File Seventy-Nine: The Mysterious Shiragami-sama
Mayor Hinohara. Conan's hand rose to his chin, deep in thought, as the group made their way out of the mansion. Was an athlete nominated to be the Japanese representative in track and field at the Olympics.
He had won several medals due to his magnificent performance, Hattori had later commented, but for some reason none of them could understand yet, the ribbons had been removed from all of them.
There is also that… A ridiculously expensive statue of Unzou, part of the Niou, a pair of guardian kings of Buddha. Shouldn't Azou be there, as well? If it was stolen, as everyone in that town believed, Unzou would be more than gone.
Nothing made sense ─ Conan huffed in utter irritation. But at least, I think we can say for sure that it wasn't a robbery.
This would be much easier… He turned to give the amnesic teenager a side look. … if this forgetful detective remembered anything.
It had been frustrating, to say the least, when Shinichi had walked out of Okuda Makoto's room, still as quiet as a mouse and gaze stuck on the floor, claiming that he couldn't recall a thing. Though it must have been frustrating for him as well… No, far more frustrating than it is to any of us.
… Or maybe he's just worried about what that woman said before.
"Yes, I know all about it, Kudo-kun. About your ulterior motive," said the reporter, right after laughing boisterously at the perplexed teenager. "Huh, what's with that face?" Startled, Shinichi took a step back, while the woman sneered in his face. "Did you think I hadn't found you out?"
Shinichi only stared back in silent surprise. "Well." The woman shrugged after a while, yet her sardonic smile had yet to leave. "If you come around and want to confess it all to me, come and see me at the Kotou Inn, where I'm staying." Watching the woman walking away, the teen couldn't help but frown a little. "If you do, I can write more favorably about you in my article."
At the memory, Conan's gaze narrowed ever so slightly.
"About the truth that you've tried to keep hidden ─ the truth that must not be said."
But it went all away the moment he noticed the teenager in question was staring back at him with a rather puzzled expression of his own. Having been caught observing, Conan's gaze darted somewhere else and sealed his lips shut. By the corner of his eye, he noticed Shinichi giving him a long, awkward look, before slowly focusing back on the road.
Conan hesitated, glancing sideways at him for a couple of moments. A heavy sigh escaped him, and he turned to face him, completely. "Say, Shinichi-niichan," he spoke up, a faint smile making its way to his face. "You… You still don't remember anything, do you?"
Lowering his head, he gave the child his answer. The smile on Conan's face dropped a bit, but remained ultimately intact otherwise. "Ah, well." His arms crossed behind his head. "It can't be helped, I guess."
With that, the kid looked back ahead, only now noticing that the rest of the group were walking a distance ahead of them. Probably, they wanted to give him a time alone with his brother, he shrugged.
"By the way, I haven't introduced myself, have I?" he said, not even glancing at him. "I'm Edogawa Conan."
The older boy fell silent at that, to which Conan paid no attention. "Who…" That was, until a few seconds later, that he heard a hoarse, more-or-less like his own, voice reaching his ears. "Who are you to me?"
Conan found it incredibly hard to swallow the lump in his throat. "Someone..." Yet, he did his best not to let it show. "Someone that really, really looks up to you, Shinichi-niichan."
The perplexed expression he saw in the teenager's face was almost amusing to him ─ but he couldn't laugh. "You're… a big idiot, you knew that? A lying, highly insensitive and incredibly arrogant individual..." Just forced his smile a little bigger, and raised his head to see the darkened sky above them. It was cloudy, he noted, and faintly wondered if it would rain soon. "But I guess you have some redeemable qualities somewhere."
Conan took a deep breath then, closing his eyes, added.
"Because, ever since I can remember... I have always wanted to be like you, Shinichi-niichan."
Suddenly, the teenager had disappeared from his peripheral vision.
"Shinichi-niichan?" he called, sort of worried, but paused when he saw him there, standing quietly still and staring at him in a way he hadn't before in this entire life. His eyes had also widened just a bit, as if he was looking at something else rather than Conan.
In his eyes, for the first time in this entire day, Conan could see something sparking back into life. Something real, genuine.
Yet, as strange as that was, he still couldn't see Shinichi.
Oniichan… He didn't move, he didn't speak. Just kept staring back. Are you there, Oniichan?
A faint rustling reached his ears, prompting him to tear his gaze away from the teenager and to his surroundings. Though, no matter where he looked, he couldn't see anything. A wild animal?
They were walking through the forest, after all, making sure to follow the indicated path in order not to get lost inside. Momentarily, his mind went back to the story they had been told, about this Shiragami monster that lurked in the woods, and almost laughed at the absurdity of that thought.
A cold feeling on his nose startled him. "It's started raining..." Kogoro's voice confirmed for him before he could even say something. Some part of his brain registered that this was the part where he should start running to the inn, but he wouldn't move.
Just searched with curious eyes for whatever was in that forest.
That was, until a faint tickle, followed by a loud sneeze caught him by surprise. "Ah!" Ran gasped, suddenly very aware of the fact that the already feverish kid was getting soaked wet. "Conan-kun!"
Suddenly, he felt his feet leaving the ground. "Hattori," he sighed, slightly annoyed by the teenager that had just picked him up, and started jogging with him in his arms. "I can get to the inn on my own, you know."
"Probably, after standing like an hour in the middle of the rain staring at the trees." Heiji gave him a side look. "You're creepy, kid. Hope you knew that."
Conan found himself unable to shoot something back so he just rested his chin on his shoulder with a loud, annoyed groan, wordlessly watching Kazuha pushing Shinichi from behind and urging him to hurry.
And then, he saw it ─ in the darkness of that forest, a shadow moved. Blinking, Conan tried to focus on the mysterious silhouette standing in a branch of a tree.
The Shiragami? He chuckled to himself. What an absurd, random thought.
Maybe his fever had gone up, he mused when a slight tremor struck his body. Because he wouldn't be able to explain why he wasn't particularly worried, not even a little bit, about whoever ─ or whatever ─ was gazing so intensely at them otherwise.
Noticing the shivering Heiji frowned then, holding Conan tighter, hastened his pace.
Finally asleep, huh?
Sighing, Hattori looked away from the slumbering little boy to watch Ran fall on her knees right beside her charge's futon and gingerly dab the sweat from his forehead with a damp cloth. After getting caught in the rain earlier, it wasn't really a surprise for any of them when his fever peaked ─ if anything, Heiji had to wonder how did this kid manage to get soaked wet twice in a single day. Fell in the water two days in a row, too. According to Ran, that was how he had caught that cold in the first place.
At least it was going down now, confirmed Ran, to which Kazuha sighed in relief.
"You should head to your room, Ran," said Kogoro, walking closer to the group. "It's getting late."
At that, the girl stubbornly shook her head. Gently, she placed the cloth on top of the kid's forehead and just sat gazing at him, concern shaping her features. And she did not yield, even when her father tried to reason with her. "It's just a cold…" He huffed irritably. "Even the brat told you not to worry, didn't he?"
Well, that is true, actually. Heiji had heard that clearly from his spot behind the bathroom door when Ran had ushered the kid there to get him dry ─ had also gotten the door closed shut in the face by the kid the moment he retrieved the clothes Heiji had brought for him. Even now, his poor nose still hurt.
"It will be fine, Ran-chan," Heiji joined when he realized her father was getting nowhere close in convincing her. "We'll take care of him ─ Occhan, Kudo and me."
Even if all Kudo was doing was staring out the window, lost in his own thoughts, and definitely not paying any kind of attention to anything else.
"Besides, it would be cruel of you to leave Kazuha all alone with that Shiragami roaming around." Kazuha winced at that, but he ignored it in favor of grinning at the other girl who wouldn't stop gazing at the little kid. "We'll call you if something is wrong."
Slowly, albeit reluctantly, the girl stood up and offered him a small nod. Kazuha jumped back into her feet, hand on Ran's shoulder gently guiding her away. Before the girls left, however, Ran glanced over her shoulder, and briefly looked at Shinichi.
And frowned.
"Say, Kazuha-chan," she said, once they stepped up into the hallway. "This is just speaking hypothetically, alright?"
In the meantime, Kogoro watched with an raised eyebrow the teenage detective moving closer to his own futon, then reached over to it. Confusion turned into realization while watching him drag it, until it was right next to Conan's, and sighed.
He turned to Shinichi and crossed his arms in front of his chest. "Hey, you." The detective in question flinched when he realized he was addressing him. "Go get some water," he ordered, with a stern and also annoyed, tone in his voice. "You're amnesic, not invalid."
Not daring to disappoint the man any further, Shinichi stood up and immediately went to do as he was told, uttering no word. The other two stared at him until he disappeared behind the door, then Hattori shook his head.
"That's actually a bit unsettling," commented the boy, plopping down onto his futon. "Seeing Kudo acting so indifferent about this kid."
"What do you expect?" Kogoro shrugged nonchalantly, as if he didn't care enough. "The detective kid doesn't remember him."
Hattori hummed at that, unable to get rid of that weird feeling, until he heard the child shifting. "Seriously," he sighed tiredly, setting his eyes back on the kid that had turned his head, causing the cloth on his forehead to slip. "None of this would've happened if you just stayed put like a good kid." He grabbed the rag once more and rubbed his nose. "And my nose still hurts, by the record..."
Kogoro didn't comment on it, just turned around and went to his futon ─ it caused Heiji to smirk, seeing that the man was doing the same thing he had done a few moments ago, despite not being 'particularly concerned' about the little boy, but ultimately kept his amusement to himself.
"He didn't have to do that," instead, he continued, huffing as he did so. "What's the deal with all that, anyway?"
At that, the man went completely silent, greatly confusing the detective. "Still self-conscious about that old scar, huh?" he muttered, more to himself than to anyone else, while standing up.
"Scar?" Hattori arched his eyebrows. "Ah, the bullet wound on his stomach?"
Kogoro gave him a long look, before he turned back to drag the futon, more or less like the teenager had done a few minutes ago. "No," to Hattori's surprise, he replied, a frown prominent in his features. "Shoulder."
At first, Heiji blinked, ultimately confused about those words until the coldness that came with the sudden realization made him shiver. "He was shot more than once."
Kogoro nodded. "I take it he told you about the time he was kidnapped, right?"
He nodded in response. "He said Kudo found him."
"Well, he did. But the brat was shot, and he shot the detective kid by accident." Dropping the futon, he motioned to his side. "He felt so incredibly guilty that he forgot about it, until a few months ago, apparently."
The man said nothing else, probably more than willing to abandon the uncomfortable subject completely, and Heiji didn't even try to press him any further. Instead, he put the cloth back into place, watching as the child stirred slightly.
Blue peeked out of heavy eyelids causing Heiji to freeze, with his hand still reposing in the kid's forehead, who wouldn't do anything but to stare ─ which was more than disturbing for Heiji, but kept that fact to himself. Instead, he opened his mouth to ask if he needed something.
"... Thank you..." Yet, that small, feeble whisper stopped him. "... Oniichan."
Just like that, the child dozed off again, leaving Hattori to gape at him ─ rather stupidly, he was sure ─ without a clue of how to act. Unlike him, Kogoro shrugged, not giving the event any kind of transcendence.
He was brought out of his stupor when Kudo walked in, a basin with water between his hands and handed it to Kogoro. Once he delivered what he had been tasked with, he excused himself to the bathroom in order to prepare for the night.
Not a glance towards his little brother, Kogoro and Heiji noted, yet did not comment on it.
Rather than that, the teenager's gaze tore away from the door his fellow detective had disappeared from and fell on the child who slept so comfortably that actually made him smile.
"Say, Occhan," he called, while settling the blankets tightly around Conan. "About that incident you were speaking before..."
"What is it?"
Heiji's eyes took a sharper glint as they fixated on him.
"How bad was Kudo's wound?"
"I'm never letting go of this arm, you hear me?!"
Conan gritted his teeth, forcing himself to endure the pain in his limbs, in favor of keeping a tight hold onto his brother. His fingers were moments away from giving out, and he mentally cursed himself ─ for not being strong enough, for being unable to think of anything else.
Yet, no matter what, he kept an iron grip. He absolutely couldn't let go ─ even if that meant falling back into the violent waters himself.
But then, his brother smiled at him, and Conan realized he wouldn't like what would happen next.
"Sorry..."
He had taken his wristwatch out ─ he was aiming at him. Conan's eyes widened in horror, and unconsciously clutched the arm he was gripping ─ he couldn't, he couldn't let go, no matter what.
He couldn't ─ he had that distinct feeling settling in the pit of his stomach. If he let go now, he wouldn't see him ever again.
And that was something that terrified the little boy to the core.
"I'm sorry for this, Conan."
Little fingers grabbed with all feeble strength he had ─ but it was draining. As darkness made itself known and tried to pull him with it, Conan tried to hold on.
Until finally, he slipped away. Desperately, his hand reached forward.
And grasped it.
Blinking lethargically, Conan struggled to make something out of his far-too-blurry surroundings ─ but failed miserably. What he did note, however, was a flinch under his hand, and a sharp intake of air ─ it made him wonder who could be this surprised, or rather, why.
Oh, he was grabbing onto something. Right ─ he didn't think of releasing them, anyway.
A cold something was placed in his forehead ─ it was weirdly pleasant, Conan mused ─ and a figure moved. It took some squinting, but this time around he distinguished white. White hair, he observed. Black... Black clothes... And are those feathers?
The fact that this unknown person didn't activate any alarm in his mind surprised him, but not enough for him to think of anything else. Instead, he made a small sound of appreciation when something ─ fingers? ─ caressed his warm forehead. It was cold, but not a bad kind of cold either ─ a gentle, soothing and strangely familiar loving touch.
Closing his eyes once more, he curled into himself and allowed the dark veil of sleep to descend upon him, as if it had never left. This time around, he didn't let go.
When the boy opened his eyes again, he was glad that his head wasn't threatening to split itself into two like the night before, and that the burning behind his eyeballs was gone now. Stirring slightly, his gaze fell on Hattori, who was sound asleep in the futon beside him ─ which was, now that he thought about it, oddly near to him, and certainly he didn't remember it being like that before. Kogoro's snores sounded distinctively close behind him, too.
He didn't think much of it so, shrugging, he sat up, stretching himself before blinking. Slowly, he lowered his hand and stared at his closed fist for a second. When he opened it, he found himself cluelessly staring at the black piece of cloth resting on top of his hand.
Judging by the endings of it, he realized it had been ripped from something else, and immediately felt his face warming up at the thought of him clinging into someone else so tightly to cause this to happen.
Taking a deep breath, he glanced at Heiji, and froze, staring for a moment more than necessary at his red shirt. Same with Kogoro ─ white.
Then… Then did he…?
His head snapped to the futon on the opposite corner where he remembered Shinichi would spend the night and stopped entirely.
Not tearing his eyes away from that spot, Conan blindly tried to shake the teenager next to him awake.
Hattori was woken up with a hand on his face instead. Grumbling, he roughly whisked the hand away and looked at the source. Annoyance turned into slight concern when he noticed the young boy sitting, staring ahead with a shocked expression.
"C-Conan? Do you feel-?"
"Shinichi-niichan is not here."
"What?!"
Hattori shot up from his bed, now wide awake with the news, to realize that Kudo was nowhere to be seen. "Hey, Hattori…" the child asked, slowly turning to face him. "Do you think it has to do with what that reporter said?"
He didn't have an answer to give him. Instead, he got up and went to wake the older man up. Conan did not wait for him, just bolted to the bathroom and swung the door open, just to find it empty.
… No way.
"H-Hey!" Heiji called, startled, when the kid ran right past him. "Wait!"
But he didn't ─ he rushed out the room and took a turn to the right. He saw a blur of pale pink and blue, but before he could even think of stopping, a pair of hands latched onto his shoulders, preventing him from colliding into their owner.
"Conan-kun?" He looked up to see Ran blinking down at him, just like Kazuha next to her. "What's wrong?"
"Shinichi-niichan," he said, causing the girl to worry a little. "He's not here."
"Eh?" the girls chorused, shocked.
"That's right," Heiji confirmed, sliding into a stop and grabbing into the doorframe, a panicky expression all over his face. "His futon was left empty."
Conan frowned. Without memories, he couldn't have gone far… Right? And just as he was about to slip away from Ran's grasp to continue his search, Kogoro came up to them running, after apparently asking a few villagers ─ he completely missed when he had left the room, but supposed he was too into his task of finding him to notice that.
"They said they saw him go into Mayor Hinohara's house early in the morning!"
While he didn't completely understand what he could be doing in a place like that, Conan didn't question, just immediately went that way with Hattori in tow. Once there, he didn't waste a second and opened the door right away.
"Shinichi-niichan?" he called out, stepping inside. "Are you here?"
"He is, it seems."
When the older detective pointed at the shoes in the entrance, Conan frowned slightly, recognizing them as the ones that Hattori had lent him the day before. A pair of high-heeled shoes were also there ─ they belonged to the reporter, if the child remembered correctly.
They nodded at each other, and made their way further inside the mansion, both calling for Shinichi. Turning his head from left to right, the child saw no trace of his older brother, and moved to the stairs.
"Oh!" Just before he could do anything, Hattori smiled, and made a beeline for the study room. "Found you."
The child instantly did the same, a relieved smile touching his lips when he saw Shinichi standing there. "Did your memory come back?" questioned Hattori, resting his hand on top of his shoulders. "That's why you came here… Right, Kudo?"
Strangely enough, he didn't react ─ Conan raised an eyebrow and walked closer to them, mouth opening to ask what seemed to be wrong. But he froze half-way, eyes gradually opening as he stared back at the shaken teenager.
Heiji's hands and Shinichi's entire chest were covered in red.
Shock turned into horror as realization dawned on him. Wait… His mouth had gone soft, unable to form a mere word, let alone a proper sentence. He couldn't have…
He took a step back and, as if fate wanted to prove him wrong, he felt his feet colliding into something. Ever so slowly, he started to turn, more than a bit frightened about what he could see next. And he saw her ─ the reporter from before, lying on the ground motionlessly. Blood sprouted from a wound in her mid-abdomen, covering everything in sight with that dreadful, scarlet color.
Then, a twitch. "Kawauchi-san!" So he fell onto his knees, hands pressing against the wound. "Hold on, Kawauchi-san!"
His cries seemed to wake Heiji out of his stupor. "Hey, Kudo!" His first reaction was to shake his fellow teenage detective, violently. "What is this?! What happened?!"
Shinichi's eyes widened, finally focusing on Hattori. "I don't know..." he whispered, reaching to press his palm against his forehead. "I fell unconscious… And when I came to, I was here..."
A metallic clatter resounded in Conan's ears, "Was it me?" together with the shocked, trembling voice that was barely his brother's any longer. "That person… Did I do this?"
No matter how much he wanted to think otherwise, to convince himself that this was nothing but a sick joke, he couldn't. Not when the knife slid on the floor and stopped right beside him ─ the blood in it was still fresh, the child couldn't help but notice.
No. He shook his head and forced himself to look away from the weapon. There is no time for this.
Not until the blood under his little hands stopped flowing ─ not when he could feel Kawauchi's weak pulse under his palms.
Damn it… Closing his eyes tightly shut, he pressed harder. This can't be happening...
He barely noticed Hattori sitting crouching down beside him until he pried his hands away from her. "Hattori!" he exclaimed with some sort of urgency, but subdued when he started to do the same thing he had been doing before.
Gazing into the kid's bewildered eyes, the teenager nodded. It took Conan more than he would be happy to admit understanding what he meant, yet when he did, he sprung into action.
The next moment, the child was back onto his feet and running out the room, barely dodging Kogoro who, clueless about what had really happened, was just making his way to the crime scene.
"Oh, that's how it is," said the police detective while he let his eyes roam across the crime scene. "You all had questions about how the murder case that occurred here two years ago was settled and, despite having visited this place last night, you came here again this morning."
It was at times like these that Conan kind of wished this had happened in Gunma instead ─ really, he had never thought that day would come. Yamamura would have been a million times easier to trick, but as things were right now, he had no other choice but to stare back, blankly, at the rather competent investigator when he focused his attention on him.
"The blood in your hands indicates you tried to aid Kawauchi Misato-san." Conan had no other choice but to nod. "Were you the first one to find her, boy?"
Again, he nodded. "I was too excited to help Kogoro-ojisan to solve the case that I ran ahead without thinking." His entire expression lacked any emotion, which was actually a bit unsettling to the rest. "I found Kawauchi-san and tried to help."
"And? When you got there, there was no one else except the victim, right?"
"I'm certain I told you that already." Conan's eyebrow rose. "Do you need a drawing or something?"
Confused blinking was all he received as a response ─ not that he cared enough to do something about it.
Laughing nervously, Ran crouched down next to him. "Conan-kun told you everything he knows," she said, placing her hands on his shoulders. "We need to go get the blood washed… Can we…?"
"Ah, it's okay." The investigator nodded, standing back again. "Once we check the footprints in the entryway, we'll know who the culprit was soon enough."
"But how will you know from that?"
"They were left behind in the muddy ground to the rain that fell last night. Both the victim's and the culprit's footprints are deep and distinct."
"But, Detective..." tried Kogoro, with an awkward smile. "Those may have been our footprints."
"No, when you came here the sun had come up, and the ground was fairly dry."
He desperately needed Yamamura in charge of this case, Conan decided, but kept it to himself when the police detective hummed in thought.
"What bothers me are the footprints left by the culprit when they came here while the ground was still muddy this morning… Why did they leave out the back of the house after the ground had dried?"
"Isn't it obvious?" questioned Conan with a plain, bored tone. "The culprit must have escaped when they heard us coming in."
"But boy, why would they wait-?"
"Not many people go out in the rain." The kid shrugged. "If you saw someone with wet clothes, you'd surely remember them. It wouldn't be good if they wind up becoming a suspect." He glanced at Kogoro by the corner of his eye. "That's what you were thinking, right, Kogoro-ojisan?"
"E-Eh..."
"Right, Kogoro-ojisan?"
"A-Ah, yeah. Of course."
"See? Can we go now?"
The detective gave him a long look before his eye began to twitch, irritated. "So, boy, if everything is that obvious..." Conan didn't even blink. "Mind explaining this to me? Considering the tracks after the ground had dried, there should be five people here, but there only seem to be four." He noticed Kazuha, Kogoro and Ran flinching at those words. "Furthermore, for some reason, the footprints of the fifth person leave from the back door. Answer, why is that?"
Conan just stared back at the detective, who was clearly expecting an answer, and didn't say anything for several seconds.
"How should I know?" A childish grin crossed his face. "I'm just a kid."
"B-But-"
"What are you intending? You need to do your work yourself, Detective-san." With that, he took a startled Ran's hand and led her away. "Make sure to put that criminal behind bars, okay?"
"Wait-!"
He didn't, just disappeared behind the door with the girl instead. For a moment more than necessary, the detective stared at the empty space that had been previously occupied by that odd kid, and shook his head with a sigh.
He turned to Kogoro, who visually winced.
Once out of sight, both the girl and the little boy leaned against the wall, suddenly exhausted as if they had run for miles. "Seriously, that idiot detective," groaned Ran, slightly irritated. "Even without his memories he keeps causing trouble to everyone..."
Conan couldn't agree more actually ─ he showed this with a weak nod. "I don't understand it though," he admitted, letting his head drop. "Who could have called the police and the ambulance?"
That was something that puzzled Ran too, actually. Back when they had found the victim on the floor, Hattori had ordered Kazuha to call an ambulance, but not the police ─ since this would result in having Shinichi get publicly involved, something they did not need right now, considering his current position.
"Maybe it was the culprit?" she suggested, gently leading the boy to the washroom. "If they wanted to frame Shinichi, they would have done that after running away."
Falling strangely silent, the kid frowned as he thought about that. That detective was right. Besides Hattori and Shinichi-niichan's footprints, there was nothing else when I checked the backdoor. Which meant that nobody had left from there. If there was another person in there, there has to be a way for them to escape…
But there wasn't ─ he had already checked the entire house before the police arrived.
Probably sensing that it was probably in vain, Ran didn't even try to pressure him into answering. With a faint smile, he lifted him into a stool and opened the tab, allowing the water to flow ─ Conan just stared.
A fond sigh escaped her. That Conan-kun, lost in his own world again. With an astonishing amount of patience that could only be hers, she took his hands into hers and put them under the water. I wonder if he knows how much he's like Shinichi…
She pursed her lips. Shinichi…
That thought struck her mind before she could help it ─ just now, Conan resembled Shinichi more than Shinichi himself.
Conan's eyes fixated on the water, now dyed red with the blood that Ran was scrubbing out of his hands ─ the blood that his brother had spilled.
What am I even thinking? He frowned, trying with all his might to shake that stupid impression off his mind. Oniichan is not a murderer.
He had gone a long way to confirm that fact, a long time ago. Even so, how was he supposed to explain this?
The back of her palm resting against his cheek brought him back to reality. "I didn't get to check on you this morning, but it seems like you're all better." She smiled at him, helping him off the stool. "That's a relief."
Well, that was true ─ even his voice seemed to be fine now, but he hadn't noticed it until now. "So," she continued. "Dad and Hattori-kun really took good care of you."
Not that he had a way of knowing ─ he had been sleeping the entire time ─ but he shrugged anyway, slipping his now clean hands back into his pockets.
His fingers grasped something, and he froze momentarily, taking into its texture and realizing that it was a piece of cloth ─ the one he had been grasping this morning.
Shinichi clothes, other than bloody, had seemed to be in perfect condition, he recalled.
Then, who...?
"Maybe you should go with Hattori-kun," said Ran suddenly, startling him. "We probably can't leave yet, but I can make some excuse for you." She kneeled down right in front of him. "You don't have to be here… And you must be worried about Shinichi."
"Are you?" The girl blinked at the question she did not expect. "Are you worried about Shinichi-niichan?"
It took her a moment to reply. "O-Of course, Conan-kun."
He didn't reply to her right away, just narrowed his eyes slightly, as if trying to look into her very soul, before nodding and jogging out of the bathroom. But, even with him gone, Ran didn't move.
"If someone you liked suddenly reappeared after you've waited so long, but had lost their memory… If it were you, Kazuha-chan, what would you do?"
"Well… I'd be crying like mad! The joy of seeing him after so long and the sadness over his forgetting about himself would come welling up together."
Closing her eyes, Ran took a deep breath, and stood up once more. Slowly, she made her way back to the crime scene, telling everyone that Conan had sneaked out of her sight when she wasn't watching, and that he couldn't find him anywhere.
"If you didn't feel that strongly about it, it wouldn't be someone you love, but maybe just a normal friend."
As Kogoro grumbled, annoyed, at the revelation and Kazuha let out a nervous laugh, her eyes drifted to the pool of drying blood. Shinichi's dull eyes crossed her mind again, and she bit her lip.
She still couldn't feel anything.
"H-Hey, you can't be serious…"
Hattori Heiji couldn't believe his ears and absolutely denied the possibility that he had heard right. Yet, there he was, standing right next to Kogoro's car, where he had just hidden Kudo, wide eyes staring at the little kid that, in turn, gazed back at him with a resigned, yet equally determined glint behind his glasses.
"There's no doubt about it," he said, pointing at Kogoro's trunk. "You're hiding a criminal."
"What are you talking about?" Hattori was more than baffled at the accusation just now. "Kudo wouldn't kill anyone. You know that more than anyone else-"
"I know!" the child snapped, prompting his mouth to click shut. "I know. There's no way Oniichan would kill anyone..." The determination dimmed, and his gaze fell to the ground. "But I looked. I looked everywhere. But I could prove that it couldn't have been anyone but him."
"Let's not jump into conclusions, shall we? The culprit must have drugged Kudo and-"
"And then what? Teleport away from the crime scene?" He scoffed at him, then gave him the angriest glare he could manage ─ if it was really aimed at him, he couldn't tell. "Believe me, Hattori, when I say that I thought of every single scenario where Shinichi-niichan didn't stab her-"
"... 'Shinichi-niichan', you say?" Conan blinked at the teenager, unable to see his point. "You called him 'Oniichan' just a moment ago."
Conan's eyes widened in realization that, indeed, he had done that ─ it hadn't been a conscious action, it had slipped from his tongue without even realizing it.
"Say, Conan," Hattori whispered, crouching in front of him. "Did you tell Kudo you're his brother?" He was surprised when the young detective shook his head. "Why?"
"I… don't know, actually." His eyes travelled around restlessly, searching for an answer to his newfound internal conflict. "It just felt that… I shouldn't do it."
In response, the older detective hummed ─ that was interesting, to say the least. This boy right there was more than comfortable to call the old Kudo his brother, but it wasn't like that to the current one. Why?
Sure, a person without memories was like an entirely different one, but wasn't this too much? And not only Conan. From what he could see, the same thing was happening to Ran.
Wouldn't they try to stick to Kudo until he remembered everything?
"Hattori?" Conan blinked owlishly. "You're making me uncomfortable…"
"Ah, sorry."
He stood up immediately, realizing that he had probably been staring too much. Conan's eyebrow rose, questioningly, before sighing, probably seeing it better to let go. Shrugging, he let his gaze wander to the truck where Shinichi was hiding, and frowned.
His brother was innocent, beyond a doubt. But also, he was certain, this person right there was guilty.
Groaning, he held a hand to his head ─ he was definitely going to develop a headache by the end of this day.
"Ah, Heiji and Conan-kun!" Kazuha exclaimed, walking up to them with Ran and Kogoro in tow, and turned to her childhood friend entirely. "I don't want to lie anymore!"
None, not even Ran, dared to say anything about it. Quite honestly, Conan felt bad about her not knowing why exactly they were doing all this, but it wasn't like they could keep telling people ─ Ran and Kogoro had already been involved with Shinichi since early childhood, and Hattori was a detective. Kazuha-neechan is a civilian, Conan reminded himself. And she isn't directly connected with Oniichan either.
"Wait a moment," at some point, Hattori wondered out loud. "Since that house has been locked, how did the culprit get in? Neither Kudo nor Kawauchi-san had the key on them, did they?"
"That's right. That policeman, Shiroyama-san, opened it for us last night," added Conan, surprised as well. "Why did he have one, anyway?"
"Daiki-bochama entrusted it to me." The sudden voice caused the kid to jump and twirl around to see that the policeman in question was right behind him. "As for the keys from the former of the house, Mayor Hinohara and his wife, I have custody of them. If anyone else has one, it would only be the adopted son of the household, Makoto-kun, who's gone missing."
His classmate, Hikawa, had also been given a key once, turning her into a suspect ─ for both cases, Hattori began to think about it out loud, before he chastised himself for getting derailed from the case they had just stumbled upon.
He cursed loudly, undoubtedly frustrated. "If only Kudo were in his right mind, we could combine wits and give the answer in no time..."
Kazuha frowned. "He must have really encountered the Shiragami-sama."
Ah, that ghost story again? Conan rolled his eyes again, remembering that the people had said something like it, which was honestly stupid. Had heard scarier stories watching Gomera with Genta and the others.
"Last night before we went to sleep, Ran-chan and I asked someone at the inn," Kazuha told them. "We asked what we should do if someone had been cursed by the Shiragami-sama and they said-"
"Go into the forest while the sun still shines," continued the policeman for her. "When you see the Shiragami-sama, call out to him at the top of your voice. If you continue praying to him with a clear and unclouded heart… his curse will be lifted."
Conan was tempted to scoff at the absurdity of it all. Please… Yet, he refrained himself. As if a creature like that would...
His hands fell limp into his sides, gaze falling into the forest ahead of them ─ he had that distinct feeling of being watched, triggering the memories of that black figure he had seen standing on a tree the night before.
Black…
Black clothes. Feathers. White long hair… It all popped into his mind, leaving his mouth to hang slightly open with shock.
You… You have got to be kidding me...
"H-Hey! Ran is gone!"
"Eh?!"
Ran was nowhere to be seen.
He didn't know how much time had passed since they had started looking for her, but pondering about it was a luxury he definitely did not have. "Ran-neechan!" instead he called, as loud as his voice allowed, and forced his feet to move even faster.
A branch creaked under his weight when he stepped on it, his breathing was heavy and Kogoro's voice boomed through the woods ─ yet, he couldn't hear what he desperately wanted to hear.
She couldn't have gone far. Gritting his teeth, Conan's head frantically snapped from side to side, looking for some sort of sign. No such luck ─ she wasn't answering at their calls, which by itself was reason enough for worry. Damn it!
Where is she?!
If only I could see better… Somehow...
He stopped in his tracks, head snapping towards a rather high tree and frowned.
"Hey, brat! What are you doing?!"
Disregarding Kogoro's surprised exclamation, Conan jumped, but scowled when he didn't reach the branch he had set his sight on. Ran-neechan... Frowning, he tried again, but the result wasn't much different from the last time. Ran-neechan might be hurt, somewhere.
He could hear the others getting closer from a distance away, but he didn't even cast them a glance, just reached to turn the dial on his shoes. If only... A relieved smile touched his lips when he jumped higher this time and latched onto a branch. If only you were here.
With some effort, he climbed up. If it was you… Slipping and catching himself before he could fall, Conan latched into another one. … you would have found her in no time, right?
Hissing in pain at the twig that scratched his cheek, the kid pulled himself up. I'm almost there. After taking a moment to catch his breath, he continued. Just a little. His hand curled around another branch. Just-
"Watch out!" Hattori's alarmed voice rang in his ears before he could register them.
With a faint snapping sound the branch he was standing on gave out, and the others' startled cries prompted him to react, and latch himself into another one, leaving him swaying dangerously in the air.
"You idiot!" Any other time, he would have glared at Kogoro, but he didn't. "Get down!" But instead, he just took a deep breath and pushed himself up. "What is he doing?"
"He's trying to get a better view," answered Heiji, a frown present in his features. "If he gets high enough, he might see her."
By the time he regained his footing, Conan was panting, exhausted.
I don't want to lose her, too. His brother's smile crossed his mind, causing his hands to curl into tight fists. So please, please…
Huffing, the boy raised his head.
Help me out, Oniichan!
And found himself blinking stupidly ─ there, a few trees ahead, partly covered by the foliage, someone was staring at him under long, white hair that covered his entire face. Feathers decorated his black clothes… black clothes, Conan's brain caught in that detail.
His eyes widened when they fell on his sleeve ─ it looked like a small part of the cloth had been teared away. Instantly, he reached for something inside his pocket and pulled it out.
Silently, he contemplated the black piece of cloth on his hand, before his gaze rose again, only to get shocked to see the mysterious creature ─ person? ─ smiling at him.
I see… Bit by bit, his lips curved until Conan's expression mirrored his. That's how it is.
The little boy nodded, fingers curving around the black cloth piece and pressing it against his chest. Lead the way, then. His eyes followed the strange 'thing' that hopped into another tree, then another. Shiragami-san.
Before long, he had disappeared from sight. Wait, isn't that direction…?
"Conan-kun!" He glanced down at Kazuha, who looked up worriedly at him. "It's dangerous up there!"
Smiling, he started to make his way down. "Don't worry, I won't fall."
Hattori placed his hands inside his pockets and smirked. "Even monkeys fall from trees..."
"Hey, does that make me a monkey?"
"Just do it quickly!" Kogoro interrupted the teenager before he could even think of replying. "We need to find Ran-"
Once he was reasonably low not to break a bone, the boy jumped off. "It's okay," he said when his feet touched the ground. "Ran-neechan is alright."
The adult stared at him. "Huh? You saw her?!"
Not that he could tell him he didn't, so he started running without gracing him an answer. The other three followed right after him, without a word and, in no time, they found themselves in front of an old mountain hut.
Kogoro and Kazuha went ahead immediately, unlike the police officer, Hattori and Conan, who stayed a little behind.
"H-Hey..." Conan wasn't surprised when Heiji stared at him, as if he had grown a second head or something. "Isn't this…?"
He nodded calmly and moved closer. "That's the mountain hut I got trapped in earlier."
"But… Are you sure it's safe?"
The kid gave him a plain glance over his shoulder. "Do you think I would have brought you all here if it wasn't?" Shrugging, he continued his way, leaving the western detective to gape, incredulously. "See it for yourself."
"Eh?"
Huffing irritably, he didn't think of adding anything else, just let his eyes travel across the cabin, before they focused on an open window. Relieved by the sound of Ran's voice while talking with Kazuha and Kogoro, explaining that she had just woken up there.
I don't remember this being open, he thought, climbing up the window. Did someone get in here-?
His thought process stopped completely, along with his breathing.
"Who could have done all this?" said Hattori, in surprise, as he and the policeman joined the boy inside.
Conan barely shook his head, wide eyes roaming around as he observed that all walls were covered completely with newspaper articles and pictures of Kudo Shinichi. When they focused on a certain one, the boy frowned. "Not a fan," he decided, grimacing a little at the knife stuck in the middle of his brother's face. Woah, it has been chopped to shreds...
He kind of wondered who he had gotten this angry.
"The person who trapped you in here..." Hattori showed him a small radio. "Must have used this to tell that someone entered."
"Yeah. Probably mistook my voice for Shinichi-niichan's..." His nose wrinkled at the thought. Well, my voice barely sounded like mine. That should barely count, right?
The other three entered as well after being called by the teenager, and his surprised reactions did not take long to make themselves known. Conan barely paid them attention, in favor of contemplating the rather grim looking carving on the table next to him:
"Failure means death."
The kid did not like the implications of it.
"It appears that the owner of this cabin is none other than the Shiragami-sama." Heiji was holding a white hair from a wig made of polyester as a proof. "The Shiragami-sama you met had white hair, right?"
"Yeah." Ran nodded. "But he didn't seem to be that bad of a person. He was scary, though..."
"That's right," Kazuha agreed. "It seems he was the one who gave Ran-chan medical treatment."
"Well, one thing's for certain..." He picked up an empty box of bullets for a handgun. "He's a dangerous guy-"
"Wrong."
The boy didn't seem to care that all gazes had fallen on him right now, confused by his intervention, just grabbed something and raised them to see. "See? A smashed mirror. There are like five or six of them in this room."
Leaning forward, Kogoro gave the broken mirror a closer look. "So?" His eyebrow rose, not understanding a thing. "What is this supposed to mean?"
"That this 'Shigarami' guy isn't a bad person. I just told you that."
"But this and that don't have anything in common!"
Deciding to offer the exasperated detective nothing but a blank glance, Conan sighed and directed his gaze somewhere else. One thing is Occhan not getting it, and another… He turned to Heiji, whose sharp eyes were set on the broken mirrors laying in the floor, pensive. Come on, Hattori, is not that hard.
"Oh, what is this?" Suddenly Kazuha said, kneeling in front of a bag that was left in the corner of the room.
Not wasting a second, Conan moved closer to it, fueled by curiosity. Under everyone's gaze, he opened it and peered inside. "Looks like a set of clothes… Toothbrush, a water bottle..." He halted in surprise about what he had found next. "... And my notebook."
"EH?!"
Upon closer inspection, he confirmed that, indeed, it was his. "I forgot it last time I was with Shinichi-niichan," he explained to the confused trio looking from over his shoulder. "He might have been trying to give it back to me."
Kazuha exchanged a questioning look with Ran. "Do you think Kudo-kun dropped it somewhere and the Shiragami-sama picked it up?"
"Maybe..."
Hattori didn't offer an answer, just caressed his chin as he thought about it. His eyes opened when realization struck, and immediately darted towards the child ─ he was smirking back at him, satisfied with what he was seeing.
Finally.
"Ah, Conan-kun." He was forced to look away when he heard Ran calling for him. "Here, this is also yours."
When he turned around, he was surprised to see a smaller bag between the girl's hands. "I found this in the other room," she explained with a kind smile. "You dropped it earlier, didn't you?"
With everything that had happened in the span of a single day, it had completely slipped from his memory. "Ah, right!" He accepted it, rather hurriedly, and held it close to his chest. "Thank you, Ran-neechan."
"No." Her finger rested on his cheek, tenderly rubbing against the scratch in his cheek from earlier. "From what I heard from Kazuha-chan, you were trying very hard to find me, weren't you?"
Honestly, the child didn't know what he was supposed to say. Choosing to stay silent, he nodded slowly, cheeks warming up a bit.
"Thank you," she said, giggling at the embarrassed boy in front of her. "But be more careful next time, alright?" Her gaze fell on the bag he was holding and smiled warmly. "You can't get hurt when you have such an important task between hands, right?"
He nodded again, looking more flustered than ever before.
All the while, Hattori watched them, wondering what in the world could possibly be in that bag that Conan was hugging so tightly against his body.
A/N:
CherryGirl 21-6: Actually, it is going to happen, but there's still a while until I do it. This chapter is set in May, and The Raven Chaser in July… And there's also Holmes' Revelation, which should take place around late June and early July, too...
F. C. Meyer: Well... XD
taziricherry: Wish I knew, actually...