Chapter Text
“Hey. Wake up.” Paws nudged the edge of Luffy’s face. He turned to the side, to get away from Salamon and her incessant prodding. “You have school today, idiot.”
Luffy pulled his blanket over his head. He didn’t want to deal with this today, not after yesterday’s loss to that Ogremon. “Not now…” He muttered, trying to get back to his dream. It had been a nice dream. His brothers were there.
“Look, if you don’t get up soon, I’m going to eat your breakfast.” And that did it. He immediately bolted up, knocking his reverted partner to the ground. “...Why is it always this…?” She groaned.
“Shishishi! Sorry, Salamon!” He reached over and picked up the puppy with one arm. “Come on, let’s go eat!”
“Fine…” The Rookie muttered. “Oh, by the way, after you fell asleep, I sensed a Digimon. I bet we could take it even as I am now. So when your school’s done, we should track it down.”
Salamon had learned early on in their partnership- was it really a whole year and a half ago?- that attempting to order Luffy around was an exercise in futility. She was still rather aggressive, but the Pirate King thought he was finally getting through to her, just a little.
And she did have good ideas. It was nice to have someone do the thinking for him.
“That sounds like a great idea!” He agreed. But first, and more importantly, breakfast. Breakfast, and then school, and then being a Tamer. He grabbed his hat and Digivice from where they sat next to his pillow and ran to start the day.
It turned out that getting Flamemon out of the house was even easier for Sabo than getting him inside was. The duo ran towards the park, enjoying the fact that it was early enough there weren’t very many people on the street that could see them.
When they got to the park, Koala was already there. It took her a few moments to acknowledge Sabo’s presence. “So, would you care to explain just what I had to cover you for yesterday?” She asked. He chuckled sheepishly and glanced aside to where his partner was standing, Digivice in hand.
“Koala, I would like to be the first to introduce you to Flamemon, my Digimon partner.” It wasn’t the first time she’d looked at him like that, and certainly not the last. It was the first time in a long time that it hadn’t been after he came out of a manic episode, though.
“Of course they’re real… But a Flamemon? Are you going to be okay?” Which was, admittedly, a good question. Sabo had woken up in the middle of a phobic episode that morning, so having a powerful source of heat right next to him had been… difficult, to say the least.
Needless to say, he was going to help Flamemon set up his own sleeping area as soon as possible, whether or not they decided to keep him secret in the end. He was not going to deal with suffering panic attacks first thing in the morning just because of a lack of space.
“I’ll be fine, Koala. Where are Sanji and Nami?” Because he wanted to introduce all of them to his partner. It wasn’t like it’d break their minds or anything, they’d all been to the New World.
“Not here yet. And don’t change the subject. This is serious! What if you burn down Shinjuku?” A very valid point.
“We won’t burn down Shinjuku. I promise. Now…” He reached into his school bag and brought out a sack of breakfast pastries. “Who wants to eat?”
They’d already eaten all of them by the time Sanji and Nami got to the park. A lot of it was Flamemon’s fault. It turned out that the Digimon could easily match his Tamer in terms of appetite.
“You didn’t leave anything for us?” Nami asked. “Not even a donut?” Sabo wasn’t sure why she was surprised. She’d sailed with Luffy, after all. She knew how much they ate.
“I was hungry,” Flamemon pointed out. “I think I like food. We didn’t have it in the Digital World.” And that was enough for him to get Sanji’s favor.
Honestly, Sabo wasn’t sure what he was expecting from today, but this was honestly the best he could have hoped for.
As soon as class ended, Ace pulled out his Digivice. It was a reflex at this point, given that, as of last week, he’d been a Tamer for an entire year. Coronamon would be waiting just outside the school building, and they could go hunt down a Digital Field.
He hadn’t expected to detect a not-Coronamon Digimon outside of a Field, though it had happened before. Digimon could show up in the middle of the night, or come in from a part of town not patrolled by a Tamer. If there were other Tamers. They still weren’t entirely sure on that part.
Actually, the signal was coming from the same direction as Coronamon. That made things easier. Or not, because the fire Digimon was not in his normal hiding space.
“Flamemon! Flamemon, where are you!?” At least he wasn’t the only one. Which probably explained the new signal, actually. It also gave him a new concern.
He knew that voice. He wasn’t sure from where, so it couldn’t be anyone he’d spoken to within the past decade or so, but Ace knew that voice. And something told him that he had to follow it.
The other boy had gotten to the school gates by now, already moving in the direction the Digivice told him to go. So the other signal was likely his partner.
“Flamemon… that’s the name of a Digimon, isn’t it?” Ace spoke up, giving the other boy pause. He turned around, and Ace suddenly realized where, exactly, he knew that voice from. How could he have forgotten?
A mostly blue outfit. Goggles, of all things, on top of his head, though they weren’t around a hat the way they used to be. Blonde hair, and eyes that, upon seeing him, widened just a fraction. What were the odds, that of all the hundreds of people he’d called family, that the first one he’d find would be his ever-so-slightly younger brother?
“A-Ace…” Sabo’s voice was already quivering, which Ace would have expected more from Luffy, but that didn’t matter, because his long-lost little brother was standing right in front of him.
Nothing else mattered. Coronamon could take care of himself for a bit, anyway.