A/N:

Warnings:
Strange English, OOCness, KIDConan

Genre: Drama, Humor, Romance
Uploaded: 2016-12-27
Chapter rating: T
Words: 3,400

Chap. 6
Pick up

Conan deadpanned as Hattori grinned happily when he sat down and then glared at the Osakan as Ran served him a glass of chocolate milk. The bastard. He was probably just there to pester him about his "secret boyfriend". This was the punishment Conan got for not telling the nosy Osakan about his boyfriend, but how was he supposed to bring something like that up? Especially when he looked the way he looked.

Haibara had assumed that he was dating a pedophile, and Hattori would probably think along the same lines. All in all, Conan would never tell the Osakan that he was dating Kaitou KID, or how they met, or how they knew each other. He would either have to lie or think very carefully about his answer. Hattori had put his foot in his mouth a few times too many by continuously calling him Kudou. Kudou this, Kudou that. Despite all of Hattori's kindness and expertise, the detective could not be trusted with a secret and expected to keep it.

Conan grumpily drank his beverage as he listened in on the conversation around him and decided to ignore the Osakan as much as possible. If only to annoy him.

Conan licked the ice cream in his hands and dangled his legs as he sat by a table with the others outside the ice cream parlor. The sunlight burnt hot in his hair, drawn in by its color. He wasn't happy, but he wasn't as disappointed anymore as he mostly ignored the conversations around him. He felt the brittle cone in his small hands as he turned the ice cream and licked on another place where the sweet substance had begun running down. He would much rather be licking something else. Kaito came to mind. Something he could've been doing if it wasn't for the Osakan.

The detective turned child froze at the thought, but then smiled to himself as a small blush colored his cheeks and pretended to eat his ice cream without a care in the world.

"Ran-san!" Kazuha exclaimed excitedly in the middle of Hattori telling Ran how he'd won a tournament and pointed to a store window where a man was placing a dress on a doll, "look at that dress!"

"Oh, wow," Ran agreed and made Conan turn around to throw a glance at the dark blue gown, consenting that it truly was a work of art; his mother would've loved it. It was probably as pricy as it looked too.

"Let's look closer," Kazuha suggested and Ran nodded.

"Hattori, look after Conan-kun for a while, will you?" his caretaker asked of the Osakan and immediately left the two guys.

"Oi, Kudou," the dark-skinned detective began as the young women were far away enough and was ignored by child.

"Kudou?" Hattori grew confused as his friend didn't answer, "hey, listen ta me!"

Knowing that the teenager was going to start getting loud, Conan glared at him.

"You're going to be the reason I get found out, you know!" the child complained with a scowl and sighed, "you should stop calling me Kudou in private and always go with Conan-kun."

"But that's weird since I know that ya're Kudou!" Hattori insisted and received a sour look.

"You have no idea how worried Ran became once she found out that something is wrong with me, now she thinks that I'm some kind of burn victim and refuses to come home because of it. She demanded that I send her a picture of myself, which I for obvious reasons can't do."

"Oh, crap," Hattori buried his face in his hand and groaned at the trouble he'd caused for his friend, "I'm sorry."

"I forgive you, this time," Conan smiled and returned to lick his ice cream.

"Okay, but what if ya take a temporary antidote and then take a photo of yerself?" the dark sinned detective suggested, making Conan deadpan.

"Yea, and now guess what I was going to do this weekend except spend time with my boyfriend," Conan came clean of his plans and felt a new wave of disappointment as he scowled.

"Yer boyfriend? Ya really have a boyfriend?" the Osakan sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, "I'm sorry, again. For destroying yer plans."

"You're forgiven," Conan smiled even though he felt annoyed and kicked his legs.

"Does he know about ya being shrunk?" the detective whispered and kept an eye on the girls that were gushing over the dresses in the window.

"Yep," Conan grinned, excited by the mere thought of Kaito, "he's seen me as both Kudou Shinichi and Edogawa Conan, but he's never seen me change between the two, and I hope he never will."

"Yea, it's not that pleasant ta even think about," Hattori grimaced as the thought of changing his body by shrinking or growing. "So, how'd ya meet?"

Conan frowned at the innocent question, knowing that he couldn't tell the detective the truth.

"Hattori," the small child lowered his head, causing a glare in the glasses to obscure his eyes, and continued in a solemn voice, "I'd happily place my life in your hands, but you can't keep secrets. His name is Kaito, that's all you get."

"I see," the detective said in a low voice and then grinned falsely, "but I'll get ta meet him some day!"

"Yes, Hattori, I will speak to him about meeting you," Conan smiled sadly, seeing how painful it was for the detective to not be trusted. "I'll tell you as much as I can, but we met under strange circumstances. Circumstances I can't tell you yet. Actually…" the small detective quickly picked up his phone and called as he sent a glance to the girls that were standing by the window, talking as another dress had joined the first. "I'll ask if he can show up right now. If he befriends Ran then he can babysit me instead of the drunkard or Sonoko."

"Hey, Kaito, what are you doing?" the detective's voice grew wistful and made the Osakan detective blink surprised at the obvious change as he listened in on the conversation.

"Hattori wants to meet you… Yes, him," Conan listened for a second and then shook his head.

"No, nothing about you… Well, I was thinking that you could pretend to bump into us. You recognize me and I recognize you, and you befriend Ran. If you need to tell her that you're Shinichi's boyfriend, then do. We're in Shibuya heading into Harajuku. We're here for the street market. Yes, exactly!" The detective deadpanned, "of course you do… I'm not scheming!"

Hattori kept in a chuckle, eager to meet the boyfriend that was a secret.

"Fine, I am scheming. How are you going to find us? Yea, sure, I'll turn it on. See you." Conan ended the call and turned on the GPS in his phone before pocketing it. The small detective looked up and found himself facing an amused Hattori grinning at him.

"What?" Conan asked with annoyance and watched the detective's grin widen before he looked away. Hattori took a deep breath to stop smirking amused and then turned back with a somewhat neutral expression.

"Ya sound so happy. Ya sound like yer truly in love," the detective stated and then began to smile again, "cute."

"Shut up," Conan muttered with a blush. Hattori opened his mouth to retort, but as his eyes flickered up his demeanor changed to calm.

"So how goes school, Conan-kun?" Hattori wondered and looked to the child, making Conan realize that the girls probably were on their way back.

"Bad for Shinichi, good for Conan," the teenager in a child's body sighed and turned back into the child he was supposed to be, "I caught up on all of my homework!"

Conan kept an eye out for sneaky magicians ever since they got to the street market, and by how Hattori's eyes kept darting back and forth over the crowds he was looking too, despite not being able to recognize Shinichi's secret boyfriend, but he would be able to pick up a face that was staring at them from afar.

They had only spent ten minutes walking in the market when suddenly a person stopped in front of Ran, making her walk straight into him and spill her water over his back.

"Oh my god! I'm so sorry!" Ran exclaimed horrified as the person turned around with a shocked expression on his face. Conan was grinning and was expectantly waiting for the great Kaitou KID to perform the moment he'd seen the messy mop of hair.

"Shinichi!" Ran's entire manner changed as she grew angry. Conan was alarmed the moment he saw the young woman take an attack position, knowing that the thief was injured badly.

"Kaito-nii!" Conan yelled and jumped in front of his caretaker, expecting his body to be kicked at any moment.

"Conan-kun!" Kaito called out happily and crouched, knowing that the karate champion wasn't going to attack him if the child was completely in the way.

Ran froze as the two gave each other a hug and then started to see differences between the stranger in front of her and the detective geek that was her childhood friend.

"Kaito?" Hattori asked surprised, shocked by the sudden appearance of what could be Kudou Shinichi himself, if it wasn't for the fact that Kudou Shinichi was shrunken to a child and standing right beside him.

"Well, if it isn't the Great Detective of the West!" Kaito exclaimed happily and picked up his secret boyfriend as he stood up, "Hattori Heiji, what a pleasure to meet you!"

Kaito bowed with a grin as Conan happily hung in his arms. Hattori blinked and remembered the plan he'd eavesdropped in on.

"Ya must be Kudou's boyfriend," the Osakan bowed back and heard the girls chorus their surprise.

"Eh? You're the boyfriend?" Ran asked surprised and looked him over as Kaito nodded, "I'm so sorry! I thought you were Shinichi for a moment, and was about to attack you!"

"I'm happy that you didn't!" Kaito laughed, fully aware that the karate champion would've had him beaten in a flash if it wasn't for his boyfriend's quick thinking. He imagined the injuries worsening to the extent that he had to go back to the hospital with only one kick from the young woman.

"And I'm sorry that I spilled water on you!" Ran bowed deeply with her face red from embarrassment from almost attacking someone completely innocent.

"Oh, no worries, in this heat it'll dry up in a few minutes," Kaito claimed with a calm exterior, already knowing that it was water and having planned for it to happen. With a small smile, he held Conan with one arm and reached out with the other. The women looked at it strangely, but their faces turned to wonder as he snapped his fingers and was suddenly holding a rose.

"For you, Ran-chan," Kaito grinned and the woman stared at him in wonder.

"How do you know my name?" Ran wondered as she took the presented rose.

"Shinichi's told me about you, Mouri Ran, his childhood friend and daughter of the famous Sleeping Kogoro," Kaito explained excitedly and bowed again, "my name is Kuroba Kaito, a magician!"

"Kuroba-kun-," Ran began but was interrupted.

"Please, call me Kaito."

"Very well, Kaito-kun, how'd you and Shinichi meet?" Ran curiously wondered and sniffed the flower.

"Well, it's a funny story actually," Kaito laughed a little and decided to go with one thing that had actually happened, "Shinichi showed up on one of KID's heists and Hakuba mistook him for me and berated him for a prank, threatened to cuff him and all that before I showed up. Poor, Hakuba, he looked like he'd seen a ghost as he stared between the two of us. Then he apologized to Shinichi and told me that Nakamori wanted me to check the traps for KID."

"Wait! There's someone checking the traps for KID?!" Hattori chimed in, surprised by the new fact.

"There was, before KID died," Kaito seemed sad and sighed.

"Did anyone check ya ta see that yer not KID?" Hattori wondered suspiciously.

"Yes, Hakuba even had me in handcuffs the entire heist once, just to make sure that I wasn't KID," Kaito laughed a bit and Conan wondered how his amazing magician had gotten out of that one, but the Osakan seemed happy with the explanation.

"So ya know Hakuba? Ya friends?" the Osakan kept asking and received an elbow in his side from Kazuha.

"I know ya dislike Hakuba-san, but don't be rude to Kaito-kun!" Kazuha commanded and made the detective blush.

"It's ma best friend's boyfriend, of course I'm gonna question him!" Hattori scowled and made the magician laugh amused.

"It's okay, Hattori-chan," Kaito said to the young woman from Osaka and made both of the tourists blush.

"Wha-, What?" Hattori stammered.

"Oi, we're not together!" Kazuha defended herself and Conan wanted to laugh at them, but instead he just turned his face away, proud of his boyfriend for his ability to deflect questions and steer the conversation wherever he wanted.

"Really? But you seem so close? I'm sorry for jumping to conclusions!" Kaito grinned, clearly not sorry and turned to the blushing woman that took a step away from her childhood friend.

"Madam," Kaito bowed, produced a red rose and held it out to Kazuha, making the tiny detective roll his eyes and send a glance to the Osakan detective, "I'm sorry for my rudeness, and hope that you accept my apology, and by any chance; may I have your name?"

"Toyama Kazuha," the woman said and accepted the flower with a blush and then grinned at it, "it's a pleasure meeting you Kaito-san."

"The pleasure is all mine!" Kaito grinned happily.

"Oi! Ya have a boyfriend, remember? Stop flirting with others!" Hattori bit back angrily, flushed from jealousy and only made the magician laugh.

"Yes, I'm taken, but it's just harmless flirting. If you're jealous I can give you a flower too, but I don't think you swing my way," Kaito explained and tightened his hold on Conan that just grinned at the frustrated detective; it usually took him ages of arguing to work Hattori up like that.

"How about we go to that café over there," Ran suggested loudly so to stop the fighting that she was sensing about to break out.

"Actually I was just heading there, it's one of the best places here," Kaito half-lied; he'd just headed there to meet his boyfriend, but he knew that the café had high ratings.

Hattori kept glaring at the magician who amused one of the waitresses with a simple ball trick where the ball kept vanishing and then shoving up in her hands. The waitress, Yui, and the young women in his company were spellbound and amused, but Hattori knew how the trick worked and was only growing more irate as the moments went on.

"What's wrong, Heiji-niisan?" Conan asked from his place in the magician's lap and drank his juice from a straw. The question made everyone turn to the detective who laughed a bit awkwardly.

"Well, I just know how tha trick works," he claimed, but Conan knew that he was still feeling jealous from before as he continuously glared at the magician and not the trick.

"Kaito-niisan!" Conan said with a smile and pulled a bit in the magician's shirt, "Shinichi-niisan and I solved the card murder, could you show Heiji-niisan so that we can solve one too!"

"Sure, but are you sure the ladies appreciate such a horrid magic trick?" Kaito began as the waitress left them and Conan got off his lap to sit between him and Ran.

"We're fine, we're used to hang out at crime scenes with our detective friends," Ran chimed in and watched how the child picked up his small notebook, remembering that Shinichi had always one with him, but his was always black, and Conan's usually was white. Funny how similar the two were, yet how different; it was something that Ran thought often.

Seeing that the detective-turned-child picked up his notebook Hattori raised his eyebrows, wondering if it really was that complicated. It was just some stupid card trick. The magician's expression changed and he smirked confidently, as if nothing could ever go against him. A deck of cards fluttered into his hands and he spread them into a feather, showing that nothing was wrong with them and then started to tell a story of Kings and Queens that had gathered to speak of their kingdoms trading routes.

Kaito watched his detective's expression of anticipation as he made a greater show of mixing the cards. He used all of his cardtistry skill to amuse the ladies, which "Oh"ed and "Ah"ed at the advanced way of mixing the cards. Even Conan's face lit up with amazement as he watched, only Hattori seemed mildly amused so Kaito turned it into a feather and held it out to Kazuha.

"Choose a card and show us," Kaito grinned and watched her pull a card.

"Ten of hearts," Kazuha said and placed it face up on the table so that everyone could see.

"I see, excellent choice," Kaito grinned and challengingly sent a glance to the Osakan detective, "then this will be a hard case."

"Whatever," Hattori muttered and received a kick to his legs from the woman beside him.

"Be nice!" Kazuha demanded and nodded to the magician to continue so Kaito drew his hand over the table cloth, making the Kings and Queens appear from seemingly nowhere, and just like Conan had seen before one of the cards had a sliver between her neck and her head. The Queen of Spades had been killed. Kaito leaned in closer to the table and lowered his voice.

"Now my dear audience. During the morning breakfast Queen of Spades was found dead with a narrow mark around her neck. Someone has killed the queen in front of the other queens and the servants in the dining room. A bold crime indeed."

Conan scribbled in his note that ten of hearts meant that the Queen of Spades had been killed through strangulation and then expectantly looked up to the magician.

"You have 15 suspects in total. The queens' four knights, the four kings, the four jesters and the three remaining queens, all with dark motives, all with something to gain," Kaito explained as he moved a hand over the table and made the jesters and knights to appear.

"Maybe Hattori wants to decide the killer?" Kaito grinned and held out the spread deck towards the detective who seemed more and more intrigued.

"Fine," the detective pulled a card and placed it face up in front of himself, just like Kazuha had done, "Eight of Clubs."

"I see," Kaito mused and narrowed his eyes for a moment, remembering which story it was that went with what card. The magician made a show of mixing the cards and then held it out to Ran, "Ran-chan, would you pull five cards and place them in any order you want." Ran did as he'd told and took the five cards before placing them down, for a moment she hesitated, but then mixed the cards and placed them in a random order, looking somewhat expectantly at the magician.

Kaito hummed as he shuffled the deck and then placed out the remainder of it, two cards for each suspect and then began to tell a story Conan had not heard about what was going on in the dining room during the evening and night. He quickly scribbled down the story in shorthand and made sure that Ran couldn't see it, because she would probably recognize Shinichi's shorthand.

"So, Conan-kun," the thief smiled down at the detective, "what do you want to do first?"

"Examine the body," Conan answered and looked to the two cards above the Queen of Spades.

"Then that's what we'll do," Kaito grinned and started to tell how the detective examined the body and everything he found on it. Both of the detectives were having a great time as they questioned the witnesses and the girls shared a piece of cake as they waited. They had just questioned everyone as they were interrupted.

"Oh my god! He's dead!" a chilling call came through the calm café and Hattori jumped to his feet just as fast as Conan. Kaito shivered; it was truly unnatural how often this happened. The Curse of the chibi-Shinigami had struck.