Disclaimer: I do not own Detective Conan/Case Closed.

Pairings: eventually Kaito x Shinichi

WARNINGS: Eventual shounan ai (boy/boy pairing), you have been warned

Dark Side Chances

By V. Shalyr

File 4

Assistant

Conan heard the gunshots before he saw the snipers. And he saw the snipers moments before he saw the white form of the thief veering sharply in the sky. He had no idea if the thief had been hit or not, but he didn't have the time to speculate. His brain told him to go after the snipers, but there was no way he could get to them in time. And even if he had, there was no way he could have knocked them all out by himself. And his frantically beating heart was telling him to go check on Kaito.

Kaito who he had come to consider a very close friend, perhaps even the closest friend he had ever had.

Racing down the museum stairs and out into the streets, Conan hurriedly activated the tracker in his glasses. It had taken a lot of convincing to get Kaito to carry a tracer on him during his heist, but it had been worth the effort. Without it, he would never have been able to find the magician now.

Following the point of light on the lens of his glasses, Conan found himself making his way cautiously up the driveway of a modest house in a quiet seeming neighborhood. It was quite an ordinary house at least from the outside and Kaito had never brought him to it before. All the curtains had been pulled closed, allowing only a faint sliver of light to seep through. Worried and nervous, Conan adjusted his tranquilizer watch and reached up to press on the doorbell. If this wasn't one of Kaito's safe houses, he would be ready.

The man who opened the door was…not exactly what Conan had been expecting, even though he wasn't really sure what he had been expecting.

A balding man with gray hair and a small mustache to match peered around at the street before looking down and spotting the "child" upon his doorstep. He looked surprised, but Conan spoke up before he could.

"Hi, I'm sorry but I'm looking for a friend of mine. I was wondering if you've seen him."

The old man blinked behind his glasses and crouched down, a kind smile on his face. "Oh, I see. Can you describe this friend for me?"

"Well," Conan started, watching the man's expression carefully and hoping he wasn't making a grave mistake, "he's a teenager and he's got really messy brown hair and really likes magic."

The man's eyes widened for a moment before he forced his expression back into a neutral mask. There had been a hint of suspicion in those eyes as well, but that was when looking like a little kid actually came in useful. Instead, the man examined him with veiled curiosity.

"May I tell him who's asking for him?"

"Conan," he answered, smiling with some relief, "Edogawa Conan."

It was the first time he had ever met Konosuke Jii, Kaitou KID's main assistant, though it certainly wasn't the last. It seemed that heists often ended or began with a brief meeting with the old man. And though the two had tread rather cautiously around one another at first, Kaito had quickly taken care of that, wasting no time introducing his best assistant to his favorite detective. A detective, he had joked while ruffling Conan's hair, who was also quickly becoming one of his assistants. Conan had swatted his hand away and scowled, but hadn't argued. He was just relieved that the magician was okay.

.

Smile

"How can you keep doing that?"

"Doing what?"

Conan gestured helplessly at his face, not quite able to articulate exactly what he meant. "Keep on—being so cheerful all the time, keep on smiling even with all this."

He waved his arms to indicate everything around them. Other diners glanced curiously their way but he ignored them.

Kaito calmly took a sip of his sweet tea. "What's not to smile about?"

The detective raised an eyebrow in disbelief. "Well, let me see. How about people trying to kill you—kill us? Or people trying to arrest you, our families being in danger if people find out so always having to lie—me having to repeat elementary school, you having to postpone or possibly even give up your dreams to have a career as a magician…"

The list went on and Kaito just sat back and let him vent his frustration on all the unfair cruelties that fate had seen fit to bestow. He had to admit that it was quite an impressive litany of woes and fears and everything in between. Finally, Conan slumped in his chair, exhausted by his own turbulent emotions and uncertainties.

"Here, try some cake," Kaito said, sliding his plate across the table. "It's good."

The detective stared at him for a long moment then picked up a fork and took a bite of the dessert without a word. It wasn't until he'd almost finished that Kaito spoke again.

"I made a choice."

Unusually solemn indigo eyes met blue and held them.

"When I decided to revive KID, I knew what I was doing. I'm a thief. I have a lot of enemies on both sides of the law. Jail, injury, death—they're all things I decided that I was willing to risk. Normal life, normal relationships, I knew that I would be giving that up. It just wouldn't be fair to the people I care about if I tried to hold on to it all. These were all consequences I accepted, sacrifices that I was willing to make."

He smiled, though it was a grim sort of smile with more sardonic humor than amusement. "I'm not always happy about it. I am human after all. But it was my choice, and I know that given the chance I would make the same choice again. So all I can do is move forward. Some things just aren't meant to be."

Conan—no, Shinichi—would never forget that smile. And it made his insides twist painfully because he saw in that smile all the things he hadn't been willing to give up, all the things he had tried so hard to hold onto only to discover that the only things he had left in his grasp were ghosts.

.

Favor

Conan lay in bed staring up at the ceiling and trying to sort out his thoughts. It had been a week since that conversation with Kaito and he'd been thinking about it a lot, trying to figure out how he felt about the answers and the questions—and what he wanted to do about them. He cringed inside every time he imagined continuing on the way he'd been living for the past three years. He just couldn't do it anymore. But what other options did he have? Where could he go? It didn't change the fact that he looked like a nine-year-old child.

Rolling onto his side, he gazed out the window that he'd left partially open. He'd wanted to be able to see the moon.

It was ironic really. He was sure that if he asked Hakuba or Hattori or any of the other officers who had had to deal with the master thief, they would agree that KID acted just like his namesake, maddeningly clever, carelessly arrogant and immature. Yet Conan knew now that that was just one of the thief's many faces—not fake exactly but not the whole picture either. Even before he'd gotten to know Kaito, he'd glimpsed some of those other faces, the calculating calm, the unfailing confidence nonetheless tempered with painstaking caution, the sadness and the determination and the certainty. And at the end of the day, it wasn't Kaito but all the rest of them that were the real children.

Perhaps you had to recognize that before you could really grow up. It wasn't always about getting what you wanted. It wasn't even about pursuing justice or knowing what was right from what was wrong. It was about knowing that sometimes things had to change, and that sometimes you had to make sacrifices in order to keep on living.

Maybe… Maybe it was time for a change. It seemed like all he'd been doing since he'd been shrunk was adjust to other people's actions, guided by other people's decisions. He'd never even thought of really trying to change things on his own, too caught up in the limitations of his forced transformation to consider the possibilities. Then again, he'd believed so fervently back then that he'd be back to his "old self" in no time, and then "no time" had turned to months and then years. He just hadn't wanted to acknowledge that.

Taking a deep breath, Conan sat up and reached for his phone. He'd made a decision, but there were some matters he had to settle before he could leave.

"Kaa-san, I need to ask you a favor."

.

Moving Forward

Kaito opened the door of his apartment, blinked, and looked down in surprise at the kid standing on his doorstep. "Er, Tantei-kun?"

He wasn't particularly surprised that the mini detective remembered where he lived even though he'd only taken him there once when they'd been out and a thunderstorm had unexpectedly swept in.

Conan shifted the bags he was carrying a little self-consciously. He'd been doing a lot of thinking and soul searching over the past few days, and his end conclusions had brought him here. He just hoped he was right and the thief wouldn't turn him away. "Um, can I come in?"

"Sure." Kaito shrugged and moved forward to help him with his belongings. "This sure seems like a lot of stuff for a visit."

Conan looked away at the hint of question in his voice. It did seem rather sudden of him but, "I, uh, was kind of hoping I could stay here."

The magician stared. Of course he'd guessed as much from the luggage, but that didn't mean it wasn't a surprise.

"I do have the room," he said carefully, "but are you sure?"

He was, after all, an internationally wanted criminal, even if he was basically nonviolent and returned almost everything he stole.

Conan nodded, looking relieved. "I'm sure."

Still trying to figure out what exactly the detective was thinking, Kaito led the way to the guest room, which he'd furnished but had remained empty since he'd moved in—he was a showman and every room had to be presentable even if it wasn't in use. Watching the shrunken detective scurry around the room putting his stuff away, he asked finally, "Not that you're not welcome here or anything because you are, but just out of curiosity—what are you doing?"

Conan paused, staring down at his hands then back up at his new housemate. "I'm making a choice."

TBC...

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