A/N: Here's the first chapter!
So, read it and let me know what you guys think! Critiques are just as awesome as praise, so don't be afraid to break out the big bad red editing pen. If I'm doing something wrong, I wanna know it. :P Particularly on anything regarding characters feeling OOC, spelling/grammar/punctuation, honorifics, or a plain old "This line was just awful" or "It would have been so much better if this had happened instead of that." I'm not just talking about anything that's necessarily wrong, either. Let me know if you see anything that you think could be improved.
Inspired by a combination of my own original zombie story I wrote years ago, the new anime Highschool Of The Dead, and Vermouth's line from episode 334: "We can be both of God and the devil since we're trying to raise the dead against the stream of time."
Also, I'm thinking that I might change the name, but I'm not sure what I might change it to. If you have any ideas, let me know!
Enjoy! ^_^
Edit: 04/08/14
I'm going to be writing more for this story after quite a long time on hiatus. There have been certain things that have happened in DC since this story was first published, such as the appearances of Sera and Amuro, that I'll be trying to work into the plot. (And Haibara somewhat getting over her fear of Okiya.) However when this story was first conceived, none of that had happened yet. As such I'll be doing my best to work these points into the story later, but I've decided not to edit anything that already exists. Just thought you should know.
"We can be both of God and the devil since we're trying to raise the dead against the stream of time."
-Vermouth
Mouri Detective Agency
July 6'th
6:35 A.M.
Conan, barely able to hold his head up and still dressed in his pajamas, clambered about in the bathroom, performing his usual morning rituals with half hooded eyes, essentially running on autopilot. It was on days like this that he spent a lot of time thinking about one of the smallest inconveniences of his current shrunken state. And that, was coffee.
Coffee, the detectives best friend, the overworked officers go-to solution for hard nights and harder mornings. But children, as Ran had reminded him time and time again, weren't allowed so much as a sip of the dark brew.
The final sectors of his brain beginning to whir to life, he had only to change out of his pajamas before making his way to the kitchen, where he found Ran standing in front of the stove and the tv on in the living room, a news anchor reporting on some situation in the Middle-East though he wasn't sure where. His attention was stolen by the taunting aroma emanating from the coffee machine on the counter, a fresh steaming pot sitting in wait.
"Good morning," Ran called over her shoulder, stirring something he couldn't see.
"Morning," he mumbled back, climbing up into his seat at the table. He turned his attention once more to the report playing out in the living room. After trying for a few moments to listen in, and not being able to make out what was said, his curiosity finally got the better of him and he hopped down from his chair to turn it up. He knew it'd probably take him longer to look for the remote than it would just to press the button on the side of the tv despite what most people seemed to think, so he went up to the side and counted up four buttons from the bottom. Two for the channel up and down buttons, one for the volume down button, and then one more for the volume up button.
"There are twenty confirmed dead and thirteen more reported missing in just the last two hours," the golden toned reporter spoke as Conan took a step back so he could see the screen. "In total, that's over one hundred dead from Uzbekistan alone. There are also reports that fatalities have occurred in Turkey, Armenia, and Azerbaijan as well, though the numbers are not yet in." Here, the anchor shuffled through a small stack of papers on his desk before tapping the bottoms of the pages lightly to straighten them out.
"We now go live to Katsuya Mazaki, where-" the anchor trailed off, looking off to the side in a very unprofessional manner . A moment later he faced forward again, his brows falling and creeping together in a look that could only be confusion. "But first we'll take a quick brake. We'll be back with the live report from Uzbekistan after these messages."
Well that was... Odd, Conan thought, though he didn't pay it much mind. It could be a technical problem, trying to connect with their team, or it could be as simple as the team's cameraman having walked off to use the restroom.
"Breakfast is ready!" Ran called, effectively putting an end to that train of thought.
"H-hai," he called, giving the power button a push as he went running into the kitchen, trying to give off an energetic vibe when he could hardly keep his feet from dragging. But as he sat down, he found the story playing through his mind again. There were so many dead, he thought, downcast as a plate was set before him, a cup of juice following it shortly. "Thanks!" he piped, plastering on a big grin, Ran returning a gentle smile as she went about preparing a plate for her father who had yet to even get out of bed. He pushed the more negative thoughts aside with little effort. He'd become pretty good at that, after all these years. But still, after seeing so much violence, so many criminals driven to do the unthinkable, so much bloodshed, he still couldn't wrap his head around the why. It just...
"Conan-kun," Ran asked as she sat a plate down at her father's spot, once again derailing his train of thought as he looked up, meeting her gaze. "Could you go wake up tou-san for me, please?"
"Ok!" he chirped, hopping up from his place and running around the corner, where the faked enthusiasm drained away to be replaced by apprehension. He shrugged, soldiering on as he raised a hand to rub the top of his head where, very shortly, Kogoro's fist would be leaving a soar bump on his head. Again.
Teitan Elementary
July 6'th
1:10 P.M.
"Seven times ten is seventy! Seven times eleven is seventy-seven! Seven times twelve is eighty-four!"
Conan mumbled along with the mantra, fist under his chin holding his head up.
"Eight times five is forty! Eight times six is forty-eight!"
Kobayashi was paying most of her attention to the back right of the classroom, where some boys were smiling awful wide to be doing times tables. So Conan, in the front left corner of the classroom, had little to worry about in the way of being called out for his lack of enthusiasm.
"Eight times eight is sixty-four!"
"Kudo-kun." At least, he had little worry that Kobayashi would call him out. Haibara, on the other hand...
"Eight times twelve is ninety-six!"
"What?" he whispered without looking in her direction, letting some of his boredom into his words.
"Nine times two is eighteen!"
When she was silent, he turned toward her only to be greeted by a dark "don't-you-what-me" look. He sighed, the mantra of the students carrying on without them. "Yes?"
Not seeming to find this answer much more appeasing, Haibara was quiet for another few moments. Just when he thought she wasn't going to say anything at all, he heard her whisper "If you keep acting like that, you're going to attract unwanted attention."
"Ten times three is thirty!"
"But we've already learned this," he protested. "Twice."
"Ten times five is fifty!"
"The great detective of the East is being thwarted by revisions?" she continued in a humorless monotone.
"Ten times six is sixty!"
"It's not like it isn't getting to you," he grumbled.
"Ten times eight is eighty!"
"I would have figured you'd be having a harder time than me, actually," he continued. "With all of your 'advanced classes' and everything."
"Ten times eleven is one hundred and ten!"
"Then I suppose your perceptive abilities aren't as good as you would have the world believe," Haibara countered.
"Eleven times-"
There was a loud pop followed by bursts of intermittent static, the telltale signs of the old P.A. system kicking on, and the children fell instantly silent.
"Attention, all students and faculty!" the principal's voice boomed a moment later, voice a level, cool calm.
Every pair of eyes in the room rose up to gaze at the speaker, a handful of students letting out a quiet groan. The only thing that ever got a school-wide announcement like that was a drill, and regardless of what they were practicing for, it more or less came down to two scenarios: Having to stand around outside in the unbearable heat, or sitting absolutely still and quiet in the corner of the classroom. Neither of which were they particularly eager to do.
The only exceptions to this were Kobayashi, who knew all too well that there wasn't a drill scheduled for today, and Conan and Haibara, who both thought it a little too close to summer vacation to be practicing their drills. The mystery didn't last for long.
"An intruder has been spotted on school property!" the principal's voice once again rang throughout the classroom. "I repeat! An intruder has been spotted on school property! Begin lockdown procedures immediately! This is not a drill!"
The students hopped out of their chairs, a frightened few more quickly than the rest, then began to gather in the blind corner of the room directly to the left of the door. Conan waited for a few of the kids to gather up before taking the nearest position to the door, one fingertip hovering over his tranquilizer's trigger. If there was one thing he'd learned in his life, it was that it was better to be safe than sorry. Especially when dealing with the unknown.
"E-everyone," Kobayashi stuttered, getting up to lock the door. "Just stay in your corner. Everything's going to be fine." She had to wonder who she was trying to reassure then; The students, or herself. Maybe a little of both, she decided. There's nothing wrong with being a little afraid, after all.
Haibara sidled in next to Conan, whispering a warning as she sat down. "I wouldn't use that."
He turned, the word "what" already forming on his lips, when Ayumi sat down between the two of them. She didn't say a word, but she did cling to his arm the instant she'd hit the ground. She turned, a surprising mixture of fear and determination in her eyes when she stared at him, and it was then that he remembered staying quiet had always been one of the biggest rules during a lockdown drill.
A moment later Mitsuhiko claimed the empty space on the other side of Haibara, Genta taking the spot in front of Ayumi, sparring only a moment to send a mild glare at Ayumi's grip on Conan's arm.
And so they sat in still silence, the only sound being Kobayashi's shoes as she headed towards their corner after having just closed all of the blinds and made sure all of the windows were locked, then sat down in the middle of the students, struggling with a brave face that was starting to fray around the edges.
A quiet murmuring rose from some of the students the farthest back in the corner, though they were silenced quickly by Kobayashi's gentle touch on the shoulder as she lifted a finger to her lips. That was when Conan first heard it.
He had to strain to listen to it, and at first he thought it was probably just his paranoia getting the better of him. But then he heard it a second time, and a third, and on the fourth it was unmistakable. Footsteps. They were slow, and twice as quiet, but definitely there. He held a finger over the crosshairs release, before Haibara's warning came back to him. What had she meant?
There was another footstep, and he could tell that they were definitely drawing closer. He flipped the crosshairs up, taking aim at the door, when everything seemed to click. "If you keep acting like that, you're going to attract unwanted attention," Haibara's earlier warning came back to him, and he snapped the crosshairs back down. If they just suddenly fell unconscious, it'll certainly raise some suspicions, he realized. But, if there's something that causes it...
There was another step, this one practically right outside their door, and he wasn't the only one to notice it. He felt Ayumi's breath catch as she squeezed his arm tighter, Genta turned to Mitsuhiko, who nodded in return, and several of the kids gathered around Kobayashi closed their eyes and buried their faces into her.
THUNK!
The classroom door shook violently on it's hinges, one of the little girls in the back letting out a terrified squeal. Conan scowled, starting to work his arm out of Ayumi's grasp. The door wouldn't be able to take many more hits like that.
CRACK!
Another blow seemed to shake the floor as the door visibly bowed inwards, the sound of splintering wood filling the air, and any rules about silence had been forgotten. Kobayashi stayed frozen, more like a statue than a person, watching numbly as the door was once again dealt a devastating blow, the window in the door shattering, sending a storm of broken glass all the way across the room where it struck the windows, making a sound like tiny hail stones as they struck.
This can't be happening, she told herself, oblivious to the chorus of shrieks around her. Nothing like this could ever happen here. So this must be a dream. The thought wasn't strong at first, but with every moment her conviction grew. Shira... Shiratori-Keiji would be here, if this were real. So.. So it can't be.
"Ayumi-chan, let go!" Conan shouted, any hope that their intruder might think they weren't inside already thoroughly thrashed to pieces.
Bang!
The door flew off it's hinges and skid halfway across the classroom floor, taking a fair amount of the splintered remains of the door frame with it. Ayumi brought her hands to her mouth to hold in a scream, and finding himself suddenly freed Conan shot up, hand on his shoe's dial, soccer ball already half inflated before he'd gotten both feet planted firmly on the ground. Fortunately the intruder seemed to have been caught off guard when the door gave way, and didn't notice what Conan was doing.
"Hyaaah!" With all the strength he could muster, Conan sent the ball flying, scoring a perfect hit on his intended target. The figure - definitely a man, wearing a brown suit and tie - crumpled to the ground, unmoving. The balls momentum carried it on, imbedding it into the drywall where it became the epicenter of a mass of spiderweb cracks.
It was as the ball deflated and fell to the floor that he felt a hand grab his shoulder. It was small, and soft, but gripping him too tightly to be Ayumi. "Haibara?" he whispered. He felt her move to stand behind him, almost like she was trying to hide, her fingernails digging into his shoulder painfully. "Haibara?" he whispered again, a little more worried. "Haibara? What is it?" The only times that she'd ever acted like this was when one of them was around. And the very thought that an Organization member could be in their school... That thought alone was enough to get his own heart racing.
"Ai...Chan?" Ayumi asked tentatively. "Are you ok?"
"We need to leave," Haibara replied coldly. "We need to leave now."
Conan turned to face her, her nails leaving long scratches on his shoulder, though the adrenaline coursing through his veins dulled the pain. "Haibara, what are-"
"We don't have time to discuss this," she continued in barely a whisper, her eyes taking on a frenzied gleam, never leaving the fallen man.
"Haibara!" Conan shouted, grabbing her shoulders and turning her bodily toward him. "What are you talking about?"
"Look at him!" she yelled back, knocking his hands aside.
With an even mix of apprehension and confusion, Conan did as he was told. He walked up to the man's side, allowing his critical eye to search for whatever it was that had Haibara so alarmed. The man's cheeks were red, and while at first Conan thought it could just be from where the ball had struck him, he went to check the other side. He touched the man's head so that he could turn it to the other side, only to pull his hands back an instant later. The man had a rampant fever, and while he was no doctor he'd say that the man should've definitely been in a hospital. But Haibara couldn't have possibly noticed that, he thought. And even if she had, that still wouldn't explain anything.
He moved down from the head, only to stop as he spotted something else. Is that... Blood? He knelt down by the man's stomach, and just as he was about to reach down he felt a firm hand on his shoulder again.
"Don't touch it," Haibara warned.
However, Conan barely took notice of her, instead searching for the source. His eyes raked up and down the man's back, only to settle on a spot on his upper inner thigh.
The man's leg looked like it'd had a chunk the size of a grapefruit ripped off, shreds of his pants soaked with blood laying limp against the gaping wound. Worse, the wound looked old. It was scabbed over, and some sections of it looked like scar tissue had begun to form. He had to guess that the fall had caused the injury to open up again. But a wound like that, going untreated... It should've definitely been fatal, and that's not even considering the risk of infection, nor the sheer debilitating pain that a wound like that would cause that would keep him from being able to walk.
Conan had always prided himself on his ability to reason a situation out, but this... He couldn't understand any of this. And the only piece of the puzzle he had, was standing right behind him. And even that was a mystery in and of itself. "Haibara," he whispered. "Do you know what happened to him?"
He felt her hand leave his shoulder, though she didn't move from behind him. "I'll explain once we get out of here. This place isn't safe."
"Safe?" he echoed. "What-"
"I said," she uttered more emphatically, "that I'd explain later. Now lets go, before more of them show up."
"We can't just leave these kids here by themselves though!"
The two of them spun around, coming face to face with Ayumi, Mitsuhiko and Genta by her side. "I mean," she continued, looking a little more sheepish. "If you think more people might be coming, and we can't stay here anymore, then we need to tell everyone else. Right?"
Some of the frantic energy glowing behind Haibara's eyes seemed to fade, and with a heavy sigh she turned to face the rest of the students, most staring at their little congregation around the unconscious man. Kobayashi looked like she might be going into shock.
"Of course," Haibara said.
"Ahhh!"
They all turned sharply towards the door, the screech echoing in the narrow hallways.
"That sounded really close," Mitsuhiko said under his breath.
"I trust you, Haibara," Conan whispered, an urgent edge to his voice. He held her gaze for a moment, making sure she didn't change her mind, then turned to the rest of the students. "We're leaving now!" he shouted. "And all of you need to come with us! The door's broken, so more bad people can get in! And this one," he said, a jerk of his thumb indicating the man behind him, "won't stay unconscious forever!"
"But, Kobayashi-sensei..." a little boy in the back started.
A chorus of screams tore through the air, sounding like they were right outside in the hall. This time they were younger. Students.
"I know what she said," Conan continued, trying to keep his voice level. "But think about it. If the door's broken, what's going to keep someone else out?"
A solid thump grabbed his attention, and he looked over to where Haibara had opened one of the windows. "Come on!" she called. "If we don't leave now, we won't be able to at all!"
Conan could hear the sounds of sirens in the distance, but if the screams in the hall were anything to go by, they wouldn't make it in time. Some of the students were getting up, sending troubled glances back at Kobayashi, who wasn't doing a thing to stop them but wasn't getting up either.
"Come on!" she yelled again.
Conan ran up to Kobayashi, pulling on her sleeve, putting on the most childish act he felt he could pull off. "Sensei?" he asked cutely. "It's time to go outside. Won't you come with us?" He pulled more incessantly, and even though she didn't say a word she did stand back up, glazed eyes blinking as she took in the room as if he'd just woken her from a strange dream. "What are you all doing, we've got to stay in our corner," she mumbled, only just loud enough for Conan and the students nearest her to hear. "He got in, Sensei," he continued as if he were talking to a spooked animal. "We need to get out now. Do you think you can get through that window?"
She just stared at him for a couple of seconds before her gaze went up to the window. "Yeah, I think I could," she said softly. "But why would I want to?"
"Because you're following us!" Conan said in a matter-o-fact manner. "Hurry up or you'll get left behind!" He turned to the kids all around him, knowing that at the very least, they would probably follow him. "It's safer outside than it is in here," he continued on, allowing some of the childish tones to fade to be replaced by a more authoritative demeanor. Out of time and desperately hoping his ploy would work, Conan lead the uncertain students toward the window, where Haibara and Mitsuhiko had already climbed through, Ayumi only waiting for him and Genta only waiting for Ayumi.
As if she were moving in slow motion, Kobayashi stood and began to make her way toward them. After a couple of steps, she seemed to notice the splintered door and the unconscious man for the first time. That image gave her the kick she needed, letting out a yelp as she fell back to reality. But as her shout echoed in the hallway, the meandering footsteps outside froze, only to resume a moment later. Headed straight for their classroom.