You Saved My Life

"Fifty minutes. We're still waiting." Ai was speaking on a tape while sending worried glances to her patient who still was shivering quite badly.

"It seems like the antidote wasn't strong enough this time as the reaction should have taken place almost immediately. The temperature of the test person has increased, but not more than from a regular fever." she added, then stopped the recording. She would write her other observations down and his pulse needed to be checked anyway.

"Shinichi?"

"H-hai?"

She didn't like how weak his voice sounded, but it was to be expected in regard of how exhausting the last hour had been for him.

"Give me your arm."

No comforting words, no pity. She needed to keep her head clean of unnecessary thoughts like those and do her job.

As always he obeyed without hesitation, presenting his wrist to her in full trust. Her small fingers made contact with the hot skin and she counted the seconds in silence. Eventually Ai got up and opened her notebook. She wasn't pleased at all with her results.

"Edogawa-kun, your pulse is way too fast…" she said- more to herself than to him."If it doesn't come down in the next minutes, this could get dangerous…"

Ai felt no need to lie to him or to go easy on him with the truth as he wasn't the person to freak out about risky situations. It was better that he knew.

Conan nodded, his eyes half closed and still dizzy. "So make an effort and try to calm down and relax, okay?"

"Yes." He let himself fall down in the pillows of the coach, but it didn't help the pain. His chest hurt, his arms and legs hurt and the heat radiating from his body was driving him crazy. Sometimes even breathing got difficult and all that for nothing…

He searched Haibara's eyes hoping to find some hope in there, but she successfully was keeping her poker face up. Her thoughts unreadable.

Minutes passed by and slowly his temperature fell. Ai was observing him quietly, just giving short instructions now and then. After half an hour she considered him stable.

"Okay…I think we're done with that part now…" She sat down next to him. "How do you feel, Kudo-kun?"

He wanted to say fine, but maybe better not lie to your doctor.

"Dizzy. My head is hurting."

She nodded shortly. "Normal. It's an after effect of the pill." Nothing to worry about.

"Well, if this is everything, I suppose we're done here. But stay seated a few more minutes to make sure. "

She reached out to give him another pillow. "Lay down if you want to."

Shinichi nodded in agreement and covered himself with his jacket. He didn't say it, but he felt quite miserable, not to mention disappointed to still be stuck in a child's body. Ai was tiping her results in her laptop, a frown on her forehead as she started to see the strange effect the drug had had this time. The boy was silent, maybe he had already fallen asleep.

"Hello! I'm back!" The old professor had been buying some fruits and vegetables like she had told him and had entered the door with a smile. It quickly faded as he spotted Shinichi on the couch.

"What happened? Didn't it work this time?"

"No, it didn't." Ai said calmly, but she secretly wished no one would mention it anymore. It was bad enough, she had failed again to find a cure.

"You're all right Shinichi?"

"Hm." Conan's voice was really muffled because he still had his head pressed down in the cushions.

"Just worried about what Ran will say, if Shinichi doesn't show up for her birthday again."

Ai stopped writing for a moment listening as the boy continued to speak.

"I just hate to make her sad again. And make her wait for me. "

Agasa looked surprised at this statement, even though he of course knew about Shinichi's feeling for Ran, but it was rare for him to talk so openly about it.

"I miss her a lot." the young boy added very quietly and the professor was sure the drug was to blame for his sudden honesty.

"I know, Shinichi. I'm sorry."

Ai stared down at her hands. If she only could create a permanent cure…if she just tried a bit harder…

"What's wrong? What's wrong, boy, come on…"

Haibara was startled by the sudden exclaim of the professor who had hurried over to Shinichi. She jumped from her seat immediately.

"What happened?"

"It…it's just…" Conan seemed unable to bring out the words and she realized he had gotten pale. "Let me see him."

She pushed the professor aside and kneeled down in front of him. Just as she reached out for his pulse again, she felt a strong spasm going to his arm, the muscles contracting painfully. He let out a moan, forcefully suppressing a whimper as he felt his body tense up more and more. Even his stomach was cramping a bit.

"Hakase, the thermometer, quick." Ai ordered, but her hope vanished as she felt his forehead. His temperature hadn't changed.

"Another side-effect then. Although it would be much better if this were real growing pains…" she explained, going back to the table leaving Shinichi's symptoms to fade away by themselves.

"Shinichi…" The old man had taken a hold of his young friend's hand while he was just burying his head in the pillows. He hoped it would already stop, but hissed in pain as his arms and legs jerked from the tension.

"Ai-kun, what can we do?" Agasa asked, while gently pulling Shinichi up to carefully place an arm around him, rubbing his back. "Not much." Haibara turned around on her seat to look at the worried man, but she closed her mouth at the sight of the two of them. Conan maybe really needed help this time.

"I will see if I can find something …" And soon she came back with a little pill box. "Take one of the blue ones. It's a relaxant."

And thank good the pills did their job. Several minutes later Shinichi stopped squirming, his body hurting but at last calming down.

"Finally.", Agasa said relieved. "Yeah." Ai could just hope it was.

Conan was about to fall asleep on the sofa and after a last check up, she finally decided to leave him alone for a moment.

"I'm going to my room for a while, okay?"

The professor nodded and Shinichi stirred a bit. "Thanks Haibara."

Great, she said, on top of everything that had happened today, he was grateful anyway.

"Nothing to thank for. I'm really sorry for causing you pain. I thought it would be work much better."

Conan managed to smile a bit and shook his head. "It's all right. You're just trying to help. It's not your fault." And he didn't sound bitter at all.

Ai stopped in her tracks, unable to ignore her feelings anymore. "It is. You know that." she answered quietly, facing the wall.

"You don't believe that, Ai, do you?" Shinichi stated in shock and the professor went over to the girl, laying a hand on her shoulder.

"Ai-kun, you're our friend and we wouldn't want to miss you for anything anymore, right Shinichi?"

"Right." The boy said. "Gin and Wodka are the ones to blame for…"

"-Stop it, Kudo, you know I created that poison!" Her voice was thick with guilt as she told him that, feeling suffocated by all their tries to apologize or minimalize her mistakes, her crimes. She knew what she had done.

"Professor, please let me talk to Haibara alone for a moment." Shinichi pleaded his eldest friend who nodded reluectantly and then slowly left the room. The boy himself insecurely got up to approach her.

"You shouldn't stand up." But Shinichi ignored her words.

"We need to talk this out. It's a fact that you didn't wanted them to use the APTX 4869, they took it from you…like your sister."

A sob escaped the girl at the mention of her older sister Akemi.

"I'm so sorry." Conan cursed himself for his stupidity, but still didn't know what to do. Ai was just another victim of the Black Organization for him. Born into a life of crime, but deciding against it at last.

"You don't know what I've done. This drug was meant to kill…" she continued wiping her tears away.

"But it didn't…"

Ai turned around and looked at him furiously. "Oh really, Mr. Detective?! Always a solution for everything, isn't it so?! "

Conan backed away from her, not knowing how to handle her sudden outburst adn nearly tripped in process.

"You're always so keen on finding the truth, but you have no problem lying to the others and I don't mean Ran!"

Her eyes started to fill with tears as she continued to scream at him.

"Don't you think I see how much you're hurting? How much I hurt you just today? How sad you get speaking about her…"

Her voice was getting softer again, full of shame and regret while Shinichi could only stare at her.

"And what a bad friend am I. All I do is blame you for something I did. I wasn't even able to comfort you at all…"

With that she let herself fall down on her seat, burying her face in her hands. A moment of silence followed.

"Ai, don't do that to yourself."

Shinichi chose his words very carefully now.

"You're always there for me. And for the children. You gave me something to make it stop today and you weren't hurting me intentionally. No damage is done. "

There was something soothing in his words what helped her to control herself again as she put her hands down.

"But…I…wish I could do more. Like Ran or the professor…"

Conan smiled at her gently, shaking his head. "It's not me who needs comfort, Ai. I'm not unhappy and nobody is feeling great all the time…I'm just like you."

He paused to think about it for a moment.

"I'm horrible when it comes to emotions. Remember when you had a breakdown about…" – maybe he shouldn't talk about Akemi anymore- "…that incident, or when you were panicking about the black organization? I should have helped you, be there for you…but I couldn't. I shot you with one of my tranquilizer darts."

He looked down in shame at this. Saying it out loud, sounded even worse.

"Now who's the bad friend."

"Self-pity doesn't sweet you, Kudo" Ai mocked him lightening up a bit. "But that's not the point."

He looked at her expectantly.

"The point is that if not for my fault you wouldn't be in this mess at all…everything would be different."

And to her complete surprise, he nodded in agreement.

"You're right. Without you…I would be dead."

"What?" Ai couldn't follow nor understand his argumentation.

"You heard me. Just imagine you wouldn't have produced the poison, Gin and Wodka would have killed me like they normally would. With a gun, a knife…who knows? Fact is, I would have be gone for good and lost Ran forever. I would never have made such good friends, never met you or Heiji or everyone else. "

Her eyes had gotten wide at his sincere speech, putting the whole story in a completely different light.

"Call it a coincidence, call it unintentionally…I call it chance. You were so brave to stand up against the organization and retrospectively made the first big step to bring them down. No one else, no policeman nor detective could have done this. And with your decision…" his ocean blue eyes met her brown ones "…you saved my life."

She didn't know what to say anymore and still Shinichi continued. "So thank you for that by the way."The boy winked at her hoping he had finally convinced the girl. But she wasn't answering.

"Haibara…?"

And all of a suddenly he found himself in her embrace, holding him tight with all her force.

"Thank you so much, Shinichi-kun. Thank you so much. You're also the one who saved my life" She whispered, before letting him go as quickly as she had initiated the hug.

Conan nervously rubbed the back of his head, blushing a bit from the sudden body contact and her words.

"You're welcome."

All they could do was stand next to each other, an awkward silence filled the room...

"Well…and what did you get Ran for her birthday?"

THE END

Thanks a lot for reading and I'm happy for every review! I'm no native speaker, so please correct my spelling or grammar!