Author's note: Alistair Krei's assistant with short hair and glasses appears in this chapter. As she hasn't been given a name as of yet I have decided to name her Denise. However, if she is ever given a name from an official source, I will immediately change it to whatever Disney picked.
Chapter Six: So He Changed It
"So this is how I think Fred and Wasabi should find out about us," GoGo whispered as Fred, Wasabi and Honey-Lemon watched TV in Fred's massive living room with Baymax sitting in the corner, attempting to figure out the purpose of a Chinese finger trap. Alistair Krei had said that he wanted to talk to the group and they agreed to meet at Fred's mansion rather than Krei Tech. She discreetly took Hiro's hand. "I want them to discover us in the perfect couple moment. They catch us in the middle of a nice, normal kiss.
"Because just telling them would be silly," he said drily.
"Are you saying that you don't want to kiss me?" she asked, fluttering her eyelashes seductively at him. He audibly gulped. Those eyelashes of her were deadly, deadly weapons when directed at him.
"Alright, alright," he said, reaching for the back of her head and leaning his face towards hers with his lips slightly parted.
"Hey, come on," she said reprovingly, "You're not going off to war, just give me a nice, gentle peck on the lips." And with that, she stood on her toes and lightly kissed him on the lips. Apparently, whatever was on the television made for some truly riveting viewing as no-one looked over at them. Also, as the kiss was supposed to be "a nice, gentle peck on the lips" there was no passion allowed in the action and Hiro and GoGo basically just stood there with their lips pressed against each other's with no movement.
"You should know that I have never hated anything this much," Hiro mumbled against GoGo's lips after thirty seconds had passed. She rolled her eyes but continued. "I don't think they saw us," Hiro said, his his lips still brushing against hers, "What now?"
"I don't know," she said, "Maybe you should cough to get their attention." He did as she instructed. "Not in my face, dude," she said sharply, "Turn your head and then cough."
However, it turned out that all of their effort was in vain as Honey-Lemon looked up at them, ginned mischievously and asked, "Have you two told these knuckle-heads that you're hooking up yet?"
"Now they look," GoGo said irritably as Wasabi and Fred's heads swivelled in their direction.
"Alright," said Hiro, "Obviously this is huge news so do you have any questions?"
"I actually thought that you two were already dating," Krei said as Fred's butler, Heathcliff, led the billionaire and his short haired personal assistant into the living room.
"Wow, Krei," GoGo began, "In a few minutes, I'll be giving out the "Who Invited You?" award and you're going to want to get your speech ready." The CEO cracked a grin.
"You know, I really look forward to our talks," he said with a swagger. His assistant, Denise, rolled her eyes, long used to her employer's cockiness.
~o~O~o~
Hiro and the others had had a very rocky beginning with Alistair Krei, the multibillion dollar CEO of Krei Tech. When Hiro had first met him, he was not impressed with what he saw to be an arrogant one percenter who would step on anything or anyone if it meant making a profit. Sure, he must have been in possession of some techno know-how because he was the owner of the biggest tech conglomerate in the world but he had cut corners and crossed lines to get where he was.
At least according to Professor Robert Callaghan.
Even after five years, Hiro could not look back on that without his hands shaking with rage.
He had trusted that man, idolised him, and in return, Callaghan stole his invention and murdered his brother for what was ultimately a needless revenge scheme.
That what was what angered him the most. The fact that, in the end, Callaghan had no need to do anything in the name of revenge as his daughter was alive all along.
This wasn't to say that Krei had been a saint all along. He had done things of a morally ambiguous nature to get where he was. Nothing illegal, or even evil but just little things that added up and after Big Hero 6 had saved him from Callaghan's wrath he was filled with disgust at himself for his actions over the many years. For the first time in a long time he was filled with perfect clarity about his future. His small misdeeds would snowball into larger acts of immoral nature and one day he would wake up, cold, withered and alone, having driven away everyone in his life that mattered. He saw the future that was ahead of him and realised that he wanted no part of it.
So he changed it.
He started by paying for the construction of the Tadashi Hamada Convention Hall at San Fransokyo Tech to replace the building that had been destroyed in the fire that started the chain of events that led to his soul searching but he didn't stop there. After Callaghan's attack, he paid a visit to a small café run by a woman that he could only describe as "bubbly" and said that he wanted to talk to her nephew.
Hiro didn't say anything at first, just silently watched Krei as he tried to explain what he wanted to do. "You want to sponsor us?" he said finally, the word sponsor laced with derision.
"Not exactly," Krei said quickly, "This isn't about me or my company. I just want to help you and your friends."
"And I'm sure backing a team of superheroes makes for great PR," Hiro said sarcastically.
"I just said that this isn't about me or the company," he replied, "You helped me, you saved my life and I just want to return the favour. As you probably know, I've been involved in a lot of shady deals in my life and… At the end I just want to be able to say that "At least I did that." One good thing simply for its own sake. Please let me help you," he pleaded, "With the resources at my disposal you could help so many people."
"I'll run it by the others," Hiro said noncommittedly, "But no promises."
Strangely enough, it was Honey-Lemon and Fred who were the most supportive of the idea. Honey-Lemon was adamant that people could change and wish to better themselves while Fred insisted that, if Krei was not a supervillain, he could be a little bit like Batman. "By day, multibillionaire, by night, multibillionaire that fight's crime," was how he put it.
It took a whole night of discussion but, in the end, the pair had, for the most, won over their more cynical teammates.
"Alright, alright," GoGo had said, "We'll give a trial and see how it pans out."
~o~O~o~
"Alright, Alistair," Honey-Lemon said politely, "What did you want to talk to us about?"
"Oh not yet," he said, turning back to GoGo and Hiro and grinning, "I want to hear more about the happy couple. How long has it been? Is she a good kisser? I always thought that she was a biter? What about him? I imagine that he is a big cuddler. Is it serious? Come on, details, details."
Fred laughed.
"You guys just totally blew my mind with the big reveal," he said. Baymax, his pudgy fingers still trapped finally took interest in the discussion.
"If you are interested," said the robot, "I will download some pamphlets regarding safe sex and the prevention of transmitted–"
"That won't be necessary," Hiro cut in, preventing the conversation from going someplace scary, "That really won't be necessary. Anyway," he said, turning back to Krei, "What's the situation?" The grin slipped off the CEO's face.
"I did some digging on that Skylark woman," he said.
"I did some digging on that Skylark woman," Denise corrected him.
"Semantics," he replied before returning to the matter at hand, "Anyway, I was sure that I'd heard the name Katherine Skylark before and it turned out that I was right."
"So what did you, or rather, Denise, find?" Wasabi asked.
"She used to work for us," Denise answered, "She had a job at Krei Tech."
"WHAT?!" GoGo exploded, "She was working for you and you didn't tell us?"
"Was working for us," Krei replied, "Emphasis on the word, was. She was fired six years ago, among other things. Anyway, my company has hired tens of thousands of people around the planet, you can't expect me to know them all by name."
"So what can you tell us about her?" Wasabi asked, desperately attempting to get the conversation back on track.
"In scientific terms," said Krei, "She's nuts." The others looked to Denise, hoping for a more… technical description but, to their surprise, she shrugged and then nodded at them. "She was with us for four years as a designer at our Sydney headquarters in Australia," Krei continued.
"She worked with kangaroos?" Fred asked eagerly. Krei and Denise looked at him, their expressions clearly saying that they had no idea on whether he was joking or not.
"Sure," Denise said finally, "Why not? She worked with kangaroos."
"Wicked," Fred said happily before motioning for them to continue.
"Anyway," said Krei, "From what I've read, she was brilliant. She actually helped design some of the tech that we still use today in most of our factory generators."
"So why did you let her go?" Honey-Lemon asked.
"Like I said, she was nuts," he explained, "She became fixated with – no, obsessed with one of the technicians working under her. She would send him inappropriate messages at all hours of the night, show up to his home unannounced and then finally she attempted to shoot his wife and child at a family celebration. She thought that if she killed them, he would then be free to be with her."
"She is nuts," Hiro agreed.
"Where on Earth did she get a gun in Australia?" Wasabi mused thoughtfully.
"She built it," Denise instantly answered, "It was an earlier version of the weapon she used on the train."
"So I get why you fired her but why is she not stuck in some Australian prison right now?" GoGo asked.
"She was confined to a psychiatric facility but it turns out that she and fifty others were released prematurely due to extensive budget cuts from the new government, just two years into her treatment."
"I'm suddenly feeling a lot better about our country's mental health treatment," GoGo muttered darkly.
"And now she's on the loose somewhere in California," said Hiro.
"You remember what I said about catching her not being our problem?" GoGo said.
"Yeah," Hiro replied.
"I take that back. I really don't want her on the loose."
"There's more," Krei cut in. He turned to Denise and motioned for her to fill in the rest.
"She didn't get out of lockup on her own," said Denise, "Yesterday I was finally able to get one of the officers present on the night to talk to me. According to her, two men broke in and shot up the place before getting away with her in Skylark in tow. They later found the getaway vehicle used in the escape abandoned outside the Black Sapphire nightclub."
"So she has a backer or followers or something like that," said Honey-Lemon sourly, "That's just great, I wasn't worried enough already." The normally stoic Denise cracked a smile.
"So, anyway, I was thinking that we, or rather you, could try to amplify Baymax's scanner even more than you've already done so," said Krei.
"I'm going to have to stop you right there," said Hiro, "We don't have any of Skylark's DNA."
"Doesn't Baymax just scan everybody automatically?" Denise asked in confusion.
"Not anymore," said Wasabi, "Automatically recording the data of everybody we come across isn't ethical so we reprogramed the scanner to only record when someone is in distress and in need of medical assistance. All of us are exceptions though so he can watch our vitals during missions."
"Damn," Krei muttered, "Okay, well, we'll need some other way to find her."
"I've got an idea," offered Wasabi, "I've been working on a "Detective Mode" for my suit's visor. Sort of a pet project but I could actually put some work into it and see if it could help."
"That's good," said Krei, "Anyone else have anything?" Honey-Lemon shrugged.
"We could see if there's any DNA belonging to Skylark at the station," she suggested, "I know it's unlikely after two weeks but I still think that we should at least look and make sure."
"I can help with that," said Denise, "I'm pretty sure that they'll let me back in."
"Go team," said Fred enthusiastically.
As he watched these young minds brainstorm about how to solve the present problem, Krei could not help but smile.
He saw the future that was ahead of him and realised that he really loved being a part of it.
~o~O~o~
About the ethics of scanning people – I only made that an issue so that it wouldn't be an instant win deux ex machina. I'm not trying to push an agenda one way or the other so don't worry about that.
Also, while I haven't decided whether or not Hiro and GoGo will have sex or not in this story, if they did, how much detail would you want. I'm not turning it into a lemon or anything like that, I just have a massive hatred of the fade to black trope as I think it is really lazy writing.
Thirdly, I've been tossing up the idea of changing the fic's title as I am not 100% sure that it fits with where the story is going. Any thoughts or suggestions would be welcome unless you think that the title is fine, in which case, let me know in your reviews.
Finally, I'm thinking of possibly setting up Denise with one of the remaining three heroes. Any thoughts on that.
Thank you for reading. Please review and I'll see you next time.
