Chapter Text
It starts like this:
Kaito wakes up and he's a cat.
Or, no, perhaps he should backtrack a little.
Kaito has a fight with Akako, and then, he wakes up and he's a cat.
Not just any cat either, but a black one, to be exact, because apparently she went and grew a sense of humor in the time between shouting at him and flicking him in the head with one finger, effectively knocking him out.
He sits in the mouth of the alley he woke up in, staring down at his newly acquired paws with something akin to despair. What the hell is he supposed to do now? No amount of vinyl records could've prepared him for this . Most of his skills rely on the fact that he’s a human, so being a quarter of his normal size and covered in fur across his entire body is the kind of thing that definitely messes with his ability to perform any kind of magic tricks.
The bustling street is filled with commuters when he finally walks onto it after some questionable attempts at shifting back into his human body. He takes slow hesitant steps at first, one paw in front of the other, still getting used to this new perspective, and feels somewhat relieved when he discovers that, at the very least, this body feels comfortable enough that he doesn't stumble like a newborn fowl as he learns to navigate it.
First order of business is figuring out where he is, which is easy enough once he checks the signs lining the sidewalk. Unfortunately, it turns out that Akako was cruel enough to turn him into a cat and come all the way to Beika to dump him behind a dumpster. Beika . He's starting to wonder if this might actually be another one of her murder attempts - he'd thought they were past that, but it's now become clear that one can never really tell when it comes to witches with anger issues.
But no. Maybe that's not where it starts at all.
Maybe it only actually starts once he's been wandering the streets for the better part of a day, and he turns the corner of a neighborhood that looks no more familiar than all the others he’s walked through today, and runs straight into someone's legs.
The first thing he registers is the deep familiar scent of them, amplified by his cat’s nose. Then his eyes land on a pair of black sneakers with pale gray laces and the dark blue jeans above them, loose at the ends, where the folded cuffs almost swallow the back of the shoes.
"Oh," the person says, and Kaito feels a shiver run up his spine as he recognizes their voice, the low timber of it.
Slowly, and with great apprehension, he raises his head and meets the gaze of Kudou Shinichi, who is smiling down at him with a softness Kaito has never before seen on his face.
He wants to turn tail and run as soon as he recognizes him, put as much distance between them as he possibly can, but it seems his fight or flight instincts have decided to turn off for today, and he finds himself frozen like a deer in the headlights instead, staring up at Kudou towering above him.
"Woah, hi," Kudou says, carefully crouching down, "those are some gorgeous eyes."
Kaito has no idea what that means, as he’s yet to have found a mirror to check himself out at, but he sits on his back paws and lets himself be inspected anyway, heart tripping over itself in his chest.
In an unexpected move, Kudou pulls his phone out of his back pocket and starts tapping away at it, before raising it up to Kaito's face and presumably snapping a picture or taking a video. This is all regular behavior when encountering a stray cat, really, except Kaito is most definitely not a cat, which makes the entire ordeal a whole lot more mortifying.
Still, Kudou looks unusually intimidating from this perspective, with broad shoulders and big hands, so Kaito surrenders himself to the modeling job for the next few minutes, changing poses from time to time in order to glimpse the rare delighted face Kudou makes every time he does, moving this and that way, angling his phone in every direction.
Finally, once he's seemingly had his fill, Kudou locks his phone and slips it back inside his pocket. He smiles down at Kaito, eyes crinkling at the corners, and extends his arm to rub two gentle fingers under his chin. It’s the first time someone’s attempted to pet him - mostly because he’s kept out of people’s ways during his wanderings - and the feeling is almost surreal, like getting a head massage at the hairdresser or finally scratching an itch that's been bothering you all day, except multiplied by a thousand. Before he really realizes what he’s doing, Kaito is leaning into the touch like he’s starved for it.
"Aren’t you friendly?" Kudou chuckles, continuing on with his ministrations and dragging his fingers down Kaito's spine, over and over again. "Are you really a stray? Or did you run away?" He tilts his head down, eyes narrowed, and then, after a long moment of silence filled only with the sound of Kaito's purring, because that's a thing he does now, it seems, he gives a small nod and says, "I bet you ran away from home, didn't you?" He runs one knuckle along the side of Kaito's face, over his whiskers. "Your owners must be looking for you, I can't just leave you here."
Before Kaito can react, Kudou has both his hands under his armpits and is picking him up, cradling him to his chest like a baby. He immediately starts squirming, trying to free himself from Kudou's grip, but the other holds firm, rubbing his cheek over the top of Kaito's head in an attempt to calm him down.
"It's okay, I'm not gonna hurt you," he says in a soft whisper, walking down the street at a sedate pace. "You must be hungry, right?” He hums, the hand holding Kaito’s lower body giving him a light tap on the backside. “Don’t worry, you'll be back home before you know it."
Kaito wants to scream at him to let go but all he can really manage is a cracked meow, which Kudou seems to find impossibly cute by the way he laughs and goes to scratch him under the chin again. After a few more minutes of fruitless squirming and clawing at the fabric of Kudou’s hoodie, the absolute humiliation of it finally gets to be too much and Kaito closes his eyes, tucking his nose into his chest.
Whatever, he gives up, let Kudou take him wherever he’s taking him. It’s not like he’s going to get any more lost than he already was before Kudou picked him up.
It is decided, then , Kaito thinks, as he stares at the bowl of dry food and water that Kudou places in front of him on the kitchen floor, once I’m out of this mess, I am going to kill Akako.
“What’s wrong? Aren’t you hungry?” Kudou asks, running a hand down Kaito’s back from where he’s crouched next to him. “It’s yummy, I promise. It’s the same one Azusa feeds Taii.”
Even if this was the dry food served to the emperor’s cat, Kaito wouldn't eat it. He turns his nose up, hoping Kudou understands the sentiment, and then pushes the bowl away with one paw for good measure.
“Haah, are you a gourmet kitty? Do you want wet food?” Kudou gets up to his feet and walks up to the counter, where he’s left the grocery bag he returned with not long after dropping Kaito at his house. “I bought some of that too.” He searches around the bag for a moment, before pulling out a round yellow can that spans the entirety of his palm. “Here it is!”
Kaito wants to gag as he watches Kudou scoop the contents of the can out onto the bowl, where they land sloppily on top of the dry food, but unfortunately, whatever scent the wet food is supposed to give off for humans, his little cat nose seems to have a different idea. If he didn’t know any better he’d think he was being served a meal straight out of a five star restaurant.
Without a conscious decision on his part, he finds himself leaning forward and sniffing at it, closing his eyes as the heavenly smell of tuna and oil fills his nostrils. Usually, just the thought of fish would be enough to raise goosebumps all across his skin, but right now that sort of fear feels galaxies away.
His stomach clenches, suddenly too empty, the result of an entire afternoon without eating. Clearly, Kudou doesn’t have any plans of giving him actual human food, the bastard, and if he’s honest, this one is looking more and more appetizing by the minute. Surely one bite wouldn’t hurt, right?
Half an hour later, as he’s using Kudou’s newly bought litter box for the first time, he realizes what a mistake it was to even think of eating anything.
He kicks the sand back with his hind legs and jumps out of the box as if burned, hoping he’ll be out of here long before he ever has to use it again.
“Good boy,” Kudou says, giving a slow clap. “You’re even potty trained, now I’m certain you’re a house cat.”
Kaito pretends not to hear him and runs down the hall towards the large living room, where he jumps onto the couch and makes it his business to rub himself all over the velvet surface of it, hoping his fur stays and sticks to the pillows. Take that!
Kudou follows him into the room at a slower pace and only lets out a small chuckle at his behavior, as if completely unbothered by the cat on his couch. “You probably already have a name, right? If I give you one you’ll get confused.” He brushes some hair out of his eyes, looking thoughtful. “I have to call you something , though.” With slow steps, he makes his way to Kaito’s side and sits on the couch, rubbing a hand over his bared belly.
Kaito grabs onto it with all four paws, keeping his claws retracted so he doesn’t accidentally scratch him. Not that he cares if he hurts Kudou - a little scratch would do him some good, actually - but he doesn’t want to risk angering him, still very aware of the current size difference between them.
“What about Kuroo?” Kudou suggests, fingers tickling Kaito’s belly. “That seems generic enough.”
Kaito can’t exactly reply, so he keeps to his task of batting at Kudou’s hand and gnawing on his fingers. He doesn’t care what name Kudou decides to call him by, though he wishes it didn’t sound so close to his real one, if only so he can later pretend this entire experience happened to someone else.
“But really, you have such pretty eyes,” Kudou continues, leaning his head closer, because he apparently doesn’t know that’s basically an invitation to get his eyes clawed out. Kaito doesn’t do that, of course, but a lesser cat might have. “Something familiar,” he mumbles under his breath, blinking down at Kaito like if he stares hard enough he’ll somehow figure out what it is.
Kaito, for his part, still doesn’t know what exactly his eyes look like right now, so he couldn’t help Kudou out in that regard even if he abruptly gained the ability to speak. Instead, he lays still and allows Kudou to observe him, taking this chance to get a closer look at him as well.
Long eyelashes, dark blue eyes, pink pale lips. Kaito’s seen it all before, has analyzed it so he could use it as a disguise - even the smaller details like the odd beauty mark on his cheeks and the slight bump on his nose. He’s never been unaware of Kudou’s looks, the way he sometimes seems like a painting come to life when the light hits him just right, but being in such close proximity to him really drives home the fact that he’s, well, for lack of a better word: handsome. Handsome in a way Kaito never really considered before. In a way that makes him feel a little out of breath. Just a little.
Embarrassed by his own thoughts, he submits himself to another petting session which lasts considerably longer than the last one, then runs off to hide under one of the loveseats spread around the coffee table, where he spends some time cursing himself for getting all bothered over Kudou Shinichi and then subsequently falls into a light nap after tiring from his own anxiety, lulled by the sound of Kudou tapping away at what he assumes must be the laptop he had earlier spotted attop one of the bookcases by the door.
When he resurfaces from under the loveseat an undetermined amount of time later, there is the distinct smell of cooking meat permeating the air. He follows it all the way to the kitchen, where he finds Kudou standing by the stove, stirring something around in a pan as it heats over the fire.
Kaito lets out a loud meow, demanding his attention, and Kudou turns to him with a small smile. “Hi, Kuroo,” he says, leaving the pan unmanned so he can lean down to pat him on the head, “did you have a nice nap?”
Yes, he did, thank you very much. Now he’d like to know if any of that meat is going to be shared, or if Kudou is going to keep it all to himself.
Kudou must notice him staring up at the pan because he lets out a snort and says. “Oh, I see. Is that what woke you up?” He gets up again and goes back to pushing the meat around with a pair of chopsticks. “Sorry, but this isn’t for Kuroo. Kuroo has his food over there,” he points at the corner by the fridge, where the bowl of dry food and water is, “this is for me.” He points at the pan then gestures to himself, repeating the motion a couple of times before saying, “Not for Kuroo, for Shinichi.”
Kaito has half a mind to roll his eyes, but he’s not sure he can even do such a thing right now, so he sticks to turning around and leaving the room again. Whatever, he’s not going to beg for food like an actual cat, he’s got more dignity than that.
Barely twenty minutes later, Kudou comes back into the living room, apparently all done with his meal. He looks at Kaito, who’s lying once again on the couch, and says, “It’s time for bed, Kuroo.”
Kaito wants to ask how it can possibly be time for bed when Kudou has just finished eating dinner, but alas, he is once again faced with his inability to express such questions, as relevant as they are. He grudgingly allows Kudou to pick him up, curious as to what exactly he plans to do with him now that it’s night time. If he’s lucky, maybe Kudou will decide to kick him out after all, and he’ll be freed from this place.
His hopes are immediately dashed when Kudou does not take him towards the entrance door, instead heading down the hall towards the stairs, which he climbs two at a time until he’s standing at the very top.
“Okay, I’m gonna let you sleep in my room because I don’t trust you to not make a mess if I leave you alone at night, but please be a good boy, yeah?” He kicks the door to what Kaito presumes is his bedroom open and walks in, dropping Kaito on his bed before closing the door behind him. “There, isn’t it nice?” He gives a nod as if satisfied with his own decision and moves across the room towards the dresser, where he starts pulling out what looks like a pair of shorts and an old looking t-shirt.
Uh oh.
As soon as he realizes what Kudou’s about to do, Kaito curls down at the foot of the bed and buries his face beneath his paws, wishing he’d just stayed curled under the loveseat instead.
He stays in that position as Kudou gets changed, and still as Kudou leaves the room and he hears the distant sound of a toilet flushing and water falling, then the door opening and closing again, and finally the loud click of the light switch as Kudou turns it off and slips into bed.
“Sleepy time now, Kuroo.” Kaito keeps his head tucked under his paws, feeling the movement of the bed as Kudou adjusts himself into a comfortable position. “If by Monday your owners haven’t replied to the post I made, we’ll drop by the vet to check if you’re chipped.”
Kaito does lift his head at that.
The vet? The place where they stick thermometers up animals' buttholes? His tail starts swishing dramatically across the bed, in tune with his emotions.
He’s pretty sure it’s still the same day it was when Akako knocked him out, which means today should be Friday. Only two days. That’s all the time he has to figure out how to get out of here before Kudou takes him to get manhandled by some random person wearing rubber gloves.
For the first time in his life, he experiences a deep sense of sympathy for all the animals who have previously been laughed at for fearing the vet. He lets out a miserable sounding meow and Kudou chuckles softly.
“Yes, you’re very cute.”
Being a cat is hard work.
Kaito wakes in the morning with a full bladder, and then is forced to decide whether he thinks he can hold it long enough for Kudou to wake up and open the door for him or if he should force him awake himself.
He tries waiting for a while, but then it starts becoming painful and he remembers his bladder is now significantly smaller than it used to be, and he doesn't want to try and find out whether or not he'll be able to hold it back if it becomes too urgent, so he walks up to where Kudou is lying half engulfed by his blankets and lets out a loud meow, hoping to rouse him.
Kudou, because he always does the exact opposite of what Kaito needs him to, barely reacts, turning his face deeper into his pillow as if pointedly ignoring him.
With just a little bit of spiteful intention, Kaito slaps him on the cheek once, then twice when Kudou remains unmoved, and then a third time for good measure, making sure to put more strength into that last one.
"Hnng, what the-" Kudou lifts his face, blinking bearily at Kaito sitting directly in front of it. There are pillow creases on his cheek, criss crossed from his chin up to just below his right eye. It’s only a little bit cute. "Kuroo? What is it?" He still sounds half asleep, voice low and gravely.
Kaito looks at the door, then back at him, and when Kudou keeps watching him with confused half-lidded eyes, he jumps off the bed and goes to scratch at the door frame, taking the chance to also stretch languidly along the wood.
"Oh! Right, you must be hungry," Kudou slips out of bed and pads towards the door, gently pushing Kaito aside with one foot. "Or do you need to go potty?" He cracks the door an inch, letting Kaito circle to the other side before fully opening it. "You woke me up instead of peeing here, good boy."
Kaito is going to end up developing some kind of pavlovian reaction to the words 'good boy' at this rate.
He sprints out the door and down the stairs, then into the bathroom where Kudou set his litter box the previous day, ignoring Kudou shouting after him to be careful on the way down or he might slip.
Once he's done, he follows the low thrumming sound of a machine to the kitchen, where he finds that Kudou has apparently started a pot of coffee and is now sitting at the small kitchen table, scrolling through his phone as he waits for it to be ready.
"There's wet food in your bowl," he says, noticing Kaito in the doorway. "And fresh water."
Kaito pretends not to understand, cocking his head, and Kudou lets out an amused huff and points at the bowl.
"Yummy food, for Kuroo," he says, as if baby talk will somehow be more comprehensible to an animal. "Eat, eat." He mimes the act of eating, flexing his fingers in front of his mouth and then chewing on air.
It looks absolutely ridiculous, but Kaito somehow finds himself helplessly endeared by it, because he's clearly begun suffering from some kind of stockholm syndrome here.
He makes his way to the food bowl, giving it a cursory sniff, before deciding he's not quite hungry enough yet to demean himself to that again and drinking some water instead to clear away the taste of a long night's sleep.
He finds out quickly that there's not much he has to do as a cat, but the lack of autonomy is incredibly depressing. He can't go anywhere with closed doors, he can't grab anything unless it's made out of a material he can stick his claws into, he can't eat any actual human food because it's all hidden behind cupboards and wrappings he can't open, and worst of all: he can't speak. Considering he's stuck with someone with whom he can barely communicate, he thinks it’s safe to say that’s the most glaring problem in this situation.
Sure, he can point and look and meow, but that can only get him so far. And no matter how many times he does it at the front door, scratching at the wood and mewling like his life depends on it, Kudou is adamant about not letting him out.
"I can't just let you go back to wandering around outside, you could get run over or worse." He picks Kaito up, ignoring his feeble little hisses in response. "Bad Kuroo. This is for your own good."
Knowing Kudou isn't technically doing anything wrong does not help detract from Kaito's sullenness in any way, since he is still very much locked inside this mansion with no way out and a very near deadline.
He tries to be positive for about five seconds, thinking that maybe getting checked for a chip won't be so bad, maybe it won't work like an actual check-up and they’ll just let them leave as soon as they scan him, but Kudou immediately ruins that for him by having a phone call with Mouri-chan and loudly declaring that, yeah, of course he'll get them to do a full check up on Kuroo, better safe than sorry.
Kaito is perfectly healthy, he does not need whatever a full check-up entails for a cat - thermometer or no thermometer. But obviously, Kudou doesn't understand this and is under the impression that he's doing him some kind of great favor by keeping his health in mind.
Kaito admits he sulks for a few hours after that, once again hiding away under the loveseat in the living room, with its circling curtain ends that keep out most of the light, making it the perfect napping spot. Kudou doesn't seem to notice his temper tantrum - probably chalking it up to regular cat behavior - which is so infuriating Kaito almost attempts to trip him when he's on his way to the toilet. He chickens out at the last minute only because he starts catastrophizing and making up scenarios where Kudou falls wrong and hits his head and Kaito is left with his possibly concussed body, unable to do anything to help because he is still stuck as a cat. So, yeah, no tripping happens, as tempting as it is.
He soon finds out that Kudou doesn’t seem to have any plans of leaving his house, which means there are no opportunities for him to slip unnoticed through an open doorway, much to his chagrin. Really, why did he have to be picked up by an introverted house-bound detective with nothing better to do on a saturday afternoon than sit on the couch reading a mass market paper-back thriller? Kaitou would cry if he was capable of it, the least this guy could do is turn on the tv!
Still, as they’re sitting side by side on the couch, he does end up gravitating towards Kudou’s warm body, completely by accident, he swears, and spends the next few hours curled up against his thigh, nose tucked into his own belly, sleeping peacefully to the oddly satisfying sound of turning pages. He’s discovered that no matter how little energy he spends, he will find himself yawning and dozing off against his will anyway, as it seems like regardless of whether or not he’s an actual cat this body still functions exactly as one. That probably means Kaito should be cleaning himself daily as opposed to just ignoring the problem like he’s been doing, but he’s decided to leave that issue for future him, since he’s still hoping he’ll be back to his body soon enough that it won’t make much of a difference. It’s not like he’s stinking or anything, he’s sure Kudou would’ve mentioned something if that were the case. Then again, Kudou also seems like the type to just spring an impromptu shower session on him, so it might be best if Kaito at least pretends he’s been taking care of his personal hygiene, just to avoid that particular scenario.
He’s woken from his light nap by Kudou shifting beside him, despite his obvious attempt at getting up unnoticed.
“It’s okay,” Kudou whispers, petting Kaito on the head with gentle fingers. “Go back to sleep, Kuroo.”
But Kaito is already wide awake by then, so he follows Kudou out of the room and up to his bedroom instead, lingering by the door as he watches Kudou rummage around his dresser’s drawers for a while before pulling out a leather bound notebook. Kaito trails after him as he walks back down to a giant library sized room he’d somehow missed the day before, excited that he’s finally doing something other than sitting around reading in silence.
Kudou sits on the desk at the far end of the room, picking up a pen from one of the pen holders spread across it. Realizing that sitting on the surface of the desk won’t help him read whatever Kudou is planning on writing, Kaito climbs up and then wriggles his way onto his lap instead, facing the now open notebook in front of him and getting settled in for some nice snooping. He stares down at where Kudou has placed the tip of the pen against a blank page, eyes wide with curiosity.
“What? Are you interested now?” Kudou lets out a soft laugh, rubbing Kaito’s chest with one hand. “Or are you a KID fan?” He snorts at his own joke, tapping the back of the pen on the page. “I bet he’d like that.”
Kaito doesn’t get what the connection is at first, but then as Kudou keeps dragging the back of the pen across the pages and then off of the notebook and onto the table, he notices it’s not just your average pen at all, but a KID merch one. Kudou Shinichi owns a KID merch pen. Why -
“I got it from one of his heists,” Kudou says, as if reading his mind. He twirls the pen around in front of Kaito’s face, as if trying to entice him into swiping at it. “His fans hand them out all the time, like they think it’s some kind of holiday event instead of, you know, a pre-planned theft by an internationally wanted criminal.”
Deciding to take the little jab to heart, Kaito slaps the pen out of Kudou’s hand, so hard that it flies across the room and hits the floor with a clatter, rolling away as it does.
“Ah,” Kudou says, though he doesn’t seem particularly bothered by it, since he was trying to instigate that exact reaction. He leans forward, shielding Kaito from the edge of the table with his arm, and fishes another pen out of the pen holder.
Another KID pen.
Kaito stares.
“They hand them out at every heist,” Kudou says defensively, as if he needs to justify himself to a cat. “It’s not like I seek them out.”
I believe you , Kaito wants to say, but when he peeks up at him he can just barely see the reddened tips of Kudou’s earlobes, which ends up giving him some reasonable doubt.
"Anyway," Kudou shakes his head and places the pen's point to the paper again, "I should make a list of all the things we'll need in case you turn out not to be chipped and your owners don't get back to me by the end of the week."
What? Is Kudou seriously planning on keeping him if no one calls? Like an actual domestic cat? A house cat?
First a vet trip and now life imprisonment, is this guy actively trying to make Kaito’s life harder, or did he just happily stumble into that by accident?
“Hmm,” Kudou says, lower lip jutting out as he stares thoughtfully down at Kaito, “Would you like a cat bed, Kuroo?”
Kaito swipes at his hand, trying to dislodge the pen from his grip, no, no need for a cat bed at all, Kuroo-chan will be out of here very soon!
Kudou chuckles as he raises his arm out of Kaito’s reach. “No cat bed? Or is that your way of saying yes?” He holds Kaito back with his forearm and leans forward to write ‘cat bed’ down on the page. “What about toys? Cats need enrichment toys, right? I don’t need you scratching up the curtains, my parents would kill me.”
As Kudou continues on with his speculations, adding some ideas to the list every now and then, Kaito can do nothing but sit in his lap and silently despair. No matter how hard he thinks, he can’t figure out any way for him to escape this place unless Kudou opens a door, or a window at the very least. Why is the entire house closed up like some kind of prison cell? It can’t be healthy.
After about five minutes spent on the list, which turns out much longer than Kaito thought possible considering it’s about the necessities of a single cat, Kudou moves onto the next page over and starts writing down a math equation - a switch so random that Kaito is left baffled as he follows the sharpness of his scrawl across the paper. Kudou swiftly solves it in under a few seconds and then lets out a sigh, as if unhappy with the results, crossing the entire thing over with a bit more force than strictly necessary.
Kaito looks up at him, puzzled, and Kudou gives him a wry grin in return. “Yeah, I’m an idiot, I know.” He rubs his nose against the top of Kaito’s head, the tip of it cold where it touches his skin through the fur. “It’s not like he’s ever been consistent with the dates before, I don’t know why I still try to predict when he’ll send notices.”
Kaito stills at that, the words echoing over and over in his mind. He can only mean one thing by that, but the implication that Kudou keeps track of his heists to the point of eagerly awaiting them is so unexpected that he feels a little dizzy with it. The thought shouldn’t send such a rush of warmth through him - and yet, it does, spreading from his chest and across his limbs, leaving him lightheaded. He’d always assumed Kudou somewhat looked forward to his heists, but only in that sort of way where he’d mostly forget about them until KID sent another note, at which point he’d remember his existence and start trying to decipher it as usual. He never imagined Kudou would think about him outside those high periods, didn’t even consider that KID was anything other than some rare form of entertainment that stayed in his peripheral most of the time. The idea that he’s perhaps seriously underestimated Kudou’s dedication to catching him is equal parts scary and exciting.
He puts aside his own embarrassment for a moment and rubs his head against the side of Kudou’s hand, trying to convey to him the strange little feeling growing inside his chest. There’s something like guilt mixed in with it too over the realization that this entire time he’s been misjudging their relationship, that Kudou has been putting more thought into their meetings than Kaito ever thought he would be willing to.
“What? Are you happy with your list?” Kudou asks, amused, as he rubs Kaito’s cheek with the backs of his fingers. Kaito presses harder against them, closing his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, you’re sweet, aren’t you?”
The notebook gets closed then, and Kudou pulls Kaito into his arms, getting up from the chair and leaving the room with a strange spring to his step.
“Maybe I should get a cat,” he says as he scratches Kaito’s neck. “I’ve always liked cats, and maybe it’d liven this place up. The house is too big for just one person.”
Kaito looks around, at the empty halls and darkened corners of the mansion. Kudou’s right, it is too big. And it must seem doubly so to Kudou, who spent the last few years living with the Mouri family, in that small agency where everything is close and comfortable, lived in rather than abandoned.
In a way, Kaito can relate. He hasn’t had anything to compare it to in a long time, not since he was a kid and his dad was still alive, but he knows an empty house of one is a hard place to live in. The way your voice echoes in the space around you, the way you often forget to even speak at all, with no one there to answer. He’s glad for his doves, in that way, because they help him pretend he’s never as alone as he is. Maybe that’s the kind of thing Kudou is looking for when he says he wants a cat. Some respite from the solitude forced on him by his parents.
Sunday starts with the loud shrill of a ringing phone startling Kaito nearly out of his skin, because apparently Kudou is 70 years old and doesn’t know what a silencing function is.
The rest of the previous afternoon was spent following Kudou around and trying to reshape the image of him in his head. Matching Kudou the aloof detective with a competitive streak a mile long to Kudou who waits excitedly for KID heists, who takes in cats from the street and pets them gently with kind fingers. Kudou who kicks balls up at Kaito in his hang glider and Kudou who rubs his cheek over Kaito’s head and holds him in his arms like he’s breakable.
They’re not so different. They’re all the same Kudou who helps Kaito when he’s in genuine trouble, the same Kudou that runs towards danger solely to make sure no one else gets hurt, the same Kudou that sometimes gives Kaito these weird little smiles when they meet at his heists, like they’re both in on some sort of secret joke that Kaito still hasn’t really figured out. It’s just Kudou, admittedly-strange-and-sometimes-annoying Kudou, but Kaito thinks he’s finally got him right.
With his fur just starting to come back down on his back, he watches as Kudou picks up the call with a hoarse sounding hello, rubbing at his eyes with his thumb and index finger.
“Oh, yes, yes, that’s me,” he says, turning to look at Kaito with an odd expression on his face, a mix between relief and disappointment. “Ah, I see.” He purses his lips, looking up as he listens to whoever’s on the other end speak. Kaito can just barely make out a female voice, but Kudou has the sound so low not even he can understand the words from this distance. “Right. Yes, they are pretty distinguishable.” A pause. “I did notice it, on the right eye, yeah. It’s definitely him.” He leans forward, shifting the bedsheets off of his lap, and reaches his free hand out to pet Kaito on the head.
It’s obvious from his side of the conversation that someone has called in to claim Kaito, which can mean one of two things: someone is trying to scam Kudou somehow, or Akako has finally come to her senses and is trying to get him back. He supposes it wouldn’t be too hard for her to find him even as a cat, being a witch and all.
“I see,” Kudou lets out a few hums, fingers dragging down Kaito’s spine as he does. “It’s no problem at all!” He grins at Kaito. “Really, he’s been very nice so far, you have him well trained.” Some more hums, and then, “Yeah, Wednesday is fine by me. Just text me the details and we can arrange a meeting.”
Kaito narrows his eyes. Wednesday? That’s three days from now, what the hell? Maybe it isn’t Akako after all. But if so, he really doesn’t want to go with whoever is trying to fool Kudou into giving him up.
“I’ll tell him,” Kudou chuckles, eyes twinkling. “Yeah, bye. See you soon.” He hangs up and drops his phone by his side on the bed, turning to Kaito with a wide smile. “So…” He tilts his head. “Guess you’ll be stuck with me for a few more days.” Kaito allows him to pet him some more. “And your owner told me to tell you ‘you’re very naughty for running away’ and that ‘the stain on her dress did not come off’. I guess you’re not as well behaved as you’ve been pretending to be, huh?”
The stain on her dress.
So it is Akako, and apparently she’s still mad at him for ruining Aoko’s gift to her. Talk about holding a grudge.
And she totally knows who Kudou is and has still decided to leave Kaito in his clutches for the next three days. Ignore the fact that Kudou has been nothing but perfectly kind and welcoming. For all she knows he could be subjecting Kaito to daily torture!
He seriously needs to get new friends.
Kudou spends the better part of the morning vacuuming the living room, because according to him Kaito has been losing more hair than should be physically possible.
With nothing better to do, Kaito watches him from his vantage point atop one of the bookshelves, tracking the way his shirt bunches between his shoulder blades every time he moves the handle forward, then back, then forward again. It's a strangely transfixing motion, but that might just be attributed to the fact that Kaito is currently a cat, and anything from a dust mote to a fly catches his attention these days.
As it turns out, Kudou sort of sucks at housework, so by the time he deems the floors and couches clean, Kaito can still very much see clumps of cat hair in several odd corners. He can't exactly call them out to him, though, so he stays in his spot and lets Kudou put away the vacuum cleaner, hoping he doesn't later notice the state the place is still in and decides to take it out again for another round. The machine's noise is grating on a good day, but on Kaito's cat ears it somehow manages to be even worse.
“Much better,” Kudou says, dusting off his hands with a satisfied smile on his face. “How about lunch, Kuroo- no, I mean, Kaito.”
Kaito violently startles from his lying position and almost falls down from the shelf. He stares down at Kudou, wide eyed, for a long moment, before his brain kicks back into gear and he realizes that - right, Kudou talked to Akako, and she must have told him what Kaito’s actual name is. It’s beyond him why she thought it was a good idea to do that instead of making up an alternate name, but he’s never been privy to the strange machinations of her mind, this might just be another one of her revenge plots.
“Huh,” Kudou stares up at him for a long moment, “So it’s really you, then.” He walks up to the bookcase and reaches up so he can grab Kaito, pulling him down to his chest with careful hands. “I was almost 100% certain when she also knew about your little eye freckle, since it didn’t show in the picture I posted, but this really proves it.”
He shifts Kaito around in his arms until they’re facing each other, and looks closely at his face. Then, almost as if in slow motion, his eyes widen and he blurts out, “Oh!” A sudden smile splitting his lips. “I got it! I know what you remind me of!”
He rounds the couch and drops Kaito onto it, sitting beside him. He pulls out his phone and starts scrolling through it, seemingly trusting Kaito not to run away while he’s at it. Once he finally finds what he’s looking for, he lifts the phone next to Kaito’s face, comparing him to whatever’s on the screen.
“Yes, that’s totally it.” He laughs, strangely amused.
Kaito turns to look at the image displayed on the device and his heart almost skips out of his chest when he sees that it’s a closeup shot of his face in one of his latest disguises. He’d been dressed up as a man that worked at the museum’s front desk, and he hadn’t bothered to wear contact lenses because the man’s eye color had been too similar to his own for it to make much of a difference.
Clearly, that had been a mistake. Leave it to Kudou Shinichi to notice such a minute detail and somehow manage to capture it in a picture.
In a human, Kaito doesn’t think his eyes would be all that special, but considering Kudou’s actions it’s probably safe to assume his eyes currently still have the same pigmentation as always, and blue eyes in a cat aren’t all that common. And only now does he fully understand what Kudou had been talking about with Akako, something Kaito overlooked when deciding to bypass the contact lenses: the very distinctive freckle on his right eye. It’s so small, he never imagined anyone would notice it, not unless they were looking from really up close, or examining a candid shot they took of him during a heist.
He taps at the phone with one paw, trying to zoom out so he can check whether any other aspects of his real appearance slipped through, but Kudou pulls it away before the device can even register the touch of his paw pads.
“Do you see it too? You guys are eye twins.” He smiles down at the screen, fondness creeping onto his expression. “He’d probably like you, he has a thing for animals.” There’s an unexpected soft edge to his voice, like he’s talking about a loved one.
Kaito banishes the thought as soon as it comes, but it sticks in his brain for the next few hours anyway. Kudou with his KID merch pens, Kudou with a picture of KID saved in his phone’s gallery, Kudou who smiles when he talks about him.
Maybe this is how he finally goes insane: overthinking Kudou Shinichi’s every action, wondering if he’s become delusional to the point where he’s seeing things that aren’t there.
He needs to leave this place.
It’s late in the afternoon when the doorbell rings.
Now that he’s been forced to wait for Akako to come get him herself, Kaito has no reason to try to escape through an open doorway or cracked window, so he doesn’t bother getting up from his spot on the couch when Kudou goes to let whoever it is into the house.
He hears the faint sounds of conversation echoing in from the hallway, then Kudou comes back into the room with Mouri-chan trailing after him.
She coos as she walks in and spots Kaito on the couch, then moves closer and kneels in front of it on the floor, immediately reaching out to pet him on the chin. “You’re so sweet!” She shakes her head, squeezing her eyes shut as if overwhelmed by his existence. “You’re just a little baby, aren’t you?” She rubs his cheeks between her fingers as she says it, then looks over her shoulder at Kudou and adds, “He’s even cuter in person, Shinichi! You should’ve let me come see him sooner.” She turns back to Kaito so she can continue smothering him in pets.
“I didn’t want to overwhelm him right after I’d just brought him in,” Kudou says, moving closer to sit by Kaito’s side. He rests a hand over Kaito’s back, palm warm even through his fur. “He’s a little shy.”
Kaito throws him a look that probably goes unnoticed. Shy? Is that what Kudou thought all his hiding away meant? Shyness?
“He seems really friendly, though,” Mouri-chan comments, tapping Kaito on the nose and laughing when he sneezes.
“He is,” Kudou tilts his head to the side, “maybe ‘shy’ isn’t the right word, but he seems a little introverted. Likes his alone time, you know.”
“That’s just how most cats are.”
“Hn, I guess.”
They sit in silence for a moment as Mouri-chan pets Kaito, then she gives Kudou a curious look and asks, “Did you hear back from his owners?”
Kudou grimaces, scratching his cheek. “Yeah. She’s coming to get him this Wednesday.”
“I see.” Mouri-chan shifts slightly, moving closer to Kudou so she can rest a hand on his knee. “You got attached?”
Kaito doesn’t hear Kudou’s response, their conversation fading out as his eyes zero in on Mouri-chan’s hand, where it lays on Kudou’s knee. Her other hand is still scratching Kaito behind the ears, but the previously nice sensation now feels more akin to a prickling, uncomfortable and unbearable.
He slips out from under her touch and jumps onto Kudou’s lap, though even as he does it he asks himself why any of it matters. It’s not like he’s never seen them touch before, and besides, he’s pretty sure Mouri-chan is dating someone else right now. Not that it would matter even if she had been single - Kudou’s relationships aren’t any of his business.
He watches Mouri-chan’s hand slip away from Kudou’s knee as she leans against the side of the couch, adjusting her position so she can sit properly on the floor.
“You wanted some cuddles, neko-chan?” She asks, making a funny face at him, lips jutting out in a pout.
She’s so nice, Kaito can’t help but feel a little guilty over his own stupid feelings and irrational reaction. He lies on his back and gives her a long unblinking look, willing her to pet him again, and she seemingly understands his intentions because she starts gently scratching his belly.
“His name's Kaito,” Kudou says as he plays with one of Kaito’s ears, twirling the tip between two fingers. “He likes belly rubs, but he usually bites when I do it.”
“Maybe Kaito-chan likes me better,” Mouri-chan says jokingly.
And it'd be funny if not for the fact that just a week ago that would've been a little too on the nose. Newly developed possessive streak over Kudou aside, Kaito's always thought nicely of Mouri-chan, who smiles like Aoko and has always been especially kind to him whenever he's disguised as anyone but Kudou, who she sometimes seems to have a bit of a strange almost divorced-couple-like relationship with. It’s very rare for him to have any negative feelings about her that don’t involve fear of getting kicked or punched in the face, but he supposes there’s a first time for everything.
Since she claims to have plans later in the day, Mouri-chan only stays for a little while longer after that, playing with Kaito and chatting with Kudou about both their weeks. When she finally leaves, she pauses at the door to give Kudou a short hug, the kind of hug that speaks of years of friendship and easy intimacy, and Kaito pointedly ignores the burn in his stomach that rises in reaction to it, since it's ridiculous and very much unwarranted. He's half convinced this is some kind of cat instinct acting up on him, there's no reasonable explanation for it otherwise.
Once they’re both alone again in the house, Kudou turns to Kaito, hands on his hips, and says, “I’m your favorite, though, aren’t I?”
Kaito wants to laugh at the silliness of the question, but instead he rubs along the side of Kudou’s leg, purring loudly as he does. Because, incredibly enough, Kudou is his favorite. The world might just end tomorrow.
Kudou spends most of Monday out of the house, since he can’t very well skip school just because he’s acquired a cat. As for Kaito, who is definitely skipping school because he’s said cat, there isn’t much to do but sleep the day away and wait for Kudou to return.
He dreams about being back in his regular life, planning a heist, having dinner with the Nakamoris, putting on a magic show down the street from his house for some little kids walking by.
He’s not a cat at first, as he walks around the mall and takes the bus over to the public pool to meet Aoko, but as he’s in the water, swimming around and floating peacefully under the sun, he suddenly realizes he’s smaller than he should be and his swimsuit is gone. There’s fur on his arms, down his back, all over his body, and his tail splashes across the water as he tries to twist onto his belly so he can swim back to the stairs.
He gasps for air, failing to keep his chin over the surface, and as he frantically searches around he realizes Aoko is nowhere to be seen. In fact, the pool is deserted now, the sun gone - there is only darkness and the black black water below him, pulling him under, his arms useless against the inevitable sinking.
He wakes up from drowning, eyes wide and chest heaving, and has to take stock of his surroundings to truly convince himself he’s safe. He’s lying in the living room couch, curled up in the very corner where he can fit between the back and the armrest. It’s Kudou’s house. There’s no danger here.
The unsettling nature of his dream can probably be attributed to his current situation. He’s used to having stress dreams whenever his life gets a little too chaotic, and if he’s honest he’s surprised it took this long for him to have one. As embarrassing as it is to admit, it probably only happened because this is the first time he’s been left alone since Kudou picked him up. The gentle sounds of him existing in the same room are missing, and everything feels slightly off balance because of that, an underlying anxiety brought on due to the sudden emptiness of the place.
Still, the smell of the room helps him relax again, that distinctive scent of Kudou and old furniture, woodsy and dusty and warm all at once. He settles back against the corner of the couch and closes his eyes, and soon enough, he’s pulled back to sleep.
He wakes up again hours later to the sound of the front door opening. Before he can really think about it, he’s jumping down from the couch and running to the entrance hall to greet Kudou, meowing loudly when he spots him by the shoe rack stepping out of his sneakers.
“Hi, Kaito,” Kudou laughs, leaning down to pat him along the spine. “Did you miss me? You’re such a good boy.”
Kaito feels momentarily ashamed of his obvious eagerness to see Kudou, but then he remembers he’s just a cat in Kudou’s eyes so there isn’t much to be embarrassed about. He rubs against him and purrs with his whole chest, trying to communicate how happy he is at the fact that he’s no longer alone. Kudou seems to appreciate the attention, because he hums low in his chest and picks Kaito up to cuddle him in his arms, rubbing his cheek over his head as he does so.
“You’re too cute,” he says, squeezing Kaito gently as he walks to the kitchen. Once there, he drops Kaito on the table and opens up a fresh can of wet food, filling Kaito’s bowl to the brim. “Here, have some food, Kaito.”
Kaito jumps off the table and goes up to the bowl, sniffing for a moment before taking a few bites. Licking his whiskers, he rubs against Kudou’s leg again and taps him on the knee, asking to be picked up again. Kudou complies, knocking their foreheads together for a moment as he holds Kaito before him with both hands under his armpits.
“I admit I’m going to miss you,” he says with a sad smile. “But I’m sure Akako-san has missed you even more. She would’ve come pick you up sooner, you know, but she said she had some urgent family thing going on and couldn’t make it all the way here until Wednesday.” He makes a thoughtful noise and brings Kaito to his chest, cradling him properly. “I still don’t know how you managed to make it all the way to Beika from Ekoda in such a short time, are you secretly some kind of super cat?” His tone is playful, but it’s clear from the look in his eyes that he really has pondered the logistics of it and is still confused about how it was possible. Of course, he’s never going to consider the fact that Akako herself came to drop Kaito off in a random alleyway, because he seems to be under the impression she’s a great lovely pet owner who loves her little cat.
He takes Kaito up to his bedroom, dropping him on the bed and lying down beside him with a long sigh, then spends the next few minutes petting him on the belly and over his back, switching according to Kaito’s wishes.
The sad fact is: Kudou’s hands are warm and big, and Kaito is kind of addicted to them - he’s a little scared he’ll be suffering from petting withdrawal once he’s back to normal and no longer in a position to receive such daily treatment. Even more than that, he’s still wondering how he’s going to be able to return to his regular life after experiencing this entire ordeal, it can’t have done his psych much good; and he was already a little messed up to begin with.
“You know, I’ve been wondering something,” Kudou says, resting his chin on his forearm, “why did she name you Kaito, of all things?” He taps a finger to the space between Kaito’s eyes. “Does she know someone with that name? Is it some kind of inside joke?” He drags the tip of his finger down until it stops on Kaito’s nose, the tenderness of his touch making Kaito’s heart pick up speed in his chest. “It’s a pretty common name, I guess. Maybe she chose it because of your eyes?”
No, his parents just had a very weird sense of humor. And Akako had exactly zero input on the naming process, considering she was either a baby or still in her mother’s womb back then.
“They really are the same,” Kudou goes on, and it seems like he’s jumped topics now. Kaito knows he’s mostly just talking aloud, not expecting him to actually understand, but some context would be helpful sometimes. “Even the shape is the same. I never really thought of it before, but I guess he has cat shaped eyes, huh.”
Oh, he’s talking about KID again. About Kaito.
He lets Kudou trace the outside of his eyes with one finger, over and over, and tries to keep down the stirring in his stomach that grows the longer he looks at the soft affectionate expression on his face.
Seriously, Kaito gets he’s a cute cat, but still, any more of this and he’ll actually go crazy.
Kudou spends most of Tuesday out of the house again.
Kaito tries to repeat his routine from the previous day, sleep, sleep and sleep again, but even as a cat, it turns out that at one point one becomes incapable of falling back asleep, so after a few minutes of lying around with his eyes closed and willing his brain to shut down, he finally gives up and resorts to poking around the house in search of some kind of entertainment instead.
Kudou closed most of the bedroom doors when he left, something about not wanting Kaito messing around in places he shouldn’t, but the one to his bedroom is still open, most likely because Kaito has slept there every night and has yet to do anything to destroy the belongings and furniture in there.
He starts by sniffing around the dresser, which he’s seen Kudou open a few times to get his clothes, then goes to investigate the desk by the window, whose surface is full of school work and the odd article about murder investigations that Kudou seems to be following along with.
Kaito doesn’t care about any of it, so he quickly moves on to the nightstand - another crime paperback, some eye drops, face cream, and an empty bottle of water. He tries halfheartedly to open its drawers but the round knobs don’t agree with his paws and the weight of the wood makes it hard for him to attempt any kind of successful pulls, so he ends up giving up on that.
With nothing else around easily accessible to a cat, he’s just about to give it a rest and leave the room when he notices the large crawl space under the bed and decides to give his investigation one last try.
It’s not as much of a tight fit as he had been expecting, but then again, his usual body is much bigger than this one. Expectations low, he moves across the floor, one paw in front of the other, until he’s well and truly under the bed. It’s dark and dusty (Kudou clearly never cleans under here), but his eyes adjust to it much faster than usual and he’s quick to spot a square shaped object sitting only a few inches away from him, which, huh, so Kudou is the kind of person to keep mystery boxes stashed away in his bedroom?
As he’s dragging the box out from under the bed with his teeth, he takes a moment to wonder if it’s a good idea for him to be rummaging around in Kudou’s stuff. It’s certainly a breach of privacy, and since he’s a cat Kudou didn’t know to tell him not to look under the bed or snoop around his stuff when he first brought him into the house.
Then again, it’s Kudou - what could he possibly be hiding in his little under-the-bed box? It’ll probably end up being some kind of Sherlock Holmes collage or something equally as weird and absurd.
Mind made up, he claws at the edge of the box until the top pops up and he can push it away. Once opened, he takes a peek inside: a stack of unsealed envelopes, some knick knacks that he recognizes from Kudou’s time as Conan, and a few medals and ribbons he assumes must have been awards Kudou received growing up. He pulls out the envelopes one by one, dropping them on the floor at his side, and then starts painstakingly slipping their contents out with careful paws, so as to not leave any holes in the paper with his claws.
The first one turns out to be a birthday card, and so do the next five envelopes. They’re all addressed to Kudou by his parents, which paints his last few birthdays in a bit of a sad light. The next few envelopes contain tickets to soccer games, some even signed by presumably one of the players.
Finally, Kaito gets to the last bunch of envelopes, distinguishable by their light shade of blue as opposed to the others’ stark white. He opens the first one, curiosity and excitement building up in his chest - and stops, staring, as the edge of what he recognizes as one of his notice cards sticks out from inside it.
Slowly, he pushes it aside and opens the next envelope. Another notice. He opens the rest of them almost in a trance, paws working but mind a mile away. They all turn out the same.
Kudou has a little memory box tucked under his bed, filled with birthday cards and game tickets and medals and trinkets and Kaito’s heist notices.
Kaito’s heist notices.
It feels surreal, seeing them there mixed in with things that Kudou clearly values enough to want to save for as long as he can. Hidden away like they’re precious, like they’re not just a piece of paper Kaito put together in just a few minutes and dropped off at the agency in hopes of getting some better entertainment at his heist.
His heart is pounding so hard in his chest he’s scared it might actually burst. How often do cats go into cardiac arrest?
He arranges the heist notes by date and lines them up in front of him. Besides the one from the first heist Kudou ever attended, these are all the notices from the heists Kaito personally invited him to, which means Kudou decided to start saving them very early on. Maybe he started doing it to try and figure out Kaito’s writing pattern or some other distinctive aspect of his cards, but somewhere along the way his reasons for doing it must have changed. Looking at them, the notices are all in pristine condition, even the ones that are some years old, so Kudou clearly handled them carefully from the moment he got them to the moment he put them away under his bed.
Something about that thought leaves the spot behind Kaito’s ribs hot and tender, a feeling bubbling up in his sternum that he can’t quite contain. This week has made him look like an idiot. Somehow, he had himself convinced he knew everything there was to know about Kudou when in reality all he knew were surface level things.
But no, this is Kudou. He sleeps on the left side of his twin-sized bed instead of the middle, he makes coffee every morning and grimaces at the taste every time even though he continuously refuses to put sugar in it, he’s unexpectedly decent at cooking but absolutely sucks at housekeeping, he hoards KID pens and heist notices and knows the exact shade of color of KID’s eyes, he’s obsessive, a perfectionist with a penchant for overdoing things without even realizing it. He’s stubborn and kind and self-sacrificing and possibly socially inept, all things considered.
And Kaito is, bizarrely enough, a little bit in love with him.
Oh no.