AN: I will fully admit to grinning like a fool while I was writing the tail end of this chapter. It was a fun part to write, so I hope it's an equally fun part to read! At any rate, the third chapter is here! Please don't forget to leave a review if you can, I'd really appreciate it!
The Bells Chime Beyond
Chapter Three
Kamikakushi
"Conan-kun, did you find anything?" Ran and Kazuha made their way carefully off of the boat, following behind the child and the fox, leaving Naoki behind to watch it. As their feet sank slightly into the mud of the river bank, they followed the small footprints that Conan had left behind. "Conan-kun!"
"I'm here, Ran-neechan!" Conan called out, carefully wriggling his way out of the small cave. There was no way that Heiji could have fit inside of here, he thought. It was possible that his cap had been blown in here by the wind. "Look," he said once he was out, holding up the cap. "I found Heiji-niichan's cap."
"It really is." Ran's voice nearly caught in her throat, almost feeling her heart sink. "What is it doing here?"
"Maybe Heiji was here?" Kazuha ventured, kneeling down in front of Conan and carefully taking the cap from him, attempting to knock more mud off of it. "Where did you find it, Conan-kun?"
"I didn't find it by myself." Conan shook his head, glancing over towards the fox, who was now making it's way out of the cave. "This fellow found it for me. It was inside of that small cave."
"There's no way Hattori-kun would have been able to fit in there." Ran observed, checking it out herself. As if to test it out, she attempted to worm her way through the opening- but quickly pulled back once she realized that forcing it would just wind up with her being stuck. "How did it get in there, then?"
"Maybe the wind blew it inside?" Conan offered. "Or there's a bigger opening somewhere else."
"I'm sure it doesn't mean anything bad has happened to Hattori-kun, Kazuha-chan." Ran was quick to say, getting back to her feet again, trying in vain to wipe some of the mud off of her pants. They were all going to need a good bath after this. "He's probably still alright."
"Yeah, I know." Nodding her head, Kazuha held the cap close to herself, ignoring the way the mud stained her blouse. "I'll go ask Yamahara-san if he knows anything about this cave. Conan-kun, do you think you could check it out more for us?"
"Yeah." He was planning on doing that anyways, even if nobody asked him to. Casting an eye towards the fox, who had been watching him this whole time, Conan couldn't help but frown. A dead body was one thing, but how did this fox know to show this to him? And that expression on it's face just earlier...
No, no. Shaking his head, he instantly put the thought he was heading towards out of his mind. There was no way something that absurd could be possible.
He missed the way the fox rolled his eyes at him again, grumbling lowly to itself as it stalked back towards the cave ahead of him.
"Be careful, Conan-kun. If it looks dangerous, come right back." Ran advised him, kneeling down by the mouth of the cave.
"I will, Ran-neechan." Flashing his best childlike smile at her, Conan quickly crawled back into the cave's opening again, letting the shine of his wristwatch flashlight guide the way. He could see the fox just ahead of him, waiting for him with a slightly impatient looking swish of it's tail.
"There's no reason to get angry at me. I can't move as easily in here as you can." Conan found himself saying. The fox seemed to accept this explanation, and carefully made it's way ahead of the boy, stopping periodically to check to see if he was still following behind him.
Blessedly, the cave seemed to expand as they continued inside, and eventually Conan was able to safely stand up inside of it. The mud from the riverbank gave way to hard rock, making it less slippery going as well. Shining his wristwatch flashlight above him, he noticed that the ceiling of the cave had indeed gotten a lot higher- maybe there really was a bigger entrance into it somewhere around here.
"How is it, Conan-kun?" He could hear Ran's voice call from outside of the cave, reverberating around on the inside of it.
"It's gotten bigger!" He called back. "I'll check it out some more, there might be something here!"
He wasn't exactly certain what he expected to find. If Heiji's hat really was here, then was it possible Heiji himself was somewhere in this cave after all? It had been at least five or six days now since he had disappeared- if he'd been stuck here without food or water the entire time, things weren't looking that good.
Shining the wristwatch flashlight on the floor, Conan carefully made his way through the cave, following after the fox's guidance. It certainly seemed to be trying to lead him somewhere, at least, and the not-child could only hope that that somewhere wasn't besides Heiji's corpse.
"Huh?" Conan blinked, lowering his wristwatch slightly, realizing that there seemed to be another light source coming from somewhere deep inside the cave. A faint sound also drifted into his ears, although he couldn't quite tell what it was at the moment. Frowning, he carefully made his way towards the light source. He could make out the silhouette of something illuminated by it in the distance, but like the sound, it was too difficult to tell what it was at the moment.
The sound he identified first- it was the sound of bells. Using his wristwatch to illuminate the walls of the cave, he noticed that there seemed to be tiny bells fixed onto the ends of ribbons, their color faded over the years. The ribbons themselves seemed to be nailed onto the walls.
There was also the sound of footsteps- not human ones, he quickly noted, but rather, the sound of claws clacking against the stone floor of the cave. It was the same sound that the fox ahead of him made as it walked, but Conan knew that it was most likely there were other foxes lingering about in the cave. None of them seemed very interested in paying him any mind, at least.
He had a sneaking suspicion now as to what the object ahead of him might be.
As the light source illuminated the cave ahead of him, Conan switched off his wristwatch flashlight, allowing himself to be guided by the light of what turned out to be candles. That in and itself he found curious- if there were candles around here, there had to be someone who came here to both light and replace them. But who could it be? And where, exactly, did they come from in the first place?
After all, the cave seemed to be coming to a dead end here, and there was no other entrance in sight. It would have to be someone awfully small to worm their way through the same entrance he'd come through.
But, he supposed, looking at the shrine in front of him- at least he'd managed to solve the mystery of the missing second shrine. And considering the location of the cave, he had a sneaking suspicion that perhaps he was directly underneath the first shrine to Grandmother Fox. Briefly glancing at the curious brown fox that had perched itself on a rock next to the shrine, Conan made his way towards it.
The shrine itself appeared to be well cared for, if not more worn than the one above ground. He couldn't help but wonder about the logic of placing it here in the first place- but perhaps the land had merely shifted over generations, resulting in it's current location. It would also explain why nobody seemed to be able to find it.
Conan decided to take this chance to study the shrine in detail. While the one aboveground had a stone carving of a fox, the carving placed on this shrine appeared to be that of a young woman, with fox-like features. Curious to see if there were any more signs of Heiji lying around here, he decided to begin investigating.
What caught his eye first wasn't any kind of trace of his missing friend, but rather an peculiar stone. Unlike the others that surrounded the shrine, that appeared to be natural formations of the cave, this one appeared to be perfectly round- as if it had been made that way by human hands. Curious, he carefully rolled it aside- only to flinch as he began to hear some kind of grinding sound, something he quickly recognized as some kind of hidden mechanisms beginning to work.
The fox neatly leapt off of it's rock, coming to sit next to Conan, as they both watched as a hole opened up in the wall in front of them. Conan felt his breath catch in his throat as began to process the sight before him, another mystery finally clicking into place.
Not only was there a hidden room in these walls, but it was a hidden room that was filled with riches. Gold pieces, glimmering emeralds, and brilliant rubies of various sizes all filled Conan's vision, and he quickly realized just why the mayor and his cohorts were probably so eager to make Fox Mountain their own.
They were probably searching for this.
Glancing down towards the fox by his side, the animal returned his gaze, seeming to motion with his head towards the treasure. Carefully reaching out a hand, Conan plucked out a single gold piece, before rolling the stone back into place, causing the secret entrance to close once more.
The gold piece he would show to Ritsuko later, and no one else, he thought, tucking it back into jacket. If word of this got out, all hell would probably break loose. If there was anyone who knew something about this, it would be the priestess herself.
"Is this what you wanted to show me?" Conan found himself asking the fox, watching as it again flashed a grin that was too familiar for the pint sized detective's comfort. Narrowing his eyes, he carefully assessed the animal in front of him, for the briefest of moments allowing himself to consider that impossible theory of his- before he shook his head, putting it out of his thoughts again.
Sure, he'd been shrunk down to the size of a grade school student. But there was no way- absolutely no way- that a human being could turn into a fox.
The brown fox by his side could only make the most exasperated expression it's canine features allowed it.
"Dad, good timing!" Ran greeted Kogoro as he came through the entrance to the shrine keeper's house. "I was just about to call you to come back."
"Is something wrong, Ran?" Kogoro observed, taking note of the fact that his daughter had apparently donned a hakama. "What's with the outfit? I thought you were going with that brat and that Osakan brat's friend to look for him."
"I was. My clothes got all muddy though, so I bored this from Ritsuko-san." Ran told him, lifting up an edge of the fabric. She'd loaned another spare hakama to Kazuha, and had spent awhile digging through her wardrobe before she found a large sleeping shirt to lend to Conan while his clothes were washed- his were the muddiest of anyone's. Somehow or another Kazuha had been able to give the fox a bath, something which it had been strangely meek throughout. "Everyone's gathering in the living room. Conan-kun said he has something he wants to tell everyone."
"Did he find that Osakan kid?" Kogoro asked, leaving his shoes at the entrance, before heading into the house proper.
"No." Ran said, shaking her head. "Although we did find a trace of him at least. But I can't really say if it's good news or bad news."
"That's rather vague." Kogoro noted, following his daughter into the living room. Already gathered there were Conan, Kazuha, Ritsuko, and Takahiro, and the two latecomers quickly took whatever seat was available to them. "So? Ran here says you found something, Conan."
"I did." Conan nodded his head. "First things first, we found Heiji-niichan's cap." He told him, looking over towards the hat in question. Kazuha had cleaned it of any mud, and had placed it on the table. After his bath, the fox had all but retreated underneath the cap, only it's head poking out from underneath it. It appeared to be sleeping, not paying any mind to those gathered around the table, at least for the moment.
"But not it's owner, I take it." Kogoro observed. He sort of understood what Ran had meant earlier- it was hard to tell if finding his cap on it's own was good news or bad news indeed.
"And also, I think I figured out the real reason why that mayor is so interested in Fox Mountain in the first place." Conan said, before placing the gold piece that he'd found on top of the table. "Ritsuko-neechan, do you know anything about this?"
"This is!" Ritsuko's eyes lit up, picking it up from the table and showing it to Takahiro. "Where did you find something like this, Conan-kun? Takahiro, you don't think this could be...?"
"Yeah." Nodding his head, Takahiro took the piece in his hands, studying it himself. "At least that's what I would think myself."
"Oi, is that really gold?" Kogoro asked. Takahiro passed it over towards the man, who turned it over in his hands, before turning towards Conan. "Where exactly did you manage to dig up something like this, Conan?"
"Like I said, on Fox Mountain." Conan told them. "At the very back of the cave where we found Heiji-niichan's cap, there was a small shrine."
"Then does that mean you found the second shrine, Conan-kun?" Ritsuko asked, an expression of wonder gracing her features- even more so than when she'd been shown the gold piece. "That's amazing, Conan-kun!"
"Yeah, I did." Conan nodded his head, finally taking the gold piece back from Kogoro and placing it on the table. "So, can you two tell me? You both seem to have an idea about what this gold piece is."
"I thought it was just a legend." Ritsuko confessed after a moment, still looking a little bewildered. "It was long rumored that at one of Grandmother Fox's shrines was a large stockpile of her treasure that she'd accumulated over the many years of her life. According to the legend, when something bad happened in the village, she'd send out a fox with a piece of the treasure to help the villagers. But I didn't think it would actually be real..."
"It's really real." Conan nodded his head. "Or at the very least, the fact that there's a huge treasure hidden by one of the shrines is true. There was a lot more besides just this."
"I see." Takahiro's eyes narrowed, his brow furrowing in thought. "With that kind of money, the mayor and his supporters could probably do anything they wanted."
"So they wanted to obtain ownership of Fox Mountain so they could search for it without any hindrances." Kogoro finished, folding his arms in front of his chest. "Using the story of wanting to open a ski resort on it as a cover up. It's certainly true that a big treasure would probably make people more willing to do horrible things."
"Hey, do you think maybe Hattori-kun found out about this?" Ran asked, glancing over towards her father. "And that Morioka-san, whose body we found in the mountains, him too."
"It's possible." Kogoro nodded his head. "Especially in the case of Morioka-san- if he found about either the treasure or the fact that the mayor was searching for it, they might have killed him to keep him quiet. They probably left the body where it was because they originally thought nobody would find it. Where did you find this, Conan-kun?"
"In a cave." Conan told him. "But I don't think anyone who wasn't around my size could get inside of it in the first place."
"It's true." Ran nodded her head. "I tried to go in through the entrance myself, but I couldn't."
"But if they're willing to kill someone to cover up the fact that they're searching for it, doesn't it sound like they're pretty sure it exists?" Kazuha asked, glancing over towards Ritsuko. "Do you have any idea why, Ritsuko-san?"
"No." Ritsuko shook her head. "Even I thought it was just a legend, after all. I'm not sure why they'd be so convinced."
"Takahiro-niisan seems to know something!" Conan piped up, quickly gauging the expression on the man's face. "Don't you?"
"Eh?" Takahiro blinked, before finally heaving a sigh. "Yeah. I do at least have some idea." Turning to Ritsuko, he placed a hand over her own. "You probably don't remember yourself, Ritsuko, but when you were found in the forest, you were apparently carrying a sizeable emerald on you."
"Eh? I was?" Ritsuko blinked, visibly shocked by this information. "I don't remember that at all! Why didn't grandfather tell me?"
"He didn't want you to think he'd taken you in just because of that." Takahiro told her.
"What happened to that emerald?" Kogoro asked. He wasn't surprised to hear about the fact that Ritsuko had been adopted- he'd gathered that much while speaking with people in the village.
"It's long gone." Takahiro told him. "He sold it in order to afford raising Ritsuko in the first place."
"Now that you mention it, I did always wonder how he managed to send me to such an expensive school for high school. He paid for the apartment I lived when I was there too." Ritsuko frowned. "He always told me that he had a secret savings stash when I asked about it... I didn't know it was from something like that."
"Do you remember where you might have gotten it from in the first place, Ritsuko-oneechan?" Conan asked. He couldn't help but find it more than a little curious that she would have such a thing. Granted, as a child she would have been the perfect size to fit through the mouth of the cave, but it would have been hard to reach without a boat.
"No." Ritsuko shook her head. "I don't remember anything from before grandfather found me. No matter how hard I tried, I never could recall anything. Sorry, Conan-kun."
"It's likely that the mayor heard about this from someone, and decided that this meant the treasure was real." Kogoro said after a moment. "That's probably when he started sending threatening letters to your grandfather- or at least, someone who works with him did. He probably suspected the old man knew where the treasure was hidden himself."
If that was the case, it's possible that Ritsuko's grandfather was cornered by his killer, and was pressured for information. When they figured out he didn't know anything, that was probably was when they killed him, Conan thought to himself. Now things were beginning to add up- at least in terms of motive. It was too early to say how directly involved the mayor was in all of this business, though, but Conan had a suspicion that he knew something, at least.
"Oh, that's right, dad. Did you find out anything about Hattori-kun when you were out?" Ran asked, her gaze briefly lingering on the boy's cap before she turned back to her father. The fox's ears seemed to perk up at the change of topic, and it let out a silent yawn, peering over towards Kogoro as well.
"No." Kogoro shook his head. "I asked around quite a bit to see if anyone had seen any traces of him since the night he disappeared, but it didn't appear that anyone had. Well, there were plenty of silly stories though."
"Silly stories?" Ran asked, blinking. "Like what?"
"Something about him being taken away by foxes, or whatever." Kogoro said, scoffing at the mere idea of it. "Probably some kind of version of being spirited away, more than likely. I doubt it."
"Taken away by the foxes, huh..." Kazuha mumbled to herself, flushing a little when all eyes fell on her- she probably hadn't meant to say that out loud. "E-exactly what does that entail, Ritsuko-san?"
"It's true that we do have legends like that, but our stories don't really work like that." Ritsuko told them, shaking her head. "All of our village's legends about being taken away by foxes involve innocent people being saved from bad situations by Grandmother Fox. There's also cases of her giving those breathing their dying breaths the chance to live again. In every case, the person taken away by foxes usually becomes a fox themselves. But the fox legends here don't involve any stories about the foxes taking away anyone just because."
It was the way Kazuha's gaze flickered briefly over towards the brown fox at those words that caught Conan's attention the most. He couldn't help but let his gaze shift towards it himself, realizing with a slight start that the fox was staring at him again.
No, no, no. There was no way. There was definitely no way. No matter how Heiji-like the fox could seem at times, there was no way the fox was somehow actually Hattori Heiji. No, no, no.
The fox almost seemed to grumble, working it's way out from underneath the cap, walking across the table to sit in front of Kazuha. With a slight smile, she reached over to lightly pet it's head, before frowning, looking up and glancing over towards Conan. Realizing that the young boy had caught her looking, she quickly looked away from him again, focusing once more on the fox in front of her.
What was that about?
At the end of the day, they had little more than speculation to go off of- nothing that they could actually accuse the mayor or any of his men of. If they played their cards wrong, even, it was possible that they might learn that the legendary treasure apparently wasn't a legend after all, and that wouldn't be good.
The top priority at the moment was to gather more information, and to find evidence.
And, of course, to find the still missing Hattori Heiji.
With his clothes having finally dried off, Conan tugged them on, feeling a little more comfortable to not just be wearing an oversized shirt. Ran had already come to take her clothes off the line, but he couldn't help but notice that Kazuha's were still hanging there, in spite of being rather dry as well. Recalling that she had gone out for a walk, he figured she probably didn't know yet, and decided he'd go find her and tell her.
Speaking of the Osakan girl though, Conan couldn't help but notice that her worries about Heiji's disappearance had all but vanished. Naturally, that struck him as strange- had she perhaps come in contact with him somewhere while in the village, and just hadn't told anyone yet? It was possible that Heiji was hiding somewhere around here, after all, but why he'd ask Kazuha to keep this a total secret was something he couldn't understand.
Maybe the best plan would just be to ask her about it directly.
Tucking on his shoes and leaving the house, Conan glanced around, wondering what direction Kazuha had gone in. It would probably be better if he didn't stray too far into the forest, he thought- he didn't want to risk getting lost.
"All I'm saying is, if you want him to know, you should just tell him yourself."
Wasn't that Kazuha's voice? Conan perked up at the sound of it, trying to figure out where exactly it was coming from. Creeping silently in that direction, he peered around a corner of the house, to find Kazuha sitting on the porch. For a moment he suspected she was on her cellphone, but he didn't see any trace of it in either of her hands.
Then, who was she talking to? The only other thing around was the brown fox that was sitting in her lap.
"What do you mean, you want him to find out about it on his own?" Kazuha arched a brow, moving to scratch below the fox's chin. It shook off her affections, shooting her a dirty look. "If you do something like that, idiot, he's never going to figure it out. He's just a kid, and besides, he doesn't believe in stuff like this in the first place."
What was she talking about? Conan frowned, growing more curious by the second. Was she talking to the fox? No, no, it sounded like she was having a proper conversation with someone. The thought that she was having a proper conversation with the fox was something that stubbornly rushed to come into his mind.
"You're so stubborn about the weirdest things." Kazuha said with a sigh. "But alright. I won't say anything if you don't want me to. But it'll be a problem if-" She blinked, frowning a little as she suddenly cut her own words short. "What do you mean, someone's listening?"
Scooping up the fox in her arms, Kazuha got up, peering around the other side of the porch. "Geez, what are you talking about, Heiji? Nobody's even here. Are you sure those big ears of yours are really any good, idiot?"
"Oh, Conan-kun. Is something wrong?" Ran frowned, taking notice of her young ward just inside the entryway of the house. "Your face is pale."
"N-no, it's nothing, Ran-neechan." Conan shook his head, letting out a deep breath. The moment he'd gotten even a hint of the fact that Kazuha suspected someone else was there, he'd made the fastest dash in his life for the door, and had barely made it in time to avoid being caught spying.
In retrospect, he wasn't entirely certain why he'd run away from Kazuha, of all people. At worst she probably would have chided him lightly for eavesdropping- but given the strangeness of her conversation with seemingly nobody, he had ended up acting purely out of instinct.
What had that been about? Clearly Kazuha had been speaking with someone, but nobody had been around, and she wasn't on her cellphone either. That only left...
The fox.
No. No, no, no, no.
There was no way. Definitely no way. A human being turning into a fox? It wasn't possible, scientifically speaking. If something like that were to happen, it would have to be the work of magic, and there was no such thing as real magic. What was he even considering?
There was just no way!
But then again, the legend about the hidden treasure had turned out to be true. No, no. That could still be explained logically. This? This couldn't.
Still, if he were to accept the possibility that such magic might actually exist, then things did start to make some sense. The way that fox reminded him of Heiji, the way Kazuha had ceased to be worried about her childhood friend from the moment she'd met the fox, the fact that Heiji's scars and the fox's scars matched up...
"Oh, it's Conan-kun!" Kazuha said, opening up the front door, peering down at him. The fox was walking by her side, his ears perking up as he looked over Conan's way. "Ah, you're back to your own clothes now- does that mean they're dry?"
"Y-yes, Kazuha-neechan." Conan stammered slightly, slowly nodding his head.
"Oh, that's great! I'll go get changed, then!" Kazuha said, quickly taking off her shoes and hurrying towards where her clothes had been left to dry. As she hurried off, Conan found himself locking eyes with the fox that had been left behind, finding the animal once again staring rather intensely at him.
"You. Are you..." He began, before quickly shutting his mouth, turning away from the fox. No. There had to be a more logical explanation for everything. Holmes might have said that once you eliminated the impossible, whatever remained must have been the truth- but it honestly felt a lot more like he was eliminating the possible and keeping the impossible right now.
Once again, the fox let out a silent sigh, looking at the not-child with impatient eyes.
Oi, Kudo. Wake up already.
"Hattori?" Conan blinked awake, slowly drifting out of his slumber. For a moment, it took him a second to remember where he was, before it all quickly came back to him. Staring up at the ceiling of the room he was sharing with Kogoro, he groaned, trying to figure out what the weight pressing down on his chest was.
Oh, of course.
The brown fox was sitting on his chest, staring down at him, a familiar grin on it's face that was visible even in the darkness of the room. Groaning a little, Conan rested his head back down on the pillow, wondering if the fox would just go away if he ignored it.
Instead, the fox grumbled, giving the boy a good smack with one of it's paws. Realizing that it had no intention of leaving him alone to go back to sleep, Conan grumbled himself, pushing himself up into a sitting position. Neatly jumping off of his chest as he did so, the fox trotted over to where Conan had placed his glasses, and dropped them in his lap, his tail wagging slightly behind him- and an excited gleam in it's eyes that Conan already knew too well from someone else.
Now that the impossible idea had implanted itself in Conan's head, he was having a hard time denying the similarities between Heiji and the fox before him. Of course, it was possible he was only imagining them because of the absurd idea that he had, but at the same time, that alone didn't explain everything.
"What do you want now?" Conan asked, keeping his voice to a low whisper so as to not wake Kogoro up. Groaning a little as the fox perked up and scurried over towards the door, pushing it further open with one paw, he realized that once again, the animal wanted Conan to follow him.
"Alright, alright. Just give me a second." Conan mumbled, fumbling to change his clothes in the dark, before grabbing his glasses and putting them on. Carefully, he followed the fox outside of the house, only pausing to put his shoes on. By the light of his wristwatch flashlight, he followed the fox down the shrine's steps.
This was, he thought, probably one of the more ridiculous things he'd done in his seventeen years of life. Following a strange fox (that might possibly somehow also be his best friend, as much as he didn't want to admit that) down an unfamiliar road in an unfamiliar village in the middle of the night? He was definitely never going to tell Ai about this particular adventure, that was for sure.
"What are you trying to show me anyways?" Conan asked dryly, letting out a loud yawn. The fox glanced back at him, only giving him a grin and an excited swish of his tail in answer to his question, before it continued down the road. "Right then. Not sure why I expected an answer."
Still, he kept following the fox. It had lead him not only to a corpse, but a huge piece of the mystery. Putting aside whether or not it could possibly be Hattori Heiji, the animal hadn't lead him wrong yet.
He followed behind the fox in silence for what seemed to be several minutes, before it suddenly came to a stop, dashing into the nearby bushes. Taking this as his cue to be the same, Conan ducked into them as well, quickly switching off his wristwatch flashlight, and letting his eyes adjust to the darkness. Before long, he could hear the sound of voices coming up the road- two of which, he thought were rather familiar to him.
The mayor and the police chief, Conan thought, narrowing his eyes. His gaze briefly flickered to the fox, whose attention was now fully focused on the approaching people.
"Has no one found the boy's body yet?" He heard the mayor say, a certain hush to his tone. "It's imperative that we find it and collect it before anyone else does. How exactly does a well known high school detective come to the village, and none of you recognize him?"
It didn't take a genius to realize that they were talking about Heiji.
"As long as the villagers believe that foolish notion of him being spirited away, that works to our advantage." He heard another person whose voice he didn't know speak up. "The same can't be said about that detective, Mouri Kogoro, though. He's really trouble. If by any chance he finds the body before us..."
"It won't happen." Ueda spoke up now. "We've been combing the entire river for any signs of that detective boy, but we haven't turned up a single thing. Are you certain he's dead, Imamura?"
"I saw him fall into the river, the same as Watanabe." The man, apparently named Imamura spoke up. "There's no way anyone could have survived that."
Oi, oi. Conan felt the color drain from his face as he listened to the men's conversation. If he recalled correctly, Watanabe was the last name of the man whose corpse had washed up on the bank of the river, just before they had arrived here. If that was the case, did he really have something to do with Heiji's disappearance?
And why were they talking like Heiji was already dead? That couldn't possibly be true! He couldn't possibly be... it couldn't be.
"Have that detective and those kids hanging around him noticed anything yet, Ueda?" The mayor asked. "It'll be trouble for us if they do. There's only so far we can stretch accidental deaths before things start looking fishy. Thanks to Watanabe's screw up, we're in enough trouble already."
"I don't believe so." Ueda shook his head. "At least not to my knowledge. I'll make sure my officers keep an eye on them. Of course, I haven't told them the reasons why."
"Good. Keep it that way." The mayor instructed him. "If all goes well, the four of us will be rich beyond our wildest dreams- but before that, we have to do something about that bothersome priestess."
"If it's in regards to that," The man whose voice and name Conan didn't know finally spoke up again. "I do have an idea. A big finishing act worthy of a fox priestess."
"Oh?" The mayor spoke, and the hint of amusement in his voice was more than enough to make Conan's gut churn. "That's reassuring news indeed. I look forward to it."
At that point, the men's voices started trailing off, and Conan realized they'd gotten too far away for him to hear them properly. Getting down on his hands and knees, he silently crawled behind them, trying to stay within earshot. If they were discussing what they thought they were discussing, then he definitely needed to hear this.
"As you should, Mayor! But have no fear, it'll completely look like an unfortunate accident." The man reassured him. "On the last night of the festival-"
Snap.
Conan had to bite back an urge to use every swear word he knew, at the sound of the twig breaking underneath his knee caught the attention of the men. He could already hear them mumbling, trying to determine if someone was there- before the fox that had been following along behind him sprung into action, leaping out of the bushes. Glancing up at the group of men, it raised up a paw to scratch behind one of it's ears.
"What, it's just a fox." The mayor said, letting out a deep sigh of relief. "That give me a start."
Conan didn't let out the breath he was holding until after the men were well out of earshot. It would be too risky to continue following them after that close call. Falling back down on the forest floor, he took in and let out a deep breath, calming his racing heart somewhat. These men were definitely ready to kill if someone found them out, he thought.
And by the sounds of it, they'd already...
Closing his eyes, Conan tried to beat back the tide of negativity rising up inside of him. Was it really possible that Heiji could have really been killed? Were they too late? A wave of guilt surged through his small body, broken only by the faint sound of rustling as the brown fox rejoined him, peering down at the not-child's face.
Opening his eyes and turning his head so that he locked eyes with the brown fox, Conan's eyes narrowed, studying the too familiar blue eyes of the fox. Blue, he thought, was a strange color for a fox.
Pushing himself up to a sitting position, he picked up the fox, placing it in his lap. The animal didn't seem to protest, instead seeming to look at him with no small amount of anticipation. Compared to the prospect of Heiji being dead, the idea of him somehow, however absurd, being turned into a fox like the legends, was considerably more appealing.
"What are you thinking, Kudo." Conan finally said to himself, scratching his head. "There's no way it could be possible."
As he watched the fox's face fall, it's expression changing to one of apparent irritation, the fox jumped backwards off of his lap. Twitching it's tail in an apparent show of anger, the fox seemed to grumble to itself- before it seemed to come to some kind of decision. Using it's tail to sweep away the leaves on the ground, it produced a single claw out of it's paw, and began to scratch it against the forest floor. Once finished, it tapped the ground below it's writing, giving the pint sized detective a rather intense gaze.
"What?" Conan grumbled, not liking the feeling of being bossed around by an animal. Still, he lit up his wristwatch flashlight, curious as to what it was the animal was doing. No sooner than he did, he found his eyes going straight back to the fox's face, watching as it's expression changed again to that familiar grin.
Written in the ground was a single character- which, unmistakably, read as idiot.
Opening and closing his mouth, Conan for a moment, found himself rendered completely speechless. That... this? It couldn't be. There was no way.
But-
"...Hattori?"
If watching the amazingly familiar way in which the fox perked up at his words wasn't enough to momentarily stop all of the gears in the Detective of the East's brain, then what happened next definitely did the trick.
Because before his eyes, something happened that there was no way he could explain with logic or science- in an instant, the brown fox in front of him almost seemed to vanish into smoke. The tendrils of smoke shifted and gathered together in the air, leaving behind someone that had become infinitely familiar to Conan over the course of the past several months, an unmistakable grin on the face of the dark skinned boy that all but floated in front of him. A fox mask was worn askew on the side of his head, the last tendrils of smoke curling around his form to finish forming the black and red kimono he was clad in, one that somewhat lazily hung off his shoulders, as if he were not the least bit bothered by the chill of the night air. Around his neck hung an unmistakable omamori, one that was part of a pair.
The distant sound of bells chimed in Conan's ears, invoking in him a brief image of the hidden shrine, all lit up by candles.
The mouth of the dark skinned apparition floating in front of him might not have moved, but there was no mistaking the voice that Conan heard in his head, ringing out loud and clear.
It took ya long enough, Kudo! Some great detective ya are, honestly!
On some subconscious level, some part of the tiny detective that didn't want to be caught stunned into speechlessness by Hattori Heiji of all people, a voice bubbled up to the surface. The next thing out of his mouth, perhaps, was arguably one of the stupidest things he'd ever asked in his entire life.
"...do you know you have a tail, Hattori?"