SailorStar9: So with Chapter 82 uploaded, this is Chapter 83 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: Established!Furuya Rei (Amuro Tooru)/Mizuno Ami
Disclaimers: I own absolutely nothing, except this plot and pairing.
Chapter 83: Miss Lonely and the Detective Boys
"Hey, coming your way, Haibara!" Genta shouted a warning to the yawning Haibara. "What are you doing?" he chided when the soccer ball flew over Haibara's head.
"It's your fault for kicking it someplace weird." Mitsuhiko scolded.
"I'll go get it." Ayumi volunteered.
"What's the matter?" Mitsuhiko asked, the rest of the Detective Boys running over when Ayumi paused to look at Komori Tomoko who was sitting under a shaded pavilion, drinking wine.
"That woman..." Ayumi trailed.
"She seems kind of sad." Mitsuhiko agreed as Komori poured herself another glass of wine. "I see." he noted, seeing a man walk up to Komori. "She's been waiting for him."
"Doesn't look that way." Haibara corrected when the rejected man walked off.
"Hey," leading Mitsuhiko and Ayumi towards the lady, Genta spoke. "What are you doing?"
"Why are you drinking alone in the park?" Ayumi inquired.
"Why do you have two glasses when you're alone in..." Mitsuhiko focused on the second untouched glass on the wooden table. He stopped himself when he saw Komori started sobbing.
"I'm sorry." Komori wept. "The tears came when I remembered. My beloved..." she turned a wry smile at the children. "He died..."
Later in the Sasagokita Botanical Park...
"I think this is the lost girl from the announcement just now." Kajiki Kohei brought Ayumi to the information booth.
"Excuse me," Komori voiced, the children were reunited. "Thank you very much."
"It's fine." Kajiki assured. "I'm just glad your daughter is all right."
"She's not mine." Komori corrected. "They're friends. I don't have any children."
"You must like kids." Kajiki noted.
"Kajiki Kohei," Komori read the name card Kajiki presented to her during lunch. "You're a company president?"
"I manufacture and sell men's cosmetics." Kajiki explained.
"What are mech prosthetics?" Genta wondered.
"Men's cosmetics, Genta." Fumio sighed. "It's makeup for men."
Several days later...
"This place is huge." Professor Agasa gawked at the large mansion that was Komori's house. "Does she live here alone?"
"Before her husband passed away, it was probably the two of them." Conan noted.
"Who is it?" Komori answered the door.
"It's Professor Agasa." Ayumi chimed.
"I'm something like a guardian to these kids." Professor Agasa admitted.
"Please come in." Komori stepped aside.
"Kajiki is here, too." Conan noticed Kajiki's shoes at the entrance.
"Kohei is waiting inside for all of you." Komori informed. "I invited you here today because I have something to tell you." she told the group, after leading them to the terrace on the third floor where Kajiki was asleep on the chair he was sitting on.
Just then, Kajiki awoke to the sound of his phone ringing. When he reached over the railing to retrieve his phone, he fell off the terrace when the rotted railing broke under his weight.
"The deceased is Kajiki Kohei, forty-five years old." Takagi rattled out the information after Inspector Megure's unit was called in. "He was the president of a men's cosmetics company."
"What's the cause of death?" Inspector Megure asked.
"A cerebral contusion resulting from a fall." Takagi replied. "He seems to have fallen from there." he looked up at the gaping hole in the railing.
"Are you the owner of this house?" Inspector Megure turned to the weeping Komori.
"Yes." Komori nodded.
"Excuse me, but what was your relationship with Kajiki?" Inspector Megure inquired.
"He and I were in a romantic relationship." Komori answered. "We met and began dating quite recently. Hr proposed to me today. He'd asked me before, but I just lost my husband."
"Judging by the situation, foul play seems unlikely." Takagi concluded.
"We can't be sure yet." Inspector Megure reminded.
"This is an accident." Mitsuhiko interjected. "We saw it happen."
"When we came to the terrace, Kajiki tripped and fell." Ayumi insisted.
"He fell from here?" Inspector Megure looked at the broken off railing when he and Takagi went up to inspect the incident site. "You and Kajiki were drinking here?" he turned to Komori.
"Yes." Komori nodded.
"How much did you drink?" Inspector Megure asked.
"I didn't have that much." Komori admitted. "But he had enough to get drunk and fall asleep."
"Look at this." Conan pointed to Kajiki's phone that was sitting on the bottom rail.
"That must be Kohei's." Komori supplied.
"What's the victim's phone doing here?" Inspector Megure wondered.
"I figured it out." Mitsuhiko cut in. "Why Kohei fell. He received a call after getting drunk and falling asleep. Woken by his ringtone, he hurriedly tried to answer his phone. However, his hand slipped and he dropped his phone. He got up to collect his phone from around the edge, but because he was drunk, he tripped. Because the railing he grabbed onto was rotten, he unfortunately fell from the terrace."
"Based on the victim's blood alcohol concentration, we know he was drunk." Takagi confirmed.
"It's my fault for leaving him alone." Komori muttered.
"What's this?" Genta then spotted a fallen contact lens on the floor.
"It must be the victim's." Takagi noted, Fumio pulling out a piece of tissue paper and handed the lens to the detective. "The body had only a contact in one eye."
"Professor," Conan tugged Professor Agasa's pants, his mind making the connections when he witnessed the mineral water dripping from the table after Genta knocked over the water bottle.
"We'll be leaving now." Inspector Megure informed.
"Wait a minute." Professor Agasa voiced. "This wasn't an accident. Kajiki didn't fall by accident. He was made to do so. Look closely at his phone. There isn't a scratch on it, even though it was dropped on the ground. Isn't it possible that Kajiki's phone was on the ground near the railing not because he dropped it, but because someone put it there? There's only one person who had full access to this house."
"Even if she left his phone by the railing, surely, that wasn't enough to make him fall." Takagi argued.
"That's not the only thing she did." Professor Agasa continued. "She used an illusion to make Kajiki trip and fall. She made his phone appear as if it was floating in front of the step."
"Allow me to recreate it using this sprat bottle in the hallway." Fumio stepped up. "First, we place the phone on the step near the edge." he demonstrated. "Then, we use this to wet the floor away from the phone." he sprayed the water on the ground.
"I see." Inspector Megure noted, seeing the phone's shadow on the wooden floor. "When the drunk victim saw this, even if he thought it seemed strange..."
"He might accept it as the truth without thinking too hard about it." Takagi added.
"But the key to this illusion isn't that the phone appeared to be floating, but that the phone appeared to be in front of the step." Professor Agasa continued. "Woken by his phone's ringtone, because of the illusion, Kohei thought he could reach his phone before he hit the step. Believing him to be safe, he went to pick up his phone without much care. But his phone was actually on top of the step. He misjudged the situation and tripped on the step before he could reach his phone and fell from the terrace. Because this illusion vanishes once the ground dries, it also has the benefit of leaving no trace. The railing was probably rotted beforehand and made to break at the slightest touch."
"Do you have any proof?" Komori questioned.
"Of course." Professor Agasa answered." Kajiki used foundation to cover his wrinkles, didn't he? A contact was missing from his body, but there were no signs that he rubbed around his eyes. However, there was something that looked like fingerprints on his upper and lower eyelids."
"We did find those." Takagi confirmed.
"No one would open their eyes to remove just one contact." Professor Agasa reasoned. "It's only natural to assume someone opened them for him and removed one. And when Genta spilled the water earlier, you changed your mind about removing your handkerchief from your pocket; perhaps the foundation you wiped with your fingers is still on that handkerchief."
"But why would she do that?" Inspector Megure was puzzled.
"Because a large difference in acuity between your two eyes disrupts your depth perception, increasing your risk of falling." Professor Agasa explained. "When combined with the illusion, it became extremely likely that Kohei would trip over the step. There's most likely foundation on Komori's handkerchief and the phone used to call Kajiki's somewhere in this house.
"Komori, do you have anything to say?" Inspector Megure turned to the woman.
"And could we examine your handkerchief and the inside of your house?" Takagi requested.
"It was going so well, too." Komori snorted. "You've ruined my masterful performance. I hate little kids like you." she leveled a glare at the children.
"So you were using the children right from the start." Professor Agasa declared.
"That's right." Komori bragged. "He said in a magazine interview that he liked kids. In order to catch a big fish, you need to catch some little ones first."
"Check this out!" Genta stumbled out from the living hall. "In this room..."
"What is all this?" Takagi was shocked at the four tamaya alters located in a back room of the house.
"Surely not all of them, too?" Mitsuhiko was stunned.
"If that's the case, then we're dealing with a 'Black Widow' serial murderess." Fumio concluded.
"My plans were all ruined because of you." Komori sneered.
"Komori Tomoko, you can tell us the rest at the station." Takagi made the arrest.
SailorStar9: Any OOC-ness is regretted, by the way. *Sighs* Don't you just hate plot bunnies sometimes? Read and review.