Hi! I'm waveringshadow and this is my first Big Hero 6 fic, as it's only been a few weeks since I saw the movie. Because of that, I'd like to apologise in advance for any inaccuracies. This is basically me procrastinating on my other major story, homework, exercise, you name it. I'll let you get on with reading, but I just wanted to let you know that this will be a two part short story. Thank you for reading!
Disclaimer: I do not own Big Hiro 6 or any of its characters.
The Phoenix, Part One
Hiro arrived home from the lab in the afternoon, dragging himself through the door and down to his workshop where he promptly collapsed onto the couch in a strung out heap after disposing of his backpack. It had been over two years since the death of Tadashi and the events that followed. He had grown a lot since then, almost able to rival Honey height wise. His face had matured and grown more angular, though older girls still cooed over his 'baby face', being rounder than the average male his age. He kicked off his shoes and hung his head over the arm of the sofa, his jet black hair falling back from his eyes and almost sweeping the floor as he arched his back. He then collapsed, shutting his eyes for a moment while he decided what he would do now that he was home.
"Hiro?" Aunt Cass' voice called from the outside the door, causing Hiro to jump upright, swiping groggily at his eyes. He looked around to find orange and pink tones coming through the open garage door, the clock reading 6:30pm. Where had the time gone? He half-heartedly tried to brush the hair out of his vision, only for it to fall back over his eyes.
"Yeah?" he replied, voice croaking slightly.
"You've got visitors!" Hiro swivelled around to see Honey Lemon lunge towards him in her usual fashion while the rest of the gang practically trudged in comparison behind her.
"Hi Hiro!" she cried, hugging him with enthusiasm.
"How's our child genius?" Gogo dead panned as she made herself comfortable in a nearby armchair. Wasabi rubbed Hiro's hair with his oversized hand and Fred perched on the arm of the couch, lightly punching his shoulder.
"Oh, the usual," Hiro shrugged running his hand through his ruffled hair. "What brings you here so late?"
Fred leant forward eagerly. "We have a Code 9," he informed Hiro, who just blinked blankly. Fred had insisted on having all these codes and procedures like something out of a spy movies which, unfortunately for him, no one had bothered to learn.
"Which one was Code 9 again?" Hiro asked, looking around at the others for help. Wasabi promptly moved over to the computer while Gogo elaborated.
"Supervillain," she started.
"Again?" Hiro groaned glancing around at the serious faces. Over the past couple of years they had versed about five 'supervillains', who all were defeated within the first 15 minutes or so of their tyranny. None of them could compete with the debacle with Callaghan and barely phased the group of young geniuses and their robot. They did run into trouble once, however, when Gogo accidentally nicked the shoulder of one of the villains, prompting her to exclaim in pain. Impelled by this, Baymax changed into nurse mode and nearly had his head lopped off by the irate woman. Though they had been unable to change this feature in Baymax, they did later give him better defences against crazy villainous ladies with large knives in hand.
"This one is different," Honey Lemon continued on from Gogo, "he has tech. Good tech. He can throw flames from his hands, directing fire like he can command it. He's already injured a small group earlier today, and he's been spotted heading towards the centre of the city."
"Here?" Hiro asked in alarm.
"Possibly," she nodded.
Wasabi moved away from the computer to reveal pictures of this villain. He wore a black suit, made out of something that looked like leather, and was probably fire proof. In the blurred picture you could make out a ball of fire forming in his hand as other flames flickered around him. The most alarming thing about him, however, was the scarring on his face, as if one half of his face had been melted, while the other was hidden by a mask that was decorated with flame like designs.
"There's something else," Honey started, trailing off when Hiro turned to look at her.
"What?" he asked, feeling incredibly confused by Honey's behaviour. Gogo stood up, shoving the much larger Wasabi out of the way as she came up beside Honey.
"This guy has revealed his name. Well, a name," she stated, softening her expression slightly so she appeared a bit less hostile.
"Let me guess, something lame. Flamo? Hotshot?" Hiro questioned, trying to lighten the mood and comfort himself as he got wide eyed looks from the others.
"He says his name is Hiro. Hiro Hamodo," Wasabi informed him, opening his palms towards him.
"Hamodo? Maybe it's a coincidence. If it was directed at me, why not just say Hamada?" Hiro's voice raised slightly as he tried to grapple with the new information. What was this man's design? His plan?
"I don't know Hiro," Honey Lemon replied softly, shaking her head.
"You know, this was always going to happen," Fred's voice called their attention as they all turned away from Hiro to see that he was still perched on the arm of the couch. "Once you've defeated the villain's first line of attack, they have to resort to a new angle and, more often than not, that is to discredit the hero," he explained.
He received blank looks from the others. "Are you suggesting that this is a villain we have already faced?" Wasabi asked.
"Yes," Fred said, pointing at Wasabi, then he faltered. "No, maybe, I don't know." He shrugged noncommittedly.
Gogo groaned and turned to face Hiro, who then swivelled his head to catch the eyes of the others.
'Suit up?" he asked, looking around the group.
"Yeah!" Fred cried, punching the air as the others nodded.
"Suit up," Honey confirmed.
"I'll get Baymax," Hiro offered, running back towards his apartment.
()()()()()
A somewhat comical scene followed, as they all tried to find places to get changed into their suits. After some shoving around and wrestling with tight lycra, they emerged, convening at the side of Aunt Cass' shop. The suits had not changed hugely over the years, though they had refined them, of course, and made some small changes here and there. Hiro emerged in his suit with the armoured Baymax.
"Which way?" Hiro asked. Hands on his waist, he looked out towards the street as if he would just spot the guy shooting past on a wave of flame. Unfortunately, or fortunately, that did not happen. Instead, Wasabi pointed towards the CBD.
"The news said that way, two minutes ago."
"Ready buddy?" Hiro asked Baymax as he climbed onto his back.
"Of course, Hiro," he replied simply.
"Mount up," he told the others, who proceeded to do so.
"Do the thing, Baymax!" Fred demanded as he hooked himself onto a leg. Baymax swivelled his head to look down at him, before playing a typical superhero fanfare as they were lifted into the sky.
"Oh yeah!" Fred cried, proceeding to pull hero poses. Wasabi rolled his eyes as he tried not to look down. It was better now that he was attached to Baymax the same way Hiro was, but he still did not like heights.
It was not long until they found the man they were looking for, surrounded by bright orange flames that reached up toward the sky as he stood in the middle of a square, people fleeing in all directions from him.
After a quick examination, Hiro began to give orders. It was a bit odd at the start of the Big Hero 6 that Hiro was in charge when he was so much younger than the others, but he really was the best at it. He did give the others a turn, but each time they ran into disaster. Honey Lemon got dazed and distracted, Wasabi got tongue tied whenever someone was in immediate danger, Gogo got frustrated with everyone and started yelling, while Fred… well, to their surprise, Fred was not too bad at it, with all his superhero knowledge from his comics and charisma. But that was also his downfall, all his knowledge was from comics and the laws of his fictional world did not always apply to this world. So the leadership reverted back to Hiro, who seemed to cope quite well with it all, despite being many years younger. Perhaps that was why he was so good.
"Fred, you go in first, you're the most fireproof. Honey Lemon, I want you to work on that fire."
Honey nodded and began coding in her chemical equation as Fred leapt enthusiastically into the ring of fire with an almighty roar. The flamethrower seemed a bit taken aback at the sight of his attacker, which was strange as the Big Hero 6 had become rather famous in Fransansokyo, and probably elsewhere as well. And if he knew who Hiro was, he probably knew about the Big Hero 6. However, after he had paused to boggle, the man of fire threw himself back into action, a ball of flames forming in his gloved palms.
"It's getting rather hot in here," Fred called through their communicators as fireballs whizzed past his head.
"Working on it," Honey Lemon replied, throwing one of her orbs at the ring of fire, causing half of it to go out as frosty ice took its place. The flamethrower looked alarmed by this, his head swivelling around rapidly in shock as the others landed behind Fred. Honey Lemon continued to put out the surrounding fire as they dismounted Baymax.
"Get ready to fight buddy," Hiro said quietly.
"Are you sure that is the best plan?" Baymax replied, never keen on violence.
"Uh-," Hiro began.
"Watch out!" Gogo cried flinging one of her disks at the mysterious man, causing him to dodge instead of throw his ball of fire at them.
"That is some serious tech," Hiro gasped in amazement as he got a closer look at the complex network of piping that came from a compact pack on the man's back and winding downs his arms to his hands.
"Can we admire the tech after we've disabled it?" Wasabi asked nervously.
"Okay guys, destroy that pack!" Hiro called out to the team.
The dark figure was yet to speak a word, yet he seemed to understand what they were saying as he sprung into a flurry of movement at Hiro's words.
Chaos ensued. Each of them flung their all into destroying the man's flame taming gear. The masked figure tried his best to fight them off, shooting flames in all directions. Honey continued to extinguish the excess flames, added to by Fred who was attempting to fight fire with fire, which was working poorly for him. Both Gogo and Wasabi were trying to slash at the pack as Hiro stood back and tried to coordinate them before they cut each other instead. And in the middle of it all stood Baymax simply regarded it all with no reaction.
"Come on Baymax, what are you doing?!" Hiro cried out to him as he dodged flames.
"Tadashi is here," he replied in his robotic voice.
"What?!" Hiro shouted in confusion, jumping back as Gogo shot past.
"Tadashi is here," Baymax repeated.
"Now is not the time for a philosophical discussion!" Hiro yelled, turning back to the concentration of their attack. He cheered as Gogo managed to slash the piping on one arm, extinguishing the flame in the masked man's right hand. He paused for a moment, startled by the malfunction in his machine. Wasabi took this opportunity to stick his laser blade into the pack causing it to spark and break down, but not before the villain threw his last fireball, shooting straight over their heads and into Baymax's armoured chest.
"Baymax!" Hiro shouted in alarm running over to the healthcare robot, who had fallen flat on his back. He began frantically removing the melting armour before it melted through and destroyed the robot inside. Honey Lemon and Gogo hurried over to help while Fred and Wasabi were left to guard the ex-flamethrower who had collapsed into a caved over kneeling position on the pavement, breathing heavily. Soon the armour was removed and the three helpers stepped back to assess the damage. Baymax appeared to be unharmed, though the armour was in ruin. Slowly, he stood himself back upright.
"Great," you could hear Fred say to Wasabi, "there goes our ride home."
Gogo turned and glared at him while Hiro ran to give the giant marshmallow a hug. "There, there," he comforted, patting Hiro on the head. Hiro laughed at his companion's antics.
"Baymax?" a broken voice called out from behind them. The whole group turned to look at the masked and scarred man who was staring at Baymax with round eyes. The team pulled out their weapons as the man slowly lifted himself from the ground, not taking his eyes off the white robot. Baymax moved forward so he stood right in front of the man dressed in black.
"Tadashi is here," he said. The man gasped as if in pain, while Honey Lemon turned to look at Hiro with a questioning look. He just shrugged and shook his head.
"Tadashi," the man repeated, tasting the word in his mouth, then moved forward to place his hand in the middle of the robot's chest.
"No!" Hiro protested, before realising the flamethrower just stood there, with his hand on Baymax's chest. The scarred man then turned to face Hiro.
"Who are you?" Hiro asked. "And why are you using my name?"
"Your name?" he asked.
"Yes. Hiro," Hiro responded, holding himself steady.
"Hiro…" the man repeated, just like he repeated Tadashi. "Take off your mask, Hiro."
"Mask?" he asked, before realising the man meant his helmet. "Only if you take off yours."
Seeing that the man moved to do so, Hiro bent over to remove his own, his hair falling into his eyes. He then looked up to see the man without his half mask. While the side that the mask revealed was all mutilated and scarred, the other half was perfectly intact and caused Hiro to pause. Before he could study it properly, however, the man of flames threw his mask to the ground, then looked at Hiro. Seeing Hiro's face, the man started to cry, falling back down to the ground.
"Hey. Hey, it's okay," Hiro found himself saying as he walked towards the cowering man. He knelt down in front of him, not quite sure what to do. He felt Gogo and Honey at his back along with Fred and Wasabi at his flanks; he was not unprotected.
"Forgive me, Hiro?" the man sobbed, looking up at the boy with his face screwed up full of tears.
"Well, yeah, su-," Hiro's last word never fully left his mouth as he suddenly realised what was strange about this face. It was Tadashi's face. "Tadashi?!" Hiro's heart leapt out of his chest and the others jumped and murmured around him as realisation began to dawn on them. Tadashi just nodded and sobbed harder, reaching out and pulling the limp boy into his lap, holding him like he used to when they watched scary movies, or when Hiro had nightmares. Unbeknownst to Hiro, that position had been a comfort to Tadashi as well, all those years ago. Hiro began to tear up too, and was undone by the smell of the shaking man. There was no doubt who this man was now. Hiro buried his face into Tadashi's shoulder as he too began to cry. The rest of the team looked on for a few moments in shock and disbelief, before Honey cheered and began crying tears of joy, nearly knocking the brothers over as she joined the embrace. The others quickly joined until there was a pile of bodies on top of the weeping Tadashi. There was a squeaking sound and the group suddenly found themselves eclipsed by the large cuddly robot.
When people came out of hiding, this was the sight they were met with. At first they thought the whole lot were dead, much to their alarm, but soon realised they were very much alive. Tadashi, was very much alive.
I hope that wasn't too confusing. Reviews would be well received. Please? :) The explanation for how Tadashi ended up in this position will be in Part 2, where I tell Tadashi's story. Feel free to ask questions! I will either PM you, or if a guest reviews before I post part two they'll get a response in that chapter. Thank you for reading!