Pairings: Kaito/Aoko, Hattori/Aoko, Hattori/Kaito. Sort of? It'll make sense when you read it.

Warnings: Crossdressing, Hattori's poor poor luck with women. Kaito being Kaito. Aoko and her shoe.

A/N: I seriously have no idea with this one. Just… yeah. Prompt provided was Blind Date. Characters, Kaito, Aoko and Hattori. And this was what was born from it. Because my mind refuses to work any other way than ridiculous.

Blind Date

"When you say 'blind date' do you mean the, when Toyama finds out about it she's going to pull your eyes out with her bare hands, kind of blind? Because that's precisely what's going to happen, Hattori." Conan said drolly over the phone after Hattori called him up excitedly to tell him the news. It was past what the Mouri's deemed a sick Conan's bedtime, he had declared sourly – rather than a typical 'hello' or even 'what's up' – upon answering the phone.

It explained at least, Hattori thought, why the other boy was speaking to him in a whisper, even if a 1:00 pm bedtime seemed more like a punishment to him than any sort of sick care.

Honestly, the kid had gotten so fatalistic ever since he'd been shrunk (along with catching colds like fans at a baseball game caught foul balls; a lot) – Hattori told him as much and got a few words from the other detective that the Osakan was pretty sure grade schoolers weren't supposed to know the meaning of. "This ain't some kind of online hookup where I could be meetin' with some forty year old pervert, Kudo. Okita knows a girl who's been trying to find a guy for her friend fer just about forever; hung up on an old flame or somethin'. Gave me a picture of her, she's a real cutie. Looks a little bit like yer Nee-chan though."

There was a muffled whump across the phone line that Hattori cleverly deduced was either the sound of Conan dropping the phone to the futon through suddenly nerveless fingers, or of the pint sized detective attempting to commit suicide via suffocating himself with a pillow. Either way he gave the other boy a few seconds to gather himself.

"Ran?" Conan hissed, and Hattori thought of those yappy little ankle biters who thought they were guard dogs but always looked a bit more like rabid squirrels, and how Conan still forgot most days that he didn't have much of a leg to stand on anymore when it came to intimidation. "What does Ran have to do with any of this?"

"Nothin'." Hattori bit out exasperatedly. "Was just an observation Kudo. 'm allowed to have those every now and then, ain't I?"

"Not when they include Ran." Hattori thought he heard, but Conan must have been trying to kill himself again because the words were muffled into the pillow.

The bullet train from Tokyo chose that moment to pull into the station and Hattori climbed up to stand on the bench he'd been waiting at, ignoring the dirty look he got from the granny in the blue kimono who'd been sharing the space with him; the old bint'd been watching him suspiciously since he'd sat down anyway, and he didn't want his date to have any trouble spotting him from the disembarking crowd. He recognized her as soon as she stepped off the train, brown hair down around bare shoulders, dressed in a cute, but modest blue sundress and sandals. "I gotta go Kudo." Hattori said, waving her over once she'd spotted him. "My date's here."

"You called me on your date?" Conan squeaked, sounding a bit more like the rug rat he was supposed to be. "You idiot! Hang up the phone!"

"'s what I was tryin' ta do." Hattori drawled, rolling his eyes and snapping the phone shut with one hand just as the pretty little brunette stepped up, clutching her purse nervously to her chest and smiling waveringly at him. He smiled reassuringly back and hopped down from the bench, slipping his phone into his pocket and an arm around her shoulders. "Nakamori Aoko, right? Hattori Heiji, it's nice to finally meet you."

"Yeah." She said, letting him lead her away from the station, fiddling absently with the clasp on her purse. "It's nice to meet you too." Her eyes were so blue they were almost purple.

~*~

Hattori decided to take her on a short tour of Osaka after she admitted to never having really taken the time before – "I've only been once or twice." She said, twirling a bit of hair around her index finger and staring up at the clouds with a distant expression on her face. "And I always had something I needed to do, so I've never had a chance to just take in the sights." – Which Hattori informed her was just a tragedy really, and he took her by the arm and set forth educating her on the wonder that was Osaka.

"An' the top of Tsutenkaku tower lights up every night with—"

"—with a weather forecast for the next day, right?" She laughed at Hattori's slightly disbelieving look, throwing her head back into the sound, eyes and teeth sparkling in the sun. She punched him once playfully on the shoulder and Hattori was surprised to note that it actually hurt a bit. "I've been up there at least. The view is amazing. It's almost like flying."

"So long as it ain't fallin'." Hattori muttered almost unthinkingly, memories of his time spent here with Conan rising unbidden in his mind.

Aoko flinched almost violently, purse dropping through suddenly nerveless fingers and modestly manicured hand rising to cup the right side of her face. It was probably too much to ask, he thought despairingly, to hope that she hadn't heard about his tendency to attract death from above. And the day had been going so well too… "Sorry." She said – chirped – after a moment, bending down to retrieve her purse and allowing him the barest glimpse of her pale blue underwear in the process (heaven help him but for graceless girls). Straightening again she flattened the sundress against her thighs and flashed him another bright white smile. "Sugar crash. I overslept and ran out the door without breakfast so I could make the train."

"Well why didn't ya say somethin' earlier?" Hattori crowed, grabbing her by the arm and setting off at a quick and even pace, not realizing until she stumbled on an uneven patch of ground and ran face first into the small of his back that he was practically dragging her along now. He set her back on her feet and proceeded after a moment's hesitation at a more sedate speed, cursing himself all the while for failing so utterly at making a good first impression on this date.

His detective's intuition was already telling him that there would not be a second one.

Still, that didn't mean that there was no hope of him salvaging it either. "I know this great little okonomi-yaki place, best 'n Japan – do ya like okonomi-yaki?"

"I've never had it." She admitted, and Hattori stopped short so suddenly that she nearly walked off without him, only the tight grip he'd had on her arm preventing their premature separation. She made a small moue of pain and Hattori loosened his hold, but before he could apologize for his carelessness, or possibly berate her for her own (Who in their right mind could live seventeen years in Japan without having tried okonomi-yaki before? It was practically criminal!) a loud, shrill cry cut through the air, like a harpy's hunting call.

"Heiji!"

"Aw crap." Hattori's shoulders slumped as Kazuha stomped resolutely toward the two of them, an avenging goddess in high tops and a ponytail. "What're you doing here K'zuha?!" He yelped as she drew nearer, taking a step back and putting an arm up to shield Aoko instinctively.

Quietly, like a demure mouse or doe, she stared up at him with wide blue eyes.

… actually, she was pretty tall for a gal, now that he thought about it. Nose coming up right about to his chin. Sturdy sort when he'd tugged on her arm as well; could likely hold her own against Kazuha if he let them at each other. Not that he would of course, but it was always a good thing to keep in mind. Just in case.

Kazuha's eyes narrowed like a lioness that had just spotted her prey. "What am I doin' here, Heiji, I live 'round here, same as you! Except you shouldn't be here because you told me you were goin' down to Tokyo to see the brat." She stopped short just a few paces in front of them, squaring her shoulders and inhaling deep, thrusting an accusatory finger in his face. "Well this isn't Tokyo, Heiji, and that (spinning to point at the now rapidly blinking and slightly gaping brunette at his shoulder) does not look like the brat, Heiji, it looks like a very pretty girl—"

"… you think I'm pretty?" Aoko asked, mouth pursed cutely and head cocked to one side, hair tumbling to cover one shoulder and bare the other to the warmth of the midday summer sun. Hattori felt the sudden strong urge to say, no duh.

"—who I don… er. Yeah. I do." Kazuha said, losing steam all of a sudden and looking more than a little confused. It wasn't very often that someone dared interrupt Kazuha in the middle of a full blown rage, that boy with the messy hair and the hummingbird smirk (here and gone again in a flash) who got on the train at the station change to Beika and pressed a tiny pink carnation into her hand and told her that pretty girls should smile more being the last one he'd witnessed. "You've got really nice legs. And a cute face, sorta like Ran-san's…"

"I knew it!"

Kazuha's head whipped back around to stare at Hattori, pinning him with a newly rekindled glare. She had smiled for the boy that time, even as he disappeared in the crowd somewhere near the back of the car, cheeks dusted pink and flower clutched close to her chest. There was no smile for Hattori now.

"Er…" Hattori said, taking another step back and nearly tripping over Aoko again. (And didn't she just seem to disappear when she wasn't bringing attention on herself by speaking?)

Kazuha matched him step for step. "Don't you 'er' me mister! Why aren't you in Tokyo?"

"I—"

"He was showing me around as a favor for my dad." Aoko provided, flitting forward between the two of them as gracefully as a butterfly, hands tucked neatly behind her back. "Daddy knows I want to follow him into the force when I graduate and he thought it'd be a good idea to spend some time with such an accomplished young detective. But he didn't want me around town because the force is having their annual budgetary review today and he couldn't have me distracting him from the ritual brownnosing that's always necessary to approve further funding with so little to show for it."

Hattori felt his chest puff up proudly at the compliment even as he tried to place her surname, this being news to him too. Nakamori, Nakamori, Naka… "Yer dad heads the Kaitou Kid task force!" And was more likely to kill him for having designs on his daughter than commend him for a case well solved, actually. That man had a temper to rival Mouri Kogoro's and a vocabulary that would make a sailor with Tourette's blush, particularly when Kid had just gotten away with yet another priceless jewel. And she was his daughter? How could such a well mannered girl—

"And one of these days he's gonna catch that stupid thief and throw him behind bars!" Her resulting shout left his ears ringing, and he was forced to stumble back several more hasty paces to avoid receiving a black eye from her suddenly vehement hand gestures.

Oh, Hattori thought dazedly, that's how.

In the lull following her sudden outburst Aoko had slithered forward, taking Kazuha's hands in her own and giving her that weird 'best friends forever' look that Kazuha and Ran had switched so easily into once Kazuha had deemed her not so much a threat as an ally. That all girls seemed to get whenever there was a boy nearby, even if they had been biting each other's heads off only moments before. "I'm so jealous." She whispered, just loud enough for Hattori to hear her, but still wonder if she had meant for him to. "I wish I had your figure. You've got such great curves, and here I look like such a child."

"No…" Kazuha rushed to reassure her, and their voices grew more hushed and giggly, both girls taking turns to peek back at Hattori before returning to their huddle, a few louder, excited squeals piquing his interest and one rather frightening cackle making him really begin to rethink this entire day.

Finally they broke free from each other, Aoko with this pleased little blush on her cheeks and Kazuha sending him one long, hard look before waving and turning away, disappearing quickly into the bustle of a downtown Saturday afternoon. He stood, gaping. "What did you guys—"

"Girl talk," Aoko said sweetly, hooking her arm through his and leading him away from the flow of foot traffic that their strange little reunion had apparently been disturbing for quite some time from the looks of a few rather aggravated faces in the crowd (though a few others were smirking and elbowing their companions in a knowing manner that made Hattori's blood boil). "Is not meant for the ears of boys."

Hattori huffed and cast he eyes about for visible street signs to reorient himself after such a disorienting encounter. He hated that sort of evasive answer; whether it came from a murder suspect or a pretty young girl. Or both, as the case often was. "Well how did you know about—"

"Your little not so much a hobby as a life's passion, tantei-han?" Aoko said, eyes hooded in a strangely mischievous fashion. "I have read the newspapers, Heiji-kun." She smiled into a sudden breeze. "That, and I go to school with Hakuba Saguru."

Hattori practically snarled. "That bastard?"

Aoko laughed. "He didn't have very many good things to say about you either. At least," She slanted a look at him through her eyelashes. "if you were to take everything he said at face value."

A creeping suspicion made itself known along the back of Hattori's neck and the pit of his stomach. "Oh no." He said, shaking his head and fighting off a sudden gag reflex. "Please tell me that he isn't the old flame." There was no way he was taking seconds from that jerk.

"Excuse me?" She said, and for the briefest, most terrifying moment, Hattori feared that he'd said the last part out loud. "Old flame? Who's an old flame?"

Hattori opened his mouth to answer.

"Kaito!"

His head swiveled to the left to see the crowd part just enough to reveal another Aoko, hunched and panting tiredly, hands on her bare knees and hair crazily windswept. To the right and his Aoko had fallen into a classic defensive position, hands up and smiling beguilingly. Left, and the other Aoko was still there, death in her eyes. What. The. Hell.

"Kaito!" The newest Aoko shouted, crouching down to pull off her shoe and throwing it at Hattori's date (he might have taken affront to that, but the girl was surprisingly quick on her feet and the shoe wound up sailing rather harmlessly over her head). Their newest arrival started shrieking about her shoe then, which Hattori thought was a bit foolish considering she was the one who had thrown it in the first place but his Aoko (his Aoko? Really?) only smiled like she was used to it and even, perhaps, thought all of the hysterics cute or amusing, and went to fetch the shoe, placing it back in the lookalike's hand with a kiss on the cheek and a pat on the head. She was rewarded for her good deed and good humor by being smacked on the head a few times with the newly returned shoe. "How long did you think you'd be able to trick me into thinking it was Friday?!"

The first made a great show of checking her wrist for a watch. "Six hours apparently." She said, voice falling almost an octave lower quite suddenly.

As quickly as she had swelled with anger, the second Aoko deflated, laughing weakly and leaning against the other's shoulder. "God I'm starving." She moaned. "I ran out in such a panic once I figured out what day it really was – I haven't eaten since last night."

Aoko, who Hattori had mostly figured by now was not actually Aoko but more than likely this old flame that he had been warned about (though clearly not enough; what sort of loony ex, precisely, dressed in drag and crashed a date, and did such a goddamn good job of it and – oh Christ – he'd looked up that boy's skirt) grinned like a jester, swinging his arm over the snickering girl's shoulders. "Okiono-maki?" He suggested breezily.

"Love to."

"It's a date~!" The would be tranny trilled, swinging the two of them around and waltzing them off down the street in a real time waltz – one, two, three, one, two, three – leaving Hattori behind without a backward glance.

"…what?" Hattori said.