So so so sorry it took so blasted long for this to be written. I really don't have an excuse.

(-)

I'm Okay

Chapter Two

Tadashi passed out again when he was trying to be quiet and still when he had felt Callaghan and whoever else was there, look at him. He wasn't sure how much time had passed since he had fallen asleep for the second time, nor how long it had been since the fire. In his educated guess, it had probably couldn't have been more than two days, he was slightly hurt from the fire, and very exhausted from the flames heat, so it wasn't entirely wrong to guess he had been out for at least a day.

His brown eyes fluttered open as he awoke this time, and he was slightly relieved at that. He lay there on the concrete ground for a few minutes, staring up at the warehouse looking ceiling before he attempted to move. When he did, his whole left side of his torso felt like it was on fire. He turned his head to look at the damage that had been done to himself from his own momentary stupidness. He was honestly shocked to find himself dressed in a loose button down shirt with some kind of first aid bandages stretched and wrapped around most of his left side.

He probably should be a little mortified at the fact that someone partially undressed him, but since they seemed to have only cleaned where he was burnt and hurt then dressed it seemed to override the momentary horrified feeling.

Tadashi rested his head back onto the floor and raised his arm to rub the bridge of his nose.

Only, he couldn't. His arm wouldn't move past a few inches off the floor.

That immediately got him sitting up and ignoring the flaring pain. He looked down at his right arm to find he was handcuffed to a random pipe running the length of the room.

"What the hell?" He grumbled to himself as he twisted his arm around to see if there was any way to get the handcuff off either his hand of the pipe, but it didn't seem like there was.

"Ah, you're awake." Callaghan's voice ran up Tadashi's spine, had he been a dog or some other animal that could be vicious when need be, the fur along his back would be standing straight up.

Tadashi's brown eyes narrowed at the professor, but he stayed quiet.

Callaghan seemed unfazed by the look he was receiving and continued walking closer to the young adult on the floor. "How's you're side?"

"None of your concern." Tadashi barked.

The older male scoffed as if Tadashi just told a horrible joke. "It was just a question, no need to get defensive."

If only looks could kill, Callaghan would have died twice over.

"What do you want?" Tadashi hissed as his professor kept stepping closer.

"At the moment, I'm trying to check out your burns." The SFIT professor exasperated with a huff.

"Don't touch me." Tadashi tried to scoot away from the hands that were trying to 'help' him.

Blue eyes rolled with annoyance before Callaghan pulled his hands away. "Fine."

"What do you want?" Tadashi repeated.

The twenty-one year old didn't like the smirk that suddenly appeared on Callaghan's face. It made the young adult try to move away even more. "We just need your help with a few things, they're time consuming and in a few tight places that we're-" He trailed off looking for the right word to both lighten the mood and make this sound as small of a deal as he possibly could. "Too old to reach without complications." He finished with an almost genuine smile, attempting to joke.

Tadashi wasn't falling for it. "Can you please take off the handcuffs?" He mumbled the question.

"And risk you running off?" Callaghan raised an eyebrow at the student.

The young adult gave him a look that practically screamed really? "That's seriously a thought that is crossing your mind right now? I can't feel my left side at the moment, but the second I try to move, it'll hurt like a bitch. Do you really think I'd attempt to move let alone run off?" He deadpanned. Tadashi was pissed that he was being held here just to work on something Callaghan and whoever were too lazy to work on themselves, but of course the whole 'seeing your professor steal a showcase invention' was probably also the reason he sat there, handcuffed to a pipe on the wall.

Callaghan didn't move as he tried to read his former student's face, looking for any hint of a plan forming in his eyes.

While Tadashi seemed to be a 'goody-two-shoes', doing whatever was asked of him, going beyond what people expected, he was a damned good liar.

And he had Hiro to thank for that; having to lie about how he knew where the teen was when Hiro would be knee deep in the dark alleyways and bot fights.

Callaghan looked at him for a few minutes before he gave a roll of his eyes. He was just about to say something but was cut off when the sounds of a heavy door squeaking echoed through the room. Matching sounds occurred from what Tadashi could only guess, was the same door closing before footsteps were heard coming from out of his line of sight.

"Awake?" The same voice Tadashi heard earlier asked.

Callaghan stood up and walked out of Tadashi's line of sight as well.

The young adult tried so very hard to turn even just a little bit to look at the two people standing behind him. But he just couldn't force himself to move and put up with the burning pain that would no doubt, accompany the movement, no matter how slow he'd attempt to move.

He heard the two kidnappers walk away, whispering in hushed tones. Tadashi strained to hear them, to understand what was being said, but it was fruitless. He couldn't hear a thing over the ringing in his own ears that he wasn't aware was there until that exact moment.

Tadashi sighed tom himself and leaned his weight against the wall behind him.

(-)

"Oh good, you're still awake." Callaghan's voice startled Tadashi out of his empty thoughts, causing the latter to jump. The jerk his body made sent little pulses of sharp pain through his entire being.

"Can I go home now?" The twenty-one year old spoke through clenched teeth, whether he was clenching his teeth towards Callaghan or trying to ride through the pain he was in, Tadashi wasn't quite sure.

The former professor made a face. "See, that's the thing," He started in a condescending tone of voice. "At the moment, no. In the future," He shrugged. "That's all contingent on you."

The younger male raised an eyebrow. "Excuse me?"

Callaghan walked further into the room, pacing in front of the college student. "At this precise moment, no you can't go home." He clarified what was already clear to Tadashi.

"I got that." Tadashi deadpanned. "The second part is what I'm questioning." The smile that crept onto his professor's face was not a smile he liked, it raised a large, flashing red flag with an alarm bell in Tadashi's head.

"Here's the deal." The robotics teacher stopped pacing in front of his former student, crouching down to be as close to eye level as he could. "We need some help with putting a few things together."

"'We'?" Tadashi still couldn't place where he had heard the second voice from before, but who ever it was, must have been as involved with this as Callaghan was.

"Yes, 'we'." Callaghan huffed. "Anyway, we need some help putting a few things together. Now, if you put them together, and they work, we might let you go later."

Callaghan saying 'might' did not miss Tadashi. "'Might'?" He repeated one word again.

"If you help us, you might leave. If you don't, you certainly won't be leaving." With that, Callaghan stood up and started walking away. "I'll give you a little time to think that over."

Tadashi sighed. "Can you at least unhandcuff me now?" His arm was killing him; having been kept held up at an awkward angle, it was asleep and sore at the same time.

Blue eyes rolled. "Fine." He had thought about it since Tadashi had asked earlier, and had worried that the young adult was just trying to trick him, but he saw the pain in Tadashi's face when Callaghan just startled him a little bit ago. The young adult wouldn't be going anywhere. He slowly walked back over and pulled the cuffs' key out of his pocket. Tadashi sat as still as he could, muscles tense as he got ready to knock Callaghan over and bolt the second he heard the click of the cuffs and felt the weight being taken off his wrist.

Tadashi knocked the back of Callaghan's legs; throwing his balance off and making the older male fall to the ground. Ignoring the searing pain from his entire left side, he jumped up and ran the best and fastest he could, which turned out to be just slightly better than some kind of zombie running limp-like movement.

He ran down hallway after hallway, turning corner after corner, hoping that he wasn't just running in circles, or squares, and praying that he could find a way out, and get out, before Callaghan or the other guy caught up to him.

He didn't take in too much details of the place he was in, other than it seemed like some kind of warehouse-esque facility. High ceilings with industrial support beams, metal stairs leading to little catwalks that looked like they were made of chain-link fences, and definitely unsafe. The only windows were up towards the top of the walls and made with a frosted glass, so he couldn't even see anything out of them other than the fact that by the orange sky, it was either evening or early morning.

Tadashi was too busy trying to see out a window to realize he ran down a dead-end hallway. "Shit." He muttered to himself as he started to turn around until something slammed into him, knocking him to the floor, pinning him to the concrete.

"You're fast for someone who's injured." Callaghan spoke above him.

It's about time all the years of track Tadashi did in high school paid off.

"Now, I was going to give you time to decide if you'd help us or not, but I don't really feel like being nice right now." Callaghan said as he put more weight on Tadashi's back, causing the young man to grind his teeth together in pain.

Callaghan took a second to attempt to catch his breath. "You can either help us," he paused for what felt like a dramatic effect. "Or we can get your brother in here to help us." Callaghan smirked when he felt Tadashi freeze up. "He is the one who created the Microbots, he'd know exactly how to make more of them."

Tadashi dropped his head to the floor. He didn't even have to think about this. Of course he wasn't going to let Callaghan, who Tadashi thought was a good man, bring his little fourteen-year-old brother into this.

"Fine." He breathed out. "I'll help."