[A/N]: Weekly Bonus Chapter's here, folks! If you're loving the ride so far, hit it with those stones and drop a review - let's keep the hype rolling and push this story to the top! 🚀🔥
"Hey," Jay said, his tone becoming genuinely warm, "what if I told you I might be able to fix that? All of it."
The entire team went silent. Even the distant sounds of Tokyo traffic seemed to fade.
Fred was the first to break it, his voice uncharacteristically serious. "Wait, you mean like... Just like the Castle family from Central Park?"
"I've got a track record," Jay said simply. "People called me the Doctor for a reason. It's something I'm genuinely good at."
Hiro's eyes were wide behind his visor, hope and disbelief warring across his features. "You... you're serious? You could really...?"
"I can try," Jay said honestly.
Tadashi's voice carried a note of desperate caution. "Hiro, we should be careful. We don't know his motive, and if something goes wrong—"
"Nothing's going to go wrong, we need to take risks," Hiro interrupted fiercely, his voice cracking with emotion. "Tadashi, this could give you your life back. Your real life."
The pain in his voice was raw, unfiltered. This was a kid who'd been carrying the weight of his brother's suffering for years.
"Please," Hiro whispered, and the word carried everything. Hope, desperation, love, and faith that only existed between brothers.
"Okay," Tadashi said softly through Baymax's speakers. "Okay, let's try."
Despite continued protests about evacuation procedures filtering through his visor, Hiro had made his choice. The duo loaded onto Baymax, which was awkward, and flew to the Hamada residence.
The house was a fascinating blend of old and new. Traditional Japanese architecture seamlessly integrated with modern technology. But Hiro led them straight to what had clearly been Tadashi's old room, now transformed into something that looked more like a medical facility than a bedroom.
Banks of monitoring equipment lined the walls, their screens displaying vital signs and neural activity. Multiple computer workstations showed real-time diagnostics and remote control interfaces for Baymax's systems. Cables snaked everywhere, and the constant beeping of medical equipment filled the air.
"Jesus," Jay breathed, taking in the setup that represented years of desperate improvisation. "How long have you been living like this?"
"Three years, four months, sixteen days," Tadashi's voice answered with the kind of precision that spoke to counting every single one. "Not that I'm keeping track or anything."
Despite everything, there was still humour there. Still, the Tadashi that Hiro remembered.
Jay heard the full story now and piecing it together from the equipment and Hiro's haunted expression. The fire had been catastrophic. By the time emergency services arrived, Tadashi had been buried under rubble, his body broken and burned. They'd gotten him out alive, barely, but the damage was extensive.
Sixty percent burns. Smoke inhalation destroyed his lungs. Crushed vertebrae. And injuries that left you wishing you'd died instead.
Hiro had refused to let him go. Probably spent every waking moment since the fire building this setup, turning Baymax from a healthcare companion into a lifeline. Creating the neural interface that let Tadashi's mind pilot the robot while his body lay trapped in this medical tomb.
Three years of watching his brother exist rather than live. Three years of guilt and desperation and hoping for a miracle that never came.
Until now.
Jay didn't need to see the extent of the injuries to understand. His healing aura was already showing him everything. Burns covering sixty percent of Tadashi's body, damaged organs, scarred lungs from smoke inhalation. Survivable, but barely.
"This is going to take some time," Jay said, approaching the bed where Tadashi lay connected to a maze of tubes and wires. "Fair warning. It's going to feel really weird. Like your whole body being rebuilt from the inside out."
The healing process pushed Jay to his limits for the second time that day.
He had to rebuild Tadashi's respiratory system from scratch, regenerate nerve pathways severed by scar tissue, and restore organ function that had been compensated by machines for years.
Jay poured everything he had into the healing, sweat beading on his forehead as his power worked overtime. He could feel Tadashi's body responding, damaged tissue sloughing away and being replaced by healthy cells. Lungs that hadn't drawn clean breath in years began to clear.
His hands burned. His vision blurred at the edges. The exhaustion from healing Shingen earlier that day compounded with this new drain, and Jay could feel his reserves bottoming out. His enhancement gave him more stamina than most supers, but even that had limits.
He pushed through anyway, because stopping halfway would be worse than not starting.
By the time the rest of Big Hero 6 arrived, Tadashi was sitting up in bed under his own effort for the first time in over three years.
"Holy shit," Go Go stopped mid-sentence as she pulled off her helmet, staring at Tadashi like she was seeing a ghost. "You're ... you look exactly like you used to."
"Better, actually," Wasabi said quietly, his usually nervous demeanor replaced by genuine awe. "The scars are completely gone."
Fred bounced into the room still wearing his monster suit, took one look at Tadashi standing and stretching, and promptly sat down hard on the floor. "Dude. This is actual magic. Medical magic."
"It's not magic," Jay said tiredly, slumping against the wall. "Although I appreciate the compliment."
Jay's hands were shaking. The room tilted slightly, and he had to brace himself against the doorframe to stay upright. Two major healings in one day, with a fight in between. Even his enhanced physiology screamed rest.
That's when Aunt Cass arrived home.
She walked into the room carrying groceries, probably expecting to see the same medical setup she'd lived with for years. Instead, she saw her nephew. Whole, healthy, standing on his own for the first time since the fire, laughing with his friends like nothing had ever happened.
The grocery bags hit the floor with a crash, apples rolling everywhere.
She didn't say anything at first. Just stood there, frozen, her brain trying to process what her eyes were showing her.
Then her face crumpled. Her hands came up to cover her mouth as the first sob broke free, and she stumbled forward like her legs could barely hold her.
"Tadashi?" Her voice was barely a whisper.
"Hi, Aunt Cass," Tadashi said softly, and his voice cracked on the words.
That broke the dam.
She crossed the room and threw her arms around him, the sound escaping her something between a laugh and a wail. Her whole body shook as she clung to him, one hand cupping the back of his head like he was five years old again.
"Oh god," she gasped, pulling back just enough to touch his face with trembling fingers. "You're real. You're okay."
Her hands moved frantically. Touching his cheeks, his shoulders, his arms. Checking for burns that were no longer there, scars that had vanished. Years of forced composure shattered completely.
She kissed his forehead, his cheeks, anywhere she could reach. The tears came harder.
"Thank god," she whispered brokenly. "Thank god."
Hiro was crying too, unashamed tears streaming down his face as he watched his family being put back together after years of being broken. "Aunt Cass, this is Jay. He... he gave me my brother back."
Aunt Cass turned to Jay, and the look on her face was something he'd remember for the rest of his life. Pure gratitude mixed with disbelief, like she was staring at a saint or an angel or something equally impossible.
She crossed to him and grabbed his hands in both of hers, squeezing so hard it almost hurt.
"You brought him back," she whispered fiercely, gripping Jay's hands. "You gave me my boy back. How do I even thank someone for that? How do I—" Her voice broke again, and she pulled him into a hug that felt like it might crack his ribs.
"Hey, I'm just glad I could help," Jay said gently, carefully extracting himself from the embrace while smiling despite his exhaustion.
He reached into his jacket and pulled out a business card. "If you really want to be heroes, and I mean real, professional heroes, you're going to need better equipment than homemade suits."
Hiro read the card aloud. "Stark Industries?"
"Tell Tony I sent you," Jay said with a grin. "Prove you're worth the investment, and Tony will set you up with proper gear. Kid genius to kid genius. He'll appreciate your work."
Back in the present as Jay settled into his hotel bed, the day's events played through his mind like highlights from the perfect vacation. But underneath the satisfaction was a question that had been nagging at him.
Was it okay to have this much fun? To take time off from the larger conflicts and just... enjoy himself?
Tomorrow would bring its own challenges. Jay had a bullet train to catch to Osaka, and a very specific shrine maiden to find.
Tonight, he was just a guy who'd seen a giant robot statue, bought way too much anime merchandise, and helped a superhero team save Tokyo Tower.
Life didn't get much better than that.
[A/N]: I write across multiple fandoms. Support my writing and get early access to 45+ chapters, exclusive content, and bonus material at my P@treon - Max_Striker.