I thought I had uploaded this years ago... Obviously hadn't. Written Valentine's day 2008.
Notes: Thanks to juneaddams for betaread and influence, and Claude for er... Title suggestion help? XD Based off a Fanart (4869 hits on my Deviantart page).
Final Slumber.
He'd passed out. In front of her. With his heart pounding his chest so hard he thought he was about to die. His last thought before the blankness came had been a resigned "Oh well." He knew what the pounding had meant, had noticed the sweat turning into steam on his hands, on his face.
Maybe it was for the best.
Maybe at last his burden of lies would go away, the pus accumulated by deceit would be washed from their friendship.
Maybe it wouldn't leave much of their friendship standing, but he was tired, so tired of the pain.
She'd taken him in her arms, shouting a name he could no longer hear over the thumping in his eardrums, as his legs had buckled beneath him. He had a small smile on his face, before his eyes closed and the files he'd been carrying slipped from his now inert fingers.
He had known the risks when he had taken the pill. Haibara had made sure to remind him, had even implored him to think twice, to consider using another approach. But he knew this chance wasn't one he could allow to slip away, and for once Conan's size, that had been the exact thing preventing him from getting at what he needed, what they needed to return to their true forms once more, was also the very thing he had a way to overturn for a short time. It had been chance that Ran had spotted him then, followed him there. He kept his explanations minimal, as he quickly searched the drawers, the dead man's outline on the floor ignored as a case already solved.
He had to be quick. Not only was the antidote he had taken temporary, but he had no idea how long it would be before -they- came to inspect the place, to clean things up. He found the file, clearly labelled, along with a box containing some of the dreaded product that had started it all. He took both. He turned to exit the office, but that's when his body started playing up. Swifter than it had ever done before.
It was too late. The toxin was claiming his body once more.
It shouldn't be long before Ran finds that it is Conan she is cradling on her lap.
Not long now. Not long till he awakes.
Police sirens cry as he sleeps. An ambulance passes by, its whine smothered by the patter of the rain, the mournful toll of the temple's bell.
He doesn't hear Ran's sobbing, the professor's outburst of disbelief, nor Haibara's dismayed silence. He doesn't know of the lies told to hide Conan's true whereabouts. He doesn't feel the burn of the flames ignited just for him.
The file he had grabbed and the box of apotoxin are left behind, on the floor of that office, soon devoured by the very fire he had wished to save them from.
Ashes to ashes...