Disclaimer: I don't own the DCMK characters.

Smile for Me

7: Stepping Out

"So this Mouri Ran, she is a close friend of yours, if I recall correctly."

"Yes."

"She was the one who gave Hakuba that big bruise."

"Er, yeah. She studies martial arts. She's won a couple tournaments both in high school and in college. So please try not to make her angry."

"Don't worry about it. You may not have noticed, but I am very good at persuading others to my point of view."

Shinichi had noticed, and it was one of the magician's most formidable abilities as far as he was concerned. One minute with Kaito and even a stubborn person would find himself agreeing to whatever mad plan the man was suggesting this time. The strangest part was that even those who had been victims of this before could not escape repeating the whole cycle. He could convince you to do things you knew were stupid or wrong by making them sound brilliant and right. And it wasn't until after the fiasco that reality retuned and you wondered what the hell you had been thinking.

But none of that was important, was it?

They were about to meet Ran. The meeting had been orchestrated through Hakuba, who had chosen a secluded little café hidden away behind decorative walls of ivy twined through intricate, iron fencing. Because of the ivy, even the café's outdoor seats managed to maintain a semblance of privacy.

"I must say, I'm a little surprised," Kaito remarked as they approached the arched entryway into the café's outdoor seating area. "Hakuba actually volunteered to help set up this little meeting. He never volunteers for anything. I usually have to twist his arm a little."

Shinichi didn't comment, though he couldn't help but wonder what exactly that meant. Then he recalled some of the photo collections Kaito had rather gleefully shared with him the other day as part of a "memories you may consider drawing upon for conversation" lesson. He had called them keepsakes, but the contents of some of those photos… Well, the word "blackmail" came to mind.

Pausing just within the shadows of the arch, Shinichi scanned the tables. There weren't all that many of them, so he found Ran almost instantly. He'd just made to walk towards her when a hand closed like a vice around his wrist. The next thing he knew Kaito was dragging him down and to the side behind a decorative potted plant.

"What is it?" he asked the magician in a whisper, blue eyes searching their surroundings for any signs of…of…well, he wasn't sure what exactly. Signs of danger or trouble, for the most part. But to his growing puzzlement, there was nothing.

He returned his attention to Kaito—who was peering intently around their leafy hiding place. He blinked. "Kaito?"

"Shh," the magician hissed.

Falling silent, Shinichi sat for a moment at a loss before moving to see what Kaito was looking at.

Ran was sitting at one of the café's round, white tables across from the blond figure of one Hakuba Saguru. They both already had cups in front of them, and they appeared to be engaged in deep conversation. As far as Shinichi could tell, there wasn't anything particularly unusual or interesting about the sight. The only other guests at this hour were an elderly couple who were entirely absorbed in their own conversation. There was nothing of note about them either except perhaps that it was nice seeing two people still getting along so well despite the wear of the years.

"Who would've thought," Kaito remarked, sitting back with a bemused grin dancing around his lips. "That certainly explains a few things."

Shinichi gave him his best 'what are you talking about' look, earning himself a laugh.

"Don't you see?"

"If I did, I wouldn't be asking," Shinichi retorted, beginning to get annoyed. Honestly, Kaito was acting even weirder than normal today, and that was not an easy thing to achieve.

"That!" Kaito waved an impatient hand at the duo they had come to see. "Look at them. That's why Hakuba volunteered to set this up. It's because he wanted to see this friend of yours again. This was the perfect excuse."

Shinichi stared at him. "…What? But, I mean, his jaw…"

Kaito shrugged. "Well, not a very romantic start, I'll admit, but definitely one that would leave an impression. This could be interesting, don't you think?"

Not knowing how to respond, Shinichi scratched at his cheek. Blue eyes turned back to the two people in question. Ran was smiling. There wasn't any suspicion or dislike on her face—quite the opposite in fact. So he assumed that whatever Hakuba had said to her, it had been enough to convince her that he wasn't a terrible villain. What she thought of the blonde now however, Shinichi had no idea. She did seem to be enjoying their conversation though. Her eyes were bright with interest, and she was leaning forward a little even as her tablemate did the same. Did that mean anything? Romance was not one of Shinichi's fortes (Sonoko had once told him that he had the romantic instincts of a wallflower, though she'd never explained to him what that meant), so all he could say was that it wasn't impossible. Why that struck Kaito as interesting was entirely beyond him.

"They're still waiting for us," he pointed out, tugging on the magician's sleeve. "Shouldn't we go meet them? I mean, that is the whole point of coming here in the first place."

"I suppose you have a point." Kaito heaved a melodramatic sigh. "Punctuality does make for a better first impression." Rising from behind the potted plant, he pulled Shinichi up with him and strode towards the table for all the world like he had just arrived.

"Hakuba!" he called out, grinning when the blonde jumped in his seat.

Hakuba craned his neck to find Kaito fast approaching. His instincts were to run, but he knew he couldn't. Why did he feel like he'd been caught at something he shouldn't be doing?

He was still puzzling at that when the magician arrived and it was revealed that Shinichi had been trailing behind him.

"Shinichi!" Rising from her chair, Ran moved to embrace her friend (and surreptitiously check him for any signs of ill usage). Satisfied that her friend did not appear to be hurt in any way, she stood back and smiled. "It's good to see you again."

"Yeah, sorry about the trouble," Shinichi replied, scratching his cheek and looking sheepish.

"It wasn't any trouble." Next, Ran turned her gaze to Kaito. "So you must be Kaito."

"That's right." Giving the girl his most charming smile, Kaito bowed and offered her a yellow rose. "My name is Kuroba Kaito. It is a pleasure to meet you at last, Miss Mouri."

Ran blinked in surprise at the rose before taking it, clearly delighted. "That was amazing the way you just made it appear like that. How did you do it?"

Dropping into one of the open chairs, Kaito wagged a finger at her. "That would be a trade secret, my dear lady. Such information is costly."

She snorted but returned to her own seat as well. Shinichi sat between her and Kaito. Now that they were settled down, Ran found her gaze shifting from her friend to Kaito then back again. She didn't mean to stare, but still…

"Shocking, isn't it?" the magician quipped, correctly guessing at the girl's thoughts.

Ran blushed. "It is a little strange," she admitted. "I mean, I heard you looked a lot like Shinichi, but, well, I didn't expect the resemblance to be so…" She waved an expressive hand. "I guess it's true what they say about everyone having a twin out there somewhere."

"Perhaps so," Kaito laughed. "I might even have met yours." Indigo eyes studied Ran's face for a moment before the magician nodded decisively. "You could definitely pass for my friend Aoko with a little cosmetic assistance."

"Really?" Ran leaned forward slightly, interest piqued. "What's she like?"

"Oh she's great. Her father works in law enforcement, and she's working to follow in his footsteps."

"What about you?" Ran asked suddenly. "I heard you're following in your father's footsteps too. It's what Shinichi has been helping you with, right?"

"Yeah. I handle a lot of the small cases that come up already and do some of the meet and greet for him that the bigwigs like to have."

"So won't sending Shinichi in as your double be shirking your duties?"

"Not at all. It's only a banquet. There'll be a lot of higher ups there, that's true, but I'm just supposed to be on my best behavior and make a good impression. Frankly, your friend Shinichi here might be better for the job than I am. He does a great serious and attentive face."

Ran laughed. "He does, doesn't he?"

"I'm right here, you know," Shinichi grumbled.

Hakuba cleared his throat. "If any of you would like to get refreshments, I can go place orders."

"Nah, we'll go." Kaito stood, pulling Shinichi up with him. "What do you two want?"

"I'm fine for now, thanks," Ran replied.

"As am I."

"Right then. Come on Shinichi."

Shinichi stumbled before he was able to get his feet under him. Kaito didn't let go of his arm until they were inside the café.

"What was that all about?" he asked, taking a moment to straighten out his clothes.

"Isn't it obvious? We're giving them some more time alone with each other."

"…Oh."

"So what would you like? All of their baked goods are amazing. The hot fudge sundae cake is truly unparalleled. They also have some soups and sandwiches—not exactly unique stuff but good quality."

"How's their coffee?"

"Ah, yes. I don't order it often myself, but I have heard that it is quite good. I can personally recommend the mocha, but for your peculiar taste buds, the house blend would probably be the better choice."

Shinichi shot the back of the magician's head a flat look. "I'll have you know, plenty of people out there like plain coffee."

"And I shall never understand any of them. So? Made up your mind yet?"

Shinichi cast an eye over the menu and the glass display case full of cakes and pastries. "I think I'll have the chicken salad sandwich and a coffee."

"You don't want to try the hot fudge sundae cake?"

"Not really."

"I guarantee that it's delicious."

"No, thank you. I'm sure it's just as wonderful as you say, but like I said before, I'm just not a huge fan of sweets."

"You can try a bite of mine," the magician concluded, leading the way to the end of the line. "You're totally going to regret not ordering one for yourself."

They were still awaiting their turn to order when there was a cry at the other side of the café. Heads turned. A young woman wearing the café's employee uniform was hurriedly picking up the fragments of a broken mug.

"I'm so sorry," she said to the young man and woman seated (well, standing now) at the table there. "I didn't mean to knock over your drinks!"

"Look what you did!" the man exclaimed. "This shirt is ruined! Do you know how much it cost me?"

"I'm really sorry."

"Your apology isn't going to clean my shirt!"

"I—I'm sorry—"

"Stop apologizing, Hana," one of the other staff members said, arriving on the scene with fresh towels to clean the spill. He gave Hana two of the towels before turning to deposit the third on the table in front of the angry man. "Here, Sir. You can clean it off with this."

"You can't get coffee stains out with a stupid towel," the man sneered. "This girl's gotta pay me for this shirt she ruined."

"It's just coffee. A run through the washing machine will clean it up just fine. And if that doesn't work, you can use a bit of bleach."

"What about my coffee?" the guy shot back, stepping forward menacingly. Unfortunately for him, the waiter was taller.

He stared coolly down at the angry man. "Since one of our own did cause the accident, we will be happy to give you a fresh cup for free."

This seemed to somewhat mollify the irate man. He returned to his seat, but his expression was still stormy.

Activity in the café resumed. It seemed that the action was over. But Shinichi found himself watching that corner of the café out of the corner of his eye as they waited.

The waitress, Hana, had finally finished mopping up all the spilled coffee. Rising with the pile of sodden towels in her arms, she hurried for the back room. However, en route, her foot slipped and she fell with a cry. Her shoulder hit the corner of the counter. Her cry turned from surprised to pained and the pile of wet towels fell from her arms to clump around her feet.

"Hana!" the waiter who'd spoken out for her came back around the counter. "Are you hurt? Let me see."

It was only because he was watching that Shinichi saw the tiny smirk that crossed the face of the man with the coffee-stained shirt. Come to think of it, the guy's face was a little familiar.

He turned to ask Kaito about it only to find that the magician was no longer standing in line with him. A quick sweep of the café revealed that Kaito was now standing right beside the table where Coffee Stain and his female companion were sitting.

Concerned, Shinichi hurried over. As he drew closer, he could hear them talking. Or, well, talking was probably too gentle a word for what they were doing.

"That was an unacceptable use of magic," Kaito stated, bringing his hand down on the table with a smack that instantly got him the full attention of the table's occupants.

"What are you talking about?" Coffee Stain sneered. "That klutz of a girl can't even walk straight. It's no wonder she knocked over our stuff. Why did they even hire such a pest?"

As Coffee Stain raised a hand, Kaito caught his wrist. The magician's hold looked gentle, but the wince of pain that flashed across Coffee Stain's face suggested that it was anything but.

"No more of that. I would hate to see a fellow magic user continue such folly."

"What're you talking about?"

"It was your spell that tripped her just now," Kaito said, voice low and hard. "Do you realize that if she had fallen in just a slightly different way, she could have hit her head? Then what?"

Coffee Stain scoffed. "What's your problem? It was just a little joke. She deserved a little payback for ruining my shirt."

"Joke," Kaito repeated. His tone was light and curious, but the look in his eyes made Shinichi's blood freeze. It was the first time he'd seen Kaito looking angry, and he would freely admit that it was frightening. In that moment he found himself reminded of the fact that Kaito wasn't just any magician but the heir to one of the country's most powerful families. "So, for the sake of this little joke, you would have killed someone."

"What?" Coffee Stain spluttered, suddenly looking both outraged, uncertain, and frightened all at once. "I didn't kill her. She's perfectly fine."

"But she might not have been. Magic isn't meant to be used for such petty things. It disgraces the name of mages everywhere."

"Geez, I told you it was just a joke! Who the hell are you anyway? Going around talking down to me. Do you know who I am?"

"You're Takowara Shindo, third son of the Takowara clan."

Coffee Stain gaped, clearly shocked into speechlessness. Finally, he made a valiant effort to recollect his wits. "Well if you know that then you should know that my family owns all the restaurants and related establishments in this area. And that means I can do anything I want here, and you have no right to lecture me."

"On the contrary, even if your logic wasn't already full of holes, I would still have every right to lecture you, as you put it," Kaito quipped, still holding the guy's wrist in his iron grip. "My name is Kuroba Kaito. Ah, I see you've heard of me. Then you will also know that preventing magic users from recklessly throwing their magic around to harm or otherwise mess with non-mages is one of my duties. Inflicting bodily injury to someone just for the fun of it is a crime punishable by prison time or possibly even death depending on the degree of the transgression. Of course, that means that the severity of the injury must be taken into consideration. But let me tell you this. If she'd hit her head and subsequently suffered any permanent harm, you would have been looking at jail time for that little joke. I wonder what your father's going to think when he hears about this." Kaito leaned down and whispered something to the guy that none of the rest of them could hear.

The man paled. "What? B—but I didn't know—I wouldn't have if—! I—I'm sorry. Please don't tell my father!"

And now suddenly Kaito was all smiles. "No need to freak out. We know you didn't actually intend to mortally injure anyone, right? Your temper got the best of you and you acted without considering the possible consequences."

The guy looked relieved. "Yeah, that's exactly it. Everyone makes mistakes, right?"

"True. And when we make a mistake, the mature thing to do is to fix it. After all, unlike children, adults clean up their own messes. So how about you apologize to the poor young lady and help her clean up."

"I—I will." Coffee Stain leapt up and hurried to help pick up wet towels.

Kaito watched him critically for a moment before turning to the table's other occupant. He wasn't done yet.

"And what do you find so amusing about all this, Miss? Do share."

The girl looked taken aback. "Me? I didn't do anything."

"Exactly. You didn't do anything. You were just laughing, and I was curious to know why. Laughter is, after all, something that should be shared."

"I was…just recalling something I heard the other day," she replied in a murmur, peering up through her lashes at him.

"I see. I'm glad to hear it. I would hate to think that such a pretty young lady had the poor taste to laugh at another's misfortune."

Shinichi coughed lightly. He was instantly the focus of both speakers' attentions. "I'm sorry to interrupt, but Ran and Hakuba are still waiting for us…"

"Oh right, almost forgot about them. Well, I bid you farewell then, Miss. I do hope the rest of your day goes well."

"Uh, thank you. And the same to you…"

Shinichi waited until they were back in line on the other side of the café before giving Kaito a look. "You know you made a scene."

"I could have made a bigger one," Kaito quipped. Seeing Shinichi's expression, he let the smile drop to be replaced by a much more serious expression. "There are some things you can't turn a blind eye to."

Shinichi glanced back the way they'd come before returning his attention to Kaito. "So he tripped her with a spell…?"

"Not just any spell," the magician replied, tone grim. "It was a spell that calls down misfortune. It was lucky for her—and for him for that matter—that he cast it so clumsily. I wasn't exaggerating when I said he could easily have caused her permanent damage—or worse. That spell is a nasty one."

Shinichi opened his mouth then closed it again, shocked and slightly horrified. "Is that kind of magic even legal?"

Kaito gave him a sardonic look. "You have to ask? The problem is, a lot of people don't realize just how dangerous that spell really is. They see something that says "give someone bad luck for a moment" and think hey, it can't be that bad. You'd be amazed how many people don't bother to read the fine print. It doesn't help that most people can't cast it properly enough to actually kill. The fact that that spell originated as a killing curse is not at all common knowledge."

"Doesn't anyone teach that kind of thing?" Shinichi demanded. It sounded to him like the kind of information that all magic users should be required to know.

"The teaching of magic has always traditionally been handled within magician families. Parents teach their children, and so on and so forth. It evolved that way because every prominent magical bloodline has a few secret spells that are considered, ah, family treasures. Kind of like those secret techniques you see in martial arts stories. You know, the ones that masters only teach to really dedicated students from their schools. There are some books out there, but they tend to be horded just as much."

"So then what about the laws governing the use of magic?" Shinichi asked. "Who teaches those?"

"The same. I learned everything from Dad. Of course, not all children listen to their parents." The magician's lips quirked into a wry grin. "And not all parents are good teachers. But it's just like with other laws. Ignorance doesn't grant you immunity."

Shinichi fell silent, mulling over this new information. No wonder there were no classes on the subject. It all sounded rather…outdated to him, actually, but he supposed his view on the issue was pretty limited considering that, a few weeks ago, all he knew about magic was that it existed.

He wanted to know more. It was like he'd discovered that, all his life, he had only been seeing part of the world around him. But now, finally, he was beginning to see the rest. He wanted to understand it.

The couple in front of them finally finished placing their orders. Kaito stepped forward and struck up a conversation with the girl at the register. Ten minutes later, orders in hand, they headed back out to rejoin Ran and Hakuba.

X

"I guess I'll be seeing you after the festival then."

Shinichi nodded. He and Ran were standing just outside the café. Kaito and Hakuba had gone to dispose of their trash, though Shinichi was pretty sure that what the two were really doing was giving them some time to talk in private.

"You can call me if you need anything," he said.

"You better make sure to keep your phone charged then," the girl replied, tone just a touch dry before her gaze softened. "Let me know if anything happens, okay?"

"I will."

She nodded then smiled. "You know, I think this has been a good experience for you."

Shinichi blinked. "What do you mean?"

But Ran only waved him away. Before he could press the issue, Kaito and Hakuba returned.

"Well, Shinichi and I better get going then," the magician announced. "It was a pleasure meeting you, Miss Ran. I do hope we get the chance to speak again sometime."

"It was nice to meet you too. I expect you to take care of Shinichi while he's with you," she added with a pointed look.

Kaito laughed. "I intend to. Bye then. Oh, and Hakuba here will escort you home.

Ran glanced at the blonde in surprise. "You really don't have to go to the trouble."

"It's no trouble," he said quickly. "I know this place was a little out of the way for you. Please allow me to drive you home."

"Oh, well… Okay then. Thank you."

Waiting by the curb as the blonde left to bring his car around, Ran found herself thinking back over the day's meeting. Now that she had met Kaito in person, she felt a lot more comfortable with the thought of leaving her friend with him. But it wasn't so much Kaito himself who had set her mind at ease. Rather, it was the way Shinichi had been behaving.

Shinichi had always been rather more on the reserved side of things. He was a little too observant for his own good, she'd always thought. Not that being observant was a bad thing. But he also had a bad tendency to point out his observations (rather bluntly) to people, which more often than not offended someone or other. He'd been more vocal about such things when he was younger and full of the childish arrogance of those who knew that they were bright. It had made him more enemies than friends. As they'd gotten older, he'd learned to keep his opinions to himself—perhaps a little too much so. Nowadays he tended to keep everyone at arm's length, wrapping himself up in his own little world of knowledge and logic. She worried sometimes that he might be lonely, but he only ever scoffed at the idea and insisted she was imagining things.

It had been a long time since she'd seen him actually laugh a real laugh and not one of those little, amused snorts. This Kaito person, whatever else he might be, had managed to bring out a side of her friend that she hadn't seen in years. She was grateful for that.

It was, Ran hoped, going to be the beginning of a beautiful change. Whatever else, Shinichi's horizons were about to become a lot broader. And it was going to be up to him to figure out where to fly from there.

TBC