Changes
Virginia smirked as Cass realized it was him who had placed the absurdly large order for breakfast pastries. He would have to remember not to order so many next time, she had only been open for an hour or two and he had taken most of her pastries.
“Virginia!” Cass exclaimed, nearly dropping the tray, “I wasn’t expecting you. Are you eating all of these alone?”
“Probably.” he shrugged, “I eat a lot. But if you have the time, please feel free to join me for a big.”
Cass bit her lip, glancing around the shop. It was still too early for the usual morning rush, so she was certain she could spare a few minutes to sit and talk. That didn’t stop her from looking astounded as Virginia devouring several of the pastries.
“Sorry. Not used to eating with people.” Virginia wiped his mouth with a napkin, “So how are you doing?”
“Huh?” Cass blinked, she wasn’t used to being asked that.
“Figured I should ask, all things considered.” Virginia took another bite, “All the stuff with your boys lately. I doubt anyone has asked.”
“I’m…hanging in there.” she finally sighed, sagging in the seat, “I mean, I raised them so I know how to handle this. But it’s weird with them being bigger. I mean, Hiro had two accidents last night. Two! He didn’t even have any when he was three.”
Virginia said nothing as she swiped one of the pastries and took a bite out of it.
“And Tadashi! I love affection, ya know, but he was so cuddly last night. It made me feel terrible every time I had to get up, he’d shoot me this look like I had done the worst thing in the world. The other strange part was he was doing the potty dance all night. I swear he almost had as many accidents as Hiro did have!”
“Regressive behavior.” Virginia commented as he ate the last of the pastries, “At least that’s what it sounds like.”
“Regressive….what?” Cass’ eyebrows furrowed together, “What is that?”
“Couldn’t explain it. I’m not a psychologist.” Virginia shrugged.
“Then why would you…”
“Aunt Cass?”
Both adults snapped their attention towards the curtain that divided the restaurant from the apartment. Tadashi stood there rubbing his eyes, the collar of his shirt darkened from where he had been chewing on it and his hair sticking up in every direction.
“What’s the matter Tadashi?” Cass was on her feet and over there in an instant.
“Hiro had another accident.” Tadashi mumbled, glancing around Cass, “Was Virginia here?”
“He was…” Cass turned to look, sighing when she spotted the empty table and the stack of bills.
“Oh.” Tadashi looked down at his feet.
“Come on Tadashi, let’s go get Hiro cleaned up.” Placing a hand on her nephew’s shoulder and guided him back up the stairs.
On their way up, Tadashi paused at the window and watched as the police whipped by with their sirens on. He swore that, for a split second, he saw a blur of green racing down the street with them.
Virginia swore softly to himself as he flopped down on the bed in his safe house. Never had a ratty old couch felt so good. This was supposed to be a vacation, but he was just as busy as always.
“What is with this city and robots?” he grumbled as he threw a tennis ball at the wall, catching it as it came rocketing back to him.
He had made some progress on the masked man case. He wasn’t as active as a normal super villain, no high profile robberies or threats yet, but he did manage to track down the source of that red bird symbol: Alistair Krei. He had plans to stop over there as Agent V tomorrow and question the man in hopes of getting something useful out of the businessman.
Hopefully it would go well and he wouldn’t have to dangle the man out of a window.
He nearly popped the ball when his phone went off. The only people who had his phone number were the Hamadas and the Marshmallow, so he barely hesitated to pick up the phone.
“Hello?”
“Are you free tonight?” Cass’ voice surprised him for a moment.
“I…should be? Barring some emergency. Why?”
“You’re coming to dinner.” Cass stated, “The boys suggested it and I figured it was a good idea. It’s the least I can do.”
“I don’t have a choice in this do I?” Virginia sighed, running his fingers through his hair.
“Not at all. Can you be here by 6:30?”
“Sure.”
“Perfect. I’ll see you then.” Her voice was still chipper as she hung up.
Virginia shook his head as he set his phone down, throwing the tennis ball one last time. Dinner, with normal people.
How in the hell was he supposed to do this?
“Am I…early?”
Virginia felt uncomfortable, tugging at the collar of his t-shirt. He had left both his armor and under-suit back at the hideout and managed to fish out a passable outfit with a green shirt and a pair of jeans. He felt naked.
“No, not at all.” Cass smiled to hide the fact that he had surprised her, “I actually wanted to talk to you before we ate anyway.”
“The boys?” Virginia eyes the stairs he knew led up to their room.
“They’re napping or doing homework. Just involved enough that they won’t make their way down until I call them.”
Cass waved him into a seat and sat down across from him after making sure nothing was going to burn.
“How were they today?”
“Like last night.” she sighed, “but all day. I’m amazed I managed to get anything done with them acting like that. I don’t think Hiro even has any underwear left. Not to mention Tadashi had a very near miss, and let me tell you I haven’t seen him that upset in ages.”
Virginia paid only half attention to what she was saying, part of his very, very aware of how much she was moving as she talked. Had she always been like this? He must not have noticed before.
“But anyway. I did some research on what you said this morning, regressive behavior, and I wanted to talk about it. This one website said that…”
Virginia listened as she went on about what she had found. He already knew what it was, but he needed her to know so she could get a grasp on how her boys were acting. He had to admit that she had been thorough, she had even stumbled onto age play and a bunch of other stuff that involved regression. He was impressed.
She also owned a total of thirty knives that he was certain were razor sharp.
“Is it harming them?” he finally cut her off.
“No?”
“Then its how they’re handling it. Hiro has had an attempt on his life and Tadashi has nearly died twice. There are a lot worse ways to cope than regression.”
“Does it make me a bad person for being hesitant about all of this?” Cass asked after a few minutes, “I mean, they’re my boys and I want what’s best for them but this is just….”
“It’d be weird if you didn’t have any hesitations about it.” Virginia shrugged, “But it is better than what they were doing.”
“You’re talking like you’re going to be here to help.” Cass shot him a look, eyeing him.
“They followed me to the docks and got attacked because of it.” Virginia tapped his leg, “It’s kind of my fault.”
Cass frowned but didn’t argue with him. He might not be one of her boys, but she knew that look on his face well enough to know that nothing that she was going to say was going to change his mind about that. So she smiled at him before going back to the stove to finish cooking.
Virginia rose to his feet and politely offered to set the table.
“Boys! Come eat!”
Virginia mentally prepared himself in the event that the boys charged, he didn’t want to hurt them on accident just because he was feeling jumpy. He had already shattered one of Cass’ plates.
“Virginia!” Tadashi wrapped him in a hug as soon as he noticed him standing there, “You came!”
“Yeah.” Virginia awkwardly hugged him back, “I had some free time.”
Hiro, who had been trailing behind his brother, blearily hugged the man in-between yawns and mumbled a greeting. Virginia smiled and placed the half asleep boy in a chair.
Tadashi snickered as Hiro perked up at the smell of food, only stopping to insist that Virginia sit next to him.
Dinner itself went off without a hitch. Hiro and Tadashi didn’t make colossal messes out of their food, Virginia scraped through with passable table manners, and Cass was fully delighted that her boys were actually eating a healthy amount of food as opposed to just picking at it.
“That was good Aunt Cass.” Tadashi chimed in as he carried his plate to the sink.
“Thank you. I’m just glad you two actually ate more than just enough to survive.”
“I always eat enough.” Tadashi pouted as Hiro made a disgruntled noise from his spot at the table.
Virginia and Hiro stared each other down, Hiro’s face set into a stubborn pout.
“Hiro, you can eat that. It’s two bites.”
Hiro shook his head, crossing his arms.
Tadashi moved to say something only to be cut off by Cass, who shook her head when he gave her a confused look.
“Alright, I guess I’ll just have to take Tadashi with me on that walk later.” Hiro’s face switched from stubborn to curious, “Yep. I was going to take you with me but if you don’t eat, you won’t have the energy to go.”
Hiro frowned, eyes darting between his plate, Virginia, and outside. With a huff, he picked his fork back up and finished eating.
“Good job.” Virginia ruffled the smaller boy’s hair as his picked the plate up.
“Dessert?” Hiro yawned, his fingers inching towards his mouth.
“Actually, we need to have a talk first. Then dessert.” Cass said as Virginia slid past her towards the sink.
“Are we in trouble?” Tadashi’s eyebrows knitted together as he sat down.
“No, not at all.” Cass kept her smile calm.
Virginia waited a moment by the sink, having rinsed off most of the plates as best he could without breaking them, until he was certain Cass had their full attention. Once he knew she did, nobody was looking and their situational awareness was pretty bad, he reached over and unlatched the window with the intent of slipping out.
“Virginia, don’t go!” Tadashi’s voice cut Cass off at the same time he whipped around to catch the wet napkin aiming towards his head.
Virginia sighed, he couldn’t say no to the faces they were giving him. And he did promise that he would help Cass with them.
So with that in mind, he took his spot back next Tadashi and nodded slightly towards Cass.
“Right. So we all,” she shot a look at a seemingly unrepentant Virginia, “need to talk about how you two have been behaving lately.”
That had an instant reaction from the two. Hiro curled in on himself, drawing his knees to his chest and sticking his fingers in his mouth. Tadashi’s eyes went wide and frantically darted between Cass and Virginia, his fingers toying with the collar of his shirt. Virginia’s hand hesitated towards Tadashi’s shoulder before returning to its place on his lap.
“We are in trouble aren’t we?” Tadashi mumbled, not meeting either adult’s eyes.
“No, you’re not.” Cass reassured, “It’s just something we need to talk about.”
“Hiro.” Virginia cut in, his eyebrow’s furrowed together, “How fast does a driver have to go off of a twenty degree ramp to land fifteen meters away?”
Hiro scrunched his face up in contemplation before mumbling something.
“You have to be louder than that for me to hear you Hiro.” Virginia encouraged, leaning in just a bit.
“Fifteen point one meters per second.” Hiro stated, just loud enough to be heard.
“Good job. Tadashi, what’s the maximum height?” Virginia turned his head, focusing on the younger boy.
Tadashi’s mouth moved and he traced out numbers on the table as he worked on the problem. Hiro sat up just a bit, pulling his legs away from his chest, and Virginia could almost hear the gears turning in his head as he worked out the second part.
“One point three eight meters!” Tadashi’s head snapped up, a smile on his face as he gave the answer.
“Good job.” Virginia hesitantly tapped the boy on the back, smiling.
“What your aunt is saying is that there’s nothing wrong with what you two are doing. You need to understand that off the bat, nothing is wrong. You’re coping with what’s happened, which has been a lot in recent weeks.”
“There’s just going to be some small changes.” Cass continued when Virginia stopped, “Like the accidents and the curling in on yourselves, that’s not good.”
“I don’t mean for it to happen.” Hiro mumbled around his fingers, “I just get doing something and it happens. I don’t notice.”
“You’ve always been that way.” Tadashi rolled his eyes, “I could draw on your face when you’re working on a project and you wouldn’t even notice.”
“Could not!” Hiro protested.
“Could too!” Tadashi shot back.
Virginia stared as the two boys argued back and forth, a strange look settling across his face.
“If he’s having accidents and not noticing,” Virginia spoke up over the boys, directing his gaze towards Cass, “why not just use something like pull-ups, or diapers?”
All noise stopped as the Hamadas stared at the green haired man, who only blinked in response. Then Cass turned towards Hiro while Tadashi’s face went pensive.
“Hiro,” Cass’ voice was calm, “what do you think?”
Hiro’s fingers stuck themselves firmly in his mouth as he refused to meet anyone’s eyes. Tadashi bit his lip, looking worriedly between his brother and the adults in the room. Virginia placed an arm around him, doing his best not to stiffen as Tadashi pressed himself closer.
“Hiro?” Cass pressed, but Hiro merely shrugged.
“Alright then.” Virginia rose to his feet, detangling himself from Tadashi, “Hiro, let’s take that walk we talked about earlier huh? Then when we get back Tadashi and your aunt will have desert ready.”
Tadashi frowned as Hiro scrambled out of the chair and grabbed Virginia’s hand. The only thing that stopped him from curling up into a ball was Cass putting a hand on his shoulder and asking him what he wanted for dessert.
Virginia bit back a swear as he eyed the night crowd, there weren’t supposed to be this many people out this time of night. Why did he have to pick tonight to try and act like a civilian? Even his glasses would have been enough.
Hiro’s grip tightened on his hand, snapping him back to the present. Protect the ward, accomplish the mission. With that in mind, Virginia swept Hiro off the ground and placed him on his shoulders.
“No accidents up there. This is my only shirt.” Virginia commented as he started down the sidewalk, making sure Hiro’s head wouldn’t hit on any signs.
Never one to lie to himself, Virginia wanted to get Hiro talking about what had been going on. Not his behavior, that had been handled already, but the fire and the shipping yard. But it was also very difficult to get someone who goes non-verbal to talk.
The only noises he got out of Hiro were huffs or giggles as they made their way down the street. There was one whine when Virginia spun around an ice cream vendor before Hiro could signal the man for ice cream.
“None of that. We’ll have dessert when we get back.” Hiro whined, “Really, we will. With your aunt and Tadashi.”
Hiro snorted at his brother’s name.
“Oh? Are you mad at him?” Hiro made an affirmative noise, “Is it because of the fire?”
Hiro tensed at the mention of the incident, but made another affirmative noise.
“Yeah. You do know he won’t do something like that again right?” Virginia stated as he turned another corner.
“Stupid.” Hiro finally mumbled, laying his head against Virginia’s.
“Yes, it was a very stupid decision and he’s paying for it now. Just like you are from following me to the shipping yard.”
Hiro whined.
“I know.” Virginia patted him on the leg, “But you can’t be too mad at Tadashi when you did the same thing.”
“Fine.” Hiro grumbled.
Virginia checked that talk off his mental checklist as he ducked his way into the store. He felt Hiro squirmed as the clerks greeted them, and a few people cooed at him, but Virginia took it all in stride and waved them off.
Hiro groaned as his ride turned down the aisle full baby stuff, kicking his legs. Virginia responded by pulling him down and pulling out the back of his waistband, reading the tags.
“Stay still. I would have just scanned you but I don’t have my glasses tonight.” He explained, “So this is the only option.”
Hiro grumbled and roamed further down the aisle once he was let go, leaving Virginia inspecting the variety of packages in front of him. He did the calculations, factoring Hiro’s size in with the notes on the packaging, and snagged two of them off the shelves.
“Come on Hiro.” Virginia waved the boy back to him, “We have dessert to get back to.”
Hiro didn’t return empty handed, having come back with a giant box of crayons, two coloring books about robots, a package of pacifiers, and odd bear/blanket combination.
“What’s yours?”
Hiro held out one of the coloring books and the pacifiers.
“And the others are for Tadashi?”
Hiro nodded, miming putting the blanket part of the bear in his mouth.
“Ah. Well, let’s go pay for it then.”
Hiro blinked in surprise, having expected to be told no to something, before grinning and following him.
“No Hiro, put the gummy bears back.”
Hiro pouted the rest of the way to the counter, even as the woman working tried to coax him into saying something while telling Virginia that his son was adorable.
“He’s my cousin.” Virginia corrected as he handed over the correct amount of cash, “But thank you. Where is your restroom?”
He smiled and thanked her again after she pointed it out before he grabbed Hiro’s hand and walked him to the bathroom. Hiro bit his lip, finding something unnerving about the toilets.
“I’m not expecting you to use one.” Virginia stated, “Just go put one of these on.”
Hiro looked at his options, one was an actual diaper while the other was a pull-up, and weighed them carefully. Virginia leaned against the door, barring anyone else from entering, and watched as Hiro made his decision with the pull-up.
“Are you going to need help?” he asked as the small boy started to strip.
Once Hiro shook his head, Virginia politely averted his eyes enough that it didn’t look like he was staring as Hiro changed his clothes. He only snapped back to attention when Hiro was struggling with the button on his shorts, which he kneeled down and did for him.
“Alright, let’s get back then.” Virginia scooped up the bags and Hiro in one swoop and headed out the door.
Virginia sat on the Hamada’s couch in the dark, slowly listening for the rest of the household to fall asleep. Once they did, he planned to slip out the window and make his way back to his safe house. He had spent enough time out of armor and imposing on the Hamadas.
With that in mind, he silently slid a window open.
“Don’t go.” A voice mumbled, “Don’t like it when you go. Supposed to say good bye.”
Virginia turned, hand reaching for a knife that wasn’t there, and faced the half-asleep Tadashi. He doubted the boy would remember the conversation, he was rubbing both his eyes and his new bear was dangling from his hand.
“Go back to sleep Tadashi.” His voice was barely a whisper, “I’m not going anywhere.”
“Goin’ potty.”
With that, the boy stumbled off to the bathroom and Virginia sat back down on the couch, waiting until Tadashi stumbled his way safely back up to his bed before getting comfortable.
He really needed to learn how to say no to that boy.
“You’re still here!”
Virginia did flinch slightly this time as Tadashi charged and wrapped his arms around him. He didn’t exactly sleep last night and it was setting him just a bit on edge.
“Yes, I told you I wasn’t leaving last night. Can’t go without saying good-bye.”
Well, he hoped that was the social norm anyway.