Shinichi felt a rough hand choke his scruff. "Damnit, what's with cats messing up crime scenes?!" Inspector Yokomizo growled, tossing Shinichi harshly. He shook his head from behind the police tape as the inspector went back to grumbling.

Shinichi then found himself being scooped up by a far gentler grip, and twisted to see Ran. She gave him a little smile, opening her bag. He leapt in once again, and she stepped over the tape to begin chatting easily with the inspector.

Shinichi knew a distraction when he saw one, especially with the way the bag was being subtly tipped away from the officer's line of sight. Shinichi gave a grateful glance before prowling towards the body— of Tokio?!

And only wearing one glove...

xXx

Mouri was easily located, and Shinichi's guess was correct: he was drunk out of his mind.

Next… to Tokio's room.

xXx

Just as Yokomizo insisted when Mouri indignantly pointed out that the police hadn't even searched Tokio's room yet at the bar, the security lock was in place.

Easy enough to saw through, though. Shinichi winced at the sharp, high buzzsaw pitch, covering his ears with his paws and burrowing into the darkness of the bag.

The room key and Tokio's clothes lay strewn about right by the door, and the wind played with the curtains of the massive open balcony.

The police seemed to conclude that he plunged off the balcony from drunken stumbling, indicated by the glove caught in the railing.

"But why would he leave all that stuff, and try to climb down without a rope?" Shinichi whispered to Ran, climbing out of her bag while the police and Kogoro talked. She passed the questions to her father, who merely shrugged.

A gust of wind found Shinichi bracing hard, then had him lamenting his puny size. Ran let out a little gasp of surprise, and Shinichi saw something bounce down from her bag and off the balcony— he pawed for it in vain.

"There goes my chapstick," she shrugged with a little laugh, scooping Shinichi back up to join the cops in making their exit.

xXx

Back down to the corpse again; this time, Shinichi whispered to Ran to look at his tie. She was sharp, able to point out it was backwards and different looking than the one they had in their possession that belonged to him. The inspector noticed on his own that the belt was upside-down, thankfully.

Conclusion: someone else dressed him. Question: who?

xXx

Next was the interrogation, looking for alibis.

And none of them were solid at all. How could the singular suspect be determined when there were so many holes in everyone's story?!

xXx

On the elevator ride back to their rooms, Shinichi boiled in frustration over utter lack of solidity in anyone's stories as Ran asked Akiko about ordering room service or any other forms of proof of innocence. She actually managed to find one— Akiko had called the front desk at 10:00, and they kept a record of any calls.

Any sort of joy from Akiko was interrupted when the elevator doors slid open to reveal the menacing figure of the Night Baron.

Three gasps echoed, and Akiko gave a small, fearful, "how" before Ran leapt into defensive action.

Shinichi was momentarily glad, considering he had no idea what to do to help as a diminutive cat with claws not sharp enough to pierce the tranquilizer into the thick Night Baron costume. That relief evaporated when Ran kicked thrice at the figure, and they moved like a snake, contorting quickly to avoid being struck.

Shinichi leapt out of the bag to follow the quickly disappearing figure, leaving Ran staring at the floor, looking stricken.

xXx

No luck; he got away. Shinichi had to shamefully return to the elevator with no news.

xXx

Kogoro was disappointed at Ran's inability to strike down the Baron, but his ranting was cut short by police dragging in a knocked out man— the one who had been guarding the Baron costume.

Said costume was found floating in the pool.

He just showed up and left, doing nothing? But why?!

xXx

Once again, nobody had an alibi, considering they were all confined to their rooms by order of the police. Shinichi growled a bit.

xXx

Room checks gave Shinichi the opportunity to have Ran open windows so he could peer up and judge distances while the wind did its best to buffet him.

It needs to be a place where the killer could jump from room to room, considering they couldn't have left without the security lock coming undone. It also needs to reasonably line up with the impaling site.

Shinichi flicked his ears to hear the search progress over the wind, just in time to catch Akiko talking about her sleeping pills.

xXx

As investigations continued, the suspects slowly turned things into a gossip house, as they often did; this only muddied the waters further, considering it seemed all of them had a connection to the virus or hacking in some manner.

xXx

Finally, less flimsy evidence arose: Hideko had the same pills as Akiko, but claimed they were for colds when Ran asked about them under his hint.

xXx

Shinichi sighed, strolling out through the hallway— he couldn't exactly kick a soccer ball to help his thought process, so just walking around would have to do.

The best room would be the one under Tokio's, and that's Kaneshiro's.

His thoughts were interrupted by voices— he quickly ducked behind a faux plant to avoid being seen.

Thankfully, it was only the CSI, not any sort of hotel staff. They were too caught up musing about the transparent tape located on the cut off lock of Tokio's room.

The clues clicked together, and Shinichi shot off back to Ran.

xXx

When Shinichi gently pawed open the hotel door, he heard a faint sniff— and he could've sworn that Ran faintly murmured his name, his real one.

"Are you alright…?" he meowed faintly, slowly entering and taking in Ran's hunched form on the bed.

She quickly dried her tears, giving a fake smile. "I'm fine!"

Shinichi frowned.

"You know… it's weird, and all, but you can talk to me," he said in a small voice. "I'll listen and help," Shinichi continued, winding around her legs with a purr.

Ran gave a watery laugh, plucking him off the ground and burying her fingers in his fur as though for comfort as she held him to her chest.

"It's fine," Ran said a bit more honestly, pressing her chin to his back. Shinichi suppressed the instinct to puff up in embarrassment. "I know what I have to do, now."

"That's good," Shinichi said earnestly, a bit befuddled but happy that Ran seemed to have recovered. "Now, this is going to be kind of complex— but I don't have hands, so you'll need to do it," he explained, then began digging into how to set up the lock trick.

xXx

It worked— it was always good to find the truth, but dammit, couldn't things be convenient for once? With the ability to lock the door from the outside, the aforementioned escape routes were out the window (hah!). His one primary lead… defenestrated.

After the test, Ran explained everything to the inspector; the conclusion was obvious. The killer dressed and then tossed Tokio after presumably drugging him and stealing his room key, then exiting, using the lock trick, and finally reopening the room with the room key to toss the key in and pull the remaining visible tape off as best they could.

xXx

The alibis slowly came together with more questioning of surrounding witnesses.

Akiko can be eliminated, as she was seen with Night Baron, as well as the phone call. The bartender was able to confirm Hideko's presence despite the fact that she roofied Mouri, and Kaneshiro and his cruel looking caretaker were confirmed to be downstairs as well.

Only two suspects… Satoru and Konno.

And Satoru's the only one who could've dodged Ran like that.

This will break her heart—

And then Ran barged in to interrupt him: "it's not Satoru!"

Shinichi cocked his head.

"See," she gestured to the two girls behind her, who were whispering that Ran was talking to her cat. She noticed, and picked Shinichi up, explaining in a lower tone as the went to find the police, "they took a picture of him with a timestamp!"

Shinichi gave Ran a headbutt, secretly glad of her idol's innocence as well— "good job."

But why did he not mention this when questioned for an alibi?!

Shinichi paced outside the scene of the impalement, then stumbled on something. Lipstick…? Ran's lipstick!

He wiped his paws of the sticky red stuff, glancing upwards— it's nowhere near where it was dropped.

Wait! The wind!

The case was slowly sliding together— the murderer would need somewhere sheltered from the harsh gusts to accurately toss the body, and there was only one such room.

xXx

One showy display revolving around labelled blanket dummies being tossed downwards later, it was proven the room Tokio had to have come from, considering it was the only one that landed consistently on the statue's deadly spike.

The lock trick and the stuck glove was but a ruse; the true room that held the murder was 1901: Aniko and Satoru's room, and the only one sheltered enough by the wind. And only one of them was in it at the time of the impalement.

From there, the police force could lay it out with minimal breadcrumbs from him via Ran.

Satoru attempted to confess, but was thrown off when Ran pointed out his now perfect alibi. When he continued to insist, Aniko stepped forward with a true confession: "so it was you? You dressed up as Night Baron to cover up my crime?"

"I found the wig, since you didn't put it on Tokio," he said slowly, sadly.

Akiko laughed— "no harm in confessing it now," she shrugged at the police force. "He deserved to die— he killed my brother; pushed him into committing suicide by stealing his successful software. I planned the tour, and lured Tokio here with the prize of a powerful virus I didn't have. It was so easy to bait him, to get him to my room," she laughed again, radiating sick confidence and anger. "An end to a man full of greed and lust. I did a service." She paused, regarding a tende Kogoro directly, "I thought you would ruin it; I was going to push one of you into the pool off the balcony to scare you away, but all I found was a stupid cat that went and jumped off itself," she chuckled. Shinichi stiffened in Ran's bag, and Ran gave him a bit of an inquisitive glance. "You sure picked a bad wife, huh Saturo?"

"Akiko…" the man keened morosely.

She laughed until she cried as she was lead to the police car.

"I love you, and I'll wait for you," Saturo promised, and the laughs became nothing but sobs.

xXx

ugh why does the show try to have this weird love triangle thing between Satoru (a 30 year old married man), Ran (16 years old! 16!), and Shinichi (also 16). uuuuugh

anyways im only going to get 5hrs of sleep at this point but i hope yall enjoy this shsjdbdjs i am… depression.