Chapter 26: An Obvious Fact

I had enough of sitting around doing nothing to last me a lifetime. It was time to take action. We were all hurt at the moment. It would be a few days before we could actually do something, but I was through playing around with the detectives. Things were going to happen and they were going to happen soon. I'd be the bait if it came down to it, and they had no way of stopping me.

"Ouch," I yelped, trying to draw my foot away as the professor prodded it with his large fingers. We'd all gone back to his house since it was right down the street, and because none of us wanted to be around Kogoro any longer. Not only was that man an idiot, he was an obnoxious idiot. It was a wonder how well Ran turned out.

"You should really go to the hospital with these injuries. There may be bones broken or a fracture further inside your ankle. If so, those won't heal well by themselves. If you don't get help, it may even get worse."

"Hopefully, it's just a hairline fracture. I can't afford to be stuck in the hospital right now." I got my foot away from the old man without too much un-due pain. I had been sitting on his desk while he was in the chair so my foot was already hurting from the slanted motion.

"Kuroba-kun, you can walk on it, can't you?" Hakuba looked over at me from where he was laying on the large green couch. "If you can't walk, then I don't think you should be doing anything until you can. Running is one of your only redeeming qualities and you can't do that without your foot."

"Says the guy who's wrapped up like a mummy," I snorted. Hakase had taken the time to help with the detective's injuries as well. Under his deep brown button up shirt, which he'd gotten from Kudo, were tightly wrapped bandages that had been taped around his torso. It severely restricted his movement, which was the only reason he was laying down and talking to me instead of sitting up.

"At least I freely admit that I'm hurt. I also have to add in the fact that I don't think a simple car accident could cause as much damage as falling off a building."

"I said I didn't fall," I repeated myself, in a somewhat indignant tone.

"It doesn't matter." Kudo spoke up from across the room, where he'd just come out of the shower with wet hair and a towel draped over his shoulders. "Everyone's hurt so everyone's going to rest for the time being. I can't possibly take them on alone, so there's no need to rush things."

"Of course there is. Until we stop them, anyone who is associated with any of us is going to be in danger. Considering they've seen all of us but you, Conan-kun, that is still a lot of people."

"There's nothing any of us can do about that until everyone is at least healed enough to move around freely without wincing, or do you think that we'd stand a chance against them the way we are now?"

"Geez," I mumbled unhappily, my tirade a bit put out by Kudo's words. Both of them had been ganging up on me about staying still, something I wasn't use to doing for such a long period of time, and waiting. I wasn't going to let the detectives win this one.

Hattori was sleeping in the other room so he couldn't add his input. Although he'd had time before he passed out to get his shoulder properly wrapped up, in addition to taking some antibiotics to aid in the healing process. Being unconscious and injured was still helping the other two detective's standpoint though, even if he didn't mean to.

"I think we have bigger problems than trying to find them right now." Kudo's eyes darkened as he looked out the large windows at the night sky. "I've been trying, but I can't think of a way to stop them. Taking down the organization would be great, but pretty much impossible at the moment. There's no other way I can think of to get everyone back out of danger besides taking them down."

"You can't."

The new voice distracted me, but its familiarity was enough not to overly startle me.

"Can't what?" Hakuba asked, at eye level with the girl as she stood across the room after just coming up from the basement.

"You can't stop them. I'm amazed you've gotten as far as you have without any of you dying. However, your luck won't last much longer."

"Haibara," Kudo said to her sternly, "You don't know that."

"You may act like the voice of reason, but you're an optimist at heart. I'm not." The blonde girl walked to the front of the room and leaned against the wall so that we were all in easy view. "So what was your plan? Were you guys just going to go up to them and tell them to stop trying to kill everyone?" There was a mirthless laugh behind her sarcastic smile. "That's not going to work."

On all accounts, I really hadn't been thinking about how I was going to deal with them. I didn't know how to stop murderers. In fact, I was hoping that Kudo or Hakuba had a solution for that. Kudo didn't, and neither, apparently, did Hakuba.

Haibara nodded in understanding. "That's what I thought. Even if you did have some idea on how to get out of this, it wouldn't have worked. There isn't a way to take them on."

"Me," I whispered. "There has to be some way we can use me."

-'I wouldn't use it against you'-

Vermouth's words echoed in my head. I'd taken them for the truth at the time. Her colleagues then wouldn't have any information on my real self, at least not from Vermouth, which left me free as Kid to take on the danger without bringing the danger back to my friends or family.

"Kuroba-kun, I don't-"

"Be quiet," Haibara snapped in a deep voice and turned to watch Kudo. The small teen was sitting in a rather uncomfortable looking position in front of the desk, his fingers interlocked under his chin.

"I really don't think that you're thinking straight." Hakuba tried to get up, taking in a sharp breath of pain in his attempt.

"Stay still you idiot!" Haibara's strict and sudden outburst made the detective fall back onto the couch as she rounded on him. "If anyone here was thinking straight, then they would have handed you and the children over to them. That would solve everyone's problems, and no one would be in danger anymore. It would only cost a few lives that would be lost anyway. They are not going to let you walk away from this, at least not alive." The girl was close to Hakuba, but stopped to give them both space. "If you don't let them try to find another way, then it's pointless and you should already count yourself among the dead."

The professor shook his head somewhat sadly behind me, the slight motion causing me to turn around to look at him; I'd turned away from him to face the others in the room. I guess he was disappointed about what the girl had just said.

Of all of Kudo's acquaintances, Haibara seemed to be the most intelligent, and the most mature. With how she'd helped me, and the fact that she was staying with the professor, I came to two conclusions; she was either a relative of the professor's with a high IQ, or she was in a situation similar to Kudo's, involving these people in black. Judging from the way she spoke of them with experience, I was going with the latter.

I may not understand the method, but I understood the means of what that must have meant for both of them.

It wasn't surprising then that, though Hakuba was clearly mad at Haibara, he kept his temper in check, instead settling to just glare at the young girl. The two just stared at one another in silence. I couldn't tell if it was because Hakuba didn't want to yell at a girl, and a young one at that, or if he simply had nothing to say back. Of course, considering that Hakuba did not know about Kudo's "little" situation, it wasn't surprising that Hakuba would not lash out against someone who he assumed was just a little girl.

"Kuroba-kun," Kudo spoke up, causing me to look down at him.

"Yeah?"

"Even with your help, I can't think of any reason they would let Hakuba-kun live. They want this disc that you have, correct?" Kudo turned to the detective. Hakuba broke eye contact with Haibara to nod to him.

"If they get the disc, that shouldn't be enough to stop them either. I was thinking you could pretend to be Hakuba-kun and fake your death, being that you have more practice with that kind of thing, but that would leave him with nowhere to go afterwards. He'd have to change his identity and hide from the organization for the rest of his life."

"I'm not going to hide," Hakuba bluntly informed us.

"But he would be alive," I added. "Let's call that plan B."

"Right," Kudo nodded. "The only other outcome I can think of is if they do get the disc, they somehow let him go. That would be enough, though unlikely. The children I'm a bit worried about. We'll have to keep them hidden, possibly for the rest of their lives as well."

"So, where Hakuba's concerned, we hope they keep him alive and if they don't, then I simply have to pretend I'm him and fake my death somehow. That's easy enough."

"First things first, we need that disc so that they can have the evidence they're looking to retrieve without hopefully killing everyone. Where is it?"

We all turned to look at the detective, but he just put his head to the side and ignored us. "I have no reason to tell you. If you're going to go behind my back and make plans on your own without involving me, than I have no reason to share my information with you in return."

"Hakuba-kun, we are not hiding anything from you." Kudo's logic was better than my own so I stayed out of the conversation. "It is a well-known fact that Kuroba-kun can handle himself better than you can. Do not take that the wrong way. We have to go with the path of least resistance and highest success rate. If you want to make a suggestion, then go ahead. Don't sit there and complain to me that life isn't fair when you have control over what we do. Just speak up and give us a better option."

I could see that the detective was trying to ignore Kudo, but the boy made too much sense, forcing Hakuba to give in. He sighed and turned back to look at us.

"I'm not sure exactly where the disc is, but I'm guessing it's still at Kuroba-kun's house."

"Why would it be at my house?"

He looked up to meet my eyes, this time with a smile. "I gave it to you when all of this first started happening. With how curious you are, I thought you would have found it a long ago."

"Where'd you put it? The first time I knew anything was happening was after that fire."

"Which was when I gave it to you. You didn't return it so I thought that you were keeping it. I didn't even consider the thought that you never even looked and in fact, it just slipped your mind."

"You didn't give me anything, but your jacket."

Hakuba raised his eyebrows at me, making me realize as I slapped a hand to my forehead. "It was in your jacket, wasn't it?"

The detective laughed at me. It was a small and short laugh, but it was real and it lightened the mood in the room.

"So we'll need to head over to Kuroba-kun's to get the disc. We'll do that only after at least a day of rest, which means, at the earliest, tomorrow night. We'll have to 'accidentally' get their attention and see what they plan to do when they have the evidence back in their possession. I would like to make a few calls too, so that we're not doing this alone."

"Okay, but I'm going as Kid right? Is it a good idea to bring other people along?"

"I don't know if you're going to be the distraction or not. Even if you are, I'll make sure to explain the circumstances so they don't go after you." Kudo smiled in amusement at the thought. "I don't think the FBI's reputation could stand up to anything less than success if they did try to catch you, but I'm sure I could convince them, with the Black Organization being involved, to tolerate your involvement."

Haibara shook her head and walked away from Hakuba, heading back downstairs. She stopped next to Kudo to whisper something to him.

"You're on your own for this one Kudo-kun," Haibara said quietly. I was close enough to catch her words, though no one else could. Calling him by his real name solidified the fact that she knew more than most. "Don't get yourself killed."

"I won't."

"Well," I stretched with a yawn, the effects of not sleeping for more than twenty-four hours finally hitting me. "I'm going to go to bed."

I jumped off the table, wincing as I landed on my foot funny. Everyone turned to look at me, but I shrugged off the pain as I went into the other room to sleep in the bed next to Hattori. I would have stayed in the room with Hakuba, but he looked more like he was in the mood to talk than to sleep, and I really wanted to sleep.

At a certain place in my instep, I could feel sharp pain run through my leg whenever I put weight on it. I tried not to pay any attention to it, but walking for any length of time was going to be taxing.

It felt stupid, but I put a pillow under that foot as I laid down. I had to sleep on my side so that it would hurt a little less. The headache I'd been carrying around since I'd gotten hurt kept me from falling asleep immediately. Eventually, the necessity of it took over and I passed out. However, I have no memory of how long it took me to fall unconscious.

…

It was no surprise that Hattori woke up before me, but the noise he was making made it hard for me to wake up in a good mood.

Whatever it was the Osakan was doing was very loud and, considering he was only a meter or so away, very annoying. I peeked my eyes open, only to find Hattori messing with some of the stuff I'd had in my jacket. A jacket which I'd forgotten to get back from him.

"Hattori-kun!" I shouted, getting up too fast and forgetting about my foot. I hissed in pain as I put too much weight on it. Quickly recovering from the sudden discomfort, I immediately grabbed the very loud, very high pitched, ringer out of his hands. I brought it with me in case we ever ran into dogs. At the moment, the frequency was low enough to be heard by most humans. I'd had it set higher for stealth and, on the way to school one day, had all the dogs going crazy before I'd finally found the stupid thing, since I couldn't hear it and had forgotten where I put it. I'd set at the level lower after that so I wouldn't repeat the incident.

I located the hidden button on the small black device, turning it off so that my ears would stop ringing. "Quit playing around with my things."

"Sorry," he murmured, scratching his head and looking at me apologetically. "I couldn't tell what it was."

"You're not supposed to be able to tell what it is. All my things are designed to look strange or normal looking so don't go messing with them, or the next one might not be an annoying noise but something worse."

"I don't think ya'd carry anythin' dangerous."

"How do you think I get through glass windows and metal grates, with magic?" I took my jacket back and played with the lining until I found the opening I was looking for. I took out a glass cutter, opened with no protection across the blade since the pocket itself served as the sheath. I waved the blade in front of him. "I have some dangerous toys too, so keep your hands off."

"I wouldn't have hurt myself. I know how ta be careful when I hafta."

"Sure you do detective, but I do not want you touching my stuff," I said in exasperation.

"It's not like I'm goin' after ya or anythin'. What have ya got against me seeing yer gadgets?"

"I'm just not used to people messing with things that are mine, especially these kinds of things. What if I went through your room and looked at everything?"

"That would be weird, but it's not like I've got anythin' to hide."

So like a detective to say that. "Just don't touch anything unless you ask. I'm not dealing with a five-year-old. If you want to know about something, ask me."

"Ok then. How come ya didn't tell me what had happened when I'd gone ta sleep, but ya didn't mind talkin' ta Kudo and Hakuba-kun when they asked ya? Seems like yer still tryin' ta keep secrets."

"Of course I am." I sat on the bed and faced the other teen. I don't think I would ever have this conversation with Hakuba or Kudo, but Hattori was different. He might just understand me.

"I'm not a detective, and by all accounts I'm not even considered one of the good guys." I watched him to make sure he understood and he shrugged instead of nodding. Good enough. "I can't trust the temporary alliance to make any difference when everything goes back to how it was. If Kudo-kun and Hakuba use anything against me, it will be stuff that I've accidentally let slip here. At the end of the day, I'm still a thief and I don't plan on changing that any time soon. For my own reasons," I quickly added.

"I think yer an idiot."

Hattori didn't articulate any further. He just left the statement hanging and watched me.

"Wow, Hattori-kun's words of wisdom. How enlightening they are." I tried to laugh off. However, Hattori kept a straight face.

"Go steal the Eiffel Tower for all I care. I've gotten to know ya, whether ya wanted me to or not. Kudo's even keener than I am and probably has ya pegged better'n I do. Heck, Hakuba-kun knows you. There's no way that any of us would do somethin' like that. I don't want ta see ya behind bars."

"You don't mind me stealing and you don't want to see my arrested? You can you call yourself a detective after saying that?" I asked with a smile.

"An' a damn good one!" Hattori shouted in offense, getting to his feet. "I've seen ya risk yer life fer me when ya didn't hafta! I know that some thieves, like you claim ta be, wouldn't have done somethin' like that unless he was ridin' on important morals and values. If yer stealin', yer doing it for some damn good reason and I can see that. Heck, everyone can see it. We're not lettin' ya slide 'cause we're bad detectives, we are doin' it 'cause we know it's worth the risk to trust ya. Apparently, ya don't feel the same."

Hattori went over to the door and I could tell he wanted to slam it, but instead he forced himself to close it slowly as he shouted to me, "Get yer priorities straight!"

I watched the door with undisguised shock for a few moments.

"Damn it," I whispered under my breath to myself. Damn it, damn it, damn it. I just made the one detective that I felt I could trust mad at me. Hakuba was trustworthy to a point as well, but he didn't understand me and I knew, somehow, that he would never be able to. We'd grown up too differently. He had too strong of an honor code to let me walk away with no repercussions.

'I need to know that catching those who break the law, even for good reason, is right.'

And damn it, he was trying to understand me. It hadn't even occurred to me that Hakuba wasn't prying into my life to get a good look at me, but actually trying to understand how I was feeling.

And didn't that just make it all the worse.

My brand of trust, my brand of thinking, everything about me was wrong, but it wasn't like I could change it all at the flip of a coin. I needed… something. Hakuba had already shown me that he was willing to help; that he understood what I was doing must have been important just like Hattori repeated to me. It just didn't seem real.

What did I want to do was the question. I wanted to trust the detectives, I really did. At the same time though, I couldn't. I couldn't let them know anything about me that might endanger me at some point, or worse, endanger them.

I never really had anyone I could talk to before. Jii was there but he was old and couldn't understand what I was feeling most of the time so I never burdened him with it.

And I wasn't even using that as an excuse to ask for help like Hakuba had. It was hard to separate the things in my mind that I was willing to tell them and those that I wasn't. I could erase that line one of two ways; I could tell them everything, or I could keep going on as I have been and let slip only what I thought I could get away with. Neither option was to my liking.

"Kuroba-kun," Hakuba whispered my name as he opened the door. I smiled a little and turned away from the detective, feeling guilty about my own thoughts. Hakuba closed the door and sat on the bed across from me, slowly and carefully so as to not hurt himself further.

"Why'd you grab Conan-kun instead of trying to ground yourself? That way you wouldn't get hurt. And here I thought self-preservation was the instinct that most people defaulted to," I asked. It was a thought that occurred to me, but I didn't really want to know the answer. It seemed like when I am under stress I just spew out whatever question or thought comes to mind so that I wouldn't be asked anything instead.

"Apparently, I'm more like you than I believed I was and the safety of others came to me before my own. I wasn't even conscious of the decision. All I was thinking at the time was that there was someone next to me and I had to protect them because I could. It made it a lot easier to see how you could let yourself get shot instead of ducking out of the way and protecting yourself. I didn't, no…" He laughed a little. "I couldn't understand it before the car accident."

"Hm." Hakuba was trying to understand me. I hadn't really tried to understand how he was feeling, not like how he was trying. I knew he felt divided about accepting my help, but that problem hadn't come back up since we'd met up with the other two and Hakuba began to experience my way of life.

I was getting exposed to his life now, and I wasn't comfortable with it.

"You look like someone just spoiled one of your magic tricks for you. That's something truly unforgivable," Hakuba said with a smile, before his expression became a little more concerned. "What's wrong?"

"I'm sorry." It was all I could say at the moment. I hadn't even noticed how unfairly I'd been treating the detective, even when he'd brought the accusation up against me.

Hakuba looked at me, confused, closing his mouth before he was able to say anything.

"You don't speak my language, right?" I smiled. "Sometimes I don't speak it either." I placed my head on my hands and rubbed my eyes. "I don't know. Maybe I'm the one confused now."

"Well, I can't offer any words of wisdom on this case or your side job, but I'm open for almost anything else if you want to ask. Kuroba-kun…" he waited for me to lift my head back up, but I still kept my chin rested on my hands, unconsciously making myself smaller. "What's wrong? I don't think I've ever seen you look depressed. It doesn't suit you."

"I… can't really see us as friends." I looked down again, but didn't hide my face. "I know I said we were but… I think I had the wrong definition of 'friend' at the time. It's not that I don't want to be friends with you…"

Hakuba smiled, somehow getting something different out of what I said. I expected him to be depressed about it too. "You just don't know how to be friends with someone like me, am I right? I'm quite fine with waiting until you get used to the idea. I had to get use to being friends with a thief after all, and I know it takes some getting used to."

"What if I never get used to it?" I whispered. "And what if… what if it's a bad thing? What if being friends with you gets you…" Heck. A lot of things could get the detective killed. His own stupid code of honor for one. That tended to put his life in danger, especially now. I didn't want to add anther reason to that list.

"Kuroba-kun, I would like to ask you something."

I looked up and Hakuba wasn't smiling anymore, but he didn't seem mad either; just contemplative.

"Sure."

"I want you to pretend to be in my place for a moment. So lets say you've gotten yourself in danger, not a hard feat for you to pull off. Now, you're in over your head and don't know how to handle the situation so you go looking for help. You find it. Again, since I said I wanted you in my place, say you found me to help you."

The detective waited until I nodded to show I understood.

"Now, again I'm switching the circumstance to seem more probable. Say we're on a murder case and you can not help even though you want to. In fact, I keep getting hurt trying to find the killer, and there is nothing you can do about it. That would understandably frustrate you, would it not?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"What do you mean why? I wouldn't feel comfortable playing backseat to anything. I'd find a way to change things."

"I can't do that. No surprise there. What if you couldn't either?"

"I'd find a way." I instinctively stiffened my hands in defiance against the accusation.

"And what would be your reason for that? Would it be to see the bad guys get caught…" Hakuba started to smile now, the only emotion he had shown since he started the hypothetical situation, "Or would your determination be aimed at trying to get me out of danger?"

"I'd get you out of danger first, and then go after the criminal."

"Ok, now say there was another detective there as well. Hattori-kun, just for example, because I'm unsure of any other detective that we would both be familiar with. If we were both in danger, which one of us would you help first?"

"What kind of stupid question is that?" I let my hands fall and sat up straight so that we were at eye level. "I'd get you both out!"

"And if you couldn't? If you knew there was only time to save one of us?"

"Then…" I let out a quick breath. "I guess we would all die because I'd try to get you both out anyways."

"Exactly," Hakuba's exclamation made it seem like he thought I would understand what he was saying. "I don't think it's your definition of friendship that's messed up. I think it's your definition of trust. Responsibility and friendship often get mixed up with you and you've broadened your perception on friendship to match the other, giving you more reason to strive to save people. If there was no danger, would you still find it amusing to hang out with me?"

"Yeah, I guess."

"Why?" He let his smile grow now and he tried to relax without hurting himself. "There wouldn't be any need to be around me because there would be no danger. Why would you want to be in my company if you did not need to be?"

"But there is danger. If there wasn't, maybe we could be real friends."

"So you can only befriend me when you feel safe in your own environment, when there is no outside force getting in your way. I didn't know you were so controlling." Hakuba still wouldn't stop smiling. "I admit I understand the feeling, but you can't take on the world alone like you are trying to do now."

"And you know what?" He added, somehow making his smile turn sad. "It's very lonely doing things that way."

"I like things the way they are now, minus the whole evil organization trying to kill us part."

"Only because you have Aoko-kun to counteract it with. You can spend the nights alone and the days with a friend. You let her in and, with at least one person there besides you, you can feel that things are alright. They aren't, and you'll find that out sooner or later."

Hakuba took a few moments before he continued. "At least you have her." He sighed and laid down, again, doing so slowly. "That will hopefully be enough for you."

"I love how the one preaching this to me spends his days locked inside his house, doing whatever it takes to keep himself busy and one step ahead of everyone."

"I admit to being controlling myself. And yes, because of my interests, I have many acquaintances but very little friends. Unlike you, though, I do know what a friend is and I have no qualms about it. The few friends I have are very precious to me. However, I don't smother them to keep them out of danger…" He let himself reminisce on something in the past before adding in a quiet voice, "That can sometimes be a fate worse then death."

"Nothing is worse then death."

"Kuroba-kun," he sighed, closing his eyes. "There are many things worse than death and, having been around the former for quite some time, I am confident in that statement. Maybe it's a good thing that you can't understand it."

The room was silent, but after a few seconds Hakuba opened his eyes in surprise.

"Kuroba-kun?" The detective got up and tried to look at me. He made it half way before his curiosity got the better of him. "What is it you're so afraid of?"

"What do you mean?" I asked him. I didn't know what he was referring to, especially when my mind was still running in circles after what he'd just finished telling me.

"Something in the past must have scared you, badly; enough to force you to keep risking your life. The enigma of Kid; the way you can't trust others, but you can care for them more then yourself, how you're willing to risk your life for even those who don't deserve it… There's something there, fueling your actions. I believe you truly care about life, but there's something else as well. Something that makes you completely forsake that life you care so much about for the safety of others…"

I shook my head to show him he had lost me, but Hakuba didn't notice. He was on a trail and, like the detective he was, completely focused on the task.

"It's not the fear of death that scares you, like it is for most people. It's the fear of other people dying…" Hakuba absently moved his fingers as he thought, brushing back his hair where it had fallen into his eyes and inadvertently showing off his new bruise.

"Oh!" His fidgeting all but stopped. He looked at me as if I were some new strange phenomenon that had just appeared before him. "Kuroba-kun, you're afraid of being left behind aren't you? That's why you don't let anyone close to you! You've known Aoko-kun for years so she's a safe bet, but you keep your distance from everyone else because you're afraid they may leave, permanently if not figuratively."

He put a hand up to his forehead. "Of course that's why you're having such a hard time accepting me as a friend! I don't live here! At least, not all the time. On top of that, I'm also a detective and prone to running off. Being a detective also means I have a high probability rate of dying, even if you are there."

Hakuba laughed as if it was so obvious, that he should have noticed sooner. I could only stare blankly back at him, lost in some neutral territory of my mind where I didn't have to think too deeply.

"What in the world would make you feel and think that way? Kuroba-kun, this is so abnormal that I can't even find words for it. Humans are very social people, as you obviously are. I have my own reasons for growing up the way I have, but you've been gifted with an environment that your personality should have flourished in. What affected you so much that you've given up on making any real connections to anyone?"

"Nothing." I had no real thoughts on the matter; my tone was just as emotionless.

"Kuroba-kun," He smiled. "I'd like it if you could tell me. I have no reason to use anything you say against you, since I don't plan on chasing you as Kid after this is all over. You should have no problems telling me now."

"I honestly couldn't tell you since I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Fine then, answer me this and then we can get back to my first question. If you feel this strongly about being left behind, then it means that at some point in your life someone left you. Left for some reason you couldn't prevent. Who was it?"

"No one has left me."

"Kuroba-kun, you can't lie to me." He gestured a hand in my direction. "I can tell by your posture that whatever it was upset you greatly."

"He didn't leave!" I shouted. I didn't know where the emotion came from because I hadn't felt any warnings of it seconds ago. In fact, I hadn't felt anything at all during the entire conversation, until now. "He was taken and I won't let anything be taken from me again!"

I got up to leave the room; I did not want to stay there any longer. Hakuba jumped up as well and grabbed my wrist. I felt the gloves hold tight against my bare skin. His sharp short breaths reminded me of his injuries, which stopped me from hitting him.

"Don't…run!" He got in before I could make a move to dislodge him. "You're no coward, so quit acting like one!" He took a deeper breath to try and control his breathing, but his limited movement restricted it. "I'm not a possession. I won't be taken from anyone because I do not belong to anyone! Kuroba-kun, do you hear me? I'm not going to disappear and I'm not going to be treated like a stranger either! You're my friend, even if I'm not yours, and I don't want you doing this to yourself! I'm sure Aoko-kun wouldn't like it either if she could see you now!"

Calm down. He doesn't know what he's taking about. Don't say those words you were just about to yell out, I told myself. I was close to just about twisting the detective's arm and claiming I was right about not being able to be his friend. I knew the consequences that would have come if I had so I didn't. Breathe and calm down.

"Fine Hakuba." I relaxed myself and looked him in the eye. "I don't want you interfering with me in the future because what I'm doing needs to be done. Not you, or even Aoko, can stop me on this. My decision is set. However, if you want to understand, I'll tell you."