Previous disclaimers apply. With apologies to Robert Frost.

Chapter 20: The Road Less Traveled

Blackness, welcoming and empty, the guardian against uninvited dreams...

No, wait. That's the inside of my eyelids.

Kaito yawned and stretched languidly beneath the covers, letting the comfortable fog of sleep recede as awareness slowly crept back in. He hadn't felt so rested since... restarting mental processes paused uncertainly.

Bad question to ask. Moving on...

He blinked fully awake, pausing in surprise as his eyes opened to darkness mitigated only by the faint light of the city that slipped through the room's closed blinds. The sun had apparently gone down while he'd been sleeping. Turning his head, he found the clock on the nightstand and discovered that the time had just passed three in the morning.

...Which was odd, because even in the pre-dawn silence he couldn't hear Riku at all, either the mild snores of sleep or even simply regular breathing to denote his presence. Propping up on his elbows, Kaito focused on the other side of the room and realized that the bed was still made, with no signs of occupation past or present. Riku didn't seem to have bothered to go to bed at all.

Well, then.

Kaito slipped out of bed and ghosted through the rest of the house, wondering what Riku could possibly have found to occupy his attention. Under the circumstances, there didn't seem to be many options besides a book or a bout of moody rumination, but Kaito'd thought that Riku'd been doing better... or maybe his own problems of the past few weeks had simply kept him from noticing. Distraction didn't even begin to cover it.

Speaking of distracted—Kaito paused as he approached the closed study door, straining futilely to hear anything through the solid barrier. Even as the effects of Solomon's tea faded slowly away, the nightmare's memories continued to linger far too clearly for his peace of mind. After a few moments' vacillation, Kaito silently crept forward and cracked the door, trying to cultivate a sense of internal calm, quiet, and safe-at-rest. The last thing he wanted to do was wake Hakuba, and have the blond ask why Kaito felt compelled to check on him in the middle of the night when all sane folk were asleep. One embarrassing situation due to the irrational need to confirm that the detective remained alive and intact was more than enough.

Listening through the quiet of the night, Kaito's ears caught the sound of Hakuba's quiet breathing. He smiled faintly at the sound and moved on.

To Kaito's surprise, however, Riku was nowhere to be found. Instead, after confirming that all of the rooms in the house were conspicuously lacking the islander's presence, Kaito quietly raided the fridge for leftovers from dinner while he pondered what could have caused Riku to go traveling alone. If the younger boy had been inclined to brood, any of the empty rooms should have sufficed, and if not... Kaito wasn't aware of any pressing obligations elsewhere on Riku's part.

Unless something had come up while he'd been asleep...

Given the time lapse, it was a viable possibility, but it still meant that Riku was offworld for some reason—and the only reason Kaito could think of was trouble with the Heartless or Nobodies—without backup. And Kaito couldn't follow.

:Would you like to fix that?:

Kaito blinked at Méraud's voice in the back of his mind. Solomon's tea had definitely left his thinking, if not his memory, fuzzier than normal, if he hadn't thought to ask Méraud about this already.

"Yeah..." Since he wanted to save his energy for traveling, Kaito opted to talk to thin air rather than summon Méraud. It helped him differentiate between his own thought processes and what he wanted to communicate. "We got interrupted yesterday, didn't we?"

:...Yes.:

It was amazing how much wry humor could be packed into a single word.

Kaito smiled sheepishly down at his bowl of rice, recollection of the previous afternoon clearer than it had been the first time around.

"I'm doing better now."

Nightmare's death was still there, prominent in his recent memories, but guilt had softened to a faint regret over the man's choices and a quiet byt determined interest in Kenta's future.

:That's not very difficult, given your previous state.: Amused warmth brushed against his mind.

"...It's been a bad week."

:So I observed. I had wished to help in some way, but...: A sigh. :Your human minds are so very odd, and it has been a long time since I came in close contact with one. Dark Magician or the Blue Eyes are far more accustomed to your manners of thought, but you have no bond to them.:

"I'll work it out." Somehow. "You can help plenty by explaining what I have to do to catch up with Riku."

:Of course. The concept is not so very difficult, when you understand the nature of the Shadows. It is not, however, something to be attempted lightly.:

"Dark Sage mentioned that, I think... that it's really easy to get lost if you aren't careful."

:Yes. You see... The Shadows are everywhere, a single mass between what you call 'existence'. Consequently, they touch ALL existence: not only every place, but also at every time. Since the normal rules of time and space, as you know them, do not apply to the Shadows, all you need to know is where you want to leave to. ...'Where' just happens to involve more variables and precision than what inhabitants of four-dimensional space-time usually consider necessary.:

Kaito considered the implications of that for a moment. "So if you're fuzzy on the specifics when you try this, you're aiming for a patch of space-time rather than a definite point. ...No wonder it's so easy to get lost."

:Yes, I have known some who drifted out of time because they lacked the ability to precisely describe, and so envision, their intended destination. If you do know where you want to go, however, and have the ability to open the paths, it is quite simple.:

"For a given definition of simple."

:You have already instinctively used the Shadows, to pull time and space that you know closer together, when you act as the Kid. To open a portal you merely pull harder, to the Shadows beyond, and then again to the other side.: She paused, sense of presence dimming for a moment, then continued. :Dark Sage suggests that the two are not unlike the difference between bunching a doubled cloth to bring two places closer, and piercing through both layers to reach the other side.:

"Well, except that your exit could be any other place on the cloth, once you'd made entry, right? And no matter where you're going, there's no intervening space... but there's still two rips in space, made in really close succession. ...It's possible to only make an entrance in, and not out, isn't it?"

:Indeed.: If anything, Méraud sounded faintly amused. :The first is always more difficult than the second, because the level of the Shadows is always lower. With practice, you can use the momentum of the first to... punch through, I believe you could say, to the other side in no time at all. ...So long as you have your destination in mind.:

"...Yeah, we keep coming back to that. How, exactly, am I supposed to make sure I don't get lost?"

:That depends on you, I suppose. For a place, a well-detailed mental image may be enough. People are more difficult, since appearances change around the soul, but heat signatures are unique enough that you could navigate by them...:

"...Méraud, my ability to see is limited by the color spectrum."

:Oh. I'm sorry, it's so difficult to remember that you're only human. You feel...: She trailed off.

"Yes?" Kaito prompted the silence.

An impression of a sigh accompanied a sense of faint melancholy. :...The feel of your mind, such curiosity and determination and the echo of the Shadow's presence, is very much like that of my younger brother, Nilam. He... left, a long time ago, to explore the deep Shadows beyond the Shadow Realm. There is much that we do not understand about them, for while they may be interconnected, they are not homogenous by nature. However, traveling the Shadows for themselves is quite different from using them as transport across reality with a destination in mind... and they need not be actively malicious to be dangerous.:

"He never came back? Did anyone try to find him?"

:The Shadows outside our own Realm obscure any abilities I have known to seek and find others within them. Nor do I know of a way to travel through the Shadows to other Shadows unless you wander aimlessly, for how can you describe and differentiate that which is by nature undefined?:

"...I'm sorry."

:It's been a long time. But we have strayed from our topic,: Méraud added, tone lightening considerably. :Perhaps a different model... how does Riku-san find his destinations?:

Kaito thoughtfully scraped the last of his rice from the bowl and stood to rinse his dishes in the sink. "Well, he hasn't talked about it much, but from what I remember... it has a lot to do with emotional connections that he's formed with people or places, among other things." Kaito's lips quirked. "Navigation by heart."

:How apt. An empathic sense of orientation may work well in this case, given your intended scope of travel, though a visual image should also have a role in destinations you have previously visited. Your subconscious mind should help define parameters that your consciousness may not consider.:

"...No offense, but that sounds less encouraging than you probably intended it."

:I never claimed to be a very good teacher,: Méraud reminded him. :Do you think you understand how to tear rather than bend the Shadows?:

Kaito nodded, strolling from the tiny kitchen to the more open, comfortable living room and flipping on the light. "The concept makes sense. We'll see how good I am with the actual application."

:To make things simple, then, why not try to open a path right back into this room? You will have no better-defined destination, and if you succeed, the evidence will be obvious.:

Kaito cocked his head thoughtfully, pivoting on the balls of his feet to absorb the room in detail. "Right. Here goes..."

He closed his eyes, hand reaching out in instinctive echo as he sought out the familiar presence of the Shadows around him.

Now that he was looking and had a name for the blend of ghostly sensation that had always accompanied his better tricks, it didn't take long before he managed to touch here and twist there until he felt the brush of possibility open up before his mind, and all that was left was to reach out and pull with a sharp tug of will instead of a guiding influence and—

Kaito opened his eyes and and remained silent for a long moment, gazing steadily through the Shadow-edged tear in reality before him. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the second rip, the window that was allowing him to stare straight ahead and yet see himself in profile from several feet away.

There was no helping the deadpan comment, there really honestly wasn't.

"...The cake is a lie."

:The... what?:

"Sorry, gaming reference. That one was pretty good for maintaining manual dexterity, too. So if I walk through this..."

Kaito took a step forward and blinked at the abrupt change in perspective, before a manic grin spread across his face with a will of its own.

"Wow." He bounced lightly on his feet, a noticeable level energy drain being accompanied by the rush of adrenaline he'd long since learned to anticipate and make use of at the height of a heist. "It works!"

He'd have to get better at this fairly quickly, though, or every few rips outside of this world he was going to crash, and crash hard.

:It will not always be so easy,: Méraud cautioned. :The Shadows are very present here, for obvious reasons. You must be careful not to exhaust yourself, or to become careless in your aim.:

Kaito nodded absently, already absorbed in examining the Shadowrift more closely. He ran a hand cautiously along the edge, smiling as fringe-tendrils tickled across his palm and fingers. Hidden behind and between them, however...

"Two rips in space. When two things exist next to each other in physical space, there's always a gap between them, no matter how miniscule. If you weren't paying attention... you could fall through, couldn't you."

:Yes. And you may have already guessed, but... to open a path solely from within the Shadows is both easier and more difficult than when based within reality. Easier, of course, because the Shadows are directly at your fingertips; complicated, because your foundational frame of reference then exists only your memories and mental landscape. It would not be difficult to simply... slide out of synch.:

"...I'm sensing a theme here."

:I warn you so that you will be mindful of the pitfalls as you develop and hone this skill. There are reasons why not many even among Shadowchildren have ever used this ability... and even fewer, for very long.:

"Cheerful thought."

Mostly irrelevant, though. He needed to learn this—not just for his own sake, though he looked forward to being able to travel independent of Riku when convenient or necessary—but to get Hakuba safely home. The blond's opinion on the matter was... not quite irrelevant, but close. Someone needed to be home to look after Aoko, and as much as Kaito wished he could be there, keeping an eye on her, Riku needed someone to support him too. Kaito was currently the only one available and qualified for the job. Hakuba could take care of things back home, and he would be better off in the magic-dampened atmosphere there instead of traveling between the stars.

He sighed. "All right, let's try this again." He eyed the two portals critically. He could feel their distortions in the fabric of the world, pinned open by his Shadows.

He reached out and released the Shadows with a twist of will, feeling them slip away back to their unseen source. And the portals both closed without a sound, like curtains falling back into place when their fastening cords were pulled undone, leaving no trace of their presence behind.

:If you have a familiar destination in mind, you might try opening a path back to your home. It would not be more difficult than any other place outside this room, though you might need to rest briefly before trying to return.:

Kaito nodded. "I'm going to have to manage it sooner or later; might as well start as soon as possible. I've got a few hours before anyone would miss me, anyway... since I don't think I want to start playing with trying to arrive back here a few minutes after I left, when I'll have my hands full just trying to GET back."

:Yes, quite. Perhaps your room at home?:

"Yeah..." The process was easier the second time around, now that he had a better idea of what he needed to do, and Kaito spared half a thought for taking advantage of the visit home to give Aoko a call and at least let her know that he knew about Kenta. He owed Kenta that much, at least, what with... everything.

When the Shadowrift opened this time, the light from the Motou's living room spilled through the portal to illuminate the familiar furnishings of Kaito's room back home.

:Well done.:

"You know, even knowing what I'm trying to do, that's pretty bizarre." Kaito learned through the hole, mentally reminding himself to not try and rest his hands on the thin air around it as he did so. In the dimness, his gaze caught on the red digits of his alarm clock. "Wait a minute..."

The small numbers read: 7:41 pm.

He stepped through completely and made it to the light switch, then found his cell phone where it lay charging on his desk and checked the date.

"...It's Sunday. Again." The full dark of after sunset, to be sure, but not the pre-dawn of early Monday morning.

:The worlds may not necessarily be temporally parallel, but you seemed to arrive in Domino City at similar time to when you left Tokyo. A more likely scenario is that you colored your destination time with a desire to speak with Aoko-san, and the sooner the better.:

Kaito whistled under his breath. No wonder people drifted so easily. "I'll take this, this time. The less times I have to try to get here, the better off I'll be when I try getting back."

In theory, he could just leave the rift open, but he didn't trust one of the Motou's to not wake up early and find the portal in their living room while he was busy talking to Aoko. Their discovery of a parallel Japan would lead a multitude of things that if perhaps not necessarily bad would still be time consuming and less than pleasant.

Returning to the other side briefly, he grabbed his Duel deck and his shoes from the guest room and turned out the living room light on his way back. Closing the portal was easy enough, but when the Shadowrift vanished this time Kaito staggered slightly where he stood from surprise. He'd known the Shadows were dampened here, but still hadn't entirely expected the loss of the open connection to Domino's high density to feel like being wrapped in thick cotton. If he concentrated, he could still sense their presence, but with nowhere near the ease of before.

He sighed faintly. Since there was nothing he could do about it, he'd just have to learn to compensate. Eventually.

In the meantime, he'd settle for a shower and a change of clothes.

Twenty minutes later, hair still damp, Kaito settled onto his bed with his cell phone and hit the only speed-dial he had besides Mizuki's cell number. The phone rang several times, before Aoko's slightly breathless voice answered.

"Kaito?"

...Not even two days, and she'd been waiting for him to call. Two days, after six weeks without a word, two weeks back, and another abrupt departure.

Probably waiting for proof that unlike last time, I haven't effectively dropped off the face of the planet. Again.

Because for some obscure reason, despite their slow—necessary—creeping—estrangement of the past months, she still thought their friendship was worth holding onto.

Kaito smiled into the phone, keeping his tone light. "Hey, Aoko, how are you doing?"

"I'm fine. ...How are things with the show?"

"Same old, same old. I'm getting worked to the bone, but it's worth it."

"That's good. I'm glad you're having fun." Kaito winced at the slightly wistful tone in Aoko's voice. "Where are you now?"

Kaito opened his mouth, the lie of 'Kyoto' rising easily to his lips, but then stopped. He's promised himself over a year ago that he'd only ever lie to Aoko to protect her when he couldn't creatively bend the truth.

"I'm in Tokyo right now," he admitted, purposefully interpreting the question to refer to him rather than the show. "I forgot some stuff back home"—nothing big, just Hakuba's safety, equilibrium and general well-being—"and on my way here remembered Hakuba-kun mentioning yesterday that you were taking care of Kenta-kun now. So I figured I'd call and ask how things were going with that."

"Oh!" Aoko's tone instantly brightened. "Yes, we have temporary custody of Kenta-kun right now, at least until all the legal ramifications of Connery-san's death are worked out. After that... we'll see. Daddy's more of a softy than he likes to admit, and Kenta-kun's an adorable little boy, even if a little... subdued... right now."

"...He's lost a lot."

"I know. But some good did come of it," Aoko continued, smile evident in her voice. "Kenta-kun hasn't had many friends his age, and Saguru-kun gave me the number of another girl who has a ward. We actually only got home a little bit ago from meeting Ran-chan and Conan-kun."

"Conan-kun?" Kaito managed to barely stifle his recognition of the name, though not his surprise, during a brief moment of panic.

If Conan ever ran across Kaito because of Ran and Aoko's friendship—the girls were going to get along well enough to warrant house visits, and Kaito featured in at least half of the pictures denoting Aoko's childhood—the miniature detective would know.

...And even though Hakuba seemed to have thrown his lot in with Kaito, Conan had only ever seen the Kid. Oh, he'd honored the game, ever since he'd accepted Kid's challenge that second meeting on the Suzuki corporation's yacht, and never tried to chase Kid down outside of a heist... but that didn't mean that if he did find out, he wouldn't try to capture Kid like he'd promised to do that same meeting.

All of that flashed through his mind in a split second, as Kaito quickly covered for the brief panic by commenting, "That's a pretty unusual name. Were his parents American?"

"He seems full Japanese, but according to Ran-chan his parents live in America. He certainly lives up to his name, though—I think he loves Sherlock Holmes almost as much as Saguru-kun does."

Understatement of the year.

"So did they get along?"

"Yeah... I told Ran-chan about Kenta-kun's history before we met up, and she told Conan-kun about what happened to Connery-san. Conan-kun was really good about not prying too much, and Kenta-kun really enjoyed spending time with him. They spent most of their time talking about detective work: how Kenta-kun wants to be a policeman like Connery-san was, and the mysteries Conan-kun's solved before now with some of his other friends from school. I think he'll be really good for Kenta-kun as a friend."

Kaito frowned pensively. If Kenta wanted to be a cop like his father, that opened the doors to all SORTS of unpleasant possibilities in the future, if Kenta ever found out that Connery wasn't as... good... as his son thought he was. Although if Kenta could be introduced to the reality of police work through Conan and his little gang, to see the faults of humanity and have the benefit of of a support structure like that in the intervening years... he might be strong enough by then to make that discovery and not shatter along with his perceptions of the man. Kaito was hardly in any position to mentor Kenta, but Conan, as a grade-schooler with a teenager's—a teenage detective's, no less—perspective...

"...Kaito?"

"Huh? Oh, sorry, Aoko. Something just came up. I've got to go, okay? I'll call you again soon."

"Oh. Okay..." She didn't try to hide the disappointment in her voice. "Take care."

"You too. Say hi to Kenta-kun and your dad for me."

"I will."

"All right... Bye."

Kaito hung up the phone and sighed. Conan was in an unprecedented position to help Kenta in ways that Kaito couldn't, but wanted to have happen... but for Conan to be able to do so, he had to know about it first.

...Somewhere, the gods are laughing themselves sick over the irony of a thief asking a detective for a favor.

Conan would not react well to receiving a personal note from Kid, never mind that all of this couldn't be relayed very well through a note—or even a phone call, if Kaito was feeling absurd enough to try it and thought Conan would believe it— anyway. And relaying the situation through the girls was utterly out of the question.

...If I'm going to pull this off, I'm going to have to visit the miniature detective in person.

Great.

Author's Note:

"The cake is a lie" references the game Portal, in which the player has a gun that can make portals, with some limitations.