Blue
.
"Look, Kudou, not that I don't like havin' ya around, but if ya keep comin' here Osaka's death rate is gonna end up lookin' real bad. Seriously, this is the fifth time this month!"
"I know, I know," Shinichi murmured, hands in his pockets as he leaned over the frozen corpse one last time, spotting the broken zipper he was looking for on the victim's jacket pocket. "The fisherman, right?" he said to Hattori.
"That's what I was thinkin', yeah."
.
Double-teamed by the Great Detectives of the East and West, the fisherman had indeed launched into a fervent sob story after the somewhat showy explanation of the murder, and had been carted off by the police.
After they'd given their official statements, Shinichi and Hattori went right back to what they'd been doing. Or they'd tried to. Apparently it was a bit much to expect that the restaurant they'd been eating at would stay open for the night after a body had been found in their freezer. Still, they found another place and sat waiting for their food, slipping right back into their conversation as if they hadn't been interrupted by murder. Again.
"So Neechan really dumped ya, huh? I can't believe it. She was always talkin' 'bout ya an' thinkin' 'bout ya, an' worryin' over ya. An' now… what happened?"
"Haibara says she 'built it up too much in her mind,' and when I came back it was a letdown," Shinichi muttered, slumping a little with his cheek scrunched against the heel of his hand and a sour expression on his face.
Hattori cringed. "Harsh."
"I think she's right though," Shinichi sighed. "I did the same thing sort of. Thought I would come back and everything would be great, but she was still getting mad at me all the time…" He shook his head. "Then one day she goes into this teary confession about how I came back but nothing was different and how I'm still putting mysteries first and that we were 'officially over.'"
"Well, if ya ask me, it sounds like what ya need is somebody ya'd drop everythin' for the way ya do when a case comes around."
"…What do you mean?" Shinichi said, eyebrows creasing together.
"Ya know – like how ya get all excited an' start smilin'. If ya weren't feelin' that with Neechan, ya just need ta find somebody ya do feel it with."
"I don't know, Hattori. I don't think it's quite the same thing."
Hattori just shrugged. "Well, if ya don't figure it out soon, just come ta me. I'll help ya find somebody good."
Shinichi scoffed. "'Cause you're such an expert at this stuff," he said flatly.
.
Shinichi was walking home from the train station that night when he passed a shop with a TV in the window. The news was on and he stopped short, staring. The headline running along the bottom of the screen read, "Kaitou KID's latest notice – first heist in months!"
Instantly and without even realizing it, Shinichi straightened up, a grin splashed across his face and his heart racing just a little, and it struck him just as abruptly that this was exactly what Hattori had been talking about. How had he seriously been so blind as to not see it sooner?
Shinichi blinked and refocused on the screen. They were displaying the notice now and he pulled out his phone to take a picture of it, puzzling over it the entire way home, and through the night, and into the next day, and when he solved it he didn't bother to tell the police. If he played this right, he'd have a chance to talk to KID alone.
Right now, that was all he really wanted.
.
"Ah, there you are, Tantei-kun," KID said casually, pulling himself up over the edge of the roof and vanishing the card gun and grappling hook attachment almost before Shinichi had glimpsed them. "I hope I didn't keep you waiting too long."
"Heh. All things considered, I'd say a few months really wasn't bad."
KID's grin softened somewhat. "And you're you again."
Shinichi just tucked his hands into his pockets and shrugged.
"So…" KID said, sauntering toward him, his eyes on the large sapphire he was suddenly holding, turning it musingly in his gloved fingers. "Is the game on again? I'm back. You're back. Same old chase?" He stopped right in front of the detective and raised the jewel up, letting it flash with moonlight.
"Actually KID, I was wondering if you'd want to hang out sometime."
KID almost dropped the gem onto his face. "Huh?"
"I'm asking if you'd like to hang out. With me. Not at a heist."
KID stared for a moment. Then a grin broke across his face. "How's tonight?"
.
As promised, Shinichi found the doors of the Ekoda station clock tower unlocked and made his way to the room behind the clock face where he'd agreed to meet KID. It was surprisingly well-lit, for safety purposes he supposed, and he sat down with his back against a wall, staring up at the massive cogs of the clock.
It wasn't long before the door to the room opened and KID stepped into the doorway, his posture bizarrely timid as he fiddled with the silk hat in his hands. "I wasn't sure if… if you were expecting KID or–"
"You don't have to rush it," Shinichi said easily, gesturing for KID to sit beside him. KID smiled and closed the door, coming to Shinichi's side and settling in on the floor next to him.
"So," KID said, tipping his head back to look up at the clockwork. "I'm curious. What brought this on, Tantei-kun? We've been dancing around each other for years. Why now?"
Shinichi scoffed. "It was something Hattori said."
"That detective from Osaka?"
"Yeah, but… It's not just that. I missed you."
KID leaned over to get a look at Shinichi's face, but he had turned away. Still, KID could see the faint pink coloring his skin.
He… He missed me, huh?
"Hey… KID…" Shinichi murmured.
"Yeah?"
"I still don't understand… How did you even know we were in trouble that night?"
He didn't need to clarify. The last time they'd seen each other, KID had put his life on the line to pull Shinichi and Haibara from the clutches of the Black Organization, and had managed it, too. Gin, Vodka, and Snake had all been arrested, but KID had been badly hurt, and for the sake of his secret identity Shinichi had been sent away by KID's accomplices without knowing if he'd be okay.
"You disappeared," KID answered, his voice low. "And… I don't know; something wasn't right. I was looking into it when… they came for Haibara."
Shinichi just nodded. It was clear KID didn't want to talk about it – after all, Shinichi knew what bad memories were like. He knew about nightmares.
"Hey, KID," he said again, turning to him. "Do you have any dreams?"
KID laughed out loud and grinned over at him, suddenly much brighter – pouncing on the subject change with all the vigor of a kitten with a string. "Of course I do, Tantei-kun!" he said. "Doesn't everybody?"
Something warm spread through Shinichi's chest at the light in KID's eyes and he smiled. "Like what?" he asked.
"Like everything!" KID stood abruptly and spread his arms, looking up at the steadily shifting tangle of metal above them. "I wanna become a famous magician, and travel the world, and find love, and find Pandora, and–"
"Whoa, whoa, slow down," Shinichi laughed. KID turned back and leaned over him with his hands on his knees, grinning.
"What about you, Tantei-kun?"
"Me?"
"Yeah. What do detectives dream about?"
"Becoming a greater detective, obviously," Shinichi answered, smirking at the skeptical twist to KID's lips.
"But… aren't you already a great detective?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Not yet," Shinichi said, and KID straightened up, blinking at him with childlike confusion. "I can always improve. My real dream…" His eyes shifted away for a moment, but he brought them back up to KID with some determination. "I always talk about wanting to be like Holmes, but… I want to surpass him. I'll find my own way to being the best."
KID stared for a few seconds more. Then his eyes closed and his hands moved to his hips, a small, warm smile on his face. "You know, I think I had you all wrong," he murmured. Then he held his hand out to Shinichi and Shinichi took it, standing with him. Neither let go. "I was wrong," KID said again, stronger this time. "You really do know how to dream."
.
They talked through the night and well into the morning, just wandering the clock tower until the employees started to arrive to get the station ready to open. "Let's do this again soon," Shinichi said as they were finally saying goodbye, standing on an outside ledge beneath the clock.
"Maybe with food next time~" KID agreed. Then he took a chance and leaned over, gloved fingertips light under Shinichi's chin as he touched a soft kiss to his cheek. The satisfied smirk on his face as he set his hat atop his head said he was extremely pleased with the blush he'd caused. "'Til next time, Tantei-kun," he said, and he dropped from the ledge, his glider carrying him out into the faint and distant sunrise.
.
The next few times they met in that way weren't really planned. They'd wound up on rooftops or in forests or, once, on a plastic outcropping of a mountain in Tropical Land, and they would sit and talk, just enjoying each other's company. Neither tried to force it to be more than it was. Even the night that KID showed up still in uniform but with both hat and monocle perfectly absent, neither commented. It was an unspoken comfort that they had developed with each other. Still, it was months before anything really changed.
The night was quiet, high above the city noise. Shinichi was lying on an outer ring of the Bell Tree Tower with his head resting on KID's thigh, just watching the stars, when he thought to ask the question.
"Hey, KID."
"Yeah?"
"Are we dating?"
"That depends," KID replied.
"On what?" Shinichi asked, unconcerned.
"Are you hungry?" KID answered and Shinichi laughed.
"Yeah," he said, sitting up and glancing over at him. "Do you have some place in mind?"
"As a matter of fact, I do."
KID slipped Shinichi's phone from his pocket and typed in an address, somehow unhindered by his gloves. "I'll meet you here," he said, handing it back. "Say, an hour or so?"
Shinichi stared down at the address. It was in Ekoda, but not an area he was familiar with. "Sure," he said anyway, and KID smiled as he leaned over to touch his customary kiss to Shinichi's cheek before diving from the tower.
.
Shinichi's heart was racing frantically when the taxi pulled up in front of a large house in a quiet neighborhood. He triple-checked that the address was correct before getting out and standing before the front gate. For a long time, he didn't move.
The nameplate said "Kuroba." The one next door (he couldn't help noticing) said "Nakamori." KID… had sent him here.
Shinichi reached out and opened the gate, stepping through and easing it shut behind him as quietly as possible. Part of his brain was still assuming some kind of mistake had been made – that he was unintentionally trespassing in Inspector Nakamori's next door neighbor's yard. Trying to shake the thought, he walked up to the house and rang the bell.
KID opened the door.
It was undoubtedly him. They weren't strangers. They knew each other… extremely well by now, and a white suit alone can only disguise a person so much. This young man, in dark slacks and a black button-down with the top buttons undone, was the person he'd been with just an hour ago. And this was his home. …And his name was Kuroba.
"Is there a given name to go with that?" Shinichi asked, and anyone else would have found it nonsensical, but KID just smiled and held his hand out to Shinichi. Shinichi took it.
"It's Kaito," he said, and he drew Shinichi inside where a few candles shed warm light over a collection of take-out containers and a single red rose on a kitchen table. Shinichi grinned.
"I'm not much of a cook," KID – Kaito – explained with a smile.
"It looks great," Shinichi said, but he turned away from the table and grabbed on to Kaito instead, meeting his eyes. "Kaito," he breathed, and they were close enough that he could feel Kaito's pulse quicken even before their lips had met.
.
Author Note
Next installment is called "White." Please look forward to it~!