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“Giroro?”
Giroro glanced up from his attention to the small backyard fire, letting out a quiet hum in acknowledgement as he picked out Dororo’s voice and silhouette standing atop the Hinata fence. Dororo hopped down from his perch, stepping closer, his form illuminated better by the light of the fire.
“I received your letter — what do you need to discuss?”
Giroro opened his mouth to respond, then seemed to change his mind and instead looked back down at the fire for a moment.
“... I don’t think this is the place. C’mon, we’re goin’ somewhere else,” he said with a tone of finality as he rose from his seat and began putting the fire out.
“... Not the place?” Dororo asked, cocking his head inquisitively. “Is it a private matter?”
“Uh… a little. Maybe… I dunno, really,” Giroro admitted. “I just don’t need annoyingly prying eyes and ears poppin’ into the conversation — c’mere, we’ll take my hoverboard.”
Dororo stepped towards the board as Giroro stood upon it and turned it on, Dororo’s expression even more confused. “Is… everything alright, Giroro?”
“Hm? Oh, uh, yeah, everything’s fine, just… wanna talk about some stuff,” Giroro answered a bit vaguely. Dororo could see that Giroro’s hands were fidgeting a bit on the control levers.
“... Well, where do you plan to take us?”
“I got an idea in mind — let’s just go ahead and go.”
Dororo obediently climbed onto the hoverboard, hugging around Giroro’s waist as the board lifted into the air. His mind trailed along endless possibilities of where this evening could be headed — Giroro was clearly troubled by something… Perhaps it was some sort of issue or argument he got into? Is his father or brother involved, maybe? Or is Giroro going through a more internal conflict?
He decided to just let Giroro speak for himself rather than press him on the matter along the way, and he let his concerns drift into white noise in the back of his mind as he watched the lights of the late-night city blur and rush by beneath them. Eventually, the lights grew sparse and dimmer, and soon, the two were flying through the mountains, through the forestry nestled at the base of them, where the lights and bustle of the city couldn’t reach them anymore, and it was only then that Giroro began making his descent.
He lowered the saucer to the ground, a clearing on a cliffside overlooking the very edge of the forest with the view stretching far enough that Dororo could still see the outskirts of the city on the horizon. He let go of Giroro’s waist and watched him step off and wander closer to the cliff edge, plopping down onto the grass cross-legged with a huff.
“... Well?”
“O-Oh, um, right.” Dororo climbed off the saucer as well, joining him at the cliff and taking a seat next to him.
A long silence fell between them, Dororo staring off into the dimly-lit distance and occasionally glancing over at Giroro, whose expression was… frustrated? He certainly looked like he wanted to say something, but Dororo didn’t understand where this hesitancy was coming from.
“Is everything alright—”
“H-How have you been—”
The simultaneous questions threw them both off, looking at each other in surprise. Giroro’s face pinkened a little as he looked away with a quiet huff.
“S-Sorry, uh…” Giroro cleared his throat, the action a little awkward. “How… How have you been?”
“... I… Fine…?”
Dororo wasn’t usually rendered near-speechless so easily, but the question really did throw him off guard in the moment.
“... How… are you, Giroro?”
“... m’fine. Uh, thanks.”
Another stretch of silence.
“... Giroro, is something the matter?”
A huff of frustration escaped Giroro as he leaned forward, rubbing his face with his hands as he sighed.
“Yeah, I… m’good, just…” He took a deep breath before sitting up again, crossing his arms over his chest. “Look, I’ve been… I-I guess I’ve been thinking about some stuff lately. Stuff about… the past, and our childhood, and a bunch of other shit. And I… I guess I got to thinking about… well…”
He cleared his throat again, his voice growing a bit quieter as he continued, “... I kinda realized we’ve drifted apart over the years.”
Dororo looked to Giroro with surprise. “... Oh.”
“I-It might be stupid of me to be so fixated on it, but—”
“No, no, it’s okay!” Dororo countered quickly as he shook his head. “I’m actually… well, this is quite unexpected, but I’m quite happy to hear you say such a thing!”
Giroro cracked an eye open to glance over at Dororo. “... Yeah?”
“Absolutely! I certainly feel as though our friendship has stagnated as the years have gone by, and that is a natural progression in any long-term relationships, certainly, but… I-I always felt a bit sad that we couldn’t stay as close as we did when we were children. I’ve… I’ve missed it, really.”
Giroro was silent, seemingly mulling Dororo’s words over as he stared out into the distance.
“... Are… Are you perhaps interested in rekindling a bit of our friendship, Giroro? Is that why you wanted to speak with me?”
“... That’s the long and short of it, I guess, yeah… I kinda just wanted to, y’know… go somewhere private and… I dunno, catch up?” Giroro shook his head a little. “That doesn’t feel like the right word — it’s not like we haven’t actually seen each other in years, we fuckin’ work together.”
Dororo chuckled, bemused. “Well, even so, it’s not as if we frequently discuss how our newfound daily lives have changed since stationing here on Pekopon. Certainly, there must be things about the new norms of our lives that the other isn’t really aware of, no?”
“I suppose, yeah…” Giroro puffed air through his nose, smiling a bit. “I dunno how much I’d have to share, in that regard — my days are pretty cut-and-paste, just like in training. Keeping to a consistent schedule is a vital part of forging a soldier’s mentality. I’m sure you and I both know the value of a well-crafted regimen.”
“Most certainly — I try to keep my daily plans to a proper schedule so that I don’t overexert myself or accidentally leave something unattended.”
“What even are you doing these days? The rest of us are busy trying to do what we were sent here to do—”
Giroro cut himself off, feeling Dororo’s stare on him, and sighed. “Okay, yeah, Keroro and the others really aren’t actually doing much of anything to advance the invasion at all, but you get what I mean!”
Dororo’s stare lightened up, his eyes trailing along the horizon line far in the distance. “Well, to answer your question, I’ve been doing quite a lot with my time these days. Koyuki and I will partake in our own training regimens we’ve devised for ourselves, we tend to our garden and maintain it as a primary food source, and I spend time helping Koyuki with her studies so that she can keep her grades up. I also do a lot of solo hiking and traveling along mountain trails, just exploring the mountainside and appreciating the nature and wildlife of Pekopon.”
Dororo smiled a little to himself, his eyes fluttering closed in thought. “It’s… nice. Peaceful. Truly, I feel far more at home with the ninja lifestyle than I ever did as an assassin. Assassin work was too… cold. Distant. Almost… metallic, in feeling? Like I was being broken down and built up again to be an unfeeling killing machine… well, because I was, I suppose. Living as a ninja, connected to the world around me, it’s much warmer and more vibrant, inside and out. Connecting to the natural world and attuning myself to its wavelength… It’s rewarding in and of itself, even if the day brings about nothing otherwise notable.”
Dororo let out a gentle sigh, looking over to Giroro and growing a bit warm, realizing Giroro was just… silently staring at him. “Ah, s-sorry! You know I’m not one to just… ramble like that, usually!”
“Wh— n-no, no it’s fine!” Giroro countered, looking a little embarrassed himself as he turned to face forward again. “I, uh… I will say this new lifestyle does seem to treat you kinder than your assassin days, that’s for damn sure.”
“Saying it like that is rather an understatement.”
Giroro huffed, the gentle laugh escaping past his small smile. “Yeah, fair… I’ll think about our days after training school sometimes, and it’s pretty insane thinking of how many goddamn arcs you seemed to go through in our lives — you started out as a big crybaby in training school, then became distant and aloof when you enlisted for the Assassin Corps., and now… now you’re sniffin’ flowers and growin’ cabbage without givin’ a rat’s ass about invasion anymore.”
“Not true at all,” Dororo countered. “I do care about the invasion, but I care about doing it right, in a manner that benefits all sides peacefully rather than the general militant methods of coming in guns blazing to assert dominance over these people. This planet deserves better than that, I feel.”
“What does it matter what this planet ‘deserves’? What about what we deserve — i.e., recognition and accomplishment by displaying our strength and capability via a successful invasion?”
“Why does a peaceful invasion prevent us from being seen as strong and capable? If anything, wouldn’t taking a more non-conventional method of planetary conquest make us more capable-looking in the eyes of the public and those in higher ranking? By showing we don’t rely on the same methods that all other platoons utilize?”
Giroro fell silent after that, the two of them sharing a pregnant pause in conversation. Dororo briefly wondered if he had crossed a line somewhere in asserting his side of things, but his worries faded once Giroro spoke up again.
“... Tch. Whatever. I still think you’re just bein’ too soft about it all.”
Dororo smiled again. “You’ve always known me to be rather soft-hearted, though — this shouldn’t come as a surprise to you.”
Giroro’s smile returned as well. “I guess… although the Assassin Corps. really tried to grind that shit outta you, didn’t they.”
Dororo sighed a little, looking up at the night sky. “They… certainly did try.” He chuckled a little. “Perhaps that may be why I felt I was never quite fit to be an assassin — to constantly detach myself from everything and live only to kill as I am asked to… It simply felt too lonely, no matter how qualified and skilled I became. Even Jirara, the captain of X1 and the highest-ranked assassin of the army, inevitably grew tired of living as we did. I understand the need for our army to have a division like the Assassin Corps., but… I worry about the strain and mental toil it can have on a person, not to mention the physical strain it certainly has.”
“You ever regret deciding to become an assassin?”
“Oh goodness, not at all — I think it really did a lot to strengthen me in many ways that helped my foundation for becoming a ninja, and even though my hands will forever be bloodied with numerous past assassinations that I cannot undo, I can at least move forward in a much more peaceful way of life, like I would like to.” He paused, huffing with a small smile. “In fact, I would consider my assassin work to be rather a necessary evil in my life, for if I hadn’t decided to undergo the training and the stress I did, I likely wouldn’t have been qualified to be arranged on Keroro’s platoon with the rest of you, and that would, admittedly, make me rather sad.”
“Geez, didn’t expect the question to get ya so sentimental on me.”
“Then it sounds like you don’t know me at all, Giroro,” Dororo joked lightheartedly.
Giroro chuckled. “Yeah, okay, fair enough… but, uh…” He cleared his throat, a little awkwardly. “Y’know, I… ‘m glad that, despite how a lot of our childhood went, ya still care enough about us to wanna stick around and be friends still.”
“Well, my childhood was certainly… less than ideal, to put it very mildly, but I’ve come to accept that it’s just how it was, and there’s nothing really to do about it now.” He paused, then sighed. “Although any sort of remorse or apology from Keroro would certainly be pleasant to hear…”
“Tch, yeah, good luck with that — dumbass is too self-centered and has the emotional intelligence of a fuckin’ raisin.”
“Truly.”
Another stretch of silence as they gazed at the night sky together.
“... Hey.”
“Hm?”
“... He won’t apologize, but… but I will.”
Dororo looked at him in confusion.
“I-I mean, like… yeah, Keroro did a bunch of shitty things when we were kids, but… I wasn’t exactly super helpful to a lot of it, y’know? I probably could’ve prevented more shit from happening than needed, but I… I didn’t. And that hurt you, in the end. So… I guess I just wanna apologize for my own inactions… or something.”
Dororo felt his chest fluttering a little, and he smiled at Giroro as he reached a hand over to gently lay it on Giroro’s shoulder.
“That’s… incredibly kind of you to say, Giroro... Thank you. Let it be known, I never did hold much malice or disdain for your inaction as a child — you were young and did not know the severity of how much of what happened would affect me in the future. I’m just… well, I’m just glad that I can still call you a good friend, even so many years later.”
Giroro’s cheeks grew a bit warm, huffing and crossing his arms. “W-Well, that’s… I agree. I consider us… pretty good friends, even though we kinda drifted apart as we grew older.”
Dororo chuckled, retracting his hand to rest in his own lap again. “And the fact that you care enough about our friendship to drag me out to the middle of nowhere just to have a private chat about our feelings certainly demonstrates your desire to keep the fires of our friendship kindled and burning.”
“I-I just didn’t want any annoying interruptions!”
“Of course, of course!”
Dororo rose from where he was sitting, holding out a hand for Giroro to take. “It’s a lovely night — why don’t we take a stroll along the mountain trail while we talk?”
Giroro smiled a little at the hand, nodding and taking the offered hand. He let himself be pulled up with a grunt. “God, my knees get shittier with every passing year.”
“Must be unfortunate to be old, hm?” Dororo teased.
“Oh shut up — you’re only a year younger, jackass,” Giroro retorted with a smile.
They began walking away from the cliffside and deeper into the forest, following the worn-out dirt path. Giroro felt a bit stiff in awkwardness, considering that Dororo… never let go of his hand, and they continued to hold hands as they walked together. He normally isn’t so touchy, but… his inner soft, romantic side couldn’t help but appreciate having his hand held. It was oddly a comfort, something so familiar from his youth during times when he would guide Dororo — then Zeroro — through unknown territory or help him escape whatever fresh hells Keroro wrapped them in. Now, though, the script was flipped, and Dororo was quietly guiding him, along a mountain path at night, reflecting on their relationship and holding his hand in a more gentle, almost sentimental way, and it put a bit of gentle heat under Giroro's skin.
“Say, I’m curious to know how much you’ve changed since our youth.”
Dororo’s question dragged Giroro out of his thoughts. “Hm? Oh, uh, whaddya mean?”
“Well, I’m just a little curious… Do you still hold a passion for trains?”
Giroro’s cheeks grew warmer as he averted his gaze and fidgeted with the hand in his. “Ah, I mean… they’re, uh, they’re cool, I guess... “
“Giroro, don’t be so shy to be honest with me — you can just say you’re still passionate about them.”
“... Fine. Maybe I am.”
Dororo giggled. “That’s good! I always thought your interest in trains was quite endearing, and you really held such an incredible breadth of knowledge about them! It was very impressive to listen to your rambling explanations when we were younger.”
“Ah, c’mon, that shit is just embarrassing to look back on…”
“It’s very sweet! Do you still collect models?”
“... Not really. Nowhere to really keep ‘em, and most of my collection is still at home in my dad’s house.”
Dororo hummed. “That’s sad. Pekopon certainly has quite the collection of train models and memorabilia — as I’m sure you’ve seen. Perhaps it might be fun to start a mini-collection for Pekoponian train merchandise?”
“I… I mean… m-maybe— w-wait, why are you pushing this so much?!”
“I-I just really do think it would be nice for you! Something to feel passionate about other than constantly being so focused on the invasion at all hours — your work ethic is admirable, but to only think about or focus on work can ultimately be very draining on a mind. You deserve to have a bit of an escape from work, and getting yourself back into train-collection would be a wonderful way to do that!” He squeezed Giroro’s hand gently, making a quiet hum of realization. “Actually, I have an idea… while I’m already on this train of thought.”
“You’re not funny,” Giroro remarked with a smile.
Dororo giggled, bemused by his own joke. “Shush. Anyway, I have a request, if it’s not too much.”
“What’s up?”
“Well… I’m sure you’ve looked into Pekoponian trains, to some degree. Do you have a particular favorite? I’m just curious.”
Giroro hummed, mulling the question over in his mind. “Well, depends on how I gotta decide on the favorite. If we’re talking about in terms of speed and efficiency, then I gotta go with the Shinkansen H5 and E5 models — they’re the fastest bullet train models in this country, currently, capping out at 224 miles an hour. Pretty shoddy numbers compared to a lot of standard Keronian and intergalactic trains, but it’s very impressive for a planet like Pekopon.”
Giroro felt a smile grow on his face as he continued rambling. “Now, if you wanna talk about luxury, this planet’s got some pretty solid options for consideration. The Seven Stars is this incredible model that carries this sort of, like, dated charm to it — apparently it’s on purpose? Guess it’s meant to reflect a certain aesthetic of a specific time period? — anyway, it rides around the island of Kyushu and goes by the sea and the mountainside and has a lot of on-board luxuries for Pekoponians to indulge in. The shit is so luxurious and exclusive that they can’t even book a ticket like normal — they hold a lottery and you just gotta hope you get selected when you buy a place in line.”
“Oh my, exclusive indeed,” Dororo commented, smiling to himself, happy to hear Giroro so enthralled in his one-sided conversation.
“Yeah, no shit. Reminds me a lot of the way they run shit on Ascleria, and you know how lavishly those guys like to fuckin’ live.” Giroro made a happy-sounding hum, grinning wider as he stared up towards the mountaintop, gesturing a bit with his free hand. “Just remembered — another good one I can think of that caught my attention was the Orient Express. It’s definitely another high-luxury model with a lot of nice accommodations and high price points and shit, but what makes it interesting is how much of an impact it had in a cultural sense. See, the Orient Express isn’t just a single train, but it’s actually a service, meaning there were multiple trains operating under the same name. A lot of those trains actually became subject for a bunch of different media and stories and stuff. Specifically, the Simplon Orient Express is a notably high-luxury travel train that became the setting of a famous Pekoponian story called ‘Murder on the Orient Express’ , which is this, like, murder-mystery novel that takes place on the train. I’m a little interested to read it eventually, not gonna lie — I’m normally not one for reading fiction, but something about the premise is interesting, not to mention it takes place on such an interesting vessel.”
Giroro sighed, pausing before chuckling a bit to himself with flushed cheeks as he rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. “Ah, sorry — didn’t mean to… talk yer ear off like that.”
“No, no, it’s absolutely alright, Giroro!” Dororo quickly replied, squeezing his hand gently again. “I think your passion is quite admirable — endearing, even! You deserve to speak for as long as you like about the things you enjoy.”
“Hah, well… uh, thanks, I guess… just feels a bit silly for a man my age to still get all starry-eyed over something like trains, y’know?”
Dororo shook his head. “I wholeheartedly disagree. I see no good reason why a grown man cannot hold a fascination with something as technological and diverse as trains.”
Giroro was silent for a moment, then huffed, his smile softening as he stared at the path ahead. “Fine, I’ll let ya have this one… Least it’s cooler than being super into flowers.”
“Hey!! What is so wrong with having an interest in flowers?!” Dororo’s tone was offended, but the smile was very clearly heard in his voice.
Giroro chuckled, grinning at him. “Oh, nothing, nothing… just isn’t as cool as trains.”
“Flowers can be cool, too, you know!” Dororo defended. “Think of how many flowers we know about that can easily do physical harm! Blindness, scarring, internal damages, even death! Does that pose no fascination to you at all?”
Giroro’s laughter grew a bit louder. “Relax, relax — I was just ribbin’ you. Flowers are plenty cool, alright?”
Dororo huffed, still smiling. “That’s better.”
…
“Hey.”
“Hm?”
“... There any particularly interesting flowers here on Pekopon?”
Dororo’s smile widened, happy that Giroro was giving him a window to go on his own deep-dive. “Most certainly! I’m sure you’ve come across imagery of a particular Pekoponian flower called a sunflower — I’m particularly fond of them for how summery and happy an energy they radiate. They grow to tremendous heights compared to most Pekoponian flowers, and they have a particular strength in being multipurpose, in medicine, dyes, foods, and they can even naturally decontaminate soil that they’re planted into! They’re lovely!”
Giroro chuckled. “Still seems pretty dull compared to a lot of the other wild flowers we encounter across the galaxy.”
“Well if you want something a bit different , Pekopon has their own share of interestingly dark or dangerous flora. Have you ever heard of the corpse flower?” Met with a shake of the head, Dororo continued. “It’s a massive plant that blooms only for a short while, and it is named for the powerful odor it emits when in bloom — the smell is apparently akin to that of a pile of rotting corpses.”
“How fun that must be,” Giroro joked.
“Oh, certainly,” Dororo replied sarcastically. “There are also plants like the Venus flytrap or the bladderwort flower — they work similarly to the pribiana bushes in the Wanashi galaxy, trapping smaller creatures and consuming them. There’s also a wide variety of flowers and berries and mushrooms and the like that pose serious threats to those who eat or even just touch them.”
“Hm, well I guess that’s a little exciting… Hope it’s something we can look into and explore eventually — I’d wanna take on a challenge that Pekopon can actually offer. This planet hasn’t been able to offer me a goddamn thing in terms of a challenge.”
“Well what can you expect? This is a planet millenia behind modern intergalactic advancements. We can only anticipate so much from a global society that could never
dream
of keeping up with the technological arms race that the rest of the galaxy has far surpassed them at.”
“Dumbasses don’t even know there’s other species and shit out there… Like, c’mon, you’d think that’d be one of the first things ya learn after developing some level of space travel, right? That’s how it was for most everyone else, it feels like.”
Dororo chuckled. “Pekopon has remained too divisive and too segregated a planet for them to full adhere to any sort of strategy towards deep space exploration. We can’t expect a species so against its own kind to collaborate effectively.” He looked up, watching the many stars twinkle in the mountain skyline. “... I think that’s why I dream of a more peaceful, all-winner solution to the invasion of Pekopon. These people are so lost, and many of them don’t realize how detrimental their actions and behaviors towards each other is holding them all back as a species… I’d love to see such a beautiful planet thrive under the unity and cooperation of its inhabitants.”
Giroro huffed, smiling just a bit. “You can hope and dream for somethin’ like that all ya want, but the reality is that these Pekoponians are, on a global scale, kinda shitty people, at the end of the day. They hate anything that ain’t like them — even people of their own fuckin’ kind. I can’t see any way in which ‘peacefully’ invading would get done successfully when these assholes would surely just start firin’ away at us the moment they get a look at us.”
“Well not all—”
“Not all, but most.”
“...” Dororo sighed. “That’s probably fair…”
Giroro squeezed Dororo’s hand a little. “Hey, buck up, soldier — we’ll get this invasion shit figured out one way or another. I’m sure whatever method that ends up finally workin’, we’ll manage to keep the place lookin’ as nice as we can, if not even better.”
“I certainly hope that’s true…” Dororo looked over at Giroro, smiling at him despite his mask. ”... Thank you, Giroro.”
Giroro cleared his throat a little, averting his gaze as he felt his face grow a bit warm. “Hm? Ah, I-I don’t see what I’m bein’ thanked for here.”
“Just… for being here, with me, I suppose… This has been really nice.”
“... m’glad you think so, too.”
Giroro felt that awkward air surrounding himself again like before, and he had no idea what had him so tense and flustered — it was only Dororo, and they’d been friends for ages. There was nothing to feel nervous about, but even though he knew that logically… the hand in his felt both heavy as a brick and light as a feather, and he couldn’t help but continuously be aware of its touch against his skin.
“... Giroro.”
“Huh— what?”
Dororo giggled a little. “Sorry, were you thinking about something?”
“Wh— ah, n-no, no, just kinda… got comfy and zoned out a bit. D-Did you want somethin’?”
“Well, I wanted to ask… Can we have more nights like this? Go somewhere ourselves, be alone, just talking? That may sound a little bit silly of a request, but—”
“Yes.”
“... What?”
Giroro coughed a little, clearing his throat again and trying to get over how quickly and almost eagerly he said yes. “I-I mean… if you’d like to, I-I’d enjoy it, as well.”
Dororo nodded, eyes showing the smile beneath his face mask. “Good… I already feel like we’ve rekindled so much of our lost closeness, and I want to keep it going.” He paused, then looked over at Giroro. “... I really do get the feeling of how much you want us to grow closer again… It feels so potent and genuine… and it makes me happy to know that I’m becoming that much of a priority in your mind,” he admitted, face a bit warm.
“I-I-I mean…!! I-It’s not THAT big’a deal or anything — I just… y-y’know, I miss hangin’ out and stuff, and we’re two grown fuckin’ men who can choose to spend some free time together whenever we want, so we may as well do it, y’know?” Giroro quickly explained and defended himself, cheeks redder than the rest of him.
Dororo laughed, the sound light and airy in the quiet night. “M-My apologies, Giroro — I didn’t know my comment would embarrass you so much!”
“I-I’m not embarrassed!!”
This only made Dororo continue laughing, and in the end, Giroro couldn’t help but laugh along with him, the sound contagious and Giroro’s emotions feeling just too, too light for a change. As they continued along the mountain path, Giroro looked up at the stars, then down the mountainside to gaze down at the twinkling city, their current home base… He found himself seeing what Dororo meant about how beautiful the planet was. Maybe they really ought to try and preserve some of its natural beauty when they invade this dumb place.
He looked over to Dororo again, who was still a bit giggly and cheery, and Giroro felt his own smile grow soft and relaxed.
If anything can keep a planet lookin’ beautiful, it’s definitely his presence.