Lenalee Kudo - It's not prewritten no, I'm just a super speedy writer!

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Summary: In which Shinichi is amused, and Kaito has a visitor.


"I've got to admit," Kudo says, "I wasn't quite expecting this."

Still in pain from the taser, Kaito doesn't respond with anything other than a wince. He's pretty sure that he's going to be fine, but he still feels like he might throw up. And his ears are ringing, which, all things considered, probably isn't a good thing.

He lets out a groan, runs a hand through his hair.

"You're not very good at keeping out of trouble, are you?" Kudo continues. His tone, while seemingly exasperated, is coupled with a small smirk. He's amused by this - by the fact that Kaito's struggling with the aftermath of being tased. "You'll feel better if you take deep breathes."

Kaito tries to breathe. It's not too difficult, really, to regulate his breathing and calm himself down, but it does take time until he starts to feel moderately human again. He wonders how Kudo knows how to deal with being tased? Has he himself felt it, or has he seen the result after a particular case?

"Thanks…" Kaito says after a while, leaning backwards to stare up at the ex-detective. If he looks closely, he can see scarring beneath Kudo's lip, one white scar reaching down the side of his jaw. It's faint - he'd not seen it before when they'd met, but now it's prominent and Kaito has to consciously tell himself not to stare.

He wonders how he got it.

"For a phantom thief, you're not very good at planning your escape though, are you?" Kudo says after a while. He's sat on the bottom bunk, leaning back against the wall. His arms are crossed, his legs spread out in front of him.

"I was almost out," Kaito protests.

"Almost isn't quite free though, is it?" Kudo says, raising an eyebrow. He rolls his eyes, turning to stare at the wall, rather than at the thief himself. "I mean, you can pretend all you want, but in the end you've just made things harder on yourself."

Kaito doesn't have a plausible explanation for that. He's known from the moment the handcuffs were placed around his wrists that he was going to be treated as a flight risk - now that he's actually tried to flee though, he's going to be flagged as an even higher threat to security.

Admittedly, it wasn't his best idea.

"I'm surprised they didn't throw me in solitary confinement or something." Kaito breathes, standing on shaky legs to glance outside the cell bars. Even on his toes, it's difficult to see over the railings. "At least I got off fairly lightly."

Kudo purses his lips. He says, "I imagine they think assigning you to a new cell is punishment enough."

Looking over his shoulder, Kaito tries for a smile. It's not quite KID-good, but he's pretty sure he could fool people into believing he's unaffected by his conversation with the ex-detective. He says, "I get the top bunk, right? So it doesn't seem like much of a punishment."

Kudo doesn't respond. Instead, he lays back against his bunk, scoops one arm beneath his pillow and curls into a ball, ending the conversation without some much as a second thought. As Kaito climbs his way up to his own bunk, he can hear faint mutterings from the bottom bunk.

He's not sure what to feel about that.

"I don't get it," Kudo says after a moment, "the guards all change over at this time. Why would you try to escape during the busiest twenty minutes of the day?"

Kaito isn't completely sure.

"You can't be both reckless and free in here," Kudo mumbles as Kaito closes his eyes. "You need to choose one and stick with it."


Kaito has never needed much sleep - it's a side effect of stealing under the moonlight while still being a high school student - so he's kind of surprised when he jumps down from his bunk to stretch his legs and finds Kudo reading a book.

"Oh," Kaito says when the other man looks up. "You're already awake?"

Kudo yawns, placing his book down onto his bunk. He looks different today, it's less easy to read him - yesterday he'd been a book written purely in Hiragana, today he's kanji.

"I wanted to finish my book before the library cart comes around," Kudo says, shrugging. "so I've been reading since the shouting woke me up."

"Shouting?" Kaito asks. He's a fairly light sleeper, so he's kind of surprised he slept through it, especially if it's loud enough to wake other up. stretching out his arms, he spares a glance outside his cell. Sunshine is starting to peek through the windows, but overall, the grey walls make the place seem lifeless.

"It's Saturday today," Kudo says, re-opening his book. It's a dog-eared copy of a Edogawa Rampo book, pages yellowed and curling in on themselves. "It's visiting day. Naturally, people are excited."

Kaito has obviously missed that memo.

But that makes him stop - will he get any visitors? Or will he go into the visiting room, sit down and wait for people who don't want to see him. He wonders if his mother will come, or if it's too much of a risk for the Phantom Lady to set foot near any prisons. It would have been nice to have known in advance.

Kaito runs a hand through his hair - Will Aoko visit him? Will Inspector Nakamori? It's stressing him out because he didn't even know, and now he's nervous.

"…You didn't know about the visits." It's not a question.

Pivoting on his foot, Kaito jumps back up to his bunk, burying his head into his pillow. He says, "I did not."

Kudo clicks his tongue. He says, "then you're not going to even go to the meeting rooms. People don't just show up to visit, you have to send them a visiting order first."

Lifting his head from his pillow, and leaning over the edge to face the ex-detective, Kaito sends him a smile. Worry dissolves into his stomach, leaving a faint relief behind. There's also lingering disappointment bleeding out of him. It's been over a month since his trial, and he really misses… he feels like he's trapped in a bird cage, and if there's anything KID wasn't ever meant to be, it is trapped.

"How about you Kudo-san," Kaito asks, the name sounding wrong from his lips. Maybe if they'd met in the past, he'd have called him detective, but he doesn't now. The label won't fit. "Are you expecting any visitors?"

"I try not to." Kudo sighs, turning his page, "there's someone who shows no matter how much I tell her not to though, so… who knows?"


It turns out that Kudo does have a visitor. The guards open the cell, give Kaito a glare, before dragging the ex-detective out of the cell with fingers digging into his shoulder. Whether it's painful or not is a question Kaito can't answer - the moment the guards opened the lock, Kudo's face switches from faintly amused to a cold glare.

Kaito isn't sure which expression is the real face of Kudo Shinichi, even with his experience of masks and poker faces.

"You as well," the guard says, beckoning him outside. Kaito hesitates, but jumps down from his bunk when he receives another barked order, "you've got a visitor."

"I didn't send out any visiting orders-" Kaito says, when one of the guard puts a cuff over his wrist, warning him that they'll shoot him with the taser if he so much as blinks without permission.

"Idiot," Kudo says, flippant now. "It means you've got a legal guest. Maybe a lawyer, maybe a police officer or something. Do you seriously not know anything about how this place works?"

For a moment, Kaito bites down on a sarcastic response. He swallows it instead, wary at the sudden stony-like glare and gritted teeth that are sent his way. What exactly has he done wrong?

"I've not exactly been here long," Kaito says instead, "I'm just getting the hang of it, Kudo."

The other prisoner hums, the sound low in his throat. It sounds almost like a growl, animalistic in a way that shakes Kaito to the core.

As they start making their way down the corridor however, Kudo turns his head so that he can see Kaito faintly, sends him a quick smirk and winks. He mouths, "it'll be a detective."


After all of the movies he's seen depicting various different prison visits, Kaito can calmly say that he feels extremely underwhelmed. There is no room with one way mirrors leading into a room that's secretly filming him. Instead, he is led into a room large enough to hold twenty small tables, chairs on either side of them.

He's not handcuffed to the table he's assigned either, which frankly, is a little offensive because Kaito is certain there's an easy way out. There's a vent at the end of the room, in the corner, and if he could just unscrew the grate Kaito would be out within seconds.

The difficult part would be unscrewing the vent - it'd be impossible without any tools, and even then he'd need to factor in the guards and what lies on the other side of the vents.

"Okay…" Kaito mumbles to himself. For a brief moment, he wonders whether he'd be able to steal any of the cutlery from the prison's kitchen, if he volunteers to help make meals. He's not sure though… if it turns out that each item is counted daily then he'd rather not add extra work to his schedule.

Plus he'd also have to find a way around the checks each guard conducts before entering the room.

He's so focused on a potential escape route, that he doesn't notice his visitor sit opposite him, sitting straight in his chair. He doesn't pay attention until the polite clearing of the other's throat, at which he turns his head, tongue clicking in irritation.

"What're you doing here, Hakuba?"

Hakuba is a lot of things. He's antisocial in an accidental way - the type who, in his attempt to fit in, only manages to ostracise himself further. He's dilligent, smart enough to see through Kaito's various heists, and his own identity. He's the one who eventually shackled him with handcuffs, the one who eventually handed him over to Inspector Nakamori to arrest.

Yes, Hakuba Saguru is a lot of things, but Kaito is pretty sure that he's not the type to gloat.

Meaning there must be a reason for the detective's visit.

"Kuroba," Hakuba says, posture alert as his eyes flicker around the room, "looking for ways to escape, I presume?"

Kaito shrugs, "nervous that I'd manage it?"

"I caught you once," Hakuba places his hands on the table. He doesn't steeple his fingers, but Kaito thinks that he's the kind of person who could without looking like a complete idiot, "I'm certain I could catch you again."

His poker face can do a lot, Kaito thinks, but it cannot hide the twitch of his eye. He says, "that's rather presumptuous."

Hakuba's smile is tight-lipped, and there is something behind his eyes that lurks, unspoken. Instead, he says, "you're just out of practise. Apparently you tried to stage an escape yesterday."

Leaning back in his chair, Kaito returns to looking around the room. He shrugs again, a self deprecating smile making it's way onto his face. "I wasn't quite expecting the tasers."

A small smile. For Hakuba, it's practically like he's beaming, the sadist.

"I am here for a reason though," the detective leans forward, "it's regarding your later heists."

"I'd assumed it was related to KID."

"Yes, well, we're still working through all the paper work even now," Hakuba sighs. It's hard to feel bad for him when Kaito's the one in prison, even if he knows how tiring police paper work can be. "It's about the heist where you attempted to steal the red admiral opal."

Kaito remembers it well - it had been the only heist where he'd been seriously injured. Following a confrontation with Snake, he'd managed to leave the gemstone at the cost of a bullet wound. He'd been lucky Jii had been waiting outside the heist location.

And here he'd thought Hakuba hadn't caught on to that. Someone must have heard the gunfire.

"Oh? That old butterfly stone?" Kaito waves the comment away, "why'd you want to bring that up? I'm pretty sure you were asleep for most of that one."

"I heard the shooting that night," Hakuba says, "and when you came into school later that week, you weren't exactly the epitome of health."

Hand lingering around the scar from that particular heist, Kaito wonders how much Hakuba had actually known all along. Had he had the proof outside of each heist? Had he waited until he could actually corner him during one of KID's shows?

"I… want to know more about the people shooting at you." Hakuba sighs. His shoulders are tensed. "I've got some questions if you'll answer them."

Kaito stills. Ever since he first found out the truth of his father's - the original KID - death, he'd decided to take down the organisation that did it. Not overtly, no, Kaito doesn't think he could ever take down a criminal syndicate by himself, but he had planned on stealing pandora for himself.

A gem that cries tears of immortality - The premise is both intriguing and terrifying.

He'd promised himself he would destroy it, and Kaito… even if he's been imprisoned, he know's he'll find a way to keep that promise.

"I'm not sure what I can tell you," Kaito says, relaxing his shoulders. He taps his fingers against the table, repeating the same word in Morse code: pandora.

"There was no shooting at all."

Hakuba purses his lips, frowning. "We can catch whoever did this-"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Kaito waves the comment away, discarding it like shredded paper. Pandora is his to find, not Hakuba's, not the police. It will never fall into the hands of Snake and his men.

Pandora is the only thing driving him.

Kaito will shatter it if it's the last thing he ever does.

"I see," Hakuba says, although it's pretty sure from the slight tilt of his head, gold hair splayed over his forehead, that he doesn't. "If that's all, then I'll make my leave."

"I have a question," Kaito says, as Hakuba moves to stand up, "before you go."

The Brit's eyebrow quirks.

"Aoko… how is she?"

Hakuba stands. Sighing, he tugs on the corner of his jacket, gaze shifting towards the doors. "I haven't spoken to her much, she's not exactly keen to talk to the person responsible for taking her best friend from her."

Like a flower in bloom, Kaito tries not to wilt. He says, "she's always been stubborn."

"She has, however, expressed outrage at the fact she hasn't had a single phone call from you." Hakuba turns, pushes away from the table, "so maybe you could ask her yourself."

Maybe he should.

As Hakuba leaves, and Kaito's escorted back into the main prison though, he realises that he probably won't.


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