Gogo never did like surprises.
It would caught her off guard, a sharp pang of panic impaling itself inside her heart, causing her to immediately react on instinct as she defended herself with something near she could get her hands on. And usually it had to do with a wrench.
Tadashi Hamada didn't exactly get the message since the first time.
But the surprises he brought can be pleasant, something she had begrudgingly admitted to herself even without the other party's consent.
(Like she would tell him anyway, no way would she risk it no matter how nice he was.)
But see, even though his surprises were something she would admire him for -something she wouldn't say despite Honey's persistent nagging- it was the way he brought out those surprises.
That itself can be an unpleasant surprise.
One of the first few big surprises it happened, Gogo was still at the lab, alone with her thoughts during late at night as she studied through the blueprints and calculations for what felt like the hundredth time that day. She had sprawled them out on the counter, the only source of light was her corner of her working space and the lone light shone at the entrance of the room.
She gnawed on her bottom lip, using her hands to support herself as she leaned forward, eyes darting on the equations and numbers that she had scribbled on her notebook, flipping through the pages as she thought of better ways to make her project perfect. The bin she had been tossing her unsuccessful tires was going to overflow soon, and despite her great determination to finish this as quickly as possible, her patience was corroding slowly.
She straighten herself while running her fingers through her dark hair, tugging on the strands a little as she shot the offensive book an accusing glare. As if it was its fault she couldn't figure out what the problem was. It was then the soft hiss of the mechanical doors could be heard, followed by the sound of footsteps striding calmly into the room.
"If you had laser beams, that table would have melted."
She looked up, where Tadashi was gracing his presence with a smile as he walked towards her way, a paper bag held in his hand. She raised an eyebrow when he stood beside her, setting the bag beside the empty mug as his eyes flitted to her work. "You're beginning to sound like Fred," She deadpanned. She motioned her head towards the bag. "And what's that?"
He shrugged, leaning on the counter with a hip as he shoved his hands in his pants pockets. "Just a little surprise."
She reached out for the bag, peering inside to have a look at its contents. She took out one. "Chocolate chip cookie?" She enquired.
"A little midnight snack," He replied. "I was out for a while to get some for myself when I heard you were still here."
"Let me guess," She drawled as she gave him one of her bored looks. "A little birdy that happens to like chemistry more than any birdies would have ever liked told you this particular kind of info."
"Well," He chuckled. "It's quite obvious she's trying to set us up."
"And you're, what, going along with this?" She snorted, waving the cookie slightly as emphasis. "Honey's a good friend, sometimes she can be a little too good," She took a bite, her usual mantra of chewing gun had been abandoned a couple of hours ago after it tasted stale. "Thanks anyway."
"No problem," He countered, taking one for himself and tuck in. "Would you have any problem with it though?"
"Of what?" She took another bite of her cookie, half distracted by the work on the counter.
"You, me," He shrugged again, hiding his nerves by eating the rest of his snack. "Us."
She glanced at him, and said person was averting his eyes as he wiped his hands together. "What are you trying to imply, Hamada?" She asked warily. "That you want it to happen?"
He stopped fidgeting and willed himself to meet her eyes, a wry smile on his lips. "Would you?"
She blinked. "You can't answer a question with a question, that's avoiding it all together," She protested, crossing her arms together as she held him with an annoyed look. "Are you seriously letting it go through your head?"
"Honestly? I was curious, still am actually, since you're not giving me an answer," He paused, searching her face. "So, would you think so?"
She was a little taken aback, because she didn't have an answer to that. Sure he was attractive and had all the good personalities that any mom would probably want for their daughter, but she just didn't know.
"I," She opened her mouth, but words were hard to get out. "Don't know," Her words ended in confusion, and she found herself frowning. "I don't -I guess-" Then she took hold of herself, shooting him a glare for making her speechless and clueless. "What is it to you anyway?" She retorted, her voice sounded harsher than she intended as she started to get defensive. "Why are you even thinking about it? It'll mess with your brain, and restrain you from doing work," She turned back to her work, indicating that she didn't want to discuss it any longer.
It took a moment for him to answer. "Not everything's about work, you know. But then, I accept your answer, since not everyone is exactly ready for those type of things," When she faced his way, he gave a small smile. "Don't stay up too late, Leiko." With that, he turned around to make his way out.
"It's Gogo," The words were blurted out before she could stop herself, and she could feel the heat on her cheeks when he chuckled. "And it's not like you're going home anytime soon."
He smirked. "True. Just so you know though," He paused at a door that was located at one side of the room, where it was the one that led to his lab. "I wouldn't exactly mind if it did ever happen." With a mock salute, he left, leaving her to stare after him with her lips pursed, her heart jumping excitedly inside her chest.
She seriously didn't like surprises.
Especially those that had to do with her being all tongue tied and blank.
And those things that had to do with Tadashi Hamada precisely.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
When she heard Hiro screaming his name, she immediately ran towards their way.
She could see them just standing there in front of the burning building, where Hiro had his hand clutched onto Tadashi's arm, pleading for his big brother to stay.
Everything had been so perfect, the exhibition, Hiro's success in showing his microbots to everyone, Tadashi being so blatantly proud of his little brother as they gave each other high fives from different sides of gravity, Hiro's admission to their school, everyone was happy.
It wasn't until, out of nowhere, a fire started.
She could see that he was struggling, the look on Tadashi's face was full of distress as he kept looking back at the collapsing building and at Hiro. "Don't you dare do it, Tadashi," She muttered desperately under her breath, tearing her way across the sea of people who ran the opposite direction she was going, away from the fire, away from the Hamada brothers. "Don't you dare."
She was close, so close to getting to them when suddenly he said something that made her blood turn cold.
"Someone has to help."
He had known she was there when he gave her a glance above Hiro's head, before turning around and sprinted inside the building, his signature cap flying behind him.
"No," She called out breathlessly, at the same time Hiro shouted for him.
"Tadashi, no!"
Hiro only managed to take a couple of steps forward, before he was thrown back from the force of explosion.
Gogo used her arms as a shield to cover her face, gritting her teeth as she felt the heat of the fire from where it had blasted. When she lowered them down, she felt as if she couldn't breathe anymore.
She expected some sense in him, she assumed he would save himself from the fire than go barging in when she knew there was no hope in saving anyone else. She knew he was much more smarter than that.
But that was just the thing.
It was all what she thought.
He had too much hope in his heart, too much goodness in it that he truly believed that he could save Professor Callaghan, he had probably thought he could save both of them in time before anything could happen.
Too much hope had killed him instead.
She shook out of her shock, forcing herself to move towards Hiro, who had been staring the burning building where his brother had been. She felt numb when she fell to her knees beside him, touching his shoulder softly in greeting.
He didn't acknowledge her, too in disbelief to face her way. "Tadashi," He mumbled instead, the cap in his hands crinkled as he clutched onto it.
She wrapped her arms around the paralysed boy, who gave in without a protest as he buried his face into her neck, a raw sob tore out of his throat as he latched onto her waist tightly.
That was the second time Tadashi had left her speechless with shock.
Old age should burn and rave at close of day.
She didn't know why she did it, visiting him where he deserved to rot in jail.
But she needed answers.
She knew he was hiding something from all of them.
As she sat on the chair opposite the glass window, Callaghan had his head drooped, avoiding her eyes with his wrists shackled in handcuffs. She nodded to the guard behind her. "I'll take it from here."
The guard stared at her, and she sighed when he didn't move. "Look, he wouldn't do anything to me, and I wouldn't do anything to him that would hurt him physically, but there's something I need to talk to him about that has to do with my school," She raised an eyebrow. "You can wait at the door if it makes you better. Tell your buddy to do the same for him." She suggested with a jap of her thumb at her ex-professor's way.
He looked reluctant to leave her alone, but nodded nonetheless. The guard rapped the window with his knuckles, and gestured for the other guard to wait at the door.
Once they left, Gogo picked up the phone. She looked back Callaghan, where he was already holding the phone to his ear. She rested it on her ear. "Mr. Callaghan."
"Haven't you done enough, Miss Tanaka?" The man rasped, sounding more tired than she had ever seen him in years. "You have put me here as my punishment of being filled with bitterness, spare me with my old age."
She tighten her hold on the phone, the planes of her face tightening with anger. "And that didn't stop you from endangering the whole city, doesn't it Mr. Callaghan?"
"I lost my daughter-"
"And now I lost a friend," She hissed. She took a deep breath to calm herself. "He's dead because of you."
He was quiet for a while as he glared witheringly at her, the wrinkles at his eyes became more prominent under the white light of the room. "You're here about Hamada." He stated in a matter of fact. She felt fury clawing at her throat at how emotionless he sounded. "He was a good student, there's no doubt about that, but not good enough."
"He tried to save you-"
"It was his own fault to run after me," He snapped, his knuckles white after gripping onto the phone too hard. "He made his own decision," He held up his hand when she opened her mouth. "But, he isn't dead."
Her anger disappeared for a moment. She felt her breath stuck in her throat, her mouth becoming dry when she heard those words. "He's alive?" She asked quietly. Then, she was snapped out of her reverie. "What do you mean he's alive?" She snarled, furious at how quickly she was distracted. "I saw the building blew up, and with all the chemicals in there, it's impossible for anyone who didn't have any cover to survive," She shot him a pointed look.
He leaned back his chair, rubbing his face tiredly as he answered. "But he did. Some sort of miracle looked out for him, and he survived," He studied her face, his arms crossed across his chest. "I can't assure you he'll be for long, the impact had caused him to slip into a coma, he had been in this state for the past few months, his chance of waking up will be slight to none."
"And how would you know about his condition?"
He was caught off guard by her question. "Excuse me?"
"How would you know," She repeated slowly. "Whether or not he's going to survive? You said so yourself, he wasn't good enough, so why did you help him in the first place?"
He didn't say anything for the past few seconds, and she waited, getting more impatient every time spent.
"That doesn't mean I don't respect him for his bravery."
She didn't know what to feel then, intense emotions raged in her heart that she felt overwhelmed. She swallowed the obstacle in her throat so that she could speak, her voice coming out as a soft tone.
"Where is he?"
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
She didn't tell her friends about her visit with Callaghan, much less their talk, she wanted to make sure first.
Walked along the quiet corridor, she tightened her jacket around her shoulders, inaudible conversations between nurses and patients whispered past her. Callaghan had told her Tadashi had almost been crushed by a beam, but he managed to get away before it broke his spine. The thought of her friend being squashed to death like an ant terrified her, because she would never think that any one of her friends would even have receive that type of horrendous fate. Even the word 'almost' could have sent people into a panic attack.
She faltered in front of a door with the number 25, taking a deep breath as she thought of things to say if, no, when he did wake up. She'd just greet him, tell him welcome back and be done with it.
Pushing the door open, she slowly came in. When she saw him, she had to remind herself to calm down.
Basically, the left part of his body was covered with bandages. The one that was wrapped around his head covered his eye, tubes were poked into his nostrils and needles were buried under his skin. A blanket was drapped to his chest, the monotone beeping sound of the life supporter rang like a death sentence in the room.
She made her way slowly to his side, pulling up a chair closer so that she could sit on it. It was like the life was sucked out of her as she collapsed on the chair, still couldn't believe at what she was looking.
He was alive, dear god Tadashi was alive, the sound of his beating heart was like music to her ears. Callaghan was right, it was a miracle that he was breathing, it was only a matter of time before he would wake up.
Daring herself, she brushed her fingers on his bandaged hand, before making up her mind and took his larger hand in her smaller ones. She opened her mouth to say something, anything, to fill in the silence, but she only managed a broken chuckle. There was so many things she wanted to say, to express how she felt all those times between them, and during the period when he was gone. But it seemed, even when he didn't do anything at the moment, he had in fact left her speechless.
After a while, she finally got one comeback after what he did all those times.
"No more surprises." She murmured. Reluctantly, she grazed his scared cheek with her other hand. "I hate surprises."
"Agreed."
She jerked her hand back, eyes widen with shock. The edge of his lips lifted slightly into a smile, amused at her reaction.
If he wasn't so damaged, she would have hit him.
"Dammit Tadashi I-" She breathed out shakily, resting her forehead on his hand as she felt his grip on her hand tightened. "I said no more."
"I know."
She lifted her head, pursing her lips as she tried controlling her emotions. "When did you wake up?"
"Three days ago," He responded. "I kept sleeping though, being sick is tiring."
She stared at him, couldn't comprehend that he was actually here, talking to her, making jokes with her. It was bliss, it was completely... "Unbelievable." She stood up, pressing her forehead to his as she closed her eyes, tears teasing at the corner of her closed lids. "You're an unbelievable man, Tadashi Hamada."
His hands cupped both of her cheeks, a ghost of a chuckle breathed against her lips.
"Even I have faith in myself."
The italics are based on a poem by Dylan Thomas, Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night.