"There you are, Ran-kun!" Kogorou explained as the girl pulled the little boy through the door to their office. The place had seen better days and worse alike, whether on the part of the people inside the room or outside aiming sniper rifles at the window, but there were some high points currently – for example, there were no beer cans lying about anywhere, and the place was very clean and shiny. It looked like the man had finally found enough time (read: 'blatant obligation') to do some of the housework while his child and their lodger had been tied up with the police. "It's nearly eight o' clock. You've been gone for four hours! I was worried sick about you!"

Ran brought the boy over to one of the sofas and sat him down. "I'm sorry, otou-san," she replied. "We had some problems coming here. Have... have you been watching the news?"

The thirty-seven year old sighed. "Of course not," he said. "I've cleaned this place from top to bottom; I haven't had the time to watch anything. That, and just before you came in I had another client, so I'll be snooping around tomorrow investigating."

Conan stared up at him blankly. "I thought the horse races were on?" he pointed out.

"Yes, but I didn't listen to them," he replied. "The only thing I wanted to do was make this place a little more seemly for our guest just then." He marched over to the desk, back straight and stride confident.

Mouri Kogorou was a man you didn't want to meet if you were a crook of some kind. Well, that was what they said about him, anyway. He was tall, and despite his age and apparent thinness a bit of muscle was indeed there, hidden under the dulled blue suit. Said muscle was used quite a bit; back in the day, he had been a judo champion, and he had never forgotten any of the techniques he had learned. His hair was always slicked back except for one or two short hairs that curled down onto his forehead, and he wore a small neat moustache parted at the middle. The man had a piercing glare that often dulled whenever he drank, which was usually rather often. However, as noted before, the room was devoid of any of the cans that normally littered it. Kogorou usually stopped drinking when he was fired up.

Ran glanced around, a little shocked by it all. "Otou-san, did you drink at all today?" she asked.

The man stroked his chin, sitting in his chair. "Well, no... I already knew about this client since he talked to me about coming over this morning, so I didn't bother," he replied.

The girl looked away. It was pretty evident that she hadn't been expecting that kind of answer from such a person. "Well... I'll be going to cook dinner, if that's alright." She knelt down in front of the boy. "You stay here, in otou-san's sight, if that's okay?"

Conan nodded. "Okay," he said, and immediately picked up the one bit of mess that had appeared since this morning, a recent copy of Shounen Sunday with a slightly battered-looking cover and a small fraction of the pages missing from inside it. He flicked through to the Yaiba! chapter and began reading quietly. Ran frowned, and stepped to her father.

"He didn't notice that wasn't there this morning," he pointed out. "Isn't that odd?"

"Otou-san, did your client bring that book?" she asked.

"Yes, he did," he replied. "I mentioned about Conan-kun and he asked if he could bring that over for him. He took out the pages he wanted to keep and brought the rest of the book for the kid."

Ran sighed. "I see," she said. "Well, what would you like for dinner?"

The man rested his head on his fist, turning on the television for the first time that day. For that matter, the radio seemed a little dusty despite how everything else looked. "I'm not too bothered, really," he replied. "Though, curry sounds good right about now, if it'll bring the kid out of his reverie. He hasn't been alright in the head too recently, has he?"

"No, he hasn't." She shook her head, and went into the kitchen. Once there, she opened the fridge door, blocking the voice of her face if they tried looking.

There was something wrong with her father as well. The man never stopped drinking despite the health problems he could face if he continued to do so, and she'd never seen this place cleaned up after getting back from school before. Her father had mentioned a client, and quite specifically that that client was male – something else that didn't usually click, since the only time anything around here was cleaned up was when a young woman entered the room. And even then, the item that was cleaned up was Kogorou, not the room. Not to mention the fact that the horse-racing had been on today and, from the sound of it, he hadn't bothered to watch, or even made a single bet...

She bent forward and took out the vegetables. It wasn't right. There was something wrong with everybody. Conan was acting strangely, as was her father... for once, Ai had actually spoken to her about Conan – which never happened, not even when it seemed Conan was Shin'ichi – and speaking of Shin'ichi, she'd had fewer phone calls in recent weeks. There was also the matter of Sonoko, who had recently stopped flirting with boys, and Hattori Heiji, whose last text had involved him mentioning how she ought to check out a nice place he had managed to locate in Hyôgo rather than his home town of Ôsaka, and there had also been a few messages from Takagi and Satou down at the police department discussing a possible engagement with her... not to mention, Kaitou KID's mysterious disappearance from the map hadn't seem to startle many people after that brief little mention of things the day after the heist.

She and Ai had managed to decide that Conan's awkwardness was the effect of the anomaly. Was it possible it had affected other people as well? She realised how insane it sounded, but there didn't appear to be much other explanation. The anomaly definitely had something to do with it all. Figuring that out had been like a game of Spot the Difference with all the difficulty removed.

She kept scouring through the fridge, anxious to keep her deductions under wraps, when she noticed something that had been inside the cool appliance for a little bit of time.

A pair of milk cartons was sitting in the shelf on the door, one of the two open and nearly empty. Who was it that liked milk in the family again? The last she had checked, her dad did indeed enjoy it in his coffee every now and again, and she was fine for the majority of the time as well as long as she didn't use too much of the stuff. But then again, that wasn't enough of a reason to have bought two cartons at the same time, as milk went bad rather quickly; also, her father tended to take his coffee from the shop of the floor below them. And she didn't use it in any of her cooking. So why...?

Conan! That was right. Conan loved milk, and he wasn't intolerant, so he could drink a lot of it. That was why she'd gotten enough milk for the next week so that he could. Shaking her head to try and forget the troublesome thoughts that had made her abandon the dinner, she opened the vegetable draw and pulled out some ingredients.

She had just gotten out the potatoes when she remembered with a start that the only other person she knew that was able to drink milk was Shin'ichi. Who also loved it.

MKMKMKMKMK

"I hope you now find yourself fully informed," Hakuba said. For the last few hours he had been trying to convince the police of what Commander Stonewall had been telling him in this very room. This was fast becoming the room of the secret, as many of the other officers had been pointing out over the past few weeks; Hakuba had noticed himself that this seemed to be the place they had to go to discuss anything. Partway through, of course, a very livid Nakamori had entered the room upon learning of the detective's actions and almost let off his lid. Thankfully, the response from the small group had assured him that this was not going to cause as much trouble as he had hoped.

By small group, of course we are referring to the officers who had been allowed inside that interrogation room to talk. Hakuba had specifically picked out the officers whose names he had seen alongside Mouri Kogorou's and Edogawa Conan's. That had whittled down the secret-bearers to three: Megure, Shiratori and Satou, all of whom had repeated contact with the boy – no, not boy, teenager. If anybody needed to know about this, it would be the people who were most likely to run into him and most likely to talk to him. That way, it would be easier to get them to disclose the information to him. Currently, the select few were having several issues with his explanation, but the ainoko took confidence in the fact that they were also struggling to find an argument that would stand against his own.

Well, Shiratori and Satou, anyway. Megure was sitting there with a knowing look on his face. He had been the one to demand an explanation; one could only assume that he was satisfied.

"I hope you realise that you're speaking of the impossible," Shiratori said. "You're telling us that beyond that anomaly is another world that is able to sustain living, sentient life."

"That was where Kaitou KID was travelling to," Hakuba replied, nodding. "As I have already told you, his intents were to steal from that world. Unfortunately, he had a way of making it seem as though he never came back."

"But he did," Nakamori continued. "We have the physical proof of a heist note delivered to us just this morning. We managed to locate his target as well, the Morning Guardian." He suddenly turned to look at the boy, who stared back. "There was also something else that KID dropped when he came out of the anomaly. It was something we ourselves gave to him just before the heist. Isn't that right, Hakuba-kun?"

Hakuba paused. "We have a problem with that," he answered, after a little deliberation. "I don't have it anymore."

Nakamori tried his hardest to contain himself. "Excuse me?"

"While I was here giving you that heist note and explaining to you what it meant, it was stolen from my house," he said calmly. "Baaya-san and the maids have been reviewing the security cameras thoroughly, but there are no cameras in the room where the drive was."

"And why is that?" Nakamori said, ignoring the audience.

"Because that room is my bedroom. The cameras are not there because of privacy." Hakuba shook his head. "But there were heavy security measures in place. I don't understand how the thief could have possibly gotten past it all."

Nakamori banged the table with his fist in desperation. "Just great," he yelled. "The Beika police think we're insane and we have no proof to stop them thinking that!"

"Ahem."

The quarrelling pair looked up at Megure, who removed his hand from his mouth.

"I first decided to come to you when investigating the incident today at the library," he said. His two fellows turned to him, brows furrowed in near-identical expressions. "The reason is that I reviewed the security tapes in the library at the time. The assailant crept in and shot a man to death without a single human being noticing and only ran when a small child screamed. He wasn't caught then. When slowing down the film we discovered it was the same creature that had shot at one of our recovering officers the day after the heist and then ran so fast only that man himself could tell us where he escaped to. It was easy enough to make a connection between those two incidents." He nodded over to Hakuba. "Order your maids to slow down the recorded tapes to one-sixteenth regular speed and you'll most likely be able to find it."

"Megure-keibu, the news only reported it as a monster because all the witnesses were saying it was some kind of giant purple rat with a gun," Satou pointed out. "And nothing on Earth can run so fast it only shows up when a video is slowed down that far."

"Which is why I'm pointing this out," Megure replied. "If they get the creature on film the way I've told them to, it'll prove their story."

There was a brief pause while Hakuba conveyed the message to Baaya through his phone.

Once the mobile had returned to its familiar jacket-pocket, Shiratori hummed. "Did we ever ask Conan-kun what happened that day?" he asked them. At once, every ear in the room pricked up. The man was surprised at the response, but mostly at that of Hakuba and Nakamori, who had both tensed at the name. Interesting reaction... but what did it mean? "I take it he's entangled in this?"

Nakamori was quite clearly at a loss for words – Conan had been mentioned earlier that day, in reference to the video Hakuba had just lost. Apparently, Kaitou KID had requested that Conan-kun be allowed to watch it… at least, that was how he remembered Hakuba saying it. And yet, he still wasn't sure how exactly that had all happened. He knew Conan was always up to chasing Kaitou KID every time they requested the Sleeping Kogorou's help in the matter. The boy might even have been the only reason that they bothered to do that at all, and KID seemed to appreciate having him there if the 'tantei-kun' theory proved correct, to the point of treating him as an equal and as a friend. But that thief had already shown his protectiveness – warding Hakuba away from the last heist had seemed to be his top-priority. Why on earth would he mix up a child into this quite frankly dangerous matter?

"...I asked... Conan-kun what happened when I visited the Mouri office," Hakuba noted. Nakamori glanced at him, and immediately noticed his expression. Pursed lips and eyes focused on his hands. "He did indeed tell me about the incident with your Takagi-keiji and the aftermath. He actually ran into that creature. It was hiding at... Kudou Shin'ichi's house when Conan-kun caught up to it. It fired at him, but Kaitou KID was there for some reason or other and managed to ward him away. I..." He shook his head in embarrassment. "I certainly wish I was making this up, but this is Conan-kun's word and I think we can trust it."

"Now that he mentions it..." Nakamori stroked his chin, "wasn't Conan-kun one of two people who Kaitou KID entrusted the tape to?"

"WHAT!?" the others exclaimed. The door got a few surprised glances outside the room.

Megure rubbed his head. "Now how do we know Conan-kun isn't making it all up?"

Hakuba sighed, and knotted his fingers together nervously. God, how he wished this was all over... but to wish that would not be very possible, considering just how far they had come already. It basically went without saying that with everything they knew, and with all the current complications, the end was a long way off. "Kaitou KID wanted Conan-kun to listen to the tape because... because..." He rested his head on his hands. There was still a lot he hadn't told Nakamori despite every warning that secrets were to be punished. It didn't help that he felt like he was betraying everybody involved by speaking about it at all.

"...Conan-kun is the reason why he got interested in the video he hacked from the military to begin with. Because there's something terribly wrong with him." He breathed. He could talk around it. He knew how to. "KID thought it had something to do with the anomaly, but he didn't understand it much... he decided that the jewels that were spoken about in the video – the Chaos Emeralds – might be a cure for it. That's why he left to get them." Hakuba reached into his pocket and fished out the double-sided card he had received. "This heist note here is exactly the same as the one Conan-kun received before the first heist."

Nakamori grumbled about 'more secrets; I'm gonna kill that kid'.

"The forsaken child looks to the horizon and sees a land beyond the abyss. Upon it, a glow promises dawn's return. Who shall claim that sunrise first?" he read aloud. "Don't you think that a forsaken child sounds like a description of a little boy like Conan-kun?"

Megure shook his head for once. "But Conan-kun has his family taking care of him at the moment. Nothing sounds so forsaken about that," he said.

Hakuba winked. "Are you so sure?" he replied. "What is the name of Conan-kun's family?"

"Well, his family name is Edogawa...!!" A look of understanding overtook his face.

"Exactly," the lone teenager congratulated him, his hand briefly forming a thumbs-up before flickering back into its original position. The other inhabitants of the room looked from Hakuba to Megure in a small amount of shock.

Good. I've managed to do it. He had just had to dodge saying that Conan was Shin'ichi. Not only was it absolutely crazy, but he'd have broken trust as well. The whole point of being Conan at all was to hide away from that organisation that had accidentally shrunken him down when trying to remove a witness to their crimes. "Conan-kun's family is called Edogawa. But the family he is currently staying with is called Mouri. I checked some records." He hadn't – there were no records. He asked Conan very specifically about it instead. "Edogawa Fumiko-san left this country for America a few months after Conan started staying with the Mouri family promising to come back and hasn't returned since, instead paying some money into Mouri Kogorou-san's bank account. His mother practically abandoned him."

"Would the Kaitou KID even have access to that information?" Shiratori pointed out.

Oh, right. "I'd imagine he could work out for himself what happened just looking at the names in the newspaper," Hakuba mused, "or else he could have just met him in his everyday persona and gotten him to talk about it." He waved his hand around, as if trying to bat away any sense left in his words. "An insane move on his part, but this is Kaitou KID that we're dealing with here. I think we can excuse anything along those lines."

"Right, so we've assessed that this message is referring to Edogawa Conan-kun," Megure noted. "But what about it actually proves anything that you have been talking about? I'm sure Shiratori-kun and Satou-kun would like to know."

"Right." The boy read out the note again. "The boy is looking to the abyss and seeing a shining light on the edge of the black. Don't you think it sounds like Kaitou KID is going to bring something to him? The abyss, we can assume, is the spacial anomaly. The land beyond is the other world. The light is the jewel that he carried back with him. Doesn't this occur to you?"

Shiratori rested his forehead on his hand. "I still can't believe you came to that sort of answer," he said. "Edogawa-kun is not in any trouble. And why should Kaitou KID be trying to heal him? The two of them shouldn't even know each other or care that much."

That was it. He just couldn't dodge it, could he?

"That's where it get's confusing," he sighed, bowing his head. "Because Edogawa Conan-kun very clearly is very sick."

"Sick!?" the rest of the room exclaimed. Hakuba rubbed his ears. He had tried and failed to hold his tongue about the whole thing. Well, not entirely; he knew he'd have to tell at some point or other – the truth was unavoidable, after all, especially when it was so crucially relevant to the entire case - but he hadn't realised just how much of a shock that statement would cause. Nakamori had already warned him against keeping secrets, just a while ago. Any more and he'd be given a fitting punishment. He was in for it now, he could feel it.

"Edogawa Conan-kun doesn't me to give out any more information on that," he said, standing. "I've already manage to break my promises to both him and Kaitou KID. I can't afford to do any more damage."

He began to walk out of the room. That was, until Nakamori interrupted.

"Don't you dare walk away!" he cried, grabbing Hakuba by the shoulder. "You are going to tell us everything you're hiding!"

The boy froze in place, tensing up. There were a few seconds, and then suddenly Hakuba shot a glare back at him.

"You don't understand," he said. "Kaitou KID has a plan. I am not about to ruin everything he's working for. And Conan-kun's sickness – and the problems he's had for the last two years – if anybody were to find out about them that shouldn't, he could get killed for it. I am not about to endanger the life of anybody, even if the police need me to be involved. Besides," he scoffed, "don't you think that if Conan-kun had to say anything, he'd have told the police today?"

"What he said," Megure cut in, putting an immediate stop to the argument, "was that the creature could be following Kaitou KID."

Hakuba's eyes widened. "What did Conan-kun look like when he said that to you?" he asked.

Megure shrugged. "He was the most unstable I've ever seen him. Conan-kun has never visibly panicked over a dead body before, but this time he was on the floor hyperventilating after seeing the man. I don't know if the seeing the bullet hole straight through the neck and the man still gasping did anything to help matters, but even when he's seen somebody die before, he's never done anything like that."

Hakuba's fingers brushed over the door handle. He closed his eyes. "…What were you thinking, hmm?" he mumbled. "Why didn't you say a word…

"…Kudou-kun?"

A/N: If Hakuba keeps breaking promises like this, there's a lot of punishments coming his way.

Sorry it's so late. I had trouble with that scene, which basically exploded into most of the chapter.