Summary: In which escape is a popular concept, and Kaito makes a deal.
Seven days pass without a word on Kudo.
Kaito tries to ask other prisoners of his whereabouts, but they refuse to talk, tell him that they'd much rather not deal with the consequences their rumours cause. He is not given any answers from staff either. Some guards laugh his question off, asking if he's wondering how long his safety will last. Others shut him down and tell him that it's none of his business.
Slowly, Kaito comes to the conclusion that Kudo is either dead, or has escaped.
He considers the possibility of the other being in the infirmary - maybe to check his throat and make sure there's no lasting damage to his trachea - but Kudo's not there when he checks. He glances around anyway, during his routine check up, BMI taken by the infirmary's nurse, but the ex-detective isn't there.
By day eight, Kaito finds himself hoping that Kudo has escaped.
He's not sure how he'd respond if he found out that the other man was dead - not when he'd only been talking to him hours prior to his disappearance.
Unease transforms into anxiety, and Kaito finds himself staring at the walls of his cell more often than not. There's only one way, really, for him to find out about Kudo's status. He needs to escape.
If Kaito's right, and Kudo has broken out of the prison, then the media will be covering it with such ferosity that the entirety of Japan will be on the lookout for him. All he has to do is break out and find the nearest news outlet, which - well, if Kaito takes Kudo's advice and looks in all the right places…
Plus, on the outside he can get back to finding Pandora, performing his magic during his heists. He plans heist notes in his head, wonders whether Inspector Nakamori will continue to solve them if he sends them out, or whether the KID task force will be headed by someone without personal ties to the case.
Not for the first time, Kaito wonders whether he's ruined Inspector Nakamori's career. He doubts he's been fired - but he's almost certainly his capture has thrown a cog into the works, leading him able to progress on to a promotion in the future.
Either way, Kaito knows he needs to get out.
Kudo was right, he can't be both reckless and free. So Kaito chooses freedom, and he plans.
His plans aren't too complex, because sometimes, the simple plans are the most efficient.
Kaito needs to find something to break out of his cell. The lock keeping him trapped is a deadlock - complex yet without an alarm - but with his experience opening Samizu Kichiemon's puzzles, Kaito thinks he can have it open within seconds.
This, he decides he can think about later. For now, he needs to find out about the patrol schedules and come up with an escape route. And then he needs to find something that he can wear over his overalls to avoid the colour being seen.
He said it before, people tend to over look what they are not expecting to see.
"Okay…" Kaito says, brows furrowed. "I can do this."
By the end of the eighth day of Kudo's disappearance, Kaito has the beginning of a plan. It is less like solving a puzzle, and more like creating a masterpiece. Anyone can solve a puzzle with enough time, but only the best can create with depth, and his escape will be art.
The ninth day includes adding the fine details. His hour outside is used with a determination filling his stomach as he judges which part of the yard he should run to be quickest. He makes a mental note of the entrance to the gatehouse, and the vent that is outside it.
He does't mind exactly where it takes him - he knows that the gatehouse isn't patrolled as much as each cell block, and even then, that's only during the day when prisoners are being fed into the system, or lead into the visiting room. If he gets inside the gatehouse, he'll simply have to improvise.
There's no way to know the layout inside, so Kaito focuses on what he does know.
He returns to the nurse at her request, escorted by the guard Kaito has seen talking to Kudo many times, to receive his results from his tests. He's fine, except for a blood sugar level that's lower than it usually is - Kaito doesn't explain that it's probably just his body reacting to the lack of sugary content.
As she's giving him a shot of glucagon, ("this should do the trick, but you'll have to come back soon to make sure you're back at the average levels"), Kaito notices the hair grips in her hair. It's wouldn't be so difficult to get a few, and… well…
His plan starts to come to life.
It is not until he is sat back in his cell, the evening approaching lights out, that Kaito curses himself for not questioning the guard for any information on routine patrols. Hiding the hair grips he's managed to take beneath clumps of his own hair, Kaito stands, lying back on his bunk, waiting for the guard change over to finish.
After five minutes, he grows bored, and decides to prepare instead. His blanket is a dark navy blue, and he plans to bring it with him to cover the white t-shirt and green overalls he's been issued as prison uniform. He'll wear it as soon as he leaves his cell, shrouding himself to blend in with the darkness.
By the time the lights go out, Kaito has gone over his plan multiple times, adding and subtracting details as he goes to make it as effective as possible.
He needs to get to the west workshop near B-block before he makes his way to the gatehouse, needs to pick up a screwdriver to unbolt the vent outside. It shouldn't take long, and the lock will be child's play compared to his cells deadlock.
"Okay," Kaito breathes, pulling the hair grips from his hair. He bends two into something resembling a pick, keeping the third in his hair on the off chance that one might break. Then, after wrapping himself in his blanket, Kaito makes his way to the cell door, jimmying the grips in the lock until he hears a faint click.
Keeping them in place with one hand, he pulls the handle up, opening the cell just wide enough to squeeze through. Then, he closes the cell door again, throwing the grips into his overall pockets.
The laundry shoot, Kaito knows, is on the third floor, near the staircase. It's wide enough that Kaito will be able to fit in it, making his way down to a room just outside the cells. From there, he just needs to unlock the door outside of the laundry room and make his way out into the yard.
Each step is riddled with uncertainty - instead of wearing his shoes, Kaito moves barefoot, shoes in hand to avoid any cracking of soles against the floor.
Moving quickly enough to avoid the sight of any prisoners that might catch notice of him, yet slowly enough that they do not see him moving, Kaito makes his way to the end of the corridor.
The moment he reaches the steps, he leans forward peering through the gaps. There aren't many guards patrolling the actual block, just two or three nearby the exit, illuminated by their torches.
He sneaks down the staircase, and lets out a sigh of relief when he realises none of the torches moved towards him. He lingers, ears listening out for any footsteps, as he readies himself to climb into the shoot. Glancing down, inky blackness greets him, daring him to jump down and embrace it.
A giddy feeling wells inside of him.
Kaito holds his breath, and disappears into the dark.
He lands in a hamper of dirty bed sheets.
For a moment, he relaxes, letting a laugh bubble up from where it's been trapped within lungs, breathless and ecstatic. In the next, he smothers the sound, pulling himself out of the hamper and scuttling forwards to the exit.
He smiles, retrieves the hair grips from his pocket and unlocks the door.
There are several differences to being outside during the day and being outside during the night.
The thing about being attacked by the wind during the early hours of the morning, when the sky is black, freckled with thousands of stars, is that it is liberating. It is whispers in his ear telling him he should be indoors sleeping until the morning comes back for him. It is ignoring the messages of melatonin in his blood telling him he should rest, despite how alive the night makes him feel.
Having rain spit out at him during the dark is like collecting secrets in a jar for later use, drinking them up and revelling in them until he's had his fix.
For Kaito, standing beneath the moonlight is addictive.
Even when the moon is not full, even when it's waning and has left him behind.
Still, he loves it, this feeling that he cannot share with anyone else. It makes his heart thump against his chest, makes him feel alive in the only way that matters, and for a split second, Kaito forgets about escape and wishes only to stand staring up at the moon in wonder.
Then he remembers where his is - reminds himself that the moon will still be there when he is outside the prison gates. It doesn't take him long, then, to spur back into action.
He glances up at the walk ways, trying to see where each guard is - he counts five patrolling the perimeter, and thinks that it's probably best to stay nearer to the prison walls so less can see him. His gaze follow beams of light designed to hunt him and anyone else brave enough to try to escape down. He time each sweep of the beam across the yard, and attempts to figure when the best time to run is.
He waits…
Shuffles across to the wall, and waits.
And then - now.
Kaito sprints, eyes narrow as he glances towards the west workshop. He needs to find that screw driver and it needs to be found quickly before anyone notices his absence in his cell. The blanket that he's covered himself in ripples around him, making him feel more like a ghost than a convict attempting to flee.
For a second he almost feels like a phantom again.
Gasping for air, he reaches the west workshop, hides behind one of the walls while light bathes the entrance. He catches his breathe, and as soon as the light moves again, he races back towards the door, jamming the hair grips into the door, haste making him sloppy as he opens the door. Luckily, even his sloppy work is quick.
He closes the door behind him seconds before the light returns, crouching out of sight of the windows and crawling towards one of the workbenches. He quite likes the workshop, even if he can't create anything outrageous, simply because it demands each prisoner to be innovative.
So far, he's seen someone make a 3-D model of a boat out of broken chopsticks, another person creating a replica of a race car out of match sticks.
It's brilliant, Kaito thinks, how much the mind is capable of when it's left without anything to do.
He picks up a screwdriver from one of the benches, gripping it tightly as he unbends the hair grips, threading them back into his hair. He contemplates for a moment whether he will have enough time to unscrew all four screws within the time he had between the lights hitting him, and doubts it.
When he races outside, he keeps the workshop unlocked, sprints towards the vent and tries to undo the first screw irregardless. It's surprisingly easy to unscrew, and while he pockets the screw, Kaito keeps an eye on the lights.
Before it can come back to expose him, Kaito throws himself back inside the workshop, gasping for air. He continues this until the grate is open. As he crawls inside, leaving the grate by the entrance, Kaito pulls himself forwards, biting his lip as he realises - he does not exactly have a plan for if the other grate is also screwed on too tightly.
Eh, he thinks, he's got a screwdriver now, it's nothing he can't handle.
The vent leads him into the prison's visit room. It is empty, and Kaito has to stop himself from letting out a cheer as he places the vent back into place.
With a grin, he stands, turns his head and makes his way to the door Hakuba had left out of.
He waves for a moment, at the camera's he walks past - because if the camera's are going to pick him up anyway, then he's going to have to wear the mask of KID and smile at them all.
It is almost as if he has performed a magic trick without needing to create any false illusions.
"Okay," he whispers to himself, making his way out of the door and down towards the exit. He pauses for a moment when he realises that the initial door leads into a small room, which then leads outside. If Kaito's right, then only one can be open at a time, and it requires the press of a button from the reception.
"Dammit", Kaito hisses, and returns back to the visitors room, squinting around for any rooms labelled 'staff only'. It's difficult to see in the dark, so he has to check each door individually. Eventually, he finds it.
It is labelled 'no entry', and Kaito, rule breaker that he is, completely ignores it and breaks in.
And is met with the scowl of one the guards.
"Shit."
He is thrown into solitary confinement for two days, limbs jerking with electricity, mind racing with a strange euphoria.
Maybe he didn't escape this time, but if he keeps improving with every attempt, well - then Kaito really will be able to free himself someday.
If only they'd stop fucking tasing him.
After two days of boredom, staring at the wall and replaying memory after memory, coming up with countless designs for future heists, Kaito is released.
They release him shortly before lights out, probably to keep him disorientated - even though they have drugs for that.
Which he doesn't really know how to respond to. All he knows is that they want him to take sleeping pills every night to make sure he's not alert enough to break out again.
The first two days he takes them, tries to teach himself what the effects feel and look like, so that he can emulate them when he next attempts to leave. If it makes them lower their guards…
Either way, he's tired by the time he is paraded back into his cell, eyelids drooping. He's so tired, it's easy to forget the pain that is painted into every crevice of solitary confinement, the tiny laughs that echo ongoing anxieties.
People, Kaito knows, are social creatures - him more so than anyone, he needs a crowd as opposed to people and his skin itches more so every day that passes without one - and solitary takes advantage of it.
"Stay inside this time," his guards growl, and Kaito suppresses a grin when he realises he still has hair grips buried beneath his hair, waiting to be used again.
"Let me guess… Tramadol?"
It takes him a lot more time than it should to realise the cell isn't empty.
"Kudo-kun!" Kaito turns to him, eyes widening. "You're not dead!"
The other man raises an eyebrow, "…why would I be dead?"
Kaito shakes his head, lets out a small laugh and attempts to climb up to his bunk. It takes him a second longer than usual, and he hears Kudo's choked laughter behind him, but soon he is sat on him bed, squinting over at Kudo.
"You were gone over a week." Kaito says. "And I tried to escape."
"Solitary confinement is a thing…" Kudo sighs, exasperation echoing in his voice, "seriously, didn't anyone tell you I was there?" He pauses. "And let me guess, you made more progress this time?"
Kaito hums his agreement.
"Listen…" Kudo says, his voice quiet. Kaito doesn't turn to him, but he can hear desperation echoing in his voice. He wonders whether it is genuine. "I can help you get out of here, if you really want to go. But I want to go too."
Kaito pauses, closes his eyes. Even with exhaustion weighing down on him, seeping into every bone, his mind races at the proposition. Firstly, Kudo is smart - he's obviously intelligent enough to match Kaito, and if he's capable of getting information from guards, then he'd be a valuable asset.
But he's also a murderer - is it right to say yes?
Is it smart to say no?
"We work together until we're free," Kaito decides, "from there, we go our separate ways."
Hopefully, this will give him enough time to get under the radar. Hopefully, the police will prioritise serial killer over a phantom thief.
"Of course," Kudo says, and from across the room, Kaito doesn't need to see him to know he is smiling. "It's a deal."
The author very much so enjoys comments.