Disclaimer: I don't own DCMK.


The Show Goes On

7: The Door in the Mountain

Shinichi woke with a groan. His head throbbed. Had he hit his head? The last thing he remembered was looking down from the walking cabin's front porch at the confrontation between Kaito and the thing that he assumed was the King's messenger. Had he fallen off the porch and hit his head or something?

Wait, back up. The King's messenger!

Shinichi shot bolt upright. He regretted it immediately as the world spun. He clutched at his head and whimpered in pain.

Strong arms wrapped around him, pulling him back against a solid and familiar warmth. He would have known who it was even if he hadn't had his new and improved sense of smell. He relaxed. Kaito was here and unhurt. So, whatever had happened, it had turned out at least partially all right.

"Where are we?" he rasped, grimacing at the dryness in his throat. "What happened?"

"We're in the cabin," the magician's voice replied as a calloused hand rubbed soothing circles on Shinichi's back. "We reached the river a few hours ago, and we've been following it ever since. Not much change in the scenery so far."

"And the messenger?"

"I drove it and its little shadow army off with one of my best flash bombs, but my guess is that they'll be back."

Shinichi sighed. That wasn't good news. On the bright side, it wasn't much of a surprise. "Did I fall off the porch?"

Kaito let out a quiet snort. "No. Tantei-san hit you with a hairdryer."

At that, Shinichi's brows wrinkled. "What? Why?"

Kaito was silent for a long moment. When he did speak, it was in the grimmest tone Shinichi had heard him use since they'd arrived in this dreadful place. "Apparently, you tried to strangle him."

Shinichi felt himself go cold. "What?"

"His theory is that you were possessed." The magician's hold tightened around his partner. "Do you remember anything?"

"I… The last thing I remember is watching you talk to that shadow," he said haltingly. It was hard to think through the pain in his head. "Then I…I could hear music…"

"Music?" Kaito prompted. "What kind of music?"

"I don't know. It…it wasn't clear. It was more like an echo at first, but then it got louder and…" He shook his head. "That's all I can remember. It might have been a flute though."

Indigo eyes narrowed above Shinichi's head. "I see. The messenger did have a flute with it. It was the only solid thing about the creature, now that I think about it. Perhaps it's a Pied Piper sort of thing, using music to control the shadow beasts."

"But if it could control people too, why didn't it just capture all of us that way?" Shinichi asked. He was beginning to feel a little sick, and it wasn't because of the throbbing in his head. He had actually attacked one of his colleagues? He could have actually hurt someone. Maybe worse—

He gagged, curling further in on himself.

"It wasn't your fault," Kaito said, correctly interpreting Shinichi's suddenly ashen face and distressed expression. "And the twit is perfectly fine. Now that we know about this, we should be able to keep the situation under control. Keep our losses to a minimum and all that."

Shinichi let his breath out in a long exhale that was half hopeful relief and half despairing dread. Why? Why had the flute player's music only affected him?

"Maybe the music only works on non-human animals," he murmured. "If it works on flesh and blood non-humans then I guess I would be the only one he could use."

"I thought of that," Kaito said. "But the creature could also just have a sick sense of humor."

"Could you make me a pair of ear plugs?" Shinichi asked hopefully, cracking open one eye to peer up at the magician. The taller man only shook his head, shattering Shinichi's hopes for a simple solution. "Ear plugs only work so well for humans, and I don't know how you'd plug a dog's ears. But now that we know it's possible, you should be able to tell us it's happening, and we can help you resist it. Or we could tie you up when you start hearing it."

"The way you say it, it sounds like a joke," Shinichi mumbled, his voice coming out rather muffled because he had his face buried against Kaito's chest.

Kaito chuckled, though his eyes remained dead serious. "Rest assured, I am being perfectly serious. I won't let them hurt you."

X

None of them were sure exactly how much later it was that the mountain appeared before them. It was difficult to keep track of time in this endless, unchanging night. Frankly, time seemed all but irrelevant here. But back to the mountain.

They had seen a hint of it for a while now as a strip of blackness over the trees where no stars shone. As they drew closer, the river they had been following spread and deepened until it became a vast, black lake nestled in the foothills. On the far side of the lake, a thin, white waterfall cascaded down the face of a cliff whose top they couldn't even see.

"Looks like a good place for a break," Hattori said, peering out across the mirror smooth waters. They could see a good distance in every direction from the shore.

"We will also need to come up with a new plan of action," Hakuba said. "There is no more river to follow."

They debated for a while before deciding that none of them wanted to risk lighting a campfire right now. That meant no hot food. Then again, they did have a lot of fresh pastry to eat before it went stale. There was actually something rather homely about sitting around the hotel room's small table, munching on pastries and talking. Of course, there weren't enough chairs, so they had had to pull the table over to where some of them could sit at the foot of a bed. And Akiyama's current appearance added a certain…quirk to the picture that made it feel just a little bit off. But the electric lights were bright, and the room was warm, and there was nothing beyond the window right now but an empty blackness broken only by the gleam of the moon in still water.

"So, uh, you feeling better?" Hattori asked, studying Shinichi carefully.

The blue-eyed detective frowned, nibbling on his pastry. "I don't know how to answer that. I don't think I feel anything strange, but considering there isn't anything normal about this situation, there's nothing with which to draw the comparison."

"Well, in your case, you should warn us if you hear anything new," Hakuba replied dryly.

Shinichi's face paled a little and his shoulders went stiff, but he didn't say anything. He only nodded and continued to eat. Kaito shot the blonde a nasty look when the others weren't looking.

Oblivious to the tensions thrumming in the air, Akiyama turned to Kaito. "Do you like this pastry then? It's the first one you've eaten."

"It is," Kaito agreed, his tone neutral. "It is quite well made. We will certainly have to thank Nikko if we ever see him again."

"That one's the apple pastry, right?" Hattori leaned over for a look then nodded. "I thought that one was good too, but sort of way too sweet."

A frown flitted briefly across the magician's face before it smoothed into his customary laid back grin. "I thought it was a little bit too bland myself, but I guess I'm just not in the mood for apple pastry."

"What, you in the mood for sucking blood from young women or something?" Hattori said jokingly. "I mean, you are a vampire now. Maybe that's why you haven't had much appetite."

"Hattori," Shinichi said warningly, casting a worried look in Kaito's direction. The magician had risen from his seat and was now standing by the hotel room window, looking out over the lake.

The scarecrow detective only laughed. "Come on. I was just kidding. You should expect that kind of stuff when you come dressed as a vampire if you ask me."

"I think he means that your tactlessness may very well be taken as more than just a joke in our current situation. Kuroba, you may have noticed, has not eaten much of anything since our groups joined up. As far as we are aware, he has only eaten a little bit of pastry here and there."

"And he told me that everything tastes kind of bland," Shinichi murmured unhappily. "And eating doesn't affect if or when he feels hungry."

Akiyama shivered. "Do you…do you think that, when he gets hungry, he'll want…"

"Isn't that the million dollar question," Hattori muttered, letting out a low whistle and shaking his head. "I don't know about you guys, but I seriously hope it doesn't come to that. All this is strange enough without having to add that kind of weird."

"But if it does happen," Hakuba persisted. "We should have a plan. As you have undoubtedly all noticed by now, he has a great deal more physical strength than the rest of us combined right now, not to mention all his usual bags of tricks. If he starts to crave blood like vampires do in books and movies, we will be at a great disadvantage."

"But, I mean, Kuroba wouldn't kill us," Hattori reasoned. "He's not that kind of guy."

Rather than saying anything, Hakuba directed Hattori and Akiyama's attentions to where Shinichi had joined Kaito by the window. The magician's hand was running absent fingers through Shinichi's hair. The smaller boy was leaning into Kaito's touch. But what caught all their eyes was the tail wagging happily this way and that: all a cheerful swish, swish, swish.

"I doubt he is doing that on purpose," Hakuba said.

Hattori snickered. "Definitely not."

Hakuba ignored him. "We are looking here at proof that these bodies we now have can and do affect us. Their instincts, such as the urge to wag your tail, and other such animal inclinations may very well be creeping into our minds and altering the way we think and feel as we speak."

"Dude, seriously, it's not that big a deal. We're all still us. None of us have changed much in the personality department. So we might need to poke a few holes in our clothes or whatever. We can deal with that. A little shape changing didn't stop Kudo before, so I don't see how it should stop any of us now."

Hakuba turned to frown at Hattori. "What was that you said about Kudo?"

"Huh? What did I say?"

"You said that a little shape changing didn't stop him before," Akiyama said helpfully—or unhelpfully, depending on the point of view. "Has he encountered this sort of situation before? That would be wonderful! He might have answers about how to fix ourselves then if he thought about it."

"Er, no, that's not what I meant…" Hattori trailed off, biting his tongue. He just knew that, if he said any more, he was going to end up saying a lot of things that he would later regret. Fortunately, he was saved by the sound of Shinichi's voice.

"Something's in the lake."

Everyone in the room froze. Kaito tensed most of all.

"What is it?" Hakuba asked. He edged around the table and moved to join the detective and the thief at the window.

"Over there." Shinichi pointed. And there it was. It was a ripple in the glassy surface of the water. They wouldn't have seen it at all if not for the distortions it caused in the moon's reflected face. Then something sharp and black began to rise from the shimmering moon in the water. It rose higher and higher until they could see that it was a crown of six horns. The horns were sprouting from a reptilian head attached to the end of a very, very long neck.

"I think it's a variant of the Loch Ness Monster," Shinichi said after a moment's consideration.

Kaito relaxed. "Good."

Akiyama, who was flattened against the wall so that nothing looking in through the window would be able to see him, shuddered. "What's good about that? Just look at it! It could reach all the way over here if it wanted to and swallow us, cabin and all!"

"I don't know. It doesn't look that big to me," Heiji said critically. "Besides, it's got no reason to want to try and eat our cabin, even if it does have chicken legs."

They all watched as that long neck with its spiky, saurian head glided through the water, leaving long, black and silver ripples in its wake. Then, just as slowly and silently as it had appeared, the creature sank back beneath the lake's surface. In moments, even the water had stilled, leaving no sign at all that the beast had been there.

"No fishing for us, I think," Hattori said under his breath.

Akiyama slid to the ground with a clatter. "This place is absolutely dreadful," he said with feeling.

Shinichi turned away from the window, though he remained where he stood next to Kaito. "Well, now that everyone's done eating, we should go over what we're going to do now."

Hakuba and Hattori resumed their seats at the table. They were joined shortly by Akiyama. The mood in the room took a turn for the somber.

"We still have to try to find the others," Hattori said, breaking the silence. "If we're here, Ran and Kazuha should be too."

"Perhaps, or perhaps not," Hakuba replied, frowning. He drummed his fingers on the table as he thought. "Their room was on a different floor. I've been thinking. If, as Shinichi has suggested, this forest is the same forest that our floor was decorated to be then it isn't impossible that only the residents on our floor were brought here."

"So you mean this world could be just our floor of the hotel and not the entire hotel itself," Hattori summarized. "Yeah, I guess that's a possibility. But we have no proof that this world is entirely dark forest, if you know what I mean."

The blond detective turned to Shinichi. "Didn't the foxes give us a map?"

"Not a very good one," Shinichi admitted. "All it really tells us is that there's a castle where this Ghost King lives and its somewhat relative position in regards to the Court of Stars and another castle that probably belongs to the Queen they told us about."

"No geological features then."

"None."

"It might help if we knew what the themes of the other floors were," Akiyama suggested. "Otherwise, we wouldn't even know if we found them."

"Our floor was the dark forest," Kaito said, leaning against the wall beside the window with his arms folded. "I believe there was a floor decked out as a mad scientist's lab, and there should also have been a graveyard."

Akiyama shivered. "I'm glad my room wasn't on that floor.

"Does anyone remember any of the other themes?" Shinichi asked, glancing from one young not-man to the next.

"There must have been at least one haunted house or witch's lair type thing," Hattori said, frowning. The floors weren't all single-themed, and a lot of the big ballrooms and lobbies had themes too. There was a sort of devil's garden type place, if I remember correctly, and a haunted mine, and there might even have been a sort of cave of wonders themed room. I saw it when I was exploring the convention the other day."

"So, in conclusion, there should be a lot more out there than just black forest," Kaito drawled. "If this world is our hotel. The real question is, how will we find any of these places? Or have they become other worlds as well?"

"All we can do is travel around and ask people," the Osakan pointed out. He sighed, tugging distractedly at his hair. "Man, I shouldn't have invited Kazuha to the convention."

"Think about it this way," Hakuba said dryly. "If she too has become her costume, you won't have anything to worry about."'

"What's that supposed to—oh, uh, I guess I see your point."

"What are you talking about?" Akiyama asked, curious. "These friends of yours. What were their costumes?"

Heiji grinned while Hakuba just rolled his eyes. "You'll find out eventually."

Shinichi cleared his throat loudly. "We can't forget about the other guests from the convention either." He produced a small notebook and pen that he had found amidst the foxes' eclectic horde. He opened it and slid both items over to Hattori. "I've started a list of the attendees Kaito and I saw and what they were dressed as. Please add anyone you can think of. If the person is already on the list and you agree that the costume is correct then place a check mark next to it. If you think we have the wrong costume then put a question mark and write down what you think it should be."

Hattori nodded and began to write. When he was done, he passed the notebook on to Akiyama.

"Good thinking," Kaito said. "We should all try to memorize the list as well. Then we can organize as we search. And they can be our eyes and ears when we need them. Wherever and whatever this place is, we don't want anyone getting left behind by accident when we bust ourselves out."

"And that will involve elaborating on our own map," Shinichi concluded. "I have some preliminary sketches on the last page in that notebook. You guys should check to see if you can add anything. Once we have a better grasp of exactly what this world is like, its geology and components, maybe we'll find out how we got here and how to leave."

"So the end goal is to get everyone—including the other party guests we have not yet acquainted ourselves with, out of here and back home."

"I kind of thought that was obvious," Hattori said then laughed. "So we're all on the same page after all."

"We will need a hotel map as well," Shinichi continued, eyes narrowed in thought. "If we can match the two maps up, we might actually be able to find a front door. Or at least the way back to the ballroom. I have the feeling that that's where we're going to find our answers."

There was another long silence as everyone mulled this over. The notebook was returned to Shinichi, who tucked it safely back in his pocket. This time, it was Akiyama who spoke first.

"So does this mean we're just going to go wandering around the world now, looking for our friends and drawing maps?"

"Without any clear destination, that's all we can do," the blue-eyed detective replied.

Hakuba let out a resigned sigh. "I fear that we are going to be living in this world like this for a very long time to come."

"Don't jinx us," Hattori grumbled, but there wasn't any bite to it. He was having that exact same feeling.

"One of you, turn off the lights."

Everyone in the room turned to Kaito with varying degrees of surprise. The magician had had his gaze fixed on the view outside the window throughout the conversation. Shinichi had assumed he was keeping watch.

"Hurry up," Kaito snapped, losing his patients.

The bite in his voice had Hattori currying to do as he was told. The cabin lights went dark.

For a moment, none of them could see anything. Then, gradually, the starlight outside drew the window to their attention.

It was because he was still standing beside Kaito with the magician's arm wrapped loosely around his waist that Shinichi saw it first. The darkness into which Kaito had been staring with such intensity was not, in fact, pure darkness after all.

The solid blackness that they had all assumed was the face of a massive cliff—the very cliff down which that towering waterfall cascaded. There was a light there.

It was a faint, bluish light that was so dim it might have been called another shade of darkness. But it was definitely paler than the darkness around it. And, if they looked closely, they could see that it was shaped like an arch. An arch of light in the black expanse of the mountainside.

"Could that be a door?" Hattori asked, voice so low that the others could barely hear him.

"If it is," Hakuba replied just as quietly. "Then it must have been built for giants."

Akiyama let out a strained laugh.

"Do you think we could reach it?" Shinichi wondered aloud, squinting through the darkness in a vain attempt to make out more of the opposite shore. Improved night vision or not, it was impossible to really see anything from this distance.

"We'll have to get closer if we want to check it out," Hattori said. "A few of us can stay here while the others circle the lake."

"No. We take the cabin with us," Kaito said in a tone that forbad argument. "We can't afford to lose it. It also has the longest legs out of all of us. It can cover more ground more quickly if we have to run."

"But this thing's too big to approach undetected," the Osakan detective argued anyway. "We already know this place ain't friendly. We don't need to draw unnecessary attention to ourselves when we can avoid it. Right, Kudo?"

Shinichi frowned. "I agree with Kaito. We have no idea what kinds of creatures are out there. That means we can't assume they haven't already noticed we're here. More than anything else right now, we have to stick together."

"I guess you have a point…"

"I shall tell the cabin to begin following the shore," said Hakuba. He moved towards the door. Yelling directions to the cabin was a fairly effective method of steering, but they had found that speaking regularly while standing by the front door worked just as well. None of them were entirely sure why. Soon, they could all feel the cabin begin to walk again.

Akiyama groaned. If he'd had hair, he might have been pulling on it. "Do we really have to go investigate it? What if it's filled with more monsters?"

"If we're lucky, those monsters will be our fellow party guests," Kaito replied.

"And if they're not?"

"Then we may have to fight them."

The skeleton groaned again. "I feel so useless! I mean, what can I do? You guys all have these new abilities, and I can't even hold a cup without using both hands because it'll slip. I'm only going to get in everyone's way."

Hattori leaned over to whisper into Shinichi's ear. "I've been meaning ta ask you, who is this guy? He's a real pessimist."

"He was one of the guest magicians at the convention," Shinichi explained. "He specialized in working with animals. I think he's just having a hard time adjusting to his new shape."

"Guess I can't blame him. But still. He's being a real downer."

"Akiyama."

Pausing in the midst of his lamentation, Akiyama looked up to find Kaito looming over him.

Akiyama gulped. "Yes?"

Kaito grinned at him. And, right now, Kaito's grins tended to be a bit pointy and not very reassuring. "Come on," the vampire magician said, grabbing Akiyama by one bony arm. "I've got just the thing for you. We're going to make you our secret weapon."

"Secret…weapon?" Akiyama squeaked, trying and failing to pull away. "Wha—what do you mean?"

"You'll know shortly."

In a last ditch attempt to escape his fate, the skeleton magician turned to Shinichi. "What is he talking about?" he asked, half desperate and half scared. He was dealing with mad people after all.

Shinichi only shook his head. "Just go along with it. If you don't, he'll make it worse for you. Trust me."

Now feeling very un-reassured, the skeleton let Kaito haul him up into the cabin's attic.

Seated on the bed below, sipping contentedly from a mug of fresh coffee, Shinichi listened as thumps, thuds, crashes, and cries seeped through the ceiling overhead. Sometimes he could hear laughter. That was Kaito. Other times, he heard whimpering and the occasional shriek. Those, he knew, were Akiyama. But it didn't sound too bad, so it was probably okay.

When Kaito and Akiyama returned to the main room, the skeleton had undergone an astounding transformation.

For one, just looking at him, no one would have thought that he was really just bones right now. Kaito had draped a long coat over the skeleton and filled it out with all sorts of paraphernalia that he wouldn't explain just yet (though, judging by the way Akiyama seemed afraid to make big movements, some of it must be volatile). Because of the wrapping and stuffing, Akiyama now looked, from a distance, like a regular human being. Until you saw his face anyway. It was partially hidden under a hat and wig, but you couldn't really use make up to give a skull a face of any kind.

"And now he'll be our secret weapon if we do have to fight," Kaito said to Shinichi, that wicked gleam in his eyes that had sent hundreds of police officers running in the past.

"You mean you turned Akiyama-san into your personal traveling supply kit," Shinichi said dryly. "It kind of feels like you're exploiting him."

Kaito waved him away with a laugh. "Exploiting is such a sinister word. I just gave him some stuff he can use if we do end up having to deal with real enemies. And the padding might do him some good. Wouldn't want him breaking any bones, right?"

Shinichi only sighed again and drank the rest of his coffee.

The lake was much larger than they had thought. It took their cabin almost sixteen hours to walk halfway around the perimeter.

Left with nothing else to do, most of them had opted to nap or, in Kaito's case, go over his equipment and supplies. He did this on the bed he and Shinichi had shared earlier. The detective was napping on his other side, half curled up around a pillow. Every now and then, Kaito would reach back to run his fingers through Shinichi's hair or finger one furry ear. They really were like velvet.

Gradually, the roar of the waterfall grew louder and louder. They knew they had arrived when the thunder of the water grew so loud that they could barely hear themselves speak.

Together, they climbed down out of the cabin, though Akiyama stayed on the porch to act as a lookout.

The shore here was hard and slick with water. The waterfall sent sheets of white spray over their faces and churned the black lake waters into a roiling mess of foam and freezing liquid.

The "door" they had thought they had seen was, in fact, a door-shaped cavern mouth. It towered so tall that even the walking cabin looked small in comparison. It opened out of the mountainside right beside the waterfall at the top of a zigzagging path of broad, flat plateaus and jagged rocks. Like the steps of giants.

The bluish glow that had first caught Kaito's attention was coming from somewhere much deeper in the mountain. They couldn't see the source from outside. All they knew was that the air in the cave was suffused with a pale, phosphorescent light that shimmered blue and white as frost and electricity.

"Should we go in?" Shinichi asked, peering up at that yawning maw.

"It's not like we got anything better to do," Hattori replied. He was already sick and tired of the slow, uncertain pace of this journey. He was ready for some action.

"Inside it is then," Hakuba muttered, though he didn't sound entirely pleased. "I recommend we brace ourselves. The cabin is going to have to jump to get up there."

They climbed back up into the cabin. Each of them grabbed a hold of something stationary. Then the floor beneath them heaved upward as the cabin leapt. They all landed with a jolt as the cabin set foot on the highest and final ledge just outside the massive, cavern mouth.

"Well," Hattori said then stopped.

"Getting cold feet?" Kaito drawled.

"Nah, just…wondering, that's all. You know, if there's really gonna be people in there."

"We won't find out by standing here," Hakuba replied dryly. "Let's just get this over with."

And so the cabin, along with all five of its occupants, lurched forward and began to walk, slow and steady, deeper and deeper into the fluorescent cave. Akiyama was thinking of giants and what they might have to do if they were forced to fight one. Hakuba was wondering what it was about this place that made him expect the worst. Maybe it was the company. Hattori had high hopes for stumbling into another piece of the real hotel. After all, that light looked like it could be electrically generated. Maybe they'd find the kitchen this time. Shinichi was trying to identify the faint humming sound he could hear and praying that they found everyone else before anyone got themselves hurt—or worse. As for Kaito, well, he had opted not to speculate. Instead, he watched and waited, ready to react to whatever might roar up out of the depths of the mountain.


TBC