The third time they met, Hakuba Saguru caught him.
He'd been looking for the Cyote Kid.
... sort of.
He knew that the Kid travelled disguised as a woman now, a fact that he was pretty sure that no one else was aware of. He also knew he probably should have passed that information on to some of the others trying to capture the Cyote Kid as well, such as Hattori Heiji and Kudo Shin'ichi, but it was kind of nice having a lead on them. That and Kudo Shin'ichi was definitely missing. No one knew where he was.
Rumour also had it that there was something going on with Hattori Heiji as well, but no one was quite sure of what. The Detective of the West was being exceedingly secretive, something out of character for the loud detective.
So when Saguru travelled, he kept an eye on the women travelling, something that he learned to do subtly after a rather lousy incident with a young woman and her over-protective beau.
It was not an incident he cared to repeat.
Fortunately, not one that he had been anticipating to repeat in the Stagecoach between Kobe and Kyoto. While it had been... entertaining to referee the match between the rivalling Kohnan and Ohgane Clans, he was looking forward to reaching Kyoto and hopefully from there, home.
Constant travel was exhausting.
There were four other people in the stagecoach with him, a pair of bickering young teenagers that he had thought were brother and sister until they introduced themselves as Kurogane Yaiba and Mine Sayaka, and they were Just Friends, Thank You Very Much.
She was carrying what looked like a squeaking sea cumber and a spiked frog rode with him. A very large striped tiger and a huge vulture also appeared to be following them around as well.
He sat -across- the stagecoach from them.
Next to the two teenagers was a skinny elderly man with one of the biggest, fullest moustaches he had ever seen. And laughed a lot. And carried around a large glass jar that made noises like someone was dropping coins into it despite the fact that no one could see anyone putting coins into it. He hadn't caught the older man's name and considered himself somewhat fortunate for that.
And sitting next to him was an elderly gentleman who had pleasantly introduced himself as Kounosuke Jii, told them in a high wavery voice it was an honour to meet them all, then crossed his arms, braced himself against the seat in a manner that bespoke of much time spent travelling, and promptly fell asleep.
Saguru figured he was the only other sane person in the stagecoach.
Time passed, and he had entertained himself by reading Kudo Yusaku's latest Night Baron mystery and solving it before he reached the end. By that time, the other teenagers had finally wore themselves out talking and fell asleep, curled up against each other, the sea cucumber and frog resting on top of them like strange twitching plushies. So he pulled out his notes to review the latest titbit of Cyote Kid information he'd learned.
The Kid did have a gun. That shot, out of all the improbable things, playing cards.
He was trying to figure out how a gun could shoot something that could technically be considered wadding for black powder when Kounosuke startled him slightly by suddenly waking up with a startled jerk.
They stared at each other for a moment before the elderly man yawned and asked what time it was. He fished his pocketwatch out of his vest watch pocket and told him. He took a moment to fondly run a finger over the top of it, emblazoned with his family crest, a dancing white horse, before slipping it back into it's proper spot.
Kounosuke noticed and chuckled fondly at him.
"A present from my Grandfather." He explained. It had been a gift when he first went to school, most likely to assure that he would get to his classes on time. But it was a good watch, and never lost time.
... Unless he forgot to wind it.
"Ah." Kounosuke nodded. "A very good one too at that."
The stagecoach hit a bump, sending the papers in his lap flying as they hastened to brace themselves. The teenagers stirred for a moment, readjusting themselves before falling back to sleep, the frog and the sea-cumber pulling out a miniature deck of cards and playing a game on top of their slumbering forms. Saguru pointedly ignored this. If he didn't see it, he didn't have to try to figure it out.
"Master Toichi's card gun." Kounosuke commented, handing him notes that had fallen to the seat between them. "A fine piece of working art, that is."
"Master Toichi?" He echoed. Kuroba Kaito's father?
The elderly man nodded. "Kuroba Toichi. I used to travel with him and his family, before his supposed accident."
He pounced upon that scrap of information. "Supposed accident?" He echoed. "You mean it wasn't an accident the first Kid died?"
"Goodness, no. Was no more an accident than someone reaching over and killing a pesky fly with shoe." Kounosuke bristled a bit. "Was those bastards in black, getting rid of an annoyance to their organization."
"Kaito warned me about them..." He mused, remembering their first meeting, when he thought of the wild hair boy as a friend, before he had learned of the Kid. He'd heard vague rumours since then, but nothing concrete. Whoever they were, they were more ellusive to track down than the Cyote Kid. "Told me to keep an eye out for them."
The man with the jar snorted, stirring in his sleep, and they both paused, realising that he was dressed in black as well. Then the moment passed, and they resumed their conversation in hushed tones.
"Wise words." Kounosuke commented quietly. "There were people in black slinking around our tents before Master Toichi's last performance. Officially, his death was an accident when one of the horses in the acts became startled by a wasp and threw Master Toichi before trampling him."
"My god..." Saguru breathed. No wonder the Kid was phobic of horses. "Kaito saw the whole thing, didn't he?"
"The horse charged at him after Master Toichi stopped moving." Kounosuke said sadly. "He escaped with a few cuts and bruises, and a nasty blow to the head." The elderly man tapped the temple of his left eye, where his left eye was a medium blue, while his right was a slightly darker hue. "The horse ran away after that. When it was finally stopped, I found several slivers of wood covered in an strange liquid in the blanket on the horse. They had been digging into the normally gentle creature's hide and driving it insane."
Saguru felt sick. "So that's why he took up his father's mantle."
"Master Kaito didn't know about his father's activities at the time." Kounosuke looked faintly sad. "I can only surmise that he discovered recently, and took up his father's cause."
Heralding the return of the Kid after an eight year disappearance. "Stealing and returning gold?" He raised an eyebrow.
"Stopping the men who killed his father." Kounosuke corrected gently, a small smile on his face. "They killed Master Toichi for his interference, after all. Or so I believe."
Saguru frowned slightly, his brain turning over these latest bits of information and fitting them into the puzzle of the Cyote Kid. It felt right... but it also felt like he was missing pieces of the puzzle. He still didn't understand why the thief stole.
The teenagers woke up shortly after that, insisting to join the card game the frog and sea-cumber were in and Kounosuke drifted back to sleep.
He never did figure out how the sea-cumber held on to the cards.
The rest of the trip passed by in the haze of travel and unending bumps, and he was more than happy to finally reach Kyoto and the hotel's soft beds.
Only once there, he found himself unable to relax to sleep. His mind was too full, the mystery getting too dark. It settled uneasily in his stomach.
He'd finally pulled on his coat and shoes, deciding to take a walk to clear his head. He hadn't gotten more than a block when a cry went up from the other side of town that the Cyote Kid had just robbed the bank.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a white shadow flash past the gap between the houses behind him.
He took off running. "HALT!" He shouted, darting between the houses to the side street where the Kid was running pell-mell down the back alley.
The thief, of course, ignored him as he wrestled with the white cape on his back which was apparently not cooperating with him.
As he ran, Saguru spotted a lariat resting on a back post and scooped it up as he ran, the rough woven rope biting into his the skin on his fingers. The coil of rope loosened in his grip as he grabbed for loop at the end when he remembered a very important fact.
He still hadn't learned how to toss a lasso.
Never one for setbacks, he did the next best thing he could think of, tossing the entire bundle of rope at the Kid. It struck him on the back of the legs, tripping the lanky boy and tangling in his legs, causing him to crash into the ground.
Kid hit the ground hard and Saguru winced as he heard the grunt as the wind was knocked out of the thief's lungs. The dark haired boy rolled on to his back, a wheeze in his breath as he sat up to free his legs from the tangle of rope.
Saguru closed the distance between them, grabbing his shirt and pulling him upright. The thief's eyes flickered to the rooftops above them, as if gauging how easily he could climb up there, when a shadow flickered across his face.
The Cyote Kid raised his hands in surrender, his mismatched eyes sparkling with resigned mirth and a weak grin on his face, even as the shouts and pounding footsteps of the townsfolk closed in around them.
"The duster suits you better than that giant coat I first met you in." The dark haired boy said genuinely as the local sheriff ran up, grabbing the raised wrists.
Things became chaotic then, as the sheriff escorted Kaito away and people crowded around him noisily, talking and laughing and patting him on the back.
He just stood there, feeling unsettled as he realised...
He'd never gotten to ask his question.
-fin-
Kurogane Yaiba and Mine Sayaka and the animals are from one of Gosho's earlier series, Yaiba. The frog and the sea-cumber are actually two of eight youkai that were sent to kill them by Yaiba's rival Onimaru. (who is trying to take over the world) Those two youkai end up joining Yaiba, and the sea-cumber often travels in Sayaka's blouse/cleavage.
Ran has a charm on the end of her cellphone of the same sea-cumber, by the way. ^__^
The old man with the coin jar, Kohnan and Ohgane are references to another one of Gosho's earlier series, Yoban Saato, or Third Base Fourth.
The old man's kinda like a jinn, he grants their wishes of being able to play baseball like they want to with a bat and a glove. In order to channel the abilities they want to use, they have to put money in their back pocket. The money then magically falls into the coin jar the old man carries with him.
Kohnan and Ohgane are the names of the baseball teams the two boys who make a deal with him play on. You see them in Detective Conan vol. 43 & 44
Give us time, and we'll eventually throw in references to 'Goshow Presents' as well! XD
I'm not sure that was actually Jii who was talking with Saguru, or Kaito dressed as Jii. Sorry.
No clue where the whole Horse/Toichi's death thing came from, it just showed up. Much like the rest of this fic. ^^;;
Next Chapter:
"The fourth time they met, Hakuba Saguru saw him hang."
He'd been looking for the Cyote Kid.
... sort of.
He knew that the Kid travelled disguised as a woman now, a fact that he was pretty sure that no one else was aware of. He also knew he probably should have passed that information on to some of the others trying to capture the Cyote Kid as well, such as Hattori Heiji and Kudo Shin'ichi, but it was kind of nice having a lead on them. That and Kudo Shin'ichi was definitely missing. No one knew where he was.
Rumour also had it that there was something going on with Hattori Heiji as well, but no one was quite sure of what. The Detective of the West was being exceedingly secretive, something out of character for the loud detective.
So when Saguru travelled, he kept an eye on the women travelling, something that he learned to do subtly after a rather lousy incident with a young woman and her over-protective beau.
It was not an incident he cared to repeat.
Fortunately, not one that he had been anticipating to repeat in the Stagecoach between Kobe and Kyoto. While it had been... entertaining to referee the match between the rivalling Kohnan and Ohgane Clans, he was looking forward to reaching Kyoto and hopefully from there, home.
Constant travel was exhausting.
There were four other people in the stagecoach with him, a pair of bickering young teenagers that he had thought were brother and sister until they introduced themselves as Kurogane Yaiba and Mine Sayaka, and they were Just Friends, Thank You Very Much.
She was carrying what looked like a squeaking sea cumber and a spiked frog rode with him. A very large striped tiger and a huge vulture also appeared to be following them around as well.
He sat -across- the stagecoach from them.
Next to the two teenagers was a skinny elderly man with one of the biggest, fullest moustaches he had ever seen. And laughed a lot. And carried around a large glass jar that made noises like someone was dropping coins into it despite the fact that no one could see anyone putting coins into it. He hadn't caught the older man's name and considered himself somewhat fortunate for that.
And sitting next to him was an elderly gentleman who had pleasantly introduced himself as Kounosuke Jii, told them in a high wavery voice it was an honour to meet them all, then crossed his arms, braced himself against the seat in a manner that bespoke of much time spent travelling, and promptly fell asleep.
Saguru figured he was the only other sane person in the stagecoach.
Time passed, and he had entertained himself by reading Kudo Yusaku's latest Night Baron mystery and solving it before he reached the end. By that time, the other teenagers had finally wore themselves out talking and fell asleep, curled up against each other, the sea cucumber and frog resting on top of them like strange twitching plushies. So he pulled out his notes to review the latest titbit of Cyote Kid information he'd learned.
The Kid did have a gun. That shot, out of all the improbable things, playing cards.
He was trying to figure out how a gun could shoot something that could technically be considered wadding for black powder when Kounosuke startled him slightly by suddenly waking up with a startled jerk.
They stared at each other for a moment before the elderly man yawned and asked what time it was. He fished his pocketwatch out of his vest watch pocket and told him. He took a moment to fondly run a finger over the top of it, emblazoned with his family crest, a dancing white horse, before slipping it back into it's proper spot.
Kounosuke noticed and chuckled fondly at him.
"A present from my Grandfather." He explained. It had been a gift when he first went to school, most likely to assure that he would get to his classes on time. But it was a good watch, and never lost time.
... Unless he forgot to wind it.
"Ah." Kounosuke nodded. "A very good one too at that."
The stagecoach hit a bump, sending the papers in his lap flying as they hastened to brace themselves. The teenagers stirred for a moment, readjusting themselves before falling back to sleep, the frog and the sea-cumber pulling out a miniature deck of cards and playing a game on top of their slumbering forms. Saguru pointedly ignored this. If he didn't see it, he didn't have to try to figure it out.
"Master Toichi's card gun." Kounosuke commented, handing him notes that had fallen to the seat between them. "A fine piece of working art, that is."
"Master Toichi?" He echoed. Kuroba Kaito's father?
The elderly man nodded. "Kuroba Toichi. I used to travel with him and his family, before his supposed accident."
He pounced upon that scrap of information. "Supposed accident?" He echoed. "You mean it wasn't an accident the first Kid died?"
"Goodness, no. Was no more an accident than someone reaching over and killing a pesky fly with shoe." Kounosuke bristled a bit. "Was those bastards in black, getting rid of an annoyance to their organization."
"Kaito warned me about them..." He mused, remembering their first meeting, when he thought of the wild hair boy as a friend, before he had learned of the Kid. He'd heard vague rumours since then, but nothing concrete. Whoever they were, they were more ellusive to track down than the Cyote Kid. "Told me to keep an eye out for them."
The man with the jar snorted, stirring in his sleep, and they both paused, realising that he was dressed in black as well. Then the moment passed, and they resumed their conversation in hushed tones.
"Wise words." Kounosuke commented quietly. "There were people in black slinking around our tents before Master Toichi's last performance. Officially, his death was an accident when one of the horses in the acts became startled by a wasp and threw Master Toichi before trampling him."
"My god..." Saguru breathed. No wonder the Kid was phobic of horses. "Kaito saw the whole thing, didn't he?"
"The horse charged at him after Master Toichi stopped moving." Kounosuke said sadly. "He escaped with a few cuts and bruises, and a nasty blow to the head." The elderly man tapped the temple of his left eye, where his left eye was a medium blue, while his right was a slightly darker hue. "The horse ran away after that. When it was finally stopped, I found several slivers of wood covered in an strange liquid in the blanket on the horse. They had been digging into the normally gentle creature's hide and driving it insane."
Saguru felt sick. "So that's why he took up his father's mantle."
"Master Kaito didn't know about his father's activities at the time." Kounosuke looked faintly sad. "I can only surmise that he discovered recently, and took up his father's cause."
Heralding the return of the Kid after an eight year disappearance. "Stealing and returning gold?" He raised an eyebrow.
"Stopping the men who killed his father." Kounosuke corrected gently, a small smile on his face. "They killed Master Toichi for his interference, after all. Or so I believe."
Saguru frowned slightly, his brain turning over these latest bits of information and fitting them into the puzzle of the Cyote Kid. It felt right... but it also felt like he was missing pieces of the puzzle. He still didn't understand why the thief stole.
The teenagers woke up shortly after that, insisting to join the card game the frog and sea-cumber were in and Kounosuke drifted back to sleep.
He never did figure out how the sea-cumber held on to the cards.
The rest of the trip passed by in the haze of travel and unending bumps, and he was more than happy to finally reach Kyoto and the hotel's soft beds.
Only once there, he found himself unable to relax to sleep. His mind was too full, the mystery getting too dark. It settled uneasily in his stomach.
He'd finally pulled on his coat and shoes, deciding to take a walk to clear his head. He hadn't gotten more than a block when a cry went up from the other side of town that the Cyote Kid had just robbed the bank.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw a white shadow flash past the gap between the houses behind him.
He took off running. "HALT!" He shouted, darting between the houses to the side street where the Kid was running pell-mell down the back alley.
The thief, of course, ignored him as he wrestled with the white cape on his back which was apparently not cooperating with him.
As he ran, Saguru spotted a lariat resting on a back post and scooped it up as he ran, the rough woven rope biting into his the skin on his fingers. The coil of rope loosened in his grip as he grabbed for loop at the end when he remembered a very important fact.
He still hadn't learned how to toss a lasso.
Never one for setbacks, he did the next best thing he could think of, tossing the entire bundle of rope at the Kid. It struck him on the back of the legs, tripping the lanky boy and tangling in his legs, causing him to crash into the ground.
Kid hit the ground hard and Saguru winced as he heard the grunt as the wind was knocked out of the thief's lungs. The dark haired boy rolled on to his back, a wheeze in his breath as he sat up to free his legs from the tangle of rope.
Saguru closed the distance between them, grabbing his shirt and pulling him upright. The thief's eyes flickered to the rooftops above them, as if gauging how easily he could climb up there, when a shadow flickered across his face.
The Cyote Kid raised his hands in surrender, his mismatched eyes sparkling with resigned mirth and a weak grin on his face, even as the shouts and pounding footsteps of the townsfolk closed in around them.
"The duster suits you better than that giant coat I first met you in." The dark haired boy said genuinely as the local sheriff ran up, grabbing the raised wrists.
Things became chaotic then, as the sheriff escorted Kaito away and people crowded around him noisily, talking and laughing and patting him on the back.
He just stood there, feeling unsettled as he realised...
He'd never gotten to ask his question.
-fin-
Kurogane Yaiba and Mine Sayaka and the animals are from one of Gosho's earlier series, Yaiba. The frog and the sea-cumber are actually two of eight youkai that were sent to kill them by Yaiba's rival Onimaru. (who is trying to take over the world) Those two youkai end up joining Yaiba, and the sea-cumber often travels in Sayaka's blouse/cleavage.
Ran has a charm on the end of her cellphone of the same sea-cumber, by the way. ^__^
The old man with the coin jar, Kohnan and Ohgane are references to another one of Gosho's earlier series, Yoban Saato, or Third Base Fourth.
The old man's kinda like a jinn, he grants their wishes of being able to play baseball like they want to with a bat and a glove. In order to channel the abilities they want to use, they have to put money in their back pocket. The money then magically falls into the coin jar the old man carries with him.
Kohnan and Ohgane are the names of the baseball teams the two boys who make a deal with him play on. You see them in Detective Conan vol. 43 & 44
Give us time, and we'll eventually throw in references to 'Goshow Presents' as well! XD
I'm not sure that was actually Jii who was talking with Saguru, or Kaito dressed as Jii. Sorry.
No clue where the whole Horse/Toichi's death thing came from, it just showed up. Much like the rest of this fic. ^^;;
Next Chapter:
"The fourth time they met, Hakuba Saguru saw him hang."