumbled.
"Are we allowed to talk now, Iori?" Came Upamon's voice from the boy's own bag.
"And what about me?" Chirped Patamon, "can I come out of your backpack Takeru? It's stuffy in here."
Takeru laughed. "Not yet, there are still too many people around and someone might see you. We aren't that far away so it won't be much longer"
"Alright…" Said Patamon, sounding dejected.
"So what are you getting Hikari for her birthday, Miyako?" Iori asked.
"Top secret," Miyako said, turning to waggle a finger and wink conspiratorially, "I happen to have deep, special, inside information that has allowed me to identify the perfect gift for her. However, I may have some information that I am free to-"
Glass shattered! Metal screeched and tore! Something exploded, a gust of burning air, smoke rising! Loud slams and crashes! Sirens wailed! People screamed and ran! Someone, somewhere shouted the one word:
"MONSTERS!"
A moment later all three Chosen Children heard their D-Terminals beep. For a moment, they froze. Then all three of them spoke at once:
"How could Digimon have -" "- Have to help them before -" "- Brought my laptop in my bag!"
Their eyes met. Then, Iori, Takeru, and Miyako started running.
After the sixth time that a convenient looking side street or alley had turned out to be full of people Kouichi officially gave up looking for a convenient place to Dive back to the Digital World.
Odaiba was certainly living up to its reputation as a tourist trap. Tokyo's shining man-made island with its gorgeous amusement park and gleaming shopping centers was apparently in full swing this afternoon. Yes, it was certainly a very nice afternoon to spend outside on the waterfront and Kouichi was stuck here no thanks to the fair weather. After starting off with such certainty ready to go make a difference, hitting a wall like this had turned conviction into frustration.
After catching himself fuming Kouichi sighed and took a deep breath.
"You can't be a good hostess if you're full of bad feelings. If you're in a bad mood you have to learn to force yourself to let it go. Days like those are always the hardest, but being a grown-up means you have to do things you don't like sometimes."
Mother had said that to him once, when grandma was near the very end. That night mother had been crying so hard that her eyes were red and raw and she had tear stains that streaked all the way down to her shoulders. And yet, after hours bent over a table covered in tissues and while she was still wracked with sobs mother got up and washed her face and put on makeup and smiled and got ready to go out to work that night. Kouichi had asked her how she could still smile that was what she had said. At the time Kouichi hadn't understood her answer, not really. In that moment it was just another thing adults said, another excuse for leaving things as they were and why things weren't better. And of course it hadn't made him happy, mother worked too hard and he was afraid, then and now, that she'd run herself ragged and end up sick and in the hospital herself (though at least some things had quietly gotten a little better over the last year).
Looking back now? Kouichi understood now. Fighting to protect the Digital World a year ago, fighting since then to maintain the boundary of the Real World, this last year had made Kouichi start to really appreciate his mother's words even more. Sometimes you did have to do something, even if it was a bad day. And he wasn't a hostess, but it turned out you couldn't be a good Warrior if you were full of bad feelings either.
So Kouichi tried to let go. Of course it was easier said than done, but the first thing to do was to refocus. Try to be positive. Relax a little. Breathe. Kouichi was here for a reason and after meeting Hikari he felt like he could actually say what it was now, and why he was here.
Angry to gloomy to resolute… All of his friends had told him he was too serious at least once, though it was especially rich that one time he'd heard that from Kouji. All right, try to lighten up a little then. If the middle of the city was no good try someplace else. So Kouichi turned and walked away from the urban sprawl.
Among all the exciting buildings and the big amusement park and the television station and whatever was going on in this world's version of the Tokyo Big Site, Odaiba also had picturesque parks made of rolling emerald lawns stretching right up to the edge of the ocean. If he was going to be stuck in Odaiba at the very least Kouichi could go be stuck someplace nice, and it took a surprisingly short walk to reach someplace nice.
Kouichi parked himself on a bench looking out over the ocean. In front of him was a cobbled path that traveled along a guardrail next the water. Behind him an expansive field of grass. To the left and way down the path was the Fuji TV station with its distinctive big bulb. From the right Kouichi could hear the shrieks and laughter of young children.
He breathed out.
This place, the other Tokyo still didn't feel quite right. Kouichi still didn't belong here, his mother, his brother, and his friends weren't here. And no matter how many times he tried Kouichi still couldn't quite get past Hikari's Tailmon. It should have been impossible. It would have been impossible back home.
The message in Bokomon's book had been absolutely clear and depressingly accurate, if a Digimon were to enter into the Real World it would create a distortion that would eventually bring the world to ruin. Kouichi had seen that for himself this last year. The pathway between the worlds should have been closed after their battle with Lucemon, but the tyrant's ambitions had carved a lasting scar into the world. Even if the Digital World had been restored, a path was now open, a path that had never been intended to exist, and that path allowed Digimon to travel between the worlds. Some came by accident, some tried to do it on purpose. Some who came through were good Digimon who came by happenstance or for some misguided reason, others were violent or wicked Digimon who reveled in the destruction they caused.
Either way it always came to the same result. In the presence of a Digimon the city, the world, it all began to break down. Electronic devices of all sorts malfunctioned around a Digimon. Televisions stopped working, displaying static or flickering images. Phones either broke or started dialing at random. Streetlights flickered off and on before they eventually burst. Stoplights changed at random. Emergency sirens would start blaring blaring, loss of power, rolling blackouts… Eventually anything electronic burned itself out. The only Digimon that could exist in the Real World were Hybrid Digimon, Digimon that were also human enough to not distort the world. Digimon like Agnimon or Wolfmon. Or Lowemon.
And so the new generation of Legendary Warriors had a new battle, a battle to protect their home and preserve the balance between the worlds.
Kouichi had spent the last year with his friends doing everything they could to keep Digimon like Tailmon out of the Real World. They did this to preserve the harmony and stability of both worlds. And so it was completely impossible according to all of his knowledge and against all of his instincts that Hikari could just go out for the day with her Tailmon friend.
So was he second-guessing himself? Of course he was second-guessing himself! Everything he thought he knew about the world was suddenly wrong. Apparently here at least one of this world's Legendary Warriors had a Digimon friend who also acted as her bodyguard even in the Real World. Something that ridiculously impossible had Kouichi questioning his place in this world.
So much for letting go.
Looking out over the ocean Kouichi felt a sudden crawling feeling go down his spine. How could he be sure he wasn't going to become a danger to the harmony of the world? Not by choice, of course not, never… But that hadn't mattered in his world. Good, honest, heroic Digimon still had to be sent away. Their presence, them EXISTING was enough to wreak havoc on the world. It was different here, what it was TOO different? What if Lowemon, what if he was accidentally a danger?What if all those Digimon in the City of Beginnings were right about him and he actually was…
Someone screamed. People ran, panicked, shouting, yelling, shrieking!
He heard the word:
"MONSTERS!"
Kouichi grabbed his phone on reflex and ran towards the din.
Across the beautifully manicured field people ran scared. A man in a suit fled, his tie flapping in the sudden wind. A younger man tripped over his feet. A huge shadow washed over him and the man rolled onto his back, looked up, and scrambled to pull himself onward, crying in fear. A mother clutched the hands of her two daughters, she shouted desperately to be heard over the buzzing and the screeching, dragging her girls away from an abandoned picnic site in the shade of a tree.
High overhead was a massive, eyeless praying mantis at least six meters long. Its grass-green body showed clearly in the light of the sun, but what caught the light even more clearly were the huge metal sickles on its forearms.
Snimon, Kouichi recalled. Junpei had fought one, though the one he had described had been much smaller.
Up above, the Digimon flew in erratic circles, its wings buzzing loudly sending leaves and petals into the air. Then it shrieked and swung its massive blades, throwing sickle shaped waves of deep red light into the ground. Where the attacks landed they flashed and exploded throwing grass and dirt into the air with a roar.
Kouichi had seen this before with other Beast-type Digimon that had crossed over into the Real World. Thrown into a whole new world some Digimon just went on a rampage. A place like Tokyo could be overwhelming to a Digimon, especially one that had been suddenly dragged from its home. The city was huge and bright but also gray, it was loud, full of vehicles and people talking and crashing and movement, and it had the scents of ten million humans all crammed together. All of that all at once? Just like this Snimon, some Digimon went on a rampage. It was attacking at random, and so far nobody had been hurt, but it was just a matter of time…
No. He had to stop this right now. This wasn't his world, but these were still people who had lives, precious lives that were worth protecting.
So Kouichi let go his hesitation.
The boy swung his cell phone forward with his right hand, catching a streamer of darkness from his shadow. In a moment it transformed into his familiar black digivice. Kouichi raised his left hand conjuring a circle of gleaming code. Then, he brought both together.
"Spirit Evolution! Lowemon!"
For a moment all of the shadows in the park swung towards him, offering their deference to the newly evolved Warrior of Darkness. Lowemon looked up at the wild Digimon and drew his spear.
High up above the Snimon paused from flying in aimless circles. It suddenly sensed something it knew. A Digimon. It turned around toward Lowemon. A tiny black thing, only a third its size. Easy. It chittered. Prey.
The Digimon swung both of its scythe blades throwing its Shadow Sickles down at Lowemon, and then dove at him with its huge body. Lowemon's spear flashed twice, his first swing cutting clean through one attack, his second swing deflecting the other off to the side. Lowemon raised his spear to challenge the charging Snimon, but his eyes widened in horror when he saw the second attack fall down near a group of fleeing people. Where it landed the blade burst with another loud explosion. Someone screamed. Lowemon swore.
I can't fight here, there are still too many people around!
The Snimon screeched and barreled down on Lowemon, blade arms at the ready to crush and dice him. Lowemon leapt hard to the right, out of the way. The Snimon swung, but too late! Its blade missing Lowemon's ankle by less than an inch.
The insect Digimon slammed through a park bench and through the seaside railing with a crash. Buzzing its wings, it turned in a clumsy half circle coming up around for another attack.
Lowemon focused, thrusting the other Digimon out of his mind to think about the shadows. The Snimon had finished turning around and rose into the air to prepare for another divebomb.
The park on this bright day was full of shadows. Snimon raised its left blade high, the sun gleaming wickedly off its edge. Remember, a human's shadow had two arms and two legs, find the direction that had the fewest of those shadows.
The Snimon swung its arms throwing more attacks down to the ground. Lowemon jumped back, once, twice, three, then four times and then a fifth time dodging to the side again. The Snimon shrieked with disappointment as the black Digimon slipped out of its blades, but it quickly flew up into the air again to try for yet another pass.
That direction had too many humans... That direction was over the ocean...
Snimon swung its blades again and Lowemon dodged to the side yet again. The insect screeched in frustration. How long could he keep going? How long before it landed a lucky hit, or worse it lost interest in him? If the Snimon decided it really wanted to hunt a human…
That direction? There weren't many human shadows but, no, those shadows were cars, cars meant people. That direction still had too many, but there… Trees, birds, a butterfly, garbage cans…
Lowemon turned and ran.
Up above Snimon screeched. Frustrating prey. Rage and anger. The black one would feel its blades. It knew how to hunt prey across fields like these. Pen it in. Dive. Delete. Kill.
Chasing after Lowemon, Snimon threw its Shadow Sickles wildly, slash after slash hitting the ground and blasting grass and dirt everywhere.
Lowemon ran, weaving back and forth between the blades raining from the sky. All around him the ground burned with the falling blades. The huge Digimon screeched overhead. Lowemon kept his eyes forward, tracking his pursuer and its blows by the shadows they cast.
Every time the insect swept from side to side his heart missed a beat, certain he had dragged this on for too long, that the Snimon had gotten tired of this game and soon he would have to chase down the other Digimon before it found a victim. After only minutes and far too long Lowemon was there, the dead zone without shadows. Nothing but grass a hundred meters in any direction. It was time to put an end to this, one way or another.
Lowemon came to a stop and turned to face the Snimon bearing down on him. The insect chattered in joy and dived down, both sickles raised high. It swung down, throwing the weight of its whole body into the attack. Lowemon held his spear lengthwise and braced himself, catching the razor-sharp tips of both scythe blades.
The blow hit like thunder, shockwaves scattered leaves in every direction. The sheer weight slamming into him pushed the smaller Digimon back, his black greaves leaving skidmarks through the churned up soil.
But Lowemon remained standing.
Snimon raised its sickle arms and shrieked again. It swung down its blades again and again and again. Each time Lowemon swung back parrying the blow, each strike clanged off of his spear. Snimon threw another Shadow Sickle and Lowemon confidently knocked it out of the air. Snimon reared back raising its blades high for a final decisive strike and slammed downward.
Its arms sunk into empty earth.
"Ewig Schlaf!"
Lowemon's spear struck true, his jumping attack piercing down through the Snimon's back.
The insect screeched in pain in confusion. It saw the point of the spear running through its chest, it's jaw clicked, it started to turn its eyeless face back towards Lowemon, and then it was no more.
After a moment the massive insect's body faded to black and the shining ring of its DigiCode appeared. Lowemon breathed a sigh of relief. He could still protect the boundary of this world. Lowemon drew his digivice and step towards the defeated Snimon.
"Rogue Digimon who threatens this world, be reborn at the end of your long night. DigiCode Scan!"
Lowemon watched with some satisfaction as the egg that had formerly been Snimon dropped through the ground leaving a slight, rippling distortion in the world as it passed. And then it was gone, back to the Digital World to be reborn and live again.
No sooner had Lowemon relaxed when he heard voices coming up behind him, still faint and in the distance. There were two of them, humans, judging by their shadows. Kouichi hurriedly devolved and turned around to see two men walking up the gentle slope of the park towards him. The man in front was half turned to his partner who was fiddling with a television camera. Thankfully, neither seemed like they'd been paying attention to him.
"What kind of reporters would we be if we didn't even try?" The first man said. This man was well into middle age, tall and a little gaunt with brown hair. His face was thin with narrow features and he had bags under his sharp, small eyes. He wore a salaryman's dress shirt that was wrinkled and stained with what must have been years of wear. His voice was serious and no-nonsense, rough in a way that took even more years to achieve. This was exactly the sort of man that mother spent her evenings serving drinks to.
"I'm telling you Mr. Ishida, it doesn't work like that! No matter what camera I try it always fogs up with noise when I try and film one of those monsters. Until someone can figure out- wait- hang on... There it goes!" This man was younger looking with a much newer shirt and glasses, his voice had lifted into a gleeful shout. "Now I've got you this time! This time I can get some real footage of… Oh." He looked up through the lens for the first time seeing Kouichi, then turned the camera from side to side confused.
The first man, Mr. Ishida, turned to follow the cameraman's lens and spotted Kouichi.
"Tell me young man, I don't suppose you've seen any monsters fighting around here?" Mr. Ishida said, as he approached, his voice sounding surprisingly warm.
"Monsters?" Kouichi asked, trying his best to sound innocent.
"Yep, that's what I said, monsters. We had a report called in about monsters terrorizing this park, and seeing as it's right in our backyard, we came to take a look and do some reporting seeing as we're reporters and all. Oh, right sorry, I guess I should've introduced myself up front," the man took out a press ID and gestured at the building behind him, "I'm Ishida Hiroaki, I'm a reporter with Fuji TV back there."
"Kimura Kouichi," he bowed automatically. The man's voice was pleasant, but his eyes were steely. They were scrutinizing Kouichi very carefully. The boy suddenly felt extremely uncomfortable. "Is... Is it normal for there to be monsters here? Like, should you be out here looking for them? I mean, you said you were a reporter wouldn't you think it was…"
"A hoax?" Mr. Ishida finished for him. He chuckled. "A few years back I would've said yes but after everything that's happened… Well... But if you're new in town welcome to Odaiba, the monster capital of Japan. You'd think it would be Shibuya or Shinjuku, right? Well, it's not as bad as it was in the heyday when the invasion happened, but sometimes giant monsters show up around here. And we're always the ones who get called about it for some reason. I suppose the TV station did get demolished in the Odaiba Blockade Incident, and so I guess that means people think we're experts all the sudden." The man shrugged. His smile held, but so did the sharp look in his eyes. "At least it means that your Fuji TV reporters are always first at the scene."
Kouichi's head was spinning. What kind of world had he landed in? An invasion? A blockade? He suddenly felt very small. The reporter's eyes seemed like they were looking right through him. Like the man knew something about him. Had he devolved fast enough? Had the man somehow seen him stop being a Digimon? Right now he wanted to be somewhere else far away.
"You get calls about monsters...?" It was the best he could manage at the moment.
"That's what I said, we've got phones ringing off the hook right now, there's been a ton of monster sightings all across the city."
It took a few seconds for Kouichi to process what the man had said, but when he did he stared up at Mr. Ishida in alarm.
"There are other Di-Monsters around than the one that was in the park?"
"That's what it seems like, it sounds like a bunch of them came over, just like last Christmas." Mr. Ishida said. For some reason his gaze softened a little bit.
Kouichi began to turn away, then he paused and gave a nod to the older man.
"I'm very sorry, but I just remembered I have something I need to do. I'm sorry I couldn't tell you anything about monsters." Kouichi turned and began to run.
It made him look suspicious, but in that moment he didn't care. Another Digimon on the loose was more important, and that meant he had to go. And, no, it was more than that, he could just go! Even if the reporter started asking around about him he would never find him, this wasn't his world, nobody knew who he was.
For the very first time since he had arrived in Odaiba that thought didn't make Kouichi feel sick to his stomach.
"Er, should we go after him? I don't need to be a veteran reporter like you to know the kid was holding something back," the cameraman said.
"No, I don't think so. I think that boy is probably just a good kid trying to do the right thing the best way he knows how. You have to respect that in somebody. And I don't want to get in his way, especially if my gut is right."
"Uh, your gut? Is this your famous "Reporter's Instinct"? What does your gut say, sir?"
"It says he knows what he's doing," Mr. Ishida gave a rueful little smile and shook his head. "You know how our shows always say "don't try this at home"? It's the same thing here. You should always leave the serious work to the pro."
"He's a professional? At what? Monsters? No offense sir, but he's just some kid."
Ishida Hiroaki just chuckled, watching as the boy crossed the horizon into the city and was gone.
Comparatively faster progress, no? Four months instead of a year and a half is a definite improvement. Of course it's not as fast as I would like to be, and no doubt not as fast as anyone who's reading this would like to be, and so this is a kind of compromise. My initial outline for this chapter goes on for a while longer, but at some point I realized that the final scene of this installment actually made for a completely acceptable place to end for now and so I'm cutting what I had outlined for chapter 3 into two parts. Here's hoping I'll finish the next one even faster!
This separation is somewhat begrudgingly, I add, because the the true meaning behind the chapter title is still forthcoming. Still, you should never let perfect be the enemy of good, so here we are.
I probably don't have to point out that I contrived a lot of stuff related to Digimon Frontier out of whole cloth. Part of this is for the sake of the story and so I beg your pardon on it, but at the same time the show is actually astonishingly light on detail when it comes to the Real World lives of the main characters hence all the stuff that I contrived. And whatever I didn't contrive I owe to more fan authors and fan works than I can recall and to them I am sorry about that. If I had any idea that I would actually be publishing this story a decade ago I would've written at least some of them down. To those authors who took the plunge before me, I salute you.. I would talk about being on the shoulders of giants, but that sounds incredibly arrogant.
Like always reviews (of any sort) are greatly appreciated. And those who still read it, I hope you enjoy it and continue enjoying it.
To Be Continued