Lost in All of Our Vices

Ding-dong.

"Yo, Heathcliff I've got this." Fred called out pulling open the door to grin at Hiro. "Hey, little man, what's up?"

Hiro nervously glanced around the neighborhood trying to see if he could spot any prying eyes. Ever since receiving that note at the Lucky Cat Café, he'd been spooked. He'd done his best to hide it from his family and even though he'd had a lot of success with keeping Aunt Cass in the dark, Tadashi was another story altogether. Hiro had never been able to keep this sort of thing from Tadashi, not for long anyway. Tadashi was already beginning to notice something was up which meant Hiro had been on the receiving end of questioning gazes and concerned queries. If he wanted to protect Tadashi and keep him in the dark, he had to do something and he had to do it fast which is why he were here, visiting the one person he knew would fill him in on what he'd missed without asking too many questions. "Um, hi Fred." Hiro gave Fred a nervous wave. "Can we talk?"

"Sure." Fred pulled the door open wider in order to give Hiro space to enter. "Mi casa es su casa. That's French for please come in." Fred declared with an exaggerated bow. Heathcliff was standing beside him, pointedly ignoring Fred's antics.

"It really isn't." Hiro said walking into the mansion. Even though he'd been there many times since that first night, Fred's home never failed to amaze him. He wasn't sure if it was the expensive stuff or the crazy portraits and paraphernalia that astonished him more. Most likely it was the strange mix of the two but he didn't really have time to ponder the problem. He was here for an entirely different reason. "So…" Hiro glanced at Fred who was easily keeping pace with him as the two headed towards Fred's bedroom. "How did you guys find me?"

As expected, Fred's eyes lit up with the question. "It was EPIC, dude. You should have been there. Tadashi appeared out of nowhere the day you disappeared. When he found out you'd been kidnapped he was like a man with a mission! He went through your room, your notes and your PC looking for clues." Hiro nodded, remaining silent despite the sense of betrayal he felt at having his space invaded like that by his brother. Logically he knew why Tadashi did it but emotionally he was finding the revelation difficult to digest. "At first we were all, like, on the wrong track. We looked up all the old villains that we put away because you know it's always the ex-villain that kidnaps the hero only this time it wasn't. We tried to hide the fact that we were Big Hero 6 from Tadashi but then Tadashi asked Baymax to playback the video from the day you were kidnapped and…"

"Wait… wait, wait. Just hold on a minute." Hiro raised an arm in a bid to stop Fred's story telling tired. "Tadashi knows we're Big Hero 6?"

Fred nodded. "That's what I just said. Baymax played back the video of the day you were kidnapped and Tadashi kind of figured it out. Not that it was all that hard. That video is pretty incriminating you know."

"But it's supposed to automatically be encrypted. How did Tadashi figure out the passcode?" Hiro demanded, a mixture of fear and confusion coursing through him. Why had Tadashi not said anything about Big Hero 6?

"He didn't. Wasabi accessed the file."

"What? How could he?" Hiro demanded fighting with a renewed sense of betrayal, this time directed at Wasabi. "That's top secret information. Tadashi isn't supposed to know!"

"Look man." Fred raised both his arms defensively moving them up and down in an attempt to calm Hiro down. "We were desperate. We had no idea how to find you and figured Tadashi might be able to approach the problem differently. We tried to find you without his help, we really did but we didn't make any progress so we decided to look for a new angle. You're the one that taught us that."

Look for a new angle. Tadashi's words echoed through the air between them and the irony of the situation was not lost on Hiro. The very words that Tadashi has spoken to him in order to help him get into SFIT, the words Hiro had adopted as a way of life and passed onto his team mates, had come a full circle and led those same team mates to seek out Tadashi's help. Hiro sighed, running a hand over his face, closing his eyes to silently count to ten before speaking once more. "Ok, so Tadashi is the one that figured out who had taken me?"

Fred nodded opening the large doors and stepping into his room before resuming the tale. "He figured that his appearance, your disappearance and the appearance of the various monuments from the past had to be linked. The weird notes you were sending him, really helped. This notes were EPIC! Which reminds me, how did you send them?"

Hiro flopped down onto Fred's couch absently watching the TV screen while speaking to Fred. The TV was on mute, airing the news. "Notes? What notes? I didn't send any notes."

"Really?" Fred paused, looking thoughtful. "They were all written in your handwriting. You even signed them."

"Someone sent you notes written in my handwriting?" Hiro asked in disbelief. The news momentarily forgotten. That simply didn't make sense but then again nothing made sense when Fred was involved.

"Yeah." Fred nodded so hard the tip of his beanie flopped with the motion. "I don't recall the details but they are the reason we made the connection between the time portal and your kidnapping. Once we figured that out the rest was easy. Tadashi, Gogo and Wasabi created a map of all the time phenomena and used their locations to predict where the portal had to be. We then planted smoke bombs, crackers and flares in the building to scare everyone. We sneaked in during the chaos and rescued you." Fred finished with a grin.

Hiro nodded, processing the new information. The fire he thought he was running from must have been an illusion caused by the smoke bombs and flares. "Any idea what they're after?" Hiro asked glancing up to meet Fred's gaze once more.

Fred shook his head. "We weren't really focusing on what they were up to. We were more interested in trying to figure out where you were." Disappointment coursed through Hiro. He'd come here hoping to gather clues that would help him identify his kidnappers and even though Fred had told him a lot he hadn't known, none of it was very helpful. "Come to think of it…" Fred continued, raising Hiro's hopes once more... "We did find out something. According to Gogo, they stole the torpedoes from the World War II submarine that Gogo and Honey went to investigate the day you were kidnapped." Fred announced, proud at himself for remembering that tidbit of information.

Hiro shook his head, frowning as he processed the stray bits of information he had managed to obtain. "That can't be right." He mused. "They're not able to fully control the machine yet. The submarine was brought through the rift by accident. It would be too much of a coincidence if the object they were trying to retrieve just slipped through the time… rift…" Hiro completely lost his train of thought along with all color to his skin. A flickering image caught his attention drawing Hiro's focus to the newscast that was still airing on Fred television. The news report was covering some kind of Charity Gala, showing snippets of various celebrities arriving at the event. The celebrity that had caught Hiro's gaze was none other than Alistair Krei. The wealthy entrepreneur stepped out of limousine and thanked his driver before entering the crowd of photographers waiting at the door. The driver of said limousine was...

Inquisitor.

- BH6 - BH6 - BH6 –

A/N: Mwahaha and so the plot thickens.

Kiki Anderson: I am writing the chapters as scenes and generally end the chapter when I need to skip to the next scene. I do, however, aim for a minimum of 1000 words. Some of the earlier chapters were simply scenes that ended up rather long. All my chapters are between 1000 - 2000 words. I ended up with a lot of chapters that were between 1000 and 1100 recently. This one ended up a bit longer. As for Hiro, he is definitely not willing to lose his brother again. He's not willing to go through the grief of it.

CrazyBlueOwl: Yeah it's corny but I'm having fun with it. Liked the idea of using the quote when I read an earlier review. (Yes, I'm weird that way). LOL... I see you really want those kidnappers dead. What did they ever do to you? :P

Ern Estine 13624: Hiro does need help... the stubborn little bonehead!

snarky snark: You should lean towards honored. I'm only having a little fun and that quote was too priceless to pass up. The villain is supposed to be full of himself because he got a bit of power and let it go to his head. Inquisitor is not the best of names, I agree, but it got the point I was trying to communicate across. His real name is going to be revealed in a later chapter. PS: Thanks for the grumpy reviews. Sarcasm aside, you're just trying to communicate what you feel would make this story better. XD XD XD

Guest: LOL. I hate to disappoint you after that awesome whoohoo but the note is not a reference to a sequel. This story is still continuing until I reach a satisfactory resolution to what is going on. I must say I've heard people refer to Tadashi as an Angel but I've never heard anyone call Hiro a penguin! The idea of him waddling around just makes me want to laugh. I can just picture the dirty look Hiro would send me at the very suggestion.

Anony mouse101: Yeah, the bad guys are not done with Hiro yet...

shooting2stars: I liked that quote too. It is very Tadashi. The bantering was loads of fun. The two brothers really care deeply for each other and it shows, even when they are giving each other grief but the villians are not done yet. They didn't get what they wanted. Their penance is coming...

Dreamer: Sorry but Tadashi didn't see. He also didn't manage to snoop. As for the guys taking the pictures. Feel free to lock them away! The damage has already been done *insert evil laugh here* I'm glad you appreciate the effort I put into this... makes the effort worth it. Interacting with you is loads of fun! Hate to break it though. It's highly unlikely I'm anywhere near you. I'm in Africa! Our weather has been super crazy too. Earlier this year we were getting drought warnings and were in a water crisis.