A Complicated Web

Chapter Thirty-Three: Sammy

Note: Updating so Sammy is no longer "screaming" at the audience in her speech to Baymax

Darkness covered the ground as Loki contemplated his options. There was something niggling at the back of his mind that he'd missed something. He had no idea what though and that bothered him.

There were spells he could use to try and locate the missing teens. But they would require the use of some DNA from one or the other. He hadn't found any in Kally's dorm room and hadn't thought about it at the other places.

He supposed his best bet was to return to an area most likely to carry the DNA of either subject. That meant a trip back to Stark Tower. Or, in retrospect, he could visit the boy's home over in San Fransokyo. All he had to do was go there and find some. A strand of hair would work best.

Upon further contemplation, the god of mischief decided that might be his best course of action. With the right tools, he could be there by morning, charm the aunt, or just sneak in and be on his way.

It was so simple he wasn't sure why he hadn't thought of it before. Without a second thought, Loki set out for San Fransokyo.

....................................

Hiro had lost track of time and that was a dangerous thing to do. Since he only slept when he had to, there was no telling how long he'd actually been in that lab. It didn't help that there were no windows to indicate night or day. Nor were there any clocks. Weeks could have gone by and he wouldn't have known it.

The designs for a robot similar to Baymax were easy to create. He'd done that more than enough times to remember them by heart. What made it take longer was trying to build in a flaw that wouldn't be obvious or easily detected. Someone watched his every move and double-checked his work. Or what they could understand of it. He'd opted to use a code for all his work, one that he and Tadashi had devised as children. That way the visual information was there, but the technical specs couldn't be replicated without him present.

If he was designing a robot, it only took a moment to realize they wanted Kally to create a program to run it. This, of course, meant they'd eventually have to be put together, though he doubted that would happen before either one of them broke in spirit. He could only hope she'd find a way to sabotage their plans on her end as well. With the careful scrutiny he was under, he wasn't sure he could build in a fault or not without them knowing.

Hiro's stomach felt funny. It was a feeling he'd been ignoring for some time, along with the slop they called food. There was no way he was going to eat that. And since he kept himself at least looking like he was busy, it was fairly easy to avoid, though he had to pretend a time or two to eat the disgusting stuff. That and he hadn't had much of an appetite anyway, at least as far as that slop was concerned. He didn't know how anyone could.

The world swam before his eyes and he leaned against the worktable where several long rods were laid out. To all appearances, he was merely looking at some small detail in the metal. Just how long had it been since he'd actually eaten anything? Or slept, for that matter. He wasn't sure. He'd been too busy looking at different materials to notice. And since he'd lost all sense of time, he had no way of knowing. Not that he'd have eaten that play dough tasting crap if his life depended on it. He didn't know how anyone could.

And then there were the dreams that weren't quite dreams when he closed his eyes. He knew they were all memories of his past lives. The Doctor hadn't said anything about them continuing to haunt him like a really bad case of PTSD, though part of him had gotten used to it. Okay, who was he fooling? That's exactly what was happening and he knew it, the PTSD part. And it took just about everything he had to not outright lose it. Baymax usually helped him calm down after any such occurrences, but Baymax was who knew how far away. And there was no way he wanted him there, not knowing these people would leap at the chance to tear him apart and reverse engineer him if Hiro failed.