"I take a hammer and fix the baby."

-Griffin McElroy

At 8:57 pm, Linderman received a phone call. He recognized the number as one of his agents: the announcer from the New York Fighting Stadium, who detailed the unexpected event which had occurred in the ring that night.

"It was insane," the announcer said. "One second the Crimson Arc was done for, and then-boom! His buddy appears and takes the hit for him!"

"His 'buddy'?" Linderman echoed, raising his eyebrows. "Surely you aren't referring to the Time Master." He cringed as he spoke the childish name of the late fighter. "That fellow died nearly a month ago-mangled beyond repair. I would know; I tried to bring him back when the requests came pouring in."

"It was him," the announcer insisted. "He sacrificed his life for his friend, who then proceeded to go berserk and totally wreck his opponent's shop!"

"Hmm… I see." Linderman stroked his chin, fascinated by the impossible recount. "How badly damaged was the body?"

"Time Master or the Electric Soldier?"

"Mr. Nakamura," Linderman clarified. "I could care less for Ms. Bishop, and I get the feeling the audiences share my sentiment."

He had yet to receive a call regarding Elle's fate, but the people loved Hiro. He may have been controversial when he had first started out, but as it turned out, audiences appreciated a fighter who didn't kill his opponents. It was really a shame about how good a job that samurai fellow had done of carving him up. Linderman's power had been useless. But if what the announcer said was true, he just might have a second chance to earn some devoted fans' money.

"Well, it's good you don't want the girl, because she looks beyond repair to me," the announcer said. "But apart from a nasty burn on his chest, our boy Hiro looks good to go."

Linderman smiled. This would no doubt be extremely lucrative.

"Bring the body to me," he instructed. "Let's give everybody's favourite 'time master' a second chance at life, shall we?"

When Hiro and Ando had been in elementary school, Hiro had gotten bullied a lot. He was such a stereotypical nerd that it was almost inevitable, but that didn't make it any less awful for Ando to see his friend with bloody noses and black eyes all the time. He wished he could hunt those bullies down and give them what for, but he was no more equipped for physical combat than Hiro himself.

It probably didn't help that Hiro, along with his nerdy interests, acted kind of odd. He didn't always get social cues, he had trouble making eye contact, and he liked to do things like flap his hands and rock back and forth in the middle of class. Kaito managed to train most of this behaviour out of him as time went on. Hiro stopped stimming, he made eye contact, and he kept quiet when he got the urge to infodump. It made him a more convenient child, certainly, but not a happy one. Even though he didn't totally understand what set his friend apart from other kids, Ando absolutely despised Kaito for treating his son in such a way. Hiro was a really nice, friendly guy, and he didn't have to conform to social norms in order for that to be obvious to anyone who talked to him. Besides, anyone who got weirded out by Hiro's quirks didn't deserve to be friends with him in the first place.

"Hey, Hiro, you know you can act however you want, right?" Ando asked him once as they sat up in Hiro's bedroom, playing video games. "You don't have to be normal for me to like you."

Hiro chewed his lip in concentration as he mashed the buttons on his game controller. He didn't respond to Ando for some time-maybe he hadn't even heard him. After he beat the level he was on, he set the controller down and turned to face Ando with a grin.

"I did it," he said. "Didja see?"

"Good job," Ando told him. "It took me forever to beat that level."

That was a lie, but he figured it was better to praise his friend's skills than criticize them, even if it was undeserved. Hiro got enough flack from basically everybody in his life; he deserved some compliments. Honestly, Ando had no idea how Hiro managed to keep such a positive attitude.

Hiro pushed up his glasses, giving Ando a side-eye. "I know you're lying," he said.

"Huh?" Ando asked. Usually Hiro wasn't so good at telling when people were lying, or even being sarcastic. Was he really that easy to read? "How can you tell?"

"I saw you beat the level in five minutes when I was at your house last weekend," Hiro reminded him. Then he smiled and gave Ando a pat on the arm. "But thanks for trying to make me feel good."

In middle school, around the time that Hiro's mom grew ill, Kaito put Hiro in behaviour therapy. When adults talked about Hiro now, they threw around terms like "high-functioning" and "mental age". Ando didn't know what they were talking about half the time, but he hated it. Hiro is just a person, he wanted to yell. He's no less human than all of you! Hiro didn't seem too fond of the labels either, but when he voiced his complaints he got sent to his room.

Hiro was a special kid, everyone said. Some said it with pity, and others in gentle, sympathetic tones to hide the true meaning of their words. Hiro believed he was special as well, but not in the way the adults told him. He was the save-the-world kind of special. Ando never really believed his friend's claims of having some grand destiny, but there were some days when he really wanted to. He wanted to believe that Hiro had a bright future ahead of him. God knew the kid deserved it.

He still should have had some of that future ahead of him. It wasn't fair for him to be gone. It just wasn't right at all.

Hiro was not supposed to wake up.

He knew this as soon as he heard voices at the edge of his consciousness, beckoning him back into the world of the living. Once he opened his eyes to find himself lying on his back staring up at a pristine white ceiling, he was certain. His head was fuzzy at first; he couldn't quite remember the last thing that had happened to him, but somehow, the thought I'm not supposed to be here tugged at the back of his mind. Groaning, Hiro raised his hand to rub his temples, trying to recall what had happened. He found that moving his hand felt strange, like his muscles weren't expecting him to use them.

The last thing he remembered was teleporting into the ring. Ando was in danger, he recalled. A pang of worry shot through Hiro; had he managed to save his friend, or...?! But no, he had been successful, he remembered with a sigh of relief. He had blocked the attack and-

It had hit him instead. Now Hiro remembered, with a sickening twist in his gut, the searing blue bolt of electricity catching him head-on, burning through his chest and shocking him. He winced at the phantom feeling of electricity coursing through his body, half-blinding him with its brightness. He remembered Ando screaming out in anguish, and then…

Nothing.

Oh, no. I'm dead, he thought, the realization settling heavy in his chest-the chest which should have been fried beyond recovery. No heart could keep beating after that. And yet here he was-alive. How was he alive? I shouldn't be here. The thought returned to him, and now he knew why. He wasn't even supposed to be alive, let alone here in this… wait, where was he, anyway?

As Hiro's higher senses returned to him, he slowly sat up and looked around. He was in a small, cramped room, lying on a stainless steel operating table which was shoved up against a wall. All the walls of the room were painted white, and save for the table, it was completely empty-there weren't even any windows. There was nobody currently in the room, but there was a door on the side opposite to the table through which Hiro could hear people talking. Hopping off the operating table, he tiptoed over to the door and pressed his ear up against it, listening in.

"What if it doesn't work?" somebody was asking. Hiro recognized the voice as being the announcer from the New York stadium. "People are going to want their money back, aren't they?"

"That's if it doesn't work," another man said. He sounded vaguely familiar as well, but Hiro couldn't quite place it. He couldn't remember having heard it in a long time. "I believe he should be waking up at any moment now."

Hiro's eyes widened as he realized they were talking about him. Was the person speaking now the one responsible for him being alive?

"As a matter of fact," the oddly familiar voice continued, "I think I'll go in there and check."

As the doorknob turned, Hiro squeezed his eyes shut and tried to teleport away. Nothing happened. Alarmed, Hiro glanced around the room for somewhere to hide. Under the bed, maybe? It was the only spot in the otherwise bare room where he could conceivably hide… however, before Hiro could scramble underneath the bed, the door opened and an older man in a sharply pressed suit strolled in.

As soon as he entered the room, Hiro recognized the man. It was the last person he had been expecting to see, and yet somehow it made sense when he thought about it. Standing in the doorframe, staring Hiro down with a satisfied glint in his eye, was none other than Daniel Linderman.

"Ah, Mr. Nakamura," Linderman said in a shockingly friendly tone. "So nice to see you up and about. Would you care for something to eat?"