I'd love to hear some theories as to what's going on! ;)
"Mom, do you have my birth certificate handy? There's something I want to look at real quick..."
Kuroba Akita felt herself reflexively stiffen up for a moment after the question was asked as her son entered their house after school (a few minutes late, she realized,) wondering what he could possibly want to know about his birth parents that would be on the piece of paper, but she relaxed again and shrugged her shoulders before stopping her chores and drying her hands on her apron. "Of course I do, but it will take me a few minutes to get to it. It's locked in the safe."
She turned and looked at her son, who was definitely not in his usual joking, jovial mood. "Is there any reason in particular you'd like to see it?" She didn't mind that he wanted to see it- she and Toichi had always been very open with Kaito about the fact that he was adopted, after all, deciding on that course of action with him from the day that the adoption had been finalized- but she was still wondering why he was wearing that strange, pensive expression and what his birth certificate could possibly hold for him...
Kaito shifted uncomfortably on his feet for a few moments while looking down at the floor before meeting his mother's eyes again. "Well, you see, this lady showed up after school today..."
"A lady?" inquired his mother, wanting to hear more about this since it clearly had her son so worked up and so unlike himself right now. She opened the cupboards, poured them both a glass of water and sat down at the kitchen table before indicating for Kaito to come sit at the other seat, which he slowly did after realizing what his mother was asking.
"Yeah," Kaito finally replied a few moments after sitting down and apparently making up his mind to tell the story. "When I went to go walk home from school today this black car was waiting there down the street a little ways in a parking lot- a four-door black car. Then a slightly plump, short black-haired woman got out of it when I walked by the car and thanked me." There was no way, of course, that Kaito would or could ever let her know that for a panicked, fear-laced moment he had thought Snake and his minions had decided to come after him, his family or his friends (or perhaps even all three) in broad daylight. They had known his father Toichi's name, after all...
"Thanked you?"
"Yeah. That was the weird part. She thanked me, but I'd never seen her before in my life," Kaito explained. "So I asked her what she meant, and she said 'Aren't you that young man that helped me translate so much when I was on vacation in Germany last year?'" While his mother stared at him with a puzzled expression, he nodded again. "Exactly. I've never even been in Germany, much less been able to speak German fluently."
He then took a sip of the water Akita had placed on the table for him in a mug and continued. "Then when I explained to her that I had no idea what she was talking about and that I'd never visited Germany before, she looked at me and said 'Oh. Well, that's surprising. I really thought it was you, which was why I waited here for you after seeing you walk home this way the other day. That young man could have been your twin.'" He looked up at her, and Akita suddenly, fully understood.
"I see," Akita stated with a nod and smile. "Well in that case, I'll be right back." This woman that showed up raised the distinct possibility that he has a twin out there somewhere- and who knows, he just might, we never found out much about the circumstances of his birth before we took him home- so he probably wants his birth mother's name so he can see if a second certificate was issued at the same time. It makes sense, and he should be able to do the search quickly enough.
She entered her bedroom just as she had finished her musing and walked into the closet, where the small fire safe lay tightly locked and snug in its corner on the upper right hand shelf. She carefully opened the safe (it was touchy) and extracted the carefully folded Certificate of Live Birth that was in it, tucked among the other personal papers.
"Here you are," she called as she quickly reentered the kitchen, her voice snapping Kaito out of gazing aimlessly out the window as he turned to her with a dazed look that lasted only a moment before clearing into a happy, relaxed expression that was far more usual for the teenage magician's face to be wearing. "Just be careful with it, it's the only copy I have," she added with a smile as she placed it onto the table.
"Thanks. I'll be back soon, I have my phone on me," he added quickly as he got up, gently took the certificate, put on his coat and headed out the door to head to the library for some research. He couldn't explain why, but he had the curious feeling that he already somehow knew exactly what he was looking for; it was just a matter of finding it- whatever that 'it' was. Well, I suppose looking up her name would be a good start. He carefully opened the certificate as he strolled down the sidewalk towards the library that was a few blocks away, beginning to scan the certificate for his biological mother's name.
What Kaito didn't see thanks to his focus elsewhere was a small, white two-door car that held the woman who had spoken to him earlier in the day, carefully tucked in among some trees in the back sector of a fairly empty parking lot another two blocks or so down from where they'd had thier earlier encounter. As she saw Kaito walking down the street, serious face scanning an aging, fragile piece of paper that he was carefully holding, her slightly plump face broke into a wide smile.
"Good to see your instincts are in the right place, my other silver bullet-kun," she whispered to herself happily as she watched him enter the library before she started up the car and drove off into the brilliant fall afternoon.
"What the hell is going on here?! What is she THINKING?!"
Gin quickly whipped around when he heard footsteps crunching in the leaves behind him after he hissed these comments to himself quietly, having not meant those comments to be heard by any but himself. I really hope I don't have to shoot somebody...I'm not in the mood to right now...
"Aniki, are you talking to yourself?" inquired Vodka's familiar voice, the agent coming around from the back of Gin's Porsche that was currently parked in front of the safe house Quinine had been delivered to an hour ago. "What the hell who's thinking?" Aniki never talks to himself like that...
"It's better if you don't know anything about it," snapped the blonde gruffly before fishing his cigarettes out of his pocket and realizing that his hands were still lightly shaking from the shock that had come after Quinine's face was revealed to him.
Surprised, Gin? I know you are. After all, I'm supposed to be dead...
The poison you gave me didn't kill me...
He had demanded that Quinine tell him what exactly had gone on, but the boy (he couldn't remember his name, but he certainly remembered that face and giving him the poison since it had been one of the only times Gin had personally used the stuff) had merely sat back in the seat and said nothing more, stating that that was one set of questions that he refused to answer. But I gave him the apotoxin! I placed it in his mouth and MADE him swallow it back then! How the HELL did he not die?!
"Aniki, did you accidentally see Quinine's face or something? Don't worry, I'll help lie for you if Quinine tries to say you did," Vodka quickly spat out with a nod accompanying the emphatic statement. "You won't get executed."
"I told you," Gin replied in a low hiss, "to drop it."
"It's OK, aniki." Vodka leaned slightly towards the other and added in a conspiratorial, breathless whisper "I haven't told anyone this yet but I've heard Bitters's real voice. He was in the backseat but his bodyguards weren't there yet and the soundproof partition in between the front and backs wasn't up because we weren't driving yet, and he seemed too wrapped up in the call to realize that he wasn't using his voice changer." He took a deep breath when he had finished.
"Oh?" inquired Gin in an equally quiet tone as he lit a cigarette and took the first wonderful, soothing puff. "So there is more than one of them, then. What did he sound like?"
"He had a young voice and a real thick Osakan accent," replied Vodka immediately. "And he called someone ahou a lot when he took the phone call on a cell phone that looks different from ours."
"Called someone ahou? The hell?" And a non-standard cell phone? he added mentally, not liking that last detail at all- another deviation from the norm, and deviations were dangerous things that could potentially lead to disaster. Why the hell are these guys getting all kinds of things others would be shot or at least tortured for?
"Yeah. Oop, ssh," Vodka hissed as he pointed to the door of the safe house which was opening. The two quickly broke apart and entered their respective vehicles while the other hooded figure, thier bodyguards and Quinine slowly emerged from the house. Quinine quickly ducked in and buckled up, no longer concerned about his hood falling down with just Gin in the car now that his secret was out- at least to Gin.
"I wonder if it's even really him," the boy muttered darkly as the Porsche started, not bothering with the voice synthesizer either. So Bitters is definitely a male as well...Vodka said Bitters sounded male and now Quinine just used 'he'...
"What do you mean by that?" inquired Gin mildly, honestly curious about the quiet, sad statement.
"None of your beeswax," Quinine eventually stated in reply while still staring out the window, but the tone was unvindictive enough that Gin knew he could get at the information if he wanted to badly enough. It was only a question of time and patience- and asking the right people the right questions. I'll find out everything eventually...what the hell are you up to, Vermouth? "Are the guards going to be alright?" the boy continued, shaking Gin out of his machinations.
"What?" Gin managed to spit out a few moments later, as surprised at the question itself as the fact that a boy with eyes that hardened and angry would ask it.
"Whatever you gave them- will it kill them?"
"Of course not. I'm not stupid enough to kill my own people with a very good reason to do it," Gin snarled in reply. "It's just a nasty case of food poisoning, that's all."
"Good," Quinine replied simply as they fully exited the rural area the safe house was located in and pulled onto the first tenuous dirt lane in the area that had the moxy to actually call itself a road, a tiny sign indicating that it was Route 43.
