Disclaimer: All characters from Meitantei/Detective Conan and Magic Kaito are the intellectual properties of sir Gosho Aoyama.

Author's Notes: Let me tell you guys that I am sorry! I know you must be thinking that I've already given up on this work of fiction but I haven't. Either that or I'm dead. Sadly, I never really had a proper semester break as I had issues with my examination and I had to do my final exam (Anatomy) during the holidays.

I know people have commented about the 'discontinuity' or at least the anticipation built up in Chapter 1 which diminished in Chapter 2 due to the heist note and what not. I will reassure you that I have all the intention of building up the tension as the heist and Shinichi/Conan's appearance in the story will in the next chapter.

This chapter maybe considered a filler chapter due to less action going on compared to Chapter 1 but I believe I had to expound on and set up the relationships between Aoko and Kaito as well as Kaito and Saguru before delving deeper into the plot I had in mind.

(Please don't kill me for my love of exploring characters' psyches and mindsets!)

There is a change in point of view beginning in this chapter that will probably carry through half of Chapter 4 as I want to explore Kaito's personality from the eyes of someone else.

PS: I know this doesn't make up for the fact that I haven't updated in quite a while but the chapter is longer than my previous ones people (at least I think).

For those who have followed and waited patiently for this chapter, I hope you guys enjoy it. Your reviews and/or pm about the story are always appreciated.

Edited: 01 Sep 2014

Word Count: 3, 140

Of Mysteries and Thievery

Chapter 3

Heights coupled with the wind blowing against his face never failed to soothe his nerves and calm him down. It was perhaps the reason why Kaito had chosen one of his rooftop hideouts in Ekoda High as a place where he and the blond tantei would meet as soon as lunch break started.

At least, he was hoping the other would come.

Having disarmed one of his more elaborate pranks hours earlier, the dark-haired youth had apparently managed to convince Hakuba that he was not an impostor.

It probably dawned on the other boy that only Kaito would have been devious and rather daring enough to even contemplate of placing a booby-trap inside his desk a few days in advance. Not only that, it had been a contraption containing a timer that was set to go off just minutes before today's lunch break; one that would have left Hakuba with emerald green hair and a matching citrine coloured shirt.

Currently, the teenage thief was sitting by himself on the gym's sun-baked roof. His legs were held closely to his torso; his chin resting lightly on his knees. The elation brought about by the events that transpired early that morning had now been slightly dampened by his ever growing apprehension.

There was always the possibility of Hakuba not showing up. All things considered, the light-haired youth was not bound by any promises.

Even after proving his identity, Kaito had noted glumly that the other youth's trust was tenuous at best. But, he should've expected it, right? After all, Hakuba was truly convinced that he was the white cladded, monocle wearing, card-gun toting, magician-of-a-thief and the only thing keeping Kaito away from the cold, metallic walls of a jail cell was the lack of hard evidence on Hakuba's part.

He was on the wrong side of the law and the tantei upheld justice and lawfulness diligently and without respite.

The irony of it was, Kaito would be confirming the other boy's suspicions with his very own words. He would be giving a verbal statement and confession that could not only ruin any hopes of creating the friendship he so desperately wanted between them but ultimately send him to incarceration as well. But if he was being truthful to himself, Kaito was more concerned about potentially destroying any meagre trust the blond youth had left in him. Any threat of being thrown inside a prison cell paled in comparison.

Just when he was about to lose all hope that the other adolescent would ever turn up, he heard a soft clink. Not long after, the metallic grunts of the rooftop hatch opening followed.

Kaito's body tensed up momentarily; relax only upon hearing the voice of the British tantei. A relieved sigh—one that was thankfully concealed by a timely gust of wind—escaped his lips which soon curled into a wan but, nonetheless, hopeful smile.

'Kuroba, you better have a good reason for asking me to meet you at such an inconvenient time. I've had to search three other buildings within the campus before I happened upon your whereabouts,' Hakuba said. Judging by the other's choice of tone, he wasn't all too happy or pleased with the teenage magician.

Being quite honest, Kaito was quite taken aback by Hakuba's annoyed reaction. No matter what prank, trick or jest he pulled, there was never a time that the other let more than a sliver of his emotion slide past anyone.

Suddenly, it was becoming apparent to him that he wasn't the only one hiding behind a mask.

For what it's worth, perchance they may have more in common than what the dark-haired boy had originally thought. Then again, he never really knew Hakuba more than his research had already unravelled. Likewise, the aforementioned person couldn't have known the true Kaito prior to the sets of misfortune that had found their way into his life.

'Ano…Hakuba I thought I told you to meet me here. I…did, didn't I,' Kaito asked, not for the first time that day, with confusion.

Kaito didn't look back due to the bitter feeling that was building inside the pit of his gut. Instead, he merely kept staring off into the distance, uncharacteristically tucking his legs closer to his chest much like what he would have done in a childhood that now seemed all too distant to him.

'Actually, you merely told me to meet you at a rooftop within school grounds. Never did you actually specify which one was to be our meeting place of sorts,' was the other's reply.

'Sou ka? Must've slipped my mind. Go…gomen.'

'I…it's okay…I…er…I guess,' the other stuttered in reply.

'N…not that I'd l…let you off so easily the next t…time you do s…such a thing.'

Odd. Hakuba never stuttered this much in front of anyone and that's including me.

Suddenly intrigued, Kaito quickly lifted his head to look back behind his shoulder and found himself staring at a wide-eyed and comically flustered looking Hakuba. The teenage magician had an initial urge to heartily laugh at the other boy's reaction. Instead, he was able to overcome the passing emotion and opted to give the other boy an amused smile.

Not a moment later, Kaito returned to his former position, resting his chin against his knees once again. He then patted the clay tiles beside him as a sort of invitation for the other to sit down next to him. It didn't take long for the blond student to make his way alongside Kaito and take a seat a foot or so away.

'Kuroba, would you kindly and clearly tell me what is going on? All of a sudden, you're acting all strange and I find that to be thoroughly disconcerting,' Hakuba said with what Kaito thought to be a hint of concern.

'You know Hakuba, for someone who is dead set in proving that I'm Kid, I've got this niggling feeling that you care somehow,' Kaito unintentionally mused his thoughts out loud enough for the other young man to hear him. By the time he realised what he had said out into the open, it was already too late.

Guiltily, Kaito flinched. Indigo depths met with warm browns; a lingering moment of hesitation and trepidation shared between both boys.

'I…er…Hakuba…I didn't mean to—' Kaito began before being abruptly cut off.

'Darn it Kuroba! O…of course I care, you git! It's in my nature to care for someone, a law abiding citizen or not. It's the reason I want to know a criminal's motives. Can't you see? I need to understand their psyche to the best of my abilities if I even want a fighting chance to stop those set of circumstances from ever happening again. But…Kaitou Kid just had to and still remains a mystery to me. I could never comprehend what drives his actions. And while he gloats in his accomplishments—if you could even call them that—I am stuck in contemplation on how to protect the baka from himself,' Hakuba blurted out in a single breath; taking a few seconds to pause and catch some much needed air.

All the while, those same brown orbs never broke contact with Kaito's. Rather, their uncertainty were replaced with a determined resolve that the dark-haired youth only knew so well.

'Do you really think I could just stand here and allow him to run around and get himself killed with all the stunts he pulls off at every heist with knowledge that there's a third party wanting his life extinguished? How do you think that makes me feel Kuroba,' The Brit placed shaking hand to his chest.

'How would you feel if the only plan you could come up with to protect someone was to put them behind bars—especially when, for the longest time, you've held that someone as your rival and the closest thing you had to a f…friend,' Hakuba said, his voice tapering down to a barely audible whisper.

It was only then that the eye contact was broken and Kaito was left dumbstruck by the sudden revelation that had just unraveled before him.

'Hakuba…do you honestly believe Kaitou Kid would steal just for the heck of it,' Kaito asked after an uncomfortable amount of silence.

The moonlight magician lifted his gaze towards the afternoon sky, his eyes following the drifting clouds that were lazily making their way across the azure expanse above. Having time on his hands to ruminate on trivialities, Kaito had found it strange, that he—much like Hakuba—had begun addressing Kaitou Kid as a different person. Despite such an oddity, though, it almost felt appropriate—fitting even—to do so.

'Yes! No!? I…don't know anymore,' the other boy said, his tone successively morphing from an outburst of anger to uncertainty within the span of a few seconds.

'If he has a reason, then it'd be bloody convenient if I knew what was going on instead of me helplessly feeling my way in the dark, wouldn't you agree,' Hakuba huffed.

'That's the whole point on why I asked you to meet me somewhere secluded,' Kaito began before giving out an apprehensive sigh, 'so I could tell you everything about Kaitou Kid hoping that you guys could meet each other halfway and reach an understanding of the full situation.'

Taking the curt nod that the British tantei gave as a sign that he was paying attention, the teenage magician asked, 'Hakuba, what do you know about my oyaji, Kuroba Toichi,' barely preventing himself from shedding tears.

'Your father?' the other teenager asked.

'What does Kuroba-san have to do with Kaitou—' Hakuba began to say before realisation hit him right between the eyes.

'He was the original Kid,' the tantei almost exclaimed, managing at the last minute to lower his voice down and cover his mouth much to Kaito's relief.

In exchange, Kaito gave a nod of his own.

'I don't know how he'd gotten himself into thievery. That tape recording he left soon gave out once I found it and played it back. All I could gather was that his hidden talents didn't go unnoticed to those people who had searched keenly enough. Just when he was about to give up the life of a thief, the people after his service used kaa-san and myself as their bargaining chip. We were safe as long as he helped them search for what they were looking for. When he wanted out, they staged oyaji's death as an accident all those years ago.'

And as Hakuba began to ask questions about the past, Kaito in turn started to weave and lay out a great tapestry of tragedy belonging to the figure known as the International Criminal 1412, Kaitou Kid—the thief he never should've been.

Caring moulded who he was as a person, much more so than his close affinity to mysteries. It was the magnetic field that pointed his compass needle to moral's true north; the very fuel that drove him to see through that justice was served and maintained.

But maybe, he cared a little too much for his own good even if his smarmy showmanship and aloofness appeared to prove otherwise.

With destiny seemingly trying to play a cruel joke and exploiting the irony of it for everything with which it was worth, Hakuba Saguru found himself walking alongside an internationally renowned thief and the daughter of a police inspector whose taskforce's sole purpose was to catch the aforementioned criminal.

But despite the situation he was currently in, the British youth never felt more comfortable—or accepted for that matter—in the presence of others until now.

Living through a life where he was ostracised by other children for being different—both appearance and behaviour-wise—had taught him to keep his emotions under wraps. In the place of the sheepish tow-headed boy who wanted nothing more than to gain friends emerged a young man who was a self-reliant and untrusting individual.

Eventually, Saguru had even convinced himself that although he possessed no amicable relationships with others, people at least gave him a wide berth and consequentially stopped the harassment he had undergone as a child.

For roughly the past nine years of his life, it had been his routine to set aside who he was every morning and don on the cultivated image he had established up for himself. It was a feat he had long since perfected; never revealing his genuine feelings to anyone apart from his mother or her family.

As experience had taught him, if other people knew, there was always the chance that they would find him weak and ultimately not worth their time.

Then came along Kaitou Kid and the adolescent hidden behind the signature monocle and ivory suit who, out of all people, managed to break the barrier he had created to protect himself from others. He should've known that his remarkably embellished masquerade mask was already beginning to crumble when he decided to help the thief against Chat Noir. Why then did he remain willingly oblivious and ignorant to the fact up until this afternoon's conversation with Kuroba?

Maybe I should have seen it coming.

Unlike everyone else who kept their distance, Kuroba Kaito never left the British tantei to his own devices. No, the bloke just happily invaded Saguru's privacy on a day to day basis as if he'd never heard of nor had known the concept of personal space. Then, there were also the other youth's pranks that either left his own hair one of the many shades comprising a rainbow or surprised him out of his wits. In spite all of this, the constant interaction and challenge that the brown-haired boy presented had, in the end, renewed the fair-headed youth's earnest longing for camaraderie.

'Hakuba-kun, is everything alright,' Saguru heard Nakamori-san say and caused his musings to come to an abrupt halt.

The boy shook his head, blinking a couple of times in order reorientate himself and straighten out his thoughts. He had unknowingly fallen behind the other two students in front of him.

'Alright? Oh, yes, quite so! Gomenasai… I was just sort of lost in contemplation Nakamori-san,' he replied, allowing his lips to finally form a smile; not the generally condescending smirks he'd been using but a reassuring one. It felt strange—no, different but oh, so right—after having been used to fabricating ones every so often. Despite this however, there was an overwhelming sense of freedom which reminded Saguru that this was truly who he was meant to be.

The blond youth quickly picked up his pace until he caught up with his classmates. On his way, something suddenly irked him and he found himself mentally retracing his earlier choice of words.

Goodness Saguru, not just classmates. Never again! Beginning today, Nakamori-san and Kuroba are no longer just fellow students. They've become your friends, he thought to himself.

'You know what Hakuba-kun, you should smile more often. It suits you,' Nakamori-san said, bearing a smile of her own.

His eyes widened; a healthy blush spreading across the boy's cheeks due to embarrassment. No girl, or anyone for that matter, had ever commented about his physical appearance—much less so complimented his features—apart from his mum.

'Yeah, it makes you look less like a grumpy ojisan and more like your own age,' Kuroba interjected with a toothy grin.

As a force of habit, Saguru's mind whirred into forming a snide remark only for the tantei to quickly push it aside in favour of mentally berating himself. The other boy was probably trying to distract him from the discomfort he was feeling at present.

Perhaps it would do him good if he joined in the friendly banter seeing that he still needed a good comeback anyway.

'I'd take that as a twisted way of expressing your appreciation of my dashingly good looks then Kuroba,' Saguru said, unsure if his attempt at pulling a jest would be taken for what it was. The boy feigned a self-satisfied smirk only to realise a moment later the shocked expressions the others wore on their faces.

'Hakuba-kun—'

'Hakuba—'

'Aoko did he just—' Kaito asked. In response, the girl nodded slowly; barely taking her eyes off of the blond youth even as she did so.

'Oh dear.' The teenager inwardly cringed.

I must look like a narcissistic jerk right now.

'Nakamori-san, Kuroba, please don't take my previous statement seriously,' he added as his heart anxiously fluttered against the cage of his chest.

'It was specifically meant to be a jo—'

'Joke,' the couple said in almost perfect unison before looking at each other and bursting into fits of laughter.

Saguru blinked uncomprehendingly, eyes widening once more.

'We knew it was a joke Hakuba,' the high school magician finally said, wiping away a tear from his eye after managing to control his laughter.

'But the look on your face right now… it's just so priceless.'

Another bout of chuckling came from the brown-haired boy.

'I'd take a picture but…I'm afraid you'll get back at me somehow.'

Saguru's gaze then turned towards Nakamori-keibu's daughter who had stopped laughing as well.

'Did you really have to partake in teasing me as well, Nakamori-san,' the boy asked, his pained look—not unlike that of a kicked puppy—only serving to emphasise his slightly dejected mood.

'Go…gomen Hakuba-kun. Aoko just thinks the way you blink when you're flustered is really cute. Kaito always did that when he was a kid too,' she said, bowing her head apologetically.

Cute, the tantei wondered. Another blush began to creep across his cheeks, the warmness spreading all the way to his ears.

Is this how being truly appreciated feels like?

'Ahouko, I so didn't do that as a kid,' the dark-haired magician said in protest; discernible glints of mirth reflecting off of his eyes. But unlike those times when Kuroba had often used that particular term to infuriate Nakamori-san, the other boy had just said it with such foreign tenderness and endearment that it was hard for Saguru to ignore the implications it entailed.

His denial was met with her insistence; ultimately leading to a play-fight between the two.

Without a word of warning, the dark-haired boy began to sprint, proclaiming that if Nakamori-san was able to catch him, he may in fact admit to what she was saying a few moments prior. In return, she raced after him; promising that she would win in the end.

Another smile crossed Saguru's lips as he shook his head at the amusing sight before he himself made a run for it; the gravity of knowing Kid's identity and the danger he and Kuroba were getting themselves entrenched in forgotten in the light of his newfound friendship.