So I had this idea after watching a sweet video called "My dad's story". You should go watch it. Anyway, this is my third fanfic for Big Hero 6 in like, two days. I'm glad this one doesn't contain any extreme sadness or violence like the other ones. I need to admit, I LOVE the relation Tadashi and Hiro have. They're just too cute as brothers.
Also, if you're wondering when this takes place, you can either think it takes place before the movie or you can think it takes place after my fic "I'm not giving up on you". I'll go with the second one because I think it's even cuter that way ^^
Enjoy :)
The sun had just risen on the city of San Fransokyo. As always, Tadashi was the first one to open his eyes at the Hamada's house and soon he was ready to begin his day. He put on his cap and looked at himself in the mirror before going to the window beside Hiro's bed. Tadashi yanked the blinds up, throwing the sun directly into Hiro's eyes, who responded by groaning and cramming his pillow down his head.
"Tadashi, today is Saturday. Leave me alone.", he mumbled into his mattress.
"We've talked about this before. You can't sleep too much in the morning because if you do you don't sleep at night. Now get out of bed!"
The only reply Tadashi got was an unintelligible mumble.
"Ok. If you don't get out of bed, I'll have to drag you out."
Hiro tossed his pillow aside and looked to his brother, curling up in his bed.
"You wouldn't dare."
Tadashi laughed as he rolled up his sleeves. In less than one second he had grabbed Hiro's ankles and dragged his younger brother all around the floor as he flounced and yelled, trying to grab something to make Tadashi stop. His head would hit on the corners of the walls and on the furniture, causing Tadashi to laugh every time he heard a thud.
"Fine! I won't sleep! Now let me go!"
Tadashi giggled and dropped his brother's ankles, causing his legs to fall on the floor with a loud thud. He stepped over his brother, who just grumbled and tried to go back to sleep on the floor.
"Go do something productive with your day! You're a genius for robot's sake!"
"Really?" Hiro said, sitting up "And what are you going to do in a Saturday?"
"I'm going to my school to work on a project of mine. I want to get it done as soon as possible. It will..."
"... Help a lot of people, I know. You say that about every project of yours." Hiro rolled his eyes as he curled up on the floor, too lazy to go back to his bed.
"Because it's true." Tadashi said, poking Hiro's arm with his foot "Hey, have you seen my camera?"
"What camera?"
"The red one."
"Why do you even need it?"
"I recorded some videos last night of my annotations and I'll need them. Did you see it or not?"
"I think I saw it inside the left drawer."
Tadashi left his brother alone and went to the drawer. He was in such hurry that he didn't even notice there were two cameras inside the drawer and just grabbed the first one he saw, believing to be his.
"Found it, thank you. I'm leaving now. Wanna come?"
"To your nerd place? No, thanks."
Tadashi shrugged. "Ok then. I'll be back for dinner."
Hiro waved goodbye nonchalantly without even bothering to open his eyes or take his head off the floor. His older brother just rolled his eyes as he smiled and left the room, grabbing his keys as he went downstairs.
Hiro opened his eyes and rubbed his face. He tried to go back to sleep, but it was useless. He looked around the room and saw that Tadashi was already gone, probably off to do some nerd stuff.
"Thank you very much, Tadashi. The one day of the week I can sleep some more you drag me around the room."
He rubbed his head as he stood up. It still hurt from all the times he had hit it on corners when Tadashi was dragging him around. After he got up on his feet, he blinked a few times and tried to concentrate as he rubbed his belly through his pajamas. He looked around the room again and noticed that Tadashi had left the drawer wide open. He rolled his eyes and walked up to the desk to close it, but then something caught his eye.
A red camera.
Hadn't Tadashi taken it with him? Hiro grabbed the object and stared at it. He frowned in confusion as he tried to understand. He was pretty sure the camera he had on his hands belonged to his brother, but at the same time he was also pretty sure Tadashi had taken a camera with him. So how was it still there?
Hiro's eyes widened as realization hit him. He went back to the drawer and emptied it frantically, looking for his own camera. It looked exactly like Tadashi's, except that it was a reddish color mixed with purple, but nobody would notice if they didn't look really closely. They looked pretty alike, and that was the reason he had put a label with his name on his camera. He was pretty sure he had left it on the drawer the night before.
If he was holding Tadashi's camera, that could only mean his brother had taken Hiro's one by accident instead.
"Oh, no. Oh, no. No. No. No!" He said to himself as he ran around his room trying to dress up as quickly as he could, leaving his pajamas on the floor as he rushed downstairs with Tadashi's camera on his hand, jumping on one foot as he tried to put the other one inside his shoe. He knew the college was ten minutes away by foot, so he could get there quickly if he ran fast enough. But then again, Tadashi had left almost half an hour before and he had gone by motorcycle. At that rate, his brother was already on the college and there was a chance he was already using the camera he thought to be his.
"No. Oh, no. No, no, no, no." Hiro repeated to himself as he finally left his house running as fast as he could toward the college.
Tadashi opened his laptop and pressed the button to turn it on. The screen turned from black to blue as the machine got started. Meanwhile, he went to the computer of the laboratory and plugged in the cable of the camera. As the computer started to read the newly plugged device, he typed down the name of the file he needed. He tilted his head when a pop up saying "Nonexistent file".
"What? But I recorded the videos yesterday! How come they're not..."
He glanced at the camera and saw something under it. He grabbed it and spun it around, finally noticing the label that said "Hiro."
"Oh, come on! I just got here and now I have to go back? I should have checked before I left. Ugh."
Tadashi was about to unplug the camera when he glanced back at the screen. There was only one file on that camera. That would have been pretty ordinary, but then Tadashi read the name of the file.
"Tadashi lies".
He knew it was wrong to watch something that he didn't have permission to. Mainly when it was something that belonged to his brother, the person he trusted the most. The right thing to do would be to forget about it, unplug the camera and pretend that had never happened. But he couldn't help it. Had it been any other name, he would have done the right thing. But Tadashi lies? What could that video be about?
Still feeling guilty, he clicked on the video and the computer started to play it.
"Is it recording? Hello? Is this thing on?"
Tadashi watched as a video depicting the image of a younger Hiro appeared on the screen. His little brother poked the camera lens and tilted his head.
"Ok, I think it's recording."
The young Hiro pushed a box until it was in front of the camera and sat down on it, looking right at the camera and smiling.
"I am Hiro Hamada, I'm seven years old and this is a video for my big brother Tadashi."
Tadashi smiled as he watched the young Hiro grab a piece of paper and hold it in front of the camera, showing his handwriting full of grammar mistakes that were often made by children.
"I wrote this letter just for him and I hope he likes it."
He flipped the page and cleaned his throat before straightening himself up and looking down at the paper.
"My brother Tadashi is the best brother I could ever ask for. He's always there for me when I need him and even when I don't want him to be. He taught me what's wrong and what's right. He is a very cheerful person and I can never be sad around him.
He is the most handsome, strongest, smartest brother ever! I bet all the girls who know him like him. Everybody likes Tadashi, because it's impossible not to! I love my big brother very much.
He is my everything."
Tadashi couldn't help but giggle. He remembered when Hiro was that small and innocent, and he couldn't believe he had recorded a video when he was a kid about him. But Tadashi could never imagine what that young Hiro was about to do. He watched as the boy's smile faded into sadness and he put the paper away, now looking right at the camera.
"Tadashi is just great", he said, motionless, and sighed. "But he lies".
Tadashi tilted his head in confusion.
"Tadashi lies when he says he's not too tired to play with me."
Tadashi gulped as he watched his little brother speak as he was an adult, a serious expression on his face. He could tell Hiro was not reading anything; he was speaking as if he had known that for a long time.
"Tadashi lies when he says our family is not incomplete at all. He lies when Aunt Cass is too busy working and can't make us proper dinner and we have little food to share. He always says I can have it all because he's not hungry, but every time he does it I hear his belly rumble at night."
Tadashi sighed as he looked into his brother's eyes. He could almost swear it was real, not just a video, as he listened to each one of his words.
"He lies when he tells me he doesn't remember a lot about mom and dad because he doesn't want me to feel bad that I never got to know them very well. Tadashi lies when he says everything's going to be fine. He doesn't know if it's all going to be fine, but he doesn't want me to know he doesn't know it. So he lies. He lies when he says he's studied enough and can play with me at night. Because after we play and he puts me in bed, I wake up hours later and see him studying more. Tadashi is very smart, but even he needs to study. But he lies to play with me."
The Hiro on the screen wiped his tears away as he looked down.
"He lies..."
The little boy slowly lifted his head to look at the camera again before finishing his sentence.
"... Because of me."
Tadashi took a deep breath and covered his mouth with a hand and shook his head, trying not to cry. He was about to turn off the computer when young Hiro started to talk again.
"Tadashi told me himself that lying is a bad thing. But he does it a lot. And he does a bad thing because of me. I make Tadashi lie. I make Tadashi do a bad thing. So I made this video to ask sorry. I'm sorry I make you lie, Tadashi. I hope you can forgive me."
The young Hiro waved goodbye before reaching out and turning off the camera. Tadashi stared at the black screen before reaching out and touching the spot where his brother's face was a second before. He sniffed and finally unplugged the camera, looking down at it. He stood in silence for what seemed to be forever until the door slammed open.
"Tadashi! You grabbed the wrong camera!"
The real Hiro, the one who was fourteen years old, entered the room panting and walked toward Tadashi. He grabbed the camera in his big brother's hand, smiling in relief because he thought Tadashi hadn't played it yet.
"This one is yours," he said, wiping the sweat on his forehead and giving Tadashi his camera. "You took mine by accident."
"I lied to you a lot, didn't I?", that was all Tadashi said. It was enough to make Hiro open his mouth in surprise and look down, embarrassed.
"Please tell me you didn't watch that."
"I did."
Hiro folded his arms after sticking his camera down his pocket.
"You didn't have the right to. It was something..."
"... You recorded it for me when you were seven. Why didn't you show me before?"
"I don't know, ok? It just seemed so silly when I watched it again. I don't even know why I recorded that."
"It's not."
Tadashi kneeled down and wrapped his arms around Hiro's neck, finally allowing his tears to come down his face.
"I'm sorry I lied to you."
"Dude, come on, don't make me..."
Hiro sighed and closed his eyes, finally returning his brother's hug. He was never someone to reveal or talk about his emotions - which were one of the reasons why he had recorded that video instead of saying it eye to eye to his brother - but in that moment, it all felt ok. Before he could notice, he started to cry too.
"It was never easy taking care of you after mom and dad died, but... I wanted you to be happy. You don't have to be sorry you made me lie."
"Tadashi, really, I recorded that when I was seven. I don't feel that way anymore."
Tadashi pulled apart and tapped Hiro's head.
"Of course. I don't feel guilty anymore either." He chuckled as he stood up, "But why were you so scared of me watching it?"
"Hum, because, hum, because I look ridiculous in there. I was seven! And I talk like it was a big thing. I mean, come on."
"Of course." He repeated, "I don't really feel like working anymore today. Why don't we go play some video games and eat non healthy things?"
"Really? Like we did when I was seven?" Hiro jumped and smiled in excitement, but then he shook his head and pretended not to be interested. "Yeah, I guess so. It could be fun."
Tadashi rolled his eyes and smiled before wrapping his arm around Hiro's shoulder and taking him outside, giving him one of his helmets as they walked toward Tadashi's motorcycle. Before Tadashi could sit down, Hiro wrapped his arms around his brother.
"One last hug."
"One last hug." Tadashi agreed. "By the way, you'll never be able to break my record on that game."
"Tadashi, stop lying." Hiro chuckled as he sat down behind his brother on the motorcycle and they left the college.
Yeah, this was pretty short and common. I hope you guys liked it! After their aunt Cass said she didn't know a thing about children, I started to think that maybe it was all up to Tadashi to raise and take care of Hiro for the first years of their lifes after their parents died.
I think I may be creating my own headcannon for the story, perhaps?
I hope you enjoyed this :D