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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Instead of executing her…

Instead of executing her immediately as they would have done to any other traitor twenty years later, Seiya's parents tried to reason with the seventh crow behind closed doors. She should learn to abide by the rules lest she ruined the Organization, they warned her. Apart from draining their resources and making it increasingly difficult for the Organization to balance its budget, her actions also endangered the whole system since it was impossible for the other crows to work efficiently if one of them simply changed the rules without the others' knowledge. They applauded her for her generosity and her courage—and in a better world, they would allow her to save every single soul on earth. However, utopia hadn't arrived yet! It wasn't wise to overestimate one's own power—and the Organization couldn't afford to take care of (and watch over!) so many criminals who were accidents waiting to happen or rather ticking time bombs waiting to explode.

Then the rules should be changed so that the crows could detonate the loudest ticking bombs in time, the seventh crow suggested. Traitors should be disposed of immediately so that the Organization could focus on the members who were able to live up to the Organization's standards. It wasn't ethical to ignore so many victims in need for fear that ten percent of them could turn out to be rotten apples past saving. As for the money they needed: the Mafia, the Yakuza, and all the terrorists groups and the governments and banks and big names they blackmailed had more than enough to spare. Instead of taking insignificant crumbs from them, the Organization should be more daring and make more lucrative deals with rival groups, who were all more than willing to pay a handsome sum for sensitive information!

If she really had the courage of her own conviction, she should openly propose all these solutions at Pandora's Box and listen to the other crows' opinions instead of going behind their backs, Seiya's parents replied.

When the seventh crow introduced her ideas to the other crows during the following meeting at Pandora's Box, she received a wholesale rejection. What she proposed was starting a war in order to save the scum of the earth, the other crows answered. Although they couldn't deny that—under extremely fortunate circumstances—individuals with a strong personality could change, the danger of the scheme outweighed its merits. The seventh crow's suggestion that they could create a system of multiple subgroups like Anokata and the seven crows—in which every "boss" supervised seven subordinates, each of whom, in the same way, supervised seven subordinates—was greeted with derision. It would create the sort of bureaucracy that crippled democratic Western nations, the other crows said. And giving the bosses the right to execute a traitor without a trial would foster violence and corruption.

"Let me guess: Although all of them voted against it, she went ahead with her plan."

"Well, she was very much like Haruka-san, from what I've heard. And she was so extremely hard-working that all the other crows had to work overtime to clean up the mess she had made."

That's why they came up with the "red card", Seiya continues. Since scolding her and warning her didn't work, they needed a formal punishment for a wayward member of their select circle. Inspired by the Mafia's Queen of Spades and the red penalty card in sports, they gave the seventh crow a custom-made red Queen of Spades (as opposed to the black Queen of Spades in card games) as a warning that they would have to execute her if she continued to endanger their organization.

When she fell in love with her fencing teacher, they were all relieved. Finally, the maniac got herself a life so that she could stop the folly! All the six crows agreed that the seventh crow's altruism was a compulsion the poor woman couldn't suppress. And since the best psychologists of the Organization stated that you couldn't cure someone who didn't want to be cured and that there was no medicine against her condition, they had to accept her as she was. For a while, they viewed it as a burden of love.

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The situation escalated when they found out that Jean Black, her new boyfriend, was a double agent and also had a relative holding a high rank in the FBI. She either had to break up her relationship like any other codename member who had accidentally dated 'the enemy' had done or at least keep it on a casual, no-strings-attached level. She wasn't allowed to move in with her lover since—even if she kept her mouth shut forever—he was so close to her that he could stumble over Pandora's Box by coincidence.

Of course she passionately defended her relationship, claiming that she had finally found true love and that a love like theirs should always be free. She was going to marry Jean and raise one or two kids and pursue her private happiness because it was her right—a human right the Organization always accepted. Therefore—under the watchful eyes of the other crows, who were disgusted by the hypocritical wretch, who had often demanded that the codename members under her jurisdiction left the love of their life whenever it was inconvenient for the greater cause, citing "those who come together in passion stay together in tears"—the Boss formally kicked her out of their syndicate.

"That's when she received the second red card, I suppose? The card announcing her execution?"

Seiya slowly shakes his head.

"Of course not."

At first, the crows were only happy that she was gone although they knew that they had to continue watching her lest her boyfriend caused trouble. It also took them months to determine the scope of the havoc she had wreaked since they were distracted by James Black, whose secret agents and informants in the Chicago Mob and street gangs had become mixed up in several shady deals with the new members of the Organization. After the first hurried executions, the crows were gripped by paranoia when they discovered that Tenoh-san's mother hadn't only freed and fed and educated all the criminals she could dig out but also given some of the smarter specimens a cocktail codename behind Anokata's back. It was then that the first suggestion that she should be shot immediately was put forward and rejected.

"My parents argued that she was harmless now that she was expecting Jean Black's daughter—especially since she knew that a second red card would mean certain death. Maybe my mother pitied her because she was planning to become a mother herself. In contrast to Yaten, Taiki, and me, Kakyuu was a planned child, you see…"

It was a pain to track down all the new codename members Tenoh-san's mother had named since she refused to give away their identities. She felt responsible for those members and was afraid that the crows, whose patience had worn thin, would execute them without a trial to protect their Organization from the Chicago street gangs and the FBI. But the crows, who had to work days and nights to impose some order on the chaos again, managed to locate the whereabouts of the new codename members after an extensive investigation even without her help. Once again the proposal that Tenoh-san's mother should be executed with all her new codename members, whose loyalty only lay with their "saviour" or with the Organization's money instead of the greater cause, was put forward. The crows mistrusted the new codename members, most of whom were lone wolves who blackmailed and robbed and stole purely out of selfish interest and who might be willing to side with the street gangs or the secret services against their Organization.

This time, the proposal received fifty percent of the possible votes: three votes out of six—as the Boss had yet to designate another codename member to take on the position of the seventh crow. Since Anokata's vote carried the double weight of a crow's vote and Seiya's parents still opposed to an execution, Tenoh-san's mother wasn't executed although she received a "last warning".

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What happened afterwards was a miscalculation on both sides, Seiya tells you as you two arrive at the bench where he and you met each other yesterday. Terrified by the warning, which she mistook for the proof that the crows were ready to snap and execute her and her family soon, Tenoh-san's mother began to search for new allies among the national motorcycle police, many of whom had trained the crows without knowing their identities. She also implored Jean Black to ask for James Black's help and hunt down Anokata and the seven crows to kill them before they could kill him and her—but her boyfriend, who reasoned that they shouldn't endanger their peaceful life by committing so many murders, suggested that she give away the crow's identities so that his cousin could watch them, arrest them, and bring down the Organization.

Fearing that the Organization would strike faster than the government, Tenoh-san's mother refused to work with the FBI while Jean Black, who could understand his girlfriend's fears, didn't try to talk her into revealing her secrets. And the situation would probably have calmed down if it hadn't been for Tenoh-san's mother's decision to draw the agents motards on her side. Driven into a corner just when the Silver Bullet was nearing completion, the crows were forced to eliminate all the motorcycle police officers who refused to join the Organization and showed no interest in becoming a mediator. Since the crows didn't know how much Tenoh-san's mother had revealed to her new allies, they took out all the people she had met up with in private and put pressure on the blackmailed politicians and judges to jail the closest friends and colleagues of the officers who were known to be indiscreet.

"You must know that the CIA and the FBI had already tried to infiltrate the Organization at that time—a move which wouldn't have been possible if Haruka-san's mother hadn't assigned criminals who had connections to the Chicago Mob a codename rank. Since they had put her under constant observation, the crows had also found out that she had tried to convince her boyfriend to kill them. Of course it was impossible to prevent her execution this time. When the proposal was made, all the six crows voted for it."

Listening to his lovely low voice while smiling at the elderly couple at the pond, who are beaming at you and casting him curious glances, you acknowledge with a pang of guilt that even a terrible tragedy like Tenoh-san's mother's fate only left a slight ripple on the surface of this world's history—a fragment of a colourful and poignant but ultimately incomplete story. Before your inner eye, you can see the crows gathering in front of the fireplace, debating on when and where to carry out the execution of the crow they all hated. The second red card, a red Ace of Spades, was designed and sent to Jean Black's place. They were going to execute her some day—it announced—although she wasn't going to die yet…

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There was no sense in punishing a child for her mother's sins, the Boss decided. Hence the former seventh crow should be allowed to raise her daughter until Haruka was seven. According to the Organization's psychologists, seven was the beginning of the end of a girl's childhood. Eight-year-olds no longer depended on their mother's caresses so that having only a father and a nanny should just about do.

The following years brought momentous changes. Seiya's parents completely fell in love with their daughter when she was born. The beautiful red-haired girl with her shy, endearing smiles, who never caused real trouble and seemed so content with herself and the world that she might as well have descended from heaven, was named Kakyuu, which meant "Fireball"—an extremely bright, exploding meteor, the radiant shooting star that was going to bring hope to the dark, cold world…

Kakyuu was kept on their private isle among sweet osmanthus trees and rose bushes and weeping willows and treated like all princesses should be treated—for her parents had begun to fear the crows, whose paranoia and frustration had slowly morphed into cruelty. Whenever they were in France or Chicago, they would take her with them and leave her with her nanny and their most trusted bodyguard in their luxurious suite, where she would play with the three children they had adopted: three little boys of the same age, who were only one year younger than her.

No one knew where they had come from—the three babies who had been abandoned at the same shrine on the same day, who had bright opalescent eyes and angel's voices which entranced all the adults who heard them (even when they only burbled and screamed as all babies did in the beginning). Seiya's parents immediately adopted them and treated them like their own child, and the nanny claimed that the three children of unknown heritage were a gift from heaven—the reward for Anokata's dedication and hard work so that they could find joy in their children while bringing the world the childhood it needed.

The day of light, when the old world would die and the new one would be born, was near, as a codename member had already tested the newly developed drug on herself and turned into a young woman although others who had followed her example died. The Organization knew all the necessary ingredients for the Silver Bullet. The tricky task was to determine the amount of the ingredients needed for an age reversal without endangering the person who took it.

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Then, out of the blue, the head scientists who overlooked the project died in an accident. Thorough investigations were carried out to find the traitor who had meddled with their car. In the end, it seemed that the mistake had been made by the scientists themselves. Immersed in their studies (they were the type of people who would abandon their own children to focus on work), they had rushed to the lab to test a new formula and ignored their chauffeur's warning that the brakes should be replaced since they appeared to be malfunctioning.

All hopes for a fast development of the Silver Bullet was gone—wiped out by a freak accident—and the Organization went through a time of unrest when more codename members, whom the six crows hadn't named, emerged. Corruption was rampant; the new members who had been accepted into the Organization although they had been recruited by the former seventh crow were arrogant and dissatisfied; the blackmailed people, who were sick of paying ever-increasing exhorbitant sums, became rebellious; and the secret services grew dangerous, as their motivation to bring down the Organization only increased with time. Personal friendships and feuds interfered with work. When the seventh year since the second red card was handed out approached, the crows were ready to tear Tenoh-san's mother to pieces.

She had singlehandedly ruined their Organization, brought them the dregs of humanity so that they would be swamped with never-ending problems, destroyed the moral order by giving them the sort of trouble which could only be solved by executions, and still continued to live a happy, cozy family life in the warm nest Jean Black had built for her and their pretty blonde daughter while they—the true heroes and heroines who had had to give up their loves, abandon their families, and eliminate their friends (in some cases, the murdered agents motards and the crows they had taught had been close friends before the mess)—were forced to live in constant stress and fear.

They waited until the day of her wedding, watched the ceremony and even the party afterwards, and waited patiently until everything was over before they kidnapped her daughter. On the seventh crow's pillow, they left her the last red card: a red print of the seven crows' emblem on the back of a copy of Van Gogh's "Starry Night"—the artistic depiction of humankind's eternal longing for what some people would call peace or salvation or forgiveness, for stars in the night sky always symbolize the everlasting, unattainable beauty of the universe.

You can see all the images vividly although you rather wouldn't—images which Tenoh-san conjured up when she described her mother's execution to you. The seventh crow—a proud woman—had begged for her daughter's life. She would accept any punishment no matter how severe, she pleaded, as long as they spared her husband and her child.

Although she was in no position to negotiate with them, the crows listened to her plea. Haruka was to be spared if she promised to tell her father that her mother had exchanged her life for her family's safety. Perhaps they only intended it to be a formal exchange—a deal. Or perhaps they wanted the seventh crow to know that her death would destroy her family even if they didn't hurt the child. Whatever they intended—to Tenoh-san, it was all the same: All she saw was a group of men and women in black, who dragged her into a cave and who murdered her mother while she was staring at the scene through the gap they had left open to "give her air and light". Then they carried her back to her father's house—or rather one woman did: an elegant lady in black, who smelled of a warm, sweet, very distinctive perfume.

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Contrary to your expectations, the story doesn't end here.

After the execution, which his parents didn't support but couldn't prevent, things went downhill. The crows were losing hope of finding the Silver Bullet in this lifetime since no scientist in their Organization could decipher the notes the head researchers had left behind. They were also positive that the CIA had already managed to infiltrate their Organization. Double agents and traitors and loyal followers alike were struggling against the new bureaucracy and the terror, which had replaced camaraderie and compassion among the younger members. Executing all the new members was impossible in this time of upheaval, in which the Organization needed every single member available. However, it wasn't only a costly and complex but also an impossible undertaking to separate the wheat from the chaff.

After killing the seventh crow, the crows started to place the blame squarely on Anokata, who had been "too weak". If only the Boss—who had turned into a doting fool after becoming a parent—had agreed to eliminate the troublemaker in time, they could have prevented this chaos.

On a sunny day in July, the day before the seventh birthday of Anokata's youngest child, the crows drove to the isle where the Boss resided and brought a small present—a bomb, which they smuggled into his children's room. Unfortunately, the youngest son of the family was a curious and impatient kid, who couldn't wait to see what he guessed to be a Jack-in-the-box in the mysterious package. Having listened to all the mystery novels his Sherlock-Holmes-loving parents had read out loud to him, however, he found the ticking sound from the package most alarming.

The crows were all shot without a trial, for the Boss, who had lost their trust in the unmanageable bunch of assassins, decided that this was only killing in self-defense. A new group of "seven crows" was picked from the most loyal, most capable members of the second generation, who replaced the first-generation crows so completely that they didn't only take over their jobs but also their code names. From then on, each crow was obliged to choose a secretary to work with, as the Boss had begun to believe that only people who were able to work efficiently in pairs would develop the necessary social skills to work in a group.

"As we both know, that approach didn't succeed either," Seiya concludes in resignation. "They weren't much better than the 'real' first-generation crows despite their happy childhood and the good education they got. If anything, they were more snobbish because they believed themselves to be shiny messiahs who were going to bring the world eternal peace…" He trails off when he meets your gaze. "What's wrong?"

"You said the first-generation crows had all been replaced…"

After all, they couldn't be trusted after that failed coup, Seiya explains, puzzled by your distress, as you seemed calm enough only a minute ago. All the first-generation crows who had tortured and executed Tenoh-san's mother had been shot and replaced with other codename members. To all the other members of the Organization, the change went unnoticed since the crows only had contacts to the highest codename members and the age gap between the first two generations was small. This piece of the Organization's history, which was only stored in the hidden files in the real Pandora's Box (the laptop), was only accessible to Anokata, who—to protect the Organization from the mistakes of the past—had turned into the hard, pitiless, authoritarian ruler whom only the highest codename members of the "revived" Black Organization were allowed to know.

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