You're Gonna Go Far, Kid
Summary: "A race for the Cygnus Diamonds! Kaitou Kid VS. Lady A!" What happened to getting the consent from your opponents before advertising about your challenge? It's another heist for Kaito, and an old thief on the verge of retirement's not a threat to him, especially when Kaitou Kid's presented with a challenge. Unfortunately, fate has other plans.
Pairings: A few hints here and there.
A/N: Own nothing that's canonically DC. Recommend you read all the stories listed in the Prequels and Side Stories if you want better understanding. Song by the Offspring.
Lady A: Phantom Thief with Robin Hood-like motives.
Prequels: "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot", "Scarborough Fair", "Last Farewell"
Side Stories: "Clockwork Relations", "Invisible", "Meltdown"
When he walked into the classroom alone and saw Hakuba's smug, victorious smirk, Kaito's first thought was, 'great, I've given him a chance to prove that I'm Kid.'
And then there wasn't any time for second thoughts, because his entire mind came to a screeching halt. Wait, hang on.
No, that wasn't right – he hadn't given that annoying, time-obsessed, upright, stick-in-the-mud detective with a narcissistic attitude a chance to prove that he was Kid. He hadn't sent any notices for heists or left a trail of breadcrumbs to follow. And since Hakuba Saguru never made that smug, arrogant face around Kuroba Kaito unless there was something Kid-related involved, Kaito couldn't figure out what was making him look like the cat that had finally gotten the canary. Like that one cartoon. And much like the lispy-voiced canary with the oversized head and the undersized wings always did, Kaito planned on turning that smile upside-down with a few clever prods and magical luck.
"What's gotten you so happy?" he asked his sometimes-enemy, sometimes-frienemy, always rival. "You look like Sherlock Holmes became real and told you that he wanted to marry you."
The words had the effect he'd been aiming for. Immediately, the smug grin was cleanly wiped off and replaced with a scowl. Score five hundred for Kaito, zero for Hakuba. "Don't act like you don't know, Kuroba," the detective replied after a pause. Kaito would happily say that it was because he couldn't come back with a response, but he knew that the Brit was just looking around to make sure no one would overhear them talk. It was an unspoken agreement between the two of them, something neither would ever acknowledge aloud or willingly.
Kaito raised an eyebrow. "Don't know what?" he asked, determined to pull this out as long as he could. All the more power to him.
Hakuba returned the eyebrow raise and tossed the newspaper onto his desk. The front headlines were there in black and white – "A Race for the Cygnus Diamonds! Kaitou Kid VS Lady A!"
He snatched it out of the detective's hands before his rival could even blink or smirk. "What the hell?!"
Another blond eyebrow rose to join the one already lifted high on his forehead. "You're telling me that you didn't know?"
"Of course I didn't," Kaito said gruffly, flipping past the thin pages after reading the 'more on page five'. He nearly ripped it a few times in his hurry. "I'm not Kid," he added as an afterthought.
It sounded as convincing as a wet paper bag with a rotten orange in it, but it was a ritual between the two of them. To not complete it would be to give in or admit something.
And he wouldn't give in, not even when the proverbial kingdom came.
Rolling his eyes, Hakuba craned his head to see what page he was reading. "Right. Well, if 'Kid', like you, didn't know about this, it would make sense. It seems that it was Lady A who sent the challenge to the publishing company."
Kaito stared down at the block of text. "So hypothetically, there is a possibility that the real Kid doesn't know about this."
"Yes, hypothetically, if the thief didn't read the papers and didn't have anyone to kindly lend him their copy."
Dear god, that guy managed to drip sarcasm from every little fragment of his words. He could have – at the very least – put in a little effort to look sincere.
"So hypothetically," Kaito just continued on, "Kid doesn't know about this challenge. That's not very fair, is it? I mean, what happened to the good old days when people alerted the folks they were challenging before sending the challenge?"
"Still speaking hypothetically, and denying that you're Kaitou Kid?"
He was enjoying this way too much. Kaito shot him a glance that was a cousin of a glare, irritated at him for sneaking in punches and wasting time. "Of course."
"What a shame. In that hypothetical case, I would tell the hypothetical Kid to suck it up and be the hypothetical master thief he's supposed to be. A true gentleman, no matter how hypothetical, would bend to the whims of a lady."
Kaito was going to protest in defense of his alter-persona and the gentlemanly-ness of said alter-persona, but Hakuba continued on. "Unless he's too much of a coward to take on the challenge."
. . . . He did not just use that card.
Whoever said that the British were well-mannered and respectful had lied to him. They hit under the belt, and hard.
"I've seen the article. Kid seems attracted to cursed stones," Akako slid into the seat closest to them, clearly not caring that it wasn't her own. The actual owner of the seat didn't seem to mind. In fact, he acted like it was an honour that the class beauty would rest in his usual spot.
Looked like someone was going to be stealing a chair later to take home. "Where's Nakamouri-chan, Kuroba-kun?" Akako didn't even glance around to look for the missing girl, but if she could hear Hakuba and his conversation when no one else could and join in like it was the most natural thing to do in the world . . . . "It's odd to see you here without her around to keep you in line."
"She skipped school today," he replied. Aoko deserved a break after the concert that was supposed to loosen her up only backfired and wound her up more than ever. Tantei-kun really needed to see some sort of exorcist, because that death streak was beginning to spread to people around him. Normally he would have let it be – kids would be kids, even those that attracted death like decaying carcases attracted flies – but this one had traumatized Aoko. That made it hard, if not impossible, to just 'let it slide'.
Pink hair, tantei-kun, pink hair. Permanent, too.
But Aoko was at home right now, watching bright, cheery cartoon shows meant for children. They were colourful, cheesy and sweet enough to cause diabetes to anyone over the age of five, so she'd be fine for a while. He needed to learn more about the objective of the new challenge, and these two had useful knowledge on the diamonds. "Cursed stones?"
"Oh, that rumour," Hakuba's voice adopted the skeptic's tone. "It mostly has to do with how they were gathered, and who was responsible for the creation of the collection." He sounded bored at the idea of a curse. Yes, people killed each other for pretty sparklies. Again. Ho-hum, moving on.
Detectives and their internal death magnets.
"No mere rumour," Akako insisted. "Those diamonds have the souls of the entrapped bound to them by confusion, by foul play and by murder. They're capable of quite a large amount of grief and misfortune."
All he really knew about them was that they had a bloody history, and that they weren't big jewels. Most of them were around the size of his thumbnail – big for an ordinary gem, but not the size he was looking for. Because they couldn't possibly hold Pandora, they'd flown low and away from his sparkly radar.
But a challenge – that was another story. "Exactly how much misfortune are we talking here?" he asked both of them.
"Cancel it," his mother said immediately when she heard his plans. She didn't look like her usual glamorous self – no makeup to cover up the bags under her eyes, and a wrinkled bathrobe wrapped around an equally wrinkled t-shirt and sweatpants. Still, her eyes had flashed with more life and determination than ever when she had heard about his questions regarding the Cygnus Diamonds challenge.
Kaito politely and pointedly ignored her. "Are you sure, Jii-chan?"
His father's former assistant nodded apologetically. "Master Toichi said that Pandora was definitely not hidden amongst the gems in the collection."
Kuroba Chikage ran a hand through her hair. "There, see?" she demanded. "There's no need to participate in this stupid dare. Kaito, just cancel it."
Kaito was used to her irritated (and dare he say, whiny) side now after seeing it constantly (thanks, Dr. Hailey, thanks so much for traumatizing his mother), but old man Jii was not. The semi-retired assistant gawked outright at the lady. "Mistress Chikage?" he asked uncertainly, glancing over at Kaito as if to make sure that it wasn't a disguise switcheroo or something.
His mom didn't spare the old man a glance. "Those gems are dangerous, Kaito," she said. "They were gained through bloody, terrible means, and kept only as a collection with fear. The Cygnus Diamonds are a disgracing taint to any true, self-respecting phantom thief."
Yeah, he'd heard the story, told by a very cynical Hakuba and an amused Akako. One version involved a detective's frustration at a criminal evading justice, the other a fascination with the curses each of the nine diamonds was supposed to carry. Both involved murder and shiny stones.
"I know, mom," he replied. "But Kaitou Kid never backs down from a challenge, and he's not one to start."
Lying in bed, staring into the laptop screen, Kaito's brain was divided. The larger portion of his brain was whirring away like a supercomputer, calculating details, making changes and deductions, all weaving a large, mysterious and complicated tapestry called his plans for the heist. It was fun to do – the trick was to make everything elaborate and calculated enough to function like clockwork, but leave some wiggle room. Loose, but not too loose. Tight, but not too tight.
That was around seventy-five percent of his brain actively functioning and working right there.
But he'd always been an awesome multi-tasker.
The other twenty-five percent of his brain was deciphering the Cygnus Diamonds – and their collector. Cygnus, the pseudo-phantom thief – Cygnus, the taboo.
A phantom thief should never kill. Steal, yes, be elaborate, yes, use mind-boggling tricks and never be expected to act as predicted, definitely hell to the yes.
But never kill to steal.
The search engine pinged softly, and the screen was filled with dozens of images. Bloody wedding dresses, grainy photos of the smiling deceased, swans, diamonds . . . .
But the top result was a sketched portrait of a beautiful woman, staring down at her bloody hands.
Cygnus, the woman who had stolen ten diamonds to create the replica of her namesake, but only used nine.
Cygnus, the thief who'd stolen both diamonds and lives.
Cygnus, the murderer.
Well, Kaito supposed she'd be classified as a serial killer. One death for every diamond. Trophies? He'd have to ask Hakuba about that when Akako wasn't there challenging the detective's scientific beliefs with her magical logic.
"What's so different from you and I, then?"
The wording of that question made it sound specifically like a follow-up question, but Kaito hadn't heard the ones prior to it. He blinked and stared at the woman sitting across the round glass table, the kind found in a café around his house.
"I beg your pardon?" he said, looking up and down, categorizing details about her. Blonde hair ten or so centimeters past her shoulders, hands covered in blood and in a wedding dress with a huge bustle.
Holy crap.
"What makes you so different from me?" she asked again, carelessly brushing a golden lock of hair behind her ear. A streak of blood was left smeared on her pale skin, and Kaito looked down at his palms out of instinct and habit.
His palm and fingers didn't have the same detailed lines that they should have had. There was a simple explanation for that – no matter how good his memory was, even he wasn't capable of recreating, down to the very last line, the prints on his palm and fingers.
"This is all a dream," he said aloud.
Kaito looked back at the woman. She was what he imagined Cygnus to look like – in the time when she was active. Probably a lot older now, but the real-life version of the sketch wasn't half-bad looking. "You're Cygnus," he said, pointing.
She crossed her arms over her chest, staining her white dress. "What," she repeated like a broken record, "makes you so different from me?"
He pinched himself. No pain, and no waking up from the dream.
. . . He was conscious of the fact that this was all a dream, and he couldn't wake up. What the hell.
"We both wear white," she gestured at his clothes – he was in Kid apparel for reasons he couldn't comprehend – "we steal precious jewels and return them, and we're international criminals. What's so different about you and I?"
He dug his nails into his palm, but got nothing. "This is a dream," he said aloud, trying to get his body to realize this.
Cygnus reached out for him, hands still impossibly dripping with blood. Was her hand bleeding? Was that the reason why her hand didn't run out of blood? "What's the difference?"
He backed away – or tried to. Standing up first might have been a good idea.
Instead he stumbled, tripped over the chair's curving metal legs and fell, the ground opening up under his feet.
It looked like the Disney version of Hell, only it didn't have the funny cartoon characters or the semi-cheery music playing in the background.
Cygnus fell with him. "What's so different?" she asked, and he nearly screamed when he saw the blood running out of her eyes.
And then they fell into the pool of blood.
He swam, thanking someone up there for the lack of fish before squashing that thought – no jinxing his situation. "What's different?" he demanded once he wiped the blood away from his face. Not that it mattered, but it just felt right to do it. "I don't kill people, that's what's different. I don't hurt them."
It was impossible to tell whether Cygnus was still bleeding out of creepy places or not – she was drenched. "But what if someone you care about is in trouble? What about revenge?"
He woke up before he had to answer. His mother stood over him, bagged eyes worried. "Are you okay?" she asked. Kaito felt her hand on his shoulder and realized that she had shaken him to wake him up. "Would you like something to drink?"
The edges of his windows were slightly lit with grayish light – maybe four, five in the morning. His breath tasted like the mother of all morning breaths and he didn't feel as rejuvenated as he should have from the full night of sleep.
"Yeah," he rose out of bed, ignoring the slightly damp pajamas sticking to his skin, "I'd like that. Thanks, mom."
I'll post the epilogue for Last Farewell later. This has been sitting in my doc for too long.