He pooled all his resources: resources that had taken him two years to gather, resources that cost him most of his time as a high schooler and nearly cost him his chance with the girl of his dreams. Resources and connections that he honestly wouldn't trade for anything, not even what he had lost.
Upon looking at his network and finally seeing the final piece fall into place, he grinned. He grinned a grin reserved for cases solved and culprits caught. A grin that the small girl next to him couldn't help but smile at in response. He wouldn't give that reaction without reason; the trap was set, the pieces in place, and the empire was about to come tumbling down.
He had members of the FBI that owed him their lives, and that he trusted with his. He had friends in the CIA that would do anything for him if asked. He had contacts in the Japanese Secret Security Force that would assist if asked, and even a member of MI6 that was willing to cooperate. He had Kaito Kid on emergency speed dial, and Lupin the Third for backup assistance when needed. He had three detectives -three friends- that he trusted with his life and wouldn't replace for anything in the world. And upon obtaining Kaito Kid's full trust and getting the information he had on the Black Organization, he realized his trap was finished. He had something that no one in recent history had even gotten close to obtaining.
He had a way to take down the Black Org. He had a way to demolish an organization that others had spent lifetimes attempting to quell. He had achieved something others had worked eons on in only two years; and he succeeded in it only because of their help.
They tried to kill him and only managed to weaken him, shrink him. The irony in it is that that was the only way he could be as strong as he is now, through that sudden loss. He was an adult basically, with the experience and knowledge of a fairly seasoned detective trapped in the seemingly harmless body of a child. This allowed him to get close to people no one else could, and obtain information they would never even get close to mentioning if they thought the person they were near was old enough to understand or a big enough threat to act on it.
Take Kid for example. He would never let any other detective fly with him on his hang glider. He would never allow someone with the same physical strength as him as close as he had allowed Conan to get. He wouldn't trust anyone that much unless he had a perceived advantage. And without that perceived advantage, Conan wouldn't have been able to make one of his closest and most trusted allies and friends.
A similar situation applied to Hattori Heiji, one of the three detectives Shinichi trusted above all else. He would have had no reason to come meet him if he hadn't of thought Shinichi had vanished, wouldn't have tried to bond with him if he wasn't given a situation where Shinichi actually needed his help. He would have just kept competing with him from afar, and they would have remained only rivals instead of turning into the friends they were now. He wouldn't have stuck around if Shinichi wasn't at a disadvantage in his current situation, wouldn't have bonded with him as much. Shinichi couldn't be more grateful for the shrink than he was at that thought.
Sure, he had nearly lost Ran, but he still had a change to fix that. And the strain on their relationship he honestly felt was worth it if that strain was what gave him Hattori, Haibara, Kid, Sera, Hakuba, Akai, the kids, and all the other allies he'd gained through this. Especially if he could clear up the problems they had afterwards. So with his reminiscent thoughts in mind, Conan picked up the phone and started the calls. Soon, soon he would succeed. Hopefully he could protect his precious friends in the process.
First thing first was locating the leaders base. They had many agents inside such as Bourbon and Kir, but none of them were given quite that high a status or amount of trust. Kaito had given him the solution to this issue though upon revealing the copious amount of snipers that have appeared at his heists. He had given the peculiar, non alcoholic code names to Haibara, to surprising results.
He had assumed the non liquor related names meant they were pretty low on the totem poll if unrelated entirely, but it turned out just the opposite. They were the bosses private force, sent out to locate something particular for him that he trusted no others to find. When Kid had told him what they were after, he had assumed it was a joke. As much as Kaito loved a good joke though, he made it abundantly clear he was serious. This special force was looking for a jewel that granted immortality, and seemed to be granted access to the boss himself. They were also just as ruthless -if not more so- then the other agents, having successfully killed one Kid already. Whether or not what they searched for was real, the threat they presented was still terrifyingly leathal. It was also amazingly useful though, if he could just catch one.
And that's what they did. With the help of Akai and a tranquilizer gun, two martial arts trained detectives (a.k.a. Sera and Hattori) and one of Kid's heists, they successfully destracted, neutralized, and captured not one, but three snipers. Hakuba drove them to his own personal interrogation room (the existence of which was both creepy and useful) and they left a strange friend of Hakuba and Kuroba's alone to extract the information. They had what they needed and three brain fried hostages by morning. When asked how they had obtained the girls help, they both mumbled something about owing her a favor now. When asked how she extracted the information, Akoko just laughed heartily and called it a witch's secret. Kudo didn't know if he wanted to know if that line was true or not. He was starting to realize that around Kid, sometimes the impossible really was possible, and he wasn't sure how much he wanted to confront of it before this mission. He had started watching for shinigami though recently.
With the information in hand, they had to obtain access to the facility. It turns out that the boss had just been hiding in one of the regular bases, disguised as a lower level agent. Access to his location was easy to obtain with the help of their insiders. Taking the base down and getting him though, not so much. Conan and Haibara had taken the antidote beforehand so as to be in full fighting strength, though this did result in them getting outed to the few people present in their ambush who hadn't already figured it out themselves. It really didn't effect the mission much though.
Once inside, they followed the schematics they had obtained beforehand of the base, quickly and efficiently knocked out any agent they came across while tracking the bosses current whereabouts. To everyone's amazement, they found him. To very fews amazement, Shiho shot him upon entering the room. This led to a brawl with his top agents who did put up a fairly lethal fight. Miyano got in one last kill, finally getting her hands on Gin while he was still in shock, before Shinichi suddenly blacked out.
Wisps of awareness slowly flowed back in, starting with the warmth surrounding him. Upon further inspection the warmth was soft, both above and below, and felt velvet; He was in a bed. Opening his eyes he saw the familiar -but long absent- sight of his own bedroom ceiling. Wait, that wasn't right. Last thing he remembered he was mid battle as Shinichi against-
He jolted up in shock. "Careful, Ahoh! Are you trying to kill yourself?!" He felt a firm hand push him back down as Hattori's stern face came into view. "You've given us enough of a scare on that part, thank you."
"How long have I been out? What happened?" He said, rubbing his head with his right hand. Everything hurt, and now that he thought about it, there was a particular external pain near the back of his skull. Heiji's screaming wasn't helping.
"Vodka hit you in the back of the head with the butt of his gun after he ran out of bullets, knocking you out cold. It's a miracle you weren't shot this time too." Heiji grumbled out, settling back into a chair Conan just noticed was to his right.
He belatedly noticed a weight in his hand, and looked to his left to see an unconscious Sera propped in a chair and passed out against his bedside, hand firmly locked with his. "She's been like that since we got you back." Sugaru said calmly from the door, coming in with a platter of tea cups. "Ive had the water for this prepared since earlier. I finished it upon hearing our dear companions high volumed responses. Thought that something soothing might help." He said, as him and Hattori shared a small, not really heated glare. Everyone was a bit too tired to truly be mad at each other right now.
"Did we, um, did we all make it out?" He asked, still gripping his pounding skull with his free hand.
"Miraculously." He heard Kaito's voice say from the other side of the room, and he glanced over to see him lounging on a couch, one he doesn't remember being in his bedroom last he saw it. "A few scrapes, a couple shot, but no ones dead, so that's what counts. No one but you even passed out, Meitantei." He said with a sarcastic grin, relaxing even more into his resting place.
Conan ignored the offhanded comment about his slip up and focused on the flippantly relayed report. "Two shot?! Who?" He asked, glancing more firmly at Kid even if he didn't try and sit up this time.
"That would be Mr. Sarcasm over there, and Jodie-san. Both of whom are currently recovering, though in a fair amount of pain." Hakuba calmly informed, before whipping around towards Kuroba. "And you aren't allowed to joke about him getting injured you idiot when you are the one who got shot!" He all but growled, stalking towards his injured friend to check the bandage wrapped around his left arm, which had until now been out of Conan's view.
A month ago had anyone told him Hakuba Sugaru was protective of Kaito Kid he would have scarcely believed them. Now? Well, let's just say the man sure does exceptional things to keep his 'enemies' safe.
"Though you have to admit there's a hint o' irony in it. Everyone here's been shot at least once now except you." Hattori said with a snarky grin. Sugaru's slightly more heated response came naturally, and Conan relaxed with a small sigh. Everything seemed to be falling back into place.
"Glad to see everyone's humors intact." Sera said as she sat up, finally releasing his hand to stretch. "Don't scare us like that again, okay?" She said while giving him a meaningful look, before throwing her own grin at Hattori. "Some of us have a tendency to panic when worried about you." The argument started up fresh with Sera's input, and would have continued unhindered, if it wasn't for the sound of the door downstairs coming off its hinges.
Ai entered the room not long after the noise, a calm look on her face. "Ran has come to pick you up, it seems. Your excuse for the weekend fell flat." His excuse having been that he was staying with the professor and the other kids for the night; his excuse for the kids being that he and Ai were sick and Ran was taking care of them. Neither had quite worked it seemed.
An angry Ran stormed up the stairs and paused upon seeing a head-bandaged, glasses-less Conan lying in Shinichi's bed surrounded by teenagers. She observed the now silent room for a minute before relaxing and plopping on the sofa next to Kid with a sigh of relief. He carefully inched away from her, but she didn't seem to mind. "So it's all over, right? That was really your worst excuse yet. The kids snuck out past the professor with a 'get better soon' bento for you and Ai and came knocking on our door. Not wanting to get them mixed up with whatever you are involved in I sent them back telling them you were contagious and would visit them once better. I'm not sure why you had the sleepover, it gave them reason to visit. I waited until I saw commotion over here and came to find you."
Huh, she...seems to know, at least something about what was going on. That's not quite what he was expecting. Well, no point in being overly cautious at this point, considering who she had seen on the way in here. "They demanded a weekend gathering and I couldn't think of any other way out of it on such short notice. We had already planned the big finale for this weekend. How...what do you think is going on right now?"
"I think my childhood friend just beat whatever big bad organization he was hiding from while he was living under my roof, and will now be explaining why he was so determined to keep lying to me for two years even when it was obvious I was suspicious in the first couple months." She said with a smile towards him, though a little taxed. "Shinichi, I'm no detective, but I do know you when I see you. It may have taken me a while to ignore logic to see you, but I did. Four times. You talked me out of it for three of them, so I just didn't alert you to my suspicions the last time so you couldn't make me feel like an idiot again."
"That - wasn't my intent." He said with a sigh. "I was trying to keep you safe, but with no other way to continue detective work and make the connections I needed on my own I had to live with you so I could, well..."
"Use her dad as a puppet?" Kaito chimed in cheerfully from beside her, earning a set of glares and a sharp elbow from Ran, thankfully in the side and not the arm.
"Not the wording I'd use, but yes. I needed a way to look for information on the guys who did this to me." He said, looking her straight in the eye.
"Wait, so the Conan thing wasn't by choice? I kind of assumed you had had the professor make you some kind of drug so you could hide this way." Questioned Ran.
"He wishes. No, his current predicament is on my shoulders, I'm afraid." Haibara pitched in as she came up in front of Ran, holding out her hand for a shake. "Let me re-introduce myself. My name is Miyano Shiho, and I'm an ex-agent and scientist for the organization we just crushed. I had invented a poison for them that was supposed to completely degrade the human body and leave behind no trace. There was a 1 in 100000 chance of it having a different effect however and, simply put, shrinking a person instead. He managed to anger the wrong men when he followed them after your visit to Tropical Land, and got a dose of it."
"He got the lucky result." Kid chimed in again.
"Depends on your idea of lucky." Conan muttered. He continued louder, "It wasn't pleasant but I survived, and ran to the professor for help. After you found us that day, he suggested I live with you and try to get information that way. So here we are. Haibara came along later after trying to poison herself and getting the other result." This actually received some gasps from the rest of the room who hadn't actually asked how she ended up this way until now. They had assumed the org had decided they didn't need her anymore and attempted to delete her.
"I didn't have anything left to live for at that point." She glanced pointedly at Conan before looking around again. "Now I do, so my suicidal tendencies are no longer a concern."
"Says the girl who still attempted it three times since she got here." Conan responded with a glare.
She shrugged, "Sometimes self preservation is more mental than physical, and dying young can be a nice outcome compared to some of the things they could have put me through. Still, I accept your point."
He looked at Ran. "So...what now? You have proof, not just speculation."
"I just want to know one last thing. With all the people in this house you told or that found out, why did you never want to tell me?" The hurt was evident, the pain profound. She wasn't even trying to hide it, she felt betrayed.
"Because I was thinking that if you didn't know and I managed to fail, when they went asking to see who was told what and started the killing spree, maybe you could escape the blunt of it." He admitted honestly.
"I also contributed in that, as I tried to keep him from informing anyone when I could. The less who knew, the less who could slip or have it tortured out of them." Ai mentioned as well.
Ran sighed. "Well then. I'm not pleased, and I won't forgive you right away, but I'll take that answer for now. So the real question of what happens now is up to you. Can you even turn back?"
"There's a chance." Haibara cut in again. "I managed to extract my parents research and my research from the facility we destroyed. Hopefully with all the information on the drug -apotoxin is its name, by the way- we will be able to construct a cure. In the mean time, I hope you have patience."
Ran laughed. "More than is probably healthy. I think I could give Penelope the Faithful a run for her money thanks to him." Conan blushed, but didn't comment. Ran smiled softly at him. "We will talk about our relationship later." Ran chipped in to his direction. "For now though," she started as she stood up, "I see a house full of hungry soldiers who just won a war. I think it's time I cook them a celebratory feast." She grinned and headed towards the kitchen, sleeves getting pushed up as she went. Hakuba followed soon after to give a hand, and Akai pitched in as well. Kazuha had tracked Hattori down as well once Ran messaged her, and upon arrived also joined in.
Conan just sat back and relaxed for once in his life. The love of his life was fixing dinner, he was surrounded by good friends, no one had died recently, and the biggest threat to his life was gone. There were still loose ends to tie up, minor agents to catch, but they had one of the best starts anyone had ever had in the organizations history. For the moment, as far as he was concerned, life was good.
