Day 2 - Wormmon and His Evolutions: My Partner
Ken lied on his bed after returning from the Digital World for the first time ever. He couldn't get over how amazing it had been, even with the fact Osamu caught him right away and confiscated his digivice saying it was his. He didn't seem to mind, because he knew exactly when Osamu had put it and it was easy to get it. He was so happy about meeting his partner for the first time that nothing else seemed to mind. He rolled over and slumber overtook him.
The Digital World was absolutely breath-taking. Ken had never seen such a cute city before in his life. The Village of Beginnings – which he found out what it was called later on – smelled like baby powder, even though there were no human babies around. The seven-year old boy felt like he was stepping on a cloud; that was how soft the ground felt like.
As he was walking through the fluffy green carpet, soft and low lullabies echoed all over. His digivice glowed purple and vibrated in his hand, so he brought it up and stared at it.
"What's going on?"
He looked around him, hoping to find something that was reacting just like his digivce, and quickly spotted a digitama glowing in the same purple tone. As he was getting closer, the color on both things got stronger until they were both flashing in bright purple.
Ken knelt down and grabbed the digitama in his hands, which immediately stopped glowing. He looked around, hoping to find someone who could help him on what to do next. But there was no one around.
"How am I supposed to hatch this?" He involuntarily rubbed it and a small crack appeared on its shell. "I guess I have my answer."
Seconds later the digitama was fully hatched and its shell had turned into a crib. On it there was a light green Digimon with a large leaf hanging over his head and something that looked like a pink pacifier.
"Hello, Ken. We finally met."
"Who are you?"
"I'm Leafmon, your Digimon partner."
"What? My Digimon partner?"
"That's right. Every Chosen Child has one."
"Chosen Child?" Ken grabbed his digivice and stared at it. "You mean, there are other children who own one of this?"
"Yeah, that's what I'm saying."
The boy put his digivice in his pocket and proceeded to pick his partner from his crib.
"Nice to meet you, Leafmon."
"Nice to meet you too, Ken." He grinned and snuggled on his chest. "I've been waiting a few months for you. I'm glad you're finally here."
"You were waiting for me?"
"I could only get hatched with your help."
"Oh." The boy was surprised by it. "I'm sorry for taking too long to come find you."
"It's okay. You're finally here. That's all that matters."
Ken couldn't help but smile and held his partner tight against his body as he stood up. "Let's get out of here, what do you say?"
"I say let's do it."
.
The cold breeze messed with Ken's hair when he stepped outside his building that morning. He didn't seem to mind at all though. In fact, he was just relieved everything was over and the Digital World was at peace again, as well as the Earth. He held Wormmon close to him and they crossed the street ahead.
"Ken, where are we going?"
"I'm taking you to a place I used to go with my friends from school before…"
He never got to finish his sentence and Wormmon looked up at him, curious to know what had happened.
"Ken."
"I'm sorry." He opened his eyes after shutting them tight.
"It's over. You're not that person anymore."
"I know." Ken nodded. "It still haunts me from time to time. It will take a little while until it fully goes away."
"I'll make sure it doesn't come back again."
"Thank you, Wormmon."
"So where are we going?"
"You'll find out very soon." It was all he said for the rest of their way.
The duo soon arrived to a public soccer field near the Ichijouji residence in Tamachi. As expected, it was empty because of winter.
"Here we are." Ken walked towards it and stopped right by its border. "This is where I used to play soccer almost everyday after class. I can't even count how many times my mother had to come all the way here and beg me to go home. I could easily spend all night here."
"You don't talk to them anymore?"
"Not really. I lost touch with them after I became obsessed with the Digital World and thought it was just a videogame."
"Well, it's never too late to start over. It hasn't been that long since it happened, has it?"
"It hasn't, but I just… I don't know."
"So you and your friends came here to play soccer?"
"Mostly, yes. We'd get to caught up on it we didn't want to play anything else. Now I'm just not that sure if I'm actually good at it or it was because of the dark seed I used to have on the back of my neck." Ken absentmindedly touched it, as if he was expecting to find it there or something.
"I'm pretty sure you're good at it. You're good at everything you do. I've seen it with my eyes."
"Thanks, Wormmon."
"Aren't you gonna play?"
"No, it's too cold for that. Besides, you can't really play soccer alone."
"You can call Daisuke. I'm sure he'd come here."
"Nah, he lives far and is probably with his family. Let's just go back home."
"Alright. But Ken…"
"What is it?" He looked down at his partner.
"You can still play with Daisuke. I'm sure he will love to."
"Maybe." He looked back up. "We'll see how it goes next time we see each other, whenever that will be."
"So call him and change that."
"I'll think about it. Let's go home."
.
Ken stood in the sidewalk and looked up towards the campus. There were a bunch of stairs to climb to reach the building, but he decided to sit down and relax for a few minutes before going to class. He couldn't help but notice there was a large number of people with Digimon partners, and some of them even brought them to class. There hasn't been a single one of them who didn't smile at him automatically when they spotted Wormmon with him.
"Ken, you have a lot of friends already."
"They're not my friends, Wormmon. They're only smiling at me because of you, actually."
"What?"
"That's right. It's all because of you, because we have a partner, something in common."
"Ken?"
He immediately turned around when his name was called and saw Hikari coming up the stairs towards them. "Hikari? What are you doing here?"
"I made you lunch and wanted to give it to you before I go to college." She smiled warmly as she handed him a pile wrapped in a green napkin.
"Wow, thank you so much." He stood up after picking it up from her hands. "Aren't you going to be late for class because of it, though?"
"No, don't worry about it. I still have some time. College isn't that far from here, as you know."
"I do. So I can take you and then come back."
"No, you don't have to. It's perfectly fine, I can go on my own. Tailmon is in my bag in case I need her."
"You brought her?"
"Of course." Hikari opened her bag and showed her partner to her boyfriend. "She didn't want to be alone at home. I mean, without me."
"I see. Hello, Tailmon."
"Hi."
"Are you sure you don't want me to walk you to college?"
"No, I'll be fine." She walked to him and stared into his blue eyes. "But you're definitely more than welcome to pick me up later."
"I will do that." Ken couldn't help but smile and placed his hands on her hips. "If I let you go, that is."
"Well, I guess I can stay five more minutes. But not more than that."
"I'll take what I can have." His hands slid to her back and he pulled her towards him, meeting her lips halfway in a passionate and slow kiss.
After about five minutes Hikari had left to her college, Ken and Wormmon finally made their way upstairs towards his building. The green package gently swinging with his movements. He looked up at sky, paying attention to its light blue color and the few clouds kilometers away from him.
"Ken?" Wormmon called his name a few meters away and the boy looked down at him. "Aren't you gonna come? If we don't hurry, we're gonna be late for your first class. I'm sure you don't want this."
"Right." He looked down at the ground briefly and let out a warm smile. "Let's go."
"You seem happy."
"You think so?" Ken bent down and picked his partner up and they walked in together.
.
Ken stepped into the grass with his bare feet. He didn't really like the itchy feeling from it on his feet, but sometimes he'd let himself experience that sensation. That day was one of them. The fresh countryside breeze passed by him, messing his short blue hair gently. He inhaled the scent of dew from a typical fall morning in the woods and stepped further in the small green area in the back of the house. It didn't take long for Wormmon to join him.
"The weather here is so nice, isn't it?" He said cheerfully beside his partner. "It's perfect."
"Yes, it is. It's refreshing. I didn't know I need it until we came here."
"So it was actually a good idea to follow Hikari's suggestion, huh?"
"You can say that again." Hikari's voice echoed from the back porch and the duo looked over towards her. "It was hard to convince him to come here. He's not really the type to get away for the weekend."
"Okay, I deserve that."
"It took the doctor to say it'd be good for our child and their mom to spare for him to agree to come." She removed her flip flops and stepped into the bright green grass with a large smile on his face.
"Ken!"
"I'm sorry. This isn't exactly my ideal place to spare."
"Then what's it?"
"The city."
"Your ideal place to spare is the city?"
"That's right." Ken nodded. "When I need to spare I go jogging for longer that than I usually do."
"You could try talking to someone too." Hikari sat on the grass and hugged her knees. "That's also very helpful."
"That's the teacher talking." He remarked with a grin.
"Well, my students love it. So I don't understand your complaint."
"I'm not complaining." He grabbed a small rock near him and threw it away. "Isn't it humid for you to lie down?"
"No, it's actually perfect." Hikari moved her focus from the light blue sky above to her fiancé. "You should try it."
"Nah, I think coming here is enough for me."
"Being in touch with nature is good too. Come on, try it."
"Hikari is right, Ken." Wormmon spoke. "You're gonna have to give in into this eventually, when your child arrives."
"I know." He was reluctant for a moment and then lied down next to his fiancee. "Alright."
"So how does it feel?" She looked at him while gently rubbing her slight growing belly.
"I have to admit you were right. It feels good."
"Does that mean you're willing to come here or any other place closer to the nature for a small trip?"
"I don't know. There's a possibility."
"I have a feeling our son or daughter will love these places, so you don't really have a choice."
"Well, I guess I'll just have to accept it then." He turned his head to look at her.
"That's right." She stroked his cheek softly before leaning over and kissing him briefly.
.
"Hana, stay where we can see you." Ken said when he noticed his four-year old daughter was going too far.
"But, daddy, the butterfly is flying away."
"What butterfly, sweetheart?"
"The blue one that was on a flower. We need to go after her." Hana ran to him and grabbed his hand, trying to pull him up. "Let's go, daddy."
"Wait a minute, Hana. We need to clean things up here first."
"No, we can come back later. Please, daddy." She looked at him with pleading eyes.
"Alright, let's go." He turned to Hikari when he heard her reacting to the whole situation and noticed a smile on her lips. "What?"
"She completely dominates you. She just look at you like that and knows she wins you."
"She does not."
"She just did."
"I… I…" Nothing he said would prove her wrong.
"I knew you'd see it as well."
"How can I say no to her? She's our daughter."
"It isn't easy, but you'll learn it eventually." She stood up and looked at him. "We're ready to go here."
About five minutes later, the couple arrived at where Hana was with Wormmon and Tailmon. She was knelt down near a flower watching curiously the butterfly she was staring at earlier.
"Ken, look at this." Wormmon said proudly and looked at his partner. "Hana loves bugs."
"Yeah, I can say that." Ken replied with a smile and knelt down beside his daughter. "Is that the butterfly you were talking about earlier?"
"It is. Isn't it pretty, daddy?"
"It's a beautiful one, yes."
"Daddy, can we take it home?"
"I'm sorry, Hana, but no. This butterfly lives in the nature. We can't take it away from there, it won't survive."
"So we'll have to leave her here?"
"That's right." Hikari bent over and placed her hands on her knees. "It may not seem like it, but she's much better here. Believe me."
"Mommy, can we get a puppy?"
"I don't think so, sweetie. Me and your father work all day and we won't have time to take care of a puppy properly."
"Daddy?"
"Hikari, can't we talk about this?"
"Are you gonna take care of a dog?"
"I'm sure we can figure something out."
"Not right now, I'm sorry. Hana is too young to take care of a pet alone. Maybe in a few years we can talk about it again."
"Okay." Ken picked the girl up and placed her on his shoulders. "A balloon would be good though, right?"
"Absolutely. A balloon is okay."
"Can I get to choose which one I want?"
"Of course." He looked up at her with a smile.