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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This is your version…
This is your version of the "Ghost at Twilight"
—and like the others, it's neither complete nor true.
All versions of this tale lie when they tell the truth.
The missing fragments are still hidden from you.
Kudo and I are now sitting together in the small, dilapidated but clean tea pavilion near Hikawa Shrine (the same picturesque Hikawa Shrine where, according to Seiya, "Rei-chan" lived and where Odango and her friends met up to study together), waiting for the drizzle to stop. Apart from us (and from the waiter and the waitress, who can't be older than thirty), the few people in the pavilion are at least fifty-five. All the children, teenagers, and young adults (except for Odango) must be on the way to Two Lights' or waiting in the queue in front of the entrances of the club, hoping to catch a glimpse of their worshipped gods or to snatch a new set of playing cards.
"Why do you want me to study this stuff during such a sunset?" Kudo asks with audible resentment in his voice, darts me reproachful glances, and runs his fingers through his dishevelled hair.
"You're like a grown-up squirrel that refuses to become independent. Hence I'm kicking you out of my nest and showing you how to find the nuts on your own," I cheerily declare and heartlessly sip my fragrant jasmine-scented green tea while he mumbles under his breath that squirrels are callous mothers of the worst type.
The cold was washing over her,
and the sky assumed the colour of blood.
Her handbag had fallen out of her limp hand
—but she couldn't let go.
Someone depended on her painkillers,
which only she could make
—and being the responsible scientist she was,
she couldn't leave before knowing he wouldn't suffer.
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The sunset slowed down as Time began to stretch,
to cut off twenty-four hours of Eternity
—and the Ghost rose and hurried into the park,
towards the bench where he would be waiting for her.
g.
The last twenty-two hours have been a game
—the price for the one day you received.
You've defended yourself and fought against the Gods,
supported by the very men you've wronged.
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You've been travelling through the present and the past,
roaming Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, and Paris,
rummaging through the twenty-three years and eleven months of your life
for an answer to the questions,
for the one truth…
or for justice…
"Aren't you glad now that you didn't marry me? It would have been a hell of a marriage—at least for you!" Smiling, I peer at the two glowing orbs in the sky, into the soft afternoon light pouring over the bustle of the world, colouring my dress purple and giving Kudo's hair a deep chestnut tint. While I can't claim that I'm in high spirits after everything I've gone through (beyond doubt, today has been one of the unhappiest days of my life!), I'm feeling peculiarly light, as though I'd finally reached the state believers in Buddhism would call "nirvana".
"It wouldn't have been in the least boring," he graciously agrees, shooting me a dark look. "You'd have kept me occupied, even during sunsets in early spring, among cherry blossoms, which other couples would be gazing at while we two are studying."
Pluto and Jupiter are your formidable opponents.
Chronos has asked Time to run in circles for a day.
Fortuna has shuffled, reshuffled, and distributed the cards,
The Fates have thrown the dice,
And Justitia is presiding as the judge.
g.
Venus and Mars are still following the game
While Cupid has been secretly messing up the cards.
Felicitas has always been trying to help,
But Nemesis has always interfered.
"Are you sleeping?" Kudo's husky laugh breaks through my reverie. Exhausted by all the drama since yesterday's twilight, I've been dozing on the wooden chair with half-opened eyelids, abandoning myself to the languor of the late afternoon. The air is warm and smells of spring flowers and grass. In the distance, I can hear birds singing. The light rain still looks like a thin veil of opals and diamonds. Even though I firmly believe that nature is cruel and only kills us, I must admit that there are moments when its beauty is unrivaled.
"No, I'm not." I yawn. "I'm just… watching the sunset, trying to distract myself so that I won't die of boredom. I'm going to test you in ten minutes, though, so you'd better focus."
Kaito, Hakuba, Hattori, and Jean Black are Jacks.
Kakyuu, Akemi-nee-san, Odango, and Kaioh-san are Queens.
Kudo, Gin, Rye, and Tenoh-san are Kings.
Anokata, their crows, and the Professor are Aces.
The people around us, who don't seem to care much about Three Lights' merchandise but more about their acting and their music—are all excited about Three Lights' comeback, which doesn't seem an unsubstantiated rumour. There was a short interview on the radio half an hour ago, a shapely brunette in a tweed dress claims. Taiki Kou and Yaten Kou, who are usually mysterious and reclusive, have commented on the movie projects and revealed that they're thrilled to return to the stage with their youngest brother. One shouldn't build one's hopes up when it comes to Seiya Kou's comeback, however—as Seiya-san, who is a bit of a rebel, can't be found anywhere and hasn't given an interview yet. Also, the rumours about his comeback have always been unreliable, as the notorious womanizer has often changed his mind, carelessly breaking the hearts of his fans.
While Kudo obediently studies the formula, I study the people around us and listen with rapt attention to their talks, trying to take in as much information as I can. If the pace of evolution were faster, I would be developing mutant eyes and ears.
"He has shut himself off to play drums, says his agent. Seiya-san is very focused and doesn't let anyone near him during his practice sessions…"
"But Two Lights said in the interview that they'd been searching for him everywhere and that they couldn't find him in his studio…"
"Taiki said he thought Seiya has run off by himself again. I bet there is another love story behind this, as always, and he is already on a flight to Venice or New York. Our pretty Casanova is famous for pursuing his affairs at the most inappropriate moments…"
"But that's part of his appeal, isn't it?"
"Maybe he is fleeing from a jealous husband of a new lover?"
The news disturbs me for unknown reason, causing a curious pulsating, churning feeling in my stomach. Gazing at the moonlit sunset illuminated by the fine mist of rain, which is less brilliant than the radiant sunset yesterday but even more enchanting in its motley colour scheme and its many-hued softness, I have an eerie feeling that there is something I haven't comprehended, or rather something I've neglected to do.
Seiya and his brothers are the San Hikari,
The Sun, the Moon, and the Stars in the dark
—The most beneficial or the most harmful wild cards,
The highest trumps or the worst excuses,
The jesters that can turn the game around,
Depending on the rules
And on luck…
"If it was really serious between you two, his agent must be right and Seiya is probably playing drums at the moment," Kudo remarks. "It's his way of coping with grief, as everyone knows. That was another reason why I suspected him: a fellow musician told me Seiya had been practicing like a maniac for the whole week before his sister's death."
As the final moments of our disastrous date flash through my mind, I wonder whether I would have shown more grace during our farewell if only I hadn't been out of my mind with anger and grief. If it had been possible for me to stay, I would never have left—and even now I feel cheated by what others would call fate, which separated us just when I believed it could last.
"You should at least say goodbye to him before he goes away." Kudo remarks, sighs in irritation when I don't answer, and folds the formula to put it away.
"You'd better study that than give me advice on how to take care of my love life. If you can't make APAH yourself, you're going to die a horrible death—and I'm going to watch you shuffle out of this mortal coil without moving a finger!"
A crooked smile tugs at his lips but doesn't reach his eyes.
"I already know it by heart."
"You know, Kudo, if one could earn money by selling smugness, you'd be the Scrooge of Beika."
"It's only the truth, you can test me if you want to."
I do want to test him—and he can really recite the formula by heart and explain the whole procedure to me, much to my relief. Apparently, we still have a little time left before he has to go home, shower and shave, and fetch Ran from the train, as he doesn't get ready to leave but only lingers in his chair, stirring his tea.
"You know, I absolutely can't make you out." He scrutinizes me with bewildered eyes. "I don't know why you've run from him like you've run from me at Pandora's Box although you're so besotted with him." But he hopes that I'm going to tell him some day, in a few years, when I'm finally over it…
"At your age, you should have learned to abandon vain hopes." I shoot him a withering look.
He gazes down into his cup for a few seconds before he sips at his tea as though he had just realized that it's drinkable and he is supposed to drink it.
"Apropos vain hope… My proposal," Kudo begins, and I freeze, taken aback by the ease with which he talks about it. "What was actually the answer you'd have given me if we hadn't fought about the files?" He looks at me expectantly. "Was it a 'No', or was it a 'Yes'?"
There is no limit to his cluelessness, I realize in amazement, wondering how—after all these years and all our talks in Paris, on the ship, and at the Professor's grave—he still doesn't know. As brilliant as he is, Kudo is the type that needs an unambiguous answer, for he tends to see the world in contrasting black and white or at least in bold expressionist colours. But even though his slowness irritates me to no end, the thought that he seems to have been haunted by Pandora's Box just like me consoles me. It might not have been torturing him in his dreams, but it must have been haunting him at night whenever he couldn't sleep. He can't let go of the past before knowing the alternative to his present life. In a way, it's almost touching…
I cast my mind back to the past, trying to conjure up the possible future that never happened—and it dawns on me that I, too, don't know. I've always thought it was a clear "Yes", believing myself to be the one who has been rejected—but when I reminisce about it now, I'm no longer sure. Cautiously guarding my secrets, I had to push Kudo away because he is always too fast at sensing the incongruities, too fast at deducing or guessing the truth even when he doesn't have sufficient clues. Wasn't it the same I'm doing to Seiya now?
"Yes" or "Thanks, but no thanks"—does it really matter, I ask him. It's been over for so long, and we both have finally moved on.
His eyes flash with anger at my reply.
Of course it does matter, he insists. After all, the difference between "requited" and "unrequited" is like the gap between "guilty" and "not guilty". Although years have passed, the gap still matters to him. He has been pondering about it all the time, wondering what he meant to me in Paris, wondering "why the deuce" (he tends to quote Sherlock Holmes at the most inappropriate times) I simply threw the necklace he gave me away with Pandora's Box—a gesture which infuriated him so much that he snapped.
"I didn't throw it away. The pendant was stuck in Pandora's Box and I was trying to get it out. I accidentally let go of it when you sneaked up on me."
Kudo is staring at me as though he had never even considered the option that it could simply have happened—that the gesture he saw at Pandora's Box, which was filled with so much symbolism from his point of view, wasn't supposed to mean anything.
"You were standing at the ship's rail," he weakly protests.
"Just because I had to get rid of the laptop… and I could already hear your footsteps in the vicinity." I sigh and laugh in dismay, realizing that three years ago, fate, or whatever it was, played a prank on both of us. "It was an accident, Kudo. That's the absolute truth! I suppose your detective mind just had to connect the dots and turned everything into a story."
"Ah," he only says, looking so relieved and yet so taken aback by the discovery that I almost pity him. Afterwards, we silently watch the sunset, which is slowly changing as the rain stops falling. The world seems to brighten up for a moment, when the late afternoon sun peeps through the thin layer of orange and golden clouds.
"So, was it a 'Yes' or a 'No'?" he asks again, in a trembling voice, eyes bright with anticipation.
"Yes," I sigh, since telling him about all the different nuances of that simple "Yes" would be a pain. "Although I despised—and still despise!—the very thought of marriage. You… took me by surprise, I suppose, and I thought I should simply give you what you wanted so that we could stop arguing."
"Ah," he says again, flushing, looking so deliriously happy about a simple past "Yes"—a relict from a bygone time—that I don't know how to react. Hence I say the only thing I can think of at the moment, for time is running short. It's already half past four on my watch. And he still has to shave and at least change into less rumpled clothes before fetching Ran.
"Well, since you have to leave soon… Good luck in Osaka, and send me a card from time to time, preferably on my birthdays."
He chuckles, darting me an amused look before he turns serious again.
"You've got it all wrong! I'm not going anywhere."
"You said you've 'come to terms with Osaka'." I give him a blank look, folding my arms. If this is a joke, APAH must have worse side effects on him than I thought.
"But you've really misunderstood what I said! What I meant to say this morning was: I've come to terms with the reality that Ran will go to Osaka while I'm going to stay here." He buries his forehead into his palms, closing his eyes in resignation. When he looks at me again, his gaze has softened. "Our relationship has been stagnating for a whole year, and we both have tried to distract ourselves with work in the hope that it's only a phase. After sleeping for a night on your sofa, I realized that it felt great to sleep alone for once. I'm going to fetch Ran from the train and admit to her that I can't keep doing this forever, stealing her time and trying to love her when all I can think of is how much I want to be single and free again."
The ghost lingers on in the ending sunset,
knowing it can never really win against Time.
All the cards stay on the table for the very last round,
until the ghost turns away as the silence falls.
The truth, in this world, can't be expressed by words.
But a silent love can't survive in an imperfect place.
On the horizon, the last ray of sunlight fades,
and the ghost at twilight returns to its time and space.
g.
This version of the tale doesn't have a happy end,
for all the lovers will be waiting in vain.
Your sorrow, however, is both pain and bliss,
the exquisite suffering which only love can cause
when having met the beloved is already enough.
This is only one version of the "Ghost at Twilight"
—and like the others, it's neither complete nor true.
All versions lie even when they tell the truth.
The missing fragments are still hidden from you.
g.
A/N: I don't know if this happens to other writers, but writing about Shinichi's migraines usually gives me a migraine although I seldom (almost never) have headaches; and now I've had to learn that editing the chapters in which Shinichi has a migraine gives me a migraine as well.