After Hiro's triumphant presentation, the crowd began to disperse. Tadashi, beaming with pride, slung an arm around his younger brother. "Come on, genius. Let's get you a celebratory burger. We need to talk about your future." He led Hiro away, leaving the revolutionary microbots behind for the judges to view.
The rest of the team gathered around Ward, buzzing with excitement. But Ward's attention was elsewhere. He scanned the crowd and noticed a conspicuous absence. Professor Callaghan was gone.
A cold certainty settled in Ward's gut. He knew exactly where the professor was going, and what he was about to do. Hatred, he thought, a flicker of something almost like pity crossing his mind. It truly is a terrible, powerful emotion. He made no move to stop it. To get what he needed, Callaghan had to be pushed to the brink. The portal project had to be restarted, and only a man who believed he had lost everything would take such a risk. Firebrand, his rescue robot, stood silently nearby. A perfect, terrible irony.
He turned back to his friends, his face a mask of good-natured celebration. "Hey guys," he said, nudging Gogo with his elbow. "Let's get out of here and go celebrate with Hiro."
The suggestion was met with immediate enthusiasm. The other exhibits seemed dull by comparison.
"I'm in!" Fred shouted, throwing his hands in the air. "We should throw a party! A huge one!"
"As long as there are no cucumber sandwiches," Wasabi said primly, adjusting his sweater.
"Maybe we could have a race!" Gogo suggested, her eyes gleaming with a competitive fire.
Chatting and laughing, the group followed Ward toward the exit. They had just reached the main doors when the first scream tore through the exhibition hall. It was high and panicked, followed by another, and then a chorus of them. A shrill, deafening fire alarm began to shriek, and a plume of thick, black smoke billowed from the far end of the hall.
"It's on fire! Fire!"
Panic erupted. The fire spread with unnatural speed, feeding on the countless flammable materials and wiring of the exhibits. The hall became a chaotic scene of fleeing students and guests. Tadashi and Hiro, who had been just outside, saw the smoke and rushed back toward the commotion, their faces etched with alarm.
The team regrouped safely outside as the entire hall was engulfed in a roaring inferno, the surging heat wave pushing them back like a physical blow. Tadashi frantically scanned the faces in the crowd.
"Where's Professor Callaghan?" he cried out, his eyes wide with horror. "He didn't come out!" His gaze snapped from the terrified face of his brother to the wall of flames. Responsibility and devotion warred on his face. "I have to go back. I have to save him."
"Tadashi, no!" Hiro screamed, grabbing his brother's arm.
Tadashi looked back at Hiro, his expression one of pure, agonizing love and apology. He gently pulled his arm free, leaving his signature baseball cap in his brother's hands. Then, with a look of grim determination, he turned and ran headlong into the inferno.
"By the way," Ward said, his voice cutting through the stunned horror of the moment, his face a perfect mask of sudden, dawning realization. "I remember now… Firebrand is still inside!"
"Yes! Fast, Fred, get the controller!" Wasabi reacted instantly, shaking Fred by the shoulders.
"Right, right! My dad has it!" Fred snapped out of his shock and began frantically searching the crowd. He finally spotted his father standing with a stunned Alistair Krei. "Dad! Dad!" he yelled, waving and sprinting over.
"Fred! Oh, thank God you're alright!" his father said, hugging him tightly.
"I'm fine, but Tadashi and Professor Callaghan are still in there! We need Firebrand!" Fred said breathlessly.
"What?" His father's face went pale. He fumbled in his jacket pocket. "The bracelet, the bracelet…" He pulled out the heavy-duty red controller.
"Switch it to intelligent mode!" Ward commanded as he and the others ran up.
"Okay, okay…" Fred's father manipulated the screen, his hands shaking. "The manual control needs the VR headset… the AI is still in beta, it might have glitches…"
"There's no other choice!"
"Done!" he said, activating the mode. All eyes turned to Ward.
"Then all we can do is trust the intelligent system I designed," Ward said, his voice heavy with feigned helplessness.
"You're Mr. Ent, aren't you?" Alistair Krei said, his eyes lighting up with a disturbing mix of shock and opportunism. "I have to say, your invention is remarkable…"
"Sir," Ward said, pointing to the burning building. "I think we can talk later."
"Oh, right, sorry…" Krei mumbled, looking awkward.
At that moment, fire trucks screamed to a halt, but it was already too late for a human rescue. Firefighters began unhooking their hoses, aiming them at the blaze.
"Firebrand is moving," Ward announced, his eyes fixed on the controller's screen. "He's approaching the door."
Every head snapped toward the entrance of the inferno. A moment later, a fiery red silhouette appeared in the heart of the blaze. It burst through the wall of flame like a demon from hell, cradling a large, oval-shaped object in its arms.
A collective gasp went through the crowd. The robot, now clear of the fire, seemed to determine it was safe. Steam hissed violently from its joints as the cooling system worked, and the oval sphere in its arms unfurled, revealing itself to be the fireproof cloak. Inside, lay the still form of Tadashi.
"Tadashi!" his mother, who had just arrived, screamed, running forward.
"Paramedics! We need paramedics over here!" Ward shouted, tossing the bracelet to Fred.
Medics rushed over with a stretcher, quickly checking Tadashi's pulse before carefully lifting him. His clothes were charred, his skin covered in angry red burns.
"How is he, doctor?" Hiro asked, his voice trembling as he ran alongside the stretcher.
"He's alive," the doctor said quickly. "He passed out from smoke inhalation, and he has extensive burns, but his life is not in immediate danger. We need to get him to the hospital now."
A wave of relief washed over the family. Then, Hiro's face fell. He turned to Ward. "But… Professor Callaghan?"
Ward pulled the data chip from Firebrand's console and plugged it into a tablet. After a moment, he looked up, his face a mask of carefully constructed grief. "I'm so sorry, Hiro. Firebrand's life-form sensors… they didn't detect anyone else." He bowed his head. "I'm sorry. I couldn't save him."
"Oh, Ward, it's not your fault," Honey Lemon said, giving him a gentle hug. "You did everything you could."
"Yeah, man," Wasabi added. "If it wasn't for your robot, Tadashi would be…" He couldn't finish the sentence.
Ward remained silent, letting their comfort wash over him, his feigned guilt a perfect shield for the cold, hard truth.
The fire chief, his face smudged with soot, approached their group. "Excuse me," he said, pointing a thumb at the now-standby Firebrand. "That robot… whose is it?"
"It's mine," Ward said quietly.
"Is it real?" the chief asked, his voice full of awe. "Can it really do what we just saw?"
"It's still in the testing phase," Fred's father interjected, stepping forward. "But we would be honored to work with your department to get it field-ready."
The fire chief looked like he was about to weep with gratitude. "Thank you," he said, his voice thick with emotion. "You have no idea what this could mean."
The next day, news of Professor Callaghan's tragic death spread throughout San Francisco. The students of SFIT, dressed in black, attended the memorial service. Tadashi was in the hospital, stable, but facing a long recovery. The doctors, using an advanced tilapia skin graft technique, were optimistic he'd make a full recovery in a month.
In the days that followed, Ward secluded himself in his lab. The team assumed he was grieving, overwhelmed by the tragedy and his perceived failure. But in reality, he was processing. Callaghan was "dead." He now had the motive for revenge and, thanks to the fire, the means: Hiro's microbots.
Ward's plan, terrible and costly as it was for others, was proceeding perfectly.
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