"You're hiding something from me."

Conan shrunk under Haibara's harsh glare, looking nervously to the side. "N-no I'm not..." He stuttered, then quietly mumbled. "Not really."

Haibara just slightly narrowed her eyes at him. "You've been far more jumpy the past few days, and you're never like that unless something happened. And it usually has something to do with the organization. So tell me." She demanded, although quietly, not wanting any of the others to overhear.

The rest of the detective boys were also there, just a bit off to the side, but they were too busy marveling at the view from the Haido city ferris wheel car they were currently riding in to notice.

"It's nothing, I swear." He said meekly. "Nothing important..." He quietly added.

Haibara let out a long sigh, realizing the endeavor was useless. "Just, tell me that it's not related to them, or dangerous."

"No, no! It's not." He quickly assured, shaking his head.. before he realized that wasn't exactly true. "Or.. at least I don't think."

He had survived the past few days without being killed by Jodie (or anyone else), so he figured it should be safe to assume she wasn't anyone dangerous.. but that still wasn't guaranteed. And, even then, she knew he used to live in America, and therefore probably also knew he illegally snuck into Japan (or at least could easily figure it out), and he high-key didn't want to get arrested or forced back to America.

Haibara's expression turned much more serious and panicked. "If you still think it could be them, then you should tell me!" She whisper-yelled.

"But, it's-" He frustratedly groaned, slumping his shoulders. "She didn't even do anything." He grumbled.

"Who?" She asked pressingly. "Who didn't do anything?"

"It's-" He stopped and looked to the side a bit embarrassedly. "It's Ran's new English teacher." He said. Haibara just stared at him, making it clear that wasn't a suitable explanation, and waiting for him to continue. "She's creepy." He promptly added, with a fake exaggerated shiver for emphasis.

Haibara looked even more irritated than before. "Really, what is it?" She asked - even though it sounded more like a statement - her voice strained.

"I-I'm not kidding!" He quickly assured. Though, it sounded like he was lying, despite how truthful he really was. "I wouldn't lie to you about something like that!"

She blankly paused. "You told me you were Kudo for 6 months."

Conan winced. "I said I was sorry..." He mumbled.

"Ah!" A shout interrupted them. "You guys are doing that thing again!"

Conan and Haibara both startled and looked over to see an angry looking Ayumi.

"The Professor got us all tickets and you're not even enjoying the view!" Mitsuhiko chided.

"It's a case, isn't it?" Genta grumbled.

"It's not a case." Conan said.

"Ah, it is a case!" Genta yelled, as if that confirmed it.

"What-!?"

"You shouldn't keep secrets!" Ayumi interrupted, angrily stomping her foot into the floor and crossing her arms. "We're detective boys too!"

"We weren't-!"

"Edogawa-kun was just telling me about that case a few days ago." Haibara chimed in. The detective boys actually quieted down and listened to her. (For some reason, she was always able to do that, which didn't make sense, considering he was actually their age.)

"Uh, yeah. It was that one at the arcade." He quickly went along with her lie (or, actually, it technically wasn't a lie, because Jodie technically was related to that case). "I already told you guys about that one, right?"

"Oh." Genta deflated. "That's boring. Still a case though." He added, pointing a finger at him.

"It's already solved!" Conan argued back exasperatedly.

Genta let out a 'tch' and turned back towards the window, as Mitsuhiko and Ayumi did the same.

Conan leaned back against his seat, relieved.

"So?" Haibara began, resuming their original conversation. "Will you actually tell me what's wrong?"

Conan internally groaned. "I swear I wasn't kidding." He said weakly. "Ran's English teacher really is creepy." Haibara gave him another look. He shrunk back even further. "I.. I think she might've known me..." He finally decided to say.

Haibara raised an eyebrow, now looking confused. "What do you mean..?" She asked.

"Like, from when I was still in America."

"Oh..."

"I-I mean.." he stuttered, "she didn't do anything, or say anything. I- I don't know, she seemed to recognize me, and the way she reacted to my name... I don't know..." He said again, sighing.

"Do you know her?" She asked.

He shook his head. "No, as far as I'm concerned, that was the first time I've seen her. But, I could've been really young or something, or she could just know my parents..."

"Hmm... You don't think she's a member, right?"

"No?" He said, pitching his voice up a few octaves, heavily unsure. "I don't think so, but I can't be certain. She just didn't seem.." he recalled how she seemed almost.. guilty, when she scared him - he lightly shook his head, "it's just a feeling. Besides," he added, "if she was, wouldn't I be, like, dead or something?"

"Probably, but not necessarily..." She ominously said.

"Huh?" He tilted his head in confusion.

"Surprisingly, not every member immediately resorts to killing - that's mostly just people like Gin." She explained. "Or, she may want to keep you alive or kill you later for some reason."

"Oh... That's real comforting." He said deadpanned.

"You're welcome." She replied, with the same level of sarcasm.

"Ah!" Mitsuhiko suddenly loudly said, breaking their conversation. "It's Sato!" He pointed somewhere out the window.

Conan followed his gaze, and, after a second, he managed to find Sato on the ground, staring up at the ferris wheel.


After meeting up with Sato, and subsequently Takagi and Shiratori, Conan wasn't exactly expecting Shiratori to nearly get blown up, but, to be fair, most of the shit that happens in his life is never really expected, so.

(Well, it wasn't as unexpected as it could be, considering Takagi also almost got blown up a few days before the whole Jodie incident. But, those culprits had been arrested, and put in jail, so, still unexpected.)

Him and Sato were currently crouched down beside Shiratori where he was laid just a bit away from the currently burning car. His head was bleeding, which probably wasn't good, but he was able to speak and move slightly, at least, so he figured it could be worse.

"But, if you can speak and move, you must be alright." Sato said, looking down at Shiratori, pretty much voicing his exact thoughts.

Conan absently nodded in agreement.

"Acute subdural hematoma." He suddenly heard Haibara say from behind him.

He turned his head around and said, "Wha..?" Incredibly confused, considering it just sounded like she said gibberish.

She stepped over next to Shiratori. "He's bleeding from the left side of his head," she bent down and lifted up his hand for a second, before letting it back down, "and the left side of his body is paralyzed." She stood back up. "If you don't get him to a hospital soon, he'll be in danger..." She finally explained.

(If what she said wasn't so dire, Conan would've criticized her because, usually she's pretty good at acting like a kid, but no seven year old is going to know what an acute sub-hema-whatever is.)

"Oh..." Sato glumly said, Haibara's words having effectively brought down the mood.

"U-uh, anyways," Agasa nervously began, stepping up beside them, "we should move him away from the car. If the fire reaches the gas tank, there could be a second explosion."

After Agasa's very valid and worrying point, they quickly moved Shiratori away and onto the side of the road.

With nothing to do but to wait for the ambulance to arrive, Conan began to wonder, both, why the culprit seemed to be targeting the police, and why Shiratori was, well, alive - or, why he decided to leave his car before the bomb ultimately exploded.

And it seemed his questions (or actually just one of them) would be answered just a bit later.

"Here." Shiratori choked out, lifting up his un-paralyzed arm and clutching some piece of paper in his hand. "I wanted to show it to you right away..." He said to Sato. "That painful memory you can't forget. This is your chance to break free of it."

Sato curiously grabbed the paper from him, unfurled it, and began reading, "'I'm a fast-pitching, hard-hitting major leaguer. Now, the extra innings have begun. The games begin at noon tomorrow and end at 3 PM. Even if you prepare a good stopper, it won't help you. I'll turn it around in the end. If you want to end this game, come find me. When you police bastards climb the bloodstained mound, I'll be waiting in the steel batter's box.'"

When she reached the last line, Sato gasped, as a deep angry scowl quickly made its way onto her face. She tightly gripped the sides of the paper, crinkling it even worse than before.

If Conan was just mildly curious before, he had to say he was intrigued now. He's never seen Sato this angry before.. and, he didn't have any school tomorrow - schools were on break (well most of them, Ran had some mock exams for a couple days), so, technically, it should be fine if he followed and or pestered Sato for the day to see what was up.. no matter how morally correct it may or may not be.

(Well, he had an idea of why she was so angry. During that whole thing with the parade where Takagi was almost blown up, he and the other kids had heard the name Matsuda thrown around and were pretty curious as to who that was and what happened. So, they asked Yumi, probably the only person there who'd be willing to tell them anything. And they were right. Her story was.. dramatic.. to say the least. Apparently, Sato and Matsuda were 'madly in love', but he couldn't be sure if that was true or if Yumi was just exaggerating.

Anyways, Matsuda had died in a bomb incident, sacrificing himself to save others, and there was this whole dramatic moment with them on the phone and Sato desperately calling out his name before his death (according to Yumi). So, he could easily see why Sato was angry, if this was the same bomber from 7 years ago (which it probably was considering what Shiratori had said). But, he was definitely still curious, not just about Sato, but the actual code too - he was a detective.)

(And, Sato had always been more inclined to let Conan into crime scenes and do stuff he probably shouldn't be allowed to do - or, at least more likely than the others - so he couldn't help being a bit worried about her general wellbeing.)

As if on cue, Conan noticed Sato's signature bright red car pull up to the side, out of the corner of his eye. Chiba subsequently got out and rushed over to Sato.

Conan glanced over at Sato. She seemed to be yelling at someone over the phone. Occupied then...

After quickly making sure everyone else was still focused on Shiratori and the surrounding commotion, Conan took his chance and slowly started sneaking towards the car. When he got up to the door, he experimentally pulled on the handle, the door popping open. It was unlocked then. How convenient.

He opened the door further and lifted a foot onto the car's floor, about the head inside, when a voice suddenly stopped him.

"What are you doing?"

Conan nervously looked behind him to see an angry looking Haibara, crossing her arms at him. Well, the other detective boys were also there, but Haibara was clearly more pressing.

"Uh..." Conan glanced back at the car, then back at them. He slowly lowered his foot back to the ground, like a dog caught eating something it wasn't supposed to. "Getting into Sato's car..?" He truthfully answered, as if it were obvious.

"Without us?" Mitsuhiko angrily asked.

That's what they were worried about?

Well, he figured that made sense for them, at least.

Haibara seemed to have the same thought, considering she just looked exasperated now.

"Well, not all of us can fit in her car." He countered. "She's gonna notice."

"We're not just gonna let you go off and solve the mystery on your own again, Conan!" Genta yelled.

"But-" Conan stammered, looking around nervously, before he noticed Takagi on the side of the street. "Why don't you go with Takagi? I'm sure he'll let you." He suggested, pointing at the man.

The three detective boys all paused, thinking over his suggestion. In unison, they exclaimed, "Ah!" realizing they could just.. do that.

They each rushed over to Takagi, to go pester the poor guy.. or something.

Conan and Haibara both sighed, although Conan's was of relief while Haibara's was probably not.

"I'll go make sure they stay out of trouble." Haibara said, resigned, as she turned around to follow after the others.

Before he could consider the consequences, Conan asked, "You're fine with leaving me alone?"

"No." She curtly said - understandable, really, but still unfortunate. "But I'm sure Sato can handle you; Takagi cannot."

"Ah.. right." He awkwardly laughed.

Without another word, Haibara turned around and headed towards Takagi.

Conan quickly climbed into Sato's car and closed the door, before she came back.


Conan honestly didn't expect to get this far. Really, while he was in the back seat, he was sitting right in the middle, so he thought Sato would've spotted him through the rearview mirror or something, at least sometime after they left. But, even after what felt like five minutes, she was still staring out at the road, with her hands tightly gripping the wheel and that same scowl affixed on her face.. which is probably why she didn't notice him, on second thought.

But, while he was glad she didn't notice him and kick him out or something, he did sneak into her car for a reason.

"Hey." He said to get her attention.

It worked, perhaps a bit too well. Sato jumped, immediately whipping her head around towards Conan. She accidentally jerked the wheel to the side, almost crashing the car, before she quickly corrected it, looking back at the road.

"C-Conan-kun!?" She exclaimed, glancing through the rearview mirror, a bit more collected than before, although still surprised. "When did you get in here?"

"Before you left..."

Sato faltered a bit. "Right... Why are you here though?"

"I wanna know why the bomber hates the police." He said.

"Ah, there were two bombers in the case seven years ago." She quickly began to answer. Unexpected, but not unwelcome. "They set the bombs in-"

She was suddenly interrupted by the sound of a ringtone. Feeling the vibration in his pocket, Conan immediately knew it was his. He brought out his phone, seeing Agasa's ID on screen.

"Sorry, just a second." He sheepishly smiled at her. He quickly accepted and brought the phone to his ear. "Professor?"

"Ah, Conan?" He said. "Sorry, I can't find you guys. I tried calling Ai-kun but she didn't pick up..."

"Oh, I'm with Sato. The others are with Takagi."

"You.. are..?"

"Yeah, we wanted to try and solve the code!" He cheerfully said.

"But-"

"Oh, yeah!" Conan realized, interrupting him. "Can you call Ran and tell her I'm spending the night with you? Oh, and probably for the others too." He added.

"I can't just-"

"You've done it before."

"Bu-"

"K' thanks bye!"

"Ah, wait-"

Conan hung up, as if any of that was normal. He sheepishly smiled at Sato again, stuffing his phone back in his pocket. "Sorry, where were we?"

"Ah, right..." Sato cleared her throat, starting the story again, "The bombers 7 years ago placed the bombs in two apartments..."

The police were able to disarm one of them, but not the other, forcing them to give into the demands. The timer stopped and they all thought it was over, until one of them bombers called asking why the timer was still counting down, having misunderstood a TV program. The police tracked the call and tried to arrest him, however, while trying to escape, he got hit by a car and died. The second bomber restarted the timer, which ended up killing all of the bomb disposal squad there. In short, the second bomber probably thought the police gave fake information to the TV, making his accomplice fall into the trap and die.

"But, the issue is where the bombs are this time..." Sato finished, sounding determined yet also worried, her eyebrows set into a stern line.

"Yeah..." Conan noncommittally replied, pushing himself off the seat and climbing onto the divider between the two front seats.

Sato seemed only slightly surprised at his actions, but wisely kept quiet.

After Conan had sat down in the passenger seat and had the seatbelt safely buckled (because he still did value his safety, at least a little), he asked, "Can I see the code again?"

"Oh, yeah." Sato said, pulling out the paper from her pocket and handing it to Conan.

"Thanks." He unfolded it and skimmed over the code again. His eye was immediately drawn to the words 'extra innings'. Promptly, he pulled out his phone and brought up the maps. "It's probably at South Haido Station."

"Eh?" Sato glanced down at Conan, surprised. "It is? How do you know?"

"Yeah." Conan nodded, turning his phone towards Sato and pointing at the screen. "The roads by the Haido city ferris wheel and the Beika Central Hospital from last time meet at the South Haido Station. I thought it was obvious." He added, because.. he truthfully did. It was kind of the first thing he thought of when he first saw the code.

Sato didn't acknowledge that, and instead just paused to mull over his explanation for a second. "But, isn't that pushing extra innings and extended lines a bit..?" She asked.

"But if there's a railroad there it should be it, right? 'Cause it's like a 'stopper' for the road."

"Ah! I see." Sato realized. "We need to tell the others."

"Uh, hold on..." Conan rummaged around in his pocket, placing his phone back inside and replacing it with his detective boys badge. "We can use this." He smiled, brandishing it to her. Sato smiled back.

He pressed a button on the badge, calling Haibara. It connected a moment later, just in time for them to hear Takagi say, "So, the 'steel batter's box' would be..."

"Yes." Haibara answered. "The trains are the steel boxes and the 'bloodstained mound' is referring to the red carriages of the Touto line trains."

"That too." Conan added, pointing at the badge.

Sato nodded.

"Aah!" Takagi hurriedly yelped. "W-we gotta tell the others!"

"Ah, don't worry! We heard!" Sato loudly said. Conan lifted the badge closer to her. "We pretty much came to the same conclusion here!" She grabbed the badge from him and yelled into, "I'll contact the Inspector, you get the bomb disposal squad! Hurry!" She finished, sounding noticeably more frantic than before.

She practically shoved the badge back to Conan, before whipping her phone out and dialing up Megure.

Conan turned off the badge and placed it back in his pocket, content to just stare out at the road as Sato yelled some more things to Megure.

The code's answer was obvious, but he felt like it was too obvious. As if there was something deeper in the code that they were missing. Just like the code from 7 years ago.

He had a feeling the night was going to be much longer than expected.


And he was right.

The police had searched pretty much every train carriage that the code could possibly be referring to, but the only bombs they found were fake joke ones. They also checked various baseball fields - for obvious reasons - but quickly gave up that search after finding no bombs, not even fake ones.

It took a while for the police to wrap up the search, going far into the night. Conan and the other detective boys all tried to stay awake, but ultimately failed (well, except for Haibara, who he was pretty sure she was used to all nighters). However, a seven year old running on 4 or so hours of sleep was still a pretty tired seven year old. Hence why, when Sato and Takagi had taken them to a cafe to get breakfast, Conan had ordered a coffee.

Usually, Conan would never consider doing so. He quite disliked the bitter taste of coffee, along with the twitchiness and intense need to run a mile that came after. But, he had a feeling he would need that extra energy for the day. Besides, after dumping 5 sugars and 3 creams into the coffee, it basically looked and tasted like sweet milk. Haibara tried (and failed) to hide a disgusted look watching him make his coffee, but he was also disgusted by her straight black coffee, so it was mutual.

Everyone sluggishly finished their meals, then headed off on the road again, all with Takagi this time.

With his thoughts going a mile a minute, Conan was eager to get back to solving the code, but his hopes were crushed short when Takagi revealed he was taking all of them home instead.

However, the discovery that the code was referring to the Touto Tower and a lot of pestering later, he eventually caved and changed directions towards the tower. (The Touto Tower was also red, and the elevators inside were the 'steel boxes' 'climbing the bloodstained mound'. It was so obvious that Conan was almost embarrassed he didn't realize it earlier.. but he kind of forgot that the tower even existed until Mitsuhiko made an offhand comment about it.) Well, a bomb actually going off in one of the elevators really helped with Takagi's decision, but the pestering definitely contributed.

"You guys wait in the car!" Takagi ordered. "Don't move from there!"

Conan watched as Takagi ran towards the tower, disappearing into the crowd of people surrounding it.

It didn't take him long to come to a decision. Not to sound like Genta, but he couldn't just let Takagi hog all the code solving to himself. He only knew a pitiful amount - that a bomb went off and stopped an elevator - and he couldn't let that stand! (And, while most of the coffee's effects had faded, there was still some lingering, so he wanted to get outside and shake some of that out.)

Only waiting a few seconds after Takagi ran off, he undid the door lock and grabbed the door handle, ready to follow after him.

However, he didn't get very far when he heard Haibara coldly say, "What are you doing?"

Conan slowly turned his head over to her. He blinked. "...Leaving?"

Haibara didn't really change her expression, but there was now an air of exhaustion to it. "Didn't Takagi tell you to wait in the car?"

"I mean.. that's never stopped me before."

Haibara slumped in defeat, the tiredness now clearly evident. "Just.. don't die."

"I'll try."

Haibara narrowed her eyes, sending a harsh glare straight into his soul. It was a fairly simple expression, but it sure got the point across.

Conan scoffed. "Geez, I'm just gonna go check things out. I promise I won't do anything dangerous."

Haibara looked skeptical, but eventually conceded, "Fine..."

Conan brightly smiled at her. "Thanks!"

He grabbed the handle again and pushed it open, hopping onto the ground.

"Eh!" Ayumi immediately yelled. "You're leaving too, Conan?"

"Yeah." He smiled at the other kids with confidence he didn't really have. "Watch the car for me, will you?"

"Hey, why are you allowed to leave?" Genta grumbled.

"It's an important job, you know." He said, ignoring Genta's question (because he, you know, wasn't). "You gotta protect all of Takagi's stuff and make sure no one suspicious gets close to the car." He smiled, making it seem like more than it was. "You guys are detective boys too, right?" He parroted, flashing back to the conversation from earlier. "I'm sure you can handle it."

The three now had an excited sparkle in their eyes. They each gave him a determined nod, ready to do their 'important' job.

People always said flattery got you nowhere, but Conan quite disagreed.

Conan nodded back, before rushing after Takagi and into the Touto Tower.

The Touto Tower - he's always wanted to go there (well, he's been to the Tsutenkaku Tower, which is basically the Touto Tower of Osaka, and, according to Hattori, it was ten times better than the Touto Tower ever could be, although that was clearly biased) - it was a staple of Tokyo after all - but he never seemed to have the time.. which was both surprising and unsurprising. He's been living in Beika for quite a while now, but that 'while' was filled with a lot of murders and other incidents that normal people don't tend to experience. So, needless to say he had been quite busy.

Although, he can't say he expected his first visit to be like this. Jamming his way through the panicked crowd of people trying to get down the stairs, to investigate a case rather than to enjoy the view. But hey, at least he was getting in for free - none of the guards or police were paying enough attention to notice the little kid sneaking in. Besides, it wasn't as if it was hard to sneak in - he has experience after all.

He quickly made it up to the floor where all the commotion seemed to be. The last of the guests were shuffling towards the stair's entrance, and there was a small gathering of police further down the floor. Conan quickly headed towards them, immediately finding Takagi.

It didn't take him long to realize the situation. They were all gathered by an elevator, however it was clearly broken and had stopped, only a small slit at the top open. A woman that definitely didn't look like an officer was standing on a chair and reaching into the elevator, worriedly calling out the name, "Akemi! Akemi!" (Ironic.) The officers and employees all stood there awkwardly, unsure of how to get the child (presumably) out of the elevator.

The gap was certainly too small for any of the adults to fit into, however...

"Why don't you lift me up?" He asked, looking up at Takagi.

Takagi flinched, immediately whipping his head down to Conan behind him. "Wha- Conan-kun!?"

"I can fit right?" Conan smiled innocently at him.

Takagi paused, looking conflicted. He glanced at the elevator, then back at Conan.

"I suppose..." He hesitantly said, apparently realizing that, while less than ideal, it was the only option they had.

He reached down and picked Conan up from under his armpits, like he would do when Conan was in a crime scene without permission. The presumed mother of the child stepped off the chair, Takagi taking her place. He lifted him up towards the elevator.

Conan grabbed the edge and poked his head through the gap. He rested his arms on the floor, and looked up to assess the situation. He locked eyes with a little girl at the far end of the elevator, who, strangely enough, looked like what he imagined Akemi would look like as a child. She was clutching onto a stuffed bear and had tears in her eyes, ready to spill.

"Uh, hi..." Conan opened with.

...Not a very good start.

As if to add insult to injury, the girl let out a small whimper and shrunk even further back into the wall.

Conan pursed his lips, internally panicking. He's been a scared child before, he should know what to do! Or at least have an idea...

"Uh..." He nervously began when the silence had started to go on for too long. He caught sight of the bear in her arms. "That's a cool bear you've got there." He tried. She made no response. "Um.. what's its name?"

The girl sniffed. "Chamcha..."

"What a cool name..!" He said, trying to sound cheerful. "Can I come over and see it..?"


It took a bit of coaxing and more questions about her bear (because that was just about the only thing he could think to talk about), but he eventually got the girl to leave the elevator.

Takagi handed the girl over to her mother, the two breaking into relieved tears.

Conan smiled, both, because of their reunion, but also because he was just glad that was over.

"Your turn, Conan." Takagi said, holding his arms out to grab him.

"Yeah." Conan nodded, scooting himself over towards the gap.

However, he was stopped when a loud boom suddenly sounded in the near distance. The elevator slightly shook for a second, before it lurched. Conan let out a startled yelp as the floor fell out beneath him. In an instant, Takagi, the mother, her kid, and the other personnel that were on the floor below him, were now immediately above him. He could barely hear Takagi's worried yell of, "Conan-kun!" Over the loud screeching of the elevator scraping against the shaft. He lifted his arms up around his head, and screamed as he fell down along with the elevator.

Even though it felt like time was going in slow motion, the elevator screeched to a halt just a second later. Conan fell to the ground with a harsh thud. He groaned, slowly bringing a hand up to his head. His body ached - he was definitely going to have some bruises after this - but he didn't think anything was broken.

As he slowly started to push himself up, he began to realize that the ground he was on was soft? ..and also moving?

He looked around, finally becoming aware of his surroundings, and noticed that he landed right on top of Takagi (how he even got in the elevator was a mystery to him).

Takagi groaned, slightly pushing himself up, rubbing his head.

Conan stood up and off Takagi so he wasn't sitting on top of the poor guy anymore. "Takagi..?" He asked.

Takagi blinked his eyes open and looked towards Conan. "Conan-kun!" He suddenly shouted, sounding very worried. He shot up and clapped his hands into Conan's shoulders. "Are you okay!?"

"Are you okay?" Conan asked back. Takagi was probably in worse condition considering he, you know, landed on him.

"I-" Takagi began. He leaned back and placed hand on his head, looking over the rest of his body. "I think so..." He finished. He looked back over at Conan. "Are you?"

"Yeah." He nodded.

Takagi stood up. "We should..." He trailed off, looking contemplatively around the elevator. A sheepish expression formed on his face as he realized he didn't actually know what they should do. "...Why don't we call Sato?"


Conan sat on Takagi's shoulders as he shuffled him over to the elevator's roof hatch. After they called Sato and explained the situation, she told them to check the roof for any bombs, after they had made sure there were none in the elevator itself (which was pretty obvious considering that would be the first thing they would notice).

Sounding a bit embarrassed, Takagi said, "S-sorry..." over the phone with Sato, replying to something.. presumably. Conan felt around for the hatch, then pushed it open with a grunt. After a moment, Takagi said, "Yes, Conan's checking the roof right now." And paused again. Conan lifted himself up with the edge, standing up on Takagi's shoulders. He crawled onto the roof and off Takagi, quickly beginning to look around.

He gasped only moments later, staring at what looked very much like a bomb just a few feet away from him.

(Well, he was only assuming, but there was a timer and wires and everything, and, considering the situation, it would be more surprising if it weren't a bomb.)

Takagi started saying something to Sato again, but Conan stopped listening.

Conan was really hoping this wouldn't happen. He knew it was entirely possible, and maybe even likely, that a bomb would be up there, but he was hoping that his small amount of good luck would manage to win over his bad luck, because in no way was he qualified to deal with a bomb.

Conan quickly calmed himself down enough so that his fear was at a more manageable level, then slowly and carefully crawled his way over to the bomb. He peeked underneath the open cover and saw all sorts of different colors and types of wires and other weird devices that he didn't recognize. (Well, he couldn't really see that well, but he wouldn't dare risk using his flashlight in case there was some light sensitive thing he didn't know of.)

It looked really complicated...

That was definitely much less than ideal. Conan had some slight bomb knowledge - more than the average person (because Shinichi had straight up textbooks and notes on bombs in his library and bomb defusal was pretty interesting, so he actually read those) so he could probably defuse a really simple bomb that only had one or two wires, but definitely not something of this caliber.

He then looked around the bomb itself. The only thing he noticed was a small device next to it, almost hidden behind. He leaned in closer, then relaxed seeing that it was just a wiretap, and not some other weird bomb device.

He picked up the wiretap and tried crushing it in his hand, but it didn't budge. It seemed the bomber had actually bought a sturdy one, unlike the ones Agasa made that were easily destroyable. A shame.. or actually maybe it was for the better. The bomber might've just detonated the bomb himself if he had broken it. He probably should've considered that before trying to crush it.. whatever.

Just for a bit of fun, Conan banged it on the roof a couple times. Clearly that didn't do anything, but he hoped the bomber had fun listening to that.

He set it back down before he did something even more stupid and get them killed, then looked back at the bomb. Thankfully, nothing had changed (except for the timer), but, as he looked closer, one of the weird devices actually looked a bit familiar... He felt as if he's seen it before, probably when he deep searched Shinichi's extensive library and read all that bomb stuff.

It was a small glass tube, slightly tilted to one side, one end with a small metal wire looking thing, and the other with a small metal ball. Or, it didn't really look much like a ball. It was misshapen and looked more like melted metal instead, like a little glob of mercury.. mercury...

That was it! It was a mercury lever!

He vaguely remembered seeing that in one of Shinichi's books. He wasn't sure why his mind decided to remember that specifically but he was thankful.

Now.. what exactly was a mercury lever..?

Thankfully, that question had a much easier solution. He whipped out his phone and typed in the term. He quickly read through the first result, and, basically, it was a motion activated switch that triggered when the mercury touched the wire at the other end.

Motion activated... That can't be good.

He looked back at the mercury lever. It was tilted, but it was so slight he could barely tell. The mercury would definitely move with any slight movement.

Just great.

"Yeah, I'll climb onto the ceiling and we'll have to wait for the rescue squad to come down." He heard Takagi say, suddenly jolting back into the conversation.

He only had to think about that for a second to realize that would most certainly trigger the lever.

"Uh, I wouldn't recommend that." Conan quickly said.

"Huh?" Takagi asked.

"There's like a bomb up here."

"E-eeeh!?" Takagi sputtered. "A-are you sure?"

"Yep, I'm pretty sure." He glanced back down at the bomb, as if to double check. "It's got a timer and everything."

"O-oh..." Takagi said, sounding much more somber. "But, isn't that even more reason to call the rescue team down here and..." He trailed off.

"No, that won't work." Conan curtly said. "It has a mercury lever."

"Mercury lever..?" Takagi repeated, now confused. "Conan, what's a mercury lever?"

"Uh, it's.." he trailed off, realizing he didn't exactly know how to describe it that well, then promptly brought out and turned on his phone again, pulling up the search page he left it on, "a, uh.. 'an electrical switch that opens and closes a circuit when a small amount of the liquid metal mercury connects metal electrodes to close the circuit'." He read.. which probably just made Takagi even more confused. "Uh, so basically.. with any slight movement, we will go kaboom." He explained.

"Ah..." Takagi blankly said at his.. eloquent description. "But," he realized, "can't we have them drop a rope down or..."

"I wouldn't recommend that either..."

"Why?"

"There's a wiretap here." He explained. "If the bomber hears us leave he'd probably blow us up, right?"

"Oh..." Takagi said dejectedly. "Then.. there's nothing we can do..."

Conan wanted to agree with him - or, well, he didn't, he was glad there still was an option, but it was an option he really didn't want to have to go with. He would rather wait and see if there was something else they could do, but he didn't think they had the time.

"I..." He hesitantly began. "There might actually be something..."

"Eh..?"

Conan gulped. "I could.. try, to defuse the bomb." He heard Takagi let out a startled noise. "If," he quickly said, "you can get the bomb guys to tell me what to do."

"O-oh-! Um..." Takagi stuttered, realizing what he meant. "I-I can see, uh..." He brought up his phone again. "Sato-san, could you..." He began talking.

Conan stopped listening, instead focusing on calming and preparing himself for what he was about to do.

This wasn't going to be fun...