Chapter 13, everybody! Time to deal with the aftermath of the paperweight being stolen….Also happy St. Patrick's Day! :D Remember to wear green!

I don't know if Tadashi snores or not but it keeps popping up in my stories so we'll go with it. Obake is quoting Dot Warner and Scar there, by the way. And another spot obliquely inspired by the fic that inspired this one, Ctrl-Z. Fred has the ability to be weirdly meta, as it turns out. And considering one of Andrew Scott's other roles…yeah Moriarty is an appropriate image. And apparently Fred's last name was Lee before the series (which makes sense considering his dad is Stan Lee) and his original powers in the comics involved turning into a giant kaiju.

In other news, apparently MIT was/is in the habit of hanging people's cars from bridges just to show that they can do it. Remember reading an article about it years back and being baffled that they 1) could do such a thing and 2) actually did do it on a regular basis.

James the apple, thanks for the review! Oh sure, totally a one-off and not a recurring problem, it'll be fine (not).

Big Hero 6 © 2014 Disney

Obake was not thrilled at getting woken up the next morning dangit sleep schedules were for the weak let him sleep in please if mornings had any sense they'd start at noon and "Tadashi touch me one more time and I'll break your hand."

"You are literally going to miss breakfast and probably school," Tadashi said. "You do go to school, right?"

"No, now go away."

"Great—I fix one truant kid and get another. I will defeat you."

"Go away, Tadashi."

Tadashi did, but he also saw fit to drag Obake with him, eventually slinging him over his shoulder to take him downstairs.

"I hate you," Obake muttered. "So. Very. Much."

"It's not my fault you're a slug in the morning," Tadashi said, plopping him down in a seat and watching him sag onto the table. "Did you not get any sleep last night?"

Not really. "You snore."

"Do not."

"Do too," Hiro said.

"I do not!"

"You do too!"

"You have no proof."

"I have proof—you blamed it on trucks downshifting outside, and when I didn't buy that you tried to blame the cat."

"Mrow," Mochi noised.

"Such a pity that tape was lost and never heard from again," Tadashi said, taking his hat off and putting it on his chest. "But moving on—you," he said, putting his hat back on and poking Obake. "Get something to eat, be productive, go to school."

"Obake graduated early like I did," Hiro said.

"So I really did get a replacement truant—great, I needed a new project."

"I will hurt your brother badly," Obake told Hiro.

"I feel like I should object, but I know you can't actually hurt him," Hiro pointed out, gesturing with a breakfast roll. "You're a twig and he's not."

"There are ways."

"I'm sure," Tadashi said. "But back to you—find something productive to do with your day that doesn't include bot-fighting."

"Make me."

"Oh I could—Baymax!"

Oh no not the robot babysitting—"Fine, fine, I'll strive for productive," he said, rolling his eyes and waving his hands slightly.

"That is all I ask."

"No it isn't," he muttered when Tadashi walked off.

"No it isn't," Hiro agreed. "Why does Baymax bug you so much? He's like the most nonthreatening thing on the planet."

Because he had insensibly linked the most nonthreatening thing on the planet to his last great trauma and was totally refusing to work through it. On a slightly more logical note, he was just a tiny bit concerned that Baymax's scans would out him somehow—at the very least, he'd reveal that he'd been through the wringer more than once, and he'd rather skip that part.

Of course we weren't going to unpack any of that—hence him going with "Baymax is antithetical to battle bots—it's the principle of it."

"You're weird," Hiro decided.

"You have no idea."

The brothers went off to SCHOOL, OBAKE—unfortunately left Baymax behind, which meant Tadashi intended for Baymax to report on him, which meant that rebuilding his drone would have to wait. Okay, what else could he do….

Spent a good hour or two at the desk in the boys' room, writing down what he remembered of his grandiose plans plus contingency plans after taping up the webcams on the computers. Not that he thought that he'd been made already, but…you never knew.

Tap his pencil against the desk after evaluating his timeline, a messy outline with several notations added to it to the point that the whole page was full of messy black scrawling. The issue, the main issue, was that his original plans went clean out the window once Big Hero Six got involved. Yes, he was able to adapt to this, but without that adapting…that meant no opposition, no need to change and shift his plans to what they had become….

He needed a plan. A foolproof plan.

…And regrettably, he knew at least one fool who'd be on board for this nonsense.

She could sense that something was off the next morning even before she took in the hole in her window and the missing paperweight. Examining the security tapes only confirmed it, someone had stolen his old project.

But why?

Stare at the empty wooden plinth as campus security went over the tapes and dusted her desk, reflecting that she would most likely have to make an announcement to explain increased security to the students…would have to figure out a way to do so without causing a stir. Someone stealing a paperweight from the dean of students? Most likely attributed to SFAI, would be considered generally a nonissue, just an early volley for Spirit Week.

Except she had seen the footage from last night that showed a bright explosion over the city as well, one that smacked too close to familiarity for her to be comfortable. To others, this was a simple paperweight.

To her, it was a reminder of him, of that brilliant student that she had failed by not setting limits.

Was he even still alive, she wondered, looking out the window at the bright and sunny expanse of the campus. Had he ever recovered from that horrible incident? She had tried to keep up with him, had been forced not to by the restraining order SFIT enforced in an attempt to avoid lawsuits. By the time it had run out, he had long since vanished.

She wondered whatever happened to that poor boy.

Sigh, shake her head—that was in the past, and right now she needed to address the present.

"Professor Granville?"

Look over her shoulder at the next young prodigy she was dealing with—perhaps the universe offering her a mulligan. "Yes, Mr. Hamada? And Mr. Hamada," she added, seeing the elder brother poke his head in as well.

"Wow, what happened?" Tadashi asked.

"A simple theft, possibly someone getting a head start on Spirit Week," she said, shooing off potential concerns. "I'd hurry along if I were you two—wouldn't want to be late for class again." This with a pointed look at the younger Hamada, who grimaced and scurried off, the elder brother looking somewhere between amused and concerned before following. Already the boy had a better campus life than the one who owned that paperweight before—perhaps she'd be able to evade that issue.

Perhaps not.

Check to see if her folders were cleared, open a couple and flip through them. So. She needed to make sure he was properly integrated into campus life—her too, she reflected, scanning the one folder detailing what had been the youngest to ever attend SFIT, beating her old protégé out by a few months. She had kept that so-called paperweight to remind herself to never make those same mistakes again. She had failed him, left SFIT in disgrace…but now she was back, and she couldn't afford to make those same mistakes again.

This time, she couldn't afford to fail.

Okay, as much as he'd like to keep this to himself, and as much as he hated to consult this particular source for help….

He needed a fresh perspective. He had already thwarted step one, had stolen Granville's quote-unquote 'paperweight' that had been his old project (why had she kept that? Did she know what it did? Had she known he was coming all along and used it as bait…no, no, she had been surprised to see him that last time). He was having to play against himself, a genius scientist…he needed to make sure this was foolproof.

He knew just the fool to test it.

The butler arched an eyebrow at him saying he was here to see Fred, closed the door to go and announce him. Pace the front stoop, going through his notes to ensure there was nothing incriminating, going over the story in his head again—he needed to make it so that even if this knucklehead did go blathering everything to everyone, it still wouldn't be incriminating…maybe change that bit right there.

He was sitting on the steps and editing when Fred finally stuck his head out.

"Dude!" Fred exclaimed, gesturing to him. "Oh-bake, my main man! What are you doing here?"

At this point? Severely questioning his life choices.

"You're an English major at SFU, correct?" he asked, deciding it was probably better to focus on the reason he was here to begin with.

"I am," Fred said, nodding. "Why?"

"I, ah…firstly want you to not tell anyone about this."

"Dude. Is it serious? Do we need to get our stories straight? Because if anyone asks—"

Obake waved him off irritably. "No, I just—have a…story idea, and I wanted to run it by someone who knew about this sort of thing and wouldn't laugh it off."

"DUDE!" Fred barked, bouncing around him before hauling him upright. "You want me to beta for you? I have ALWAYS wanted to beta for someone THANK YOU dude!"

Okay, Obake was now severely regretting this decision—mostly because Fred was now hugging him. "Fred. No hugging."

"Right—sorry," Fred said, letting go. "Well come on! We can brainstorm in my room where I have easy access to reference material—he's all right, Heathcliff," he added to the butler waiting just inside. "Hey can we get some snackage in my room? We're gonna be working on fic ideas."

"So glad I told you I didn't want this getting around," Obake said flatly.

"Nah man, Heathcliff's cool, he'll keep it on the down-low," Fred said, waving him off as he led him through the house. "So my dude, this fic you're working on, what do you have on it so far? Like is it a concept that needs fleshing out or do you already have some ideas?"

"Let's…say it's a time-travel…superhero story," he said. Looked Fred's room over when they entered. "I felt like you might be the one to consult there."

"You, my dude, have come to the right place," Fred said, doing one of those finger-gun things, backing up to the couches as he did so. "And I am loving this idea so far—is it like an Avengers Endgame thing? Or is it like Minutemen? Are the superheroes going back in time to fix something that went way wrong or is it a group of dudes who go back in time routinely to fix things?"

Obake spared the painting that was just as offensive to the senses in person the barest of glances before focusing on the idiot who had commissioned it. "More like…I guess you'd call him the villain—he gets sent back in time to before the…it's going to be a superhero group—gets formed."

"Oh man, intrigue!" Fred said, sitting down on the arm of the couch. "So I'm guessing the villain's motivation is stopping the superhero group from forming?"

"Well…yes," he said. "But there's kind of a snag."

"Good—good stories have snags. Is this like the start of a villain-to-hero redemption story?"

"Let's not go crazy just yet," he said, despite telling himself that he had unintentionally asked for the crazy by coming to Fred. "Focusing on the snag: since the villain got sent back in time, the original version of himself still exists, and is planning on going through with a plot that got thwarted by the superhero group that now no longer exists."

"Dude." Tap his chin, thinking on this. "Okay, my first thought is that this is what the villain intended…why is it a snag?"

"Because the plot is destroying a city?"

"Harshness. But I'm still not getting why the time-travelling villain has a problem with this…unless in going back in time to stop the superhero group he gets attached and villain redemption story!"

Ugh. "Fine, we'll go with that."

"Trust me my dude, done well the readers love it." Flop backwards onto the couch. "So. I'm thinking the obvious solution is the reformed villain impersonates the original villain—have you already thought of that? Does that work or is there a reason it doesn't?"

Ah, if only. "Firstly, this wasn't through any choice of the villain's—he was sent back in time through unknown means, which also resulted in him being de-aged to teenagedom. No, I haven't figured out how yet," he added, when Fred pointed and opened his mouth.

"Intrigue! I like it," Fred said, sitting up on his elbows. "Does it get explained? Or is it like, planned to just always be a mystery?"

"I'd like to have an explanation, to be fair."

"Okay," Fred said, rolling off the couch and pawing for a notepad and pen sitting on the coffee table. "Sit my dude, we're gonna be here a while. So I'm guessing a direct confrontation doesn't work."

"No," he said, sitting down and putting his notepad on the table. "The villain is more of a planner that likes to toy with his enemies."

"So more Moriarty and less Megazon, is what I'm getting."

Considering he knew more about the former than the latter: "Yes. Moriarty is the image you need to have."

"So super-duper-ULTRA planner, got it," Fred said, scribbling this out—wrote a few more things as Heathcliff came in with refreshments, gave him a thumbs-up when he finished. "Thanks my man."

"Let me know if you need anything else, Master Fredrick," Heathcliff said, bowing before gliding back out.

"So," Fred said after their moment of silence and a bite of a dumpling. "Since we've got a Moriarty on one side, do we have a Sherlock on the other?"

"Eh…no," Obake said, considering. "Closest we have is a boy genius." At Fred's expression: "Part of the reason I don't want you telling the others is because I may have based the superhero team off of them."

"My dude, trust me, they'd actually be really stoked—I know I am—do I get to be on the superhero team? I give you permission to use my name. Like, call my dude Fred Lee, that works. And, if my superpower could be turning into a kaiju, that'd be awesome."

"Sorry, we couldn't turn you into a kaiju and stay on budget," he said drily. "You get a kaiju-shaped costume. That breathes fire."

"All right!" Fred said, pointing at him. "I'll take it! And my dude, technically the superhero team has a Sherlock on it: the reformed villain dude!"

Hmm. "I suppose technically…mostly he's wanting to solve this problem without prompting the re-formation of the superhero team."

"Now how can you deny fictional-me his kaiju costume?"

"If you're nice and help me figure this out I might make it for you."

"Ooh, doubly motivated now!" Fred declared, going back over his notes. "So it's two brainiacs against each other and trying not to get the superhero team reformed, one working with the benefit of hindsight. BUT I'm guessing the ripple effect starts kicking in, starting with the one big change you made."

Had to take a beat to remind himself that Fred was thinking authorial intent. "The getting rid of the superhero team, yes." Tap his notepad. "I've been writing down what ah, what originally happens so I can keep track."

"A good idea. Should probably have the original stuff at like, the beginning of a chapter as a flashback so the audience stays grounded. I mean unless they already know what happened, but outside of fanfiction and messing with canon it's safer to just show it."

"Right." Made a point to write that in the margins so Fred would keep believing the narrative. "So some of these points were immediately erased by preventing the superhero team from forming—"

"Does the superhero team have a name?" Fred asked, taking a sip of his smoothie. "Superhero teams usually have awesome names, for the record."

"Eh…Big Hero Six, I'm thinking. Fictional-Fred spearheads the name."

"Good for fictional-me! Also I like the fact that some of the stuff that happens was the direct result of the team—what's some of the stuff?"

"A purse thief steals one of the team's chem purse and ends up a glob-monster."

"Ooh, we're directly responsible for one of our villains! Awesome!"

Yeah sure. "Also this bit where the villain stole a robot to find the team isn't happening because there's no team to find."

"Okay, okay…so we go through this and figure out what exactly is immediately directly a result of the team existing, and then we figure out like, the waypoints of canon—that's the stuff that would have happened no matter what," Fred explained at his dumbfounded glare.

"Well…that is why I came over," he muttered.

"See? The importance of having a beta. Let's do it."

Obake ended up flopping straight down on the Hamada's couch once he returned, groaning into the cushions.

"Where have you been?" Tadashi asked.

"Don't ask," he muttered. Yes, he had accomplished what he had set out to do…he just wished he hadn't needed Fred to do it.

"Yeah sure," Tadashi said, leaning on the couch back to poke him. "Hey, listen—someone stole Professor Granville's fancy paperweight."

Oog. "You don't say."

"Yeah. Hiro and I were thinking about doing some sleuthing to figure out who. I think Hiro's doing it to get in her good graces."

Oh brother. "Most likely someone from SFAI was getting a head start on Spirit Week."

"Probably…how do you know about that?"

Oi. "Someone tried to draft me during orientation, firstly. Secondly you don't live in a college town where people's cars get dangled from the Torii Gate Bridge on a routine basis without being aware of Spirit Week."

"Ah. I just figured you were doing your research on new ways to get Hiro in trouble."

"Not that that's not tempting," he said, finally surfacing a little from the couch. "But I needed a break from competing against your goody-goody tendencies."

"It's called being nice. You should try it sometime."

"I did—I ended up spraining something."

"So that's what you've been doing."

"You will never know."

"Oh I'll find out eventually. But back to the paperweight—any ideas? Things you want to get off your chest?"

"If you sit on me I will smother you in your sleep."

"Seriously?"

Rolled a bit to better glare at him. "I have been behaving myself. There is no reason for you to be getting on me about my day-to-day activities."

"Sorry, you've established yourself as the truant, now I have to."

"No you don't, shoo."

"Seriously? What's next, a flyswatter?"

"I can't deny that you're bugging me."

Tadashi's next comment was fortunately cut off by Cass calling them for dinner, and he had some blessed peace for as long as it took for the meal to end and him to retreat to the garage to try and rebuild his drone. At least it was the not-as-annoying brother this time.

"So what did you do today?" Hiro asked.

"Why do you want to know?" Obake demanded.

"Because I'm wondering if you'll have tomorrow free."

"And you need to know this why?"

"Well…Tadashi thinks the paperweight was stolen from someone at SFAI, so someone who doesn't have class could maybe sneak in and find it? Pretend to be a prospective student so you can nose around—"

"Hard no—I have my pride."

"But if we get the paperweight back, then Granville will get off my back because then she'd totally buy me being trustworthy—and if you help then maybe she'd be so grateful that maybe she lets you attend too—"

Not hardly, considering the last time he attended had been twenty years ago and involved blowing up the campus (accidentally) using said paperweight. "It wouldn't work, Hiro."

"Plus we get to start revenge schemes early for Spirit Week," Hiro said, still focused on the prize. "Hey while you're there get schematics for the Shimamoto statue."

Wait—

Wait going there early could be an excellent way to derail everything if he got the journal then he could stop himself it was the journal plus the painting that did it—

Granted, he also couldn't look too eager—Hiro would suspect. "Your brother put you up to this, didn't he?"

"Tadashi has been griping nonstop about you all day," Hiro said. "Something about I'm doomed to have truant kids haunt me this is your fault Hiro you started this." Hand him a screwdriver. "So what is this anyway?"

"Your brother doesn't have anything better to do, I'm guessing."

"Well yeah, but what are you working on? It looks like the drone you made—what happened to it?"

"Technical difficulties—we'll leave it at that."

"Right, sure—don't say that in front of Tadashi, I used that excuse one time too many when I first started bot-fighting."

Huff. "Okay maybe I'll help with the paperweight—at the very least to get the golden boy off me."

Hiro snorted, got ready to respond—

Was cut off by Tadashi sticking his head into the room.

"So hey we're having an emergency meeting," Tadashi announced. "Something happened at Honey Lemon's dorm, everyone's coming over here. That means get in the café, you two."

"I'd like to go on the record and say that I had nothing to do with whatever," Hiro said as they followed him in.

"No chill at all," Obake teased.

Which, as it turned out, was the opposite of Honey Lemon's current problem.

"Honey Lemon you're alive!" Wasabi wailed, tackling her in a tight hug. "I was so worried! I thought I'd never see you again!"

"Is he always this clingy?" Obake asked.

"So this is part of the reason why we're having this meeting," Tadashi sighed.

"It's nothing, really," Honey Lemon said, hugging her pack close. "My roommate got lemonade, so I decided to try a recipe for instant ice."

"You froze your whole dorm," Gogo pointed out.

"It's okay though—it'll thaw soon enough, and the clinic says that Regina won't have any permanent damage so that's good," Honey Lemon said, waving that off. "I'm just—kinda homeless, right now."

Obake immediately glanced at Fred, thinking of the mansion and wondering if he'd volunteer—recalled that the rest of them probably still thought he lived under a bridge somewhere.

Which was Gogo's thought too. "No," she said, spotting him looking at Fred. "Fred probably doesn't have any extra room in that cardboard box of his."

"Dude," Fred sniffed. "Oh wait Gogo you have your own place!"

"No. No roommates. Wasabi?"

"I live on campus, remember?" Wasabi asked. "No mixed dorms?"

"Unless your room thaws out in the next couple of days, someone here would end up on the couch long-term," Tadashi pointed out.

"I volunteer as tribute," Obake offered.

"No I had enough of a time getting you off the couch."

"I mean I'm sure we can come up with something," Honey Lemon said.

Everyone started pointedly looking at Gogo.

"Ugh, fine," she groaned. "Just until your dorm room gets thawed, we can do it in the morning—no offense but my neighborhood is super sketchy I don't recommend moving boxes at night there."

"YES," Wasabi cheered. "Moving is my jam I'll get the organizational stickers printed up tonight—"

"We're still left with the problem of where Honey Lemon is going to stay tonight, though," Hiro pointed out.

"Aunt Cass, can Honey Lemon stay over?" Tadashi called.

"Sure!" she called from the kitchen. "But no shenanigans!"

"I am more than reasonably sure that was directed at you don't give me that look," Obake said to Tadashi.

"Okay fair but I'm the one on the couch tonight," Tadashi said, looking to Honey Lemon. "You can have my bed, don't listen to Hiro he snores."

"I do not YOU do!" Hiro barked.

"You do," Obake agreed.

"Yay! Thank you guys, you're awesome," Honey Lemon said, darting around and hugging everyone.

"Well at least we get a break from Tadashi's snoring," Hiro muttered to Obake.

"At least there's that," Obake said.