Disclaimer: "Detective Conan" belongs to Gosho Aoyama, and "Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon" belongs to Naoko Takeuchi.

This is an alternative story to my other fanfic "Encounter in Venice" and one of the possibilities of what could have happened if Ai had taken the antidote before Shinichi brought down the Organization.

Thanks a lot to my friends and betas Rae (Astarael00) and SN1987a and the Aicoholics on LiveJournal, without whom I would never have started this fic.

FS

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Ghost at Twilight

(edited version)

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As if he could see…

As if he could see the air thickening around our table, Furuhata Motoki obligingly hurries to the scene of trouble to salvage the situation with his tried and true weapons: assiduous, undivided attention, broad winsome smiles, and friendly words.

Is everything all right with your lunch? You haven't touched anything!—he casts a mournful glance at the almost untouched plate of fish on the table.

The food is great. I force the corners of my lips upwards into a bright smile. We're just not hungry at all.

"I've got an idea," he cheerfully suggests. "Since you haven't visited us for so long, your order is on the house. But I won't let you go before you've ordered something else because I can't allow you to leave this restaurant hungry!"

It makes sense that Furuhata-san's pride wouldn't allow him to let his customers pay for a meal they haven't enjoyed. And yet my pride doesn't allow me to accept his offer when the food is excellent and the service impeccable.

"Everything is absolutely perfect," I assure him. "I'm only less hungry than I thought since I had a late breakfast only two hours ago."

What a pity! Despite being a big eater, he can't enjoy lunch after a late breakfast either, Furuhata-san commiserates, turning his attention to Kudo. "You haven't touched your food either—but I see you've had a late breakfast, too," he pleasantly adds with a glance at Kudo's full bowl, his already wide smile broadening as he registers Kudo's crumpled shirt and my dishevelled appearance.

Evidently, Kudo is still struggling to digest the news that I've spent a night with the culprit of a previous case (the one he had to give up out of all cases!), as he distractedly—and thoughtlessly—clarifies that, no, he didn't have breakfast at all, much to my dismay.

"I'm sorry. I must've misunderstood… Since you both haven't touched your food, I—" Bewildered, Furuhata-san darts searching glances back and forth between Kudo and me.

"She didn't have breakfast with me, if that's what you've been thinking," Kudo ruthlessly spells it out, whereupon my patience snaps.

"That is, I spent last night at another man's place and had breakfast there," I stoically declare, watching Furuhata-san's and Kudo's countenances slip as if I had revealed a scandalous secret. To Furuhata-san, who has mistaken Kudo for Kaito and thinks we two have been together for two years, it must look like we're having a falling-out because I was unfaithful.

Nevertheless, I can't comprehend why Kudo is looking daggers at me at the moment. Wasn't he the one who started this? I only played along.

"Well, you see…" Furuhata-san hesitantly begins, racking his brains to come up with a few words of wisdom he can offer his two problem customers.

It's always a tough challenge to be with the same person for long, he courageously launches into an improvised sermon. One is forced to adjust to the partner's different lifestyle, which necessarily leads to irritation and fights. On the other hand, couples that are too similar often lose their initial spark and bore each other silly very soon. In any case, long-term couples tend to drift apart at some stage in their lives and need time to rediscover each other—a natural process, which is sometimes tragically disrupted when one partner gets carried away by feelings for someone else.

A new infatuation might feel more intense. But can it really hold a candle to a serious relationship, which has much more memories attached to it and which has evolved over a long period of time? With hindsight, people often regret a breakup. To make matters worse, a new relationship is often burdened by the wreckage the old one has left. In view of all the drawbacks such a situation brings, it's always advisable to settle one's issues in the troubled relationship instead of embarking on a rebound love affair with a new lover.

Memories are slowly built over time—he gently concludes. And real emotional intimacy, which has deepened in years, can't be developed within a few weeks, especially not when one is still committed to a long-time partner.

On other days, I wouldn't have minded Furuhata-san's well-meant counseling service in the least. Today, however, I'm so peevish that his platitudes raise my hackles.

"You've completely misunderstood…" I can hear Kudo's irritated voice trail away into a sigh of exhaustion. While Kudo possesses both the stamina and the determination to tackle any intellectual problem for days without needing either food or sleep, emotional issues tire him out within seconds as if they were demons sucking up all his energy.

"There is no intimacy between us," I tell Furuhata-san (or "Motoki-san", as he is usually called by his customers) in a confidential tone. "He has another girlfriend and almost never visits me." Simulating heartbreak, I let my eyes well up with tears.

But that's unacceptable, Furuhata-san grimly reproves my lunch companion, changing sides without further ado. "If you don't cherish your beautiful girlfriend, it's no wonder that she'll find someone else to replace you!"

g.

"Why did you do that?" Kudo asks me in disbelief after Furuhata-san has left. "You make me look like a two-timing jerk!"

To protect myself! I shrug. "It's the first time that I've spent the night at a stranger's place and you behave as if we were a couple and I were promiscuous."

My mood doesn't seem to have improved much, Kudo dryly observes. "So the call wasn't from him?"

No, I admit, as it would have been difficult to lie about this with Kudo's watchful eyes on me. The call was from an old acquaintance who wanted to do some catching up after a long absence.

"An old acquaintance, presumably an important person from a long time ago, judging from your expression when you talked to them and completely ignored me when I tried to tell you I was going to solve a case for your landlady," Kudo deduces. "It can't be anyone I know. Moreover, you've been living in your apartment for only three years. Knowing you, I know it's highly unlikely that you'd call anyone you've met at university during the last three years 'an old acquaintance'. I gather it was someone you've known in the past before we two met." He presses his fingertips together. "Who can it be? And how come he or she knew your phone number?"

Preoccupied with Seiya, I've forgotten about Tenoh-san, whom I must hide from Kudo's troublesome curiosity—a deadly disease which can't be cured. The last thing I need in my present situation is meitantei-san investigating Tenoh-san and stumbling over the truth about Pandora's Box by accident. I've already sacrificed so much for my secret—Kudo, Seiya, my inner peace—that I can't allow Kudo to dig it up now.

She's just a random acquaintance from my first semester at university, who moved away two years ago, I lie through my teeth. Some women are clingy for no reason, and she seems to like me so much that she asked me for my landline number, a request I was too kind to refuse.

In reality, Tenoh-san has found out my number on her own, for I was still living in the Professor's house the last time we met. I'm sure she has continued to have me watched out of personal interest or even out of a sense of obligation, as if she were obliged to safeguard her erstwhile partner in crime for the rest of her life. With the help of the Night Baron copy, it must have been a five-finger exercise for her to obtain my new address and phone number within a few seconds. I sometimes wonder what would have happened had I given her a backup of Pandora's Box as planned—whether she would really have used it within limits as I once thought or whether she would have lost control completely and burn herself out during her relentless quest for revenge. Inspired by her heavenly name, the insidious influence of her deep-rooted mistrust, and her androgynous beauty, which had no equal at Infinity, I've often likened her to Lucifer, the fallen angel.

"You're a case I'm never going to solve," Kudo asserts calmly, giving me a skeptical look while shoving the fish, which he has given up eating, aside. "You're keeping secrets I won't try to uncover since I don't want to pry into your private affairs. But I can't help but wonder why you have to hide your friends from me."

Because my friends don't necessarily have to be his friends, I testily rejoin. Because I'm not his girlfriend who feels the need to introduce every new person she has met to him!

"Does it mean that you feel the need to introduce your friends to him?" The treacherous glint in his eyes warn me that this can't have been a harmless question without a specific purpose. Alarmed, I consider my words carefully before giving him my answer.

"No, I don't. I'm fiercely possessive of him and won't ever share him with anyone—especially not with nosy detectives who still owe him an apology."

Kudo's eyes narrow. Satisfied, I realize I've chosen the right topic to distract him from his cunning plan for using our friendship to worm a belated confession out of Seiya and to investigate my peculiar attitude towards my supposed new boyfriend in one fell swoop. Even though we seldom meet, I can still read Kudo like a book.

"Come on, Ai," he blurts out in his frustration. "You're usually not so gullible!"

Since disputing Seiya's possible innocence with Kudo is futile without disclosing the contents of Misa's love letter (I don't want Kudo to revive the old case now that life has returned to normalcy for all the people involved), I resign myself to the ancient tactic of "calling a tacit truce by creating a diversion".

"Shiho," I pedantically correct him before I realize that I've offered him my first name instead of my last. "I'm not Haibara Ai anymore."

Kudo has obviously noticed my concession, as he instantly perks up and smiles, charming the three girls that have just entered Furuhata's bar and are now following Furuhata-san to the table they've booked in advance while eying my companion. Feeling their stares on him, Kudo shoots each of them his usual cool, analytical, dissecting gaze—the same he gave me when I entered the classroom six years ago. It has effectively nipped any potential hero-worship in the bud, as I can tell from the looks on their faces. Impressed, I wonder whether Seiya could put Kudo's killingly critical gaze to good use to fight off his groupies after his comeback in December.

On the billboard at the intersection opposite our window, Two Lights are hovering over the traffic like Greek gods levitating over the bustle of the unworthy humans they liked to toy with. After making their acquaintances, it's not difficult for me to discern the resentment in their eyes—the rebellious air their fans love so much about them must be a legacy from the disgust they felt at selling the impossible dreams and illusions neither of them believed in to make a living. Seiya's easy-going, buoyant demeanour has appeared so effortless to me that I've believed it to be the result of an innate ability he didn't need to cultivate. But now that I've met his two foster brothers, I wonder whether his happy-go-lucky attitude was initially a counteraction against their infectious despondency and fatalistic pessimism.

From the bar, Furuhata-san's gaze rests on me in an expression of whole-hearted, grim support. He seems intrigued (or titillated?) and, at the same time, scandalized—as if I had just transformed from the nice lady next door into the tragic man-eating femme fatale. Normally, I'd have been perturbed by the spectacle Kudo and I have made of ourselves. After reliving Pandora's Box, however, I have the feeling that no petty worries will ever bother me again. Does it matter that Furuhata-san believes you're either Kudo's bit on the side or you've just cheated on your negligent boyfriend, asks a voice in my head. Thoughts are inherently ephemeral just as life is evanescent. And one day, when you're at death's door or in a coma like Kakyuu, whose life was intertwined with yours without your knowledge, what Furuhata Motoki thought or didn't think of you today won't make any difference.

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"I don't think I owe him an apology, but I do think I owe you one," Kudo suddenly remarks, startling me out of my reverie. "I'm really sorry…"

The familiar words sound so out of context that I can't place them at all. It takes me a beat to comprehend that he is alluding to our quarrel at Pandora's Box and another beat to recall that he tried to apologize to me after the Professor's funeral as well.

"For what?" If it makes him feel better to listen to me telling him yet again that I'm over it, I'm not going to deny him the satisfaction, I graciously decide, realizing that if I were Ran, I'd be jealous of me for being able to satisfy so many of his needs. I cannot only alleviate his migraines by giving him the strongest painkillers ever invented but also assuage his guilt by giving his perfect fairy tale a perfect happy ending…

"For pushing you overboard." He smiles ruefully, visibly conscience-stricken at the remembrance. To all appearances, he is right about the claim that I will always remain a mystery to him (or, as I'd put it, his usually formidable intellect will always be on standby when it comes to the workings of my mind.)

"You didn't push me overboard, I must beg to differ. I was washed overboard! If you had pushed me, I'd have exerted a terrible, bloody revenge."

For three years, Kudo seems to have entertained the thought that I resented him for sending me overboard in a fit of anger whereas in my mind, the accident was at worst an interruption to our quarrel—prolonging the impasse—and at best an embarrassing episode I'd rather not dwell on.

"Maybe I should apologize for my behaviour and my words then?" To my dismay, Kudo doesn't feel inclined to stop. On the contrary, he is more chatty than usual, as if he has exhausted his reticence during the past years and is now compelled to share all the thoughts he has been holding back with me. He is still sure that what he said was right, he continues, as he hasn't changed his opinion in the meantime. "But the way in which I told you those things was wrong. I wish I hadn't attacked you like that… Afterwards, I was shocked by what I did, pinioning your arms and—"

"You exploded and lost control over yourself once you got started. It can happen to anyone," I mildly told him, whereupon he eyes me warily, apparently suspicious of my generosity. "And if you hadn't let go of me, I'd have freed myself," I add with a smirk. "Did you know we had a self-defense class at Infinity? I suppose you do since it was mentioned in the files you read in the cabin."

"No, I don't," he laconically asserts. Then, with a tinge of irritation, he adds, "I was distracted by the files on you and Gin."

Gin... Another topic which will forever remain obscure, as I've failed to discover his true motives I was once so sure about before it was too late for further investigations. Seiya has added a whole new dimension to the story whose gist I thought I've known for years. A mentor, friend, lover, protector, enemy... All the facets of Gin's character and the many different roles he played in my life were less transparent than the bland files in the fake Pandora's Box have made them out to be.

The silence between Kudo and me, only punctuated by the sound of either of us reaching for the drinks, feels oddly comfortable, as if we were once again Edogawa Conan and Haibara Ai before taking the antidote. From the speakers at the bar, Tenoh-san's latest piano piece is holding all of Furuhata-san's customers spellbound. With its endless cascades of downward arpeggios, it evokes the image of the composer's girlfriend's soft, long curls, which must be reaching her hips by now. Everyone deals with a dark secret in their own way and inflicts self-punishment on themselves in their own style, I muse. Tenoh-san told me after the Professor's funeral (the last time we met) that Kaioh-san would never cut her hair again after Pandora's Box—an almost unbearable fashion faux pas for a woman like her.

It seems I harbour no grudge against him for what he did and said, Kudo breaks the silence with his husky voice, in which surprise is mingled with relief and uncertain apprehension.

"There is nothing to forgive," I tell him truthfully, feeling once again indescribably tired like the moment I almost fell asleep at Seiya's place before he offered me coffee. Kudo still doesn't realize that the action which genuinely pained me was the reflex he couldn't control—an automatic reaction, for which he cannot apologize. He didn't push me overboard but he pushed me away from him, instinctively recoiling from me when I needed his support. The morning after, when I was lying in the log cabin, under which the Organization had kept "Pandora's Box" (as Seiya observed, the ship, the laptop, and the decoy computer all shared the same name), cocking an ear at Hattori and Kudo's discussion in hushed tones about Kudo's dilemma of choosing between hurting me or Ran (If ya don't make up yar mind now, ya're turning me inte yar accomplice, 'nd I can't lie te nee-san 'bout 'tis!—I wished I could murder the Detective of the West for his sing-song dialect I couldn't stand!), I had plenty of time to consider the full implications of what had happened. If getting rid of Pandora's Box had been enough to make Kudo recoil in horror from my touch, what would he do if he knew the truth about all the other things I had done? Sure Kudo wouldn't (and couldn't) ever hand me over to the FBI or the police—but it was also beyond dispute that he would file away everything he knew about Sherry / Haibara Ai / Miyano Shiho in a folder labelled "Unrepentant Criminals Past Saving".

"You know, I was extremely jealous of Gin," he admits to my bewilderment. "Not because of his past relationship with you but because of his influence on you even after his death." After everything my villainous ex had done to me, I still cared so much about him that his death left me completely devastated, Kudo claims. "I suspected that you threw it all away because of him, sacrificing a possible future with me for the memory of a person who wasn't worth it…"

Perhaps he was only unable to deal with my rejection, which came as a great shock to him when he was almost certain that his feelings were reciprocated. He truly didn't know how to deal with it, Kudo elaborates, his bright eyes glued to our unsteadily flickering candle, whose tiny vermilion light is dwarfed by the midday sun.

Casting my mind back over the few moments between us before I returned to the ship's galley to deactivate Pandora's Box, I remember that he clearly couldn't make sense of my anguish after Gin's demise. My deathly silence after the latest mental breakdown (Kudo was always conveniently present whenever I cracked up, as if fate had chosen him to be a helpless witness of my sorrows on a whim), my flight when he tried to kiss me and I left the cabin in the conviction that I had heard Hattori's steps, my cool, almost indifferent reaction on the phone to his rash proposal…

What difference would it make if he knew the truth? I can still see him knocking the weapon out of my hands, shaking me out of my murderous stupor, telling me that my attacker was lying on the floor and that I should stop shooting lest I ran out of bullets or killed our most important witness.

I know you're feeling guilty about it now but it was self-defense, I remember Kudo imploring me afterwards, after Gin's death, when we were huddled together in the cabin. And your prompt reaction saved Hattori and me, if it's any consolation to you, he attempted to joke, which came out noticeably cooler than he had intended to. Kudo had misread the situation, which was uncommon for him—but his opinion of me was so tremendously high that he failed to see the alternative explanation for my wretched mood.

All my plans ruined because of two bullets which missed their intended target! I could almost hear Tenoh-san's voice in my head, groaning in exasperation, "I thought I didn't have to tell you to aim for the head!"

One of us should return to the bridge of the ship—as the weather had worsened and we were about to pass a few dangerous rocks—while the other two should stay to clean and bandage Gin's wounds, Kudo suggested after finding Gin's pulse and propping my unconscious ex against the door to the galley. As he was indubitably the most skilled of us when it came to steering the ship, Hattori volunteered to go back to the bridge alone.

Hopefully he makes it through the night and won't bleed to death, Kudo grimly said, inspecting Gin's wounds, which consisted of several bruises, burns, and two bullet holes by courtesy of me. It was not only a question of kindness (even though kindness certainly played a large role as far as Kudo was concerned). Since the files in the captain's cabin had turned out to be unsatisfactory to both Hattori and Kudo, a witness like the second crow was their only chance of learning the truth about the Organization.

I'll stay with him while you get us something to stop the bleeding and disinfect the wounds, I told Kudo, tossing him the Browning (Vodka's weapon, with which Vodka had given me the small flesh wound back in the log cabin) I had picked from the floor. You'd better take this with you before I succumb to the temptation.

No, I'll leave it here in case you need it to defend yourself. But if he stirs and you can't stand his face, just whack him with this! Kudo returned the Browning to me, handed me a large pan from the galley (I didn't know whether he did it in jest or not), gave me a reassuring pat on my shoulder, and disappeared, his steps growing fainter as the seconds ticked away. I waited uneasily, eyes trained on my ex-husband's face until Gin finally opened his eyes and smirked at me, as expected.

How could Hattori and Kudo fear for his life just because he had received a few nasty wounds? The devil—or his incarnation, in this case—wouldn't let himself be taken out by Tenoh-san's and my efforts combined. Gin wasn't going to do me the favour and drop dead in an instant. Neither could he do it voluntarily if he wanted to, as robust as he was. I could remember all the other wounds he had received in his life, all the burns and cuts I had to treat when he came home from yet another mission in a rotten mood because his victims—surprise, surprise—had had the impertinence to defend themselves instead of obediently letting him execute them. If he had likened me to a greenhouse flower, I had likened him to weed. Fortunately, I had the perfect weedkiller in my locket—if only I dared to use it.

No, it wouldn't do either Kudo or me any good if I confessed my guilt, I decide. Why should I burst Kudo's bubble and extinguish his lingering feelings for me by telling him how we had won? The Organization is destroyed even though he hasn't stained his hands with any evil deeds. All I need to do now is to remind myself never to mention what I used to throw at him in my nightmares—what I could only express in my dreams when I couldn't contain the wish to confess: the truth that no glorious victory has ever been snatched from the jaws of defeat without sacrifices...

After all, even he could only resume his normal life at a cost of a hundred times twenty-six white mice.

g.

Tenoh-san's piano piece has stopped in the meantime—the last note, which should have been allowed to linger in the air, brutally interrupted by the moderator's enthusiastic voice announcing some "important news". As the musical world doesn't interest me in the least, I turn my attention back to Kudo.

"There was no reason to be jealous," I inform him. "I… sort of forgave Gin for the things he did after his death because it's easy for me to forgive the dead. But if he hadn't passed away so peacefully, I'd have made sure he died before we left the ship!"

Alas, half-lies and white lies are still lies. Just like the poor excuse I gave Seiya this morning when I told him that I was unable to stay in a long-time relationship and would like to stop pretending. An illusion created to keep his idea of me intact: a nice woman, a victim of circumstances, who happened to be so frail and so traumatized by a past love that she can no longer commit to anyone…

"Why did you throw it away?" Kudo asks again, obstinately trying my patience.

"I don't think we need to go into this any further unless you're searching for a reason to send me out of this window in front of so many witnesses," I snap. "I've told you more than once why I did it. Since we won't ever agree on the topic, just let it rest, please!"

"I didn't mean the files." Kudo gazes at me directly for the first time since his contrite apology, and I'm lost for words before the sound of Seiya's name steals into my ears, thwarting my attempt at giving Kudo an answer.

Three Lights are returning in July (on Seiya-sama's next birthday!) instead of in December as planned, touring around in Japan before going to LA—the moderator squeals in delight. They're going to stay in Los Angeles for at least five years, as all the three of them have been offered main roles and are also writing and singing the music for some (still mysterious) high-budget Hollywood series.

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