2 The fateful meeting

Aoko died, huh?

Kaito had honestly trouble believing Hakuba. Maybe especially because it was Hakuba he couldn't believe it to be true. They just wanted to make sure he wasn't looking for her, right? He had hurt her so much so that they wanted to keep him as far away as possible and what best way was there to accomplish that? Make him believe she was dead and he'd move on, one day for sure.

But Kaito wasn't stupid.

Had keibu told him that, he might have believed it but Hakuba? That bastard? He knew how much Hakuba hated him, especially after how he had left back then. Hakuba had let him know as much back then.

But Kaito wasn't stupid.

Five years ago, and he had thought it was due to his heists being mostly far away from Japan, like Europe and America, there was a time when keibu had missed his heists completely and when he had attended again, he had been very absentminded. It made sense, if he just thought about it. Of course, Nakamori-keibu would be absentminded and distraught if his daughter died. Of course, he wouldn't have the strength to continue losing against him, again and again.

But it was Hakuba who told him Aoko was dead and so he just couldn't believe it. At all. There was absolutely no way. Aoko couldn't be dead. Not his way too smart, bright eyed best friend forever. He never even got to tell her goodbye.

No, there was no way Aoko was dead. She couldn't. He'd know if she was dead. They just wanted to make him suffer the way he hurt her and it was just their really elaborate plan. It was fine – he could live with that, so long as Aoko was alive and well he could live with anything. Even the most horrible lie.

xXx

For Mouri Ran things had always been pretty straight forward.

There had been a few constants in her life like her best male childhood friend Kudou Shinichi or her best female childhood friend Suzuki Sonoko or the fact that her parents were not living together but had yet to get a divorce.

Shinichi was a prodigy detective and Sonoko was the rich girl through and through and Ran herself thought she could get her parents back together if she just tried hard enough. Things had been easy, just like that.

And then, because life was never nice and easy, things changed, and her constants became variables that changed every day. First, Shinichi disappeared. Then Conan appeared and then she found out that Shinichi was Conan and he never truly left. And then she met another friend, Nakamori Aoko, who became another constant in her life but even that constant vanished with the girl one day and until this day no one believed her that her death was not true. And first it was Shinichi, then the lies and deception, then it was another loss and the fact that no one believed her, they just watched her with those eyes full of pity and fake understanding for the girl who lost everything a second time and no she wasn't crazy but she might as well be getting there.

"Ran-chan, how do you fell today?"

It wasn't that she lost friend after friend that broke her – it was bad enough and she was never good with loss – but the lies, the pity, the voices that told her she was wrong and give it up, mostly from people she trusted the most (Shinichi Shinichi Shinichi) that had her mind rot away in madness.

Life had been calm after that. (No, it hadn't. Until this day she felt like Alice who fell down the rabbit hole, crazy crazy crazy madmadmad.)

She felt the corners of her mouth go up into a friendly smile.

They did that a lot lately (for years now but she had stopped counting a long time ago). People liked it and believed she was back to her old self (which she wasn't, never would be anymore). And Ran was smart and after a while became a very good actor – despite her wish from a long time ago to become a lawyer or a pro in karate or maybe even a teacher. In the end, she became a broken doll, a perfect actor in a world that pretended perfection was the only thing that ever mattered.

"I'm fine."

She wasn't but nobody wanted to know really. Nobody cared enough to dig deeper, to find the gaping hole in her spirit and heart equally and maybe it was her own fault for being so perfect in pretending that she, in fact, was fine. Besides, it kept her out of trouble and it made her father and mother feel better about themselves. If she just pretended hard enough, they wouldn't worry anymore and her mother would continue working continuously and her father wouldn't drown his sorrow in even more alcohol than usual.

(Long has the perfect family picture shattered into a million pieces.)

"I'm glad to hear that. How is Kudou-kun? I saw he accompanied you here again? My, what a lovely boyfriend, isn't he?"

Being with Shinichi had always been something Ran had been looking forward to. She had loved him for such a long time and he had been this infallible best friend, smart and strong when it mattered, and he cared about her. Once upon a time. The thing with Conan happened afterwards, and when he was back being himself again, he wasn't. He wasn't the Shinichi she knew and the lies and deception hit deep and she couldn't forgive him so easily.

She did, in the end. She loved him that much, after all.

But then Aoko happened and he was the one who told her to let her go, she's dead. But Ran couldn't let go. She couldn't and she didn't but he did and that was something she couldn't forgive him.

Being with Shinichi was easy, it was convenient. It was something everyone expected of her and she figured he loved her, or maybe he felt responsible for her current state and only stayed by her side because he felt he needed to. If he loved her or not, Ran couldn't care less anymore. It was good for her, for her act, to be with him and fool everyone into believing she was back to her old self. Back when things were simple and clean.

Being with him was the compromise she negotiated with herself in order to find a semblance of freedom ever again, as being with him was restricting, and had she not known the game he was playing, watching her like a hawk, controlling her, following her, she might have lost her mind all over again. But she wasn't stupid even if most thought her to be and she adapted the game to her advantage. Keep Shinichi happy and unsuspecting and she was fine and free to do whatever she wanted.

"Yes, Shinichi likes to spend all his time with me."

Except when it came to cases. It was a case which broke her mind after all, he couldn't very well keep her around all the blood and gore and murder and negative emotions, right? And he didn't – most of the time anyway. He never let go of cases but he also sometimes postponed them or even let the police handle them. He wouldn't just leave her unattended but he'd bring her somewhere safe, to her father's place, his own or her mother's and only then he'd leave for the case. He'd hurry back unlike before but even now he couldn't just leave a case be. And to be honest, she wasn't even angry anymore.

xXx

Usually, Kaito wasn't violent.

He was good in strategizing, laying traps, outsmarting his opponents and escaping to safety after accomplishing his goals.

Usually, he didn't even like fighting because fighting required practice and experience, both which he lacked greatly. He never learned any martial arts, never any fighting sports and the most fighting experience he ever got, was when Aoko chased him with her mop and he had to train his evading skills. But that was as close to any fighting experience as it got. Furthermore, fighting meant he'd have to use his hands or legs, but most importantly his hands, which was just out of the question – those hands were his career. He couldn't quite risk them.

And damn was he good with his hands, quick and clever and that mixed equaled being undefeatable, however, fighting as it was, was not one of his strengths. Thus, fighting was one thing Kaito didn't do unless unavoidable. Unless he didn't have his trusted card gun with him. Unless all his traps failed and all his preparations went up in smoke. Unless he was at wit's end.

Only then Kaito would fight.

Usually, he had a clear mind and remained level-headed in all situations, was it at one of his heists or one of his shows – he had long perfected keeping his emotions in check. He had become a professional when it came to being a professional, concerning both his careers. Even in situations when he had faced real danger, like men with real guns pointing at him, even when they had hostages, he'd been nothing but calm and focused.

Point was, Kaito had long become calmness in person.

But as things stood, his thinking abilities and Poker Face still went straight out the window, even eight years later, when it came to Aoko.

And so it wasn't very surprising to find him behind bars, with a blue eye and a cross look on his face.

He barely remembered hitting Hakuba, but his knuckles were torn and bloody, proof enough something happened, and he was glad they had him calm down in a cell instead of a hospital bed where they'd drug him and he couldn't do anything to protect himself. (Something he needed to be able to do otherwise he'd lose his mind.)

But his knuckles were torn and bloody and Kaito wondered how it happened. Hakuba was supposed to be this great police inspector, shouldn't he have been able to evade his punches and defeated him right away? Kaito had not been thinking straight, he had no magic tricks up his sleeves, just straight old fists-against-face punches. Why did Hakuba let him hit him? Either way, it didn't matter. Hakuba was a liar and maybe it was his way of alleviating his guilt. He'd have to ask Nakamori-keibu, simple and easy.

xXx

"Alright Ran-chan. Do you have an answer for me today?"

Ran sighed inwardly.

No, she didn't have an answer. She didn't have it a year ago and she still didn't have it now. And the answer as to why was so simple – she couldn't remember. She was supposed to remember though, so that she would never again do something like that again.

Ran pulled her mouth into a smile again. Then she shrugged.

"It's really difficult to say, Yamada-sensei. I still don't remember, I'm sorry."

She saw the disappointment in the woman's face but Ran didn't care.

So she poured boiling water over herself, so what? She couldn't quite remember why anymore, she only knew it was because Shinichi said something about Aoko, probably something along the lines of forget about her, Ran, she's dead and then she must have snapped and it wasn't like Ran wanted to kill herself. Until today she never felt like she wanted to die and with boiling water she could have barely killed herself, anyway, so why were they all making such a fuss about it?

She'd been hospitalized after that, a few long months long but even that time Ran barely remembered. Whenever she thought about it, it was like static, she knew there was a time span but she just couldn't remember it. It was blank. It wasn't filled with anything. It must have been there that she trained her actress abilities, unconsciously, since she obviously couldn't remember a single thing from that time. But she must have been good because they let her go after a few months, let her go back to her family and friends. Back to what broke her in the first place.

But then again, she wasn't suicidal, never had been, so there was also no need to keep her hospitalized any longer.

She had just overreacted, the water had been in her hands, and she had just overreacted.

xXx

"How did your session go?"

His hand was warm around hers and in the beginning she often wondered if he held her hand so that she couldn't run away from him or because he genuinely wanted to hold her hand.

Shinichi's voice sounded sincere enough, sincere enough to enquire about her progress with her therapist. Like always she wanted to answer but that wouldn't satisfy him and he'd only inquire further and Ran didn't feel like being questioned today. So she lied.

"Good."

Another thing she had grown incredibly good at – lying. It wasn't anything she had planned or anything, it just happened. It was the first that came so natural to her, a simple I'm fine when in reality she didn't know what she was – but not fine. Then – things had never been as easy, lying had never been as easy and he was none the wiser.

"Yamada-sensei asked for an answer, just like always. I think I'm getting there."

She wasn't but Shinichi didn't need to know that.

"Where are we going?"

If she pretended to be interested in her surroundings, he wouldn't notice the madness in her eyes or on her lips or on her mind. If she just tried hard enough, he'd never find out. And truth be told – Shinichi didn't really want to know, he never truly looked because if he did? Not even her best acting abilities would be able to hide the despair from her eyes.

"Station. There are some files I need to deliver to Superintendent Megure."

xXx

If they thought handcuffs and a lock could keep him away from answer, then they were wrong. He wasn't Kaitou Kid for nothing, after all.

"Where is Nakamori-keibu?! I need to talk to him, right away! Get me to Nakamori-keibu."

Kaito wondered what happened to his level-headedness. It used to be there. Once upon a time. Even when Aoko was still around – Aoko… his chest restricted painfully in his rib cage. That's right. Just the thought of her being dead was enough to make him lose his mind – and not because he was so in love, well, he was but that was neither here nor there, but because he just couldn't imagine a world without this woman in it. She was taken away from him, so suddenly, so viciously. He'd only been able to continue his live, to continue night after night as Kid because he'd been dreaming of a life after. A life with or without her (but not dead, never dead), mostly with her right beside him, or as a friend. He would have been fine if he'd just been the silent protector. He would have been fine with anything – except this.

Aoko being dead? It was unacceptable. He could live with them wanting to keep him away from her, he could live with that just fine but a world without her? Without Aoko?

"Where is Nakamori-keibu?"

It didn't take long after he fled his cell for police officers to start running after him, restricting him again, but he would fight them until someone told him it was nothing but a joke.

"Damn it, where is he? You can't really tell me Aoko is dead. It's a joke, right?! There is no way it's true!"

They pushed his arms behind his back again, he felt the telltale cold metal around his wrists again, cutting sharply into his skin but he just couldn't care about something like that. He barely even felt the pain.

"Oi! I want to talk to Nakamori-keibu! I want to hear it from his own mouth. Tell me the truth! Tell me Ao-"

And then there she was, standing right to the side, half covering her face with her hands, with a look filled with horror and – but no. It wasn't Aoko. Aoko didn't have such scars, she didn't such empty eyes, Aoko was dead (deaddeaddead).

Just like that, with just one breath, all his strength left him and he let all the officers drag him back into his cell without any more struggle.

It wasn't Aoko. It was another girl, another girl who knew the truth, the undeniable truth that Aoko was…

He felt like choking, he felt like dying, like the world lost all its light and there was just darkness everywhere, as if the world was plunged into an eternal night.

Wallowing in despair and hopelessness, Kaito barely registered the steps getting closer and he also didn't care. A world without Aoko in it was worthless. And that girl had known the truth, that was why she had been so shocked. Because he was five years late and opened wounds which must have long closed.

The steps stopped right in front of his cell.

"Kuroba Kaito?"

He didn't even have the strength to lift his head.

"Aoko isn't dead."


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