When I wake up again, the sun is beating down on me from above. The sky is blue. In the corner of my vision, I can see the leaves of a coconut tree, swaying gently. It smells like sand and my back feels hot. Cold but gentle waves beat against the soles of my feet.

I take a deep breath. It sounds ragged and it hurts and I have to sit up, coughing and sputtering. After a few seconds, I pull myself together again. I breathe in, I breathe out.

Breathe in, breathe out…

I blink. My hands fly to my face but meet nothing but what feels like a metallic mask.

…Hands? Hands. I bring my hands into my vision. I have… hands. Not real hands, but hands. The right is slim and dark purple, the left encased in engraved stone armour. The tips of the gauntlet’s fingers and pointed and sharp. I touch my hand to the gauntlet, running it down the wrist and up the arm. It’s all encased. All the way up to the shoulder. It’s all armour. Yellow armour.

I grit my teeth, teeth I suddenly have, and with my mind coiling with icy, murderous thoughts I try to rip the armour from my arm, from my shoulder, from my face. My entire head is encased in a helmet of armour. If I touch it, if I run my hand over where my eyes should be, there’s nothing there but armour.

I jump to my feet. I have feet. I have legs. Not encased in armour, but dark purple and humanoid. My feet aren’t long. They’re clawed, but apart from the colour, that’s the only strange part.

My legs tremble. After a few seconds of standing, I collapse back into the sand. The waves are loud but it feels like they’re roaring at me.

I put both hands against the sides of my helmet and try to pull it off, but it won’t budge. It won’t go away. It’s stuck.

“A-, auu…”

The sudden voice makes me fly back to my feet, head spinning and body twisting around to find the speaker, but there’s no one around. No Elecmon, no Gomamon, no…

If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

I gulp. My hand touches against where my mouth should be. There, on the front of my armour, is a movable little piece. Like the visor of a knight’s helmet. Reluctantly, I push it open.

The salty breeze touches my open mouth, falling onto my tongue, bringing with it the taste of algae. I lick the open air, thirsty for the wind, hungering for the atmosphere. I lick and I lick and I breathe deeply and I swallow down everything there is.

“A-, auuuhh…!”

Something wet and salty runs down the side of my helmet, going into my mouth, slipping into the cracks in my armour. My face feels hot. It’s hidden, but I can taste it. Slowly, I sit back down. I have arms now, and legs, and a mouth. But what good is it for?

“Auu, auu…!”

I pull the visor back down and squeeze my knees to my chest. Ah, the sun is going down. I wonder if my tears might damage the irremovable armour? I can’t even wipe them away.

I gulp. Salty goes down my throat. I sniffle.

“Bukamon…”

My voice doesn’t sound right. Speaking doesn’t feel good, either. It’s like I’m a cat, trying to form indistinct jowls into actual words. It doesn’t feel right. I don’t want to talk.

But I have a mouth. And-, and maybe I didn’t promise it out loud, maybe I never even told myself so, but… I said I’d do better, didn’t I? With a mouth, I won’t have to eat creatures anymore. I can eat… Seaweed. Or other stuff. Anything, really. This world is made out of data, isn’t it? Nothing is real. I could take a bite of that coconut tree and I’d get the same amount of data as if I ate one of its fruits.

…But, for now, I should get home.

Home…

I sniffle again, but frown at the motion.

Bukamon is…

I touch a hand to my chest. He’s right in there. It was only thanks to him that I could evolve, wasn’t it?... I hope… I hope, for his sake, that I’m a data-type now. I don’t want him to have to eat digimon. It would just be wrong.

The sun begins dipping down below the waves of the sea. I stand up, instinctively rubbing at my helmet. Obviously, it does nothing. All I can do is try to lick off the tears from the inside. I hope my next form is… No, that isn’t important. Right now, none of that is important. None. Food, getting stronger, finding my way home… That can wait.

I turn my back to the ocean. This place is…

It’s an island. A small, almost tiny little island. You know when you open up a newspaper and you check the Sunday comics, and at least a solid third of them will be some stupid joke about deserted islands? ‘At least it can’t get any worse than this,’ the deserted character will say, and in the background you can see a banjo-player hover down from a crashing plane like an oracle sent by God.

It’s that kind of island, but unfortunately enough, I seem to be alone. I don’t know for sure though, because it isn’t quite empty. There are the aforementioned palm trees, alongside a bushage. I would love to explore it to make sure it isn’t the home of some horrible digimon that can eat you in one bite and leave nothing but red pixels behind, but the sun is getting dangerously low and I would like to not accidentally look at the man in the moon.

I take a step towards the inner parts of the island and instantly stumble and fall, kissing the sand bank. Okay… that could have gone better.

I try to stand up again, but my legs wobble and I’m forced to use my tail to keep stable. Oh, I still have that thing? Huh.

Now that I think about it, don’t cats use their tails for balance? Yeah, I could do something like that.

I guess.