NOTE: UNFINISHED WORK AHEAD, READ AT YOUR OWN RISK. This part posted purely for archival purposes; [...] marks truncated sections.

The fifth time Kaitou Kid gets shot at during a heist, Saguru goes home and incinerates a two-by-four-foot target, inch by inch by inch.

(The practice room in the Hakuba estate isn't even supposed to be open at this hour, but Saguru finds his usual setup waiting when he gets home anyway. It only serves to further confirm his current theory that Baaya has some latent telepathic abilities, but that's neither here nor there.

The point is, Saguru thinks almost viciously as he hurls twin streaks of fire at the next two points indicated by lasers, selected by a randomisation algorithm he'd written himself – he'd long since learned to decouple the physical gesture from his powers, of course, but tonight there's an oddly visceral satisfaction to the movement, to seeing another two points scorched with pinpoint accuracy –

– the point is, Kuroba Kaito is a bloody moron with the self-preservation of a suicidal lemming, and hell if Saguru's going to stand by and let him do just that.)

The next day, Saguru throws a wadded ball of paper at Kuroba during lunch break.

The magician had turned up for class this morning looking cheerfully unperturbed as usual. That much was expected, but even then Saguru had felt an annoyed flare of heat that he'd forcibly tamped down by ascertaining that Kuroba showed no visible stiffness of movement that could indicate a serious injury.

Little wonder that Nakamori-keibu has issues with hypertension, Saguru thinks, as he watches the crumpled ball fly in a perfect arc to hit its target unerringly – Kuroba had a tendency to be endlessly irritating in either persona.

"Ow!" Kuroba whirls around immediately from where he'd been talking to Aoko, rubbing at the back of his head – for show, obviously, since Saguru knows for a fact that his pain tolerance is significantly higher than that, but Kuroba is nothing if not a consummate showman all the way through. "What's your problem, Hakuba?"

Saguru has the rare privilege of seeing both Kuroba and Aoko at a genuine and complete loss, for once. "Well," he answers blandly, "I figured you could work on a shield to deflect projectiles, Kuroba-kun, now that you've gained sufficient control over air currents to fly."

Aoko's expression turns distant for a moment, then morphs into understanding. "That – you'd have to accelerate the air quite a bit to compensate for the low density, but that might actually work, Kaito! Besides, Aoko knows that you've been bored out of your mind in training since you mastered the flying thing."

"Of course," Saguru answers, though he's speaking mostly to Kuroba – whose expression is one of comprehension, as well, if for a completely different reason. "I wouldn't have suggested such a thing without having done the preliminary calculations myself. So, are you up to it, Kuroba-kun?"

"Don't be ridiculous, Hakuba, of course I – wargh!" Kuroba dodges with an ungraceful yelp as Saguru lobs another paper ball at him, but – there. It could've been an unlikely trick of the light, but Saguru is fairly certain that the ball's path had deflected.

Only infinitesimally, of course. He'd been expecting that.

Saguru doesn't particularly mind. This exercise is turning out to be fairly therapeutic for him, if nothing else.

(Aoko joins in soon enough. Kuroba doesn't look best pleased with either development, but given the number of pranks Saguru has been on the receiving end of in the past week alone, this is entirely fair payback as far as he's concerned.)

Kuroba finds him on the roof after school, as Saguru had been expecting him to do. "So, what was that really all about?"

"Do you know the momentum of a rifle bullet, Kuroba-kun?" Saguru asks, and it's not a rhetorical question but he doesn't wait for a response anyway, because feigned ignorance isn't really a thing he wants to hear right now. "The average bullet weighs 10 to 20 grams, and travels at 900 to 1000 metres a second."

He rattles off the numbers quickly, but he can already see Kuroba doing the calculations in his head. "That's..."

"Higher than you could realistically hope to counter, by several orders of magnitude," Saguru interrupts, because he's always been a stickler for precision but this is one case where the exact numbers are of little consequence. "Unless you've developed the ability for near-instantaneous supersonic acceleration without me noticing."

Which is a possibility, if a highly unlikely one – even for someone of Kuroba's proficiency, breaking the sound barrier isn't exactly something that can be done on a whim, but Saguru has learned not to dismiss the improbable when it comes to Kuroba.

His deduction is borne out, though, in the sharp shake of the magician's head.

"Detection and deflection, on the other hand..." Saguru continues, watching Kuroba out the corner of his eye, and catches the gleam of realisation there.

[...]

Kuroba is a annoying fast learner. By the end of the week, he's already had a successful deflection rate of 80%, though it does vary a fair bit depending on how much warning Kuroba gets.

(Which, as Saguru helpfully points out the Aoko – all the more reason for testing this newfound skill when Kuroba least expects it. Of course.)