Nor'hanger Abbey
A Detective Conan Fanfic
By
Deborah (Kosagi) Brown

Acknowledgements:
All usual disclaimers regarding ownership of Detective Conan and related characters apply. This stuff is copyrighted to Aoyama Gosho.

Much thanks to Ysabet and Ryo Hoshi for their beta-reads, without which I'd probably have far too many spelling, continuity and grammatical errors.

Chapter 2: The Usual Suspects: In which entirely too much food is served.

Dinner was an elaborate affair, very suitable to the house and its décor. A long table covered in fine linen and set with silver and gold-rimmed china stood in the middle of a dining hall as elaborately ornamented as the rest of the house had been. On each plate was a small folded ivory-colored card marked with beautiful hand-written calligraphy – both English and Japanese – bearing the guests' names in bright gold ink.

The youngest of the group were all placed together at the lower end of the table. "Below the salt," I muttered in English.

My comment got a surprised and mildly confused look from the professor type. I gave him a raised brow, and his sour look softened a bit as the younger man leaned over and whispered in his ear, "You see, Nakamura-sensei? Not all teenagers are ignorant little nuisances. He knows English history." He was trying to be discreet about it, but the Professor was apparently a trifle deaf, forcing his assistant to speak up in order to be heard. He smiled a bit apologetically at the rest of us. "The Professor is an expert on English archeology so he's naturally a bit concerned over how badly the subject of English History is taught in our schools," he explained, and immediately had to soothe the older man. Apparently the concern was the subject of a favorite rant.

"Below the salt?" Ran murmured to me, questioningly while Nakamura's assistant tried to quiet him down.

"That's where the lower class people had to eat in England," Conan said, smiling up at Ran. "But I dunno why Heiji-niichan said it."

I raised a brow at the kid. He was doing a good job of covering for himself, answering the general question, but not the specifics. Ran smiled at him with that fond amusement she gets when she thinks he's being cutely adult. "Oh, I see. Heiji-niichan means that he thinks we've been put at the foot of the table because we're just kids."

"Honestly, Heiji," Kazuha grumbled at me. "Why don't you just say what you mean? And it isn't a big deal, anyway. You really need better manners."

"Like you're going to teach them to me?" I demanded, making a circle around the table in order to read the names before sitting at my assigned place like a good little monkey. The younger man had to be Fujiwara Akio, sitting beside Nakamura Genta, while the couple had to be James and Sarah Aden.

Ran helped Conan into his seat as I settled into the one across from him. That has got to be humiliating, I thought to myself, and was suddenly very glad that I had to touch someone to read anything about them. I really didn't want to know how much it bothered Kudo to have his girl treating him like a little kid. Even if he was one to her eyes.

A hand patting my knee drew my attention sideways and I realized I'd been placed beside the fortuneteller. I glared at her, recognizing the gesture as simply a Westerner's way of being motherly, but not particularly pleased with it in any event. "You're a troubled young man," she said softly. "Perhaps we should discuss it in private sometime."

I thought I was going to choke, especially when Kuroba started giggling. Fortunately, his girlfriend bopped him a good one, silencing him while I answered, as politely as possible, "Er Sorry. I'm not really into fortune-telling."

She blinked at me. "Really? Strange. I see the signs in you. They were there when we met before, but now Now they are so much stronger."

Glancing over at Conan, I saw his eyes widen and felt a sharp surge of fear. It was possible that she was simply dramatizing herself, even possible that she really did have some talent as a fortune-teller. The trouble was, she might also be part of the Black Organization, and the last thing I wanted was for them to realize that I was the one who'd broken into their lab last month.

Fortunately, I was saved by the sound of a man's voice from the doorway. "Miss Abe begs your indulgence, but she has been called away on a matter of great importance regarding her latest acquisition." The newcomer was middle-aged, dressed in an expensive silk suit, and had the look of someone in the legal profession. His next words confirmed my impression. "I am Wanabe Shiro, Miss Abe's legal representative. She has asked me to handle the introductions and the festivities planned for tomorrow."

"I really don't care about festivities," Nakamura-sensei answered sourly. "I came to see the artifact."

"Artifact?" Kuroba asked, lounging in his seat. "What artifact?"

Smoothly, Wanabe shook his head. "I'm afraid that is private business, young man," he murmured regretfully. "Professor, for the sake of security, I must ask you not to discuss the matter further."

Nakamura-sensei huffed. He clearly didn't appreciate the insinuation that he couldn't keep a secret. Still, he subsided, leaving the rest of us to our curiosity, and Wanabe continued, "Tonight Miss Abe's chefs have prepared a simple meal for you, since it's rather late. Once you've eaten, you'll be shown to your rooms. Tomorrow I'll be guiding anyone interested through the castle and tomorrow evening anyone who'd like to will have permission to choose an area of the castle to investigate for supernatural phenomena." From his expression, Wanabe clearly didn't approve of the last, but he continued. "Miss Abe has recording equipment for all of you to use and hopes that you will have a great deal of success in making contact with those who haunt this place."

I forced myself not to make a sour face. Before I'd met up with the ghost hound I might have been willing to give the hunt a try. Now, all I wanted was to stay where there was warmth and light and people. Light didn't prevent my ghosts from showing themselves, but it was a helluva lot less unnerving facing a dead thing in the middle of a lighted room than it was in darkness, when every shadowy motion might be something long dead. "So," I said, "When do we eat?"

One of the smaller doors leading into the dining hall opened and Heidi came in pushing a tray of covered dishes. "Right now," Wanabe said, gesturing. "I've dined already, so I'll be leaving you now. Professor, we can discuss matters when Abe-san returns."

***

The failure to hear more about the artifact was disappointing, but hardly unexpected. He'd have to see about listening in on Wanabe and Nakamura-sensei's conversation – especially since he wasn't yet sure the thing would be worth bothering with. Until he was, there wasn't much point to putting a lot of effort into checking the place out for its security. And tomorrow's fun and games will be a perfect time to do so. He watched the others with a grin, still puzzling a bit over the mystery Hattori Heiji presented. He had no doubt Hattori was as bright as represented, but that faint edge of something else, of something he was keeping as close and secret as Conan kept his true identity as Kudo hidden, kept flickering at the edges. And if there's anything I don't like, it's letting other people's secrets alone. Especially when they might affect me.

***

I dropped on my back with a *woof* of overstuffed pleasure. Dinner had been in the western style, with a large cut of prime rib, potatoes and broccoli. I'd eaten, according to Kazuha, like a pig, and was beginning to feel the effects. Fortunately, she wasn't there to scold me further as I undid my belt and sighed. I hoped the girls were comfortable in their room. More so than I was going to be in this one. Above me, ever so faintly, I could see a body hanging from the rafter. We would get a room where some damnfool soul had decided to suicide. Fifteenth century? I wondered. The dress style suggested it.

"Wow. You really put it away, Heiji," Conan said, perching on his bed.

"Yeah, well so did you. Another growth spurt?"

Sourly, Conan grumbled, "I can only hope. I was short for years the first time around."

I knew how he felt. I hadn't gained my present height until I was a teenager. At least I don't have to go through that twice, I thought to myself. "Hey, Ku Conan."

He sighed, "Would you please not do that? What is it?"

I glanced at him with an embarrassed expression. I really was going to have to get that habit out of my system. I'd convinced Ran that I was calling him Kudo as a joke because he was almost as smart as her missing friend. "Sorry," I muttered. "I was just wondering Did you notice the same thing I did about Heidi?"

"Aside from her being stacked?" he gave me one of his patented 'looks'. "Yeah. She put her hose on too quick."

"She had a bit of greasepaint just under her collar."

"That hair is obviously a wig."

"And our hostess is known to do her own make-up."

We looked at each other with identical grins and said, in unison, "She was the old man. And probably is Abe-san."

I laughed, glad to be able to talk with Conan as Kudo without having to worry about his secret. I doubted I'd ever tell him, or that I even needed to, but it meant a lot to have someone around who knew how my mind worked and to whom I didn't have to explain the facts in slow and patient detail. I just wish it wasn't necessary to pretend in front of people. That Ai would find a cure, so we could go to town on the bad-guys without my having to cover for Conan's brilliance.

Thinking about Ai made me ask, "Oi, Conan? That mutual friend of ours ever tell you what the stuff you and she got was supposed to do?"

"No. She's been pretty quiet on that count. I've got a few guesses. Ten years is a long time for a lab animal. Maybe the reason they thought it wasn't working was because it takes you back too far?" Conan moved to sit cross-legged on the pillows near me, so he could speak more quietly.

"Disappeared, maybe?" I wondered what happened to the part of Shinichi that had been wiped away in creating Conan. Where did it go, and where did it come from when he'd changed back those few times? Thinking about it made my head hurt.

Conan nodded. "That's my guess," he admitted, and his expression grew distant. "'Trying to bring the dead against the stream of time'"(1)

"Eh?"

"That's what they're up to, according someone they were forcing to work for them." He put his chin on his fist and looked thoughtful. "Y'know. That might just fit in with your experience, too."

I nodded slowly, beginning to have some inkling of what they might be up to and not liking it at all. From Conan's expression, he didn't either. I sighed. "Until we have more facts, though, I don't think there's much we can do about it. For now, let's just get a good night's sleep and find out what horrors Abe-san has for us tomorrow."

"Speaking of which, what was up just before we entered the sitting room?" My expression must have showed the sour annoyance I was feeling, because Conan grimaced and added, "A real one?"

"Very. Black dog. No head and very, very angry. I have some niggling memory of something like that"

"Hound of the Baskervilles," Conan said, questioningly, and I remembered his fondness for Sherlock Holmes.

Shaking my head, I shrugged. "No. You know I prefer Ellery Queen, anyway. That's part of the memory, but No, it's just not coming back to me right now. Something I read when I was a kid, I think." I could see the words Black Dog in English, but I had so many English readers in my shelves that figuring out which one it'd come from was going to take a while.

"Oh." Conan bounced off the bed and went to his suitcase. "Oh, yeah, before I forget. The professor had a couple of things he wanted to give you." I sat up and watched him toss things around as he searched the bottom of his bag. "Ah, here we are." He held out a watch and a pair of sunglasses. "Remember all those tests he ran last time you were up? He had some ideas based on them that might help you."

I raised a brow. They looked perfectly normal to me, but I knew how good Agasa-hakase was at making little toys that looked like nothing and did everything. I'd complained jokingly once to Conan that Agasa loved him more than me. Not that I have any reason to expect otherwise. Shinichi grew up around him. I'm just that bratty kid from Osaka. Taking the watch, I examined it curiously before sliding it on. "What do they do?"

Conan touched a button on the edge of the watch and I felt the hair stand on my arm. "Shake my hand."

"Huh? But"

Before I could stop him, Conan grabbed my hand and I was stunned not to be inundated with impressions. Oh, a few faint images brushed through my mind, but they were so weak as to be unreadable. "Oh. I see." I noted that the effect made me feel a bit like I was getting a mild static charge. "So I can shake someone's hand without worrying about getting more than I wanted." That was cool. It'd been hard to avoid skin to skin contact with people this last summer. "How do you switch it on and off?"

"This way." Conan showed me the buttons. "He's working on a bracelet you could wear on the other wrist, but since you don't wear jewelry, it's going to have to be something pretty unobtrusive. Unless you want Kazuha to think you're going nuts?"

"She already thinks that," I said absently. I'd done my best in the last month to hide the truth from her, but we grew up together. She couldn't help but notice a change. And I don't have Conan's advantage of Ran not knowing he's Shinichi. Besides, I'd swear Ran-chan's beginning to suspect as well. "What about the glasses?" I asked, returning to the present.

"Simple. You can't afford to be distracted by what you see when you're biking. These have a life sensor in them. It picks up the bioelectric fields that surround living things. You'll be able to see if what you're looking at is alive or not."

I put them on and looked at Conan. The faint line of light around him was just barely enough for me to see, which was good because I couldn't afford the distraction. Then I looked up. "You can tell him it works then." I could see our ghostly friend up there, her body swaying slightly in a non-existent breeze, but – unlike Conan – it wasn't limned with a thin glow. "Would you thank him for me? I've needed something like these things bad." I'd had to stay off my bike in the last month and was getting stir-crazy.

"One's up there? Is it nasty?" Conan peered up at the ceiling above us with a frown.

"Nah. Another old one and nothing compared to that damned dog. We've seen worse corpses." I shrugged. "Let's get some sleep, Conan. Tomorrow's going to be a pain, I think." I turned off the watch – its field would drive me crazy if I kept it going all the time. Folding the glasses, I put them on the table between Conan's bed and mine and rolled my still over-fed body into a better position for sleeping.

***

As the building quieted down for the night he slipped out for a bit of pre-festivity exploration. The former Abbey was huge, one of the biggest homes he'd ever had the pleasure of casing, and he wanted to make use of every minute available. It came as no surprise to find Abe-san's devices in full operation, but it was easy to avoid the things and even easier to avoid their host's other security measures. Even if it isn't the Pandora Gem I might just go after the whatsis just to show her how lax she's being. This place would be a piece of cake for a determined amateur, much less a professional like me.

To Be Continued...

Authorial Notes:
(1) This is from one of the manga scans at Jane's "Detective Conan" site. http://www.conan.esmartkid.com/. Specifically "White Snow, Black Shadow".