Grieve Me

Who to Trust?

Hey guys. I just want to apologize for the long wait you guys have to go through for this story. It's been pretty busy with work and my sister just got married (praise God almighty! It's been eight whole years she and her fiance been together - bout time they got hitched!) Please enjoy the chapter and God bless you all so much!

Tadashi was at his wits end as he ran around the apartment, searching around for his brother. Once he got released from the hospital, Hiro began telling him all about his 'sleepwalking.' At first, the older Hamada didn't believe Hiro until, one night, he caught his brother walking out the room. He thought it was Hiro's usual sneaking out to go bot fighting but when he tried to stop him, Tadashi noticed the kid's eyes were dulled and unresponsive.

These glitches told the older boy that something was wrong with Hiro's system and he wanted to fix it, but that was difficult due to their situation, and the night glitches added to that.

However, now it was out of control.

Tadashi scolded himself for letting things get like this. "Maybe it was the fire that glitched him?" he murmured as he searched the garage for his brother. "Once I find that kid, I'm going to be sure to fix this." But how was he was going to do that without alerting the lad?

There wasn't time to figure out a solution when he heard his brother yelling for him. Rushing back into the apartment, the two knocked into each other. Unbothered by the crash, Hiro talked away about the masked man, rushing through every detail he could recall.

Not once did he pause.

Tadashi couldn't keep up with the boy's maddening pace. In an effort to calm the kid, the older brother placed a hand on the younger's shoulder and covered the other's mouth with the other. "Breathe, Hiro." He calmly urged before making the kid start over. "What was that again?"

Tadashi couldn't remember the last time Hiro gave him a hysteric look. Slower than before, Hiro told his brother everything that happened that night. Tadashi listened and silently wondered if what Hiro experienced was true or just those glitches getting worse. He believed it was the latter once Hiro told him about the 'dream' of them being kids. That was a memory Tadashi covered when he was coding Hiro's body...and it was a memory that Tadashi took great lengths to block out.

If Hiro was remembering things like that, then Tadashi believed his work was coming undone. As calm as he could, the older patted the younger's head. "That sounds like a wild dream you had, Hiro. Your sleepwalking's getting out of control but thank God that you're home again."

"It wasn't a dream!" the younger one protested. Shoving off Tadashi's hand, Hiro stated, "There's a psycho out there producing countless microbots. He attacked me!" Hiro was growing sick of that familiar smile his brother threw his way. It was the usually patient kind, but now he could see in the other's eyes that he was being taken seriously. "I was fully awake, Dashi." It was a pitiful plea but Hiro wanted his older brother to believe him. He didn't want the other one to look down on him as if he was a crazy person.

It was bad enough that he felt crazy himself.

Also, he wanted to find out WHY that masked man had his invention and what he planned to do with it. All Tadashi wanted however, was to fix his brother, and to block out those memories again.

'Along with those hallucinations.' He thought. "So, what do you want to do about it?" He questioned, playing along in hopes of softening his brother's anger.

There was no reply.
What could Hiro do?

He was a kid and it didn't matter how smart he was, kids don't get taken serious by adults. Hiro wacked his brain but nothing came up except for, "Stop the masked man." It was something, Hiro concluded, even if that something was grasping at any straws could. "We can catch the man and take back my microbots."