.

In reflection of the events, Agasa thought the gloomy weather looming over the nighttime city was really matching.

Even if he had next to no idea about exactly what happened.

The walking figure on the street lamp pulsated in neon green a few times before turning into a standing one in warning red right in front of him. Not like the old professor minded that in particular – he was already panting, soaked suitcase held above his head to make up for his missing umbrella. That was not on his negligence, he reassured himself. There were hardly any clouds on the sky when he had gone out to Colombo to meet one of his clients. The downpour was totally uncalled for. That, however, didn't evaporate the water squeezing through between his toes at every step. He just hoped he wasn't going to catch a cold or something.

And there was Ran-kun's call and the police cars – just what in heaven's sake was going on?

He was just about to finish his business with the disinsection company that ordered a device from him for catching mosquitoes and other bugs in open-air areas. The theory was not much of a challenge, really: he just had to take a sticky substance and use pheromones that attract the targeted insects and bam – it's ready. The practical implementation was not that easy though – ahem, so when he was about to let that project go, he noticed his cell phone buzzing and politely excused himself to the toilet.

Ran-kun was calling, asking about Shinichi.

Honestly, it wouldn't have been surprising to hear that his favourite teenage detective had gotten into something fishy again. He had a knack for finding trouble just as he had one for cracking mysteries. But, fortunately, the call turned out to convey simple curiosity than sudden need of assistance. Only some seconds, and he became ear witness of date's progress between the two childhood friends. Yet, even through the phone, something was off.

Almost like when a nice-looking scientific formula was getting uglier with each line of process in solving the equation.

And the unknown on the power of five had a little dark cowlick.

Even if nothing seemed especially wrong or dangerous, he decided to call it a day and head home. Ran-kun's concern felt eerily valid, even if nothing that could stand in the light of science supported her premonitions. He was a person favouring logic – he was by no means superstitious or paranoid. But the thought of an 'edgy' Shinichi terrified him. He needed a good talk with the teen if he wanted a peaceful sleep that night. He also wanted to meet him before Ran-kun could get to him again.

Why though? Did he think that Shinichi has gone mad or something? Such thoughts were driving him insane instead.

Just like the sound of his teeth clattering ever since he took a step out in the rain –

It was torture. If he stood in one place, he was freezing. If he ran, he was out of breath after two streets. Nature truly showed its cruel face with making an old man like him take his voyage to home in such a weather. It was definitely not because of him ordering that second plate of takoyaki that left him without money for a bus ticket. Refusing to eat anything under the excuse of running short on money while the company representative was having dinner would have been pitiful after all. Too bad nature didn't care.

The lights finally turned green and he could actually close the distance between himself and his house instead of just running in place to keep himself warm.

When he got home, he needed to change first. His trousers and even the bottom of his coat was soaked with mud. Some crazy drivers had passed by him at some point and had given him a cold shower while they were there. He would have reprimanded them for their manner if they hadn't been police officers rushing to a crime scene. Instead, he had stuffed his grumpiness into a mental box, thinking that they probably had a very good reason to race like that in the downtown at evening.

– they all had been going towards Haido city. Tropical Land was around there, wasn't it?

If that was somehow connected to Shinichi, then he had every right to worry. There had been at least twenty of those passing by, sirens and all.

If only he was at home! Two streets – he could manage that at double speed.

He almost doubled over when he reached the front gate.

He could recognise those nasty dark bangs and deep turquoise eyes anywhere. He had spent years with watching that little head with the unique cowlick running around in his lab. He had spent years watching the shine of those bright childlike eyes as they looked at his inventions – mostly falling apart soon after the demonstration, unfortunately. Even if that curious childhood phase had passed and he had found his interest in something entirely different, that part of him never changed.

That was why seeing Shinichi casually sitting on the wet and cold sidewalk – the sidewalk! – in drenched clothes sticking to his body was so unnatural and simply not right. His bangs, weighted by water, were hanging down to his face just enough not to let him catch a glimpse of his eyes. Where his hair stuck to his face, small rivulets of rainwater were flowing down on his cheeks, down to his neck and under his shirt. He was sitting there unfazed, unmoving – almost as if –

He panted a couple more times. "S – Shinichi?"

The wet bundle supposed to be the child he practically raised finally looked at him. After a blur moment of utter emptiness, his gaze filled with recognition.

"D – Doc?!" His voice was of disbelief. "No, that's impossible. Screw this act, Vermouth!"

Shinichi forced himself to scoot away. It broke him to see him desperately trying to stand, even if he had to use the bars of his gate to support his shivering body. The way he grit his teeth to control his shaking and focused his harsh gaze on him made it look like as if appearing strong on the outside was an everyday act for the teen. His stomach sank at the thought that Shinichi had been only acting as if everything was alright for – how long? At every step he took towards him, he took one backwards.

He slowly extended his arm towards him. "No, Shinichi. It's me, Agasa Hiroshi. Your neighbour – "

In that moment, Shinichi slipped on the curb. In that moment, he noticed the blinding headlight appearing behind the slender figure, heading towards them. He grabbed his arm on instinct. Shinichi struggled against his touch but stopped when the truck pulled past inches behind him, driving up a shower worth of cold water onto his back. Disregarding the frustrated shouts coming from the driver's seat, Shinichi slowly turned towards him, realising what he had really done there.

Widened deep turquoise eyes betrayed his thoughts – thoughts that he visibly started to doubt. They stood silently in the pattering rain for some seconds. He waited for Shinichi to say something, something that would let him understand what had happened to him. Because the fact that something did was evident. For starters, there was that 'Vermouth' person. He had no idea who they were but even in face of the events, Shinichi seemed to have a hard time accepting that he, in fact, was a different individual.

"Doc – you're really – " Shinichi visibly tried not to tear up. That was it again. The Shinichi he knew – the Shinichi that left that morning would never cry over something as simple as seeing his neighbour. In the next second, he was grabbed on both arms. "Doc, something's wrong! Where's Haibara? Akai-san? Amuro-san? Mary-san?"

He had no idea how to respond. "I don't know Shinichi – "

"Even my parents would do! I would give anything to see Hattori, or even Sera, even if I can't say anything – "

"What are you talking about, Shinichi? What happened? Who are these people?"

As soon as he said those words, he immediately regretted it. Shinichi let go of him, looking as if he died on the inside right then. His gaze met eyes that were staring at him with a terrifying emptiness as his hands reached for his head, fingers curling around flocks of his dump hair. He heard a whisper that he couldn't catch.

"Why – " It was louder next time. "Why did you forget – why do I see all of this – "

It was shocking. Reality was light years worse than what Ran-kun had told. Shinichi looked like a mental wreck. His mind was as if it was run over by a bullet train back and forth for good measure. What bugged him was what could traumatize him, for whom tripping over a corpse weekly in the course of daily life was considered normal, to that extent. Frightened yet determined to get the bottom of the situation, he decided to act like an adult he was supposed to be for once.

He placed a hand on his shoulder. "Let's go inside. We need to find ourselves some dry clothes."

Strangely enough, it was the scent of his house that brought Shinichi to his senses – partly, at least.

He hadn't visited his family home in literal years. It had been too dangerous to do so after everything turned for the worst. It had been too dangerous to stay in the city in the first place. It was kind of ironic that even he had no idea exactly when things went downhill. Had it been when their spies were ratted out after another? When Haibara and him were discovered? Or – he looked at the family photo on the shelf under the mirror on the wall. The odd angle of the light was covering out his father on the picture.

His vision shook suddenly. Someone was rubbing his head with something –

"Leave it, doc. I'm not a child."

He grabbed the towel, batting away the old helping hand, and wrapped it around his head. The fabric greedily sucked in the moisture from his wet hair. He was inwardly cursing himself for mistaking the doc for Vermouth – even if that was the natural assumption on his end. At least it had been the natural assumption before. Still, he should have known better than letting the doc see him like that. He should have known that even the person with a thousand faces was unable to disguise as someone with a totally different build. He should have known that even though she avoided directly harming him, she was not stupid enough to save him – her enemy.

He simply dropped the soaked towel to the floor and laid onto the sofa, momentarily enjoying the warmth of his newly found dry clothes. It had yet to sink in for him how much he truly forgot as when asked, he had no idea where his wardrobe was. The doc helped him find it, apparently confused at his lack of trivial knowledge. He wondered what the theory was about him – amnesia, perhaps? It was the opposite. He had memories – many memories that he would rather forget, but had been engraved into his mind against his will. Memories that not a single person seemed to remember apart from him, as if those events were non-existent.

And that was the final problem.

So far, he had something to grab onto, something that offered him a proper explanation on the happenings. But in the moment he had busted the crows, he also busted his own perception on the world around himself – or rather erased the misperception he had had previously. What he was seeing was not an imaginary world. It was real, in some shape or form that exceeded his comprehension. There were no clues, no evidence pointing out the exact way he had landed here, leaving him to float in the unknown with his memories as a fake compass. Said compass was what drove him to subconsciously return to the place where everything started.

But the doc wouldn't remember that too, right? That how he proved him that the seven-year-old child barely reaching his waist was indeed him, that how he was suggested to conceal his identity to protect others, of how he came up with the name 'Edogawa Conan' –

His mouth twitched into a smile at the sight of his loyal neighbour hovering above him, worry apparent in his eyes. Even here, he was the one acting as a mental pillar for him. He was the one ushering him to find shelter from the rain and change into dry clothes. He was the one who even tried drying his hair when his restless thoughts left no room for self-concern. He was the one who had been looking after him ever since his parents had flown away to America.

No matter how many valuable allies he collected over the years, Agasa Hiroshi remained one of the most important.

His death was one of the worst. Both for him and Haibara.

He was thinking about many things after his funeral. Things such as whether it would have been different if he had decided not to tell him anything – a question he asked himself by every grave belonging to one of his allies in fighting the crows. Many of them weren't even detectives, police officers or agents – they were normal people that his carelessness had gotten involved in some twisted way. He wanted nothing more than an answer to his question, yet the said answer was on his tongue the entire time.

If he hadn't decided to depend on them, he would have died long ago.

He needed the doc on his side. But if he told him, he would place him in mortal danger again. He couldn't do that –

The doc sat down, facing him. "Can you tell me what happened, Shinichi? It may be hard to remember but I can't exactly help if you keep stuff for yourself."

He wanted to scream. He wanted to shout at him, to yell simultaneously at the doc's stupidity that made him willingly dig his own grave and his own mind that was tempted to just selfishly load his burdens on him, but no voice left his throat. Realisation dawned upon him. He had to tell the doc. There were no other people who would believe a word of his at this point. Being truly alone would be a huge burden both strategically and personally – even he doubted he could lie to the entire world.

Lying was one of the few things he actually regretted. At least to certain people, Ran leading the list.

Lies were tricky things. They cushioned the situation but never actually did any good. They were ultimately useless – he only lied to the people he had gotten implicated in that hopeless masquerade of his by chance, thinking that they would be kept out of the crossfire if their minds were blank.

Bullshit. They were already targets by association before the first lie could bounce off his lips.

The doc was trying to get him speak. "Focus, Shinichi! Anything will do. What's your last memory? Exactly how much do you remember?"

"There was – an organisation." It was alright, there was no way to keep to doc safe. He was essentially already a target. "It had connections in almost every country, dealing with almost everything under the sun. It had a transaction scheduled near Tropical Land tonight. According to my memories, I had followed them once all alone, not knowing a thing about how dangerous they were. There was a person in black trench coat and sunglasses – epitome of bad guy, really – trading a microchip for a suitcase stuffed with money. The trade partner was from some huge company. He was also nervous, as if the one in black held his life in his hands."

The doc was not used to hear about cases of this calibre yet. No wonder he had already started paling.

"I was recording evidence when I was caught. I was hit on the head with a pipe and poisoned. Even though I was supposed to die, that drug somehow turned me into a seven-year-old kid." He saw the look of absolute horror on the doc's face shift into confusion. "I know it sounds unbelievable. I was having a hard time accepting it. I escaped the police station I was brought in and rushed home, where I happened to bump into you. You were the first one to learn about it. Then – "

" – wait, wait. I don't get what you're talking about, Shinichi. You're not a seven-year-old kid."

"I – I know. Would you – would you believe me if I told that this is the second time I live through this day?"

Something flashed in the doc's eyes, something akin to a shocking recognition. "I would, in exchange of an answer. Shinichi, what year are we writing?"

The rain finally seemed to stop. Ran opened the window to let the fresh air exchange the scent of alcohol filling the space.

And that, as expected, earned a complaint from the person occupying the place behind the desk. "Ran! Close it up, it's cold outside!"

'Occupying the place behind the desk' was truly the right way to put her father's activity. He was dead drunk, his cheeks coloured red by the contents of the dozen-so beer cans standing on his desk or just simply scattered all over the place. Some drops of beverage left in the cans were dripping on the floor and furniture, adding on the unbearable scent that permanently engrossed the premise. Just to make sure that she suffocated, a tiny yet smelly spiral of smoke was emerging from the ashtray of carelessly put out cigarettes. It was not a surprise to find yet another one in his mouth, emitting the smoke scraping her throat.

His suit was nowhere to be found, his tie was hanging around his neck loosely, not even having a chance to keep his hastily buttoned shirt together. All while he was lazily leaning into his dingy swivel chair, feet in holey socks on the table, busy with cackling idiotically at the horse race in the television.

"C'mon Flash – hic – tis is so good, I should've made some bets – " He reached for another can, but a slender arm stopped him.

When he looked back, he found himself under the pressure of her glare and in the pressure of her grip. "Definitely not, dad. This place is a sty! Just look at the mess you made around yourself again! That's the reason why we haven't gotten a case in ages and mum left – !"

" – shaddup! Eri has nothing to do with tis. I choose my cases – auch!" He wished at moments like those that his daughter wasn't a district karate champion. Better change the topic to something that interested her more than his drinking habits. "Oh yeah, where's that kid who calls himself a detective? Weren't you with him today? I thought that he'll drop in after your date. Did you get into a fight or what? I don't care, just let 'im go – you know there's ain't such thing as a normal detective – "

"You're a detective too, aren't you?" She snatched the beer can from him before threatening to throw it into the bin.

Her father immediately jumped from his seat. "Raaan! Wait, that's still full – "

He facepalmed the floor after tripping in her extended leg. Her attempt to sober him up failed miserably when he just fell asleep on the floor, bleeding nose and all. With a sigh, she grabbed the bin and collectively pushed everything on the desk into it. Not like there was anything really important there, just the usual amount of lost lottery tickets, doodles of boredom and a mountain of beer cans. The breeze from outside made her shiver. It was a cold night. Normally, she would have gone to bed by then – there was school the next day after all. But she knew that even if she did then, her dreams would circle around a certain teenage detective –

Memories threatened to flash back but she shook her head. Subconsciously, she tried to lock up the events of the previous evening into the most hidden places of her mind. She wanted nothing more but to forget the headless corpse and Shinichi's strange behaviour. However, no matter how hard she struggled, his indifferent face reappeared in front of her mental eyes every time she closed her real ones. She stopped to look out the window, into the darkness that reigned over the city.

He was somewhere out there in the cold night, shifting further and further from her until he – she bit her lip.

She had called his neighbour to check up on him but that did little to ease her worries. She wished for someone she could talk about her problems. She looked at the clock on the wall silently ticking ten in the night – it was probably too late to call her mother. Glancing at the sleeping bundle emitting an alcoholic scent that was supposed to be her father, she concluded that even if she woke him to be her audience, he wouldn't remember a thing of what she said say by the morning. Not as if he would understand her in his rare sober moments either – he was prone to oppose her growing 'friendship' with Shinichi after all. Only she could be blessed with an insensitive father like him –

The office phone rang. She had no idea who could be calling, but she picked up the receiver nevertheless. "Yes, Mouri Detective Agency."

Her face went white in seconds. A kidnapping? What should she –

"Ran, give me the phone." His father was standing behind her, looking at her solemnly. There was no sign of disorientation in his gaze. Not having an idea how he went from a dead drunk sleeper to a sober and responsible detective every time a case happened, she was grateful for his interruption though.

She heard him promising the client his assistance before he slammed the receiver to its place. He cut through the garbage lying on the floor at record speed and stepped into his shoes. He was in the hall in half a minute – successfully tripping and bouncing down the staircase in the dimly illuminated part of the building. She fought the urge to facepalm and grabbed their jackets and his suit instead. Before rushing after him, however, she had the presence to turn on the lights.

"Jeez, dad." She sighed at the sight of his father lying sprawled out at the bottom.

Since he scratched himself up from the ground in seconds, she assumed none of his limbs was broken. His leather shoes kicked up some dirt as he ran to the road to stop a taxi. Fortunately, she had enough time to get to him before he could tell the driver of the green taxi car coming to a screeching halt besides him to head off to the given location. She slammed the door once both of them were inside and the engine started up. He noticed her after a few pants.

"Ran? What are you doing here? You should've stayed home! Driver – !"

His voice was cut off by his daughter adjusting his necktie. "There's no way can handle this all alone after twelve cans of beer, dad. Stay put and let me fix you up."

She was lying. She desperately needed a distraction, even if that was a kidnapping – she had just realised how awful the idea was.

After a couple of seconds under her hand, her father finally looked like a decent person. She could feel his gaze on her as she was elbowing next to the window, face held in one hand. Her eyes were wandering into the night again, behind her reflection on the glass, just like the time she was taken home. She knew she was being unusually silent. Tugging at his warm jacket after adjusting his suit a bit, order seemed to form in his mind too. His look towards her turned worrying.

That was no wonder. They were on the way to deal with a dangerous criminal after all.

"Ran, I need you to promise that you'll go home when I say so."

She folded her arms. "Fine. But you should also keep yourself in check. You don't have to chase after the culprit by yourself just because you used to be a police officer."

The driver glanced into the rear-view mirror in the middle. "Excuse me for the curiosity, but are you some sort of detective?"

"Yes, my name is Mouri Kogoro, private detective. This is my daughter, Mouri Ran, just tagging along. Why ask?"

The driver's eyes shifted by to the road. "Nothing in particular. Just there was that commotion not so long ago. Some chase near the highway or so I heard. Plenty of police got involved and no civilian cars were allowed on the road there. I wonder if you know what happened."

Her father scratched his head. "I apologise but I have no idea. My case seems unrelated – "

She, however, put more thought into that chase. It happened too soon to be coincidence. It could have easily been a continuation of the case at Tropical Land for all she knew – but that would also mean that Shinichi was, in some way, involved in that too. The way he forcibly sent her home and left, saying that he had stuff to do was suspicious too. Almost as if he wanted her to get out since he was about to do something dangerous – like what her father tried to do moments ago.

Fingers wrinkled her jacket. The thought angered her. Her father was one thing – protecting her was one the parental things he insisted on doing even if he was too drunk to see. But imagining Shinichi doing the same was different. She was the district karate champion – she had years of experience in kicking in faces. She was not some damsel in distress who needed protection. If he was planning something risky, then he should have asked for help instead of sending her away.

They were childhood friends. What happened to the trust between them – she shook her head. Perhaps she was thinking too much into the matter.

Especially since she saw his face in the stranger's too who was sitting on the backseat of the car passing by them.

Even though it was nighttime, the lack of bustle on the road was strange for Agasa. They were in a metropolis with over ten millions of inhabitants after all – there would surely be people with jobs to do at night. Hence seeing a deserted area in the downtown was nothing if not eerie. The headlights of his yellow Beetle was illuminating abandoned-looking buildings after another on the sides, trailing the white dashed line in the middle of the road. It seemed endless, he would have thought it was if he hadn't known otherwise. Beika city eleventh district was not much further – after that, he would depend on the passenger on the backseat with the directions.

Behind him was Shinichi, clad in a large jacket and baseball cap, gazing out the window. As much as the activity seemed aimless, his gaze carried the objective attention suiting a detective like him. He tried to conceal it but the professor could see that he was still shivering a bit. It was not surprising in the light of him staying in the rain without an umbrella for almost an hour. He had been thinking ever since they discussed his 'timely' problem – even he couldn't quite tell what was going through his head.

Ten years. Shinichi had come from ten years into the future.

Ten years of dangerous investigation, planning and tricking to skate on the thin ice between multiple law and intelligence agencies.

Ten years of constant lying and deceiving to protect those he could never reach, to win the invisible war behind the scenes.

It sent his head spinning. Shinichi was seventeen when he got wrapped in that case – seven physically. He was essentially forced to grow up for the second time, shunned behind and hiding in the shadows yet willing to crawl through more gruelling detective work than he could keep track of, to get to those who cursed him with that fate and end them for good – which was his only chance at returning in his original body. And all that struggling – none of it was for himself.

It was all for Ran-kun. To ensure that she would have a chance to be happy with him. A chance that she never got in his timeline. He lived under the same roof as her, under the mask of another person, trying to keep her by his side with voice-changed phone calls and ultimately preventing her from finding happiness – at least according to the teen. He doubted that she thought about it that way, no matter how long he had made her wait. That visibly did nothing to ease his suffering and guilt though. It made him emotional to hear him fighting his inner demons just to tell his story – and to realise that it was, in some sense, reality. An alternate future filled with despair.

Even if he hardly understood the half of the crumbs Shinichi shared with him, he knew he would be damned if he let all of that happen again.

And that was the reason why the teen behind him was pushing himself just to perform an 'experiment'.

He was secretly relieved when he saw something approaching them in the other line. It was a green taxi car, driving through the city with an unusual speed. Before he could think about it, it pulled past them, leaving him to face the dark road again. Shinichi looked back at it.

"Is something wrong with that car?" He minded asking.

"Irrelevant. For now, that's it – " Shinichi pulled the cap into his eyes. "Futatsubashi Middle School. We're going there."

"What are we going to do if you're right about this, Shinichi?"

Being nervous was an understatement – at least for him. He was not the one running after kidnappers every night. But that was actually the 'experiment' – according to Shinichi, a kidnapping took place in Beika city eleventh district right after he had shrunk. It was an event with supposedly no connection to the fall of dominos Shinichi had unknowingly started. Theoretically, their timelines weren't different in this case – meaning that the kidnapping should happen here too. And not only 'just' happen – it should happen the exact same way and place it had happened in Shinichi's memories. That left him thinking though. If that was so, then they had just opened a full jar of possibilities.

"Solve the case, naturally." Shinichi answered as if it was – and for him, it indeed was – the most self-evident thing in the world.

For him, it was not that self-evident. "I believe we should think before recklessly changing the future. Who knows what's gonna happen if we mess up something."

"I have an idea about one of the worst outcomes." Shinichi let out a crestfallen laugh. "As for thinking it through, I've already done that."

He snapped his head at the teen in shock. "What? When?"

"Just before. But I need confirmation before I can set my plan in motion. Hence it's an experiment."

He turned his attention back to the road. "So you're saying it's alright for us to intervene."

"If possible, then yes. This experiment is also for determining the conditions of my time travel – more accurately to what extend I can change the past. So far it seems that my hands are not tied at all, however, we can't disregard the possibility yet that some natural force or law can exist to prevent me from changing certain events in the past, let's say the ones that involve actual deaths for example. The crow chase before was large-scale but nobody was supposed to die there. It might happen differently in a murder case. We can't test that here though as the kidnapped girl wasn't killed, but it will be good for an accuracy test – "

"If you wanted to save her, then you should have started with that."

Shinichi looked at him prickly. "I just wanted to get some things straight while doing so – what's this theory called anyways? Timeline preservation?"

"I said that's not a correct name for it. Besides, if it was truly timeline preservation, then we wouldn't be talking to each other. It doesn't just prevent changes to happen in major events but it doesn't let any changes to happen in the timeline. You would be only an observer if that was the case."

Shinichi sighed. "Then what's the current top theory, scientist?"

"Divergent timelines, I think. Your conscious somehow got flung back in time, which caused this timeline to separate from the original one. Your arrival became a divergence point where the flow of time took a different turn, erasing the timeline you came from. This one is very similar to that though, since until up your arrival, they were one and the same timeline. However, that doesn't mean that everything must happen the same way here – your actions will change the events and eventually majorly alter the timeline itself."

"Butterfly effect." Shinichi had heard of that before. "Pesky, but we can work with that. How far we are?"

"If we keep up this way, then around ten minutes." He eyed the abandoned school building cautiously. " – are we going to just barge in there, Shinichi?"

"We have to confirm whether we're right or not on the theory. I might take care of it though. We have just a regular criminal on our hands, not a trained assasin. Besides – " Shinichi fell silent. It felt as if the temperature had suddenly fallen a couple of degrees under the pressure of his attention.

He was about to ask what the matter was when the teen pointed at a building on the right. "Pull over behind that. Seems like we're being watched."

"Where are you going, Asou-san?" Kogoro asked, hands in his pockets. The old butler flinched at his words. "There's something odd about what you've told us. If the kidnapper escaped by climbing the tree, the dogs should've been barking like mad. But when the maids came running out, they didn't hear any other noises but your shouting. And if you a kidnapper, your account is much too ambiguous. There was no man dressed in black, was there, Asou-san? No, should I say kidnapper-san?"

Tani – the company president whose daughter was kidnapped – immediately grabbed his shirt. "Asou, you dirty, rotten – why did you do this to my Akiko-chan?"

Kogoro turned back just to make sure there wouldn't be a murder occurring behind his back. "We can deal with that part later. Where's the little girl?"

"I – In a nearby hotel." Asou stuttered. At Tani's glare, he added: "I can take you there if you wish so."

"Woohoo! Case closed!" Kogoro went from the dead serious detective to the silly drunkard again with a triumphant yet childish shout. It felt uplifting after the pressure that had been killing him. One of the reasons he favoured being a private detective over a police officer was that he was usually asked to handle petty cases like searching for lost items or investigating affairs. Petty cases meant petty salary, but he would rather manage that than being crushed by responsibility.

Not that he had a choice this time. No detective within their right mind would be up to handle a case at that hour. The poor family was forbidden to turn to the police for the sake of the daughter, meaning that he was the only one who could help. And so, he rushed to the scene. He would be damned if he left them in the pitch. He could understand their situation. He was a father himself – he knew well the blood-boiling anger of the parent whose child is being threatened.

Yet the feeling of success was missing. Was it because it was dumb luck that he figured out the culprit?

He looked at his daughter, who looked even more relieved at the peaceful and happy resolution. There had he been, telling her to go home, but in the end, it was thanked to her being barked at by the guard dogs that he was able to crack the lie the butler had been filling their heads with. Who knew what would have happened if she hadn't been there to give that hint to him – accidentally or not. The girl could have gotten killed for all he knew and he would have been one of the people to blame.

– was that really so? Looking at the butler begging for forgiveness from the father, he started to doubt that the case would have turned into a tragedy.

A maid came running, holding a receiver in her hands. "Sir, the phone."

Tani growled. "Who could it be at this time?"

Everyone looked thunder-stricken at the disguised voice speaking through the connection. It didn't take a detective's brain to figure out the identity of the caller, even if the idea sounded nonsensical. "Forget the three hundred million. I told you not to call the police, didn't I? Since you went back on your promise, the brat shall pay – "

Tani panicked. "Please, spare my daughter! I haven't called the police! This has to be a misunderstanding!"

Kogoro was feeling dizzy, as if the drunkenness couldn't decide where to go in his mind. He was hundred-percent sure that he got the culprit right – he was standing right next to them, the disbelief plastered on his face telling them that he had no idea about what was going on. He could tell that was not an act. It was hard to imagine a spineless criminal like him to have accomplices – which meant that the girl had the luck to get kidnapped for the second time that night.

By someone much more evil, whose voice snapped at Tani. "You're in no position to make demands. If you want your brat alive, prepare one billion."

Tani gaped like fish on the dry. "T – That's impossible – "

Kogoro internally facepalmed. That was the worst thing to say in the situation, even if was true. With his comment, Tani unintentionally put his daughter in lethal danger and left him without any clues on her whereabouts. The kidnapped soon made that painfully obvious for everyone – or at least intended to.

"Then say goodbye to – aargh!"

A cell phone clattered on the floor, right in front of a pair of scraped little knees. The neon-ish light of the small screen suddenly put the darkness-covered gym storage into better illumination. The rectangular shape was reflecting in a pair of small blue eyes, wide with equal amounts of dread and shock, under some bangs of brown hair sticking to her sweat-soaked forehead. The little mouth moved, trying to say something, but the tight gag muffled the sounds into unrecognisable noises.

In one moment, the kidnapper was slowly unsheathing a knife, holding the sheath between his teeth while casually conversing on the phone.

In the next one, a scream of pain left his throat instead of a death threat.

There was someone else behind him, someone stretching back his arm holding the knife formerly directed at the girl with ruthless power. No, the devil was not in the power. It was in the technique. The fingers were literally clawing into to sleeve of his black jacket, shaking with uncontained fury. He was shocked beyond belief at the sight of someone not only being able to find him, but actually having the will and power to stand up to him. It hurt. He was not used to people hurting him.

"Who – Who the hell are you?! How the hell did you get here?"

The little girl scooped closer to the wall, as the shadow of the resisting criminal danced over her. The dance was short.

The kidnapper was pushed harshly to the side of a plyo box, arm pinned to the wooden surface. He snarled furiously at the newcomer who was apparently some sort of police or the likes. So he had been right about that yellow car out there – they were really undercover police. He had fallen for that trap – barely escaped – the last time around and he certainly didn't have the nerves to deal with that crap again. That Tani fool – did he think that he could get away with disobeying him?

And did this fool think that he could actually beat him?

With a sudden surge of muscle power, he turned the tables around and it was him pinning the newcomer to the plyo box. It was easy to estimate that he was superior in terms of physical strength and he had a weapon – it was supposed to be an easy win. Despite being clad in a baggy jacket and baseball cap, the other still seemed too young to be with the police. Yet something about him creeped him out. He wished nothing but to slice his throat and be done with it. However, he needed to know something first.

And for that, he plunged the knife into his arm. "Are you with the police?"

If he was, then he should just leave it and escape. There were more around for sure, getting ready to break in and tackle him.

If not, then he could kill both him and girl in peace. There was no reason to hurry up the escape.

He expected him to cry out in pain and slide down to the floor whimpering, clutching on his wound. He expected him to beg for mercy or answer his question desperately, trying to prove his words true in every possible way he could imagine in face of more pain. He maybe expected him to stare at him defiantly and refuse to give information if he had some guts – he would have resorted to using the girl then. He expected it to be like what it had been those times before –

Yet the only thing he received was a kick to where it hurt.

When he regained his presence, he saw him barely wincing as he pulled the knife from the wound. Only his slightly harsher breathing and the sweatdrops sitting on his forehead indicated the strain put on his body. Scarlet quickly tainted his sleeve but he paid it no attention, as if he felt no pain from being stabbed. It was insane – no, he was insane.

No sane person would, driven by either good or sinister cause, walk on like that and –

– oh. He had the knife.

He rushed at him, aiming to take the weapon back as an attempt to turn the tables again. It was no longer funny – he would not hesitate at the next chance he got. When he saw an opening on him, he thought it was over. However, he was not prepared for a hand coming out of nowhere and grabbing his wrist, twisting it with the same damn technique that overstretched his arm not long ago. And he was definitely not prepared to hear a crack and feel a stabbing pain afterwards.

That bastard broke his wrist! Not that he had much time thinking about it, as he blacked out a second later.

The last thing he saw was a pair of deep turquoise eyes.

"Jeet-kune-do. A friend taught – ahem, will teach me in the future. Perhaps." Shinichi corrected himself. "Perks of time travel."

Silence settled in the yellow Beetle as a couple of police cars passed by them. He almost felt bad for making them pull an all-nighter with his time travelling experiments and self-arranged secret operations – almost. Dealing with that kidnapping would have been actually their job, so decapitating the culprit and freeing the hostage counted as a favour in exchange for their efforts during the crow chase. Even if his way of intervention actually added on their pile of work.

However, the continuation was a tale of another day. The next one, most likely.

"D'you have disi'fectants a' home, doc?" Biting on one end, he pulled the stripe of fabric serving as a bandage tighter on his forearm. It was fortunately nothing serious, even though it pissed him that the bastard had the nerve to torture him over something as obvious as whether he belonged to the police or not.

The doc looked at him, face laced with worry. "Are you sure you don't need a doctor, Shinichi? That looks pretty bad."

"M'stly 'uperficial." He finally made a knot on the bandage. With a shallow sigh, he leaned into the seat to rest a bit. Despite his words, he could tell that the doc was extra careful when taking the next turn. "Plus revealing this one would ruin my plan. Even if it was more than ten years ago, I still clearly remember every case I solved. This incident proved that our theories on my time travel were correct and I have an idea on how to use it. For that, my identity as a time traveller must remain confidential."

It was late – or rather early. The horizon was tinted with scarlet. "What do you plan to do, then?"

The first rays of the rising sun lighted his face. "I want to prevent them."

If the doc had been drinking something, it would have landed on the windscreen. "Say what now?!"

A smirk crossed his face at the reaction. "Before you ask, I took the butterfly effect into account – or rather reached the conclusion that it isn't needed to be taken into account that much. We're talking about unconnected cases with separate culprits and motives. I can prevent a murder in the next district tomorrow without changing the outcome of another one in, say, Gunma two weeks later. It will only lose its accuracy if the people spot the pattern, which they definitely will, but the effect is not instantaneous."

The doc frowned. "As you've just said it yourself, it will happen eventually. What will you do then?"

"When that time comes, this will already have served its purpose. The problem, or the advantage depending on the point of view, lies elsewhere. More specifically in the groups and occasionally individuals that will be definitely 'interested' in my supposed future-predicting ability. We're talking about two main parties here."

He raised one finger. "The organisation. Learning about future events is a prospect they would never look over."

He raised another finger. "The intelligence agencies. About them – well, as long as you take care not to get caught, you're fine."

He could see that the doc was distressed by the concept. It was on him though. The poor old man behind the steering wheel should concern himself only with his own everyday problems instead of debating whether he should get involved in his plans and risk everything he had achieved in life together with him or stay out of it and watch him do the same anyways. Too bad that it was already impossible for the 'poor old man' to choose the latter – though he cared too much about him to do so anyways.

Even without knowledge on the future, he knew that the doc would shake his head at first. "You're not doing this, Shinichi. Even I can see that this stunt of yours would break all hell loose here while painting a target mark on your back. You can't seriously think that you can pull this off alone."

He raised an eyebrow. "When did I say that I would be alone?"

The doc sighed. "You would need a better accomplice for this than me, Shinichi. My abilities are far behind to those you plan to bait."

"Everyone would say that and nobody would lie. The only reason this is not a total suicide is that we have a trump card. Be it whatever organisation participating in this case, all their names, positions, mind-sets and abilities are engraved here – " He pointed at his temple with the confident smirk shining ever so brightly on his face. "As well as a list of potential allies. You're one of those people. Say, doc, would you like to earn worldwide fame and fortune with stopping a dangerous organisation with you inventions?"

"If you put it that way – " The doc was bought. "However, I have one condition."

He twitched. No matter what he said, the doc was getting the hang of it pretty quickly. "What would that be?"

"Just stop and look around yourself a bit, Shinichi. What do you see?"

He moved closer to the window at the unusual request. There was nothing out-of-ordinary out there. The roads around them were slowly filling up with cars as the city started to wake, the bright morning sunlight glittering on the skyscrapers' windows. In a spur moment, they pulled past a man in a beige suit sitting in a cosy diner, eating what seemed to be his breakfast. Then they happened to pass by a group of teenagers stopping by a bookstore to check out the latest volume of a manga series while a pony-tailed girl in sailor uniform passed by them on a bicycle. On the next building's wall, the painfully familiar face of Okino Yoko was looking back at him with a million-watt smile.

He was puzzled – what did the doc want him to see? He answered anyways. "Nothing special."

"Exactly. This is not just a new opportunity to defeat the organisation. This is a new chance for you to live an everyday life. I can understand your wish to create a world, which is devoid of the despair you experienced. While your plan sounds insanely dangerous and free time consuming, I want you to take whatever little chance you have and live your life to the fullest. Live the life that you never got to live. Enjoy high school. Be happy, Shinichi."

He tilted his head to the side. Looking out the window again, though, he had to admit that the doc was right. Ever since he landed in this timeline and realised the true nature of the chance that had fallen in his lap, his mind was preoccupied with how to utilize it to finish the fight he had started – in the future? The very thought that he should enjoy his newly found life never crossed his head, even though that was the very reason of his actions.

He loved being a detective. He loved mysteries and strategy. However, no matter how deeply he ventured in those, he felt something was missing.

"I guess that would suffice. Time to start everything again. From Zero."

In that moment, behind the curtains, a new era started.

Published: 27/12/2021

Aaaand wrap. For now. I still can't believe that this chapter turned out to be, like, twice as long as the previous one. But at least we're on board with the story (kind of) and have the professor in the group. And no, that was not a Re:Zero reference in the end. Really.

Talk about Re:Zero – Frost Glaive. Thank you for reviewing. Still, I think you misunderstood the concept – or rather the first chapter was ambiguous in that sense. Yes, Shinichi experienced something similar in the future, but this time is not a time loop, but a 'one-time' time travel. The time travelling concept, as stated in this chapter, is also different from what we saw in Re:Zero. (Another Re:Zero fan here.) However, I hope that doesn't drive you away from this story and you'll have fun reading it.

And a two more things I was lazy to put up in the end of the first chapter:

*This thing reeks of spoilers. Really. I put up a warning in the first chapter, but I emphasize it again.

*This story has irregular updates. Sorry, but weekly updating for me is impossible. You can safely expect a new chapter in every month though.