SailorStar9: With Chapter 41 uploaded, this is Chapter 42 of this fic. (Sighs) Guys and girls, is it too hard for you to leave a review, instead of just putting this fic up on your favorited list and story alerts?
Pairings: Furuya Rei (Amuro Tooru)/Mizuno Ami
Disclaimers: I own absolutely nothing, except this plot and pairing.
Chapter 42: The Unfriendly Girls Band, Part 2
"You want to search us again?" Fuekawa echoed.
"You just searched us thoroughly." Kibune protested.
"We just want to make sure." Takagi assured.
"You still haven't found the murder weapon?" Kogure inquired.
"And you think one of us is hiding it." Fuekawa concluded.
"Don't tell me you think we swallowed it." Kibune argued. "If that's the case, x-ray us or do whatever else you want."
"We're open to anything, if it'll clear our name." Fuekawa agreed.
"Anyway, have you examined the other bands yet?" Kogure asked. "Hagie fought with other bands all the time."
"They may have resented her." Kibune surmised.
"The other day, with a band we performed with..." Kogure recalled.
"Who is this vocalist who committed suicide?" Takagi asked.
"Shuto Akane." Fuekawa supplied. "She had a beautiful voice."
"Onee-san-tachi." Conan voiced. "Which of you first suggested that you form a band?"
"It was Hagie." Fuekawa replied. "We were classmates in college. She said she found a great vocalist, so we started a band with Akane."
"Akane could play the guitar, bass and keyboard in addition to singing." Kogure added. "She taught us all sorts of things."
"But she couldn't do anything feminine." Kibune reminisced. "Hagie taught her how to cook and I taught her about makeup and fashion."
"I tried teaching Akane sewing and embroidery, but she didn't stick with it for very long." Fuekawa added. "The only thing she kept doing was knitting, which Rumi taught her."
"Come to think of it, I want to see the practice video you said you filmed in the studio." Fumio piped in.
"Sure." Kogure pulled out her cellphone. "I turned it off while we weren't practicing, so we don't have video of the culprit, though. See?" she played the video.
"I thought you handed that in to the police." Fuekawa blinked as Fumio took the phone, Conan hurried over to the blond boy to watch the clip.
"The detective returned it to me because it didn't seem to have anything to do with the case." Kogure replied.
"Why is the video shot vertically?" Sera asked, she and Amuro were also watching the video over Fumio's shoulders.
"Wouldn't the band fit into the shot better if you shot it horizontally?" Amuro wondered.
"Our feet will be cut off if we shot it horizontally, so we decided to do it vertically." Fuekawa explained.
I see. Sera smiled.
So that's how it is. Amuro mirrored the smile.
"Seriously?" Inspector Megure echoed after Takagi reported back. "You still haven't found the weapon? The victim, Yamaji Hagie-san was strangled using a rope or string-like weapon. She even had Yoshikawa lines on her neck that indicate she struggled while she was being strangled. In other words, there must be a weapon with Yamaji-san's blood on it somewhere in this studio, so why haven't you found it?"
"We investigated all the strings in the studio, but none of them produced a luminol reaction." Takagi answered. "We also examined the scissors in Fuekawa Tadako-san's sewing kit and Kogure Rumi-san's nail clippers, but we didn't find anything. If they used them to cut a bloodied string, there would've been a reaction."
"Then, someone in a different band must've strangled Yamaji-san and left with the weapon." Inspector Megure concluded. "Were you able to call back all the band members we let go?"
"We couldn't get in touch with a couple of them, so not all of them." Takagi answered.
"That wouldn't be necessary." Sera cut in. "After all, the culprit hasn't left the building yet."
"Then, the culprit..." Inspector Megure trailed.
"Yes." Amuro confirmed. "That means one of the three remaining band members of Yamaji-san's band did it."
"Let's head back to the basement break room, where the three of them are waiting." Conan suggested.
"One of us murdered Hagie?" Kibune echoed in disbelief. "You're still going on about that?"
"It's not us that's saying it." Takagi corrected. "It's these three who are helping us with the investigation."
"I don't care if you think you're detectives." Kibune snorted.
"But none of us have the string-like weapon." Fuekawa reminded. "If you think we threw it away somewhere, you should be able to find it somewhere in the studio."
"There's no way they'll find it." Amuro took the heat off Takagi. "After all, the weapon has already been transported outside the studio."
"How could we have taken the weapon outside?" Kogure protested.
"Because you're not the one who took it outside." Sera explained. "It was the police. The police took the victim's belongings to the station where they're being examined, right?"
"But there aren't any strings in her possessions." Takagi pointed out.
"What if that string had been knitted into something else and was shaped differently?" Sera posted a question. "The knit-hat Hagie-san was wearing. The weapon is a piece of yarn knitted into that hat."
"The culprit brought a piece of yarn the same color as Hagie-san's hat with them." Amuro reasoned. "After strangling her with the yarn, they removed the decoration on top of the hat, knitted the weapon into the yarn, replaced the decoration and put it on her head. Since they folded up a larger section of the hat, no one really noticed."
"But don't you use two pointed sticks called knitting needles to knit?" Takagi wondered. "None of them had anything like that."
"There were some." Conan corrected. "Next to the woman who died. On top of the snare drum to the left of the victim, there were drumsticks. Couldn't you knit with those?"
"The three of them entered the studio for about ten minutes to wake Hagie-san." Takagi related. "Tadako-san repaired the button that was falling off Someka-san's jacket. Someka-san was repairing her broken guitar string. And Rumi-san was fixing the song you were working on. None of them had time to knit anything."
"There was one person who could've prepared for that beforehand." Amuro corrected the younger officer. "You could've prepared what you did beforehand, Kogure Rumi-san."
"And unlike the others, Rumi-san's back was to the camera." Sera added. "She could've pretended to play the keyboard while she was knitting. Apparently, you're good enough at knitting to teach the others."
"But I can knit too." Fuekawa pointed out.
"And she couldn't have done that without covering half of the security camera." Kibune argued.
"We attached a phone on a selfie stick to a mic stand." Kogure added. "It was coincidence that it ended up in front of the security camera. The three of us decided where to put it by looking at the video and offering our opinions. Or are you saying we worked together to put it in front of the security camera?"
"We figured out that trick after seeing the video of you performing together." Amuro answered.
"May we see it again?" Inspector Megure requested.
"Look at where the four of them are standing." Amuro voiced. "The positions of the drum is already set and can't be changed. And the two playing the guitar and bass will stay in frame no matter how they move. So the position of the phone being used to shoot the video depends on the keyboard in the top left corner. In other words, Rumi-san could control where the phone will be set, depending on the location of her keyboard. It would even be possible to control it so it would be covering half the security camera image. If she was too close to the drums, the phone would be positioned closer, preventing her from blocking the camera. If she was too far away, the phone would also move away and the phone would disappear from the camera's frame."
"After blocking half the security camera's image, you pretended to go wake Hagie-san, and strangled her with the yarn." Sera took over. "You used her drumsticks to knit the yarn into her hat, all the while pretending to fix the song. Then, you put the hat back on her head and returned to the break room like nothing happened."
"But unless she knee Hagie-san would sleep on the drums..." Inspector Megure voiced.
"Someka-san, didn't you mention that Hagie-san always slept like that?" Amuro inquired. "If she always did, by mixing sleeping pills into Hagie-san's drink, then she'd predicted that Hagie-san would return to the studio along to nap against her drums. I'm sure you'll find a plastic bottle with traces of sleeping pills on it if you search the garbage cans in the studio."
"Search them." Inspector Megure instructed. "And tell forensics to examine the victim's knit hat. Kogure Rumi-san, could you come with us to the station?"
"But what about the scissors?" Kogure questioned. "Without scissors, I couldn't have removed the pom-pom on top of her knit hat."
"You used nail clippers." Sera answered. "You knew Tadako-san would lend you hers if you let your nails grow out."
"That's just your imagination." Kogure insisted. "There's no proof that I did it."
"It's obvious." Conan took a hand. "After all, you borrowed her nail clippers, but you didn't trim your nails. It means you knew you wouldn't be practicing anymore today. You wouldn't need to cut your nails."
"And from the yarn in Hagie-san's knit hat, I'm sure they'll find her blood and your fingerprints." Amuro added. "Modern forensic investigators can even collect fingerprints from the fluffy surface of a tennis ball."
"You're not making any sense." Kibune retorted. "Rumi would never use that knit hat as a murder weapon."
"Yeah." Fuekawa agreed. "After all, Rumi and Akane were the closest in the band, and she knit that hat."
"That's right." Kogure admitted. "I used that hat because Akane had knit it. I wanted her to taste Akane's bitterness. You know how Akane ruined her voice, right?"
"When Hagie was drunk, she told her that she wanted her voice to be deeper." Fuekawa recalled.
"That's right." Kogure hissed. "She took her seriously and gargled with liquor, and pressed a cushion against her face and screamed to achieve a huskier voice. But Hagie... that's what she said. It was too much. She didn't understand how Akane felt. Several days later, Akane jumped in front of a car and killed herself. So I avenged Akane."
"It wasn't suicide." Kibune corrected. "It was an accident."
"It was suicide." Kogure insisted. "Otherwise, she never would've ignored the traffic light."
"You're wrong, Rumi." Fuekawa cut her rant off. "It was a boy who ignored the traffic light and jumped into traffic. Akane was hit by a car trying to save him."
"You're lying." Kogure stood her ground. "After all, Hagie said at the funeral that it was her fault that Akane died."
"Probably because Akane did when Hagie told her to do." Fuekawa reasoned. "She said 'Don't speak until your voice recovers. You'll get your beautiful voice back in no time. I'm sorry for saying something so stupid when I was drunk.'"
"The people who witnessed the accident said she jumped into traffic to save the boy instead of calling out to him." Kibune added.
"You didn't know because you were bedridden from the shock of Akane's death." Fuekawa stated.
"No..." Kogure wept.
"No way." Sonoko gaped as Kogure was led off by Takagi. "The keyboardist did it?"
"But I'm impressed, Sera-chan." Ran noted. "You solved another case."
"You think?" Sera blinked. "With Amuro-san and Conan-kun's help, a case like this is a piece of cake. I'm only a detective because of my brother's influence, though."
"You mean the smart brother you mentioned during the Red Woman case?" Ran asked.
"No, that's my middle brother." Sera replied. "I was influenced by my oldest brother."
"I thought your oldest brother was dead." Ran blinked.
"Was he a cop who died in the line of duty?" Sonoko asked.
"Yeah, but he wasn't a Japanese cop." Sera answered. "He's an agent of America's FBI. Apparently, he had a hard time getting his green card."
"Hey, what's your brother's name?" Conan asked.
"It's Akai Shuichi." Sera grinned.
"Uncle Akai?" Fumio choked in shock. "Sera-nee-san, did you know kaa-san almost made him my godfather?"
SailorStar9: Any OOC-ness is regretted, by the way. *Sighs* Don't you just hate plot bunnies sometimes? Read and review.