A man was sat at a table out the front of his local cafe, enjoying a quiet Saturday.
However, on this particular Saturday, something wasn't quite right.
He couldn't shake the feeling someone was watching him.
Glancing around as he sipped his coffee, he noticed something odd.
The nearby tree had eyes.
In amongst the foliage, two vibrant blue eyes set in a golden face stared out at him.
A digimon was watching him.
Encountering a digimon was not uncommon these days. Whilst they had been a rarity to begin with, they had gradually become more common after some kids had done some pretty crazy stuff in the digital world.
Since then, digimon had figured out the human world was much safer than the digital world. Many made the trip to seek refuge from the fighting that was so common in the digital world.
The authorities had tried to cover up their existence at first, but quickly realised it was going to be near-impossible to do so. Trying to detain a digimon generally didn't go well, and that required knowing where they were in the first place. Rumours said a mysterious organisation in Japan had equipment that could track them, but nobody had managed to confirm that.
The majority of digimon turned out to be at least moderately intelligent, and fairly reasonable when not provoked. Some even ended up partnering with humans, who came to be known as tamers.
This turned out to be rather convenient when the small minority of less-reasonable digimon decided to cause a fuss. When trouble inevitably started, conventional weaponry turned out to be fairly useless against the might of digimon. However, tamers and their digimon partners proved themselves invaluable in despatching these troublemakers.
In the end, most authorities agreed that it was simpler to just let them be. There were still some dissenters, xenophobes who feared the digimon would take over or overzealous anarchists just seeking conflict. However, they too found it difficult to do anything meaningful against the typical strength of digimon.
So, all things considered, it was fairly typical to encounter a digimon out in public.
What was much less common was to have one outright staring at you from a tree.
The man kept his eye on it, expecting it would stop staring and move on. However, it just continued to stare.
He tried his best to ignore the stare and just enjoy his coffee. Unfortunately, now he knew he was being stared at, he couldn't get that fact out of his head.
He mentioned it to the waiter bringing out his focaccia.
"Ah, thank you. Hey, is one of your colleagues a tamer or something?"
"Uh, no... why?"
"Oh... just, there's a digimon in that tree that's been sitting there staring. I figured it must be the partner of one of the staff."
The waiter gave a disinterested glance across to the tree.
"Oh... that. No, it's a wild one. Been hanging around here for about a week. I wouldn't worry about it, hasn't been bothering anyone yet."
"Uh, ok. Does it always just sit and stare?"
"It comes and goes. Do you need anything else?"
"Uh, no thanks."
The waiter headed back into the cafe.
He sat there eating for a few minutes, occasionally glancing at the eyes in the tree.
As he let his mind wander, he had a silly thought.
He looked back to the digimon in the tree and called out.
"So, you know it's considered rude to stare, stranger?"
The eyes held his gaze for a moment, before the digimon then vanished.
"...weird."
He looked around, trying to see where it had gone, but found no signs of the digimon.
His attention was grabbed by the sound of something clattering on the table in front of him.
He turned back to his food, which was now being watched by an oversized falcon that had perched itself on the other side of his table. Beady eyes stared at him from amongst a mix of brown and green feathers.
"Uh... where'd you come from?"
The bird ignored the question, eyes focussed on the food.
"Falcomon want food. You give food."
"Sorry dude, that's my lunch. You'll have to ask someone else."
This clearly agitated the bird, which let out a screech and puffed out its feathers.
"NO! Falcomon's food!"
Growing concerned, he went to pull the plate away from the digimon, but it lashed out with a clawed wing. Its aim was feral, but the long claws still grazed his arm, leaving a faint trail of blood.
"OW! Damn, what the hell!?"
A third voice interjected.
"You should not attack humans, Falcomon."
The mystery voice had a calm confidence to it, but with an underlying threat. The owner stepped up beside the table.
The man took a sideways glance. The newcomer was quite tall, he guessed probably a similar in height to himself. It was roughly humanoid, but with more animalistic features. Pointed ears and a long muzzle, all covered in gold and white fur. Purple gloves covered its arms past the elbows.
But the most interesting thing was the eyes: an icy-blue colour that was distinctly familiar.
"The tree-starer."
The bird was a bit flustered by the sudden appearance of a challenger, shuffling away from the other digimon.
"You... you go away. Falcomon's food."
"Unfortunately not, Falcomon. That is not your food. You should leave now."
The bird hesitated, seemingly debating whether the food was worth fighting over.
"...fine... not want stupid food anyway."
It seemed the food was not that interesting after all. The bird hopped down and waddled away in a huff.
The man let out a tense breath.
"Phew... that was kind of scary. Uh... thanks for scaring the little bugger off."
"You are welcome."
His saviour's gaze fell to the wound on his arm.
"...are you injured?"
"Huh?... oh, damn."
He only just noticed the blood on his arm. He grabbed a napkin and wiped along his arm. The faint trail had already began to dry.
"Hmm, not too serious. Just a bit of a scratch."
"That is fortunate. A Falcomon's claws can be quite lethal in the right circumstances. I apologise for not stopping it sooner. I did not believe it would go so far as to attack you."
"Hey, I'm just glad you did at all."
"And I am glad that it did not come to a more serious end."
"Right. So, uh... that was you sitting in the tree?"
"Yes. I was keeping watch."
"For what?"
"That Falcomon. It had been eyeing this area for some time. My presence appeared to be the only thing keeping it from harassing others."
The man got the implication.
"Until I hassled you. So if I'd just ignored you, I probably wouldn't have received this little trophy."
He gestured to the scratch on his arm.
The digimon raised its eyebrows at the man, with a look almost as if to say he should have known better.
"That is possible."
"Ah, well. Win some, lose some. So... you have a name, stranger?"
"I am Renamon."