Chapter Text
It wasn’t the fact that he was a teenage detective or his mixed lineage that made him different. No, what made him different was the fact that for as long as he can remember he could see what others could not.
He could see the spirits of the dearly, depending on who you asked, departed.
Traveling back-and-forth from England to Japan ever since his parents divorce had given him the chance to see how different people truly were. Mainly in terms of the hidden truths being revealed by the ghosts which haunted them all. It bothered him, but for the most part he’s been able to avoid acknowledging their existence. Mainly due to the fact that had he not chosen to ignore them, then his constant nightmares would be filled with even more gruesome images of corpses. It was one thing to see a dead body during a case, and another thing to see that bodys' ghosts constantly moving and invading one's personal space no matter how gruesome their appearance was.
Most would think that a ghost looked the same as how they did when they were alive, but he knew better, every ghost he’s ever paid attention too looked exactly the same as their corpse the moment their heart stopped beating.
Definitely the cause for nightmares.
Reaching 17 years of age he’s learned by now how to control his odd ability. Although, for the most part he’s decided to act as though his ability to see the dead did not exist. Despite what he may have told others, it was definitely easier— not healthy in the slightest, but easier for him to just ignore the ghosts. He’s been successful in that endeavor, up until the moment he arrived in Japan and attended his first Kaitou Kid heist.
The heist itself was something that he had never experienced before along with the task forces methods to catch the Phantom Thief. Sadly, he found himself highly distracted by the image of a burnt corpse hanging around Kaitou Kid. He was so startled by the sudden appearance that he’d frozen where he was as a fake Kid distracted the others, while the real Kaitou Kid snuck off with someone who’d been burned following after him.
Due to his epidemic memory, all throughout the course of the night the burnt body that he had seen at the heist seemed to haunt his dreams. He felt nauseous when he walked into the classroom 2-B of Ekoda High School and saw the very same ghost, because what else was it, following around his new classmate; Kuroba Kaito.
He’d done so well to ignore ghosts thus far, but every day he’s faced with the same one almost as annoying as the boy it haunts.
When he’d come to the realization that Kaitou Kid and Kuroba Kaito were one and the same, and he confronted Kaito on the matter; the ghost that’s been following Kaito began to follow him on some days as well.
Hakuba did not like having his privacy so easily invaded upon. It took him a bit of researching but after a background check on his classmate he realized that the ghost could be none other than Kuroba Touichi. Kaito’s father who had died years ago due to a magic show gone wrong. What unnerved Hakuba about the man was that whenever he decided to follow Hakuba home, he never spoke or did anything other than stand off to the side and watch him. He knew that the ghost was capable of speaking, he heard him make comments to Kuroba all the time. Hakuba had to make sure that whenever he followed him he never did anything that could giveaway anything about him, especially his ability to see ghosts.
It took a Kaitou Kid heist gone wrong for Hakuba to let his guard down around the ghost.
The heist proceeded just as how every other one had in the past, Kid arrived on time and his tricks managed to fool everyone on the task force bar himself. Hakuba managed to avoid the majority of them, sadly not all of them seeing as a few of the task force members had grabbed on to him to keep themselves from falling into one of the traps, and make it onto the rooftop just in time to see Kid go down. Not down as in leaping off the building with his hangglider open, but down as in plummeting over the side— well. Almost.
Kuroba Touichi’s yell was enough to spur Hakuba into action.
He raced towards Kid’s prone form, grabbing a hold of his cloak and keeping him from fully falling off of the roof. The moment he moved out of the shadows bullets came flying at him. He could hear Kuroba-san yelling at him now, demanding to know what the hell he was doing and to get away, to get off of the roof. Hakuba ignored him for the most part as he immediately crouched over Kid, shielding him from the bullets still coming in their direction. Hakuba winced, he felt a brief pain in his side, then a few more, but ignored it as adrenaline rushed through his system. He couldn’t afford to lose focus, neither could Kaitou Kid. He slid his arms under Kid’s armpits and grunted lightly as he pulled Kid up enough so he wouldn’t be dragging his entire body. He kept himself hunched over, using his body surface to cover as much of Kid as he could. Hakuba rushed as he pulled Kid’s body with him towards the nearest cover which happened to be the entrance to the roof. Oddly enough the roof didn’t have anything on it other than the entrance and a few pipes sticking out of the ground. Hakuba kept himself shielding Kid as he braced him against the wall by the door as he tried to open it without dropping Kid.
In the end he managed to fling the door open, but not without a few close calls as bullets dug into the concrete wall right by his head; sending bits of concrete flying and slicing into his skin. Hakuba tried to ignore Kuroba-san but the man continued panicking and was constantly repeating, “Oh god please don’t die. Please don’t die.” Hakuba wanted to snap at the man that his constant commentary was not helping but he knew if he did that than the man would know he could see him.
Hakuba made it into the stairwell just inside by the roof’s door which he slammed shut behind him. Now with at least a brief moment of peace, Hakuba glanced down at Kid to make sure he hadn’t just been dragging a corpse around with him and not an unconscious thief.
Thankfully Kid still had a strong and steady pulse throbbing beneath his skin.
Hakuba sighed in relief before focusing more clearly on Kid’s face now that he was up close, Hakuba ignored the fact that he had Kid in his possession and that he could clearly see his classmate Kuroba Kaito beneath the hat and monocle. Instead Hakuba focused on the blood dripping down the side of Kaito’s forehead, a bullet had grazed him.
He swallowed thickly as it struck him how close Kaito had been to becoming one of the ghosts he see’s wandering around.
He needed to get him out of here.
Hakuba reached inside his coat and pulled out his handkerchief before pressing it against Kaito’s wound causing said person to unconsciously wince.
“Sorry Kuroba-kun,” Hakuba muttered, ignoring Kuroba-san’s loud gasp as he said his son’s name. “It needs to be done otherwise you’ll lose to much blood.”
After five minutes and thirty-four seconds passed, during which time Hakuba assumed the task force were off chasing Kid’s double, Hakuba hesitantly pulled his soaked handkerchief away from Kaito’s skin and was glad to see the blood slowed down enough to where less than a small drop was still easing out of the wound.
In that moment Hakuba swore to himself he’d start carrying a bit of gauze and tape on him at all times, perhaps a few aesthetic wipes as well.
Shifting Kaito’s body around was like controlling a ragdoll but thankfully Hakuba managed as he pulled Kaito onto his back and shakenly stood up in the position of giving him a piggyback ride.
“What are you doing? Where are you taking my son?”
Kuroba-san sounded nervous. Understandable, really. Hakuba barely managed not to jolt backwards as Kuroba-san’s face suddenly appeared right in front of his own, close enough for Hakuba to see just how badly burned his skin was. The man looked completely unrecognizable.
Hakuba kept his eyes on the ground as he began walking, due to his height advantage on Kaito and the fact that he wasn’t really heavy, to begin with, Hakuba was able to carry him easily enough. He carried him down all the stairs, not wanting to take the elevator and risk getting seen on the cameras or by the task force, and out the back way of the museum. By the time they made it outside, Hakuba was panting from exertion. Walking to the end of the building to glance each way on the street, Hakuba made sure there was no one to pay any attention to him as he quickly began walking away from the museum. Once they were at least four blocks away, Hakuba ducked into the nearest alleyway and settled Kaito down, hidden behind a dumpster with him sitting on his cloak instead of the dirty ground.
Hakuba unbuttoned Kaito’s suit jacket and began shifting through the pockets until he found Kaito’s cellphone.
“Who’re you calling?”
Hakuba flinched as Kuroba-san spoke directly into his ear and wondered if the idea of invading others personal space ran in the family. Hakuba brushed off the unsettling feeling of having Kuroba-san leaning so close to him in favor of unlocking Kaito’s phone and pulling up his contacts.
“Ooh, we have a hacker here!”
Hakuba shifted through the contacts and his brow furrowed as he saw contacts for, Tantei-kun who had to be Edogawa Conan and Tantei-han, but Hakuba didn’t know who that was since he knew Kaito called him Tantei-san which meant he knew another detective. Hakuba felt annoyed as he saw his own number, which he never gave, in Kaito’s contacts as well.
Other than him, the two other detectives, Aoko-san, someone labeled as a witch and the contact for Chikage-san whom he knew was Kaito’s mom, there was one other number saved under the name Gramps.
He's not entirely sure why but Hakuba clicked on that one and hit call. Once the call connected, he dropped the cellphone into Kaito’s lap and he stood up.
“You’re not just going to leave him there are you?!”
Hakuba ignored Kuroba-san’s yell and instead walked to the other end of the alleyway and hide in the shadows. After almost ten minutes, and Hakuba was steadily growing worried as Kaito had yet to show signs of waking up— plus he was starting to get really dizzy, a car screeched to a stop outside the alley and an elderly looking man came running into the alleyway right towards Kaito. Hakuba didn’t relax until he saw out of the corner of his eye that Kuroba-san seemed relieved to see the man near Kaito.
Seeing as his job was done, Hakuba turned and headed home.
Hakuba barely made it into his house and greeted a shell-shocked Baaya before collapsing on the floor and causing her to scream. Hakuba watched in a daze as Baaya rushed towards him and pulled his head into her lap and she began running her fingers through his hair, something which always soothed him. He began to block her out as she began talking about calling the family doctor and for him to stay awake, instead Hakuba’s attention turned to a startled Kuroba-san.
“You were injured?! Oh my god, Hakuba-kun don’t you dare die! You protected my son, why? Why didn't you turn him in? You saved him, y-you can’t die. It’ll kill him if he found out you got yourself killed because of him, because of us….”
“M’fine.” Hakuba slurred attempting to reassure Kuroba-san and a frantic Baaya.
“He’s saying he’s fine, hah! You are not fine! I swear you’re just as bad as Kaito!”
Hakuba scowled at Kuroba-san, finding it slightly hard to focus on him, “...m’not K’ito…”
“Wh-What?”
Hakuba gulped realizing what he just did.
“Y-You can see me?”
“IF YOU CAN SEE ME THAN YOU REALLY ARE DYING?!?!”
Hakuba was so startled by Kuroba-san’s scream that he flinched violently and the sudden movement caused a flare of pain to overcome him. The pain was too much for him at that point and Hakuba lost consciousness.
At that same moment the doorbell rang, Kuroba-san began yelling for Hakuba not to die and Baaya began crying as she rushed towards the front door.