Chapter 10: Amnesia

Grovyle peeked through the bushes behind Kangaskhan Storage. He looked both ways before glancing back towards Laura and motioning that the coast was clear. The duo quickly dashed towards their destination: Sharpedo Bluff.

Once they had arrived, he cautiously looked down into to their little hideaway before entering, with Laura following close behind. He peered out after her, making sure that no one had seen them. Once he was sure that the coast was clear he relaxed, flopping down on the ground with a sigh and pulling out his treasure bag.

"One down, four to go," he muttered, pulling out the Time Gear that he had reclaimed from Treeshroud Forest. He glanced over towards Laura. She was sitting with her knees pulled up to her chest, gazing at the Time Gear with wide, awed eyes. Grovyle chuckled, and she jerked in surprise. She noticed his amused look and blushed, looking away.

"You always were fascinated by the Time Gears," he said, shaking his head in amusement. Laura immediately perked up at this tidbit of her forgotten past and gave him her full attention.

Grovyle didn't seem to notice. He was too lost in his memories as he continued, "I understand why, given your upbringing… well, what little upbringing you had, anyways… but still, it was bordering on obsession. And you were so excited that you would get to see Temporal Tower in its prime…"

"In its prime?" Laura asked, cocking her head.

"Yeah, opposed to all the times you saw it in the paralyzed future when you—" Grovyle abruptly cut himself off, glancing towards Laura with a strange look on his face. Her expression turned to one of confusion, and he looked away. He frowned and seemed to debate something within his mind. He sighed and glanced back at her apologetically before saying, "Anyways… hopefully we'll get to see it soon."

Laura frowned in confusion. Why was he changing the subject? But she decided to ignore it and asked, "How long do you think it will take to re-gather the gears?"

"It shouldn't take too long," Grovyle answered, putting away the one from the forest. "I know all the quickest and safest routes now, so as long as we don't run into any trouble, like when you and Paula tried to stop me—" he stopped himself again, cringing, and looked away in shame. "I'm sorry," he whispered.

Laura frowned in confusion. Grovyle turned back towards her, guilt clearly displayed on his features, as his eyes travelled over her body, looking at all the bandaging. He gulped before timidly asking, "How… how badly did I hurt you?"

Laura looked away, finally understanding why Grovyle was so upset.

"Please, Laura," he begged. "I… I have to know."

Laura sighed before mumbling, "According to Chatot… I nearly died."

Govyle closed his eyes, as if in pain.

"It's… it's okay, though!" Laura assured. "I—!"

"It is not okay!" Grovyle growled. Laura jumped at his tone. "I should have… I don't know… I should have done something!" Grovyle berated himself. "I should've…." He trailed off, covering his face with his claws. "At least now I know why Dusknoir was so enraged when he captured me at Crystal Lake," he sighed.

Laura looked at him in shock. "Why would Dusknoir care that you hurt me?" she asked.

Grovyle cringed, mentally slapping himself for not watching what he was saying. He tried to think of a plausible explanation. "Uh… because… uh…" he glanced at her bandages again and blurted out, "Hey, we should probably change those! It's, uh… it's been a while…"

Laura glared at him for the obvious subject change, but he pretended to ignore it.

Grovyle undid the bandages and inspected Laura's wounds. They were mostly healed, and only a gash on her upper arm remained in need of bandaging. Even then, the gash was very small and would probably heal within a day. Laura watched curiously as Grovyle took some Oran Berries and squeezed their juice onto some fresh bandages before winding them around her arm.

"Why'd you do that?" she asked. "Couldn't I have just eaten the berries?"

"Force of habit," Grovyle sheepishly admitted. "Raw berries weren't very effective when you ate them as a human, so we had to do things like this."

Laura nodded her head, filing away the information. "Grovyle… what was I like as a human?"

Grovyle blinked and rubbed the back of his neck. "Ah… well, your skin was very pale… and your eyes…" he trailed off, contemplating how best to describe them. "Well, they were very… unique," he finally decided. "Let's see… you had brown hair. It was short out of necessity… but you always hated it. You would have preferred it long." Laura cocked her head, encouraging him to explain why. Grovyle obliged. "You said that short hair always reminded you of one of your… guardians."

"My 'guardians'? Not my parents?"

Grovyle frowned. "You never mentioned your parents…to tell the truth, you rarely mentioned your guardians either, but from what you did say about them…" Grovyle sighed. "Well, it didn't seem like you had a very good relationship. Actually, I'm surprised that you remembered as much about them as you did. You weren't very old when we met."

"How did we meet?" Laura asked.

Grovyle chuckled. "You fell out a tree and landed on top of me."

"R-really?" Laura asked. He nodded, and then began to laugh when she blushed.

"Yes, it was… an interesting experience," Grovyle said, a grin on his face. But he quickly sobered up when he got another look at the bandage on her arm. "You were injured then, too," he said quietly, looking away.

Laura sighed and crossed her arms. "Grovyle, I don't blame you. If anything, it's my fault for getting amnesia and forgetting our mission," she stated. Grovyle looked back at her with a frown, so she continued, "I mean, it's not like you expected me to have become a treecko and forgotten everything."

"I should've been on the lookout, though," Grovyle mumbled obstinately, looking at the ground. "It's not the first time that you've lost—" Grovyle froze, horrified at what he just said. He glanced over at Laura and saw her shocked expression.

Laura slowly uncrossed her harms and asked, "…What do you mean? Has… has something like this happened before?"

Grovyle gulped. "N-no," he stuttered unconvincingly. "I just, uh… it was just a slip of the tongue. What I meant to say was that I should have figured that something as catastrophic as this had happened when I didn't hear any word from you."

Laura wasn't convinced, and Grovyle knew it. She glared at him, demanding an explanation. He sighed, "When we were travelling together, there were certain times when…" he trailed off. Then he sighed again and looked her straight in the eye. "Laura… I know this is frustrating. But this topic… we don't have time to talk about it now. When it happened... I did what I thought was best, okay? Let's just leave it at that."

Laura frowned. She was still unhappy with the lack of information, but she knew that Grovyle wouldn't tell her anything else. Not at the moment, anyways. He was right about time being limited. Still, she couldn't help but sigh and flop down onto her back, muttering, "I hate amnesia…"