I'm Not Giving Up On You [Tadashi Hamada X OC] [COMPLETED]

Test #11

Cherry's POV

There's a knock on the door of my loud shared workroom, and I look up from my textbooks to see Tadashi running towards me looking desperate. I haven't seen him for days, nor have Cass or Hiro; he's been working almost nonstop in a private workroom he hired out to do this special project that came to him the last time we rescued Hiro from the botfighting arena. The last time I actually spent time with him was when we talked about not having kids at his place - that was two weeks ago.

His hands slam down on my table, and he says through wild coffee-fueled eyes, "Do you have vinyl? I need more vinyl!"
"Uhh," I reply, a little bewildered by this odd side of my boyfriend I've never seen before, "Why do you need vinyl?"

He pauses, shakes his head, and widens his eyes. "Oh Beyonce, I haven't shown you yet, have I? Well, I'm about to do my third test when I get some vinyl, so come on!"

He grabs my hand and whisks me off my chair and out of the packed room before I can even properly stand. He tugs me into his private workroom, then instantly leaves mumbling to himself urgently, "Vinyl, vinyl!"

I turn around from the door and immediately gaze up at the huge robot partially made in the middle of the room.
It's huge, it's white, and it's big. I go to and gingerly poke it, ready to leap back just in case it's alive, and thankfully it doesn't activate. It feels made out of vinyl - ohhh, now I get it.

The door opens and in rushes Tadashi with a bunch of vinyl patches. They all look very mismatched and different variations of aged, and before he tries to weld them onto the rest of the vinyl I ask, "Uh, Tadashi? I don't think those are gonna work. Maybe you should produce more, or start the exoskeleton again?"

"No, no, now," he mumbles, mostly to himself, and keeps welding. I think he forgets I'm even here as he becomes more fixated.
Wanting to get back to my reading but also wanting to spend time with my boyfriend and wanting to know what he's about to do next, I simply sit on the only empty space of desk and watch him with a slightly shaking head. I can tell this isn't going to end well. For starters, I don't think he's slept in at least 24 hours, judging by the lack of sleeping equipment here and the dozens upon dozens of empty coffee cups. Why isn't he using the reusable one I got him with the spare bit of change I had once?

Eventually Tadashi steps back, and the robot is fully covered in mismatched vinyl. He breathes out like he wasn't breathing the whole construction time, and I step to him and place a caring supportive hand on his shoulder.
At my touch he reels back with a surprised yelp, then sees it's me and blinks multiple times.
"Cherry? When did you come here?"
"You pulled me in here before you went and got that vinyl," I remind him in a voice usually reserved for kids who are making trouble at my cafe, and he blinks a lot again.

"Oh," he says, and stumbles a little before picking up a small test board and walking up to the robot. He switches on a camera he's fixed onto the head of it and smiles in a very forced way to make it seem like he hasn't been up forever.
I sit on the chair behind him that's covered in sheafs of paper, so I'm in the camera line. I can't wait for Tadashi to watch this in a few months' time and cringe at how his girlfriend watched his sleep-deprived ass get beat up by a robot. How else would this outcome be?

"This is Tadashi Hamada, in my 11th robotics test, with an improved exoskeleton. Come on now, bud."
He puts the board down - well, drops it with a clatter on the floor - and presses a round button on its chest with a card in it so it slots into the skeleton.

The robot comes to life through two black orbs connected by a thin line on its face; it blinks... and does nothing.
Tadashi freezes in his living dead state, and says, "Uhh... hello?"
He pushes it gently, but enough for the robot to swing backwards on its inflatable stubby legs and come back with a hit to my boyfriend with its huge belly, which as it comes into contact with him tears apart and causes almost its entire exoskeleton to tear.

Tadashi himself falls to the floor, and instantly I'm off the chair and kneeling next to him. I check his pulse and heartbeat and breath: all seem normal. In fact, he's fast asleep - him finally lying on the floor made him drift off from the sheer fatigue he's gained from God knows how long he's not slept.

I gently stroke his forehead, slicking his hair that's fallen from his cap into place. I hang his cap on the desk lamp, go into my packed work room, borrow a blanket and pillow from my friend Cindy who works overtime a lot, and go and tuck him up on the floor. I smile at him snuggling tighter in the blanket, and kiss his forehead lightly.

I look up to the robot, whose camera and eyes are still on and overlooking its sleeping creator. I get up and walk toward it until I'm standing in front of it.
I laugh a little. "You know, I've never seen Tadashi as crazy over this as much as he has for anything else - apart from me. You must be pretty special."

I smile again and press the camera button, and then the round button with the card inside. The eyes of the robot close and I look around for some sort of stand to lean against the skeleton in case it falls over and breaks.

Once it's successfully secured against the side of a wall, I phone Aunt Cass and tell her that Tadashi is staying overnight to sleep in SFIT again, only I'm staying with him this time. She agrees with relief, and I hang up and lie beside my sleeping boyfriend. He unconsciously pulls me close, and despite the hard cold floor beneath me I close my eyes and snuggle into him.