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A Curse Marked Fate

21: The Balance of Things

Lying in his hotel bed that night, Shinichi found sleep eluding him. So much had happened over the last twenty four hours that he could hardly believe it had only been a day. It didn't help that he had spent what felt like a week in what was essentially another world just that morning. The knowledge that that week had in reality only been an hour between breakfast and lunch was skewing with his perception of time. That was something the mages at Clover Institute would have to take into consideration when they began making their Vision Books available to the public, he mused, making a note to mention it to Kaito.

Thoughts of the Sky Mage had his stomach doing something strange and fluttery that he didn't understand. Maybe it was guilt, he reflected, rolling over onto his side so that he could gaze through the crack between the curtains at the night sky beyond. He had come to this event fully intending to hide his identity from his old friend because he hadn't wanted to risk getting Kaito involved in his problems. But he had slipped up. Not, he reflected ruefully, that he really believed there was anyone out there who could keep anything from Kaito. The Sky Mage had always been a master at ferreting out secrets. Even when they'd been kids, Kaito had been quick to notice the little things about people—their quirks and interests, habits and character. Add to that his natural charm and talent for acting and you had someone who would be right at home in any spy story.

Yet while the ease with which Kaito had found him out was not exactly surprising to Shinichi, he worried that maybe he had let it happen too. Or at least that he had hoped that it would happen.

Because he had missed Kaito.

And he couldn't help but be elated that he had finally met Kaito again and that the Sky Mage not only wasn't upset with him for his sudden disappearance but was apparently ready to pick up their friendship where they'd left off. But his own joy made him feel guilty because really, Kaito didn't know what he was getting himself into. How could he? They had been reunited for only a day. He had no idea what Shinichi's life was like on a day to day basis—of the murders and the criminals and the bodies that sometimes fell from above or simply tumbled out of their chairs next to him. Those weren't the kinds of experiences he would wish on anyone, especially not a friend.

But there was no going back now. He just hoped that he would not have cause in the future to wish that he had done a better job of keeping his secrets.

In another room in the resort, Kuroba Kaito was having just as restless a night as Shinichi was, but his unrest was founded upon a very different set of reasons. He had found his little Shin-chan finally after all these years, and though there were more shadows now in those big blue eyes he loved, he could still see in them his brilliant, thoughtful young friend from all those years ago.

It was invigorating in a way he couldn't quite explain.

The murder had been a downer, but, other than that, he decided that this venture had been a success.

Grinning into the dark, he raised a hand to tip an imaginary top hat to the world at large in a salute to new beginnings.

X

Though the festive atmosphere of the magical inventions expo had been subdued by the death of one of its star guests, the fact that her murder had been so quickly solved meant that the event had been allowed to progress as scheduled. And all the guests did their best not to let the tragedy of the previous day overshadow what was still a wonderful showcase of ingenuity and artistic flare.

Kaito spent most of the second day with the Mouris, Shinichi, and Sonoko being given the grand tour of both the expo and the resort itself (for the second time, on Kaito's part) by the Suzuki heiress (with Kaito contributing anecdotes from his end of working with the expo's planning committee). Halfway through their self-guided tour, Makoto joined them, and the talk turned from the expo to martial arts, competitions, and travel.

It didn't take Kaito long to notice the burly martial artist's interest in Sonoko or the wary, assessing looks Makoto began giving him when Sonoko brought up their Level Seven exams and began gushing about Kaito's performance and asking him if he'd be willing to teach her that spell for walking on air. Apparently she had looked it up, but she hadn't been able to make heads or tails out of the instructions she'd found. When he explained that the spell he had used at his exam was his own variation on the standard spell, her excitement had only grown. And Makoto's expression had grown correspondingly stern.

Deciding that he had better diffuse the situation if he didn't want the rather warrior-like Earth Mage challenging him to some old fashioned duel like his father had told him people used to do in the old days for the rights to a lady's hand, he scooped an unsuspecting Shinichi up into his arms and lifted him up so that Shinichi ended up sitting on his shoulders.

Grumbling at the look of the thing more than at the fact that he was being manhandled again, Shinichi folded his arms on top of Kaito's wild nest of hair and rested his chin on top of that.

"You'll be able to see more from up there," the Sky Mage said by way of explanation. Catching Ran watching him, he offered her a smile and fell back to walk next to her (not so coincidentally giving Sonoko and Makoto some space). "I've offered to show Shin-chan around Clover Institute sometime at the end of the month. They always have presentations during the last weekend every month on recent developments, breakthroughs and things like that. Would you like to join us?"

Ran started at his words, her gaze darting from the Sky Mage to her miniaturized friend and back again. "You know?"

"Shinichi didn't tell you?"

"I didn't have the chance to," Shinichi grumbled before smiling a little shyly at Ran. "I meant to tell you last night. But with everything that happened, it sort of slipped my mind."

"Well, as long as you're okay with it," she replied before turning her attention back to Kaito. "Thank you for the invitation, but my karate club is holding a training camp that weekend. So I'm afraid I won't be able to go."

He nodded. "Another time then."

X

Kaito caught a ride back to Ekoda with the Nakamoris and Hakuba as the expo was closing because his mother needed to stay behind to deal with some of the after event cleanup.

"It's too bad you didn't win the contest," Aoko said from where she and Hakuba were sitting in the back of Nakamori's car.

Kaito shrugged. "It's a shame, but I see what they were getting at. There really was too much variation." He had noticed the problem when the four of them had been playing the game the other day. With all the possible sets, the game had become less about spotting patterns and more about your debate skills. "Besides, that Reversee Garden was pretty cool. It got one of my votes too."

"Me too," Aoko admitted. "It was beautiful. And it smelled really nice too. I really liked watching the way the flowers sprouted and bloomed."

"It was elegant work," Kaito agreed. He glanced up at the rearview mirror, noting that Aoko and the blond detective were sitting rather close together. He studied their reflections for a long moment before returning his gaze to the streetlamps flashing past beneath the purpling sky.

It was odd really. Seeing them sitting together wasn't annoying him nearly as much as he had thought it would.

He wondered why. It wasn't as though a whole lot had changed.

An image of a delighted face, all big blue eyes and delicate features, gazing in awe upon the manmade splendor in the Vision Books flashed through his mind, bringing a small but genuine smile to his face as his chest filled with warmth and a surge of protectiveness.

Well, he mused, it seemed he had some more thinking to do.

X

Clover Institute was a sizeable, modern building in downtown Ekoda. Situated right across from the area's largest public library as well as neighbor to a small but very well kept park perfect for outdoors celebrations, it was known throughout Tokyo as not only a place of learning but of fun and fresh ideas—a haven for people from all walks of life to meet and mingle and blaze new trails through unknown territories of both science and magic alike.

Having had free run of the building since he was ten, Kaito knew the institute like the back of his hand. He knew most of the people who frequented the place by name too, and he greeted them as he passed, receiving several smiles and waves in return as well as numerous congratulations on passing his Level Seven exams.

"Not that any of us doubted you'd pass," one of the visiting graduate students told him. "But remember, this is only the beginning. What's important is what you do with what you learn."

"I'll remember that," he promised.

He found ins father in the smallest of the three chambers generally referred to as the Viewing Rooms. Long, padded benches lined the walls of each Viewing Room, accompanied by a scattering of small, rolling tables that a viewer might tug over to take notes on. The center of the floor, however, was devoted to an enormous, circular space marked out by a low wall topped with glass panels set into metal frames of a variety of different shapes and sizes. The space inside the circle typically shimmered with a faint, white haze of light. When a spell was activated within that field, however, that white fog would shift and part, becoming ribbons and patterns of light in every color imaginable.

"This is how our magic really looks behind the scenes," Kuroba Toichi had told his son when he had first shown him into a Viewing Room. "I've made it my goal to truly understand what these images can tell us about our magic, our world, and our selves."

Today, when Kaito stepped into the room and locked the door behind himself, he found his father standing before one of the largest glass panels in the circle. Floating in the glass was a translucent blue image of what could only be somebody's Curse Mark.

"Who's Curse Mark is that?" he asked, wandering up next to his father to study the image. He'd seen a number of different Curse Marks before in his father's books, but this one was new to him.

"You don't recognize it?" Toichi asked, apparently unsurprised by his son's sudden arrival.

"Should I?"

"I suppose not. But you did meet the man who has it just the other day. This is Mouri Kogoro's Curse Mark. Magic Nullification. It is one of the rarest curses out there. It's so rare, in fact, that many people do not believe it exists. Or that it can truly be as powerful as people claim."

"Is it powerful?" Kaito asked, interest piqued. He'd seen the way that the hummingbird guide at Bell Tree Springs had malfunctioned and begun spinning circles over Mouri Kogoro's head, but that had seemed more like a nuisance than anything else. It was cool that the man didn't have to worry about having malicious spells worked on him, but the apparent unpredictability of it all was a definite handicap.

Toichi shrugged. "Well, it has its limits, naturally. For instance, it can't be applied to a specific target. It's more of an areal effect, but it can be strengthened when the bearer focuses on it. Its potential is enormous."

"Is this image accurate? It kind of looks like the blessing and curse patterns are just mirrored copies of each other."

Toichi laughed. "You noticed that did you? It's not really that surprising if you stop and think about it. Magic nullification is, by its very nature, both a blessing and a curse."

Kaito nodded thoughtfully. "I see. That does make sense. Anyhow, Mom said it gave you an idea about how to make that curse nullification thing you were working on."

Toichi grinned, looking for a moment almost exactly like his son. "Indeed. Two in fact. This Mark could very well be the blueprint we need to solve the problems caused by curses once and for all."

Kaito quirked a dubious eyebrow at that grand statement. "I'm not seeing it."

"I had a long talk with Mouri-san while we were at the resort. I was also able to study the effects of his Curse Mark up close."

Kaito experienced a momentary stab of envy at having missed the opportunity to study that remarkable phenomenon for himself, but the moment passed quickly as he wouldn't have traded his time with Shinichi for anything.

"From what I was able to observe, his curse had two parts to it," his father continued. "The first was the general absorption of the magical energy around him. The second was a release of that energy in a new form—one that disrupts spells in progress. And that was when it occurred to me. If the energy being used to create that disruptive wave was being supplied by the magic absorbed, namely our Sky and Earth Magic, then it might be possible to duplicate the effect artificially by combining the two in just the right way."

"Can you really do that?"

Toichi shrugged. "I can't say for sure yet, but I feel it is worth a try."

"You said you had two ideas though," Kaito recalled. "What was the other one?"

"As you may recall, there's an old theory that each curse is meant to balance out the blessing to which it is attached. In most versions of this theory, this is considered to be a matter of, for lack of a better term, making things fair. However, the structure of this Curse Mark," Toichi tapped the Mark floating in the glass panel, "makes me wonder if perhaps curses might actually be the side effects of blessings. Perhaps every Curse Mark absorbs certain energies to power their blessings, and it is that gathering of power that causes what we call curses."

Kaito raised an eyebrow. "I can see how Mouri-san's Curse Mark would suggest that. But, even if it was true, how would that help?"

"I don't know yet," his father admitted. "But it would open up some new avenues for exploration."

"Is there anything I can help with?"

Toichi smiled at his son. "Not at the moment. But I'll let you know if something comes up."

TBC

A.N: Happy New Year!