Words: 1412

A/N: This is the first time I've written close to 5000 words in less than 10 days! Here comes the chapter you've all been waiting for! (sort of)

I can't take…

Chapter 4: Baffled

Over the past week or so, Edogawa Conan had been considering the truth and possibility to Haibara Ai's suggestion. He had replayed the events from the day he was "kidnapped" by Kaitou KID in his head in an attempt to analyze KID's actions and to come up with alternate plausible explanations. He hated to admit it, but the 'It's just KID being KID' rationale really didn't quite cut it – like Ai said, if KID really did believe in that prophecy, then it'd have made his actions a lot more sensible.

Now the main question was, as Ai asked, what if KID was serious about uh, stealing his heart? At first he did consider such suggestion to be bizarre and outrageous, but after giving it some thought and reviewing his feelings regarding the whole incident, he found that it's not entirely unacceptable. He knew he had fun and enjoyed the day out, and he actually looked forward to the thief's next heist even before the talk with Ai. He'd never admit that in front of the creepy scientist, though.

Another thing he knew for sure – if it was Hattori Heiji who did the exact same things as KID, he'd be outright weirded out and would've either ran far, far away or sent his Osakan friend to a shrink.

Anyhow, he still felt rather baffled about this whole mess, so hopefully it'd get sorted out tonight. If KID was merely playing a trick with his mind, he'll definitely deliver him directly to Nakamori-keibu with his soccer ball.

As Conan's eyes readjusted to the light that's once again illuminating the ballroom, he focused his attention on the white-clad phantom thief, who was standing right next to the suspected heist target and making his usual flashy introduction. Conan was suddenly distracted by Ai, who currently wrapped her fingers around his. That evil smirk and half-lidded eyes on her face seemed to be saying something scary. "…Why did you grab my hand?"

"Oh, don't mind me. I'm simply collecting data to validate my hypothesis."

"What hypothe– never mind, I don't want to know."

"That's a wise decision."

Conan let out an exasperated sigh as he turned his attention back to KID. As much as he valued Ai as a friend and an ally, sometimes he'd rather be jabbed by Mouri Kogorou than to deal with her. To his surprise, KID just stood there and apparently froze while staring at him, instead of making a move to grab the suspected heist target or even to dodge Hakuba Saguru, who was pouncing right from his back.

It seemed the British detective was just as shocked that he actually caught KID as KID was shocked that he was being grabbed. Conan could see a panicked expression briefly cracked through KID's poker face before pink smoke surrounded the area. After the smoke cleared, the blonde detective was knocked out cold on the ground with his hair dyed to shades of rainbow. The crystal halo and the sapphire necklace were both missing from the angel statue, with the phantom thief nowhere to be seen – unless you counted the dummy that's currently flying away from the hotel. Conan and Ai covered their ears as Nakamori-keibu's agitated yell and KID fans' excited cheer echoed through the ballroom. Just as expected, the entire task force immediately chased after said dummy. Will they ever learn? Conan wondered.

"Well then Kudou-kun, shall we go after KID to determine the winner of our bet?" Ai raised an eyebrow in amusement while holding her hand out in an inviting manner.

"Of course. Let's check the rooftop."

Kaito stopped at the rooftop to catch his breaths while clutching onto the loot he took from the ballroom. He was glad that despite the mental turmoil, he still managed to knock the annoying blonde out and to activate the dummy. Running on auto pilot, his hands brought the jewels up as he inspected them with the moonlight. Nope, not Pandora. Not that he was expecting them to be anyway. Ah well, old habits die hard.

The heist didn't go as planned at all – it was overall an extremely poor performance. He hoped his audience weren't as disappointed as he was. After witnessing that, his instinct had been in a fleeing mode. Tantei-kun already had a girlfriend… why didn't he realize that before? It seemed Lady Luck really hated him lately… if he never dragged the detective out that day, he wouldn't have realized that he liked the detective and he wouldn't be feeling so heartbroken right now. He didn't even need to check with a mirror to know that his poker face was already a lost cause.

He quickly turned around and braced himself as he heard a couple of running footsteps approaching. Right, of course Tantei-kun wouldn't be tricked by that dummy. He totally didn't want to see the detective with his girlfriend right now… it's a painful reminder that the possibility of the detective accepting someone of the same gender would probably be close to null.

"KID!" The boy detective yelled as he rushed in and gasped for air, while still holding onto his girlfriend's hand. It made Kaito incredibly jealous but what could he do about it?

"Good evening, Meitantei," said Kaito as he took a deep breath to recollect himself. No matter what, he was still Kaitou KID and he couldn't let something like this throw him off completely. "I believe you're looking for these?" Ensuring that he had both of their attention, he tossed the crystal halo to the cherry brown haired girl and the sapphire to the detective, who promptly caught them.

Both children blinked at the jewels as if they were surprised by his gesture. They probably didn't expect him to return the jewels without resisting. "Yes, the jewels, and I wanted to ask you something."

"You may ask but I might not answer."

The not-child deadpanned but chose not to comment on the sarcastic remark. "Well…" He coughed briefly as if to clear his throat before looking straight into the magician's eyes. "Was I your heist target? Did you intend to steal my heart?"

Kaito could feel his face immediately flushed at the direct questions. He totally didn't expect that – and he could tell from the way the girl face-palmed and jabbed the detective's side with her elbow, that she was perturbed by the boy's bluntness as well.

"Ow! What's wrong with you?" The boy rubbed his side as he rolled his eyes at his assailant, who responded with the same eye roll plus a snort.

"You're the one with issues here."

The magician thief watched the pair in front of him bicker over the appropriateness of the questions, and internally let out a defeated sigh. These two did make quite the couple. Perhaps he should really give up before he falls further… or else the crash would be even more excruciating. He cleared his throat briefly to regain the pair's attention. His face still felt heated up, but he really wanted to just get this over with and go home.

"Yes and yes, but…" But he really didn't need a rejection to be voiced right at his face. Trying his best not to let his wistfulness show, he bowed gracefully in front of the pair, indicating his departure. "Farewell, Meitantei. I wish you the best of luck. Please be careful and be safe."

"Eh?"

Within seconds, the entire rooftop was engulfed by blue smoke. The phantom thief took his opportunity to grab the detective and pressed their lips together. The boy in his arm stiffened at the sudden contact just as the New Year fireworks could be heard sparking through the night sky. The coincidental timing was astounding. It's a shame they couldn't stay like this forever.

Letting go of the detective before he could react and retaliate, Kaito set off his hang glider and allowed the night wind carry him away as the smoke cleared. It was regrettable that he failed to leave with his true target tonight, but at least he stole a farewell kiss from the detective to partially compensate for his loss. It was the first time he had fallen this hard for anybody… it'd probably take a long while for him to recover and to completely take his eyes off him.

If the magician had looked back at this moment though, he would've seen the most beautiful shade of red that had ever crept onto the detective's cheeks.

TBC.

Afterword: Thanks for reading! Please review and tell me your thoughts! Big thanks to everyone who fav-ed/alert-ed/reviewed, as well as everyone who put me on their author fav/alert list! \^q^/

Wee! We're finally half way through this portion of the story! I rushed through this, so please point out any errors/typos you found! This is a KIDco fic even though I ended up writing more AiConan than intended. Sorry about turning Kaito into an emo wimp orz =q=;;

Moral of the story: Don't make assumptions! Just because someone's holding hands doesn't mean they're dating! *gets shot by KID's card gun *

There won't be any update for the next two weeks or so, because I got an extremely important credential exam coming up. So yeah, sorry about halting the story here but it's time to stu-u-u-u-u-u-u-u-udy! *hides*

PS. Anyone noticed a trend with the chapter titles?