Takagi: Looking back

by CJaMes12

Who said it all ends well. Now properly Edited

Disclaimer: I don't own Detective Conan or Magic Kaito. Aoyama Gosho does, now properly edited.

Takagi closed the door to this dank apartment, waiting until after he had locked and latched it before removing his hat and plain-beyond-belief coat, hanging them over the tarnished hook near the door. He walked along the tea stained threadbare carpet to the dingy kitchen.

He looked around his drab surroundings while waiting for the kettle which he had placed on the rusty stove to come to the boil. It seemed to take forever. A forever in which Takagi could regard his surroundings and recall what brought him here to this crappy little apartment in the shitty block of flats in the darkest part of the city. It all started with Conan-kun's disappearance.

The kettle's light flicked on he poured some of the boiling water on to the teabag he had dropped into a clean-but-brown cup. He stirred the dark liquid a couple of times, leaving it to stew for a few more moments while the silence of the apartment pounded against his ears, screaming to him of the unnatural stillness around him. He spooned the teabag out of the cup, onto a saucer and sipped the still hot liquid, scalding his tongue. He didn't care. He didn't care about much at all anymore.

The police were searching in earnest for the little boy who'd helped them on so many cases. The boy who always seemed to be everywhere, pointing out evidence, but now was nowhere. He'd vanished without a trace. Takagi got home and threw his bag into a corner in frustration, full of worry for the mini-tantei. Damn the kind of person who'd kidnap a ten year old! Damn Mouri for taking so long to report him missing! It had been five days now, almost a week, and the longer it took for a lead to turn up, the less likely it was that one would.

The last time Conan-kun had been seen, he'd been running back to school to get something Ayumi-chan had left behind. Apparently Genta-kun and Mitsuhiko-kun had been fighting over which one of them should go get Ayumi-chan's homework, as they wouldn't let Ayumi-chan go by herself. Conan had proclaimed them baka and run off himself, with a smile and a wave and a promise to return soon. Ayumi-chan's homework was still exactly where she'd left it. They'd found it after Haibara-san had persuaded the others to follow him moments later. "We shouldn't leave Edogawa-kun on his own for too long," were the words she used, according to the rest of the Shounen Tantei Dan.

There was a knock at the door and Takagi crossed the room in a step to answer, opening it slightly, to peer outside at whoever was there. Something pushed past his leg, forcing its way through the meagre gap between door and doorframe. He shut the door and spun around to see the girl, Haibara Ai, from the mini detective group. Takagi looked at her in open surprise, the cogs of his brain whirring.

Out of everyone involved, this girl seemed to know more than she was letting on, hiding it behind barbed remarks and icy silence, and yet here she was, eyes flickering around the room, looking... absolutely terrified.

He opened his mouth to speak only to be silenced by an upraised finger. She took something out of her pocket, a small black gadget and flicked a switch on it. She kept her finger at her lips for a few moments longer and, after nodding to herself, she raised an eyebrow (oh, how he longed to be able to do that. ) towards him, inviting him to speak.

"What's that?" he pointed at the device.

"A transmission blocker. The professor made it. Nothing we say leaves this room. "

A chill settles on him, starting at his lower spine and seeping through him, slowly. Whether it was her words, or her change in demeanour from precocious ten-year old, he knew that he was about to step into something that he would be unable to return from. He knew what this was in relation to.

"What do you know about Conan-kun. "

"Before we go there, I want to make something clear. I never originally wanted to get you involved with this, but Agasa-sama said... Well I'm here, to tell you what I can. With Edogawa-kun gone," she shivered, "he was impulsive, but at least he had an idea of what to do, he protected me and everyone. I can't leave here now, because that would leave everyone else... They'll know, and They won't stop. Edogawa-kun knew what he was doing, he kept himself between Them and Us, and now, well you're one he seemed to trust, so..."

She trailed off. Her outburst had to contain more words than he had ever heard her say before. This wasn't what shocked him though. It was what she'd said. She seemed to have many trains of thoughts running into each other, and was unable to pick which one she wanted to follow. She was scared of Something. Them? There was something else that'd he'd up on which worried him just as much as any shadow-people.

"Was? Seemed?" He hoped that she'd look up now in surprise and apologise for the slip in tense, she was just tired and tripping over her words... but no. She just looked at him directly in the eye and he felt what remained of his insides flash-freeze.

"There's an organisation. The Syndicate. The Black Ravens. They work behind the scenes and kill those who find out about them. "

"What's this got to do with Conan-kun?"

"Two years ago, he saw something, Kudo Shinichi saw something. They caught him, and attacked Kudo-kun. He got away, but They thought that he was dead. "

"That's why Kudo-kun wants his name out of investigations!" Takagi realised with a jolt, finally a puzzle piece clicked into place, it was to hide from Them.

"Yeah, it's not as if the baka could just keep out of them totally, because that'd have been just too hard. " the girl muttered under her breath a touch bitterly. Takagi regarded her for a few moments in silence until she spoke again, trying to put more pieces together.

"The point is, he knew. If the Syndicate found out, even if that's not why they took Edogawa-kun in the first place, they will have by now... I hope I can speak about him in the past tense. "

She stated that so coldly, so simply and yet still with so much meaning, that it shot through Takagi, igniting a flame of anger. Anger he didn't usually feel. Frustration yes. Irritation, yes. Anger... no. He would never forget the expression on that ten-year olds face, in her eyes, one of pain, sadness and thoughts too old for a child her age.

"How can you say that!" he growled, his anger slipping from him in this short outburst before he reigned it in again.

"They like kids. "

These simple words cut through his restrained rage like a knife.

"What?" he croaked.

"They like kids that are smarter than others, more skilful. These kids, ones that the syndicates fancy, vanish. They aren't seen again, and if they are, they are cold blooded killers, monsters compared to how they were, how they were going to turn out. The stronger ones, like Edogawa-kun are broken first. And if he goes through that, then it will come out, and every one he could have told will be dead. "

That night lingered like a bad taste in his mouth, one that couldn't be washed away with tasteless tea. Looking back, he could see how ambiguous she had been with the relationship between Conan-kun and Kudo-kun. She'd gone on to explain her standing with the Syndicate, or at least an adapted version. She also laid out everything Kudo had later discovered. They even had the Bosses phone number for Christ's sake!

"If it makes you feel any better, as soon as he found it, he wanted to hand it over to the police, to you personally actually, but I talked him out of it. It was too dangerous. "

They were going to meet up two evenings on from that night to discuss options, what they could do. Meanwhile, he had gone back to work and tried to pretend as if a bombshell hadn't been dropped on him. He even went as far as to snap as Satou-chan when she'd asked him what was on his mind.

Haibara hadn't showed up. As discretely as he could, he made his way to the Professors house, right next to Kudo's which stood empty and ghostly next door. Uninhabited.

The door to the professor's house was ajar and the atmosphere held an air of unnatural chill. Wasn't that becoming the norm, he thought to himself dryly. Heart in mouth he slipped through the door to find the room beyond unnaturally still. Something stopped him from calling out, a sixth sense which told him that announcing his presence there wouldn't be the wisest course of action.

He saw a door on the other side of the room near a table complete with computer and messy notes. He walked through it and found himself at the top of a flight of stairs which ended at yet another door that seemed to emit ominous-ness. If that was even a word. Takagi padded down them and reached out to pull the door open, but the sound of a voice on the other side of the wood stopped him. There was a handy hole in the wood, made forcefully by the look of it and peered in at yet another scene that he wouldn't forget to add to his soon to grow collection.

Inside the room was a mini-lab, computer, chemicals, test tubes, the lot, but all within hand reach of a kid.

By the far wall he could see a large figure, wearing a coat which was once white but was now stained scarlet. Agasa's glasses were cracked and twisted, dangling from one ear, his eyes that lay behind them, usually twinkling with glee over some knew puzzle he'd developed were now glassy and empty.

The girl he'd been searching for was lying on the floor, propped up on one arm, hands bound, blood sliding from a cut across her cheek, almost like a tear. Her eyes were blurred, slightly watery but any emotions were being firmly kept back. Except two. Anger and defiance shone in them, directed at the man who stood as centre piece, the orchestrator of the whole picture. The man who stood amongst the carnage and revelled.

A part of Takagi told him to run from this man who emanated an aura to be feared. His eyes pierced the air, judging and deeming irrelevant everything but the pitiful, bound up girl before him who fearlessly stared back, meeting the man's gaze.

The man had long, silvery-blond hair, caught up in a hat, a sharp nose and a long black trench coat. Takagi could swear that he'd seen him before somewhere. The man's most dangerous accessory however, was pointed at little Haibara Ai.

His cruel mouth formed words while the gun never wavered from its target.

"I want you to die, Sherry, knowing that everything that happens is your fault. "

Sherry? Was he talking to Haibara-san? She said that the members of the Syndicate were labelled with alcoholic nicknames. Did that mean...?

"I want you to know that everyone you know, everyone you may have told, will die. I may play with a few first, like him. " The man's free hand gesticulated vaguely in Agasa-sans direction noncommittally. "We would have kept you alive, to experiment on, you understand. Your method of hiding on us was, interesting, I must say, but we got all we needed from that 'tantei' of yours. He was brave, I'll give him that. Never mentioned you or any other names. We'll push him a little further though, I think. Everyone breaks eventually. His suffering is also you're fault. "

Haibara-san stiffened at the mention of who could only be Conan-kun. Takagi felt ill, especially when he realised that his handy looking hole was made from a bullet. He looked at Agasa. It was obvious how much he'd suffered. They've had him for over a week, he thought, and he's still alive.

Haibara-san'd control broke.

"Gin, you bastard! No one knows anything! You don't need to harm anyone! They're all innocent!"

Gin stared at her for a moment.

"Oh well. " The words were soft, almost concerned. "Better safe than sorry. "

He pulled the trigger.

The force threw Haibara-san back, flipping her body so that her lifeless eyes bored into Takagi's startled ones, below the red hole in the centre of his forehead.

Takagi wanted to throw up. He wanted to burst in there and shoot the bastard. He wanted to shake Haibara-san and tell her to wake up. He wanted to stop this from happening. He wanted a lot of things, but good sense prevented him. For the most part. He pulled out his commissioned gun and planned to shoot Gin through the door. He was the next best shot next to Satou-san. He stopped when Gin spoke.

"Burn the place. It was a lab explosion. "

"Of course Aniki. " replied a deep voice as a stout man wearing similar black clothes and sunglasses stepped into Takagi's line of vision. Damn! He couldn't deal with both... He could try.

He angled his gun when...

"Don't be an absolute Baka!" scolded Haibara-san's voice in his head.

"Yeah!" Conan-kun's voice joined in, "Leave now, build up reinforcements. There's little you can do if you die now. "

He left.

There was no point calling the police, they wouldn't get there in time, and any moles would know what he saw. Instead, he watched the house as smoke started to rise, leaking from the windows and the two murderous shadows glided form the house and into the black Porsche idling on the curb. He noted down the number plate, all the while knowing the futility of the action. It was probably fake anyway.

Was he insane for imagining the 'kid's' voices, he thought four years later, moving his cup in a circular motion, watching the brown liquid swirl. It all happened quickly after that. He'd skived off work, staying in the station but avoiding his superiors and colleagues, working quickly with the materials and contacts at his disposal to create false passports for the Shounen Tantei Dan and their families. Four days later, he'd called the parents to meet him at a discreet cafe. He'd flicked the switch on that device Haibara-san had left for him then sat them down and told them what he could. That there was a case that their kids had stumbled on which proved dangerous. That they should take the passports and get the first plane out of the country. To pack while their kids were at school, pick them up and go straight to the airport as discretely as possible. No, don't contact the police. He didn't know who was in 'in-the-know. '

Yes, he had reasoned to himself, it may be suspicious for them all to vanish at once, but Gin was planning to kill them anyway, so if they could just get safe... His reasoning was sound. But he'd been outmanoeuvred.

Their plane went down in the West Pacific. They didn't even get over Asia. Engine trouble. Yeah right. Bomb most likely. No survivors.

He remembered the kid heist a week later. It'd clicked with him then that snipers had been shooting at Kid for a while, and Haibara-san had mentioned him in passing. He'd gone to the heist and been surprised to see Hattori Heji there. Looking dejectedly pissed off.

He'd found out about Conan and the rest of Shounen Tantei Dan and come to Tokyo with Aoko to help support Ran-chan, who was unable to contact her boyfriend Kudo Shinchi. He'd thought that Kudo-kun had gone even further under radar after the deaths of the mini-tantei. Oh, how naive he'd been.

He'd gone to the heist and had a better idea. He'd left, and seen Hattori-kun, obviously with the same plan. Takagi remembered how Hattori-san had had worked with Kudo-kun on that Highway Case and followed him. He figured that Hattori-kun would be better at figuring out where exactly they had to go better than him.

He wouldn't have had a chance to speak to Kid at the heist itself, so he'd planned to meet him afterwards. After Kid had left on his hang glider. Which had to go with the wind.

He'd vaguely remembered that Conan-kun had used a similar tactic. Often he would vanish before Kid left the heist scene then show up later with the stolen jewel. He'd remembered fondly the time that the tantei had caught Kid halfway up a building. Takagi, as an observer, had recognised the respect that the two had had for each other, watched it become a game between the two kids. He was more perceptive than most gave him credit for. Lot of good it did me, he berated himself, downing the rest of the bland tea.

He arrived on the rooftop soon after Hattori-kun and like him watched the building which was the stage for Kid's show. A puff of smoke, the shattering of glass followed by the white silhouette flying towards them. It became clear as the figure neared them that something was wrong.

It was listing slightly and losing height faster than it should. Part of him sighed with relief when Kid successfully cleared the low wall around the building's edge. Kid crumpled upon contact with the gravelly roof, quickly donning a black hooded cloak as he did so. Hattori-kun ran forward exclaiming in concern. Kid recoiled when he heard the crunching footsteps, but as he straightened, he grabbed his side and doubled over, hissing in pain.

Takagi ran out of his cover to Hattori-kuns side, who flashed him a glance before focusing on the more immediate problem. Takagi could see now the contrast between the white of Kid's suit and the crimson spreading like a blooming flower from the gash cutting up the fabric.

Before Kid could try to pull away again, Hattori-kun slung Kaitou's arm over his shoulder and nodded for Takagi to grasp his other shoulder.

"Come on, we gotta get yeh somewhere we can treat that. "

Kaito nodded, teeth gritted, he must have realised that this wound was too serious for him to deal with on his own, before he passed out.

He next came round in Takagi's flat; the one place that Takagi knew wasn't bugged, thanks to Haibara-sans handy device and frequent checks for suspicious persons watching his apartment.

Kid was able to sit up and help them treat his wound sitting up and raising his arm so that they could see the gash and bandage it efficiently.

It was an angry gouge, taken from along his ribs, you could see the red stained white of the bone underneath at the deepest point of the wound. What merited Takagi's interest was the menagerie of scars that lined the thief's body.

Thin and thick, raised and flat, short and long white lines crisscrossed his lithely muscled arms and defined torso. It had never occurred to Takagi how physically fit Kid must be, or how many times he'd been shot at. Tonight's bullet seemed to be the armour-piercing kind which rendered Kids bullet proof vest ineffective. Someone really wanted to kill the young man.

All this time, Kid had never removed his hat or trademark monocle.

"Yeh know we're not gonna arrest yeh. " Hattori-kun stated rather exasperatedly.

"This is the policeman's apartment is it not?" Kid asked with a weak shadow of his normal cocky grin on his lips.

"We, well, I just want to talk to you. "Takagi assured, "I've got bigger problems than a thief who returns what he's stolen. "

Kid's grin grew more real, "It's a shame other police don't see it that way... No. It wouldn't be anywhere near as fun. " He reached up to the brim of his hat, "Well, as is the deal, you have me; I can only prize you with my identity. " In a swift motion, he removed his hat and monocle, "It's a deal I had with mini-tantei, but you got there first"

Takagi's first thoughts were well expressed by Hattori-kun's exclamation.

"Jeez, yeh look just like Kudo-kun!"

And he did, the only differences Takagi could note was Kaito's hair which was messy while Kudo's was neat. It might have been the light, but his hair and eyes were a few shades darker as well.

Kid smiled a one-sided smile, "I know, it makes it so easy to impersonate him," He grew serious, "About mini-tantei-kun, where is he?" He was genuinely concerned.

Hattori-kun stiffened, "No one knows. "

"That's not entirely true. " Takagi murmured quietly, hoping that his suspicions were correct.

Both teens turned their eyes to him sharply.

"Wait! You know where he is, but you aren't getting him out!" Hattori-kun exclaimed in a louder-than-strictly-necessary volume. It clicked, "Unless... Him, along with the other kids..."

"Someone really wanted rid of them. " Kaitou Kid said into the heavy silence, eyes shaded, face set in stone.

Takagi thought of what Haibara had said, "We hope. "

Hattori-kun hit him. Hard.

"Yeh 'eartless...! How can you talk like that?"

"From what I've heard about Them, the people who got to him, it's the best we can hope for!"

Hattori-kun's eyes widened and he took a surprised step back, he knew which 'Them' he was referring to.

"Yeh know about Them?"

Takagi nodded, rising to his feet from where he'd been knocked down by Hattori-kun, resisting the urge to hold the injured area. Damn the kid hit hard.

"Haibara-san told me. "

"Them?" Kid was watching their interactions with a curiously blank expression. Poker Face. Waiting for his question to be answered.

"There's this Organisation..." Takagi started but Kid cut across him.

"Wearing black with weird codenames?"

"Yeah. " Takagi confirmed, not at all happy that his suspicions were ringing true.

Hattori-kun seemed to be thinking along the same lines as well, "Tell us what yeh know," he said, "And we'll tell yeh what we know. Trade o'information. "

Kaitou mulled this over for a moment, this thought processes flashing across his eyes, stirring through his well kept Poker Face.

He then began to tell a story, starting with the death of his father, the famous magician Kuroba Toichi, the discovery of his father's night job, a jewel known as Pandora and finally his nightly roams as Kid.

Suddenly Kid's actions made sense, why he stole and then returned his prize. It was also stupid. To bait those who would kill him. His scars testified to both his stupidity and how well he was able to avoid death.

"Snake?" Hattori-kun pondered, "I though' they were all alcohol based. "

"There's snake wine," supplied Takagi, "It's when they infuse snakes into the alcohol. The whole thing, scales and all. That might be what they're referring to. "

"Probably," Kid let disgust twist his features for a moment at the thought of such a drink while Hattori-kun shivered. Kid shrugged then realised why that wasn't the best idea as he winced, "Now, what do you know?"

Takagi took over, spelling out everything that Haibara-san had told him.

"I've been trying to get in touch with Kudo-kun, like Ran-chan, but no luck. "

"Yeh won't. " Hattori-kun said it so quietly, Takagi almost missed it.

"Sorry?" Hattori cleared his throat.

"Yeh won' get in touch with Kudo-kun. He vanished wi' Conan-kun. Yeh see, they're the same person. "

A moments silence greeted this statement.

"You don't seem surprised," Hattori-kun directed at Kaito Kuroba who began to shrug then decided against it.

"Figured it out. "

Takagi wasn't that accepting.

"How the hell did that happen? How is that even possible?"

"Yeah, that was one thing I didn't figure out. " Kuroba-kun regarded Hattori-kun with intent in his expression that one could only relate to Kid.

Hattori-kun's face was aggrieved, clearly remembering the young Tantei, "He saw somethin' he shouldn'. He got caught. Got 'imself fed an untested-on-humans poison. ATPX 1499-or summin' like that. Every time we saw Kudo after tha', it was when 'e took an antidote. "

"Or I impersonated him. " Kaito supplemented.

"There was an antidote?"

"Yeah, a temporary one, but Kudo-kun kept building up immunity, so Haibara-san had to keep designing new ones. "

"How could a girl do that?" He was being slow, wasn't he; he'd seen her lab himself.

"Haibara-san was in the same boat as Kudo," He continued over the astounded look that crossed over Takagi's face as another piece clicked into place, "She was the original creator of the poison. She took her own drug in a suicide attempt. "

"Sherry?"

"Yes, that was her name. "

Once all the stories were out in the open, they'd started to plan.

"I'm not willing to continue risking my mother's' or my friend's lives. That even includes Hakuba. " Kaito had grimaced. His plan had gone into action first. It's relatively difficult to fake one's death effectively. Unless you have a policeman on your side.

One day, on a school trip to the mountains, Kaito-kun was talking to Hakuba-kun when he slipped. Down the mountain. Takagi was a pretty masterful puppeteer he discovered, pulling strings from behind the scenes, making sure that his name stayed out of the investigation. At one point, to much internal cringing and moral debate, they even had his mother identify the body. To this day, Takagi thought that she knew it was a ruse. He had to say Kaito-kun was the loudest 'corpse' he'd ever worked with, complaining about the cold of the metal slab, making jibes about how blind the coroner must be, for not noticing Kaito-kun when Dr Gato walked in on him when he was preparing to his 'viewing'.

It was his way of coping, Takagi soon realised. He was more torn up than he'd ever let on. It probably wasn't healthy, but he attended his own funeral.

Kid's heists continued, but with a much more sombre air, what with the lack of Conan-kun. His disappearance had hit Japan hard. Everyone knew the kid as either Kogoro's little helper or as Kaitou Kid's nemesis. Some of the stuff tabloids were posting on it... Some had put that the lab explosion that 'killed' the Professor and Haibara-san, was because of a little girl's depression after losing her crush. She'd had a tantrum, messing with the Professors experiment, resulting in the explosion, killing them both. You'd think that people with half a brain would be able to see through that crap, but...

The Shounen Tantei Dan were known as 'one of the greatest losses of potential the law enforcement world had ever seen'.

Heji-kun estranged himself from his friends and family. He moved to Tokyo, telling his father that he needed space after the massive spat he'd started with Kazuha. He kept his new address from her and rejected her calls. But Takagi had found a box of letters Heji-kun had written to her regularly, apologising and explaining, telling her what he was up to, how much he missed her, and so much more.

Everyone had their own way of coping.

Kazuha-san's way had been spending time with Ran-chan, mourning together the loss of their Tanteis. Kazuha-chan had practically moved from Osaka to live with the Mouris.

Without Conan-kun to solve cases, Mouri's business had crashed. Truth be told, he'd stopped long before the general public noticed that the Sleeping Kogoro stopped making appearances in his deductions. With his daughter sad and his own distress over Conan-kuns vanishing (for he really did care for the kid) all the heart was taken out of his work.

Ran-chan had continued to try and contact Shinichi-kun and every time it failed, Kazuha-chan had been there to comfort her. It was lucky though, for Kazuha-chan, that she'd been out shopping when the bomb went off.

The bomb had been left in a shopping bag in Poirot's, it wasn't exactly hard, and it demolished the little cafe, along with the two floors above it.

"Please look at me Takagi-kun. " He looked up to see Satou-chan, hands on his desk, leaning forward to peer at him closely.

She looked at his face, probably taking in the bags and the redness of his eyes.

She sighed, "Come on. " Before he could say or do anything to the contrary, she'd grabbed his elbow and pulled him out into the corridor, near the snacks machine. She backed him against a wall and put a hand to his cheek.

Her fingers were cool and soft and he flinched. Part of him worried. The whole department had noticed him distancing himself from her. No one understood why, but nobody teased him. They seemed to realise the sensitive nature of his actions and left him to it. They didn't even make a move on Satou-chan. Miyamoto-san had ranted at him but had given up, extremely perturbed when all she got for her attempts to get the couple back together was a blank and un-Takagi-like stare.

It was all for her benefit, right?

"We all miss them Wataru-kun. " Satou-chan whispered, her usually cool eyes filling slightly.

Takagi looked at her in open shock. She had called him by his first name!

"It's not healthy, staying behind, not moving on. You taught me that. " Her searching eyes, trained on his own decided him. He had to tell her. She could help! How could she know to duck and cover if she didn't know she was being shot at?

"There's more to it than that. " He muttered, "Come to..." he was about to tell her where to meet him when a suspect, who was being taken to the cells, just a petty thief, passing the end of the corridor went berserk.

He elbowed one of his guards hard in the face and stamped on the instep of the other. Both of them temporarily crippled, he ran down the corridor towards Satou-chan and Takagi.

Satou-chan stepped forward, drawing her weapon at the same time as Takagi, but she was caught mid action as the bastard bowled her over, shoving her hard towards the snack machine. Takagi hit him in the face with the butt of his gun, felling him. Takagi proceeded to wrench the guys arm behind his back, pushing him to the floor, keeping him down with a knee in his back as officers swarmed around him, relieving Takagi of the prisoner.

Someone, Miyamoto-san, cried out and what Takagi saw next made his blood run cold and the floor drop out from beneath him.

Satou-chan was lying crumpled at the base of the snacks machine, face pallid, eyes closed. There was a smear of blood, starting from where her head had come into contact with the corner of the metal box, tracing her course as she'd slid down the machine to her, crumpled at its base.

He didn't hear or see anyone else as he ran over to her, crying out her name, Miwako-chan. He knelt by her side and could vaguely hear Shiratori-kun call an ambulance. The sensible, cold part of Takagi which had been growing in him since Conan-kun's disappearance stopped him from shaking her, holding her. Instead, he took her cool, slight fingers, which were hanging limply and felt heat rush through him when he found her pulse in her slim wrist.

He'd never found out if the escaped prisoner was a set up.

The hospital had been a sterile creepy place, full of bustling people going about their daily lives. Or deaths, as the case may be.

Satou-chan hadn't woken up. She'd been hooked up to life support, looking small and fragile for the next two years, when due to her wishes in such a situation, the life support was turned off.

People around him were falling like flies. He had to get out of there. He'd resigned and gone into hiding. Hattori-kun had followed. They'd continued to try and fight the syndicate from the shadows, but little came of it. Trails went cold; more, now faceless people died. He'd often sneak back into the stations to rifle through files. He knew that Megure knew, but the Inspector didn't try to stop him. Megure seemed to know that Takagi was involved with something big, and one day, once it was over, the Inspector wouldn't hesitate in accepting him back.

Takagi went to Satou-chan's funeral; Kaito helped him with his disguise. He had to stop himself crying when Shiratori-san spoke over her.

Shiratori-san had looked right at him while giving his speech, as did Megure.

They'd known who he was. Takagi didn't stick around. He'd disappeared amongst the trees without a word.

Takagi walked into his grimy living room, walking slowly over to the window. Did he blame Kudo-kun for keeping all those secrets to himself? Partly. But mainly, Takagi knew that, even if Conan-kun withholding information had been what led to today, he had only done it in an attempt to protect them all. Takagi had lived too much in the last four years to feel angry or vengeful. He just felt tired. If everything had gone to pot, maybe it was always supposed to. At least now there was a ray of hope. Just yesterday he'd found some key information which could help. He'd just set a meeting with his colleagues, Heji and Kaito. Now he had to wait.

Takagi moved a blind to peer out of the window. This was his final mistake.

A small . 22 calibre bullet made its way across the intervening street, through Takagi's window, into the target Takagi had unwillingly presented to the sniper. It hit his heart with deadly accuracy and flung his body back, a red stream trailing behind him. He fell onto the grim, tea-stained carpet to be found by his ex-co-workers ten minutes later, when the police were called to the disturbance.

A top the building, across the way, the sniper packed away his gun into an innocent looking rucksack. It was just another target dispatched by the Syndicates most skilled assassin, Cauim. It didn't even matter to the fourteen year old that it was someone he knew, that kind of care had been beaten, drugged and tortured out of him years ago.

The assassin who used to be, but was now just a shell of, Edogawa Conan smiled.

A/N Read, review, tell me what you think. Please. Open to both thoughts and criticism.