A/N: This chapter was supposed to be uploaded earlier today, but I wasn't able to get into my account. *pout*
Warnings:
Strange English, OOCness
Shinichi's age: 17
Uploaded: 2014-01-03
Revised: 2014-10-04
Chapter rating: T
Words: 3,000
Chap. 29
The Pandora Gem
Despite the fact that Kaito knew that he was looking at a disguised Night Baron he still couldn't help but to memorise the features of the seemingly Japanese man in front of him. The western thief smiled over his dessert as he caught the magician staring at him again, making Kaito smile back a bit embarrassed. They had eaten their cakes in silence, only stealing glances of each other, both changing between feeling comfortable and uncomfortable with the other's company, unsure of what they should talk about in order to not reveal too much about themselves or put the other thief in danger.
"I want to work with the police force," Night Baron suddenly confessed quietly and looked up with an expression holding a tinge of sadness.
"Really?" the magician asked curiously and bent closer, "why don't you just stop and vanish then?"
"I have some personal matters that I need to deal with first," the westerner averted his gaze to the table, showing that he didn't want to talk about it.
"That's unfortunate. You would probably be one of the best police officers ever seen," Kaito smiled as Night Baron beamed at his comment, "you're very good at what you do right now, and with those skills you'll be a great officer."
"Thanks," the young man answered and felt shy for the first time since he'd been much younger, "and I'm guessing that you want to be a magician?"
"Yea, I want to be the best," Kaito stated dreamily.
"Really?" Night Baron asked shocked and drew him out of his fantasy, "but aren't you already the best?" The black thief's comment made the magician smile.
"I won't be the best until I beat my father," Kaito stated and saw the other nod.
"And how long are you planning on staying in this profession?" Night Baron asked and realised just after the question had slipped out of his mouth that he knew exactly what his white-clad foe was dealing with.
"That's just some personal stuff," Kaito murmured unhappily.
"I see, well, this relationship seems to have started off badly," the westerner sighed and saw how his love-interest smiled forgivingly, "a relationship is supposed to be built on trust, but we have so many secrets that we can't tell, and so much that can go wrong, maybe…"
As Night Baron interrupted himself and slowly stirred his coffee Kaito got a foreboding feeling that he was about to hear something that he didn't want to hear.
"Maybe we should just give up, just let it go, at least for now. We could try again later if we still feel the same," the black-clad thief murmured thoughtfully and Kaito wanted to argue back, but as he thought about it, he realised that he didn't really know Night Baron; he only knew who he believed the thief was.
"Why don't we get to know each other before giving up?" the magician smirked confidently and leaned forward to take an intense eye-contact, "or are you afraid that you'll fall for me deeper? I know that my charm's irresistible."
With a grin Night Baron placed enough money one the table to pay for them both, unaware that he made Kaito remember that the westerner never returned the things he stole.
"Yea, let's get to know each other."
As soon as they got outside Night Baron took his hand and smiled as they walked into the park beside the restaurant near Tropical Land. With a shiver Kaito followed into the forested area, both afraid and excited over what could take place there.
"We'll need some way of getting in contact with each other without exposing who or where we are," Night Baron's shadowed face whispered as he kept a sharp eye on the people in the park, making sure that none of them were watching them, not that they could see them in the shadows of the trees, but you could never be too careful when working for the Black Organisation, "some things we need to keep off the forum."
"Sure," the magician murmured and brought the other's gloved hand to his mouth, kissing it tenderly and watched how a cheerful grin took its place on Night Baron's lips. With slow movements the black-clad thief placed his black mask over his face and Kaito let go of his hand, but Night Baron only smiled and placed a second black mask over Kaito's own face.
"Dye it white," Night Baron murmured and cupped the face of his love-interest, caressing his thumb over the smiling lips, "I don't want you to get to know me with the wrong face, and I don't want to know any face that isn't yours: this will be the only time we show our fake faces."
"Until we take off our masks to show the real us," Kaito whispered and placed a hand over Night Baron's, keeping it to his cheek.
"Our real faces," the westerner whispered agreeing and bent a little bit closer.
"Our real names," Kaito answered just as quietly and neared the other's face, keeping the passionate eye-contact that seemed to overpower him.
"Our hidden secrets." The hot air that caressed their lips sent shivers through their bodies.
"Our hidden wishes," Kaito whispered, feeling the tingling sensation of the other thief so close to himself and then felt their lips connect, allowing them both to forget everything and only exist in their own, blissful world.
Shinichi grinned as he closed the door to his home and leaned on it with a quiet sigh. He'd been in a daze the entire way back and he just couldn't stop smiling. His moment of happiness was suddenly disturbed by the sound of laughter. With an even larger grin he eyed his parents, seeing them hang over the back of the couch, mirroring his own feelings of mirth.
"They kissed, and KID liked it" Avaron grinned to her husband and ruffled Satoru's hair, "you lost."
"Yea, well, it's a good loss," the blonde laughed and saw how his son tried to stop smiling in order to be mad over the fact that his parents had made a bet about him.
"We're dating," Shinichi said and felt how his mouth grinned, as if it had a will of its own and refused to stop.
"Congratulations!" his parents chorused.
"When do we get to meet him?" Avaron quickly continued, but was almost interrupted by husband.
"Can we start planning a wedding?" Satoru grinned widely.
"Our son is getting married!" Avaron clapped her hands in excitement.
"Hold your horses!" Shinichi tried to interject, but his parents had already begun gushing about the imaginary wedding, "we've just met! You can't begin planning that!" The teenage thief was thoroughly ignored and was only able to pick up small words and phrases as his parents seemed to talk on every language they knew at the same time. As he tried to follow their conversation he managed to piece together the fact that Kaitou KID and Night Baron were going to have a huge public wedding where Satoru was going to be priest and Avaron was going to walk down the aisle with her son. KID's assistant was going to bring KID and doves would be bringing the rings to them, and they were going to be carried away by a flying white chariot, drawn by one black and one white horse.
With a shake of his head Shinichi decided to ignore his parents until they had become normal again and walked into his room. He pulled the drapes shut before he opened his laptop to study his next target; he wouldn't be allowed to be free until the organisation was gone, and now he had Kaitou KID to protect. Shinichi took a deep breath, still sensing the stirring feelings that KID had fashioned within him with his magical lips, and made up his mind to focus on the coming heist. KID would have a lot of questions about why Night Baron went on a heist while knowing that KID couldn't attend, but the eastern phantom didn't know that Shinichi was going to meet Whisky for the first time.
With a satisfied smile Shinichi jumped off the building in where the heist had taken place and vanished into an alley as the KID-impostor crushed a window and flew away, followed by the police officers' blaring sirens. With quick steps the teenager got to a parking lot and got into the back of the silvery car. With quick movements he opened secret compartments underneath the seats and stuffed everything incriminating away before jumping to the front and turned the key to start the vehicle. As the thief drove out from his parking he pushed a button and made the registration plate spin around to show a registration of a different car of the same model and colour. As he got halfway to Whisky's place he stopped and took out the hidden jewel before he donned his Night Baron-identity; Aaron Smith, and then continued on his way.
Sighing quietly, Shinichi got out and studied the Japanese-styled house that he'd parked in front of. He was at the edge of the city, in apparently one of the richer parts of the suburbs, judging by the size of the yards and houses. On confident steps and with a relaxed pose he walked over to the door, but before he had time to knock, it opened and a geisha bowed for him before moving to the side, allowing him to enter.
"Good evening," Shinichi greeted, uncertain of how geishas normally were treated; should he ignore her or speak with her. As the woman silently took out a pair of slippers he removed his shoes and put them on. Without allowing the fabric of her kimono to make a sound she gestured with her arm as she bowed and then began walking. Assuming that he was supposed to follow Shinichi studied every nook and cranny that he could see of the hallway without looking too suspicious.
As they got to an open room, a rather short man was sitting on the floor behind a long table, sipping a tiny cup of tea. The person who Shinichi had to assume was Whisky had a very short Fu Manchu moustache, short black hair surrounding a large bald spot and a fairly round body shape.
"LeBaron," the man greeted as he placed the cup on the top and got up from sitting behind the low table, "let's talk outside." Without a word Shinichi followed his boss outside and saw a large yard surrounded by a high wooden fence. A delicate wooden bridge crept over a small stream of water and reached to the grass on the other side. As Whisky walked out on the grass the thief walked beside him.
"Snake dislikes you," the short man chuckled as they got to the middle of the yard and turned around to reach out for the jewel.
"The feeling is mutual," Shinichi stated in his accented Japanese and placed the diamond in his boss' outreached hand, unwillingly giving it away without letting it show.
"I figured," Whisky snorted and smiled a half-smile, almost going over to a sneer, "you're famous for being a pleasant person to deal with, so the fact that Snake was nagging me to relieve him from working with you was a clue that you two didn't get along."
"I know that you have checked quite a lot of diamonds in Japan," Shinichi changed the subject without any regard of Whisky's wish to small talk, "so preferably I want a list of which ones so that I don't waste my or Anokata's time by going after the wrong ones." The request was made in a calm voice, which held such an amount of authority that anyone could think that Shinichi was the superior and not the older man.
"I have prepared that for you already, but there are more things that I'm going to tell you," Whisky smirked and looked to the diamond, "but first: How much better than Kaitou KID are you?"
"Sadly not much, I'm barely beating him," the thief stated with a scorn, as if he hated his white adversary.
"But beating him none the less!" Whisky stated with a wolfish smile and continued with contempt in his voice, "that's more than Snake ever managed to do; he even led KID to my house so that I had to move."
"In all honestly, Snake and I are not even in the same league. It's shameful to be compared to someone like him," Shinichi bit back as gently as he could, testing to see how much respect his boss held for him.
"I agree, my mistake, it won't happen again," the man excused himself quickly and took a breath before he continued, but Shinichi had time to see that Whisky was seeing him as an equal or slightly superior.
"As you probably have realised; we're searching for a large jewel, a rather special jewel that went by the name Pandora in ancient times, but might have been renamed since no jewel by the name Pandora have been found or exists. The only thing we know about it is that it's a large diamond that when held to the moon-," Whisky raised his arm and held the jewel high, "-reveals another diamond inside it, also known as the Pandora gem. The Pandora gem will shine in red when faced with the light of the moon, and when the Volley Comet passes by earth it will cry a tear of immortality," the man explained, missing how shock and disbelief crossed the thief's face, "and whoever drinks it will become immortal. With the help of our cutting-edge technology we will use the tear as a prototype and create a drug. Anokata has told me that you also are on the list if you want it." The man got a smug expression as he took down the jewel from the air and turned to the thief. "How about it?"
"I will serve Anokata with honour to that day and beyond. I vouch this on my life, eternal or not," Shinichi placed a hand on his heart as he swore, keeping his insides composed, but only showed nobility and gratitude in his body language and face.
"He'll like that," Whisky chuckled and handed the jewel back, "it's the wrong one. Do whatever you want with it." As Shinichi accepted the stone he smiled towards his boss. "I'm guessing that you're going to taunt KID."
"You know me all too well already, and now we part for a while. If the diamonds are wrong I'll just leave them."
"Do that. Yoko will show you out," the man continued and made the thief turn around to walk inside, but then stopped.
"Will I ever meet him?" Shinichi wondered as he stopped and slightly turned his head, seemingly indifferent to the answer.
"Maybe one day, but not yet," Whisky stated and turned to watch the moon.
When Shinichi got inside the geisha got up from sitting on the floor and showed him the way out. While forcing his mind to stay blank he got into the vehicle and drove off. The cautiousness forced the thief to drive into a parking garage, where he switched the plates of the vehicle. On quick feet he got out and opened the secret compartment to get his sensor and scan for any signals that didn't belong in the car, in case someone had bugged it at Whisky's place. With a sneer he found one underneath the driver's seat and a second hidden in the back of the trunk. After removing them and placing them in the van next to his Shinichi went over to the trunk again and opened the second secret compartment. Silently he looked around, only observing people at the other end of the garage and then pulled off the thin, magnetic sheets that covered the vehicle's metal surfaces. In hurry to not be seen he carefully rolled them all together and hid them in the compartment before he went around the car to pull off the black leather from the seats, changing the colour of the entire car's surface to a dark red and the seats to the original brown leather. After hiding them and closing the secret compartment he changed his own face and clothes and drove out of the garage.
When he parked the car in his garage at home he sent a glance around the metal fence that covered every surface of the inside and blocked any kind of signal from being transmitted through it and smiled; even if the organisation had placed a bug in the vehicle that didn't transmit from the very beginning they still wouldn't be able to find him.
When he walked into his home he allowed his unruly thoughts to ridicule the organisation for their superstitious goals and ability to kill for something as thin as a whisper of a legend; he would definitely destroy them now, together with the jewel. For his freedom and for Kaitou KID's. Who even wanted to be immortal? To stay alive while the world around you changed, while everyone you got to know died off, leaving you behind forever. A human mind can only take in a certain amount of knowledge; what happened when the brain became full of information, memories and had to take in more? A human would only be able to keep up with the technological changes for a finite of time, but what would happen if you lived an infinite life with a finite mind? Of course, the human technology would improve and then after a while people would come up with ways to integrate humans with machines: one day humans might even have an infinite memory.
As he watched his parents play-fight over who was going to hold the diamond first he couldn't help but to smile and remember that he would taunt Hakuba Saguru with it in the morning, after a thorough cleaning.
Answer to Guest review: mya
Thank you, I'm glad to be back. I've missed writing so much!
