A/N: While Akako's section of this chapter is, in many ways, less intense than the canon events it corresponds to, it also frames those events differently, in ways that could upset some readers. If you're concerned, please glance at the end note.
Also, please be aware that, like most fanfiction, this thing is made of headcanons. Enjoy!
Chapter 2: School
Koizumi Akako did not know what to make of Hakuba Saguru. She suspected much of him, but she knew none of it for sure.
Very obviously, his destiny was connected to that of Kuroba Kaito's—though her guesses as to how were no more than that. Her strongest suspicion was that he was to Kaitou KID's alter ego what her mother would often call a "Twin Star."
Her mother had come of age in the late 80's when Tokyo Babylon was released and had eagerly followed the storyline into X/1999. Akako had been suitably confused by what she'd seen as an ancient reference, her mother had been suitably insulted by the term "ancient," and a fight had broken out.
"This is what having a Twin Star is like," Akako's mother had said, interrupting one of Akako's angry screeches. "Whenever you meet them, a fight is certain to occur. The two of you are matched in every way, but never on the same side of any debate, large or small. Twin Stars exist to balance each other out, to shore up both sides of a debate or war equally without tilting it in either direction."
At this point, Akako, who had been raised on Pokémon, asked, "Is it like a destined rival?"
"Twin Star has more gravitas," Akako's mother said. Akako knew that meant, "yes."
"So they exist but I'll probably never meet one," she'd concluded.
Her mother had agreed, and that had been that, until years later, when a blond teenager had walked into her homeroom and locked eyes with Kaito. She felt their meeting, its significance radiating through her bones.
Imagine, getting to meet a real-life Twin Star (the term did, in fact, have more gravitas), in her own town. She had to confirm it. All she needed was something of Hakuba's.
That was easier said than done. It was like he knew what she was—which was impossible, as he had no magical aura whatsoever. He was as mundane as poured concrete. And yet—he knew something. He refused to lend her anything, wrapped a shed eyelash in a tissue rather than flicking it to the floor as she expected, and flinched away from her attempts to pull at his hair.
She finally had to resort to borrowing a pencil that Keiko had borrowed from him. Kaito was an easier matter—she found taking his hair impossible as well, as he always seemed to know when she was behind him, but he lent out pencils carelessly enough.
Unfortunately, something in the spell went horribly wrong—perhaps Keiko acting as the middleman on Hakuba's side distorted the magic? At any rate, whatever had gone wrong had gone wrong spectacularly, since none of the results so much as mentioned Hakuba. She was a bit put out, and rather sure she'd made a mistake in thinking the two were Twin Stars, but she didn't give it much thought until Valentine's Day.
Even then, Hakuba Saguru was only of interest to her because he was connected to a delicious morsel—Kaitou KID and Kuroba Kaito, all wrapped up in one package that resisted the pull she exerted on men. He was…intriguing. She wanted him. So she would make him hers.
The sorcery she wanted to do at the heist was more complex than her standard fare, by quite a lot, so it took a great deal of preparation. She spent much of her time at home, studying the intricacies of what she had planned and taking steps to make certain it would not fail.
Four days before the heist, she found a book on her doorstep, entitled, Consent: What It Is and What It Means to YOU. She burnt it and used the ashes in a potion.
Three days before, she found a bundle of pamphlets, topped with one emblazoned with the words, "No Means No." She threw them in the river behind the house.
Two days before, every link on her computer took her to the same site about the meanings of "yes" and "no" in sexual situations. Baffled, she performed a few charms on the computer, then called a tech support line in frustration when not a single one worked.
On the last day before the heist, she left a small flame spell around her house for any printed material bearing the words "no" or "consent," and she felt it activate moments before she woke up.
On the day of the heist, she found twice as many pamphlets, scattered just outside of her spell's range. This time, she disintegrated them.
At the heist itself, she marked out a barrier to prevent interference from whoever was leaving the pamphlets. She should've known better. The Task Force manage to restrain Commander Nakamori from wounding and weakening KID, as she'd planned him to (with or without her pamphlet-distributor, she'll never know). And then, when snow started to fall, someone threw a snowball that skidded across the ground and wiped clean a small section of the edge of her circle, making it inert.
This was disturbing for a number of reasons. First, someone would have to have quite a throwing arm to be clear of her barrier and still manage to throw a projectile that far, that accurately. Second, to know that disrupting the circle would end the spell…well, perhaps it was a lucky guess, but given all the other interference, she thought not.
Someone else in Ekoda had known exactly what she was doing, and had taken steps to prevent her from doing it. That indicated the presence of another witch, one her spells couldn't detect.
Though…perhaps their interference was for the best. Kaito's words…the way he treated her after the heist…she wasn't certain how to respond, but checking out that book about consent from the Library seemed a good place to start.
When she read it, she recalled Kaito, scrambling away from her frantically and felt sick. She didn't cry, though. Tears would rob her of her magic, and she needed that. She needed it to make atonement. She had nearly done something unforgivable, and, as distasteful as the thought was, she owed not only Kaito, but also the unknown magic user who had apparently predicted her actions and then tried to stop her. Now, she just had to figure out who it had been.
A few days later, Hakuba passed her on his way out of the classroom, eyes strangely wary, and she began to suspect it was him. Male witches—warlocks, if one wanted to be old-fashioned—were less common than their female counterparts, but not so rare as to be unheard of. There were also witches who could hide their abilities from other witches, making themselves seem mundane when they were in fact anything but.
Of course, she had no proof. And she couldn't get any without confronting Hakuba—which could become very dangerous very quickly if it turned out that Hakuba was not the witch in question. The last thing she wanted was the attention of one of Tokyo's most single-minded mundane detectives.
Oh, yes, she suspected Hakuba Saguru of being many things—Kaito's Twin Star, the interloper who'd prevented her from gaining control over Kaito, another witch with the ability to see the future—but she could prove none of them.
It almost gave her a bit of sympathy for the man and his suspicions regarding Kaito.
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"I suspect him to be another witch, but I have no proof," Akako said.
Only Poker Face, learned from her husband, kept Chikage from spitting her tea everywhere.
"On what grounds?" she asked, after gathering herself.
Akako flushed, just a bit. "I'm sure your son has told me of our first encounter while he was dressed in white. Someone knew about it before it happened, and did as much as they could to try to prevent it as they could, without directly injuring me or destroying my property."
"They could have guessed," Chikage suggested.
"It is possible," Akako allowed. "And it is true that they used no magic. But their guess was extremely accurate."
"Why do you suspect Hakuba-kun?" Chikage asked.
"He seemed wary of me, after the heist," Akako said. She leaned forward, and the neckline of her already-revealing shirt slunk lower. "That is not normally the reaction I receive, from men."
"Ah," Chikage said. "If it was Hakuba, is it possible that he simply deduced what you had done?"
Akako shrugged, and the neckline slipped down further. "I don't know much about deduction. I suppose so."
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Momoi Keiko actually got along with Hakuba pretty well, but it was a very deliberately well-kept secret. They didn't have much in common, at face value. They didn't have much in common, period, in fact—except one thing, but that thing happened to be something that both of them felt was rather important: Nakamori Aoko.
Keiko had a lot of friends, but Aoko was probably her best friend—and she was Aoko's best female friend, at least, since the best-friend slot was occupied by Kaito until her friend recovered from her constant state of denial. At any rate, the point of all of this was that, aside from Keiko's family, she was the most important person in Keiko's life. She also happened to be mostly neglected by her dad, innocent to a fault, easily hurt when it came to emotional matters, and hopelessly attached to Professional Idiot Kuroba Kaito.
As Aoko's friend, Keiko was mostly reduced to worrying a lot.
So, while she wouldn't deny that she'd spent some time thinking of Hakuba as "the hot transfer student," the moment that he came to her to talk about Aoko, he'd immediately become "her comrade in arms," instead.
She remembered it vividly. It was a few days after Valentine's Day, when Kaito had gotten dozens of chocolates and brushed off Aoko's offering like he didn't care.
Hakuba had walked up to her desk, looking almost hesitant. It was weird, to see someone that tall look nervous about talking to her.
"Should I be worrying about Nakamori-san?" he'd asked, hesitantly. "She's seemed…quiet, after Valentine's Day, and-I don't wish to pry, but I am concerned…"
Keiko, remembering his first day in class, raised an eyebrow. "So you're worried that the girl you have a crush on is worked up about having her chocolates rejected by someone else?"
He responded…oddly, holding up his hands up frantically as if she'd accused him of something serious instead of just denying it like a normal person. "I—I didn't…" he trailed off, looked away, blushed—finally, a normal reaction—and then gave her a weird little smile that seemed kind of wistful. "Nakamori-san is a lovely girl, but she's not—she's clearly not interested in me and I shouldn't have tried to flirt with her the way I did."
All that blushing and flirting back when you kissed her hand didn't seem much like disinterest to me—but I guess her crush on Kaito's kind of obvious, Keiko reflected.
"I only wish to know if she is doing well," Hakuba said firmly.
Keiko considered. It wasn't really a violation of Aoko's privacy to tell him that much, not when he probably could've deduced it himself if he'd wanted to. She wondered why he was coming to her instead, but it seemed rude to ask.
"She's okay," Keiko said. "A little upset, but she'll be fine."
Hakuba took a deep breath and smiled, slowly, looking like she'd taken something heavy from him. Then, he gave her a considering look. "Would it be…permissible, should the circumstances arise, for me to consult with you again on similar matters?"
It took Keiko a good minute to detangle that mess, but once she had, she nodded, slowly.
"I promise that I will never request to know the exact nature of your conversations," Hakuba added. "I will only ask after Aoko's emotional state, and perhaps her willingness to speaking with myself or Kuroba-san."
"That sounds fair," Keiko said.
"In return, perhaps, I could alert you to when my or the Task Force's actions may upset her?" Hakuba offered.
Keiko glared. "I hope you're not expecting that to be often."
Hakuba winced. "I hope it will be rare as well," he said.
And that was when Keiko decided she liked things about him besides his fluffy blond-ish hair.
She nearly changed her tune a few weeks later, however, when Hakuba stopped by her desk while she was filling her bag to leave, and said, "I have to do something, tomorrow, as part of an effort to catch KID. Aoko will be upset. Please look out for her."
And then, he breezed out of the classroom before Keiko could gather her last composition book and give chase.
She didn't have to wait long to figure out what he meant, at least. The next day went down in Ekoda High's history. It wasn't every day that someone out-and-out accused another person of being Kaitou KID in the middle of class.
Keiko still remembered every detail. Hakuba, finger extended toward Kaito's chest in a perfectly straight line, stock-still like a kabuki actor in a mie pose. Kaito, scrambling backward and halfway out of his chair, his expression wavering between shocked surprise and unnerving, stony blankness. The rest of the class, frozen and silent in the wake of Hakuba's loud, shocking claim.
Aoko will be upset, Keiko thought, recalling Hakuba's words as she stared at the chaos. She'll be distraught, especially if he's right.
She wanted to punch him, then, but she thought she'd have to get in line behind Kaito, Aoko, and possibly Akako. And Keiko had a pretty strict policy about messing with Akako, which went something like, "Don't."
But at least she was prepared to comfort Aoko. Her fridge at home was full of chocolatey pastries and she had a list of karaoke bars near their houses in case Aoko ended up angry. As it turned out, she'd needed both—Aoko had eaten most of the pastries, ended up sugar-high enough to practically pass for drunk, and insisted on going to karaoke, where they sang angry pop songs badly until Keiko's curfew.
Within the week, the whole thing had blown over—Keiko never did get the details of how, but somehow Kaito had managed to prove to the Nakamori clan that he wasn't KID without even swaying Hakuba's opinion slightly. Still, Hakuba continued to lack evidence and Aoko was no longer upset by his accusations, so Keiko was willing to forgive him.
Especially since he didn't forget their arrangement. A few days after the debacle, he came up to her again, looking more sheepish than ever.
"I apologize, with the full knowledge that saying it was necessary will not affect your anger in the least," he said. "How is she?"
"Very relieved that her childhood friend isn't the criminal that her father has been chasing all her life," Keiko said cooly.
Hakuba had the grace to look embarrassed. "I appreciate your honesty," he said, and left.
Eventually, they came to be on better terms. Sometimes, Keiko would even seek Hakuba out, when she thought he might not be aware of a mood swing of Aoko's. Once, when Hakuba was acting particularly moody, she even reversed the normal process and gave Aoko a heads-up that her friend was probably going to be a little touchy today.
"How do you know that?" Aoko asked absently.
Keiko just laughed and said, "I have my ways."
It was better for everyone if no one knew about the arrangement she and Hakuba had. After all, Aoko might not appreciate it. Kaito would probably get all territorial. And Akako might decide to enforce her monopoly on manipulation at Ekoda High. And that could interfere with the very workable, effective system the two of them had for making sure that Aoko was okay.
Now, exactly why Hakuba was so concerned about her, when he had said outright that he knew Aoko wasn't interested in him, and that he was okay with it, was a bit of a mystery. Keiko had wanted to solve it, at first, but she'd quickly realized she would've needed to be Hakuba in order to figure him out—she would either need to be inside his head or have his detective skills if she wanted the least hope of deciphering what was happening inside his mind.
People tended to mistake Hakuba for normal because of the company he kept. He spent most of his time with Kaito, Aoko, and Akako, and they were all extremely bizarre. Kaito did sleight-of-hand as easy as breathing, acted dumb but was blindingly brilliant when he forgot to pretend not to be, and vaulted across people's desks without even disturbing their schoolwork. Aoko knew martial arts, wielded brooms like bo-staves, and could do complex math while jumping around the classroom like a monkey. Akako had some sort of supernatural power over every boy in the school—teachers included—except for Kaito, and when she threatened people, she actually meant it.
And then there was Hakuba. Hakuba, who seemed the most harmlessly odd—unlike Kaito and his KID obsession, Aoko and her random bursts of violence, and Akako and her threatening aura, Hakuba was a detective. He was with the police. But the police he was with were the Task Force and they weren't exactly the sanest—after all, they gave rise to the whirlwind that was Aoko. For all that Keiko loved her, well—she had never understood how Aoko could regard the Task Force as normal.
And Hakuba fit right into their weird. It wasn't just the odd clothing and the bizarre time obsession and his insistence that Kaito was KID. It was the way he stared off into the middle distance while he made logical leaps with no warning whatsoever, and the odd wariness he seemed to gain without warning every so often. It was the way he seemed to regard violating Kaito's privacy repeatedly as part of his job and yet treated Aoko's privacy as all but sacred. Keiko could write a book on every way he wasn't quite right, but everything was so subtle that it didn't really seem bad unless you looked at all of it together.
So, yeah, she had no idea what Hakuba's deal was. But he was her ally in worrying about Aoko and she was pretty much forever grateful for that.
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"We have an alliance to protect Aoko-chan, but you can't tell anyone," Keiko said.
"To protect Aoko from what?" Chikage asked.
"Anything," Keiko said. "A whole lot of things. Mostly her own mood swings and Kaito-kun's thoughtlessness. You're Kaito-kun's mom, you know how they get."
Chikage nodded. She did, in fact, know.
"I tell him when she's actually worked up over something and he runs interference between her and Kaito-kun when she needs it," Keiko said. "And he warns me if something's gonna upset Aoko-chan."
"Like what?"
"Um, he warned me he was going to do something upsetting, the day before he accused Kaito-kun of being KID," Keiko said, looking a bit uncomfortable. She added quickly, "I'm still mad about that, but I'm glad he warned me! I had chocolate on hand and everything and otherwise I wouldn't have—"
Chikage held up a hand. "You're not responsible for him."
Keiko laughed. "Believe me, that's a relief," she said.
"Oh?" Chikage said. "He's a detective, you wouldn't think…"
"No one does!" Keiko burst out. "He looks so normal next to all the others, but all four of them are crazy, him included!" She turned red. "Um, sorry, ma'am."
"I take it 'all four of them' includes my son?"
"Um, yes, sorry?"
Chikage shook her head. This wasn't getting her very far. Perhaps she'd have more luck asking Ginzou or one of the other Task Force members.
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There is a house. One enters it blind and comes out seeing. What is it? A school.
-Ancient Sumerian Riddle
A/N: To be more direct, Akako's attempted actions during the Red Tear heist are framed in terms of consent, specifically sexual consent. No actual sex occurs, nor is it planned to. To me, especially in the Magic Kaito 1412 anime, the Red Tear heist approached these themes already, but they weren't actually text so warning for them seems fair.
The format for this chapter—character POV, interview, character POV, interview—will be the standard format until chapter 7. In other news, I posted meta about Akako on Tumblr in preparation to post the chapter; you can find it under the "riddle in reverse" tag.