Chapter 12

The first thing Shinichi realized as he slowly rose to consciousness was how badly his arms hurt. They burned, his shoulder joints feeling like they pop out any second, as if someone was trying to pull them out. He knew this feeling. He was hanging from the ceiling by his arms, just like last time. Which meant… Shinichi peeled open his eyes, unsurprised to see Harper Valentine inches away from his face.

The ex-assassin pouted at his lack of reaction. She looked older—her hair with a bit more grey in the blond, a few more wrinkles around the eyes—but other than that and the eyepatch, she looked exactly the same as the last time she kidnapped him, down to the same all-black assemble. But Shinichi wasn't a terrified 9-year-old anymore, so he raised an eyebrow in annoyance. "Really, Valentine? Chloroform?"

"Would you prefer blunt force trauma?" Her voice was even the same, he thought with a shiver. "Don't you know how easy it is to die from that? I want you to have time to regret your life choices before you die."

Shinichi swallowed hard. "This is about the eye."

"This is about the eye," she agreed. "But not entirely. I can't blame you for what you did, kiddo. You were only 9 and really it's my fault for not expecting the son of a renowned hitman to have excellent aim." Valentine stepped away from him, shrugging. "To be completely fair, I could even deal with losing an eye; sure, no more depth perception, but that's something I can train myself to compensate for.

"So, really, this isn't about the eye. Or you. Except for it is." Unholstering her gun, she pointed it at Shinichi. To his shock, she could barely hold it, her right hand twitching and trembling too much to properly aim. Valentine smile bitterly. "It's about your Pops. But since I can't find him, you're gonna have to do."

She turned away and Shinichi quickly looked around. He was in a warehouse of some sort, on a balcony overlooking the main floor. Windows were broken, none near him though. His hands chained to the ceiling but his feet were free and barely touching the floor. On his leg, instead of seeing his ankle monitor, there was just a silver bag. "What's on my foot?"

"Just something to keep Interpol from finding you." Valentine rummaged around for something on the table. "I don't want them to find us before my fun is done." She turned back around and in her hands was a modified cattle-prod. Shinichi flinched away.

"You don't have to do this."

"I do, kiddo, I really do."

"No, you don't. Everyone has a choice, Harper. Even you. Especially you. Please. Let me go."

Her frozen smile seemed to falter and Shinichi dared to hope as her eyes softened. "You're a good kid, Shinichi. It's a shame I hate your dad too much for you to live."

"Yeah." He spat. "Such a shame."

"Now, don't give me that look. This is only going to take ten, fifteen minutes tops, then it will be just like falling asleep, I swear." She pressed the wires on the end of the cattle-prod into Shinichi's stomach, her finger brushing over the switch. "So, let's get this over with, shall we?"

Omake:

Any moment spent with Hakuba was bad enough on its own, but now? With Shinichi missing, Interpol breathing down their necks for being the ones who "lost" him, and Kaito's personal emotional threshold reached for the day, he wanted to go back home and take a nap, not be cooped up in one of Hakuba's cars with the detective.

Hakuba wasn't even looking at him, just staring at the GPS on his phone. "Okay, this is where his signal was last picked up. Baaya, stop the car."

They pulled over, warehouses all around them, and got out. "This is pretty close to the train station," Kaito observed. "How do we know he didn't just ditch the tracker and go somewhere else?" He did talk to his family, he remembered. It was possible that they met up to remove the tracker after he left. Left because of him after having a panic attack, falling down the stairs, and hitting his head.

Kaito winced.

"Not possible. His tracking anklet can only be remove with the key which Inspector Zenigata keeps on him at all times. If anything else enters the keyhole, it will administer a sedative and activate a different alarm." Hakuba looked around. "There's no one else on the street. Is this area usually so abandoned?"

"A lot of this area is storage. No one I know goes here unless it's to vandalize or get high." Kaito got a look from Hakuba. "Which I don't do! It's like you have no faith in me."

"…Right. Anyway, we'll probably have to start searching the individual warehouses, so let's spit up and get to work. We've only got so much time left."

A/N: I've written this chapter like five times and I still can't get it to the point I want it to be. I'm just… gonna move on and explain more in later chapters. Explanations later. Kay? Kay.