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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All the people in the vicinity…

All the people in the vicinity have begun to throw furtive glances at you—probably wondering why a young woman like you have come to Shinobazu-no-ike to view cherry blossoms alone, for all you know. The elderly couple at the pond have started to direct their attention from the ducks and the gulls to you as well, eyeing you with poorly concealed curiosity while talking to each other in hushed voices. To communicate that you're waiting for someone (and therefore not particularly keen on making the acquaintances of the men who are leering at you), you demonstratively check the time. Even though it seems to you as if you had spent hours ruminating on the past, it is only six o'clock on your watch.

Meanwhile, a comforting thought has just struck you and taken root in your mind, kindling a spark of hope, which shakes you out of your apathy. Seiya, who might expect you to come to the bench at the same time as yesterday, may be roaming Ueno-koen to return to this bench at half past six. If that's really the case, you only need to stay planted to the spot and wait until you two meet.

At the same time, you remember that Taiki-san has told you that Shizuka-san, their agent, is searching for Seiya as well because they all still have to pack their luggage for New York. There will be no time for Seiya and you to talk in private if you wait for him here.

"Excuse me!"

You explain to the elderly couple, who are giving you the relaxed, attentive smiles happy couples often wear, that you're searching for a man of your age, who has blue eyes and slightly curly black hair. If he happens to turn up in the next couple of minutes, could they please tell him that Shiho would be back at half past six at the latest and that he should wait for her?

They amiably agree, claiming that they're waiting for friends as well and staying here for another hour, anyway—and you set out to search for Seiya in Ueno-koen since you can't bear to wait for him any longer. On other days, waiting for an hour on a bench at this pond (among cherry trees and gulls and ducks in a fairly pleasant weather) wouldn't have seemed like a superhuman feat—and last night you could wait for Kudo for hours. But tonight, you have a nagging feeling that not seeing Seiya again before the sun disappears from the horizon would be the most terrible tragedy of all.

You can't even tell what you expect from the meeting—especially since there is no way you're ever going to tell Seiya the truth. No matter how deluded you are when it comes to him, you don't nurture the slightest hope that he will ever forgive you for what you've done. You aren't sure you're hoping for a sense of closure either… As irrational as it sounds, you almost expect a continuation of your story as if you two could just pick up from where you left off, disregarding the past and the unavoidable future issues which would drown this relationship under a giant pile of Pandora's Box debris…

Ueno-koen is now swarming with people, many of whom are sitting or kneeing on thick blankets, celebrating hanami parties. On an island in the middle of the pond, Benten-do—the temple of the biwa-playing goddess of rivers and water and music and art—is surrounded by festival food stalls while lanterns already light up all the trees for yozakura. As much as you'd love to admire this rain of cherry blossoms in their mysterious, ethereal glow, you doubt that either Seiya or you will be around to see it tonight.

Despondent, you realize that you're never going to find Seiya among this sea of people, in this dim, ever-shifting light. Like you used to do in your most desperate moments when you were small, you close your eyes for a second to conjure up his presence—to summon up the memories of all the outlines, shapes, scents, and sounds for the right blend of the spirit you want to call. Unlike in your dreams, your approach naturally doesn't succeed—and the park is packed with strangers but still lacks the one you're looking for.

The very instant you abandon hope is also the moment you see him again. He is strolling past the food stalls in a desultory manner, with his long ponytail tucked into his jacket and half of his face hidden by his giant sunglasses—unmistakable with his proud singer's head and his light steps, which haven't changed despite his supposed heartache over you. While you behold your ex-boyfriend's arresting profile in the colourful grey of the moonlit twilight, you marvel at Yaten-san's accurate depiction of his youngest brother on the 'wild card' when he clothed him in all the colours of the rainbow. Like a star among drab grey rain clouds, Seiya has the tendency to make his surroundings fade into a blur once he appears on the scene—and you begin to wonder whether the much quoted claim that if you love someone, you'll let go of them for their own good might be just another mantra, another cliché one always stumbles on.

You've left your stranger like a grown-up abandons a childhood dream that can never be realized—but you've failed to foresee that the euphoria of a requited infatuation in its initial stage is only a small cozy flame compared to one which has been tainted by loss and been allowed to escalate with time. Staying with him was impossible after experiencing how easily love can be replaced by hate. But staying away from him seems just as unimaginable now even if you could muster up the will to leave.

Luckily or unluckily, the decision is not yours to make. Unlike last night, when he immediately sensed and acknowledged your presence, your stranger is so distracted that he doesn't seem to take notice of you at all. The reason for his inattentiveness is obviously the woman leaning on his arm, with whom he is having something which closely resembles a lover's quarrel from the distance. Staring at the attractive dark lady, who looks as if she is just as attached to him as you were this morning, you curse yourself for expecting to meet Seiya Kou out of all people alone in a park while the inveterate womanizer is forever surrounded by female admirers and former or present lovers.

You can see at first glance that he has a rather rumpled look to him this time, which alters but doesn't diminish his attractiveness. Crouching on a blanket, an artist is eagerly sketching the bickering couple with hard pastels while the women walking past them are ignoring their partners to gaze at him. Overcome with disappointment and unspeakable anger, you briefly consider confronting the chameleon-like Casanova to see whether he will bravely defend his vices or come up with new fanciful lies. But since renouncing all claim to the lover is intrinsic to ending a romantic relationship, you decide after the first flash of fury that it would be ridiculous to bother an ex-boyfriend about his general lack of honesty.

Torn between the urge to stalk them and the wish to preserve your last ounce of pride by turning away and leaving, you end up following them at a discreet distance while sizing up the woman on his arm. Judging from the looks of the women you've seen until now, Seiya definitely has a weakness for the fine-boned, petite type. The twenty-odd-year-old brunette, who looks like a prettier and more heavily made-up mix between Odango and you, is of a delicate stature, has a medium-length bob with bangs a few shades lighter than Hino Rei's hair, and sports an almost imperceptible limp—an illusion which must be caused by the broken heel of her right shoe.

"But I only wanted the best for you!" she coos in a husky voice as she squeezes his arm, which she is leaning on, and gently drags him to a food stand, where she buys them a box of sakura mochi. They must know each other for much longer than you and him, that's for sure, and you wonder briefly whether you ought to be shocked at the discovery that he must have cheated on her with you.

Seiya coolly declines the piece of sakura mochi she offers him as if he were refusing an offer of tacit truce, which surprises you, as you didn't expect him to be so resentful towards a pretty woman. Now that you've come precariously close to them—any closer and you would be able to jerk at his hidden ponytail if you reached out your hand—you can also see that he looks uncommonly pale and tired and that his eyes, which are no longer hidden behind his sunglasses, are flashing with anger like this morning when his brothers told him about the date of their comeback.

"I think it will be much easier for me to get over this if you do me a favour and stay out of my life for a few months!" His voice sounds startlingly sharp and cold, and you allow yourself to drown in nostalgia for a moment as you recall how lovely it sounded when he said your name.

"Aw shucks, don't be such a kid, darling!" She pouts when he carelessly wipes her hand on his arm away. "You know how much I adore you! Otherwise I wouldn't have worked my ass off to—"

"But I'm not interested in your plans for me, period! You know how much I hate your tactical ploys and how you try to turn everything into a debating gambit!"

To your relief, he is less interested in her advances than you thought, and their story, whatever it was, must have ended long ago. Now that the misunderstanding is out of the way, you almost feel sorry for her—especially since you can imagine Seiya treating you with the same icy attitude after you've broken up your relationship.

Agitated, they both quicken their pace, leaving you behind, and you can't hear the next sentences, which get lost in the continual bustle around you.

"I don't know why you're doing this to yourself!" you can hear her again as you draw closer. "No woman who ditches you after one night will ever fall in love with you for real. You're either a lousy lover—inexperienced groping always sucks!—or you two lack chemistry, or she is simply the type that never jumps into the same bed twice. Whatever, you can't say no to both offers without losing your face! I wish you were more sensible like Taiki!"

"If I were like Taiki, who never forgets a grudge, I'd sue you two for character assassination since that's what Haruka-san and you have done to me! But it wouldn't have bothered me at all if you hadn't turned my own brothers against me and… your lies!"

"You can't keep doing this forever… hiding from the girls and… travels… and… money…"

"I'm… all the time… because they bore me silly and try to own me or tell me how to live my life! The first time I've found an interesting single woman who… Taiki, Yaten, and you absolutely had to ruin it for me!"

"Aw… so dramatic… doesn't suit you, darling… only way to heal… work… whenever you're suffering from… or heartbreak… at your best."

As the distance between you and the pair has grown again, it has become harder for you to overhear their conversation, and you hastily weave through the strings of couples and families who have come between Seiya and you to close the distance. You arrive at the cork gun shooting gallery just when she gets on her toes and pecks him on his chin, on a spot near a corner of his mouth—a familiar gesture which doesn't seem to surprise him or annoy him at all. Although their feelings aren't synchronized and they have never been in a romantic relationship, as you can tell from the various snippets you've overheard, a kiss is still a kiss! His dark-haired beauty must be much dearer to him than you wanted to believe.

They part without Seiya returning the kiss, to your relief, and you continue to watch him in silence as he takes a cork rifle from the gallery owner while a very young woman (this time it's a tall blonde, who can't be much older than eighteen!) stops at the gallery to devour him with her large blue eyes. Without hesitation, he nonchalantly shoots down a small white bear, the prettiest available prize, without visibly aiming at it—and you vaguely wonder what would have happened if Seiya and you had encountered each other for the first time in front of Pandora's Box when you tried to open the door to the log cabin.

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