Author's Note: This idea has been hanging onto me for a while, so I decided to write it down before I forgot it. I'm pretty sure that this idea has been written by many different authors before, but I hope that you'll find this one to be one that you enjoy.
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Edogawa Conan dropped stiffly into his seat next to Haibara Ai.
In a glance, Haibara could tell that Kudo was in a bad mood. A really bad mood. It wasn't the type of frustrated mood he had when he didn't quite understand a case, nor was it the type of mood that sometimes surfaced around him when he was feeling annoyed by others. No, it was that mood. The mood that always made her feel guilty inside.
"Hello," he murmured gruffly, slamming his backpack onto the desk and taking out the notebooks needed for the class.
"Edogawa-kun, what's wrong?" There was really no need to ask, it was always the same answer when he became this way.
"Ran." That word confirmed Haibara's suspicions. She sighed as she took out a pencil and placed it next to her book. "The other part of your life?" she asked quietly as Kobayashi-sensei started to discuss the events of the day.
Kudo buried his head in his hands. "She's so depressed," he whispered. "I call her, but...it doesn't seem to help. She cries in her sleep."
Haibara looked at him with pity in her eyes and then turned back to Kobayashi-sensei.
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Edogawa Conan was not having a good day.
Ran, for the third time this week, had woken him up as she cried out in her sleep for Shinichi. When she wasn't sobbing in the night, he in turn had nightmares, nightmares of her being murdered by Gin, with his mind coming up with more and more creative ways to kill her.
Classes passed in a blur and Kobayashi-sensei glanced at him worriedly several times that day. He passed it off as sleepiness and allowed his thoughts to drift and wander.
Everyday now he woke up with the same bitter thought. I'm still a kid. The words mocked him and it seemed that vague spirits hovered around him, sneering at his predicament. Conan had never believed in the supernatural, but this, this was truly testing him.
Conan wanted desperately to get out of the whole thing, to be able to be Kudo Shinichi again. Not for 24 hours, not for 48, not even for a week, he wanted to be Kudo Shinichi forever. He wished had hadn't been so stupid and headstrong that day when he ran after Vodka.
The school bell rang and everyone ran out. Conan glared at his cabinet as he took out his walking shoes. In a few weeks, the kids would all be graduating and he'd be turning 9 and going into 4th grade. 4th grade. He should be turning 19 and heading off to college now, not suffering through class after class each day! (A/N: And yes, I have done my research regarding Japanese education) In frustration, Conan punched his cabinet. He was no Ran, but he still had enough force to dent the neat nameplate that read "Edogawa Conan".
"Conan-kun?" Ayumi poked her head over to look at him, frowning at his angry face. "What's wrong?"
With an amazingly large effort, Conan pasted a fake smile onto his face. "Nothing, Ayumi-chan. I'm just not feeling very good today."
Ayumi blinked twice. "Well, maybe you should stay home tomorrow," she suggested, and then turned back to her cabinet.
Haibara was looking at him with those all-knowing eyes, examining him as if he were a very interesting specimen, a feeling he knew all too well. Conan shot a glare at her and then headed off by himself, telling the Detective Boys that Ran had told him to come home early to help her with something.
Alone, Conan walked towards the Mouri Detective Agency. He shouldn't be walking alone, he thought grimly. He should be walking with Ran, the two of them laughing, him talking about some case that he had just had. He should be bouncing a soccer ball on his knee...and be able to knock someone out without having to waste time twisting the dial on his sneaker. The Black Organization had robbed him of everything he had to look to, all the little joys of life. What he would give to go back to the life he used to know…
Conan walked into the Mouri Detective Agency without bothering to say hello. Kogoro was out at a Yoko concert and Ran had karate practice for an hour or so. Conan had the time to himself.
In an attempt to calm himself, he pulled The Sign of Four from the bookshelf. He had told Ran that "Shinichi-niisan had lent him the book", which of course led to a bombardment of questions regarding how he was and where he was that Conan hastily answered. But even Sherlock Holmes couldn't calm him down. Conan glared at anything, everything, the pillows, the mattress which he called his bed, the books on the shelf, everything seemed to be mocking him, telling him that he would never be able to return to the life he once knew.
Conan slammed the book onto the table and threw off his glasses. He grabbed his head and yelled in agony, yelled out all his emotions, all his suffering, everything within came boiling out.
"Do you want to get what you originally had back?"
Conan glanced up wildly to see where the voice had come from. It was an odd voice, dark, seemingly evil, but at the same time soothing. It was a tone that made you immediately on the alert for craftiness, and the tone made Conan shiver. He didn't know who the voice belonged to...or, perhaps, what. Conan shook his head. He was going crazy today.
"Do you want to become Kudo Shinichi again?"
"My mind's playing tricks on me," Conan murmured as he leaned against a wall, closing his eyes. "I can't become Kudo Shinichi again without Haibara, and she wouldn't bother installing mikes into the walls to see my reaction."
"Do you?" The mysterious voice seemed to echo through his head. Conan grasped his head in both hands and shook it as hard as he could, trying to get it out of his head.
"Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you? Do you?"
Conan did the only thing he could do, fall onto his knees and cry out in agony.
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Where am I? Conan thought as he opened his eyes. It felt like he was drifting through space, and all he could see for miles and miles was black. He checked his pulse. He was (supposedly) still alive, which was good. But where in the world was he?
"Edogawa Conan." Conan whirled around at the sound of his name. "Or Kudo Shinichi. Whichever you prefer." Conan's eyes narrowed at the sound of his true identity. The voice didn't sound threatening, but it didn't sound quite friendly either.
"Who are you?" he called.
"I am everything, but I am nothing. What I am is not important. Your choice, however, is. This is your only chance, if you don't take it, you won't be able to get it again, at least not this way," the voice boomed.
"Why should I care?" Conan asked defiantly.
"You should care, because I am giving you a chance, just one, to return to the life you originally had."
Conan blinked. Was he dreaming? Was this truly the chance he had waited for? It couldn't hurt to hope, couldn't hurt to try, could it? Hesitantly, he asked another question.
"If I...If I take this chance you're offering, will there be any side effects?"
The voice chuckled. "You will only have a vague memory of your time as Conan, only a mutual feeling when danger is there, or during times you would have a strong emotion. That is yours to decide on whether to follow. You may feel a vague familiarity with certain things if you happen to stumble upon something you've seen as Conan. You may recognize certain people you would never have met as Kudo Shinichi. Those are the side effects. Nothing major. Can't have you cheating on cases, can we?"
Still, Conan hesitated. This was a once in a lifetime chance! A chance to go back to everything he wanted to have! But...but...something felt wrong.
"Why are you doing this? Do I have to give anything in return?" Conan asked, narrowing his eyes. People, or rather, things, don't give out chances to get something you've always wanted back for free.
"For my pleasure, Kudo Shinichi, and only that. Now, will you take the chance or not?"
Conan took a deep, shaky breath. "Ok. Ok."
There was a sudden burning sensation in the pit of his stomach and Conan screamed in shock and pain.
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His eyes opened and he was shocked to see himself standing in Tropical Land. He turned and he saw Ran, looking at him with concern in her eyes. "Shinichi, oi, Shinichi, what's wrong?"
He took a shaky breath and glanced wildly around. Calming himself, he had a nagging feeling, as if he shouldn't be here, as if something was wrong. What was wrong? He was Kudo Shinichi, who else could he be?
"Nothing, Ran, nothing. What were we talking about again?" Shinichi tried to pass it off casually, though in the back of his mind he resolved to figure the feeling out later.
Ran crossed her arms, annoyed. "Never mind, it's obvious you weren't paying attention anyways." She sighed, and for some reason, Shinichi felt like doing it too.
Suddenly, a man in black ran past the two. It was the man they had seen on the roller coaster case, less than 10 minutes ago. He seemed to be looking around for something, with an air of somebody late to a meeting. Shinichi's "suspicious" nerve immediately sounded, though it was accompanied by something else. A nagging feeling, as if something wasn't right. Was he going out of his mind? Why all these bad feelings? Shinichi trusted his own judgement, but now he wasn't sure exactly what his judgement was.
Shinichi started to run after the man, and Ran yelled, "Shinichi!" He was going to wave his hand at her, tell her he was going to catch up with her later when he felt something pass over him. It seemed both hot and cold and it seemed to scream with pain. The feeling was both like one when somebody poured a bucket filled with ice-cold water on you, while someone else poured a boiling bucket of water on you. Shinichi had a bad feeling, almost as if he was running towards his death. He hesitated, and that fraction of a second was all it took for Ran to grab ahold of him.
Shinichi looked at his childhood friend in confusion, and when she looked back, still clutching his arm as if it were her lifeline, he was surprised to see tears in her eyes. "Don't go, Shinichi," she pleaded, no, begged. Shinichi's eyes widened even more, he hadn't seen Ran break down like this since they were 10. "Please don't go. I have a bad feeling, it's like...it's like I'll never see you again. So please don't go, Shinichi, please don't."
Shinichi allowed himself to be dragged home by Ran, but at the same time, he couldn't help wondering.
What was it with these feelings?
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Author's Note: This is relatively short for my chapter, only about half the length of my norm chapter, but since it's the intro, it'll have to be shorter. So, how do you like the idea?
Ok, so I got offtrack of writing Taken. But I really, really, absolutely could not resist writing this story, sorry, but I really couldn't! I apologize for that, and will try not to delay my updates for Taken because of this.
From now on, this story will be updated at around the rate of one and a half weeks for a chapter, around 4000 words long, 10 pages if I put it into a document.
Please review!