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Sky Colored Eyes

18: Warm Hearts

Shinichi groaned into his pillow. His head felt like someone had stuffed it so full of wool that the pressure was threatening to burst his skull open. The shrill beeping of his alarm clock was not helping. Each sharp note sent a throbbing pain lancing through his head. He shifted slightly, thinking he'd reach over and turn the horrible little machine off, but every muscle in his body protested the movement. Aching was only the beginning. His body was somehow managing to feel like it was made of water and like it was crammed full of lead weights at the same time. He struggled with his rebellious limbs for a few more moments as the clock pounded hot nails into his skull, but eventually he gave up and just lay there, counting down each agonizing second until the time when the alarm would shut itself off.

It was the longest one minute of his life.

Then blessed silence fell.

He sighed. It was both a sigh of relief and a sigh of dread because, though the alarm had stopped, he knew that in a mere five minutes it would be back to torment him again. The worst part was that, when it did, he really would have to make himself move—to get up and start the day. It was a daunting prospect.

The five minute reprieve dribbled away in no time and the alarm shrilled out again. With another groan, Shinichi rolled over and levered himself up until he was seated at the edge of his bed, staring blankly at his toes through the haze that had taken up residence in his mind. It was a moment before he remembered what he was supposed to be doing. He was supposed to get dressed. Get dressed then go to school. Yeah, that was it. He needed to go to school.

Tipping forward off his bed, he tottered across to the closet like someone meeting the heave of a ship's deck for the first time. He half fell, half leaned against the closet door. His fingers fumbled at the handle until the door finally opened. Fortunately, Shinichi had never much cared what kinds of clothes he wore as long as they were comfortable and presentable. That meant he usually just wore his school uniform even if it wasn't a school day. But that wasn't important right now, was it?

Grabbing the nearest article of clothing, he found that it was indeed a school uniform. He put it on. It was only when he picked up the tie that he realized he'd put on his Teitan uniform and not his Ekoda one. Damn. His mind just wasn't working this morning.

With yet another groan, he traipsed back to the closet and nearly face-planted into the cloth folds of its contents. There was a convulsion in the universe, or so it felt to Shinichi. Then his knees were on the ground, and he still had his face in the clothes in the closet. His ears buzzed.

Okay, he thought groggily. This wasn't normal. He'd been sick enough times in his short life to know what it felt like. He was definitely sick. He'd bet he had a fever. But he wasn't coughing—not yet anyway. Slumping back onto his heels, he took a moment to breathe and steady his nerves. Then he slowly, carefully, pushed himself up off of the floor. Loathe as he was to admit it, he would not be making it to class today.

So, as per his responsibilities, he walked very slowly to his desk where he found his phone. It took trembling fingers three times as long to dial the number as it should have. Shinichi didn't even remember the actual conversation afterward. He just knew that he'd been told to rest well and not to worry about work until he was better.

That order of business dealt with, he ran into another problem. He still felt like lead jelly all over, but he knew that you had to eat something in these situations. Anything would do. He also needed to boil up some water and find that cold medication he hoped he'd remembered to buy in the medicine cabinet. There was quite a lot he needed to do, but all he wanted to do was collapse back onto the bed and not move again for a very long time.

Well, maybe just a short nap first. In his current state, he'd probably burn the house down by accident.

Tossing the tie he hadn't bothered to use over the back of his desk chair, he wandered back to his bed and fell onto it. He didn't bother trying to get under the covers. He was asleep before he took his second breath.

He woke up much later because his stomach was trying to gnaw a hole in itself and his throat felt like it was on the verge of cracking. Letting out a resigned sigh, he clambered laboriously out of bed and headed for the kitchen. On his way out, he grabbed a bathrobe and wrapped it around himself for warmth.

He had just pushed open his bedroom door and started down the hall towards the kitchen when he ran into someone. It was a tall and very solid someone with a mess of dark hair and eyes that never told you anything they didn't want you to see even while they saw everything in you that you didn't want them to know.

"Kaito? How did you get in here?" he asked, shocked into alertness—or as close to alertness as his pounding headache would allow.

The magician gave him a rather strange look. "I let myself in of course. If you'd like, I can recommend some better brands of locks."

"I…but…huh?"

"It's too easy for anyone who wants to to break into your apartment with these locks. You need to upgrade them."

"Oh…" Shinichi's muddled brain thought this was very sensible for almost a full ten seconds before it finally caught on to the fact that, sensible or not, the quality of his locks didn't actually explain why Kaito had broken into his home. Although to be fair, he hadn't gotten that far in his questions either, had he?

"Why—"

"We heard you were sick," Kaito said before Shinichi could finish the question.

"We…?"

"He means us." Aoko appeared behind the magician followed shortly by Hakuba. "How're you feeling? Have you eaten anything? We brought food."

"I was about to make soup," he said blankly.

"Oh we can do that," the inspector's daughter said immediately. "You just go lie down."

"We'll just put this in the kitchen," Hakuba added as he and Aoko bustled into the kitchen. Shinichi made to follow him, but a hand caught him by the arm before he could.

"Oi, oi, what part of 'go lie down' don't you understand? Sick people are supposed to stay in bed and rest."

"But this is my house," Shinichi protested.

"Well, yeah, that's why we're here. So?"

"So I can't just go to bed."

"Why not?"

The detective opened his mouth then closed it again. From his point of view, it seemed like it ought to be obvious. This was his house. He was the host. He couldn't just go to bed. Not only would it be rude, he would also feel awkward trying to sleep while there were guests tramping around his apartment unattended.

"Don't push yourself on our account. We don't want you getting sicker because you didn't rest when you could've," the magician continued. "You can at least think about the rest of us if you won't think about yourself. You don't want to spread whatever you have around, do you? Especially since we're here to help. It'd be a pretty poor thank you. The best thing you can do for everyone is to get better soon."

That…actually made sense. Shinichi deflated. "Fine, I'll go lie down. If you guys need anything—"

"We won't." Stepping behind Shinichi and placing his hands on the detective's shoulders, Kaito began to propel him gently back towards his bedroom. "Don't worry so much. Stress is bad for the healing process. I promise we won't burn the place down."

"That's…reassuring…"

"Yep. So here you go. Let me take that robe. I don't think it's going to fit under the blanket. Or not comfortably anyway." Kaito took the bathrobe and hung it up. When he turned back around, it was to find Shinichi sitting on the edge of his bed with the dress shirt from his Teitan uniform on over what were clearly his pajama pants. Obviously he hadn't had time to dress properly that morning. It made him look a bit like a lost child when combined with that feverish confusion.

"Go on," he said encouragingly. "Get some sleep."

Shinichi looked across the room at him, blue eyes for a moment clear and deep and full of searching questions. But then the moment broke and Shinichi slid under the bedcovers.

"I'll go help them with that soup then," Kaito said as he stepped out the door. "We'll bring you some when it's ready." That said, he shut the door as quietly as he could and went to join the clatter in the kitchen.

It took Shinichi several minutes before he could get his muscles to relax. He had no idea what those three in his kitchen were doing to the place. Every now and then a loud bang or clank would make him wince. But, well, how much harm could they cause? He shuddered to imagine. But somehow, right now, he found the thought almost funny. They hadn't had to come, but they had. They didn't have to make him soup, but they were insisting. It was…it was…

As he drifted back into the arms of sleep, he could hear the murmur of voices and the clatter of cups and cutlery humming through the apartment. And he found himself marveling at how warm it felt. It wasn't the warmth of the blankets cocooned around him, but something more—something deeper.

X

"You know, for a guy who lives by himself, his apartment is really neat," Aoko remarked as she searched the cupboards for cups, bowls, and cutlery.

"We can be neat too," Hakuba replied, sounding mildly affronted.

"Oh I know you're neat," Aoko assured him with a warm smile that brought a hint of pink into the blonde's pale cheeks. "I'm just surprised because he's so busy all the time. He really does push himself too hard," she said, shaking her head. "Do you know, I heard from my dad that he runs over to the Beika police station at least three or four times a week. It's quite a trip even by train, and that's on top of school work and the cases themselves. I heard he's solved more cases already than some police officers do in their whole careers!"

"I had heard of his involvement in some high profile cases," Hakuba mused. "However, I must admit that I never gave it much thought. People can make a lot out of nothing. But he's really into it, isn't he?"

"Aren't you?" Kaito quipped, dropping into a chair at the dining table. "You're a detective too."

"Yes. But there are lines and limits to all things. At our time of life, we should be focusing on our studies first and preparing to step out on the paths that will lead us to where we plan to go in the future. While I would not ignore a case should it come my way, one must know how to prioritize. Getting entangled in other people's business to the point of neglecting your own responsibilities would be foolish."

"Coming from one of you nosy detectives, that's pretty unconvincing."

"I simply meant to say that, while I admire his dedication, I feel that a little moderation would be advisable. We have a police force. He doesn't have to pursue every potential case that he hears about. But I guess it would be hypocritical of me to say that he shouldn't."

"Yes, very," Kaito agreed dryly. "So how's that soup coming along?"

"I think this pot should be big enough. Saguru, can you give it a quick wash for me while I start on the ingredients? Kaito, come cut these up."

"Yes ma'am." The magician saluted and suddenly he was twirling a pair of knives in his hands. "What did you want cut up? Just point the way~."

Aoko edged hurriedly away from the whirling blades. "Be careful with those! Anyway, I want you to chop up the vegetables once I've washed them."

"Can do."

The kitchen was soon filled with busy clattering. Aoko lowered the chicken into the pot and turned up the heat before glancing around to see how the others were doing. Hakuba had volunteered to brew them all some tea, but he appeared to be having trouble locating any tea leaves. He had, however, found more than half a dozen bags of coffee beans. Then there was Kaito—who now had seven knives instead of two. Six of said knives were spinning through the air to trace flashing steel patterns like deadly, silver hummingbirds. The seventh—which changed every few rotations—was being used to reduce the vegetables into neat little wedges.

"So that's where it was," Hakuba said triumphantly as he stood up from where he'd been on his knees, searching a lower cupboard. He had a box of tea leaves in his hands. He took a step back and reached down to shut the cupboard door.

Aoko opened her mouth to cry out a warning, but it was already too late. The only thing she could do was watch and think how she should have known better than to let Kaito near the knives. Here in the confines of the apartment's small kitchen, three was most definitely a crowd. This meant that Hakuba's step back had his shoulder bumping into Kaito's own. The magician, while nimble, didn't have eyes in the back of his head no matter what he liked to make other people believe. Therefore, intent on his knife-juggling and the simultaneous reduction of assorted vegetables into unnaturally uniformed bits, he wasn't prepared for the interruption.

And he was still juggling seven sharp knives.

It was only the magician thief's finely honed reflexes that saved him and the blonde from an unfortunate rain of steel. Hands that were about to toss two knives back up into the dance applied just enough extra force and spin to have the blades sailing out away from human contact instead. One knife disappeared under the kitchen table while the other bounced off the counter. A third knife clattered into the sink before Kaito used two of the remaining four to bat their fellows to the floor. Everything happened in the span of a single breath, leaving Aoko and Hakuba to stare wide-eyed at the knives on the floor.

Kaito looked around quickly, listening for any signs that they might have woken Shinichi. Hearing nothing, he heaved a dramatic sigh. "Man, now we have to wash them before we can get on with it."

Hakuba rounded on him, face going from the white of fear to the red of irritation in the blink of an eye. "What the hell were you thinking? Were you trying to kill someone?"

"Hey, you're the one who bumped into me," Kaito retorted. "If you'd been watching where you were going, my hand wouldn't have slipped."

"The least you could do is apologize."

"Apologize?" Kaito repeated incredulously. "Hell no. You should be thanking me. If I hadn't reacted as fast as I did, you'd have lost a piece of your right ear!"

"But the whole situation would not have happened at all if you hadn't been messing with those knives."

"I was not messing with them. I was—"

"Guys, guys," Aoko cut in, stepping between them and waving her hands as though she could physically brush away their glares. "Kudo-kun's still sleeping."

Both boys fell silent. Seeing that they looked suitably ashamed, Aoko took the box of tea from Hakuba. "Why don't you go sit down first? Kaito, pick up those knives you dropped and rinse them. Then you sit down too."

With only one person in the kitchen, things went a lot smoother. Knowing that the soup was going to take some time, Kaito excused himself to check on Shinichi.

He found the detective lying curled up in a tight ball under his blankets. The boy was shivering but sweating at the same time. Frowning, Kaito brushed aside damp, black bangs and pressed the back of his hand to the detective's forehead. That was definitely not a normal temperature.

Darting out of the room and into the bathroom, he rummaged through the medicine cabinet, ignoring Aoko and Hakuba's hushed inquiries. He found what he was looking for and shook his head. The bottle hadn't even been opened. At least he didn't have to worry about accidentally giving the detective an extra dose of medicine. He returned to Shinichi's room with two pills and a glass of water.

Aoko watched him go with thoughtful eyes before turning back to the pot, smiling to herself.

Hearing a ring, she glanced towards the table. "Did you hear that?"

"Someone's at the door." Hakuba stood up and set his teacup on the table. "I'll go answer it."

Hakuba didn't know what he was expecting—maybe a postman or police officer. What he was not expecting when he opened the front door was a little girl around nine years of age with a backpack and what looked suspiciously like a medical bag. Shoulder-length hair framed a pair of the sharpest eyes he'd ever seen. Those eyes did not belong in a face so young. She looked vaguely familiar to him in a 'seen from a distance' kind of way, but he couldn't for the life of him say from where.

"Hello," he said politely. "How may I help you?"

The little girl glared at him with her hands on her hips. "Who are you, and where is Kudo Shinichi?"

TBC