Under the blue skylight of the dark attic located directly above the conference room of Club Ritz, Big Boy and Lord Deathstrike were in the middle of a consultation. They had been going at it for the past two hours and it was high time that the penultimate phase of the master plan was to be finished by nightfall. Tomorrow morning, the portal would be complete and what they planned to do with it, no one knew… except for Lord Deathstrike himself. The majority of the recent activities going on in the club had forced the building to shut down until further notice, using only a simple "Closed" sign as a façade for the discreet meetings and operations of the Apparatus. Everything that was stolen remained in the attic for safe-keeping and the skylight was large enough for the bigger pieces to fit through.
"So we get into the island, take whatever we can find and just leave?" Big Boy asked feverishly.
"Yes…"Lord Deathstrike added lowly. "Along with a portion of the original portal. As for its placement for the final act, my microbots will do the rest."
The other hoods waited in the conference room, lolling around and stretching about in their chairs, waiting for Big Boy's result. Flattop drummed his right fingers impatiently on the table to the tune of "Separate Ways" by Journey as he shot an ill glance at Crewy Lou, who was sitting on his left. Flint Marko had his back to the wall, arms cross and lost in thought and Frank Redrum was already prepared with his Blank mask on. Spots, 88 Keys, Laffy, Pruneface and B-B Eyes were only ones smoking off of cigarettes. Coffyhead had been stirring a cream puff cappuccino with a teaspoon in his left hand. Breathless was looking down at the skirt and sleeves of her full-bodied black leather dress that she had been wearing frequently for a month.
Am I the only one wearing the right choice? She thought.
At last, as if waiting a dentist's drill, Big Boy and Deathstrike came in shouting. "This is it! The penultimate climax! Get out the guns!"
Immediately, the hoods went to the ammunition closet hidden in the left side wall of the room and began arming themselves with machine guns and shotguns.
"Next stop, Akuma Island," Big Boy continued as he opened the safe for his Colt 1911. "And then, we go on – to the ceremony of the new Krei Tech headquarters."
"Are the cars fixed already?" Breathless asked him as she stood near the safe.
"Just mine and Lips'," Big Boy was stuffing the gun in his turquoise right vest pocket. "The taco van has enough room for the rest of us and we'll be taking our own private ferry to the island."
"Good," Marko said with utter satisfaction. "At least water will be the least of my problems."
"I can see why," the Blank stared at him emotionlessly.
"Try not to let anyone see your rods, or tip 'em to anything bein' wrong. Okay? Leave that to me. Keep it calm, cool and collected," Caprice instructed. "And while we're there, keep an eye out for anyone who tries to intervene."
It was at that moment when Marko asked. "Excuse me, but, Krei Tech?"
"That's the name in case your ears are clogged with sand, Sandy," sassed Big Boy. "We get him, we get his company and we get the city to ourselves."
Then he turned his head to Breathless.
"I knew Alistair Krei personally, I even had a meeting with him once, didn't I tell you?"
He took Breathless roughly by the hand and pulled her out the room followed by Deathstrike and Flattop as he continued ranting.
"But let me tell you something else, we might as well just put a bullet through his head!"
"Watch the sleeves!" she snarled. "I paid $156 for this!"
"Just keep your mouth shut 'til we get to the island," muttered Big Boy as they crossed through the vacant showroom.
"Why?"
"Even walls have ears," said Flattop in a stage whisper.
As the other hoods followed after them in nervous, strong-headed and excited steps, Big Boy, his mind aiming to the garage, made one final proclamation before entering his Cadillac.
"You might think that Tracy and the men in blue have got this island surrounded, but we're gonna get outta this!"
The garage doors opened, the cars and taco van raced through the street and slowed down once they reached the pier. Big Boy paid the owner of the Baylink ferry, a retired naval officer, a generous tip of $1,500 and immediately took the boat with everyone except the man onboard, saying that he needed a rest anyway.
"Now this is how you run a ship," he whispered as he turned the wheel three degrees to the starboard.
On their way home from Mike's Diner via Haight Street, Tess and Junior were discussing about the "unidentified flying object" that might as well could have been a rocket as Junior asked his adoptive mother.
"So what do you think it was?"
"I don't know," Tess said, crisply. "It could have been anything, a plane, a rocket, a flying robot for all I care! Anything that's anything has to be logical by today's standards."
"I'd go with the flying robot," Junior abetted. "It did have two jets going out of the end and two jets means two feet."
"Whatever you say."
Then Junior asked Tess something he didn't think of recently.
"So what was Tracy's big deal about calling the fire last month an electrical spark? Didn't they find the real cause?"
Tess stopped turned back to face him.
"Well, if your dad had to put the lid on the Callaghan-Hamada case, he had to pick something."
"But isn't that what you'd call injustice?"
"It's called deductive reasoning, kiddo. You'll know a lot more about it later in life."
The Lucky Cat Café was up ahead. Tess felt that a chat with Cass was all she needed to lighten her dreary week of "AWOL Tracy at the PD". And so, taking a lump of the street air into her lungs, she walked the steps and entered the door with hidden courage. Junior followed her with a similar thought of Hiro being at home all day.
At the sound of the bell, Cass, who had been washing the dishes in the kitchen, walked over to meet her customers. Aside from Tess, Junior and herself, there were only six people in the café during the evening hours before it closed at 8:00 PM. She went over to the ruby-headed wife of a famous detective with a smile that only caused Tess to feel a pain in her head.
"Hey, Tess. You and Junior looking for an extra bite?"
"No," Tess replied sadly. "We just ate."
"I wanted to know if Hiro was home," Junior added out of the blue before Tess could answer. "For the sleepover, I mean."
"He's out with friends," Cass confessed, trying not to sound disappointed. "But I'll let you know if he's back tomorrow morning."
Tess walked over to the menu, a glazed expression fixed her facial muscles as she spoke into the darkness.
"Out with friends, huh? I'll bet he's doing some nifty undercover work as well."
"What do you mean?" asked Cass.
"Think about it: Tadashi, the victim of the fire, was Hiro's brother and Hiro is so distraught that he's trying to make peace with his brother's death by trying to figure it out all by himself like the true genius he really is."
Cass was flustered. Tess' words made it seem like her nephew was putting his gift of high intelligence to another use of greatness: detective work. She couldn't bear to think of losing Hiro as well, but seeing him leave with Tadashi's friends made Cass feel insecure and unleash a branch of overprotectiveness in her personality–the same kind Tadashi had when Hiro attended bot-fights all those months ago. But she had to be strong and supportive for her "little man".
"Tess, maybe you're just overthinking this. Hiro's fine, he's even going to school with friends."
Tess turned back with a leaden expression.
"That's what he wants you to think," she said blandly. "And I think he's covering it all up so you wouldn't have a heart attack."
Cass thought about it for thirteen seconds. It was apparent to her that she needed more proof…just like her husband.
"If I see Hiro, I'll tell him what you said."
"Good," Tess' lips created a tiny smile. "Then we're even. Come on Junior."
Junior, who had been looking into the ice cream bowls for a late night dessert, heard her voice and followed Tess out the door on quick feet.
When they arrived back at the house, however, Tess was sitting in her red Plymouth, staring into the emptiness that belonged to the color of the garage. Before Junior could ask her what she was doing in the car, Tess cocked her head and told him.
"Why don't you take the trolley and see what your father's doing at the police station? I need some time alone."
Junior nodded and he turned on his heels, passing B.O. Plenty, as he was fifteen feet away from the house, who saw Tess and stood next to her by the driver seat window.
"Evening, Miss Tess. Y'all goin' someplace?"
"Just for a drive," Tess said, not looking at him.
"Same here," B.O. chuckled. "But I just got back from a walk with Gertie and the kid and saw this humdinger of a rocket flying right by."
Too dazed to see any connection to Junior's "flying robot", Tess continued to keep B.O. out of her field of vision.
"You know something? I need to relax. I don't know why, but, I just feel so bored."
"Maybe, you should see a comedy."
At last, Tess turned her eyes on B.O.
"Thanks, but no thanks."
She ignited the engine, pulled out of the driveway, and turned east down Haight Street, intent on visiting her mother's apartment above the deli on Columbus Avenue. She was certain that the news of Tadashi Hamada's death would have reached her by now. Two years ago, the Hamadas visited the Trueheart home on Thanksgiving along with a few of Mrs. Trueheart's neighbors for a large dinner, and Cass brought in the extra plates while Hiro and Tadashi carried in the turkey and the pumpkin pie on silver dishes. It was also on this historic occasion that Dick Tracy made his announcement to have Tess as his wife.
Tess looked through the rearview mirror to B.O.'s head watching her as if he was stalking her, but she let out a short laugh at the memory of the ten karat diamond ring Tracy had given her. Now she was heading into the city with a strong mind and a lonely heart.
The sunset was a beautiful display of yellow, orange, red, purple and pink that went further than all the colors of the rainbow. The waters of the San Fransokyo Bay were stagnant in a lazy breeze of the ocean air that swept through the turbines and airships patrolling the sky. It was a perfect scene that could only be conceived by the mind of a true artist.
Hiro, Sora and Baymax, sitting on the DigiChan Cameras blimp, watched the sunset with strong eyes and placid breaths as the higher levels of the sky turned to dark shades of mauve, then indigo before fading into the darkness that was outer space. To Hiro, watching the sun go down was a frequent pastime with him and Tadashi. With Baymax and Sora in his place, he only had a robot and a young man from another world to share the beauty of the unspoiled, pristine colors of the beauty found within the nature of the atmosphere.
"There are many colors that make up light, and out of all of them, red is the one that travels the furthest," the man Axel told his nobody Roxas through his "shared" memories.
Taking in the colors with hidden excitement, Hiro wobbled his feet smoothly in and out. Baymax looked down at the boy and copied his action slowly and carefully. With their feet locked in a perfect synchronization, the boy and the robot continued to enjoy the beauty of the sunset sky, which was turning pink and the clouds were transforming into a lovely shade of strawberry ice cream that was so tasty and so delicious that no one could reject it's tempting flavor.
As he admired the view, Hiro tried to find the right words for his flight with Baymax.
"That was-"
"Sick," Baymax interrupted.
Hiro and Sora looked up at Baymax with a surprised frown. For the very first time, the former healthcare robot had developed a use of slang and expressionism in his vocabulary (or at least the word "sick" was just the beginning).
Seeing the confusion in their faces, Baymax took the pitch of his voice up by two octaves.
"It is just an expression."
Sora and Hiro chuckled. The younger male slapping the back of his left hand against Baymax's right hip as he stuttered. "That's—that's right, buddy."
He looked back and continued to gaze into the sky. If anyone were to see them from behind, all three were neatly camouflaged with the pink sky by the sun, which decorated the silhouettes of themselves with a rim of red that was as bright as the fading sun itself.
"It's a shame Tadashi had to miss this."
Sora cocked his head at Hiro's direction with a different subject on his mind.
"Hiro…have you thought of a team name?"
"For my friends?" Hiro said as if he could read Sora's mind. "I guess you could call it…"
He thought for a whole minute, and at the last second, the official name came into his mind.
"Big Hero 6."
"For just…" Sora counted his fingers. "You and your friends?"
Hiro nodded.
"Well, since you guys aren't from around here…this is just something for me, Baymax, Go Go, Wasabi, Honey and Fred."
Sora understood, as foreigners, he, Donald, Goofy and Spider-Man's team had no chance of being a part of a native superhero team.
"I am never taking the bus again," he said fatalistically.
After three seconds, Baymax widened his eyes and looked down at Hiro.
"Your emotional state has improved. I can deactivate if you say you are satisfied with your care."
But Hiro had come too far to deactivate Baymax, and even if he could in the present, the robot's luggage was back home on his room.
"I don't want you to deactivate now," Hiro said, standing up. "We still have to find Yokai and Big Boy."
He pointed his right thumb down at the earth below. Sora stood up as well, watching the boy as Hiro ordered.
"Fire up the super-sensor."
At Hiro's command, Baymax used his left hand to support himself and stood on his feet. Then with balled fists, his visor glowed a florescent green that turned into a grid system complex that disappeared instantly.
"Functionality improved. One thousand percent increase in range."
From his readout, almost half the population of San Fransokyo came in the form of green figures, male and female, which started from the Financial District to the lower neighborhoods before his patent, represented by a red figure was found…on Akuma Island surrounded by three female figures and twenty six males. Shortly after, Hiro and Sora heard a soft beep.
"I have found a match," Baymax informed them, and he pointed his left index finger to the location. "On that island."
Sora and Hiro looked out into the distance…Akuma Island was about five square miles away from the blimp.
"We'd better get the others," Sora told Hiro, who uttered a quiet "Yeah" and climbing back aboard Baymax, the two males hurried back to Lee Mansion.
On the back porch, Fred had been brainstorming a name for the team as well, unaware that Hiro came up with the name first. The title "Fred's Angels" popped into his head like the title card of the similarly named "Charlie's Angels" from 1976; a crime drama series featuring a trio of strong willed women who used their state-of-the-art combat and high performance vehicles for the greater good. When Baymax arrived at the garden with Hiro and Sora, Go Go was the first to say.
"Well, it's about time."
Hiro and Sora hopped off the newly formed robot warrior, and it was the boy genius who brought forth the breakthrough of the mission.
"We found Yokai and Big Boy—on Akuma Island."
"Glad to hear that, Hiro," Donald answered. "But how do you expect us to get there? I mean, we can't all fit in the Gummi Ship."
Goofy nodded in agreement.
"I can fly too," Nova held his right hand on his chest. "But I don't think I have enough strength to carry my own teammates."
"And my web-shooters are unable to produce a line long enough from here to that island," Spider-Man confessed sadly.
Hiro calculated his party of eleven (twelve including himself). He looked at the S.H.I.E.L.D. rookies, turned his head directly at a confused Sora, then Donald and Goofy, and finally to his friends who were on the ground. The answer came into his head after thirty eight and a half seconds.
"Here's what we'll do: Sora, you go with Donald and Goofy in the Gummi Ship. Nova, you can fly beside us. Spidey, you can form a web chain under Baymax's waist for the rest of your friends to hold onto. Honey and Go Go, you can join me on the wings. Fred and Wasabi, you're taking the gauntlets—and one other thing: hold on tight."
It took the team a minute and six seconds to take their positions: Hiro remained in the middle of Baymax's spine, with Go Go on his right hand side and Honey on his left. Fred's eye pullover was locked in a death grip with Baymax's left gauntlet while Wasabi held on to the right in an indecent position of a bear climbing a tree. Sora took the pilot's seat of the Gummi Ship with Donald's permission and Goofy took the navigator's seat. Nova went first, surrounded by a light blue aura as he defied the law of gravity. Once Baymax was in the air at about eight feet, Spider-Man launched a web line from his left web shooter and quickly jumped to the tail that was attached to Baymax's corset. White Tiger gripped the line behind him, then Power Man in the middle and Iron Fist was dangling over the edge, trying to remain calm and strong with powerful instincts from a long period of training.
The sky was turning indigo as they flew over the harbor and across the first acres of the bay. Hiro's eyes were locked in a deep level of emphasis on the island, bringing in the thought of seeing his brother's murderer suffer at the mercy of his new team and their resilient capabilities. Honey looked nervous, fearful of a long drop into the water as her left hand clung to Baymax's left wing, but Go Go, admiring the concrete beauty of her home city, confessed her enthusiasm with two simple words:
"Killer view."
Hiro turned his eyes at her before ignoring another compliment from his peers. From Baymax's right gauntlet, Wasabi was holding on for dear life with his hands and feet, trying without avail to conceal his cowardice as he grinned a fake smile to Go Go up above.
"If didn't have acrophobia, I'd probably love this!" he shouted rapidly. "But I'm terrified of heights so I don't love it!"
He squeezed his eyes shut and pressed his face against the gauntlet. Fred, who was mentally laughing at the afro's lack of heroism, was currently posing like a regular superhero out of a Green Lantern poster; a smile with his arms and legs wide that quickly changed into a Superman-like posture, with a serious mug on his face, his left arm extended and fingers curled into a fist, his right arm curled under his chest and his legs in a straightforward stance.
First night out as a superhero and he's already afraid of something! The comic book expert giggled with pleasure in the caverns of his brain.
When they approached the island, Hiro found the facility he had been looking for from afar. From what he had known about Akuma Island in the past, it had served as an outpost for the United States military and a holdout for weapons and technological research. He was sure that a place like this island was a perfect candidate for the Apparatus to steal as many components as they could find for whatever they were building.
Hiro pointed to the landing pad with his left index finger.
"Down there!" he called to Baymax. "Take us in!"
They circled once around the island and came to the landing area that was secluded by a wired fence. Spider-Man and his team hanging from the web landed first and Baymax took an upwards position, followed by Fred, who was dancing excitedly to catch the villains. Baymax then lowered his left gauntlet to let Honey, Hiro and Go Go down while Wasabi remained glued to Baymax's right hand. His eyes were still shut before realized that his feet were on solid ground—concrete ground to be exact.
"Awesome!" Fred cried with zeal as Nova and the Gummi Ship landed next to them. "Our first landing together as a team."
There was nothing else in the area besides the entrance to a white colored facility, three crates, six piles of sleepers and twenty four oil drums that were rusted with age and sea-air conditions. Hiro kept the lower half of his body on steady feet and so did Honey who remained silent as he whispered "Come on," to the others, but Wasabi kept his eyes on another object of curiosity…or concern. His field of vision was locked on a yellow sign which read "CAUTION Quarantine Area" in a black bold font. Next to it on the fence of his left hand side was another sign which had the word "Quarantine" on the bottom. Above the words were a pair of deadly looking crossbones and a menacing skull that would have frightened the poor afro to the core.
"Do any of you know what 'quarantine' means?" Wasabi asked as he directed his right thumb at the sign.
Baymax, as per usual, lifted his right index finger to answer Wasabi's question.
"Quarantine. A forced isolation to prevent contamination that could lead to disease or in some cases…death."
"Really?" Wasabi asked as if he was teaching a classroom of infants. "What about that skull and crossbones over there?!"
"Oh shut your damn mouth and be on your guard," White Tiger sheathed her left claw at him in a threatening demeanor.
"Careful, guys," Hiro whispered back to them. "They could be anywhere."
They stood in front of the metal door to the facility for a second or two before the silence was broken by the sound of a twig snapping. Sora, standing behind Baymax, saw Honey reach into her purse as did Go Go with her disks. Not willing to have the team waste their energy, Sora motioned his right hand in a defensive gesture.
"Wait," he said quietly.
His blue eyes looked over his left shoulder, the light in his right hand materialized into the Kingdom Key, he spun around—and the tip of his Keyblade was three inches away from the beak of a female pigeon—a very brave pigeon who cocked her head at the sight of the ridiculously dressed human beings.
Now this pigeon had gone out of the nest to feed her babies, assuming that the landing pad on Akuma Island was flat enough to capture a large sum of worms. When she saw Hiro and his friends landing on the island, the pigeon became rather curious and thoughtful of these brightly colored creatures called "humans". She decided to get a closer look from a nearby tree, but the branch she was sitting on had grown fragile from old age and snapped a quick three seconds after her toes gripped the thin branch, forcing her to drop safely onto the ground.
When Sora realized his mistake, he confessed what would have been an embarrassing scene to the team with a shy, "Oh, it's a pigeon."
The mother pigeon cooed confusingly as her head remained cocked to the right side by six degrees. Then she flew off back to nest with some interesting news to tell her children at dinnertime.
"Bye, bird," Donald waved back. His smile was warm, and Sora and Goofy could tell that, as a duck, Donald was very friendly to his own kind, even if they intimidated him. Hiro, on the other hand, did not tolerate any chance to stop and smell the roses. He was hell-bent on bringing Tadashi's killers to the iron fist of justice, and maybe this time, Big Boy Caprice would be getting the life sentence he deserved after using his anorexia to guilt trip the warden of Alcatraz into filing his release forms.
"At least we know how to be careful next time," Honey giggled.
"Now to open this door," said Iron Fist, summoning his chi and focusing it into his left hand.
He reached all the way back and asserted himself, but the result only left a crater in the door handle. He tried again, this time with his right hand that delivered a powerful bow that sent the door flying right off the hinges. They all peered inside to see a dark hallway lit by fluorescent bulbs, with steel walls and streamlined fixtures. As the heroes were completely inside the hall with no other source of light from the outside world, Fred took an inopportune time to (quietly) sing his own anthem for the team.
Six intrepid friends lead by Fred,
Their leader, Fred.
Fred's Angels, m-m-m.
Fred's Angels, m-m-m.
Harnessing the power of the sun
With the ancient amulet they found in the attic.
M-m-m.
The amulet is green.
M-m-m.
It's probably an emerald.
But Wasabi, who felt that Fred tone-deaf, had enough. He seethed through his teeth, glaring at the concealed nerd with a knife hand.
"Fred, if you don't shut up, I'm gonna laser hand you in the ass!"
Hiro ignored them as he turned to his robot.
"Any sign of them Baymax?"
In his readout, the red figures appeared to come from all directions.
"This structure is interfering with my sensor," Baymax admitted. "It may be due to low wi-fi."
But they were saved of any trouble of looking for the villains, when Honey heard a whisper of voices that seemed to be coming from the door next her. One of them had a gruff voice, supposedly belonging to Big Boy Caprice. The other voice was new, something that was foreign to Honey, but still sounding American.
"So tell me again, what we plan to do with this junk?"
"It's simple. Once we get rid of Tracy, the whole city's gonna clear out for us…young folks."
Curious, she peered through the crack of the door. Sure enough, there was Big Boy talking with a heavy built brunette in a green striped t-shirt.
"Guys," she whispered. "It's Big Boy."
In the room that lay on the other side of the door, Big Boy's misdirected vision caught a quick glimpse of Honey's left eye and sensed danger, he turned to Marko and put his right arm over his back. They walked over to the other criminals, and most of them were already gone by the time Honey had slid the door open all the way. She went in first, followed by Wasabi, then Go Go, Hiro, Sora, Baymax, Fred, Spider-Man and the remaining six members of the team.
Whatever it was, the objects in the room appeared to be the remains of an old roller-coaster, with a track that was completely frayed and ended going up in a straight position. At the end of the room were a pair of crooked balconies and on their right was a thirty foot tall ring. Titanium steel walls filled the room from above and then went down to the ground floor of the facility. Florescent lights shined over the opposite end of the complex, giving the atmosphere a non-photo blue tinge of eeriness.
"What do you think it is?" Go Go asked Hiro.
In spite of his IQ number of 155, Hiro was uncertain.
"I don't know…but look."
He pointed his left index finger at the red and white logo below them. It was the same logo depicting the sparrow he had seen at the Naval Shipyard that Yokai had recovered from the sea.
"I wonder what's in here," Sora gestured Hiro to what looked like a control panel sitting in the middle end on their side of the complex. The interior of the panel was lit with a crimson beam of light that faded into the darkness. They walked over to the door and Nova, making sure that it was not locked or anything else, opened it and the others peered curiously into the empty panel. There no sounds, not even a whisper of Big Boy's crew from the other side, and if there was, it was only sight and inaudible. Five empty chairs watched over the dormant controls and the glass appeared to have been completely shattered from an explosion of sorts.
As Hiro placed his left foot into the room, Power Man, who was all the way in the back of the party of twelve, turned to Iron Fist.
"See anything Danny?"
Iron Fist waited until they were inside.
"It looks clear...to me."
Seeing that there was no one around to attack them, not even by surprise, Hiro clicked left side bottom of his helmet, sending his crystal clear visor up into the helmet. His face was illuminated by a deep scarlet computer screen which displayed the sparrow logo in a funeral parlor shade of black. The computer screen itself appeared to be over twenty two feet tall, a bit larger than Fred's Ultra HD television screen.
Let's see what this has in store for us. Hiro moved his right hand over the wide keyboard, his index finger pressed the "6" button and the screen went from blood-red to sky blue within a split second. The sparrow symbol also went from black to white as well before it was replaced by nine screens; each one presenting a different perspective on the recorded events of what had been chronicled in the early days of this facility.
On the top middle screen was a still-frame of Alistair Krei, leaning his hands over the controls with a panicked look on his face. In the background stood his assistant Alice while a general in a navy blue suit and medals on both sides of his chest stood in the foreground.
"Krei," was all Hiro said, in the far background was another figure.
"Tadashi?"
"How come he didn't tell us about this?" Honey asked quizzically.
"Top secret information," Fred added. "Seen it a million times."
"S.H.I.E.L.D. has top secret info," Spider-Man turned to face them. "I even had several unauthorized opportunities to look through them."
"Like the island I picked," Nova uttered quietly out of an unneeded reminder.
But nobody heard his voice when Hiro pressed the rewind button and the screens of each camera were going back to the very moment were the moment of interest began.
He stopped on "Portal Track 03", which showed Krei, an entourage of two women, an executive businessman and the general (named Hammond from a close inspection of his tag) walking smoothly towards the ring on the left hand side. Compared to what it looked today, the facility was in a pristine, crystal clear condition and the two rings were intact, with eight red lights attached to every angle of an octagon. The walls were non-photo blue and rest of the interior was sleek and futuristic in almost every way possible.
"That's right Hammond," Krei's voice came from the video. "We were asked to do the implausible: reinventing the very concept of transportation. Friends, I present Project Silent Sparrow."
In the screen labeled "Portal Track 1", Krei stood before his small audience in front of the large ring. Holding out his left arm, the interior of the rings were filled with a glowing blue mass of what some might call a dimensional rift. Honey and Go Go gazed at each other for a second before returning to the screen. The movements of the two girls distracted White Tiger out of incessant curiosity, while the former condition of the facility reminded her of the Aperture Science Enrichment Center from Portal.
"We developed an artificial wormhole that links two regions of space and thus succeed in creating a time-space tunnel that allows for instantaneous travel. General Hammond, may I have your cap please?"
Hammond surrendered his hat from his head, placing into Krei's right hand and flinged it like a Frisbee into the substance, which created a ripple and the sound of a bubbly whoosh—coming out from the other side and into the waiting hands of a man in a white coat and hard hat who stood from a yellow scissor lift with an orange deck. He waved the hat over to Hammond, who was standing on the other side, with his left hand.
"Oh. My. God," Fred exclaimed. "It's a magic hat."
"That's no magic hat, gilipollas," Sam spoke offensively."It's a trans dimensional portal."
Honey, understanding Nova's obscene insult, darted her angry eyes at him as quick as a fox before going back to the screen. From the bottom right corner, she could have sworn to have seen a slightly black haired Professor Robert Callaghan embracing a young woman with chestnut brown hair locked in a ponytail.
In the video, the man in white twisted himself backwards for a strong force of push and threw the navy blue cap back into the portal on his side where it came to the left ring. It landed into Krei's hands before he made his conclusion, handing the cap back to General Hammond as he spoke.
"Teleportation. The transport of matter instantaneously through space. Science fiction has become a reality."
Every member of Big Hero 6's eyes were locked on Krei at every angle.
"It appears I made a wise decision when we invited you and your colleagues to work at our facility," Hammond replied.
"Yes," Krei reciprocated in acceptance. "But we didn't spend billions of tax dollars just to teleport caps. I believe that this invention can do wonderful things for our country. We can use it for transporting goods and materials or even for space travel. I think it will be a great help to people all over the world. After two separate experiments involving a dog and a monkey, the portal is now ready for human testing. Our data shows a 100% guarantee of success."
He pressed a call button on the console.
"Ready to go for a ride Abigail?"
A muffled voice could have been heard saying "You're going to be a part of the moment of the century," before the said woman whose name was Abigail sat down in a capsule that was a small as, but more sleek and futuristic looking than an Apollo command module. Abigail was slender with blue eyes; she wore a paper-white skin-tight outfit with red accents and white armor on her chest and shoulders, along with a matching helmet. On the left side of her helmet was her last name, printed in blood red with all caps, but none of the team members had any foresight to look carefully into this particular little detail.
"We've invited all these people," Abigail said, pressing three buttons above her with right index finger. "We might as well give them a show to remember."
"T-minus thirty seconds to launch," a female voice spoke over the P.A. "Twenty nine, twenty eight…"
In "Pod Camera 01" which focused entirely on Abigail from her transport, the woman was looking nervous as she pressed another three buttons on the opposite side with her left index finger. She looked down at the rail that would send her into the portal and so did the team members watching "Portal Track 03". The capsule jerked to a stop as the countdown reached twenty seven.
"Capsule is in position," Abigail announced.
Abigail took a deep breath as she was about to become a household name (or so she thought). The rail buckled by an inch, then like a drop tower, the capsule surged at a speed of thirty miles an hour directly into the portal. But before Krei could his chance for an applause, of the technician, a young short-haired brunette named Lester, raised his left hand to Krei's chest, gaining his attention.
"Sir, we seem to be picking up a slight irregularity in the magnetic field."
Whatever it was, it was something only the occupants in the footage could see, for the group's point of view was obstructed by the back of the monitor himself. Krei looked at the situation on the screen as another technician with black hair and small glasses by the name of Howell curiously peered at the screen from his side of the control room, which was on Lester's right hand side.
"Probably, just a spike," he muttered before directly addressing Hammond. "Don't worry George, it will soon stabilize. It's well within the parameters, and all we can do is wait for our test subject."
And so it did, but before Krei could get another chance for an applause, an alarm started to ring.
"The anomaly is growling larger!" shouted Howell.
As Krei looked over the confusion, the left side of the right ring began to shimmy just as the nose of the capsule appeared, but the black metal of the ring turned to gold and red as it burned to create a bright light and exploded into a roar and a burst of flames that propelled the capsule much too fast than what the scientists and technicians had expected with the previous experiments. The pod slammed to the floor in a scream of tortured metal and crashed into the wall, ending the catastrophe with the sound of breaking glass and a completely inaudible "snap".
The others watched with genuine reactions of horror as a technician, Tadashi, rushed out of the control room to retrieve the pilot.
"Oh, Dios mío, esto es terrible," said Honey in a shaken voice as she performed the sign of the cross.
Krei in the video sensed danger too, for a low rumble sufficed the facility. Matters began to spin out of control as various pieces of debris and equipment were sucked into the right portal like a fusion reactor gone bad into a magnetic terror of chaos. Two cameras and the very end of the track to the right portal were sucked in as well and the control room seemed to oscillate violently from the containment breach of the explosion.
"SHUT IT DOWN NOW!" howled Hammond.
Krei pressed the corresponding buttons on the console where Lester was sitting. The blue substance faded and the debris fell to the floor in scattered heaps of rubbish.
"I want this island sealed off and abandoned permanently!" Hammond shouted.
Having seen enough, Hiro stopped the video at that moment, although a curious Honey Lemon wanted another look at the man who appeared to be her late teacher. For such events involving digital media, she always carried a junk drive in her purse. As she placed the drive into the mainframe, copying most, if not all of its contents, Sora re-summarized the events recorded in the footage.
"So the government shut down Krei's experiment and now he's using your microbots to steal back his machine…" he paused for a concessive conclusion, holding his hands out as he did. "Why?"
Before anyone else could come up with a supposition, there came a loud voice that derived from the other entrance of the control room shouting, "Reach for the ceiling! All of you!"
The gang turned around. It was Flattop, wearing a bright red double breasted suit and indigo bowtie, the same black boots and gloves and was carrying his Thompson in both hands with the mannerisms of a serial killer. He fired twenty bullets into the ceiling, forcing the gang to duck out of force of habit. He came closer to confront the group; but Hiro, wanting to test his armor, kept on his hands and knees and his left hand delivered a strong uppercut that sent the Tommy gun out of Flattop's hands.
"Bet you didn't know my gloves were strong enough to break through cement, didn't you?" Hiro addressed everyone present.
He turned to face Flattop in an aggressive state of mind, pushing himself against his personal boundary.
"Tell me, how well do you know that your employer under the Kabuki mask is Alistair Krei?"
Flattop darted his eyes at the pre-teen.
"I have no idea who he is. Never even took his mask off," his glare turned into a baleful smirk. "But since you're here, why don't you ask him…yourself."
The team turned and followed direction of Flattop's open left hand. There was Yokai, looming above them in a Darth Vader-like atmosphere of formidable proportions. The (literally) crooked criminal Big Boy stood on his right and the doyenne of Club Ritz herself, Breathless Mahoney, stood on his left. All three were covered from the waist down in a black mass of microbots, while the remaining members of the Apparatus stood below them. Flint Marko was also using his sand to reach Yokai's level, his arms and the lower half of his body covered in malleable sand. Flattop ran down the stairs out of harm's way to join Crewy Lou and Itchy, who were standing at the base of Yokai's microbot pile.
"I have the strangest feeling about this guy," Spider-Man squinted. Then it hit him like a lightbulb going off after a split-second of deduction; he remembered the sandy island where they spent their vacation, and it had seemed that there was a good reason why the island itself was filled under a classification section.
"You and the rest of your freaky friends have just said good-bye to oxygen!" Big Boy shouted from above.
"Says you and your gang!" Fred responded childishly.
The words struck Big Boy as though a bullet from his gun misfired and struck his lungs. He whipped out his Colt 1911 and yelled. "NOBODY CALLS ME THAT!"
He turned to Yokai.
"SIC 'EM!"
Yokai, having excavated a twenty five foot slab of cement from the floor while the heroes were watching the video manipulated the microbots to hurl it right at the control room, it smashed through the window, destroying the controls in its path and possibly them itself as Baymax held his hands out, hoping to push it back with no success.
"Strike," Big Boy clapped his hands condescendingly.
Yokai turned his body counterclockwise to face the remnants of the portal, intent on stealing the right ring which was still intact and still functional to serve in his grand plan. Afterwards he would use the microbots to generate the electricity, as the portal was constructed to serve as portable device for any occasion prior to the mishaps that occurred.
Under the rubble, Honey coughed as Baymax used the visor of his helmet to illuminate the darkness of the claustrophobic situation the team was currently in while his hands held the slab to his back, trying to gain balance. Hiro looked up at Baymax, frightened as though he had seen a ghost. Wasabi and Go Go exchanged glances of relief and Sora asked, "Donald? Goofy? Are you okay?"
"We're fine!" Goofy and Donald were struggling to liberate themselves from the rubble and so were Spider-Man and his team of rookies. Hiro command his robot loud and clear as Power Man tried his own way to lift the debris: by pushing it back up.
"Baymax! Throw it back at him!"
Baymax complied, however, he used his rocket fist, which broke through the block and reached all the way to the ceiling, catching the attention of Yokai, Big Boy and Breathless as the microbots crawled onto the remnants of the left ring, attaching it. They turned and watched the glove hover in the air for second, then came back into the magnetic grip of Baymax's right wrist, where it found itself in the company of fourteen heroes, ready for action to take the grotesque criminals of their fair city.
"Go for the transmitter behind his mask!" Hiro shouted like he was directing a football team…and it felt good considering his sense of leadership. But Big Boy could only verbally translate Yokai's reaction of annoyance.
"Oh, what the fu-just get them already!"
The criminals and Sandman screamed like whooping Native Americans as they hoisted their firearms high above their heads, preparing to fire every ounce of lead and sand at their will. Yokai brought a scoopful of microbots to the palm of his right hand, then after lifting it up, shot the microbots forward at the speed of a rushing river in the straightforward direction of the heroes, but Baymax picked up a five foot chunk of the already-destroyed slab and used it as shield, hoping to the defect the nanobots. But the stream that Yokai had sent rushed through the middle of the concrete at a tremendous pace, bisecting the piece and sending the ex-nurse bot flying backwards on a throne of fragments. A scintilla of dust peppered the heroes, but it wasn't enough to blind their visors to the point of irremediable damage.
Hiro moved his arms hastily over the rubble, shouting the robot's name as he leaped over the trifling wall of concrete and as he climbed, nearly making his way to Baymax, Wasabi asked, "So what's the plan?"
"We get the transmitter behind his mask like Hiro said," Sora summoned his Keyblade and ran off to the bottom with Donald and Goofy following.
With a smirk of bullishness, Fred pulled the top eye onto his head before uttering, "It's Fred time." He ran towards Yokai, shouting "SUPER JUMP!" as he used his pogo hydraulics to perform a nine foot leap. He held his arms out as the crooks prepared to fire, shouting "GRAVITY CRUSH!", but a barrage of microbots from left struck his tail, defying gravity even further as Fred remembered another move from the various football games he would watch, live and on TV.
"Falling haaaaaaard!"
As Fred fell into a superfluous area irradiated by red lights, Big Boy made small chuckle and so did Yokai, but it did not reach his ears. Frantic, Wasabi asked again, "Seriously what's the plan?"
"Get the mask," Go Go's face went uber-serious as she activated the visor.
"I know that," Wasabi said as Go Go, White Tiger and Honey left for the battlefield. "But specifically for real, WHAT ARE THE EXACT DETAILS OF THE GODDAMM PLAN?!"
"I'm right behind you!" Honey shouted after Go Go, readying her right hand with a chem-ball.
Go Go used the remains of the capsule track and catwalk to fling her right disk at Yokai as Big Boy and his cronies fired away at the color of her armor, reminding them too much of Dick Tracy and his signature chic attire. In return, Yokai lifted his right hand at another beam of microbots at her just as jumped and her feet landed on the other side of the ruined track. The disk came back to her and she found herself flying among the walls close to Sandman as he and Yokai shot rectangular blocks of sand and microbots at her, forming an odd looking staircase as her altitude elevated with the velocity of her body. Yokai's second attempt to strike her was intercepted by the ferocious White Tiger, who fell to the floor and slipped immediately into catalepsy.
"What sandbox did you crawl out of?" the jaunty voice of Spider-Man had to confirm his suspicions about this human sand pile that was obviously misunderstood.
Sandman turned and saw the masked face of Spider-Man flying directly towards him from a web line. The wildly gyrating Go Go Tomago was quickly replaced by a human arachnid going through his body. Sandman instantly reacted, extending the right arm of his hammer fist and grabbing Spider-Man, catapulting him towards Nova, Iron Fist and Power Man. Nova flew out of the way, but Luke and Danny weren't so lucky, they were pummeled to the floor by a screaming Spidey.
"I never knew a bunch of kids would be so retarded to break me out of a prison surrounded by water," Sandman gloated.
No one bothered to ask further questions, not even the pre-informed Big Boy, whose cobalt colored hat and Persian lamb overcoat were turning Colombia blue from the bright lighting of the facility. At the point she spun her body two times upon impacting the ground, Go Go tossed her right disk directly at Yokai, striking him square in the nose. Go Go was certain that such a blow could have easily torn his mask off, but it was slightly crooked by an inch. Re-adjusting himself and his mask, Yokai ushered a chilling warning through his distorted voice.
"I show no mercy to any who stand in my way!"
But Go Go ignored him, she jumped over another pillar of microbots and landed at the floor level of the gun-toting convicts. Texie Garcia chambered a shell into her Mauser Broomhandle and fired away, but the amount of lead carried by all thirty criminals combined were no match for the bulletproof fabric and armor of the suits. With her disk returning to her, Yokai, Big Boy and a stiff Breathless jumped to the floor, caught by the large molehill of microbots as the other criminals moved quickly out of the way. Flattop responded by firing a wild volley of .38 bullets at her, yet the amount of absence in training his aiming skill had taken its toll.
Once Nova circled around Sandman, hoping to confuse his wits down by a maximum amount of befuddlement, Honey jumped down to aid Go Go as Yokai and the criminals chased and fired away at her. She dropped the pink chemball she had been holding in her right hand and splashed down behind a pillar into a gelatinous mass that turned lemon chiffon upon impact then quickly darkened into an ice blue color, allowing her to a make safe landing from a six feet jump.
She ducked behind the pillar closest to her for cover, then stepped out towards another, watching Flattop let his Tommy gun rip with jejune insanity. With heaving breaths, she stepped behind a third column and typed the chemicals to create a sky blue colored chemball that landed in her right hand. She was about to throw it at Yokai when her entrance was blocked by the clicking of a gun and a thin figure with a pale face and a French blue bowtie pointing it between her eyes. It was Sketch Paree with a SIG-Sauer P226.
"Avez-vous des problèmes, mademoiselle?" he asked with a sinister smile.
Honey thrusted her right foot at his chin and with his head wobbling on both sides, he fell to the floor like a sack of potatoes.
Go Go, meanwhile was running away from Yokai at the speed of a rollercoaster, and Nova, who had been circling Sandman for twenty seconds, was finally knocked into unconsciousness by the living pile of shingle who used his left hand to swat Nova like a fly. He crashed into the titanium steel walls and fell to the floor with no broken bones, though he did however, suffer a severe headache from the impact and a cringe worthy "ow" to go with it.
Sora rushed over to Nova, but as he jumped safely down to the lower level on his feet, he was blocked by Itchy with his Thompson M1 and an old excuse that was as tempting as fate itself.
"You wouldn't hit a guy with glasses would you?"
"No, but I can do this!" and Sora reciprocated by striking Itchy's head with the tip of his Keyblade. He ran over to Nova, helping him up while Donald and Goofy went back for Hiro and Baymax, who was still struggling to liberate himself from the debris.
"Hello sailor," was what Go Go said to Pruneface once she passed him.
She raced up the wall, and when she was about three feet above the floor she spun around in a 360 degree turn and flung her right disk at him. Yokai stepped out of the way as the disk struck Pruneface's forehead, knocking the criminals and those standing behind him, Influence, Mole and Spots to the floor. The disk continued on to strike Honey Lemon's visor and bounced off, causing her to throw the chemball in an unexpected reflex and it crashed to the floor before Go Go could see it as she raced down the wall, foolishly slipping her fast wheels in a puddle of ice blue oil and fell on her rear end, sliding on her spine. Honey, who saw her coming, quickly lifted her left foot, but Go Go's crotch had made contact with her right one, sending her to the floor like the weak sort of women most males enjoyed to perceive one as.
"Well, that takes care of the girls," Big Boy chuckled to Breathless, who was given a cocky smile in return.
"You wanna dance, mothafucker?" came a voice. Yokai turned to see the source: Wasabi.
"You talkin' to me?" Big Boy placed his hands on his coat for emphasis.
"Yeah, I'm talkin' to you, asswipe!" Wasabi shouted back in a rather crude behavior. Big Boy was confused until the dark skinned man spoke again.
"You wanna dance, masked man? Cause, you'all gonna be dancing to these!"
Bouncing around to prove his point, Wasabi activated his plasma blades, which he held with both arms up.
"Hand over the mask or you'll get a taste of THIS!"
The Blank wielding a Colt Model 1903 in his right hand, fired a bullet was quickly sliced into two pieces by Wasabi swishing his left hand in a 90 degree turn. The other criminals fired off their guns in return and so did Yokai with eighteen arms of microbots, but no matter how hard they tried, Wasabi was too fast for them. Using his memories of dance lessons for battle stances, Wasabi flung his hands to the left, right, sideways, slantways, and front ways eight different times. Hiro and Sora, who had managed to free Baymax from the rubble, watched him from afar. It seemed to all three of them, that his blades were the most useful in destroying the microbots.
At last, after resting his arms, spread apart from each other, Wasabi had one last crack to pull before he could expect another wave of lead and microbots. He chuckled at the success of his weapons, admiring them as he hunched his torso, imitating Big Boy.
"Is that all you got?"
The answer to his question came in the form of a crawling feeling that covered his shoes to his ankles followed by a lasso rope of undulating microbots that wrapped around his throat, choking his Adam's apple in the process as he was thrown forcefully to the right.
Fred, who had been climbing his way through the ventilation shaft (which was surprisingly large enough for his suit to fit), came rocketing out of the grate as Donald and Goofy landed on opposite sides to support the cause. Donald was Fred's right, balancing his staff. Goofy was on Fred's left, hiding his face with his shield.
"Back into the fire!" the comic book nerd shouted with a river of flames spewing out of his mouth.
But before he could take action, Wasabi flew into Donald, creating a domino effect that pushed against Fred and Goofy. The three victims were thrown off their feet and slid across the ice laced floor towards the girls, who had regained their own feet while Wasabi was fighting off the microbots and the bullets. They were piled pel mel in a small corner off to the right side of the room, and Coffyhead, tea-cupping his Smith and Wesson Model 36, was about to fire before Laffy Smith held him back.
"The lead's useless," he told his peers.
"That's the brightest thing I ever heard you say," Coffyhead smiled, but Pear-Shape, cross-thumbing his Olympic Arms OA-93 with a 90 round drum, held his arms forth at the victims. They were just about standing up when Yokai created a fourteen foot rectangular hammer of microbots, and it was large enough to squash the whole team, if not kill them repeatedly by hammering the hapless heroes. Sora watched from afar and quickly brought his Keyblade glider into the air just as Hiro had finally freed Baymax from the concrete.
The whole time, as Breathless remained on her perch of microbots with her hands on her hips, quietly singing "Nobody but Me" by The Human Beinz to herself, she saw what looked like a flying missile coming straight towards her. It was Sora on the glider, followed by Hiro and Baymax, who charged at Big Boy, shouting "Leave them alone!" But Yokai jabbed his right arm, creating a large pillar that pushed Baymax to ceiling, jolting Hiro off the robot while Sora kept charging at Yokai, having been thrown off guard by Hiro's distraction. Hiro flailed his body over the Kabuki man, his head butting into the mask and so did Sora, who ran into Breathless. The impact somewhat disabled the microbots, causing all five to plummet through the seamless body of Sandman to the steel floor.
Breathless landed at the threshold of a staircase, watching Hiro and Lord Deathstrike rolling down the stairs to the lowest area of the facility while Big Boy landed on his head about six feet away from the two. Sora, who had fallen at the bottom of the stairs, watched Hiro using his hand to stand himself up, slowly approaching Yokai with calm, patient and vengeful steps.
Bracing themselves for the end, Honey, Go Go, Fred, Wasabi, Goofy and Donald waited to be crushed, but the microbots fell like heavy raindrops. The other criminals turned to their fallen leader and Sandman, who had been disoriented from Nova spinning around him about a minute ago, shrunk down to his normal size, restoring his human appearance as he tried to recover from the distraction. Spider-Man and his friends were still down for the count, lying there with idea of what was happening around them.
Hiro moved toward the insensate Yokai, squeezing his fists as he murmured, "I hope you can understand the pain that you have caused me."
He stepped right up to the body and gripped the mask with his right hand, knowing that he had to be quick.
"It's over, Krei."
Then, ever so slightly, he pulled the mask off…