Chapter 15: What Happens Next
CRACK! The noise of the gunshot echoed through the warehouse.
Tadashi wasn't sure what happened. He heard a gunshot, there was blood, and then silence.
No… he had fired the shot. He looked to the floor and saw Mr.S on the floor, lifeless, blood running from the hole in his head.
Tadashi's hands began to shook. He looked at the antique in his hands, which grew heavy as he dropped it on the floor.
"Oh god." he whispered in a shaky breath as his eyes became locked on the body before him. "What did I do?"
You won Tadashi. A voice in his mind spoke. You beat the bad guy.
"I killed him," Tadashi said to his thoughts.
You did what you needed to do.
How could this be happening? Tadashi had never held a gun in his life, and now he put a bullet in a man's head.
This man was going to hurt your aunt and Hiro, but you stopped him.
Tadashi tried to stop listening to the voice…. but it was right. Mr.S was a scumbag who cheated and murdered to get what he wanted. In his line of work he was going to get himself killed anyway.
But still… Tadashi killed someone. It was the strangest feeling. Not like the feeling he got from stealing, not a rush, but a shaky feeling. A feeling that didn't settle well with him.
Stealing money was nothing like stealing someone's life.
Except for the escape.
People still worked at the port at night, so somebody was bound to have heard the gunshot. Tadashi needed to get the hell out of there.
He picked up the gun to leave no evidence, and started for the door, but not before glancing at Mr.S's body one last time.
Funny. Tadashi was the one who shot him, but this disgrace for a human being was killed by his own doings.
"Rot in hell you son of a bitch," Tadashi spat. With that done, he ran like hell to his moped.
He stuck the the shadows that large cargo crates made as workers ran past him toward the warehouse, his presence unknown to them. When the coast was clear, Tadashi ran to his moped, started it up, and he didn't waste any time getting the hell out of there.
He left the port unseen, but he had no idea where to go.
He had just killed a man, and that wasn't something you could just walk away from. Not only was this mentally straining, but what would happen to him if he was caught? He left in a hurry, and there was a good chance he had left behind some kind of clue that would trace back to him.
But he had to go somewhere, and there was only one place he could think to go: SFIT.
Tadashi had all hour access to the building, so he could come and go as he pleased at any point. He never came during the night, only stayed through it, but it was the only real place where he could clear his mind and think.
He sped to the building, surprised he hadn't been pulled over, and made his way to his lab space. He locked the door and simply paced back and forth, talking to himself in a low voice, and in his own mind.
"Mr.S is dead," he mumbled to himself. "MrS is dead, Mr.S is dead-"
And YOU were the man behind the gun, he cut himself off.
"I didn't mean to."
Of course you did. That's why you went there. You had no plans on just yelling his ear off, you intended to end his life.
"Well he's dead, so now what?"
I'm telling you what you've done, not what to do. We're the same person, so anything you think of is what i've thought of.
He was losing it. He was talking to himself. When he realized it, he didn't hear the voice speak again, but he knew it would be back.
He stopped pacing and sat down. He buried his face in his hands and tried to calm his nerves.
There was nothing he could do now. Mr.S was dead, and there was no changing that. Was that such a bad thing though? Guys like him were the scum of the Earth, and died probably everyday. Tadashi didn't like to think like that but it was true.
He looked to the corner of the lab space and saw Baymax's red capsule. Working on the health care companion always helped Tadashi to clear his head, however horrifying the results were. He wasn't gonna think about Mr.S right now, nor was he going to think about bank robbing or covering his tracks.
He was gonna work on a defective robot instead.
Cops never came to the port. Nothing usually went wrong there. Workers came and went, as did cargo ships, and no drama ever occurred. In a way it was one of the most peaceful places in the city.
But tonight, lights of red and blue swarmed the port like bugs to a corpse.
Gerson walked under the police tape blocking the entrance to the abandoned warehouse. Thank god Callaghan hadn't accompanied him this time. He was too busy on his bank robbery case. People got shot in the head all the time where he came from, so this didn't excite him as much.
All the CSI guys were in the back where the man was shot. Right in the head is what they had told him. All the workers had heard the gun go off and had found the man lying there, with no clue who he was or what he was doing in the port.
Gerson walked into the back room where the body was located. He expected to see some sort of horror show, but it was actually pretty clean. The guy simply had on bullet hole in the head, and barely and a pool of blood next to him. Definitely not as gruesome as blowing the limbs off gangsters.
One of the CSI guys was examining the bullet wound in the man's head, trying not to touch him, but hovering his fingers over him like he was trying to. The rest were looking for anything suspicious in the room, but there really wasn't anything else but a box in the corner.
"So how'd this happen?" Gerson said to the man examining the body. When the man moved, Gerson got a better look at the body. The guy looked about thirty, and he had brown hair and didn't dress like a worker from the port. He had on a jacket and jeans along with simple running shoes. He was certainly out of place here.
"Well," the man began as he stood up and adjusted his glasses, "all we know so far is that this man was shot in the head-"
"I can see that," Gerson said annoyed. "How did this happen?"
"We're… not sure. The workers said they heard a single gunshot and then found him lying here. Doesn't have any sort of ID on him, and all he had in his pockets was a phone, but from the looks of it, it's one of those untraceable phones." The CSI guy held up a plastic bag with a small phone inside of it.
"You can tell it's untraceable just by lookin' at it?"
"Sir, gangs all over the city have phones like this. Every other bullet riddled body we find has one on them, so we've gotten pretty good at spotting them."
Gerson looked over the man's shoulder to gaze at the body. Whoever he was, had something to hide. The absence of an ID and an untraceable phone were proof of that.
"So the guy likes his privacy," Gerson said to him. "But that's all we got? What about the murder weapon?"
"Well obviously no weapon was left behind, but he have the bullet that was lodged in the wall after exiting the man's skull. It doesn't look like any american make. I don't think it's even from this decade."
"What do you mean?"
The CSI guy put the bag with the phone inside of his coat pocket, and pulled out another bag that contained a small bullet. It was stained with dry blood.
"I've seen bullets like that before," Gerson said.
"Right, but that's because you're in San 's lots of contraband that comes into the country through the city that we never notice: guns, bombs, bullets, you name it. Best guess is that this is some sort of Japanese make, but not a modern one. You can tell by the shape and the length."
Gerson paused. Old Japanese bullets fired from an old gun. He thought back to the file from the Silent Sparrow Repository. Along with the money, and antique World War 2 pistol was stolen from one one of the boxes… No, it couldn't be. Too much of a coincidence.
But Callaghan had started to make Gerson feel like something weird was going on, what with this Steven White character possibly being alive.
Gerson looked to the body again.
"Sir are you okay?" The CSI guy asked.
Gerson looked back to the man. "Huh? Yeah i'm fine. I need you to check something from me though. I wanna know if this guy's face matches anything in our database. Not just criminals. Everything; victims, suspects, deceased."
The man looked baffled. "Um… alright…. I can have someone take a look at that for you. Might I ask why?"
Gerson began to walk away. "No."
He needed to see Callaghan. That old nut was onto something, and Gerson wanted to find out just what the hell was going on in his city.
It was a new day.
Tadashi awoke in his lab space after the sunlight shined through the window and into his eyes. He fell out of the chair he had fallen asleep on and landed hard on the floor.
"Dammit!" he yelled as his head hit the hard floor. Had he fallen asleep here? It wouldn't be the first time. He'd work through the night for hours on projects to the point where he was too tired to walk out the door. He was surprised he wasn't used to waking up falling on the floor.
He picked himself up off the floor and looked around the room, trying to remember what he had accomplished last night. He looked to the corner of the room to find Baymax. The healthcare companion was bumping into the wall without stopping, or even trying to turn.
Tadashi just stared at this for a while. He wasn't even sure what number of attempts this made.
"It's too early in the morning to deal with this," he decided as he walked out of his lab door without even giving the confused Baymax a second glance.
He walked down the empty hallway, making his way to the exit. Aunt Cass never worried when he didn't come home, due to Tadashi usually falling asleep in his lab. He had things to do however. Get clean clothes, take a shower, address his friends about the whole Mr.S situation, hide the gun he used to start said situation, and feed Christian….
Tadashi wasn't sure what to do. He couldn't just tell his friends he murdered someone, except maybe Wasabi who would probably figure it out. His friends barely joined in when they found out he wanted to rob a repository. Then there was Christian.
What was he gonna do with that poor guy? He seemed nice enough, but he was still going to tell the police. Maybe if Tadashi told him what had happened to Mr.S, he'd stay quiet. He wasn't out to get Tadashi, just Mr.S, and that had been dealt with the previous night.
Nonetheless, Tadashi still needed to feed him. The guy at least deserved that.
But first thing's first: hygene
Nothing felt better than a hot shower. Tadashi felt as though all of his worries were being washed out of him and sent down the drain.
When he arrived home, Aunt Cass was making breakfast, not surprised at all that Tadashi had fallen asleep in his lab again. She just seemed cheerful and happy as always, which made him feel uneasy. Not even twenty four hours ago, he had killed someone. He had shot Mr.S right in the head. What would replace Aunt Cass's cheer if she ever know about that? Anger? Sadness? Confusion?
He didn't want to know. That's why Aunt Cass couldn't find out… about any of it.
As Tadashi climbed out of the shower and put a towel around his waist, Aunt Cass called from downstairs.
"Tadashi!" she yelled from somewhere downstairs, scaring the shit out of him. The house wasn't that big. She didn't have to shout.
He poked his head out of the bathroom door. "What?" he replied.
"You've got a phone call."
"Just let me get dressed first."
"It's Gogo. You know she only uses the house phone when you don't answer your cell, and you know very she gets mad when you don't answer her." Tadashi couldn't see his Aunt, but he could tell she probably had the biggest smirk on her face.
Not wanting to have to watch out for Gogo's fists later, Tadashi walked downstairs in nothing but the towel around his waist to talk to Gogo.
His Aunt handed him the phone when he was downstairs, smiling like she knew something no one else did. She loved it when Gogo yelled and got mad at Tadashi since Aunt Cass got tired of doing it herself every now and then.
"Hello?" Tadashi said as he leaned against the kitchen wall.
"Where the hell were you?!" Gogo yelled through the phone, making Tadashi's eardrums burst. "I've tried calling you four times!"
"I was in the shower," Tadashi replied, recovering from the loud burst. "My phone's in my room-"
"Do you not know what happened?"
Tadashi fell silent. He knew what this phone call was about.
"Umm… no. What… what are you talking about?" Tadashi was going to play this off like he knew nothing. Gogo barely joined him when he announced he was going to rob a bank. What would she think when she found he had murdered someone?
"He's dead Tadashi." Tadashi heard something in her voice. It was quivering slightly.
"Who is?"
"Mr.S!"
Tadashi began to walk upstairs to that Cass wouldn't hear Gogo's voice through the phone. He walked into his room and closed the door.
"What?" Tadashi continued. "What do you-"
"The cops found his body last night. He was in the warehouse with a bullet in his fucking head!"
Tadashi almost told her he knew, that he had put that bullet there himself. But he couldn't bring himself to do it.
"Oh my god," he said as he sat down at the foot of his bed. He was afraid that Gogo would see right through this charade. He was a horrible liar. Every time he and Hiro got in trouble… or rather when just Hiro got in trouble, Aunt Cass could always tell when Tadashi was lying to cover for him.
However, Gogo said nothing as they both continued to talk.
"Tadashi, w-what are we gonna do?" Gogo's voice was faltering more now. "Somebody killed Mr.S. What if whoever did it comes for us next?" Tadashi could now tell that Gogo was trying not to cry.
She was terrified. She was terrified of the person who killed Mr.S
She was terrified of Tadashi.
He had made Gogo afraid for her and everyone else's lives when they weren't even in danger… as far as he knew.
As much as it pained him to hear Gogo sound so scared, he still needed to lie to her. He'd rather have her scared of someone who doesn't exist than have her be scared of him, a friend.
"Calm down," Tadashi said soothingly. "Nobody's coming for you. Nobody's coming for me or Wasabi or Honey Lemon or Fred. You had an idea of what kind of person Mr.S was. Hell, he had a blown up. He was bound to have enemies who wanted him dead. This honestly shouldn't come as a surprise to any of us."
"How can you be sure-"
"Just trust me Gogo. Just keep cool and don't attract any attention. We'll talk about this later, okay? We're all gonna talk about this."
Tadashi heard her sniffle through the phone. "Alright," she said quietly. "I'll talk to you soon. Bye"
Before Tadashi could reply, Gogo hung up.
Then he just sat there. He sat on the edge of his bed in nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist. He was very still as well, not moving and barely even thinking. It was as if that phone call had put him into some sort of shock.
Then he flipped his shit.
He aggressively stood up and threw the phone into the wall as hard as he could, smashing it into pieces that flew everywhere.
He couldn't take this anymore. He couldn't take the lying or the stealing… or the killing.
What the hell was he thinking? He was no criminal. He was an aspiring robotics student with a bright future. Now he was stealing from thugs, lying to his friends and family, blowing up crime bosses and robbing banks.
Why was he doing this anyway? What possible reason could he have for all if this mayhem?
"Hiro…" he said to himself. "This is for Hiro."
As soon as he said those words, everything became so clear. He'd been so worried about what would happen if he continued these acts. Now he was worried about what would happen if he didn't continue.
Sure, he'd get his heart transplant no matter wat. Those doctors just weren't gonna let him die. But Cass couldn't afford that, and Tadashi couldn't have either of them living in debt the rest of their lives.
He shouldn't care what happens to him. He shouldn't care what happens to people like Mr.S. He shouldn't even care what happens to his friends. It was an awful thought, but all that mattered to Tadashi was his family.
Tadashi, finally took off his towel and put some real clothes on. He slipped on a striped blue and white T-shirt, boxers, and a pair of blue jeans.
Seeing as how he smashed the home phone (Cass was gonna kill him) he grabbed his cell phone off of his nightstand and dialed Wasabi's number.
No surprise, Wasabi picked up right away.
"Tadashi, did you hear what happened to-"
"Yeah, Mr.S is dead and i'm sure we're all shedding tears, but I need you to get everyone somewhere we can meet."
"What are you- Tadashi this is serious. Mr.S is dead, and you wanna just call a team meeting like it's a fucking social hour?!"
Gogo was usually the calm and collective type, and even she cried over this, so Tadashi couldn't even imagine how Wasabi was feeling about all of this.
"Look, Wasabi, there's a lot we need to talk about. And you know I hate calling you when you're having a panic attack-"
"I am not panicking."
"Whatever. Just tell everyone to meet me in my lab later. Like noon."
"Why are you being so calm about this?"
"You know, I kinda have a lot of shit going on right now and I really don't need someone trying to tell me that i'm acting weird. Just do it, alright?"
"Okay, but-"
This time Tadashi hung up first.
He was a man on a mission.
He needed money and loads of it. The only way he could do that is by sticking to Mr.S's fake plan.
It was risky. It was highly illegal. It was sure as hell the stupidest thing Tadashi had ever decided to do. But, it was the only way to make enough money.
Tadashi was going to break into probably the most heavily secured building in the city: Krei Bank.
(A/N) Well… I failed. I'M SO SORRY FOR NOT UPDATING! :( Life just got in the way, and I understand if some people might have lost interest in the story and stopped reading. That's all on me. But for those of you who stuck around, thank you so much. This chapter turned out to be much longer than I thought, and was long enough to the point where I couldn't include everything I wanted it to. Now that i'm back in the swing of things, however, I will be updating MUCH more frequently. Anyhow, thanks for reading, and that's DaydreamDepartment out of your hair! ;)
