#obi's shoe choice is in one line but guess how long i spent deciding that

[sabraeal]

Through the Wringer

Go For Broke | Previous

Obiyuki AU Bingo Mystery AU

“So let me get this straight.” Suzu heaves a sigh like a pair of cement shoes, nose pinched between a pair of fingers so long and spindly that if he moved them together with the other eight, spiders would start jawing on about his fine set of gams. “You just...gave her the paper.”

“Gave is a strong word.” Obi kicks his heels up, dirt crumbling right onto the placard that reads SUZU EASON, ADJUNCT. “I showed her the stuff, and she took ‘em.”

Right out of his hands too, so quick he’d hardly had time to blink. That Nowakoski girl had some fight to her, that’s for sure.

“And by ‘she,’ you mean our murderess,” Suzu snips, waving his hands. “Get your boots off my desk! This is-- this is an academic institution, not some-- some speakeasy or something.”

He slants his smirk the way he knows will drive his favorite almost-professor crazy. “They don’t let you do it at bars either.”

“Then I cannot fathom why you think you can do this here, to my very own desk!” Suzu frowns down at the worn desktop, running his fingers over the grooves of the hundred despairing adjuncts that came before. “I just got the thing, Obi, I want to keep it nice for at least a little while.”

He gives it to him, dropping his soles back down to the dirt. The egghead looks like he could use the break.

“And stop smiling!” Suzu huffs, brushing the clay and gravel off after him. “You just let a murderess take our only proof that Kain Wisteria may have died of something other than an unlucky break in Amiens.”

Obi waggles a finger at him “You’ve been hanging around that fussy grouch box and his rocks, haven’t you?”

Suzu puffs up, using all six foot, four inches of him to be just as intimidating as Raggedy Andy. “Professor Lata is a tenured professor.”

Obi doesn’t have the heart to tell him that’s not as impressive to all the non-eggheads outside.

“And he’s the geology chair,” he continues, as if that’s helping matters. “So his opinion--”

“Ah.” Obi fishes a wrapper out of the trash, the spicy scent of hot pastrami still thick on the air. “He bought you lunch.”

Suzu deflates, eyes skittering away from Obi’s grin. “I don’t see what that has to do with anything.”

“Seems to me like you’re taking pages out of his book,” he says as Suzu snatches the paper out of his hands, crumpling it back down into the trash. “Being a real grouch, I mean.”

“I’m not-- I’m not being grouchy!” he hisses, mouth pulled thin. “Do you know how much trouble I could get into for all this? You told me this would just be a little favor and now--” he throws up his hands-- “I didn’t even ask Shidan for permission! We’re sitting on a-- a ticking time bomb of a theory that you just gave to a murderer.”

“Oh come on.” He shrugs beneath the weight of his trench. “She didn’t kill anyone.”

Suzu’s as pale as they come in this city, so it’s a real light show when he gets hot and bothered. Which he is right now, if Obi can tell his colors.

“And which head made that deduction?” he grits out. “I’ve practically staked my career on this-- by accident-- and now our only proof is in the hands of--”

“Hey.” A head sticks around the corner, wearing a face so cute someone could slap it on a doll and it’d sell like hotcakes. “So this is where you’re hiding out.”

“Oh!” Suzu presses a hand to his chest, clutching at the cotton of his button-down. “It’s just you, Yuzuri. Can you tell Obi that he can’t just--”

“I’m not here to get involved in your lover’s quarrel.” Her hands hook on her hips, right where her sweater meets the swell of a decent pair of hips. “Shake a leg, mister. You’re needed down in reception.”

Suzu blinks. “Wha?”

Yuzuri’s mouth purses, sour, accentuated by the vibrant blush of her lipstick. Most earthly creatures could only aspire to be in Haki Arluleon’s league, but the department’s secretary certainly comes closer than most. “Kihal Guerreiro is down there reenacting Sunrise Over Okinawa.”

Obi tilts his chair back, mind grinding through his memories like a freight train through a signal gate. “Isn’t that the one where the girl burns down--”

“Sure is.” She fixes Suzu with a glare. “And it’s your fault.”

Ah, the girl’s got spunk. No wonder Suzu’s so stuck on her.

The aforementioned adjunct gapes. “M-me? I’ve never met her in my life! I don’t know anyone famous!”

Yuzuri cocks her hip in a way that clearly says, yeah, pull the other one, too.

“Okay, well,” he hedges, “I did see Rita Hayworth having an ice cream once. But that’s it, I promise!”

“I don’t care if you saw Hedy Lemarr dancing naked on Rodeo,” she snaps. “That woman is down there kicking up a real fuss because of you.”

Suzu goes whiter than a sheet that’s shook hands with Clorox. “You haven’t-- you haven’t told Shidan, have you?”

She barks out a laugh. “I didn’t have to. She’s down there reading him the riot act as we speak.”

“Oh.” Obi’s seen poltergeists with more solidity than this post-doc. “Oh no.”

“So you better get down there lickity-split,” Yuzuri tells him, “or else I’ll tell her where you live.”

She turns on her heel, real neat, like some of the flyboys did in their birds, showing off that long seam up that back of her nylons before she slams the door behind her, hard enough to rattle a diploma off the wall.

“Oh hell,” Suzu breathes, hands digging runnels through his hair. “Oh hell, I’m in for it now.”

“You know,” Obi muses, gaze lingering on the door. “I like that dame.”

Suzu sighs. “You would.”

Reception’s never been a quiet place; the secretaries are always typing away like gunfire, writing up the department’s next magnum opus or fielding calls that have them cradling their receiver like another appendage, but today it’s certainly, well--

Louder.

“Listen here, Mister.” The words ring off the walls like an air raid siren, spoken from the diaphragm with true talent. “My friend has been calling your office for days, and she hasn’t heard from a single person who can give her an answer for this.”

Obi rounds the corner just in time to see Tinsel Town’s rising star shove a paper right into the professor’s chest, blue eyes blazing with a fire that would put Dresden to shame.

She’s dynamite up close; an Amazon straight off the isle with the stilettos she’s wearing, staring Shidan straight in the eye without having to crane her neck. Every inch of her is as dangerous as the femme fatales that have made her a household name, but still--

He’s hardly paying attention to her. Hard to, when her shadow’s got hair so red it practically blazes.

“My apologies, Miss Guerreiro,” Shidan soothes blandly, gaze hooded with the kind of weariness only a chair could muster. “I would normally be happy to answer any questions one of the public may ask, however--” his mouth pulls thin-- “I wasn’t even aware that one of my fellows had undertaken such an investigation.”

Suzu stiffens beside him, knuckles white where they grip the corner. “Well,” he breathes, backing away. “That’s my cue--”

“Why look.” Shidan’s gaze snaps over his shoulder, fixing Suzu as thoroughly as formaldehyde. “Here’s my fellow now. Suzu--” his teeth flash as quick as gun cotton-- “why don’t you come over here and explain yourself to this nice young woman.”

Suzu gulps, throat making a hollow thunk. “Ah...of course, Professor Weise.”

Obi’s not the kind of guy that leaves a man behind, but as Suzu shuffles his sad-sack self into the fray, he finds himself diverting from the flight plan, circling right around to where a high-necked blouse and Mary Jane bobs worriedly in Guerreiro’s wake.

“Well, well, well.” She jumps, turning those big eyes toward him, green as any of the arsenic bottles in the lab’s cabinet. “If its isn’t our winsome Wisteria heiress. Funny seeing you here.”

Her mouth pulls thin. “Oh. It’s you.”

“It’s me,” he agrees, slipping up beside her. She smells nice, something floral and vanilla that clings to her hair and makes him think of cookies at grandma’s. “I gotta say, Miss, for a humble war nurse, you sure got friends in some very high places.”

She huffs, arms crossing over her chest. “For your information, we met long before she got into show business.”

“That so?” he hums, hiking up a brow. “Now that you mention it, she was in one of Kain Wisteria’s flicks, wasn’t she? That one about the South Pacific.”

“She was in three,” the little miss corrects primly. “But the one you’re looking for is Sunrise Over Okinawa.”

He snaps his fingers. “Right, it came out just as I...”

She turns, all question.

“Ah, never mind,” he coughs. “Seems like Wisteria sure liked her work, if he kept using her like that.”

“Mm.” Her face crumples with the shadow of concern. “He did. He told her that with a little more work, she could be his muse.”

“Hah.” Obi lifts his hat, scratching at the back of his head. “That man liked his muses.”

Her knuckles blanch where they grasp her elbows. “He sure did at that.”

“You know, I’m surprised he didn’t try to put you in one of his flicks.” He grins down at her. “You might not be no Veronica Lake, but you got that Judy Garland look.”

Something happens to her face, so quick he can’t catch more than a ripple of it before it’s gone. She turns to him, shoving a paper into his hand.

“Here’s your report back,” she says, the words trembling. “You might want to be more careful where you leave these things.”

She glances at him, and he hears loud and clear: or who you leave them with.

“Right.” He glances down, catching the coroner’s letter head, stark and official under the university’s warm light. “Hey, ah, if you’re having trouble, I could get you in to see my friend.”

The girl whips back to him, wide-eyed, staring like maybe he’s missing a couple of sandwiches from his picnic basket. “I...appreciate the offer, detective.”

“Obi,” he offers, giddily.

“Obi.” Her mouth parts just slightly, uncertain. “But isn’t he right there? I could just ask him myself.”

“Well, sure,” he wheedles, “but that’s no guarantee he’ll talk to you. You know these egghead types. Insular.” He leans in, flashing a smile that could charm the hose off a Hepburn. “But me, I can put a good word in for you.”

She hums, hose still snug. “That so.”

“Sure thing.” He nods toward the charlie foxtrot happening hardly two yards from where they’re standing. “I could go up there right now and ask for you. I’m sure he’d be happy to do me the favor.”

“Of course he would,” she huffs. “He’s having a strip torn off him from both sides. Thank you very much, Mister...Obi, but I think I can wait.”

“Not at all.” He grins so wide the Cheshire Cat would go green with envy, and he’s rewarded with a look so wary that Wisteria’s pet cop would slap him in irons just to head him off. “Good thing for you, Miss, I don’t have any shame.”

She blink. “What? No, you can’t--”

He steps right up to the Western Front, marked by Guerreiro’s sharp elbow and says, “Hey, Suzu, this is the girl I was telling you about. Miss Nowakowski. She’s got some questions about that report you gave me.”

Suzu goggles at him. “Ah, sure, pal.” His mouth pulls into a rictus grin. “I’d--I’d love to meet her. Why don’t we all just go up to my office--”

“No need.” The red head shoulders through, nearly knocking him off his feet. She might be a tiny thing, but she stands shoulder to shoulder with the rest of them like she’d the tallest personality in the room. “I only came here to say that I’m giving permission to exhume the body.”

Shidan chokes. “I-- I’m sorry? I don’t think I heard that--?”

“I’ve already put in the request at the precinct,” she explains, shoulders square she she stares them all down. “But I want to come down here as request personally that you do the toxicology report, Mr Eason.”

“Oh, I-- I don’t-- I’m not--” Suzu pants, hand hooks in his sweater vest-- “I don’t have the authority for that, Miss.”

“But I do.” Shidan stares down at the lot of them, his mouth in a thin line. “I think we should be discussing this in my office. Come this way, Miss Nowakowski, Miss Guerreiro. It seems I’ve missed a few crucial conversations.”