Obake Itoko Chapter 9: Right Place, Wrong Time, a big hero 6 fanfic

Chapter 9, everybody! Surprise—having a good run of writing for this fic, so we're having a double update this week. :D

In other news—BlackKittens' fic Changes in the Wind: Big Hero 7 The Series over on AO3 brings up an important point on how the timeline of the movie and the timeline of the series don't quite line up. So, the timeline for this fic has the expo taking place in the spring with the events of the fic taking place late June/early July. Feels like an important point to mention here.

And here's a good question: with Obake and Hiro's timelines smashed together, who exactly is responsible for the explosion?

The Authverlord, thanks for the review! Thank you! Mmm-hmm—we get maybe a whole minute of younger Obake, so there's a lot of blank canvas in his background, but that cunning and ruthlessness has to come from somewhere; he lacks inhibitions in canon, but that behavior was most likely there to begin with, and that's actually very interesting to play with. Learning how to work without limits has probably only aggravated this behavior—and honestly, some of the episodes of the show has me convinced that, had it gone differently, he and Hiro would have gotten along like a house on fire. ^^ Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps….

Obake did not approve of going to the police.

"Well what do you propose we do!?" Hiro demanded, gesturing at the police building in front of them. "I'm open to suggestions!"

Obake flexed his hands, glared away, like he wanted to come up with a better idea but couldn't.

Not that his hesitation didn't have merit, as it turned out.

"So let me get this straight," the officer behind the counter said, looking like this was the third weird thing to cross his desk this week and he was a thousand percent done with it all. "A man in a kabuki mask attacked you with a bunch of…tiny robots."

"Microbots," Hiro corrected, holding up the petri dish for him to see as Obake tried using the tape on the counter to patch up Baymax—his attempts to reinflate himself on the way over had alerted them to the fact that he had a lot of holes in his vinyl. "Like this—I made them, he has them—he's mass-producing them!"

The officer blinked at him slowly—Hiro wondered if his coffee was strong enough. "Microbots," he corrected finally, typing something out on the police report. "Did you file a report when your microbots were stolen?"

"No—I thought they were lost in the fire—there was a fire—at SFIT—"

"Ah," the officer noised—of course he would have heard about that. Look back at him. "And were you the only one who saw this guy?"

"No—Baymax was there—so was Obake—" Run around, grab Obake, drag him forward, despite him digging his heels in—Obake suddenly became very interested in the ceiling.

The officer looked him over, like he thought Obake was familiar but couldn't place it—glanced at Baymax. "And are either one of them volunteering any information for this report?"

Hiro elbowed Obake on the side nearest him, the left—Obake crumpled a little around the impact, glared at him—crossed his arms and looked away. Right.

"Obake doesn't talk," Hiro said, glaring at him before looking at Baymax. "But Baymax took pictures—right Baymax?"

"That is correct," Baymax said, stepping forward. "Officer, Hiro is telling the truuUUUuth—"

Hiro and Obake stared at him. "Er, what? Are you okay?"

"Low bAttery," Baymax slurred, slouching—and very nearly flattening Obake when he fell on the skinny boy.

Hiro glanced at the officer. "Uh—"

The officer shrugged, reached for a clipboard. "Look, kid, why don't we just call your folks—" Stopped, head jerking slightly—Hiro noticed his attention on a board behind the desk, more than a few posters on it—

Obake noticed too, grabbed Hiro, shoved Baymax onto him partially, led the charge in hauling him out the door.

"Hey!" the officer barked. "Hey wait a minute—"

"Okay," Hiro said, once they were down the street, him and Obake on either side of Baymax and struggling to keep him heading in a straight line. "So that didn't go as well as I hoped."

Obake's expression very clearly said well DUH.

"Hey, it's not my fault," Hiro countered—or maybe it was; it wasn't like everyone hadn't gotten mugshots the night he got busted for bot-fighting. His face was probably up on that wall under juvenile delinquents, don't listen to them when they talk about weird guys wanting to kill them.

That made him stumble worse than Baymax's drunken weaving—that guy had legitimately tried to kill him and Obake. No saying anything, no hey you kids what are you doing here—Hiro wasn't sure what his intentions were when/if he caught them, but he was pretty sure it wasn't anything positive.

He glanced around, suddenly wildly nervous—they needed to get out of the open, preferably with some good distance between them and the warehouse district—and with Baymax useless between them—

They had to get home.

The hardest part about getting home—and then inside—was Baymax, honestly.

The entire nerve-wracking time, braced for an attack, listening for the telltale skittling noise of the microbots—Hiro had spent the entire time mentally berating Tadashi for whatever sleep-deprived collegiate idiocy prompted him to put this in Baymax's programming. It was like trying to wrangle a drunkard, except Hiro was pretty certain a drunk person would be easier to maneuver. The three back steps were a trial all their own, and by this point Hiro was plotting a séance to drum Tadashi up for the sole point of expressing just how much of an absolute mess this coding was, you and I are about to have some words, big bro.

Said words would probably be in duplicate, considering Baymax fell on Obake once they were in the door.

"Are you okay?" Hiro asked, wincing.

"AIIIIII wiLL SCAaaan you now," Baymax volunteered, flopping an arm.

"Hiro?" Aunt Cass called.

Hiro winced again, waved at Obake as he edged around. "Just—I'll distract Aunt Cass, you get Baymax up to his charger."

Obake made a distressed noise, waved his arm around—Hiro dodged, ran into the kitchen. "Oh, hey, Aunt Cass! How's—how's everything?"

Aunt Cass looked a little bemused. "I'm fine—what was that noise?"

"Uh—that was…Mochi! Oh yeah—that darn cat."

"Mrow."

Hiro winced, glanced down at Mochi winding around his legs—dangit Mochi, you're ruining the scheme here—toss him up the stairs when Aunt Cass wasn't looking, busy with some dish.

"Okay," Aunt Cass said. "So I'm trying a new kimchi dish I was inspired yesterday—got some dumplings and your favorite hot wings going too, so I hope you boys are hungry!"

"Starving," Hiro said, following her into the kitchen and hedging so she couldn't get by him—had to distract her for like, two minutes—"So I-I was thinking—that maybe I should be help-HELPING!" Dodge around, raise his voice to cover Baymax's drunken slurring. "Helping you in the kitchen more! Y-you know, sort of a…family bonding…thing."

That—apparently succeeded in confusing Aunt Cass. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah—YEAH! Yeah of course I'm fine—the uh, well you know, growing up fast, all that—gonna—gonna be going to college soon, so…yeah."

Aunt Cass blinked. "You mean it? You're going to SFIT? I mean, I know you wanted to, but then you kind of…."

Lost interest in the place where his brother had died? Oh goodness yes. "W-well, yeah, but—y-you know, get back on the horse, or whatever, going to college might help with those…pubescent mood swings…."

Aunt Cass smiled, but it was the sad sort of smile—pushed his bangs back. "Are you okay though? You look…well, you look kind of upset."

That generally followed almost being killed.

And then before that—that stupid fleeting moment where he thought that Tadashi had used the microbots somehow to survive the fire.

Except that—whoever it was—there was no way they were Tadashi. Tadashi would have said something, would have let him know he was all right—

Tadashi wouldn't have tried to kill him.

"It's—it's nothing," he said, glancing away and rubbing an arm.

Aunt Cass put her hands on his shoulders. "Listen—you don't have to make any decisions right now, okay? You can…you can give it another month, before you…because, you know, it doesn't start up again until September…."

Because of all the repairs they were having to make. "Y-yeah…it's just…."

She hugged him. "I know."

He hugged her back, savoring her warmth, her comfort—no, she didn't know, not really—didn't know about the fresh cut he just had, where Tadashi was almost alive again—he missed his brother with every fiber of his being, and nothing was going to change that.

Something bumped upstairs.

"Is that Mochi again?" Aunt Cass asked.

"Probably," Hiro said, hugging her tight before letting go—Obake and Baymax were probably upstairs by now. "I'm…going to go wash up."

"Okay," she said, ruffling his hair. "Tell Obake to too—dinner should be ready soon and ohgoshI'mburningthedumplings—"

Hiro laughed, turned to head upstairs—

Glanced back—waited until her hands weren't full before tackling her. "Last hug."

So life had just taken a majorly insane turn—but at least Aunt Cass was still a constant.

Now it was a question of for how long.

Obake was grousing and cursing whoever was responsible for the marshmallow robot and his drunken programming, had the sneaking suspicion it was the dead brother.

He had a lot of words planned for said brother, not the least from:

Getting squashed by the robot multiple times.

Trying to herd said robot up the steps.

Trying to keep said robot quiet.

Trying to do all this without breaking his neck.

And now trying to get the robot to step into the charger, all with him leaning heavily on Obake. And at this point, Obake suspected the robot was missing the charger on purpose. Grunt as he tried to reorient the robot again—

Blink in surprise when the robot was suddenly squished against him and shuffled into the charger. Look—

Hiro peered around the other side of the robot.

"So Aunt Cass has dinner cooking," Hiro said, gingerly backing away from the robot before letting go—Obake did too, watched the robot slouch a little before straightening up, hiccupping, and slouching again.

"I mean I think he's charging," Hiro fretted.

"Hairy baby," Baymax said, pointing at the cat.

Hiro sighed, turned away—pulled the petri dish containing the microbot out of his pocket.

"I don't get it," he said, watching the microbot tap away at the container. "Who was that? Why did they want to kill us? Why my microbots?" Pace away, gesturing. "What kind of creepy guy would need to mass-produce them in—in a warehouse after s-stealing—" Slam to a halt.

"S…stealing my microbots," Hiro breathed, slowly looking at him. "That guy—he stole my microbots—I bet you anything he started that fire!"

Now it was Obake's turn to feel like he'd been struck. If that guy—if that guy had started the SFIT fire—

Then it meant that his own project hadn't malfunctioned.

It meant that his work was sound.

It meant that it wasn't his fault.

Hiro was pacing again. "If that guy—he started the fire to cover his tracks—" Glance at the partition. "We've got to do something—ugh, but what? The police didn't believe us—what?" he asked, looking over at Obake's finger-snapping.

In response, Obake grabbed a notepad off the desk, dashed off a quick message:

We take care of him.

Hiro read it, tossed the notepad back onto the desk. "I don't know if you've noticed, but we aren't exactly fit to take him on. I'm small, and you're…well, let's be real here, I think we know each other well enough for me to tell you that one good sneeze would probably break you."

"A: sneeze, would most likely aggravate Obake's ribs at least," the robot put in.

"Good to hear you back, Baymax."

Obake groused, hating that he couldn't exactly deny that Hiro had a point—hit on an idea. Open the drawer from earlier—haul Megabot out and plop him on the notepad.

Hiro considered the battlebot for a moment before shaking his head.

"No, Megabot's no match for all those microbots," Hiro muttered, pacing away, hands tucked under his arms. "We'd need something bigger, something that could hit harder…."

Obake looked over at Hiro's trailing off—saw him looking the marshmallow robot up and down.

"…Something with all the groundwork already in place," Hiro said slowly, sounding like an epiphany was striking. "Baymax, what do you say to an upgrade?"

An upgrade? The marshmallow bot to a battlebot?

Baymax blinked, looked at them both before settling on Hiro. "Would: apprehending the man in the kabuki mask, improve your mood?"

Hiro looked at the partition again, looked at Obake, something strange in his eyes—

It hit him then—the brother, the dead brother—he must have died in the SFIT fire.

The fire that the microbot thief started.

The fire that had ruined both their lives.

This was it—this was how he'd get Hiro.

Because revenge was a powerful motivator.

He nodded, knowing his grin was savage but having a hard time editing it—but Hiro was grinning too, not in the hunting for blood way, but he was sure he could change that.

"Yes," Hiro said, looking back at Baymax. "Yes it would."

Baymax blinked. "Then I will assist."

"Excellent. Let's get started."