"Yo, Kudo, what'd that girl have to say about what's goin' on?" Heiji asked me as soon as I walked in.
Conan hasn't shown up yet, I guess that means Ran is out, I replied, "She thought it was funny, but we still don't have any way to fix this."
"At least you won't have to worry about your identity being exposed,"Heiji said with an odd tone, "Since that Conan honestly thinks that's who he really is."
"No... There's a problem..." I started, but I wondered if I should really say anything about Conan's suspicions.
"A problem? What happened?"
Right, if Conan slips up or tells Ran about his suspicions then it'll be the end of everything. I can't communicate with Conan, but if I warn Heiji he can at least be more careful not to slip up, maybe he'll even be able to clear Conan's suspicions somehow. Though it's too early to just tell Conan everything, he wouldn't believe it...
"Conan has begun to think that you, Haibara, and I (Shinichi) are all involved in some kind of secret..."
"hmm? What would give him that Idea?" Heiji asked.
"It's because you keep calling him 'Kudo'," I said in a flat tone.
"It's an accident!" Heiji objected, "and it's not like we can do anything to throw off his suspicions."
"and what if he goes up to Ran like 'Shinichi-niichan and Heiji-niichan are up to something, but they're being mean and they won't tell me what they're doing!'" I suggested, "Then she beats you up because she wants to know what we're doing, she'd probably even tell Kazuha that we're up to no good."
Heiji gave a weak laugh, "That's pretty realistic..."
As luck would have it, at that time Ran came home causing Conan and I to switch.
...
A-re-re? That's weird... I don't remember falling asleep, why am I home now?
Ran-neechan's back home from school... how long was I sleeping for? Oh well, I think my colds all better.
Before they do anything sketchy I should tell Ran-neechan about the Shinichi-neechan/Heiji-niichan/Haibara conspiracy... there are probably other people involved too but it seems pretty important so she defiantly needs to know about it...
Wait...! Heiji-niichan is here too, he must've finished solving that mystery, and he probably realized I'm suspicious so he's sticking around to watch me... It's only the three of us here, what should I do? If I try and tell Ran-neechan about the suspicious thing then Heiji-niichan will probably stop me...
"Welcome home Ran-neechan," I said. I've gotta act casual, if I'm to suspicious then Heiji-niichan will realize I'm up to something and make up a lie to cover for himself as usual.
"Oh, hello Conan," she said, smiling.
"Heiji-niichan, did you solve that case you were talking about?"
"hm, uh yeah I solved it pretty quickly," Heiji-niichan answered.
"Ne ne, Heiji-niichan," I said trying to act normal, "let's go over there, so you can tell me all about it."
Heiji-niichan was confused, but I didn't think he'd answer me if I asked where Ran-neechan could hear, he'd probably just make up a lie and weasel his way out of it.
"What are you up to?"
"Wha- what are ya talking about, Conan?" Heiji-niichan replied with a somewhat panicked tone.
"Don't think I didn't notice! You're always calling me 'Kudo' by mistake, and earlier Haibara did too, so you, Haibara, and Shinichi-niichan are up to something right? You wouldn't be keeping it a secret if it weren't bad... So what is it?"
Heiji seemed to think about what to say for a moment.
"If I tell ya the truth will you promise not ta tell Ran?"
I didn't hesitate to answer, "No. I'll tell her if you're doing something bad."
"Kudo is in a very dangerous situation, and you, me, that cold girl, and the professor are helping him. Ya see he was shrunk when some suspicious people gave him a poison that was supposed to kill him and now he looks just like you the professor made him a bunch of gadgets to help him solve cases and you've been helping him by letting him pretend to be you so he could get away from the bad guys," Heiji-niichan explained, "but Kudo doesn't want Ran to know because she'd worry about him, so while the squinty girl works on making an antidote for the poison he's keeping his identity a secret. We actually already told ya about all this, because it's important for you to know that someone's going around using your name and face... But I guess ya must have gotten a bit of amnesia from that hit ya took in that last case and forgotten all about it."
"Really? That's so cool!" I said loudly. To think, I was really involved in such an awesome operation! I'm like a spy! I have a doppelganger! Oooohhhh Shinichi-niichan can go to school for me and no one would notice!
"Um... yeah and also those glasses are set up so that Kudo can hear anything you hear and see anything you see," He added like it was an afterthought , "I think there's also a receiver so you can talk to him."
'That's right'
Whoa it really is true! I can hear Shinichi-niichan, it's almost like he's talking in my head! So cool!
...
Well, I guess it isn't completely a lie. I'm a bit surprised Heiji was able to come up with something like that so quickly. But Conan might get suspicious again if he doesn't ever get to see me in person... hopefully we'll fix all this before that happens.
Conan now seems to be able to hear some of my thoughts if I'm 'thinking' at him, under the assumption that it's the mike on his glasses that he's hearing me through. That's pretty convenient, but I'll have to make sure I don't reply to his thoughts, of course he'll only ever reply to me out loud so we'll need to be careful not to be overheard. It might would have just been easier to reveal to him the truth that he's not real... but for now this will be safer, I'll explain that to him later.
Kogoro came back home in time to eat dinner with the rest of us, though it was clear he had been drinking. After dinner Heiji and I were able to talk (in private) for a while, he decided that he'd stick around for a while to keep an eye on Conan, we told Ran that it was for detective training and we told Conan it was to help fix his amnesia. I also made sure to send a text to Haibara to fill in the details on the lie Heiji had told Conan, so she would be able to act accordingly.
With that, everything should have been cleared up, if only for the moment. Still, I couldn't shake the feeling that something disastrous was going to happen soon, I tried to just brush it off; I'm just paranoid, maybe Haibara's starting to rub off on me.
A day or two passed with nothing too strange happening. It would have been fine if things had just continued peacefully like that, of course things couldn't be that simple. I'll probably never live a simple life. Because I'm a detective.
If only Conan didn't get involved in a case, everything would have been fine.
