Prompt: "When they first met, he underestimated the child, fooled by his innocuous appearance. Later on, he becomes wary of the child and, at the same time, intrigued by the unbounded intelligence he possessed. Conan Edogawa was just one mystery waiting to be unravelled, and what better way to get to know your rival than to stalk them. 'Cause, you should know: phantom kaitou makes for a better detective."

Requestor: Tokoyonokuni

Pairing: some slight Kid x Conan, pre-Kaito x Shinichi

Note(s): Not entirely sure if I nailed the prompt, but let's give it a go, shall we?

Casual Stalking

For the most part, Kaito prided himself on his ability to accurately judge people's characters.

It was a talent necessary for his job, really. He needed to be able to observe someone's actions, their little idiosyncrasies, their secrets, in order to replace them. And that required him to read and learn them as quickly as possible. Based on the fact that he hadn't been caught just yet, he thought he did a pretty decent job at that.

Unfortunately, though, Kaito thought as he swiped antiseptic over a particularly bad scrape on his knee, there was a slight problem. And its name was Edogawa Conan.

Because Edogawa Conan made absolutely no sense, from what Kaito had observed.

At first, Kaito had just assumed that the kid was a prodigy of some kind. Who somehow managed to solve his heist notes and murder cases alike. That wasn't completely unheard of.

And then Conan had somehow acquired those weird superpowered shoes and the ball-dispensing belt and heists became approximately three hundred and six percent harder. Which was okay, really – Kaito could (maybe?) understand that Conan had an aggressive streak and plan to accommodate for it.

But apparently Conan wasn't done revealing odd pieces of himself, because tonight, Kaito had nearly gotten sniped. He had been standing on the rooftop after a heist, checking the target gem, when he'd seen moonlight glint off of something in a neighboring building. Before he'd known it, there was a bullet was whooshing towards him.

Kaito was fairly certain that if a soccer ball hadn't come flying out of almost literally nowhere, knocking him over and out of the way of the bullet, he would be a dead man.

The soccer ball, obviously, had belonged to Conan, but what was most disturbing was the timing and accuracy with which it had hit him. Any earlier, and the sniper would've been able to re-aim and fire again; any later, and Kaito would be lying in the morgue. The angle of the ball, combined with the force, was just enough to throw Kaito to the ground and not go careening off the rooftop. The amount of force, the timing – all of it was perfectly calculated.

Then there was the fact that it had been a sniper targeting him from another building, well-hidden in the shadows and silent. Kaito himself hadn't even known he had been in someone's sights until it had been too late. How the hell had a six-year-old noticed the man before him?

The last thing was the way Conan's face had looked – steely cold eyes behind those oversized glasses, eyebrows slanted at angry angles – when Kaito had managed to get a good look at him. Maybe Kaito was being ridiculous about it, or maybe he was reading into it too much, but that expression hadn't been one of a six-year-old. Those had been deadly serious eyes, eyes that challenged and promised and glinted, and there was absolutely no way they could belong to a gradeschooler.

So now, Kaito was faced with a question: Who, exactly, was Edogawa Conan, really?

And another: What, exactly, constituted as stalking?

...This probably constituted as stalking, Kaito had to admit.

He ran a hand through his hair as the camera attached to Heart, his favorite dove, twitched, the image going fuzzy. From what he could see on the video feed, Conan, who was holding a soccer ball, was talking to his friends – the Detective Boys, he thought they called themselves – at a park.

The five of them appeared to come to a conclusion, and three of them – the freckled boy, the headband-wearing girl, and the heavyset boy – laughed and flapped off down the hill. Conan tossed the soccer ball in his arms at them before turning to the blonde girl standing at his side.

Kaito blinked and squinted at the screen. From what he could see, the bright-eyed, "I'm so excited to be at the park" look had melted straight off of Conan's face, replaced by a far calmer, much more mature expression. Something sort of – adult, and serious...

Something almost like what Kaito saw when he looked in the mirror.

The girl at his side smirked, rolling her eyes, and made some comment that made Conan's eyes snap wide open and his jaw drop before she strolled off after their friends. Conan followed, squawking something, and Kaito slanted his head at that.

There was definitely something off about him.

This plan was riskier than the camera-attached-to-dove, admittedly so, but Kaito had weighed his chances of getting hit in the face with a soccer ball against his chances of getting closer to solving the mystery of Edogawa Conan and deemed it necessary.

Which was why he smiled timidly, fixed his shoulder-length hair, smoothed down the front of his apron, and chirped, "Welcome to Poirot!" as Mouri Kogorou, his daughter Ran, and the subject of Kaito's investigation entered.

Mouri barely cast him a glance. "Good morning," he grunted, sitting down at a spot at the window. "Coffee, whenever you can."

"Of course!" Kaito fluttered about to grab a coffee pot and a cup for the private detective. Beaming at them and avoiding meeting Conan's eyes, because he wouldn't put it past Conan to realize that today was supposed to be Enomoto Azusa's off day, he poured a cup of coffee for her. "Here you are, Mouri-san."

Ran, who had slid into the spot beside her father, smiled at her. "You look pretty today, Azusa-san," she complimented as Kaito set down a menu in front of her. "Did you do something with your hair?"

Twittering, Kaito handed Conan a menu. He could feel Conan's gaze attach to him and flinched inwardly.

Aloud, he just laughed. "Oh, not today," he giggled, waving a hand at Ran. "But thank you anyway, Ran-san."

"It's nothing." Ran bowed her head a little before opening her menu. "What would you like for lunch today, Conan-kun?" Her expression turned stern when Conan didn't reply immediately. "Are you listening, Conan-kun?"

Across the table from her, Conan, who had been eyeing Kaito pensively, started and broke into nervous laughter as Ran's frown intensified. One of his hands rose to rub at the back of his head. "A-Ah, I think… uh, omurice? Sorry, Ran-neechan."

Eyebrows lifted, Ran glanced at Kaito. "I'm sorry, he's just sleepy right now," she apologized.

Kaito doubted that, but he just smiled patiently. "I see. Omurice for Conan-kun, is that right?" He locked gazes with Conan for just a second – just a second – and had to stifle an urge to shudder. Conan's eyes were so incredibly not-childlike, so incredibly aware and knowing and no, a child was not supposed to look like – that.

"And for you, Mouri-san? Ran-san?" Kaito forced himself to look away, smiling pleasantly at Mouri.

Mouri ordered beef steak and Ran ordered curry rice, and Kaito turned away from the table as quickly and naturally as possible, heart pounding.

As he headed towards the kitchen, he heard Mouri ask Ran, "So, what did the detective brat call you about?"

"His name is Shinichi, Dad," Ran corrected irately, her tone reprimanding. "Kudou Shinichi. Stop calling him the 'detective brat,' because he's a great detective and he helps out the police a lot. And what we talked about was none of your business." Making a point of changing topics, she said, "So how was the professor's house, Conan-kun? It's too bad you missed Shinichi's call – he asked about you, actually. I bet you would've wanted to talk with him."

There was a strangled sort of sound, followed by Conan just about chirruping, "The-professor's-house-was-great-and-it's-fine-I-didn't-talk-to-Shinichi-niichan-I'm-so-hungry!"

As he handed the order to the chef, Kaito quirked an eyebrow. Suspicious behavior.

So… "Kudou Shinichi," was it?

"Stay safe, okay?" Ran whispered into Conan's ear, patting his shoulders and kissing him on the forehead. She was clearly on the verge of tears but trying to delay them until after Conan was gone.

Conan just nodded, smiling wide. "Okay, Ran-neechan! I'll miss you when I'm in the States with my parents!" With some difficulty, he tried to lift his suitcase into the trunk of the waiting taxi.

Mouri caught his arm, muttered something like stupid brat, and hoisted the luggage into the taxi. But there was still something like affection in his gaze when he ruffled Conan's hair hard, grumbled, "We'll miss you... or whatever. Come visit, I guess," and turned away, storming back towards the detective agency.

Ran gave a choked sound and hugged Conan to her chest one last time. "Are you sure you don't want us to go with you to the airport?"

"No, I'll be fine with the nice driver," Conan answered.

"Right. You're a responsible boy." Despite her words, Ran glared at the taxi driver through dewy vision. "Take care of him, okay? Make sure he gets to the right terminal and everything."

The taxi driver nodded, tipping his hat at her. "You're paying for it, after all," he shrugged.

Huffing, Ran stepped back. "Okay. Come back to visit, okay, Conan-kun?"

Hesitation flashed in Conan's eyes for barely half a second before it was gone and he was beaming up at her. "Okay!"

He hopped into the taxi and pulled the door shut, waving through the window as the taxi pulled slowly down the sidewalk. Ran let out a sob.

Across the street, from where he was dressed as a jogger, Kaito watched and smirked to himself.

Shinichi probably shouldn't have been surprised when Kid, of all people, landed on his windowsill that night.

He'd had his suspicions, of course, especially when Haibara had made that "your precious thief is keeping an eye on you, I see" remark back at the park, and when Azusa had popped up on her off day, that Kid was onto him, though, so he just rolled onto his stomach and looked at the phantom thief.

"Good evening."

A jaunty tip of his hat, and Kid landed lightly in the room. "Hello there, tantei-kun."

The appellation made Shinichi nod in understanding. "So you figured it out."

Kid shrugged, the cape whispering behind him in an ethereal ribbon of white. "It wasn't too difficult. I knew from the start that there was something wrong with Edogawa Conan, and when Mouri-chan dropped the name 'Kudou Shinichi,' I figured it out pretty quickly. Considering he disappeared right around when Conan started living with the Mouri family. Coincidentally enough, that was also about the time when 'Sleeping Kogorou' became famous."

Shinichi sighed, balancing his face on his hand. "So you really were Azusa that time. And the jogger from earlier – I thought he looked suspicious."

"Well done. I was indeed both of them." Kid smiled at him. "As expected of the great Kudou Shinichi."

Rolling his eyes, Shinichi sat up. His bed creaked underneath him. "Is there a reason why you came here tonight, then?"

"Well…" Kid seemed to hesitate, oddly enough. "I guess I just wanted to confirm my theory, I suppose. And I have." He took a step back towards the window. "I suppose I can leave now."

"Wait." Shinichi was rocketing to his feet before he realized it. At Kid's eyebrows-raised expression, he softened his voice. "You know who I am. Can I know who you are?"

He doubted he'd get his request, but he'd always sort of been – entranced by Kid. It had always sort of intrigued him, the idea of meeting Kid's civilian identity. After all, Kid shone brilliantly enough in a cape and monocle and moonlight, so how brightly would the real Kid – the face behind the mask – burn?

Kid's face was unreadable for a long, long eternity, and then he offered a faint smile. "Fair enough, I guess," he murmured, and suddenly, in a white blur, disappeared out the window.

Bewildered – what was that supposed to mean? – Shinichi stared after him for a second before sitting back down on the bed heavily. He wasn't going to meet Kid as a civilian, was he?

He would have to retract that thought when he opened his door the next morning to find a messy-haired, indigo-eyed man standing on his doorstep, smirking and saying, "Hey, I'm Kuroba Kaito."

Admittedly, I didn't quite understand the prompt, so... hopefully this was, um, close enough, Tokyonokuni?

Anyway, this is my second to last request! I'll be back soon in a few days with the last one, which is a Shinichi-and-Kaito-take-care-of-the-Detective-Boys fic. Yay? - Luna