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Chapter Text

PROLOGUE

Null Space.

Scientists and fiction writers alike had theorized about this place. A place between universes, a gap in what could be considered reality or the ‘material’ places.

Science and technology were advanced, but they had limits, and it was only now that general theory was even beginning to stand on the cusp of understanding alternate planes of reality and perhaps — incredibly — traveling to them.

As far as he knew, he was one of a handful of people to have ever come here. Maybe even the second ever.

He might have been freaking out like a kid in a candy store if not for the very real danger he was in.

Low gravity environment, Hiro’s analytical side provided in a rapid-fire sequence as his mind raced, trying to take in all the factors and account for everything that could go wrong in this place. ‘Presence of oxygen? Possible. Suit’s not hermetically sealed, but the ambient temperature can’t be too far below freezing or else I’d be feeling it. Atmospheric pressure seems normal...

So much unknown, and unexplained, so much he could discover...but that wasn’t what he was there for and he had a very real time limit.

“Baymax! Can you see her?” He yelled.

“Scanning.” The big, healthcare robot, decked in enough armor to tackle a battle tank, answered him, as calm as ever.

Robert Callaghan’s daughter was in this place somewhere.

They had to find her and get out before that portal collapsed and trapped them all here forever.

God...how long had she been here? A year? Five? Ten?

‘Based upon details of Professor Callaghan’s appearance around the time of the incident versus now, factoring the effects of stress on aging, accounting for the growth of the vegetation at the test site...no less than five months, but no more than five years…’

At least five months without food or water...

How was she still alive?

Hiro shook his head; it was something he could figure out later. Right now, he needed to focus.

Hiro guided Baymax through the field of debris that spun about, still bleeding momentum from the force that had sucked it in. Half-awed by the eddies and swirls of the nebula-like clouds that stretched out to infinity, he found himself wishing he’d installed a camera in his helmet when they finally spotted the pod.

“There!” He pointed, pulling one of the magnetized gloves off of the corresponding node on Baymax’s armored back.

The big red robot drifted through the debris field towards the pod, latching onto it with gloves and boots like an overgrown limpet. Hiro turned, looking over his shoulder towards the wormhole that lead back home to San Fransokyo. Just go through that and they’re in the clear…

“Alright buddy, let’s turn this thing around and —”

“Secondary life-forms detected.”

Hiro blinked. “What?”

“Secondary life-forms detected.” Baymax repeated. “One hundred seventeen meters.” He pointed. “That way.”

Hiro looked into the void towards where Baymax was pointing. The debris was still spinning off, chunks ranging in size from a soccer ball to a monster truck pinballing against each other and jetting off in new directions. The prismatic gasses and dust inched outwards in the distance like the corona of a supernova, but there was nothing else of note, nothing more to see — except, he realized as he spotted it, a glimmering white dot.

Were those...lights?

He looked to the Wormhole again, worry and fear mingling in his chest. If they stayed too long, then it would collapse, and both he and Callaghan’s daughter would be trapped, again.

And then, he remembered his brother.

Tadashi had looked just as afraid, just as worried.

And he’d still gone into that building.

Steeling his nerve, he looked to Baymax. “Ok. We can’t leave whoever it is in here. Thrusters on, take us closer. Be fast and careful.”

They moved, and Hiro took a moment to peer through the glass of the pod: Callaghan's daughter resting within, unconscious and completely unchanged.

He had no idea what had preserved her, but he was glad of it. It looked like she hadn’t aged a single day.

“Visual contact.” Baymax brought him back to the present. “Scanning. Shall I intercept with the  pod and Miss Callaghan?”

Hiro looked at the glimmering white...square.

No. Not a square...

A… door?

There was a woman standing there, a woman whose age he couldn’t quite place with a suit and a hat that looked straight out of a fifties movie.

From the distance, he couldn’t make out details, but he saw clear movement behind her — a person? Two?

With the backdrop of light, it was impossible to see. But the sound he heard in the next second was unmistakeable.

*BANG*

*BANG*

Thunderous, echoing out into the void- Two gunshots.

Fear, sharp and cold, lanced through his stomach with each massively loud crack.

Then, through the door thing, a body was thrown, tossed in here like so much garbage.

“Female victim injuries severe, consistent with —”

“Go! Go! Get her!” And Baymax’s foot and jetpack thrusters burst alive as he pushed the pod towards the individual. Hiro gave directions, guiding Baymax around any debris as they angled upwards towards the falling figure, who was slowly spinning into the weightlessness of zero gravity. It was then, when he glanced up for a reason he wasn’t sure of, that Hiro finally got a good look at the woman in the miniature doorway just before it closed.

Dressed in a suit and fedora, sculpted with attractive, distinctly Italian features, she gave him the most dismissive of glances — like he was an ant or a stray housefly — before turning away, the doorway sealing shut behind her.

No time to focus on that. Hiro turned his eyes back to the falling figure, clothed in little more than a hospital gown, with a crown of long brown hair that spread out and undulated in the lack of gravity.

He stretched out his arms to grab her.

He caught her, shifted her so he could get a better grip, and looked at her face.

Only to discover the massive hole in her head.

And her missing right arm.

“B-Baymax...she’s —” He gulped, nausea welling up in his gut.

He’d just witnessed an execution.

“She’s dead...”

“Incorrect.”

Hiro blinked, looking at the back of his robot’s armored head. “What?!”

“The patient has been grievously injured, but is still alive. The bullets did no extensive damage to her brain. Based upon her heart rate, blood pressure, and neurological activity, the chances of survival are —”

“Double time back! Now!” He shouted.

“What is double time? I am unclear on the definition of —”

“Double thrust output! Max power!” Baymax obeyed, the rocket boots’ ignition doubling in output as Hiro held onto the person in his arms tight. His magnetic boots and suit were the only things keeping him upright and not flying off as Baymax held the pod, veering straight towards the wormhole and to home.

Chapter Text

Arc 1

COLONIZATION

1.1

Feel.

She could feel.

Soft.

Around her.

Top and bottom.

Front and back.

There was...a tone.

Incessant, repeated, rhythmic, almost mathematical in precision.

Eyes...she had eyes.

(What are eyes?)

Was she blind? It was dark.

Muscle by muscle, fiber by fiber, she became aware, controled, moved.

Her eyes opened. Light.

Blinded. It hurt. She wished to close her eyes but was not fast enough.

Then her sight cleared. All colors. Bright. Too bright.

The tone continued.

Beep. Beep.

Vision… all colored softness on her. All color walls. A shape, four corners, glimmers of color and light on its side.

She heard the sound of a click. And voices.

Her eyes moved to the sound, trying to find it with these senses. Something else moved in the space around her it emits sounds before it sealed a gateway.

(A door? A door. What is a door?)

Time passed. She didn’t know how much.

Then...they were there, more of them. They entered, walked around her, they made sounds....communicating through sound…

Primitive.

(Talking. Is it called talking?)

One reached down. She wanted to pull away, take control of it, to cease its movements, but nothing happened…

It reached down and she felt her head move. Softness.

She listened with her ears, but felt her eyes falling closed on their own. Heavy.

She felt sluggish, weakened.

Did the creature do something to her?

They stood around her, touching things, touching her. One of them got close. Bright light in the ocular organ. She closed it shut. Tried to assert control over it.

It did not obey

They stayed, communicated.

Then walked away, leaving her.

She...did not understand.

She felt tired again.

She slept.

(X)

Noises once again.

Communication.

Communication through sound...

(Talking.)

She opened her eyes, half lidded and feeling tired.

She saw many shapes enter the room. Two big. One of smaller stature. Two even smaller still. An obese one.

They did not obey.

More talking.

One with bright long fur continued to communicate, the sound was loud. It moved. Up and down.

Jumping...

Why were they around her?

Why didn’t they obey?

She heard their voices soften.

They stayed.

Time passed.

One by one, they left the room when the white one waddled closer..

One of the small figures looked back for a minute.

She felt tired again.

Sleep.

(X)

She heard noises as her eyes opened.

They communicated.

Yes. Figures making noises. Communicating…

(Talking. They talk to one another.)

She did not understand.

It entered. Then another. Two. One small, one large and wide again.

They made more noise. Then the small one came closer, the large one waddling behind.

The small one leaned in close.

It made more noise.

She did not understand.

“I’ll help you… I’m not sure how much I can help. But I’ll do everything I can. Promise.”

She did not understand.

Time passed.

She slept.

Chapter Text

1.2

It was just another day.

They came again.

The one called Hiro and the one Hiro called Baymax.

A young man and a fat balloon machine.

Thoughts, memories came easier, these days.

Images, the remembrance of pain, desperation…

The glare of golden light.

But she can't remember them. Hiro, Baymax.

Can barely even comprehend what they try to communicate.

She has become aware of her body now, muscles and limbs that ache as she moves them.

But it was important that she move, pain or not…

She started with her lowest extremities, the digits on her… legs…

(Toes.)

Her other digits were next...fingers.

The young man and the robot brought her things. Food. Sugars and carbohydrates and calories.

They were called snacks.

She prefered his foods to the others.

The others… the nurses, they called it rice porridge.

Sloppy, goopy. They didn't taste good, regardless of how many variations

They all made sounds… spoke.

Hiro always spoke the longest.

She tried to categorize his sounds, determine the pattern as he babbled on.

'Aunt Cass'. Our fat cat, Mochi. Gogo, Wasabi, Honey Lemon, Baymax, Fred, Big Hero Six, School, Building, Designing, creating, Tadashi, Portals, Healing, Recovery.

These sounds he made often.

She listened, tried to discover more of his sounds, pay attention.

Eventually, he would leave. When he did, she was left alone, and soon a nurse would enter and turn on the television, or turn it off if it was time to sleep, placing the remote back and fixing up the coverings over her before leaving again.

It was her fifth month before she discovered how to do it herself.

It was her eighth before her fingers had the dexterity to press the button.

She wished to listen to more words.

(X)

Hiro and Baymax were back again, and in Hiro's hand were two cylindrical containers…

Cups, she remembered. They were called 'cups.'

"Heya." He smiled as he walked in, sitting next to her. Her eyes followed his movements.

"So… I noticed you've been getting bored of the porridge, right?"

It took her a long time to understand, longer than normal, Hiro was already continuing by the time she did.

"I stopped by Samurai Sam's and…" He offered the cup and the straw. "I got a shake. It's vanilla!"

He reached towards her, angling the straw in a way that had become familiar.

She noticed that, the first time she could remember him doing this, he had to sit next to her on the bed. Now he could stand relatively comfortably.

He'd grown taller.

She wondered, then- how long has it been?

Her mouth opened slightly and clamped onto the straw before she suckled.

Her eyes made a bare rise upward, so slight that it would've been easy to escape notice.

It was…

"Patient is showing signs of endorphins and increased brain activity in the ventral stratium." Baymax intoned with a raised finger.

"Ventral Stratium?" Hiro asked. The flow was slow as he took out the straw.

"It is a part of the brain that is associated with the following emotions: Joy. Happiness."

"Oh!" Hiro brightened up. "You liked it?" he asked with a cheerful smile.

Her eyes went to the robot, half-lidded as they are. Baymax waved.

Hiro seemed to notice her stare.

"Oh yeah, I didn't tell you. I finally managed to reproduce a lot of Tadashi's old work. That means by this year's tech-seminars I should be able to show off to some of the big companies and see if we can get a mass production model running. Get some money flowing in."

He was smiling brilliantly, white teeth bared.

Whatever he was saying was pleasing to him.

"We're still awhile away from mass production, but it's a start. I'm still trying to find a way to mass produce him and help benefit hospitals."

The broken, suckling sound indicated the drink was finished, much to her disappointment.

Hiro pulled the straw away. "Anyway. I also finished some upgrades on Gogo and Wasabi's gear! Next week, I'll get to working on Fred's — gotta think of a new delivery system for Honey Lemon. Something that can't slip off her arm when she's running."

He continued to speak.

She listened.

(X)

More memories returned. Sometimes in the forms of dreams.

Sometimes, most of the time, those dreams were bad; leading to restless nights.

An overworked, absent father.

A betrayer who became nothing to her in the end.

Her power of control.

A system that enabled monsters.

An emotionless man in armor.

A girl who loved dogs and no one else.

A charming sociopath.

A darkness, trying to make a better life for his sister.

A friendly know-it-all.

A monster of the sea.

A snake in a man's clothing.

A malcontent healer.

A genetically altered, loyal companion.

A madman who wanted the world to burn.

A monstrous abomination.

Nine thousand beasts.

….

The golden morning.

Khepri.

The Endbringer she'd all but become...

She hated these. These nightmares. She couldn't place names on them. Only images. Faces.

But she was beginning to understand. Slowly.

It has been so long… In this bed. Being fed the porridge and the IV.

Hiro would always come.

She would see the ones he calls his friends. Gogo with the cautious look in her eyes. Honey Lemon with the constant smile. Wasabi, tentative and wary. Fred, loud, colorful.

When she looked upon them, she saw the dog-lover, the skull-masked darkness, the charmer, the sociopath, and the imp. She also saw images of the traitor, the friend she had lost before the nightmare began.

They came infrequently, standing out in her memory only due to her own broken recollections.

It was late in the day… the sun was already beginning to set when she heard the door click open.

"Oh! Hello!" said a...not-nurse.

She didn't recognize this one. Not one of Hiro's, not a nurse.

What did this one want?

Her face seemed familiar...

She brought a hand up to her hair, brushing it back behind her ear. It was short, barely reaching her neck.

"Hiro wasn't feeling too well today, so I volunteered to drop by while Baymax takes care of him."

She showed her teeth...a smile.

"Well, you can just call me Cass or Cassie. Hiro, his friends, and everyone else does. I mean, once you can speak again, of course. Not that there's any rush for that just to say my name but I'm sure you wanna be able to talk and say things for yourse —"

She made too many sounds, too fast. She only recognized Hiro, Cass, and Friend.

She stepped closer into the room, and Taylor's eyes finally found the brown bag.

The woman showed her...smile again, sitting down in Hiro's seat.

"Hiro told me you like the soup in the shop across the street, but they're closed for holiday today, so I decided to make you something. Its not as healthy —" she closed one eye and opened it again quickly — "but it'd be a sin if you go any longer without trying it."

She opened the bag and held out a white styrofoam container

She opened it, revealing a pale cube.

It looked like lumpy bread.

Strange ritualistic delivery…

The woman took a white plastic fork, sliced off a bit, and offered it out to her

Taylor opened her mouth and took a bite.

The woman didn't have a Baymax here to tell her what Taylor was feeling.

Nevertheless, she smiled brightly at the young woman's reaction. "Good, huh? Its called 'Tres Leches.' I probably butchered that pronunciation, but that name is still way better in Spanish than English, butchered or not — haha!" She laughed at herself.

She took another piece off with the fork, waiting for Taylor to savor and swallow, before holding it out again.

Taylor watched her eyes, as she ate the soft, mushy bread.

The woman's eyes turned up to her head, trailing down.

The light in her eyes dimmed, her brow knitting as her mouth turned down sadly. She reached her hand over, settling it on Taylor's.

"Who could have done this to you, sweetie? Such a cruel thing..."

Her words went by, unanswered.

Taylor just ate the soft, spongy bread.

As soon as it was done, the woman put the styrofoam container back in the bag, bunching up the brown paper and setting it down beside her.

Then, rummaging in her purse, she pulled out books…

Yes. She remembered that was what they were called.

Two of them.

"Well… I'm not sure if you like to read, but Hiro told me that the doctors say your recovery is a possibility, so I brought you this. Maybe it'll help.

She held out the book, showing it to her. Merriam-Webster Dictionary was printed across the front, though to Taylor, the letters were only strange, vaguely familiar shapes.

"This one's a dictionary." She smiled. "Its kinda boring, but it'll help you learn or remember words faster once you learn to read again. It has English in it, so I'll be sure to bring another dictionary with Chinese and Japanese in it."

Then she showed her another book. Adventures of Hucklberry Finn.

"This is Mark Twa —" She opened the book.

The door swung inwards.

"I'm sorry, Ma'am, but visiting hours are almost over," said the nurse in the doorway.

"Oh...yeah, I did come by rather late." The woman sighed, then smiled again, settling the two books beside her hand. "I'll come by and read them to you tomorrow, if Hiro's still not feeling well."

She smiled again, showing her pearly white teeth.

Taylor looked at her face, eyes narrowing in thought just a bit.

She shouldn't be smiling…

She did not remember her face bearing a smile...

After she left with another smile and a wave, Taylor was alone, the last rays of daylight fading as the sun set outside the window.

She looked down at the books.

The next day, when the woman returned, she didn't have enough time to read much aside from the Asiatic language books, so she didn't notice that the page towards the middle of the dictionary was folded.

(X)

In the weeks and months that followed, she lost track of time, of the passing hours and changing days.

When she was coherent enough to measure time, she measured it by the milestones she reached.

Three days after she could walk —

Two days after she learned to bathe herself —

One week after she learned that she could feel the insects in the walls, with the same sort of there-not there surety she had when she closed her eyes and still knew where her arms and legs were.

Three days after she learned to move those bugs.

Four days after she could remember how to use her senses of hearing and touch through their insect minds.

These were the milestones she used.

Always, Hiro was there, talking, helping, trying to make the time go faster.

The others came.

But it was always him that was there in the end.

As such, a day finally came where she felt she had to do something.

The day started out as it normally did. She would wake, be bathed, rest, read in private, and listen in to the world and goings on outside.

Around noon, Hiro arrived with Baymax.

"Hey, Sleeping Beauty." He offered a smile in greeting.

And from there… he kept talking.

She didn't blame him. It wasn't like she offered much in the way of conversation, these last few months… Year? Years?

Still. There was something he had to know.

"My name is Taylor."

The crash of Hiro falling over in his chosen seat sounded like a gunshot. With how loud it was, it was surprising that a nurse didn't burst in immediately, carrying a defibrillator.

Baymax helpfully leaned over him. "On a scale of one to ten, how would you rate your —"

"You can talk?!" Hiro all but shot to his feet, staring at her with wide, shocked eyes, as an ecstatic grin began to stretch over his face.

She felt her own lips begin to curl up into her own, small version of a smile.

"Yes." She nodded. "And I have to say: you're not very good at the whole 'secret identity' thing."

His face was priceless.

Chapter Text

Interlude- Hiro Hamada:

Hiro stepped off the bus; the telltale squeaks and squeals of vinyl as his friend walked through the door behind him were familiar and almost comforting.

Baymax waddled out, hopping off of the last step to land on the pavement with a bounce, to stand directly behind him. Hiro yawned as he walked up the block and into the gated community where Fred lived.

He still couldn’t get over the fact that Fred lived here. That first time, all of them soaked and cold and hesitant, on an adrenaline high after being chased through the city, still played through his mind like a broken record, and only now was it really starting to sink in that his friend was probably one of the richest people in the state, if not the country.

Fred. Who ate days old Pizza and dressed like he got half his clothes from a salvation army boxes.

Freakin weird.

Anyway, today was a little get together. Heathcliff was doing barbecue, and Fred would not shut up about his butler’s culinary skill.

So here he was to see if it was exaggeration...and also because he wasn’t going to do something as stupid as turning down free food.

Minutes later, he was pressing the front door intercom of the mansion.

“Yes?” drawled Heathcliff’s monotone.

“Hey, Mr. Heathcliff. It's me: Hiro.”

“Ah, Master Hamada.” The gate clicked and was opened. “I'll be at the door momentarily. Master Frederick and the rest of your friends have already arrived.”

Hiro sighed. Late.

Being a fifteen year old boy genius has its benefits and downsides.

One of those downsides was that he couldn’t even apply for a driver's license, yet.

Hiro stood at the door, waiting; with the Golden Gate Bridge stretching towards the other side of the bay to his left, his mind wandered as he shoved his hands to his pockets and looked towards the skyline of San Fransokyo.

Or, more specifically, towards the building that served as San Fransokyo General Hospital, where the girl from the portal lay in bed still. That same girl who was dropped into the Null Space with a severed right arm and two bullet holes in her skull, and who, despite her healed wounds, was still recovering.

At first, Hiro had maintained his distance. It was he and Baymax, fully kitted out in their armor, who had delivered that girl and Abigail to emergency services, and given their distinctive heights and body types, Hiro wanted to make sure no one would make the connection between those brave heroes and scrawny Hiro Hamada and his faithful healthcare robot. That was one of the reasons it’d taken a month to go see her after the events at Kreitech, and the other was that it had simply taken a while to find her.

He’d managed, though; there were only so many Jane Does in long term care.

No one knew her. A facial recognition search with Baymax’s scans as a baseline was turning up absolutely nothing, and that was with him looking through the UPN, Interpol, and the Russian databases. Every missing persons database in the world had turned up only similarities, never an exact match. The closest was a forty-something woman up in New Hampshire, but even that was only tenuous and twenty years too old, besides.

There weren’t any good theories. She could have come from some other country, maybe slipped through the cracks somewhere — it was even likely. But there was a feeling in Hiro’s stomach, a niggling doubt.

There was never anything to prove that Null Space couldn’t connect to multiple places, multiple realities. In all those infinite possibilities, maybe one society was advanced enough, prosperous enough to have outright beaten them in the technological race and could just open up portals to Null Space whenever they damn well pleased.

Alternate earths, worlds by the same name where one event, one single difference, had irrevocably changed history.

Or she could be from the future? Or the past? (Maybe he’d been watching a little too much Sci-fi with that last one.)

They were only theories, though. Other than that single glimpse he’d gotten, that strange woman standing on the other side of a portal shaped like a doorway, and a girl who didn’t, according to all records, exist, there was no proof.

Maybe it was far-fetched to entertain ideas of alternate earths, but he was willing to try anything at this point.

He visited her regularly.

Every time, he felt his chest ache in sympathy at the sight of such a young woman, barely a few years older than him, filled with needles and plugged into so many tubes. Every time, the rhythmic beating of her heart monitor made him feel queasy.

When he showed up the first time, her head was shaven. The long, dark tresses of her hair had been completely shorn away, probably for the sake of surgery, and it was a shame — her hair was one of her nicer features. She looked like she’d taken care of it before...whatever happened.

He visited twice a week, at first, without Baymax, then later he increased it to three times, then four, and then finally every weekday. Hiro tried having a conversation with her, talking on how his day went, although it was really more of a monologue, since she was still out cold. He told her everything, whether it was Wasabi’s bumbling during their training, some gross thing Fred did with his socks, or a cool exploit Honey Lemon or Gogo did when they went out to stop some petty criminal or put out a fire. He had a lot to talk about that, them and the group moonlighting as the new ‘hero team’ in town that the media had dubbed the “Big Hero 6.”

He made sure to whisper, at least. Didn’t want to get caught by any nurses walking in on the controller of the Big Hero 6’s mascot hero boasting in front of a coma patient.

The routine continued for weeks. Months. Her hair was growing back.

Then, she woke up at long last.

She was barely responsive, staring at them eyes so flat and dead that they unnerved him. Baymax explained that, after such a traumatic injury, it was very likely she didn’t even remember languages anymore, much less how to communicate in any meaningful way. It was like an infant trapped in a grown person’s body.

An infant with a very intense stare.

Hiro’s train of thought was broken by the sound of the door opening, and the bored looking butler was standing at the ready. “Master Hamada.” Heathcliff greeted before stepping aside. “And Master Baymax. A pleasure.”

“Thanks, Mr. Heathcliff,” Hiro replied as he walked through the door, Baymax waddling through, still squeaking. Baymax offered his fist, and Heathcliff bumped it, the robot uttering a “balalalala” with a wiggle of fingers in turn before following his master.

Heathcliff opened the secondary door for the wide robot to enter. “So, are Fred and the others out back?”

“Yes, sir.” Heathcliff closed the doors and walked in front, escorting the two through Fred’s lavish mansion. The decor. The marble statues. The paintings of Renaissance Europe and pre-Union Japan and China. Along with the occasional signed movie poster of some SciFi B-Movie Fred was super into. Hiro could hear the telltale yell of a ‘Cannonball!’ and he looked out past the mansion to see Fred diving into the water of his large pool.

To his right, Damian Waynes, better known as ‘Wasabi,’ was at the top of the jumpboard, waiting for Fred to surface from his childlike plunge. He looked to have green and silver trunks.

Laura Rodriguez, or ‘Honey Lemon,’ was on her tablet humming happily and giggling. Must have been watching some videos on Facepage. Leiko Tanaka, or Gogo Tomago, was sunbathing. Odd, coming from the punk adrenaline junkie. Honey had a yellow and pink-flower one piece to go on her tall and lithe physique while Gogo donned a yellow and black bikini. Hiro made sure not to ogle… Or at least not be caught.

...He was a genius. And a teenage boy. Not a nun.

“Hey Hiro!” Wasabi called out from atop of the diving-board. Hiro waved.

“You never told me it was gonna be a pool party!” Hiro laughed as he sat by Honey Lemon and Gogo, Gogo noticed his presence with a simple “Hey” before going back to dozing, while Honey Lemon jumped to her feet and glomped the boy.

“Heya!” The blonde chirped, Hiro smiled bashfully up at the beaming girl. Then she paled. “Ohmigosh that’s right! We forgot to call you last night about it! Oh I’m so sorry!”

“It’s fine.” Hiro stepped back, bumping into the belly of his giant medcare robot. “I made a detour anyway.”

“Hospital again?” Gogo asked as she blew out another bubble of gum. It popped, and she gnashed it back into her mouth. Hiro felt the mood get dampered a he sat down on the lounge chair next to Gogo, who was probably looking at him past her sunglasses as she laid prone. Hiro nodded.

“Yeah… she was awake again. Doctors are saying she’s slowly getting minimal movement back.”

“Primary function is being restored in patient ‘Jane Doe’s’ toes.” Baymax pointed out with a raised hand. “Subject’s motor functions, given current rate of recovery along with medical technology available to the patient, are calculated to last approximately eight months, two weeks and five days before subject is capable of speech and full motor control and ready to begin full rehabilitation.”

Honey Lemon sat next to the boy, placing a hand on his shoulder. “Well, that’s good. At least she’s getting better.” Hiro heard the Fred’s laughter and looked up to see Wasabi dive on in with a whoop.

When Fred turned towards him he smiled, “Heeeeey, man!” The big nosed blonde offered his fist, the two fist bumping. “Heeey, Biggie B. What’s hangin’, bro?” Fred offered his towards Baymax, who bumped his fist and uttered “balalalalala,” complete with his usual finger waggling.

Wasabi's head popped out of the water, shaking his head and swimming in the pool before he spoke, “What’s really got me shakin my head is ‘Who is she?’ ya know?” He put forward, floating on his back in the pool. “I mean...two bullets to the head and tossed into an inescapable dimension. That had to be some serious haterade they had for her. I mean, who survives gunshots to the head?!”

“Honestly, only people I’ve ever heard of that get shot like that are criminals or people who ticked off the wrong kind of people. You're not meant to survive two shots. Ever.” Gogo commented, popping another gum-ball, still looking up but Hiro could feel her eyes on him. “Girl’s probably dangerous, Hiro. You really should be careful, motor functions or no motor functions. Don’t get too attached to Sleeping Beauty, there.”

Hiro opened his mouth to speak when Honey Lemon beat him to it. “Come on. We don’t know anything about her! We can’t go starting by saying she’s a bad person. That’s not fair! For all we know she could be very very nice!”

“Look, you guys are seriously overthinking this.” Fred chuckled, pulling himself out of the pool and walking over with a swagger and confidence. “I know exactly what happened and why our miss Sleeping Beauty got the headshot treatment, yeah?”

“Oh?” Gogo’s voice showed just how very much she believed him.

“This ought to be good…” Wasabi rolled his eyes.

“Yeah. Ya see,” Fred had his arms out as he began to narrate, voice lowered as if he was a camp counselor or some cheapskate uncle in the Oregon backwoods telling scary stories by the campfire. “The way I figure it, she’s a real big time warlord where she comes from. Like, major big time. Like Hossein Al-Barouk big time! With like… like the ability to turn people into suicide bombers or drones! Take control of them and make them do whatever she wants!”

Now he was just pulling stuff out of his ass. Hiro couldn’t help but smile, though.

“And thus, she was eliminated from her place because she was just too dangerous, or was becoming too powerful for the evil Shadow Organization to control, all of this done after she, in her mind, did everything she needed to do to make her world safe by any means necessary, from some unstoppable force of nature that was a threat to all creation in the universe that she had to put down at all costs!”

Fred nodded to himself, utterly convinced. Then he looked down at his nails. He was in need for a clipping. “I betcha that happened.”

There was silence between the lot of them. Gogo removed her sunglasses, head moving for the first time as she made direct eye contact with the blond heir.

“How do you function?” Gogo deadpanned.

“Yeah, Fred. That one sounds far fetched, even by your standards!” Wasabi chuckled from where he was still at the pool.

Hiro sighed, ignoring the argument that was now occurring as he looked to Baymax. “Eight months?”

“And three weeks and five days.” Baymax nodded. “Yes.”

“It’s already been nearly five, Baymax...I mean… we have eight more to go?”

“And three weeks and five days.”

“Two bullets to the head, Hiro,” Honey Lemon reminded, taking a seat beside him. “It's a miracle she’s still alive at all.” She offered him a sad smile. “Let’s give it time, okay?”

He sighed. She was right.

She was definitely right.

But...he just hated not knowing, his curiosity gnawed at him.

Why was she shot? Why did they throw her out of that portal? Where did that portal lead to? Who was the woman in the suit...

And he thought back to Honey Lemon’s words as he sat under an umbrella as Heathcliff prepared hamburgers made out of Kobe Beef.

Chapter Text

1.3

I needed to go to rehab.

Rehab was a major pain.

I needed to go to rehab.

I saw Nurse Jolyne, a fat young nurse with big cheeks, enter the room with the wheelchair, smiling as bright as usual with her syrupy sweet charm. "Good morning, Taylor!" she chirped, her smile so wide she was almost squinting. "It's time for breakfast!"

I nodded. "Morning." I tried to muster a smile, but I wasn't sure how well it survived when I needed help getting to my feet enough to make it to the wheelchair.

If I had been skinny and lanky before, I look downright skeletal now. I'd been kept alive through simple protein porridge and an IV for… nearly a whole year now, give or take a month or two from what I understand. My once toned and decent musculature I had built up during my villain/Warlord/hero career had atrophied, gone completely down the proverbial drain.. I needed to gain weight again. Both in body fat and in muscle.

Essentially going to rehab and stuffing my face.

The second half of the process wasn't so bad, even with hospital food.

The first half though…

I wasn't a stranger to hard work, to effort. I knew those things like they were old, well-worn friends.

I never realized, however, just how humiliating it was to not even have the power to stand up on your own two feet… to need to call for help just to get to the bathroom. To need help to even...just brush your damn teeth in the morning.

I didn't consider myself a prideful person, but this…

They said I was doing unbelievably well. At this rate, just two more months, they said.

Just two more months… Some days, it felt like they might as well have said two decades.

I felt myself being wheeled down the hall, leaning back and looking down at my stump of an arm. The nurses and doctors had asked me if I wanted a cybernetic prosthetic.

To offer something like that so casually, as if a robotic arm was just… mundane…

I hadn't accepted, of course. Too many unknowns. Too many factors I couldn't account for, yet, to know what the hell this place was. I could ask later, but for now, I was sticking to my left arm before I asked to become more like Defiant than I wanted. Even though I saw other patients and even a nurse or doctor here with a prosthetic limb.

All I'd managed to find out was that this place, wherever it was, whatever Earth it was, was full of very advanced tech.

Had they found a way to mass produce Tinkertech here?

Whatever this world was, it either had found a way to mass produce Tinkertech, or it just had Tinkers for days.

It was also called San Fransokyo, at least the city. It was definitely, geographically speaking, where San Francisco, California was back home. The similarity in the name alone would have tipped me off, if not for the famous golden gate bridge that I could see from my hospital room.

A whole new world.

Alone. Without Dad…

Was he even alive? How many were, now? How did this place escape the damage of the final battle? The destruction, the lives lost…

The number had been...unquantifiable.

I took a deep breath and looked at the ceiling.

"Thinking on something?" asked Jolyne. My train of thought came to a stop and I turned my gaze towards her.

"Oh, well… yeah." I looked off. "Just wondering how I survived back then."

"You mean the gunshots? Or Null Space where you were found?"

I half opened my mouth to correct her — after all everyone knew of the Golden Morning — when I shut it, realizing my mistake a half second before I made it.

"I suppose," I hedged instead.

"Heck if I know, sweetie, but you managed to survive somehow. And it sure stirred up a storm. Physicists and mathematicians are all scrambling over each other to get the chance to explore that place, that Null Space. Did you know the government went off recently to try and launch probes in there?"

"I think they did launch them," I said, remembering. Hiro had been going at it a mile a minute since I first talked to him, apparently trying to cram everything about this world into my head during the hours he spent at my bedside.

Two satellite probes, if I recalled, after the tech had been cannibalized and repurposed into a new doorway. One, the science team had named Jane, the other, Abigail.

I doubted they'd change its name if I called them up and said my name was actually Taylor. Too late to change the good ole Jane Doe.

I suppose I was...lucky. Being in a coma for so long had let the news and the media frenzy basically blow over onto different things now.

My memories were returning. Slowly but surely, like...water trickling back into a sieve, filling it up drop by drop.

The Golden Morning was the first.

Staring at Scion, his face a mask of sorrow, holding himself perfectly still as he awaited the death blow.

He'd looked straight at me.

I didn't think I'd ever forget that image. That gaze.

It would be burned into my mind until the day I died.

Then came others, bit by bit every hour, every minute of every day, until I could assemble the picture in my mind like a giant jigsaw puzzle arranged in perfect order.

I could remember everything.

Useful.

Especially when it came to remembering how to control my insects.

Didn't have alot of control. Not even alot of range. Where before I could direct insects with pin point precision now it was... sloppy.

Even my range was just a few feet, not the city blocks it used to be.

Though both those things were changing day by day. Millimeter by millimeter.

Had Contessa planned this?

She must have.

Most powerful cape in the world, who literally could not fail, barring Scion and the Endbringers.

She planned for this kind of recovery.

Only explanation for why it was going so smoothly.

Now, I just had to find out what path she was following that had this as a consequence to the end result.

We wheeled into the physical therapy center and I almost groaned at the sight of the equipment there. Ballet posts and rails to help me walk. Weights and dumbbells looked too light for a normal person to be a dumbbell.

Except I wasn't normal. I was basically skin and bones, and I was just barely above the threshold for underweight and malnourished, because of the nutrient paste and occasional snacks and shakes Hiro brought me.

"Alright, let's get you walking. Don't be afraid to take your time," Jolyne spoke as she lifted me up in her big arms. For a fat girl, she was strong, or maybe I was just as light as a feather. Anyone was stronger and heavier than me physically, at this point.

Anyway, Jolyne had a cheery disposition about her, though there was no escaping that she was bigger, taller, heavier, and wider than even Piggot had been. Then again, anyone can be cheery when they weren't in charge of Brockton Bay.

Which in this world is called Portsmouth, for some reason. And there were more islands around there instead of an open bay. Could have used those islands when Leviathan dropped by, too.

…

God, that just felt...awkward.

I placed my bony hand on the rails, took several deep breaths, and held on as Jolyne strapped the nearby harness around my waist, hooking it over my shoulders like suspenders. It had a tether attached to the ceiling track that would keep me upright.

That was good.

Because I literally could not get up when I fell down.

Christ, I couldn't remember feeling this helpless and weak since that time Bonesaw put me on an operating table.

I gripped the bar and held on, taking step after step…

Well. Just one. I grunted after step one.

"You're doing good, Taylor. Keep it up!" Jolyne exclaimed from in front of me. She smiled, broad and encouraging, as she held her hands forward like a parent, ready to catch the toddler if they suddenly tripped and face-planted.

I turned and focused on my next step as my arm began to shake from the strain of carrying most of my weight, forcing me to rest it on my shaking knees.

It felt like an eternity before I finally made it to the other side.

I was sweating, every limb felt like it was on fire, I was panting like a winded dog, and I'd barely made twenty feet.

This was goddamn pathetic.

"That was fantastic, Taylor!" Jolyne smiled.

I tried not to glare, really, I did.

"I didn't think you'd make it the whole way!" She continued, oblivious, or choosing to be. "Not this soon!"

She probably said that to all her patients.

"Updating calculations."

I heard a familiar voice behind me.

I turned, and the big, white, squishy Bay-

No, wait… Not Baymax. Different.

Still white, still tall, but harder plastic rather than the inflatable vinyl to which I'd become accustomed. A little skinnier, as well.

That, and I didn't see Hiro.

"What's that?" I found enough breath in me to ask.

"This unit calculated that rate of recovery would necessitate an additional three months, two weeks, and two days before full recovery could be achieved. Given current rate of progress, this unit is updating its estimated recovery time. You now have two months, one week, and three days before full recovery is completed at current rate."

I blinked and turned towards Jolyne. "So uhhh, did I miss something or did this become a thing?"

"Oh yes!" Jolyne waddled over. "This young inventor is now selling numerous of these Baymax 2 MCUs. Quite a few hospitals are ordering some. Especially for physical therapy and elderly patients. We're one of the first to get them, and we have around a dozen here at San Fransokyo. I hear at least every hospital in the city is going to stock some."

Well… I hoped Hiro read the fine print on whatever contract he signed.

"So…" I held onto the bars as Jolyne brought the wheelchair and I all but collapsed into it with a grunt. "Again?" I asked.

"Yep. Gotta build up that muscle memory. Well, first the muscle, then the memory." Jolyne toyed. "I'll go get you a protein shake after you do one more walk in...how does ten minutes sound? That okay by you?"

I nodded. "Vanilla, please. And thank you."

Chapter Text

Interlude: Wasabi

"So… she knows our identities."

This statement, delivered with the forced casualness of a child who knew he was about to reveal some very bad news and was trying very hard to downplay its negative implications as much as possible, prompted several reactions from everyone.

Fred did a spit take, spraying much of his cola out of the mouthpiece of his suit, then cried in dismay at the sight of the rest of it trailing down the inside of his lizard costume and into his pants and socks.

Gogo nearly crashed into a wall. She lost her footing for a moment, and when she found her balance again, she ground her wheels against the cement hard enough to leave a clear and defined divot in its surface, then rounded on him with an expression of utter incredulity.

Honey looked confused, tilting her head just so.

Wasabi did a military style, one-eighty about face.

"Say what, now?" he asked, bearing a nervous, twitchy smile. "You..uh...I coulda sworn I heard you say —"

"How does she know who we are?" Gogo asked, stepping forward, the wheels of her feet rising to hover just above her ankles as she placed her hands on her hips. She looked at Hiro as though her eyes could fire laser beams.

"Well…" Hiro looked down. Baymax, in his red armor, stood passively behind him. His cheeks were a bright, cherry red, and he refused to meet anyone's gaze.

"I kinda sorta talked to her while she was recovering...trying to get her to learn to talk again and…" He paused, and actually went so far as to wring his hands. "Kinda told her...stories…"

"What kind of stories?" Gogo stressed, laser-beam-eyes narrowed dangerously.

"Umm...Our...kind of...stories..."

"Dude!" Fred's hands were on the crown of his suit. "Superhero Rule Number One: you do not talk about secret identities. Rule Number Two: you do not talk about secret identities! Rule Number Three if there are any questions about rule one and two: you do not talk about the secret identities!" He began to pace. "Why did you tell her, man! Aren't you the leader?!"

"I didn't like...flat out say it. I just told stories and... she… just figured it out herself. I mean, we did talk a lot about it and I think, well… she connected two and two together and —"

"This is bad. Really, really, really bad," Fred bemoaned.

"Guys, it'll be alright! Let's not jump to conclusions, here!" Honey insisted, running a hand down Fred's back as she leaned over to plead with Gogo.

Meanwhile, Damien 'Wasabi' Wayne was experiencing…

'An event' was a good way to put it.

In his life, everything had a place and a purpose. Things did not overlap, they did not step out of their place, otherwise there would be nothing but a pure, disorganized mess…

He didn't like mess.

His hero persona, similarly, had its place. It was to be kept separate from 'Wasabi,' the college student that specialized in highly advanced photon technology.

They were not meant to overlap. They did not step into each other's place.

Wasabi certainly wasn't the one who went out and stopped bank robberies or high speed car chases.

And Hero Wasabi didn't hand in reports in school.

Things were nice, simple, uncomplicated that way.

Organized…

Free of mess…

But now, that vision was rapidly shattering right before his eyes, crumbling to a messy pile at his feet.

What would any future employers say? What would all the respected science communities say?

What would his mother say!?

He started to hyperventilate.

He could hear her now, calling on the phone, screeching about his risky behavior, demanding he come home, and when he said no, she'd fly out here to supervise.

…

Oh god…

Oh god, why. Oh the humanity!

In the span of ten seconds, Wasabi went from panic, to rage, to fear, to uncertainty, to acceptance, back to panic, and ran through the gamut of emotions several times.

"I can't take it, I can't take the pressure anymore, and —" Wasabi stopped himself as he noticed everyone was looking right at him.

"I was thinking outloud, wasn't I?" he asked with wide eyes, like a deer caught in the headlights.

"Yeah… Caught that," Fred said, deadpan.

"Especially the part about your mom," Hiro put forward.

"Kinda...shouted it at the top of your lungs," Honey Lemon offered.

"Mama's boy," Gogo added.

"But it's fine! Honest!" Hiro explained. "Taylor said she'd keep it a secret!"

"That's what they always — who's Taylor?" Fred caught himself.

"Oh! You know her name?" Honey Lemon spoke up, smile on her face. She was taking this...well.

"Y-Yeah. Her name is Taylor Hebert, apparently. She's very nice and said she'd keep it a secret." Fred let out a long frustrated sigh.

"Hiro, Hiro, Hiro. Look, you're new to the superhero game." He knelt down, hand on Hiro's shoulder. "I mean, you haven't been exposed to the rules and the mindset like I have. But I think, after enough movies and enough of our escapades going out there for peace and justice and radical awesome, you'd think — you'd THINK —" Fred raised his voice. "— that maaaaybe it would be smart to keep your identity under wraps, lock and key?"

"As much as Fred loses brain cells on a daily basis, watching those movies, he has a point," Gogo commented, standing up and walking over to Hiro. "You shouldn't have talked with her about anything we do. Loose lips sink ships, Hiro." There was a noticeable edge in her voice. "What do we do?"

"Huh?" Honey asked.

"Uhhh, isn't it obvious?" Fred brought fingers to his lips, and zipped them. "We gotta shut her up. Make sure she doesn't chirp."

"What!?" Wasabi squeaked. "Kill her!?"

"Of course we're not killing her, moron!" Gogo shouted.

"Nah, man. I ain't crazy!" Fred protested.

Wasabi breathed a sigh of relief.

"We'll just use Hiro's amnesia machine to make her forget about everything."

They stared at him.

Honey took a breath, raising one fist, finger pointed in the air —

"Moving on!" Gogo loudly demanded before turning to Hiro with her accusatory glare.

"Oh, come on, she said she was going to keep it a secret!" Hiro spoke out, eyes wide. "I mean, what can she do with our identities?"

"Gee, I don't know." Gogo dryly rolled her eyes. "Because the fact she came from a portal and has no money to her name, no ID outside of the name she gave you, and nothing to lose, you'd think she'd sell this tidbit of information to the San Fransokyo Gazette for a whole money bin. Or blackmail Fred for a fortune and a half."

"I wouldn't mind a money bin," Fred mused. "Would be cool swimming in it. Oh! Or making a wave pool of money..."

"Aren't you, like...filthy stinkin' rich?" Wasabi asked with a quirked eyebrow.

"No reason to get technical about it," Fred answered, crossing his arms.

"Why do I bother?"

"Guys, I'm with Hiro, here." Honey walked over to the group. "If this girl promised, then it's a promise! And we aren't going to 'shut her up'. I mean, how would we even do that and why would she ruin a good thing? She's been watching the news for goodness knows how long while cooped up in the bed, so she knows how much good we do! Crime rate's down ten percent a from a year ago when we first started!" She exclaimed brightly.

Wasabi took a breath. He knew Honey Lemon could be bit of a ditz while being sweet enough to give someone diabetes, and maybe that made her a little bit naive, but he really hoped her and Hiro's optimism panned out in this instance.

He really, really did.

Just then, the police sirens sounded out just a few blocks away, and they could see the flash of red-and-blue lights on the sides of the buildings. Everyone stopped bickering and turned towards Baymax.

"My scanners indicate a situation on: 8th Avenue and Liberty Street." Baymax reported.

"Isn't that where the Concert Hall is?" Honey Lemon spoke out.

"I think so. Let's get going, then!" Hiro swung himself up onto Baymax's back in a fluid, practiced motion, and off they flew into the night.

Chapter Text

1.4

"Three...two...and...there!" I took a step forward, standing up in between the racks, hands gripping the bars. I took deep breaths and looked at Jolyne, who clapped her hands.

"There we go!" She almost looked like she wanted to start jumping for joy as she clapped her hands, walking over to me. She wrapped one arm around my waist and gripped my bicep with the other, holding me up before helping me walk over to the wheelchair and setting me down on it. "You're making fantastic recovery time here, Taylor!"

"Yeah...thanks…" I breathed. Today was the first day I'd done it without the harness, and honestly, it was a boost to my confidence I sorely needed. The thought that I could walk on my own was… honestly beautiful.

They said I was doing great, but I doubted that. The treatment and rehab care here had things that could pass as Tinker Tech back home. With that kind of technology, I should have been out of here, already!

The only upside to the fact that I was stuck in this hospital was that it gave me a lot of time to catch up on my reading.

Specifically, history. This Earth had a history that was largely identical to what I could remember from mine. The point of divergence, as far as I could tell, was the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries

That was the point of the divergence, judging from what I gathered in numerous history articles.

From there onwards, the United States' technology evolved fast, to the point that it practically blitzed past the heavy reliance on the fossil fuels that Earth Bet and Aleph used in under three decades. With a speed that would make a historian's head spin, it was pushed aside in favor of clean energy like wind, solar, and hydro-electric.

This made the United States something of an aloof superpower come the early to mid 1900s. They became so colossal that Europe and its various nations felt insanely threatened by their success. As a result, the European Union had been born decades before their creation in my Earth.

Then, as the US sought to expand their interests worldwide and found themselves butting heads against the European Union, they turned eastward, for Asia.

Japan had been the obvious target at the time, having just won a war with Russia, a declining but still major player back in the early 1900s. The US started fostering good relations with them, outbidding and offering more lucrative opportunities and deals than the European Union could, at the time.

They'd been allies and close friends ever since, to the point that Japanese relief workers who helped repair it in the aftermath of the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906 had been offered full US citizenship as a thanks for their service.

So many had stayed that they'd renamed the city in their honor.

Which is why this place was named San Fransokyo, not San Francisco. It was why it had signs written in English with Japanese translations on every street corner and vice versa.

Eventually, the Japanese Empire and the United States allied to form the Union of Pacific Nations.

That's what I'd read so far anyway.

Jolyne pushed me over to the workout bench, where some light weights were at, and I sat down and she handed one to me. Five pound dumbbell, but it felt like a fourty pounder to me.

I was still weak, but over the last month, I had managed to put on more muscle mass in my legs and arms, so I wasn't a skeleton anymore, and due to my reinvigorated appetite, I was putting on even more weight; I was at a point that could probably pass for healthy. Maybe. For a Merchant, maybe.

Well… I'd get the muscle and meat back on me, eventually. I had the time for that, now.

I had the time for it…

With my one arm, I took the thing and began to do some curls. Jolyne turned on the volume on the TV that was in the room and the news was playing.

'... and onto other news, the team of vigilante heroes, the Big Hero Six, were spotted again last night, aiding in stopping the pursuit of a fleeing suspect-

I looked up as the video clip began to play.

First was Baymax, the big fluff bot now armored like a behemoth, flying around with a purple limpet on his back.

He stopped a speeding car with an absurd degree of gentleness for a Brute. Slowing it down enough for the pink-wearing superheroine to toss some spiderweb-like gunk onto the wheels and a pink glob of adhesive onto the doors and windows.

Then, as the cops were rounding the corner, sirens blaring, Big Red took Lady Pink, who was waving at the cellphone camera, and flew off into the sky.

"You know, every time I hear about those guys, it makes me smile," Jolyne commented. "They're really doing a lot of good things

Hmm. I nodded. "You hear about them all the time." 'And get regular visits.' I added mentally. "Crime rate's gone down thanks to them, I hear."

"Oh yes!" Jolyne perked up. "A lot of the gang members got all wrapped up and shipped off to Granite Bay Prison up the coast. They've been a big help!"

A big help, huh. Heroes doing things and being showered with praise.

Was this how it was?

How it started? Was this the 'Golden Age' I'd heard stories about, before my world went to hell?

Was this this world's version of the Triumvirate? Cauldron? People who started off doing good, only to get dragged further and further into the mud pit?

Hiro seemed like… a good person. There weren't alot of people I could say were the same.

But what about the others? Would he be the 'Legend' of their group, well meaning but ultimately ignorant of how far his teammates would go? Or did go?

Apparently, my mood was showing on my face. "Something wrong, Tay?" Jolyne asked

I shook my head. "Just wondering what kind of people they are. Things aren't so cut and dry."

She shrugged and smiled. "Oh, who knows? Lots of people speculate what they're like on the forums and image boards." The pleasantly plump woman answered. "People say Big Hero, the red one, is the leader, but I don't buy it. Some people say Tracer-Girl, the yellow and black one, is the Leader by example."

Not quite. The leader was the kid clinging to the back of the robot like it was an overgrown plush toy.

I yawned, too slow to fully cover my mouth as my lone arm struggled with the dumbbell.

I set it down as soon as the yawn subsided, taking a breath and looking to Jolyne. "Think it's time to go."

She looked at her cellphone clock, nodding. "Yup. Just about," she answered, marching over to the wheelchair.

"I'd like to walk, please," I said.

Jolyne looked at me. "You sure hun?"

I nod. "You said I've been doing well… time to prove it."

"Sweetheart, this isn't a race. You can take as much time as you need."

"I have," I answered...demanded, staring at Jolyne in the same way I'd learned to look at so many others in my life that needed to be...convinced.

I tried to pretend I didn't notice her shiver just a bit.

I also tried to pretend it bothered me more than it did, but I was bothered much more by how unbothered I was.

She recovered quickly, though, smiling. "Well… I suppose it wouldn't hurt to try." Jolyne pondered. "You got me for a nice cushion to lean back on! But just in case, B-six-two."

With a soft glow of light from its chest and then its eyes, the plastic robot turned on, looking to us and stepping off of its power cradle, walking towards us with a stride that was more stable and less of a waddle than Hiro's Baymax.

"This unit is ready to serve in any capacity."

"Well, B-six, we're gonna try to walk to the room now, so if you're gonna help grab the chair and bring it up behind us, and if our patient is gonna fall, you help me catch her, ok?"

"Understood, Nurse Jolyne."

As the robot obediently moved to the chair, I took a deep breath… and pushed myself to my feet.

(X)

It should have been a short walk. Down a hallway, up an elevator, across another hallway, and there was the room.

All in all, less than two hundred steps. It should have taken less than five minutes.

It took me almost twenty. And as I lay in the bed, exhausted, able to do nothing but breathe heavily, trying to catch my breath, Jolyne's words of praise felt hollow.

I had to walk again...I had to be myself again and get out of he —

I opened my eyes, staring up at the ceiling.

Get out…

To go...where, exactly?

I have no home, here. Not even a medical bill to pay. Free healthcare. But I have nowhere to go… No income. No Job. Not even a freaking ID.

All I had to my name were the two bullets Contessa put in my skull to...weaken my passenger.

Even my powers felt alien. Granted, I felt like I was back at the level of strength I had when I'd just started, power wise but I was no warlord Skitter, or Weaver, but feeling such a drop off in both range and dexterity, along with muscle atrophy, only helped to add onto my current state of feeling like a stranger in my own body..

I literally had nothing at the moment.

The only evidence Taylor Hebert ever existed in this place could basically be summed up in these crumpled sheets and the reports Jolyne filled out every day about our sessions.

It was a...disquieting thought.

…

...

What do I do?

I lied in bed for a while, trying to think of a plan, when I felt someone move towards my door through my bugs' senses.

The silhouette seemed familiar, and I tried to pull the person's identity through my memories.

The door opened, and there was a girl, dark hair, streak of pink running through it in a way that reminded me of Aisha, though that was about where the similarities ended. There was no smirk or grin, no joke hanging off the tip of her tongue, and she was asian where Aisha was black.

She was actually glaring at me, arms crossed and eyes narrowed.

There were only a few people who knew I was here at all. That narrowed down my list of suspects, especially since I doubted Contessa would...send anyone. Cauldron's secret weapon wouldn't have had a need for it.

The asian girl closed the door. She had a simple white blouse, leather jacket, yoga pants under a black skirt and converse. She crossed her arms and leaned against the door

"Look here, Taylor." She spat it out my name like it was a curse. "Let's talk."

She was trying to be intimidating. Given the lean muscle and my current inability to properly move, she would have been had I been anyone else.

I'd faced too much more than her for it to work, though. I had to hold back a smirk and remained stoic. So I simply blinked.

Ahh. That's who she was. I remembered her now. She came here with Hiro sometimes, back when I couldn't move or speak.

"I don't know what you're planning, but I promise you, you try to hurt Hiro, or any of my friends, and those bullet holes they put in your skull will seem like a mercy compared to what I'm gonna do to you." Tracer Girl snarled, eyes narrowed at me.

I almost laughed.

"And I know what those things mean. It means that you were damn dangerous. Hiro thinks you're ok. He's a good kid, but he's naive. Innocent. I won't let you take advantage of that." She growled. "Stay away from Hiro."

I looked at her, stared into her eyes.

She meant every word.

It made me smile a bit.

I heard her snarl, watched her lip curl with a sneer. Then, there was a swivel of the door-knob, someone trying to get in.

"Oh. I'm sorry," a nurse said as the door bumped into her. She was bringing in my evening meal.

"No problem. I was just saying goodbye." Tracer Girl mumbled to her before slipping out, tossing me a glare over her shoulder before she closed the door.

"Didn't mean to interrupt your friend." The nurse apologized.

"It's ok. She had to run, anyway," I answered. I turned my head towards the window and began to think.

She was looking out for her friends. Or trying to. And for good reason, as I gave it more thought. I was a no one. A nobody that they knew nothing about and who's motives were completely unknown.

Even so, there were far more important things on my mind than a girl who was trying to be intimidating.

… Maybe I shouldn't underestimate her, on second thought.

After all; The one time I really felt people were going after my friends, I ended up killing my childhood hero. A woman who could go toe to toe with an Endbringer.

I had no intention of surviving the end of all worlds just to end up being this girl's 'Alexandria.'

(X)

It was a few days later, as I was watching the news, that I found something interesting.

A small wrinkle in this otherwise utopian image I'd seen so far.

It was a man, one that was walking out of a court house. He seemed Asian, with sharp, narrow eyes, black hair, and a pointed nose. The bottom caption read:

PROMINENT CEO ARTHUR CHENG FOUND NOT GUILTY FOR CORRUPTION

"Mr. Cheng, how do you feel about the not guilty verdict?"

"Mr. Cheng, what do you have to say to the allegations of witness intimidation or jury tampering, sir?"

"Mr. Cheng —"

The man had a smirk on his face.

He reminded me of Coil.

That same air. The same self assured confidence of a man who knew he was going to win, regardless of the outcome.

"I find it relieving. To know our fair justice system came out with the right verdict is all good by me, Mr. Smith. I can't wait to return to the arms of my wife and two daughters." More shouts of 'MR. CHENG' came out.

"What do you have to say of your opponent's' claims of your alleged ties to the Triads and the funds from Cheng Foods?"

I listened to him answer every question as if he'd rehearsed it.

…

I realized, with a start… that I was smirking

It was like a bucket of cold water over my head, the… amusement I felt at the… prospect...

I looked to myself, my atrophied legs and physique, then to my arm, slowly shaking my head as I eyed the stump.

Even now… I probably could...

Put it out of your mind. I told myself, leaning back on the pillow and changing the channel. Put it out of your mind.

The sound of a creaking door made me turn down the volume of some bickering talking heads and I turned towards the source.

"Oh! Were you napping, Tay?" asked a brunette woman in her mid thirties. I recognized her.

Cassandra.

Aunt Cass.

"No, you're fine." I smiled, or tried to.

I must have done a half decent job, because she smiled back. "I hope your day is going well Tay."

I nodded, then, realized I should probably be a bit more talkative.

"That's good. Anyways, I hear you're almost done with rehab. That big girl? Jolyne? She's been singing your praises in the hallways."

"I-I see…" I said, unsure what to say. "Maybe I should thank her, then." Or tell her to stop. No one needed to know how weak or healthy I actually was.

"Anyways, Taylor." She sat down, leaning forward, staring straight at me. "You don't really have a place to stay, right? Nowhere to go after you get out of here?"

I raised an eyebrow.

"No…" I admitted slowly. "No real memory of home. And given how I showed up with a pair bullet holes in my head, I'm not sure I'd want to go back." I lied. The lie came easily. Even if I could have returned to Earth Bet, even if it wasn't a blasted, charred wasteland, even if I wasn't the single most hated creature across the multitude of universes, I wasn't sure if I ever… ever wanted to go back.

Cass remained silent and took a deep breath. "Well, Hiro has been going in and out of the house more often and crashing at his friend's house for school and work," Aunt Cass said nostalgically. "Call me a crazy mother hen and all, but there's room in my home."

I felt an eyebrow hiking up to my hairline.

…

W-was she serious?

"Uhhh… Mrs. —"

"Well, after everything you've been through, I can't let a girl like you go out there and fend for yourself. Everyone needs some help every now and then. Nothing wrong with that, right? It'll be easier for you to get back on your feet, this way." She smiled at me.

Already my eyes were searching, looking for the ulterior motive, the angle.

I wondered what that probably said about me.

"I… can't pay you..." I offered lamely.

She shrugged, smiling. "I kinda knew that Tay."

"I… W-Would I work for you?" I asked, still not sure what she could ever hope to get out of it. Recovering or not, I was still… crippled in every sense of the word.

"If you'd like to, then sure. I could always use the help."

"I don't want to be trouble."

"Oh you wouldn't cause any trouble." She chuckled. "Also." She leaned in and whispered. "I think Hiro may have a crush on you. Don't tell him I said that, okay? He's really fascinated by you!" Cass let out a soft laugh, probably at the fact her nephew was smitten or my reaction.

I raised an eyebrow, biting down the sarcasm at the tip of my tongue.

The girl with one arm, the mess of hair, the bullet scars on her forehead, and the litany of other scars across her body was not crush material at all.

"I...I see. That's... new," I responded as politely as I could. I could feel the awkwardness in my smile. "Well, in any case… I...I would be happy to work for you."

Cass beamed at me like she was the one that had been offered a job and a place to stay.

Chapter Text

Arc 1: End

I stirred in my bed, and I knew almost instinctively that I'd woken up before my alarm. I didn't even need to look to identify the familiar weight pressing down on my ribs.

It was my impromptu roommate.

A big, fat, Japanese Bobtail cat was purring and making itself at home on my chest, staring at me with its yellow-green eyes. It pawed at my chin.

I smiled just a bit and raised my remaining arm to pet the fat, lazy cat, scratching his ears.

"You haven't been fed yet, have ya?" I asked knowingly. Usually, Hiro was the one who fed the cat when he was around but there were days he forgot, and since Hiro would just stay asleep and Cass was too busy, my feline companion had learned rather quickly who it could get food off of when it wanted it.

Mochi. I had no idea what it meant, except a vague idea that it was Japanese and probably a pun.

I looked at the clock. 5:37.

Not much earlier than my 6:00 AM alarm. Just about ready to open shop, too. I stood up, dislodging Mochi, and I got out of bed.

First things first, I reached for the prosthetic arm charging on a stand by my bedside table and pulled it free of its charging station.

I put the arm on, feeling the strange sensation of sensors finding and connecting to my nerves, hearing the whirs and clicks of the strange joints. I turned, glancing out the window to the first rays of sunlight turning the sky a slate grey color.

I could already hear Cass downstairs; she filled this place to the brim with pastries and Asiatic foods by the truckload before 6:00 AM opening. I couldn't cook half the menu here. There were pre-made Bento, Pocky, cream cakes, doughnuts, endless supplies of coffee, and that's not even going into the the desserts.

I had nowhere else to go, nothing to my name, nothing else I could do. Hiro had seemed happy with my decision, same with Cass. The kid even let me have his old room, considering that he was practically moving out to live in his own college dorm, now that he was putting in more hours in the robotic lab there than he was here half the time anyway.

I reached for the door-knob with my prosthetic, deciding to get in as much practice with the faux muscles and circuitry as I could. The limb was a lightweight metal, with a surprising degree of strength, though there was some minor lag because the motors and servos didn't have quite the speed and dexterity of real fingers.

Even so, it was better than going around with just one arm.

Cass and Hiro had been with me for the fittings and medical procedures

Complete strangers… sitting for hours on end, days at a time to help me get a prosthetic limb.

They deserved far more than simple gratitude. Even so, that was still all I could give at this juncture.

As such, I tried to work as hard as I could for Cass. The store was… different. Not what I was used to. I didn't deal well with people. With crowds. I tried to smile, tried to sound pleasant and happy like that nurse, Jolyne, did.

Wasn't sure if I was any good at it.

Probably not.

It wasn't that I was depressed or sad… at least… I don't think I am. I wasn't melancholic.

I was just… lethargic. I guessed that would be a word for it. It felt strange…

After everything that happened… slowing down… felt alien to me.

Hiro and Baymax came by virtually every other day and always on the weekends or holidays. The ride here wasn't exactly a road trip. His friends showed up too sometimes, though one was notably absent after one trip.

The one they called 'Gogo'. Tracer Girl, in other words.

She wasn't dead, as far as I knew.

She'd apparently underestimated Cass' kindness and altruism. So did I. I'll admit, I found her flabbergasted face more than a little funny when she saw me and heard I'd be working and living here.

It privately made me laugh.

I put on my robe and walked down the hallway, turned the corner, and there before me was a shambling zombie with sunken eyes and wild, frayed hair, wearing flour stains and a rumpled apron.

The first couple of days spooked me; now, it was all routine.

"Tired…" She hissed. "No...more...baking…"

"You're gonna have to do it again tomorrow," I drawled.

She groaned. "Coooooffeeeeeee…"

"Sure."

"Wiiiiiith suuuuuugaaaaaar… "

I patted Cass on the shoulder as I walked past.

Mochi the cat was already down the stairs, meowing in disgruntled impatience. For a fat cat, he certainly was fast when he had a goal in mind. I got down to the kitchen and dug out the cat food as Mochi meowed loudly. He wound around me, walking figure eights about my ankles as I poured the scoops into his bowl, and barely a second after I'd finished filling it up, he pounced on it and went to town. I changed his water, then put a pot of coffee on, before walking over to the fridge and starting my own breakfast.

As the food cooked, I started to get the shop ready, setting the tables and chairs with both arms. When that was taken care of, I ate my nearly burnt breakfast before I flipped the sign from CLOSED to OPEN.

I still wasn't sure about exactly how 'convenient' it was to live in an apartment just above your workplace. The travel was nonexistent, sure, but to have people knowing where you lived felt… exposed… careless… dangerous.

Either way, those weren't thoughts I needed to entertain.

Before long, Cass came down, and the shop was officially open.

The 6:35 AM jogger showed up right on the dot, smiling and asking for his usual cup to end his jog and head home. Familiar, worn out faces passed through the door, smiling at Cass, who smiled back, smiling at me, who tried to return the courtesy. A steady stream as the morning hours peaked.

"Hey, Ms. Hamada. Muffins smell good, this morning."

"So they don't smell good every morning, Chris?" she answered with an easy smile that I honestly could feel envious of.

I worked the register more than the tables. It didn't take a genius to realize I wasn't the most… personable person. Something in my eyes. Something that told people I was sizing them up… measuring them like I always used to.

It set them on edge… and it wasn't an instinct I was sure I wanted to lose.

I looked out the window towards the neighborhood.

This wasn't my old home. This place felt peaceful… felt… like something Earth Bet lost a long time ago.

It felt like it wouldn't last. Like the other shoe was just waiting to drop...

There was nothing to tell me that. No Parahumans… No Endbringers or Cauldron. Certainly no Scion.

Just me. Just me and my little bugs, watching in and around the store..

As the hours rolled by and the morning rush died into the work-hours… a truck pulled up.

A familiar one.

Just outside the store, at the intersection stop light.

One big truck with the same drivers. Every week… like clockwork

There was nothing extraordinary about it. Nothing unusual…

Except that the driver and passenger were both carrying guns. And the back of their truck didn't carry food, even though it said 'Chang's foods' along the side.

Sometimes they would drop by. Walk in to Cass' store, order coffee.

I gave it to them whenever they did without so much as a cross look.

Just little old me. Little old me with my bugs that could still see and hear everything.

A woman came in, her son alongside her, wearing a red shirt with the Baymax's armored face plastered all over the front of it.

I took their orders, trying to improve my smile.

Arc 1: Colonization End.

Chapter Text

JUBILATION

2.1

The days rolled by.

One… after the next after the next.

I fell into a routine. And every day, I had to remind myself that this was what it should be. That this was what normalcy looked like. This was what it was like to be an ordinary human being, without dragon-men to fight, or megalomaniacal psychopaths to dethrone, or eldritch abominations to drive off.

It just didn't feel normal to me.

But I tried. With a shaking hand and cold dread in my stomach, I tried.

Cass handed me my check, closed the store at four, and I moved three blocks down to deposit it before returning, unsure of what to spend it on or what to save it up for.

I saved the world. Where could you even go from there?

I walked in through the back door, as I always did, now. Cass was putting away the food that wasn't sold or throwing it out, as needed.

"Hey, Taylor," Cass called out. "Hiro came over while you were out." She smiled. "He said he wanted to talk to you about something."

I raised an eyebrow. "Did he say what about?"

She shrugged. "Not sure, but knowing Hiro, it's some project or other he's got on his mind and he needs you to stand around and do something. Did it with me and Tadashi all the time."

I felt my nerves light up with a strange, queasy anxiety.

I'd been under the scrutiny of Tinker 'projects' in the past, and I didn't like very many of them.

I had to remind myself that was over. Done. This world didn't even have… passengers. Even if Hiro was a true Tinker, he wasn't going to hurt me.

I had to remind myself of this with every step I took up the stairs.

Mochi, the fat cat, sat at the top like an oversized rug, making me step over him to get up to the last step.

I remembered. Dad was allergic to cats.

Shame Dad was allergic to cats, too…

I opened the door to Hiro's room, forgetting to knock in my preoccupation.

Hiro started from where he sat on the bed, looking at his phone.

Baymax waved from his place at the charging station by the wall.

"Greetings."

"Oh, hi, Taylor!" He smiled, looking up at me. "So… how was work?"

"Fine." My answer was so clipped I felt myself inwardly cringe. "Little slow," I elaborated. I was never good at small talk.

"Something wrong? Cass said you needed to speak to me."

Suddenly, he seemed rather nervous, and his smile edged into awkward.

"Oh, it's no big deal, just noticed that you've been kinda… I don't know, cooped up in here. You just work and stay here. Not that I, ah… blame you or anything with the, uh… you know. Circumstances. But… ya gotta get out of here and do something…" He shrugged, trailing off, looking everywhere but me before finding my eyes again. "So I was thinking, well… We could go out? I know of this really cool arcade-slash-pizza place downtown. Wanna come?"

My first reflex was to say no.

I wasn't a people person. And I wasn't fun to be around in a setting like an 'arcade.'

Very likely the less he interacted with me, the better.

Baymax raised a single finger. "First dates are a natural, healthy part of a growing adolescent's —"

The horror on Hiro's face was as much hilarious as it was mildly insulting.

Heh. Date me. The transdimensional former warlord with one arm who hid her bullet scars with a bandana over her forehead…

I'd have to come up with a snappier, quicker one-liner to describe myself, at some point. That one felt like you could run out of breath trying to say it all at once.

Through Hiro's shouted protests and hasty clarifications, he made it abundantly clear that this was a 'group' outing.

Me, him, Baymax, and his… teammates.

"I don't…" I tried to find the right words. "— play hero…" I paused, scratching at my forehead, and hoped he'd take the hint.

He seemed somewhat oblivious, though not entirely so. "Oh… No, no — not. I mean… if you wanted, but no — this isn't a euphemism for that, it's actually going to get pizza."

Ahh.

Then he shifted his eyes away.

My memories of the know it all and the others had returned enough for me to know when someone was… holding back. "And?"

Under my stare, he seemed to resign himself. "Aaaand… to… kinda sorta-"

"You told them about me knowing your identity..." I concluded.

"Yeeeaaaah…" He rubbed the back of his head. "So, I figured that, well… if you came along we could, like… talk it out and stuff. Gogo, Fred, and Wasabi are kinda nervous about it."

I should have expected this.

Correction. I had expected this. But after a few days of not hearing anything and a few days turning into nearly two weeks, I figured Hiro was just tracking me with some tinkertech spy cam or something.

Did he really wait this long to confront me about the whole identity thing?

If he was this laid back about an emergency, I had to wonder if he really knew how far in over his head he was getting.

"I'll come with you."

The answer was blurted out of my mouth before I could stop it. Hiro looked back at me with wide eyes, a smile beginning to form over his face.

"Y-You will?" he asked. I looked to the side.

I nodded. "Yeah." They were… kids. My age, but still, just kids that didn't know the first thing about what they were getting themselves into.

They would get themselves hurt.

I wasn't sure… what, exactly, I was planning to do, yet, what I was going to say. If I was going to say anything. But I couldn't just… sit on my hands, waiting for them to bite off more than they could chew.

If my rather… apathetic manner was off putting, Hiro didn't show it, smiling from ear to ear.

"Great, you're gonna love the pizza. Me and Baymax'll wait for ya downstairs whenever you're ready!"

I tried to smile. I really did. Maybe I succeeded at least a little bit, because his smile didn't diminish as he left, Baymax waddling off behind him with little rubbery squeaks.

I looked at my clothes, wondering for a moment what I could wear that at least looked decent enough. My relatively brief time out of the hospital and my limited funds didn't give me a great deal of options, but, looking through the drawers, which, I assumed, belonged once upon a time to Hiro's late brother, Tadashi, I was able to put together something I didn't have to be ashamed about….and that didn't clash with the necessary headwear to cover up my scars.

Call me vain or stupid. But I didn't like them. Didn't like the reminder, didn't like to see it in the mirror or for others to see it in passing. As I took a quick shower, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and it made me think of Hiro and this whole… Big Hero Six thing he'd started all over again.

He's the same age I was when I first went out...

The thought came unbidden, a bucket of cold water that sent ice crawling down my spine before I shook my head.

No.

No.

This world was… different. There was no Protectorate, there was no Cauldron, no Endbringers, no Entities… No Scion.

Just because he started this didn't mean it'd turn out the same as me. Besides, he started even earlier than I did.

Already, he had a much better reputation than I could have ever hoped for.

I finished dressing myself, adjusting the bandanna in the mirror to make sure it was centered on my forehead at least, before stepping out the door and marching down the stairs.

(X)

We sat on a trolley on our way to the wharf, the equivalent to Brockton Bay's Boardwalk. From what I gathered, it was an old fishing port, once upon a time, before it gradually modernized into a melting pot of restaurants, from pizza to seafood. Hiro sat by my side, and Baymax stood in the middle, too big for the seats, along with having legs too stubby to work them. I wondered, not for the first time, how advanced this place was for a real robot like Baymax to not even get a sidelong glance.

I looked at Hiro, who was busy fiddling with his phone, but… I wanted to know what I was getting into. "So…" I ventured. "What are they like? Your friends."

He looked up, seemingly puzzled for a moment, before his mind snapped back into place. "Oh, well. Wasabi is a good guy. Major worry wort though, but he's really got a head for plasma tech. He's been experimenting on plasma cutlery and working on getting it patented." Hiro looked back up at me. "Honey Lemon, I think you'll get along great with. Then again, she gets along great with everyone. Super sweet."

"With a name like Honey Lemon?" I smiled.

"Heh. Kinda obvious, yeah?" He laughed.

"Heh." I let out an awkward laugh. "I guess so. Like… they have normal names. Right? Those two and Gogo Tamago?"

"Oh yeah, of course." Hiro waved it off. "Honey Lemon's real name is Laura Rodriguez, Wasabi's is Damien Waynes, and Gogo's is Leiko Tanaka. And then, there's Fred Miller." An awkward smile curled at his lips. A kind of embarrassed fondness, if I read it right.

"He doesn't have a nickname?" I asked. It was obvious that this Fred Miller was 'Fredzilla' amongst the Big Hero 6. He sure did act eccentric when in costume.

"Nah, just Fred. Also, don't be surprised if he acts smart. He…kind of isn't. But he's a good guy! Just... "

"Just?"

"He doesn't really care for appearances, or what people think. You know." He shrugged, smiling. "Free spirit. Major comic buff. Like, he has a massive shrine dedicated to them."

"A shrine?"

"A shrine." Again, the awkward looking grin. Either it was true, or there was more he was letting on. Now, I was intrigued.

Free spirit. Comic nerd. Got it. "Right. And Leiko is Gogo... " I nodded, marking the name to the face. Aka Tracer Girl.

The trolley came to a stop, the driver sounding out the wharf as our destination. We stood up and got out, me and Hiro first, followed by Baymax, who squished his way through the door. Then, he came out with an audible plop, before waddling by our side.

I looked around and saw countless people everywhere. It looked like a good mix of Caucasian and Asian dominating the meandering crowds. I could point out a few other ethnicities, but they were few and far between. The smell of the sea, the smell of freshly caught fish and various other foods being cooked, hung over the place like a blanket, soft and warm and welcoming.

This was far better than the Boardwalk.

"Pizza place is over here." Hiro led the way, with me following through the crowds. Everyone seemed so at peace, here. No looming specter of the Endbringers. No failing economy.

I wondered, instinctively, how long it would last.

Making our way through the streets, I found myself stepping behind Baymax. His massive girth overshadowed me and served as something like a shield. Along with Hiro slightly ahead and to the left of him, people stepped out of their way, allowing me to walk without being touched, for which I felt grateful, to be honest.

I wasn't sure why, what it was, this...aversion to people I'd developed. But it was there, and I didn't know if it'd go away anytime soon. It was why I liked handling the register in Cass' shop, rather than waiting on tables. I was separated by a counter and only got cash and handed stuff out, rather than asking for orders and all that.

When we made it to the pizza-slash-arcade place, it wasn't 'full to bursting,' but it wasn't empty, either. It was still early, so I suspected that soon enough, it would be jam packed with people and keep filling up as the night wore on.

"The guys are already here, too, and they should be…" Hiro drawled out as his finger scanned the crowd.

"There they are." Baymax droned, pointing his marshmallowy arm towards a booth.

"Yo, Hiro!" called out a voice.

Stepping out from behind Baymax, I spotted Hiro's friends.

The one waving was a big nosed man with blond hair and wearing… something. A horrible clash of tie-dye and orange with a beanie. I was reminded of a skater from the eighties or something. Or a hippie. That had to be 'Fred.'

I recognized Gogo at an arcade game just behind him, pulling and jerking on the controls with one hand while the other rapid pressed buttons. The black guy next to her was Wasabi, if my memory served.

"Hey, guys!" Hiro waved, smiling as he walked forward. Baymax and I followed a second later.

I looked them over, eyeing each critically.

They were my age, maybe even a little older.

But with the way they acted, the honest, unguarded looks in their eyes... they just seemed like… such children.

It was Laura, or Honey Lemon, that first noticed me, her eyes widening for a moment before she smiled and stood to greet all three of us.

"Hi! I'm Laura, but most people call me Honey Lemon. Hiro told us you're Taylor, right? We've really been looking forward to meeting you."

I nodded, trying to remember my manners, trying to be polite, trying to ignore how badly these kids were gonna get hurt. When had I last met anyone so carefree, so...naive?

"Yeah. Taylor Hebert. Likewise."

I tried to smile back.

Chapter Text

2.2

The pizza was good.

Even with a prosthetic that was clumsy at the best of times, I could still enjoy it.

With pepperoni, a tomato sauce that had some spice or seasoning I wasn't used to, and top grade cheese, I could safely say these people could bake a good pizza.

As good as it was though, it really didn't do anything to block out the tense awkwardness I could feel radiating from the group around me.

The black guy, Wasabi, or Damien, looked like he was stuck in his chair, sitting ramrod straight, and staring at me with wide eyes like he just wanted me to finish my pizza so he could get to talking. Fred, the hippie looking one, was looking at me, cupping his chin in deep thought. Gogo was glaring daggers into me.

Hiro sat in the middle, very obviously trying not to fidget.

Frankly, the only ones that seemed completely immune (or oblivious) to the tension were Honey Lemon and Baymax, with her animatedly poking his medical files to bounce ideas for her chemistry.

At least, I think that was her shtick.

I listened to her as I ate my slice of pizza, calmly ignoring the other three.

I cleared my throat.

"HOW MUCH DO YOU KNOW? AND WHO HAVE YOU TOLD?"

I half-jumped where I sat, blinking as I suddenly found myself staring up at the wild eyed, terrified looking Wasabi, who was leaning over the table looking at me like he was about to cry. Even Gogo and Fred were as spooked I was by his sudden declaration, looking scared silly.

I blinked, opening my mouth to speak —

"You can't tell my parents! Seriously! You can't! I'll be in so much trouble, and if the school finds out, I could lose my scholarship! And if that happens, that means dead Wasabi! Seriously, Fred will pay you! Just ask how much!"

"Hey!" came Fred's indignant squawk.

"I'll make him pay you!" Wasabi promised.

He seemed finished…

I opened my mouth again.

"Please!"

He really did look like he was about to cry.

…

I cleared my throat.

...

"Could you pass the parmesan, please?" I asked.

There was silence across the table before Baymax helpfully assisted by bringing forth one big, fluffy hand, grabbing the cheese shaker by its little curved handle between two fat fingers, and sliding it towards me.

"Thanks," I said, slowly taking it out of his hand.

"Sit down, idiot." Gogo all but snarled, grabbing Wasabi by the back of his belt and pulling him to his seat, before turning towards me.

"Look. Stop dragging this out," she said. "You want something, or will want something, with what you know. So, what exactly is it gonna take to keep you quiet?"

Not for the first time, I recognized just how different this place was.

Back home, the thought of holding someone's civilian identity over their heads like some kind of ransom would have been ludicrous. It would have put me on everyone's instant hit list.

Hell, I would have been dead the moment I got on the trolley.

Here, though… here, the unwritten rules didn't exist. They had no reason to exist. As far as I could tell, these were the only 'Heroes' the world had, not even any notable criminals that used any kind of special equipment or masks.

I hoped it stayed that way.

"I don't want anything," I said, shaking my head. "Wanna make that perfectly clear. It's why I came here tonight." I tried to emphasize that as much as possible. "Hiro told me while I was recovering, trying to tell me stories so I could learn to talk again. Even if I did have someone to tell, I wouldn't turn around and screw over someone who saved me and kept helping me for over a year."

Honey Lemon turned to Gogo, sticking out her tongue. "See, I told ya!"

Gogo didn't look at all convinced, still glaring at me like she could bore a hole through my skull.

That was good. Better than Honey Lemon or Wasabi, whose relief was almost a tangible thing as he slumped in his seat.

Kids, I was reminded.

Children.

"Well, that's all well and good." It was Fred that spoke up this time, rubbing at his chin. "But you still know about us…"

He snapped his fingers. "I got it!"

Gogo smacked her forehead, dragging her hand down across her face. "Oh my god." Her dismayed groan was muffled by her hand.

"Nah, think about it!" Fred gushed, leaning forward with renewed enthusiasm. "This could really be great. All the best teams have one, somebody to hold down base, be the brains of the group that goes out there to fight. Like, gathering intelligence. You're probably great at gathering intel and listening in on people!"

I took a long, slow drink of my soda. I was doing a wonderful job of ignoring the dozen or so conversations my bugs had been listening to for the last ten minutes while trying out the best poker face of my life.

"It's like, Sightseer with the Raptoresses! Or Darknight for the League of Paragons! Or Lady Arachnia for the World's Strongest! Coming up with strategies, finding weaknesses, giving heads-up to bad stuff coming our way! I bet that you're great at the multi-tasking we'd need."

What the hell was he on?

"Heck, I bet that you could —"

A hand, Wasabi's hand, slowly inched its way over Fred's mouth, clasping down and reducing his shouting to muffled nonsense that sounded vaguely like words.

And yes. It had grown to shouting.

He didn't seem to have noticed. He was still screaming his head off into Wasabi's palm.

"This happens," he offered as an explanation, along with an awkward smile.

I nodded. "I… see that."

"It's… not a bad idea," Hiro tentatively put forward.

I looked towards him, and he was smiling a little nervously in my direction. "You already know. So… the more involved…"

The less incentive I'd have to go talking about it. I finished the thought in my head.

Less incentive than Fred, at any rate.

"We don't even know the first thing about her, Hiro!" Gogo protested. "She hasn't told us anything outside of her name. All we have is that and the fact that she pissed someone off enough that they decided she had to get double-tapped."

"Gogo!" Honey Lemon's horrified face spoke volumes, as did Wasabi's cringe.

They were all curious. They just didn't know how to breach the subject in a way they were comfortable with, apparently.

I'm not sure what look must have crossed my face as I locked eyes with Gogo, but I saw that bravado whither under my gaze.

"Don't really remember much, to be honest." I managed to bite out. "All I get are, well, flashes." I reached forward and took another sip of my soda.

A big part of me wished that was true.

She seemed to steel herself, returning to her previous glare. "Well ain't that convenient," she hissed at me with the lowest tone possible.

Baymax held up a finger. "Long and short term memory loss are common when a patient has sustained significant trauma to the head and brain. While victims that have survived bullet wounds to the cranium have, at times, recovered fully with all memories intact, others have struggled to recall basic information about their lives before the traumatic event. One subject, did not remember his birthday, or the names of his spouse, parents, or children, though he recognized them on sight."

Gogo looked like she was ready to argue with him when Hiro decided to speak up, interrupting her. "Look," he said. "Gogo, I get why you're worried, but Fred's idea isn't exactly bad, when you think about it."

It was.

It was probably the worst idea I could think of.

My powers were returning, little by little, bit by bit. But that didn't mean I wanted to return.

After Scion, if I never heard of a 'Trigger' or a 'Parahuman' or 'Villain' or 'Vigilante' or 'Hero' again, I could die a happy woman, here.

Fred wanted me to 'join up,' because he thought it'd be 'cool,' like his comic books. Hiro wanted me to join, probably because he wanted it, but also to put Gogo and Wasabi at ease by making me 'liable' — just as much a part of it as them. To make me stand as much to lose as them if word ever got out.

Gogo just wanted me to keep my mouth shut, no questions asked. Or to just disappear. Not be the proverbial Sword of Damocles hanging over their heads.

The by and large truth of it was I didn't want to get back into this.

Normalcy was boring. Nice, slow. Something I hadn't realized I'd been craving for a long time.

But I looked at them, listened as Hiro and Gogo argued back and forth, Wasabi still shutting Fred up and Honey sitting by the side lines.

Just kids, I was reminded, again.

Kids who were gonna end up getting themselves hurt or worse.

Hiro's suits didn't even really have anything to conceal identities, outside of some lightly tinted and reflective hard plastic. Honey was looking at the world like it was a petting zoo. Wasabi had thought to cave and bribe me in order to keep me quiet, not realizing that would only be a temporary measure, if it was an option at all. Hiro, like Cass wanted to see the good in me without ever really knowing me or asking me questions. And Gogo had the right mindset, but not the aggression to follow through with what she knew was the most efficient solution. If I was in her shoes, I would have taken her position and probably taken it one step further.

With black widows.

Lots of them.

"— And that's why we need somebody like you with the team!"

Fred suddenly lurched forward, out of Wasabi's grip, apparently reaching the height of his sales pitch and looking at me with a big, stupid smile across his face and drowning out Gogo and Hiro's discussion-cum-argument.

Everyone seemed to shut up, turning to look at Fred. I finished sipping my soda and went for another slice.

What was I doing?

Kids, I saw.

I saw kids.

I saw myself. Myself as a young girl who idolized Armsmaster. The girl who wanted to be a hero to prove her doubters wrong. To be a hero and stop a notorious Japanese gangster from killing kids.

Ignorance could get people killed.

Slowly, ever so slowly, I let my head bob, nodding once.

"Okay. I'll help."

Fred pumped his fist with a "Yes!" Wasabi seemed to have calmed down completely, Hiro and Honey Lemon were grinning ear to ear.

Gogo still had her narrowed eyes on me, suspicion rolling off of her like a wave. That was good. That was really, really good.

"Well!" Fred clapped his hands. "I think our new confidant is ready to go!" He cracked his knuckles. "Alright, we are going to need to give you a command station."

"A what?" Gogo asked with a incredulous eyebrow.

"You know! Lots of computers! Surveillance cameras that we can attach to our gear!" Fred exclaimed. "You can do that, right, Hiro?"

I tried to interrupt, tell them I didn't need that much, or any of it, really, but I wasn't sure how to say it, without actually telling them. Getting a word in edgewise as they started going off on a computer tech rant, with even Wasabi chiming in to bounce ideas, seemed like an exercise in futility.

Like a brick smacking me in the face, it seemed to hit me.

What the hell am I doing?

"Excuse me…" I managed as my stomach lurched, feeling sick. "I need to use the bathroom." Abruptly, I got out of my chair and made my way through the restaurant at a brisk walk, weaving past its patrons and finding the ladies room. I got to the sink and cranked it, let some water pool in my left hand, and splashed it over my face.

I let out a sigh and looked up at my reflection; not the fuller and healthier face, but a gaunt face, still not quite recovered from months in a hospital bed, and dark eyes peered back at me.

Am I staring at Skitter, Weaver, or Khepri?

I heard the door open behind me and I saw her in the mirror. Gogo. She glared at me like she could kill me with her eyes.

"You don't know when to back off, do you?" she hissed.

I almost, almost laughed.

You don't get to kill the closest equivalent to God by having those words in your vocabulary.

As it was, I did smile, staring down into the water in the sink. "Hiro did insist, and it would have been awkward, if I stayed away."

"You're taking advantage of a fifteen year old kid while having us by the balls." She pointed, jabbing a finger at me. "You may have convinced Laura, Hiro, and Fred, and maybe Damien, but I don't buy it. I'll be keeping both eyes on you and I swear —"

"That's good." The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them.

Gogo was caught by surprise. "What?"

"I said, that's good." I repeated, looking back up and at her through the mirror. "You're not as trusting. It's good… healthy. That could save you all, one day."

I remembered my own friends as I spoke.

Brian.

Rachel.

Alec.

Aisha.

Lisa.

Was this how they would have turned out somewhere other than Earth Bet?

"Keep that caution," I insisted, turning around to see her face to face. "It could mean the difference between life and death."

She looked at me, her face and her stare still hard and distrusting, before she pushed the door open and walked back out.

I spent another few moments gathering myself, breathing and washing my face again, then I returned back to the table.

"So! We have come to an agreement!" Fred exclaimed proudly. I really should talk to him about secrecy. If he was such a comic nerd, he should know better. Probably riding the high of adding a new teammate. "That you shall be our Mission Control but." He pointed at me. "It shall be twofold. With my boy Heathcliff as the driver, and you as our eyes and ears in the big pie in the sky and the dog pound on the ground." I looked at Wasabi.

"He means you get to ride in a van or some high tech car with the butler as the driver, and you working on the cameras and comm feeds," he said, translating into English for me.

"Wait." I snapped my fingers. "The butler is in on this?" So there was another person?

"Oh yeah, Heathcliff helped a lot in training us!" Honey Lemon ticked them off on her fingers. "Like being target practice, making us be targets, preparing our meals, all the good stuff! He's such a great guy!"

Well, least I knew I wouldn't be in this alone.

"Well. I know little about computers but..." I shrugged, offering a smile. "I learn on my feet. Count me in."

"Alright! Welcome to the —" Fred caught himself as everyone was staring at him, myself included. Didn't help other patrons in the restaurant were looking in on the scene. "To the, uhh. Herd! The Nerd Herd!"

"The Nerd Herd?" I whispered down to Hiro.

The smile he gave me was fond and a little sad.

"It's our little group nickname. Tadashi coined it."

"And it is with great pleasure, that I, Frederick Stanford Miller," Fred said in an uppity tone. "Welcome you into our humble abode." He even gave a super over the top bow, his hand hitting Wasabi right in the nose and bringing out a "Hey!" from him. "Enchante, Je sees confidante~".

I raised an eyebrow… "Enchanté, ma confidente." I corrected.

Fred's eyes grew wide as Laura now burst out laughing.

"Whoa, you speak French!?" he said, impressed.

"Just a little," I answered. "When you're in a hospital bed with nothing but dictionaries to catch up on the human language, plus the audio aides, you tend to learn a few things." It was true. During my hospital stay, after I relearned my English and learned basic, child-like Japanese, I looked into other foreign languages, with a preference for French. Mom's grandparents were French Freedom Fighters during World War 2. It was… always something I wanted to learn.

"Oh my god, she knows French and other languages!" Fred grinned stupidly. "It's like a dream come true!"

I saw a marshmallowy fist come close to me, and I realized Baymax was offering a fist bump.

"Is this... " I pointed at the white balloon robot. "For real?"

"He likes it." Hiro smiled.

Fuck. Why not.

I bumped it, and I got him waving his fingers as he uttered, "Balalalala."

It made me smile.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

2.4

"..."

My mouth moved soundlessly as I stared out at the street at the massive… limo? What the hell did you call a limo crossed with a hummer?

The thought 'Why?' came to mind, but I really didn't voice it.

Even with my silence, though, Hiro seemed to sense my confusion. He looked at me from the window, with Baymax offering his customary circular wave.

"Hello world...and Taylor," the healthcare bot said.

I blinked.

Was that a movie reference?

"You're hanging out way too much with Fred," Hiro grumbled before looking towards me, noticing the other question in my eyes. "Fred's parents came home… long enough to borrow the car for their cross country roadtrip."

Again. I looked at the car. "And this is the only replacement?"

Hiro shrugged. "Kinda… I woulda said take the subway, but Fred was pretty sure this'd be faster."

"...I could have taken a cab."

Judging by the look on his face, they… hadn't thought of that.

I decided to just let it go. Not like a new car was just gonna emerge out of thin air.

I stepped up to the thing, opening the door that made me feel absurdly small, before I slid into the seat next to Hiro. Baymax was sitting on a side seat slightly ahead of me, his big bulbous body smushed between the seat and the roof of the car, looking something like a marshmallow squeezed between two crackers.

"I am not small."

"No, you are not," I answered, feeling an amused smile tugging at my lip before turning to Hiro. "So… You call and pick me up on my day off of work. What's up?"

"Since we've all got some free time today, I thought it would be best if we could go on a test run." He smiled as the car began to wind its way through traffic back to Fred's house.

I didn't smile back; a knot of worry coiled in my gut.

"Simulation? Or field?"

I wasn't sure which one filled me with more dread.

"Simulation," he replied, as though it should have been obvious.

I tried not to dwell on the mild disappointment I felt.

"Me and Fred came up with it. He wanted to do a full on virtual reality thing. He's calling it 'The Danger Room' or something, but all we have are headsets. I told him this like ten times."

"Better to start slow," I said. I wasn't sure if it was for him or for me. "More pragmatic and it's basically field training without the danger." I supplied as I leaned back in my seat.

We got on the causeway and I notice a billboard.

'Come visit San Fransokyo! If you're lucky, you may see the Big Hero 6!'

It was a silhouette of the city in red and white colors, with blue figures jumping over the rooftops in the background.

Was this… how it started? The 'Golden Age' of heroes before the world went to hell?

I felt pain in my hand, and I looked down in time to see my flesh and blood fist clenched so tight my nails were threatening to break my skin.

Hiro was saying something, but it felt like white noise in the back of my mind as I struggled to calm my heartbeat and control my breathing.

Calm down… calm down… cal-

"Symptoms; accelerated palpitations, sweating of the hands, mild shaking, shortness of breath." Baymax's voice suddenly cut through the haze, bringing my attention towards him. "Prognosis: heart attack." He reached forward with both hands, his head squeaking across the roof as he leaned closer. "Clear."

It was Hiro that stopped him, leaning forward and grabbing at his wrists. "Woah buddy, I don't think Tay's having a heart attack." Even as he said it, when he looked at me I could see the concern in his eyes. "Though you do look really pale. Are you feeling okay? If you're not feeling up to this we can just-"

"Just the yips is all." I cut him off, clenching my fist to stop the shaking as I held it to my side, trying to smile as best I could

Get it fucking together, Taylor…

"Never… really done this before."

Worst. Lie. Of. My. Life.

The young boy had a pensive look. "It's just a field test. Not like you're going to be thrown into the deep end or anything. You sure you wanna do this?"

"I'll be fine. Just gotta calm down." I leaned back and took some much needed breathing exercises that I learned during my hospital stay. It did help learning those. Inhale for seven seconds… hold it in...and-

There was a mass squeak of vinyl before squishy arms were around me.

No.

I opened my eyes and sure enough Baymax was hugging me. All smushed marshmallow robot enveloping my tiny self like an overgrown throw-rug.

Then he patted me on my head.

"There, there," he said as calmly and as compassionately as possible.

I looked at Hiro.

Whom was slowly raising his phone.

"Don't you-"

Click.

He was grinning from ear to ear…

"...Thank you Baymax." I tried to be nice… I really, really did. "I feel much better."

"Psychological studies indicate that warm physical contact for at least twenty seconds in this manner is recommended when someone is nervous, or afraid."

He started to glow.

"There are approximately thirteen seconds left."

I sighed. Despite my protests, the warm glow felt incredible. Though the clinical breakdown reminded me of someone else. Someone who felt more machine than man half the time. Who I hated… and then respected.

I remembered his face.

But not his name.

Something that was becoming more and more common as the days wore on and the memories slowly returned. I got episodes.

…

I hadn't told any of them.

No one needed to know about this weakness. To say so would invite questions of my old life. Questions I wanted to avoid.

If the only way to effectively do that was to leave it buried under brain trauma, so be it.

I'd manage.

I always had.

(X)

We got to the house and the group was there, with Fred diving right into it. His mouth moved a mile a minute, detailing what duties I would have and all the gear they'd finally settled on for me.

Everything, all ranging from looking up at the sky for satellites or drones to keeping an ear on the ground for mutated crocodile men in the sewers. Or Mole Men. Never trust Mole Men.

His words. Not mine.

Hiro kept correcting his flagrant "alternative facts" with 'actual' facts and telling me the actual specs of the tech they had.

In summation: 'Look at the monitors and keep an ear on the comms'. Hiro and Fred even found a way to get some sort of black box of sorts; apparently, they used that to intercept police communications. It was how they were able to respond to the scene so fast.

They were thinking of putting special high focus cameras and comms on those weather balloons that hung around the city, but that was still, in Hiro's words, in the 'brainstorming' phase.

It sounded like a good idea to me. Best to be proactive with threats rather than reactive.

"Alright!" Fred clapped his hands and grinned deviously at me. I quirked an eyebrow. "Now, for the single most important thing for you, Taylor." He oiled, rubbing his hands like some moustache twirling villain as he approached. I could see Damien roll his eyes.

"And that is…?" I asked.

"Your costume!" Fred exclaimed. "We gotta make you a cool looking costume! You're one of the Big Hero 6, after all!"

"If she's joining, wouldn't that make it seven?" Damien inquired.

"Big Hero 7 sounds fun!" Laura chirped in, plopping down on the couch next to me

"But… Six sounds better. I mean, I'm just the…" I paused. "Fly on the wall… No one should even know I'm there."

I could feel Leiko's eyes on me before she went back to her phone, her feet kicked up and her body spread all on another couch.

"I'm sure, for this test, she doesn't need a costume, and even if she did, it's up to her." Hiro stepped in.

"I… don't really have anything in mind for a costume," I admitted.

I was lying, of course. But I'd make it myself. My spider silk was still a better option than most of Hiro's lightweight materials. Gogo's armor was more for streamlining for speed and pads to absorb impacts should she fall. Not for stopping anything fast or lucky enough to hit her. Honey Lemon's was little more than a skin tight jump-suit plus helmet.

Hiro's focus was purely in their tools. Not, so far, in the protective aspects of their armor outside of Fred, and Baymax.

I'd have to make sure that changed soon. Give them suggestions. I'd seen enough powerful Tinkers to know how effective their gear could make them.

"If I think of something, you guys'll be the first to know," I promised.

"Great!" Hiro jumped up to his feet. "Me and Wasabi found a great place to practice."

"Come on, Rook! Time's a wasting!" Fred cheered.

Rook?

Did he just… call me Rook?

"It'll pass. He probably had too much soda." Hiro placed a hand on my shoulder, Baymax waddling right behind him.

(X)

"We have arrived, sir…"

Heathcliff's droll voice billowed through the insides of the van. All seven of us were cramped in the back, with Baymax folded into his far more convenient and small powering station stuffed in a corner.

The two back doors opened a second later, letting Fred in his Fredzilla costume fall back on his ass, with Wasabi and Honey Lemon stepping out behind him.

"Watch your step, sir." Heathcliff said drily.

That let me to finally see where they intended to "practice."

…

What.

"A baseball field?" I gawked, staring up at the completely empty stands. Row upon row of empty seats loomed over us.

"Its big, empty, and gives us plenty of room for the simulations," Hiro explained, pulling out Baymax' powering station to let the big marshmallow bot pop out and step off the little platform.

"Aren't there, like… maintenance staff or something?" I questioned.

"Yeah, but they only come in tuesdays, thursdays, and saturdays on the off season. So we're all clear." Fred smiled as he picked himself up. "Scouted it out myself."

It was no Boat Graveyard…

…

I didn't like it.

"This is really exposed," I said, looking back out to Hiro as he put on his helmet, Baymax waddling beside him. The other members of the Six were wearing their costumes, so Hiro and Baymax must not be participating.

"No one can see us from the road, no one can step in here without us seeing them. It'll be fine." Hiro reassured me, pointing at Heathcliff, who sat in the van.

I reached out, stretching my senses as far as they could go.

Not far enough. Not enough to cover every entrance and every corner…. But enough at least to give us ample warning, so props there.

I moved the bugs into place, keeping more in reserve just in case I needed them to pounce on someone. If there was anyone coming, I'd be the first to know. And they could scurry off with bees buzzing around their face. Or a spider on their shoulder.

"Don't worry, we thought this through, Taylor," Fred spoke from within his lizard costume. I sighed, a hand going over my face.

"'Kay." I walked back into the van, deciding not to argue. If something went wrong, I'd deal with it. I heard the door close in behind, Heathcliff still in the driver's seat. "So," I put on the headset with the speaker near my mouth. The monitors blinked to life and I got several camera feeds on the monitors, each with a name on them.

Fredzilla. Chemistress. Wasabi. Tracer Girl. Big Red and Hero.

Hero…

I took a deep breath, pinching the bridge of my nose.

The fact that a boy genius who doesn't have a passenger as far as I can tell, so far removed from Earth Bet here, is naming himself not only after his own name but on one of the greatest Tinkers in Bet's history…

He didn't even know.

He didn't even have the slightest clue to the significance of that name.

"So, how are we doing this?" I asked, speaking into the mic.

"Alright, can you see us?" Hiro spoke through the comm as he moved his head side to side, him looking up at Baymax. With my other window, I could see through Baymax's camera a waving Hiro.

"Yeah. Gogo, Wasabi, Fred, Honey. Your feeds are good."

"Cool."

"Alright! So, what do we do next?"

"Easy!" Fred crowed. "We use the field, or go into the hallways. One's good for practicing open fighting in the streets, the other's good for practicing fights that happen in-doors in smaller spaces."

There was… nothing wrong with that logic? The 'maze' of hallways and tight corners of the baseball stadium would allow them to practice splitting up and letting me practice coordinating their movements.

I placed a fly on each of them, watching as they started to put on some eye gear.

Hiro sat down besides Baymax, and suddenly the monitors were alive with the virtual reality program coming to life.

"Sniper!" Fred yelled. I just managed to look at his monitor and catch a glimpse of some red blob on the VR feed before Fred was moving, ducking into cover behind our truck.

Gogo, Wasabi, and Honey Lemon weren't so quick.

"Ahh!" Wasabi shouted.

"And you're already dead." Hiro laughed from his control panel.

I really… really tried to bite my tongue and be nice.

But…

"That was just sad..." I uttered. "So… so sad…"

"Hey!"

"Dead again," Hiro chirped.

I pinched the bridge of my nose.

Chapter Text

2.5

Same time of the week, that truck passed through right in front of our shop, men with glocks and all.

You could call me manipulative, or impatient, or reckless.

But I'd had enough of this.

The shops busy hours were from eight AM to two PM, so I asked Cass to be let loose at two. Seeing as how I had no real social life or… any life, really, beyond Cass, her family in Hiro and Baymax, and Hiro's friends, she allowed it.

So I left. Every day at two PM. And at three when that truck rolled by, I would follow. I'd tag it with a bug until it was out of my range, then I'd make a mental note for the next week as to where that was. And the next week, I'd wait there and continue, following block by block.

Of course, they never noticed a thing, even as they left the suburbs of San Fransokyo and made their way into the east side, past the Kawa Park and Samurai Arena towards the docks.

It was always the docks with these guys.

On the last day, I was running on fumes by the time I stopped just outside the docks at a Tokyo Joe's, where most of the blue collar dockworkers went to lunch.

Ten blocks, a bus, and a short subway ride, and I was exhausted. I realized then that I had to start exercising again, because this? This was ridiculous.

I sat down at a bus stop and caught my breath, waiting.

They passed right by me.

This time, I saw where they stopped.

I just had to get close to the fence that separated me from the warehouses. I just leaned my back against the chain-link fence and looked up to cloud gaze, while I reached out to pick out flies to go in and see what this gang was carrying. Feeling around…

The roaches and flies crawled and scurried their way through the grimy floors and into the cargo crates, wriggling through the tight little gaps.

Packing foam was what I felt, little white puff balls, that concealed more boxes, smaller, the items in there were… Ahhh. There.

A false floor.

And beneath… bags, tightly packed bags.

"Drugs," I muttered to myself. I stood up and gave one last look back.

Warehouse 15.

As I began to walk my way back to a trolley to head home, I started to think, working up a story in my mind. A way to get Hiro and the others down here without revealing my powers to them.

Then… a thought came to me.

This would be their 'Lung'. I was driving them straight into biting off more than they could chew.

Kids. Children.

That was all they were.

I stole a glance back at the warehouse.

They needed experience, I reasoned.

There were no 'gang territories,' here. No "established areas" where one could find crime. This wasn't even Brockton Bay with a high crime rate where one could literally walk through the streets at night and have a high chance to find something illegal going on.

This was San Fransokyo. The gem of the West Coast of the UPN.

They'd need to learn eventually.

Mind made up, I turned and walked away.

As I walked past some of the more recreational piers, I noticed a small gathering of kids by Kawa Park, the local baseball stadium. I walked up, looking over their shoulders, and…

Were those kids... bot fighting? I saw one kid in tattoos and looked to be of asian descent control some robot tank with hammer arms go up against some UFO on treads with a rotating saw blade, controlled by a boy in an afro.

A rotating. Saw blade.

Where are these kids parents?

"Alright, kids, break it up!" called out a cop. He stepped forward, and all the kids booked it, the two bot fighters actually dropping their controls and rushing away.

"Damn kids." The cop sighed, looking to the two bots before he finally noticed me. "Enjoy the show?" he asked with a bit of a scowl.

I shrugged. "Not from around here. Never seen a bot fight." It was the truth.

"You not from around here?" He repeated. "Where ya from?"

"New Hampshire and I moved here…" I shrugged. "Maybe a year ago."

"Ah, well, bot fighting is legal back in most eastern states. Not so much here since it's widespread amongst youth. Really the only way it's legal if it's on TV. Rumble Robots is a fun show, by the way," the officer explained.

"Uhh, yeah." I ventured. "Watched a few."

"So, what have you been up to tonight miss?"

"Oh, you know. Still exploring the city." I was mildly impressed that I had somehow managed to get through this conversation without entirely lying. A novelty in my experience with law enforcement.

"Well, okay. You make sure to get back home before dark miss. Crime's gone down recently, but… you know." He shrugged.

I nodded. "Got it. Good evening, officer." I said, before turning around and offering a little wave with my flesh hand. The officer waved back.

I marched back to the trolley and took a seat by the window. I rested my head against the cool glass as I let my mind wander, already thinking about to what I could say, how I could get them to come into the warehouse.

By the time I reached Cass' shop, the beginnings of a plan were starting to form in my mind.

(X)(X)(X)

"You wanna what?"

It was Wasabi who asked the question three days later, as I laid out a map of the city across the dining room table at Fred's house.

Fred was out getting pizza, Gogo and Hiro were in a class or some such.

"Patrol routes," came the easy answer. "Right now, you guys go out there and just run around wherever you feel like going that particular night. It's not very effective.

"But, Taylor, patrol routes would make us predictable. After awhile, people will learn to just avoid them and do their crimes elsewhere." Honey Lemon protested, sipping at some fruity drink as she looked at the map.

"That's why we lay out a lot of them," I answered, recalling the way it'd been done back in my world. Or the way I'd planned out my jogging routes. "More than we need. Twenty, twenty-five, thirty, different routes, some overlapping with others, and we cycle through them randomly, or pick new ones every week."

"That could work," she admitted, before leaning across the table. "So… how do we plan this?"

"We'd have to pick different starting places," Wasabi answered. "It'll be noticed if the five of us keep starting from the same spot after a while."

I almost protested. Six of them weren't needed for every patrol at all times. Two were more than enough to assess any situation and call for backup if needed.

But I refrained. Stopped myself, reminded myself that they were still… basically playing at this.

It was inefficient, but they didn't need to learn how to run, just yet.

I let them talk, exchange ideas, and prodded with a few of my own, setting up one of the patrol routes to pass right by the docks, where I knew Warehouse 15 to be.

Two weeks. Same shipment, same truck, same time as usual.

It'd just so happen this time they'd have company.

(X)(X)(X)

I waited, counting down the days, the routine. I helped in Cass' shop, going back to my full time hours, taking orders, minding the register. On select nights, when they called, I'd go out with 'the team', Heathcliff and I in the van, trailing after them.

The act of following, or 'shadowing' the team, was honestly little more than a formality. Hiro had stuffed enough machinery in the van that the monitoring equipment had almost unlimited range, or at least enough to blanket the entire city. Even once when the team descended into the subway to answer some call on the police scanner about an on foot pursuit had yielded only the faintest bit of static.

Still, it was best to err on the side of caution. An injury, or a quick bail out might need the car. And the car couldn't exactly help if we were halfway across the city.

The crimes they stopped were… small things. Muggings and fleeing suspects, mainly, when they stumbled on them. Only once had they heard of a murder on the police scanner, but with the suspect long gone and them not being able to do anything to help the dead, they refrained from going.

A small part, a very small part of me had almost sneered at that. At the hesitance. The weakness.

The rest of me remembered that Hiro was just a fifteen year old kid, and the rest of the Big Hero 6 were good hearted people, and then proceeded to violently curse that small cruelty I harbored inside me.

I became familiar enough with the holo-interface that I could fluidly manipulate it with just one hand. Forgoing the use of my clumsy, prosthetic limb entirely while in the van and just relying on the more fluid, quick movements of my real arm.

I watched them as they worked. What little work there was. Gauging their work with the Tinkers I could recall from my world.

Not a one of them would be much of a threat.

Their teamwork hardly made up for it either.

They needed upgrades. Tech with teeth that could actually work for them. Right now, the only one that could even be called to be in a half decent state was Baymax, just by lieu of being a pseudo Alexandria Package with knowledge of martial arts.

That wouldn't be enough for…

For…

I closed my eyes. Taking a breath, reminded of the fact that this was it.

This was the extent… of what they had to face.

Normal humans.

I took a deep, shuddering breath, ignoring Heathcliffe's questioning gaze from the front, and let them… play.

(X)(X)(X)

Like clockwork. Same time, same hour, those men passed by Cass' shop in the morning.

And that very evening the team was making their way through the designated patrol route through the docks.

We, as in, Heathcliffe and myself in the car, were, in no small part due to my suggesting where to park the car, barely a block away from the warehouse, just within range of my insects.

The team was still patrolling, not quite so far but not close either. Fred and Wasabi's icons passing by Tokyo Joe's.

The bugs were listening in on the criminals' conversation, little ants and flies on their backs, shoulders, and clothes. Listening to their words, watching them work, counting money and product.

At the same time, I was paying attention to Hiro and the others.

"How's it going, guys?" I asked through the comms.

"Little boring, actually," Damien replied back to me.

"All good!" Fred added. His icon and camera were going up and down. How he doesn't get motion sickness from all those spring jumps is beyond me.

Gogo, Hiro, Baymax, and Honey Lemon were barely a handful of blocks away to the north and north west.

All in all, they could reach respond to each other in less than three minutes. It'd been Wasabi's idea, a way to make their designated patrol 'section' even more randomized, and their time table more 'efficient'.

"Thought it'd be a bit more exciting than this, huh?" I half asked, half stated, even as I heard the criminals in the building just up the proverbial street from me beginning to load up the truck again for the return shipment.

"Kinda. But quiet's good," Wasabi answered, pausing for a moment to stretch as Fred pulled up ahead.

Someone was stepping into the driver's seat of another truck.

I moved my bugs.

Fred was just within sight of the warehouse. If anyone bothered to look outside, they'd see him, and probably Damien, too, if they were observant enough.

I had almost a dozen black widows and other bugs ready to pounce. Not to cause crippling damage to the whole lot, that'd be too obvious, but to get someone in that warehouse screaming. Causing enough noise to get Fred and Wasabi's attention.

Then, a golden opportunity presented itself.

A truck was backing up, the loud, beep-beep-beep of the warning sound audible even from where I was sitting as they moved a fresh truck to a loading bay to fill it up.

I moved my insects quickly through that warehouse. Dexterously moving bugs to be carried by flies and dropped with pin-point precision even as the oblivious driver tried to swat them away.

I felt like myself again for the first time in a long time.

I felt the smirk tugging at my lips.

Fred and Wasabi were talking, half arguing, debating where they had to go to get to the rendezvous with the team. I only half paid attention to them.

The fire ants were a convenient surprise. A little mound of them tucked away between some rotting wood boards just outside the warehouse.

Surprise or not, however, I hadn't wasted any time in using them when I got here.

As my eyes and ears, and now as the proverbial teeth.

Five of them landed on the driver's clothing. And with careful little movements that kept them unnoticed, they crawled right where I needed them to be.

Before Wasabi and Fred could get further in their argument, the driver felt the, likely horrifying, pain of fire ants biting and chewing on some very sensitive bits.

With a shocked, howling scream, the man's legs tensed right up as he bucked in his seat, slamming down on the gas pedal.

Three seconds later, the truck's ass was sticking out of the half destroyed warehouse wall, at least seven crates cracked wide, wide open.

"What was that?" Wasabi asked, startled out of his conversation with Fred as they both looked down from their perch towards the warehouse where there was currently a lot of shouting.

"Don't know," I lied. "I'm calling Hiro and the others." I was already opening up the comm frequencies. "Don't move until they get there. Might be trouble."

"Someone could be hur-"

"Don't go in without backup!" I demanded, leaving no room for argument by the tone of my voice alone.

Before he could say anything else, I activated the open channel.

"Guys, might be some trouble by Wasabi and Fred's location. They might need backup ASAP."

"On our way!" Hiro answered. He and Baymax were currently flying just a few blocks away.

"Coming," Gogo stoically added, blazing through the park where I'd seen that cop earlier this week.

"Kay, Tay," Honey Lemon cheerfully piped in.

I didn't need Wasabi's camera to see that he was getting closer. I didn't need to see the broken crates and the white powder on the ground, nor did I need to hear Fred exclaim that it was a drug shipment.

I had my bugs.

Just me and my bugs.

Time to learn how to swim.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

Arc 2: End- Interlude: Akande Dubeni

The hum of the private jet was low in his ear as he leaned back in his seat.

His name is Akande Dubeni, President of Majathal Enterprises and a member of its Board of Directors. He was one of the richest men in the southern hemisphere.

"Sir?"

He looked up, and there was Adalene, standing beside him.

"We're almost ready to begin our final descent, sir. Another fifteen minutes and we'll be touching down."

"Thank you, Adalene." He smiled, undoing his seatbelt. "Don't trouble yourself, I'll tell her."

The stewardess knew better than to object. This was his job.

He stood to his full height in the cabin, all six foot-eight inches, shaven head and built with muscle as he marched through the central hallway of the plane towards the rear customized chamber.

He opened the first door, feeling the decontamination process happen in just a few seconds before he opened the next, entering the sealed chamber.

Aadhira lay in her bed, breathing softly with her eyes closed.

He walked closer, and either he was too loud or she could sense his presence in some way, because before he reached her, she opened those green eyes of hers and smiled.

"We're almost ready to land." Akande smiled back. "I would rather you not be scared by the plane's landing knocking you out of your rest."

She held out a hand, and he took it. "I am not made of glass, my husband."

So many days she seemed like she was.

Nevertheless, it was good to hear her say it.

He pulled up his seat, taking it beside her as he smiled. "Are you excited for the seminar?"

She chuckled somewhere in her throat. "Nervous, actually. It's been so long since I've been in front of a crowd… and I'm so sick now. I'm afraid they'll be disappointed."

"Never," he reassured.

The intercom beeped.

"Sir, Ma'am. We're beginning the descent into San Fransokyo International Airport, so please make sure you're seated with your seatbelts. That means you, Mr. Akande."

Aadhira laughed. She always laughed at that. So he always told the pilot to say it.

(X)

The time from their landing to the Bilton Hotel was short, just as he wished. He'd already made all the arrangements well ahead of time and every single one of the people he'd hired conducted themselves with the utmost professionalism. Their bags were taken, her medical condition was seen to and accommodated, and the hotel suite was to his exacting specifications for all her needs.

Aadhira protested and tried to assure him he didn't need to trouble himself so much for her, but he would leave nothing to chance. It had been the first time in almost a decade since his love was deemed healthy enough to leave their home country, and he wanted nothing to happen to her.

The seminar was not for another week. He wasn't wholly comfortable with her being away from home and her physicians so long. But she wanted to see the city.

So that's what they did.

For the first two days, he took her to all the places she wished to see. Took her through this remarkable melting pot of two distinct cultures even and saw her smile like she did when they were both younger.

On the second day… He discovered something interesting.

(X)

"You haven't told me where you're going."

"If it all works out as I hope, it will be a nice surprise, I promise," he answered, sitting at the back of the car. He listened to the hum of the electric engine as he pressed his phone to his ear, watching the colorful street signs passing him by, filled with japanese characters he could barely read.

"Oh… and if it doesn't work out?" was her amused reply.

"Then I will return with flowers and chocolates, begging for forgiveness for having spent a fruitless day away from you."

"As long as they're Swiss chocolates from that one popular chocolate factory. Giradeiri, I think they're called?"

"I won't settle for anything less," he assured.

The driver pulled to a stop, parking along the side of the road. A moment later, the man ran around to his side and opened the door.

"I must go, my love. I will speak to you when I'm on my way again."

"Alright, Akande. Bye."

He hung up, stepping out of the back seat and tossing a look up at the sign.

"The Lucky Cat Cafe?" It even had an overgrown cat lamp framing the words and smiling down at the passersby.

He eyed the curb, finding its edge yellow. "Go," he told the driver, stepping past him. "Park somewhere legal. I will call you once I am done here."

"Right away, sir." The man offered a stiff bow at the waist rather than a nod.

The driver rushed to the driver's seat and pulled out as Akande marched inside.

It was only then that he noted he truly should have dressed a bit more casually. At least… more casual than his usual casual wear.

Standing at his height with his white buttoned shirt, black dress pants and black shoes, he rather stood out in comparison to the beach shorts, jeans, and T shirts being sported by the other patrons of the establishment. He looked like an NBA All-Star standing amongst normal people.

Regardless, he marched up to the cashier.

It was a girl. Akande had to take a second look at her.

She was young. A thin slip of a child with dark hair and a red bandanna over her head, a pair of glasses framing brown eyes. The picture perfect young cashier at her first job.

At least, she should be.

But the way she looked at him, the very nature of her stance betrayed something far less callow. He'd been in board room meetings with the most cutthroat businessmen in the world with stares less icy. Almost as if she was sizing him up

She smiled, a stiff thing. More the smirk of a cat to the cornered the mouse than a welcoming grin.

"Welcome to the Lucky Cat," she said, pulling up a notepad. "What would you like?"

He noticed just then, almost missed it due to her black gloves. But the small shine of polished plastic and the thin, micro screws along the inside of her wrist to hold the hand in place as it moved.

A prosthetic.

"I'm actually looking for someone," Akande answered, hiding his slight alarm as he smiled back at her. "I was told that I could find a Hiro Hamada here."

When she looked at him, he could swear the room grew just a bit colder.

It seemed, however, he was overheard; in that moment, an older woman, one who had been tending the tables, walked over, carrying tray held in her hands. "Umm, hello, I'm Hiro's aunt. Cassandra. What's this about?"

"Ahh." He smiled at the woman. "So you are Cassandra? I've heard good things about you. Well-" He reached into his back pocket, fishing out his wallet and handing the woman his card. "-my name is Akande Dubeni. I understand Mr. Hamada is something of a prodigy in the fields of robotics, yes?"

"Umm." She looked at his card, reading it as she answered. "Yes, but-"

"I have something of a business proposal to make to Master Hamada regarding his Baymax model of machines. If you could call him, I would be most appreciative."

"Sure. I can give him a cal-" She paused. "Oh. But he's in class right now. He won't be out for at least another hou-"

"I will wait." He smiled. "I did, after all, arrive unannounced." He reached into his shirt pocket, pulling free a stack of hundred dollar bills.

Without preamble, he handed it to the stunned Cass.

"For your, and Master Hamada's time." He smiled.

"I-I couldn't… I… I-it's just a phone call." Cass protested, moving to give it back.

Gently, he pushed the money away. "I insist," he said. "This matter is very important to me personally. Take the money."

Stunned and more than a little dazed, Cassandra protested a few more times before finally being convinced, rushing off to call Hiro from the land line.

"Would you like a seat?"

The question was polite enough, but the dark haired girl stared at him as though she was deciding the best place to stick a knife.

"I'm sorry," Akande drawled. "I did not catch your name Miss…"

"Hebert," the girl answered, before gesturing him to a booth. "Please."

He allowed himself to be led to the booth. The girl was shorter than he was. Most people were. Soon enough though, she returned to deal with the register. Cassandra returned momentarily and asked him if he'd like something to eat or drink.

He asked her to surprise him.

Around thirty minutes later, he was offered a full lunch, with a dessert, coffee, and drink.

Akande had five star chefs in his home and his homeland and most of the time when he traveled. By comparison, Cass' cooking was a humble thing. Humble, but respectable, filling, and it had that little touch of 'home cooked' so few places could truly capture.

When he was just finishing the last of the desert, he noticed the bright red, signature San Fransokyo Trolley making a stop at the other side of the street across from him.

Now, typically this wouldn't be enough to catch his eye, of course. He had seen many of these signature ferries in the last two days. The curious chime they made on each stop was more background noise than anything by now.

But this one had the Pillsbury Dough Boy mascot stuffed in its door.

A big white fluffy thing that was currently wedged rather firmly between the door edges, with a black haired teenager doing his damndest to pull it out by its marshmallowy arms.

Akande stared.

It wasn't until Cassandra left through the front door and half jogged across the street towards him that Akande realized just who exactly had arrived.

Between the two of them, they managed to yank the marshmallow bot out of the red cart.

As they spoke, marching in, Akande reached over and took the first sips of his coffee to finish his meal.

When Hiro walked into the bakery, Cass and the machine marched in behind him… well… one marched, the other sort of waddled. Immediately, she pointed in his direction.

As soon as Hiro noticed him, Akande offered a wave as Hiro went slack-jawed.

"Hello, there."

Cass seemed to march over the dazed young man, hands on his shoulders. Almost protectively. "Hiro, this is Mr. Duh-Benee?" Cass said, cringing at her own pronunciation of his name. The words tripped clumsily off of her tongue.

"Dubeni," he corrected gently, before gesturing to the seat across from him. Dimly, he remembered that this was her restaurant, not his to be inviting people like he owned it.

Cassandra looked to another part of the restaurant. "I gotta go, Hiro. Call me if you need me, ok?"

"Yeah, sure thing, Aunt Cass," was the boy's dazed reply.

Akande watched her leave.

"You must be Master Hamada?" He smiled.

"Oh. My. God." There was a smile spreading across Hiro's face stretching from ear to ear. "Akande Dubeni! You- You're the CEO of Majathal Enterprises. You and Mrs. Dubeni basically invented the modern programing platform for AI!"

"My wife is the true genius between the two of us, I assure you." He smiled. "But I have heard many things about you. At your young age, you already possess a degree, are pursuing another as we speak today, and have developed and distributed a medical care machine that is highly sophisticated in both design and software capabilities. "

He saw Hiro's eyes dim, becoming a little sad. "It… it was my brother Tadashi's design… his idea. I just… finished it."

Ahh.

"I understand. Regardless, you accomplishments, at your age, are significant." He cast an eye towards the large robot, standing up. "I assume this is the prototype model?"

"Uhh, yeah. This is Baymax," Hiro said.

"Hmmm." Akande stood to his full height, noting the machine was taller than him.

Eying the machine for a moment, Akande turned to the boy.

"What are his capabilities?"

"Scanning," Baymax suddenly chimed in, a faint blue line appearing from his chest and overlapping Akande's body.

"Patient is a forty-three year old male, DNA reflects a sixty-seven percentile south african origin, Eastern European DNA, twenty seventh point four percentile, and Mongolian DNA within the sixth percentile. Patient is in excellent physical condition. Results however suggest a lack of Zinc. Suggestion Dietary supplements or-" a picture appeared over his chest. "Oysters."

"Impressive," Akande complemented with a laugh. "And he specializes in personal patient care."

"Yeah. The design was mainly to be a nurse bot. That's why he's inflated. Makes him soft and… huggable."

"Is he for sale?"

Immediately, just by Hiro's face, he had his answer.

"I- No. Baymax is-"

"I understand," Akande interrupted, holding his hand up to forestall the protest. He thought for a moment.

"Hiro, you are aware, that my wife Aadhira is holding a seminar next week, yes?"

"Uhh, yeah."

"Do you have tickets for the event?"

"Are you kidding?" The youth half laughed. "That was sold out almost within the hour. You couldn't steal tickets to Mrs. Aadhira's seminar.

Akande smiled. "You won't have to resort to that. I would like you to attend. At my personal invitation. You, your Baymax, and a plus one." Akande's voice was smooth and accented as he crossed his massive arms. "I will personally add your name to the list of VIP's of the Stanford University. And while Baymax may not be for sale, perhaps, if all goes well we can make other arrangements, yes?"

"B-Business? With me?"

"We will discuss it further, I assure you, at the seminar." Akande nodded. "A talent like yours could crawl, fight, and claw its way to the top. But there is no need for that, I feel." He felt nostalgic saying that. "Your potential must be honed and perfected. With my resources, Baymax won't be just known and used in the UPU." He then stood up reaching into his wallet before pulling out his card. "It will be known worldwide."

Hiro seemed star-struck. It was the girl, dark haired and dark eyed who looked at him like an insect to dissect. The question was clear in her gaze.

What's the catch?

She would be disappointed if she wished to find an ulterior motive.

Now that he cared to notice the distance, he was surprised she was able to eavesdrop from so far away at all. The girl must have excellent hearing.

Akande adjusted the sleeves of his shirt, smiling once more at Hiro and Baymax before leaving the restaurant, offering a wave towards the still busy Cassandra and calling his driver.

Minutes later, he was driving through the streets of downtown, towards Little Tokyo.

He called Aadhira. Checking in on her, listening to her voice before they let each other go. Leaving him to prepare for another call.

He closed the divider window, cutting off the sight and hearing of his driver from him before Akande heard his… other phone ring.

A custom thing. Nearly impossible to track, with built in countermeasures against any kind of hack, recorder and voice scrambler.

He picked it up on the first ring. "Speak."

He could almost hear the machine scrambling his words through the other end, the faint whisper of a guttural, static laced growl.

"Is this… Headhunter?"

Akande looked at his watch, the screen changing to show the caller ID, the safety of the line and detecting if anything was being used to track him.

"This line is secure, Mr. Cheng," he assured. "As I said… speak."

Chapter Text

3.1

The door opened with a pneumatic hiss into a rather expansive basement.

"Down the stairs, Miss," Heathcliff drawled.

I had already figured that out, been listening to the conversations down there for the last five minutes while walking up here, too.

"Thanks, Heathcliff," I said with a nod, stepping forward and down towards the basement, where I could now physically see the sparks from some welding tool or other rather than just hear them through my array of insects.

Marching down into the workshop-slash-basement under Fred's house, I wasn't the least bit surprised to find Hiro, Gogo, and Wasabi hard at work.

"Hey, Taylor." It was Hiro that greeted me, smiling, with a pair of black welding goggles protecting his eyes.

"Working on upgrades?" I asked, already knowing the answer. I even had a vague idea of what exactly they were working on.

"Oh yeah." Hiro grinned. "Check this out!"

Lifting what I recognized to be the clawed glove of Fred's suit, Hiro put it on, then stood and walked towards a nearby range, before he held it out.

The five pointed claws that I'd seen Fred use to climb onto concrete walls shot out like bullets, ripping into the hard plastic dummy at least a solid inch.

Something like that seemed outright lethal, and I didn't think Hiro would have had it in-

They started to release a visible smoke.

Ahh.

Hiro smiled, beaming towards me. "I can make them release smoke, or tear gas."

"The others are gonna need gas masks, then," I pointed out.

"Way ahead of ya!" Wasabi was the one who answered this time, holding up his protective visor and pressing a button near the ear. With a quick, electrical whir, a faceplate sprang out of the side plating to cover where his nose and mouth would be.

"Getting these integrated into everyone's suit helmets." He grinned. "And after this, I'm gonna work on some shielding tech." Wasabi then indicated towards a tablet. I walked over, inspecting it, and saw an animation of Wasabi's gauntlets springing forth his plasma blades, before the shape turned more oval and sketched a design akin to a shield of some kind to cover his front and side.

"Plasma shielding?" I asked.

"Yeah, they won't take much punishment, but some is better than none." Wasabi said. He leaned over his workbench and began working on the headpiece again.

I eyed the plasma animation for a while longer. I'd look at the notes and equations, but they were gonna fly straight over my head. I got the distinct feeling that was going to be a running theme, around here.

Looking over to Gogo, who was similarly working on her own gear over a workbench, I called out to her, "So, what're you working on?"

She didn't answer, just pointed to the far wall to our left.

One of her discs was there, attached to a target, where I noticed the faint traces of electrical burns.

"Taser," was her short statement. "Need a bit more stopping power."

Good call. For both of them.

Damien needed some extra protection to close the distance, and Leiko needed to drop her targets and move on to keep up her speed.

There was the sound of a door opening, and a moment later, I heard Laura calling from atop the stairs.

"We're back!"

She marched down with Fred, bags of burgers in hand.

"Alright!' Fred cheered as he caught sight of me. "The whole team is here!"

Before Fred could get started on whatever he was about to say, Laura spoke up.

"Hey, Hiro-" the blonde gushed with a megawatt bright smile, "-what's this I'm hearing about the Akande Dubeni dropping by the Lucky Cat, looking for you!?"

Immediately, Hiro's smile lit up the room as I felt my lips curling into a frown.

"Can you believe it!?" Hiro seemed to be just about ready to squeal like a schoolgirl at a boyband concert. "Mr. Dubeni invited me to the seminar next week!"

He might be ecstatic, but I didn't trust it. Or him.

Everything I dug up on the internet pointed to Akande genuinely being a legitimate business man. He was the face of the company, while his wife was the brilliant, frail inventor that had revolutionized modern AI tech nearly twenty five years ago.

But things like this didn't just 'happen.' People didn't drop onto your lap with money and good intentions for nursing bots. He was up to something.

Everyone with power has skeletons in the closet, after all.

"Any idea where he'd be staying?" I decided to ask. I'd searched online, but there were dozens of possible options, and going to search each one individually was horribly ineffective.

Oh, for the days when my range could be measured in whole city blocks…

"The Hanamura? The Hanbei? The Ritz? Take your pick." Laura shrugged, beginning to unpack the food.

Absentmindedly, I grabbed the offered burger. The fries were thick cut and fried to a perfect crisp. I'd have to ask her where she got these later.

"You ok there, Tay?" Wasabi seemed to have caught the look on my face. I supposed years of being a worrywart made him one of the more observant members of the group.

"I don't trust it," I decided to say, looking to Hiro. "Not the offer, and not him. People don't come with an open hand and good will, Hiro. There has to be a catch."

He looked sad enough I might have kicked his puppy. I might have even felt bad. Might.

"Taylor. I'm not an idiot. I read all the fine print before I sign anything, but Mr. Dubeni… I mean. Have you read half of the work he's done? Philanthropy, charity, business ventures he made happen. Disability treatments in Africa." And he wasn't wrong. One of the key moments I had found in my research was Dubeni's exoskeleton research helping those of frail constitution and body be able to function and walk around like normal human beings. It more or less removed the need for walkers or wheelchairs, allowing those who would be too weak or crippled to walk on their own two legs.

"I get it." I held up my hand to forestall any more protests or elaborations. "I'm just telling you to go in with both eyes open. You can like the guy all you want after you make sure everything's on the up and up."

"What do you think the business deal's gonna be about, though?" Gogo chimed in, not looking up from her work.

"Something regarding Baymax probably," I replied.

"Maybe you're being too cautious. Maybe he wants to bring those Baymax models to Africa," Fred said, setting himself on a couch with a fisfful of fries stuffed in his mouth. "To help those people."

"Whatever he does want, just... sleep on it. Okay?"

Hiro let loose a sigh. I had to take a moment of self-reflection to remember that if anyone had told me to think before I met my idols, back in the day, I would have been annoyed, too.

"Okay, I will," he finally said.

I offered a nod and kept eating my burger. After a moment, I noticed Honey Lemon go over to her own work desk she made, with countless glass tubes and machinery used to create her chemicals and the countless solutions she had stored in vials. Laura was opening a holographic screen and looking up articles and theses on…

Hmm.. That looked interesting. Standing up and walking over, I looked at the display.

"What you working on?" I asked, stepping beside the blonde.

"Oh! Hey, Tay So, I thought to myself, what can I do to help out the team in case things get dicey? You know, after the whole warehouse incident," Laura said with her wide smile. "So, I'm going to make a salve …" She had an additional holoscreen to the side as she tapped away. "That can help patch up wounds."

"In case of injury."

"Yep! Well, it's not some miracle heal wondergel." Laura shrugged. "More like a super strong bandage. I've seen it applied in the military, and I have to craft my own since, well… Military grade is pretty tough to get. Fred can only get us so much, ya know?"

She made a good point. I looked at the holo, the blown up footage of how the chemical bonded to skin and stymied bleeding.

"This is a great idea."

I didn't realize I'd spoken aloud, til Laura turned to me with a smile. "I know, right! Can't believe I didn't think of it sooner."

"How long before you get a working prototype?"

"Not sure. A few weeks? Maybe a few months," she answered. "Gotta figure out the right formula. That takes trial and error. And trial and error takes time."

More stopping power for Gogo, more long range support capabilities for Fred, the ability to close the distance safely for Wasabi, and now Honey was developing a way to patch up injuries.

'They're starting to shape up,' I thought.

"You know what we need?" Fred suddenly said as he finished his burger and got up from the couch.

He sprang up to his feet before… Posing. Hitting the air. Looking like he's making an absolute mockery of Tai Chi.

The fuck was he doing?

"We need to learn Karate! Martial arts. The skills to take bad guys down with our bare hands!"

I… had to ask.

"Why… are you standing on one leg with your arms impersonating an antenna piece?"

Fred looked at me like I was the strange one.

And that was saying something.

Then, literally hopping on one foot to face me fully, Fred stayed in his… ridiculous pose.

"You've never seen Tyke Kwon Do?"

"That a comic book or something?"

"Old movie," Gogo answered without even looking up from her work.

Ahh.

I looked at Fred again. "And… that is the fighting stance he used in the movie?"

"Wax on, wax off."

Wax wha-

The thought was cut off.

Because Fred jumped.

It wasn't a real kick. Not really, wasn't close enough, and Fred was just doing it for show. My mind knew this.

My reflexes apparently didn't care for the distinction, honed after a quarter of my life was spent dealing with the worst examples of humanity.

My organic hand whipped right out, dropping the bag filled with fries to the floor before my bare fingers grabbed Fred's sneaker, holding the surprised boy's leg in place as I stepped forward. I hooked my foot around his grounded ankle put my other hand behind his neck and yanked.

Before anyone even knew what happened, Fred had flipped end over end and was now flat on his back, staring up at me as I just stopped myself from following up with a kick. Or a grapple to snap one of his limbs.

It was quiet enough you could have heard a pin drop.

I cleared my throat, somewhat awkwardly. He was staring at me, dazed, brain still trying to catch up with what the hell had happened.

"You're right, Fred," I finally said, looking down at him. "You guys do need to learn some hand to hand."

And a smile wide enough to split his face was my answer.

Chapter Text

3.2

A stroll through downtown.

Not sure when or why it happened, but the simple act did seem to clear my head quite a bit. Perhaps it was how foreign everything looked to my eye. To these people, this was just "San Fransokyo," as it had always been. To me, it was… so very, very strange. Just the simple things like the damn street signs and products being sold. It was like going to Chinatown in New York or something everywhere you went. The technology that blended seamlessly with the background was like looking at a B-rate Sci-Fi movie about the near future back in my home, only it was real, here. Real, capable of being mass produced, and as common as toasters or microwave ovens.

I found myself marching past a sports bar eying the basketball game on the multitude of screens. Wasabi and Gogo were practically drooling over this game, yesterday. The Warriors vs the… I didn't know who. Never was much into sports.

As I walked, I listened to a million and one conversations, processing each and every one. Most were nothing. Talks about the game, some gossip or other from and about people I didn't know, arguments and debates. All of it filtered through the bugs in the envelope of my range that kept growing bit by bit every day. Perhaps one day I'd be back to… top form.

Not to my old self. Never that.

I looked up, finding a street sign.

'Lil Tokyo.'

I'd been here long enough to know that there in the city, the three major districts were West Saigon, Seoulville, and Lil Tokyo. These were where you wanted to go get the authentic good food of each ethnic group. And of course, where most of the gangs would mark their territories.

Had to give the Triad credit. They knew how to hide it better.

I listened in on conversations from the apartments going on around me as I took a seat on the bench, closing my eyes and listening as my hands were in my hoodie pocket.

Couple fighting? Old couple watching a sitcom, young girl eating ice cream and crying by herself, another family above that and…

… Ah. There.

I stopped, a bit more of my attention focusing itself on some men in an apartment above.

Yakuza.

Not Triad, of course.

After four hits on some of their larger, more lucrative operations, they'd wised up, went underground. They knew they were being watched, they just hadn't figured out how. So they were lying low.

But not before cutting a deal with the Yakuza.

Now, the city's "blue collar" criminals seemed to be actively looking for Hiro and the others, all the while still maintaining their day to day. Dog fighting rings, illegal brawls. Bot fights. And from what I could hear, running an "escort service."

Had to take 'em down, now.

Rachelle would never forgive me if I left a dog fighting ring running.

…

Or was it Rachel? Or Renee?

Fucking hell…

As I listened to the discussion, slowly, an idea began to take shape in my head.

(X)

It was Gogo, unsurprisingly, who asked the question. "A what?"

"A bot fighting tournament," came the easy answer as I scrolled through a news article on one of Fred's pads.

"Why?"

"Supposedly, there's a big one, and from what I hear, Yakuza like to make money off of them. We could use it to hit more Yakuza. And if it's big enough, we might even nab someone higher than a street grunt."

"How in the hell do you know about Yakuza bot fights or that they're running a 'big one'?" Gogo asked, glaring at me with arms crossed.

I could see the others were curious too.

The lie came easily enough.

"One of the guys that frequents the shop invited me as a date," I said.

Hiro, who was drinking a soda, promptly choked on it, receiving pats on the back, courtesy of Baymax.

"Oh - is he cute?" was Honey Lemon's immediate question with a smile.

"Sure. If you like tall and covered in tattoos." I shrugged. "But not interested. Anyway. If what he says is true, we can actually go after this big bot fighting thing and hit the Yakuza before they try to go underground like the Triad."

"I like it!" Fred cheered. "They'll never be expecting us, and if we grab some of their big bosses, imagine what it'll do for our reputation!" He was practically gushing.

"Well…" Wasabi nervously scratched his head. "It… beats going round in circles patrolling, I guess."

Gogo didn't look like she fully bought my story but I hardly expected any less. "So, where and when is this thing?"

"Tomorrow, some place called Zhan Lu's fishery or something."

"To the Google!" Fred cried, dramatically raising a single finger into the air before rushing over to a nearby computer.

"Okaaay, so." Fred murmured as he scrolled through search results fast, the few of us gathering behind him to see the screen. "You're talking about Zhan Lu's Catch. It's a fishery based in the harbor onnn… there. Northside by the bridge."

"That's near the suburbs. And just north of Chinatown," Gogo pointed out. "Why are the Yakuza using a Chinese business for their activities?"

"Its cheap, they've probably got a racketeering thing going on the side, and whoever owns the property owes them something. Take your pick," I answered.

"How would you know?" Gogo asked with an inquisitive glare,

I rolled my eyes. "Educated guess."

"And mob movies!" Fred added. "Lots and lots of mafia movies… You saw a few at the hospital, right?"

"A few." This lie came easy too.

"Then it's settled! We need to crash this place." Fred was grinning.

"Cops don't go around Chinatown all that much, probably because of the triad paying them off." Gogo told us darkly. "If we go in to hit Yakuza, we can't expect a fast response from the cops."

I shook my head. "Wait a minute. You're saying Triad has a stake in Chinatown?"

"Yeah, of course," she said. "Triad are Chinese. Of course they've got their eyes on the biggest collection of Chinese in the city. The rest is mostly Japanese and Caucasian and small pockets of other Asians."

"And yet, the Yakuza are operating in there… on their territory… without any kind of reprisal?"

That, made everyone pause.

"You're right, that is weird," Hiro said, blinking.

'Not weird, it's a trap.' I already knew, of course, but I wanted them to put the pieces together themselves.

"We'll ask 'em as we're punching them in the face!" Fred whooped, before rolling back in his wheeled chair towards the armory.

And that seemed to settle it for the team, and I had to struggle not to slap my hand across my forehead.

"Alright, let's get our new gear checked and set." Hiro, too, was smiling, apparently excited to test the upgrades as much as any of the others. "We've got a big day tomorrow."

(X)

Tomorrow came fast. Before I even knew it, the day was done and I was riding with Heathcliff in the car, headed across town towards the fishery, Wasabi and Honey Lemon in the back while the rest of the team used their own faster means of travel.

"Right. So, Hiro, what's the plan then?" Honey Lemon called

"First, we scout the building. Windows, maybe some bugs and Baymax's scanning."

For the briefest of moments, I thought, stupidly, that Hiro had somehow discovered my abilities, then I remembered what a 'bug' actually was in this context.

"Once we get their numbers and a good layout of the place, we go in, all of us from different directions."

"Sounds good to me." I heard Wasabi say, cracking his knuckles as the smile spread across his face, double checking the recently modified plasma emitters on his forearms.

Whether he knew it or not, I suspected he was getting addicted to this. The rush, the thrill.

Regardless, that was a subject for another day. "Doesn't sound good to me," I called.

"Huh? Why?" Hiro's voice crackled over the radio.

"The last part. Spreading out," I answered easily. "Sure, you get five different entry points and some more confusion, but no one around to watch each other's backs if something goes wrong. Put the teams two by two, instead. You and Baymax - though that was a given - and the other two are for the ones that can best compensate the other's ability." I held up my fingers as I counted them off. "Plasmatech with Chemistress, Fredzilla with Tracer." I had to get them used to calling each other by their cape names. Sure, they mostly used nicknames, but how many Six foot something black guys went by the name of Wasabi in the freaking country?

"Why those matchups?" Laura asked behind me.

"Your chemicals can make smoke bombs, flash bangs, sleeping powder, and anything in between to give Plasmatech enough cover and support to close the distance safely and cover his back. Not to mention that if anyone gets in close to you, you've got the best close range combatant just a shout away from you. And people will be focused so much on Fredzilla's fires that Tracer can act with almost complete impunity, given her speed."

"Oh… that makes sense." She nodded.

"You've been thinking about this a while, huh?" I could almost hear Hiro's smile.

For about fifteen minutes. Did that count as 'A while'?

I shrugged. "It's my job, ain't it?"

Once again, I pretended not to notice the look out the corner of Heathcliff's eyes.

(X)(X)(X)

The fishery smelled like fish.

Not to point out the obvious, but… really. It reeked of the stuff.

Heathcliff and I were parked just at the edge of my range from the place, just close enough for me to have the full building in my envelope. Heathcliff wanted to be further out, but the age old argument of, "Might need the car for emergency evacuation," swung the debate in my favor.

Even so, with the distance and the metal walls of the car, and the padding and the tech and all the air fresheners you could imagine, the damn car smelled like fish.

I hated this smell...

I was going to have to burn these clothes… all of these clothes. And the smell wouldn't come out of my hair for weeks, I just knew it.

Maybe it wasn't just the fish in this ugly part of San Fransokyo, but rather how...familiar it felt.

It reminded me too much of the Bay. My Bay.

…

Regardless, Zhan Lu's was a massive storage house, and inside I could see through my bugs the guards and feel the heat of the lights on their chitinous bodies. Almost out of reflex, I looked for Lung or Oni-Lee, before realizing what I was doing and shaking my head at the thought. There were no dragons or cheating suicide bombers, here. There were thugs. Thugs with pipes, pistols, switchblades, and small arms. The only real threat was a couple of guys with Uzis and automatic shotguns that could rip through the thin layer of body armor Wasabi, Fred, and Gogo had so far integrated in their suits

Why Honey Lemon hadn't done so yet was an argument I was going to revisit all over again, tonight. The only reason I wasn't worried was because some convenient Black Widows ready to strike were already in place.

On the holo map, I saw the icons of the Six get into position. Gogo and Fred were gonna go in from the front, Fred busting in. The fishery's east wall went into the water, but Wasabi and Honey Lemon would go through there using Honey Lemon's adhesive C4 like gel, while Hiro and Baymax would bust in from the back, where the boats were stored. The retracted door would be like cardboard, with Baymax flying in like a missile.

"How many are you picking up, Baymax?"

"There are approximately sixty seven individuals within the structure."

That sounded about right to my ears. Now all they needed to do was-

"One of them has a cold…" Baymax suddenly continued. "Another is suffering from the early stages of arthritis, a third has-"

"It's ok, buddy, I don't think we need the medical files and history. Where are they?"

"Forty six individuals are gathered near the eastern end of the building, the remaining seem to be patrolling the perimeter."

"Okay. You guys ready?" I asked, looking at the map. Gogo and Fred were at the northern edge of the wharf with a long hill road, leading down to the fishery. They were in an alleyway and out of sight from the guards. Wasabi and Honey Lemon were behind our van, ready to engage and sprint towards the east side once Gogo and Fred had the front set of guards distracted. Hiro and Baymax were less than a block away on the northern end.

I received a litany of confirmations from the others.

I locked my eyes in on the building, but I spread my radius, feeling all the bugs as I listened in. Outside of the rave and the bot fights going on inside the fishery, I didn't spy anyone else in the nearby buildings waiting to swoop in as an ambush.

"Okay, guys… Make it loud and make it fast!"

(X)(X)(X)

Just outside of Taylor's range, however, standing at the foot of a water tower, staring down the road towards the fishery, was a person. Staring into the holo displays along his forearm, he watched as his drone's camera picked up the approaching team of heroes.

Headhunter's smirk was hidden inside his helmet.

"Let us see what you are made of, then."

(X)(X)(X)

Chapter Text

3.3

It wasn't complete chaos-I told myself- even as the patrons and kids who came to gamble and fight with their garage-made robots screamed and ran for their lives.

All in all one could call it… active….

Fredzilla was jumping up and down across the interior of the fishery setting fire to anything that didn't move; spreading general chaos while Tracer came racing in and throwing her newly augmented disks, stunning the Yakuza with what must have been painful jolts of electricity, given how they convulsed as they hit the ground and stayed down while she retrieved her weapon and kept moving, too fast for any real effort to shoot her.

She'd better keep that up. Outside of Baymax, Fred and Hiro, none of the teams body armor could stop a bullet from one of these rifles.

I threw my eyes to the other screen, watching as Honey Lemon primed her explosive gel to the wall, stepped back behind the cover of a few crates and… froze the wall?

I raised an eyebrow, incredulous.

Did she make a mista-

My question was answered as Wasabi shoulder rushed the thing and the frozen sheet metal exploded like glass before the two were diving into the fray.

Sloppy. She should have used an explosion. The sound alone could rupture eardrums and disorient. Not to mention the shrapnel.

Until I realized that she didn't possess ear protection, and neither did most of the team.

Note to self, correct that.

On the holo map, and the screens I could see Big Red and Hero diving straight in at speeds that could be likened to a moving car

Then they're all inside and now I can call it complete chaos.

Through my insects, rather than the equipment, I can hear orders being barked in the other rooms and I felt the and heard of the movement inside as the rest of the guards scrambled to spring their 'trap'.

I leaned back in my seat, steepling my fingers as I watched.

"Don't get cocky. This can't be all the guards Baymax counted." Was my choice of warning. I felt the guards with the heavy guns readying their weapons. The sound of cocking guns making a familiar sensation settle in the pit of my gut as I tried to tell myself I wasn't fighting back a smile.

As they were about to burst in from their hiding spot on the upper floors, each one stopped where they were, seizing up in pain and beginning to scream as my black widows bit into their necks once, twice, a third time. The pain was undeniable and the five men began scrambling, trying to swipe them off.

Down below, the others were oblivious. Between the screams, the panic, the fire and the other thugs, five hidden guys in a room were just part of the background static.

Baymax rushed forward punching men with his massive fists and and shoving some others into the open water pit in the middle of the fishery. At the other side of the building Plasmatech was cutting his way through wooden bats, chains and other weapons while Chemistress followed up by sticking them with whatever her sticky goo was, holding them in place and moving on.

Fredzilla was having fun, too much fun while he jumped all over the warehouse, bouncing between walls and shelves as he used flames and the new addition of his claws to spread teargas across the place while Tracer was actually covering the three possible exits. Anyone that slipped by the others inside and managed to reach the doors was met with a taser disc to the face.

A nice bit of coordination and planning. I didn't expect them to have thought of it truth be told.

My bugs started to pick up other sounds around me, listening to the people in the nearest apartments beginning to call the police shortly before the onboard police scanner in front with heathcliffe got the dispatch call for the nearest officers to investigate.

Heathcliffe tossed me a look through the rearview mirror.

I nodded, opening up the comm channel. "Dispatch is calling it in guys. Not sure how fast they'll be but let's wrap this up." I said.

"You heard the lady!" Hiro called out. "Chemistress, Plasmate-"

"OI YOU LITTLE BRATS!"

(X)

Inside the warehouse Baymax and Hiro turned at the sound of the voice, finding, to Hiro's immense surprise, a very very familiar Bot fighter stepping in from one of the Harbor side doors with a slew of new guys.

Guys that were armed.

More bats, more chains, with at least two of them sporting shotguns.

Yama laughed at him. Standing tall with his hands on his hips.

'Fire that rocket fist right now and he's not gettin back up any time soon.' Taylor's voice crackled in his ear.

Baymax tilted his head, as though considering it.

"You think you surprised us? This was all an ambush! No cops are comin' ya runt!"

"Shit!" Tracer cursed. "I fucking knew the Triad were gonna work the cops."

"They can't ignore this forever. The building is on fire" Chemistress optimistically pointed out.

Yama laughed, before pointing a fat finger at the two of them. "You think you and this lug can take me? The Yakuza Oyabun Yama!"

He cracked his knuckles "Come on boys! Let's teach these kids not to mess with Yakuza! The Big one's mine!"

And with a singular roar the mob was rushing across the warehouse towards him and Baymax weapons raised

Hiro did not let out a squeak as he ducked behind Baymax.

Two, three, four of the guys tried to tackle the big red behemoth, but looked like four guys trying to climb onto a statue, the rest rushed straight past them towards Plasmatech, Tracer, Chemistress and Fredzilla.

With what would be the equivalent of a shrug and a shake of his massive arms, Baymax threw the men off of him. They hit the ground with thuds and got right back up.

One guy came at Baymax with a crowbar, only for one fist to come up and block the strike, and Hiro could almost see the moment the impact rippled up the guys arm, see that split second of pain on his face as he moved away, clutching what must have been a throbbing wrist.

"On a scale of one to-"

The question was cut off as Baymax was forced to raise a thick fist and clothesline a second attacker with a sidestep.

He hit the ground and this time did not get up.

Baymax leaned over him this time.

"On a scale of one to te-"

His wing extended and with a snap/crack of metal striking face and nose, the third guy who had been wielding a chain landed flat on his back, nose gushing blood.

If he didn't know any better he could swear Baymax didn't like getting interrupted.

"On a scale of-"

The last guy jumped on Baymax's back, a metal pipe or something being used to wrap around what would be his robotic friends neck if he had one… or needed to breathe.

He pulled.

Baymax leaned back.

And back.

And back.

By the time the guy realized what was about to happen, he only had time to squeak out a half strangled "Nononononono" Before Baymax landed flatly ontop of him, their bodies and combined weight cracking the thick wooden floor boards.

"On a scale of one to ten. How would you rate your pain?"

The strangled, high pitched wheeze of agony left Hiro with the firm conviction that this particular case was a solid twelve.

Baymax rolled off of the guy and Hiro managed to look at four the four men in various states of agony.

"Well." He began. "That went well. Lets go hel-"

"RHAAAAAAGH!"

The roar felt like it was just shy of damaging his hearing before Yamma's body crashed into Baymax.

Now, Hiro wasn't an expert (he was), but the amount of force (and weight) required to move Baymax even a little bit was… pretty significant.

Which is why it was surprising Yamma managed to get even half a step before Baymax had to actually take up a bracing stance and grapple his arms with Yamma's to stop.

"I'm gonna crush you like a bug!" The man roared meaty arms and muscles shaking.

Baymax looked him up and down.

"Weightlifting belts are recommended by professional trainers to avoid injury when one is about to engage in strenuous activity…"

…

'Note to self.' Hiro thought. 'Program a chip with some badass lines or something.'

"Baymax!" He cried to him. "That's the bad guy!"

"That does not change the possibility of self inflicted injury Hiro."

Hiro's palm smacked against his forehead.

(X)(X)(X)

I wasn't sure if I wanted to smack my forehead in dismay… or laugh at the absurdity.

Baymax was fighting Yama… that is to say, Baymax was giving away free medical advice while Yamma tried to toss him around.

Tried being the key word of course.

Yama may have been strong, for a baseline human but Baymax weighed almost seven hundred pounds in that armor. He wasn't going anywhere. Much less with Yama's choice of fighting style. If I had to liken it to something, it was wrestling, mixed with boxing, mixed with Sumo. All upper body strength.

And now Baymax was hugging him.

Yama was trying to lift and toss and Baymax was taking it for a hug.

Something that sounded like a mix between a sob and a laugh escaped me.

I decided to focus on the others for the time being. Tracer and Fredzilla had decided to go with hit and run attacks, with Fred jumping between the ceiling and the floor, literally pouncing on thugs as he used the smoke as cover while Tracer was moving between the crates like a mouse in a maze, losing any pursuers in the dizzying twists and turns before rushing in from a different angle, hitting them hard and fast before disappearing all over again.

Plasmatech was rounding up the unconscious people, securing them with wrist bindings to make sure they didn't get away before the cops got here.

And Chemistress was really starting to hit something of a stride.

Tinkers were always dangerous in my world. But Bio Tinkers, were something to be truly feared.

A Tinker with a specialty in Chemistry wasn't exactly something I'd want to face on my best day.

Poison gas, acid, napalm, bombs, flesh eating toxins. The possibilities were endless. I doubted Honey Lemon had it in her right now to make those things; not yet anyway, but the versatility in the tools she could bring herself to make was very much still there and she was bringing it fully to bear right now.

Freeze bombs to make obstacles, sticky resin to hold people in place, smoke bombs for cover, tear gas, slick floors to trip them up. Everything in her arsenal was being used to systematically rip the mob of nearly two dozen men to a collective of confused and dazed whimpering mess of pathetic without even laying a finger on them.

Most people would think Baymax, or Wasabi were the most dangerous of this team.

Most people would be stupid.

I gave another precursory pass of the warehouse with my insects, flies and mosquitoes flying through the air, trying to find anyone else through their senses. It was a good thing fish attracted so many flies. I could put a few more in the air than normal and the team would be none the wiser.

Then, one of my bugs hit something.

Something hovering right in the middle of the warehouse. Above the team

Something that felt like metal and shouldn't be there.

I straightened in my seat, my mind focusing on this new, unknown danger.

Another fly came in. It hit something again, this time, latching on with tiny feet to a surface that shouldn't be there.

I opened the comm.

One hundred and fifty minutes of moderate aerobic activity is recommended for the average adult male per week to enjoy a healthy heart.

I ignored Baymax currently laying ontop of a sprawled, panting Yama.

All my senses honed in on this thing.

"Guys! Something's wrong." I hissed.

"What's up Control?"

I wasn't sure.

I gave it a guess.

"There's some kind of spy drone here!"

"What!?"

"Someone's watching all of you!"

"Where is it" That was Gogo.

The controller seemed to have noticed something was wrong, with a lurch and sudden burst of movement, the thing was flying out the roof access window.

I followed it, watching with my minds eye.

"North! It's going North! Follow it!"

"I don't see anything Control" Wasabi called, peering out the warehouse door.

"Trust me!" I hissed. "It's there, go after it!"

The first one to listen to me was Fred of course, The others moved to wrap up their fights fast, but Fred was out the door and onto the roofs in a moments notice.

Of course, he had to actually know where North was. "Turn left Fred!"

He may not know where North was, but he could follow directions.

I snarled, feeling the insect about to slip out of my range a second before it finally did and I was effectively blind.

"Not seein anything!" Fred bemoaned.

"Head up another three blocks. If you don't see anything there turn back aroun-"

I needn't have even bothered.

Right there, through Fred's camera I saw whoever it was.

I had to bite back a groan.

I could just tell.

Fucking… Tinkers…

The cloaking field came undone, just in time for me to see the drone attach itself to the guys gauntlet.

I wasn't sure how big he was, or how much of that size was armor, but the armor itself was a muted slate grey color, with a leering, grinning skull for a helmet, cords or wires that looked like dreads going from the top of the skull to other parts of the suit, clawed fingertips ended in wicked points with an axe hanging off of his belt, single edged, curved with the other side of it ending in a pointed spike that looked like it could punch through Baymax's armor easily

"Ohhhhh… Guys is this first supervillain? Because this seriously feels like first supervillain!"

"Not the time!" I snapped.

If anyone said that Fred had jumped and squeaked at the sound of my voice some time after this, he would say they were a lying liar who lies.

The… villain, whoever he was, offered Fred a lazy salute before I saw the familiar sight of Jet boots and backpack activating, his feet hovering off the ground a moment before he took to the sky.

"Can Baymax follow!" It was Gogo who asked, apparently having moved close enough spot the streak through the sky.

I shook my head, crossing my arms as I leaned back in my seat. "Too much of a head start. Not to mention that he seems to be a lot lighter"

The team fell into silence.

Then, Hiro spoke up. "Alright guys, we're done here, let's meet back at HQ and talk about this guy."

As good a plan as any.

I shut off the screens turning my eyes at the sound of Heathcliffe flipping the page on his newspaper.

"This evening has proven most enlightening miss." Was his calm little droll as he folded up that newspaper.

I was really *really* starting to hate that rear view mirror.

Chapter Text

3.4

The ride back to Fred's mansion was silent, and the back of the van smelt like sweat and dirt. Hiro and Baymax opted for flying back while Wasabi and Honey Lemon rode with me and Heathcliff. Fred and Gogo were navigating through the rooftops, avoiding police cars driving towards the docks.

Fred's voice was ecstatic through the comms. "Dude! We just fought our first super villain!"

"No we didn't," Wasabi replied, helmet under his arm as he drank some water. "We fought the whole Yakuza contingent south of Seattle and found some super villain watching from a few blocks away. Also this would be our second."

"Do we count Callaghan as our first?" Honey Lemon inquired.

"No no no. That was our origin story villain," Fred explained. "That's a whole different category in and of itself. That's the supervillain we'll look back on in a few years and wonder how he ever gave us trouble by comparison. Unless he comes back bigger and badder in the sequel."

"I don't know; Callaghan had Hiro's microbots and was about to tear a hole into hammer space and went by Yokai. That's pretty supervillainy to me, so… point to Wasabi," Honey Lemon mused.

"Look, you guys need to focus. This whole thing just stinks to high heaven..." Gogo toned, her voice wary. "Yama and the Yakuza were all in a specific part of town, where they were in charge of a Chinese-run fishery. We take them down, and some armored wacko is spying on us from afar. With high-tech drones to boot. How the hell did you even spot them anyway?" The question was for me.

"The smoke from the fire," I lied, grateful that it'd taken them this long to start asking, gave me time to come up with something believable. "I noticed it warping around the drone through one of the cameras." I hoped they didn't press for answers or think to double check the feed. If they did, I could only pray one of them had panned their eyes around that spot at least for a few seconds.

Gogo grunted, I noticed her wall riding across the face of a building to jump onto another. "So… why did the Yakuza clearly have a super bad guy waiting outside of their bot fight extravaganza, but not have them run interference? Or even help?"

A silence fell over the group.

"Oh crap." Wasabi bemoaned.

"He wasn't working for the Yakuza." I could almost feel Hiro slapping his forehead.

"Right. My money is on the Triad. They're the only other group that would have the money to pay some guy to come after us."

"And seeing as how we've been hitting their stash houses all month…" Honey Lemon finally trailed off. "But he didn't come after us. Maybe he showed up late?" Honey Lemon put a finger to her lips in thought.

"He was spying on us." I finally decided to just answer, peeking at Wasabi and Honey out of the corner of my eye. "Getting information for when he eventually does fight you. Hence, the drone and him running away the second he saw Fred."

"Probably because he saw the super cool awesomeness of my suit! His own armor couldn't stand a chance against the might of Fredzilla! I'd cook him to a crisp!"

"Fred," Gogo's voice droned through the commlink. "Shut up."

"Yes ma'am, shutting up."

"We should go over Fred's footage when we get back." Hiro said. "Might be able to find something. Material, model, something."

I nodded. "I agree. Armor looked high-tech. Even with just looking at it maybe you can tell what weaponry he's carrying. That can help later."

"Also!" Fred barked. "This can't go on any longer! We need to give you a hero name, T! After all, you're one of us now!"

"There are other priorities Fred."

"It's tradition!" He insisted.

"You've been doing this for less than two years and have never named anyone or even had someone else join the team. There is no tradition."

Fred was unperturbed. "It's gotta start somewhere!"

I rubbed my forehead.

"We've been using 'Control' and 'Console'. That's good enough given that my job is literally monitoring controls and consoles."

"How about Oracle!?" Honey chimed in.

"Oh oh! I got some names! Like like, Sightseer! Controlgirl! Or Fot-Dub!"

There was a confused silence at that last one. It was Wasabi that voiced everyone's question. "Uhhh...what the heck is Fot-Dub?"

"Fly on the Wall. F. O. T. W. W for Dub."

Too close for comfort really.

"Fred…" My voice sounded deceptively like Gogo's.

"Shutting up…"

(X)(X)(X)

We got back to the mansion twenty minutes later. The van entered the garage and the others filed in as quickly and quietly as they could, with Hiro, Baymax, Gogo and Fred already out of costume as they filed in.

The garage door closed, and Wasabi and Honey got out first, going to the basement in order to shed their armor at their own respective stations.

I eyed Heathcliff as the butler opened his door. He met my gaze through that rear view mirror with a poker face that would make a Vegas card shark green with envy.

Without a word the man stepped out, closed the door, and walked away.

I stepped out of the van myself a second later, looking to the others as Hiro ran a hand through glossy hair that still glistened with sweat.

"You guys need to shower," I drawled.

"We're aware," Gogo grumbled out as she marched past me, her hair and body smelling of soot and burnt wood. "Fred! Where's the nearest of the hundred bathrooms in here?!"

"Up the stairs, left, right, left, first door ya see."

Marching over to her locker, she proceeded to grab her extra clothes and make her way up the stairs with the others soon following her example.

(X)(X)(X)

Akande Dubeni smiled thinly as he adjusted the diamond cufflinks at his wrist. The soft chorus of music lilting through his ears as he struggled to stop himself from humming along. The high skyscrapers of downtown loomed through the window of his suite, their bright lights glimmering like jewels in the night. Finally, the cufflink was in place and he adjusted the sleeve sharply with a tug before reaching for his tie.

"Anansi," he called to seemingly empty air. "Suit status?"

A thin hologram hovered in front of his eyes, offering a readout and diagnostic of his suit, where it was safely hidden away. All systems green. No security systems triggered.

Akande turned, eying his laptop computer, the drone's memory card still downloading the footage into his hard drive.

His "Secondary Business" phone began to vibrate, and Akande turned towards where the thin object was sitting on the night table. "Anansi, private line two please."

He heard the crackle in his ear. "Yes?"

"My people within the police are rounding up the Yakuza," Cheng said from the other line. "Yama was a dog, but we won't have another like him to throw out there. Did you get what you needed?"

"I do not fail..." Was Akande's short answer.

"What exactly was this for? You didn't fight them. All I see is a lost asset." His voice became terse.

Akande felt a flash of annoyance leak into his own voice.

"You, solicited my services. I did not come to you. Either trust my methods or I will return your investment and you may find yourself other help." A bluff.

"You leave and you won't get the second part of our deal!"

"Do I sound like I care?" He asked, finishing with his tie.

"Fine! I get it…."

That's what he thought.

"Good. Your problems will be dealt with in short order. But your questions are…unnecessary, Mr. Cheng."

The computer chimed, the download complete.

Akande leaned closer, eyeing the feed. He could see it all, the heat sources shaped like the thugs under Yama's employ, the ruffians bot fighting, the bots themselves, and then the chaos as the Six crashed the party.

With a gesture, the map expanded, showing the hidden images of Yama and his lieutenants inside the two boats. He began to tap on the images of the Six, highlighting them amongst the rabble as the heat signatures switched to target mode. The Six were a bright yellow, the rest of the rabble were blue. He had another screen pop up and he inputted in some commands.

"That confidence better be warranted. The Koreans hate us more than the Yakuza. No money can be used to point them at the Six."

"It is," he answered. "Here is a bit of information for you. The one called Big Red is likely a machine."

"The papers label Big Red as the leader."

"The papers are wrong." The drone's data was clear. The mass and density of the body and armor… the weight was off. As though the inside was hollow. "Either an impressive combat algorithm or remote controlled by the true leader of the six."

A pause.

"I see… and you-"

"All in due time." With the click of a button, the laptop and its readings were gone. "I am currently occupied. Rest assured I will fulfill my end of our deal. So long as yours is fulfilled."

"The payment was given upfront, Headhunter. The rest comes later." Akande let out a closed-mouth exhaled through his nose, irritation twisting his face before he schooled his features.

"Of course."

With a crackle of static in his earpiece, the call was done. Akande stepped out of the room and into the hallway, only to find Aadhira waiting for him impatiently by the elevator.

"We're almost late!" She admonished. "I thought it was women who made men wait!"

"Only when the men do not look as good as me." He smiled, reaching her and planting a firm kiss to her lips.

"What took you so long in the city?"

"I had heard of San-Fransokyo traffic. I wanted to see it for myself," came his cheeky reply as the elevator dinged on their floor.

"If we miss our appointment to this restaurant because of your curiosity-"

"Then I will buy the restaurant for you," he promised, only half joking.

(X)(X)(X)

Finally, an hour or so later, everyone seemed to have unwound somewhat. After showering and with some food, they slowly 'convened' in the basement again, their suits and armors back in their proper places and Hiro booting up Fred's built-in camera footage.

"OK…" The young Asian said as the screen lit up in pale blue. "Let's see what exactly we're dealing with…"

The recording came up, starting from the moment Fred put on his helmet.

"What time was it more or less?" Hiro asked.

"Eleven twenty five," I stated as the others started to guess.

If he thought my knowledge of the exact time was odd, he didn't mention it. He fast forwarded a little, just as the fires in the warehouse were raging in the video..

"Oh oh, rewind it a little more! Ya gotta see this one guy I pounced on. His face was so-"

"Fred," Gogo and I both said at the same time.

The boy frowned, glaring at the both of us. "Oh this is just not fair…"

Hiro laughed, "We'll watch it a little later bud."

He fast forwarded a little more.

"Stop," I said, watching as Fred jumped out of the warehouse window. "Play it normally."

He did, and I watched as all of them, sans Baymax, seemed to lean forward in their seats in anticipation.

I had to admit, it'd been a while since I'd 'met' a new supervillain that I had to gather information on and perhaps be worried about. The nostalgic feeling was undermined by how disquieting said nostalgia was in the first place.

"There!" Honey was the one to point it out, literally pointing at the screen.

With a few clicks and a drag of the mouse, the image was blown up, the grainy resolution fixing itself pixel by pixel until we had a perfect image. Braids. An axe. Skull-helmet. Armored suit.

"That's the guy that's after us!" Wasabi seemed like he was about to be sick.

"Oh yeah baby." Fred smirked, clasping his hands together.

"Doesn't look like anyone local." Gogo was biting at her fingernail at least. "I've never seen anyone like this before."

"Is that power armor!?" Honey lemon was actually leaning over Hiro's shoulder. "No, really, is that real power armor!?"

"That's military-level hardware," Hiro said, eyes wide.

"It is?"

The whole group turned to me, looking at me as though I'd grown a second head.

"Of course it is!" Wasabi was nearly shouting. "Power armor doesn't exactly come cheap or-"

I tuned him out. I was actually more surprised that they had anything like power armor at all, I wasn't trying to imply that it should be common.

I shrugged. "Sorry," I half lied. "Hiro made all your suits so I wasn't exactly sure how 'different' or 'better' this guy would be."

"My tech is at that level… probably. Like the software and the assembly. It's just the materials they have are better. More stress resistance, higher power output. With upgrades and time I can probably do anything, but I wasn't exactly planning on having Baymax tackle Power armor any time soon. If this is military-grade… he can go toe to toe with Baymax easy."

"Oh oh! What if it's the Euros!" Fred chimed in.

"I… doubt it. The European Union wouldn't be interested in dealing with us. We're just heroes running around in San Fransokyo," Gogo surmised, leaning forward.

"So… the Triad and Yakuza…" Honey raised her eyebrows. "Together?"

"To be fair, we did mess up a lot of their operations. Cost them sooooo much cash," Fred gloated.

I didn't say anything, there was nothing really to say as the team dissolved into a chorus of various voices airing out thoughts and observations from what they could see on the screen.

This guy… with the axe, the armor.

I remembered a man in armor. With a pole axe.

His name… I… I still can't bring out his name.

I looked at this one on the screen again, looking for weaknesses. Exposed skin, places where the armor was thin, where bugs could slip in.

I'd taken on other people in power armor.

It was like opening a can.

I tried not to dwell overmuch on the tingling of anticipation in my spine.

Chapter Text

3.5

"Dozens of Yakuza affiliated gang members are being rounded up by the Police as we speak. Amongst them, the prominent Daisuke "Big Boss" Yamamoto was on the list of those detained and under investigation."

I watched the news as the sun was beginning to dip below the horizon. We, officially, were open for another hour but it was pretty rare to have people show up so late when Cass was really well known for her breakfasts more than anything.

I was leaning against the counter, arms crossed with one finger tap tap tapping against the prosthetic arm.

Overall, I could say things were going…well. No one from the media or public end of things seemed to be criticizing the damage caused during the raid. Or the injuries. At least, none of it was visible yet. I wondered when exactly that would start to change. The team was still a shiny new novelty in their eyes for now.

I let my mind wander as Cass wiped down tables, eyes looking at, but no longer really *watching* the screen.

I went over the footage of the Yakuza raid again in my head, remembering what had been done moment by moment through a hundred different eyes. Looking for the things our new enemy was looking for and would be examining.

Mistakes… blind spots… weaknesses...

The team had them in spades.

Gogo had little in the way of armor on her gear. Wasabi, outside of his plasma shield-blades, would be vulnerable to anything that he couldn't close the distance with. Baymax had very little tactical thinking without Hiro. Laura's equipment offered zero protection towards even a bare fist if someone pounced on her, and Fred… actually Fred was fine outside of the occasional bout of stupidity.

The quickest solution was to simply give them new tech, new weapons to catch him off guard when he came.

But making new tech took time. Even if Gogo and Wasabi were to come up with an idea and start building immediately it would be days or weeks before they had a working prototype, even longer before they managed to incorporate it seamlessly into their armor and helmet interfaces.

Hiro was the only one that seemed to have a Tinker's build speed despite his lack of powers, building so many different prototypes so very fast. But even he was spreading himself out over three suits, especially his own that *still* didn't have proper combat armaments and weaponry.

I doubted the power-armor guy would give us weeks before he struck.

Not if the predatory theme of his costume meant anything besides aesthetics.

I estimated three days. Five at the most.

That meant the team would have to work with what they had right now.

It was unnervingly easy to try and dissect and predict his method of attack against us really.

I just had to think:

"How would I bring them down?"

Who was the most dangerous target? Or the weak target to draw the others into a trap.

My selection was immediate and obvious, on both counts-

Someone snapped their fingers in front of my face, and I jumped just a bit.

"Wow. You musta been really deep in thought," Cass said amusedly, hands on her hips.

"Sorry," I answered with a shake of my head. I really must have been if I let her, the fly resting in the pocket of her apron and her clacking heels get this close without realizing. "What's up?"

"Need you on dishes honey. They weren't washed last night."

I half cringed at that. I forgot to run them through the wash when I left my shift early to join the team before they went out.

"Sorry," I said sincerely, hoping she could see that as I pushed myself off the wall to march to the back. "Was in a hurry last night."

"It's alright. I was surprised really. It's actually the first time you've made a mistake after I taught you how to do things. Thought you had a hot date." Cass started with a smile.

"Keh." I half laughed, half scoffed. "Yeah. That's not happening."

"Oh come on honey you're a catch for any guy out there," she insisted. "Tall, nice hair, you work hard, you work out. Unlike me..." she muttered at the end.

I flexed the prosthetic rather obviously as I plucked a dish out of the pile to start washing.

"Oh don't sell yourself short because of that! And any guy that would mind doesn't matter and the one that would matter wouldn't mind. That arm hardly limits you, you can do anything you set your mind to," she said earnestly.

I smiled a close-lipped smile at the woman over my shoulder.

'Like kill a god.'

"I'm well aware," is what I actually said.

The bell chimed; someone at the front door.

"Hey aunt Cass!"

"Oh, Hiro!" Cass perked up, turning to push the door behind her open. "Back here hun."

The boy genius marched back, Baymax waddling behind him.

"Hi guys."

"Morning Hiro," I answered, plucking out another dish without turning my head. "What's up?"

"Oh uhhh… Nothing…"

I raised a slender eyebrow, turning ever so slightly and finding Cass looking at Hiro oddly as well.

When I turned my eyes back to him, Hiro looked beet red, one hand scratching the back of his head.

"You okay?" I asked.

"Yeah honey you're not looking too good. You got a fever or something?"

"Scans indicate no symptoms of fever. Scans do however indicate a-"

"Baymax, we can deal without the details buddy."

"... Are you sure?" Somehow, the droll monotone voice… I could have sworn it sounded almost teasing.

"Yes. I'm sure." Hiro bit out before looking back to the two of us.

Cass looked at me, and I shrugged, not really sure what she insight she thought I'd have.

The blush returned full force. "Umm… Well… Taylor tomorrow night is the Seminar Mr. Dubeni invited me to. I get to bring someone along and I was wondering if you'd like to join me."

I blinked. Is that what he was so nervous about? "I'd like to Hiro. But I gotta help Cass tomorrow. Friday's one of the busiest days-"

"No you don't."

"And I- Wait what?" I startled, jerking as I turned to look at Cass who stood ramrod straight, eyes wide like she'd just been shot, a slow, wide, kinda creepy smile on her face.

"No you don't. We're closed tomorrow. Didn't I tell you." She laughed, too high and too quick. "Coulda sworn I told you."

My brain was still trying to catch up. "I… What?"

"Yeah! It's a holiday."

"What holiday?" I asked. "And it's a restaurant. We kinda get more business on holiday-"

"Not this one we don't." She suddenly marched right up to me, all but shoving me away from the stacked sink still filled with dirty dishes. "Why don't you run along, pick out something to wear. I'll take care of these." She laughed again, and that too wide, too creepy smile on her face was joined by a very disconcerting gleam in her eye as she grabbed the first dish of the dirty pile.

Then, she seemed to realize something

She turned, very slowly towards Hiro. "Hiro. Formal or casual wear?"

Her nephew blinked. "Uhhh… It said semi-formal to formal on the invitation so-"

The dish was launched out of her hand to smash into the sink, probably in a thousand pieces.

Then she grabbed my arm, and moved to pull me along.

Apparently Cass didn't know her own strength because the arm popped right out of my sleeve and went along with her.

I actually heard the front door bell ring before the startled squeak when she seemed to realize what had happened and stalked right back into the kitchen, handing me my limb back.

"Sorry," she said, straight faced even as her cheeks were beet red.

"Not a problem," I answered. "Mind telling me where we were going?"

"I've seen your wardrobe. We're updating."

"I don't have the money for that."

"I'm giving you an advance."

And just like that, she latched onto the arm that *couldn't* go without me and pulled me along, tossing Hiro the keys over her shoulder.

"Close up the shop, wash the dishes and do your homework."

"I have a thesis to plan Aunt Cass. Not homework."

"Then do your thesis! We'll be back in a few hours."

I didn't hear Hiro say anything before the bell rang and we were out to the street.

(X)

My experience with dresses was… limited, to say the least.

In my fractured, half-fogged memories, I couldn't actually remember wearing a dress, ever.

Even so, it wasn't until Cass dragged me into the store that I realized just how out of my element I actually was and I started to feel the first vestiges of panic beginning to settle in.

Considering she had raised boys for over a decade, it made sense that she seemed to be growing happier as I grew more and more fearful.

Before I could even begin to think of a way out of this rapidly escalating situation it suddenly got so much much worse.

Cass turned, smiling. "Oh good; you're here!"

I looked, half dreading but already knowing the answer.

Sure enough, Honey Lemon was right there, her smile looking like something one would find on a Slaughterhouse Five member.

…

Wait… had it been five? Or was it nine?

"When did you even call her?" I half hissed; sure that Cass had never touched her phone…

Wait… had she even brought her phone!?

Laura smiled, reaching and coiling her arm around my own like a snake strangling its prey. "Oh silly Taylor don't worry about that now we have a lot of work to do sweetie. It's a girls day out!" She cheered.

Girls day out...

"Oh oh! Would she look good with a perm?" Honey Lemon was inspecting me with a look similar to how a scientist would look at an ant.

Oh god no...

"No no, ringlets clearly suit her more, which means we won't have that much work to do since it's wavy already."

"Okay, there's a salon! You, girlfriend." Laura beamed. "We're getting your groove back!"

"Never knew it was lost..." I weakly stated, and Cass laughed.

(X)

Am I dead yet?

"How's this?" I stated.

"Hmm… too clingy. You don't have enough meat to emphasize your features."

"Try these jeans! You're skinny enough, so you should be good!"

"It's formal wear."

"Don't fight it Taylor." Honey said, completely serious. "I'm going to win."

I let out a groan. This was the fifteenth outfit!

At least I think it was. I hadn't counted since we had lost my old clothes underneath a pile of try-ons.

And so I changed, going with a T-shirt and jeans that fit… nicely on me. But a bit too snug for my liking. In the form of them showing off my legs a lot.

"Perfect." Cass snapped her fingers. "Laura, next one, we still have to nail down a dress."

"How many more," I droned.

"As many as needed!" Cassandra's smile could split her face.

…

Please can someone rob a bank. Or start a hostage crisis.

Anything but this.

Please.

(X)

"Okay! Got your new casuals, your new go-out garb, and a fancy dress to help turn some heads at the seminar. Today was a good day!" Cass stated, driving as we drove through downtown back towards the store. Laura sat in the back with all the clothes while I rode shotgun. Looking in the passenger side rear view mirror at my neatly groomed hair. The salon lady had done a good job, managing to arrange it in such a way that it covered my rather obvious bullet scar, without looking overbearing.

Still; so many dresses… so many jeans and skirts that looked way too short.

We didn't even buy half of the clothes Cass and Laura plucked out of the racks after I got my measurements, but they'd gone looking for them anyway.

Why do people even do this?

"Something on your mind, Taylor?" Cass asked,

"Don't remember doing a 'girls day out' before." I answered, looking to the side, resting my head on my fist. "I don't think I actually did one to be honest."

"You haven't? Tay you're just a bit younger than Honey and the gang? Well, outside of Hiro of course." Cass stated. Laura seemed to keep quiet. "Didn't your mom ever take you out?"

"My mom… died when I was really young." Of course that I remember clearly, and it was a nice deflection to avoid the other half of the explanation regarding my… eventful adolescent life. The memories were still fuzzy, but I remembered more than enough at this point that I couldn't say "I can't remember" without it being a flat lie.

"Oh…" She paused. "I'm sorry. That was stupid of me."

"It's fine." I shrugged. "Happened a long time ago."

We rode in silence after that. I wondered if they felt tense, or awkward. Part of me wanted to put them at ease but I was hardly good enough with people to have confidence in my ability to do that.

"This is me Mrs. H," Honey Lemon said as we drove close to one of the apartment complexes in uptown. Not nearly as extravagant as Fred's place but not a bad district either from what I could gather.

"You sure hun?" Cass asked. "I can drive you the rest of the way."

"Nah, it's fine. I'll walk from here. Otherwise ya gotta go up Lincoln and through Riviera and it's just a pain."

"You call me when you get there. If I don't hear from you in ten I'll be turning around."

"Okay." Laura smiled, stepping out of the car and towards my window.

I opened and the girl ducked in to offer me a hug and a kiss on the cheek. "See ya Tay. Glad you had fun!"

I wouldn't exactly classify it as 'fun' but I smiled and nodded nevertheless, at least for her sake.

She started walking and it seemed Cass was the doting mother hen type, because she waited by the edge of the block til Honey Lemon was out of sight before she started driving again.

"That advance-' I said, turning to look at Cass. "-was almost my next month's whole salary."

The woman had the decency to look sheepish. "It's…been a while since I shopped."

Despite my exasperation, I grinned. "I noticed."

"Getting Hiro and Tadashi into a store was like wrestling a bull by the tail. Hiro still uses a shirt with a half dozen holes and tears in it, to sleep!" she defended. "Holes!"

I smiled in full this time, shaking my head.

"Thanks Cass." I said, and I did mean it. "I don't think shopping is my thing but…I really am grateful for everything you've done for me since I woke up."

Cass beamed beneath the sun glare, "What are aunties for?" .

With that, I turned my head back towards the window, trying not to let myself dwell on the feeling in my chest as we continued our way back home.

Chapter Text

3.6

I had spent the morning dressing up, using the clothes Cass shopped for with me last night. So far, I'd settled for a black dress top with long sleeves that were partially see-through but did a decent enough job of obscuring my prosthetic arm and a navy blue skirt that reached my knees.

The skirt I wasn't a fan of, but I could manage. It was a simple outfit, but Cass seemed to approve as she saw me.

"Okay, just a little here...and there…" Cass murmured as she made sure the makeup on my face looked decent. Another thing I wasn't exactly versed in.

"Are we done?" I asked.

"Just about…" Cass squinted her eyes. "Close your eyes. Just gotta do thiiiiis…" I let out a sigh through my nose and closed up, letting the brunette woman work her magic on me.

"And done!" I opened my eyes and I looked back in the mirror.

My skin looked fairer, good even, though I felt a little bit like a doll.

"You look so good!" Cass gushed. "Hiro should be here soon. Fred was nice enough to lend him Heathcliff as a driver so you guys won't need to go through the subway."

"Good, I was starting to feel a little overdressed," I half joked, picturing myself walking around in this outfit amongst the normal mid-morning riders in jeans, jackets and sneakers.

She smiled, and went off to go answer the phone as it rang. The tiny mosquito I'd placed in Hiro's hair slipped back into my range, and I already knew who was calling before the word 'hello' ever slipped past Cass' mouth.

"He's right around the corner, honey," Cass half-yelled from the phone. "Start walking out."

I nodded. "Thanks Cass."

I stepped out, hearing the bell above the door chime before it closed behind me.

The Mercedes. Fred must have been feeling generous.

The window opened and I bent down a little to look inside, smiling at Hiro. "Hey."

He smiled. I opened the door and hopped in as he scooted over, seeing once I shut the door how smushed Baymax looked in the passenger seat beside Heathcliff.

Hiro was in a suit, almost tailor-made to his size. I wasn't sure if it was his or something Fred had gifted him or something Heathcliff had made. The butler had a multitude of uses and skills. Hiro was wearing a blue tie and there had been a brave attempt to tame that mop of unruly hair, though it seemed Hiro's habit of running his hand through the dark tresses had long since made the results a moot point.

Even so- "You clean up nice," I complemented.

He blushed, cheeks going red as he ran his hand through his hair… again. "T-thanks… not really used to suits or big events like this."

"Neither am I…" I admitted, not sure for whose sake.

He fingered his tie. "Is this straight?"

"It's fine," I stated, waving off his hand before he messed it up in his attempts to fix it. "You look good."

Baymax raised a hand, raising a finger at the front seat turning his head to look at Hiro through the rearview mirror but said nothing.

The youth must have noticed my unspoken question. "He's on silent at the moment," Hiro said, a bit terse. I quirked an eyebrow.

"What for?"

"He's been having way too much fun making implications."

I really had no idea what he seemed to mean by that.

"Well," I shrugged, "if you insist." I leaned back in my seat as I looked at the driver's cabin, seeing Heathcliff drive stoically. "What are the others doing?"

"Fred is hanging out with Wasabi, Honey's got a project. And Gogo is working on her part time job as a pizza delivery driver."

"She does that?" I asked, and Hiro nodded.

"Gotta pay some bills. She's the only one of us who lives on her own. Damien lives in an apartment owned by his parents who are out of state and Laura actually lives with her parents and… well… you know Fred."

I nodded. "I see…"

We drove a little while longer, with Heathcliff getting on the highway before I broke the silence.

"So you never actually told me what this seminar is about."

Apparently, I chose the right thing to say, because Hiro's face lit up.

"It's a tech seminar, Mr. and Mrs. Dubeni own one of the the largest tech corporations in the world. Every year, somewhere in the world, they hold this seminar in a university for students of universities to show off their projects. If they're interested in the project, they can offer them a job, buy the patents, or give them funding to continue the research as an independent contractor."

"He's already approached you though," I said. "Seems like he's made his choice."

"It's not exclusive." He shook his head. "They can choose to sponsor someone, two people, or no one at all. A lot of tech companies scout for talent here, and other inventors or notable people in the science community come from across the state to participate. Its part scouting affair, job offer, convention– a lot of things really."

Interesting. Not the jobs, not for me, but at the very least I could get a better idea of how advanced the technology here truly could be.

"And why don't you take him up on his offer then?" I asked. "It sounds like an incredible opportunity." Hiro's smile faltered a bit.

"It's just… It's Tadashi's design he wants you know. It's one thing to sell it to hospitals but… a private corporation who's gonna control the patents? I admire the guy but I don't want to just have Tadashi's work be monopolized by big business. It's Tadashi's and if I follow the designs to make sure they're not used wrong, go work for him, would I have to move? Go to their HQ in Johannesburg on the other side of the world? So far away from all of you guys?"

I looked at him, and I'm sure my eyes held that calculating edge I could never quite suppress… "You want to stay here." I finally said. "Keep being a hero."

He blinked. "Well… yeah, actually. But… that's not all of it."

No. Just a huge part of it.

"Tadashi would want me to take this, and I do too but… I can't just…" He sighed, leaning back in his seat. "Give up everything here either..."

I knew what it was, this drive, this need. The mask, the fights. The constant push for the next fight, the next thrill. It was an addiction, no matter how someone twisted and writhed trying to call it something else.

"What do you think I should do?" He finally asked, looking at me.

I shrugged. "Go to the seminar, talk with the guy, try to get an offer you like. You get one, go for it. You don't, say thanks but no thanks."

He blinked. "That simple?"

I shrugged. I really didn't know if he expected a treatise on Newtonian physics for this. "Yeah. That simple." I leaned forward, the both of us seeing eye to eye. "If he presses you, just say you've got commitments here in the bay. University, friends, Cass even, and you can't just pick up and leave."

He still looked unsure, apparently the thought of actually saying no to the Dubenis was a daunting thing, and maybe it was. Who was I to say how big this corporation was and how much it could or couldn't offer him.

We spent the rest of the trip in a quiet silence with Hiro seemingly gathering his thoughts.

(X)

We arrived at Stanford in about an hour.

As I stepped out of the car, I looked to the facade of the main building and couldn't help but appreciate the aesthetic. Stanford University was nothing short of beautiful, as was the rest of Palo Alto. It was a sight to see… with a strange but appealing mixture of Japanese and contemporary American modern architecture accented by rows upon rows of sakura blossom trees that I'd never seen outside of movies.

People were already here, getting out of their cars to walk the grounds, waiting for the main event to start, either socializing or sticking to paired couples or friends. The convention center just to the right of the main building seemed to be where the event itself was taking place, lit up with floodlights and decorated with the draped banners of the Dubeni company logo along with a fairly flattering picture of the man and his wife, trimmed with gold and backdropped by dark navy blue.

I wasn't much of a judge on relationships, but either the man was a brilliant actor, or that look of sheer adoration he had for his wife in the picture was completely legit.

We finally reached the red carpet and Heathcliff opened the door for us.

"I will be in the parking lot if you need anything, Master Hamada. Miss Hebert," Heathcliff flatly stated as usual, Baymax waddling out of the car with audible squeaks and coming to our side.

"Thanks Heathcliff, we'll keep in touch." Hiro and I saw many people walking into the exhibit, primarily rich investors and their dates, whether they be spouses or just the night's arm candy.

I saw Hiro walk to my side, and offer his arm. "Do you wanna... walk together?" He asked, cheeks a bright pink.

"Sure." I took his arm, trying not to be too obvious that I had to lean down just a little bit for it to be comfortable for him given the height difference between us. It would do none of us any good for him to feel embarrassed, he seemed to nearly be goosewalking as it was with nervousness. Seriously, it was ok. Rich as the guy was, Dubeni wasn't even here, he could relax.

I noticed Baymax lean forward ever so slightly, looking straight at me, one finger raised. He must have been trying to say something.

A heart monitor appeared on the balloon nurse bot's stomach.

I wasn't an expert but those spikes seem a little too sharp for it to be healt-

"Gah!" Hiro leapt up, turning off the screen on Baymax's belly and looking back at me, giggling nervously.

Right... Okay then.

We finally arrived to the door, where two very large African guys were standing in suits. "Tickets please?" Hiro reached into his pockets, offering them two. The sunglasses-wearing bouncer looked down at the tickets, to Baymax, and then to Hiro with a quirked eyebrow.

"He's my medical care bot."

"Is he part of the exhibit?"

"Not exactly."

"Not sure if we're gonna be able to let in a bot then. Your tickets are for two people young man, and-"

"Ahhhh, Hiro Hamada!" shouted a joyous voice, and the men in black jumped, turning around to find the beaming giant of a man, Mr. Dubeni, dressed fashionably in an all-white tuxedo.

I had to admit, it fit him well. Custom, probably.

"I'm so pleased you accepted my invitation," he said, looking genuinely delighted to see Hiro as he reached down to shake his hand, his massive fist almost swallowing Hiro's forearm completely.

"M-Mr. Dubeni!" Hiro perked up, a smile forming at his lips.

Then the whispering started.

Bugs were everywhere and I could hear the snippets of conversation here and there, bits and pieces as word spread and rippled through the crowd that Mr. Dubeni had a guest he knew personally.

Dubeni stood to his full height again, turning to look at the bouncer. "Is there a problem, Joubu?"

"Mr. Dubeni sir, the young man has stated that the robot is not part of the exhibition, nor has it been cleared by the security team."

"It is my fault entirely Joubu." Akande seemed apologetic. "I have been so busy I did not inform the security of this exception, but I invited Mr. Hamada and his medical healthcare assistant personally to attend the seminar. This one is an exception, my friend."

Joubu, as he was apparently called, frowned, his large face looking none too pleased at this turn of events as his brown eyes went from a nervously smiling Hiro, to myself, to the waving Baymax and back to his employer. "He should have been cleared by the security staff, sir. Your safety is my primary concern."

"I understand Joubu. But I promise it is alright. It is a nursing robot my friend."

I saw it then, a strange little change in the guard's expression. Still suspicious but… realizing something.

"Nursing?"

"Aye. A nurse. Let him in."

There was something here, something I was missing.

Joubu looked mulish, almost petulant about it, but he caved. "Yes sir." He took the tickets, scanning them with some device and handing them back to Hiro. "Here you go young man."

"Thanks," Hiro said, smiling brightly as Akande gestured for us to follow.

I stayed quiet as we walked into the building, Baymax waddling behind us as Dubeni lead us into a throng of the wealthy and intelligent.

He shook hands, smiled and laughed with all of these people in their suits as they gathered around him like mayflies.

Finally, he seemed to find who he was looking for, smiling wide as he negotiated his way through a circle of people who were seated at a lounge area.

"Aadhira my love, there is someone I want you to meet!"

He stopped beside a mature Indian woman, my eyes taking in her features.

A faint hint of being underweight, circles under slightly sunken eyes hidden by makeup, sitting in leather chair while others stood around her, a cane beside her seat.

The piece clicked into place.

His interest in Hiro, his words at the door, the reaction of the guard.

The woman was sick.

Akande stepped to her side, taking her hand. "Aadhira my love, this is the boy I was telling you so much about just yesterday."

She turned to look, and her eyes were kind as she looked to Hiro and finally seemed to really notice Baymax.

She extended her hand. "You're Mr. Hamada then."

Hiro seemed to snap back to attention, lurching forward and taking her hand, smiling brightly. "Uhh, ye-yes. Its a real honor to meet you ma'am."

Her smile was as gentle as her gaze.

(X)

The seminar continued. The socialites and scientists mingling amongst their respective orbits, Akande offered me his arm after a while, seeing as how Hiro and his wife were enthralled in a conversation that, had I heard it in my world, I would have labeled as Tinker foreplay or something. The two of them were discussing ideas and the specifics of already developed inventions and even bits of Baymax's design, a conversation that only intensified after Hiro finally took off whatever restraint had been keeping Baymax quiet so far.

As I listened to their conversation whilst paying polite attention to Akande's talks with other businessmen who approached him, as the evening continued I realized something very quickly.

Aadhira was clearly the scientist, the brains, the one whose designs 'made the company'...

But Akande was the 'business' part of it.

The man could apparently smell a phony deal a mile away and whether it was with a calm dismissal, a veiled warning or even a polite threat he guarded those business interests very fiercely.

Most especially, anything that would even remotely lean towards being something that would upset his wife.

He continued to escort me through the hall, whispering who was who as we caught sight of them and seemingly trying (and succeeding on the whole) to play the gentleman host. Several celebrities were present, but mostly a few music artists and actors, nothing I really cared for. Most of the people here were either current or potential investors, or fellow scientists wanting to collaborate or engage Dubeni in discourse.

The fly I'd placed through the room and around Hiro let me know when the conversation turned back to Baymax.

The offer was coming soon. To buy Baymax, or the plans, and both Aadhira and Akande were turning on the charm it seemed.

"Forgive my curiosity-" Akande said as soon as we seemed to have a moment of privacy in a corner of the room, turning my attention to him. "But how did you meet the young Mr. Hamada? Was it just through your work as a Barista at his cafe?"

"We're friends." I said with a shrug. "It's because of him I got the job in the first place. He helped me out of a… bad situation about a year ago."

"I see." He nodded, and deigned not to pry into what a 'bad situation' entailed. He was probably drawing a lot of conclusions in his head, all of which fell short of the reality most likely. I noticed his eye drift towards my prosthetic arm. Probably one of his many conclusions.

He smiled. "He is a good young man. Take it from me; you should treasure that friendship."

I looked at him, searching for a double meaning, some kind of veiled threat. He wouldn't be the first to think he could cow me just by being bigger and stronger.

But I found nothing, not without seeming exceedingly paranoid even in my own admittedly paranoid mind.

I looked up, finding again, another banner of the seminar, and I noticed this time that it said this was the twelfth one of these. Again with the picture of Akande and his wife.

"What about you?" I asked. "How did you meet? You and your wife?" Hiro was talking about the specifics of Baymax's capabilities, bits and pieces about programing and robotic hardware that went clear over my head as he pointed and poked and prodded the fluffbot that sat perfectly still.

Akande looked at me, a lone eyebrow hiking up to his forehead, incredulous. "Are you merely asking to hear it from the horse's mouth?"

I raised an eyebrow myself. "I… guess? Why? This story get around a lot or something?"

He looked genuinely surprised, then he smiled. "If the tabloids have not embellished it enough to be unrecognizable." He chuckled, taking a sip of his champaign. "We met because of stupidity."

Well… that's an interesting start.

"To be fair, not hers or mine, but her father's," he elaborated, beginning to walk with me again, circling the floor of the lounge area. "He was a volunteer, you see, constantly spending time in the poorer places in Africa. One fine day, he decides to bring with him his sixteen year old daughter."

"To Africa?" Now I could understand why he called it 'stupidity.' Even without parahumans, Africa in my world was considered a dangerous place, and it couldn't have been much different here if it required relief volunteers.

"To a place considered to be nearly an active war zone in Africa… with little support from the UPU or EU… things can go from bad to worse at the snap of a finger." He smiled. "As I said, stupidity. But I am grateful for it."

He brought his eyes up, thinking. "I must have been… eight. Maybe nine. And there she was, every day, coming to the village with food, and books. So many books. She taught me how to read. And mathematics. Me and several of the other children." He smiled warmly in nostalgia.

"Sounds like quite the sixteen year old," I commented.

Akande smiled, leaning forward with a hand on his knee. "I promised myself, right then and there on my birthday that one day, I was going to marry that girl."

"Sounds like a fairy tale," I said.

He laughed, full-bellied as he threw his head back, loud enough to catch the attention of some of the others nearby. "I suppose. She would leave a year later, to go to university. I became a soldier in the army in my homeland. But I never forgot her, and in those few moments I could reach a phone I would call."

"She gave you her number?"

"She did." He nodded. "And whenever I called she would answer. And if she couldn't she would send a letter to the village telling me what she was doing and why she was unavailable and for how long she would be."

This was… kind of hard to believe. "And that went on for… what? Ten years?"

"Twelve," he corrected. "We met again on occasion when she did some volunteer work. When she got her doctorate in robotics and told me she wanted to start her business, I quit my job in the military, took all the money I had saved and flew out to be her first employee in Casablanca."

"What did you do?"

"Anything she needed of me," he said with an earnest, honest pride. "Whether it was research materials, or making it to a meeting she couldn't. I did whatever was asked of me."

"That was a hell of a childhood crush." I almost laughed, but I didn't want to seem rude.

He smiled softly, turning his head to look at the sitting woman, staring at her with a very gentle love that I don't remember seeing on anyone's face except, maybe, my dad for my mother.

"She was the best, most beautiful woman in the world," he muttered softly.

"So when did you ask her to marry you?"

"Oh, I never had the nerve." He laughed. "She… realized the need to live with no regrets. And she knew she would regret it if she never asked me… so she did."

I blinked, the meaning of the words clicking in my head. "She asked you just after she got sick?"

The smile was still there, but it was a small thing, tinged with sadness. "Yes," he said with a sigh.

"Did you know?"

"Yes."

"And you still said yes?"

"It never crossed my mind to say anything different." He took a breath. "We built our world together, with our own two hands. As she had to retreat further and further from the workings of the company, I took the reigns." His voice grew darker. "Foreign governments, rival businesses. They were like sharks, smelling blood in the waters."

Whatever gentleness I saw in his features died, and there was something else there now. Something dark and predatory hiding beneath the veneer of a kind man. "They will forever have to get past my dead body before I let them ruffle even one hair on her head."

And then it was gone, the dark thing receding back from wherever it had come.

He looked to his wife, and to Hiro, tilting his head just a bit. "Oh. It seems the two of them are finally winding down their conversation." He smiled past me. "Perhaps it's safe to join them again now."

I nodded, having heard the whole thing through the fly still hidden in Hiro's hair. "I think so."

He led me back to the seat, releasing my arm as we got close, with him moving towards his wife and I myself moving to stand behind Hiro.

"Well, Aadhira dear?" Akande smiled at the woman. "Did I not tell you the boy was special?"

The woman's skin actually seemed to have regained something of a healthy pallor, sheer excitement giving her a vivaciousness that wasn't there just minutes before. "Oh yes. And Mr. Hamada's ideas on manufacturing processes have given me so many ideas for tests and improvements." She looked back to Hiro. "I simply insist that once you're done with your studies here, for the summer or the winter you apply for our exchange program. I don't think we'll be able to teach you anything you don't already know but just the chance to-"

He squeezed her hand. "My love… before that-" He hedged, before looking to Hiro. "Mr. Hamada I understand that last time I made the offer for your machine you said no, but-"

Surprisingly, it was Hiro who interrupted the man this time, raising a hesitant hand with an equally hesitant "A-actually Mr. Dubeni… I kind of… understand why you wanted to buy Baymax from me last time…"

Akande's expression grew sombre, looking down to his wife who smiled up at him, she'd apparently deduced his 'outings' to the city too.

"Have you changed your mind from your initial answer?" He asked, hopeful.

At the look on Hiro's face, the billionaire had his answer.

"I'm sorry sir. But Baymax means too much to me and my family to ever sell. He is… the last thing of my brother's."

Akande closed his eyes, taking a breath through his nostrils. He was taking this hard. The man must have not been told no a lot recently. "I see… regardless, there are many programs and scholarship opportunities our foundation can provide to assist with your current educa-"

Again Hiro interrupted, raising his hand.

Akande this time, did not exactly look pleased frowning in clear annoyance. Two interruptions was one too many it seemed.

Hiro smiled sheepishly. "I… can't sell you Baymax… but that doesn't mean I'm not willing to make you and Mrs. Aadhira your own personal nursing bot with all of Baymax's programs and capabilities..."

Akande blinked, staring at Hiro as though trying to understand what exactly he'd just been told.

"You… but… from that model I could easily replicate the design!" he protested. "I could counter engineer it and make a profit on it!"

"Will you?" Hiro asked blinking up at the man.

Akande gaped. "I… But why would you do that? It could rob you of a fortune you are already making with your mass production models."

Hiro shrugged, smiling. "My brother Tadashi told me that he wanted to make Baymax to help people… he never mentioned getting rich… and the last thing he told me was 'Someone has to help'... so this is me helping." He smiled with a shrug.

Stupid… idealistic.

I placed a hand on the boy's shoulder.

"Hiro," I warned. "This is too fast. Get something in writing at least."

"She is right," Akande said, adjusting his white jacket. "Find an attorney, I will provide you with a list of specialists but pick any of your choosing. I will pay for all legal fees and we will have a contract made that keeps your interests safe." He put a hand on Hiro's shoulder. "I am not like the sharks out there, I will not take advantage of a boy like you."

Hiro smiled up at the man, hands twisting where he sat. "I… can have it done in a month."

Akande's features softened. "The contract first… then the machine." He stepped forward, kneeling and looking Hiro in the eye. "You cannot be so trusting…" He paused, trailing his eyes up to me and somehow I just knew his next words were for me, not for Hiro. "You need to be protected…"

I felt the urge to nod.

The silence was tense for a moment before Aadhira leaned forward in her seat, placing a hand on her husband's shoulder.

"Now now everyone," she said, breaking the atmosphere. "I believe dinner is around the corner. Darling, please do invite these two–" She was cut off by Baymax waving at her. "Three, I mean, to sit at our table."

Chapter Text

3.7: Reflections

The cafe was busier than usual this morning. Whether that was good or bad, I hadn't really decided yet.

I took the orders as usual, called them out to Cass as I typically did as well. I listened to their conversations as they sat down to drink their coffee, or even as they walked out of the shop and down the block. A hundred tidbits of information, of people going about their daily lives, and I tried not to feel anxious.

It was coming.

I could feel it. Like a tingle of electricity across my flesh, red hot iron down my spine; all the way down to my bones.

Hiro and the others went about their lives without a care in the world, believing themselves invincible, untouchable.

I knew better.

I looked to Cass, who smiled and laughed with some of the more regular customers, her easy charm and easier smile a sharp contrast to the emotions rolling in my chest.

Someone else walked up, a young woman, too busy on her phone by half to look at me as she ordered. I already knew what it was, an espresso with a granola bar. Same thing she always ordered. Her name was Bethany and she was a workaholic having trouble with her long distance boyfriend.

I knew all of that, and she probably wouldn't recognize me if I walked past her on the sidewalk.

Heh.

Sometimes… I wonder what the hell it's going to take for these people to wake up to the real world.

Other times I'm glad they're still asleep to it.

The real world isn't a nice place.

(X)

The seminar had gone well, Akande mused to himself. Aadhira had perused many new products, and showed off some the company was developing as well, enjoying conversations with young Hamada about possible applications or improvements on the tech.

All the while, he had watched from the sides, delighting in the sight of his wife being so lively again. Happy at the fact that she was happy, that her brilliant mind was engaged and stimulated by conversation with another in a way that made her eyes light up. Even without the offer of the nurse bot, he was grateful to Hamada for that at least.

He tried not to dwell on the fact that it had likely only been the cocktail of steroids that allowed her the strength to do this.

Now she was resting. Later tonight, she would board a plane back home, he would stay behind for one more day to finish business…

He looked up at the city skyline, above the bright lights and the bustle of people. His eyes caught sight of a billboard with the silhouette of the so called 'Big Hero Six' flying over an artist's rendition of the city, still so enraptured the public was with them. Enamored at the thought, the idea, of genuine superheroes.

Heroes.

He snorted

Little more than children.

Sometimes… he had to wonder what it was going to take for these people to wake up to the real world.

Other times he was content that they were still asleep to it. A thousand times more that his wife slept along with them.

The real world was cruel.

(X)

As the day started to wind down, I left the register to do the dishes and to help prepare the next day's specials. I wasn't a cook, not by Cass' standards, but I could at least take the ingredients out of the fridge and arrange them so Cass could find them more easily.

Finally, at around 4pm, the last of the day's real workload walked off. The store would officially close in two hours and I busied myself with wiping down the tables as Cass mopped the floor.

My phone vibrated in my pocket and I didn't need to read it to know the team was getting ready for the night's patrol.

As I wiped down the last of the tables, I noticed I was tense, my prosthetic hand twitching with small jerky movements of the fingers, my own flesh and blood limb aching at the joints. I forced myself to relax.

I took a deep breath through my nose, feeling my lungs stretch out my diaphragm with a good ache before releasing it in a slow exhale.

(X)

His watch beeped, and he looked down. Five till four.

The day's work was nearly done, the night's work about to begin.

Headhunter's work.

He was not a cruel man, or a blind one. He knew that his work, while necessary, was not something that would ever be viewed favorably by the people of the world. But he would not apologize for it.

The more power you gained, the more people wanted to tear you down. With governments granting contracts to rival companies due to back room deals, and local governments imposing new laws to try to strangle their dream and turn them to stillbirths on the word of rivals, there was no room for apology.

Even now, as powerful as they had become there were always others looking to bring them to heel.

He would not allow it.

The alert came in. They'd been spotted. Hmm… yes. He could work with this.

He took a deep breath, releasing it in a slow exhale.

It was time to get this over with.

(X)

I didn't go to Fred's house when I left, the patrol had already started.

Midtown, by the old shopping district there. I knew the place. It wasn't the first time we'd patrolled the area.

I took a cab, made him drop me off three blocks too far, walked the rest of the way. My head was pounding, the blood rushing through my temples as my bones felt like they were charged with static electricity.

The van was where I expected it to be, nestled in the alley between two buildings. I found it just as the sun was dipping under the horizon, the overhead sky was awash with dark purples and streaks of ruddy red.

My prosthetic hand rose, banging on the door four times in a predetermined pattern. Heathcliff opened the door, headset and microphone in place as he looked at me. Still dressed in his fancy suit too.

"Good evening miss," he drawled, removing the electronic gear from his head, handing them to me as he got off the chair and into the front seat. How he could make all that look dignified while hunched over to not bang his head on the ceiling I wasn't sure. It was probably the butler outfit.

I sat down, closing the door behind me with a slam, locking it.

"Control," I called. "Signing in. Talk to me."

"Hi Control!" Honey Lemon answered with her typical exuberance.

Fred cut in. "The team is now assembled and ready for action!"

I found myself gritting my teeth at Fred's words, willing myself to calm down…

(X)

The last of his armor clamped together with a snap of metal, the mechanical limbs that locked it in place retreating as he marched free of the mechanisms and his HUD light up in stark red within the helmet.

Systems were green. The axe blade fully charged, a full ammunition magazine loaded. Defensive systems online. Insulated undersuit, heat dispersing metals, armor plating, stun blades. Drone at 100% charge.

"Execute program thirty seven," he breathed, voice emerging as a rumble through the mask. The drone's singular eye lit up green and became transparent, flying out as Akande marched out the door of the basement to the nearest alleyway. His rocket boots activated, taking him to the rooftops.

Midtown…

His fingers moved over the wrist mounted controls, deftly manipulating the holographic keys in a few quick seconds.

Traffic cameras accessed.

Searching…

The feeds cycled through, hundreds at a time, the machine filtering through all of them in seconds, then looping back to the first all over again.

Now, the Hunt was on.

(X)

The night, like the day before it, wore on, and by the end I could feel the anxiety in my chest as something that was nearly physically painful.

Nothing was happening… but this was wrong. There had to be something.

As the team began calling it in, getting ready to head back, exhausted from their nightly activity– that's when the shoe finally decided to drop.

The scanner picked it up first,

A fire.

Something big, isolated for now but threatening other nearby tenant buildings, apartments.

"We got something. Near Cesar Chavez and Connecticut Street," I started, seeing the feed.

"I see it!" Wasabi called. "Fire, right?"

I nodded. "Yeah…"

The team was already moving and I got a look at the building through Baymax's camera, the flying robot getting a clear view of it with Hiro as they flew over the city.

No…

This was wrong… too much too fast. I knew how fire worked, and without an explosion it wouldn't already be swallowing most of the building.

"Drive us closer," I demanded. Heathcliff turned his head just enough to look at me over his shoulder, closing the newspaper he'd been reading before shifting the car to drive.

We started moving and I listened to the team laying out a plan.

'You sure?' Hiro asked.

"I can do it," Honey Lemon was insisting. "There's a water tower just two buildings away, when I get there I can fix this."

"How long?"

"Few minutes at most."

"Alright," Gogo called through the comms. 'While you're doing that we should keep going. Try to see if we can get some of the people out of there."

And that was seemingly all the team needed to decide on what they were going to do. Gogo, Wasabi and Fred rushed headfirst towards the burning building as Baymax swooped down to grab Honey, lifting her up to carry her to the aforementioned water tower.

I watched it, watched them, through their cameras, through the holo map. They moved separately, as individuals, not as a single unit.

They were uncoordinated, sloppy.

A target.

And I knew exactly which one I'd aim for…

My hand pressed to the commlink.

"Get Chemistress out of there!"

They were confused, even before they said anything I could see it, in the way that they paused what they were doing, the way they hesitated before they spoke.

"Uhhh, Control what are you-

"Get her out," I demanded as the van drew closer, close enough for them to just slip into my range, with Fred, Wasabi and Gogo now at the burning building itself, searching for people trapped within.

Of course, they found no one.

And then it was too late.

I didn't see him.

Not through the cameras, barely within range for me to hear the disturbance through the bugs.

But I heard Honey scream.

Baymax and Hiro whirled to the sound, the camera blurring with their speed before it focused again, finding Laura on the ground, hands grasping at the chemical mixer, bracing her arms against it to hold back the crackling head of a sharp axe.

Hiro snapped into action immediately. "Baymax!"

The rocket fist shot out, rushing forward and forcing the power-armored villain off with a burst from his jet boots, one arm reaching into a compartment before dropping something.

I didn't need to see what it was.

"Grab her and get down!"

Baymax's jetpack gave him the speed he needed, with Hiro latching onto his back as the healthcare bot rushed forward, arms swooping down and carving a trench into the gravel-covered roof to scoop up Honey Lemon in a second before turning on a dime and flying off the building before it exploded, water tower and all toppling over to smash into an adjacent rooftop.

"What's going on!?"

Wasabi's question wasn't the only one, just the first in a cacophony of shouted queries and panic filled explanations.

Baymax smashed into the ground hard enough to crack asphalt, setting Honey Lemon down. I used my controls to shut off Laura's connection to the others, forcing her to listen to my voice.

"Chem," I said, listening to her voice shake as she answered in a half broken "Y-Yeah?"

"He's taken you out of the fight," I explained, the calm I felt was eerie, even to me. "Without your chemicals, you can't do anything. I want you to run. Run towards the van. We're at..." I paused, looking to Heathcliff.

"Fifth and Plymouth miss," The butler supplied in his usual monotone, giving no indication as to what he thought outside of being far more focused on the monitors now, rather than his newspaper.

"-come to us," I demanded softly. "If you stay- you're just gonna be in the way."

As if to emphasize the point, our attacker landed on the street, the streetlights giving just enough illumination to cast long shadows over his skull-like mask.

"Good evening…" His voice seemed calm, off-putting, polite even. "We have not been formally introduced." He offered a slight bow at the waist, flourishing his weapon with Honey Lemon's chemical mixer still caught on its edge. "You may call me Headhunter."

Chapter Text

3.8

"You guys need to get down here now!" I half shouted, half snarled into the headset.

"We're going, we're going!" Wasabi yelled, moving across rooftops with Fred. I could tell by his voice, he was already struggling to fight off the panic.

"Is Chemistress okay?"

That was Fred.

"She's fine," I answered. "Shaken but fine. Just get here. Hiro and Baymax are alone against this guy," I insisted.

I felt my lips tighten as I watched the monitor feeds.

Hiro's inventions, for his age, for being a non-Tinker, were exceptional things.

But this guy was on a whole different level.

The first fight where he'd seen the team was a test. A measuring stick.

Now he'd come back prepared.

He recognized the most immediate and dangerous threat that could be taken out quickly and did just that.

Laura was by far the most versatile of the team, with the widest arsenal of weapons, as well as the most potent.

She was no Alexandria, but one didn't need to be when you could put your enemies to sleep, cover them in sticky goo or just flat out melt their weaponry, or them if the mood struck.

Without her, the rest of the team was… predictable.

And predictable was easy.

From Hiro's helmet camera, I watched as Headhunter drew the gleaming power axe from the ruin of Honey Lemon's chemical purse mixer, yanking it out with a crackle of sparking wires before tossing the bag aside.

The thing had been sturdy enough to keep the axe blade lodged in itself, rather than ripping through Laura's side and spine, but it was now effectively useless, with inert, base chemicals spilling out onto the floor.

I shifted my attention to my bugs on Laura, she was still moving. Nothing odd around her from what I could sense from the other insects in the buildings. She was safe.

Headhunter brandished his axe, the charged, curved blade seeming to gleam in the light, as he stared straight at Baymax and Hiro.

"A pleasure to finally make your acquaintance," the man drawled, his voice emerging as a distorted, deep bass from his helmet.

"Baymax," I could hear Hiro whisper. "Focus on the grapple and disarming styles. You've got to get him away from his weapon."

"Understood," Baymax answered with his typical calm voice.

If there was anything more to be said, no one got the chance to say it; Headhunter rushed forward, rocket boots launching the massive man across the street straight towards Baymax, who met his charge head on.

With a crash that I could practically feel through the monitor of Hiro's headcam the two smashed into each other, a red-armored behemoth and a seven-foot power-armored hitman grappling in midair before Baymax's thruster output and weight proved the stronger and the two were thrown into an insane spin, tumbling across the street, cracking asphalt and crashing into whatever cars were unfortunate enough to get in their way. I heard what few people were on the road at this hour scream and run. A car's horn blared as it swerved, desperately avoiding the two, the glare of its headlights passing through the periphery of Baymax's helmet camera, the two of them smashing into a stationary grocery truck and capsizing it.

They were getting closer to Heathcliff and myself, I noticed.

Hiro rushed after them, running at full sprint.

He had to get the hell out of there.

"Hiro," I called into the mic. "Get to the van."

"Baymax needs help!"

"And you can't help him!" I snarled. He was gonna get killed!

But Hiro was stubborn, ignoring my words as he kept rushing after Baymax and Headhunter, the latter of whom was currently being tackled through the glass pane of a closed clothing store to the cries of a mass of screaming people on the sidewalk. He rolled, unhurt and unphased.

I hissed, once more cursing how Hiro had insisted on upgrading Fred's and Baymax's suits before getting to his own. If he was going to be stubborn on this the least he could have done was give himself an adequate means of defending himself.

As close as we were it was painfully far away.

I tossed a glance at the GPS holo map, finding Gogo, Wasabi and Fred drawing closer.

I looked back to Baymax.

Whatever program Hiro had put into Baymax was working wonders right now.

He was a big, nearly unmissable target. But Headhunter was having trouble connecting that axe head with anything more significant than the heavily armored gauntlets and forearm bracers.

The armored nurse-bot-turned-hero was not nimble, or quick. His gait was lumbering and slow. A mobile wall. But his hands were fast, dexterous and strong enough to block the axe blows in such a way as to have the blade slide off the armored plates rather than bite into them.

It wouldn't last, though. Already I could see through Baymax's own monitor readouts that his plating integrity was being rapidly compromised, the power axe literally shearing off bits and pieces of armor with every swing.

Headhunter was relentless, hammering away with the axe so fast that Baymax had no room to counter, and smart enough so that whenever Baymax did find an opening, he was simply able to dance around the hasty grapple attempt.

My fists were clenched, white-knuckled on the armrests of my seat before Baymax finally seemed to strike on an idea.

With an open palm, the healthcare robot suddenly decided to catch the blade rather than backhand it away as he'd been doing.

The axe head bit deep into red armor plating and I could see the monitoring systems light up with warning lights.

His right rocket punch was disabled, and at least two fingers were rapidly losing power.

The hell was he thinking? Even if he held onto the thin—

"My hands are equipped with defibrillators."

I had about a split second to recognize what those words meant. Headhunter titled his head.

"Clear."

And suddenly the villain was practically launched clear off of his axe blade, flying across the room so fast you could have sworn he'd gotten punched in the chest by the actual Alexandria, his axe still in Baymax's grip.

The hitman picked himself up off the ground, groaning as he shoved a mannequin that had toppled onto his legs. He rested on one knee, the baleful glare of his glowing eyes looking right at the red bot.

"You are under arrest," was the robot's calm statement. "Please, divest yourself of weaponry and wait to submit to the proper authorities... Or you will need further medical assistance."

Did… was he getting sassy?

I shook my head, watching from Baymax's own helmet camera… and I could tell… read it.

The man's confidence was unshaken.

"I do not think so."

There was a crackle in my ear, a burst of static that had me wincing, yanking the headphones off and keeping my eyes on the monitors as the axe crackled like a live wire in Baymax's hand.

"Let go of i-" I tried to shout.

Too late, as a burst of sparking electricity whitewashed Baymax's camera and nearly blinded the fast-approaching Hiro outside the store. My eyes darted between various data feeds, looking for any information that would give a read on Baymax's status. Bugs didn't do well in detecting if a robot was still, metaphorically speaking, 'alive.'

Finally, the picture in the camera came back online, and I could see Baymax was staring up at an inert ceiling fan.

Just then, the back of the van snapped open behind me, and in ran Honey Lemon, looking bedraggled as she yanked off her helmet/visor. She was panting hard and had a blotch of spilled chemical mixes across her blouse and skirt.

"What happened? What was that noise?" she asked.

I ignored her. "Baymax. What's your status?" I demanded.

"I believe my appropriated weapon triggered a disabling trap of some kind. My suit's capabilities have shut down as a result. Power cells are at one point seven percent capacity...

"And that means-"

"I can't move." He finished for me.

His voice was that same calm, soothing blank that I was very appreciative of right now. The last thing I needed was anyone panicking.

"Oh my god we've got to get him out of there! What can we do? Do you have a plan? Where are Hiro and the others!?"

Like… that.

There was a clink of metal on glass beside me and I was faintly aware of Heathcliff sliding a teacup towards the rapidly hyperventilating Honey Lemon.

"For the nerves, miss," the butler drolly stated, the tea-spoon clink-clink-clinking inside the delicate glass.

"Baymax," I called, trying to think of some possible means of escape. Some kind of quick release button or something that would get him out of the suit. "Do you have some kind of auxiliary power?"

"Negative. Microphone and transceiver have dropped remaining suit power by point zero two percent."

Just then, a figure stepped over the fallen robot, axe head gleaming with crackling electricity.

"Oh no…"

"You have been an enjoyable challenge my friend. But I'm afraid the hunt is over." The mercenary said, his voice emerging deep and garbled.

I stiffened, remembering at that moment…

Hiro.

My eyes snapped up, returning to Hiro's camera, too late to shout out a warning as the youth leapt over the frame of a busted windowpane, nearly tripping over upturned mannequins just before freezing in his tracks as the burning orange eyes turned towards him.

In that split second, I nearly felt my calm vanish, my heart dropping into a pit as I recognized the danger.

This was not Baymax, who could be repaired and rebuilt as long as the chip was undamaged. This was not Gogo or Wasabi or Fred, who could all defend themselves.

This was just Hiro. A sixteen year old kid who was still running around in little more than a glorified tracksuit with a helmet.

"RUN!"

He didn't need to be told twice.

With a whir of clanking metal and shifting parts that I caught through Baymax's feed, Headhunter raised up his left arm, twin gun barrels emerging from the back of his armored fist as he began to shoot.

Hiro ducked and ran, diving down behind a cashier's desk, then crawling on all fours to stay in cover as the flimsy wood was literally ripped to shreds.

The massive man stalked forward, weapon sounding off like bolts of thunder, ripping chunks out of brick, wood, and concrete walls with every blast of his gun. Hiro hugging the floor was probably the only reason why none of the bullets got him.

I racked my mind, trying to find Hiro the most effective escape route, tagging Headhunter with more of my insects to keep an eye on his movements as he disappeared from Baymax's view.

I could practically map out the room in my minds eye, each burst of gunfire allowing me to sense him and the surrounding environment clearly.

Hiro was hiding in the middle of a clothing rack, surrounded by long gowns and blouses.

"Hiro," I demanded, silencing Honey Lemon who sat beside me, petrified. "When I tell you I want you to-"

A whisper echoed through my bugs as the mercenary turned and trained his weapon on Hiro's hiding place.

"There you are..."

"MOVE! MOVE RIGHT NOW!"

Whether it was my voice, or just instinct on his behalf, Hiro did as he was told, bolting from his hiding place and rushing across the store as the bullets ripped through the rack.

Hiro moved, ducking and weaving between aisles.

"You cannot hide from me, boy. Surrender now, and I'll make your end painless. It is nothing personal."

True to his word, the man didn't even bother with tracking Hiro. He cut through the store in a straight line towards the youth's position, time and time again. All I could do was shout at Hiro to either turn left or right so he wasn't left with rounding a corner and running smack dab into the person he was trying to escape.

I could see his heart rate, feel it through the tactile sense of the insect on his neck. If he were an older man, I'd guess Hiro was about to have a heart attack.

"Breathe." I tried to evoke a calm I didn't wholly feel. Tried to ignore the anxious, familiar nausea churning in my gut and the tingling of my fingertips brought on by adrenaline.

And then, finally, they arrived.

With a battle cry, a screech and a burst of fire Fred punched his way down through the ventilation system, just as Wasabi and Gogo made their way through the nearest available window, effectively surrounding the mercenary on three sides.

The axe head gleamed in the light as he slowly adopted a more defensive stance, flipping it around in his hand as he measured up his three new foes.

I saw Hiro take the opportunity to move, trying to gain some distance, and either at the sight of him, or the desire to protect him, Gogo, Wasabi and Fred pounced.

The camera feeds let me see the whole thing, keeping up with three different perspectives with a seamless ease that was altogether inhuman.

I could tell immediately. The posture of Headhunter, despite his power suit, was… loose. This was easy.

They weren't going to win.

Fred, to his credit, seemed to know that this fight wasn't some game. Wasn't some… comic book story where they were assured of a win. He was fighting like he meant it.

Gogo and Wasabi were the same, each one trying to land a hit on the power armored merc.

But all of their moves were… hesitant. Either by inexperience, a desire not to really hurt, or simple fear. Each attack carried with it that split second of hesitation. That split second of 're-thinking' how you were going to hit this person.

The axe-wielding merc had no such hesitation.

Every block, parry and dodge was fluid, everything made with an economy of movement and startling efficiency that he used to his fullest advantage, winning small battles in positioning that kept the three heroes in front of him and kept Wasabi from landing any meaningful strikes with those plasma blades, the most dangerous weapon the team had with Baymax and Honey Lemon out of commission. All the while he drew the three of them further into the store, using mannequins and walls as literal obstacles to keep them from truly pressing the attack and seizing their numerical advantage. He was the largest of them by far but the ease that he moved with made them all seem clumsy by comparison.

My hand flew to my earpiece. "Draw him out!" I demanded. "Don't fight him in there! Draw him out to the open!"

"Wha-"

"The only one of you equipped for close combat is Wasabi." I stressed. "Fred can't use his mid-range weapons and Gogo can't use her speed. Get. Out! NOW!"

"I'm all over it!" Fred shouted, his usual boisterousness making itself known again as he finally had an excuse to pull out the most recent upgrade to his suit.

Throwing out his hands, a cloud of tear gas spewed out from the tips of his claws, blanketing the department store as Wasabi and Gogo peeled back.

My mind focused on the insects riding the mercenary's power armored body, sensing it move through the smoke. South by southwest.

"He's going southwest, through the window!" I shouted.

"How can you tell?"

I ignored Honey Lemon's question beside me, keeping the brunt of my attention on the monitors.

Unsurprisingly, Gogo was the first one to get there.

When Headhunter burst out of the thickened smoke at the southwest window, he was greeted with one of Gogo's disks spinning through the air and magnetically clasping itself onto the left side of his chest.

The taser crackled with sparks of electricity, teeth-grinding snaps cutting through the air that could have brought down three men.

Headhunter reached up and ripped it right off. Not even phased.

Fucking… Tinkers...

"Cute."

"Oh hell…" Gogo groaned. She tossed out a second disc, this one he caught with the axe head with a downwards swing, the gleaming blade cracking Gogo's weaponry in two like a ceramic tile.

Gogo moved, rushing to gain some distance, weaving between parked cars and other obstacles along the sidewalk, keeping her eyes on the mercenary as she kept her distance.

Then he activated his rocket boots.

With a whine of engines and a blowout of teargas behind him, the man shot forward, closing the distance between himself and the speedster.

The only thing Gogo managed to get out was a startled 'Shit!' before he was on top of her.

She ducked under the swing, and I could feel her fear and hear Honey Lemon screaming loudly beside me as that axe head cut a street light in two just behind her, the mass of metal and cabling collapsing onto the pavement with a crash and the sound of shattering glass.

Gogo moved to run, trying to move her legs in that skater fashion to pick up some momentum, but even that small split second was too long. The villain spun with the momentum of his swing, bringing his leg upward and smashing her in the side.

She was sent sprawling onto her back, the wind knocked right out of her, gasping for air.

"You can be hurt later!" I snarled into the microphone. "Get up and fucking move!"

To her credit, she did try to reach her feet at the very least.

The punch that hit her broke her visor like cheap glass, I could see the spider-webbing cracks through the camera. The edge of the broken visor tinged with blood.

Then Wasabi was there.

With a scream that could have passed as a half-decent battlecry, the six-foot-something teen barreled into the man.

It was a testament to his strength that he was able to move him at all, it was also a testament to his inexperience that he hadn't just swung his blades at him to start.

Wasabi managed to get the villain all of two steps away from the still dazed Gogo before the giant of a man twisted in his grip, bringing both fists, closed around the grip of his weapon, straight down onto Wasabi's spine.

The youth grunted, falling onto his knee before Headhunter's foot came up and cracked along his jaw to send him about a foot in the air before sprawling onto the ground.

Fred dove in a second later, a gout of flame crashing into armor plates, standing in a place that would keep his downed friends clear of the flames as one of the villain's arms came up to shield him and the other brought up that wrist mounted cannon.

"Fred, move!" I shouted.

Too late.

The shots rang through my skull with deafening booms. My head throbbed, phantom pain coursing through the back and front of my skull, a voice in the back of my mind.

Contessa.

I remembered.

Fred staggered, gasping. Lurching a second later in pain as another burst of shots hit him, the suit taking the worst of the damage.

Wasabi finally seemed to come to, rising up, plasma blades springing to life and slicing at the man's extended arm.

The blades bit into armor plate and metal gun framework. The weapon was useless, and as Gogo got to her feet behind the guy and planted three electric discs right onto his exposed back, I felt for a second like we were going to win. Gogo started to move, picking up speed.

Then that optimism was gone as the enemy Tinker moved, completely unhindered by the crackling electricity.

On the contrary, the energy visibly surged, leaping from his back, through the cords that were connected to his head, down the arms of the suit and straight to his hands.

His free hand let go of the axe, reaching forward and grabbing Wasabi by the chest.

However many volts passed straight from Gogo's disks and into Wasabi, who screamed for a second before all two-hundred-plus pounds of muscle was flung back like a doll.

Gogo recoiled, trying to get back on the move before Headhunter could switch targets.

"You're not getting away!" I heard him shout, rounding on Gogo with a pair of bolas from his utility belt that he threw before she could pick up any real speed, tangling her legs in steel wire and weights.

She hit the ground with a crash, skidding on the concrete and I could see her hands trembling against the pavement through the camera, hear the hissed breaths that just barely seemed to be holding down the tears as her limbs scraped along the asphalt.

Wasabi was down, but his camera still let me see the man turn his head this way and that way, examining the three fallen heroes.

"I expected more. No matter. I'll make it quick."

"What are we gonna do?" Honey Lemon's voice trembled behind me.

I felt the blood pounding through my temples, my heart thundering in my chest as all doors and avenues slammed themselves shut on our options.

And then- the man's body locked up, seizing like he just stuck his fingers in an electric socket.

"Wha-" My eyes trailed over to the one other camera that had eyes on him.

Hiro.

I looked to other camera feeds, trying to find a better angle, finding it at least in the cracked periphery of Gogo's.

Hiro was holding his hands out, arms seemingly gripping something, and I could see wires and cables attached to a light post behind him, going from the piece of infrastructure straight to his gauntlets.

The magnetic gauntlets that he used to attach himself to Baymax's back.

"Leave my friends alone!" Hiro shouted, clenching his fists and it was like a weight of some kind was bearing down on the villain.

I saw through Hiro's camera, the diagnostics of his suit, whatever he'd jury-rigged together was being powered directly by the city grid but the readouts didn't seem stable. I was no expert but if I were to guess, this thing, whatever Hiro had made, was going to give out on him soon.

"Wasabi, get up," I insisted. His plasma blades were the only thing that could cut through that armor and injure Headhunter badly enough to keep him down once Hiro's magnetic field or whatever finally gave out.

But Wasabi didn't move, either dazed or unconscious.

"Get. Up," I urged again, watching through Hiro's camera as the power-armored giant tried to raise his damaged gun to take a shot at Hiro, only for the weapon to blow sparks and short out, becoming dead weight.

Hiro moved his hands and I actually saw the villain fall completely to his knees, the axe crunching into asphalt and I wondered if, just for a second, he would win.

And then it was over. Like a burnt out light bulb the magnetic field vanished in a second and Headhunter could move again, something he took full advantage of.

He got straight to his feet, pulled back his arm and threw the axe like a fastball, the spinning, crackling weapon hurtling through the air straight towards Hiro's head.

"Duck!"

But he was too slow and I felt the whole world turn to blank white noise as I saw his camera jerk in place, Hiro's shout of fear and surprise abruptly cut off as Laura wailed in horror beside me.

I felt my limbs go slack, my body slouching back into the seat as Headhunter stepped into sight of Hiro's camera, standing above him.

"I wonder how much more dangerous you could have-"

He stopped talking, it didn't matter, I couldn't hear him anyway. I didn't want to. Laura was crying right beside me as I turned in my seat, Heathcliff looked grim where he sat as my body trembled.

"What's that sound?" Laura asked behind me, bringing my attention to the noise I hadn't noticed until right that second.

Buzzing. Angry, loud. A million wings and chittering feet.

"Get out of the car," I said.

"Wha-"

I didn't give her time, moving past, grabbing her by the wrist and bodily dragging her from her seat. I opened the back, tossed her out, and then turned to the front to lean over Heathcliff, open the front door, and shove him out as well, ignoring his surprised 'Good heavens.'

I shut the door, shifted the car into drive and took off down the road with a squeal of tires.

They weren't far, the fight had actually dragged them closer from where it had started and I was grateful for that.

I made it to the street, nearly running over rubber-necked pedestrians that knew better than to try and get close but were too stupid to get completely out of the firing line.

They either dove out of the way or screamed as others beside them did. I didn't care.

I saw him, still there, standing over Hiro's body.

I called, and the swarm answered.

This wasn't my swarm. It wasn't an army of poisonous insects and fast-breeding creatures I'd cultivated for months and months. I'd been gathering it during the patrol, so it was big and it was close, but the vast majority of it was little more than filler.

This was crude, haphazard. Weak.

But it would do.

He was looking up, away from me, listening to the buzzing that was now an overpowering drone that bore down on the senses.

By the time he noticed me, it was too late.

I saw him activate his rocket boots a split second before the car hit him dead on.

I'd braced myself.

He hadn't.

It was like smashing into a full grown moose at full speed. The front of the truck buckled, motor and chassis caving in on itself. Headhunter's body rolled like a rag doll, smashing into a brick wall hard enough to break it entirely, bits of debris and broken masonry crumbling over his body.

My arms trembled as I forced them to let go of the steering wheel, directing my swarm to converge as I got up, out of the front seat, ignoring the smell of acid and acrid smoke from the motor as I made my way to the back, reaching to the toolbox beside the door for the crowbar as I jumped out.

The buzzing was deafening now, invading my senses, overpowering.

I walked closer.

The man pulled himself to his feet, his body shaking, axe nowhere to be found as bits and pieces sparked and leaked from the now damaged suit.

He was wounded. In pain.

Not enough.

He looked at me, and in the eye socket of the skull helmet I could see the cybernetics just peeking out beneath.

He had no weapons, not right now. Didn't matter, he was still stronger than me, better defended, better armed.

I didn't care.

The swarm descended and before he could understand what the hell was going on they were on top of him, a million insects, biting, crawling, wings flapping; searching for every cracked space, every open crevice, every exposed wire and cable.

He flailed, confused, uncomprehending.

I pounced.

The crowbar came down. Curved points like hooks, cracking into his arm, aiming for the bend of his elbow, the soft bit of flesh that had to remain unarmored to let him move.

I saw him reel, and it was then that he realized he was under attack by something a lot worse than bugs.

He lashed out, his fists and feet trying to find me, but the bugs were hiding me, the swarm now thick enough to surround me and him. Through my bugs I could hear the warning alarms in his helmet, the sirens and the red pulsing glare that was telling him he was in danger.

He couldn't see me.

He went for a haymaker. I ducked, skirting behind him, and my choice of weapon dug into the back of his knee, the armored material toughened to protect against anything piercing it.

I still punched through. Saw the blood.

I heard him scream.

I smiled, baring teeth.

His arm lashed out, blindly seeking me and I was too slow, the grip of his power-armored fist wrapping around my prosthetic, tightening hard enough to break bone, ripping the whole limb in two, leaving a jagged mess of shorn metal and circuitry.

It would do.

I jumped, my body landing on his back, my new weapon trying to punch into the seam around his collar. Trying to make him bleed.

He moved and flailed, hard enough to throw me off, my body flipping through the air to hit the ground in a practiced roll, snapping back to my feet and rushing him again, this time aiming for the spot just under the armpit, the artery.

But then, he decided differently and with a scream of rocket powered engines activating underneath him, he shot straight up into the air to escape from my swarm. To escape me.

And I was reminded then, of someone else.

Alexandria.

That's how she tried to run too…

My bugs rose, a living, breathing mass; a single organism, surrounding the retreating mercenary, scratching clawing and biting, trying to find the cooling vents for the rockets, crawling inside them, burning alive and clogging them with their charred corpses to shut them off.

He shouldn't be allowed to escape.

But it was too late, not enough bugs, not enough time to finish crippling his systems. He was gone, streaking across the sky and out of my range, and I was left with a bloodied crowbar and a torn arm, standing in the middle of the street. I was breathing ragged, feeling a surge through my body that I hadn't felt in a long time.

My fingers tingled, twitching even as they gripped the crowbar. From the back of my jaw all the way down to my toes, my body felt charged like a live wire.

I turned, finding the broken carcass of the van, smoking from the engine, and Hiro's body just beyond that, laying on the asphalt.

There was a sound to my right and I whirled, weapon at the ready as the swarm buzzed angrily over our heads.

It was Baymax, devoid of his armor, marching out of the store's entrance.

He looked to me, big black eyes blinking slowly before turning to Hiro and waddling closer.

Slowly, the charge in my limbs begin to vanish and the pain began to replace it, aches I hadn't noticed, bruises that were going to form. My ankle, now that I cared enough to feel again, sent a bolt of pain up my leg as I walked. When I crashed the van maybe? Must have been.

I limped closer too, trying to swallow down the lump of dread in my throat.

"Baymax," I called, and the machine seemed to understand what I wanted, because he answered right away.

"Hiro, has suffered a minor contusion to the left temple. Brain scans indicate signs of a mild concussion. Bruising and-"

"Wait…" I gaped at the machine. "He's alive!?"

Baymax blinked, turning to me as if my suggestion was completely ludicrous.

"Of course."

I rushed forward, tossing aside the crowbar with a clatter of steel hitting the road and realized, now that I was this close, that yes… he was still breathing.

I also realized the side of his helmet was cracked wide open.

His face.

Headhunter had seen Hiro's face…

I knelt down, my hand reaching down to pick up his head from the pavement. One eye fluttered open, foggy.

"Tay...lor?" He muttered.

I nodded.

"It's gonna be okay… you're gonna be fine…"

Chapter Text

Arc 3: End

They looked like hell.

All of them. Not just Hiro, but Gogo, Wasabi, and Fred as well. Honey Lemon was darting around the room, trying to help, bringing them food and drinks, dried tear streaks staining her cheeks, her eyes red and puffy.

Baymax waddled around, for once fulfilling his primary objective of diagnosing and tending injuries.

Wasabi had electric burns on his chest, where Headhunter had thrown the voltage from his gauntlets back into him, and was still suffering arrhythmia. He was on the couch. Fred, sitting on a massive lounge chair, had three broken ribs and a hairline fracture along his left forearm. And even though her suit was designed to withstand friction damage, Gogo was sporting some nasty, painful-looking abrasions where her body had been scraped along the asphalt; added to the pain was the bruising along her cheek and ribs where the power-armored hitman had struck her. Heathcliff had brought in plenty of chairs and sofas for a one room infirmary in the mansion.

Hiro was laying on a couch, likely wishing he could fall asleep, judging by how his eyes were drooping. Baymax poked and prodded him occasionally, forcing him to stay awake, just in case.

The doors opened. Heathcliff marched in, pushing a silver cart laden with a well-organized array of medical supplies. Bandages, disinfectants, painkillers, needles and medical wire for sutures.

Not for the first time, I was finding myself curious as to what the hell this butler did before becoming a butler.

Either way, he snapped on some latex gloves and began to get to work, circling the room with Baymax and Honey Lemon, applying disinfectant and bandages with a familiar ease.

I watched them work in silence.

It was… hard, in a way, seeing them like this. On some level, I knew this would happen eventually, that heroing would stop being a game and start being dangerous. I knew, because I'd experienced it. Just as with the 'golden age' of heroes, they were 'amazing', with extraordinary abilities that could seemingly do anything.

Before tonight.

Reality had caught up.

I didn't see the 'Big Hero Six' here.

All I saw were a bunch of college kids, worn and beat to hell.

Finally, with everyone patched and settled… there was nothing left to do. Nothing to keep them distracted. Laura was the first to start fidgeting, averting her eyes, wringing her hands as her friends lay around her.

The elephant was in the room, and it wasn't going to be ignored for much longer.

Baymax offered one more round of checkups before he seemed satisfied, waddling to the other side of Hiro and standing there placidly before his head swiveled around to stare at me.

And then, lastly was Heathcliff. He reached down to the lower shelf of the silver cart and pulled out a full kettle of steaming hot tea, arranging the cups in the center table for everyone without a word before grabbing one of the cups for himself, standing straight, walking to a corner, teacup in hand, and looking straight at me as he took a sip.

I took a deep breath.

I was never one to shy away from things for too long.

"I take it you have questions…" I mused aloud.

As one, all eyes turned to me, everyone but Fred; who raised a hand with a single finger held up.

"I, for one, welcome wholeheartedly our mistress of crowbar ass-kicking to rule over us."

I raised a slender, rather incredulous eyebrow.

"The hell happened?" Gogo finally broached the subject, wincing as she moved to settle herself into a sitting position. "Where did those bugs come from? How did you control them! Talk! Oww…"

"And the way you fought." Wasabi seemed to shudder, looking to Baymax who 'helpfully' projected a very clear recording of me from where he'd been standing inside the store watching the whole thing. "It… it was… brutal."

I bit my tongue as I leaned back and saw Hiro looking at me in a half lidded haze. Laura remained quiet, looking torn.

"How about your name. If Taylor really IS your name," Leiko growled, glaring hard at me.

"It is." I shrugged. "I never lied. I just didn't tell you everything about me."

Leiko's glare deepened, partly from her wounds. "Well, no time like the present to start being open. So spill it."

I sighed, resigning myself. With barely a passing thought I gathered up the bugs in the house, having them all crawl towards me, winding through the walls and vents.

Baymax was the one who noticed it first, big black eyes blinking as he looked to the floor at my feet and and politely waddled out of the way of other bugs crawling beneath him.

When the others finally took notice, the bugs had gathered in a perfect circle, marching in formation as others seamlessly slipped into the march and kept moving.

"I come from a place where 'heroes' and 'villains' weren't just a comic book concept. They were reality. Where I come from people have powers. Mine in particular is controlling… bugs. Baymax," I called. "Run a scan of my brain…"

"Scanning…"

"The hospital deemed it a 'benign, non-cancerous mass'. You see it?"

"Affirmative, the anomaly lies between the hemispheres of the brain, surgery would not be recom-"

"That's what controls it… That is, in part, what gives people superpowers."

"Scanning… neural activity detected." The bot seemed genuinely surprised, given the minor inflection of his tone. "Updating databases…"

I allowed a pause, letting the words sink in and watching their reactions, for a guy with three broken ribs Fred was surprisingly quick to sit up, and surprisingly loud.

"Wait. As in, you have real live powers? Like superhero powers!? That wasn't tech based like Hiro's microbots, but real to honest-"

Heathcliff's hand drifted close and pressed itself over Fred's mouth, who continued speaking, oblivious and muffled.

"Continue please, Miss Hebert," he drolled.

"Where you come from." Hiro groaned beside me, slightly glassy brown eyes trying to focus, looking up at me. "So my theory was right. The Null zone was a space between universes. Parallel universes."

"Quite a theory to jump to," I answered, my one hand reaching down to lay at his forehead. He wasn't running a fever far as I could tell.

"After I tried to run your face through all the facial recognition databases I got into and didn't find anything there were only a few theories left. That was one of them."

Wasabi's face scrunched up, blinking to himself. "W-wait. Facial rec- Hiro, did you hack into government databases?"

There was a pause, a telling one.

"...No."

"That's highly illegal!"

"That's why I'm saying no."

"Alright look," Gogo hissed, wincing in pain as she shifted on the couch. "If I hadn't seen it for myself I wouldn't buy this whole superpowers thing, but that aside, if you could do this the whole time you've been with us why in the hell were you just sitting in the car!?" she barked, murderous daggers forming in her eyes.

I looked at her, meeting her gaze and I could only imagine what I must have looked like, as she seemed to wilt under my eyes.

"Because I never wanted to go back to this. You don't know and you don't want to know how far I can go with this. It doesn't end well. I… I just wanted to retire, to put it simply."

This time the pause was more pregnant, each one of them mulling over my words. Finally, the silence was broken by none other than Heathcliff.

The butler cleared his throat, still covering Fred's mouth with one hand. "Miss Hebert. You said that 'your world' had heroes and villains… which were you?"

Now wasn't that the loaded question.

"Both." I shrugged. "At one time or another."

"And what were you before you arrived here with us, miss?"

I felt my features tighten, trying to keep my expression neutral but feeling it slowly turning into something ugly.

"Someone that got two bullets in the head," Gogo answered, the implication clear by how she glared at me.

I held back a bitter laugh. 'Someone'.

Something was more like it.

"Who cares what she was?!" Honey Lemon suddenly snapped, startling nearly everyone. She'd been so quiet it seems they'd forgotten she was there.

"Laur-"

"No!" The redhead girl cut her off. "I was in the car, thinking all of you were about to get killed! There was nothing anyone could do!" She gestured to me, glaring at Gogo, who for the first time seemed to be caught off guard by the demure girl's explosion, her mouth agape. "She saved all of us! So yeah, I don't care what she was. She's our friend now and that's all that matters. She… she saved all of our lives..." She crossed her arms, apparently trying to blink away the tears as Gogo looked away, apparently acquiescing the point.

"Thanks," I said. It felt inadequate, but it was all I could offer.

She nodded, offering a tremulous smile.

With her words, there was another lengthy pause, Wasabi broke it this time.

"One thing still bothers me though," he said, scratching at his chin. "How did you know to get Honey Lemon out? How'd you know he'd go after her?"

I shrugged. "Simple. It's what I would've done, if I had to take all of you out."

As soon as the words left my mouth it occured to me that maybe I should have worded it a bit better.

Fred, who had finally been released, stared at me. "You… you've been making plans on how to neutralize the threats we pose?"

I winced.

Yeah. Definitely should have worded that better.

"That's so cool!" Fred suddenly gushed.

"Umm… Why uhh… Why me?" Laura meekly asked, looking a tad bit more green than before.

"You're the most dangerous," I answered flatly.

She looked at me like I was crazy. "What. But Baymax-"

"Too slow," I interrupted.

She gaped like a fish. "Wasabi an-"

"Slow-er. With less range."

"Hey!"

"Gogo-"

"Fast," I conceded. "But her tasers require direct contact and good aim. She can miss, and with a Combat Thinker, a Mover, or even a Brute, she'd be useless."

"Fred?"

"Good balance of offense, defense and mobility." I nodded and pretended not to notice Fred preen in his seat. "But nothing particularly dangerous outside of his fire breath. And given his tendency to play non-lethal, I wouldn't really worry about it unless I knew he was gunning for me." I gestured to her with one hand. "You're a glass cannon; most dangerous, most versatile, and the one I can take down too fast for the enemy team to react. Perfect mix for any attacker."

"What were those names you said," Hiro chimed in beside me. It must have been the medication that was keeping him so docile and calm next to everyone else. "Brute? Thinker?"

"Power classifications," I answered. "Brute, Shaker, Striker, Breaker, Thinker, Tinker, Mover, Blaster, Stranger, Changer, Trump and Master."

"What do each of them mean? And which are you!?" Fred, if he could have, looked like he was ready to sit cross legged at my feet to listen to a fireside story.

"I was classified as a Master… eight? Seven?" I shrugged. "And a Thinker two." I took a breath, leaning back in my seat. "Brutes are what they sound like. Super strength and endurance. Baymax would be classified as one. Typically they also had the ability to fly. We called them Alexandria packages when they could. Alexandria was the most famous Brute."

"Hero, right?" Fred asked.

Slowly, I nodded. "...Yes… she was."

"Hear that Baymax!?" Fred smiled. "You're an Alexandria package Brute!"

The nurse bot as ever, was accommodating. "Registering designation…"

I shook off the memory and the feelings that came with it. "Shakers are people who can alter the environment in some way. Moving the earth, for example. Though it's hardly limited to it. One Shaker was a ferrokinetic who could 'grow metal' from the ground. He typically favored swords. Layers on layers of swords to form barriers, swords could grow out of the flat of the swords he made so he could bend and twist them into all kinds of shapes. He would even make his armor out of the swords."

"That… can't have been safe," Wasabi protested.

"The edges were dulled on the inside I'm sure." I shrugged. "He had a great deal of control and practice. Wouldn't have put it past him."

"Name?"

"Kaiser."

"Villain!" Fred snapped his fingers.

"How do you know that?" Damien asked.

"Totally a bad guy name dude, keep up."

"Okay then, nice to see you retained something from high school." Damien rolled his eyes. "So, what about Strikers?"

I nodded. "Strikers need physical contact to use their powers. Typically the hands, though some just needed skin contact. Clockblocker, a hero, was a striker, he could freeze anything in time with a touch. They were completely inviolable for minutes at a time. No known force could affect them. Not even gravity. You could drop a nuke on somebody he'd frozen and they wouldn't even feel it. Hell, you could toss them into a black hole and they'd be just fine until his power wore off. He had a full suit, so one trick he would pull off was freezing the suit over himself if he was ever in danger and he would survive the impact of virtually anything. He even froze an Endbringer."

"Endbringer?" Hiro asked.

"I'll tell you about them some other time," I lied. "Breakers basically take the rules of physics and snap them over their knee. Typically it's an effect around their body in some way, that's the primary difference between them and Shakers. Thinkers are exactly what they sound like. Their powers allow their brains to process certain information far better than most people."

"So why are you a Thinker two?" Wasabi asked.

"Do you have any idea how much processing power it takes to control twenty nine point seven million insects individually along with filtering in their sensory information?"

Wasabi paled. Whether it was from the latter half of my statement or the sheer amount of bugs I had under my control at that moment, I didn't know. He opened his mouth and clicked it shut.

"That… that makes sense."

"Whoa… that sounds so cooooool…" Fred's eyes were full of glee.

"Tinkers are what you guys would be," I said before they could keep asking questions. "They build things."

"Wait… so there was a power based on science!" Fred laughed. "How did that work!?"

"They would get schematics." I tapped at my temple. "Straight into their head. Nanomachines, artificial intelligence, the ability to shrink down gear to be much smaller than what would be considered possible for its capabilities... " how to phrase Bonesaw gently... "bioengineering… Tinkers were considered some of the most powerful capes. The more time and experience they had, the more dangerous they became. Their tech couldn't really be mass produced, and since it was a schematic straight to their head, half of them barely understood the full mechanics of what they built. That's one of the major differences between you guys and Tinkers."

"What would we be on the scale!?" Fred asked, excitedly. "Tinkers…. Seven? Eight?"

"Three," I flatly answered watching his face completely crumble. "At best."

"What…"

That was Hiro, and for the first time I could remember the teenager was glaring at me.

I felt my lips quirk in a smile. "Sorry Hiro. You're more versatile than most Tinkers that just start out, but you're spreading yourself so thin it's just not enough. If you were to take all of the weapons from everyone on the team and stick 'em in one suit, you'd crack Tinker six."

"The power requirements for…" He paused… "Oh… That's why you just said one Tinker could shrink gear…"

I nodded, a little impressed he deduced that with a concussion. "Movers have speed, as you can imagine. Flight, or genuine super speed, or teleportation. Blasters are long range artillery. Strangers have some kind of ability revolving around 'stealth': not being noticed, or erasing the memory of their existence. Things like that."

I let my eyes trail upwards, towards the ceiling. "Changers are shapeshifters, generally speaking. Though don't think they can change to just people or animals. Some can shape their body into metals, minerals, things like that. And Trumps were considered some of the most valuable capes because they either had multiple powers, or affected other people with powers. Amplifying them, nullifying them, or giving out new ones, temporarily."

"And Masters?" Gogo questioned, angry eyes staring at me.

"Masters take control of things," I answered. "Mine are bugs… but the power can be people in some cases."

Surprisingly, it was Baymax who raised his hand next. "I would like to pose a query."

The group as a whole blinked in surprise, turning to the nursebot.

"Taylor. Since your return to consciousness you have been actively engaged in heroic activities. Based on these behavioral patterns, what in your past led you to choose the non-heroic? Was the reason psychological?" An array of medical texts and images popped up on his chest. "I have become versed in many psychological treatments and help exercises since my original design."

My lips pursed. It wasn't really his fault, but I still felt a little insulted at the insinuation. "I'm not crazy, Baymax."

"There is no shame in requiring medical assistance Ta-"

"I'm not crazy," I interrupted. "I was…" I mulled the words in my head, measuring them. "Fifteen. Just gained my powers. Wanted to go out and be a hero. Ended up biting off more than I could chew and got saved by a team of villains."

"Oh oh and you found friendship and camaraderie with the misunderstood and ostracized right?"

I raised an eyebrow at Fred who seemed to be bouncing in his seat. He seemed to have gotten over those broken ribs really quick.

"Not quite so romanticized but on the whole, yeah," I admitted. "At first I wanted to infiltrate them, find out what they were doing, how big the organization was to turn them in to the Protectorate."

"What's that?" Honey Lemon asked.

"Hero organization," Fred answered.

Again, I raised an eyebrow as Wasabi complained.

"Dude!"

"It's a name like 'Protectorate,'" Fred defended. "Of course it's a hero organization." He looked smug, even moved to put his feet on the table before his ribs reminded him that they were, in fact, broken.

Wasabi looked at me.

I shrugged. "He's right."

"Oh come on!"

While Fred's 'commentary' was a bit irritating, I was grateful that it let me skim over a lot of the details with the distraction.

"So, I worked with them. Gathered up all the evidence and all of the inner workings, even found their benefactor. Then when it came time to turn them in-"

"You couldn't do it!" Fred smiled.

"Pretty much." I nodded. "So I stayed a villain. We mostly fought other gangs, though. Not the heroes.

"You mean you did grabs for territory…" Gogo cut through the spin. I tried not to get annoyed.

I shook my head slightly. "More defending territory than grabbing for it. Eventually though, the Protectorate finally cracked down on us. We'd become big enough that we warranted it. I cut a deal. They left my friends alone and I would join the Protectorate."

My mind drifted… what had been her name? Diana?

"Seems like a bad deal for them, why'd they agree?" Gogo pointed out, cutting out my trip down broken memory lane.

I bit back the words, racking my brain in search of an explanation that was 'soft' enough.

How to tell them that I'd become a warlord that controlled an entire city, and was considered to be as big a threat as a villain could get without a kill order, without actually telling them that.

"I was one of the bigger players at that point," I said. "Without me, the team was a lot less effective."

"With bug powers?" Wasabi blinked, clearly incredulous.

"Crowbar vs power armor," Fred reminded.

Again, Wasabi's mouth clacked shut, the shudder that ran through him telling me he was starting to grasp at a picture.

"That's when I became a hero, one on parole and a tight leash, but a hero nonetheless." I said before turning to Baymax. "So, thanks for the concern. But I'm not crazy Baymax. Just circumstances."

"I see."

"And how did you get here?" Gogo asked.

I hesitated again.

Then Hiro spoke up. "That lady… the one in the suit…"

My eyes shifted over to him.

"You saw her?" I hadn't expected that. Contessa never did something without reason. Why would she let him see her?

The teenager nodded. "Yeah. At least, I caught a glimpse of her back in Null Space. She… she was standing inside this square, kinda like a door-shaped portal. I heard gunshots and then she… dumped you out into space."

If the room had been quiet before, it was dead silent now. Everyone turned their gaze from Hiro to me, back forth, each one looking their own unique sort of bewildered.

"Why didn't you ask me about it before this?" I wasn't angry, not really. Merely curious.

Even so, I saw guilt on his face. "I… don't know. Worry I guess. You'd… woken up, couldn't talk and then when you did I didn't want the first thing outta my mouth to be something about the lady that tried to double tap you so… I avoided it. And it just got easier and easier to avoid."

I nodded. "I see. Well…" I took a breath. "The woman you saw, her name was Contessa. The portal was made by another cape called Doormaker." What did it matter. They'd never even meet the two, much less Cauldron or anyone else.

"And who are they?"

"The most powerful Thinker on record and one of the most powerful Shakers. He can make a portal to virtually anywhere, even different universes. As you can clearly see."

"Why'd they ummm… send you here?" Honey Lemon asked meekly.

"Contessa wanted me far away, clearly," I answered.

"Far away?" Wasabi protested. "She wanted you dead."

Not really. If Contessa wanted me dead… I'd be dead.

But they didn't need to know those specifics.

"Don't you want to go back?" Hiro asked, blinking languidly up at me from where he lay.

I shook my head. A finality in my voice as I thought and remembered just what would be waiting for me on the other side of that proverbial portal.

"No. No I don't."

(X)

The rest of the night passed by with more questions, of course. Questions and answers that I gave when I could, avoided when I didn't want to. The Protectorate as an organization quickly took center stage, particularly because of Fred and Wasabi, who both seemed interested in the multitude of heroes and powers, and the organizational logistics of such a project respectively.

By the time I was running out of distractions to some of the more pointed questions, the medication was kicking in, injury and weariness taking its toll. Even the emotional strain was showing on Honey Lemon, who was the first to fall asleep, sprawled on a long chair in a position that would leave her with a crick in her neck by morning. Baymax picked her up and took her to another bed where she would be more comfortable.

I took my leave then, feeling Heathcliff's eyes on me as I moved to sleep in another guest room.

A rather anticlimactic end to the team's first 'defeat' as it were.

Explaining to Cass the next day how I'd lost my arm and how Hiro got a concussion from a car crash was interesting… pictures of my handiwork on the car offering decent enough 'evidence' to backup the story.

She wanted to take Hiro to the hospital, but the boy's assurances that he was 'fine' along with Baymax reassuring that he was recovering well (and that the nursing bot was taking care of him) made her relent. A good thing, considering the complications a hospital visit would bring. I just had to make an order to the hospital for a new prosthetic. The old one was getting a bit slow anyway.

The next few days the team was quiet, laying low, but they were also making preparations in their own way. Gogo, Wasabi, and especially Honey Lemon were looking over new designs and new schematics to try to upgrade on their own again. It seemed like they were beginning to understand, constant improvement of their tech was the only way to stay ahead of the 'bad guys'.

Especially since the bad guy that beat them got away.

He'd be back.

We all knew it. Someone like that didn't just give up and I hadn't injured him nearly enough to cripple him permanently.

Quietly, I started making my own preparations, gathering my swarm again into being a proper weapon.

Fred had already ordered Darwin's Bark spiders at my request. Fred was surprisingly amenable to the request, much to Wasabi's horror. He seemed only somewhat placated by the fact that I just wanted them for the silk. I… refrained from asking Fred for bullet ants and Brazilian Wanderers and bombardier beetles. For now at least. Brown recluses, fire ants and a fresh brood of Black Widows would do well enough. There was a place in the park with wasps to go with the common bees I'd already gathered.

I would be ready when I needed them next.

Which would be sooner than we'd expected, apparently.

My eyes drifted upwards.

Across the street, three buildings north…

Hiro was not an unknown face, with his inventions and the science expo. I'd expected this. Just not this soon. This guy must have had quite the information broker or computer program to find Hiro's civilian life so quickly.

I measured my options, thinking of a plan even as I began to move my insects as discreetly as I could, searching for minutes as I took and handed out orders from the people in front of me. Until my bugs hit something that 'shouldn't' be there.

One… two… three drones by my count. I searched a while longer, finding nothing else.

Judging by their distance, their cameras were pretty powerful. But the rest of their sensors must have been lacking; Headhunter didn't move as I detected them. If he implemented defenses for bugs, he apparently hadn't placed them on his drones.

I kept serving the customers, my smile feeling easier than it probably should have, easier than I'd found it to come on a normal day as I kept a facade of perfect calm.

Cass was in the store with me. I placed small insects on her, hiding in her apron, in her hair, clinging to the side of her shoe.

A plan started forming in my mind, 'watching' the hitman cautiously drawing closer as I served another coffee.

I moved my insects into position, counting the seconds until I could leave for my twenty minute break. I didn't usually take it, but I'd rather this guy not get impatient and bust up Cass' shop trying to get to me. The only thing that had likely stayed his hand so far were the customers. The more people in a place, the higher the chances something could go wrong.

Finally, it was twelve forty, and I took off my apron, slipping into the kitchen for a moment and grabbing a knife off the wall rack. I slipped it into my clothes. "Cass," I called to the woman. "I'll be right back; taking the break today."

She blinked, clearly surprised. "Oh… uh yeah ok, no problem."

I hung the apron up on the hanger, marching out from behind the counter and out into the street.

As expected, the drones, and the man controlling them, followed. I moved quickly, though not fast enough to make it obvious I knew where he was.

Then, three blocks away I turned my head and looked straight at one of the drones, felt him shift in surprise in the rooftops above before I gestured for him to come closer.

Then I swarmed the three drones. A small collection of spiders carried by their flying cousins arrived unseen, dropping hastily crafted, sticky silk onto the rotator blades keeping the drones aloft.

The silk caught and twisted quickly, tangling in the blades before locking them in place. The three drones sputtered and fell straight out of the sky.

I kept an eye on the man as I slipped inside an old abandoned building that must have once been used for storage of some kind. I'd already mapped out the layout completely, had the insects eat the wires and cabling of the lights and the cameras. I was fairly sure they were useless anyway, but better safe than sorry.

I slipped into the shadows, reaching to the back of my waist to pull free Cass' favorite, sharpest knife.

Not the best tool for dealing with power armor, but it would do well enough.

I remembered how he tracked Hiro through the store just a week earlier.

Was that infrared? Sonar?

Didn't matter either way. I called more of my swarm to me, coating the walls with the insects as quickly as I could, keeping their wings flapping.

Most people didn't realize how hot insect bodies were. Add to that the sound of wings and it would do well enough to scramble those detection tools.

He hesitated, clearly he'd expected to catch me completely off guard, or to at least be able to track me. I could see him pacing over the rooftop before he finally decided to move closer.

He was careful, I'd give him that. He circled the place, looking in through the windows, trying to scout the inside himself before he finally entered through a rooftop window, rocket boots keeping him in the air long enough for him to plant his feet on an iron support structure that held up the metal roof.

Too far for me to stab this time. I was a bit flattered.

He spoke. "You are certainly more capable than I would have ever given you credit for."

I didn't answer. My swarm did

"What. Do. You. Want."

Every word was measured. Pointed. A thousand wings, legs and chittering mandibles moving in unison to project my voice and bounce it around the walls to make it impossible to find me.

Watching him shift in that instinctual, unnerved fear was just a bonus.

"Most impressive," his own deep voice responded. "How did you develop this technology? Where are you hiding the control device? Was it Hamada?"

"Answer."

The hitman chuckled.

Then, with a snap of a compartment at his hip he reached in and pulled out-

A file.

He dropped it like a brick into the abandoned warehouse and it hit the floor with an echoing thump.

"His name is Arthur Cheng," he drawled. "He is the leader of the local Triad. My employer."

The question that came to mind was simple.

"Why?"

He shrugged. "You are a young woman who attacked and won against someone in military grade power armor with nothing but an iron rod and insects. Killing you would be a waste of your talents."

My eyebrows rose into my hairline.

Was… was he offering me a job!?

"What do you say Miss Hebert? You and I… we can accomplish a great many things."

He really was…

"Your skills would be quite useful."

He didn't know what he was asking. Smart of him to ask though.

"No."

He was silent, before I heard a chuckle and I suddenly had the distinct impression he'd expected that answer.

He shrugged. "Fair enough. Until we meet again, Miss Hebert."

He activated his rocket boots, secondary compartments snapping open to vent the heat before slamming shut again. Looks like he'd caught onto my trick of trying to clog the vents in the previous design.

"You saw his face."

He paused, looking down into the mass of insects. "Clearly; If I wished to use that information, I would have." He shrugged. "I suggest… that you move on what I've given you quickly.

With a snap of the heat sinks venting again he took off into the sky, shooting out of the skylight where he'd come in. He soared into the air, the insects I'd tagged him with disappearing with him as he slipped out of my range and faded, using camouflage.

I sent my insects to the file, hundreds of roaches, ants and other bugs crawling all over it, inside of it, tasting what they brushed across, searching for a trap, anything strange.

But there was nothing, and after a moment I felt it was safe enough to approach, picking up the manila envelope and opening it at the top.

A picture was the first thing I saw. And another.

A man, sitting at a dining table with his wife and children with a large lake in the background. And then that same man watching two Chinese men in black beat the ever living hell out of a police officer outside a log cabin.

"Well," I muttered. "Hello, Mr. Cheng."

Chapter Text

Interlude: Big Hero 6

So…

Powers.

That was apparently a thing now.

Real, honest to god Powers. Superpowers like the ones in Fred's comic books.

She was still (tentatively and more scary than ever) under the category of 'Friend'.

But what did that make her?

Human? Subhuman? Mutant? Metahuman? A different species entirely? An alien? What new category did this make her? And could it even be a category if it was just her in the box?

He didn't know. And it was kinda driving him to complete distraction if he was being perfectly honest.

Everything had a place and a category. Or at least it should.

Why couldn't things in his life just do as they were supposed to do and fit in the neat boxes he put them in?

He shook himself out of it. Those were thoughts for another day. Right now, he had work to do. That Magna status wasn't gonna earn itself in his graduation.

He'd already developed plasma cutters, Hiro's design had managed to make them, effectively, hand held weapons that could cut through anything, but it still needed refinement. If he could design a system that would recognize what to cut and what not to cut, it would allow plasma blades to be used virtually everywhere, from kitchens to construction work, designating a substance that the blades could be used on when needed, or powered down when not was the next step of the goal.

He had everything he needed to get to work. A notebook for notes, a sketchbook for designs, his workbench and tools and…

And…

And there was a fly on his desk.

Wasabi's hand slowly reached for the fly swatter.

Then… a thought.

The hand veered from the swatter into his pocket, fishing out his cellphone.

He dialed.

It rang once… twice…

"Lucky Cat Cafe."

That was not Ms. Cassandra's voice.

"Taylor…" he ventured. "Is this your fly?"

The fly stared at him.

Wasabi got the impression it was smiling… somehow.

"Wasabi," she said slowly, as if she was talking to a rather dull-witted child. "I'm halfway across town. My range doesn't go that far."

"How do you know where I am then, huh!?" he asked. "How do you know I'm not just a few blocks from you? Does your range go a few blocks?"

"Because today is Monday. And you stick to your schedule like a fanatic to his dogma…" She continued to speak very slowly. "Which means, at this hour you're in your lab, and will be for the next hour and thirty seven minutes…"

…

...

"It's one hour and thirty six minutes…" he muttered. "So… I can swat it?"

"I've got spares."

The crackle of the phone coming down on the receiver told him she had hung up. He was sorely tempted to call back to ask for clarification if that meant that this fly was in fact hers and she just didn't care.

Could she read its memories? When it got back into range would she get an upload of everything it'd seen and heard?

She said her Thinker rating was just two but what was a two on the Thinker scale? Maybe a Thinker five was omniscient and a thinker ten was multiverse omniscient or some crazy shenanigans like that. Thinker two could mean anything now that he thought about it, from just thinking faster to being able to spy on people's entire week by just putting a fly in their room and passing by every once in a while.

"Ok. Ok. Just breathe Wasabi." He swallowed thickly. "You're goin' down the rabbit hole here. If she could do that she'd have… no… no she probably wouldn't have told us." He paled.

Picked up the phone and dialed again.

"Lucky Cat cafe."

"Taylor…" he squeaked out.

A sigh of aggravation. "Just. Swat. The. Fly. Wasabi."

Wasabi's face went a very odd shade of grey.

"Holy crap you really are spying on us!"

"I'm going to hang up this phone now," she said. "You do not want to call back until I'm done with my shift. Finish your project or that Hasegawa guy is gonna make you look like an idiot with his."

That made him stand up straight. "Wait! What? What's he making! How'd he get the power converter to-"

She hung up.

Wasabi immediately grabbed hold of his pencil and paper, moving towards his workbench to continue his work…

The fly was still there.

He looked around, searching everywhere, and looked back to the fly.

It looked back at him, daring him to make the first move.

Very carefully, Wasabi placed his equipment at his corner of the workbench and left the fly alone.

(X)

"Man," Fred said, rambling to himself as he sat atop his special place.

Outside of his den and bedroom, he had a special super den all to himself. He had told Heathcliff he needed complete isolation before coming here, so he should be good for a few hours. He took a deep breath, and exhaled as he sank into his humongous mass of pillows.

The Pillow Mountain of the Mind, he called it. He would have called it Mind Pillow Palace, but that sounded lame. Not nearly as cool as "Pillow Mountain of the Mind"!

And he gazed up at the stars adorning the ceiling of his old nursery. It was always a nostalgic thing laying here… and it was where he did his best thinking. On his pillow mountain of the mind...

Nodding in satisfaction that the pillow mountain was of suitable softness and fluffiness, Fred closed his eyes and began to think.

There was something he had to come to grips with. It'd been something itching at him for a good long while but that fight with that Headhunter guy and talking with Taylor after really brought it to crystal clear clarity.

Firstly how everyone in this group… kinda does their job. And they do a pretty good job of it.

And that he needed to read more comic books.

He didn't have the know-how or technical science stuff like his friends but what he did have was comic books, the great library of imaginations and words that clearly foresaw all of this awesomeness and laid out in picture perfect panels entire strategies on how to beat tough enemies or old enemies with new tricks. That's what he had to contribute to the team. Creative thinking… it'd be so much easier if he could make a portable version of the 'Pillow Mountain of the Mind.'

"If I was your enemy, it's how I would have taken you out."

He also remembered Hiro's words from over a year ago when they were fighting Callaghan at KreiTech.

"Look for a different angle!"

He had to do the same thing. It wasn't like he was going to become a machinist and learn to upgrade his own gear in a few short weeks so this is what he had to do… hell, just thinking this already showed he was on the right track…

Taylor found a new angle by imagining how she'd eliminate them… he could do that, it'd help him know what weaknesses the team had to cover.

Perfect!

He lay on the pillow mountain of the mind and let his imagination start to wander.

He imagined himself as a great monster on the loose, wreaking havoc and taking down heroes left and right as he sped down the boulevard. Some Android SWAT-man batted aside. Some G.I. Josephina chick tossed into a dumpster. A Hypergirl knock off being sent off with a swing of a lightpost, like a home run. And then…

The Big Hero Six. Yeaaah, that's more like it!

"Behold! For Fredzilla has thwarted countless foolish heroes like you. What chance do you mangy brats have at-"

Tracergirl had already attacked the eyes, stunning him, along with Wasabi slicing up his legs. He was bound by the foam of Chemistress, and Big Red came flying in with a fist.

"Whoa!" Fred broke out of his trance, breathing. "Okay… maybe cut back on the monologue?" It was cool though. Established character… but it was just gonna get him punched in the face… hmm… Maybe just keep it like a one liner? Headhunter used one.

"Okay, back to the beginning." He closed his eyes, and again. Same sequence. Same heroes being batted aside. Big Hero 6 arrive.

"No fun and games! It's go time heroes! Meet you—Waaah!" His head was clobbered by Chemistress, he was pinned by a falling lightpost cut by Wasabi while Tracergirl kept him magnetized to the ground. And Big Red again, rocket punch to the face.

"Gah." Fred opened his eyes. "Okay…. Shorter one-liner… and..." He snapped his fingers…

Same sequence. Same heroes being batted aside. Putting a kitten in a tree. Big Hero 6 arrive.

"Rumbling time!" And he got the jump on them! He was holding his own…

It looked like they were responding to every move! Every swipe and kick they dodged until Chemistress sealed off a a street. With a wall of that jello stuff she used… and then another. And another. And then another!

Tracergirl now ran around the new walls, tossing her taser discs at him… would those hurt through the suit?...

Hmmm… something to check.

RESULTS!

He went back to his mental image.

Fredzilla getting dizzy before he saw Wasabi finishing circling around. Trying to flank him and get him by surprise. As Fredzilla regained his composure, Big Red was nowhere to be seen.

Except when he looked up and got robotic fists in the eye.

Fred let out a groan. "Okay." He clasped his hands together. "Time and a place for cool monologues. Against us with Taylor on board." He made a gesture. "Not gonna happen. Villains and bad guys don't monologue. Why should I? Okay." He reached over, grabbing a night-cap and placing it over his eyes. This should help with his immersion.

"From the top." As he rambled and went through his mental simulations, a fly was in the window sill, watching as he went through his mental 'simulations' over and over again.

(X)

Laura Rodriguez had learned to always look on the bright side of life. Her parents had taught her that while she was growing up.

But right now… She couldn't imagine what her parents would think. Would they be proud? Scared silly? All she knew is that they were often supportive of her growing up and always helped her on the road to her dream but… what she was doing was dangerous. Their last fight had brought that into complete, perfect clarity more than anything before it. Even Professor Callaghan had never scared her like that.

Sitting in that van, hearing it, watching it… feeling helpless to stop it or help her friends.

She felt they were all going to die like Tadashi.

It was hard to look at the glass half full thinking about him, or that fight.

If it hadn't been for Taylor…

Another confusing thing…

She was grateful, make no mistake, and she definitely considered Taylor a friend but Laura wasn't stupid, and she wasn't oblivious to certain… issues that Gogo reminded them about whenever the subject was brought up… she just… addressed them differently.

Taylor reminded her of this… dog she'd seen when volunteering at the shelter once. Always on edge, if you walked up behind it, it jumped, if you got too close and it didn't know you it's lips curled back in a quiet snarl and when it decided to bite… well…

It was hard to stay optimistic when she took it all in. Hard to not just hang up her proverbial cape and opt out of this and try to convince the others to stop before it got them hurt. This had been reckless, stupid even.

But then she'd remember what Tadashi said.

Someone has to help.

Knowing his last words to Hiro felt almost like a violation, especially since she was pretty sure knowing it by overhearing Hiro in a private moment was a violation of privacy, but she did know it… and understanding why Hiro did this and devoted so much of his time and effort to it became easier with that.

And it was the same thing rooting her in her place now, worrisome thoughts and all.

Life had handed her a lemon… maybe a lot of lemons. So what she had to do now was make lemonade.

She looked back to her purse designs. The blueprints were clear, with little notes in angular, sharp handwriting on the side, Hiro's handwriting. Little modifications he'd made spur of the moment to make the thing function.

It had to be improved. She had to improve it.

The second she'd lost her chempurse she wasn't Chemistress anymore, she was just Laura. The ditzy dumb blonde happy-go-lucky SFIT student. Playing dress up in Halloween tights and a helmet.

Taylor told her she was too easy a target. Armor was something to be looked into but right now she had to get rid of the most glaring problem of her 'delivery system' and the weakness it represented.

She looked over the blueprints. She frowned, biting on the edge of her pencil.

She wanted to call Hiro to bounce ideas but she remembered that Hiro was working on his own tech right now. Taylor was absolutely insistent that he have a weapon. Any weapon, before the week was out.

A thought came to her… almost like an epiphany...

She saw Taylor's number. Maybe she can help? She wasn't an engineer but… she had more experience than all of them combined in this sort of thing it seemed. Would she be upset if she called?

Honey shook her head. Just because Taylor reminded her of that dog, didn't mean Honey had to treat her like it.

She pressed down on the "Call" button.

"Hello?"

"Hey Taylor, it's Honey Lemon, I wanted to talk to ya on some advice… Can we meet up? Are you free?"

There was the shuffling of something at the other end, Taylor's voice calling out an order to a customer before she answered.

"My shift ends at four, bring the purse."

(X)

The bike chain rattled with its signature sound as Gogo drew it to a stop at the red light intersection. Delivery now complete, she could afford to take it a little slow, listening to music through her headphones as she let out a long, slow breath, seeing just the barest hint of it fogging in the crisp cool air of late autumn, the jacket on her back read "Aiya's stew," her grandparents' shop. A little hole in the wall. Almost a food stand more than an actual shop. Ramen, udon, if it came in a bowl her grandparents sold it.

She didn't mind the work, didn't mind helping. It was exhausting at times, especially given her more recent… activities but her grandparents with barely a penny to their name took her in when there was no one else and worked hard to put her through school. Making deliveries three times a week was the least she could do.

They couldn't afford a car, so bikes, skates, even the occasional skateboard were her tools to get around town. She'd been doing it since she was sixteen, and that's how everyone always saw her. Going past skyscrapers. Going past parks. Until her grandmother's typical goodbye in half broken, accented English just stuck. "Go. Go," she would say, waving her away before ducking back inside to cook some more, or tend to the register.

In Gogo's life, there were a few things that she valued very much. Things that she would go to great lengths to try and keep safe or help. Her grandparents were one of them.

Her friends were another.

Tadashi had been her friend, and when he died she'd been… angry.

At him, at the pointlessness of it all, hell, for a brief time she'd even been angry at Hiro. They'd been there because of his invention. Then she realized how stupid she was being and that feeling drained out of her.

She'd lost her… friend. Hiro had lost his brother.

When she found out, when she saw Callaghan behind that mask, for a second she'd contemplated letting Hiro do it. Letting him order Baymax to "Destroy" him.

Then she'd looked at his face. Not at Callaghan's, but Hiro's, twisted in rage, something dark in his eyes, and she realized she couldn't let him do this.

Let the courts handle him, not Hiro. Not a fifteen year old kid. That shouldn't be him. And she was glad she'd snapped out of her own anger in time to help him avoid making the biggest mistake of his life.

It wouldn't bring Tadashi back, it wouldn't make Hiro happy.

Leiko wanted to protect her friends. She wanted to help them.

And then there was her.

Literally dropping into their lives from nowhere, with long black hair and looking like a twig after she rehabilitated. With glasses that framed eyes that Gogo could just see were observing them. Not looking, not watching. Observing. Looking for something right from the beginning.

She knew it from fucking jump that Taylor Hebert was trouble. Two bullets in the back of your head doesn't happen unless someone's got a serious hatred for you, or you're just that dangerous.

She didn't trust her back then and and she didn't now. Truth be told, until she stopped looking at them with eyes that just seem to hold a quiet sort of malice Gogo doubted she would ever be able to trust her.

She protected Hiro, there was no doubt about that. She got up with nothing but a crowbar and some flies and made a military-trained hitman run from her.

Respect her? Perhaps. Be wary of the skills she'd been clearly hiding? Certainly.

But trust, especially towards someone who was an admitted villain; that was another thing entirely.

She would protect her friends. Taylor may not have been the kind of threat Gogo had thought. She was not Callaghan.

But she might just be the Gogo that would have let Hiro 'Destroy' him.

The light turned green, she pedaled once and rolled quietly down the hill heading home.

(X)(X)(X)

"You don't need full functionality Laura."

Taylor's voice was added to the backdrop of noise, marching down the steps to the team's "headquarters" AKA Fred's basement. Honey Lemon was right beside her, slurping on a fruity iced drink. Taylor had a cup of coffee.

"But what about the purse's drawbacks?"

Hiro turned his attention back to his project. It was almost finished. A lot of hours had gone into it. The axe Headhunter left behind didn't lend itself to disassembly or repurposing easily. The blade/head itself was made of some kind of titanium alloy mixture, probably nickel or a few other metals. Hard and light while being supremely conductive for the electrical addition the man had added into it. Melting that down had taken the most time.

Not enough to go around for all of it so the outer shell would have to suffice, protecting the more delicate inner workings.

The shaft and grip had been another issue. Carbon fibre, flexible, shock absorbent, with an array of sensors and power dampeners and safeties to avoid short circuits or the electrical system in the weapon turning back on its wielder, things he implemented in his own design of course but that he had to make more of since it was a bit more complex than an axe head.

"The purse still has those drawbacks but the answer isn't to just shift all of its functions to something else. All you're doing then is giving the enemy a different target."

"So what would you suggest."

"Small things." Hiro caught Taylor's half shrug as she sat down on the leather couch, taking a sip of her coffee. "Backups, emergency stashes, surprises. If someone gets your purse it doesn't mean you have to be completely disarmed. Keeping some emergency reserves in your hand, something explosive maybe."

"Oh. Like maybe keeping the mixture of my sticky grenade stashed in some cartridges in my gloves?"

"Sure. Anything that can help you in a pinch when the enemy gets close. Maybe put something near your helmet, that way when you're face to face with someone you can just activate it and hit them. They get a faceful of whatever nerve agent you put in there."

"That's a really good idea. I'll have to put in some kind of deployable mask so I don't breathe it in too and put myself to sleep, but I can definitely see that." Honey's voice held that tinge of excitement again and he himself tried to shove the ideas Taylor was putting in his head in order to focus on finishing the last bits of this.

The left servo was a little loose, not quite closing right.

Reaching for the tiny tiny screwdriver to his right he reached in to make his adjustments, praying he wasn't about to break absolutely everything, or worse, drop the screwdriver in there.

"Sleep. That works," Taylor mumbled, taking another sip of her coffee.

"Oh hey!" Laura perked up. "What about some kind of weapon, like maybe a collapsible baton?"

"It never runs out of ammo." He could almost hear the smile in Taylor's voice and Hiro got the distinct impression that Honey Lemon's suggestion was met with a bit more enthusiasm than others.

Suddenly, a door slammed open startling Hiro enough that he nearly lost his grip on the tiny screwdriver, which would have sent it tumbling into the delicate machinery below.

He brought his head up and glared, finding Fred standing at the open door, with Baymax and Wasabi behind him.

"I. Will never wear anything else again."

Laura suddenly scrambled around to get a good look at them, ogling over the back of her chair. "Is that… silk."

"I've made each of you an undersuit," Taylor drawled. "Should stop knives and small calibre bullets. Don't test it against anything bigger than a handgun though."

"...You can make full silk clothing?"

"Spiders fall under my power last I check—Hey!"

Honey grabbed onto Taylor's arm, about ready to bodily drag her away before said arm slipped free and kept going, leaving a rather irritated-looking Taylor on the couch, half her coffee going with Laura.

"People really have to stop doing that."

Hiro heard Honey in the other room.

"I am going to try on absolutely every—Huh? Taylor?"

"You could actually make a lot of money with this ya know?" Wasabi put forward, stretching to get a feel for the fabric. "Real genuine top of the line silk… Oh yeah. You could make a killing in the market."

Taylor opened her mouth, then clicked it shut. "Oh. Right…" A smile started to tug at her lips. "Your government hasn't exactly… caught up with how parahumans can affect economies."

Wasabi seemed to blink, and if Hiro were any judge, his friend was doing a mental calculation of just how many dominoes he'd just knocked over in the economic chain by giving Taylor ideas…

Fred stepped up beside Hiro, covered head to toe in dark silk. His eyes shined. "Ohhh, is that what I think it-"

"Yup. Now shut up, it's almost done," he confirmed, grabbing the welding torch. Just one last panel to seal up.

"I trust-" Taylor's voice almost ruined the final touch, startling him with the sternness within it. She had stood up, and was stalking towards him much like a teacher bearing down on an unruly student. "That is the weapon you're supposed to make for you, right?"

Hiro cringed, almost curling in on himself. He looked back up and grinned nervously. "Kiiinda?"

Taylor's glare could cut through steel. Someone so skinny and with glasses *really* shouldn't have looked that intimidating but she did.

He held up his latest project as a peace offering.

Taylor raised a slender eyebrow.

Seeing as how she wasn't chewing his head off, he decided it was relatively safe to show.

Getting off his chair from the workbench Hiro stepped forward, 'weapon' in hand.

"I drew it off of your fittings so there should be zero problems with the size." He smiled, holding out the gleaming metal arm.

"The alloy is extremely lightweight and durable. I got custom neuro links so it should be much more dextrous and fluid. It's got an inner compartment where you can store something small, a grappling hook and a little something something I think you're gonna like." He beamed.

Taylor frowned. "I'm staying mad at you." She looked like she was about ready to cross her arms when she realized it wasn't quite going to work out with Honey Lemon still in possession of her prosthetic… and her coffee.

She reached for the offered limb instead.

"You can't bribe me with a grappling hook and-" The second the neural links connected, the blade he'd hidden along the outside of the wrist sprang forward, her whole new arm crackling with electricity.

"It can double as a taser," he explained, sounding just a little bit cheeky.

Taylor looked like she was trying very, very, very hard to keep her word about staying mad at him as her fingers flexed and she brutally smothered the faintest hint of a smile that threatened to spread over her features like wildfire to dry kindling.

She swiveled her eyes around and glared at him.

He smiled.

"I'll let it pass… once. If the next thing you make isn't something I can see on your suit I will dismantle the arm myself. Or smack you with it."

Somehow he doubted the former. The latter? Probably.

Feeling rather pleased with himself, Hiro turned back to his workbench with a spring in his step.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

4.2

Napa airfield, according to simple common sense, was big. As most airfields were. Miles and miles of empty runway in all directions.

I didn't like it. It was too big. My range couldn't cover all of it. Sheer size could give snipers or lookouts and backup a hiding place.

I'd have loved to scout the area beforehand, but an open airfield was just that, open. If they had people looking and checking in on the warehouse they'd likely see it. And this was our best shot at Cheng. Too good of one to let it slip.

There was also another, very distinct problem.

"Dude this is so messed up."

"What is?"

"Everything Fred! I mean. How are you not worried about this!? They've been watching us for weeks! And then she just doesn't say anything?"

"… You do know that she's got probably got a bug listening on us right now, yeah?"

"Wha-Nah she…"

He trailed off.

I decided to spare Wasabi and myself the headache it would entail to offering a pointed look out of the corner of my eye, focussing instead on testing the responsiveness of my new limb one more time before picking up the articles on the table in front of me and marching to another nearby room.

They were angry, all of them were. I could almost taste the disquiet in the air. From Gogo's palpable anger as she put on her gear to Honey Lemon's uncharacteristic silence.

They were focussed for now on the job we had to do however, which was enough. It's what I wanted. Everything else could be dealt with later. Secondary.

I closed the door behind me, beginning to change out of my clothes as I listened to Hiro call Honey Lemon and the others over, apparently having downloaded the floor plans to the particular warehouse we were heading for in Napa. Warehouse Twenty Six.

He was attempting to come up with a breaching plan.

"If this is a trap and Headhunter's there, what do we do about it?" Gogo was the one who asked. Sensible.

"He gave us the information." Honey pointed out.

"That doesn't mean we don't have to get ready to fight him!"

"I have the crowbar framed on my bedroom wall. I could give it back to her."

I felt myself go perfectly still.

"Gogo's right and Even *if* Taylor can pull that kind of win off again, we can't just assume Headhunter hasn't prepared for her this time."

I nodded with a sound of approval in my throat at Hiro's words.

"Shouldn't we like… call her over? What's she doin in the other room?"

I- felt the bug shift on Hiro's back as he shrugged his shoulders. "Dunno. She probably has a bug on us or something, so I'm pretty sure she's listening to us right now…"."

A pause.

"Duuuude…" Was Wasabi's dismayed whimper.

"Look, one of the things that let Headhunter disable Baymax was a localized discharge that overloaded the suits systems, and used Baymax's own suit battery to power the surge. I've already installed some failsafes so, if he shows up, Baymax can fight him and we don't have to worry about that again."

"And I've got some things ready too." Honey Lemon declared, there was steel in her voice I hadn't heard before. "He's not gonna take me out of the fight with one swing again."

I hesitated as I went to slip on the silken glove of my prosthetic, realizing my mistake before making some fast modifications, cutting open a slit for the grapple and another for the blade along the side and underside of the wrist and cutting the fingertips off with a box cutter for the electric surge to pass through unimpeded.

Shoddy, hasty work. But it would do.

I slipped the glove on, testing how well they fit. With no fat or skin on the hand they were a little loose. Not to mention Hiro's design was altogether smaller than my regular prosthetic. Another modification to add in later.

"The north side of the building is almost solid wall. They won't expect a breach from there. Honey can freeze it, break it open for Wasabi and her to get in real close, Baymax, and I can come in through the east wall. If Fred and Gogo can wait by the main entrances south-"

"Leave the south side to me." I call as I marched to the door, opening it as I used my free hand to gather up the mass of my hair and place it to fall along my back rather than all over my shoulders.

Their eyes turned to me. Gogo was glaring, with Honey Lemon blinking in curiosity as Fred grinned like a loon.

Wasabi actually seemed to pale as Hiro's jaw dropped.

"What the hell is…" Hiro gestured.

I felt a smile tugging at my lips, bringing my hand up, the mask falling into place, staring at the world through yellow lenses again.

I felt… at ease. Nostalgic. I could feel butterflies in my stomach… or was it the spiders creeping down my back? I don't know… but it was an old, familiar feeling that made me feel tight. Wired.

"Leave the south side to me." I repeated.

(X)

"How much longer?" Fred's voice crackled through my ear. As I'd expected, he was too far for me to hear through my bugs, along with everyone else.

His impatience was reflected in the others, I was sure. They wanted in. They wanted this sword hanging over their heads gone. They were angry, and they were looking for a fight.

Not yet though.

"Heathcliffe you there?"

"Present and accounted for Master Hamada." The butler's droll voice responded through the comms, I heard a sound. The clink, clink, clink of a teaspoon stirring in a teacup.

"You still ok with the interface?"

"Quite. Miss Hebert's alterations to the system were not so drastic as to make re-learning them impossible. "

I only half listened to the butler, instead I focused my attention towards an interesting conversation inside.

"I paid you your fee, Mercenary. And you have the gall back out now?!"

I couldn't hear what was said at the other side of the line. But Mr. Cheng, or so I assumed given how people deferred to him, did not sound happy.

I could guess who was on the other end.

"One extra snot nosed kid doesn't justify you tripling the price of our deal! Not with what we had in place!"

Another pause, I turned my focus to the lower floor, finally feeling myself catch the last of the guards with some flies, marking their locations.

Almost...

"It's a one minute run from where we are to Cheng's hangar." I started, pressing my fingers to the radio. "Start approach. Baymax, Hiro, begin descent in thirty seconds."

Honey, Hiro and Fred offered confirmations. I didn't hear Gogo and Wasabi. But I was sure all obeyed.

"And what about the other half of our arrangement?

My eyes narrowed.

Other half?

Perhaps I needed to ask some questions when we caught Mr. Cheng.

There was a frustrated growl, followed by a phone being snapped closed. A burner phone probably, no one used flip-phones these days.

"Glad you footed my bill now?"

That was a woman's voice, I'd taken her for a lieutenant of sorts, but apparently she was another hired hand. One with a significant fee apparently.

Significant fees meant professionals and professionals in this place probably meant some sort of Tinker.

My fingers pressed to my ear, feet carrying me across the airfield runway, as a lookout turned away, yawning, bored and oblivious to the spider at the base of his neck.

"Cheng's hired some more help." I whispered.

"Another Headhunter?" Honey asked.

"Honey-Lemon. Supervillains are unique. It wouldn't be another Headhunter, it would be a wholly distinct super-"

"Fred." That was Gogo's voice.

"Shutting up."

I shook my head. "Cheng is in an office, second story, north west side. Twenty six men around the area. The gun shipment came into the hangar. Twelve of them are moving their merchandise, east side."

"Baymax and I should probably hit that side first then."

I nodded. "Guns aren't loaded, ammo crates are still on the private jet. Try and keep it that way If you can avoid Cheng's new help, try to."

"What's he look like?"

"Not sure." I admitted. "It's a woman though. Only three other women in the warehouse and they're handling the guns. So it should be easy enough to tell."

"But… if we're here to catch Cheng how are we-"

"I'll deal with her."

"Ohhhh boy.."

Fred sounded excited. I could almost picture him, giddily rubbing his hands together in anticipation.

I reached the warehouse wall, a feeling of anticipation crawling down my spine as my flesh and blood fingers clenched and unclenched, the prosthetic twitching with little clicks and whirrs.

I felt like I was breathing again after so long sucking down air through a straw.

It shouldn't feel this way. It should feel… different. Wrong. Like I was stepping back into a murky, oily filth. Instead it felt like my whole body was peeling off a shell, shedding flakes of dead skin to emerge renewed.

Fred and Honey slipped back into my range, I trailed my eyes upwards, seeing the small red dot that was Hiro and Baymax descending from the night sky.

I started to count the seconds, making a mental map in my head in regards to the enemy placements, weapons, lines of sight. The whole warehouse, top to bottom was clear in my mind.

"Baymax." I whispered. "Breach"

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

4.4

With practiced ease, I gently peeled the mask from my face, sighing as I savored the crisp breeze as it brushed past my face.

Masks. Great for face protection and hiding your identity. Terribly sweaty if worn for more than an hour.

I ran a hand through my hair, metal fingers scratching at my scalp. The sweat that had gathered along my hairline feeling unpleasant and sticky.

Safe to say, I needed a shower.

I paused and gave the air a whiff,

Scratch that. We all needed showers,

Behind me, the van's back doors were open. Wasabi and Honey were helping Gogo get to her feet. By now the adrenaline had worn off and the pain was in full swing. She'd pulled a muscle in her ankle. Nothing twisted but it looked painful, and the concussive force of the blast that Momakaze lady had set off seems to have hit her harder than me.

Should probably specify later that you should breathe out as much air as you could before a blast like that. Less internal damage that way.

Heathcliff moved like an efficient, well oiled machine, slipping off his black leather gloves for the clean white cotton ones of his 'official' job. Marching towards the large main computer and booting it up from sleep mode before smoothly turning and collecting an assortment of medical supplies from a cabinet, eyes perusing them before plucking them out with a quick decisiveness.

Baymax and Hiro finally walked in. With a press of a button on Hiro's gauntlet, Baymax's suit hissed open, the plump nurse bot's rotund body folding back to its default chubby state.

Just like that, the two split up, Hiro heading for the booted up computer, Baymax waddling towards the table where Heathcliff was arranging the medication.

Damien and Laura had gotten Leiko to one of the four metal gurneys laying her down as Fred moved to the other room to take off his costume.

I watched them, their actions almost second nature as Fred got out of his suit in a few seconds and walked over to take Honey Lemon's place beside Gogo.

They...we hadn't been hurt as badly as their fight with Headhunter. But it was clear they'd dealt with injuries before. It came with the job.

I knew that intellectually. It was another thing to see the evidence for myself with my own eyes.

"News of the Mister's and Miss' exploits, I believe, have reached the mainstream media." Heathcliff called from where he was arranging a collection of ice cold bottles of water and bits of dried food I couldn't recognize. An energy bar?

I looked to the man, black earpiece in his left ear, muffled voices emerging.

With some clicks on the keyboard, the screen of the computer Hiro was tapping away on switched tabs to the local news.

"-f right now Arthur Cheng is suspected to be the lieutenant of this particular cell of the Triad criminal organizatio-"

"-ost high profile arrest that can be attributed to the city's unique superhero team, the Big Hero Six since their debut almost two years ago-"

"-unsure at this time if this represented any significant leadership of the local triad activity-"

"-stions of the trial and appellate courts will come abound now that Cheng has cheated th-"

The talking heads rambled on. I listened, letting the words wash over me as the others (sans Leiko) gathered and listened too.

They'd always talked about the six like a… game for lack of a better word. This little novelty birthed in their city that was nice to look at. At least whenever I heard them.

This was the first time it seemed to carry real weight in their words. That they seemed to finally wrap their heads around this being a bit more than a 'fad.'

Finally, after about thirty seconds, Hiro closed the multitude of tabs, pulling off his helmet as he sighed wearily.

"We can watch all that later." He said as Honey walked out of the changing room, out of costume and back into her civies. "Wasabi, you get changed too. Honey, Fred, maybe you should help Gogo up to the living room? The long chair there is more comfortable. And Baymax has more room to work there.

"Sure thing boss." Fred tossed a thumbs up and a smile, reaching for Gogo to help her sit up. She did so with a grimace, hopping down off the gurney to balance on one foot as Wasabi retreated to the changing room.

They made it to the stairs before Gogo finally spoke.

"Hey Taylor."

I turned my head, looking at the typically taciturn speedster.

"Hmm?"

I saw her jaw work, like she was chewing on the words, looking down to the floor.

"Don't think I've forgotten about keeping us in the dark…" She finally said. I resisted the urge to sigh and grit my teeth, irritation warring inside me with the reality that it was indeed a conversation I'd put off and was always going to have-

"But…" She continued, bringing my thoughts up short.

The pause in her words was lengthy, and it looked like she would have prefered almost anything than to finish the sentence. "For… back at the warehouse. Thanks."

Oh.

I nodded, slightly taken aback. "You're welcome, Gogo."

She returned my nod, still looking unsure herself before she continued hobbling up the stairs with Fred and Honey's help,

Baymax waddled after them, medicine cradled in his big arms like a multitude of puppies.

I turned my eyes to Hiro.

His eyes met mine and he turned back to the computer without a word.

That clinched it.

He'd been acting strange since the capture. Thought it was just stress but this response told me there was something going on.

Likely with me.

Wasabi stepped out, breathing out in a huff. "I need a shower. All this sweat is…. Urgh." He shuddered.

I walked over to a nearby metal table

Wasabi looked to Hiro. "Momakaze was there. When did she get out?"

"Checking on it now." The teenager answered.

I pulled the gloves off my hands, silk folds falling onto the table in front of me.

I was slow, deliberately so. "Who was she?" I asked.

"Oh. Bout… six months before you started talking." Wasabi thought, nodding to himself. "We kinda got word of some tech being sold on the black market, we hit the spot and Momakaze was the thief that stole the tech. She wasn't suited up like… that though."

"And none of you told me about her?" I thought, not daring to say that outloud.

"She came ready." I said, sitting down to start unclasping my boots. "Criminals do that. They see you, develop counter strategies, and if you're not ready you lose. Keep upgrading your gear." I stressed.

He nodded. "I hear ya. Still, gonna go get cleaned up, changing room's all yours guys."

I was barely finished unclasping my second boot by the time Wasabi was out of sight, marching up the stairs.

Not long now.

I marched to the nearest chair, sat and waited.

Hiro kept his back to me, muscles rigid and locked.

I leaned forward, forearms resting on my knees, my mask by my side.

Minutes passed by, and I can tell he's stopping himself, trying to calm down, pushing all that anxiety under the rug of his mind.

"You have something to say." I spoke.

It wasn't a question.

From where I was sitting, I could practically feel his shoulders going completely tense, back ramrod stiff.

Slowly, he relaxed, head drooping low.

Then he turned around, looking at me in the eyes as I tilted my head to the left to face him.

"Did you think of leaving Gogo back at the warehouse?"

I blinked, my brain stuttering, taking longer than usual to register the question through the surprise.

He fidgets where he stands, but... there was...conflict twisting his face.

There was anxiety there, and anger.

Hiro was angry. At me.

"I… I could see everyone's vital signs. When I was trying to get our comms back up. Heartbeat, adrenaline. Got into the helmet cams… I could see her in trouble Taylor. And with all those bugs you were controlling, I know you did too!"

Ah. That.

I felt my own muscles unwind, relaxing just a bit.

"But you just stood there…" He accused, features tightening. He walked closer, standing in front of me and from where I sat leaning forward, he was just above eye level. "You stood and… just stopped right in the middle of the warehouse. You knew she was in trouble! And you didnt move!"

I looked at him, and his eyes were practically pleading with me to tell him otherwise, to tell him he'd gotten it all wrong.

He had… but he also hadn't.

I let out haggard breath, a hand rustling my hair as I pushed my locks back. Tired. Frustrated… disappointed.

"I told you… I wanted to stay out of this game." I spoke. "I wanted to for a reason..."

He didn't say anything, sensing that I had more to say. I was grateful for that. The words are difficult to enunciate properly as it was.

"I didn't stand in the middle of the warehouse because I thought of leaving her." I shook my head. "Her wellbeing. It wasn't even a factor in my mind… do you understand what I'm saying Hiro?"

I hoped he did. Even for me… I didn't want to have to spell it out. His eyes were now wide, shocked and hurt.

I heard the leather of his gloves creak, eyes trailing down to see his fists clenching tight.

"I was annoyed." I explained. "I was annoyed that I had to risk the goal to save her. To pull another's weight."

He looked like he didn't understand what I was saying, couldn't wrap his head around it. "Annoyed?"

I leaned back, shoulders pressing into the chair as I raised my flesh and blood fingers to massage my forehead.

I nodded.

"When I thought of it, and I realized what I was thinking... It kind of hit me like a train." I found a bitter laugh clawing its way up my throat.

My hand fell away, resting on the armrest as I looked into Hiro's eyes "I don't do Hero well." I shrugged, smiling at him sadly. "Think it was the same back… home."

"You saved us." He reminded.

I felt my lips twitch into a smile. "I did. Did it this time too. But this only gets worse. Before I kept you all in the dark, which you're still pissed about and I still feel was the right call. Today, I felt annoyed that I had to save one of you. What's my next step Hiro? Hmm? Where's the next rung on the ladder?"

I did a lot of bad things where I came from… scarred people for life, killed people, made them uneasy. Could happen here. Probably would, the longer I kept at this.

There was a silence between us in the shadowed basement, I looked into his eyes and he met my gaze unflinchingly. Braver than most. That much I knew.

"It's not my instinct." I admit. And I think it hurts to do so really. But it's the truth. "Maybe it never was." I shrugged. "Maybe falling in with villains early on was just the way it was supposed to be. That feels real when I remember it. Easy. Hero work… feels like I'm in costume. Wearing a mask. Like I'm trying at it rather than just doing it." I shrug. "I didn't want to come back… told myself that. Still do."

He was quiet, looking straight at me. I felt in that moment like I was being sized up, weighed and measured and I could almost see it… see that person that he could become if he stayed on this path he was on. See the Hero he would become.

It made me smile.

After a long interminable moment… he moved.

He turned away, and though I expected it, was counting on it, it still hurt. A pang went through my chest.

Then he kept moving and sat down in the chair next to mine.

For the longest time, he stayed quiet. I wasn't sure how long. Minutes at least.

Finally, he took a breath.

"Bad guys don't worry about not being good."

I blinked, my brain sluggishly trying to process the words.

"Callaghan..." He said, and I distantly recognized the name of the man that killed Tadashi, Hiro's brother. "He smiled to our faces… every day. Told us all sorts of things as our teacher. Made us feel like he cared about us. But when it came down to it… between his ambition and us?" He shrugged. "Tried to murder us, chased his own students into the bay where they could have drowned and didn't take a second look. He didn't care about it, about us. He didn't care about Tadashi. He just cared about his goal. He never gave it a second thought. He didn't hesitate. He didn't worry about what he was doing. "

I listened, looking at the young man out of the corner of my eye as we sat down in the dark, speaking of these things others shouldn't hear.

"You hesitated, you… you were annoyed." His head dipped. "But where did you go in the end Taylor?"

…

"Where did you go?" He repeated.

"I went after Gogo." I answered.

He nodded, resolute. "You went after her. And you helped her. And when I asked you… you could have lied. Said a thousand things. I don't know how your power works. For all I know the fires were confusing your insects, or you were checking for a bomb under the warehouse or something. But you didn't. You told me because you wanted me to know. Because you felt guilty about what you were thinking…"

He sniffed, and I realized he was crying as he wiped his eyes.

"Bad guys don't worry about not being good." He repeated. "You say being a Hero isn't your first instinct. Or that you're not a good person. Well…" His fists tightened in his lap. Then he offered a big smile.

"We can take it one step at a time til you get there!" He said, raising up, the garage lights behind him as he looked at me with those same eyes I could remember staring at me for months as I lay in a hospital bed. Patiently waiting for me to react, speak with him.

With that look… I knew he was serious.

He would stay right there by my proverbial bed side, until I was good and ready to take all these steps he was convinced I could take to reach that place he wanted me to reach.

I closed my eyes, releasing a breath.

I couldn't stop the small smile that tugged at my lips.

"You… really are… a Hero. You know that?"

His smile got a little brighter.

Chapter Text

Arc 4: End

Establishing Connection…

… 6278th dimensional cycle

Connection failed…

...6279th dimensional cycle.

Establishing Connection…

…6280th dimensional cycle

Connection failed…

(X)(X)(X)

Akande Dubeni was accustomed to traveling.

Given his profession, both of them, it was an inevitable fact of his life that much of his time would be spent abroad.

Even so, taking two round trip passages that lasted eleven hours per flight from South Africa to San Fransokyo in the United states in less than two months was…unpleasant. Private jet or no.

But if young Hamada could provide what he promised, then all this hustle would be worth it.

He took a breath, thinking back to that… unfortunate altercation weeks ago.

If his aim had been more sure, if Hamada hadn't turned in just the right way to glance the edge off the side of his helmet…

Well…

No use dwelling on that now.

Losing the business venture with Cheng, and his connections to the Chinese Government was a blow.

But one he would pay happily, many times over.

The plane descended, its downward plunge making his stomach lurch before the tires touched down with a jostling bounce. He could see the towering monolith of the city's signature bridge, wind power balloons dotting the city's skyline.

He prefered the methods of home, fields of solar panels as far as the eye could see. Perhaps the African landscape with its abundance of space had spoiled him, but the sky should not be so congested.

Too much metal, too much plastic and brick.

The jet slowed, the engines whirring on as the pilots negotiated their way through the San Fransokyo runways towards the private hangar.

He allowed himself a smile.

Perhaps he should have come through Napa. Word was there was still something of a show to be seen considering all the hardware inside.

(X)

The drive through the city streets was as he remembered. Slow, traffic laden, saturated with a shock of colors and cultures.

Signs in Japanese, Chinese, Korean, English, Spanish, all manner of goods and products from all corners of the world. Truly a melting pot of a city if ever there was one..

Perhaps there was a beauty that could be seen here, but it seemed to him little more than abject chaos with everything piled atop itself in a haphazard conglomeration.

How did anyone breath here?

Perhaps it was like that in most cities and it just seemed worse here with the clashing cultures.

Who could say?

"Sir."

Akande turned his eyes forward, towards his driver. His name was not Champ but that's what everyone called him. He'd been called Champ for years, and he could not recall a time when he was called anything different, or where the name had come from.

"Are you certain you do not wish me to take you to the hotel. You must be tired."

"Mr. Hamada has done me a service, my friend." He answered, smiling gently. "I promised him I would see him first thing when I arrived, and I am a man who keeps his promises."

Champ let out a breath through his nose, looking decidedly annoyed. "But the Hotel has a restaurant." He admitted before smiling cheekily.

Akande let out a snort. "Mr. Hamada's aunt has her own restaurant. I'm sure you can find something there if you're so hungry."

"It better be good." His driver warned, only half joking.

The man could be dangerous if you got between him and food.

"It will be."

"Oi, Boss." Champ gestured to the left. Akande looked, and found a billboard welcoming people to the city with the silhouette of the Big Hero Six flying overhead.

"You think we might get lucky and see them boss?"

He smirked. "Who knows my friend. We might just have fortune smile on us."

(X)

The Lucky Cat Cafe was as he remembered it. A humble, quaint enterprise nestled at the corner of a busy intersection, two blocks from the nearest subway entrance, three from San Fransokyo's iconic railcar lines, planted directly between the the section of the city that was mostly apartments, and the north end filled with businesses.

A good place. One that did decent business for simple people.

It would not lead to a luxurious life. It would not give them particularly impressive wealth, or any kind of power.

A dead end, of a sorts.

But it was an honest life. As close to true and good as most could get.

He could respect that.

Champ dropped him at the front door, most likely cursing the fact that he had to find parking in this city, a complaint he'd already made known every time he had to stop anywhere.

He took a breath, marching through the door.

And there she was.

The innocuous, unassuming cashier, racking numbers and prices with robotic ease, managing to turn her eye to him at just the right time to make it seem natural.

"Mr. Dubeni." She said, sounding mildly surprised.

Her acting at being 'normal' had gotten a bit better. But it still needed work.

Someone like her, someone with eyes like his, someone that fought so ruthlessly, that could bring to bear lethal force so readily; no.

She had likely seen him the moment he stepped out of the car.

He smiled, and to the whole world, not even the faintest shadow of his thoughts passed across his face.

He could act too.

And he had much more practice.

"Ms. Hebert." His voice matched his features, marching towards her with hands extended to shake her flesh and blood limb with a gentle warmth as he smiled. "How have you been, my dear?"

"It's been good here." She answered. "Hiro's out back for now. Can I get you anything while you wait for him?"

"Today's special, two, if there's any left." He replied, taking a seat by a lounge chair.

(X)(X)(X)

It would be nearly an hour before he would see hide or hair of the young inventor. More than enough time for even Champ to finish the offering of Red Shrimp soup, and strike up a rather amusing conversation regarding various seafood dishes with Miss Cassandra who was cleaning the shop for closing time.

She liked cooking them, and he certainly liked eating them.

When Mr. Hamada did appear, Akande was reminded, rather distinctly of the times when Aadhira had invented something new.

Covered in machine oil, grease, clothes damp with sweat and the five senses seemingly oblivious to the rest of the world, Hiro marched into the Cafe's main room and plopped himself down onto a stool beside the cash register, Miss Hebert absently cleaning a glass across from him with a slender, eyebrow hiking itself to her hairline.

"Got anything good left Tay? Mr. Dubeni's gonna be here soon."

"Is he really?" Miss Hebert asked, the corner of her lips twitching.

"Yeah. He's due at the airport at like… five or something.

"Ahem."

Miss Cassandra's cleared throat brought Hiro's eyes towards them.

After which he proceeded to turn to slate stone where he sat, face freezing in abject horror as Akande found it in himself to raise a coffee glass in greetings.

"Afternoon, Mr. Hamada." He smiled.

"Ah-Ahh. Mr! Dubeni! I-ah. How are you?"

"Full." He answered cheekily. "Your aunt makes a fine shrimp soup."

Cassandra beamed from behind the counter, "Why thank you. Now if only Hiro here could pick up my sense of punctuality along with my cooking skills, I'd count myself aunt of the year."

If young Hamada could look any more mortified, it would be quite a feat.

"You've been waiting…"

"For too long!" Champ suddenly chimed in. "Do you have any idea how many quarters I've had to put into the parking meter outside!? There goes my week's bonus!" His driver shrilled in exaggerated anger.

"I'm sorry, I'll reimburse you!" He swore and Akande nearly spit out his coffee as he choked down his laughter.

"Hiro." Hebert deadpanned beside him. "A) They're pulling your leg. B) Mr. Dubeni showed up hungry so even if you'd have been here an hour ago he probably would have been happy to eat before getting down to business. And C) You're currently getting oil stains all over my nice clean countertop…"

Hiro blinked, seemingly uncomprehending before looking down at the aforementioned piece of furniture, blinking stupidly at the black/brown stains that now marred it's otherwise pristine surface.

"I'll get ya a plate hun, with all the extra shrimps." Cassandra laughed, shaking her head as she marched back to the kitchen.

"I am shocked and appalled that you held out shrimps on me!" Champ called after her. "I am a paying customer."

"He's got seniority!" She answered back.

Hiro seemed to fidget in his seat. Which, given that it was a stool was a remarkable feat if he were perfectly honest. "It's. Ah. Maybe I should eat la-"

"Mr. Hamada." Akande smiled. "I am still finishing my coffee. By all means, eat first, business can come later."

(X)(X)(X)

Hamada's workshop was a modest thing, barely qualifying for the space of a garage that could fit two modest cars. A quarter of it was dominated by his computer set up alone, a custom build of course, the rest of it by the actual 'mechanics' side of robotic building. Including a jury rigged lift, power tools strewn about the floor, a rack of equipment on the far wall and more wiring and cable pieces than someone accustomed to the eccentricities of a roboticist could likely fathom.

There was barely any room to stand, but Akande could recognize "Organized Chaos" when he saw it.

It wasn't his prefered method to say the very least, but he was not stupid enough to attempt to correct the habits of a "Genius"

Not *again* anyway.

It did not end well the first time.

He really liked that car too.

Still, that aside, as Akande surveyed the shed, his eyes were instantly drawn to the tarp covered 'thing' in the corner. His impatience was almost a physical urge, begging him to reach out and rip off the tarp to see this piece of technology that might bring his wife a modicum of comfort and intellectual stimulation in these… waning days.

"Well." Hiro began, taking a seat in a chair that seemed far too big for him. "As you know, this robot is designed off of Baymax. I used him as a template for a lot of it. The AI, the Chassis, the medical equipment. There are differences but mostly cosmetic, it should work exactly like Baymax, not accounting for learned behaviors, experiences and-"

"I understand Mr. Hamada." Akande interrupted gently, smiling at the seated youth. "I'm sure whatever you've provided me with will meet my expectations just fine."

He fidgeted in his seat, before turning abruptly in the chair and began typing some commands on the computer.

The covered bundle moved, a soft yellow glow appearing at the top of it.

"One sec-" Hiro said, and Akande wasn't sure if it was directed at him or the… new arrival.

He moved, stepping closer to the bundle before pulling the tarp off of it.

"Greetings" The machine waved in a tone that sounded distinctly female, its accent a soft english one. "I am Personal Healthcare Assistant model 2.0B Specializing in home assistance and medical treatment. How may I be of use?

She was as tall as her elder brother, the Baymax model, and from what Akande could see, also inflatable. But where Baymax was rotund, this one had a more slender shape, its head a little more angular in its framework colored a soft pink.

"What do I call her?" He asked and noted that Hiro seemed distinctly appreciative of the question.

"I haven't designated her a name" Hiro answered. "Figured you and Ms. Aadhira should since she'll be yours now."

He smiled stepping forward, ready to introduce himself to the machine.

"Subject has a Folate deficiency..."

Akande blinked. "Pardon me?"

And, just as with Baymax, a holographic screen appeared across its chest. "Recommended treatment. Eat more Beets."

(X)(X)(X)

The paperwork would be finalized in just a few short days.

After just a few hours, any lingering doubts Akande had to the machine were erased. Her medical knowledge was extensive, and whilst she lacked social graces such as the concept of personal space (It had practically assaulted Champ when it noted every single bad habit his overweight Driver had been indulging in for the last decade) it was a quick study, needing only a suggestion here and there to correct its behavior thereafter.

It seemed to have a penchant for nutrition, more so than what he could recall of Baymax's behavior. It would scan them for dietary deficiencies and recommend various fruits or meats they could use to remedy it. So far, he had the aforementioned Folate deficiency, Hiro required more Fiber Champ had too many to list, Casandra needed vitamin B-12 and Miss Hebert required more iron and phosphorus.

He already liked the name 'Nutri' but he would let Aadhira decide before anyone else. It would be her nurse after all.

Standing at the counter, he watched as Champ tried to argue with the machine about her "exaggerating" his eating habits as Mr. Hamada was banished to the home above for a shower while Cassandra finished working.

"Everything you expected?"

Akande trailed his eyes, looking through his periphery towards Taylor Hebert, still minding the counter behind him.

"And more." He drawled. "I knew Mr. Hamada would not disappoint."

"Good to hear." Taylor answered. "You're lucky she didn't mention that knee when she scanned you. Hiro might have put it together at that point."

He froze.

He went deathly still, listening only to the sound of Ms, Hebert cleaning a particularly stubborn stain on the inside of the display glass.

There was a moment of silence between them.

"Don't look so scared." She said. "By my count. This makes us even."

He found it in himself to relax his muscles, fingers unclenching.

She'd chosen this moment when everyone was out of earshot. When the people around them were all distracted.

If she wanted to out him, she'd have done it.

"What do you want Ms. Hebert?" He'd dealt with blackmailers before. Rather permanently as well.

"Nothing." She said. "Like I said. This just levels the playing field. You can't use it over us, anymore than we can use it over you."

"We? Who else have you told?"

"That's my secret."

She placed her cloth on the countertop, and he turned around fully to face her.

She smiled. "Think of the next things I tell you to be… some unwritten rules if you will, Mr. Dubeni."

Well then. That was certainly a more interesting proposal than blackmail...

He smiled wolfishly, "You have my attention. Ms. Hebert."

(X)(X)(X)

Establishing Connection…

…7353th dimensional cycle

Connection failed.

Establishing connection

…7354th dimensional cycle

Connection failed.

Establishing Connection…

...7355th dimens-

Connection… established.

…

Connection established.

…

Programing Vectors…

Calculating projections.

Establishing acceptable host parameters.

Destination/

…

Destination/

…

Destination/

Agreement.