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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It has stopped…
It has stopped raining when Taiki-san and you leave the music room, but he suggests that he show you the painting collection before you two go for a walk on the roof terrace to give his brothers another twenty minutes "to kiss and make up". They both work like a clock in that respect although neither of them wears a watch, he claims. His frail older brother won't voluntarily carry anything but chopsticks (and that only during meals) while his younger brother, who is as fit as Paganini's fiddle, is still so disgusted by the inhuman schedule in Three Lights' early idol days, which he associates with calendars, clocks, and watches, that he never wears a watch either.
Yaten-san carried a mobile phone before he trashed it last night, you point out, skipping the redundant taunt that you believe Shortie to compromise his principles so that he could bother Seiya at any time.
You shouldn't assume that Yaten carried his mobile phone on his own, Taiki-san chuckles. He actually had to keep it for Yaten like anything else which Yaten needs but can't tote around himself. "If he were a sniper, I'd even have to carry his rifle," he adds with a boyish grin, which would resemble Kudo's if it weren't so impersonal and distant in its indisputable loveliness.
"Does your agent really follow Shintoism, or has she chosen the colours of your roses just for the symbolic gesture?" you ask Taiki-san as you two are beholding three contemporary oil paintings depicting Three Lights onstage by the illustrous Yumeno Yumemi, whose dreamlike illustrations jar with her pragmatic shoes and nerd glasses. Seeing Three Lights together makes you realize how much of their appeal Two Lights would lose if Seiya refused to return to the band. He was the driving force that bound them together; and without the magnetism of his sheer presence, Yaten-san's enchanting beauty and Taiki-san's mysterious elegance seem to belong to empyrean realms, floating in the highest stratosphere but failing to evoke the desperate, instinctive love the fans reserve for their more attractive brother.
Shizuka-san—a practical, shrewd woman with an unfortunate predisposition towards hysteria—follows Shintoism with the lax attitude of people who have been born into religious homes but show no personal religious inclination, Taiki-san informs you. Consequently, she only uses her knowledge of Shinto mythology to enhance her protégés' reputation and to promote the spiritual values she believes to be necessary in an insecure world.
Sensing that you have a very sketchy knowledge of Shintoism, Taiki-san explains to you the concept of the san hikari, the three lights of Shinto. Inspired by Three Lights' family name "Kou", whose Kanji means "light", Shizuka-san suggested that Three Lights throw three roses, whose colours represent the sun, the moon, and the stars respectively. The truth—or the magnitude of cosmological existence—is bound in the three lights: sun, moon, and stars. Red is the colour of the sun, whose energy and heat is the main source of life and growth and creativity. Since the universe can't exist without the sun's primal force according to Shintoism and the sun is seen as the principal light, Shizuka-san assigned Seiya, the song writer and lead singer of the band and also the happiest, liveliest of the three Kou's, the red rose.
The moon's waxing and waning—Taiki-san continues after showing you the way to his study, where a giant oil painting of the sea and the moon adorns the corner furthest from the window—represent the cycles of life and the non-linear process of growth—the silent development which only happens in solitude and darkness. Despite being less radiant and attractive than the sun due to its lack of light and warmth, the moon is just as indispensable to the growth of all life in nature.
He fails to include an explanation of why Shizuka-san assigned him the white rose representing the moon, and you suppress the urge to ask him directly because you can imagine Shizuka-san's reasons. Was his white rose the reason why he bought Kaioh Michiru's Serenity in Blue (also called The End of the World, according to the label next to the painting), you ask him instead, indicating the painting in front of you.
No, he bought it for a completely different reason, he says with an amused smile but doesn't elaborate. And you stay transfixed in front of the painting for a moment to behold the sea, whose waves are anything but serene while the full moon seems curiously calming with its pure, gentle white light, which casts fanciful shadows on the masses of clouds scudding across the night sky.
The deity of the stars in Shinto rules over the ocean—Taiki-san tells you—and the moody ebb and flow of life governed by what people like to call "destiny" is represented by the stars. Hence the three roses the Kou brothers throw stand for the three celestial forces which govern over any human life and affect the destiny a human being is supposed to fulfil according to the philosophies of Shinto.
"It's one of the few positive concepts of how life should be nurtured so that it assumes some significance. The same applies to relationships as well."
Coming to life in heat and light due to primal needs, waxing and waning in cycles and growing at night and in sleep, protected by the right actions and the right timing to flow to its final destination in the unpredictable, mercurial currents of destiny… Ideally, love should be the same—you silently agree. But in reality, love will seldom if ever live up to this ideal.
The roses, which were initially meant to celebrate life, have been mistaken for romantic tokens by the fans. Fights erupted over the flowers the first time Three Lights threw them so that Shizuka-san briefly considered selling a small bouquet of three roses to each person in the audience. Since it would be too expensive and devalue the roses Three Lights threw, however, she eventually dropped the scheme.
"I heard from Tenoh-san that Kudo-san tried to secure the top-secret files of the Black Organization for the police but lost them during the storm," Taiki-san unexpectedly says, darting you a piercing glance before refocusing his attention back to Serenity in Blue, which, on closer inspection, depicts an impending storm in the middle of the moonlit sea. Kudo-san should have learned the files by heart instead of relying on technology too much, Sticks adds with a smirk. Speed-memorization is a much-underrated skill although it can be troublesome to have an almost eidetic memory.
He must be the seventh crow, you think, as he has just mentioned Tenoh-san and alluded to the mnemonic techniques the highest codename members were required to master. Among the three brothers, Taiki-san looks like the most likely candidate for the seventh crow with his sudden fits of impatience, which border on rudeness, and his cold, calculating nature. His hair colour—a deep shade of auburn darker than yours—can hardly be described as "blonde", but it makes sense that Kakyuu asked you whether you had seen a blonde man if Taiki-san had worn a wig to protect Kakyuu.
Taiki-san would have honked at Kakyuu if he had seen her immersed in a conversation with a stranger he preferred not to meet; Taiki-san would have taken Kakyuu by the hand to lead her to his motorbike; Taiki-san would certainly have had the guts to vote against the other crows for his idea of justice even though he would have unscrupulously betrayed and murdered his boss and his closest associates while pretending to be their ally. Seiya is unlikely to be the seventh crow for so many reasons—but all the details would suddenly make sense if Taiki-san was the seventh crow.
All of a sudden you feel the urge to talk about Pandora's Box—to inform Seiya's cool but supportive middle brother (perhaps you were wrong and Taiki-san resembles Mycroft Holmes more than Moriarty) about all the things which have gone dreadfully wrong due to Kudo's foresight and a small change in plan. In the beginning, fate had seemed surprisingly benevolent. You had been extremely stealthy when you slunk away from the pension where Hattori, Kudo, and you stayed; and your remedy for insomnia, which you initially created for the Professor and which you had mixed into Kudo's and Hattori's hot chocolates, should have been strong enough to make the two master detectives sleep soundly until the sun set on the next day. You found the Beretta Tenoh-san hid for you in the forest even in the pitch dark as planned and waited for Gin at the spot Tenoh-san marked. Her well-chosen hiding place allowed you to see both the Werewolf Cliff and the log cabin, whose underground passage Gin was going to open.
Your first mistake was to underestimate Vodka's Herculean toughness. The useless brute was weakened but not killed by your poison, as Tenoh-san informed you on the phone, so you were going to face two opponents instead of one. Couldn't she come to your assistance, you asked her calmly, controlling your mounting panic. Of course she could, Tenoh-san retorted, but then she would have to shoot Kudo as well to protect her family since your shiny knight was hard on your heels! Your fancy pills don't ever seem to work properly, my little kitten!
A few minutes later, your detective made his heroic appearance by moonlight—not alone but accompanied by his Osakan friend, who had seen through parts of your scheme and purposely thrown up his dinner as well. Neither of them were in a charitable mood after the self-inflicted abuse you had made them go through, but both of them had sufficient energy left to ignore any whisper of conscious self-awareness and to deliver a sermon on how you should work together as a team instead of facing the danger all by yourself. You're so predictable, Kudo had the temerity to claim. Your tendency to sacrifice yourself is like an obsolete built-in kamikaze-function which no sensible talk can shut off. You don't even care about what would happen to me if you died for the files—and that just when we've finally brought down the Organization!…
You miraculously managed to convince Kudo to hush his voice before Gin appeared on the dot, and opened the door to the log cabin. But Kudo, impulsive as he had always been and would always be, followed your ex-boyfriend into the cabin for fear of losing hard evidence despite knowing that Vodka must still be lurking outside.
What happened afterwards happened in a matter of seconds. The three of you were tailing Gin on his way to the ship when Vodka attacked you from behind, aiming at you but shooting directly at the spot where Kudo's head would have been if you hadn't reacted in time. Vodka's aim had always been abysmal, but you were trembling with fear because, despite your apprehension, you hadn't expected him to be so deadly in his blundering incompetence.
Hattori, who had been fast enough to reach Vodka before the latter could shoot at you for the second time (Hattori's reflexes had been sharpened by years of serious kendo training while Vodka's speed of reaction couldn't beat that of a sleep-deprived slow loris), knocked out your wild card of an adversary and bound and gagged him with Kudo's help. And thus your only souvenir of the encounter with Vodka's Browning was a superficial flesh wound even though the loss of blood could have been fatal if you had been in a child's body. What would have happened had you decided against taking the antidote before your trip to Pandora's Box? The choice would have led to a completely different outcome of your story because there would have been no quarrel but also no romance in Paris—only a critically wounded Haibara Ai, who would have needed medical help so that Kudo would have had to abort the mission instantly.
Despite the complications, the Pandora's Box mission would have ended well if you had shot Gin instead of wounding him, you conclude. But without the drama at Pandora's Box, you might never have met your stranger…
"Kudo knows nothing about the real Pandora's Box," you inform Taiki-san to gauge his reaction. "All the files he found in the main computer were useless, so he didn't make a real effort to save them before the ship exploded."
Taiki-san doesn't show the slightest indication of surprise at the revelation—and you're now almost certain that he was indeed the seventh crow, who, cautious as he is, only doesn't reveal himself to you in case he is mistaken about your role in the enterprise. Hampered by the same caution and mistrust, you tell him about your attempt to backup the real files "for the agents motards" without touching on the issue of the poisons and the scapegoat you had to eliminate. You've used Meioh Setsuna's Night Baron copy to remove the data on Kudo, Hattori, and you from the email which the alert system would have sent to the blackmailed bigwigs if you had backed up Pandora's Box, you admit, but the copy couldn't compare with the real Night Baron so that you had to wipe out Pandora's Box to prevent the email from being sent after the final countdown.
"What did the Night Baron copy do?" To all appearances, Tenoh-san hasn't told Taiki-san about the Night Baron copy, which was odd if he had really been the seventh crow as you deduced.
"It was supposed to remove the names of all the people who entered the cabin, but it didn't work as it should have, so Kudo's name was still attached to the email." In truth, the Night Baron copy did exactly what it was supposed to do: it deleted all the names and particulars of the people who entered the cabin but the name and particulars of the first person who entered Pandora's Box—in this case everything but the particulars of Gin, your invaluable scapegoat.
"It's a pity Tenoh-san didn't ask me to develop a copy for her." Taiki-san smiles at the thought. "I'm sure I'd have succeeded. My virus would have been a better and faster version of the Night Baron if she had given me enough time to work on it." On second thought—he muses—perhaps Tenoh-san was right when she decided not to ask him since he would most probably have refused to support her group. "I can't trust Tenoh-san," he coldly explains. "I've never understood why Seiya helps her out whenever she asks him to! She is like the wind… changing her direction and her temperature whenever it suits her!"
As it turns out, Stick is not the seventh crow. And while you're wandering through the maze of kinmokusei and wisteria on the roof terrace, whose stems and leaves are glazed by a broken layer of raindrops shimmering in the morning light, you realize without the expected surge of relief that prudence—your old enemy and ally—has just saved you from making a dire mistake. Without appearing particularly understanding, Stick has the kind of aura which only natural psychiatrists have; and you were about to give away Tenoh-san's and your secret to him despite knowing that you can't predict his reaction.
You should have read and memorized the files in Pandora's Box before deleting them, Taiki-san insists, stressing the importance of memorization again, whereupon you ask him whether he has learned most of the books in his library by heart as you suspect. He can recite all those books and not only them, he asserts; and all the books he has read are still available to him whenever he chooses to remember them although even he forgets details from time to time.
Forgetting is an important skill as well, he thinks aloud, his dramatic voice softened yet again by his particular tranquil brand of sorrow. In certain circumstances, forgetting is even more important than remembering. "I can't forget well," he asserts without false modesty. "I'll never forget a grudge—and even if I wanted to, I'd never forgive. If anyone hurts the people I love, I will torture them over and over again and be so competent at it that they won't even manage to die before I want them to!"
The implicit threat—your life, dear future sister-in-law, will be a living hell if you dare to hurt my little brother!—has been uttered with such nonchalance and gentleness that it sends a chill down your spine. He has bought Serenity in Blue (or The End of the World) because he appreciated Kaioh-san's rendering of the moon's light, he adds as if the talk about the painting were only an afterthought and not a dizzying change of topic. Although the moon's white light possesses a reddish tint (which Kaioh-san, divinely gifted and prodigiously skilled as she is, accurately painted and which you could see if you covered the moon's surroundings with a white sheet of paper), the viewer will usually believe it to be blue. It's the nature of our perception, which can't recognize the colour of a detail without including the colours of its surroundings and which will always favour the overall impression.
"Does it matter if moonlight is red if the viewer will interpret it as blue? If you were the moon, which colour would you prefer—the true colour, or the colour other people will see whenever they look at you?"
There it is, the test you've anticipated and feared when he ushered you out of Seiya's apartment, which is more obscure and indirect than you would have expected it to be. For an agonizing moment, you let your eyes linger on the azalea and cherry blossoms, whose colours, too, would change in the moonlight until they are perfectly unrecognizable. If you were the moon, you tell Taiki-san, you wouldn't care about anyone's colour perception.
"If I were the artist or the observer, I would want to know both, though," you amend. "It's important to see both sides of the truth, don't you think so?"
"It's the harder way to live," he smiles; and while you can tell that he has come to a decision regarding you at last, you can't tell whether you've passed or failed this time.
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