Summary: In which, a hospital is chosen as a heist location.

Notes: Not much to say on this one, other than I am very excited for it, and that as difficult as it was to write, it was also super fun!

"Let's go over the plan one more time," Jii says, from where he's sat, his arms crossed. They're sat at the bar, going over the final elements of their heist, thinking things over.

They're not KID – so they will send no heist notice, but Aoko can almost understand why Kaito does. To share the plan that they've thought of for themselves… she forces herself into a state of calm.

Aoko nods.

"Let's start with security." Jii passes her a glass of water, something Aoko takes gratefully. She sips at water as she thinks back over everything they've discussed already. "Tell me about it."

"Kaito's in the short stay ward, second floor, kind of out of the way of the rest of the hospital." Aoko says, putting the glass back down. Ice sloshes against the glass. "To get into the ward, you either need to be buzzed in, or to hold a staff I.D."

Jii clears his throat, "what else?"

"The police keep watch." Aoko says, "there are three keeping guard around Kaito's room, making sure he can't escape. Two sit outside, and the other sits inside his room."

"Two trained cops outside. Detective Sato will be inside, keeping watch, if the rota in the police station is anything to go by. We need to distract the three of them, if this is going to work."

Aoko nods. She says, "we've got that covered. What else?"

"The materials are ready. You'll find them in that bag," Jii points over to a small messenger bag. It does not bulge, but Aoko knows that's because it's there's only so much hidden inside. "That alright with you?"

It is. Aoko knows that it is. She says, "ok, now to the plan."

"We arrive at hospital for ten o'clock–"

Their first hurdle is getting into the ward.

"Are you ready?" Jii asks, for probably the tenth time, as they head through the main hospital doors. Aoko hums her agreement, before falling into the role that they've come up for themselves.

"Ready to visit your wife, grandfather?" Aoko asks, a smile in her voice. Even though she's wearing a light disguise – her hair shortened, sprayed to be darker than it already is, skin a slightly more tanned shade.

"Of course, I am," Jii responds. He's wearing a disguise too, makeup designed to make him look older, in his seventies at least. "Let's go visit my darling, Mizuki."

Aoko smiles.

And she pushes Jii along in the wheelchair they've brought along. They do not stand out. Anyone who looks towards them, are stuck viewing a girl and her grandfather, the two of them making their way inside the hospital to visit a family member.

Not that getting in to the hospital is the difficult part.

Aoko presses the elevator button, continues light, fake conversation with Jii, and waits for the doors to open. As metal doors open, she glances around, wondering whether she needs to hold the door open for any other patients.

She doesn't see anyone, so she rolls Jii inside, brings the chair to a stop and presses the button for the second floor. Once inside, she lets out a nervous laugh.

"Don't let your guard down," Jii says, if not for the thousandth time. "There are cameras in the elevator as well. It's for patient safety, you see."

Aoko clears her throat, says, "I know that."

"I'm just reminding you," Jii says. "A lot of this plan relies on you, Aoko. We cannot bring the young master home without you doing your part."

"I will," she says. "I know I can do this."

Jii nods his head.

The elevator doors open. Pushing the wheelchair forwards, Aoko steps into the hallway. She takes a deep breath, tightens her grip on the wheelchair's handle and forces herself to take more steps.

The corridor is narrow. There's a bold, blue line in the middle, a pathway that leads them towards the ward they're heading towards. The little guide is a welcome sight. While not needed after hours of memorising the hospital's floor plans, Aoko's glad to know there are little aids for her, if needed.

"…On his first heist," Jii says now, voice low in case anyone turns the corner, joining them on their way to the ward, "…the young master was just as nervous as you are now."

"Right," Aoko says, a small laugh in her voice. "I can't imagine Kaito being anything but confident."

He's just trying to make her feel better, Aoko knows, but the idea of Kaito worrying, nervous and quivering over a heist cheers her up anyway. A smile settles on her face as they walk, the edges quirked up as she continues to think of him in such a manner.

"It's true," Jii insists, although there's a small smile in his voice as well. "It was quite a sight to see."

Gee, Aoko can imagine. She almost wants to keep talking about it, but shakes her head at the last moment. They're almost at the ward after all, and so their conversation turns from Kaito, to the fake Mizuki they are on their way to visit.

(Well, not that the Mizuki they're visiting is fake. They're just not on their way to visit her.)

There's a small button on the wall by the wards entrance. And Aoko presses it, waiting for the intercom to burst into life. It takes a minute of standing around, but Aoko doesn't find herself upset about that, the staff as still busy with their morning routines, will be until about eleven.

When they finally get a response, it's to a staff member saying, "are you a visitor?"

"Yes," Aoko says, "We're here to visit my grandmother, Shido Mizuki?"

There's a pause, and for a moment, it feels almost as if they're going to be denied, as if the staff members already know that Mizuki does not have a granddaughter, only two grandsons, and that her husband resides in a residential home.

Still Aoko holds her ground and forces herself not to be too relieved when the doors buzz open. Pulling on the door and leaving it open enough that she has time to push Jii in without the door slamming on either of them, Aoko lets out a deep breath.

Now, for the hard part.

The inside of the ward is the same it had been yesterday, when Aoko had come to visit.

The nurses station holds only one nurse in it, and Aoko uses the lack of people to read the room numbers, scanning for any empty rooms. There are two so far – one directly opposite Kaito's room, and the other one's a little further down the corridor, on the other side of the staff changing rooms.

"Okay, grandma's this way," she says, pushing Jii in the direction of Shido Mizuki's bay. Her bay has two spare beds, so Aoko pushes Jii into the room, pulls the curtain on the spare bed, and leaves him there, to continue with his end of the plan.

She takes a moment to look Jii in the eye and offers a small smile. "five minutes."

He offers a terse nod.

And Aoko goes in search for a uniform.

They're not difficult to find – yesterday, as she'd been leaving, she'd watched one of the nurses as they'd entered the changing rooms, tried to memorise the number. Now, she pretends that she is the nurse she'd watched yesterday.

Putting in the code to the door – 3579X – she bites into her lip. It opens, and she hopes that no one else is inside that she needs to make awkward conversation with.

Luckily, it's empty.

There are mainly just lockers in the changing rooms, but that's not what Aoko is looking for. No, she's aiming for the shelves of hospital scrubs, the yellow band ones for the medium size that she's got to change into.

Near the side of the room, she finds them.

They're blue. And baggy enough that she'll be able to move quickly in them if she has to.

Aoko really hopes that she won't have to.

The top of her scrubs stops at her elbows. She can't hide anything up her sleeve, seeing as there are no sleeves, but that's okay. Seeing as most of her role requires acting, and less gadgets.

All she has with her, is the messenger bag Jii had passed her earlier. Now, she opens it, pulling out a bin bag filled with tied bedsheets. The bag is yellow, with black stripes, and Aoko puts it to the side of her bag.

Then, she discards the clothes she's changed out of into the messenger bag. Zipping it up, she grabs the strap, glances towards the clock in the changing room and nods her head.

She loops her arm through the bag, lifts the bin bag up as well. And opens the door.

Just in time to deposit both onto the wheelchair as Jii walks past, making his way up towards one of the bays nearer to Kaito's room.

Aoko lets herself smile.

Now all they need are a few distractions.

This is not Jii Konosuke's first heist.

But it is his first time stealing a person, instead of a gemstone. Part of him is nervous, but most of him sees this as just another day's work. First, he had helped with master Toichi, and then he'd helped with master Kaito.

This is just another person to help, another heist in the grand scheme of all the others.

And so, as he wheels a chair into the spare room opposite his current master's hospital room, he treats it as such. Just another situation where he will help a thief come away with that which they want to steal.

He leaves the wheelchair just to the right of the room's door and leans down to look at it. As he does so, takes a mobile phone – something cheap, untraceable until he makes the first call, and types in the number Aoko has passed him.

Sato Miwako.

He can hear her phone go off. It's a horrible ringtone, but Jii supposes most police officers are lacking in good taste. Either way, he waits until she answers, stating her name.

"Detective Sato," Jii says, straining his voice into the vocal range of one of the inspectors on the KID task force, "we've been looking over the KID heist and we managed to get a lead on Kudo Shinichi's whereabouts."

He can practically hear her footsteps, as she paces inside of Master Kaito's room, thinking things over.

Aoko had mentioned that the detective was good at her job. That she's the type of police worker who'll stick always to professionalism. She's also willing to leave her post if she believes that the information she's receiving wouldn't be good for a master thief to hear.

They're weighing their plan on it.

"What kind of information," Sato says, sceptical, "and why isn't this a registered number to the police task force?"

Jii imagines himself as a tired, KID task force investigator, huffs and says, "there was a maintenance issue with some of the phones for us in division two. Since we're just using these old one's from storage, they're not logged in yet."

She's still sceptical, he can hear it in the echo of her footsteps from the other room. So Jii continues, "listen, if you really want, I can head into one of the offices and phone you back, but I'm meant to be in the briefing room pretty quick, so I'll have to skim over a few details."

The footsteps pause.

And then Sato says, "no, it's alright. Let me just move into another room."

She moves to walk into the empty room that Jii is in, pauses as she sees a man fiddling with the footsteps of a wheelchair and makes her way down the hall, into one of the other empty rooms.

Now, Jii begins his fake briefing.

Aoko needs to cause trouble.

She knows that she does, but there's not really anyone around who can help her. So she needs to fake it instead. One of the empty rooms will do – She can find a way to grab the attention of the two police officers waiting outside.

Maybe – yes.

She'll have to talk to them directly.

She walks up to them, brisk, hoping that her faint disguise is enough to throw them off of her identity and tries to look faintly panicked.

"I need some help with de-escalating a patient?" Aoko says, trying to make her voice wobble in just the right way. How freaked out would someone be if needing some help with a difficult patient… as young as she is, a new starter? Aoko's going to go with very.

One of the officers opens his mouth, but Aoko doesn't give him the chance to respond.

"I know it's not your job," she blurts out, "but I was meant to give a blood test – so now they have a needle… And you guys are better trained in this than me."

The concept of a weapon. They offer a nod and follow her as she makes her way down the hall.

To her non-existent patient.

Aoko knows that if she doesn't react quickly enough, she's going to be so screwed. Okay – there are two bays in this ward. Each one housing six patients. If she manages to get them to the furthest bay, then she should be able to give Jii just long enough to get things set up for the next phase of her plan.

The nurses station is empty. Aoko's heart lets out a small cheer.

"It's just down here," she says, and leads them into the bay. "Just there, third on the right."

They step past her, heading up to the closed curtain.

Aoko takes a moment to gather herself, and then, as they lean, hands gripping around the hospital curtains, bolts out of the room. She doesn't listen for their response, instead throws herself down the corridor, until she reaches the nurses station.

As soon as she reaches it, she throws herself to the floor, sliding ever so slightly to a stop. It scuffs her arm, white grazes across her forearms.

"Fuck," she whispers, as she hears footsteps racing back down the corridor.

She can only hope that she's given Jii enough time.

It's at this time that detective Sato finishes her phone call.

Her footsteps echo across the corridor, causing palpitations in the girl hidden behind the nurse's station's desk. Not that she will ever know. It catches the attention of a janitor, who walks past her, a black and yellow bag in his hands, heading to the clinical waste room.

She does not pay the janitor mind, but rather the two police officers who seem unsettled.

"What is it?" She says, her wall quickening to a brisk pace. "What's got you panicked?"

"He's gone," one of them whispers. "KID is gone."

The detective swears. "How?"

"Out the window," the other responds, and Sato follows him into the room. A quick glance around the room shows that it is, in fact, bare of Kaitou KID. Something which irks her all the same.

His bed, previously on the left corner of the room has been dragged sideways, nearer to the open window. On the bars, are tied bed sheets, reinforced more and more.

KID could not have got these by himself. She knows that, which brings Sato into wondering when the equipment had been handed over.

She'd been gone for her phone call, but the two officers had been watching.

Unless…

"The two of you left your post." She declares, turning to look at them. They don't try to deny it, so she continues, "with the three of us distracted, an accomplice helped KID escape. I'll need one of you to get the security footage to see who went inside the room."

One of them nods, and takes his leave, racing towards the doors, making his way to the security room. Then, "and you, that window leads into a courtyard. He can't have been gone that long, and with his injury he won't move quickly. Cut KID off before he leaves the hospital grounds."

The other leaves.

With both officers gone, Sato turns back to the scene. KID left a lot when he'd left, hopefully this will give her an understanding as to how. Leaving evidence… it doesn't seem like him at all.

She steps further into the room, looks out of the window and down. They're on the second floor, so it's a fair climb. But if anyone's capable, she's certain KID could do it.

Except – the thief is injured.

So, it wouldn't be possible.

She takes a step forward, makes her way to the bed, and lowers herself to look at the sheets. They've been tied together, but the knots aren't tight enough, not like they would be if someone had climbed out a window.

And there are no ripped threads, no signs of strain on the sheets at all.

"He didn't climb out of the window."

So, where is he?

She hears a faint cackle from behind her, feminine. It forces her to whip around, and there, with dark hair in a bob, wearing medical scrubs, is who she assumes must be KID.

"With my arm?" KID says, "of course I didn't climb down."

This is not part of the plan.

This is definitely not part of the plan.

Pretending to be Kaito so that Detective Sato won't start searching the room for the real KID – absolutely, 100% not part of the plan. Oh well, Aoko's pretty much screwed now.

And she's pretty sure Sato could beat her in a fight any day.

Okay, Aoko thinks to herself, she's just doing to have to figure things out in her head, very, very quickly.

Aoko is no Kaito. She's not got the skills to fool people into believing one thing when something else is true. She can't perform magic.

She's also not trained like her father. She can't fight back without putting herself at risk of injuring herself. The only fighting she can do is when she used to chase Kaito down with a broom stick.

Wait – chasing. Okay, that's what she'll have to do.

Aoko offers a small wave to Sato, something she's certain Kaito would do, and races down the corridor. If they're going to get Kaito out of the ward, then Aoko's going to have to get Detective Sato out first.

Not part of the plan, she was supposed to go with the others, but Aoko can improvise. She's spent enough time chasing Kaito to know what he's like when running, so she'll flip the board and take his role.

If only for a few minutes.

Aoko's glad that Jii made her memories the plans for the entire hospital and not just this ward, because if he hadn't… her chances would have gone from probably screwed to definitely going to prison for this.

She takes a breath, turns from the detective and sprints down the hall, heading towards the exit. The keypad out, has a simple code – seeing as the staff had told her the code on her way out yesterday, and Aoko can only let out a small sigh of relief as she throws the door open, racing out into the corridor before Sato can grab hold of her.

The door sounds like it slams as it closes behind them, but maybe that's just the sound of Aoko's heart pounding against her chest.

She's got Sato out of the ward.

Now all she needs to do, is lose the detective in the hospital.

Jii heads back into the room.

He brings a wheelchair, and a messenger bag. He doesn't risk closing the door, not on the off chance that someone will come back, looking in the room. No, they're going to have to find their way out of the room within minutes, there's no point alerting people to the fact that people are still inside.

With the wheelchair left by the bed, he heads to the storage cupboard, leaning down to open the both doors.

Inside, is the form of Kuroba Kaito.

"Hello, young master," Jii says, offering a smile. "It seems to have been a while."

Kaito lifts his head up, wide-eyed, as Jii holds out his hand for his young master to take.

"Jii," Kaito says, and then, squinting, "what are you doing here?"

His words are slightly off, for the pain medication, Jii presumes. Looking him up and down, Jii notices a few things.

He's holding onto his left hand tightly, pressing down against what can only be a cotton bud – from where he'd removed the I.V drip – to stem any bleeding. His right upper arm is bandaged, from the bullet that had grazed him days before.

"Doing what I do best, young master," Jii says, offering a smile, "aiding someone with a heist. Now, out you come."

Kaito grabs hold of his hand, leaving behind the cupboard. Once he is stood, Jii returns to the wheelchair, picks up the cushion from the bottom and unzips it. Inside, there are clothes, and a makeup set.

"A heist…" Kaito takes a step forwards as Jii passes the clothes over to him. He looks at the clothes before shrugging his shoulders. There's not point being fussy. "But that doesn't make sense, I only know to hide because of–"

He pauses, understanding swimming among his eyes.

"Because of Nakamori Aoko yes." Jii says, turning away to offer his young master time to change.

"It's her heist." Kaito says, and Jii can practically hear the grin in his voice as he thinks about that. "This is her heist, and she's stealing me."

Jii allows himself a smile. "Yes. But it is still her first heist, so let's help her succeed a little, yes?"

He turns now, glancing at Kaito, the young man dressed the part of an old woman. Kaito nods.

"Let's transform you into Shido Mizuki, a loving grandmother." Jii says.

Aoko runs.

Somewhere on the first floor, she'd thought that she had managed to lose Sato, only for the woman to come out of nowhere, back into her sights.

Already, she's breathless, running out of stamina.

Sato has more training pursuing criminals that Aoko does. It'll be impossible to keep outrunning her for much longer.

Which means she's left with either two options. Keep running until Sato finally tackles her, and realises she's just an accomplice, or, stop running on her own terms.

The second seems like it could be more problematic, but, if she times it correctly, it should work to her favour.

Well, Aoko can hope at least.

Skirting one of the corners, Aoko makes her way towards the centre of the building. It's not the busiest hospital, although that's only really in the wards. On the ground floor, well, that's where most of the people are.

Running on a phone doesn't seem the smartest move, but she needs Jii's assistance, so she brings it from her pocket, holding it in one hand.

It's difficult to run and keep speed up, and Aoko's certain that Sato narrows the gap between them, but this is something she's got to do.

A+E – leave the bag down there.

With the text sent, she grips the phone in her hand, cursing her legs for not being able to run faster. All she needs to do now, is get down the stairwell without Sato getting to close and make her way out into the main reception.

"Stop running, KID," Sato shouts, as if thinking that'll make Aoko stop. "There's nowhere to run."

"Maybe not on this floor, detective," Aoko shouts back, as she bursts into the stairwell. She takes two at a time, realises it's an ineffective way of climbing down stairs, and grabs hold of the banister instead.

Should she try to vault across? No… it seems like a way to be quicker, but one wrong landing and she could sprain her ankle.

Or worse, break her neck.

"Okay," she whispers to herself. Holding the banister, she opts to making larger jumps down the stairwell, two steps widens to four, something that leaves her a little wobbly and nervous of herself but is manageable.

The sound of Sato's footsteps following behind her are probably going to be ingrained into the inside of her skull after this, Aoko just knows it.

"Okay." Aoko whispers, as she leaves the stairwell, "time to lose a tail."

And she stops running.

Detective Sato exits the stairwell and is greeted to the sight of the main reception. It's busy, usually is at this time, but she's not looking around for members of the public, she's looking for a staff member.

Well, a fake staff member.

No one's running through the crowd, so Sato turns her eyes onto anyone walking at a brisk pace. Someone who looks like they're trying to get somewhere and quickly.

One glance at the exit – no, no one is leaving the hospital while in uniform. So KID must have gone somewhere else, where else in this hospital would there be a lot of people?

The accident and emergency department. The emergency room is always filled, is always busy and so it's the best place for someone to lay low, to blend in with the sick. And it's only a few metres away from the reception.

Sato's heartbeat hums in her ears as she makes her way forwards.

The inside of the emergency room gives no immediate clues as to where KID is. Staff come in and out of the room, and Sato looks at them with glaring scrutiny, trying to look for any signs of KID in their movements.

She looks for anyone wearing a bandage on their arm, an injury that's easy to narrow in on. Sato turns, and there – is that Kuroba?

A girl with the similar hair colour as before. The same shape to her face. Could KID have created a brand-new disguise so quickly, if someone had been there to leave the objects? He could.

Sato's eyes flicker to the girl's arm – no bandages.

It's still suspicious, she looks so similar to the disguise Sato had just been pointing out. Even as the girl stops, looking around the room, as if searching for a family member.

Sato's going to talk to her. She's too suspicious.

"Yuno-chan!"

The girl turns her head, glancing towards an elderly couple who's waving her over. "We're over her, my love."

Sato's gaze weighs onto the elderly couple, but there's nothing strange with them. One is in a wheelchair, and the other is sat beside her, although he stands up as the girl makes her way towards them.

Not KID, Sato thinks, turning back to the rest of the department. She'll just have to keep searching.

They leave through the front entrance of the hospital.

Jii pushes the wheelchair. Aoko holds her grandmother's hand, as they make their way to the machines to pay for parking. As Jii leaves to get the ticket renewed, she leans down to Kaito, trying not to laugh at the disguise he's wearing.

"You've certainly aged," Aoko says, looking across at him.

"I feel very wise," he replies, not bothering to disguise his voice this time. There's no one around after all, there's no point in it. "Although I must say, I prefer being a teenager."

Watching a deep, young male voice come out of the mouth of an elderly woman is too much for Aoko to bear. She burst into giggles, wipes tears away from her eyes.

"Of course, you do," Aoko whispers, "I prefer you that way to."

And then, before Kaito can say anything she adds: "If you're feeling wiser, maybe you know the difference between you and KID now, then?"

The smile Kaito had been wearing is quickly replaced with a grimace. Exasperation melds into the curve of his eyebrows, the scrunching of his nose.

"…I don't."

"You do," Aoko says now, standing up. It's soft this time, when she states that he does. "But maybe not consciously. That's fine, I don't mind telling you now."

Kaito lets out a deep breath. "What's the difference?"

"When you were KID," Aoko says, reaching down with her hand to interlock her fingers with his once more, "you only pushed people away. You didn't want to get them involved in everything, so you were so distant. And you… you never asked me for help in anything."

"Aoko…"

"But as Kaito… when we met again at your house, you didn't push me away, you asked for help."

"I didn't–"

She squeezes his hand, and says, "you asked me to deliver a heist notice. That was helping. Listen, I know it's not much, but it was a difference and it means a lot to me."

Kaito bites his lip.

Aoko decides she can't push it, not here in the car park. She steps away, lets their hands drop, and waits until Jii leads them back to the car. Then, after they've buckled Kaito in one of the back seats, they fold the wheelchair up and throw it in the trunk.

Aoko joins Kaito in the back. And as the car roars to life, she reaches forward to peel away the disguise they'd hastily applied to his face.

He looks much better like himself.

"Wait," Kaito says, as he watches the hospital go out of view. He turns, "Aoko – you disguise wasn't as defined as Jii's… if they run your face on facial recognition… they'll know it was you."

Aoko offers him a smile, "I know."

"You'll be… Aoko, they'll catch you." He seems panicked now, pale as he leans forward to look at her. "Your freedom."

"I told you yesterday," Aoko says, leaning forward and lifting his chin up so she's looking in his eyes, "you're not going to like what happens next. And yet, here we are."

Kaito glances away, guilty. "Why would you…?"

"You said I could have it, no matter how broken it was," Aoko says, leaning a hand down to put it over his chest, listening to the heart beat. "Well, you can have mine in return."

"Maybe," Kaito says, "but you didn't need to–"

"Kaito," Aoko says, trying not to let too much emotion filter into her voice. "I did. You think that if I were free and you the only one running from police, then they wouldn't use me as a way to get to you?"

"You didn't have to do this for me." Kaito says, although now, she can see a faint glimmer in his eye, as if he's glad that she did. Despite all the worry that she's probably already brought him.

She reaches forward, cups his head up and brings her lips to his. Kaito lips, slightly parted, lift upwards into a smile as she presses against them, the two of them smiling, as she wraps her arms around his neck.

Aoko feels breathless in a new way, like the adrenaline from the heist they've just completed is electrifying her body, and she knows that Kaito's probably feeling the same.

She wants more, but she leans back anyway. There will be time for more later, but now, she settles for shuffling back in her seat, leaning her head on his shoulder.

"I didn't," Aoko admits, "but I don't want to be free if you can't have it too."

The author really appreciates comments.