Chapter Text
He hurts. His head aches and his eyes ache from trying to focus and Kaito knows what a concussion feels like. It’s not a terrible one, but it’s definitely a concussion. There’s a crazy old man talking about brains and test subjects and a blank thing sitting on a table that looks more and more like Kaito with each passing minute the old man works on it.
Kaito would think it’s a corpse, but Kaito saw wires before the old man layered some kind of nasty skin and fake (god he hopes it was fake) hair over a silvery skull. It’s like the guy had a build-a-Kaito waiting the whole time and just needed the last finishing touches.
It’s creepy as all hell and Kaito would rather pretend to still be unconscious than watch, but any information is still information. How long was the guy planning to kidnap him? Or is Kaito really that easy to copy onto some weird robo-doll? He tries to shift subtly and finds his arms pinned down by leather cuffs at his wrists and elbows. Same with ankles and knees. Fuck. He doesn’t have his shirt on, no access to the hidden pockets. He’s lucky he still has pants, but it’s not like he can reach anything hidden there.
The doctor moves to a side cabinet, pulling out something that looks an uncomfortably lot like blood. He tsks under his breath. There’s something just out of Kaito’s line of sight behind him the doctor keeps going to, but when Kaito tries to turn to see, his head hurts so bad he lets out a groan. The sounds of tinkering stop.
The old man walks into line of sight. There’s a sickly red smear on surgical gloves and Kaito’s mildly terrified that there’s an actual corpse somewhere behind him. “Oh,” the man says. “You’re awake.” He looks like some mad scientist out of a children’s cartoon, and really the lab setup and strapping teenagers to tables really just completes the vibe. “I was starting to think I’d caused permanent damage and that would be a waste.”
Kaito flinches as a surprisingly strong hand grabs him by the chin and his personal space is invaded. “Hmm, bit of a concussion. Might cause problems in the transfer.”
“Transfer?” Kaito rasps.
The old man ignores him, going back to the robot. He plugs something into its head muttering about comparisons and brain viability and… hell if Kaito knows. Kaito tries twisting his wrist in the restraint and it barely budges. Okay. Okay, not good. Then the old man approaches with a metal thing that looks like a mind-melting helmet from a bad sci-fi movie.
“Is there a hidden camera?” Kaito tries to joke. “Because your aesthetic is B-movie villain level.” Don’t touch him, don’t touch him, don’t— The man puts the helmet on and it’s uncomfortable and weirdly warm and sticky on the inside where it touches his temples.
“Relax it will be over soon,” the man says like that’s not one of the most terrifying things he could say.
“Who even are you?” Kaito starts trying to struggle, pain be damned. “Where is this, what are you doing?”
He’s ignored as the old man goes to a computer screen full of incomprehensible charts and words too far away to read. He hits a few keys and the helmet goes almost hot and Kaito’s head feels hazy. He panics.
“Stop stop stop, what are you doing, stop,” Kaito says as something in his temples hurts. He feels the helmet slip and there’s a fraction of relief. Then it suddenly stops and the old man is in front of him again.
“Stay still or I’ll sedate you.” The helmet is fixed.
Kaito, naturally, does not stay still. The man comes at him with a needle.
o*O*o
The second time he wakes the old man is behind him, talking about failures and intermediaries. There’s clacks of metal on metal and a few softer, more organic sounds that turn Kaito’s stomach. The world spins. Metal heats on his head. He passes out again.
Light, words, his own and the doctors blurring together. Heat. Darkness.
A haze, a mess, he knows he’s hearing words but he can’t focus. Kaito struggles panic rising in a primal way about something he can’t even remember but there’s a bright light in his eyes and everything hurts. The world tilts and turns, a blurring whirl of color and light and sound like a fairground ride only it’s just his head. Kaito retches and there’s the glint of something out of the corner of his eye. Needle. No. He can’t—
o*O*o
The fourth?—Fifth? How many times now?—time, he sees his own face staring back. Kaito’s heart speeds up. What the fuck. The face smiles, exactly like his own smile. His own voice says, “He’s awake.” Then, “How does it feel to be in the presence of the superior form of you?”
Kaito stares.
The old man appears in the corner of his eye. “Give some basic information,” the old man says, to the thing with Kaito’s face.
The robot smiles wider. “Kuroba Kaito. Age sixteen, mother Chikage, father Toichi, deceased. Best friend Nakamori Aoko. Hobbies magic, dove rearing, and—” He moves his wrist how Kaito would to make a flower appear, pulls it off perfectly just like Toichi taught Kaito and Kaito cuts the thing off without even meaning to.
“What the hell?! Are you—did you—Is this some kind of mind-reading shit?”
“Memory transfer,” the doctor corrects, scribbling on a clipboard. He glances toward the computer. Back to Kaito. “Congratulations. You’re going to be the first in a series of androids indistinguishable from human form.”
“Almost,” the robot corrects. “We’ll be better. I am better.”
“Yes, yes,” the scientist says dismissively. “The transfer seems to have worked better this time.” This time? “The synthetic brain interface seems to have a better transfer rate than the digital.” He makes a note. Kaito sees the robot scowl before smoothing its face in a perfect replica of Kaito’s poker face smile. “Using that as an intermediary should fix the hiccups, though I suppose next time I’ll avoid the digital altogether… Truly I will create a superior being,” he says.
“Stronger, faster, smarter,” the robot says.
“Of course. Hmm, I’ll need more data long term, but I suppose we have the main parts.” The scientist moves away but the robot stays. Staring.
“You pride yourself on being the best and unique,” the robot says. “You are not.” It smiles and slips into Kaito’s inflection. “Do you think anyone will notice you’re gone? Or more… that you’ve been improved?”
Kaito feels chills.
No. No, they’d notice that thing they’d—
The man comes back and there’s another syringe in his hand. Kaito tries. Kaito really tries to get free, every technique he’s ever learned, but half of those rely on being aware of how to hold your body when you’re tied up and the other half rely on tools and he can’t. His heart is rabbit-fast in panic and he can’t breathe and the lights are still too bright for his aching head. His voice—he barely notices speaking—is saying “No no nonono,” over and over again until the words run together but there’s still the prick of a needle in his arm and the old man watching with dispassion. The robot smiles, a sadistic, cruel thing that Kaito honestly doesn’t think he’d be capable of, and Kaito’s arm burns. His arm burns and his lungs ache and he can feel his heart struggling. No. No.
That thing is wearing his face. That thing is going to leave and walk into Kaito’s life. That thing is going to go near Aoko and. And.
There’s spots of light and black haze vying for control over his vision. Everything is burning. He’s going to die. Kaito chokes a breath. He’s going to die.
No one is going to even know.
The last thing he sees in that damn smile on an exact replica of his own face.
o*O*o
An unsettling smile, cold eyes boring down into him, gunshots in the dark, white suit flashing in moonlight. Broken mirrors.
Toichi’s hand on Kaito’s small wrist saying, “Like this, Kaito, you hold your hand like this.”
Aoko at a window, tears on her face, watching, waiting, her mother not coming home and Kaito useless, uselss, useless.
Fire, throat raw from screaming, his hands reaching even as his mother held him back. Rain on a windowpane and an empty living room and silence that grates down to his bones. An unsettling smile. A painting that changes to a hidden room. Aoko crying becoming Aoko laughing becoming Aoko trying to kill him with a mop becoming—
An unsettling smile, cold eyes, needles coming toward his face. “Stay still.” Burning. Black, black, black emptiness and nothing, no touch or sight or sound or any kind of sense. A void.
This is death, something whispers. This is death, an endless void interspersed with the worst moments of your life.
“I’m going to America,” Kaa-san says. Her face a blur, just clear eyes and dark pink lipstick that can’t hide how faint the smile lines are compared to when Toichi—
An unsettling smile, cold eyes, Kaito’s face, cruel, cruel like he isn’t, he isn’t, he really isn’t, steel-fingered grip holding him down and—
“Do you think anyone will notice…?”
Aoko crying at a window, Kaito holding back tears beside a closed casket, a void a void a void.
He’s burning alive—Toichi is burning—Kaito is burning alive.
This is death. This is death. This is death.
o*O*o
Kaito wakes up. Everything hurts. He feels like a horse kicked him in the chest and his throat is raw and every muscle is burning. His head is the only thing that isn’t hurting and something about that feels wrong even though he can’t think why. Cool fingers touch his cheek and Kaito groans, eyes fluttering open.
He looks up into his own face and feels adrenaline stab him like a jolt of lightning from head to fingertip. Lab, robot with the sadistic smile, old man with needles—! Kaito jolts up and away, holding on to inexplicably loose clothing as he goes, away from that touch. “What the fuck.”
Different lab. A small girl and boy he doesn’t recognize and a thing with his face, and an old man that isn’t the old man and a foreign-looking teenager and—Aoko crying. Kaito flicks a look at her and back to the thing with his face. It doesn’t have a sadistic smile, looks worried, but it was created to be a perfect mimic so of course it looks worried. It’s right there, and Aoko’s here and it interacted with Aoko and he has never felt quite so quick a flash of hate toward anyone or anything except that night when he learned Toichi was murdered.
There’s something stuck to him and Kaito’s skin crawls at any semblance of restraint, rips it away even though it stings at his temples. The robot says, “Wait,” like Kaito should let them keep experimenting on him and he has no idea what’s going on but one thing is very clear.
“Imposter,” he hisses at the thing with his face. It flinches and pales in a convincing replica of emotion, but it’s nothing more than a robot playing at being him, and it’s still between him and Aoko. Aoko who’s moving forward and— “Aoko, step back!” Kaito doesn’t have a weapon or any tricks up his sleeve but like hell is he going to let that stop him from fighting back. He’s not tied down now. He won’t give them the chance to do so again.
“I’m not…” The robot looks hurt but it’s a lie. Kaito looks for a weapon, any weapon, but there’s just some trailing wires and a glass box he’s standing in that’s proportions are all off and— “I’m not…”
A door bangs and Kaito flinches, turns as his mother runs in. “Kaito!”
His mother? “Kaa-san?” And Jii is there too, but what the hell is going on?!
Chikage’s arms catch him and he’s trapped, panicking even though she smells and feels right, except she’s too big, or more he’s too small. Everything hurts and he can’t breathe and he can’t see the thing with his face anymore, where did it go? He needs to know where it went so it won’t hurt anyone, what is going on?
“Kaito,” Chikage says rocking him in her arms, “Kaito, Kaito.” She’s crying. He can’t remember when he last saw her cry except back when Toichi died and those first few months—
He holds onto her in return, feeling his eyes burn.
“You died,” she says. “I’m sorry,” she says. “I’m so glad you’re alive.”
Kaito has so many questions and can’t fight the fear thrumming through him, but for the moment he lets himself cry.
o*O*o
Kaito doesn’t know how to move on. Is there a moving on? He’s a child again, his life has been replaced, and he died. And yet somehow didn’t. That isn’t something someone just miraculously moves on from in a night, even he knows that, but he just wishes things could go back to normal. Kaito wants to go back to teasing Aoko in class and jump back into plotting Kid heists because he only had just started that when he died and he’d never had a chance to test so many ideas. He wants to train his doves to do stupid pranks and pretend he isn’t invested in whatever Aoko’s newest boy band obsession is and pester Jii at his bar.
But all that’s impossible. He’s barely a meter tall and everywhere he looks he can see where things have changed. His home. Aoko. His mother. Notes in his own handwriting he’s never written and new belongings in his bedroom and new scuffs on the door and new clothing he could have picked out himself for how close it is to his taste. Because he has a robotic brain clone. That’s just kept living his life like Kaito never died.
The robot moves into a guest room when they go home, but the fact that he has to pisses Kaito off. They might have a truce but Kaito hates him. Everyone likes this robot Kaito and he fits in with everything in ways that Kaito suddenly doesn’t and he’s always got a stupid guilty expression whenever he meets Kaito’s eyes that Kaito wants to smack him for. It’s bad enough that Kaito was replaced, he doesn’t need the imposter feeling guilty about it. It would almost be better if he was a smug bastard because then Kaito wouldn’t feel guilty about hating him.
This robot has everything. And he’s even taking Kaito’s name.
Kaito scowls at his childhood bedroom ceiling, the familiar bed beneath him that’s too big for his current body. He hates this.
“Kai-chan?” his mother says, knocking on the door.
“I thought I was Ayato now,” Kaito says grumpily even though he’s the one that chose the new name. He doesn’t hate the name, he just hates the fact that he’s the one being forced to change it while the other Kaito gets everything.
Chikage opens his door, coming over to sit next to him. “That’s just for official papers,” she says. “You’ll always be Kaito to me.”
“Why can’t we just both be Kaito?” He’s whining and he knows it. The worst thing is how he keeps feeling like a little brat compared to his robot brain clone.
“I know I have a reputation for being eccentric, but even I wouldn’t name two children the same name,” Chikage says, brushing the hair from his forehead.
“So say I’m a cousin.”
“Kaito.”
Kaito pouts and his mom pinches his nose like she did when he was actually this age and being a brat. “Kaa-san!” he complains. He grabs a pillow almost as big as he is and hugs it to his chest. “I just want to go back to…”
She sighs, petting his hair. It’s not the first time he’s complained. Considering the robot hasn’t complained loudly over Kaito’s presence he probably seems even more of a brat. He should be glad to be alive. Honestly he feels more like he missed a step and ended up falling the whole next flight down. “This isn’t forever,” she says eventually.
Isn’t it though? Even if Haibara managed to find a cure to this…whatever it is that triggered the change to this body there’d still be two Kaitos and Kaito isn’t the one who’s lived the last year and a half. He can’t just slip into place seamlessly. Not like the damn robot did to him. Kaito would have to start from scratch with people who didn’t know him if he wanted a life in his own name again. Kaito gives his mother a hard look, trying to impart all that telepathically because the words aren’t coming.
“We’ll make this work,” she says. Then she smiles. “You know I always thought about having another child.”
“You didn’t.”
“I did!” Chikage says. “Toichi and I talked about it a little over a year after you were born. But Toichi got a big break on his act and we ended up traveling so we decided it wasn’t the right time.”
Kaito can’t imagine a life with a younger sibling. What would he even do with a brother or sister?
“Of course,” Chikage adds, “then you went from being a cute, smiley baby to a hellion of a toddler and we decided that maybe one child was enough after all.”
“It never came up again?”
“Mm.” Chikage’s smile gets that sad tilt to it that means she’s thinking about the time around Toichi’s death and Kaito wants to take the question back. “We had you,” she says, “and we were happy. Of course now I have two sons anyway.”
Ugh. Kaito rolls to face away. “Well maybe I wish I was an only child still.”
“Too late.” Chikage pats him. “Things will get better. We all just have to adjust to a new normal.”
No, Kaito has to adjust. The robot just gets to keep living Kaito’s life. He bites his lip to keep from saying that though. They’re even sending him to elementary school and he hated it the first time around. How is he going to stomach that crap again?
A knock on the door and it can only be one person. Kaito curls up a little tighter around the pillow.
“I made dinner,” the robot says, “if either of you are hungry.”
“Oh, Kaito, I could have done that,” Chikage says.
“It’s fine.” It’s stilted to Kaito’s ears, strained. Where does the robot get off being uncomfortable? His whole life hasn’t been flipped upside-down. And since when has he been able to cook much of anything? Kaito gets by on simple quick-cook meals, take away, and mooching off Aoko when his mom’s not around.
“Dinner?” Chikage asks Kaito, a hand on his shoulder.
“Not hungry,” Kaito says.
“I’ll set something aside for later,” the robot says. Like he cares.
Chikage pats Kaito one last time and leaves. Kaito knows the robot hesitates for almost a minute before he leaves too.
o*O*o
Aoko has been Kaito’s best friend since they met. Kaito’s closest and, if he’s honest, only real friend for years. He’s been in love with her for at least three of those years since the first awkward throes of puberty started making his voice crack and he realized making her laugh was like being punched in the gut in a good way. So of course he had to make her annoyed because seeing her laugh was too powerful to encourage it all the time. Kaito knows that’s not the healthiest response to the sudden realization of a crush, but that’s what happened and it’s kind of a habit by now.
But Aoko’s always been Kaito’s best friend and he’s been her best friend, only shared when they were at school. Except that now he’s not. Her best friend that is. That’s reserved for the robot Kaito.
Oh, Kaito doesn’t think they’re doing it on purpose. The robot keeps subtly making sure to give Kaito time with Aoko whenever she comes over and directs things back Kaito’s way all the time, but it’s annoying because he shouldn’t have to. Aoko’s Kaito’s friend so she shouldn’t look to the robot first or be more comfortable in his physical space than Kaito’s.
She shouldn’t look at him with that gentle smile she sometimes sent Kaito’s way or touch him more than she ever invaded Kaito’s space or… Or laugh like that for his jokes. And the robot really shouldn’t look at her like he’s in love with her because Kaito is—
Kaito takes a breath and tears his eyes away from Aoko and robot-Kaito are teasing each other over homework. They’re not even alone is the thing. Chikage is cooking dinner and that Hakuba guy is at the table doing homework right next to them with a little smile on his face like this is all completely normal and something he enjoys at that. Meanwhile Kaito’s sitting there with kiddie homework shoving down the desire to scream.
Or cause trouble. Kaito balls his fists under the table before pasting a wild grin on his face and lobbing a confetti bomb right onto the robot’s head. “Fire in the hole!”
“Kaito!” Aoko shrieks as confetti goes everywhere.
Kaito laughs and runs, knowing she’ll chase. Good.
He has a split second of meeting the robot’s eyes and—Kaito doesn’t think about how there isn’t any hatred there.
Later the other Kaito corners him coming out of the bathroom. “Hey.”
“What?”
“You know I’m not trying to take her away, right? She still cares about you?”
After homework and dinner, the other Kaito and Hakuba had fallen into discussion and Aoko and Kaito had argued the merits of current pop music groups for the better part of an hour with increasingly ridiculous standards for why one group was better than another. It’s just the kind of thing they always did. Except a few times Aoko turned to the others and made them give a point and… “I know that.” Aoko wouldn’t chase him around or argue stupid shit if she wasn’t still his friend.
“Look.” The robot rubs the back of his neck looking at the ceiling like it holds all the answers. Not even a hint of a mask and it’d be embarrassing how open his is except that if you can’t be honest with your brain clone, who could you be honest to? “She loves Kaito. And you’re Kaito. And you’re not going to be small forever. And I’m not going to be around forever either, so you don’t have to worry about me stealing her forever.”
That’s a very roundabout way of saying he’s not planning on dating her, but… “What the hell do you mean you’re not going to be around forever?”
The robot raises an eyebrow. “I’m not? Ayato, I’m an experimental robot made from untested technology. There’s no way of knowing how long I’m going to exists. Think about it; your average laptop doesn’t last more than four years before a major part stops functioning and that’s with computers where everything is tried and tested.”
Kaito feels a lurch in his gut. He’s not sure which is worse, that the robot—Kaito—says it so nonchalantly like he’s not bothered by imminent mortality or that he says it like that’s supposed to be a good thing for Kaito. Which, technically it is for getting his life back but what the fuck. If he wanted to get his life back that way he could have tried offing him already and Kaito won’t because, again what the fuck, the other Kaito is an imposter but he’s still a person in the way that other robot in Kaito’s memory hadn’t really been. He has morals and can either feel love or fakes it so well it’s indistinguishable from real love.
“Hopefully by the time that happens Haibara will have a cure so you can have your life back,” the other Kaito goes on. “Maybe then you can tell Aoko how you feel and she’ll return it. I know it’s not as soon as you’d like but—ow!”
Kaito punches the robot in the gut. “What is wrong with you?!”
“What’s wrong with me? What’s wrong with you? Don’t go punching people—”
“You feel guilty so you’re just going to roll over and die?” Kaito yells.
“It’s the reality of what I am not—”
“Are we even the same person anymore?” Kaito says. “There’s no way I’d just give up like that!”
The other Kaito’s eyes narrow in irritation and good! Better than him tip-toeing around all guilty. “Look, I’m not happy about it but I can’t help being a ticking technological meltdown waiting to happen! Getting upset about it doesn’t help anyone!”
“You know what I think? I think you’ve got a guilt complex and are glad you have an out!”
Oh, there is real anger. The other Kaito’s hands twitch like he wants to strangle Kaito and good, the feeling’s mutual. “I don’t want to die any more than you do!” the other Kaito yells back. “I’m actually getting toward being happy! Everyone is! Why the hell would I want to lose that?!”
“Then don’t!”
“How?!” the other Kaito demands.
Kaito bares his teeth. “You’re a computer, so back your shit up! Any IT person can recommend that!”
“Oh, and have more brain clones of us running around?”
“No, just files. Idiot. You’d only copy everything once, and just update it every night for each new day’s memory.”
“I… would that even work?” The other Kaito hesitates and Kaito rolls his eyes.
“How would I know? Hakuba’s your tech person. Ask him how your weird robo-brain works and if it’s even remotely possible.” Kaito glares. “Also, I don’t like you but don’t you dare be all passively accepting of your own death. What is wrong with you?”
The other Kaito gives him an incredulous look. “You want a list?” He shakes his head. “You’re the one who made us be the kind of fool to risk our life on the regular.”
“As Kid. And there’s risk-reward balance and there’s waiting for death that could be prevented. Idiot.”
“Oi. You’d think you’d be happy. It solves half your problems.”
“And if you die everyone will be sad! I’m going to call you Bakaito exclusively until you get a clue.” Kaito should care less but it just rubs him all wrong. That any version of himself would just… accept that. No. Kaito’s the one that actually died and he doesn’t recommend it. And as much as he doesn’t like it, the other Kaito dying would hurt everyone he loves just as badly—or maybe even worse than—Kaito’s own death did. “Talk to your mechanic.”
The other Kaito shakes his head like Kaito’s the idiot. Jerk. He doesn’t deserve how much Aoko likes him.
“…Can I call truce?” the other Kaito says after a moment.
“Depends. Will you try to live?”
“I’ll think about talking to Hakuba.”
“Good.”
“… I’m working on a heist,” the other Kaito says as they stand frowning at each other too long. “Want to help?”
No, Kaito wants to say, because Kid’s supposed to be mine too, not yours. But it’s a genuine offer and he’d be lying if he says he isn’t curious what kind of ideas the other Kaito’s come up with. “Fine but if your plans suck, I’m making a new one.”
The other Kaito rolls his eyes. “Just come on.”
If the other Kaito waits too long to talk to Hakuba maybe Kaito should just loudly wonder about Kaito’s lifespan in Hakuba’s earshot.
o*O*o
“I need to take tests,” Haibara says following him around her lab with a bland, irritated expression and a hypodermic needle.
“I said you could give me a checkup, not play vampire,” Kaito says, angling toward the door. Of course it’s currently blocked by Jii who’d taken him here in the first place. He gives Jii his best puppy eyes but gets nothing more than an apologetic look in return. Traitor.
“And I have told you that I need to keep checking all aspects of your health,” Haibara says, “because you’re even more of an anomaly than Kudo or myself. It’s a literal miracle that you’re alive.”
“Yeah, yeah, great,” Kaito grumbles. It’s the worst that this is a room without windows. Maybe an air vent…? It’s a lab after all. He scrambles up on top of a table. “You can take tests, but no needles.”
“Kuroba, a blood test is essential.”
“Look, I’m really grateful to be alive again, but just because you got me breathing doesn’t make me your little science experiment.”
“I’m worried about your health,” Haibara snaps, trying to corner him by a cabinet. Joke’s on her. Kaito scrambles up on top of it, high above the rest of the room. Haibara huffs, hands on her hips. “There could be delayed responses you idiot.”
“Robo-me said you did experiments on my corpse so excuse me for not believing you.”
She rolls her eyes. “If you drop dead again from complications, I told you so.”
“Then it’ll be on me, not you!” He feels like a treed cat, but he just. Can’t. She’d pulled out that needle and he’d been out of the chair and half across the room before he even fully processed the movement.
“Kuroba.”
“Haibara,” he shoots back. She scowls up at him and Kaito presses his lips together. “I can’t ok? Ask me to do stress tests or take my pulse a billion times, but no needles.”
“You can’t avoid them forever,” she says.
“I can sure as hell try.”
“Get therapy.”
“You get therapy,” he grumbles.
Haibara shakes her head but goes and puts the needle away. “I’ll let this go this time, but next time you’re giving me a blood sample. I’m not joking about it being important.”
Didn’t she get enough when he first came back to life? Kaito knows she got blood samples then, he’d just been too overwhelmed to put up a fight at the time.
It figures he’d come out of all this with another damn phobia.
o*O*o
It’s been a month and Kaito isn’t sure what to make of the fact that his mother’s still home. On the one hand, it’s more than he’s seen of her in ages (yeah, year and a half dead aside). On the other he’s not used to having her around anymore and he already has to get used to the other Kaito in his space. And Kaito bringing over Hakuba. And sharing Aoko.
Chikage’s acting like a normal mother and it’s weird. Even when she comes home it’s been just a week or so at a time, and they’d still had their own lives. Now they’re having sit-down dinners with the three of them. It’s weird.
Kaito watches her sort laundry like she did in his childhood memories before she started teaching him how to take care of himself and wonders when the other shoe is going to drop.
“Do you have things you need washed?” Chikage asks like she hadn’t already gathered his clothing from his hamper.
“I can do my own laundry,” Kaito says. He’s been doing his laundry for over three years.
“I know you can, I’m offering.” She tosses one of the other Kaito’s dark Kid-reconnaissance shirts into a pile of dark colors. “What do you think, should I wash the curtains or just get new ones? It’s about time for a new look around here.”
Kaito stares. “It’s fine.”
“I’m not sure when they were last washed… Probably over six months ago when Kaito got injured…”
Kaito twitches. Right, because the robot Kaito functions almost like a human and actually has to heal. So weird. Also… wasn’t that around when Chikage found out he was dead? What did she do, have a guilt-filled cleaning spree like she was trying to suddenly project herself into some kind of maternal stereotype? “Ask Kaito, he’d probably know.” He does his shares of chores at any rate.
“He never thinks to touch the curtains.” Curtains are just there, of course he doesn’t. “Hmm, maybe change them to sheer ones for more light?” Chikage looks around. It’s a mix of old-fashioned elegance and modern minimalism depending on the room. Kaito likes the old-style rooms with their decorative clutter better. “Maybe have some plants or something.”
“Which of us would take care of them?”
“You’re both taking care of the doves just fine,” Chikage says. “But I could take care of them.”
“How long are you planning to stay?!” Kaito blurts out.
Chikage pauses, a well-worn shirt in one hand. It’s stained, one of the other Kaito’s, with grease and grass and sweat and blood because it’s an undershirt and Kaito’s never been careful when he’s caught up in things about how his clothing comes out of them. “How long do you want me to stay?” she asks.
He gives her a wide-eyed look. They talked about it once before she started going to America, just a “How would you feel if I started travelling?” and he’d responded with, “You can do whatever, I can take care of myself. I’m not a little kid, Kaa-san.” They’d never actually gone into whether Kaito really wanted her to stay, and he couldn’t say he’d missed her more than he expected when she’d gone. She’d looked so much happier once she started travelling that he couldn’t really get too upset about it. Even if sometimes he needed her and she wasn’t there.
“It’s…” He looks away. “It’s not like you need to be here. I’m not actually six.”
“Do you want me to stay?” she asks, blunter.
Kaito crosses his arms. Does he want her here? “I don’t know. Not all the time. You wouldn’t be happy.”
She sighs and he’s suddenly hugged. “I want to be here if you need me.”
“But I don’t need you here, I just need you to be.” He can’t really take the words back, but it’s true. He’s terrified of her dying and being alone without either parent, but he’s also a pretty independent person just like Chikage is. He needs to know she’s okay and alive and still out there existing and thinking of him, but she doesn’t have to be glued to his side. He doesn’t know what to do with that. It’s been so weird having her right there for the last month.
Chikage sighs again. Kaito doesn’t know what she’s feeling. He’s not quite sure what he’s feeling either. The hug is nice though.
“Oh, are we having a family hug moment?” other Kaito says, catching them hugging on his way to do whatever he does with his time (living Kaito’s life).
“You’re not invited,” Kaito says grumpily.
Chikage laughs and holds out an arm and then Kaito’s squished between her and the other Kaito.
“I didn’t agree to this!” Kaito grumbles.
“Hugs are good for you!” other Kaito says cheerfully.
“I will kick out your kneecaps.”
“Good luck, they’re metal.”
“Don’t fight,” Chikage says.
Kaito surrenders to the hug. It’s not that bad. The other Kaito’s a lot softer than he has any right being considering what he is.
“Kaito,” Chikage says, “what do you think about sheer curtains and house plants?”
“Are we remodeling? Because I’d request a sun room.”
Kaito groans and squirms in their grasp. The hug has started to feel restraining. It needs to end immediately. The other Kaito lets go but Chikage keeps a hand on him. She keeps doing that, touching. Kaito refuses to look too closely at why because he doesn’t like to think too hard about the time he was dead. “No more than four plants.”
“Four’s a bad number, go with five,” other Kaito counters.
“Get cactuses, they need less care. If you’re going to take care of them,” he says to his mother. Chikage’s smile turns a little sad. “So you have a reason to come back, but still have time to go,” Kaito adds. He doesn’t want to reject her sudden attempts to be more parental again.
Weirdly it’s the other Kaito that pats his head and Kaito swats his hand away as his mother laughs. Ugh. Whatever.
“I’ll always have a reason to come back, Kai-chan,” Chikage says with a fond smile.
Kaito looks away and aggressively starts helping sort the laundry. Sheesh. So much more mushy-gushy emotional stuff these days.
o*O*o
“Kuroba Ayato, sit down,” his teacher says like she’s said ‘stop fidgeting’ and ‘please pay attention to class’ and ‘stop disrupting class’ and ‘stand in the hall until you can behave’ over the course of the last month. She’s this close to yelling and Kaito is a wrong word away from snapping entirely. “I am aware that school here is different than what you were used to in America, but you can’t keep being so disrespectful to your teachers and classmates!”
He almost laughs in her face. Instead, he looks her in the eye and says, “No,” before walking out of the room.
She calls after him, and no doubt is going to go to the principal because of this, but he can’t sit there pretending anymore. That was only amusing the first week before it became maddeningly boring.
Kaito walks right out the building and no one even stops him. Walks down the road, past a police box and everything and no one stops him. Walks all the way home with a rising feeling of restless frustration simmering in him. Sometimes he wishes he’d taken self-defense courses like Aoko did as a kid and stuck with them because then he could punch something until he felt less off balance and not hurt himself in the process. Kaito had not taken any such courses though, so the next best thing would be to throw himself into a project until that occupies enough of his mind that he’s not stuck in his own rage.
He opens his front door and feels further irritation that he has to reach for the handle to get in.
Chikage is in the living room with a cup of tea that’s gone cold and the unfocused expression of someone who has been staring at a wall with their mind somewhere else entirely for some time. She doesn’t even notice Kaito’s there until he steps up in front of her. “Kai-chan? What are you doing home?”
“I walked out of class,” Kaito says.
“You walked out of class.”
“Yes.” Part of him wants a fight and Aoko’d be the best to go to for meaningless arguments and emotional outlet. She’s in class with the other Kaito though. Chikage’s the only one left, and he doesn’t expect to get more than a mild argument at best from her. “I’m not going back.”
“Kaito,” Chikage says, rubbing the bridge of her nose. She looks her age today, tired and worn down by the world and whatever’s currently haunting her thoughts. “You’re legally required to attend school. I can’t just pull you from it.”
“So let me skip some grades. Take a placement test. I can’t just sit there and be talked at in cutesy child-friendly voices about things I’ve known for almost two thirds of my life.”
Chikage isn’t amused. Her lips press in a thin line. “I know you don’t want to hear this, but you know that it’s best not to draw too much attention. A six-year-old child ending up in high school or more would catch local attention if not national and that’s not something we can afford with our family background.”
No, couldn’t have people look too closely at the Kurobas. Not like Toichi hadn’t been internationally famous or anything. Couldn’t have them finding out that there wasn’t just Toichi who was a thief but a whole legacy of two infamous thieves. (He’d been pretty pissed when other Kaito filled him in on Phantom Lady. Because really? Really? Neither of his parents shared anything with him in all these years? What next, were his grandparents actually mob bosses or something? Were they thieves too?
“I can’t go back to that classroom,” he says again.
“Then where will you go, Kaito?” Chikage asks.
“I don’t know. Surely there’s alternative schooling or… or… something.” Alternative schooling isn’t popular in Japan. Of course it isn’t, not when school is part of forming model citizens from the ground up and instilling community values and rigid boundaries that are perfect for setting people up for a lifetime of drudgery at expense of their individuality.
Or maybe that’s just the cynicism in him talking.
He’s so tired lately.
Kaito sits next to his mother on the couch, flopping back. Being a child again is a nightmare very few people could possibly understand. The only ones who could were—ah. “Beika. That’s where all the other cursed souls forced back to childhood are. At least then I’d be suffering with people instead of feeling completely alone.”
Chikage rubs at her forehead. “I could get you transferred there, but are you sure?”
“No.” He’s not sure of anything ninety percent of the time. He’s someone who pretends he’s perfectly sure until he believes it. He’s not believing it now though. “Do you have a better idea?”
“Not at the moment.”
They both sigh.
“I could take you back to America if you want,” Chikage offers. “We could live together there.”
“That would leave other Kaito alone.” And other Kaito doesn’t like to be alone, Kaito’s realized. He doesn’t always know what to do with Kaito’s presence, but he never rejects him, nor Chikage, and seeks out Aoko and Hakuba more than Kaito ever did with Aoko alone. Kaito feels kind of strange to realize he might be more inclined to wanting his own space than his own brain clone.
“He’d understand.”
Sure, but it wouldn’t make him less sad about it. And at the heart of it, Kaito doesn’t really want to leave Japan. His life’s been turned on end enough, he doesn’t need culture shock and full language immersion on top of it.
“I’d rather stay,” he says, knowing he’s sounding like a whiney brat but not caring enough to try not to. If he’s going to be stuck in a child body, he can at least indulge in some immaturity.
“Then we’ll stay,” Chikage says. She brushes the hair away from his face and Kaito lets her, internally enjoying the affection. Outwardly he’s still full sulk mode. He can do both. “But you do have to go to school, Kai-chan, so if you go to Beika please try your best to make it work.”
“I am trying,” he says.
“Hmm.” Her fingers scrub through his hair.
“I’ll keep trying.”
“I know you will.”
Kaito leans against her like he did when he was actually six. It’s funny how his mother can still make him feel safe even though he knows that there’s plenty she couldn’t protect him from in the world. “…How annoyed is Edogawa Conan going to be, do you think? He’s going to make a face like he bit into the sourest umeboshi.”
And Chikage starts giggling just like he hoped she would.
o*O*o
Kaito stands at the front of the class, rocking back and forth on his heels with a charming, friendly smile on his face—and subtly takes a photo of Edogawa Conan. The constipated mix of horror and irritation from the split second Kaito walked through the door are a delight. He snaps a second one of the tiny grin on Haibara Ai’s face as she takes in Edogawa’s expression. Treats for the other Kaito because he’d heard Kaito’s plan to transfer and laughed for ten minutes straight before demanding reaction pictures. How could Kaito refuse when he was so enthusiastic about it?
“Class, this is our new transfer student,” the teacher says as she writes his name on the board. Kaito carefully doesn’t laugh at her eyebrow twitch at the kanji in his first name.
“Hi, I’m Kuroba Ayato!” Kaito says in a chirpy, friendly kid voice. He’s decided that if he’s going to be stuck in this he’s going to relentlessly be that kid. The one that’s constantly borderline obnoxious but too nice to get actually angry toward, but always over the top. He’s dedicating himself to this performance. He needs something to entertain him, and being a supposedly-innocent and well-meaning nuisance is as good a way as any. (It’s not pretending to be normal like the other class, he can definitely pull this off longer.) “I moved here from America! I hope we can all get along!”
“Oh my gosh, Conan-kun!” a little girl says in a way-too-loud whisper. “He looks just like you! Is he a brother?”
“No!” Edogawa sputters. “No, we’re—”
“Cousins!” Kaito says because why not? Edogawa’s face goes murderous for a split second that Kaito faithfully captures with his hidden camera. Oh, this is opening up so many possibilities for beautiful chaos. “It’s been so long, Conan-kun!”
“…yeah… Ayato-kun,” Edogawa says between gritted teeth because he can’t say they’re not cousins with dozens of eyes on them. “I thought you were going to a different school.”
“I was, but I found out you were here and wanted to go to school with you! I can’t believe we finally have the chance!”
“Ha…ha… Yeah…”
Kaito grins with an edge of Kid’s fervor and drinks in the sharp look Edogawa sends back. Oh, this is going to be fun.
o*O*o
The kiddos mob both of them the first chance they get with a billion questions and it’s honestly a little overwhelming. But Kaito's in his Ayato persona so he answers them with responses made on the fly that get committed to memory so he can hold up his role without too many contradictions. Yep, Edogawa’s cousin, no they don’t see each other much, no they didn’t live near each other before, yes he did miss his cousin, no he’s not a detective, no he’s not into soccer, he’s into magic tricks—look what Kaito-nii showed him! They kids lap it up with appropriate oohs and awws and Kaito thoroughly enjoys himself. He always has enjoyed being the center of attention.
Of course then Edogawa’s friends mob him too.
“Conan, you never told us you had another cousin!” Ayumi says.
“It never came up,” Edogawa says with the tone of a defeated man. Kaito definitely wins this round. Not that it’s a competition. But if it was, he wins.
“Hey are you smart too?” Genta asks. “Because Conan-kun’s really smart. It’s kind of annoying sometimes.”
“Oi,” Edogawa complains.
“Ah, I don’t know if I’m as smart as Conan-kun,” Kaito says with perfect false modesty. “I get good grades though!”
“What’s America like?” Mitsuhiko asks. “Conan-kun never talks about it much.”
Kaito thinks about the trip he took to Vegas with his mother. “Busy,” he says. “Cities are really busy and there’s lots of people and outside them it’s just lots and lots of space and a lot of farms and desert and stuff.”
“You’ve seen a desert?” Edogawa asks in surprise.
“I’ve been living in Las Vegas, remember?” Kaito says, enjoying Edogawa’s eye twitch.
“Oh right. Nevada. Deserts.”
“You were living in…?” Kaito tilts his head to the side.
“Hawaii,” Edogawa says through gritted teeth.
“Right!”
“Waaah, that’s so cool!” Ayumi says. “You have to show pictures!”
Kaito makes a note to beg photos from his mom. She has to have a ton. “Sure! I’ll bring some tomorrow!”
Haibara watches all of this with an amused smile. Kaito meets her eye with a quick wink and she looks away, but clearly she enjoys seeing Edogawa annoyed as much as Kaito does. Ah, this could be the start of a friendship. If only she didn’t keep threatening him with needles.
“How far away is Hawaii from Las Be-Ve-gas?” Mitsuhiko stumbles a little over the foreign pronunciation.
“About as far from Tokyo as the capital of Laos,” Kaito says getting blank responses from everyone but Edogawa as they try to visualize this. “Closer than flying from Tokyo to Hawaii, but farther than flying to Shanghai,” Kaito tries instead and gets a little more comprehension.
“So a long way,” Genta says, and that seems to settle it.
o*O*o
It takes two days for Kaito to start needling Edogawa and for Edogawa to make pointed comments back. Kaito’d be annoyed except it’s way more fun than focusing on class. He passes notes every moment he can get away with it and enjoys how Edogawa stews in irritation while Kaito keeps a perfect innocent expression.
Of course Edogawa gets back at him during free time and ‘accidentally’ hits him with a soccer ball in PE. Kaito ‘accidentally’ messes up a magic trick and gets glitter all over Edogawa’s desk. And Edogawa. And honestly a lot more of the classroom than he meant to. Worth the cleanup though. Edogawa keeps finding glitter for days.
In the meantime Edogawa’s friends keep trying to drag Kaito into being one of their group. Which, ok. But detectives. Not his thing. Also they kids are kind of scary under all the cute? Kaito wasn’t expecting this. Haibara is laughing at all of them and Kaito realizes she’s probably the scariest of them and not just because she has needles.
He still has to sit through hours of pretending to be a small child.
“How?” Kaito complains to Edogawa in a rare moment when the child brigade isn’t around. “How the hell can you stand this?”
“Get a hobby,” Edogawa advises. “Or something to occupy your mind. I have a lot of cases.”
Kaito gives him a look of disbelief. A hobby. That’s it.
“Look, I let myself zone out ninety percent of the school day,” Edogawa says. “It’s not hard.”
“I’m going to die of boredom before this is fixed aren’t I?”
“Why are you so dramatic?” Edogawa complains.
“Why aren’t you more dramatic?”
“I can’t be suspected of being Kudo Shinichi or I’m dead,” Edogawa says bluntly. “I have a lot of incentive to try to not be noticed.”
He’s not very good at not being noticed though. Kaito’s seen him around way too many police officers and heard dozens of rumors and he’s not even doing any digging. Kaito could do way better. He just doesn’t care the same way. “Wouldn’t it be nice to skip a few grades?”
Edogawa groans. “Please don’t tempt me.”
Kaito laughs. Of course he has to them keep positing what-ifs until Edogawa kicks another soccer ball at him, but Edogawa has his good points. He can almost see what the other Kaito sees in him.
o*O*o
Okay, he hasn’t said anything much about it but it is really starting to make Kaito feel weird seeing the other Kaito interact with Hakuba. Especially when Aoko is there too. Kaito would be the first to admit that occasionally he had no respect for personal bubbles, but the other Kaito is shameless. He leans on Aoko and steals food from Hakuba and casually touches all the time. Kaito’d always flirt with how close he could get to Aoko before, but… Even he hadn’t been draping himself all over her or giving more than shoulder or hand touches from time to time.
The most uncomfortable part of it all (well aside from Kaito’s low burning, ever present jealousy about how comfortable Aoko is with the other Kaito that she isn’t with him, the original Kaito) is that Hakuba—who isn’t a touchy person from what Kaito can tell from his contained body language—is just as casual right back. It could be written off as Hakuba being more or less other Kaito’s doctor. He’s probably seen everything by this point, or at least read about the other Kaito’s body. Of course he can casually turn other Kaito’s hand over and press on it to double check proper functionality.
But he doesn't move away when other Kaito sits too close or leans on his shoulder or grabs his hand to play around with because neither Kaito or the other Kaito like having their hands unoccupied by something.
Whatever it is, it’s clearly mutual.
Which raises a question that Kaito’s not entirely comfortable with.
Kaito picks a day that Hakuba is not there—because he’s not opening this conversation with him there, god no—and waits until the other Kaito’s guard is down while they’re both planning the next heist target.
“Hmm, these blueprints don’t quite match the dimensions I took on scene. What do you think?”
“Wouldn’t be the first place with a secret room.”
“They could have just failed to update the official blueprints, but yeah, it’s worth looking into. I don’t suppose you’d be willing to do some vent crawling?”
“Hell no, too much dust.”
Other Kaito laughs and makes a notation. “If it is another hidden room Hakuba’ll be annoyed. He hates that kind of thing.”
Ah, a perfect opening. “I can’t believe you’re fine with him chasing you around heists and trying to arrest you and then coming over and having dinner the next day.”
“Well he’s not seriously trying to arrest me anymore,” other Kaito says. “And it makes it more fun.” He gives a wink. “You never got to have the fun of the extra challenge.”
“Ugh, spare me. Detectives are overrated.” Maybe the other Kaito’s just a bigger adrenaline junkie than Kaito is. “What’s going on with Hakuba anyway?”
“What do you mean?” Other Kaito flips a few pages in the notes and starts adding to their freeform idea board. It’s still weird how they have the exact same handwriting.
“Are you dating him?” Kaito asks going for a direct approach.
Other Kaito’s pen skids across the page. “Da—!” He chokes on a squeak.
Kaito honestly hadn’t expected that strong of a response. “If you are, well, whatever, just don’t mess with Aoko’s heart. I just didn’t think you’d be interested in men.”
Other Kaito’s face goes pink and he stares. Kaito stares back pretending he’s not embarrassed about talking romance stuff at all.
“We’re not dating,” other Kaito says.
“No?” He tilts his head. “So you’re dating Aoko?”
“I’m not dating anyone!” he says. “I wouldn’t.”
And there was a hint of that stupid guilt. Kaito internally rolls his eyes. He doesn’t hate the other Kaito near as much as he did, but he’s still really annoying sometimes. “Okay, but are you interested in them? Because you’re always touching them and it’s weird.”
“That’s. It’s. Not like that.”
Kaito waits. And waits as the other Kaito twists the pen between his fingers. “Okay,” he prompts as the silence continues.
“It’s complicated,” the other Kaito finally says.
Kaito narrows his eyes at him. Something ticks in the back of his mind. His interactions with Aoko. The way everything is intimate but arguably platonic. Not even teasing jokes about Aoko’s underwear and barely anything that would be taken the wrong way. Actually, those happened more with Hakuba than Aoko and… Yeah. “Are you gay?”
“Excuse me?”
“Or… When was the last time you got off?”
“Oi!” The other Kaito goes bright red. “Don’t ask that kind of question!”
Kaito rolls his eyes pretending he isn’t a little embarrassed too. “We both know how often our hormones worked us up before.” A healthy sex drive isn’t something to be ashamed of. And they have the same memories of that so Kaito is not going to be embarrassed by this. “I still have hormones even in this body.” He wrinkles his nose. “Which really sucks. Talk about dysphoria. Remembering you’re a child kinda kills the libido. So. What about you?”
“I…” The other Kaito blinks rapidly before going still. “There’s been a lot going on.”
“And?” Never stopped them before.
“…It’s been a while.”
“A week a while? Or a month?”
His brain clone bites his lip.
“Longer?” Oh, Kaito hadn’t expected that. But then again, maybe he is different there. A robot doesn’t have a need for a sex drive. “Have you got off at all in that body? Can you get off?”
“I have! Jeeze! I’d have noticed a lot sooner if I couldn’t!” Other Kaito buries his face in his hands, managing to get a streak of ink all over his cheek because he’s still holding the pen. “Why are we talking about this?”
“I’m trying to figure out what ways we’re different,” Kaito says. “I thought it was the liking guys thing, but it sounds like it’s a lot more.”
“You don’t like men?” other Kaito asks looking up.
“Other than aesthetically?” Kaito shrugs. “Never met a guy that pinged me that way.” He likes pretty things, and that extends to people, but he’s not romantically attracted to anyone but Aoko, and he’s been physically attracted to women but never men. At least not that he’s noticed. This whole thing has him wondering if he’s missed it or if it’s actually unique to the robot Kaito.
“Really?” Other Kaito blinks. “I… could have sworn… Matsuda in fourth grade?”
“He was super pretty but not in a kissing way?” Kaito remembers wanting to be his friend but being intimidated by his appearance. And a little jealous because Aoko found him pretty too.
“What about Yuuta who was at our school for a year in junior high and kept trying to get us to join the drama club?”
Also a pretty guy. Kaito, again, likes pretty things. “We were friends?” Ish. Yuuta was good with stage makeup and Kaito swapped some ideas about makeup and costuming as he started learning that sort of thing for his skill repertoire. Kaito never spent a lot of time with him though and never did join the drama club. He’d fallen hard for Aoko around then anyway. More than the ‘oh she’s a girl and pretty’ way that he’d felt before. Yuuta was the closest he’d had to a friend outside of Aoko honestly, so he did remember him fondly and had been sad when he moved.
“Okay, then Ren-Ren from the boyband Aoko was obsessed with who we got obsessed with that we never admitted to her that we watched all the dramas and variety shows he was in even though his acting was terrible.”
Kaito flushes. “Okay, that’s like one celebrity crush.” Everyone has one celebrity they’re gay for, right? …Right? Oh no, is he going to have to have an identity crisis? Again?
Other Kaito looks torn between amusement and concern. “So that one we can agree was gay?”
“Shut up.”
That gets him a stifled laugh. The pen starts twisting between other Kaito’s fingers again. “I didn’t notice a change in sex drive after I got this body, not right away. I… just stopped thinking about that kind of thing as much. There’s been so much going on for months that it… Didn’t come up at all.”
“Stress raises our libido.”
Other Kaito shrugs awkwardly. “I thought it was because I was depressed.”
“Huh. Might wanna talk to Haibara about that. Or Hakuba.”
There’s still a blush on his face that’s not going away. How does a robot blush anyway? “No. It’s not like it’s something I need so…”
Right. Not like a robot’s going to have kids one day… Wait. “You didn’t notice anything different at all?”
“No…?”
“You know that means you have a functioning fake dick. With realistic jizz.”
The wide-eyed look that gets him is worth the discomfort of thinking it. “Uh.”
Kaito grins. “Wonder what yours is made up of?”
“Um.”
“Hmm, that’s one bodily fluid Haibara hasn’t examined from you yet.” He grins wider.
“No,” the other Kaito says. “No, we’re not doing science on… on that.”
“Actually Hakuba would probably know. He’s read the notes on your body. We should ask him.” Kaito pulls out his phone.
“No!” His brain clone lunges for him but Kaito’s really hard to get ahold of in this small body. He slips under the table and between chair legs as the other tries to catch him. “Oh my god put the phone down!”
Kaito dials. “Hakuba-san!” he says cheerfully as it picks up on the second ring.
“Get back here!”
Kaito dodges from under the table toward the couch Toichi put in his underground hideaway. “So, question. Shit!” Kaito feels a strong hand clamp around his ankle.
“I’m going to smother you with a pillow!” other Kaito says, face scarlet.
“Hakuba, what’s—”
“Don’t answer!”
“—Kaito’s body’s sexual functions—”
“I’ll throw you off a building!”
“Jizz, what’s his—” Kaito starts laughing uncontrollably as other Kaito makes an inarticulate sound somewhere in between despair and rage, while Kaito still dangles from his ankle. He drops the phone and ends up tossed on the couch as other Kaito dives for it.
“I’m so sorry he—” Other Kaito pulls the phone away from his ear. “He hung up.”
Kaito can’t breathe he’s laughing so hard. “Your face!” he wheezes.
Other Kaito throws the phone at him. It hurts where it hits him, but he can’t stop laughing. “I hate you,” the robot says.
Kaito wipes tears from his eyes. “Ah. Wow. Haven’t laughed that hard in ages.”
“Hate.”
“Relax, he probably hung up as soon as he heard you screaming in the background.”
“I’m not talking to you.”
Kaito snickers. “Okay. Keep telling yourself that.” The other Kaito’s face is redder than Kaito would have thought possible. “So I take it that you actually are interested in Hakuba, huh.”
“I don’t know!” He throws his hands up before slumping against the couch. “I know I love Aoko because you knew you loved Aoko and those emotions carried over. I don’t know what I feel for Hakuba!”
“So you do still love Aoko?”
“Yes!” There’s a frustrated groan as the other Kaito hides his face in his hands again. “Maybe not the same way you did though. I don’t know. It’s been too long to know.”
“Well, I like her as a person. She’s great, loyal and stubborn and kind and calls me on my bullshit,” Kaito says, figuring he probably owes the honesty after messing with the guy. Besides, he wants to know where other Kaito stands. “And she’s not supermodel hot, but… She’s really cute. Her smile makes me feel stupid and there’s nothing better than having all her attention on me, even if it’s negative attention.” It’s harder to say the other stuff. “And, uh, I want to kiss her obviously. And uh.”
“Sex stuff,” other Kaito cuts in. “You’re interested in sexual stuff.”
“Duh.” Thank you, he doesn’t have to actually say it. “But also domestic crap like having breakfast and dinner together and helping her cook and stuff.” And he’s blushing. Lovely. A glance shows that at least the robot isn’t judging him. He has a little smile like he knows exactly what Kaito means, and, yeah, he probably does.
“I want the domestic stuff too,” the other Kaito says. “Even arguing over which place carries better boxed curry brands or the best way to make omurice.”
“Yeah.” Wow he’s feeling too vulnerable all of a sudden. Kaito coughs. “Anyway. You?”
“Most of that,” other Kaito agrees. “Less of the sex stuff. It’s not that it’s not interesting at all… It’s just not what comes to mind when I think of her first, or even second or third.”
“And with Hakuba?”
“Ugh… More domestic stuff I guess,” other Kaito mutters. He rubs a hand across his face, like it’ll scrub away the blush. “I like that he’s smart and can follow my thoughts even when they’re jumping around like a bouncy-ball on a trampoline. And.”
“Uh huh?”
“I like that ever since he found out he treats me gently.”
They both know that the list of people who were actually careful with them is… pretty much nonexistent. Aoko is anything but gentle. Jii can be, but there’s gentle and then there’s deferential and that’s not quite the same thing. Chikage is kind but not necessarily gentle. Edogawa or Haibara? Ha. Hahaha. No.
“But it’s not in a way that makes me think he sees me as helpless? Because he’s still pretty ruthless toward me in other ways. He’s just careful with my feelings and careful when he needs to touch. And I trust him.” He sounds a little surprised even though it’s pretty obvious that the other Kaito trusts Hakuba a lot. “Shit, I really do trust him.”
“Huh.” Sounds like a crush to Kaito, but eh. Maybe not a physical one. “Kissing?”
Other Kaito’s face goes pinker. “Not… a negative thought? But not something I feel I need either?”
“Hmm. I dunno what to tell you then.” A pause. “Sex?”
Other Kaito makes a choking sound.
“You know you flirt with him shamelessly right?”
“That’s banter.”
“Flirting.” Kaito pokes him. “No different than me teasing Aoko.”
“Then does that make your back and forth with Edogawa flirting?”
“Does yours?” Kaito shoots right back and laughs when he gets a wrinkled nose. “I’m not into Edogawa. He can be kind of creepy actually. The way he pretends to go all super-sweet, dumb as a brick kid when he thinks people are looking too close.”
“Wait til you know him better. He gets worse.”
“Worse?”
“Corpses. He’s like a magnet for murders.”
“Huh.”
“Yup.” They both sigh. “So. Can we drop this subject and agree that we’ve diverged at some point, and at least part of it is different biological functions?”
“Sure. But you really might want to talk about it to Hakuba. Figuring out how your brain functions differently could be important.”
“Ugh, don’t wanna.”
Kaito snickers. “Who of us is the kid here?”
“Both of us. Technically I’m only about two.”
“Fuck that, you’ve got almost eighteen years of memories. I’ve got a little over sixteen.”
“Mrrgh.” Other Kaito pops to his feet. “Heist?”
“Heist,” Kaito agrees, shelving the topic. He’s certainly got a better understanding of the other than he did before.
o*O*o
“What the fuck,” Kaito says, seeing a severed hand fall out of a locker at a park Edogawa’s cheerful kiddie group invited him to. “What the fuck.”
“Ayato-kun, don’t say bad words like that!” Ayumi says, looking a little sick as well, but not nearly as terrified and alarmed as a six-year-old should be at seeing a severed limb.
Beside them, Edogawa’s suddenly a completely different person, all sharp concentration and action. “Mitsuhiko, call the police,” he says, bending down to examine the hand. “Haibara, Genta, took around and see if anyone’s paying attention to the area.” He uses a handkerchief to open the locker further and reveals a gristly bundle of bloody cloth, a second hand, and a terrifying butcher knife.
Kaito is pretty sure he’s going to throw up. He’s almost definitely sure he’s going to throw up when Conan uses the handkerchief to touch the severed hand. He edges toward the garbage can, which irritatingly is taller than he is. He swallows, but then notices that there are more flies than a garbage can usually would have buzzing around it even with summer heat just starting to bring them out full force.
“…Conan,” he says, pointing up, really hoping he’s wrong.
Conan comes running and pulls himself up. His face twitches into an even more severe expression. “Well, at least we know where the head is.”
Kaito ends up losing his lunch after all.
o*O*o
“Who lets six-year-olds run all over a crime scene with a dismembered corpse?” Kaito demands to the other Kaito. “Six-year-olds!” He keeps seeing the limp, bloody hands and Edogawa’s face when they found the head and hearing Ayumi’s shriek when she uncovered the torso and—what the hell is wrong with people? Why didn’t the police intervene?
“Yeah, it’s like that,” the other Kaito says. “Edogawa just attracts murders.”
“What the fuck.”
“Yeah. I should tell you about the time that I ended up in a lodge and a bunch of people got killed. Or that time with the mansion. Or—”
“Is Edogawa cursed?” Kaito asks seriously.
“No, I asked and he’s not. Surprisingly.”
“Asked?”
“A witch.”
“Ah.” Kaito’s not even surprised witches exist at this point.
“As far as I can tell he just has really bad or really good luck depending on how you look at it.”
“Um, bad? Running into death and killers is bad?”
“But he solves the crimes and always gets out of it alive,” other Kaito points out.
“Isn’t that all coping mechanisms for shit luck?” Kaito counters.
Other Kaito concedes the point. “But you could say our luck is equally bad or good depending on—”
“No, we get ourselves into most of our messes on purpose. It’s good luck. The whole ‘I died’ thing aside.”
“Because that was obviously bad luck.”
“But I came back, which is smaller-than-winning-the-lottery chances good luck.”
They contemplate this a moment. “…Do you think,” Kaito asks, “my good luck will help counterbalance Edogawa’s bad luck?”
“Not by much?” other Kaito says. “At least if I’m going with my own experiences.”
“Hmm.” It’s worth a thought. “…I am not looking forward to more dead bodies.”
“It’s a little scary how quick you get used to it.”
Kaito shudders. What is wrong with people? “That might just be you, robot.”
“Brat,” other Kaito says, poking him.
“You have shit choice in friends,” Kaito says.
Other Kaito snorts. “Isn’t he your friend now too?”
Kaito thinks about how he put two dozen bouncy balls in Edogawa’s shoe locker the day before and how Edogawa had retaliated by an ‘innocent’ comment that led to Kaito bullshitting a story about a nonexistent family trip for half an hour with Edogawa ‘helpfully’ remembering differing details. “We’re not friends.”
Other Kaito just laughs like he knows something Kaito doesn’t.
“We’re not!” Kaito protests. “We’re… we’re practically enemies!”
The robot laughs harder. Kaito can’t even slip Edogawa any info to use against him in the next heist because any mental weakness of other Kaito’s applies to Kaito too. Although… “I’m telling Hakuba and Haibara you skipped your weekly diagnostic checks.”
Other Kaito stops laughing. “You watched me do them!”
“Did I though?” Kaito says. “Did I?” He runs before he can be grabbed. The only good thing about being this size again is that the house is full of places to hide until other Kaito stops looking.
o*O*o
Kaito looks at the scans Haibara takes of other Kaito with a mix of discomfort and interest. He can almost understand where the robot is coming from with his own traumas looking at them because there’s no way a body should look like that, let alone one wearing Kaito’s face. On the other hand, it is uncomfortably reminiscent of being in the mad scientist’s lab and has Kaito’s skin crawling.
He rubs his arms. It’s supposed to be his turn for tests next. Sure, he’s seen both other Kaito and Edogawa get examined before him, but it’s not any less terrifying.
Haibara has Edogawa off to the side, taking his blood pressure and pulse rate, already having collected blood samples. Edogawa looks almost bored like this is as routine as reciting their weekly kanji in school.
Kaito sticks toward the other side of the room where Hakuba is carefully double checking all of the other Kaito’s reflexes in his hands and arms. Those, it seems, break the most often. They haven’t broken yet that Kaito’s witnessed, but he’s seen the thin scars where they’d been fixed. Multiple scars in the case of other Kaito’s hands and no, not thinking about how it’s almost as much like vivisection as surgery when it comes to trying to fully understand the robot body.
Somehow the other Kaito is completely relaxed though. How? Kaito’d be running for the door if he thought he might need to be cut open. Then again, it’s probably because it’s Hakuba. Even Kaito can see how carefully Hakuba touches each and every spot.
“Your shoulder?” Hakuba asks, rotating other Kaito’s arm and shoulder through a series of motions.
“No pain. I haven’t run into anything either, but it’s not bothering me. No pins and needles or stabby-burny feeling.”
“Good.” Hakuba moves to other Kaito’s leg next and Kaito has to look away. It’s not even inappropriate, it’s just… Weirdly intimate for a medical evaluation. Especially with Hakuba kneeling to roll other Kaito’s ankle every which way and… Hrrm. Sometimes Kaito has to wonder what exactly Hakuba wants from the other Kaito because it’s definitely more than friendly looks sometimes. But neither of them have done anything with it and Kaito’s starting to think they won’t.
Because other Kaito’s got weird complexes and Hakuba apparently doesn’t have clear lines between ‘friend’ and ‘more-than-friend’ so far as Kaito can tell. Probably because Hakuba just plain doesn’t have many friends. In other words they’re both hopeless and if anything changes there, it’ll probably be because Aoko gets tired of dancing around things.
Kaito’s not sure how he fits with all of this. Because sometimes he has the exact same sorts of interactions with Aoko as the other Kaito and he’s not sure if it means the same thing anymore, and if it does, how comfortable he’d be in sharing.
Kaito knows he’s a possessive bastard, ok, he can admit his faults.
His fingers flip a pen idly back and forth. A checkup. Just a checkup to make sure he’s not… oh, going to destabilize atom by atom. Or keel over dead from heart failure. Or mysteriously end up poisoned. Or go catatonic again. Which it’s been a bit over a month; he’s not counting on it happening. But Haibara’s pretty insistent and he sees her all the time now. There was only so long he could put it off.
“It looks like a clear bill of health this time, Kaito,” Hakuba says.
“Yay, no surgery,” other Kaito says, echoing Hakuba’s weird, dead-pan humor. “I shall live another day.”
Hakuba rolls his eyes. “I think I might have the first prototype for your memory bank in a few days, but I think that’s all for now.”
Kaito flips the pen faster as he sees Haibara finishing up as well. “Kuroba,” she says loud enough to carry, and the pen slips in his grip and goes flying off behind one of the work desks.
Kaito clears his throat. “Yeah?”
“This time I need those blood samples.”
He taps his own knees double-time. “And if I still don’t want to…?”
Haibara gives him a deeply unimpressed look. Yeah, he knew he only had so long before he couldn’t push any further. That doesn’t make him any less terrified.
A hand brushes his shoulder and Kaito nearly falls off the lab stool he’s sitting on, strung too tight and nervous. “Hey,” other Kaito says. “You’re not alone.”
Kaito laughs, not even the least bit convincing. “Yeah, I know. Though don’t take it the wrong way, but you aren’t going to be a help here.”
A flash of hurt followed quickly by understanding passes across his brain-clone’s face. “Ah.”
Kaito smiles weakly. “Yeah.”
“Is there anything that would help?” other Kaito asks.
“It not happening?” But he knows he doesn’t have that luxury. “Not being in the lab?” he ventures. He doesn’t like it, too similar despite how different the places were. Labs are labs. Kaito’s eyes flick around the room. Haibara’s neutral expression, Edogawa looking tired and ready to leave, Hakuba’s slight frown of concern— Hakuba. Kaito’s brain latches onto him.
Hakuba treats other Kaito gently and with genuine care and Kaito isn’t the other Kaito but.
“Can Hakuba take my blood?” he blurts.
There’s surprised looks all around because Kaito usually doesn’t interact much with Hakuba since Hakuba’s other Kaito’s friend, not Kaito’s. Haibara and Hakuba glance at each other and she shrugs. “Go ahead.”
“And can we go sit outside to do it?”
“…It’s not sterile,” Haibara says with distaste.
“In the living room then?”
She pins him with a look. He gives puppy eyes back. She sighs. “Fine.” She goes and pulls out three vials and a sterile needle and tube set for Hakuba. Kaito can’t even let his eyes linger on it without feeling like he’s going to throw up.
He used to be fine with needles. Mostly fine with blood. Now both are…
Other Kaito rubs his shoulder and Kaito shrugs him away. Thought appreciated, not the time. Hakuba walks out first which is both a relief and not because now Kaito has to force himself to move. He hops off the chair and doesn’t meet anyone’s eyes on the way toward the living room.
Hakuba’s set everything up behind an open book so Kaito doesn’t have to stare at them. It’s surprisingly insightful and nice of him.
“Sorry about putting you on the spot,” Kaito mutters.
“I don’t mind,” Hakuba says. “I have the skills to do this, and if it makes you more comfortable than Haibara-san, I am glad to help.”
Kaito sits on the couch and thrusts out his arm, already shaking. “Just. Get it over with.”
“Would watching be better or worse?” Hakuba asks as he carefully wipes Kaito’s skin and ties a band around his arm. “My own preference is not to watch, but yours might be different.”
“I don’t know. I didn’t used to care.”
Hakuba hums. “Perhaps I could just say what I am doing instead?”
“…Not actually helpful I don’t think.”
A hand repositions his arm with a light touch, and curls his fingers into more of a fist. Kaito flicks a glance and has to stop himself from ripping his arm away. Hakuba doesn’t even have a needle in sight yet.
“Have you ever done breathing exercises?” Hakuba asks, not making a move for the needle at all, just lightly touching Kaito’s hand.
“I.” Kaito realizes he isn’t breathing and takes a breath. “Sometimes. For parts of vocal exercises.”
“Try doing one.”
Kaito tries, eyes focusing away from Hakuba on Agasa’s bookshelf. He starts trying to read the titles from across the room. Hakuba pats his arm. This is fine. Perfectly fine. Kaito’s legs starts jiggling lightly with excess nerves.
“Kaito said you’ve ended up helping Edogawa-kun solve a few cases lately,” Hakuba says out of nowhere.
Kaito’s eyes skip over a few novel titles. “Mm.” Hakuba’s not touching him anymore. He’s tensing up he can’t do this he can’t— “A couple. A murder and um. And a blackmailing.”
“Tell me about the second case?” Hakuba asks and Kaito tries to remember details.
“There was a woman who—” He feels a prick in his arm and goes rigid, stops breathing.
“Ayato—Kaito,” Hakuba says in a calm voice, “the case?”
“Um.” He can’t breathe. “She was blackmailing her cousin because. Um. Because.” He wants to run but if he moves now he’d rip the needle out and maybe hurt himself and—
“Blackmailed her cousin?”
“There was a daughter. Illegitimate. She was trying to get her cousin and the daughter out of line for. For succession.” Kaito can’t remember a damn thing about how Edogawa solved the case, the clues, how Kaito helped, none of it at the moment.
There’s a press of something on his arm and Hakuba says, “You’re done.”
Kaito blinks. Looks at his arm as Hakuba unties the band. There’s a bandage with a cotton ball already taped on him. “Done?”
“Done,” Hakuba says.
Kaito should relax, but strangely his hands just seem to shake more. This isn’t the first phobia he’s had but it’s nothing like his terror-startle-response feelings of his fish phobia. That’s fear and flight and this is feeling like he’s going to die and that’s two very different feelings. “Oh. Good.”
Hakuba crouches down. “Are you going to be okay?”
“I…” He tries to do the breathing exercise. “Yeah. Eventually.”
“I’ll go get Kaito.”
Kaito tries not to hyperventilate. It’s over, what kind of bullshit is this?? He doesn’t know how much time passes before he’s caught up in a hug. Other Kaito gives surprisingly good hugs. “What is wrong with me?” Kaito asks shakily.
“Adrenaline,” other Kaito says. “The bad fear kind of adrenaline.”
“This is embarrassing.” Kaito buries his face in other Kaito’s chest.
“I’m not judging. I’m pretty terrified of the lab too.”
“You didn’t freak out.”
“Not this time,” other Kaito says. “But I didn’t need to be cut open this time.”
“That’s…” Was he awake for any of those times? Kaito wonders with sick fascination. Was he conscious of what was happening, feeling…? It’s about as horrifying as what Kaito went through. “Please tell me she has enough samples for a while.”
“They should be good for a few months. It’s not just amount that’s the issue, it’s changes over time.”
Kaito groans. Then, “I didn’t thank Hakuba.” He’d done his best to distract him and get it over with fast too…
“You can tell him later.”
Kaito doesn’t argue. He closes his eyes and breathes.