"why are you documenting your drug use under the subtitle drigss ive been on: mild to wild?" I my friend asks.

"Writing," I respond. She nods.

"You could've at least spelled 'drugs' right," she replies, and for lack of anything else to do I nod as well.

xXx

Alright. First order of business: clothes. Second order of business: am I really human again or am I just that high?

Though Shinichi was still wobbly and his chest contracted painfully when he sat up, sneaking from the upstairs bathroom he passed out in and into the next room was fairly easy. As long as he resisted the weird equivalency of stealth to prowling on all fours and ignored the swirliness of his vision, he'd be fine.

The shirt was a little big, but hey— it worked. He relished wiggling his fingers around working the buttons into place.

"I missed hands so much," Shinichi whispered to the room, running his hands on the wall reverently. It was not too hard to deduce that he was still very-much-buzzed from the catnip.

Still, there was a case to solve, odd swirls and shapes dancing in his vision be damned.

xXx

Shinichi stumbled into the room, head spinning, chest aching, and hallucinating the floor feeling like pudding. He leaned against the wall with a bit of a huff.

Shinichi's simple "he's wrong," was more than enough to announce himself.

He was a mess, sweaty all over, but Ran still darted up to him an enveloped him in a hug. He relished wrapping his arms— arms! Not legs!— around her in return, taking a moment to wheeze as his chest constricted again.

Heiji watched on smugly.

"I knew you'd come, and I knew she was your girl," he hummed, fiddling cockily with his hat. Shinichi studied him for a long time.

"You're a good detective, but you got the case wrong," he repeated bluntly, not having the sophisticated thought process needed to beat around the bush, nor to react to the cockiness—Shinichi had a one track mind and only room enough for one single track. Heiji startled.

"What? How do you even know?!"

Shinichi was sober enough that he knew 'the walls told me' would definitely not cut it, even if that's what his mind perceived it as. "I heard it through the walls on my way in," he said, hazarding his best guess at what actually happened.

"Why didn't you come in right away?" Heiji barked, suspicious.

Again, Shinichi could definitely recognize that 'I was watching the carpet patterns move around' was another unacceptable answer, and settled on "I felt sick all of a sudden, and had to sit down."

"Should you even be here?" Ran piped up from her position of Shinichi's leaning post. "You seem like you're super sick," she continued softly, putting a hand over the one Shinichi clenched over his heart.

"There's a case to solve," he explained grandly, pushing away. Shinichi walked gracelessly through the spinning abyss that had become the room over to the door, a twirling smear of brown.

He opened the door for a few seconds, then his blue eyes blew wide, and he opened and closed it a few times, much to the confusion of Ran and Hattori.

"I missed this so much," he whispered under his breath.

"I take back my stuff about you not having a spine, Kudo— go get some rest. We can do this competition… another time. I'd feel bad about fighting someone so clearly, well, trashed— especially when I already hold the answers."

"That's only 'cus you're trash," Shinichi barked cockily back, laughing madly for a moment as though he had made the best joke. His face flashed back to seriousness, thoughts jumping back to the single burning goal of the case. "There is no competition! That doesn't matter! What matters is getting the right person and exposing the truth!"

"What matters is you getting home and not dying on your feet!" Ran interrupted before Heiji could say anything.

Shinichi opened the one last time door with a final glare, and tripped into the room. He righted himself defiantly, proud for maintaining a standing position. As they followed, Ran gave Heiji an exasperated look, and he put his hands up.

"Heiji was close— but not quite on the mark. To create this purrfect crime," Shinichi paused for a moment, laughing and clearly high to the confusion of the rest of the group. When he recovered, he continued, laying out the case in grim detail and harshly pointing out Heiji's flaws.

xXx

"How could you leave and just lurk about? You never ask me how I'm doing—"

"That's because I just can tell, Ran. I'm a detective."

Shinichi doubled into a coughing fit, and Ran dashed off to fetch a doctor.

xXx

"Kudo…" Heiji started, looking at the slumped form of his supposed rival— or at least, according to his own fantasies. Kudo apparently had no sorf of interest in rivalries, though he obviously had an interest in dying. Only that could explain why the guy was here looking to be seconds from collapsing or coughing his lungs out. On seeing that pitiful sight, Heiji's words died in his throat.

Shinichi knew what to say anyways, despite being sick and completely drugged out of his mind.

"You're a good detective," he repeated from before, hoarsely. "Just… like I said. The competition doesn't matter. Being a detective… it's all about seeing past all that deceptive tripe and uncovering the truth after all those layers. Justice and truth matter. Not… who's better."

"One truth prevails," Heiji huffed Kudo's catchphrase resignedly, placing a hand on his shoulder. "And the truth is, I think you are wasted," he revealed, attempting to lighten the mood. Under Heiji's hand, Shinichi tensed.

"No," he denied— too fast. "I just, I, it's… not that. I'm just sick."

"I think you're sick and buzzed."

"No," Shinichi said again, but couldn't come up with anything to deny it with.

"You opened and closed the door six times," Heiji started. Alright, that alone was weird, but not enough— "you also kept talking about how great having hands was, as well as being on two feet" —yeah ok but it was hard NOT to! Have YOU ever had to walk on all fours for a month? I didn't think so, Heiji— "you kept making these weird jokes— I think they were related to cats"—yeah ok those were awful and shouldn't have been made; in defense, though, the catnip made him blurt whatever popped into his head and made every idea seem like the best thing— "and lastly, you kept staring off into space and looking at things that, well, didn't seem to exist." Yeah, ok, there MAY have been some… weird shapes that kept… chirping and obscuring things. You try not to pay loud and obnoxiously colored abstract shapes any attention when they float into YOUR view!

"I might've mixed medicines I shouldn't have," Shinichi admitted,

"Makes sense. I couldn't smell anythin' on ya, or match up the symptoms with anything."

Shinichi laughed and then clamped on his spasming heart once more.

"Your girl's right, you know. You shoulda stayed away, you're in no condition to be here."

"You sound old," Shinichi said bluntly, waving his hand dismissively while also attempting to get rid of a particularly loud pink triangle nosing into his view. He rested his head against the bookshelf, feeling another wave of pain roll over. "It's almost time," he sighed to himself. "Too bad I can't tell her more while I can actually talk… Guess it was too much to ask for permanence."

Heiji cocked his head at Shinichi's low voice, barely able to catch his words. He gave an eloquent, "huh?" while Shinichi gathered in breath.

Before Heiji could do anything at all, Shinichi bolted, and quickly made himself scarce.

xXx

There was a lanky black cat near what appeared to be Shinichi's discarded clothes and in the direction of his agonized scream. Everyone disregarded this— when Shinichi became sober and conscious enough to make a call, he explained that he had an "emergency case" that required him immediately. That put all thoughts of the cat on the backburner, since nobody could come up with a reason it or the clothes lay there.

xXx

OH GOD OH NO I WATCHED THE DUB OF THIS EP SO I COULD MORE EASILY SKIP AROUND AND GOD

I AM CORRUPTED

I WROTE "RAN" AS "RACHEL"

ITS TOO LATE FOR ME. RUN. RUN WHILE YOU CAN