Chapter four's here, peoples!

I realized that I forgot to write my siggy at the end of chapter three. Wanted to fix it, but that would mean trashing away five reviews and who-know-how-many pageviews.

Here are the review replies!

Ziraulo­- Really? That's just cool. Here's the update!

Merialle- Well…let's just say that there will be some surprise guests in the future chapters, but I'm not saying who! *cackles evilly*

Katiesparks- …I don't really have a reply for that. XD

Yolapeoples- Yes! GOOOLD!!! And thank you so much for loving my story! *hugs*

Vixeriffic- Actually, it is Wataru-senpai. XD PS- You gonna update your 30 Ways? It's been a long time since our last PM!

Midori: I tired of saying this…

Me: The heck I care, say it! You only have to say it, like, twice a week!

Midori: *mumbles* Don't own DC.

Chapter 4

Shinichi ran down the hall, trying to find the Grade 6 shoebox area. If Grade 1 is in the front, then Grade 6 should be in the back…

Aha! Found it!

Shinichi quickly looked around for a few seconds, and then he quickly saw the person he was looking for.

"Wataru-senpai!" Shinichi called out to the older kid. Wataru was just putting his indoors shoes into his shoebox. He waved.

Seconds later, the two different aged boys walked towards the main entrance. Wataru decided to start a conversation. "So…Shinichi-kun, do you have any friends?"

"Well, I do have some friends in my class. But Kaa-san took my best friend's family to America last Saturday, supposedly to 'have some early fun' before our one-week spring break. They're not coming back until spring break is over." Shinichi said. Wataru could hear some traces of disappointment in his voice. Wataru then frowned. Spring break is coming next week. And today's Wednesday…

Wataru found it weird that a mother would just leave her first-grade son with a famous writer father for two whole weeks. Not to mention taking the boy's best friend's family away with her, too.

But then again, if Shinichi is so extraordinary, who knows what the rest of the Kudou family is like?

"Do you have any friends?" Shinichi threw the question back at him. Wataru thought for a moment. Then he blushed, "Actually, no, not a lot." He looked down at his feet as they continued walking, "My classmates mostly avoid me because Kurosawa-kun once hurt a girl in my class that tried to defend me when he threatened me. The girl transferred to another school, and everyone's been staying away from me ever since."

Shinichi frowned. "No friends?" He thought about his soccer friends in class, then about Ran. What would it be like without them? Shinichi couldn't imagine it. "Daijoubu, I'll be your friend!" Shinichi stated as he smiled up at Wataru.

Wataru smiled back.

"Shinichi!" Someone called. The two boys turned their heads to see Yuusaku standing there, waving at them. Wataru stared. The man in front of them was wearing a hat, a trench coat, and a pair of sunglasses. It was almost impossible to tell that this was the man he saw in the newspaper yesterday.

"Tou-san!" Shinichi chirped before running up to the man. Wataru trailed after him. "How was school today?" Yuusaku asked as he ruffled Shinichi's hair. Shinichi dodged out of Yuusaku's reach, "It was great! The person that was blackmailing Wataru-senpai yesterday got suspended!"

"Oh, really?" Yuusaku looked up at Wataru, who had been silently watching the father and son moment. "I take it that you're the famous Wataru-senpai I kept hearing about?"

Wataru blushed and rubbed the back of his head, "I-iya…I'm no where near famous…"

Yuusaku studied the boy in front of him. Wataru only reached barely above Yuusaku's waist. He had messy dark-brown hair and pale grayish-purple eyes. It definitely didn't look like this boy could do any damage even if he wanted to.

"Ano…Kudou-san, is something wrong?" Wataru asked nervously when he realized Yuusaku was staring at him. Yuusaku shook his head, "Nothing. Oh, and just call me Yuusaku." Wataru nodded. Yuusaku-san, then.

"Tou-san was just checking to see if you're good enough to be with me." Shinichi piped up next to him. Yuusaku sweatdropped as Wataru stared at him with an incredulous look. He then smacked Shinichi lightly on the head, earning an "Ow!" as a protest from his son.

"So, are you ready to go to the bookstore?" Yuusaku asked them. Wataru nodded as Shinichi said, "Yeah!"

They were on their way.

DCDCDCDCDCDCDCDCDCDC

The bookstore was empty.

Well, not like empty, empty, but like with-almost-no-one-in-it empty. Wataru doubted this bookstore had more than two workers.

"Kudou-sensei!" A man is his late forties behind the counter exclaimed, "It's so nice of you to drop in. Hiding from the editors again?"

"Yeah, they're so annoying at times." Yuusaku replied and shook hands with the other man. "I brought a few company, hope you won't mind."

"No, no. Shinichi-kun is always welcome. And who might this be?" The man asked when he noticed Wataru. Shinichi spoke up for him, "He's Takagi Wataru from Grade 6 Class B. Wataru-senpai, this is Nikiyo-san, the store owner." Wataru shook hands with Nikiyo.

"Well Wataru-kun, since you're new here, you need to know some rules." Nikiyo said sternly. Wataru gulped. "First, do not come in here not wanting to read a book. Second, do not leave until you've read a book. And lastly, enjoy every book that you read, understand?"

Wataru blinked. This wasn't what he had expected, not at all. "Hai, wakarimasu." He said with a smile. He already liked Nikiyo-san's sense of humor.

"Well, I'll be in the back working on my manuscripts. Shinichi, you go ahead and show Wataru-kun around." Yuusaku said as he walked past them. Shinichi nodded enthusiastically, "Hai!"

The rest of the afternoon was rather peaceful. Shinichi had shown Wataru how the books were organized, and Wataru cozy-ed himself in the mystery novels section. Yes, he liked mystery novels, but he's more addicted to action-type rather than the detecting-type like Sherlock Holmes, much to Shinichi's disappointment ("How could you like those more than Holmes's adventures?!").

As he placed his second Alex Rider series (1) back onto the shelf, Wataru noticed something.

Seriously, who could miss a shiny, gem-looking thing that's sitting behind the books?

Curiosity got the better of him and he reached into the space and pulled it out. It was a small, jade mouse that looked just beautiful. Wataru held up and examine the extreme details that were carved into the stone.

"Whatcha got there, Wataru-senpai?" Shinichi suddenly emerged into Wataru's line of vision. He almost fell over. Almost.

"Shinichi-kun! You have to stop appearing out of no where like that! You'll give me a heart attack one of these days."

"Gomene!" Shinichi said while sticking out his tongue. "So…what do you have there?" Wataru studied the mouse-figure in his hand and frowned. "I don't really know. What do you think it is?" Shinichi looked at the jade piece with a serious expression. "Hmmm…it looks expensive. Where did you find it?"

"In the back of the bookshelf."

"Maybe Nikiyo-san accidentally left it there when he was organizing the books." Shinichi said before running towards the counter. Wataru followed him. "Nikiyo-san! Is this yours?" Shinichi asked the balding man. Nikiyo adjusted his glasses and took the statue from the boy's hands. "Well, I'm certain that I've never seen this thing in my store before." He turned it over and over and asked them where they found it. After they told him, Nikiyo shrugged.

"It's not mine. But it could be Haruzame-kun's. He's the new helper I hired a few weeks ago."

The owner then turned and called out to the back of the store, "Haruzame-kun!" After a few moments, a man in his late twenties appeared at the door. "You called for me, Nikiyo-san?"

"Is this yours?" Nikiyo asked as his waved the jade mouse at him. Haruzame squinted at it. "No, I've never seen it before. Why?" Nikiyo pointed at Wataru and Shinichi. "These kids found it in one of the shelves. Since it wasn't mine, I thought that it could be yours." While saying that, Nikiyo had unintentionally lowered the statue to Shinichi's eye level. And knowing Shinichi, he kept staring at it until he noticed something.

"Ale? There's something engraved on it!" Though he said it out loud, Wataru was the only one that heard it. Wataru bent down and squinted. "Ah, honto da!" He confirmed. "It's a kanji…for 'mouse', I think. And there's a 'one' engraved by it, too."

"So…that's 'nezu-ichi', isn't it?" Shinichi asked. "Is that someone's name?" Wataru frowned, "No…it's more like 'the mouse is first', or something like that…"

They looked at the engraved kanji with their face screwed up in thinking. And they would have stayed that way, too, if Yuusaku hadn't interrupted them. "Shinichi, it's time to go home!" The writer called as he came up from behind. When he saw the kids' expressions, Yuusaku asked, "What's wrong?"

Wataru wanted to tell him and ask him for his help, but Shinichi cut him off. "Betsuni! Nothing's wrong!" Then he quickly put a finger to his lips as a sign for Wataru to be silent. Yuusaku seemed to buy it and he led the boys out of the store. When they were about 5 meters away, Wataru asked Shinichi why he didn't tell his father about the mouse.

"It's our game." Shinichi said bluntly. "I don't want Tou-san's help with this one. We can figure it out by ourselves." Wataru admired the younger boy's seemingly endless confidence. Most boys want their father to help them. Heck, that's another one to add to his mental "Kudou Shinichi's Fun Facts" list.

They said good bye as their paths took different directions. Wataru's mind slipped back to the jade mouse.

The mouse is first…Nezu-ichi…

Weird. He's sure he'd heard something similar to those phrases. But what?

To be continued…

Whee! Chapter four is done!

(1)- Do not question my logic. I know that there's no way the heck Wataru could have ever even heard of the Alex Rider series ten years ago, but seriously, you try thinking up of another series when you haven't read any and have a limited time to research.

And it is totally unintentional that the chapters keep getting longer and longer. XD

Equation: Pageviews + Reviews – Flames = Happy Authoress

~ruth~

Next up: Wataru does some digging, while Shinichi does some research. When they meet at the bookstore again, what more will they find?