"Ah, good." Shinichi was pleased that the police arrived so fast. On the other hand, this one time he wouldn't have minded a little bit of lateness. "Alright. Let's go."

Sonoko nodded and went back to the dining room. Shinichi and Ran set themselves in motion as well. Standing in the door, Ran put one hand on his shoulder and whispered: "What happened after everyone left the bathroom...stays just between us, alright?"
Shinichi smiled and nodded. "Of course."

Chapter 6 - The Investigation, Part I

The dining room had the usual thick atmosphere of any place where a murder happened not too long ago: on one side, the acquaintances/potential suspects, who are mostly speechless by a person being torn out of its and their life and on the other side, the investigators, who are poised to speculate what happened. But at the same time, the latter are held back by the grief of the former; the investigators have to be careful not to traumatize people who have just faced death with their cold, logical and, in the eyes of the mourning people, cruel words. Shinichi rarely stood on the side of the acquaintances, and even then he mostly investigated. Akemi came to his mind; he really didn't want anything like that to happen in the future. He almost automatically glanced over to Ran; 'No.' Shinichi thought. 'Never again.'

He shook his head to get a clear mind; this was not the time for reminiscence, it was time to catch a murderer. Shinichi looked at the police force present; what he saw were two ununiformed, male officers and Yui Uehara. It seemed like she was the one in charge here. This was a good thing in Shinichi's mind; he worked together with the 29 year old female police detective on several cases in the past - as Conan, mind you -, he knew she was pretty capable at her job. Although it did surprise him a little bit that she was here without her usual partner - and love interest if you asked Ran and Kazuha -, Inspector Kansuke Yamato.

Yui spotted Ran and Shinichi joining them in the dining room. "Ah, Ran-chan! Good to see you again, although I wish the circumstances could've been less sad this time."

Ran offered an apologetic smile. "Me too. But nothing that can be done about it now, I suppose.
Yui nodded and turned her gaze to Shinichi. "And whose that handsome fellow you got there with you? Is that your..."

Shinichi didn't like where this was going. "I'm Shinichi Kudo, a classmate of Ran. Nice to meet you."
Yui smirked. "Ah yes, I heard about you from Ran-chan. I'm Detective Yui Uehara." Yui clapped her hands together, signaling to everybody that the chit-chat was over. "Alright, now that we got everyone under our sight, shall we head over to the body and summarize the situation we have at hand?" It wasn't really a question and the officers knew that, but they still nodded dutifully. The two men went up in front of the group, while Yui walked behind everyone.
'This kind of walking formation really feels like preschool...' Shinichi thought.

He noticed that Ran started to trail a bit behind, because Yui tugged at the hem of her shirt. The two women were whispering, but Shinichi could still hear them.
"Are you together with that boy now, Ran-chan? Didn't Kazuha-chan, you and I promise each other to tell when something happened in regards to our childhood friends..." Yui whispered, with a bit of teasingly fake indignation.
"Ah, no, I remember. You see, what happened was..." Ran said, but Shinichi decided not to listen anymore. He got his fair share of girl talk as Conan regularly, no need for him to listen to that now, especially with a murder at hand. Instead, Shinichi closed the distance between him and Sera.

"Oi, Sera, got anything out of them while waiting for the police?" Shinichi whispered.
The tomboyish girl shook her head. "Nah, they closed up pretty fast and dropped any kind of conversation. No opportunity for me to press them on anything."
"Mh, would've been too good to be true..." Shinichi sighed.

When they all got into the bathroom, two guys from forensics were already working in the smaller adhered room that had the bathtub and thus the corpse in it. Yui pulled a little notebook from her blazer and stemmed her free hand into her hip.

"So, the victim is the 28 year old Masaie Hakuya. The culprit most likely hit him with some sort of blunt object on the back of his head, which rendered the victim unconscious. Then the culprit put him into the bathtub, where Hakuya-san drowned." Yui looked up at to Masaie's friends. "You told me that Hakuya-san was in charge of cleaning the bathroom, is that right?"

Tamami sniffed and had to wipe some tears from her face. "Y-yes, that and the toilet as well." She sobbed. "Everyone of us has one task to take care of when we come here once a year. Masaie cleaned the bath and the toilet. I cook for everybody." She looked over to her two alive friends. "Sumika cleans the rooms and the hallway. And Jinsuke mostly takes care of the shopping. The next store is just one kilometer away."

She had to fight back another swell of tears, so Sumika continued for her friend. "Once we're done with our own tasks, we usually help the others with their stuff."

Jinsuke started to sob as well. "If I had just helped Masaie with the cleaning instead of going to the shop, then all of this wouldn't have happened...!"

Yui took some more notes, nodding at the appropriate times during their statements. "And which one of you was the last one to see the victim?"

Tamami was in control of herself again. "He left the dining room after lunch, to work on his cleaning duties. I didn't see him afterwards."
"When I briefly checked the bathroom, I didn't see him either." Sumika added.

Yui turned her attention to Sumika. "You checked the bathroom?"
"Yes. There was some steam coming from the bath, so I thought he maybe ran a bath for some reason. That's why I took a look at it with the two girls." Sumika looked over to Sonoko and Ran, making them the center of Yui's attention now.

"Did you check the insides of the bathtub too?"
"Yes. We opened the lids to check the water temperature." Ran replied. "But there were no tomatoes floating in the water then!"
"When Sumika-san, Ran and I were finished with cleaning the rooms, we wanted to be the first to take a bath." Sonoko chimed in. "When we finished changing clothes and entered the bathroom, we were startled upon the sight of all these tomatoes in the bathtub."

Shinichi carefully listened to the order of events that happened during his little trip into the woods Sera. Now it was time for his part of the process. "When Sera and I heard their screams, we came running to the bathroom." Shinichi said. "We both had a bad feeling about the situation, so we went over to the bathtub and I pulled Hakuya-san out of the water."

"The body was not visible until you pulled him out?" Yui asked.
"No. The surface was covered in tomatoes and the bathsalts made the water all green and untransparent. Additionally, when I pulled the body out of the water, I felt that it was weighed down by something, to make sure it wouldn't float."

"I can help with the 'something'." One of the forensic guys spoke up. "We found dumbbells on the bottom of the tub. It looks like they were laid onto the victim's chest and stomach."

Yui put her notebook away. "So, the culprit not only sunk the body pretty effectively, but also obscured the surface with all of these tomatoes, to be really sure that the body wasn't visible..."

"In which order did you enter the bathroom?" Everyone turned around to Sera, who had stayed in the backround before her question. "The first person could've had a sack of tomatoes with her and could've emptied it into the tub before the others entered."

"Wait, are suspecting one of us?" Sonoko gasped.
"It's a valid question." Shinichi chimed in.
"Not you too, Shinichi-kun...!"

"Now, now, Sonoko, calm down." Ran tried to soothe her friend. She turned back to Sera and Shinichi. "Sumika went in first, since she was the first who finished changing out of her clothes. But she had nothing with her, except the towel she wrapped around her body. Right, Sonoko?"

Her friend nodded. "Yeah, that's right." Sonoko gave Shinichi and Sera an annoyed glare. "And besides, how would one of us just be able to walk around with a sack large enough to hold all of these tomatoes without drawing any attention?" Apparently she wasn't too fond of that theory.

Yui spoke up again. "So, Ran-chan, Sonoko-chan and Sumika-san could've theoretically committed the crime in the time between checking the water temperature and finishing with the cleaning."
Sonoko and Ran still looked intimidated by Yui's summarization of the state of facts so far, while Sumika stayed with her stoic look she had on most of the time, absentmindely plucking some lints from her rolled-up sleeve. A protest in favor of Ran and even Sonoko was already on Shinichi's lips, but he held it back. It wouldn't have been helpful to show that kind of bias now, so he had to silently wait for his classmates to be proven innocent. Instead of saying something, he shyly grabbed Ran's wrist. When she turned her head around to look at him, Shinichi gave her an reassuring look. It seemed to help her, atleast she looked a bit less tense than before.

Meanwhile, Yui had turned her attention towards Tamami and Jinsuke. "Now that we have a first window of opportunity, what were you two doing during that time?"

Tamami and Jinsuke looked to each other and back to Yui, unsure who should start. After a another small moment of silence Jinsuke went ahead. "Erm, well, I went shopping. Like Tamami said, that's my job each year. The next shop is a kilometer away, takes roughly 15 minutes to get there. I went there because we didn't have any beer. A-and we were also low on regular beverages..." He hastily added the last sentence when he noticed Yui's stern expression. "Anyway, I ran into these two on my back here. Right?"

He turned to Shinichi and Sera. They both nodded to confirm his statement. Jinsuke further explained that the juice he gave them was still icecold, thus confirming that he just recently bought it at the store. Besides the fact that his alibi had strong witness in the shop owner. The juice had indeed been very cold, Shinichi remembered, but other than that he couldn't say much about it. He was so in thought about his conversation in the woods with Sera, that he didn't even remember what flavor the juice had. Sera was in the same boat in that regard.

"What exactly were you doing in the forest?" Yui asked Shinichi and Sera.
"We wanted to check out a couple of things out there." Sera answered.
"In regards to the time: we left the mansion before Jinsuke-san went out to the store and looked around the forest for some time. I didn't look on my watch, so I don't know how long we were out there. On our way back we ran into Jinsuke-san, who was already on his way back from the store." Shinichi further explained.

Yui nodded. "I see. And where were you, Tamami-san?"
"I took care of the dishes from lunch. After that I started to prepare dinner." Tamami replied.
"Alone?"
"Yes. I was alone."
"Can anyone confirm that?"
Tamami looked at Ran and Sonoko. "Well, I talked to the two girls through the door."

Yui took a step towards the addressed girls. "Is that correct?"
"Yes." Sonoko answered. "We were just cleaning the dining room, which is bordering the kitchen. Tamami-san asked us whether we had any wishes for dinner."

"And when we asked if she needed our help, she told us that she was fine on her own. So I'm pretty sure that she was alone in there." Ran added.

"And was Sumika-san with you at that time?" Yui asked.
"No, Sumika-san was cleaning the upper floor alone." Ran answered.

"Unlike Tamami, I thought working together would speed things up a little, so I went down and asked them for their help. After I did that, all three of us continued to clean together." Sumika said calmly.

"But Sumika-san was definitely cleaning the upper floor the whole time. We heard the sound of the vacuum cleaner the whole time and from to time the sounds of her hitting a wall with it." Ran added.

Yui narrowed her eyes. "So, we can conclude from that, that it was possible for Tamami-san to committ the murder in the time when Sumika-san, Ran-chan and Sonoko-chan were busy cleaning the upper floor." She turned to Tamami. "Do you anything to add to that?"

Tamami's eyes widened and she panicked. "W-what are you saying?! I really was in the kitchen the whole time! Right until Jinsuke came back from his shopping trip!"

"I don't think that Tamami did it." Sumika calmly said, gaining the attention of Yui. "I only cleaned this floor with the girls, which includes the bath. Tamami knows that I'm very thorough in my cleaning duties. Would she really try to secretely committ a murder with that knowledge."

Yui raised one hand to her chin. "But then, who did it?"

Shinichi thought about that as well. 'Let's see. Sera was with me, so she's definitely out. With the store, Jinsuke has a pretty solid alibi, unless he had a secret way to cross the distance faster. Tamami could've done it. Ran, Sonoko and Sumika are also out. Unless...' Shinichi looked around the room, thinking. 'Unless the body was already in the tub when the three checked the temperature. The water was green from the bathsalts already, so Ran wouldn't be able to spot the body. It was at the bottom of the tub; I had to reach into it very deep, almost my entire underarm was in the water before I reached the body. If Ran only put a wrist length into the tub, she wouldn't have noticed the body.

If that was the case, then Ran and Sonoko could've done it together, or Sumika could've done it alone. I doubt it was Ran and Sonoko however, no motive at all, they didn't even know the guy. Sumika...she could've done, if she had a way to fake the vacuum sounds. Motive? Hm...atleast she knew him, maybe something bad happened between them...'

Shinichi was taken out of his thoughts, when the nervous Jinsuke answered to Yui's question. "The...THE WOMAN IN RED! IT HAS TO BE THE WOMAN IN RED!"

Yui was a bit sceptical. "The Woman in Red? You mean, that murderer from 15 years ago?"
"T-that's right!" Jinsuke nodded vigorously, but his face was pale. "The Woman in Red, the one that murdered someone in a mansion nearby, 15 years ago. So she really did hide in the forest for all these years! She smashed the window with the apples, she put the petals in the boiler and she splashed the door with red paint!"

Even Tamami and Sumika looked at their friends questioningly. "But why would she want to kill Masaie?" Tamami asked.

"SHE'S A CRAZY MURDERER! DO YOU THINK SHE NEEDS A LOGICAL REASON TO KILL SOMEBODY?!" Jinsuke bursted out. He took a deep breath and continued with a quiet, shaky voice, that still sounded threatening. "T-the front door wasn't locked, right? The Woman in Red has no idea where and when Sumika cleans. So she just went into the house and killed the first one she came across!" His voice got louder again. "AND ALL OF THESE TOMATOES ARE HER CONFESSION!"

Jinsuke breathed heavily; he was very nervous and started to sweat profoundly. Everyone looked at him, but it didn't seem like anyone considered what he said to be true.
'What a load...' Shinichi thought.

Yui took it upon her to break the uncomfortable silence. "I doubt that that is the case."

She went on to explain, that the Woman in Red was a woman called Komayo Takeno. When the body of the groups friend Satoko was found in swamp three years after the original Red Woman murder, the police also found a skeleton, who was already in the swamp for roughly three years. The police suspected that it was the skeleton of said Komayo Takeno, but they couldn't prove it until recently, when the umbrilical cord of the woman was found and a DNA comparison could be made. It showed, that the skeleton in the swamp was undoubtedly Komayo Takeno.

Yui sighed. "The media will be informed tomorrow. It's a very famous case, so we as the prefectural police of Nagano are fully stretched with the analysis of all the evidence." She looked very annoyed all of a sudden. If Shinichi had to guess, this analysis she spoke of took a few extra night shifts, which Yui probably would've liked to avoid.

The adults however were looking terrified all of a sudden. "Alright...but...who murdered Masaie then?" Tamami asked.

"D-don't tell me it was the ghost of the Red Woman!"
"Oh god, if that's true, how can we defend ourselves against a ghost?!"
"YOU'LL PROTECT US, RIGH?!"

They talked at the same time, making it quite hard to understand. Yui raised her hands. "Alright, alright, why don't you all calm down now. I'm sure this all has a non supernatural explanation." She stemmed her hands back into her hip. "I'll take another look around the house and then I'll decide what we'll do next." Yui turned towards the three adults especially. "You three: please wait in your rooms."

Tamami, Jinsuke and Sumika did exactly that. Sonoko and Ran went straight to the room where the teenagers all stored their backpacks. Shinichi and Sera, however, expressed interest in looking around the house with Yui, to which she reluctantly agreed. Since Shinichi and Sera were out of the picture as culprits, it didn't really matter the female police detective.

First up, they looked through Jinsuke's room. Of course, the baseball bat he had with him raised some question by Yui. One of the forensics guys started to examine it.
"So, let me get this straight: You wanted to stop the Woman in Red with this?"
"Yeah. I also wanted to drive off the prankster, who does all of these bad jokes every year, with this." Jinsuke answered.

Yui nodded. "I see." She turned to the forensics guy. "Well?"
The man shook his head. "No scratches or anything and no luminol reaction. This isn't the thing that the victim was knocked out with. But it is a bit sticky, seems like something was glued to this recently."
"Huh. Educated guess what it was?" Yui asked, but the forensics guy just shrugged. Yui sighed yet again.

"I wonder..." Sera said. "...why is there a fan in the corner, if this mansion has air conditioning?" She was right, there was indeed a fan in the room.

Jinsuke shrugged. "Well, maybe the previous guests couldn't tolerate air conditioning and they forgot to put the fan back into the closet?"

Nobody had any explanation for that, so they just left it at that. Jinsuke stayed in room, while the others went on to the room Sonoko and Ran were in. Outside, thunder could be heard. A storm was really close now.

Ran and Sonoko were sitting on the bed in the room, talking about this and that. The room itself wasn't suspicious, but Yui did check the backpacks of the teenagers, but not a complete search since it seemed unnecessary with the current state of facts. Luckily for Shinichi, Yui or anyone else found the Conan clothes he took with him under his Shinichi clothes, just in case. What she found, however, was Shinichi's bloody shirt.
'Oh crap...!' Shinichi thought.

"This is blood, isn't it? Can you explain that to me, Kudo-kun?" Yui raised an eyebrow at teenager.
Shinichi raised his hands. "Yes, you see, that's my blood. I had a little...accident..." He sheepishly said, blushing a bit. He threw a glance at Ran; her face was just as red.
"What kind of...accident?" Yui inquired.
"Ah, well..."

"OH MY GOD!" Sonoko screamed. She pointed a finger at Shinichi. "YOU..."

Everyone waited for Sonoko to continue her sentence, as she threw in a dramatic pause. "YOU SAW RAN NAKED!"

Yui, Sera, Shinichi and Ran blankly stared at Sonoko. She still pointed at him; Shinichi gulped. "And...what makes you think that?" He asked as calm as possible, trying to regain some of his composure.

"You can't fool me, Shinichi-kun!" Sonoko explained. "I didn't see you and Ran until I called you two to the dining room. You had already changed clothes by then. There is only one explanation: you two went into this room and you caught a look of Ran while she was changing, causing you to nosebleed all over that shirt! You can't fool Deduction Queen Sonoko!"

Sera and Yui were speechless, turning their gazes towards Ran and Shinichi. The two teenagers thought the same thing at the moment. 'How come Sonoko is always so spot on about these things?!'

"So..." Sonoko said. "I take your silence as a yes? Did the husband finally get to see some of his wife's most valuable goods?"
"SONOKO!-" Ran shrieked.
"I wish!"
"Huh?" The three teenage girls exclaimed.

Shinichi put on an exasperated face. "Yeah, I wish. The truth is, Ran and I were looking around for clues - both completely dressed, mind you, Sonoko - and during that, we turned around without looking and next thing I know, Ran hits me in the face with her elbow! No wonder my nose started to bleed, considering that even accidental movements by Ran are pretty strong."

His explanation caused another awkward silence. The teenage girls were still staring blankly at him, while Yui seemed to question her sanity. Atleast judging from the look on her face.

Meanwhile, Ran used the silence to fake-react properly. "What do you mean 'I wish', Shinichi?!" She said and punched his arm.
"Ow..." He said and rubbed the spot she hit.

"And Sonoko, what do you mean 'valuable goods'?" She punched her friend's arm too. "I'm not a market stall! And I'm not his wife!" She punch her friend's arm again, on the exact same spot.
"Ow...why me twice?" Sonoko said and rubbed the spot Ran hit; involuntarily mirroring Shinichi's movements.

Ran groaned. "Honestly, you should both get your minds of the gutter!"
"Yes, Ma'am..." They both mumbled, still rubbing their arms.

Sera and Yui were still speechless because of the scene they just witnessed. Yui cleared her throat. "Anyway...here." She handed Shinichi the bloody shirt. "I guess...we're done here. Let's head for the next room." Yui hurried out of the room, more than happy to escape this situation. Sera followed her immediately, glancing at Shinichi once more before she left the room completely.

Sonoko sighed. "And here I finally thought Shinichi-kun got something better than the sexy shot I send him that one time..."
"Sonoko..." Ran growled and raised her hand.
"No, no, no, Ran, please don't hit that spot again, it still hurts." Sonoko protectively held her arm.
"Fine." Ran said, before turning sheepishly turning to Shinichi. "Speaking of which: you deleted that picture, right...?"
"Ah, actually no, I use that as my screensaver now." Shinichi said.
"WHAT?!" The two girls shrieked.
Shinichi chuckled. "Relax, I'm joking. Of course I deleted it."
'Not voluntarily though...' He added mentally. For a moment, he feared Ran would punch his arm again, but she spared him.

Shinichi went over to his backpack and wanted to put his bloody shirt away, when he noticed something on the sleeves of the shirt. There were lots of...crystalline structures...?

He curiously put one of them in his mouth. 'This taste...these are definitely salt crystals...I reached into the bathtub with that sleeve...Ah!' A sudden realization flashed through his mind. 'Salt crystals on sleeves. The water in the tub. Floating tomatoes...Hehe, now I definitely know who the culprit is!'

A/N: Phew, lots of dialogue in this one, but very important for how the case works. I hope it was too painful to read, as it was a bit exhausting to write that part. Anyway, thank you so much for so many reviews on the last chapter, I'm glad it got so much approval. Always remember to leave reviews to tell me what you think, it really helps me in many ways with the continuation of this story. Alright, see you next time. Enjoy!
~13.06.2015