Chapter 13: Static Interference

Neither one of us wanted to tell Hattori anything. He was a good guy but there was enough tension between Hakuba and I, that adding a third person to the mix wasn't going to help. Of course the other teen wouldn't let it go, and he had my mom on his side which made a victory for Hakuba and I difficult.

"How'd you two wind up together anyway?" I asked Hattori. "I was sure you were going to follow Conan-kun once he had his back turned."

"Nah, I don't go lookin' for trouble when I don't hafta. Hakuba-kun ran off actin' so weird, I thought that I should follow him instead. Ya shoulda seen him try an' kick me off the bus."

"If your ego wasn't so big I would have been able to."

"My ego? Look who's talkin'." Hattori shot Hakuba a disgruntled look. "So can I help ya or not, or is yer ego too big to let me?"

Mom tried to back him up, to keep Hattori from turning it into an insult fight. "How is this any different than Hakuba-kun asking for your help Kaito? He's willing and able, and I'm sure there are things out there that he could do better than either of you."

"Like what Okaasan? I know he can't do anything better than me." I shot a smug look at Hakuba, "I'm sure you couldn't either though."

"I'm a lot better at defending myself than you," The detective shot back.

"Hey, I was hurt so how'd you expect me to fight back?"

"I didn't because I knew you were hurt, and thus you can't defend yourself as well as I can." Hakuba grinned, satisfied.

"Aren't you two supposed ta be on the same side? I thought ya were arguing 'bout me? And I can tell ya that I'm better at defendin' myself than the both of you."

Neither of us could argue with him. I was good at appearing, disappearing, and sweet talking people. All qualities that were suited for being a Phantom Thief, even though I'd been using them long before. Hakuba was better at thinking and piecing things together than I was, which would make him useful as we tried to figure out who was targeting the children and how to stop them. Hattori took the cake for being able to actually fight back.

"We won't need physical combat, will we…?" I looked over at Hakuba for a second. He didn't want to work with Hattori, but there was some deeper reason the detective didn't want the other's assistance.

"No. Even if we did, the people we're going up against are armed, so it would be useless."

"And what happens when ya can't sneak by someone or use yer brain to get passed 'em? Ya'd need someone like me."

"Kuroba-kun stop doing that!" Hakuba distracted me as Hattori started to win me over to his side.

"Doing what?"

"Defying gravity with the chair." Hakuba shook his head at me, "It's very distracting."

I looked down to see that I had the chair resting on one of the back legs and my foot was no longer using the table to balance myself. I let my weight fall forward so that the legs were all on the ground again.

"Yer fidgety ain't ya?" Hattori was watching me as I did this. "It's cool that ya can do that an' not even notice yer doin' it."

I shrugged my shoulder. "I don't know. It's not my fault I'm not really watching what I'm doing when I'm trying to think."

"Wow you're thinking now?" Hakuba quickly put his hands up to retract his comment, since we were getting off track again. I huffed but dropped it.

"Well I-" Hattori was cut off by the sound of a phone ringing. The tone was simple but loud and unfamiliar to me. We looked at each other but no one knew whose it was.

"Oh, maybe it's the phone that Jii-san left for you. Didn't you call him yet?"

I sighed and followed the very loud flute version of 'Carmen'. "No, with them coming over I got a little distracted."

It was on the other side of my dad's picture and I hesitated a moment and looked at Hattori before pushing it open. "Why couldn't he just put it on the table?" I mumbled to myself.

"I'm sure there are phone numbers in there he wouldn't want other people to have Kaito." My mom answered, even though I wasn't looking for one. That made sense.

"Hello?" I picked it up and walked back out of the room. Apparently there wasn't voice mail, since the phone hadn't stopped ringing while I was looking for it. The loud sound of static met my ear and I had to hold the phone away as I brought it back to the living room.

"Jii-chan if that's you, I can't hear anything." Moving around with the phone didn't help, which meant the connection was bad on his end. "Hello?"

I heard the static get louder as it covered up whatever words were being said on the other end of the line.

"I still can't understand you," I tried to tell him, but if the connection was so bad that he wouldn't be able to understand me either. After a minute of the static noise I hung up the phone and looked at my mom.

"That was weird. Maybe he'll call back."

"Gives ya a bit of an eerie feeling though doesn't it? Like somethin' really bad is gonna happen."

"It better not." I growled to myself, threatening whatever was out in the world to get us. "I'm ticked off at the moment and I'd feel bad if someone got hurt."

"At least Kudo's- ah," he shook his head when he said Kudo's name. "Whatever – at least he's not here or I'd take that as a sign of impendin' doom." Hattori put his hands up in the air and wiggled his fingers which made me laugh. Mom and Hakuba didn't get the joke so Hattori and I just smiled at one another.

"I won over yer leader, so I guess that makes me part of the team now. So, what's goin' on?"

"He's not leading anything." Hakuba tried to show his dominance in our partnership. "And no, you aren't helping us."

"Let's see then, since I haven't been here and all I know is it was originally yer case Hakuba-kun, answer a few questions fer me." Hattori turned to face him. "Who's been gettin' the information fer you guys?"

"Well obviously I needed Kuroba-kun for that or I wouldn't have asked him to help." Hakuba tried to vindicate himself.

"Okay, an' whose house are ya obviously usin' as… sounds cheesy, but let call it 'home base'?"

"My house isn't safe right now because there are people watching it! What else should I do?"

"'Kay, 'Kay, just hold on. You already admitted that yer here for safety and information. I'm sure there's more that he's doing that I'm not aware of 'cause ya won't tell me what the case is about, am I right?"

Hakuba crossed his arms and tried his best to ignore the other teen. Hattori just smiled and shot me a look.

"That makes ya the boss. So am I on the team or not?"

I couldn't fight him. Hattori and I were just so similar that I even enjoyed him taunting Hakuba when I was supposed to be the detective's partner.

"Sorry Hakuba-kun," my smile was a little sadder when I turned to him, though no one couldn't tell unless they were looking. "It's your case though, so I won't tell him anything if you don't want me to."

"You have just as much of a say in it as I do, and since you've chosen to let him tag along you don't have to worry about me. I've trusted your judgment this far, and it wouldn't do me any good to start doubting you now." The detective didn't look as disheartened as he should have so I took that as I sign of acceptance.

For the next two hours we all took turns filling in Hattori, and mom when we got to what happened last night, about what we'd been doing for the past few days.

Hakuba eyed me when I censored out Snake's appearance, though I left in the gun shots.

"You're still not going to explain that you me are you?"

"Nope!"

Hakuba got off the couch and forcefully put my chair back on the ground. Again, I hadn't noticed I'd been playing with it, even though I'd been juggling a few things that were in my pockets. I was happy I was able to pull both feats off at once, since I didn't have the full motion of my right arm. Nevertheless Hakuba almost made me set off one of the smoke bombs I was throwing, and I had to reach out and grab it before it hit the carpet.

"Very well then, I take it that it has nothing to do with me, the case, or anything that may hinder us in the future."

"It shouldn't." I frowned to myself. Why Snake had come after me last night was strange. The black diamond was large but impossible to see through, which meant that even if it had Pandora, no one wouldn't be able to tell. I put it off for the time being and Hakuba gave me a reproaching look.

"Okay, not withstanding the possible interference from the-"

"Kaito," my mom interrupted the detective before he could continue. "I've been letting you do what you wanted, but don't you think it would be better if you had some help too?"

"No." I left no room for argument in my statement and my mom froze at the fierceness in my voice. "I can take care of it."

Clearly dismayed at my reaction, she let it go. There was no way under any circumstances, even if I were to die, that I would let Hakuba or even Hattori anywhere near those people. I knew somewhere in my heart that if my dad hadn't been able to take them on alone, despite whatever help he got Jii, I wouldn't be able to either. I wasn't as skilled as him and he had more years of practice.

Whatever venom my words had held still lingered in my eyes and stance. No one was up to the task of trying to speak to me at the moment and I couldn't blame them. I would have snapped at the next person to belittle or go against me.

Hattori once again broke the mood by taking one of the inch-long canisters from my hand.

"How do ya work this?" He held the small thing in his hand, careful not to put pressure anywhere on it, since the detonation switch wasn't obvious.

"Don't play with that one." I took it back from him and replaced it with another identical capsule. "That's knock-out gas and I don't feel like passing out for the next few minutes."

"And what's this one?" Hattori held it up to see the differences in the two. There was only one. My dad had seemed to keep all his fume-like distractions in these portable little things. They were easy to make and they held enough pressurized gas to either hide me or put a close range of people to sleep, so I kept them. The ones with the sleeping gas were plain and the one I gave him now had a small marked dot on it for smoke.

Hattori pushed a little too hard on one end of the thing and the gas immediately tired to escape. We were all engulfed in seconds and I heard Hakuba call him an idiot before he started coughing. I made my way quickly behind the Osakan detective just as the smoke cleared.

"You did that on purpose," I whispered into his ear.

"'Course I did. Had to clear the air after all." He smiled at me even though it was hard to see eachother clearly, and I couldn't help laughing. Hakuba jumped at the noise when he saw I'd gotten behind him. "So what'rewe gonna do now?" Hattori asked louder.

"I guess we have to wait for Jii-chan to call back or we could try and find some leads on either of the groups we'd heard of from Yanami-san."

"Which groups are those?"

"We've narrowed it down to two with his help," Hakuba spoke. "It's either a decent sized group of people who are decently well-known, though we have little information on them, who have name themselves the Baku or it's some larger group who seem to dress in black that we don't know anything about."

Hattori's expression changed from calm and laid back to dead serious in a heartbeat. Since all of us were used to looking for those kinds of reactions we noticed right away.

"Do you have any information on either of these groups Hattori-kun?"

Hattori eyed Hakuba for moment before turning to me. "How mush to ya know about… Kudo?"

Okay so we're now talking about the detective without the things he's done as Conan. "I know about his little problem but not much else." I didn't emphasis little like I normally would have, since Hattori would understand.

"It's a fifty-fifty chance between 'em right?" Hattori trailed off and started thinking to himself. "Well ya better hope it's not the second group, or ya better hope there's some other large group 'round here that likes to play dress up."

His voice and body language spoke volumes even though he hadn't said anything revealing. If it was the second group, they were dangerous. Kudo was somehow involved since he'd mentioned the other teen and if he hadn't caught them, it didn't look to promising for us. The kid may attract death like a magnet but I'd never known him to let anyone get away from him.

"The kids are with that friend of yers right? Ya better call 'im back." Hattori hadn't lost his initial serious undertones but he attempted to sound more cheerful. "Just to be on the safe side since he took the time to call ya."

"Okay…" I opened the flip phone that Jii had left. It wasn't the newest model out there but it wasn't a piece of junk either. I knew by the way that the back didn't close completely that he'd modified it as well.

Jii left several numbers with names next to them and a descriptive word. For example I came across Yanami and the word informant was in place of his first name. Jii's number for whatever phone he was using was easy to find. I laughed when I saw the word 'sidekick' next to it. I hit the call button and waited for it to go through, by the sound of the static present in just the ringing it didn't look like I'd be having a coherent conversation.

"Youn…." Jii picked up and I heard his voice for a second before it was eaten again. I sighed and looked at the other three.

"It still looks like he's in a bad service area."

I spoke back into the phone, trying to tell him to get better reception. Jii didn't answer me back in anything I could understand. I was going to hang up when a loud screeching came out of the phone and I shoved it away from my ear. It was some high frequency noise and I had to put the phone down to get away from it.

"Geez, is he trying to make me go deaf! What kind of phone does that?" I rubbed my ear with my hand as I stared at it, now sitting on the table as it screamed. The color change on the screen caught my eye as it connected with some other program.

"He can send something directly to the phone screen?" Hakuba asked as we all peered at it and the ringing stopped.

There was a small map of the area within thirty miles of my house. A red dot off to the side was blinking and had Jii's name typed in red letters against the green.

"Wow, he sent ya a map of where he was 'cause he couldn't call ya. That's cool." Hattori picked up the phone and examined it. I grabbed it away from him before he could open it up and saw both detectives shoot me disappointed looks.

"Not you too Hakuba-kun?"

"It looked interesting." The detective crossed his arms again and leaned away from Hattori when the other teen gave him an evil smile.

"Looks like we got more in common then ya like, doesn't it?"

Hakuba glared at him but it wasn't as potent as it had been earlier.

"So why did he send you the map instead of just moving or using another phone?" Hakuba got up and leaned over me to look at it. "It's far but I don't see why he couldn't have called."

"Maybe he wanted us to go there anyway, so he didn't feel he needed to call since it would get the same message across." I shrugged. Ouch, I had to stop doing that.

"That or he can't move," Hattori put in. I scowled at him and all the other boy did was look off into space as he thought. "I really hope it's not 'em…"

"Who?" Hakuba and I asked at the same time. I elbowed him when Hattori meet our eyes with a smile.

"No one. Just talkin' to myself."

"I thought we agreed not to keep secrets and since I never confided in you about myself you owe, pay up." I waved my fingers as if asking for money but lost the smile. Hattori had some internal battle with himself as he stared at the table and refused to meet our eyes. He shrugged and looked up.

"I have no idea who yer first group a people is, but the second group is deadly and they won't bat an eye at murder so if it's them, ya gotta be careful." He addressed just me at this point, "And yeah, they got away from Kudo."

"I've gotten away from him too" I argued, but inside I knew that if Kudo had let a murderer escape, which I wasn't, it was serious. That guy could find information and proof on anyone if he was given the chance. He'd never seemed to take that up that opportunity with me, just a few witty comments and a soccer ball aimed at my face.

"So they're dangerous…" I was mumbling to myself as I stared at the blinking red dot. "Then hopefully it's not them, since Jii-chan seems to be well enough to call and send the nifty map."

"Yeah," Hattori got up and was at the door in seconds. "So what are ya waiting for? Let's go."

"Hakuba-kun," I turned to him. "There is no way that I'm walking that far and I'm running low on money. I'm sure Hattori, in all his eagerness, doesn't have any on him either, so can you pay or get your housekeeper to take us?"

"Baaya seems to be the most appropriate choice." He dialed the number for his house and shouted to Hattori, "If you want to walk be my guest, but we're getting a ride!"

"Thanks."

Hakuba just waved me off and started speaking into the phone. I took the time to go up to my room and get a jacket that would actually keep the cold out. I found a black one with a fair amount of padding that didn't make me look like a plump duck. Hakuba had brought a thick coat from wherever he had gone to, and Hattori had been well dressed since he barged in on us at Agasa's.

I came back down stairs and everyone was waiting for me at the door.

"You make me feel like I took an eternity getting a coat" I grumbled. Mom shoved a winter hat on my head as Hattori opened the door. I turned back to her a little confused.

"The bandages," she explained. "You didn't cover them and Kaito…" She bent to kiss me on the check and whisper into my ear. "I know you like to help people but try not to do it as yourself. Walking around them as Kid might be funny but I don't want anything bad to happen to you."

"Nothing bad is going to happen," I kissed her back. "And whoever is after the detective and the kids won't see hide nor hair of Kuroba Kaito, so don't worry."

Hakuba turned back to my mom and bid her goodbye. Hattori stumbled as he stopped himself from continuing to walk forward and did the same.

"Ya got a nice mom. I wish mine was like that." Hattori looked up at the sky which was now filled with stars as we walked out the door. "Mine's always on my case. I couldn't go to the bathroom without her yellin' at me."

"I don't have that problem, since mine's back in England and my father doesn't take much interest in my affairs."

"That's why ya grew up a snot noised kid." Hattori winked at me. "An' you must take after yer old man 'cause I don't see yer mom snatchin' gems."

"More of a legacy actually," I snapped my fingers and confetti, along with one of my favorite doves, appeared on Hattori's head. "This is what I got from my father."

"Wow, how'd ya do that?" Hattori put a hand up to his head and the dove preached on his finger. He used his other hand to try and get the confetti out. It wouldn't work since I'd added glitter which would stay in his hair, but I didn't need to tell him that.

"Trade secret," I waved a hand over the bird and it was gone in an instant, obviously not anywhere on my body since the poor thing would have suffocated.

"Why didn't ya stick to real magic, not that stuff ya pull off when ya steal things?"

"I'm… doing something." I waved my hand in front of him to flash his wallet and some sort of pouch he had around his neck. "You're lucky I'm not a real thief or you wouldn't be getting it back."

"If ya ain't a real magician an' ya ain't a real thief, then what are ya?"

"A phantom of course." I didn't use smoke but took my jacket off for a split second and appeared on Hattori's other side, a little in front of him so I wouldn't shove Hakuba out of the way. "At least for now."

"I'm shocked anyone managed to shoot ya with how fast ya are." Hattori shoved me lightly on the back of the head. "An' quit showin' off!"

"I'm bored and the cars not here yet" I moaned. "And if you think that's showing off you haven't seen anything yet."

Hakuba grabbed my arm and shook his head before I could do anything.

"Kuroba-kun please lay off on the antics. We don't know if anyone's watching and I'm sure a smoke bomb or flash of light will guarantee unwanted attention."

"Point taken." I glanced at my watch which was currently residing in my pocket. "What's our story?"

Hakuba looked at me for a while before giving up and sighing. "Our story for what exactly?"

"You've been gone for more than a day, which I'm sure your housekeeper would have noticed. Now you're back with two people she's never seen before and we're driving clear across town. I'm sure I would want some sort of reason."

"Right," he put his hand to rest under his chin. "She won't need it but some explanation would be nice. I don't think she was too fond of my hair the last time she gave us a ride."

"I don't think she was too fond of me. Not that she'll know it's me again." I'd been wearing a wig the first time she'd picked us up. Thinking about what mom had just said, changing my appearance didn't seem like a bad idea. "I'm sure Kudo-kun wouldn't mind that I borrowed this."

I took the dark face makeup out of my pocket. I hadn't meant to keep it, since I had some of my own, but Kudo's mother didn't seem like she'd be using it and I didn't want it to go to waste. I grabbed a small mirror and reapplied it.

Hattori giggled and I shot him a look.

"What?"

"Nothin'," He continued to laugh, though he was trying to stop. "Ya just look like a girl when you were doing that."

"How else am I supposed to put makeup on?" I felt my face get red but he wouldn't be able to see it.

"How 'bout not putting makeup on. That would work."

I snapped the mirror shut and put the cosmetics away as I took out a small unlabeled bottle. "I'm sorry I'm not a chameleon," I spat sarcastically. I took off the hat and spread the dark goo in my hair, successfully changing its color from brown to jet black. The coloring gel would dry in seconds and it allowed me to lay my hair down flatter, curling away from my face.

I had made sure to get everything that I might need from home now that I had the chance. No one could tell it but, besides a small bag I had over my shoulders, all available pocket space and lining had something in it that I might find useful at some point. I took a pair of contacts out and put in, a nice shade of amber.

"If I hadn't seen how easy it was for you to do that, I wouldn't have believed it." Hakuba ran a hand through his hair.

"What?" I put the hat back on.

"Wow," Hattori hadn't been watching me after the makeup insult, I guess trying not to make me feel too self-conscious about his comment. "I wish I coulda done that when I tried to help Kudo."

"Eh?"

"I don't think you fully appreciate your ability to change your physical continence. " Hakuba sighed "And here I put so much thought into changing my own appearance and you can do it so much quicker and simpler than me."

"Because it's temporary," I held my fingers up that were still black as I wiped them off on a cloth to show how easily it came away. "Of course it would take longer if I wanted to change my appearance for any length of time."

"It's still impressive." Hattori nodded to me. "When I tried it, everyone could tell right away it was me."

"I've had more practice," I looked at him coyly. "I'm sure you don't go around all the time where a disguise could save your life." I caught a look from Hakuba and added, "or career. I'd be a terrible thief if I couldn't impersonate people with definite results."

The convertible that Baaya drove came around the corner as our conversation ended. As she pulled up beside us, she didn't take her eyes off of Hakuba. Hattori and I got into the back seats.

"Young master, I'm sure it's not my place but I've been worrying about you recently." She shot a look back at me and Hattori. If we'd have been different ages we may have looked like brothers. "And I've noticed you've been hanging around some new people."

"Its fine Baaya. Hattori-kun is a detective like me and I've met him before… and his cousin wanted to come along." Hakuba didn't pause long when he realized he hadn't come up with an excuse or identity for me yet. "They live in Osaka so I didn't get back until recently."

"Hey cousin, sounds like Hakuba-kun didn't like bein' away from his home." I picked up the accent in a heartbeat and made it my own. I gave him an exaggeratedly sad face and stared laughing. Annoying cousin was a role I could play.

"Knock it off… Natsuki-kun."

I stuck my tongue out at Hattori for the unimaginative name. I leaned close to him to whisper.

"Where'd that come from?"

"I was tellin' ya to knock it off and it just kinda came out…" Hattori shrugged. "What's wrong with it?"

"Nothing." I settled into the seat and enjoyed the feeling of the cold air flipping around the hair that stuck out of the hat.

…

"Are you sure this is the right place young master?" Baaya asked after we approached our destination, my ears becoming numb at this point.

I looked around at the dilapidated buildings and those still under construction. It was like a building graveyard for all those that didn't survive the modern age of Tokyo. I flipped open the phone to check the map again. We were less than a mile off, which is where we wanted to be since driving up didn't seem like a good idea. I looked around the area once more that seemed to suit the homeless and the desperate rather than old man and a bunch of children.

"Apparently."