Three months, and he was no closer to understanding his erstwhile house guest. Three months, and he was no closer to tracking down the two men who would have killed him if it weren't for the aforementioned guest. Three months, and Agasa had no relevant news or breakthroughs with the sample of the virus they'd managed to retain.

It really was true, bad news always came in sets of three—well, lack of good news was more accurate. Shinichi dribbled a soccer ball absently as the thoughts drifted through his mind, a little perturbed as to how calm everything had been despite the lack of good news. Kaito had taken to his new life like a fish to water—though he refused to go through primary school again. As it was he was continuing his high school education via online courses, and he'd conned Shinichi into taking the official tests for him (but only after the detective had quizzed the shrunken teenager on the material, there was no way he'd allow Kaito to use his condition to cheat the system)—it was scary how easy it was to slip into the other's place using only a bit of hair gel.

Ran had been surprisingly accepting of the new kid, coddling him like an aunt would her favorite nephew whenever they were in the same room together. She'd often 'kidnap' him for a trip to the park and some free ice-cream, leaving Shinichi feeling left out, and a little envious (although he'd never admit the last one aloud, even under pain of death).

Last but not least, Kaito had slid almost seamlessly into Shinichi's own life, much to the annoyance and perturbance of the high school detective. There were times when he didn't even realize the child was there, just continuing his own routine of school, crime scenes, and soccer. In retrospect, if people noticed that he was leaving a seemingly ten year old child alone in such a large, empty house for hours on end while he worked the seamlessly endless stream of cases, he could end up in quite a bit of trouble. However, most of his neighbors—minus Agasa, of course—were not even aware of the child living with him, so there wasn't much to worry about. It wasn't as if Shinichi was trying to exclude Kaito from such a large part of his life, the boy expressed no desire to wander around the scenes of countless murders, stating that it was Shinichi's job to be the detective, not his.

The statement had drawn a rather confused look from Officer Takagi, who had been selected as the police's messenger boy for that particular occasion, but in the end was explained away by childish idiosyncrasies. As it was, Kaito had completely missed out on every one of Shinichi's cases except for that first one, way back when in an ice-cream parlor. Come to think of it, the aversion to cases was understandable—being present when a pregnant mother poisons her boyfriend out of spite was not a good way to build up an interest in police work.

"OW!" He was thrown roughly out of his own little world by a sudden impact to his head, it wasn't so much painful as it was surprising. Shinichi rubbed at the slightly stinging location as he glared at the black and white ball rolling innocently to a stop a few feet away—he'd kicked it a little too hard, resulting in it going straight into his chin instead of harmlessly up into the air like he'd intended. A chuckle wafted from the green jungle to his right, causing Shinichi to shift his glare to the tousled brown-haired head that rose just a little above the remnants of his mother's wild garden. "I'd like to see you try it, kid."

The mock growled, slightly annoyed statement drew another laugh, and a dirt smudged face poked through a gap in the outer hedge than surrounded the miniature jungle, "Nah, soccer is more your thing. I'd like to see you take care of these roses though, I swear there are monkeys running around in here."

Kaito's statement was accented by an overly exaggerated wipe of his forehead, feigning more fatigue than he really felt. Shinichi felt his lips spasm slightly as he tried to keep from smiling, mimicking the kid's tone, "Nah, gardening is your thing."

Kaito hadn't had much to do during the first week or so to keep his mind off the recent upheaval of his life, so he'd volunteered to try and whip Kudou Yukiko's old garden into something resembling the ordered, neat plot of land it was before Shinichi's parents decided to go gallivanting around the world. It still resembled a miniature rainforest, but it had come a long way from its years of wild growth, Shinichi had to admit that gardening wasn't something he'd every really gotten interested in. He'd taken to coming out and joining Kaito on nice days when he didn't have a case clamoring for his attention, practicing his soccer while the shrunken teenager worked with the plants. Other than mealtimes, these little outside sessions were really the only time they spent together, what with Shinichi's school and work.

After a couple seconds of shuffling leaves, Kaito's diminutive frame exited through the gap in the hedge, too lazy to find the proper entrance amidst the ruckus of vine-like ivy and weeds, "Ne, Kudou, I'm gonna go into the city for a while."

"Fine." The detective kicked the ball one last time, catching it easily and tucking it under one arm, "Just don't—"

"Talk to, or take anything from strangers." Kaito rolled his eyes, reciting the normal instructions, feigning annoyance. He knew that Shinichi wasn't patronizing him, merely teasing, "I'm not really ten, you know."

"I was going to say 'do drugs', but that works too." The detective chuckled before waving his arm in a shooing motion, "In any case, go on. I think I'll go drop in on Inspector Megure in case you need me for anything."

There was something strange flickering across Kaito's face, before the normal smile dropped into place and the dirt-smudged head bobbed up and down in an understanding nod. Shinichi took note, before eyeing the not-child as Kaito began to make his way back toward the house, gardening tools in hand, "And make sure you wash up too!"

"Yes Mom!" came the laughing response.

Despite the lack of progress, things really weren't all that bad.

--

"Inspector! Inspector!"

"Mm?" Megure looked up from his half-eaten donut, quickly flicking a few stubborn crumbs away from his bushy mustache and placing the pastry down on the napkin. He turned around in his swivel-y chair, noticing a huffing officer standing outside his office, breath uneven as though he'd just run a marathon. He struggled to speak, but the words came out all jumbled and unintelligible.

The inspector sighed, gesturing one arm toward the water dispenser just down the hall, "Relax a little and get a drink. Then you can tell me."

The blue-clad officer nodded mutely, trudging off in the indicated direction. Megure took the break to finish up his donut, wiping the last remaining slivers of the glaze covering when the man returned. He was still breathing hard, but once more capable of speech.

"Well?" The portly inspector prodded, a little interested in what it was that had the other police man tongue-tied.

"The letter was a positive match! It IS the kaitou's writing!"

Megure's face brightened a little, he, along with most of the police force, looked upon Kid as a welcome distraction from the more deadly cases. Getting assigned to 'Bandit watch' was a very welcome assignment among the homicide unit, the thief never hurt anyone, and the stolen goods ended up returned within the next day or two. As it was, Kid had been unusually silent for the past three months, the longest consecutive time since his initial eight year vanishing act. "Go inform Nakamori, and have someone on standby to cal the detectives, should we need them."

The unnamed officer snapped to attention, giving the Inspector a crisp salute before running off to fulfill his orders. Megure chuckled a little on the young man's enthusiasm and stood up, pushing in his chair as she headed toward the door, dropping his napkin off in the trash bin on the way out. He consulted his mental map, before heading off to the unofficial meeting hall for the Kaitou Kid Taskforce. It wasn't all that far away, but the maze-like hallways in the precinct made navigating between departments a pain. About halfway there he was joined by an unnervingly ecstatic Nakamori. The man had been working on the Kaitou Kid cases of roughly eight years before, and had been tackling the recent wave with enthusiasm that bordered on obsession. Many believed he was unusually obsessed with the overly flamboyant thief, but whether or not didn't really matter. The man was the reigning expert when it came to the Kid.

Without a word the two entered the large conference room, heading to the table that currently housed the sealed letter with Kid's distinctive scrawl. About the table milled one or two senior members of the task force that had managed to catch the news, waiting for the official leader (Nakamori, of course) to open the letter.

Megure stood back as Nakamori slipped on a pair of gloves, picking up the sealed envelope and opening it with delicate precision. Any outsider might think it was silly, handling a piece of paper with such caution, but it was from the kaitou with a predisposition for practical jokes. Many earlier missives had come with some…surprises included. Smoke pellets, packages of colorful confetti, and once even very flimsy, very small paintballs than made a huge mess when they burst, squirting out far more brightly colored pink paint than should have been contained in the small containers. None of the presents were life threatening, but they were humiliating, and no one ever wanted to clean up afterwards.

The current message seemed to be void of any such booby traps, the letter sliding easily out of the paper prison that surrounded it. Nakamori unfolded the square, taking a breath to read it aloud, before nearly choking on the first word. His mouth snapped shut and his eyes narrowed, scanning the distinctive script with an ever tightening jaw line. Megure did not know that a person's skin could produce so many different shades of red, and it was even border lining a sort of red-violet before the other inspector threw the letter down on the table in disgust, "That was not written by Kid!"

Megure's eyebrow arched quizzically, picking up the slightly crumpled paper and smoothing out the wrinkles that had been created by the fall, "While the message might be strange…" He began after a moment, taking the time to scan the words and ponder them (also trying to let Nakamori calm down, but if the coloration was any indication, it wouldn't be anytime soon) "We've already established that the handwriting and caricature on the envelope matches previous heist notes, and the letter inside seems o match the envelope…"

It was standard procedure to run a handwriting analysis the moment a Kid heist arrived, and only once a positive was confirmed would it be brought to the attention of the superior officers of the target area (and Nakamori, of course). It was amazing how many false notes were delivered, especially when there had been a considered gap between publicized heists. People were probably trying to goad the thief into showing himself since it was a well know fact that the kaitou did not like other people doing things in his name.

"It is not." Nakamori repeated stubbornly, jabbing a finger at the note still held in Megure's hands. The homicide Inspector was in charge this time, since the letter had been delivered to his department, "Kid would not do that!"

"What? Retire?" Megure shook his head, "The bandit is a human, and humans get older. As people get older, they get tired of doing what they have always done."

Nakamori echoed the other Inspector's motion; only his movement was much faster and much sharper, driven by the force of his denial, "Not like this. The bastard would either go out quietly like last time, or go out with a bang, something overly flamboyant and utterly humiliating for us." The taller man looked down at the letter in thinly veiled disgust, "That is NOT Kid."

"All evidence says otherwise." Megure picked up the envelope and slid the note back in, "Unless you can find support for your conclusion, I'm pulling my men out of the task force. I'm sure the others will as well."

The leader of the homicide unit tipped his hat to the other man, "Have a good afternoon, Inspector."

The other two officers—having opted to remain silent and out of the way during the debate—quickly followed him out, not willing to be caught in one of Nakamori's infamous rants. They left the ears ringing since the Inspector had such a loud voice, and was well versed in how to make it carry as far and with as much force as humanly possible.

The door swung shut, leaving Nakamori Ginzo, the leader of the soon to be disbanded Kaitou Kid Task Force, to an empty room.

A/N: Sorry! Half a week late, I know…I'm a bad girl x.x I might as well just not give myself deadlines since more often than not I miss 'em anyways.

:O Plot appears! I've finally decided on a semi concrete plot (Maybe now I'll stop zoning out in the middle of class…) and have already written out sketchy versions of later events and the epilogue in my notebook (where most of my stuff is. I don't have much time to write except during school. Not much time on the computer at all, frankly.)

In any case, hope you liked it. Sorry about not having Kai-chan's POV, maybe next chappie? It shouldn't be so hard to write…new plot ideas new drive for me to write.

I did get started reading/watching Full Moon wo Sagashite again…--; if it comes down to it I'll make Takuto or Mitsuki do a cameo just to avoid the plotbunnies. I might have to do that with Danni Phantom too… bleh…evil plotbunnies T-T

See ya'll in another couple weeks! Off to bed now…