Ai walked in silence beside Conan, one of the privileged few people she dared even greet.

It wasn't that she was an unemotional block of ice that was mean and cruel to every person or thing she saw, but Ai was just a natural loner. She always preferred to be alone, to be left in her own business. One would think it gets tiring, always being alone, willingly observing others from the shadows, but this was the life she chose.

It didn't matter if she was eight, eighteen, twenty, or an eighty-two old person wrinkly and gray, living with sixteen cats in a musty run down apartment. She deserved it. In every corner of her mind, in every millimeter of her soul, Ai Haibara knew she deserved this. She would suffer alone with no one else around to bring down along with her. Shiho Miyano would repent for her sins. She didn't want this, but it had to be done.

And so, the young Haibara's once colorful view on life dimmed. She became colorblind. Not in the physical sense, but mentally. Shades of gray were all she saw. When one was bent on suffering to somehow earn the forgiveness of the dead, it happens.

If one would ask her what she'd think of kids going out of their way to please a parent, she'd tell them the parent most likely bribed the kid into obeying or perhaps the child was seeking praise.

If one asked her what she think of firemen, Ai would scoff and tell them the firemen were there to prove how incompetent people really were. How people always make mistakes and cause accidents.

Rainbows were no longer colorful and uplifting in spirit. Although they held the promise of worldwide floods to never happen again, the rainbow only existed because there was one. There was a worldwide flood that wiped out billions of men, women, and children. That so called beautiful rainbow reminded Ai of all the condemned souls.

And what about medicine? There couldn't possibly be anything wrong with that, right? Sure, she'd admit medicine saves lives, but given in wrong doses, they could also take lives.

Nothing was ever black and white anymore to her. There was always a bit of good in the bad, a bit of bad in the good.

Ai was almost starting to enjoy the repeatedly seen scenery they passed walking to school everyday when Conan spoke up.

"Haibara, why don't you ever smile? Every time I see you, it's either frowns, scowls, or no emotion at all."

"Because I never had a need to." She answered simply.

"Have you ever wished you did?"

"Kudo, enough with the nonsense." Ai frowned. Her breath would not be wasted on pointless questions. "I have other things to mull about other than a simple gesture such as a smile."

Conan immediately jumped at the chance to use her loophole to further prove his point. "See?"

"No, I don't see." Ai interrupted flatly. "All I see is your brain going to mush from continuously reciting the multiplication tables in class."

He ignored her comment. "If smiling is such a simple gesture to you, then why don't you ever do it?" They passed the gates of their school.

"I refer to my previous statement. Furthermore, I'd appreciate it if you'd stop interrogating me like a criminal and to cease your fruitless analyzing of my habits." The two arrived at the classroom and took their respective seats.

The teacher, whose name Ai never bothered to remember, had started class off with passing out speed drills with a three minute time limit. Ai took the paper, completed it, and wrote down how long it took her about the same time Conan did. They were so mind-numbingly simple. Her mind drifted back to the young detective's question.

"Haibara, why don't you ever smile? Every time I see you, it's either frowns, scowls, or no emotion at all."

"What business is it of his?" Ai thought, trying to push her mind away from it. Try as she might, she couldn't help but replay the conversation in her mind.

"Have you ever wished you did?"

"No, I haven't. Such foolish inquiries."

"If smiling is such a simple gesture to you, then why don't you ever do it?"

Although Ai had told Conan she had no need for the simple gesture, truthfully, she didn't know. "Is it really that hard for me to smile?" She frowned. "No, I've done that on multiple occasions." Her lips were about to tilt up just to show she could, but then Ai stopped. "Why do I feel the need to prove myself to him?" She allowed a soft sigh to escape her lips.

Discussing pointless questions in her head proved to be just as useless.

Once the class had turned in the speed drills, the teacher made an announcement. "Today, class, I have received special permission to redecorate the east wall of our school!" She exclaimed happily. "Each of you will have your own little section to do whatever you want by finger-painting. Doesn't that sound fun?"

All students but two erupted with joy. Conan looked at the teacher with that flat eyed stare of his, wondering if she was still sane. Ai diverted her sullen gaze out the window. "There is no way I'd participate in that. Not even if the teacher drags me out there kicking and screaming."

That afternoon, Ai found herself staring up at the courtyard wall with a dead panned expression on her face and a bowl for paint in her hands.

"Come on, Haibara, cheer up. I'm sure this'll be lots of fun." Conan tried to encourage her that it would be quite enjoyable, though his face stated otherwise. He grimaced at the sticky paint that landed in his face from some students who were carelessly flinging it around.

Genta, in particular, was having the time of his life chasing poor Mitsuhiko around with his paint covered hands. Ayumi bounced up to Conan and tried to get him with her own paint. Not wanting to get any more paint on himself than necessary, Conan sped off with Ayumi hot in pursuit. The teacher, on the other hand, was frantically attempting to restore order.

Ai stood there against the wall, avoiding any stray heaps of airborne paint. She scanned the wall to see if anyone had actually done what the teacher had intended for them to do.

Her ice blue eyes jumped from splotches of paint to the next when finally, her eyes settled onto a smiley face.

"If smiling is such a simple gesture to you, then why don't you ever do it?"

"Not this again…How many times must you invade my mind, Kudo?" On the inside Ai may have been a wave of bitterness, self-loathing, and confusion, but outwardly, she remained impassive as ever.

Conan had spotted her off to the side after he escaped Ayumi. Temporarily taking it upon him to make her business his, he saw fit to fabricate some other emotion from her regular ones. He snuck out of her line of vision.

Ai froze when something wet slid down her cheek. Her whole body stiffened considerably and the color in her face waned. "Blood?" Having lived in fear and paranoia had taken its toll on her. Sometimes, even the simplest things would scare her. The creak in a door at night, the revving engine of a passing car and the tires screeching to a stop, footsteps behind her lone figure, gunshots, screams, and the dark, all of these had Ai expecting Gin and Vodka either killing or kidnapping someone.

Did you find it absurd for Ai to be afraid of the dark? One would think Ai, being a prodigy in the matters of science would be logical enough to rule out a young child's ever present fear of the dark and the creatures often imagined with it. Oh, but Ai does not believe in the boogeyman. She is a firm believer in darkness being a place where the light does not reach, a place devoid or partially devoid of light: not receiving, reflecting, transmitting, or radiating light.

Have you ever wondered why they call it the Black Organization? Why not the Japanese Mafia? Or the Underground? Actually, no one had officially declared them the Black Organization. It never had a name, not until some nut job came around and dubbed them that. The name just sort of stuck. A drunken nut job, actually. I believe I am confusing you now. Perhaps I should start from the beginning.

When every member is admitted into the organization, each is given a codename from an alcoholic beverage. Now, as always, there's bound to be an uncooperative person in every respectable syndicate and have their…disagreements with their superiors. And, naturally, they're punished.

Early punishments in the organization once included unbearable amount of physical assertion from the body, but they discovered psychological trauma proved much more effective. As such, members were punished by being locked in a soundproofed room in the dark with nothing to eat or drink but the alcoholic drink they were named after and a slab of cold bread. The time spent inside ranged from the severity of your…for lack of a better term, felony.

Before we came to know and love this stony ice cold Ai Haibara, she was once known as Shiho Miyano, better yet known to the organization as Sherry. Although she may have been only a child when she was forced to take her parents place in the syndicate to slave away at some poison she never intended to be used, let it be known that the Black's were ruthless.

When she first joined the organization by means of coercion, she was a hardheaded, stubborn, feisty, energetic little girl who would've ran up and down, around and about, screaming about her parents if given the chance. No matter how much any child specializes in a subject, the loss of loved ones will always turn them into just that. A child.

I'm pretty sure by now you can imagine the little Miyano struggling against her captors in a desperate attempt to run away with her beloved sister as foolish as it was.

"I demand you to release me!" Little Shiho Miyano wriggled against the grown men with all her might that small body of hers could muster. Her short but slender legs flailed uncontrollably often catching her captors in the shins with her heels.

The men remained impassively silent while hefting the indignant girl most likely twenty years younger than them and with an extensive vocabulary of colorful words. But just because they kept quiet the two didn't bother to hide the displeasure clearly etched onto their faces.

Next thing Shiho knew, she was flung into a room. She landed in an undignified heap on the floor, only to roll onto her side and glare icily over her shoulder at them. The only response she received was a smirk and slam of the door.

Silence and darkness greeted her.

Next few hours were torturous to little Shiho. Darkness clawed at her mind, trying to probe deep into her mind to force out her greatest fears. Her mind reeled with panic, filling every corner of her mind.

Her breathing came in small shuddering gasps, almost as if breathing too hard would release a merciless dog that would rip her to pieces and devour her without a second thought. She clenched her eyes shut and curled herself into a ball trying to escape from the glowing beady eyes in the back of her mind. Fear had clogged her mind from thinking clearly anymore.

Frantically, she stood up with no sense of balance and found the floor rising to smash into her face. Hand brushed over something smooth and cold. A soft clink was heard. Shiho's small hands immediately fumbled to grasp it in her hands. 'A bottle? Of what?'

She turned it over, and the liquid rushed down to fill the air. She nearly dropped it with her shaky hands. She ran her hands up the smooth cold glass until her hands brushed cork. With a bit of strength, she tugged it open. Apparently, it was already loosened. A strong smell of red wine came from the bottle. Shiho recognized it as "Sherry", the only drink she was allowed to have other than water. She was limited to four cups of water whenever she misbehaved and had to drink this "Sherry". She tried to avoid it as much as possible.

Shiho's eyes nearly rolled to the back of her head from the smell alone. Her eyelids fluttered a bit before she re-corked the bottle. The girl hacked a bit before setting the wine bottle down gently and rolling it away from her. Shiho's face wrinkled in disgust but also sunk in disappointment. She desperately wished for something to break her out from this room that was devoid of light.

Slowly, the primal fear grew in the back of her mind…it threatened to swallow her in the darkness. She could help but wonder with each passing second if she was locked down here with a trained serial killer or maybe assassin. It definitely felt as if someone was watching her. But that was impossible wasn't it? The answer was so incredibly simple that she could've smacked herself for not realizing it sooner if she wasn't so afraid.

Inferred cameras.

Suddenly, head was pulled back and something was pressed against her neck. It came as fast as it went.

Something wet slid down her cheek.

Ice blue eyes widened in fear. What was in here with her?

"Haibara?" Conan's worried face peered into hers. He hadn't seen her this worried since the last time they had a close encounter with a member of the Black Organization.

Ai snapped to attention when he entered her line of vision. Her fingers slowly reached up to her face. She hesitantly touched the wet trail down her cheek and pulled her hand down to examine.

Blue paint.

Any women fearing-man that put self-preservation as one of his priorities would've immediately seen how the intensity in Ai's ice blue eyes went up a few notches. The cause of this could've ranged from anger to lust, but seeing as how Ai looked as if she wanted strangle Conan, it was safe to say it was probably one of the angry emotions.

As much as Conan loved being detective, he didn't feel like sticking around long enough to identify the specific emotion that flashed across her face. Ai was never one to easily lose her composure over little things, but apparently, smearing blue paint in her face might have been an exception.

"Kudo…" She growled out.

That was all the encouragement Conan needed to run away from the normally calm Ai Haibara.

Ai ran after the miniature detective, her lips pursed into a determined line. She dashed past Ayumi and grabbed the bowl of paint from her hands.

Pink paint.

"Perfect…"

Moments later, Ai collapsed onto the school's courtyard breathing heavily as she appraised her new work of art. She watched as a flustered Conan, splattered head to toe in pink, scramble back and forth out of embarrassment, trying not to be seen.

She ducked her head to hide the smile that was beginning to form, but it didn't quite get there. A shadow suddenly enveloped her small figure.

Looking up, she found not Gin, not Vodka, but a certain Conan Edogawa standing over her with an entire bucket of paint in his hands.

Even with her face flushed crimson and panting from exhaustion, Ai managed to shoot up at him her dead panned stare. "Kudo, you wouldn't dare."

"Justice will prevail." He grinned.

The two were back up and running in no time flat.

"It was a joke!" Came the panicked cry from Conan. "Smile and laugh already!"

Blue paint covered Ai stopped and glared at his retreating form in the iciest manner she could. "If he held it so dear to himself as to see me participate in this activity…" She muttered darkly under her breath. She walked over to the table full of art supplies, grabbed the first thing she could reach –the gray paint- and dumped it into her hands. Moving over to the wall, she smeared the gray onto a blank space on the wall that no one had yet to splatter with airborne paint.

"That should satisfy him." Ai glared at the gray smear on the wall as if her misfortune was all its fault. She turned and made her way to the restroom to make herself at least halfway decent when she entered Agasa's home.

That afternoon Ai was still irked over what had happened even after a somewhat relaxing bath. She was lucky the professor had thought of making his own specialized shampoo to wash out anything or else the paint would have been an absolute nightmare to wash out. "Hopefully, Kudo wasn't as lucky." She thought darkly.

She sat in front of her computer watching what seemed to be an endless amount of formulas and different combinations pour down her screen. She had her head propped on one hand, her eyes effortlessly following each line.

"Smile and laugh already!"

"Why did he have to go and say something like that…?" Ai massaged her temples in annoyance. "I-The last time I heard it was when Gin hissed into my ear…" Her face screwed up in disgust as her mind drifted back to the memory which was so clearly scorched into her brain.

"Sherry."

The seventeen year old Shiho in a lab coat with a clipboard in one hand paused to see Gin walk over to her with a slight swagger in his steps. "My dear Sherry, how have you been?" He asked with a smile. But Shiho was not to be deceived. She knew his intentions were anything but to find out about her well being. Besides, who would trust someone whose smile had a malicious edge to it? Besides the fact he proclaimed himself to be her boyfriend and soon-to-be-murderer at the same time...

She ignored him and turned in the opposite direction to avoid a confrontation with him. Not that it did her any good, it was already too late. His hand shot out and latched onto her wrist applying a painful amount of pressure. Wincing, she stopped in her tracks. "Gin, let go of me now." She demanded in a low voice.

"I don't think I will, Sherry."

She felt him lift her hair from the back, weaving his fingers through it. Thoroughly disgusted now, she whipped around seeing the same crazed look in his eyes she saw every time. He always did want to kill. More specifically, kill her. He was making her extremely uncomfortable. No one touched her. No one but family.

Her ice blue eyes narrowed. "You are, without a doubt, the absolutely most nauseating piece of filth I have even had the distinct displeasure to meet." Shiho spat out bitterly. She tried to yank her arm away but to no avail.

She was suddenly swung around violently, her back slamming into a wall. Her hand was held above her head. She reflexively brought up the clipboard in her other hand to act as a shield from Gin. Stars clouded her vision but her mind immediately cleared when his disturbingly hot breath caressed her face. Thankfully, her clipboard kept Gin from getting any further than he already was.

"Sherry, my sweet precious red wine, you are indeed intoxicating to your fullest." His smile stretched further at one corner, turning into a malicious smirk. Gin had trapped her from all sides, cutting off any means of escape. He pressed closer. "Smile and laugh for me will you, dearest?" He whispered into her ear. "I want to see you smile and laugh before I hear your screams of death. I'll cherish the memory, the memory of seeing the bottle of Sherry shatter and the red wine from inside staining the carpet."

"Let me go, Gin." She repeated. "Release me now."

"And what if I refuse? Will you smile and laugh for me then?"

"Let. Me. Go. Now." Her icy tone of anger was unmistakable.

He complied and stepped back only to strike the side of her face. "Smile and laugh already!" He shrieked as she fell from the sheer force of the blow and slid across the floor. Her clipboard clattered onto the floor. "I want to see you smile! I want to see you laugh! I want to see you die!" A few moments silence then Gin took a deep breath and calmed down considerably. He fished out a cigarette from his pocket and lit the 'death in a packet'. He looked down at her with his most charming smile, a warm caring smile that clashed with his cold distant eyes.

"Smile for me, Shiho."

She forced a tired and used smile onto her face and watched his satisfied form turn around and walk away, carelessly tossing a switchblade he found in his pocket up and down, leaving her alone with a cheek mostly likely bruised and swollen.

A soft knock interrupted her thoughts. Ai whirled around only to remember her door was locked. She hopped out of her chair to find out who wanted her while calming her heart that seemed to leap into her throat.

A certain Conan Edogawa was standing at her door shuffling his feet with his head down. Ai could see in his neatly kept black hair that some flecks of pink still remained. Conan took a hesitant look at her, and Ai raised an eyebrow. He ducked his head down again and took that as a cue to start speaking.

"I'm…really sorry for getting you so upset today. I was just carried away. I'm really sorry, I was having a small bit of fun and thought you might liked to be included…I know you don't like socializing or acting like a little kid, but-no, I'm sorry. I should've known better. I'll do anything you want in return to make up for it."

Ai was at first, shocked. The great Shinichi Kudo apologizing? It took less then one second to regain her typical cool composure. "Kudo…" She started.

"Hmm?" He looked up at her through his bangs.

"I know how you can make it up to me." A side of her lips lifted.

"What is it?" He asked while wondering what was going through that mind of hers to make her smirk like that.

"I want to see you run ten laps around the park, swim four laps around the pool, drink an entire gallon of water, do one hundred sit ups, sixty push ups, pick up my groceries from various places, and endure an entire hour of Mouri-san's soap operas."

Conan's face had gone from apologetic to a pale horror stricken expression. "A-are you serious? That's what would make you happy?" He spluttered. "Torturing me is what would satisfy you? That's sadistic…"

Ai's smirk only widened. "Thank you. I am very well aware of what that is." She turned and closed the door behind her. "Meet me at the park in ten minutes." The door clicked shut.

The poor miniature detective was left gaping at her door.