Wow, thank you so much for all of the reviews. Some of them COMPLETELY made my week! There was a question about Hattori and Kid and I'm sorry to say I don;t plan on them having big parts in this story. Hattori will probably show up just because I can't imagine Ran not calling for his help, and I can't imagine him not jumping on the first plane possible once he knows Kudos in danger. He won't have a major part though, I want this to be mostly about the normal police force actually solving a case for themselves, or at least mostly for themselves. I am planning another story where they'll have a major part, but that will be after I finish this one.
So, thanks again for all of the reviews, alerts, and favorites. Nothing excites me more than going onto my email and finding stuff from . A lot of them really cheered me up and boosted my ego, so thanks keep on reviewing.
DIsclaimer: As I said in the last four chapters, I don't own.
Ohh, POV change! Find out whats hapening back at the station.
Satou glanced at the clock what felt like the millionth time in the past half- hour. Where was Takagi? Sure he wasn't exactly late yet, but he should have called by now with some news. Even Megure was starting to seem anxious. He'd asked three times if there had been any news, and he was watching the clock as well. His fingers fumbled over his notebook as he struggled to sort through the notes Takagi would've written so efficiently.
She sighed, checking the clock again. That was it, she was calling him. If the only news he had was that there wasn't any, it would be worth it to know his status and get him back to the station. Especially because Conan had gone with him, the child had a knack for noticing small details. At the time it'd seemed good for the child to go and observe the interviews of the witnesses, but it left the main investigation without him. It didn't help that Ran had been out shopping and Kogoro was sitting in a corner drunk. She snapped open her phone, calling the number on speed dial, huffing in impatience when the she heard the familiar voice mail. Turning slightly, she saw a hopeful Megure looking at her, just as news hungry as she was. She shook her head and the inspector turned back to the scene, and Satou quickly did the same.
Where WAS he? It'd been an hour since the female officer tried to call him, and there was still no news. By now he really was late. She whipped out her phone and once again tried to call, worry finally seeping into her professionalism. The worry only increased when she once again received no answer from the man. Angry and worried she simply stared at her phone a moment, absentmindedly pushing buttons as she thought. Suddenly her finger stopped. Of course! She felt stupid now for not thinking of it immediately. Satou pressed the call button, and a picture of Conan covered her screen as she called him. Her worry reached an even greater height when his phone led her to a voice mail as well. The talented officer walked over to Megure, seeing impatience and slight worry on his face as well.
"Sir, I can't reach either Takagi-kun or Conan-kun. I've tried calling both, and neither would answer their phones."
"They should be here by now. Do you want to go find them, its not like were doing much good around here anyway."
It was true, they'd done all they could without the information Takagi had gone out to ask.
"Right. If there are any who they haven't reached yet, I'll send them down to the station."
"Sounds good. They should be almost done though, start at the end and work back."
"Yes sir!" She saluted and rushed out the door, worry abating now that she was doing something about it.
Satou gripped the steering wheel as her car peeled out of the apartment's driveway. Fear mixing with worry and churning in her stomach. She had followed the inspectors advice and started at the last house Takagi was expected to go to, only to be told he hadn't shown yet. Five houses later, she was irritated with him for taking so long when he'd gone to so few houses. For the next few houses the irritation increased until five later it started to turn into worry. Now here she was driving away from the sixteenth house out of twenty-two, and the people there hadn't seen him either. That meant in the hours that he'd been gone he only went to six houses or less. That was inconceivable! Still, thinking that he was just late was easier than worrying if he was okay.
She pulled up to park at the gate of the next house, leaning out of the car she went to press the intercom button to ask the owner to unlock the gate. As she leaned, she saw that the gate itself was slightly open. That was odd, but she went ahead and pressed the button to inform the owner of her presence.
"Hello?" She called. "This is Satou Miwako of the Beika Police department, I have some questions for you." For a moment there was silence. She pressed it again.
"Hello? Itoumo-San?" Still nothing. She saw the open gate and began to wonder if Takagi had come through and they were talking. Perhaps they were deep in conversation and couldn't hear the buzzer. In that case she had to go in and find out what was taking so long yet wasn't important enough for Takagi to call her about. Getting out of her car she opened the gate fully, then got back in and drove through. Stopping as she reached the house she noticed that all the lights were off, it looked totally empty. Still she knocked on the door, calling out in a loud voice.
"Hello? Itoumo-san? Are you here?" Nothing, he wasn't home. Sighing she returned to her car, resolving to go to the next house and come back later.
As she started toward the next house, the cop struggled to bite down her rising panic. She could think of very few reasons for his disappearance that didn't directly put him in a place of danger. There was little she could do about it now when she still had no clue just what had happened to her partner. That's right partner. This panic had absolutely nothing to do with weather or not she liked the sweet, shy, reliable officer. No, not at all... right. There was the next house. Pulling up and knocking on the door, she called out to the people inside, "Hello, this is Satou Miwako from the Beika Police Department . I have some questions for you."
"O-okay. I'll be right there." Satou sighed when she heard the slightly confused tone she'd already heard sixteen times. Looks like this was going to be another waste of time. The door opened and a woman slightly older than the officer came out.
"Hello, how may I help you?"
"Where you approached earlier by an officer named Takagi Wataru to discuss a murder case?"
"I think so. The tan officer with a small child with him, right?"
"Yes! So you've seen him?"
"Yes, but... that was hours ago. Around noon I think." It was five now, and no one she'd talked to had seen him since this woman had. If it was noon then that meant he was on schedule when he met her, so what had happened?
"Did he do or say anything strange? Especially right before leaving?"
"Other than the child not really. Why, what happened?"
"What was so strange about the child?"
The woman shrugged, "Nothing really, you just don't expect a little kid to tag along on a police investigation. I know I would never let my children do anything that dangerous. It was kind of weird that he seemed to be doing just as much investigation as the actual officer too. They didn't really do anything really unusual though."
Satou frowned, not much help there. Still, it was helpful to get a time on his disappearance.
"Thank you for your time."
"Wait! What happened?"
"Hopefully nothing."
Satou pulled back into Itoumo's driveway. Takagi was on schedule before this house, and wasn't seen after it. She had to know if Itoumo saw him or not and at what time. What if they went out to lunch and got into trouble there? Then she would have no leads. The officer whipped out phone and called her partner once again, groaning as the rings showed no sign of stopping. Moving the device away from her ear, she heard a faint, faint noise coming from the house. It was a constant ringing, almost like a... a cell phone! Suddenly it stopped, at the exact same time as her phone went to voice mail. Calling again she heard the noise restart. Drawing her gun and keeping the connecting phone open in her pocket the woman slowly approached the house. Knocking on the door loudly she called in her most cop-like voice. "Open the door! This is the police!"
Still nothing. Satou was slightly concerned that she was overreacting due to her worry, but her gut was telling her she was doing the right thing and she paid no attention to that concern and rammed down the door. The only noise was a slightly louder ringing as she entered the empty house. The officer followed the noise, occasionally redialing, until it led her to a living room closet. Opening the door the woman saw that the ringing was coming from a large plastic box. Her heartbeat quickened as she opened the box, revealing the contents. Stopping completely when she saw two suits, one for an adult and one much smaller, a familiar bow-tie, shoes, police notebook, watch, and still ringing cell phone. The owners of the items nowhere to be seen.