It's All About Haruko, Baby

Chapter 1
Prologue

Chapter Description: It all begins when Naota is on his way home from school...

It’s All About Haruko, Baby!

Prologue:

It was the closest she’d been to Earth in months as she rode in a small ship supplied by her superiors, but Haruko’s mind was focused on much more important matters at the moment as she was locked in the ultimate battle of wits, namely programming a VCR.

"Oh come on! I hate programming these stupid things," Haruko said aloud as she fumbled with the buttons on the remote to the device. As she was busy with that, however, she failed to notice that one of the many capsules containing dangerous gases being contained on the ship had fallen over, filling up the room with a blue gas that created a feel much like fog. As Haruko began coughing and saw the fog, she turned around and noticed the particular capsule that had fallen, causing her eyes to widen in utter horror.

"Err... dammit! Of all the ones it could’ve been..." Knowing that she would need to leave some sort of ID, she began to write a letter explaining the situation as she set the ship on autopilot toward a certain small town where nothing ever happens in Japan.

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It had been just another day so far for Naota as he walked home from school. Another day of schoolwork, another day of occasionally talking to Eri (he no longer called her by her last name of Ninamori), Masashi, and Gaku, another day without Haruko or Mamimi. He sighed upon thinking of that one. Sure, everything was fine without them. Sure, Eri had filled the void left by both leaving. And yet...

No, he had to get over this. He had to. He couldn’t keep dwelling on this, or else he’d never be able to get on with his life. Naota finally reached home, and there saw a sight that both pleased him and made him nearly have a heart attack: a small ship that looked to be from space. Though he’d never seen the ship before, he had a sinking suspicion as to where it came from. He walked aboard, and inside saw a naked little girl of around two years sitting on the ground, playing with a toy car. No, not a car... a scooter, in fact apparently a Vespa. A pair of clothes lay in the chair in front of the controls, laying in a pile as though they had been abandoned.

“Vroom! Vroom!” the girl yelled out, not seeming to notice the sudden intruder. Naota was just about to begin looking through the ship for a sign of anyone else when he looked down once more and saw a folded up sheet of paper with his name written on it laying on the floor of the shuttle. He reached down to pick it up and then opened it.

“Hey, uh, don’t have much time. I accidently caused a dangerous chemical to fall over. You’ll probably see me on the ground somewhere, unless I end up drinking one of the other chemicals in which case I am more than likely dead. Anyhoo, just figured you should know the effects should wear off in two weeks. Unless I’m allergic, then it might be a day or two extra.”

Naota was speechless, contemplating the fact that not only was Haruko suddenly back in his life, but it was in toddler form. His shock was cut off as the toddler Haruko suddenly noticed his presence and, like any child left alone with a complete stranger, began to scream, mostly just a bunch of wails but occasionally yelling out the word, “Stranger”, leaving her toy laying on the floor in a quickly growing puddle of tears. Naota, knowing nothing about babies and never having had any experience with them, instinctively picked her up and began doing what he had seen in such instances on TV and in books, mainly speaking in overly-high gibberish in an attempt to calm her down. Didn’t work. So he tried rocking her. Still nothing. Naota decided to try one last ditch option and grabbed the toy, offering it to Haruko as though he were offering some type of bizarre truce of some strange sort.

“Wh... who’re ?ou?” she asked as her wails reduced to sniffles, grabbing the toy and holding onto it like a normal child would a security blanket, gripping onto it as though losing the toy would mean losing her very life, like her soul would be ripped from her and cast into the unknown if she were to ever let go.

“My name is Naota,” he said as calmly as one could possibly be in his situation. He even surprised himself- he certainly didn’t feel calm.

“Nao... ta,” she mimicked slowly, almost all of the tears having stopped by now. He set the child on the floor and began to consider his predicament: he knew nothing about toddlers, he was feeling like his life could never have a sense of order, and... well, he just couldn’t believe it. This cute little two-year old who would begin to scream if she ever saw a stranger, and could be calmed so easily- she wasn’t Haruko. She couldn’t be. He had always pictured Haruko as being wacky and strong no matter what her age; how could he accept this? It wasn’t real. There was no way whatsoever any of this could actually be happening.

The war of emotions waging in Naota was suddenly interrupted as he felt something warm and wet. At first he thought it might of been his imagination, a subconscious reaction of sorts to help take his mind off of things. But then he looked down and saw a small yellow puddle forming around Haruko, who was sitting and holding her toy Vespa in the air.

“Oops, I wet.”