Chapter 5: So Much Yelling
Hiro groaned heavily when his Aunt had put yet another pillow under his resting ankle. She had followed the doctors orders to a Tee; keeping him seated with his leg propped up for a week. The lack of movement, and availability to move, was driving him insane. His uninjured leg bounced anxiously in an attempt to get rid of jittery energy. He hadn't told his friends of the masked man, and said only that there must have been someone from the ground trying to hack into their transmissions. They hadn't believed him, but had let it drop temporarily.
"Hiro," Cass sighed softly setting a water in front of her nephew and pulled a chair out for officer Brady. "You have a visitor." She smiled shyly at the man before scurrying off to wait on other customers.
"Hey kid," The officer smile warmly sitting down across from him. Hiro only grunted in a reply before his eyes darted back to the tv behind the counter. "How's your ankle?" He leaned back as if waiting for a response, but none came. Hiro was in no mood to be dealing with the man, instead, his mind was occupied with thoughts of his attacker.
"We were hacked," He growled angrily his fist grasping the edge of the table until his knuckles turned white. "They got into our tranmission wave," He looked up at Brady with a spark in his eyes that set the older man on edge. "Who ever this man was, he was a genius." Hiro hissed with a smirk on his lips. He liked a challenge, Brady was well aware of that. After all, that was why he came to him with the case about the gang.
"Hacked? By who?" Brady leaned forward placing a firm hand on the boy's shoulder. All nervous twitches came to stop as Hiro stared at the hand with his eyebrows raised. "Hiro? What happened to your leg?" The hand dropped back to the man's side, as if willing the answer forward from Hiro.
"I was attacked," He leaned in close, brown eyes darting towards the counter to make sure his Aunt wasn't listening. "Some new Yokai. It's not Callaghan," He waved the possibility away. "He's new, but whoever he is, he's smart enough to be able to intercept a very encoded transmission wave." Brady shook his head and frowned attempting to follow. He wasn't like Hiro, math and technology was not his strong suit.
"I don't understand, why is this so exciting?" Brady sighed heavily and rested his cheek on the palm of his hand as he watched the boy return to bouncing with expendable energy.
"Because, whoever it was, is a genius. I created the 'mitters to work on a radio wave that I created. It would be undetectable by police, airline trackers, even the government would have a pretty rough time picking it up." Hiro leaned back and crossed his arms smirking thoughtfully. "Whoever this new Yokai is, he's right up there with me in the tech sense. Of course he's older, so I've got a heads up on him at least. But that doesn't mean he can't be troublesome."
Brady sighed heavily as he watched Hiro bounce his leg. This new Yokai sounded a lot like the guy they were trying to get Hiro to take down, but as far as he knew, none of his informants had actually seen the man before. So why did he so readily seek out Hiro? Even going so far as to attack the boy in the middle of the day?
"Hiro," He sighed softly with a sinking feeling in his chest. "I don't think you should get involved with this guy. It could be really dangerous." He stood from the chair and smiled shaking his head, a little white lie never hurt anyone. "We caught the guy we were after this morning, apparently he wasn't as wild as we were lead to believe. So you're done with the case, alright? Why not take some time off and catch up on your health?"
"I agree," A soothing robotic voice filtered from the hallway as Baymax wobbled over to his patient. "It is time for Hiro to take his anti-inflammatory medication. After swallowing, I recommend going upstairs to your room and taking a nap." Hiro looked fondly at his robo-friend and held his hand out for the prescribed medication.
Hiro spent the night clicking through the security footage of the entire city. It took the young techno genius no time to hack into the security systems and and download all footage. His dark eyes scanned the footage for the singular mask that had managed to embed itself in his memory. The bright red lines contrasting wodnerously with the blank porcelain of the mask.
"I know you have to have been seen somewhere," He muttered clicking to the next store. The only footage he had been able to find thus far, was from a camera that was stationed on the bridge. But he had expected that. Cursing, he pushed himself away from the desk and pressed his forefinger and thumb into his eyes to stop the throbbing.
"Hiro," Aunt Cass called softly knocking before opening the door carefully. "What are you still doing up sweety?" She rubbed her tired eyes and sipped at a cup of hot tea. "Baymax said you had gone to sleep hours ago," She sighed softly and made her way across the room. The emptiness behind the byobu sent her heart trembling. The anniversary had been six days ago, and she had to tell Hiro that he couldn't go because of his ankle.
"I couldn't sleep, too much going on." He sighed leaning back in the chair and looked at his aunt. Cass sat on his bed and watched his fingers storm over the keyboard closing the computer down for the night. She ran a soft, motherly hand through his hair before helping him lay on his bed.
"Just give your mind time to clear out, hon," She brushed his bangs from his forehead and leaned down placing a soft kiss. "You need the break, I know being a hero has put so much stress and strain on you. But if you keep this up, you'll really break." She sighed and smiled tucking her nephew in before scooting out of the room quickly. Hiro groaned softly getting himself comfortable before curling up and sleeping for the night.
"Hiro,huh," The masked Yokai rubbed at the ebbing headache as he watched the young hero curl up in the warmth and safety of his blanket. "Just what made you become a leader of a vigilante group?" He sighed and leaned back on the roof to stare at the stars that were hidden under the light polution from the ground. Something about the house across the street, and the boy with oversized brown eyes and wild hair seemed to be uncomfortably familiar.
Yokai looked up at the electrical lines that connected the building he was on to the building across the street and grasped it with his rubber gloves. He could feel the buzz of the power that flowed through the rubber lines as he zipped down them landing precariously on the roof of the Lucky Cat Cafe. "Watch this Mrs. Matsuda," The man caught himself saying before shaking his head and wondering where the name had come from. He slipped into the building through the window and carefully stepped around the random chips and robotic parts, edging his way towards the bed.
"So vulnerable," He whispered as he sat on the bed and looked down at the young man he had hurt the week prior. It wasn't his intention when he initially shoved the boy off the turbine. At first, it seemed all too familiar, like a foggy game of tag he remembered playing. But once he saw the look of fear flash across his face, he felt the strongest urge to dive down and save him.
"Tadashi," The robot inflates itself and looks at him heavily cocking his head. "Scan complete. You match the health record of Tadashi Hamada. But Tadashi is dead." The Yokai jolted and glared heavily at the robot hobbling over to him from the corner. "You should not awaken Hiro, his body is trying to recuperate, so his body needs another eight hours of rest before it can begin the healing process again."
The masked man glared at the bot holding his hands up in submission before he crawled his way over to the window and leapt out.
"That was a close call," The villain whispered to himself as he leapt down to the street and raced down to the nearest alley. "Tadashi Hamada though...huh, doesn't even sound vaguely familiar. Must have gotten me wrong, not like robots haven't had the wrong specs before." He snorted stumbling through the light snowfall that had started at some point during his visit.
"You should start locking your window, Hiro. There have been four hundred and sixy eight robberies this month where the burglar has entered through an open window." Baymax placed a bowl of cereal in front of the still mostly asleep Hiro. "You should also start putting minimal weight onto your ankle, so that it remains useful and the muscles remain strong."
Hiro simply grunted in response as he grabbde the spoon and dipped it within a relative proximity of the bowl. Baymax watched as the spoon emptily entered the boys mouth before he nudged the bowl over just enough that the next spoonful would have some sustenance.
"Morning," Aunt Cass grumbled walking out of her room with hair sticking up all over the place. All mornings were the same in the Hamada household, the only one who ever was remotely a morning person was Tadashi, and that was only on rare occasions. "What's for breakfast?" She grunts collapsing into a chair across from her nephew and nursing an empty cup. Baymax, for all the robot was worth, would have sighed heavily at the resemblance.
"A balanced breakfast of cereal with a bowl of fruit salad." Baymax placed the meal infront of the adult female as well before scurrying to his station and charging himself. "A balanced breakfast is the start of a healthy diet and a balanced day."
Hiro grunted leaning too heavily on his hand and face planting in the bowl of milk. Mochi hissed from under the table, before happily laping at the milk that overflowed throught he cracks of the hardwood floor.
It was the sudden shrill of the telephone that sent both nephew and aunt scrambling to the reciever just outside the kitchen. Aunt Cass reached it first answering in a chippy tune.
"Lucky Cat Cafe, this is Cass speaking!" She hummed suddenly awake as the voice on the other end of the lind buzzed through the air. Hiro watched more awake as the muscles in her face tensed and she slamed the receiver down glaring harshly at the floor. "Stupid prank callers," She sighed and brushes her bangs back from her hair and looked at her nephew before smiling softly. "Want to help me start the baking for the day?"
Hiro rubbed away more sleep with his hands before nodding lightly and smirking, "Only if I get another bag of gummy bears." Aunt Cass scoffed and crossed her arms daring her nephew to try her patience. Hiro flinched away slightly before she pointed heavily at the crutches that, in the rush to get the phone, lay abandoned on the floor.
"No way, you get a breakfast of real food...we'll get donuts down in the cafe."