Detective Conan and Magic Kaito characters, settings, and ideas do not belong to me but to Aoyama Gōshō.
Return Triumphant
By Taliya
Adventure: Discovery
Summary: Haibara Ai figures out the newest Kaitou KID's identity.
Chapter-specific warnings: Character death references, post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety, language
Kaitou KID landed softly on the roof of a large home in Beika, disengaging his glider as he did so. The heist had been in nearby Beika Museum, and he had only wanted to take a breather to change into normal street clothing before he made his way back to Ekoda. He sighed, rolling his shoulders as he disengaged the hydraulics keeping the glider's frame rigid.
The Sukhothai Ruby was a large red gemstone that was the centerpiece of an intricate gold necklace that had been commissioned by the Siamese Phra Ruang Dynasty's King Si Inthrathit for his wife, Queen Sueang. KID had swiped it with ease despite the best efforts of Division Two, and as of now the heavy weight of the gold and gems rested safely within the inner breast pocket of his coat.
The phantom thief hopped down from the roof onto a tree branch and monkeyed his way deeper into the cover the leaves provided. Kaitou KID had been the one to leap into the tree branches, but it was Edogawa Conan who dropped down to the ground.
With an air of carefully affected nonchalance, the teenaged detective exited from the property he had landed in, casually swinging the exterior gate shut and strolling off into the darkness of the street. Along the way to the train stationed, he received a call on his Shounen Tantei-dan badge. It was Tsubaraya Mitsuhiko, and he had wanted to ask Conan if he had attended the KID heist that evening.
"Nah, I didn't go," Conan answered, his free hand stuffed in a pocket as he walked and enjoyed the cool night air. A half lie: he had indeed not gone—as himself. "I had ninjutsu practice tonight—" technically speaking, that is, "—and a lot of homework I still haven't finished yet."
The other boy sighed. "You haven't been to any since he reappeared even though we've all made an effort to go."
The bespectacled boy winced, even though he knew that his friend had not meant to be accusatory with his words. "I know… but I really have been busy…"
"Conan, we should catch up some time," Yoshida Ayumi said, butting into the conversation. Over the years, the members of the Shounen Tantei-dan had become comfortable enough with each other to drop the suffixes attached to their names.
"Yeah, Conan," Kojima Genta echoed as he joined in, "We don't see you often."
Conan chuckled. "Well, I do live on the other side of Tokyo now…"
"So let's meet up this weekend!"
"Yeah! Let's meet up on Saturday!"
"Where should we meet then?" came the sedate, ever-steady voice of Haibara Ai.
"Poirot?" Conan suggested as he passed by the street that, just a few storefronts down, was the home of Café Poirot on the ground floor, the Mouri Detective Agency on the second, and the Mouri residence on the third. He paused for a moment, taking in the familiar sight of what had been his home for four rather eventful—and memorable—years of his life. "It'd be nice to visit Beika again."
It was bittersweet for him, seeing the place. It brought to mind four years of countless moments of adventure, fear, exasperation, comfort, and fondness. Four years of joy and triumph, sorrow and heartbreak. The street held memories that Conan would never forget, even if he wanted to. A soft sigh escaped him, and Conan unexpectedly felt his chest tighten with emotion as he stared, surrounded by nothing but the light-polluted sky, the sleeping buildings, and the distant roar of traffic.
The buildings all along the street were dark—as they should be at near midnight. The third-floor apartment, Conan knew, now housed an aging Mouri Kogoro, alone. Ran had long since left the place, first for university, and then for her job as a budding criminal defense lawyer—just like her mother, Kisaki Eri. While she still visited her father often, Conan could not help but wonder how Kogoro was getting along without Ran to constantly look after him.
"—an! Conan!"
The magician thief snapped out of his melancholy torpor at Ayumi's insistent repetition of his name. "Huh?"
"I said," Ayumi huffed, "We should invite Kaori, Kousei, and Shinichi, too."
Miyazono Kaori, Arima Kousei, and Izumi Shinichi were classmates of Conan's at Ekoda High School. The three had become friends with Conan soon after he had moved to Ekoda. Kaori was a blonde-haired, free-spirited girl with an independent, supportive spirit and absolutely adored playing the violin. Kousei was a calm and introspective black-haired boy who oftentimes lost himself in thought whenever he was not playing the piano. The two of them were an item and had been dating since middle school—though how they got along with their diametric personalities was beyond Conan's understanding. Shinichi was a thoughtful, quiet chocolate-haired youth who was even-tempered, mature beyond his age, and considerate of everyone around him.
Conan had initially resented Shinichi quite a bit just for his given name alone, though he knew that his umbrage stemmed from an absurdly petty reason. But it had hurt to hear his name being called and to not respond, to know that it was not him that was being addressed. Still, he had done his best to be polite to the other boy, and the somewhat-of-a-loner Shinichi had eventually become one of his friends.
"I'll be sure to ask if they are available," Conan drawled, forcing himself to move past the Mouri home and towards a livelier Beika Station. "I'm going to shower and go to sleep." He decidedly did not want to answer questions regarding where he was in the middle of the night based on the sounds of his surroundings. "Talk to you all later, okay?"
A chorus of agreements and goodbyes followed, and Conan made the rest of the trip to the train station with only his thoughts for company. There were few people on the train; the phantom thief lightly dozed until his stop was announced. He hopped off the vehicle and made his way back home.
A dim glow lit one of the front windows of the Kuroba home, and Conan instantly knew that Chikage was still awake. The woman had a penchant for combining candlelight and tea at odd hours of the night, and he absently wondered if it was a trait all phantom thieves shared. His late-night riddling with Touichi-KID from his first childhood came to mind, along with all of the heists Kaito-KID had pulled once the sun had dipped below the horizon.
"I'm home," he called softly as he closed the door behind him, doffing his sneakers and slipping his feet into his house slippers.
"Welcome home." The former Phantom Lady was indeed sitting in the living room, a row of decorative tealights lit on the coffee table and a pot of what smelled like chrysanthemum tea on a tray next to the candles. Chikage smiled as Conan shuffled into the room, a multitude of emotions swirling in her observant eyes. "Not what you wanted?"
Conan snorted a laugh and shook his head. "This wasn't the one." He settled into an armchair across from the woman, and she wordlessly offered a cup of tea. He accepted it with murmured thanks, and the two phantom thieves sat in comfortable, contemplative silence as they watched the minute flickers of the otherwise steady teardrops of light.
"I encountered Them tonight," Conan finally said quietly. "Snake still believed me to be Touichi-san."
Chikage huffed. "That man is an utter idiot," he murmured with no small amount of contempt in her voice. Her eyes flickered up to her houseguest. "You aren't injured, are you?"
Conan shook his head. "I have a graze on my arm, but I patched it up right after I lost them. It'll scab over by tomorrow evening."
The Kuroba widow's eyes darkened in displeasure. "If only I could kill them…" she breathed.
"You don't want to kill them," Conan softly refuted, "You're so much better than that."
Chikage sighed. "You're right, I don't actually want to kill them," she confessed after several moments of silence, "But the sentiment remains."
Conan gave her a small but understanding smile. "And it's natural to feel that way, considering what and how much they took from you. But… just don't ever sink to their level." He leaned forwards to set his now empty teacup on the tray. "Would you like me to clean this up?"
"No," she replied, eyes softening as she smiled at him. "I'll clean up. Why don't you shower and go to bed?" She quirked a mischievous eyebrow. "You still have school tomorrow—or rather, today, after all."
A surprised chuckle escaped him. "Don't remind me," he grumbled good-naturedly. With a respectful nod, he excused himself and bid his landlady a good evening. After stowing away Kaitou KID's outfit and gear and a quick shower later, Conan tumbled into bed. He was asleep the moment his head touched his pillow.
Late Saturday morning found one part-time phantom thief and part-time-detective on the way to Beika with three friends in tow. The quartet was walking towards Café Poirot, animatedly discussing their plans for the coming summer break.
"—part-time job to help around the house," Shinichi was saying. "I mean, I don't want to be too much of a burden on my parents."
"I'd say you're the most responsible out of all of us," Kaori remarked with a laugh. She eyed Conan, then amended, "Well, it's really a toss-up between you and Conan."
"Oi!" Conan protest, mock-offended as he absently flipped a five-hundred-yen coin through his fingers. "Are you implying I'm old?"
"She can get away with saying that because she's still a child despite her looks," Kousei drawled, then flinched as his girlfriend smacked his shoulder none too gently. He gave her a wounded look and griped, "What? It's true."
Kaori pouted. "Just because I am like that doesn't mean you get to tell everyone!"
"We already knew," Shinichi chuckled. "It's not a state secret or anything, and even if it was, it was not well kept in the least."
The foursome made it to Poirot without any problems—or bodies, and Conan internally sighed with relief. Unlike the original trio he had befriended in elementary, this newer trio did not react well to happening upon corpses. Kousei and Kaori were musicians at heart, and Shinichi was a casual gamer in his downtime. They had no interest in trying to suss out and chase down culprits.
The door jingled merrily as they entered the café, and Enomoto Azusa greeted them with a smile. "Welcome! Please sit wherever you li—Conan-kun, what a surprise! I haven't seen you in a while!"
Conan smiled and nodded his head at the long-time waitress. "Azusa-san, it's been a while."
"Indeed it has! How have you been?" she asked as she followed the four high school students to a table of their choosing.
"Really busy," the detective replied truthfully. His friends from Ekoda knew that aside from homework, he practiced martial arts and played soccer with the school's team in his spare time, and even somehow managed to squeeze in solving murders with the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department. What they did not know was that he moonlighted as a magician-phantom thief on top of all that. It was a wonder that he even had time for friends with all of that on his plate.
His friends laughed, agreeing with him wholeheartedly. They were interrupted from their gleeful elaboration of Conan's seemingly impossible schedule by the arrival of the other half of their group.
"Conan!" chorused Ayumi, Mitsuhiko, and Genta as they entered the restaurant. Ayumi tackled Conan in a hug, and the boys traded hearty shoulder slaps in lieu of hugs as they exchanged salutations.
"Edogawa-kun," Ai greeted as she approached at a much more sedate pace than her companions.
"Haibara," he answered in reply. Unlike everyone else, the two shrunken adults retained an air of reserve around each other. Neither could forget their true ages, nor could they forget what they had both gone through. There was deep mutual respect for the other, along with gratitude for what the other had done, sympathy for what the other had lost, and a familial sort of love bred through shared hardships.
"It's good to see you again," the strawberry blond said, a faint smile curving her lips as she looked him over to ascertain his health before it flattened and thinned in veiled displeasure. She stepped up and hugged him, muttering sotto voce into his ear, "I need to speak to you privately at some point."
"Okay," Conan answered back just as quietly as he hugged her back, then stepped back and said in a normal voice, "Same."
"Please sit," Azusa said, and the group of eight picked a large table—Shinichi, Mitsuhiko, Genta, and Ai sat on individual chairs, while Kaori, Kousei, Conan, and Ayumi piled onto the bench. Ayumi still harbored a crush on Conan, much to his discomfort, as he still viewed himself as ten years older than her despite his physical age of sixteen. As it was, he subtly tried to scoot a little further away to add some distance between the two of them. The brunette had a tendency to sit as close as possible to him without actual contact whenever she could.
The group caught up with each other as they ordered their food. The Shounen Tantei-dan described their non-murder encounters with helping the police with Ai tossing in comments here and there. Their frequency in dealing with murders had dropped to practically zero once Conan had left, and Genta loudly complained about the lack of exciting cases they could have solved.
Shinichi talked a little about the latest video game he was playing, as well as his progress on coding and graphic design in an effort to eventually design his own video game. Kousei and Kaori discussed their upcoming concerts and competitions—the two of them would be performing as accompanists to the renowned opera singer Akiba Reiko in Domoto Hall.
As for Conan—he did not go into too much detail with his murder cases, but instead chose to talk about the soccer games he played. If asked, he would touch upon whatever he happened to be working on in ninjutsu, but he never once breathed a word about his one other major activity: that being the fact that he was the elusive Kaitou KID, and the third one at that.
Conan was mulling over his mental list of gems to check when he was nudged on the side by Ayumi. "Conan?"
"Yes?" he replied, blinking quizzically.
"You up for a trip to Tropical Land?" Genta asked. Conan froze. "We haven't gone in a while."
"We're also finally tall enough to ride Mystery Coaster too!" Kaori cheered, and the table descended into excited babbling about what activities everyone wanted to do while they were there.
Mystery Coaster—beheading—Gin—Ran—roller coaster—Vodka—apoptoxin—shrinking—pain—heat—agony—
"-nan?" Ayumi had grasped his shoulder and had a hand pressed against his forehead. "You went pale all of a sudden, and you're sweating despite not having a fever," she said with worry clear in her tone.
Conan shook her off as gently as he could in his still panicked state. "S-sorry," he stuttered, standing up and uncaring of the amount as he tossed more than enough cash to cover his meal. "I need to go."
He ignored his friends' concern and left the café hurriedly, no destination in mind except for the need to be alone before his panic attack escalated. His feet led him into nearby Beika Park, and Conan ensconced himself at the base of a weeping willow tree, the hanging branches and leaves providing a natural privacy curtain.
Conan pressed his hands over his nose and mouth, trying to regulate the amount of oxygen he was taking in. While the shrunken detective had been to Tropical Land twice more since his poisoning, for whatever reason there had never been a mention of the Mystery Coaster until today—
—which was apparently a trigger for him.
Just like snowy car accidents and shrapnel wounds. But those were triggers that he could somewhat ignore and brute force power through because there was usually someone's life in danger, and life always took precedence over his anxiety. But there had been no life-threatening incident, and he had not known he would react in such a way.
Squeezing his eyes shut in frustration, Conan kept a slow, if stuttering breathing pattern. Fuck, he thought, and he felt the hot wake of tears slide down his cheeks. Why am I always too late to prevent a death?
Under the willow tree, Edogawa Conan quietly cried and dealt with his panic attack. It was hours before he made his way back to his home in Ekoda.
Wednesday evening found Conan just returned from soccer practice. A revitalizing and refreshing shower later, the detective had just sat down at his desk to begin the day's homework when Chikage called to him from the base of the stairs.
"Conan-kun! You have a visitor!"
Wracking his brain for any reason he would have a visitor, Conan trotted down the stairs, freezing when he spotted the distinctive strawberry blond curls of Haibara Ai. "Ha—Haibara!" he exclaimed as he finished his trip to the ground floor.
Ai regarded him solemnly. "Edogawa-kun," she greeted. "Would you mind if we talked? Privately?"
"Uh, sure," he replied, glancing at his landlady.
Chikage smiled before slipping into the kitchen. "Do whatever you need to do, Conan."
Conan led his longtime friend up the stairs to his room. He followed after her, closing the door behind him. Ai had chosen to sit at his desk, slowly spinning in the swivel chair. The detective sat on the edge of his bed and regarded the scientist. "What's up, Haibara?"
Ai was silent as she eyed him for several long moments before she asked with a mix of emotion in her voice, "What are you doing, Kudou-kun?"
He tilted his head quizzically in response. "What do you mean?"
"Why are you playing dress up as Kaitou KID?" she asked pointedly, her eyes sharp. "I didn't realize you had such kleptomaniac tendencies."
He tensed. There was fleeting moment where Conan was tempted to deny her accusation, but he knew it was a lost cause. Instead he sighed, ruffled his bangs in self-directed irritation, and answered with a hesitant question of his own. "What gave me away?"
Ai folded her arms across her chest as she leaned back into the chair. "Nothing that the police could use to pin you," she said, and he immediately relaxed a bit. That she had been able to figure out who the newest phantom thief was had both scared and surprised him. "It's only because I know you," she continued. "And I cannot think of anyone more noble and idiotic than you to pick up the cape and monocle."
"Oi!" Conan interjected, mildly offended.
The strawberry blonde gave him a very flat look. "Was there a reason that you picked up ninjutsu after you moved here aside from additional health benefits? I can't imagine you falling in love with ninja movies enough to want to train like them."
He grimaced. She had a point.
"Not only that, your fidgeting has changed. While you still use a soccer ball to think through problems, you now also flip coins, cards, pens—anything relatively small—through your fingers with a dexterity you did not used to have." Ai leaned back into the chair, a tired expression crossing her face. "Is there something behind being Kaitou KID, or did you just suddenly decide to pick up grand larceny as another hobby of yours?"
"There's—a reason, Haibara—a good reason," he said as he deliberated on his options. To admit would be to not only expose himself as KID, but Chikage and potentially Jii as accomplices. On the other hand, this was Haibara—someone who knew how high the stakes could be with the kind of secrets she had kept. And she had been nothing but a solid support and wonderful sounding board during the time he had been trying to take down the Organization. He trusted her back then, and he still trusted her now.
"I chose to become Kaitou KID not because I thought it would be fun, but because there is another entity like the Organization out there." Ai blanched at the information. "KID was created as a means of drawing them out."
"You're crazy, Kudou-kun," she gasped. "You've already taken down one syndicate! Why are you going after another while being a criminal yourself?!" The detective could clearly read the terror in her eyes: Why are you so determined to put yourself in danger?
Conan's smile was full of melancholy and regret as he gazed at his clasped fingers in his lap. "Because it was the dying wish of the last Kaitou KID," he uttered softly, and his chest ached at the memory of Kuroba Kaito expiring in his arms, head lolling on his lap as he and the Mouris had raced on a snowy mountain road towards a hospital. "Two good men had dedicated their lives trying to take this Syndicate down." The image of a smiling Kuroba Touchi drifted across his mind's eye, the memory from one of the few times his mother, Kudou Yukiko, had taken him with her to her disguise lessons. His eyes caught Ai's, and he said with a hard promise in his voice, "I'm going to ensure that they did not die in vain."
Ai stared at him for a long stretch of time, various emotions crossing both her expression and her eyes. At length she bowed her head as an exasperated, tired chuckle escaped her. "You wouldn't be you if you let a situation like this pass you by."
And Conan instantly knew she had reconciled his decision with her fears. He reached out to grasp her hands in his. "Haibara," he said, catching her gaze with his. "I owe him this. And it's the right thing to do—if you can ignore the grand larceny… and the property damage… and impersonating various police officers… and—"
"Okay, okay, I get it," she interrupted, and gave him a weak grin. "Promise me you won't die?" she asked.
Conan chuckled as he grinned softly back. "Yeah, I promise." Ai had not asked that he be safe—she knew as well as he did the risks accepted when dealing with any power-hungry underground organization. "Besides, I'm the uncatchable Kaitou KID!" he added, upping the wattage of his grin to near-manic levels. "They won't—ow! Haibara!"
Ai quirked an eyebrow at Conan's pout as he rubbed the shoulder she had smacked. "If you are the new Kaitou KID, then the infamous phantom thief is doomed," she gravely intoned before cracking a grin at her friend's indignant squawk of outrage.
Author's Note: This idea had been bouncing around in my head for a while, though it was a bit difficult to get it out and onto paper. I will not apologize for writing Conan with some PTSD and the associated anxiety. For him to go through something as traumatic as poisoning and shrinking, I cannot imagine him not having some sort of mental and emotional scarring, even if it is never addressed in canon. Miyazono Kaori and Arima Kousei are the main characters in Shigatsu wa Kimi no Uso, and Izumi Shinichi is the main human character from Kiseijuu: Sei no Kakuritsu. Akiba Reiko is a soprano singer from Movie 12: Senritsu no Furu Sukoa. I hope you enjoyed it.
Completed: 10.06.2019
