Disclaimer: "Detective Conan" belongs to Gosho Aoyama, and "Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon" belongs to Naoko Takeuchi.
This is an alternative story to my other fanfic "Encounter in Venice" and one of the possibilities of what could have happened if Ai had taken the antidote before Shinichi brought down the Organization.
Thanks a lot to my friends and betas Rae (Astarael00) and SN1987a and the Aicoholics on LiveJournal, without whom I would never have started this fic.
FS
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Ghost at Twilight
(edited version)
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Vaguely...
Vaguely, you recall Gin's smirk when he told you that the young woman has survived. Either he thought that being in a coma didn't count as dying, or he was the opinion that it was the ideal statement to calm your frayed nerves without telling you an outright lie. Without success, you try to fight the unwelcome memories that assault your senses—all the gruesome details after Gin had regained control over the vehicle and you turned to throw a last glance at the two people on the street… The blood, the flowers, the midnight-blue car, which had helped Gin corner the biker but kept its distance during the crash and which then carelessly hit the unconscious girl from the side, sending her body to the pavement as it sped up to follow Gin's Porsche…
The codename member in that car had been executed, so Gin told you, as the Boss had strictly forbidden any attempt at purposeless killing and was justifiably incensed at this sadistic treatment of an innocent bystander, who didn't endanger the Organization and should never have been hurt in the first place. Although it reinforced your suspicion that Gin didn't want to kill the girl and that it was you who caused the accident, you had been grimly satisfied when you heard the news, thinking that, for once, Anokata's punishment made sense and was directed at the right person.
The red-haired girl—Seiya's foster sister—is dead; but you can't feel anything but pity for Seiya and yourself at the moment, when your supply of empathy is limited and you're numbed by the realization that everything between Seiya and you has suddenly changed, and that it can never be the same again. Gone is the idealistic view that you won't need to keep any secrets—that one day, you can tell your lovely boyfriend all about your past, about the Organization, Gin, the red-haired girl, and Pandora's Box, as he seems like someone who wouldn't judge but only listen.
Yet hope, as flimsy as it is, is always the last thing which dies. It goes without saying that now is certainly not the right moment to confess to Seiya that you've caused the accident, but you're almost certain that he will be able to forgive you for a tragic miscalculation in view of your good intentions. In fact, this could strengthen your bond instead of wrecking it if you're careful enough and take your time…
Or he will never be able to forget and hate you forever for destroying the girl he regarded as the personification of kindness, you uneasily concede, realizing that Seiya and you are, in a way, still strangers, and that you might never be able to read him as easily as you can read Kudo.
In your boredom, you might have wished for the unexpected—but this is the worst coincidence that could have happened, you realize, trying to collect your thoughts despite the conflicting emotions raging inside you. Ironically, you did sense that there was a connection between Seiya and the red-haired girl the moment you recognized the bike and saw Seiya wearing the blue helmet although you were already too fond of him to linger over the theory. Unaware of all the implications, which you should have been able to deduce if you hadn't let yourself be swept away by his warmth and his zest of life, you've willingly climbed on his bike without knowing what you've got yourself into…
"She is very pretty," you can hear yourself saying, trying to gain time to think, evading Seiya's troubled gaze resting on you.
"She was very beautiful." Yaten Kou begins to fidget with the red parasol in the umbrella stand beside him, apparently hurt by the realization that Seiya has already told you about her. "The drawing doesn't do her justice."
Kakyuu—the "fireball"… Perhaps it was her fiery name which made you imagine Seiya's Kakyuu to be the wild, temperamental type. The red-haired girl, on the other hand, appeared so extremely quiet and ladylike that you didn't even for a moment suspect that they could be the same person. Now that the truth seems so transparent, you wonder why you haven't drawn the parallel between "Kakyuu" and the girl's conspicuous red hair and reddish-brown eyes, which must have been the reason why Seiya's foster parents had given her the seemingly unsuitable name.
You feel guilty for all the wrong reasons, not so much because you might have caused the accident (as you had honestly tried to save her back then), but because, in the end, you have unwittingly taken away from her everything, even the man she loved. Kakyuu was, as you can see with the benefit of hindsight, a typical 'good girl' who was thrilled about rebelling against the rules by telling a stranger a lie—bragging about the lover she didn't have to give herself the air of a woman of the world.
With a twinge of conscience, you begin to see her as the complex person she was, acknowledging her quaint sense of style, her flashy dress, her heavy make-up, her overlong hair, her shyness, her sad smile, and her good manners. Being an old-fashioned lady only by upbringing and not by choice, she must have felt overwhelmed by Three Lights' fame and wondered whether she was interesting enough to keep Seiya by her side considering all his other more attractive options. In spite of her great natural beauty, Kakyuu was insecure and helpless, eager to become more glamorous and independent when the "seventh crow" stole a backup of Pandora's Box (to secure his freedom?) and the accident happened. Instead of living with her seventh crow as you thought, she has been dead for almost two years, dying on your birthday because one of her foster brothers (Seiya, according to Kudo's deduction) pulled the plug to her life support system…
The blue-clad biker, who has only been a side character in your life until now, has suddenly taken centre stage. From the things you've learned, you draw the inevitable conclusion that one of the three brothers must be the seventh crow. Since Taiki-san is much too tall to be the man in blue, who wasn't much taller than Kakyuu even in his helmet and his biker's suit, you deduce that it must have been Yaten-san, who is unable to remember you (as he didn't see you through the window of the car?) although he is visibly plagued by a sense of unease in your presence.
And yet a few things still don't make sense. How could Yaten Kou become a codename member of such an incredibly high status at such a young age? Did he enter the Organization to support his younger brothers after they left home? You're almost fond of Shortie now that you know he has assisted Tenoh-san and you and was the only one who dared to vote against Akemi-nee-san's death when all the other crows have already voted for her execution.
Why did Seiya lie to you, pretending to know next to nothing about the Organization while it's improbable that he didn't know that his oldest brother was one of the highest codename members? Apprehensive about your own deductions, you take a step back to examine them. You can still remember the figure on the bike—a slender person with narrow hips and waist—as he was racing along the sunlit, tree-lined road, slowing down when the girl behind him, who was riding side-saddle and clinging to his waist, began to lose her balance. Yet you can't tell whether it was Yaten-san, or Taiki-san (who might have grown by leaps and bounds in the past years), or even Seiya himself (who was a few inches shorter eight years ago). Just because Yaten Kou wears the same fragrance as Kakyuu (as he always mixed her perfume for her?), he doesn't necessarily have to be the man on the bike. Now that you think about it, it appears to you that Seiya, too, looks like the blue-clad biker from behind, a similarity you've already noticed before.
"Are you feeling sick again?" He gives you a worried look, touching your damp forehead. "Cold sweat is never a good sign."
"No, I'm all right… Just a little tired."
Even though one of the three brothers was the "boyfriend" on the bike, you're certain that he hasn't seen you through the window of Gin's Porsche. Now that both Kakyuu and Gin are dead, this will stay your secret forever, as you cannot ruin what Seiya and you have for a fleeting moment of relief. Ill-judged honesty and redundant confessions more often wreck love than salvage it.
Grudgingly, you admit that Seiya is less harmless than he looks if he was the seventh crow. The accomplished liar would have lied about practically anything he has told you without batting an eyelid. And he is probably keeping more secrets from you than you from him without having a crisis of conscience…
"We don't want to stand around forever, do we?" Yaten-san complains. "I'm exhausted, too, and so hungry I'm about to faint!"
"Let's go in and have a look at the gyoza," Seiya suggests, throwing his arm around your waist to pull you towards him. "You can have breakfast or a coffee while I iron your dress for you."
The world seems oddly intact again when your anxiety dissolves in his embrace. Kakyuu and the seventh crow have ceased to matter, for you're sure that nothing will be able to destroy your mutual trust, which has been as immediate and instinctive as your implicit trust in Kudo.
"You have to clean the corridor first, lazybones!" Shortie reminds Seiya with audible bitterness as he coolly turns away. "There are still a few shards. You don't want to cut your feet on them."
In response, Seiya scoops you up in his arms and, while you're trying in vain to keep your bathrobe in place, carries you into the living room, where he throws you onto the sofa before he returns to the corridor to mop off the blood and the water. Laughing off the comments of his foster brothers, who assert that infatuation invariably destroys braincells and that he is the living proof of that fact, he once again makes you believe in the illusion that love is the only thing which counts, and that the past doesn't matter in the least compared to the future.
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