I wasn't quite sure of how to start this chapter; I had a few ideas in mind. I just hope I did the right choice.
The first thing Tadashi saw when he opened his eyes was an empty place by his side on the mattress, alongside an empty pillow and if he lifted his head an inch more he would have seen a blanket on the floor. He glanced at the watch on his night stand: 8:37am. He groaned in annoyance before burying his face down in his pillow; for he was so used to waking up early that he did it even when it was Saturday and he could get some extra rest.
He was about to close his eyes again and go back to sleep when realization hit him. His eyes shot open and he gasped awake as he bolt upright in bed. His first instinct was to look for Hiro, but then he remembered the spot by his side was empty, meaning that his brother had already left the bed. He looked around his part of the room, squinting and rubbing his eyes in a tentative to adjust his blurry vision; but he had already noticed his brother wasn't there.
"Hiro?" Tadashi called, still half asleep. For a second, he wondered if it all had been a dream, but he came back to reality when a children's voice answered from outside the separation blind.
"Here, Dashi."
Tadashi sighed and shook his head, rubbing his eyes again. He stood up and coughed, stretching before finally going through the blind and entering Hiro's part of the room. He stood still when he saw Hiro sitting by the desk, and he seemed to be focused while writing something. "Hiro?" Tadashi called again as he started to walk toward his brother. Tadashi noticed Hiro's color pencil box on the corner of the desk and smiled.
"Hey, buddy. What are you doing there? Drawing?"
Starring straight at the piece of paper in front of him, Hiro sharply nodded. He seemed extremely focused, and his scribbling sounded fast and harsh. Tadashi leaned to look over his brother's shoulder, and his smile slowly became a frown when he looked down at Hiro's drawing. His younger brother was drawing a mess of red and yellow, angrily passing the red pencil by the sheet. In the blink of an eye, Hiro dropped the red and grabbed the yellow, coloring a few spots before grabbing the black. He didn't seem to be drawing anything specific; he just colored the white sheet with lines, stains and scribbles; always in red and yellow, with small black spots on the corner of the sheet.
Tadashi did nothing but look over his brother's shoulder as Hiro kept on drawing. The older one failed to comprehend what was going on through his brother's mind, but Hiro didn't seem to care for Tadashi standing there. He just continued to draw like he was doing before his brother woke up. He held the pencil with such strength that his knuckles were red.
"Hiro." Tadashi asked at last, frowning. "What is that?"
The young boy finally stopped his unceasing scratching. His arms fell on the table, he dropped the pencil and his knuckles slowly returned to their normal color. He shook his head and sighed; it was like he had been in some kind of trance when he was drawing. He looked up at Tadashi before grabbing the sheet and giving it to his older brother.
"My dream. It's fire. A burning building." Hiro sniffed. "The fire that killed Dashi."
Hiro was on the living room, sitting down on the floor in front of the TV as he watched the morning cartoons and smiled. Mochi was sleeping by his side, and Hiro eventually reached out to poke the cat or stroke his soft fur. During commercial breaks, he would lie down on the floor and put the cat on his chest, giving him a soft hug and calling him "Hairy baby".
Tadashi watched Hiro from the kitchen. The older one had calmed down about leaving his younger brother alone. Two days before, Tadashi would be by Hiro's side as he watched TV, believing that something bad would happen if Hiro didn't have company all the time. Tadashi was finally starting to understand that not only his brother wasn't a baby, but he was also a very smart five years old boy.
The older Hamada walked from side to side as he prepared breakfast for him and his brother, always looking through the door every five minutes to make sure Hiro was alright. He giggled and took a picture with his phone when he saw Hiro sitting with his back against the couch and Mochi in his lap. When Tadashi saw him smiling and laughing like that, he couldn't believe that half an hour before Hiro was on the desk of their room, as concentrated as a human being can be as he worked on his drawing.
Tadashi gulped and bit his lip. He put the dishes he was carrying in the sink and sat down on the table of the kitchen, where there was a folded sheet. He sighed before grabbing it, and it took him a few seconds of staring to get courage enough to unfold it and finally look at Hiro's drawing. If he didn't know what those scribbles were supposed to mean, he wouldn't mind them. But he could never forget the look Hiro had on his face when he told Tadashi he was drawing the fire that had killed him in his dream. He felt like he should talk with Hiro about that, but when he thought about how scared his little brother had been the night before when he told Tadashi about his dream, he wondered if it was a good idea.
He folded the sheet again and stood up, tossing it on the table. Tadashi tried to concentrate on the pancakes he was making and made his best to forget about the drawing as he finished the breakfast. He gave Hiro a last glance before setting the table, being careful not to place anything over the sheet. He yanked the blinds up, throwing the sun into the kitchen before he went to the living room to call Hiro.
"Hiro." He called from the doorway. The young boy turned his head and looked at his brother. He smiled and put Mochi on the floor, reaching out. Tadashi hadn't hugged or held him in the entire morning, and by young Hiro's standards that was way too long. Tadashi rolled his eyes and smirked, approaching and turning off the TV before grabbing Hiro. The young boy smiled and put his hands on Tadashi's shoulders.
"Hun-gy!" Hiro said as he swung his legs back and forth in Tadashi's lap.
"Do you mean you're hungry? Well, good timing. The pancakes are ready. I know they won't be as good as Aunt Cass's ones, but I hope you like them regardless." Tadashi smiled as he took Hiro to the kitchen. "You know what, Hiro? This reminds me of when mother was pregnant with you and I helped dad to make her breakfast. Good times."
"Mom and dad?" Hiro asked, not in a sad tone. The older one didn't quite get what the younger meant with that question.
Tadashi remembered Hiro's question the previous night about a family being incomplete and shook his head, putting Hiro on one of the chairs. "Are you ready to eat?" He said, trying to change the subject. Hiro's response was a satisfied nod as he clapped, watching Tadashi walk over to the balcony and bring pancakes and a jar of orange juice.
"How are you, Hiro? Feeling ok?"
Hiro nodded again as he filled his mouth with the food Tadashi put on his plate. The older one had to hold Hiro back to keep him from eating the pancakes before the older one could cut it in small pieces. He giggled at his brother's animation and watched as he ate satisfactorily before sitting down to eat too. After a few minutes in which all the could be heard was the sound of cutlery and chewing, Tadashi looked at the sheet and cleaned his throat.
"So, Hiro..." He looked up as he tried to think of a good way to get in the subject. "You had a nightmare last night, right?"
Hiro stopped eating and looked at Tadashi, gulping the food he had in his mouth before nodding. He looked aside and recognized the sheet in which he had drawn the fire, pointing at it. "F-F-Fire. I t-told you."
The older one sighed. "Wanna talk about it?"
Hiro blinked and shrugged. He grabbed his fork and looked at his food as he started to speak. "You t-t-took me to visit fluffy robot. Uncle Feddy and Wasab-bi were p-playing and t-they t-took me outside t-to play with you too. The f-fire started. You said you n-needed to save people. Then you ran. And it exp-ploded. I wanted to save you. But... The fire had already... You had already..."
Hiro stopped talking and released his fork. He had been holding it all the time while talking, but not once he had used it to take food into his mouth. He took a deep breath and finally stopped staring at his food to look at Tadashi. His older brother's eyes were sparkling with curiosity and surprise as Hiro shrugged again before finishing his sentence.
"You were gone. Forever."
They looked into each other's eyes for what felt like forever until Tadashi looked to the floor for a few seconds before looking back at Hiro, who was staring at his food again. "You were scared, weren't you?"
Hiro frowned as he straightened up on his chair, like if he couldn't understand what his brother meant by that. "Of course I was, Dashi. I don't wanna lose you. You are, like... The most imp-portant thing ever for me. I'm sc-cared someday I'll be alone. D-Do you promise me you'll n-never enter a burn... A burn... A burning b... You'll never enter a f-fire?"
Tadashi blinked, appalled. That feeling all too familiar. Every time teen Hiro left the house in the middle of the night, Tadashi was afraid he wouldn't come back. Every time Tadashi's phone rang, he was afraid it would be the hospital telling him Hiro was dying. Sometimes, Tadashi dreamed of Hiro's funeral and he woke up in the middle of the night; only to find out Hiro's bed empty because his brother had gone bot-fighting. Not few were the times Tadashi had to rescue Hiro. If Tadashi wasn't there to save his brother... He didn't even dare to imagine what could have happened. And now Hiro was telling him he felt the same.
"Dashi?"
Tadashi snapped back to reality and looked at his brother.
"Hiro... How often do you dream that bad things are happening to me?"
"I... I dunno." He said in his tiny voice. "More t-times than I'd like to."
Tadashi reached out and took Hiro from his chair, accommodating the infant in his lap as he wrapped one arm around him and used the other to stroke Hiro's hair. Hiro relaxed into Tadashi and put his head on his brother's shoulder.
"I promise I'll never go near any sort of flame. I'm not leaving you alone, ok? You don't need to be afraid."
Hiro nodded into Tadashi's shoulder. "Thank you, Dashi."
"It's ok. You mean a whole lot to me too. I hope you know it."
Hiro smiled. "I do. I love you."
Tadashi blinked as he let out some air.
"I love you too, Hiro."
Tadashi heard a muffled sound. He frowned in confusion, but the sound was slowly getting louder and more audible by the second. After lazily moving his head to the opposite side, he finally opened his eyes. The first thing he saw was the kitchen ceiling. That got him confused for a while, until he fully woke up and remembered he had fallen asleep on the chair with Hiro in his lap. Speaking of which, the boy still slept peacefully despite the noise that Tadashi found out to be his phone ringing.
Being careful not to wake Hiro up, Tadashi moved his hand over to his pocket and grabbed his phone. He tried to read the name on the screen, but his vision was still too blurry to do so. Nevertheless, he hit the answer button - better saying, the green smudge he saw on the screen - to answer the call and moved his phone to his ear.
"Hello. Tadashi Hamada here." He said, almost whispering.
"Tadashi? Ok, this is GoGo. I went to the college earlier today because my mother wouldn't shut up and I thought I could sleep on a chair there. Anyway, when I went to my locket to get my laptop I saw the gun and decided to go ask Callaghan if he knew anything about that Andy. I thought that if we find how he built the gun, it will be easier to fix it and bring Hiro back to normal."
She stopped talking and waited for an answer, but Tadashi was still half asleep. He rubbed his eyes with his fist and yawned before putting the phone back to his ear.
"Tadashi?"
"I'm listening. What happened next?"
"Ok, you won't believe it: Callaghan said Andy is in jail."
That was enough to make Tadashi wake up a little more.
"Jail?"
"Yes, because..." GoGo put one hand in the end of her phone as she looked around to make sure nobody was around her. "It looks like he was doing illegal things in the name of the college. He was stealing material and building things that, according to the law, how can I put it? Shouldn't be built."
Tadashi blinked. "What are you trying to tell me?"
"I'm trying to say that the chemistry he used to build that gun may be illegal. We can't be sure because Honey Lemon hasn't figured out all of its components yet. And by the rate things are going, she may take a while to do so. But just think about it: he turned Hiro into a kid! Before all this, I would never say something like that was even possible." GoGo stopped as she popped a gun and sighed. "I think someone should go to the jail and talk to this Andy. Ask him what he did. Maybe tell him what happened to Hiro."
"And what makes you think he'll help us? If it really is illegal like you're saying, he'll most likely want keep it a secret."
"Don't you think it's worth a try?"
Tadashi looked down at the sleeping Hiro in his lap. A small irrational part of him didn't want to turn Hiro back to normal. It felt great that Hiro was too small and innocent to even know what bot-fighting was. He loved the fact that Hiro idolized Tadashi with all of his will. He loved that Hiro told him about his feelings and allowed him to hug and kiss him. It felt great when Hiro said 'I love you'.
But a big rational part knew he had to.
"I guess so. But I don't know how I would..."
"Don't worry." She interrupted. "I know you have to take care of Hiro. I'm willing to go by myself. I have my bike, I can do it quickly."
"By yourself? Are you sure?"
"Yes!" She shouted, and then cleaned her throat. "I mean, yes."
Tadashi blinked. "GoGo? Is everything alright?"
The girl sighed. "I want to face that Andy. When I was in my first year of college, he stole one of my projects during the night and used it to increase the speed of his car or something like that. One night he was going way over the speed limit, and when they stopped the car he said it had been my fault; that I was the one who had done that with his car without him knowing. They found a similar thing in my new project so they believed him. I could have been expelled! And I was grounded for a month. He's not going to do it again with one of my friends. Not when I'm around!"
"Oh, I see." Tadashi smirked. He knew there was no reasoning with someone like GoGo. Nothing he said was going to change her mind. "I think you should take Fred, though. He said he was working with Andy, which may help. I don't know if they're friends or what, but he certainly knows Andy better than any of us."
"Fred? But he's..." She sighed. "Ok, I will. I just thought you should know."
"Thank you for your help, GoGo. Just, please don't overdo it, alright?"
She chuckled. "I'll try. Well, I have to go. I want to leave as soon as possible. I'll let you know if I discover anything. Bye!"
"Bye." He said as GoGo hung up.
Tadashi looked at the time on the screen: 2:41pm. They had been sleeping for quite a while. Hiro didn't wake up with Tadashi talking, so the older thought it was better to let him sleep. Since he wouldn't be able to do anything until Hiro woke up, he just stared at the ceiling and started to think.
Tadashi knew he would always love and help his brother. It didn't matter if he was five, fourteen or twenty. But he wondered if older Hiro felt the same as Hiro as a five year old. Older Hiro had never been one to tell his feelings; sometimes Tadashi wondered if he even had them. Tadashi also wondered if Hiro had been like that when he was five for the first time. He knew he should remember, but he had so little contact with his brother back then... And he always regretted it. That was one of the reasons why he was enjoying that experience.
Aunt Cass told him Hiro was obsessed with him when he was ten. Well, Tadashi had had a lot of contact with Hiro when he was ten to eleven. Maybe because of puberty or school, Hiro just stopped. He started to bot-fight, to keep his emotions to himself and to push Tadashi away. Tadashi could never forget the day Hiro was twelve and entered the room limping. He said he was ok, but in the following day the older one found out Hiro had broken his leg after beating someone in a fight. And the only reason Tadashi found out was because he woke up in the middle of the night with Hiro crying in pain. He agreed to tell Aunt Cass that happened because Hiro had fallen from the stairs.
It was probably the first lie Tadashi ever found the strength to keep.
He also wondered why Hiro was so nervous when he was speaking. He already knew Hiro could do it. Hiro could read a book, for crying out loud. If Tadashi could read like that when he was five... At least Hiro was more talkative that morning. Maybe it was because he wasn't around any strangers, but Tadashi wasn't sure. He looked aside and saw the piece of sheet.
Tadashi thought about that drawing. It should have been terrible for a five year old to have to see something like a burning building killing his own brother. Actually, Tadashi was an eighteen year old and he would wake up crying if he ever dreamed of Hiro entering a burning building and dying there. That thought made him shiver as he unconsciously tightened the grip on Hiro.
Then again, the younger said he dreamed about Tadashi dying more than he would like. Was that a common subject on Hiro's mind? If so, why? More than that, did older Hiro dream about that too? If he did, he kept it to himself. Just like everything else about him.
Tadashi sighed and stroke Hiro's hair. Tadashi always found it amusing how he looked exactly like their father, while Hiro was exactly like their mother. Even the face shape. Where Hiro had gotten that messy hair from was always a mystery, though. Maybe it was just something unique.
Hiro's eyes blinked open as he yawned. He rubbed his face on Tadashi's chest before looking up at his brother.
"Mornin', Dashi."
"It's almost three in the afternoon, Hiro." He chuckled.
"Hum. Afternoon, Dashi."
Tadashi chuckled again as he softly put Hiro on the floor and stood up. The two of them stretched as Tadashi rubbed his eyes. Hiro walked over the sink to get himself a glass of water, but Tadashi had to help because Hiro couldn't reach it by himself. After drinking, the younger one rubbed his stomach.
"Hungry." He said. The older one smiled at the fact that Hiro didn't say 'Hun-gy'.
"What about we go out and eat something?"
Hiro smiled and nodded as Tadashi took his hand and led him upstairs so they could change their clothes. Tadashi's earlier thoughts seemed distant as they entered their room, getting ready to take a walk.
Hey, didn't I say I wasn't going to update this daily?
So this chapter just kinda happened. I didn't know where it was going when I started and I'm not sure if I liked the way it turned out or not. It's mostly thoughts, then I hope it wasn't boring. Next chapter will have a little more dialog. I'm happy that this chapter had a little more interaction between Hiro and Tadashi, though. Even if half of it was in Tadashi's thoughts.
Well, I won't be able to write at all tomorrow. So I hope you enjoyed this. Once more, thanks for the support.
See yah!
