Notes:
Wow, more people know Alex Rider than I was expecting lol
Me actually going back and editing the previous chapters finally? More likely than you think
TW: panic/anxiety attack - if you need to skip that section, it's between the two underlined sentences: "Conan's breath stuttered," and "(Maybe if he repeated it enough, he'd believe it.)"
.
.
.
Conan wished that he could - perhaps, maybe, possibly - go two whole hours without running into another case.
But apparently that wasn't in the cards.
(Two waking hours, he should perhaps specify. He'd been in various stages of unconsciousness for at least ten hours, judging by the tension in Lucy Collins's posture, but he was pretty sure that didn't actually count as this mythical thing that people called 'a break.')
(Apparently getting summoned to a case, rather than stumbling across it, meant a full twenty-four hours of constant crises. Or maybe that was just in England? Haibara would require more data points before committing to a definite conclusion, and that was probably a good rule of thumb.)
(The cases had all been non-lethal so far, though, so that was a nice change of pace.)
(In terms of 'breaks from murder,' he still preferred KID's heists.)
The guy using the PA system was still yapping on, even though Conan hadn't bothered to process anything he'd been saying for the past however-many minutes.
(He could probably recite it verbatim if necessary, though. Just because he wasn't consciously processing what was going on, it didn't mean that he wasn't paying attention. )
And then "Doctor Cerebellum" (and Conan hated that he didn't have anything else to call him, because that name was so dumb. Genta could have come up with something more creative, seriously) said, " - no one leave their rooms, no one contact the police, or I will blow up this hospital!" and Conan was tuning in at a speed that exacerbated his mild headache.
(Did his accent sound vaguely American? Weird.)
Not five minutes ago, "Doctor Cerebellum" (ugh) had said he'd be killing one patient every hour until his demands were met, not that he'd actually, you know, told his hostages what the demands were - hopefully that was because he'd been communicating them directly to the police, though Conan honestly wasn't too optimistic about it, given that he was calling himself Doctor Cerebellum.
(Doctor.
Cerebellum.
Like, what was he going to do, straighten everyone's posture? Impede their motor function?
What on earth had made him think he needed a supervillain name, let alone one as idiotic and unintimidating as the one he'd chosen?)
Anyway, the point was:
"Doctor Cerebellum" had exponentially escalated his threats, from one person every hour to the entire hospital.
In five minutes.
What the hell.
Either "Doctor Cerebellum" ( so dumb) had no idea how to hold a building hostage, or he was getting frantic.
Which was not what one might call ideal .
(Conan hadn't expected to find himself in the position of thinking that he might actually appreciate people who'd clearly done their research on how to commit crimes - not only was their browser history great evidence for the court case, but their plans were also formulaic and logical, which made it far easier for Conan and all his practice to counter.)
Anyway, regardless of which it was, it would be better to wrap things up quickly.
On the bright side, Conan had a plan.
On the less bright side, it was a pretty dumb plan.
On the extremely idiotic side, he was going to do it anyway, even though it was definitely not medically advisable.
Conan eyed the vent beside his hospital bed contemplatively. It looked like it was probably big enough.
The adults in the room were talking - arguing, really, would be more factual - and yet again Conan let their words wash over him without actively processing them. Nurse Harris appeared to be worried about patients getting their medications on time and kept darting pleading looks at John, seemingly involuntarily. The set of John's shoulder was tense, though not as tense as one would expect for someone who had more than likely never been held hostage by a madman who was threatening to blow up the entire building if anyone set one foot out of line.
...Actually, on second thought, that was definitely the kind of thing that happened to you if you were in the vicinity of Sherlock Holmes. John probably wasn't a first timer at all, huh.
Well, that'd probably sucked for him.
(Not that being trapped inside buildings people were threatening to blow up ever really stopped sucking.)
"Could you pass me my jacket?" Conan asked Delilah, whose wheelchair was conveniently situated adjacent to the small table that appeared to be holding his clothes.
She looked at him suspiciously. "...You're not going to drink more Monster, are you?" she asked, hand hovering over his jacket. "Because I won't give you your clothes if you're just going to give yourself another heart attack."
Conan blinked, momentarily derailed. "What, they didn't confiscate it?" That seemed...irresponsible of them.
(He ignored the fact that a seven-year-old probably shouldn't know the word 'confiscate,' let alone be able to use it properly in a sentence.)
Also, hadn't it been an open container? He'd honestly be more surprised if it hadn't fallen out of his pocket and spilled all over the ambulance floor or something. Probably just as they were trying to restart his heart, or an equally dramatic moment. That seemed to be pretty in line with his luck.
(Haha, he was just going to shove the fact that he'd kind of died again a couple hours ago into a box in the back of his mind and ignore it for a while...)
Delilah narrowed her eyes and her hand twitched, like she was about to move it away, so Conan forced his train of thought back onto the tracks. Unfortunately, it immediately derailed as soon as he managed to get it pointed in what was at least vaguely the right direction. "No, I don't want more...did you say it was called Monster? What even…" Why would anyone name an energy drink after the villains in story books?
Damn, he was tired.
He shook his head, wistfully remembering the time in his life when he had a chance to take a nap before facing a possible hospital bombing.
Oh, wait.
He'd never had that.
Ha.
Haha.
Ha.
Delilah watched him patiently as Conan tried (and failed) to focus on the situation at hand. "I'm not going to intentionally drink something that will kill me," he said finally. "I'm just cold."
This was not, technically speaking, a lie.
(However, he was not capable of preventing himself from drinking coffee, as his body was so used to it that it was practically part of his DNA at this point. The day he was able to stop drinking coffee for a week was the day he died.)
The open back of Conan's hospital gown definitely was a little too... airy for his taste, in any case, and while he was a little chilled, he wasn't about to freeze to death. He was still wearing his socks and shorts, for some reason, which probably helped.
"Besides," Conan added, perhaps a little belatedly, scrunching up his nose at her, "how would I know you didn't wipe your girl cooties all over it?"
Thanks for that one, Genta.
Delilah's expression changed to something faintly exasperated and she handed over his jacket. "And how do you know I didn't 'wipe my cooties' on your jacket?"
Conan glanced up at her from where he was struggling to put his arms through his jacket sleeves. "Because you're nice," he said matter-of-factly, deciding to just let his mouth run without any conscious thought because that was what kids did and he was too worn out to care at this point. "And you'd only use your cooties for heroic purposes, like protecting people from themselves."
He nodded once, as if he was satisfied with his reasoning. Which, sure, why not. "But you're still a girl, so don't get too close," he added, scooching away from her and, coincidentally, towards the vent.
Clearly this was not part of a larger plan at all.
Delilah rolled her eyes, and Conan used the opportunity to palm the hair clip he'd clipped to the inside of his jacket lining, relieved that it hadn't somehow detached itself.
Normally, Conan wouldn't care too much about a hair clip, of all things, but he'd been waiting for a chance to use this particular hair clip for ages . He'd clipped to the inner lining of his jacket the moment he'd gotten it out of its packaging a month ago after waiting impatiently for the postal service to do its job. It was a hair clip, sure, which meant that none of the Detective Boys had been very interested in it after they had succeeded in annoying him into revealing what he'd been so eagerly awaiting. But what none of them had realized - somehow - was that it was actually also a multitool. It had a small ruler, an 8mm wrench, a small knife, and the circular part at the top could function as a coin if you needed one for one of those weird carts at supermarkets that were chained together until you put a coin in (not that he'd ever really had the chance to try that out).
The most pertinent part at this specific moment, however, was that the ends functioned as both a large and small flat head screwdriver (which could also function as a Phillips head in a pinch), depending on which end he used.
Conan absently continued the conversation with Delilah, though he didn't devote too much brain power to it. Instead, he reached into his pocket and withdrew Sherlock's phone, which apparently he hadn't bothered to take back yet.
(Well, he could just use "John's" phone for anything he needed, Conan thought uncharitably. This phone was Conan's now, at least until he could charge his own. Sherlock could have it back afterwards, once Conan had wiped off his fingerprints and any traces of DNA.)
He pretended to pull up one of those brainless, time-wasting game apps that were so popular, and he only got away with it because Delilah probably thought that this was his phone and not one that he'd pickpocketed from Sherlock Holmes.
Anyone who'd interacted with Sherlock for more than two seconds would not believe that he had any games on his phone. They would likely continue to believe that for the rest of their lives, right up until Conan physically showed them that, in fact, the app that saw the most usage on Sherlock's phone was Candy Crush.
Candy Crush.
Conan still couldn't really believe it, and he was staring at the app usage data.
This had "John Watson" written all over it.
(Even if that wasn't his real name.)
Anyway, Conan timed his taps so that he looked like he was playing a game, when in actuality he was looking up the blueprints to the hospital using Sherlock's backdoor into the City Hall records database.
Because of course he had one.
Conan's other hand, however, was using his hair clip multitool to quickly unscrew the bolts attaching the vent to the wall. Well, 'quickly' was perhaps a bit generous.
Eventually Delilah lost interest in Conan's halfhearted responses and rolled herself over to where her mother was standing, which just so happened to be at exactly the right angle to block the sightline of the adults in the room so they couldn't see him tuck what amounted to about a third of his hospital gown into his pants. It wasn't the most comfortable thing in the world, but it meant that he wouldn't be stepping on the hem if he had to start running and/or crawling.
Perhaps more pertinently, Delilah's new position meant that they also didn't notice Conan undoing the last screw attaching the grate to the vents.
Not that they were paying much attention to him in the first place, really, which was slightly concerning considering the fact that he was the only actual patient in the room.
But hey, it seemed like luck was smiling on him today!
For literally the first time in his life!
Wasn't that fantastic!
(It was not. Conan was almost pathetically grateful for this tiny dash of luck, but he knew that it'd end up rebounding on him somehow. That's what generally happened, anyway.
Well, except at heists. KID's unnatural penchant for luck seemed to permeate the entire heist site and Conan usually managed to soak up an infinitesimal amount whenever he was in the area. This mainly meant that the next time people started shooting at him, Conan was miraculously able to avoid any injuries to himself or the people he was protecting.
And, honestly? He was not complaining.
Getting shot sucked. )
Conan carefully removed the grate from the wall and gently set it down on the floor, painstakingly trying to minimize the sound as much as possible so as to avoid attention.
He examined the vent's dimensions one more time, then checked the building schematics one more time to make sure that he had the route to the announcement room memorized.
(Yes, he was aware that he was just stalling at this point, and what of it?)
It'd be a tight fit, which was, well, less than ideal, but it was good enough.
(Conan resolutely ignored the fact that the last time he'd been in a space that small, he'd ended up hyperventilating so much that he'd used up all his oxygen and passed out for a couple hours. Clearly that would have absolutely zero impact on what he was about to do.)
It was -
...It'd be fine.
(In for four, hold for seven, out for eight - )
He didn't have the time to waste dawdling, anyway.
So Conan took a deep breath, resolutely ignoring the voice in the back of his head that was screaming that he wasn't an absolute moron, so why was he acting like one , and climbed into the vent.
(The voice sounded oddly like Haibara's, which Conan tried not to think about too hard.)
"Wait, Conan? What are you - "
"God damn it, Alex - "
"Hey, what the bloody hell do you think you're - "
...It would be too much to ask that no one would notice him leaving, huh.
Yeah, he was just going to pretend that he was too far into the vent to hear them. That seemed like a good course of action. He could just...ignore the rising cacophony of exasperated and incredulous voices (and they were also possibly worried? It was hard to tell, what with the echoes and all).
(He was perhaps a little proud that he'd managed to get Lucy Collins to swear. She really didn't seem like the type to swear, and especially not in a child's hospital room. And she'd managed to refrain from cursing out Sherlock and John while she was berating them about their child-rearing-slash-babysitting skills earlier, which clearly had taken a vast amount of effort. So the fact that Conan had managed to get her to break just by existing - and, well, conforming to his fate, he supposed - was maybe a little impressive.
He was also fairly certain that he'd heard Delilah say quietly, "Hey, what the fuck." So. Double points, there.
Maybe half points for Nurse Harris, then? His reaction had seemed to be more exasperated than anything else, like perhaps he was used to children climbing through vents in an attempt to prevent buildings from being blown up. But, on the other hand, 'Alex' seemed to be a logical extension of the 'Al-' from earlier, so now Conan at least had a name for John's alternate identity. It wasn't much to go on, of course, but at least he had something for Haibara to research and possibly mitigate a small portion of her wrath. As soon as he managed to charge his phone, that was.
So.
Half points.)
(...Look, he had to get his kicks where he could find them at this point, okay. There were only so many crimes you could witness and/or solve before your worldview started shifting and you possibly started becoming desensitized.
...It was the small things that made it bearable, really. Like occasionally pranking "Sleeping Kogoro," or trolling Hattori, or even just showing up at KID's heists.
Besides, the points thing was all in his head, and he had semi-decent excuses for the rest of it. Failing that, he had his glittering puppy dog eyes and a childish pout to fall back on as a last resort.
It wasn't like mind readers were a thing that existed and could read his thoughts and tattle to Ran, so he was probably fine.)
Fortunately, none of the adults had shoulders narrow enough to fit through the vent - it was the whole reason he was the one taking the vents in the first place, after all - which meant that no one would be coming after him.
Well, except maybe Sherlock could fit, but he was too much of a posh git to bother getting his coat dirty when it wasn't strictly necessary and/or case-related.
Unfortunately, Conan had forgotten about the so-called "Case of the Mysteriously Appearing Primary Schooler."
He was forcibly reminded of said case when he heard a scrabbling sound behind him, like nails scratching at the sides of the vent and heard John add an exasperated "Sherlock!" to the disquieted muttering or possibly shouting (the acoustics in the air vent were weird, and he couldn't quite tell) that was happening back in Conan's hospital room.
Conan resolutely did not look backwards.
Not that he was afraid of what he would see, of course.
But, well.
He wasn't not afraid of looking behind him and seeing Sherlock's spindly white fingers grasping for him.
Haibara had made him watch enough horror movies. He could picture it, thanks.
(Even though they'd mostly spent their time complaining about automatically rhyming translations, questionable science, inaccurate blood splatters, and even more inaccurate attempts at first aid, rather than being actually scared, there were still some scenes that stayed with him.
Many of those scenes involved small, dark places, and reaching hands.
...This was fine.
It'd be fine.
Obviously.)
Ice cold fingers wrapped around Conan's ankle, and he had to stifle a scream. A quick glance behind him confirmed that it was Sherlock, at least, so that was...something. Good, even…?
On the bright side, it could have been so much worse.
(Zombies didn't exist, and Conan thanked his lucky star every day that they didn't, because otherwise his job would be so much harder. )
Conan struggled futilely in Sherlock's grasp until he finally managed to land a kick on his wrist, forcing him to let go involuntarily. He scrambled away, blunt nails scrabbling against the metal beneath him, and turned a corner as quickly as physically possible.
He heard Sherlock let out a quiet curse when he realized that the ventilation shaft wasn't deep enough to let him turn and continue following Conan.
Well, that was one point in favor of being child-sized.
Conan laughed breathlessly, possibly mildly hysterically, and continued crawling away, not even allowing himself a moment to catch his breath. He checked his mental image of the hospital schematics as he went to make sure that he was still on track, which he was, so that was something at least.
Sherlock's peeved muttering faded as Conan increased the distance between them, and eventually there was no sound other than his own breathing permeating the space. It was loud - too loud. So loud that he couldn't tell whether anyone was following him.
Instinctively, he held his breath.
And then there was silence.
Immediately, the suspicion that he might have overestimated his capacity to withstand small, dark spaces began to creep through the back of Conan's mind. It was a cold, pervading sensation, one that made goosebumps rise up on his arms and sent an involuntary shudder down his spine.
It was fine.
This was fine .
He was fine.
...
... It was fine.
( - in for four, hold for seven, out for eight, repeat - )
Nothing wrong here.
Clearly.
Conan's breath stuttered, speeding up as he tried to convince his brain that, no, the shadows were not reaching for him, grabbing at his legs and dragging him backwards, because that would be illogical. Shadows were intangible, and as such, could not affect his progress forward.
( But with your luck? a snide voice in the depths of his mind insinuated, and Conan had to shove that one back in the box in the back of his mind that he tried not to touch, ever.)
It didn't work quite as well as he'd hoped it would.
(Don't you attract impossible things? the voice asked sweetly, the tinny echo now surrounding it doing absolutely nothing to diminish its eeriness. Was the box warping, splintering at the corners?
...That probably wasn't good.)
Conan shook his head, trying to expel the thought from his own mind, and kept moving. He was careful to regulate his breaths, matching them to each step he crawled forward on his hands and knees - because that was both the optimal position for the practical purpose of moving quickly and a way to minimize brushing against the sides of the vent, which were definitely not closing in on him.
Probably.
(Are you certain? the voice asked, all barely concealed venom and faux concern. What if they are? What if it starts to shrink while you're still inside?)
Which was dumb -
(What if Gin and Vodka are waiting for you? the voice sing-songed.)
Which was dumb, and stupid, because Gin and Vodka were still back in Japan the last time he checked and rarely left -
(But what if they are?)
What would they even be doing in a hospital? That was just -
(But what if they are?)
Conan realized distantly that his breaths were coming faster now - too fast, really - and that he'd stopped moving forward, joints locking together as a frosty panic swept over him. Rationalization and logic didn't help much when it was his brain that he was fighting against.
Conan forced himself to take a deep breath, and wished desperately that he had a lemon or onion or something to bite down on and shock his system back to his normal baseline of low level functioning panic slash paranoia.
( - in for four, hold for seven, out for eight - )
But, because the universe hated him, he of course didn't have anything to distract himself from the way that his pulse was pounding loud and echoing in his ears, or the chill that was creeping its way into his chest and wrapping around his rib cage.
( - in for four, hold for seven, out for eight - )
Unfortunately, he did not, and it wasn't like there was produce just rolling around in hospital air vents.
And, speaking of air, Conan thought a little hysterically, there didn't seem to be enough of it.
Which was absurd, really, but tell that to the way that his breaths came in sharp, desperate pants, frost nipping at the edges of his lungs, his throat, his heart -
( - in for four, hold for seven, out for eight - )
Of course there was enough air, Conan berated his traitorous lungs. He was in an air vent. If there wasn't enough air in an air vent, of all places, then there were more serious problems afoot.
( - in for four, hold for seven, out for eight - )
A light.
There was a light ahead, and Conan almost choked on his sigh of relief because light meant that he could get out. He didn't even care if it was the right room or not, at this point, because he was useless if his stupid lungs refused to work and his brain was -
( - in for four, hold for seven, out for eight - )
Black dots encroached on the edges of Conan's vision, which paradoxically made it easier to focus on using the hair clip to unscrew the bolts attaching the grate to the ventilation system.
That, however, did not mean that his fingers acquiesced to cooperate.
Instead, they trembled and shook enough that Conan missed the notch in the second screw three times before he managed to lock it in.
He was fine.
It. Was. Fine.
(Maybe if he repeated it enough, he'd believe it.)
The second screw loosened, and Conan felt gravity abruptly take hold as the grate he was sitting on bent under his weight.
And then he was tumbling through the open air vent.
Luckily, though, he managed to land on something soft.
Conan gazed upwards for a long moment before really processing that, huh, the vent was on the ceiling and not in the wall like in his hospital room. Which was why he'd been able to fall through it, even though there were still two screws holding the grate in place.
Huh.
Go, gravity.
Oh, and speaking of which.
Soft?
Conan glanced down to see a swathe of white, which was a pleasant diversion from the icy shades of grey of metal ensconced in shadows. There was probably some symbolism there, but he didn't have enough spare brain power to properly contemplate it.
He blinked rapidly, trying to banish the black spots from his vision, but his eyelids felt like they were moving in slow motion, and the movement didn't help nearly as well as he'd hoped it would.
Or at all, really.
Which was just.
Fantastic.
Anyway.
There was no red, which meant that no one was bleeding, probably. So that was a good sign, at least.
Conan absently rubbed a section of the white fabric between his fingers, fiddling with the seam. The fabric's weave was tight and slightly stiff, still holding a crease - a cotton-polyester blend, perhaps recently removed from its packaging? Or maybe someone went a little overboard on ironing?
...He could just. Look around.
Perhaps actually look at what he was sitting on.
That would probably help.
Conan tore his eyes away from where the weave of the white fabric had sucked him in and let his eyes wander slightly.
Oh.
Hair.
He had landed on a person, apparently.
The person had dark hair and was currently laying face down on the floor, nose at an odd angle. Conan was still a little out of it, and couldn't quite tell if that particular condition had preceded or followed his drop from the air vents.
The person was also wearing a doctor's coat, which was what the white fabric was. Conan...probably should have guessed that. He was, after all, in a hospital. It was folded in weird places, though. In boxes, like it had just come out of a vacuum-sealed bag or straight off the shelves of a department store.
Weird.
...There was also an incessant staticky rumbling noise coming from somewhere nearby, which drew Conan's eyes to a phone dangling from a nearby table. He was honestly a little astounded that the hospital still used landlines in this day and age. This did not, however, stop his hand from reflexively picking up the phone and saying, "Hello?"
There was a moment of silence on the other end of the line, and then a hesitant, "...Conan? Is that you?"
"Oh." The gears in Conan's brain sluggishly turned for a few seconds before he managed to recognize the voice. "Hi, Donovan-keiji."
"...Hey, kid. Do you know what happened to the man I was just talking to?"
Conan blinked slowly. "The - the who?"
"...The man who was just threatening to bomb the hospital?"
Conan took a moment to process that. "Oh, right." He glanced down at the man he had landed on, who was currently knocked out cold. "Him."
He'd probably managed to get into one of the supply closets - not incredibly hard, since they usually weren't even locked - and put on one of the spare coats, then just...planted bombs wherever he'd decided to, and then made his way to the announcement room, because who was going to stop a doctor in a hospital?
...Conan, apparently.
Though not entirely intentionally.
"Yes, him," Donovan replied, somewhat dryly. "What's the situation in there, Conan?"
Conan was pleased to find that, while he was still out of zip ties, there were plenty of materials in the room that he could use to bind the man's wrists and ankles together without using up too much mental bandwidth. His fingers were trembling slightly, which was a bit annoying since he was trying to knot some bandages together tightly enough that the culprit wouldn't be able to slip out of them if he woke up before the police arrived, and unsteady hands were a pain for detail work like that.
He realized Donovan had asked him a question.
"Oh, everything's fine," he replied, rather belatedly. "Everything's...under control. We're all good now. Can you - can you come in and arrest this guy now? Thanks."
"Can I - wait, sorry, what?"
Conan took a moment to rewind what he'd just said, and didn't really see where she might have misunderstood him? So he just rephrased himself, elaborating with a little more detail. "Yeah, um, I kind of knocked him out. His nose might be broken? He's zip tied now. Also, I don't think he - "
He glanced around the area immediately surrounding the man's prone body and checked his pockets just to be sure, but lo and behold, he'd been right.
"Yeah, he doesn't have a detonator or anything. No guns, no knives. He doesn't even have a laser pointer."
There was silence on the other end of the line. Then, Donovan sighed and said resignedly: "...And you, of course, have experience with these types of things."
Conan barked a laugh that probably sounded a tad too bitter for a seven-year-old. " So much experience," he agreed.
Donovan sighed again. "Do you know if he has any accomplices?"
Conan shrugged, then realized that Donovan could not, in fact, see him. "Dunno. I don't think so. There's no one in the halls, so."
The announcement room also happened to be the security room. This was convenient for both Conan and the man he was currently sitting on. Although Conan wasn't too sure what the guy had planned on doing if someone had decided to test their luck and leave their hospital rooms, if he didn't have a detonator. More empty threats, maybe?
"I have a team of officers heading your way." She hesitated for a moment. "...Stay on the line, okay?"
"Okay," Conan acquiesced easily, staring at the man beneath him, who he was only just now connecting to the man on the loudspeaker calling himself 'Doctor Cerebellum.'
The unconscious man, thankfully, did not look back.
That would have been incredibly unsettling.
Conan checked his pupils on autopilot with the flashlight on Sherlock's phone, and they appeared to be reacting normally, which was good. Probably no concussion there, which made approximately one of them, since Conan could not actually perform a concussion test on himself.
Conan was just glad Doctor Cerebellum's head had apparently hit the cushy swivel chair on his way to the floor, because he might've accidentally shattered the guy's skull if it'd hit the floor directly.
(Still a stupid name.)
But, on the bright side, now that the threat had been neutralized and he was no longer slowly slowly asphyxiating in an air vent whose walls may or may not have been closing in on him, he could take a moment to get his breathing back in order and maybe, perhaps, possibly stop his brain from spiraling into a panic.
Wouldn't that be nice.
( - in for four, hold for seven, out for eight - )
By the time the police squad arrived in the announcement-slash-security room, Conan was breathing normally again, and he was totally, completely fine.
He was fine.
Yeah.
Fine.
...He was fine enough to give a cohesive police statement to Donovan, which was all that mattered in the end, really.
Doctor Cerebellum (and no, Conan was never going to get over that supremely stupid name) still hadn't woken up by the time the police showed up, which was good for Conan because he honestly didn't know what he might have done if he had awoken. But, on the other hand, it wasn't that great because that meant the guy's brain had probably taken a pretty nasty bruising.
On the bright side, they were in a hospital, and it was easy enough to get that checked out.
Conan did his best to fade into the background, which was easy enough if he buttoned up his jacket to hide as much of the hospital-issue gown as possible, and trailed along behind Donovan after giving a quick, mostly accurate summary of what had happened prior to Doctor Cerebellum's plan's demise.
It went like this:
"Well, he was threatening to blow up the hospital, right? So I asked an adult - " Here, he mouthed 'a ghost,' and Donovan had just stared at him, eyes full of resignation. " - where he'd be if he was using the loud speaker system, and they said that it would probably be in the announcement room, so I asked where that was and they gave me directions. The vent was too small for anyone other than me to fit, so I crawled through them and then Sherlock-niichan came after me and he looked like a zombie so I got scared and kicked him, and then I accidentally fell through the air vent and landed on the guy holding us all hostage."
He neatly skipped over the part where he may or may not have been hyperventilating for an extended period of time. It wasn't important to the investigation.
Not that there was too much of an investigation necessary, since "Doctor Cerebellum" had been in the middle of making a list of demands to the police when he'd been abruptly fallen unconscious.
It was a pretty cut and dry case, really.
Conan managed to make it to the front entrance of the hospital without anyone waylaying him for a check up or medication or anything, which he personally counted as a win. It was still slightly concerning, though - or, well, it would have been concerning if he were an actual child, which he was not.
But it was still a bit worrying that a small child could be so easily overlooked immediately after taking down the criminal who'd been holding the hospital hostage.
Not that many children did things like that, obviously.
And, to be fair, Conan was actively trying to avoid nurses and doctors - anyone who was associating with any type of medical equipment, really. He did this by hiding behind Donovan's legs anytime someone got close.
It didn't work quite as well as it did with Sherlock's dramatic, billowy cloak, but it got the job done.
...Right up until he reached the main entrance and John caught sight of Donovan, and Donovan dragged Conan over to them by his collar to deposit him in front of them.
"I am a police officer," she greeted them faux-pleasantly. "I did not sign up to be a babysitter. Keep track of the child, would you?"
"It'd be much easier if he stopped crawling through vents," John muttered under his breath, reaching out to relieve Donovan of her hold on Conan's collar and replacing it with his own.
Child leashes. That was what was coming next. Conan was sure of it.
Nurse Harris, who was waiting nearby and examining the bruise on Sherlock's wrist that Conan was not at all sorry about, actually, scoffed derisively and rolled his eyes. The corner of John's lip lifted in a dry smile as response.
It was the kind of expression worn by former children who had definitely crawled through an air vent or two in their time, and probably also stopped their fair share of bombings.
Conan was intrigued.
And so, apparently, was Sherlock, judging by his expression. His eyes were bright as they darted between Conan and John, like he couldn't quite figure out who he wanted to focus on more.
He looked like Christmas had come early, and, in a sense, Conan supposed, it had. Not that anyone other than Sherlock Holmes would consider the revelation that one of their closest friends was not, in fact, who they said they were or the random appearance of a child on their couch with no clue as to how he had got there a particularly good present.
...Did Sherlock have any siblings? Because this was probably the best present anyone could have ever given him.
Donovan sighed, deep and aggrieved. "...What are you doing at the hospital, anyway?" she asked reluctantly.
Lucy Collins was the one who answered that question, and proceeded to throw John and Sherlock under the bus in a way that made Donovan fight back a grin.
If she hadn't been a defense lawyer, Conan expected that Donovan would have asked her to drinks or something.
That being said, apparently there was a 'talking shit about Sherlock Holmes' group chat that Donovan was a part of, and Lucy Collins had been added to it by the end of their conversation. Conan wondered if it was anything like the group chat he had with Hattori and Sera that was devoted purely to talking shit about KID.
(He wondered if the police officers at the TMPD had one about him.
...Probably.
KID almost certainly did, assuming he had friends he could rant about detectives to. Other phantom thieves, maybe?)
Donovan herded the culprit into her patrol car - he had woken up about halfway through her conversation with Lucy Collins and had absolutely no idea how he'd been captured - and John and Sherlock followed her. Lucy Collins departed with Delilah after confirming that Conan had been handed over to Nurse Harris, under the impression that he was probably more trustworthy a human being than the two borderline disasters that were John Watson and Sherlock Holmes, and that Conan would be safer in a hospital than at a crime scene.
Which wasn't exactly inaccurate.
However.
Nurse Harris had neglected to actually take hold of Conan's jacket, or any part of him at all, which made it insanely easy to slip into the back seat of the patrol car the moment Nurse Harris took his eyes off of him. Not even the criminal, staring despondently into his folded hands, noticed him.
This was, perhaps, not Conan's smartest idea. It was, in fact, a terrible, terrible idea, but Conan had terrible ideas quite often and this particular one didn't even crack the top fifty most terrible ideas he'd ever had, so.
Comparatively, this was actually a great idea.
Conan held his breath and froze in place as the car pulled away from the curb, hoping fervently that no one would notice him if he didn't move a muscle.
Somehow, miraculously, it worked.
He had more than likely managed it purely because Sherlock, the other occupant of the back seat, had his eyes fixed on the back of "John's" head like he could see through whatever parts of his persona were crafted and straight into his soul if he stared for long enough.
Which was a fantastic distraction, actually.
Conan was slightly worried about Donovan or John turning around in their seats and spotting him, right up until 'Doctor Cerebellum' decided to start talking.
And confessing.
To holding the hospital hostage.
...Conan supposed it wouldn't make much difference. The evidence was pretty condemning even without the confession.
But here he was.
Confessing.
...This guy really hadn't ever been arrested before, huh.
"...I just wanted to pay for my wife's surgery," 'Doctor Cerebellum' said, dropping his forehead to rest on his folded hands.
A jolt ran down Conan's spine as he froze, worried that John or Donovan would glance backwards and notice him in the backseat. He was relieved to see their eyes flicking to the rear-view mirror instead, which was unlikely to be angled so he was visible. It was perfectly positioned to keep an eye on the criminal, though, and had the added bonus of not spooking him.
"...We came to England a couple of weeks ago, and a few days ago she started to feel a bit off, so we stopped by the hospital. She...her appendix was ruptured, and they had to operate immediately… And, well, there's no way that we could afford thirty-five thousand dollars, even if it's a life-saving treatment, so I decided… We… Instead of living in debt for the next thirty years, I decided it would be better to try — I mean, if my options are finding a loan shark and getting taken out by the mafia when I can't pay them back or spending a few years in jail, the choice seems obvious… Besides, it's not like I posed an actual threat or anything, so… It's not like my sentence would be very long…" He trailed off.
"...Mr. Roberts, you do realize that the operation would have cost slightly over three thousand pounds in England, correct." Sherlock's 'question' was more of a statement, and not a particularly delicate one.
"Not all countries have health systems like America, Jack," John added, a bit more compassionate.
(It was interesting that he referred to the USA as 'America,' though...)
The newly named Mr. Roberts (which was far superior to 'Doctor Cerebellum') looked like someone had ripped his entire life to shreds in front of him, and then that person had turned around and revealed that they had been him all along, which was almost exactly what had actually happened.
"...Way to confess without a lawyer," Conan muttered absently, staring out the window and forgetting himself for a moment. 'Doctor Cerebellum,' aka Jack Roberts, apparently, flinched violently and practically jumped in his seat as he turned to stare at Conan because apparently he had less situational awareness than a teacup.
The car also jolted slightly before Donovan corrected it, and John and Sherlock both blinked rapidly, so maybe it wasn't only Jack Roberts who had the situational awareness of a teacup.
...Had no one noticed him at all? Really?
He'd honestly thought they were just pretending, humoring him.
Wow.
"Conan?" John asked, a bit strained.
Conan rolled his eyes. Like they knew any other crime-solving seven-year-olds. "Yup, that's me," he said dryly.
"When did you get here?" was what Donovan followed up with. She stubbornly kept her eyes on the road, though it seemed she was severely tempted to look back and confirm that there was, in fact, a seven-year-old sitting right next to the man she'd just arrested.
Conan shrugged. "Before we left the hospital. It's not like I can teleport or anything." Haha, he knew those dumb sci-fi shows he watched with Haibara would have a use at some point. That use was, apparently, English vocab words.
He pretended to consider for a moment before adding, "But it would be super cool if I could!"
(Did he perhaps accidentally pronounce super cool the French way? Maybe, but that was beside the point.)
A faint "Wouldn't it just," from John was the only reply that he got, apart from suddenly becoming the recipient of Sherlock's unnerving gaze, which was just great.
Whatever.
He was going with it.
"How much longer until we get to the police station?" he asked, for lack of anything better to say.
Donovan sighed deeply. "Quite a lot longer than originally anticipated, since we have to circle back and drop you off at the hospital."
"And come up with a way to help Tom prevent you from vanishing again," John muttered under his breath. Conan probably hadn't been meant to overhear it, which was pretty much the story of his life.
"Well, it's not like you can stop me from re-hiding in your car," Conan pointed out in what he thought was a very reasonable tone. "At least not without physically tying me down or something. Which seems like it would create a bad image."
"We really should take you back to the hospital," John replied distantly, purely performatively now that he'd resigned himself to Conan's reality-bending stubbornness. "You did just have a heart attack, after all."
"You sure can try taking me back!" Conan said brightly, ignoring the latter half of the statement even as Donovan spluttered at the revelation and spotting a familiar building through the window. "But we're already at the police station, and are you so sure that you'd be able to keep me there at the hospital without unreasonable amounts of manpower?"
(He was just copying lines from movies at this point.)
John's expression froze as he appeared to consider it. It did seem pretty unlikely, given Conan's previously exhibited escape skills.
"Besides," Conan continued mercilessly, "technically you're supposed to be responsible for me, right?" He paused a moment for effect. "Do you really want to let me out of your sight? 'Cuz if you do, there's no guarantee I'll actually stay in the hospital, and also if I leave then it's probably better to have a doctor like Watson-sensei accompanying me, right?"
Oddly, John's posture relaxed at his response. He chuckled and muttered, "Was I really this precocious?" under his breath.
Conan made a mental note to look up what "pre-koe-shuss" meant. And how to spell it, because English had an overly complicated orthography.
John sighed and shook his head, mouth twitching up at the edges. "Come along, Conan. We still need to give our statements."
"Okay!" Conan jumped to his feet and bounced twice impatiently before Donovan opened his door for him - stupid childproof locks - before following the group into the police station.
This time, however, Conan was unable to obscure himself with Sherlock's coat by virtue of Sherlock's eyes following both his and John's every movement.
...This was what he got for crawling through air vents and stopping bomb threats, apparently.
Good karma? What was that? There was only the type of deduction-focused attention that Conan would really have preferred to have absolutely nowhere near him, thanks, but apparently that wasn't in the cards.
And speaking of his luck being absolute shit -
That was Hakuba over there, wasn't it.
The universe just refused to let Conan catch one singular break this week, huh.
.
.
.
Notes:
happy new year! i meant to post this for christmas but instead you get a new year's update and an extra 2.5k.
haha remember when i said this would update once a month.
anyway i keep forgetting my ffn account exists bc it's a pain in the ass to upload from my phone and my laptop is currently not in the world of the living. ao3 gets more constant updates (and more fics!) - i think i'm up to chapter 18 over there. same username, same fic title, if you want to check it out :)