Chapter 60, everybody! We're in the single-digits as far as chapters left! :O

Again, I went to college with a girl who was gluten-intolerant, and it really alerted me to how prevalent gluten is in food. The Wheaties complaint Trina gives was mine by the time the show introduced Rishi—okay I can buy Hiro and Karmi, they're outliers, Amara made me balk, Obake I was okay with, but when you get to Rishi being in his preteens? My willing suspension of disbelief was already being abused by Season 3 and just broke then. Also of course Trina would like cheerleading she's voiced by Kim Possible.

So according to the background info for the movie Fred became SFIT mascot thanks to some teacher recommendations, but according to the show it comes from his parents providing donations so…both? Both. Both is good. Also again Kim Possible references because of the showrunners and Trina's VA (Ron Stoppable apparently voices Hardlight in later seasons and it is a pity the two didn't interact). And a reference to Man of the House with Tommy Lee Jones—this is my happy face. And one to Baby Daddy, with the couch bit. And oh look Obake's finally back! X'D

Juxshoa, thanks for the review! Ehh…honestly that sounds about like what Obake's doing.

Big Hero 6 © 2014 Disney

"So do I ever get to meet your other friends, or do I get to be this big secret forever?"

"Trust me, it's better for both of our sanities if you stay the big secret," Hiro said, kicking the soccer ball back at the back wall—Trina had brought it along to test the robots, but for now at least they were the ones playing with it. "You saw how Tadashi and Aunt Cass were—and by the way, Aunt Cass was up all night hunting for gluten-free recipes—"

"Good luck," Trina said.

"But of the others, maybe Gogo wouldn't be absolutely weird about everything. Everyone else is acting like all of a sudden I have discovered girls when no, I was aware of girls before, it's just the only one my age attending SFIT is a huge jerk."

"There's someone else your age attending the nerd school?" she asked.

"Yeah—I mean you could attend if you tried, I bet. Obake could too, he's just totally disinterested in it for some reason I mean yes it's nerd school but for the most part it's cool."

"What, did everyone you know eat their Wheaties or something?" she asked, putting her foot on the ball. "You really think I could hack it at nerd school."

"I mean you're keeping up with me, that's sort of the bare minimum effort stuff."

"And if I attend and this Obake guy doesn't, that makes me the better friend, I win, he gets to be jealous of more than just my good looks, mwahaha."

"I…might not have told him about you yet," Hiro said, wincing.

"Why not?" she asked, kicking the ball up and bouncing it on a knee. "You tell him, he gets jealous and starts spending time with you, you end up the winner. Hey—tell him I challenge him to a bot-fight, winner gets the title of best friend."

Hiro watched her kick the ball against the back wall, managed to intercept and send it back. "I don't know, maybe I like having something that he doesn't know about. I've known him for most of the year and I can only tell you a handful of things about him. Like he doesn't like blueberry scones and his favorite color might be purple."

"Purple is definitely my fav color," she said. "Also I like sports, cheerleading, bot-fighting…does SFIT have any of that?"

"Pretty sure there's a cheerleading squad and a sports team, since Fred is the school mascot."

"Is he like in a suit, or did he just claim that title and shows up?"

"Little bit of both, seeing as how he goes to SFU."

"Then how is he the SFIT mascot? Does SFU not have a mascot?"

"Apparently it was a combo of teachers communicating and his parents donating money. Haven't really run into anybody yet who complains about him."

She made a pensive noise, kicked the ball again. "Well maybe getting into SFIT will put you into Dad's good graces—I think he finally realized that I'm hanging out with a boy and he's worried shenanigans will happen."

"You did tell him the closet was your idea, right?"

"I think he's leery of me knowing a guy who knows a guy named ghost. I'd tell him that he's all right, except I don't know, so…did tell him your brother is a massive dork."

"Glad we agree on that point," Hiro said, rubbing his arms. "So…robot time?"

"Robot time."

Trina's robot was doing much better, even able to hold its own against Megabot for more than a few minutes, which Hiro assured her was a good thing.

"I mean Megabot can tear big robots like Little Yama to shreds, so it's not like he's a lightweight," Hiro told her as he reattached her robot's head. "Also what's this guy's name anyway? I never asked."

"I'm debating," she said. "Either a pun name like O. Wurm or something scary like Snake Eye."

"Pretty sure the latter one is taken."

"Bogus. Umm…Unstoppable."

"Also taken."

"Ron Stoppable."

"Pretty sure that's taken too."

"Impossible."

"No I'm pretty sure it's possible."

"That was a name suggestion, you dweeb," she said, shoving at his shoulder. "Don't leave me stuck with O. Wurm as his name."

"What do you think, you like it?" he asked the robot—manipulated it into nodding. "I don't know, he seems to like it."

"You both suck, I need you to know that," she said. "Hey I could call him Obake."

"Nah, he doesn't look like an Obake," Hiro said. "To look like that he'd have to smile like this." Made a stony-faced expression at her.

"Boy nice guy isn't he?"

"I mean sometimes he's better but…recently…yeah no," Hiro sighed. "It just…kinda sucks."

Trina made a pensive noise at that. "You know what I think?" she asked. "I think that a guy that makes you feel like that isn't your friend. I think you can do better."

"Are you offering?" Hiro jested.

"You know what? Yeah totally I'm offering point me in his direction and I'll give him a what-for."

"Yeah no we're not starting arguments."

"Why, afraid I'll win?"

"So Obake lives with us and if you and I are going to be friends then you really need to stay in Aunt Cass's good graces and that doesn't happen if you start arguments. Especially loud messy ones."

"Wait, this guy lives with you? This isn't the kid your aunt is considering adopting, is it?" When Hiro nodded: "Yeesh, you'd think he'd be more grateful."

"Yeah, you'd think," Hiro huffed—torn between defending Obake and ranting out some of the frustrating feelings that had been welling up for a while. "Like—he starts off as this cool guy, totally invested, sometimes like, creepily so, we do cool stuff and make cool robots we even snuck into SFIT in the middle of the night Tadashi fought High Voltage to save his stupid life all of us ended up against a monster you'd think he'd be more grateful and not just—shut down and decide hey I'm too good for you or whatever the heck is going on in his stupid head." Okay so rant won by a mile.

"Sounds like he was just using you," Trina offered.

Hiro blinked. "How do you figure?"

"Well the whole friendship thing is supposed to be an equal partnership, right? Give and receive? What did you give him, and what did he give you? A hard time?" Gesture around them. "You said he was living here and now he lives in your house? You'd think he'd at least be able to spare an hour for you a day, seeing as how he bunks there."

"Well…yeah, exactly," Hiro said, gesturing a little. "I mean that's what friends do, right?"

"It is," she said, clapping her hands on her knees. "And seeing as how I'm here with you and he's not, that makes me the better friend. Matter of fact, I think that makes me the best friend at this point."

"Really?" Hiro asked, deadpan. "We've progressed that far already?"

"I mean I did meet your aunt. And your brother. So apparently at this point it's either best friend or girlfriend, and since I know I don't want to find out where we're registered—ooh wait we hook up your aunt and my dad, they get married, and then people will stop asking if we're getting together because then it'd be totally awkward."

"Still the minor hiccup of hooking those two up, especially considering my aunt swore off dating," Hiro said. "Pretty sure any plan would be too convoluted to bother."

"Nah, convoluted plans are the best plans. You gotta get like, at least three plans running at once so if one trips up you've still got the other two to get the job done."

"That's…kind of like how Obake says it," Hiro muttered.

"Actually it's something my dad says, he's into computer programming and stuff. I'd show you a picture but you know how some people get about getting their pictures taken I mean he does show up in a mirror."

"Maybe one of these days I go to your house so we're even," Hiro pointed out. "Meet your dad and the wine aunt who may or may not kill him someday."

"I mean I'd like to, but lemme get Dad wound down a bit from what do you mean you're hanging out with a boy first."

"I like how our families are on entirely opposite ends of the spectrum on this."

"Yeah," she agreed, getting her robot to coil up. "So. What's the plan?"

Hiro hunkered down, ready to focus. "So there's this tournament tonight, right? I'm thinking that the bot thief will target it, so we stake the place out too and nail them."

"Okay but how do we tell who the bot thief is? I think we should get in closer. Like, participating in the tournament close."

"That one actually puts me in danger with my family. They do things," Hiro said, affecting a thousand-yard stare.

"Like lecture you and drag you home by the ear?"

"Yeah, like that. Also Aunt Cass stress-eats, and most days I'd rather not sit on the couch doing nothing but wait for her to come out of her room. You have to be there when she does, see, otherwise you're officially worst nephew ever in the history of history and it takes a long time to come back from that one."

"Okay, yeesh," she said, waving her hands. "What about you being like, my coach or something, and then you snoop around while I'm busy owning the place?"

"So I'd have like five minutes?"

"You hear how he has no faith in you," she said to her robot.

"I have plenty of faith in him, it's just the operator I'm on the fence about."

"Excuse you," she said, elbowing him. "Come on, it'll take us like five minutes to go over there, you can tell your family that we're at the library or something."

"Tadashi will go snooping there, he'd bust our story in five minutes."

"Okay, so we send him across town. The beach or Muirahara Woods or something."

"Tadashi will know better than Muirahara Woods, I swore off ever going there again after the bear and the moose and Ned Ludd and Bessie—"

"Okay, this story I need to hear."

"It was an ordeal," Hiro confirmed. "Ooh wait—The Aquarium by the Bay. It's across town and Tadashi would buy that. He'd think I'm telling you all about sharks and remoras."

"I like it, that's now our excuse," Trina said, shouldering her pack.

"Yup—except while we're heading for bot-fighting I do actually have to tell you all about sharks and remoras in case he quizzes you later."

"Fair enough—nerd me."

"So whale sharks are the biggest extant sharks in the world but they're also the most placid because they only eat plankton, you basically have to be actively working at it to be injured by a whale shark," Hiro said, texting Tadashi as they headed for Good Luck Alley. "The next two biggest sharks are the megamouth shark and the basking shark, the megamouth shark is kinda dorky because it's got like, flat cartoon teeth, the basking shark looks terrifying because it's got this huge weird mouth but both of them eat plankton too so they're like the whale shark."

"So the moral of this is we really should be eating our veggies."

"Yeah pretty much. Sharks will do this thing called spyhopping where they peek above the water…."

Okay, at this point Obake really couldn't tell if he was succeeding or not.

The important thing was, he had hardened the Lucky Cat computers against intrusions, was busy working on his own hardened laptop, was now busy trying to machine up enough drones to be a thorn in his side once more. Difficult to do when he only kept a little bit of his stash here in the garage.

Why why why had he put all his eggs in one basket like that? His reasoning had been that spreading it out would increase risk of discovery, but how on earth had his luck sucked so bad that he had picked the one warehouse in San Fransokyo that he didn't want discovered? The odds were astronomical was he being punished this felt like a punishment just how—

And now the scales had been overwhelmingly tipped in his favor.

Grit his teeth at that—everything he had been stockpiling, gone. Gone and in his grasp, and since he knew the thought process involved he knew that he had spent a good couple of days having a grand old time figuring everything out. Had to hope that he gave the energy orb to High Voltage, that would require him to go after the dynamo so there was some hope—

And the fact that he didn't have a viable substitute for the energy amplifier.

Scrub at his face, feeling the exhaustion down to his bones—hoping that he didn't figure out a replacement was a thin hope indeed; he had, originally, plans to fix up his old amplifier when Big Hero Six had intervened, and by the time it had come to a head again he had tricked Hiro into building the amplifier for him. It had saved him some time, and while he would have to build it himself from scratch…he also didn't have Big Hero Six slowing him down and distracting him.

Fred's ripple effect had become a tsunami—he legitimately had no idea how to work his way out from under this, and now every drone he sent out fell victim to his old drones. He was living in perpetual fear of being discovered and while he wasn't completely unconvinced he was evading capture for now sooner or later his attention would be piqued he had been here already—what if he fixated on Hiro again? There was no Globby or Big Hero Six to save him now what then—

"Heyo," Tadashi greeted, coming into the garage. "Boy you look like trash."

"Then I look like how I feel," he groused. "Now go away."

"Can't, homework, gotta machine something up and besides, Hiro's out so I only have you to pick on tonight."

Out? "Out what do you mean out?"

"Should I be telling Aunt Cass you're moving in on her job?" Tadashi asked, raising his eyebrows. "Hiro has a girlfriend, he finally discovered girls and if you ever got out of this garage you'd know these things."

Stare at him blankly, none of this computing—had he really changed the timeline that badly he was pretty sure they had just had this whole conversation about Hiro not being interested. "It's not that Karmi girl, is it?"

"So that would require them speedrunning the whole enemies to lovers thing—nope, you still get to coach Hiro on the nemesis thing. You know, if you ever start talking to people again."

"Your needling has been noted," he groused. "Now are you done dangling this or do you just not know."

"First you gotta say that I'm the better brother."

"Excuse me?"

"First you have to say Tadashi is the better brother," Tadashi said, smug and preening. "Also that you're jealous of my good looks and stellar reputation."

"You don't actually know," Obake decided, going back to what he was doing. What little he had been able to garner was that the base was under repair, which meant he was in the wind and needed tracking down—Good Luck Alley would be the safe bet, he was certain—

"Yes I do and they make a cute couple, for the record—even if she is a bad influence with the bot-fighting."

Something about that twinged off a memory. "Bot-fighting?"

"Yeah—I already scolded him about it but you know how Hiro is. Tadashi stop being so LAME Trina is awesome you just don't appreciate—"

Stopped dead, Tadashi doing so as well at the speed with which Obake whipped around. "Did you say Trina?"

"Uh, yeah," Tadashi noised—flinched when Obake dove for a pile of supplies. "Dude, what is with you? What is she, your ex-girlfriend?"

Funny. "Come on," he said, shouldering a pack as he headed for the garage doors. "We're going after Hiro."

"Hiro sent me a text," Tadashi said. "Said he and her were going to the aquarium—"

"That's a lie—they're at Good Luck Alley."

"What? Why—ugh, bot-fighting," Tadashi groaned.

"That's the least of it," he said, stomach roiling at the thought—Trina had a few reasons behind her creation, but wrangling Hiro had been one of them. "Now come on, before he gets into more trouble."