Hehehehehe. I see you all liked my last cliffhanger. And as for you, Bighero6fan D, since you have your PM's disabled: Tadashi didn't tell Hiro who he was right away because they were in the middle of a fight. It may have prevented Hiro from going crazy there at the end but it would have really distracted him, and in a fight like that distractions can get you killed.

Honey Lemon just watched as Tadashi and the two other demigods disappeared into the shadows.

"Okay, so do you mind telling me what the hell is going on?" GoGo demanded, turning to Honey Lemon. "Was that really Tadashi? Were those demigods with him? And where did they go?"

"And the fire!" Fred put in, "I saw the gold armored guy throwing these giant fireballs at the monsters! How can he do that if he's our Tadashi?"

"Honey…you didn't seem too surprised. Did you know about this before today?" Wasabi asked suspiciously.

Honey sighed. "Well, yeah. I knew. That was Tadashi. He's been with the demigods all this time."

"Why didn't you tell us?" GoGo demanded, "How do you even know?"

The looks on their faces just about killed Honey Lemon. Her friends were shocked, of course, but they also looked betrayed. Why'd they have to find out like this? "Remember back after the chimera attacked us, when I said I'd call my old friends and see if anything was wrong? That's when I found out."

"A whole week?" Wasabi asked, "You knew how hard losing him was on the rest of us—Hiro most of all. How could you do that?"

"And what would have happened if I said anything?" Honey Lemon demanded, trying not to cry. She'd felt guilty about this the whole time, but now it was even worse because of the looks on everyone's faces. "Look, I wanted to tell you. Really. But you all thought he was dead! How was I supposed to just come out and say you were all wrong? Tadashi couldn't come home yet. And it wasn't my story to tell, it was his. I never spoke with him directly, but I know he wanted to explain things himself."

The others just stared at her for a minute. Finally, GoGo took a deep breath and nodded. "All right. We'll let Tadashi speak for himself. Let's go after them."

"But wait," Wasabi said, "Hiro took Baymax with him! We're stranded on this island."

"Oh, oh!" Fred cried, "I've got it! Heathcliff can pick us up in my parents' helicopter!"

Wasabi gave him an incredulous look. "They have a helicopter. Of course they do."

"Well, come on. Don't waste any time." GoGo urged. "We've got a friend to find."

She's right. Honey thought, nodding to herself. We've been apart for way too long.

Hiro admitted it freely, when the stranger—when Tadashi—finally took off his helmet, he began to cry. He couldn't move, couldn't even speak for a minute, because the entire world had just been yanked out from under his feet. Baymax had been right, Tadashi was here.

When Hiro didn't say anything, Tadashi's nervous expression was replaced with concern. "Hiro? You okay?"

"Tadashi." Hiro whispered, hardly daring to believe it. His brother smiled hesitantly and nodded.

"Yeah. It's me."

"Tadashi!" Hiro cried again, and ran at him. Tadashi stumbled back a bit when Hiro crashed into him, but he returned the hug. Hiro held him tight, because he never thought he'd have this chance again. His brother was here…Tadashi was home!

"Hey, hey, it's all right." Tadashi patted Hiro on the back, then let out a relieved laugh. "I'm home. It's okay now."

Hiro looked up at him, still scarcely able to believe it. "You're here. You're alive. Is this…is this even real? What happened? Where have you been?"

Tadashi smiled sadly and shrugged. "It's real all right. As for what's happened since then…it's kind of complicated."

"It's been almost a month!" Hiro yelled, and pushed Tadashi away. "Screw complicated! Where the hell have you been? I thought you were dead!"

Shame dominated Tadashi's features and he looked down at the ground. "I wanted to come back. I really did, but at first I couldn't even get up. After that, well…"

"Well, what?" Hiro demanded, "You could have called, or e-mailed, or something! But no, you have to disappear for weeks! Do you have any idea how hard that was for me? For everyone?"

Out of nowhere, someone's hand appeared and slapped Hiro in the face. Hard. "Cut it out!" Bringing a hand to his stinging cheek, Hiro turned to the person who'd struck him.

It was the black-armored boy. He'd taken off his helmet and was giving Hiro the look of someone who'd had their patience stretched way too thin. "You think you're the only one who's had a rough time? Kill the petty excuses and just let him explain himself!"

The blonde archer put a hand on his shoulder. "Nico. Calm down." He said quietly, before looking to Hiro. "Sorry. Lots of us have been through pretty rough stuff, but Nico more than most. So he kind of has a thing about sticking with family."

"Guys, it's all right." Tadashi said, regret obvious in his voice. He took a deep breath, then looked back up at Hiro. "I know I have a lot of explaining to do. But let's start with introductions, all right?"

"I'm Will Solace!" The archer said, brightness a bit forced. "Son of Apollo."

"Nico di Angelo." The black-armored boy said. Now that Hiro was looking at him more carefully, he realized that this boy really couldn't be any older than he was. And with the black hair and brown eyes, they could probably pass for cousins or something. "Son of Hades."

Hiro nodded slowly. "So you've been hanging out with demigods? How'd that happen?"

"Well, you remember that kid Leo who appeared in the Iris-message?" Tadashi asked. Though Hiro didn't really know what an Iris-message was, he nodded. It was kind of hard to forget a talking cloud of mist appearing right in front of him. "He saved my life. He was there on the night of the showcase, and he got me out of the fire. I was pretty banged up, so he and his girlfriend took me to their, uh, home. Camp Half-Blood."

Hiro's eyebrows drew together. "Wait. Honey Lemon told us about that place. It's only for demigods. What were you doing there?"

Tadashi just waited, probably wanting Hiro to make the connection. My brother was at a demigod camp… Suddenly, he remembered the fire that the stranger—that Tadashi had used to fight the monsters. Unless his armor was super tech like Hiro's, it couldn't be a human ability. "You can't be one of them!" Hiro gasped. Tadashi just shrugged and held out one hand. An orange ball of flame flickered to life for a minute before disappearing. "But you're human. We're brothers."

"We have both the same parents." Tadashi nodded. "Hikari Hamada was our mother. And our dad…or dad is Hephaestus, Greek god of blacksmiths and fire."

"What the hell?" Hiro cried.

Tadashi chuckled. "That was pretty much my reaction."

"Mine too." Will put in helpfully. "But Nico just fangirled at everything." The younger demigod growled at this remark, and Hiro gave him a skeptical look. A guy like that getting all excited? Not possible…well, maybe. Considering how much of a dweeb I was when I was little, anything's possible. "But how is that possible? When Honey told us about demigods she said that most of them get attacked by monsters all the time. And how come you never noticed the fire power before?"

"That's new." Tadashi explained, looking a bit uncomfortable. "It's complicated, but it's rare. Something more common would be what you can do."

"What I can do? What, being smart?"

Tadashi shook his head. "Technopathy. You're not just good with machines, you can control them. Like you did with Baymax's chip earlier. And some demigods never discover what they really are. It doesn't happen often, but considering the city we grew up in it's not that surprising."

Hiro remembered Honey Lemon saying something about San Fransokyo's high level of tech confusing monsters. And the thing with Baymax's chip…yeah, that wasn't normal. I could see the monsters too, when we were being chased. "So, we're demigods. Okay…and we have an entire army of monsters hanging around the city, not to mention your psychotic ex-professor. What do we do now?"

"Call for reinforcements." A female voice said from behind. Hiro and the others turned to see Honey Lemon and the rest of the group standing in the garage doorway. Honey's eyes went to Tadashi, and Hiro swore she got a happier expression than she'd had in weeks. GoGo, Wasabi, and Fred all gave a little jolt of surprise when they saw him, but nothing like Hiro's reaction happened. What happened after I left them? Wait…I left them! How'd they get off the island?

"Guys…I'm sorry, I…"

"We're going to catch Callaghan." GoGo said, and offered a rare smile. "And we'll stop his monsters together."

"So maybe don't leave your team stranded on a spooky island next time?" Wasabi asked lightly.

Hiro blushed. "I didn't mean to—"

"Oh, it's all right." Fred shrugged. "Heathcliff picked us up in the family chopper. And Honey explained things, too."

"Now that that's out of the way…" Honey Lemon grinned and let out a delighted laugh, then ran at Tadashi and hugged him. "It's so good to see you again!"

The rest of the team followed suit, until Tadashi was at the center of a big group hug. Hiro joined in too, and after a minute even Baymax did. Nico just watched, and Will might have been laughing at them. But Hiro didn't really care.

His big brother was home. His friends were all here. And even if they had to go up against an entire army of monsters, they'd be fine.

Because they were all together.

Leo waved his hand through the Iris-message, feeling super embarrassed. I probably just made things ridiculously awkward for him…but I can't worry about that now! If it's true about all those monsters he needs backup as soon as possible. Leo threw open the door of the bathroom (he'd been using the shower's steam for his message) and raced into the main part of the Hephaestus cabin. Leo grabbed a walkie-talkie from where it lay on his bed and used it to call the rest of his siblings. "Call off the search and come back to base! I know where he is!"

When he and the rest of Cabin Nine had realized Tadashi was missing, they'd split up into four groups. Three to roam the camp, and Leo left behind to try and contact him. The rest of the campers had been left alone, because it wasn't the first time a half-blood had taken a midnight stroll. And even if that was all it had been, there were still monsters in the woods and harpies roaming the grounds. So of course they'd been a bit on edge.

"Rodger!"

"Gotcha!"

"We're on our way!" Came the replies from the group leaders. No more than five minutes later Leo was surrounded by his anxious looking brothers and sisters.

"So?" Nyssa asked, "Where in Hades did he go?"

"Our big brother decided to take a surprise cross-country trip." Leo said with false brightness. At everyone's confused looks, he added, "Tadashi had another dream. I don't know the details, but something bad was about to happen. He got up, Nico saw him leaving, and so long story short the two of them and Will Solace are in San Fransokyo. Oh, and there may or may not be an army of monsters getting ready to wreak havoc on the city."

If this was a cartoon, Leo was pretty sure the entire cabin would have sweatdropped. As it was, they had to make do with several annoyed groans and more than a few curse words. "I know, I know. He's being a reckless idiot. But we're demigods, so that pretty much defines us."

"So what are we going to do?" Jake asked, "I know three is the normal quest group, but if there's really an army of monsters they probably need help."

Yet again, the words were met with uncomfortable grumbles. Sure, the Hephaestus cabin was strong and brave and many of them were more than confident on the battlefield, but they weren't front-line fighters. Not to mention the fact that in a situation such as this, the only mode of transportation that even had a chance of getting them there on time were the pegasi. And Leo knew full well that his siblings preferred machines over animals any day. Still, the decision fell to him.

"He's our brother." Leo said, "And he needs our help. Now, I could take a couple others and go on Festus, but it would be better if whatever group we decided on could all leave at the same time…"

"Just get the rest of the Seven to go with you." Jake suggested, "Gods know you all have enough battle experience, and from all the war stories I've heard thinking on your feet became second nature."

Leo shook his head. "Tadashi is our brother. I shouldn't be the only one who—"

"Just do it, dragon boy." Shane rolled his eyes. "Sure we don't like staying behind, but you guys are probably the best team that Camp Half-Blood can throw together."

Are they really okay with that? Leo wondered, looking at the faces of each of his siblings. Lots of them were nodding, and even the ones that seemed a little disappointed looked like they supported Jake's idea. I guess he's right. Leo nodded. "Okay, this is how it'll go down. Shane, you run down to the Big House to wake Calypso and Chiron. I'll get Jason. Harley, go into the Aphrodite cabin and try to get Piper without waking anyone else up. Jake, you do the same for Frank in the Ares cabin. Chris, you're in charge of Percy and Annabeth since I'm pretty sure she's been sneaking into the Poseidon cabin. Nyssa, you wake Hazel up. Tell everyone to meet up at the Pegasus stables, and make sure they come armed. We don't have time for any kind of war council. The rest of you…I don't know, just meet us there too! Now, go!"

Leo's siblings scattered for the second time that night. Leo himself made straight for Cabin One. He knew that he should try to avoid waking up the rest of the camp, so he refrained from kicking open the door. Inside there was a constant rumbling, and Leo wasn't sure if it was just the cabin being as obnoxious as the god it represented or Jason snoring.

The blond demigod had wedged a bed in the very back of the cabin, out of the giant Zeus statue's view. Leo ran up to him and shook his shoulder.

"Yo, Jason! Wake up!" Leo whispered. "Come on, Superman, this is serious!"

Jason groaned, but he sat up and opened his eyes. When he spotted Leo, his expression became a mix of confusion and annoyance. "Leo, what are you doing in my cabin? It's the middle of the night!"

"Technically speaking, no it isn't. It's one in the morning." Leo gave his friend a sly smile, but then went back to serious mode. "Come on, you need to get up. Grab your sword and whatever else you need to cause some havoc. We have a mission to go on."

Jason narrowed his eyes, but he nodded. He got out of bed, and as he put his clothes on he asked, "What's the problem? Where are we going?"

"San Fransokyo." Leo answered, "And Tadashi."

"Monster horde finally getting out of control, then? Where is he now?"

"See, the thing is, he's kind of already there. We noticed he wasn't in the cabin and when I called he was in the city with Nico and Will. From the looks of it they'd already been in a fight."

"Of course. Why would he think to ask for help?" Jason rolled his eyes and put his gold glasses on. They only make him seem like more of a Superman wannabe. Leo thought to himself. "Well, where to, Repair Boy?"

"The armory to pick up a few toys, and then the Pegasus stables. I sent my siblings to get everyone else and told them to meet us there." Jason nodded, and together the two boys raced out of the Zeus cabin.

As they made their way towards the armory Piper turned up, and after another minute Frank came running up behind them. Hazel caught up with their group when they were halfway there.

"So I'm guessing that 'others' means the rest of the seven?" Jason asked when their group of five entered the armory. "What about the rest of your siblings? And Calypso?"

"I sent Harley to get her and tell Chiron what's happening." Leo answered, scanning the rows of spare weapons for something useful. When he caught sight of a trunk at the back of the room he grinned and ran for it. "As for the rest of Cabin Nine, they decided to stay put. They want to help, but…"

"They aren't front-line fighters." Piper finished. "Leo, what is in that box?"

"Please tell me it won't blow up in our faces." A voice requested from behind, and Leo turned to find that Percy and Annabeth had joined them. Since the armory was in between the cabins and the stables, they must have noticed that there were people inside. "Because that would just ruin everyone's day." Percy said.

Leo looked back at the trunk he was sifting through, and the few items he'd already taken out of it. "Dude, this box is filled with explosives. But not for us, for the monsters."

"The army of monsters that Tadashi ran off to confront." Annabeth said, sounding a little annoyed. "Excellent."

Jeez, she could be a little more excited. Leo thought. He'd gotten what he needed out of the old trunk, so he closed it then stood up and turned around to face his friends. "Come on, the seven of us together again, kicking some scaly monster butt and being generally awesome? If you guys keep being so negative I might be tempted to keep these to myself." Leo held out a large bag in one hand, and what at first glance looked like a bundle of sticks in the other.

"What is that?" Hazel asked. "Are those arrows?"

"Right you are! Frank, catch!" Leo tossed the bundle of arrows to the big Roman, and he fumbled a bit trying to catch them. "Explosive arrows. I know you have some already, but these have Celestial Bronze mixed in. They'll vaporize any monster caught in the blast. And for the rest of us…" Leo opened the bag, feeling like a pyromaniac Santa Claus. He fished out one of the things inside it and held it up for the others to see. "Mini Greek Fire bombs! Shane designed them. Just throw them, and with enough force they'll detonate. They're a bit too destructive for regular use, so we haven't been using them in Capture the Flag. But they should do a nice job of either distracting the monsters or making them go boom. I've got some smoke bombs here too."

"You really think we'll need all these?" Jason asked as Leo was passing around the explosives. "It seems like overkill."

Leo shrugged. "As long as it's a kill. We don't know exactly what we're up against, so we can't be too careful. And besides, who doesn't love a good old explosion?" All of Leo's friends groaned, but he laughed in response. "You're all such downers. Well, we'd better armor up. Just remember we need to move fast."

The seven ransacked the armory, grabbing whatever pieces of equipment that suited them. Leo made sure to grab some things for Calypso, too. As soon as they all were ready they charged outside to the Pegasus stables.

It looked like a small crowd was waiting outside. The group turned out to be made of most of Leo's siblings, Calypso, and Chiron. The old centaur nodded at them gravely when they met. "I've been informed of the situation. Normally I wouldn't allow a group out so suddenly, but under the circumstances this seems to be the only choice."

"Are we taking Festus?" Calypso asked. She'd pulled her hair back and her sword was strapped to her hip.

Leo nodded, quickly fishing a remote out of his pocket. Since Festus usually hung out in the woods, Leo had designed a way to call for him if he needed to. He pressed the red button and addressed the group. "Tadashi's gotten himself into a whole lot of trouble. So we're going to get him out!"

All of a sudden, Hazel let out a loud whistle. When pretty much everyone looked at her to ask what it was about, she just shrugged and gave Leo a small smile. "You're not the only one with special transportation. Arion will be here in a minute."

"That reminds me, I have Tempest!" Jason exclaimed. He shut his eyes and got a really focused expression for a minute, then looked back at the rest of them and smiled. "One storm spirit on his way."

I came up with the brilliant plan to meet up here and nobody is even going to ride a Pegasus? What the heck? Leo thought indignantly. Just as the words crossed his mind there was the faint hum of wings, a crack of thunder, and the sound of rapidly approaching hooves. Festus appeared in the night sky and landed just as a very temperamental tan horse appeared next to Hazel and a bank of storm clouds formed next to Jason. "I…I guess we'll go in pairs then. You have that black Pegasus, right, Percy?"

The son of Poseidon nodded. He ran inside the stable, then came out a second later leading a magnificent animal that looked three kinds of ticked off. "I don't want to go on a cross country trip in the middle of the night either, but we have to!" Percy told the horse. "And if you stop complaining I'll get you donuts when we're done. Sorry, guys. He wasn't too happy I woke him up."

"I urge you all to be careful." Chiron advised as everyone started to get on their rides. "Remember, there may or may not be goddesses involved in this plot. Don't let your guard down!"

"Oh, we'd never!" Leo said sarcastically as he climbed up Festus. Calypso got on the dragon express too, and sat right behind him. "We're all about forethought and planning, right, guys?"

"You're a spastic pyromaniac!" One of Leo's siblings called, and Leo cackled.

"We should have some sort of a plan, though." Annabeth decided. "Let's meet up just before we reach the city and make sure we know what we're running into."

"Rodger that, Owl Face!" Leo saluted Annabeth, then took hold of Festus's controls. "Everyone ready? Let's go kick some monster butt!"

With a mix of cheers and tired laughter—adventure or not, it was the middle of the night—the group of eight began to take off. Arion disappeared in a flash, and Tempest galloped away with a surge of thunder. Blackjack then took to the sky, with Festus following right behind.

"If you die again we'll kill you!" Nyssa yelled from below. "Go get him!"

Leo laughed like a maniac as Festus rose into the sky. Here he was, flying off on a giant metal dragon in the middle of the night, racing towards a battle that was most likely going to be very big and very dangerous. Gotta love demigod life!

Leo wouldn't change it for the world.

Woohoo, return of the sassy Leo! I'm sure you all missed him. So the cavalry is coming, Big Hero 6! Let's hope nothing bad happens before they get there. (Even I don't know, I haven't written it yet!) And as for Hiro's reaction I felt like anger and relief would be a pretty good mix. It was the moment you were all waiting for, so let me know what you thought of it in a nice review!