Disclaimer: Characters and one line shamelessly stolen from the Detective Shinichi manga. I don't think it counts as a particular spoiler, but this whole story is spoilerific anyway.

.: Chapter 4 – Miss Witch :.

"Acting deals with very delicate emotions. It is not putting up a mask. Each time an actor acts he does not hide; he exposes himself."

~ Rodney Dangerfield ~

.oOo.

"Well the snake is a cliché touch," Shinichi commented, staring up at the shaped knocker Kaito had just pounded on the door with. The entire house looked ready for a horror film; from the dark gables standing starkly out of place against the summer sky, and a gargoyle or two they could see laughing down on them from the eaves.

"She has a flair for the dramatic," Kaito nodded, pounding on the door a second time.

"And you think she's an actual witch."

"I think she's creepy," Kaito corrected. "But I also think legends have some tiny bits of truth in them, and she knows the most about the occult of anyone I know. She might give us a lead. The world is a lot more deep and full of mysteries than you want it to be, detective."

"Your dad said that," Shinichi told him.

Kaito looked over, giving him an odd look shuttered behind his poker face. "Yeah, he did." The door swung open under Kaito's hand and a squashed-faced man peered out at them from the darkness beyond. "Um … we're here to see Koizumi-san?"

A gap-toothed leer split the man's face and he opened the door wider. "The Mistress expects you," he wheezed, straightening the cuffs of his suit and clasping his hands. "Follow me."

"She expects us?" Shinichi hissed at him as they trailed after the butler down the hall. "Aren't you supposed to be over in Europe somewhere?"

"Yeah, but I doubt Koizumi believes that," Kaito responded, keeping his voice down. "But she probably has Igor there say that to everyone that comes over."

"Are you sure this is necessary?"

"Look even for the obscure clues," Kaito answered, almost tripping over Koizumi's butler as he stopped in front of a door and reached up to open it for them. "Oh, sorry! Um … we're here?"

"So you are," a voice from inside the room answered, and the two peered into the room at its sole occupant: a dark-haired girl whose eyes were widening with a look of predatory delight. "And this time it didn't even take a spell to bring you back to me, Kuroba-kun."

She watched them with feline curiosity as Kaito cleared his throat before stepping inside, reaching down to push Shinichi in alongside him. "Koizumi-san?" he asked politely. "I think you have me confused with someone else."

"Oh do I?" she asked, eyes narrowing as her index nail tapped the crystal head of a knight that sat on the ornate chess board beside her. The sunlight streaming in from the room's tall windows gilded the room with light, making the tasseled pillows and polished wood of the tables glow with a sort of cheerful opulence.

Kaito bowed politely as the strange butler pulled the door shut behind them and introduced himself. "My name is Kudou Shinichi, and this is Edogawa Conan. I met Kuroba-kun in Rome, and he suggested we ask you about a supposedly cursed stone. You may have some idea of what sort of legends are making it so attractive to the cult I've been chasing."

"Ah," she said, smiling slightly. "So you're supposed to be a detective."

"Shinichi-nii-san says you're supposed to know a lot about legends and stuff!" Conan chirped, bouncing closer and looking up at her.

Koizumi regarded Conan for a long moment, then leaned forward and propped her chin up on her hand. "I'm sure Kudou-san would say that," she said, holding out her other hand expectantly. Kaito fished inside the inner pocket of his borrowed blazer before extracting the gem from its hiding place and holding it out to her, just out of arm's reach. She frowned and shifted forward, but let it rest in his hand, glittering in the light while she studied it. She reached out a finger to touch the gem, and Kaito's hand closed around it, shuttering it from view.

"I'd rather you didn't, Koizumi-san. It's quite valuable and doesn't belong to me … and I promised the owner I wouldn't let it out of my hands."

"Then tell me," she said, "how you expect me to tell you anything about it. Where is it from? What sort of cult is this that's interested in it?"

"They've been performing experiments in human longevity," Kaito explained, sounding cautious as he spoke. "But a jewel's a bit small to be the fountain of youth. Still, several people have died over this, and we want to know why."

"As it happens, I do know something about magical means to prolong life," Koizumi told him. "But there are many objects concerned with immortality. What makes this one unique Kudou-san?"

"It does this," Conan answered, pulling Kaito's hand down by the wrist and touching the gem. A heartbeat later, red tendrils began to infuse the clarity of the gem. Koizumi's breath caught, catching their attention so they were watching her as she watched the crimson jewel bleach back to diamond clarity. "Do you recognize it, Nee-san?"

She looked at him considering for a moment before standing and moving over to a box filled with small drawers that stood beside one of the windows. She opened one of the drawers, and pulled a square of black cloth from it. The dark sheen of the silk absorbed the light in the sunny room, and Shinichi could see the borders of it covered in embroidery incorporating symbols from at least five languages.

The silk she pressed into Kaito's free hand. "You really should wrap it; I wouldn't want the sparkle smudged by handling."

"Ah … thank you, Koizumi-san," looking from her to the silk cloth and regarding both rather like a snake he wasn't sure was poisonous or not. He finally did as she asked and tucked both into his jacket. Shinichi watched him and wondered if the stone had actually gotten wrapped in the silk, or if Kaito had just made it look like it had.

"Now," she said, a predatory gleam sparking in her eyes and holding out her hand imperiously. "If you'll give me the stone, Kudou-san, I'll be able to g"

Kaito hesitated then began to laugh. "I told you, Miss Witch," he scolded lightly, "I won't give anyone this jewel."

Now she was smiling in earnest and turned her attention to Shinichi. "Then perhaps this clever little boy is willing to help me." Shinichi drew back, throwing a confused look at Kaito that clearly asked what was going on.

"Your powers must be fading," Kaito quipped dryly, shifting so he was in front of Shinichi. "But then, Shinichi-kun is the most un-magically-inclined person I've ever met. He doesn't even like stage magic."

Koizumi watched their maneuvering, then settled back into her chair and smiled, a bit feral for a woman whose unfaultable magic wasn't working on the two males in front of her. "Perhaps they are. Or perhaps magical resistance just runs in bloodlines. It's carmot. If you want, I will loan you a few tomes for your research into these people that are killing for that stone. In exchange for a future favor, perhaps?"

Kaito didn't react, merely bowed to her slightly and turned to leave. "Thank you for your information, Koizumi-san, and your offer, but I think we will see what we can learn by ourselves first. I'll remember to thank Kuroba-kun for his advice."

She remained in telling silence as they left, and found their way back down the hall to the front door. The butler appeared suddenly as they approached it, and opened it for them, laughing soundlessly at the way Kaito jumped like a startled cat at his entrance.

.oOo.

The walk to the station that would whisk them back to Beika was a silent one, marred only by Kaito's fidgeting energy. Even shortened for Shinichi's benefit, his strides were fast enough that the smaller boy had to rush to keep up, or walk at a normal pace and just let his companion range like a restless ferret on a leash.

"Do you want a soccer ball?" Shinichi finally asked after the fifth time Kaito had made a wide circuit around their current walking path.

"A what? " Kaito asked, pulling up short and tilting his head in curiosity.

Shinichi sighed. "I usually kick around a soccer ball when I'm trying to think something through. Do you need one?"

"What makes you think I'm trying to think something through?" Kaito scooped up a smallish rock with one foot and bouncing it back and forth between his feet as they walked. Shinichi didn't dignify the question by stating the obvious.

"Does it bother you that much?"

"I'm just trying to place what 'carmot' is," Kaito evaded until he finally caved under Shinichi's silence. "Koizumi has a way of knowing things she shouldn't know, but she's never lied to me before. She knows I'm Kid and she's warned me before heists that things were going to go nine kinds of nutty, and they always do, but I've never confirmed it for her. Now I'm trying to decide if her bloodlines comment was just Koizumi trying to scare us or if she knows something we don't. Other than whatever the hell carmot is."

Shinichi walked in silence for a few moments before sighing and sliding his glasses off so he could look at his companion without the barrier of the glass. "We're not related. And even if we are, I'm not taking the word of a girl that thinks she's found out your night job by reading entrails or something. She's pretty much a nutcase."

"And you can't trust me on how much we look alike because it might be another disguise?" Kaito asked, still not looking entirely convinced. He laughed humorlessly and shook his head. "You know, I can't say I haven't considered it. It's easy being Kudou Shinichi, since it's more about acting like Kudou Shinichi than looking like him. I even looked through my dad's stuff and got mom out of the house for an afternoon so I could crawl through our attic and photo albums to see if maybe you showed up in them somewhere."

"What did you find?" Shinichi asked, slipping his glasses back on and looking curious.

"Lots of pictures of me," Kaito shrugged, "a bunch of my parents, and a few of my dad's apprentices. Nothing incriminating, and nothing suspicious."

"Then we'll just have to go through my house when we get back," Shinichi said, kicking at a stray rock in his path. "Mom loves photos, so maybe we'll see someone we both recognize. If all else fails, your mom and my parents are going to show up soon. We'll ask. We'll set this question to rest before tackling the rest of it."

Kaito regarded Shinichi – whose attention remained on the rock as he batted it before them with his shoes – for a long moment before he should his head. "You seem less freaked out than I would expect, detective. Why is that?"

A voice called, interrupting the conversation before Shinichi could answer. "Kaito?" Kaito stilled, eyes widening as he recognized the voice that had called his name before he clamped down on the reaction, slipped into a confused mask, and turned.

"Um … excuse me?" he asked carefully, running a hand over his hair and making it stick up a bit. Shinichi looked between Kaito and the girl that was approaching them and kicked sideways so he could nail Kaito in the ankle. Kaito realized what he was doing, and yanked his hand away from his hair; messing it up wouldn't help his disguise any.

The confused hope on the girl's face faltered, then faded, and she looked down in disappointment. "Oh, I'm sorry. I thought you were someone I knew. You … look a bit like him."

"My name is Kudou Shinichi," he offered.

She hesitated for a moment before bowing politely. "Nakamori Aoko."

Kaito suppressed a wince as Shinichi stared up at her with wide-eyed guile. "Are you related to Inspector Nakamori?" the boy asked. "The one that chases Kaitou Kid?"

"He's my father," Aoko nodded proudly. "And he's going to catch Kid! Ah!" her eyes lit up with comprehension. "Kudou-kun, you're the teenage detective from Beika! You've chased Kid as well, haven't you?"

"I've been at a few of the heists," Kaito answered dryly. "But I don't think I met you at any of them, Nakamori-san."

"I recognized your reputation," she admitted. "And my father's mentioned you. Also, I apologize for calling you Kaito. You really do look a lot like my friend Kuroba Kaito, though. It's almost … uncanny. Except," she hid a laugh behind her hand, "you brush your hair and Kaito never does unless he's trying out one of his new disguises."

Kaito hid a sulking frown behind Shinichi's polite interest, and dropped a hand on Shinichi's head before the detective could make good on the evil smirk that was creeping across his expression. He brushed his hair. He just didn't gel it into submission like certain detective twerps. As it was, the certain detective twerp was watching him with too-sharp eyes and a smirk that wasn't leaving.

Aoko dropped down to Shinichi's eyelevel and smiled brightly at the boy. "And is this your little brother, Kudou-san?"

Kaito didn't stop the laugh that answered her, though it was directed more to Shinichi's horrified expression than her relatively-innocent question. He held up his hand and shook his head. "No, Nakamori-san, this is Edogawa Conan. He's not my younger brother. We are …" he started to say 'not related', and then changed his mind, "cousins." There, he thought, that would be enough to explain the different last names, as well as the resemblance. And it was probably true … it just depended on how far back they had to dig before they found a common ancestor.

"Cousins?" Aoko queried. "Wow. You're not related to any Kurobas, are you? Kaito's a magician. Or at least he thinks he is. But he's also a jerk who decided to go gallivanting across the world with his mom and didn't even tell me he was going!"

"Nakamori-san …" Kaito started, cringing as she huffed and waved him off without looking.

"It's okay. He promised he'd be back when he called to say their flight had landed. Kaito's pretty good about keeping promises. I'm on my way to check on the magical idiot's doves right now, as a matter of fact. It was nice meeting you Kudou-san … Conan-kun."

Kaito moved to fall into step next to her when Conan stepped on his foot. Kaito yelped and glared down at him. "Brat! What was that for?"

Conan looked back up at him, shining innocence with a warning glance at Aoko that was too quick for her to spot and too plain to Kaito: you are going to blow your cover, idiot. Aoko was busy snickering at the two of them, and said, "I can tell you're close. You two act like brothers."

Both straightened, and Kaito slid more firmly slipped into his role as Shinichi and laughed along with her. He bowed politely, rather than the sweeping bow Kaito himself would have affected, and said, "Well, we wouldn't want our quarrelling to make the doves go hungry. Have a good day, Nakamori-san."

She smiled at him and nodded, then continued on her way, the summer sun catching brown highlights in her hair as she moved. Kaito watched her for another few moments, some part of him grateful that Shinichi wasn't saying anything or dealing bodily harm to him for hesitating. Finally, Kaito turned and walked off towards the bus stop they were going to need.

Shinichi jogged to keep up, waiting until the relatively sparse crowds around them cleared, escaping indoors away from the summer heat or beneath the shade of trees. Eventually, as they crossed into a park beyond which was the bus, a soccer ball skidded across Kaito's path. The thief stopped, looked at the ball in puzzlement, then turned back to look at the detective it had come from.

"You missed."

"Inspector Nakamori's the head of the Kaitou Kid Task Force," Shinichi said, walking past Kaito to retrieve the ball and kicked it around idly.

Kaito stuffed his hands into his pockets and glared. "Thank you, detective. Surprisingly, I already knew that."

"And his daughter is Kuroba Kaito's best friend?" The words weren't laced with accusation, but from Kaito's reaction, they might as well have been. He stiffened, and looked truly angry at the implication. A quick glance told him they were alone in the middle of a sun-washed path alongside a school baseball field. The chance of eavesdroppers was small, but Kaito still lowered his voice and dropped into a loose crouch, putting himself on eyelevel with Shinichi.

"We, detective, have been friends since we were six. We were your size when we met! I didn't befriend her because of her dad, and she would do more than chase me with a mop if she ever found out I was Kid."

Shinichi was silent for several moments before sighing and dropping his head. "I'm sorry, Kuroba. I forget that I'm not the only one who has a life to get back to. But … why? Why didn't you just put it back? You could have pretended you never found it and they probably would never have checked. They had you doing that for them, after all."

Kaito shook his head. "I thought about it. I could have gone on pretending. Just destroyed the thing, and left an imitation in its place, or left the real one behind and gone onto the next jewel on the list, leaving it hidden and as safe as it was before I found it. But until when? How long would it be until they got tired of waiting and came for me just like they came for my dad? And, I would have to keep being Kid just to throw them off the track. No. It has to end, Shinichi. We have to make sure it ends."

"And Aoko-san is a big part of why, isn't she?" Shinichi asked slyly.

"Aoko's part of why, yeah." Kaito looked away, and Shinichi pretended not to see the faint tracery of blush creeping across his nose. Kaito twisted the embarrassment into a sad smile. "I can't be Kid and let her too close. She hates Kid, and it's dangerous. They're gunning for me and I don't want anyone caught in the crossfire. But it's also about dad - it's even more about dad - and it's about justice believe it or not. Always has been. Maybe we're not that different after all, detective."

"Maybe not." Shinichi was quiet for a full minute, just watching the thief with too-knowing eyes before shaking his head. "I hate admitting it, thief, but you're right. However, you no longer get to tease me about Ran because … man, that is sad and messed up on so many levels."

Kaito hunched and glared at Shinichi. "Unless you want to be carried home like a sack of sugar, pipsqueak, shut up about Aoko. Or I could always give Ran a ring and she'd think it was from you. What do you think? We could have the wedding planned by the time you're feeling like yourself again!"

"I would be okay with that," Shinichi answered him flatly. "I tried to ask her one of the times I was in my real body, but Ai's temporary cure didn't hold out on me. That's not going to scare me, thief, I'm already comfortable with how I feel about Ran. However," Shinichi's smile turn sly, "I wonder what Inspector Nakamori will sound like when he realizes the thief he's been chasing for all these years lives over the fence, and his own daughter is tending Kid's spy doves."

Oddly, this image seemed to cheer Kaito up a bit and he grinned. "Nakamori'll probably peel the wallpaper off the walls, and go for Guinness in new curses devised for the occasion. And I …" Kaito winced, suddenly subdued again, "I will be changing my name and moving to the wilds of Argentina to raise alpacas for the rest of my life."

"Nakamori's jurisdiction ends outside of Tokyo," Shinichi pointed out. "And isn't there a warrant out for Kid's arrest in Argentina?"

Kaito paused and thought about it, ticking something off under his breath and on his fingers before he brightened again and grinned. "Not in Argentina! Besides, I can escape the Inspector's handcuffs; it's the reach of Aoko's mop I'm worried about. It doesn't have a jurisdiction." Kaito rocked back and sprang to his feet. "Now come on, we have shopping to do before facing the wharf."

"Shopping?" Shinichi asked, jogging to catch up with Kaito as he leapt off again for the bus.

"Mom would flay me if she thought I was living on vending machine coffee and onigiri, and your pantry couldn't feed mice."

.oOo.

"Why am I carrying your groceries?" Shinichi asked lugging a half-full bag of food in front of him and looking up at Kaito, who had another two full bags in his hands.

"Because it builds character," Kaito answered absently.

Shinichi sighed, rolling his eyes. "You are so full of …"

Kaito swung the nearest bag closer to Shinichi, making him start. "Ah! What would Ran say if she heard you?" he teased, unlocking the front door to the Kudou house and stepping inside.

"Heard Conan-kun saying what?" Ran asked, leaning around a doorway into the hall. "And there you are! Shinichi, I was worried you'd vanished again and taken Conan with you this time!" Kaito smiled reassuringly, relieved that she acted like she was teasing them, despite the very real relief in her voice, and the slight relaxing of lines at the corners of her eyes.

"I see you escaped from Sonoko, Ran," Kaito noted. "Weren't we supposed to meet you later?"

Ran bit her lip and laughed. "Sonoko got distracted. I decided to save you from having to go all the way down there when you're probably still jetlagged."

"The jetlag's not too bad, I promise," Kaito assured her, Kaito shifted his grocery bags to one hand and put the freed hand on Conan's head. The boy looked up to find a shadow of Kid's grin looking down at him before Kaito's attention switched back to Ran, ruffling Conan's hair just to annoy him. Conan batted at the hand and Ran snickered at the two of them.

"So what have you boys been up to this afternoon?"

Kaito held up the grocery bags he was carrying. "The cupboard was bare. And I needed to talk to someone about the case. Conan-kun wanted to come with me, and I figured we'd be back early enough." He started to look nervous and looked around for a clock. "We are back early enough, right?"

Ran relaxed and laughed. "You're both mystery nuts," she said fondly. "But all things considered, that sort of thing just runs in the family, doesn't it?" Ran seemed oblivious to the nervous fidgeting her comment set off and leaned down to liberate Conan's grocery bag. "Here, let's get these put away before all the ice-cream you decided was a basic necessity to life melts into sugary goo."

"It's not just ice-cream, Ran!" Kaito protested as he led the way into the kitchen. "There are other things in there too, I'll have you know. I can cook."

Ran laughed brightly and nodded to placate him. "I know you can, Shinichi. You fend for yourself really well, but unless you tripped across a chef while you were traveling the world, I know what kind of things you consider food. Though, come to think of it," she paused to stretch up and set something on a higher shelf, "you do seem more … normal. I mean, you haven't brought up Sherlock Holmes even once!"

"Well…"

"I'm proud of your restraint," she told him heading off what she thought would be another detective monologue. "And I know you just bought all this food, but why don't you come over for dinner tonight? Dad still doesn't know you're back yet."

"Wouldn't your dad want to keep it that way?" Kaito asked, remembering Mouri Kogoro and suspecting – from Shinichi's well-covered cringe – that the great "Sleeping Detective" might not be so thrilled to have Kudou Shinichi back and upstaging him.

"Dad went out for the evening," Ran told him. "Some old buddy of his from college is in the area and wanted to treat him to dinner. So it'll just be the three of us."

"Well in that case," Kaito grinned, "Why don't I take you and Conan-kun out for dinner too? You don't have to spend half the night cooking, and Sonoko won't yell at us tomorrow."

"I'd like … Shinichi, are you sure?" Ran was looking at him with disbelief and an ill-concealed sort of hope.

"I wouldn't have offered if I didn't want to," he told her honestly. "We can even go to the wharf if you really want to. Let's just get the rest of these groceries put away and we can go."