Dr. K, Gem, and Gemma were analyzing data from the weapon in the lab. Flynn made a smoothie for lack of anything else to do. Summer and Scott paced alternately behind him. Dillon, meanwhile, just sat on a stool he had pulled over. They were all staring at the tiny body on the couch. He was alive. He was breathing. He had a pulse. He just wouldn't wake up.
Dillon had carried him out of the lab and over to the couch. He'd been surprisingly light. Summer had put one of her pillows under his head and covered him with a blanket she swore she didn't sleep with, though Dillon had no idea why she would need a blanket quite that small otherwise. The child was definitely Ziggy, there was no question about that. He had the same slight build, the same angular jaw, the same thin lips. His face was fuller, though, and his skin had a softness to it that was absent in the older Ziggy. His hair was shorter, though his bangs still fell over his eyes, and his curls were tighter at the base of his neck while the rest was more wavy than curly. It was a lighter brown, almost blonde when the light hit it just right.
Dr. K came out of her lab with Gem and Gemma on her heals. Dillon stood up. Scott and Summer stopped pacing. Even Flynn came over, smoothie in hand.
"What did you find out?" Dillon asked. He shoved his hands in his pockets for lack of anything else to do with them. Dr. K peered over the arm of the couch at the still unconscious child.
"Well it's definitely Ra… Ziggy," she sighed. They all stared at her. It was one of the few times she had uttered something quite so obvious. She cleared her throat and continued. "It appears there was an energy build-up I had not anticipated. It overloaded the weapon and caught Ziggy in the energy field. It appears to have reverted his genetic structure to that of an earlier state. Frankly, we're lucky he wasn't vaporized outright."
"Can you fix it?" Dillon asked.
"It will take some time. I have to completely rebuild the weapon. The overload short circuited the internal hardware and I have to rewrite it from the base code up."
"Don't worry. We'll help!" Gemma put her hand on Dr. K's shoulder.
"It will go faster with three," Gem reassured.
"So what do we do in the meantime?" Scott asked.
"We take care of him." Dillon walked back over to the couch. Large chocolate brown eyes looked up at him with an innocence he had never quite seen reflected in the older version.
"How badly is he affected? I mean, will he remember anything? Will he be our Ziggy or… younger?" Summer asked. Dillon smiled down at the little boy.
"Why don't you ask him?" he replied. He held out his hand and Ziggy looked at it suspiciously. He wouldn't take it, though. He sat up and looked around at the others, taking in the garage and each individual face. They all came over and he just stared.
"Where am I?" he asked in a voice rough with disuse. Flynn bounded into the kitchen for a glass of water. Summer sat down on the couch near Ziggy's feet. Dillon took the stool he had left unoccupied earlier and Scott stood behind him. They were all just staring. It had to be uncomfortable, having so many eyes so fixated on him.
"You're in the garage," Summer prompted, reaching out for him. Ziggy backed into the corner of the couch and pulled his knees up to his chest. He was well out of her reach.
"Who are you?" he asked. Flynn offered him the water, but he wouldn't take it. Summer and Flynn looked to Dr. K who could only shrug her shoulders. This was unfamiliar territory even for her. Apparently, he didn't remember anything at all.
"We're the Power Rangers, it's okay." Scott said. He glanced at Dillon and nodded almost imperceptibly. They would tell him only what he needed to know. Ziggy watched them, took in their leather jackets and morphers, and then reached for the glass of water. His little hands wrapped around the glass and he chugged it down as fast as he could.
"I'm Dillon. This is Scott. That's Summer, Flynn, Dr. K, Gem and Gemma; they're twins." Dillon pointed to each person in turn.
"Do you know who you are? How old you are?" Summer asked. He looked warily at her hands but she kept them in her lap this time.
"Ziggy Grover. I'm six." He handed the empty glass back to Flynn. He started to rattle off an address but Dillon stopped him.
"You're a long way from home, Ziggy Grover. What's the last thing you remember?" Ziggy looked down and frowned. He picked at the blanket for a minute and Summer made a tiny desperate noise in the back of her throat.
"I was at school, I think?" Nobody quite knew where to go with that. None of them knew much about Ziggy's past. Dillon tried to think of some explanation for how a little boy could get from school to the Power Ranger base of operations in a completely different city without knowing it. Scott stepped up and took over.
"There was a monster attack, Ziggy. You got knocked on the head. We brought you here. How do you feel?" Ziggy reached up and felt around his head. His fingers combed through his hair expertly and, when he was done, he suddenly looked considerably more like the older Ziggy with his organized mess of curly hair.
"There's no bump. I'm fine," he said. Summer reached out and snatched her blanket back before he could fiddle with it any more. For lack of anything better to do with the boy, as none of them were really well versed in occupying a small child for extended periods of time, Flynn offered to show him some comics. Ziggy's entire demeanour did a complete turnaround and he practically jumped at the chance. Flynn took his hand and led him up to the bedroom and his select favourite comics. He'd been slowly rebuilding his collection since arriving in Corinth and he now had so many that most were kept in a spare room at his dad's place.
"What do we do now?" Summer asked.
"Find him a bed to sleep in and hope Dr. K gets that gun fixed soon. It's all we can do," Scott said. He followed Flynn and Ziggy upstairs with the pillow from the couch and a new blanket under the guise of setting up the spare bed in their room for their little visitor. Dr. K pulled Gem and Gemma off to the lab, hopefully to get the weapon sorted. Dillon and Summer just stared at each other.
"Did you see the way he checked his head when Scott told him he got hit? It was like a doctor checks for swelling or concussion. How do you think he knew to do it?" she finally asked quietly. Dillon looked down at the floor. He realized then he knew absolutely nothing about Ziggy's childhood. Was his dad a doctor? Did he fall down a lot? He had no clue. All he knew was he didn't like it.