#Obi's quirk is self-teleportation and he's a PI

[claudeng80]

Fight me

Okay, this is probably cheating, but I took advantage of this to clean up a leftover Obiyuki bingo piece. BNHA AU.

The large glass windows probably lit the room in the daytime, but at night all they did was let in pests. Obi included himself in that category.

Not that he even touched the windows.

The lights of sleeping computers illuminated the space with an eerie blue glow. Rows of tables were stacked with scrap paper, knick-knacks, and dirty coffee mugs - so far it was indistinguishable from any tech startup with money to burn and an aesthetic for historical buildings, but Obi’d been watching the place far too long to be taken in by that. This was the Alchemist’s workshop, he knew it, and if only he could get proof-

A tinny beep was his only warning, just enough to duck behind a sofa. Somebody’s “collaboration space,” or something equally full of buzzwords, most likely. He couldn’t hear footsteps across the room, but a computer whirred to life and confirmed he wasn’t alone. It’d be hard to plant bugs if he wasn’t alone.

But really, if he wasn’t lying to himself, he was curious. Shielding the light, he checked his phone. Who was coming in to work at 2:34 in the morning and why?

Whoever she was, she talked to herself.

The flow of words was too quiet to record, too fragmentary to be full sentences, but he stayed listening anyway. Something about esters, something about buffers, something about “is going to kill me.” A grunt behind on a deadline. Secure in the darkness, he peeked from behind the sofa to see a profile lit in crescent by the computer screen. A cute grunt.

Outside, in the alley, something fell with a metallic clang and rolled noisily. Obi peeked again, and this time the girl’s eyes were wide with fear, her body rigid and her breath fast. Not that Obi had ever worked an office job, but it seemed a bit excessive. Unless her reasons for being here in the middle of the night were less behind on a deadline and more . . . like his own.

At last she turned back to her desk, and Obi crept forward. He needed a better look at her work, a better idea of what she was doing. She could be an ally. Darting desk to desk, he drew closer, her gentle mutters about amine groups and isomers flowing right over his head. He’d had chemistry in high school, as much as any UA student got, but it had never been his best subject.

It was a desk chair that did him in, a careless heel nudging it just enough that an armrest dropped with a ratcheting clack. The girl shot to her feet, wheeling, her eyes immediately jumping to Obi exposed between desks. He was hardly ten feet away.

Her eyes stayed fixed on him as she scrambled in her pocket, then clicked something between her fingers and a fireball hovered above her outstretched hand, fuzzy at the edges and stretching into a sooty peak. He raised an eyebrow, unimpressed. He’d faced down far bigger fireballs in training, and she wasn’t even throwing it. He could probably blow this one out like a birthday cake. One more step, and the ball blurred into an arc as she swung her arm around to match his motion. Her eyes were frightened in the dancing light. He could only imagine he looked like a real threat. Good.

The smallest of shifts, a twist, and her arm was pinned behind her back. The fireball wisped out in a puff of soot and a chemical smell, and he held her tight against his chest. Her hair, an odd shade of red, smelled chemical too, like a gas grill when the fire’s not working quite right. He rested his knife in front of her face, close enough to make her shake, far enough away she wouldn’t get it in her head to try to bite him. “Who are you?” She gasped. “Did Raj send you?”

“I’m Obi, fireball girl,” he answered with a smile. It was as good a name as any, and if she was in bed with the Schenezade Syndicate, everything he suspected about this place was looking more and more likely. “Do tell, what’s so urgent that has you working at this hour?”

The smell off her hair was different now, more piercing, a little sweet. It made Obi want to sneeze.

“I shouldn’t say,” she pleaded, beseeching but not nearly as afraid as she was a minute ago. He shifted the knife, trying to get back his advantage, and it tumbled from his numb fingers. He blinked, and it took an effort to open his eyes again. He jumped away, breathing deep to let the clean air start to clear his head.

Her fireball was back by the time he set his eyes on her again, frustrated. “Are you a hero?” she asked. “Or from the police?”

It’d been long enough that shouldn’t bother him anymore, but it did anyway. ”I don’t think that’s what you should be concerned about,” he growled.

“I’m not concerned, I just need you to leave me alone and let me work.” There was another sound down in the alley. Either the local vermin were feasting in the trash cans, or they were in trouble.

“It’s important,” she repeated. “I have to stop the Schenezades before the poison apple is ready.”

He must have still been disoriented from whatever she tried to gas him with, but whatever confused face he made put a little half-smile on her lips. “And what does that matter to the Wisterias?” His eyes flicked across her desk: computer, carbon black, sugar, test tubes, but no fume hood, no safety gear. He remembered at least that much from high school.

“It matters to me.” The fireball hissed gently above her hand, sending shadows dancing, but it was her face he couldn’t look away from. She wasn’t scared of him, not one bit, and nothing he could do was going to stop her. He underestimated her, there was no way she was just a Wisteria peon-

“You’re the Alchemist.” A villain mentioned only in the most secret of rumors, the Wisteria family’s newest weapon. Her lips tightened at the word, a frown in her eyes if not her mouth, and she didn’t deny it.

“I’m the only one who can stop a terrible disease before it starts. Are you going to get in my way, hero?”

“I’m no hero.” Not anymore. The east-facing windows showed the lightening sky. “You know, if you took this to the police, they’d get you help, and you wouldn’t have to do this alone, in the middle of the night, working for a crime syndicate.”

“The security guards should be here soon. I won’t tell anyone if you go now.”

A bluff. He couldn’t help but be impressed, but it only lasted a second before the ding of the elevator announced some new arrival. It could be a security guard, could be an overly ambitious employee, but the terror on her face as she glanced from the hallway to Obi was real

He hadn’t shifted another person since he went solo. He hated passengers. And yet before Obi knew it he’d grabbed her hand, her fireball flaring and snuffing out with surprise, and he dragged her through the shadows to safety. Time to finish this explanation on his terms.