Both Koyuki and Dororo watched with open jaws as the young Keronian quickly slurped down the entire bowl of mushroom soup Dororo had prepared for her as if it was regular water. After finishing the bowl, she immediately turned to the small piece of bread that was sitting just to the side, scarfing it down just as quickly. They were stunned. In less than thirty seconds, this simple infant managed to finish an entire meal's worth of food without choking or feeling sick.
"Did she even taste it?" Dororo couldn't help but wonder. Koyuki shrugged, reaching forward and taking the empty bowl away from the baby Keronian, ready to walk over to the sink and wash it. The young alien jumped forwards and grabbed the other end of the bowl, tugging on it in an attempt to take it back.
"No!" she called out. "More! More!"
Koyuki unintentionally released the bowl from her hands in a act of shock. She was now frozen in place, her palms open out in front of her and her eyes as wide as she could muster. This baby Keronian could talk. Someone had already taught her how to speak. Thinking back to earlier when she had found her, Koyuki remembered seeing her crying and afraid. If she was an orphan, then that would mean that her parents could have possibly never wanted her and left her their. But now that Koyuki knew that she could talk, that only meant one thing; she wasn't abandoned, she was lost.
Koyuki slowly turned to Dororo, who had the exact same expression on his face as she did. Turning her body around slightly, Koyuki slowly inched towards Dororo until she was close enough to his ear, then whispered.
"If she knows how to talk, then she must have parents. Her family must have been visiting Earth or something and somehow she got separated from them." she suggested, which Dororo seemed to agree with as he gave her a nod afterwards.
"We should ask her who her parents are and what they look like. Maybe we can help her find them." he replied in the same tone of voice as Koyuki.
"More! More!" the Keronian cut in on their conversation. The two ninjas turned to the child, who was impatiently waving the empty bowl over her head. Koyuki reached forwards and took the bowl away from the small Keronian while using as little force as she could. After successfully taking the bowl from the child, Koyuki stared into the Keronian's eyes with a welcoming smile on her face and spoke her next few words calmly.
"You can only have more if you answer a question for me. Do you know where your parents are?"
The baby Keronian's eyes widened just before she turned away from Koyuki, the sound of whimpering following soon after. Koyuki back away slightly, surprised that she had upset the young Keronian. Then, with her voice suddenly sounding soar, she answered.
"I-I don't have parents."
Koyuki felt an emotional sting from inside her chest. She saw how sad she had made the child and immediately regretted having asked the question. "But then...who taught you how to speak?" she asked her next question with great reluctance, hoping not to upset the child any further.
The Keronian said nothing. She just sat there, weeping and refusing to even turn an eye at the ninja girl. Koyuki began to panic. "I...I'm sorry! I didn't mean to make you upset! I'm only trying to help! Please don't cry!"
Dororo shook his head with a sigh, slowly walking forwards until he was side by side with Koyuki. "Please forgive my friend, little one. She only wants to know where you come from so that we may send you home. We only want to see you safe again. I swear it as truth." he said, the child's crying beginning to dim down a bit. She turned back towards the two ninjas and spoke once again, occasionally being interrupted by her own sniffles.
"I don't...I don't know where I...I come from." she tilted her head down towards the floor in sadness.
Dororo and Koyuki kept their shocked expressions as every other thing that this child did or said surprised them to no degree. "You mean...you can't remember anything!?" Koyuki shouted unexpectedly as the Keronian seemed to not be surprised in the least by her outburst. The Keronian continued to whimper as she shook her head to the side for an answer.
Keroro heard the ringtone on his cell go off mere inches from his head. He slowly opened his soar eyes as he felt the bright light of his phone burn against his blurred vision. Reaching his arm out from under his blanket, he grabbed the phone from his night stand and flipped it open, realizing that it was Kululu calling. Getting up from his bed and kicking his legs over the side, he let out a tired yawn and pressed the phone up to the side of his head.
"Kululu...it's one in the morning. What's so-?"
"Good news, Captain. I found our missing experiment." Kululu answered before Keroro could finish. The green frog's eyes shot open at Kululu's response, causing him to immediately jump out of bed and stand up straight beside the new pile of mangled sheets resting by his feet.
"What!? Where is it!? Is it still in Japan at least!? Is it close!? Can you-!?" Keroro began frantically asking questions before once again being caught off by Kululu.
"Yes, it's close. It's actually currently in the hands of a good friend of ours. Sure hope he's still alive come morning. ...Or do I? I'll decide later. The point his that a certain blue frog that we both know has our little invasion plan sitting in his house right now. Kukuku!"
Keroro's shoulders sprung upwards in surprise. "D-Dororo!? Why the frog does he have it!?"
"Beats me. Just calling to let you know that you should probably alert Giroro and Tamama 'bout this, too. We may need to go out and retrieve it ourselves. Kukukuku!"
Keroro's skin went cold. His pupils turned grey and his legs began to quiver. "You mean...go after it? ...Ourselves?" he scarcely asked, wishing that he didn't already know the answer.
"You got some other plan? Either we go out and get it now or wait until morning and let it destroy Pekopon without us. Kukuku!" Kululu laughed at the dangerous situation he had now forced himself into.
Koyuki set the small Keronian in the corner and gave her one of her old handmade dolls to keep her occupied while she and Dororo sat opposite to each other as they always did, chatting about there current predicament.
"So, what do we do now? Even if she did have parents, how are we supposed to find them?" Koyuki asked with much concern. Dororo was silent at first, thinking over every option he had in his mind until finding the one solution that he felt made the most sense. Opened his eyes and gave Koyuki a stern glare.
"She'll have to stay here with us until we know for sure where she came from. I'll ask Kululu about it tomorrow. If her parents did loose her while on this planet, then Kululu should at least know how to track them. And even if he doesn't, I'm sure that whoever owns her will come looking for her eventually. I have no doubt in my mind that we'll find out something concerning her whereabouts soon enough."
"But what about her memory?" Koyuki asked. "Will she even recognize her parents if she sees them again? What if her memory is lost forever? What if-?"
Dororo threw his hand up in front of the girl, causing her to immediately drop silent. Setting his hand back down on his lap, he spoke. "We'll deal with that obstacle when we come to it. She doesn't belong to us, so whatever memory tamperings she's been through, I'm sure her parents will deal with themselves. We shouldn't get too involved in things we don't understand."
"I know, but..." Koyuki paused, turning her attention to the small Keronian in the corner. She was just sitting there, looking at the doll. Not even a smile crossed her face as she looked at the motionless toy in her hands. Her eyes appeared lazy as they stared into those of the doll, looking as if she was feeling depressed while staring at the thing. Koyuki could not place her finger on what it was, but something about seeing the small Keronian made her feel almost nostalgic.
She recognized that feeling of confusion that was plastered on the small alien's face. She had felt the same thing when she was younger. She knew what the child had to be going through. That strange feeling of being lost. The fear that you have knowing that you don't know where to go next. Koyuki had been in that same position once before in her life, and to this day had not forgotten about it. Before she was found by the elder ninjas and accepted as a member of her old ninja clan. Before she even had a name. Before she knew who or where she was. But it was long before Koyuki had learned speech. She was barely able to walk when she was first found, so she couldn't imagine how much worse it must be for the small Keronian in front of her.
Her expression turned serious as she turned back to Dororo and spoke firmly to him. "We have to help her get her memory back. Not knowing anything about herself, even where she came from, must be haunting her. I don't know how I'm supposed to do it, but I can't let her just stay that way without at least trying."
Dororo remained quiet after hearing Koyuki's words, Koyuki refusing to stop staring at Dororo until he gave a reply. Dororo sighed. "How can we? How do you help someone who you know nothing about reclaim their memories?" he asked.
"I-I told you, I don't know. But we have to try something!" she said back with much more stress in her voice.
Dororo turned to the child in the corner. Looking at her sour expression, he could see very clearly how much Koyuki could relate to her. She always told her stories of when she was just barely a toddler and how she had been abandoned in the forest before she was found by their clan and trained to become a self-confident ninja. Obviously she saw a part of herself in this Keronian child. She knew what she was going through and wanted to help her.
Dororo let out one final sigh. "Very well. We'll try to help her remember who she is in any way we can." he replied, Koyuki smiling gleefully in return before Dororo turned to her with his serious expression still in plain sight. "But remember, there isn't that big of a chance that we'll succeed.
"I know." Koyuki admitted. "But I want to at least try." Dororo smiled at her comment and gave one of his friendly bows of the head.
"So is that thing still at Dororo's place?" Giroro turned to his left to speak to Kululu, who was holding his laptop in his hands beneath a flap that he had attached to the front of his yellow raincoat to keep the device dry. He looked down at the bright screen in his palms.
"Correct. Seems to be pretty subdued. Maybe Dororo found a way to tame it. Kukuku!"
"Hey! Don't laugh at that! Dororo could be dead for all we know!" Tamama, who was standing behind Giroro while trying to hold on to the hood of his coat interrupted. Giroro felt a sweat build up as the image of Dororo's death by the hand of this monster entered his mind, which he immediately shook off. He was an assassin after all, so he knew that he could easily hold his own against most things they come across. But against this? He just wasn't sure if his childhood friend could even put up a fight against something of this level.
"I swear, if Dororo dies because of this, both you and Keroro are dead." Giroro threatened Kululu, who only laughed it off, as Giroro expected.
"Kukuku! We'll cut that bridge when we come to it. For now, let's just focus on getting my latest project back. We can mourn over our dear blue friend later."
"Alright! Enough chatter, all of you!" Keroro called out as he pushed against the raging winds to stand in front of the bickering group of frogs. Eventually making his way to the front, he quickly turned to them with Mois standing just to his side, smiling as she watched him prepare his battle speech.
"I'm not going to sugar-coat it, men! We're walking straight into Hell's doors here. What we're about to face may be the biggest threat we've ever come across, and possibly ever will. Some of you might not survive, and the rest of you will most likely be permanently injured."
"..."
Keroro paused in the middle of his speech as he began to silently panic, realizing that he had not yet been given the time to finish the rest. Everyone waited patiently for him to finish before eventually catching onto the unfortunate truth. The expressions of their faces turned into those of stress, as did the Sargent's.
"...Anyway...move out!" Keroro yelled, turning towards the dark woods and marching forwards, leaving his platoon to stand there, terrified.
Thanks for reading. See you next chapter :)