C'mon Digimon: The capering monster BUN

C'mon Digimon: The capering monster BUN (Ｃ’ｍｏｎ デジモン　Ｔｈｅ ｃａｐｅｒｉｎｇ ｍｏｎｓｔｅｒ ＢＵＮ, Kamon Dejimon Za Keiparingu Monsutā Bun) or just C'mon Digimon (Ｃ’ｍｏｎ デジモン, Kamon Dejimon) is a one-shot manga that was first published in the '97 SUMMER issue of ', which was released on September 28, 1997, along with other manga pilots, most notably '. It was later published as a special in volume two of Digimon Adventure V-Tamer 01, where an omake page by the author, Izawa Hiroshi, explained that the protagonist of the manga was the source and inspiration for V-Tamer 01's protagonist, Yagami Taichi. =Story=

Overview
In Josaki Electronic Laboratories, Jousaki Shinichirou's Deathmon fought an unnamed child's Meramon. Meramon attacked with, but said attack was easily destroyed by Deathmon's beam, which defeated Meramon as well. Shinichirou then took the kid's dock and shattered it under his foot, calling "death!" as he did so. Afterwards, one of his men told him that they had extracted Meramon's data, and Shinichirou said their next objective was to take control of area C.

An explanation of Digital Monsters, how they're battle monsters raised inside a computer which are sold in cases called "docks", how they can take different forms, and how people would use them to fight each other to raise them as pets, followed. Afterwards, the story moved to Abe Makoto, whose Digimon, a Greymon named Hard Armor III, fought and beat a Seadramon owned by another child. The children around him then praised Hard Armor III, with the blond kid pointing out that it may be able to evolve into the hidden character, Metal Greymon, to which Makoto answered that he was raising his Digimon according to his plan. Makoto then introduced himself in his internal dialogue, pointing out how he had been raising his Greymon for weeks and how it had never lost a battle so far. Furthermore, he thought of his Digimon as if it were real because he could not have pets. He continued by thinking about how nearly every boy in his class had Digimon except for Kamon Kentarou, who had also fought some high school boys in the past due to one dropping a cigarette butt, with Kentarou admonishing him because it could've started a fire.

Makoto proceeded to ask why Kentarou didn't play Digimon, though Kentarou only told him to shut up. Makoto attempted to offer him one of his own Digimon, who had died recently and returned to an egg. However, Kentarou only criticized him for it, saying that he only cared about his Digimon when it was alive and forgot about it when it died, so he could give it away. Makoto answered that he would never forget a Digimon he raised, but dead lives could not come back, and as such the new life that was born from the old one should be treasured and raised as well. Kentarou then left, with Makoto trying to stop him but the blond kid interjected, pointing out how Kentarou hates animals, how he let the chicken and rabbits from the animal pen free and pushed any cat that came his way, and how he heard that he had a scar from a bite hidden under the supporter on his left arm, with the kid wondering if Kentarou got bitten by a dog and that's why he hated animals, with the black-haired kid saying it was a pathetic reason to do so.

Makoto then tailed Kentarou to make him realize how fun it was to have a pet. As he did, Kentarou heard a noise from some trash bags, and went for it thinking it was a clock, only to find it was a Digimon instead. Makoto then showed himself and asked Kentarou if he was going to abandon it. Kentarou tried to give the dock to Makoto, but Makoto refused to take it, argumenting that God must've put the dock there to help Kentarou get over his hatred of animals, and then led Kentarou to his house to show him his 3D virtual monitor. Makoto explained that his brother, a graduate student at university, made it, and that connecting a dock to the machine would show a 3D image of the Digimon in it. Kentarou proceeded to do so, and the machine created a 3D version of the Digimon in it. Kentarou wondered what it was, but Makoto simply pointed out that it was Kentarou's monster. Kentarou objected to it being his monster, but said monster grabbed Kentarou from behind, proving it was happy Kentarou had picked it up. The fact that it kept wagging its tail was only further proof for Makoto, while Kentarou only wanted it to get away from him. However, Kentarou then realized that the monster looked like "him", then left Makoto's house.

The next day, at school, Kentarou wanted Makoto to take the dock, thinking he had left himself get carried away by Makoto the day before. However, the blond and black-haired kids told Kentarou that Makoto was not in the classroom, having been called outside a while ago. Leaving the school with the children that alerted him, Kentarou heard Makoto's voice coming from a Josaki Electronics trailer. Kentarou entered it and found Makoto who had just fought Shinichirou and lost, as shown by Hard Armor III having a giant hole in its chest and how it was disintegrating. Shinichirou explained that they had fought in the 3D coliseum, a machine that let them battle with "real" Digimon. Kentarou aggressively asked who Shinchirou was and what he was doing, and Shinchirou explained that he was the heir to the Josaki Electronic Engineering Institute who had just finished a "death battle" with Makoto's Greymon. The blond kid then explained that he had heard rumours about said death battles, how your dock would be destroyed if you refused to fight or lost, and how a rich kid was behind them, but he didn't expect said rich kid to go after Makoto. Shinichirou explained that, according to his research, Makoto's Greymon was the strongest monster in the region, though it was no match for his Deathmon, the most powerful Digimon created through absorbing the data of those it battled. Kentarou wondered what "created" meant, but Shinchirou didn't care for answering, rather, he asked Makoto to give him his dock. Makoto refused, however, as he would not be able to raise a new life in it if his dock was destroyed, and he wished to raise Hard Armor IV. Shinichirou then sent one of his men after Makoto, arguing that he had several other Digimon anyways. Shinchirou's man grabbed Makoto, and Kentarou tried to save him, only to get punched and thrown away. Shinichirou then explained that he had researched Makoto, how he was not allowed to have a pet so he raised his Digimon as one, which explained why it was so strong since he even kept a diary of its progress. Shinichirou then offered to decorate the final page of said diary, by smashing Hard Armor's dock while shouting "death!". Makoto broke down in tears, and Kentarou angrily asked Shinichirou how he could do such a horrible thing to a Digimon Makoto had raised as a real pet. However, Shinichirou didn't care about such things, as for him, the point of the game was to raise powerful monsters, and that death was the only thing awaiting a loser was a fitting rule which made the game thrilling. This only angered Kentarou more, who retorted that games could make you angry, but not sad, and Shinichirou's rules were wrong. Shinichirou, however, thought only a weakling would say that, and that Kentarou should just try and beat him in a death battle, though he'd accept Kentarou declining to fight. However, seeing Makoto's sadness and Hard Armor III's shattered dock, Kentarou accepted, exclaiming how he'd crush Shinichirou's Deathmon with the Digimon he raised. Shinichirou laughed at that and accepted the challenge, telling Kentarou to meet him at the institute in ten days, then left on his trailer.

At Makoto's house, Makoto apologised to Kentarou. For his part, Kentarou apologised to his Digimon, but decided to accept his responsibility and raise said Digimon into a strong one. His Digimon then puffed its chest to show its gust, before jumping to hug Kentarou, which made Makoto wonder if it understood what was going on. Looking at his Digimon once again, Kentarou decided to name it Bun. Makoto thought it didn't sound strong, but Kentarou didn't care. Kentarou and Makoto then started training Bun, using the 3D virtual machine since it made it easier to check the monster's progress than just using the dock. Makoto gave Kentarou a plan, based on the diaries of all the monsters he raised, which he had faith in. However, even after several days of training, Bun had not grown or evolved at all, with Makoto thinking that he should be at least an Adult-level already, and told Kentarou that Bun was cute but did nothing but wag its tail. Kentarou then stopped following Makoto's schedule after understanding Bun's personality, doing such things as letting it nap which would make it not sleep at night. Makoto told Kentarou how Bun wouldn't get any stronger like that, but Kentarou just asked him to let him handle it.

In a park, Makoto and two other children watched Kentarou and Bun play with a ball, and wondered if Bun had been thrown away because it wouldn't grow up. The black-haired child thought there was no reason to force it to grow, but the blond child pointed out that if it didn't, then Kentarou's dock would be destroyed. Meanwhile, Kentarou was fanned by Bun's tail, only to then get slapped by it. The blond child then pointed out that Kentarou always hated animals. Makoto wondered if Kentarou was not worried about his fight with Shinichirou, as while he was with Bun all the time, he just played around instead of training, and Makoto couldn't understand what he was thinking.

The day of the battle finally arrived, and Kentarou and Makoto, alongside the other two children, went to the Josaki Electronics Institute, but Bun had still not evolved. Shinichirou laughed at Bun, asking Kentarou if he truly was going to challenge his Deathmon with such an immature monster, before remembering how he had heard that one in every thousand monsters or so would be a "badmon" that wouldn't evolve no matter what, and realized that Bun was such a defect. However, Kentarou refused to accept Bun as defective, pointing out how Bun was his Digimon and was great. Shinichirou merely stated that he'd put Bun out of its misery soon enough with the Deathmon he built, and both Digimon prepared to fight in the 3D coliseum. The blond kid pointed out how Deathmon looked even more evil than before, to which Shinichirou answered that Deathmon was now a complete "convertible" monster. The children were confused at that, and Shinichirou asked them why they thought he input the data of all the monsters Deathmon beat, explaining that it was so Deathmon would gain their strength. To show it, Shinichirou had Deathmon change into Death Airdramon, shocking both unnamed children. Shinichirou then had Death Airdramon attack with, but Kentarou commanded Bun to dodge, which it did. Shinichirou didn't care though, and then had Deathmon change into Death Devimon to attack with and Death Tyranomon to attack with, none of which hit Bun. The children pointed out that he was just fooling around. Shinichirou then offered to show them the ultimate monster, Death Metal Greymon, whose data was collected from Makoto's Greymon. This angered Makoto and Kentarou, and Bun shot an energy ball at Death Metal Greymon, which did nothing. Death Metal Greymon then continuously attacked Bun without using special moves to wear it down little by little.

Makoto then criticized Kentarou, pointing out that a "badmon" never had a chance to begin with, but Kentarou didn't even properly train Bun as best as he could, not even sticking to Makoto's training schedule. Before Kentarou could answer Makoto, Shinichirou decided to finish the match, having Deathmon change once again into Death Meramon. The blond kid wondered why Deathmon had turned into Meramon, but Kentarou was clearly affected by it, as Makoto realized something was wrong with him. Shinichirou then explained that he had researched Kentarou, about how he disliked fire as, when he was a kid, a fire caused by someone's cigarette butt had taken the life of Kentarou's dog, which made Kentarou so sad that he would not let himself get close to animals. Makoto then realized that that was why he'd get into fights over cigarette butts and pretended to hate animals. Kentarou asked Shinichirou what was the point in researching that, and Shinichirou admitted there was none, it was just a precaution, but Kentarou's "interesting" past had let him come up with his plan to burn Bun to death, which Death Meramon attempted to do. Kentarou then explained to Makoto that he realized while training Bun that its personality was just like his dog's, and how his dog had died, but Bun was a battle monster and as such he wanted to raise it as a strong monster that wouldn't die. He accepted Makoto's plan was a good one, but he wanted to train Bun at its own pace. The blond kid then asked Kentarou what to do, as Bun did not have any strong attacks that could blow away Death Meramon's flames. Shinichirou laughed at Kentarou, pointing out how a defect would always be a defect, and how Kentarou's dog was also called Bun and was a stupid dog that could do nothing but wag its tail, and how the Digimon Bun would burn just like the dog did. Kentarou, however, said that Shinchirou's research was wrong, and the dog Bun was not dumb, since it had died a noble death by dragging the unconscious Kentarou to safety from the fire, which left Kentarou with the scar on his left arm. This shocked everyone else, and Kentarou continued by saying that Bun wasn't usually very reliable, but it could be counted on, and then cheered the Digimon Bun on, telling it how it was small but it was still a battle monster. Bun then fanned the flames away with its tail wag, and Kentarou commanded him to jump and blow away the flames of death with its, which finally defeated Deathmon.

The children celebrated their victory, while Shinichirou was surprised that he lost. Makoto realized that training should be varied according to a monster's personality, and Kentarou wondered if God had really given him Bun, since he would not have been able to train anyone else.

Back at school, Kentarou would now play Digimon with the rest of the children, and Makoto was worried that he had met his biggest rival, but Bun had gone back to being weak. The children laughed at Kentarou, who asked Bun if he could win once in a while, to which Bun only answered with a happy "mokyu!".

=Characters=

Main Characters

 * Kamon Kentarou
 * Bun
 * Abe Makoto
 * Greymon

Enemies

 * Jousaki Shinichirou
 * Deathmon > Death Airdramon > Death Devimon > Death Tyranomon > Death Metal Greymon > Death Meramon

Others

 * Blond kid
 * Black-haired kid
 * Digimon cameos
 * Koromon
 * Agumon
 * Betamon
 * Airdramon
 * Devimon
 * Meramon
 * Seadramon
 * Tyranomon
 * Metal Greymon (Virus)