A/N: And now we have the Detective Conan detectives. As previously mentioned, I'm writing Heiji with an accent; I could go into why at length, and might do it eventually on Tumblr, but it boils down to me thinking that regional accents are important and wanting to acknowledge that Heiji has one. The accent I've given him and the way I'm writing it aren't very extreme; they're based on what I remember of the English dub mixed with a regional accent from the area I live in.
This chapter's riddle is a special thank-you to my beta, miladyRanger, who used to write nice stories about Middle-Earth before I dragged her into this endless sinkhole of detectives and thieves.
EDIT:As of March 16, 2016, the AO3 version of this fic now has hypertext translations on the dialect bits. Head over there if you have trouble reading dialogue that isn't in American Broadcaster Standard (the kind of English you hear on U.S. TV shows).
Chapter 5: Time
Kudou Shinichi's first impression of Hakuba Saguru was I know that voice.
It took him awhile, but he finally reclaimed the bleary memory of British-tinged Japanese swearing a blue streak…it felt as though it was from during one of his transformations, but he couldn't remember which one. The memory felt older than the Sunset Mansion case, but that was the first time that Hakuba had met him, wasn't it?
It seemed pretty unlikely that Hakuba had seen him turn from Kudou to Conan or vice versa in the first place, really. Except…Hakuba's behavior at the Detective's Koshien had been odd, in a few ways.
It was Hakuba, not Hattori, who had suggested that Shinichi stand in for himself as the Great Detective of the East. It would've made sense for Hattori to do it, but it was an odd choice for Hakuba to make. Hakuba didn't seem like the kind of person who would normally humor small children, and police-station gossip confirmed that he wasn't especially good with kids. Besides, something about the way Hakuba had declared the title had been certain, in a way that didn't make sense for someone who barely knew Conan and certainly didn't know either his fake relationship to Shinichi or his real identity.
During the case, he'd felt like he was working with both Hattori and Hakuba—which shouldn't have been the case. Hakuba shouldn't have been taking him that seriously. He was in elementary school. And yet…Hakuba had treated him with the same dismissal he'd shown Hattori—he hadn't really respected either of them, but he hadn't treated Conan differently based on age. If anything, he'd treated Hattori differently after they'd clashed over preserving the crime scene.
But…he'd never said anything. He didn't act like he was on the lookout for those people in black, and he certainly didn't dress like one of them either. So, Shinichi wasn't sure what to think.
Added to that, Hakuba almost always seemed inordinately pleased to see him. Not Kogoro, either—him. Even when Hattori was around, too, and Hakuba and Hattori were constitutionally incapable of getting along.
The two of them were a study in contrasts, and not the ones you'd expect, at face value. In a room full of police inspectors, Hakuba seemed straight-laced and overly rigid, while Hattori came off as casual and brash to the point of ignoring procedure. But watching the two of them together was an entirely different experience.
Shinichi recalled a particular crime scene illustrating the point rather well.
"I'm curious, Hattori-san, do you think that the victim's blood will form the kanji of the murderer's name if you stare at it long enough?" Hakuba asked, smirking.
"Shut yer mouth, I'm tryin' ta work," Hattori snapped, not looking up from the corpse.
"Perhaps I would be, as well, were you not blocking my view of the scene," Hakuba said, annoyed.
"Find yer own murder!" Hattori exclaimed. Then, probably realizing how that statement had sounded, he amended, "I've got this case under control, go find somethin' else ta solve."
"We are in Tokyo," Hakuba said. "Technically Kudou's territory," and here Hakuba's eyes had flicked toward the currently-shrunken-Shinichi, or at least Shinichi's paranoia had convinced him that they did, "but in his absence, as a resident, I have a better claim to cases here than you have."
"Hakuba-han, we're teenagers, we ain't got jurisdiction," Hattori said flatly.
"Well, we have to decide these things somehow," Hakuba said practically.
"How about we decide them by I hit ya over tha head wit' a shinai an' then ya shut up," Hattori growled.
"I'm sure we don't need to resort to violence," Hakuba said, frowning.
"Wit' you, I really, really do," Hattori muttered.
Hattori may have seemed like the louder of the two, but it was Hakuba who was responsible for the majority of their arguments. For whatever reason, he seemed to take a special joy in winding Heiji up without saying anything that would seem especially provocative to someone who wasn't Heiji, making it pretty much impossible for Hattori to explain why he hated Hakuba outside of long, insult-laden diatribes that were usually empty of facts.
Hakuba seemed straight-laced, single-minded, and a little prone to wild theorizing, but Shinichi was fairly certain that if he ever decided to indulge his mild devious streak, they would all be in a whole lot of trouble. Whereas Hattori was actually extremely by the book, in his own way—it was just very much a book of his own that no one else had a copy of.
Shinichi had only really met Hakuba a few times, but he found him intriguing. There was something decidedly odd about him—something beyond the weird deduction style that Hattori went on about. It took him a while to realize what was bothering him, and when he did, well, he couldn't help but be suspicious.
Hakuba didn't read correctly as an eighteen-year-old. Perhaps it really just was his arrogance, but there were times when he just seemed a bit too at ease among the adults of the Task Force, as if he'd completely forgotten he was the only one among them who was still a high-school student. And while rumor had it that Hakuba did have a martial arts background, even Ran's black belt didn't excuse her from occasionally forgetting that her limbs were longer than they'd been a few months back.
But not Hakuba. Hakuba was…well, for all that he wasn't physically imposing, his movements were careful, controlled in a subtle way that reminded him of Akai or KID. Shinichi had never seen him in a fight, but he was fairly certain that if he and Hakuba were ever to be cornered by a criminal, Hakuba would be as good for backup as Hattori was. Maybe even a bit more predictable.
Naturally, given circumstances, Shinichi considered apotoxin. Statistical improbability aside, the drug shrunk a person by roughly ten years. Hakuba didn't act that much older. He seemed off by a few years, at most, and APTX 4869 didn't do that. Shinichi was jumping to conclusions again—Hakuba was most likely nothing more than a mature-for-his age veteran of an early growth spurt. Well, one who possibly knew something about Shinichi and who made Heiji nervous.
Honestly, Hakuba was a mystery…but he wasn't, so far as Shinichi could tell, a murderer or a threat, so Shinichi would have to let it bother him for now. He still had bigger—hah—things to worry about.
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"You want to ask Heiji-nii-san about Hakuba-san?" Edogawa Conan asked, wide-eyed. He looked nothing like the blue eyed justice-demon her son had described to her over video chat so many times, or the so-called KID Killer whose name was starting to become legend among the Task Force's members.
Chikage was just trying to find the Great Detective of the West, who was apparently visiting Tokyo and was her best shot at an unvarnished negative opinion of Hakuba, but of course Edogawa had to be hanging around.
"That's right," Chikage answered.
"That's a bad idea," Conan said firmly. "You'll just make Heiji-nii-san get angry and yell a lot."
"Well, I still want to ask," Chikage said, smiling indulgently.
"But, I can tell you about him," Conan protested. "I met him at the Detective Koushien."
"Did you?" Chikage asked, wondering what on Earth a 'Detective Koushien' even was.
"He's stuck-up," Conan said. "But I think he likes me, even though he doesn't like Heiji-nii-san."
"He doesn't seem like he'd be good with children," Chikage mused aloud.
"He's not," Conan said, flatly, sounding a good three years older. And then, the sugary tone was back. "But he likes seeing me! It's probably because we're both detectives."
"And is he a good detective?" Chikage pressed.
"He's in the newspapers all the time," Conan didn't really answer. "Say, ma'am, why are you asking so many questions about Hakuba-san?" He blinked at her, wide-eyed. "Are you a detective, too?"
"Not me!" Chikage said, carefully keeping her automatic revulsion at the thought out of her voice.
"Then why are you asking questions about people?" Conan pressed. For a second, the wide-eyed expression looked more like the disarmingly-innocent variant of Poker Face.
Startled, Chikage just managed to keep herself from drawing back. This was the demon her son was talking about, and he needed the truth, at least part of it, or he would be on her heels for the forseeable future. "Hakuba has been causing my son trouble at school and I've been trying to learn more about him."
The boy's eyes narrowed outright. Chikage had the urge to run on principle; she was facing a detective. "Why?" he asked.
"I want an idea of his character," Chikage said, and it was true, in the broadest sense.
"If he's causing your son trouble, don't you already know?" Conan said, curious. "Though, that doesn't sound much like him…"
"You'd be surprised," Chikage said. "And you know, you can never have too much information about someone you think might be a problem. Shouldn't a detective know that?"
The little demon's eyes flashed with something that could have either been grudging respect or a split-second of nervousness. Either way, Chikage took the opportunity to brush past him and look for Heiji.
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Contrary to popular belief, there were people who Hattori Heiji hated more than Hakuba Saguru. But most of them were criminals, so…
He knew he was being unreasonable, and he knew he should be able to explain it better. But the guy just got under his skin, every single time they talked, and he couldn't explain it. Every time he tried, he got so upset that he couldn't even sort out exactly what he was so upset about, and when he did have a clear idea, it got jumbled on the way out of his mouth and tumbled out so mixed up with epithets and insults and general outrage that he didn't blame his listeners for having zero idea what he actually meant.
Hakuba baited him, and no one but Kudou even noticed. Ever. It was infuriating. But if that was all—well, he'd had years of putting up with his dad to learn not to blow up when faced with passive-aggressive conflict. But that wasn't all of it. Not at all.
He'd finally managed to get all of it together once, while talking to Kudo at his house after they'd solved a disappearance together—the three of them, that is.
"Gah—it's just, if nobody notices 'im messin' wit' me, is anybody noticin' any o' the other stuff?" he finally burst out.
"Other stuff?" Kudou repeated, blinking up at him through those freaky little fake glasses of his.
"Like—like the way he is with bodies, you've noticed, right?"
At Kudou's blank look, he insisted, "C'mon, you can't tell me you haven't noticed!"
"I haven't," Kudou said. "What is it?"
"'E hates 'em!" Hattori burst out. "He's been a detective how long, and he still doesn't know how to be professional 'bout 'em, no' really. They freak 'im out, you can tell if yer lookin'."
"What does that have to do with you hating him?" Shinichi asked.
"It's just—ugh—that's no' good, ya know?" Heiji said, frustrated. "Like, what if he never learns to deal wit' the bodies an' nobody ever notices an' he jus'—snaps?"
"Hattori-kun, is that really likely—"
"His deductions are all kinds of weird, too, like, sometimes they're nat'ral and sometimes it's like he learned how ta do this from…I dunno…books, or teachin' 'imself, or somethin'," Hattori interrupted. "It jus' makes me nervous. I don't trust 'im. An' everyone still thinks he's some kinda bigshot while I'm just some loose cannon from the country."
"Hattori-kun, you don't have any reason to be jealous of him," Kudou said, sounding exasperated.
"Doncha get it?" Hattori insisted. "He's…there's somethin' weird about how he solves murders an' he tries to cover it up by acting better'n everyone else an' pissin' me off!"
"What are you accusing him of?" Kudou asked, eyes narrowed in a mix of confusion and concern.
"I dunno, exactly," Heiji admitted. "Somethin' like…he's not safe to be workin' on murders. There's somethin' that's no' right about 'im."
"Okay, but what do you want to do about it?" Kudou said. "Even if you're worried that he might not be stable…the police won't listen to something like that without more evidence than you have."
"I know," Heiji said, frustrated. "But—it's not jus' pettiness, ya know?"
Kudou nodded.
"Also, he's a gigantic jerk, an' he ticks me off on purpose, ya know," Heiji said.
"I know," Kudou said. "I wonder where he learned how to do that, anyhow. I don't think he's got siblings."
"He might, in England or whatever," Heiji said.
"If he had siblings, he'd have more social skills, don't you think?" Shinichi said.
Heiji laughed, a little. "Don't be all high-an'-mighty, yer the one who couldn't even figure out that—"
"If you call Ran Neechan or start talking about how we're in love, I'm going to kick a soccer ball at your head tomorrow," Kudou said, almost calmly.
Heiji quickly shut up, since he'd been thinking of doing both.
He never did talk to anyone about his concerns about Hakuba—because, really, what would he tell them? He could hardly accuse the son of the Tokyo Superintendent-General, with whom he had a very public rivalry, of being dangerous when he didn't have a lick of evidence. Well, he could do it, but nobody who mattered would listen. There wasn't much point in dragging his reputation and Hakuba's through the mud in tandem, only to stir up nothing more substantial than a cloud of rumors.
So, that left him with no choice but to watch Hakuba closely whenever he showed up in Osaka—which at least wasn't often, but still—it was as annoying as heck when it did happen. He had no idea how everyone else missed the sharp-edged glint of joy in the guy's eyes every time he got in a good one against Heiji. But somehow, they did, every time.
And every time, Hakuba flinched and skittered around the body, and sometimes his deductions were awkward enough that Heiji was sure someone else would see it, but, no. Maybe it was intelligence, maybe it was subtlety, heck, maybe it was politeness, but no one else ever reacted, much less said anything.
In the end, maybe it didn't matter much that he hadn't told anyone about it. After all, if Hakuba ever did go off the rails, there wasn't much question—it would be up to him and Kudou to run him down. No one else would even have half a shot at it. Hakuba was too smart, and he knew too much about how crimes were committed—it would take other geniuses to keep up.
After all, while Hakuba was annoying as heck, Heiji still had a lot of respect for the guy's skills.
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"I dunno what yer business wit' him is but I sugges' you find another detective, like, I dunno, anyone wit' a head smaller 'n Tsetenkaku Tower and the ability ta deduce their way outta a paper bag consistently," Heiji spat.
"I'll, er, take that into consideration," Chikage said carefully.
"He's an a**," Heiji added. "An' a…wha's the word he likes ta use…oh, git. If ya need a detective, talk to me or Ku—I mean, uh, Conan-kun, because he lives wit' Sleepin' Kogoro and ya know that guy's got a reputation."
Conan muttered something that Chikage couldn't make out and Heiji was obviously pretending not to hear.
"I was merely curious if you'd noticed anything…interesting, about him," Chikage said.
"Besides the fact that he's fulla hot air?" Heiji asked. "And a complete jerk? Like, seriously, I swear he gets his kicks from messing with people…"
Chikage sighed. She wasn't going to get any useful information here.
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This is a thing that is devoured by all things; flowers, trees, beasts, birds; bites steel, gnaws iron; grinds hard stone to meal; beats mountain down, ruins town and slays king. What is it? Time.
—The Hobbit, J.R.R. Tolkien
A/N: This chapter, I'm going to do something I haven't done for a while and ask for reviews, of two kinds. First, if anyone had problems reading Heiji's dialogue for any reason, I'd like to know. (Edit #2:Deleted some requests for help with the dialect stuff that are no longer valid.)
Second, at this point I really want to know what you think is happening. Since miladyRanger helped plan the fic, it wasn't as if I could ask her what she thought I was building toward. You guys aren't spoiled for the ending yet, though, so I'd like to know where you think this is going. Feel free to tell me what you think of the writing, too, if you want to and have time.
Responses can also be left in my tumblr inbox—I'm still ninthfeather—and the fic is still under the "riddle in reverse" tag.