Summary: In which there is a phone call, and someone asks 'why'?
"Hello?"
The voice is low, and feminine, with an all too familiar lilt of playfulness that Kaito has come to miss. It echoes in his ears, replaying over and over until he forces himself to speak.
"Aoko."
Another pause, as he waits to see whether she will hang up or not. He won't blame her if he does, will sit back and accept it - but if Hakuba told the truth during his visit… then Aoko has been waiting for this call for a while. She won't end it so quickly.
"Kaito!" She cries, emotion overwhelming her voice before quickly turning to irritation, "you idiot, you should have called sooner!"
Kaito feels a smile worm it's way onto his face, relief jittering through every synapse in his body. Joy bubbles up from his throat until eventually he is laughing, tears in his eyes. He's been worried over this? Over talking to Aoko, his greatest friend?
"…Is everything okay?" Aoko asks when he stops laughing, finally succeeding in smothering his emotions, forcing himself back to one piece.
"I'm just… really glad that you picked up," Kaito admits, leaning against the phone booth, brushing his hand up and down the phone's cable. It's short - probably so prisoners can't use it as a weapon - the cable thin enough that with big enough scissors he'd be able to cut through. "And that you haven't hung up yet."
Aoko lets out a small laugh - it is a nervous bell-like sound as if she's suddenly realised where he is, who he is. "Aoko still might, if all you're going to do is laugh at her."
"Okay, okay," Kaito says, "I'll quit laughing. Just… catch me up with you, how's everything going?"
There is a pause on the other side of the phone, and the background music halts, stopping with a small shudder as Aoko presses the off button.
"Aoko was just doing her homework," she says, "it's difficult maths, mechanics - Aoko thinks you would enjoy it. School isn't too chaotic, although everyone in class cannot get over the fact that you're-"
Kaito wants to tell her that she shouldn't falter, that she should just call him Kaitou KID and get used to the fact that they're both the same. Wants to say that KID will always be his alter ego, that he claims it as his own with pride.
He doesn't.
"Yeah…" He mumbles instead, hand tightening over the phone. He sighs, "how's… my mum, is she okay?"
"Aoko's not sure." She breathes uncertainty, and it is sad in the same way that snow is cold. It freezes him, leaves him shuddering as he waits for any more information. "the last time Aoko saw her, she was trying to find a buyer for your house, said that she couldn't bare staying in it."
Kaito stops breathing. His mother wants to sell their home? She wants to throw away the last place his dad lived, throw away the memories of Kuroba Toichi that live beneath the floorboards in his own secret room?
"She can't sell the house," Kaito says.
Aoko sighs, "you're mother doesn't spend any time in Japan, and since you can't live there anymore…"
Kaito heaves out a sigh and pushes the thought away for later. The fact that home isn't going to be there for him when he leaves - not that he'd considered going back, that'd be a stupid place to escape to - isn't something that he'd ever considered. What will his mother do with all of her father's equipment?
"I get it," Kaito says, even if he doesn't. It shouldn't matter if they can return there, as long as it remains a possibility. "Don't worry about it."
"You're not mad?" Aoko asks. Knowing her, she's sat back, frowning across at the photo of the two of them she keeps on her desk, imagining which expression he's wearing. She's seen them all - well, almost all, over the years so she should have a faint idea.
"A gentleman never gets man at the middle man," Kaito grins, before falling short. Because - well, that sounds more like KID than it does Kaito. He hopes that Aoko will overlook it, glance away from it like she used to glance away from the subtle similarities between the two personalities, but she doesn't.
Instead, there is a very audible intake of air, not quite a gasp, but not simply breathing. It's almost as if Kaito can hear her simmering on the other side of the phone, bubbling anger ready to explode.
"Aoko-"
"I want to talk to Kaito." Aoko whispers, her voice grave, "not to KID."
Kaito takes a deep breath, pulls at the collar of his shirt when he feels like he's being strangled. It doesn't help, not when it's his own words that are suffocating him. She knows - Aoko knows that he is both and neither. She should know he is just a canvas worn by both.
"They're both me Aoko." He says, helplessness seeping into his voice, "KID and Kaito… we're the same, I'm both of them."
"No," Aoko says. "They're different. Kaito is my best friend, whereas KID is the reason behind so much pain. There's a difference."
"There isn't!"
"Yes there is!" Her voice rises to a shout, leaving behind a silence and a bullet sized wound where Kaito's sure his heart should be. "And until you learn to separate the two, Aoko doesn't want to talk to you."
Kaito's voice transforms into a plea, "I can't just separate two parts of myself. Aoko-"
Kaito grits his teeth, resists the urge to slam the phone back onto the receiver. It feels, almost as if there is something within him dying - but he doesn't have the time to mourn it. He just needs to bury it, try to deal explain to Aoko in a way so she'd understand.
Maybe if he tells her everything-
The background noise cuts out. The line goes dead.
And Aoko is gone.
Kudo doesn't ask him about it, even though Kaito can see that he wants to.
Another day passes, and Kaito thanks every possible god he can that he will only have to deal with 56 more days at the most before the two of them are free again.
Already he's tired of working on laundry duty, sick of remembering to empty the lint filters every time he throws a new batch of clothes into the dryer. Sick of folding and giving out clothes to other people - he doesn't understand why Kudo thinks this is important to help them escape.
"What are we doing here?" He sighs after he's folded another set of blankets, placing them over to the rack where they will be given out to other prisoners. "There's no point to this."
Kudo grins, shaking his head. He seems a lot more relaxed than Kaito is, folding the ends of blankets with a careful precision. He says, "there's a lot of points behind all of this. You're just not seeing them because you're still moping."
"I'm not having this conversation with you again," Kaito huffs, "just tell me why we're doing this."
Smirking, Kudo places his blanket down, brushes out the creases and moves to do the same with another. As he does, he glances at the thief, eyes dancing with something akin to mischief. He says, "did you know this is the place where most things get smuggled into the prison?"
Oh. Oh.
"Well… how would we get anything smuggled in, huh?" Kaito hisses. He knows that he could ask Jii for help, but he'd told the man before that they would have to go their separate ways if Kaito was ever caught. He wonders what the old man's doing now. "I don't have any-"
"Then aren't you glad we're working together?" Kudo laughs, "I'm lucky to have someone who's able to bring stuff in for me. We place whatever we need for our escape in these blankets, smuggle it into our room and then, we've got we need for when we're ready to head off."
The idea of the ex-detective having allies in a place like this isn't actually that strange. He has a kind of superficial charm that he expels, eyes that are far too wise and experienced to seem anything but trusting. Even knowing that he shouldn't, Kaito wants to trust him.
"That guard you always talk to," Kaito guesses. He's seen them, talking to one another often. Kudo talks to other guards too, but it's always with an air of hostility, superiority rolling off him in waves.
Kudo hesitates, waits a moment, before nodding. "Oto-san yes. It'll take him time, but he'll get us whatever we need. Provided he can get it past the metal detectors he has to go through when getting into work."
"How'd you manage to get a guard in your pocket, huh?" Kaito asks. He scowls at the blanket he's been trying to fold for over a minute, but ultimately he feels hope climbing up his spine.
"I didn't," Kudo says, taking the final blanket from his pile, leaning against the counter when he is finished. "He's one of my father's contacts."
It is not private that Kudo Shinichi is the son of novelist Kudo Yuusaku. For as long as he can remember, Kaito has passed the man's mystery novels every time he's been inside a bookshop. His books are bestsellers, each one containing a plot more overwhelming than the last. He'd help solve murders with the police in the past, long before his son had started his own detective career.
Kaito had thought that the father and son duo didn't talk. The only visitor Kudo seems to get is that one female - Ran he'd called her - so naturally Kaito had assumed…
"My father is not in a position where he can openly support me," Kudo says, snatching the blanket from Kaito's useless hands, "so I have Oto-san as a go between instead."
Frowning Kaito says, "Your father wants you to escape?"
Kudo purses his lips but after a moment, he grins. "My parent's don't exactly believe that I killed those people." He shrugs. "I understand that, it's a hard thing for a lot of people to accept. That six people are dead because of me, well-"
For a split moment, Kaito hesitates.
From what he knows, Kudo Yuusaku does not make mistakes. Is there something odd about Kudo's case that makes his guilt unbelievable? Or is it the delusional thoughts of a father unable to believe that the son he has raised is capable of creating such a bloody scene, victims slashed and left skewered against the walls?
"Did you?"
Kudo's eyes widen, shock erasing whatever amusement he'd been feigning. He looks away from Kaito at first, at the window, the door, anything that is not the thief before turning back. He meets his eyes, lips thin a taut smile on his face.
"Did I what?" It's almost chilling how different his voice sounds. It's not usual irritated response he normally throws at Kaito during the day, nor is it the argumentative tone he wears around guards and their fellow prisoners.
No, this is the voice of someone who's swelling with resentment. Kaito takes a step back at the sudden change in Kudo's expression, the way his brows draw together into a glower.
"Did you really kill them?" Kaito doesn't even know why he's asking. The way he's reacting - isn't this practically a confession? But would a serial killer really be angry about him bringing up his crimes, wouldn't he be more thrilled to talk about them?
Kudo's shoulders tense, and once again he turns away. "I'm certainly… responsible for their deaths."
Kaito doesn't breathe.
"But did I actually kill them?" He glance back with a self-deprecating smile, his eyes far away but his body language more welcoming than it had been previously, "well… There's not a trace of blood on my hands."
There is nothing Kaito can do but blink.
"Although, that's for you to take however you want." Kudo says, turning away. "I'm pretty sure most of the people in this joint claim they're innocent. Actually, KID, you might be the only guilty person here."
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