Mission Two: Nothing but a Pretense

The next morning found Conan wondering if this man, Loid Forger, the spy who had taken him in, ever slept. The night before, he had tried staying up, sitting atop the bed he had been assigned and keeping an ear out for any sounds that indicated he had retreated to his room.

Which never came. Loid did not do such a thing, and the flipping of some pages had told Conan that he was probably researching something until late. Sitting in the middle of the living room, thus frustrating any possibility Conan could possibly have to sneak away, in hopes of a second chance looking for clues, without his notice.

Whether it was his much smaller body, or the exhaustion that clung to his bones since that fatidic day, Conan cursed it all the same. While it had been easy for Shinichi to stay alert for entire nights working on cases with little to no problem at all, for Conan, it was a real struggle. So, when he woke up the following day to realize he had passed out at some point, he couldn't help a guttural, frustrated groan.

Loid looked up from his newspaper to see a tiny little boy glaring daggers at him. Honestly, he was unsure of what to make of the situation.

"Good morning," he tried.

And got no response. The little boy promptly brushed past him, then plopped down on the chair next to him, silent and unmoving.

Children could be so mystifying sometimes.

It wasn't until a few seconds later that Loid realized he was a 'father' now. And that, of course, implied preparing breakfast for his children. Especially when they were so young.

Thus, Conan followed him with his eyes as he stood up, until he disappeared somewhere in the kitchen. Once alone, he allowed himself to sigh, cradling his head with his palm, mentally dreading the thought that struck him suddenly ─ that this would be his life from now on. Or, at least, until either of them fulfilled their mission.

Once this man completed it, it was clear what his destiny would be like. Beyond any shadow of doubt, he would throw both Anya and himself back to that orphanage they had come from, or perhaps a better one, if they were lucky. Then he would disappear from his life forever, leaving Conan free to do whatever he pleased.

Sure, it would be a pain to deal with the staff of an orphanage, or even eventually escaping to make his own investigation on the men who poisoned him, but even then, he supposed it wouldn't be as difficult as dealing with a spy ─ a sharp-minded one, like this one had been proving to be. So, all in all, letting Loid fulfill his mission as quickly as possible might prove to be beneficial.

But then again, I don't know what his mission is, reflected Conan, frowning to himself. Depending on what it is, I might have to stop him instead.

For all he knew, he may be trying to spark a full-fledged war between the East and the West.

Lifting his head, Conan was suddenly met by the sight of pink. Anya was standing there at the doorway, rubbing her eye viciously as she dazedly looked around the her gaze finally zeroed on his form, Conan pointedly looked away.

There was a newspaper Loid had been reading, left over the table, so, he figured, there would be no trouble at all if he borrowed it for a bit.

And halted as he caught sight of his own face ─ his real, teenage face ─ there, printed on the paper. After a moment of staring, and several perplexed blinking, he finally proceeded to read the remainder of the article.

It was surprising that they were still talking about that roller coaster murder case, even if a few days had passed ever since.

Well, it was quite the disturbing one, recalled Conan. From the corner of his eye, he noted Anya making her way towards the table, slowly dragging a chair to climb on. One moment, the victim was smiling, enjoying a harmless roller coaster trip with his friends and girlfriend. At the other, his head was violently ripped off, splattering blood everywhere…

Anya winced violently, for reasons that escaped him completely. At this point, Conan had long learned that trying to explain her behavior was pointless, and that ignoring her was probably for the best.

So, his attention was drawn back to the newspaper. He remembered having that photo taken like it had been yesterday; that cocky smirk had crawled up on his face naturally enough, proud of himself and his intellect for allowing him to wrap up yet another case the police force had failed to piece together.

I had everything. Fame, friends… A family, too, even if they were away most of the time. Somehow, they were still there.

Under his grip, the paper crumpled.

And now, look at me. Stuck as an elementary school student. Adopted by a guy whose intentions are shady, at best.

He shot a brief glance towards the girl sitting in front of him, who blinked back in return.

And stuck with a kid I'm supposed to call 'sister', even though I know absolutely nothing about her.

"I-I… I'm…"

Conan looked back up again. "Hm?"

Anya drew in a deep breath, her gaze narrowing, turning in something far more serious, sharper than even before.

"Forger. Anya Forger."

Still she remained, her eyebrows furrowed as she gave him a pointed look, as if there was a meaning behind everything. But even Conan's thoughts were silent, a blank stare fixated on the girl in front of him, unmoving.

"I knew that."

Anya flinched, like she was taken aback. Conan's eyebrow raised, wondering what was wrong with her, or if the many cartoons she watched were to be blamed for it.

"I…" She shifted in her seat, her eyes wandering back and forth in the room, like she was trying to conjure the next words to say inside her mind. "I hate carrots."

Conan failed to see how that was relevant.

"I love peanuts."

"I'm allergic to peanuts."

Anya halted.

Well, not really, remarked Conan, mentally. But internally, he hoped that it would get her to shut her mouth, somehow ─ and give him some of that sweet peace and quiet he had been yearning for so long. The girl sat back, stared at him some more, then began pondering again.

"I, uh… um… like Bondman!"

"Duly noted."

As the girl began to stutter, Conan felt himself restraining an eye-roll ─ mostly because he was aware that being so rude to a kid was not cool, but somehow, he felt as if he was nearly past the point of caring. A lot had happened, too much for him to handle, even if he was reticent to admit it, even to himself.

And he shouldn't be here, dealing with this, by any means. He should be out chasing cases, putting criminals behind bars.

I'm Shinichi Kudo, he reaffirmed in his mind. I have always been an only child, and that won't change just because of this.

I have no sister. My parents are alive and aboard. This is nothing but a temporary drawback I have to endure until I can get the hell out of here.

Conan had long looked away, his gaze wandering over to the kitchen, where he could see Loid's back as he moved around the room. He frowned profusely.

The Forgers are nothing but a pretense.

Loid is nothing but layers upon layers of deception. Anya is just a tool he's gonna discard the moment she stops being useful to him. And I'm a bit of both.

Seeing it like that, it's obvious. We aren't a family. Not even close.

And we'll never be.

A sharp intake of air caressed his ears, silencing his every thought. Turning his gaze towards the source, he paused, unsure how to react to the sight that met his gradually widening, bewildered eyes.

Anya was biting her lower lip, sobs shaking her entire frame.

"H-Hey…" tried Conan, softer this time. An awkward grimace, that had been intended to look like a smile, crossed his face. "You… aren't about to…"

As the first tear slipped from her eyes, the next followed, and before he knew it, the young girl had broken into a full-blown bawl. Startled, Conan jumped back, barely even avoiding tumbling down his chair to blink, perplexed at the scene that was developing in front of him.

Alerted by the noise, Loid practically materialized in the room, and watched in shock as the girl viciously wiped her flowing tears, her breath hitching with each sob. Slowly, he turned his head towards the boy and gave him a pointed look.

"I didn't do anything!" argued Conan, a bit louder than necessary. "I swear!"

But the look the man was giving him let him know that he wasn't believed. Rather than attending to him, the spy focused his attention on the girl, struggling to get her to calm down while Conan watched, still sort of freaked out, unable to conjure a single opinion on the matter.

Conan wasn't sure of what had just happened.

And Loid wasn't sure of what he was supposed to do.

Although Loid had only been a 'father' for less than a day, he was beginning to think that this might not be the job for him. How unfitting of him, he chastised himself, that after so many years in his profession, playing role upon role, wearing mask upon mask and performing every role to utmost perfection, he would be having those thoughts ─ thoughts of throwing these kids back to the orphanage and finding a way around this grueling mission.

But of course, his thoughts were no other's business than his own, and definitely, they were not Franky's, of all people.

In silence, he accepted the documents he was being passed, and studied each and every single of them carefully. Applications, tickets for the exam, and exam questions ─ as well as a pair of large frames lying there in the corner, light refracted on the glass and hitting his eyes.

Anya's large, innocent emerald eyes met him through the photograph attached to the file as he flipped it over. Surprisingly, or not, there was far too little information about her. Nothing on her birth, age or parents. None at all.

"I could only find information from last year, but she's been adopted four times and returned each time," Franky told him. "She's also been to two other orphanages."

One look at the files confirmed that claim. There were so many names attached to a girl so small that it was almost unsettling. But, despite it all, nothing prepared for what he found next. Alongside Anya's file, he did not find a similar document, but a newspaper clipping.

"I couldn't find anything about the boy, either," explained Franky. "Every bit of information I could find dates only a few days back, a little before he was taken to that orphanage."

"He was said to be new around," remembered Loid.

"Very. He only stayed there for a day before you came, so you can imagine it's scarce, at best."

The spy remained quiet for a bit, trying to process the information. "What about this?" he asked, motioning to the newspaper clipping on his hands.

"That's the earliest piece of information on him I could get my hands on."

Curious, Loid scanned the article he had been holding onto, and inadvertently felt himself tensing up. A young boy had been found at Tropical Park a few days ago at night, bundled in adult clothes and wounded in the head. As reported, he had tried to flee from the police, but they had eventually caught up with him.

"Why would he try to run away?" he wondered. "Maybe he didn't want to go to an orphanage."

"He was probably confused. Freaking out, too." Franky shrugged. "He got himself retrograde amnesia, after all."

An amnesiac young boy ─ that didn't sound like something easy to deal with. Loid shifted his attention away from it, and gingerly plucked out the glasses he had been entrusted with last night.

He said these were his father's, he remembered. In fact, that had been the prime reason he had proposed to place non-prescription lenses on it, so that nobody would find anything amiss at first glance. Were anyone to ask, Loid couldn't be entirely sure the kid wouldn't tell them the truth, be it intentionally or a mere slip of a tongue.

Naturally, that meant that he remembered him, or at least recalled him to some degree. It wasn't as if he had lost all of his memories.

Finally freed from his thoughts, he glanced over at Franky. He was giving him a serious, pointed look.

"They might be kids, but no good's gonna come out of getting attached."

Loid shot him a rather bland one of his own and promptly turned away. "Thanks for the concern," he mumbled, and left.

"Hello? Where's my money?!"

There was nothing more degrading than having to learn multiplication tables at sixteen.

Probably, he hadn't really checked. Granted, there were probably far worse situations and tragedies in life yet, had he been forced to prepare a ranked list, it would probably still be up there.

Keeping a sigh from escaping his lips, Conan turned a page over and began filling up the answers to the following questions. He hadn't been explained in detail why it was so necessary to study this rigorously, nor did he ask why Anya had been so deeply against it ─ though it might be just a typical childish behavior, he wasn't sure. For all the vast knowledge he had gathered on human psychology from cornering criminals, children's minds remained a mystery he wasn't particularly invested in.

It has to have something to do with the mission, thought Conan, his pencil rapidly scratching against the paper as he wrote. He's likely trying to get us to an elite school of some sort. Considering that he had been searching for a literate child in the first place, toppled up with his current predicament, it added up. And this school must require an entrance exam he can't afford to let us fail.

If it was just a kid's test, he could easily ace it without needing to study.

Or I could just flunk it on purpose…

The abrupt snapping of the tip of a pencil had him jerking back and looking down at his own. Realizing it hadn't been his, he turned to the girl seated right next to him, and found her scrambling to fetch a sharpener, then clumsily trying to use it.

Why was she this fidgety all of a sudden? Could it be that she's nervous just because she's around me? he wondered, the events of this morning vivid in his memory. Maybe I was being too mean to her.

Now, he couldn't recall saying anything particularly rude, or at least harsh enough to warrant her behavior, but he had heard that children were terribly perceptive. It could have been his tone of voice, his posture, or even his facial expression that conveyed some underlying irritation directed towards her, and she had picked up on it. Thus, she had been upset.

I'm the adult here. Well, not really, but close enough. Gotta get a hold of myself.

He breathed in deeply.

"Listen, Anya."

He was talking to a little kid; he needed to keep it together. Speak calmly, use a gentler intonation. Be kind, be gentle…

Just like…

In his mind, he saw it. That one beautiful smile he had fallen for since they were kids.

And so he did, mirroring that distant memory embedded in his brain to the best of his abilities.

"I'm sorry," he said. Her eyes widened slightly, though what was actually going through her mind, Conan could not be sure of. Maybe she didn't think he would apologize? It was likely. "I was being too mean to you."

Though having it intended to be friendly, Conan felt as if an external force was tugging his lips downwards, leaving nothing but a bittersweet ghost of what it had been. Gaze cast on his scribbled numbers, he continued.

"There's… a lot going on right now. Being suddenly adopted and moving to a new home, I know it's the same for you," he said. "But we're stuck together now. We gotta get along."

That hadn't ended as he had intended it to be, but Anya had yet to show any sign of being upset by anything at all.

In fact, she was staring. Staring at his soul.

He wondered what she could be thinking about right now.

"How can you see?" she asked, unprompted.

Conan tilted his head, not following. It wasn't until she motioned to her eyes, and after a few more seconds of awkward silence, that Conan recalled that Loid had taken his glasses this morning, so he wasn't wearing them.

Not that it explained what it had to do with anything, but shrugged it off. Children can be random at times, right?

"People don't wear glasses because they are blind," explained Conan. "For them, it's more like their sight is… kinda blurry."

"Blurry?" She blinked. "Like when Anya wakes up in the mornings?"

"Yes, exactly like that." It was not exactly like that, but Conan figured it would suffice. "But it's not the case for me. Because I don't really wear glasses."

The absolutely clueless expression the girl pulled out almost made him laugh. Almost.

He pointed over to the closest window that let them see the many buildings gathered under the sun. "You can see right through that window, even if your eyes are okay, don't you?" Anya nodded, so he added, "It's the same for me."

Besides, it's only a means to hide my identity, Conan thought, but obviously did not say. I didn't use glasses when I was a grownup.

Anya's eyes widened just a little. "Oh, that's right," she mumbled.

Then immediately twitched when the boy's puzzled gaze posed on herself.

"T-That's right!" Her eyes flickered all over the room, as if she was nervous for motives he couldn't bring himself to understand. "Anya forgot… to go to the toilet!"

"What-"

"So Anya is going now!"

Still confused, Conan watched as the little girl hopped off her chair, and in a blink of an eye, she had disappeared somewhere behind the doorway leading to the corridor. Frozen, he continued to stare for a few minutes, before eventually giving up and going back to his own childish, brain-rotting textbooks.

Because, to his great regret, there was absolutely nothing else he could do. Anya had been too adamant on following Loid that morning, so, after roughly fifteen minutes of him ushering her back inside the apartment, he had resorted to barricade the door.

Again, he could've just locked the door. The first time, Conan had thought it was a mere overlook from his part, yet at this point, he was starting to believe that the spy did not know how those work. Surely, they have locks, too. In the West, I mean.

Well, even if I had a way out, it would be for naught. Just like the other day. I haven't got a single clue to follow.

Checking the newspapers or the news had contributed nothing to his search. His disappearance had not been reported, and even if it had, he doubted it would provide any leads. Those men in black had been sneaky, used an untraceable poison not to alert anybody, unlike what it would have been with a gun ─ maybe they hadn't brought a silencer. While it was a good thing for Shinichi, in a way, it didn't make a lot of sense for an experienced murderer like those two were.

Yet, the fact that no body had been found at the site of his attempted murder was worrying enough. I have to hurry, he decided. Before they realize their mistake.

Having said that, he finished filling up the answers in his textbook.

Or at least, he tried to. His hand suddenly stopped, head perking up upon hearing a distinct sound. Eyes sliding close, he tried to focus, to determine what exactly it was, until finally, a faint sob was recognized by his brain.

She's crying? he wondered, frowning lightly as he stood up. But she was fine just a moment ago…

To add to his great confusion, she didn't seem to be in the bathroom, where she had claimed to be. No, the sounds didn't come from there, but from somewhere else entirely.

Where…?

His steps halted, eyes widening slightly as they finally located her. She was kneeling on the floor of Loid's room, surrounded by several boxes sprawled around everywhere in sight. Upon his presence, her teary gaze flickered towards him, visually astonished for some unknown reason.

"What were you doing?" asked Conan, almost hesitantly.

"I… uh…"

Moving further inside stole a flinch out of the girl, and a second look had him freezing on his spot. There, right in front of the girl, there was a suitcase ─ black, large, and fortunately unopened. He settled it with an extended look before his shoulders dropped, deflating with a sigh.

"Weren't we told not to touch his things?" Conan chastised her lightly, crouching right next to her to put things back in order. "I get you're curious, but it's rude."

And dangerous, he added in his mind. The man was a spy in his own right, he couldn't even begin to imagine what kind of gadgets could be there, gathering dust in his closet for nosy six-year-olds to stick their little fingers at. Especially this thing over here.

Intrigued, he leaned closer to it, placing a hand over the surface to investigate further. It was password-locked, for the better or the worse ─ at least this proved that he did know locks were a thing, thought Conan, with a shake of his head.

He gingelly lifted it, careful not to set anything off. Judging by its size and weight, it's not a mere suitcase. A computer, maybe? No, that's not it. You don't need to physically lock these things…

Finally, it clicked. Oh, a communicator. Conan smirked to himself, glad to have figured the mystery out. Good thing it's locked, then.

It wouldn't be any good if Anya messed with it. Who knows who she could accidentally be communicating to?

Unbeknownst to him, Anya froze.

Nodding to himself, Conan gingerly pushed the gadget back in place. Spies have a lot of enemies, he reflected. Just imagine if one of them intercepted her transmission and traced our location...

Color drained from her face, a faint tremor taking hold of her limbs.

We'd probably be dead by now… That was close, huh?

Wobbly still, the girl jumped back on her feet, earning yet another confused look from the boy and nervously began to stammer, lacking coherence in her words. Frowning, Conan tilted his head, trying to deduce what message she was trying to relay, yet failed miserably.

He stopped trying when the sound of the front door opening reached his ears.

Ah, he's back, he thought, taking a single step towards the doorway, attempting to get to the hallway. Better walk out before he finds us in his room-

He came to a sudden pause, yet not of his own accord. Haltingly, he turned his gaze to his arm, taking notice of the small hands that had latched onto it, grasping with as much strength as a six-year-old could manage. He blinked once, eyes flickering to her face, and did not fail to identify those wide eyes, and the sickly white shade her face had acquired, as fear.

He held his breath, and the newfound silence allowed him to hear better, clearer. Carefully silent steps, tiptoeing around. Slight shuffle of clothes, sliding against a surface ─ as if someone was threading close to the walls, slowly yet surely advancing towards their position.

That wasn't Loid. Intruders, the thought made his features harden. Two… No, three of them.

He reached blindly for Anya, ushering her to keep herself behind him. She did so right away, as per indicated by the small, quivering fingers digging on his shoulder.

There has to be something I can do. His eyes darted across the room, seeking for a way out, but of course, it returned no results. And of course, the intruders were slowly, but surely approaching their position, and by the way Anya had suddenly stopped backing up ─ he didn't even register he had been prompting her to do so ─ it was clear that her back had hit the wall.

This is not good. We're trapped. Anya's grip tightened. His teeth clenched, barely even restraining a frustrated growl. There's no escape.

And if they couldn't flee, there was only one option left for survival.

Anya's chimera-like plushie had been dropped at some point and was left on the floor. A box they had forgotten to put away was there, probably containing several gadgets and weapons all the same ─ which would be terribly helpful if he could get to it on time.

Especially when he could already see a shadowy figure peeking from the hallway, a giveaway of the sight that would meet them sooner than what he would prefer. That of a face they didn't know, wild-eyed and dangerous beyond any doubt, which would only widen as they came to rest on their form.

Just as the man's mouth opened to scream, Conan's head began to turn towards the frightened little girl hiding behind him, his lips curving in one last warm, reassuring smile.

It will be okay, he told her in his mind, even though he knew she couldn't hear ─ but hoped that his actions would relay the message, anyway.

As if in slow motion, lowered, his fingers grazing the floor as he crouched. His left shoe came off, sliding back to the front with a swift movement of his now socked foot.

"Kids!" screamed the intruder, whipping his head towards his partners. Conan's eyes narrowed. "They are kids in here-!"

With a short scream ripping through his throat, and drawing all the strength he could muster, Conan delivered one powerful kick. A smirk spread across his face as he stood back, watching everything unfolding in front of him; the intruder's eyes widening, darting to the shoe that hurtled his way.

It slapped him lightly on the cheek and dropped back to the floor with nothing but a light 'ouch' as a response. Not even the faintest hint of a flinch, either.

Conan could feel Anya's stare on the back of his head. He could feel the glare the criminal sent him, incredibly irritated by the whole thing.

For a moment, Conan stared blankly, until realization finally dawned on him.

Oh.

That would be his last thought before the pain took over, spreading across his back like a raging fire. Wheezing, he let himself flop back onto the floor, curling into himself while trying to recover the air that had been snatched from his lungs so abruptly, but to no avail. Everything was fading away, his thoughts dissolving into a comfortable, numbing darkness he could not fight any longer.

Not even those little hands that had settled on his arm, shaking desperately, kept him from sinking deeper.

Anya's inconsolable weeping persisted, however, echoing somewhere in the distance until he knew no more.

Conan woke up an unidentified amount of time later, his head throbbing, his body in the most uncomfortable position ever. Yet, his eyelids did not flutter open, but rather, they remained tightly closed. Every other sense of his sharpened, in an attempt to assess his situation.

Arms that wouldn't move, kept in place by ropes tied around his torso. Iron-like bars digging against his shoulder ─ he was squished inside some weird kind of cage, maybe? Along with a warmer surface that wouldn't stop trembling.

When the sounds he was hearing were deciphered as sobs, Conan understood that it was Anya pressed against his back, and that they both had been kidnapped.

Of course we were. He could sort of remember it now; the crazy glint on the intruder's gaze as he lunged towards them, and how easily he had flung Conan to the side, sending him crashing to the wall. How utterly and irrevocably pathetic for Shinichi Kudo, he thought, capable of knocking criminals left and right with a soccer ball to be defeated just like that.

Inwardly groaning, Conan tugged at his binds, attempting, in vain, to free himself somehow.

"Oh, look. The brat's awake."

Seeing no other choices available, the boy finally opened his eyes, lifting his head to glare at whoever was his ─ their ─ captor. In doing so, however, he realized that there were more than one ─ far more than one, judging by the four, no, six pairs of gazes that remained fixated on him.

The one standing directly in front of him, the guy with the mean glare and the bushy eyebrows, took a step closer, and the rest shuffled out of the way instantly. So this guy's the boss, huh? That much was obvious, at least.

Swiftly, he sent a look around, trying to verify his theory of his current situation.

After being knocked out, he had indeed taken somewhere he could not recognize. A storage room? No, wait, it's some kind of abandoned supermarket. Which made a lot of sense, considering he had been squished together with a crying Anya inside a shopping cart they had likely found lying around.

Indeed, he had been kidnapped.

But I don't think it was a premeditated crime. He would be surprised if it was ─ they had been taken in by that spy just the other day, and they had barely reached the twenty-four-hour mark living together. I think they just found us there and snatched us, just in case.

The question remained, however. How had they tracked Loid? Maybe she did get her hands on Loid's things… Anya's breathing hitched, but he said nothing about it. He really should learn to lock his things, that guy.

With a sigh, he looked back at the leader and stared at him with a blank expression.

"So?" he began, his tone bored. "What are we supposed to be?"

"We're taking you as hostages."

It was impressive that these guys were willing to explain the situation to him. He would have remarked how much of a gracious gesture it was, hadn't it been for, well, the obvious.

He raised an eyebrow. "What for?"

"You're a bait for Twilight. Once he comes here, we'll force him to join us."

Twilight? Ah, that must be that spy's codename.

That was good to know.

"And that makes you think he will come because…?"

"Because you're his children?"

An uncomfortable silence followed, with the boy merely raising his eyebrow even higher, far above his hairline.

"Are you sure you thought this through?" asked Conan, a tint of disappointment in his tone. "You're the lamest bunch of criminals I've ever met."

"You might want to shut your trap," said the leader, his eyebrow twitching. "Unless you wanna end up like your sister here."

For the first time, he glanced over to the teary girl shaking right next to him, and took notice of the tape stuck to where her mouth was supposed to be. Immediately, he let out a light, dry chuckle.

Let me guess. She was crying too loudly for them to handle, right?

Anya's shock was visible. Conan's head tilted slightly, then glanced over his shoulder, just in case. This time, it was his turn to be surprised, and not in a great way, at the figure he had just spotted, sprawled across the floor, absolutely motionless.

There's a pool of blood next to his head, observed the boy, his eyes narrowing. It was expanding, flowing across the tile floor without any of the men being extremely alarmed about it. It seems to be fairly recent. Could have been shot in the head? It was the most likely scenario. I see.

Seems that Anya wasn't the only one getting on this man's nerves. Finally, he turned back to who he assumed to be the leader, and spotted a growing, smug grin making its way to his face. She just got luckier.

"Listen here," said the man, raising his hand to reveal the gun he had been carrying ─ at least this guy had bothered to use a silencer, Conan would give him that. "You're going to talk."

Clearly, he was attempting to intimidate him, but truly, all he did was confirm his most recent working theory. For all that was worth, anyway.

Conan did not blink at the unspoken threat. "You just told me to be quiet," he stated.

"You're a cocky little runt, aren't you?"

A click ensued, yet the boy did not let his smirk vanish, despite every single thought that rushed through his mind, running in circles as he attempted to figure out a plan to escape.

If I was alone, this would be easier, he thought. Anya is here. I gotta find a way to get her out of here, too.

His fingers found their way to the metal bars behind his back, feeling for any sharp edges he could rub his rope against. Then, he would have to find a way to free the girl too, and escape, all at the same time. Maybe I could just use this shopping cart? It could work, he guessed. It didn't matter if he couldn't unbind Anya right away, as long as they were safe and out of their sight, he could do it later.

It was a good plan, except for the fact that every single member of this gang, including their boss, was surrounding them.

If only… He gritted his teeth. If only I had my old body…

"But you look like a smart one," continued the boss. "I bet you understand your position."

Of course he did.

"We're hostages," said Conan. "If you kill us, you won't be able to blackmail Twilight-san into following your orders."

He knew it wasn't like that ─ they weren't family, not even close. As a spy, it would be ridiculous to stumble into the enemy's hideout, risking his life for kids he didn't even know. It would be easier, safer just to choose another orphanage and pick another child ─ there were plenty of them in this country, anyone would make the trick.

"Or, we could just prove we are being serious…"

Tensing his muscles, Conan glared as the boss approached them, his gun in hand, leaning over them. Conan was aware of the events that were about to ensue ─ muzzle to his forehead, a sadistic grin and a cold laugh that indicated he wasn't afraid to pull the trigger to end his life. That was a classical move, the boy had seen it once or twice throughout his short detective career.

Yet, it didn't happen. Not like that, in any case.

His eyes widened, horrified at the sight. Muffled cries reached his ears, Anya's pleading, terrified gaze fixated on him, and only on him.

"We could just wipe out one of you." Pressing the gun closer to the girl's temple, the man sneered. "So that Twilight understands what destiny will await the other if he tries to act smart."

Gritting his teeth, Conan could not hold a growl in.

With this small body, I cannot use my true strength. He had faced the fact in the worst way there could be. Even his kicking strength, his strongest weapon, his ace under his sleeve that had kept him alive for so long had, just, disappeared. Leaving him a helpless, six-year-old hoping for a miracle, praying to be saved.

And it's not only me… How could I ever call myself a detective when I can't even save a little girl?

Even though… she's right in front of me…

Damn it!

"Boss!" The calling of one of the other men captured his attention. He was right at the window, pointing at something outside. "Nguyen and his guys are back from the apartment!"

He took his time to look at Conan, then glance over to Anya, who winced violently, before snorting. "You got lucky," he told her, finally stepping away.

At first, Conan had absolutely no clue of what he was supposed to think, up until the moment yet another man appeared behind the door. He was carrying something, or rather, someone, over his shoulder, his face masked by a paper bag, for some reason ─ maybe so that their new kidnapping victim wouldn't know where their hideout was?

He was dropped back onto the ground, and Conan couldn't help but let his eyes open dramatically. That light green suit was exactly like the one Loid had been wearing earlier.

It wasn't hard to connect two and two together.

"We captured him."

Obviously.

As soon as he set his victim down, leaving him to squirm uselessly on the floor, Nguyen stumbled backwards, hands settling around his throat. "Those weren't the moves of an amateur," he muttered. "He's the real deal."

The boss waved a hand at him, fairly more interested in the living package he had received. "Go rest over there," he told him.

So he did, obediently moving away from everyone else's sight, currently gathering around their victim, swarming like bugs to light. Conan watched it with a tight frown on his face.

Maybe he could use this chance, the boy suddenly realized. He had nearly unbounded himself, and their backs were turned against them ─ this could be the opportunity he had been looking for so long.

That being said, he would be leaving that spy behind, which wasn't ideal, but unavoidable. Because he could take care of himself just fine, he convinced himself ─ the least thing he needed were kids hanging around and making everything all the more difficult.

Maybe.

That was, until he took notice of Anya's wide, wide eyes that stared up ahead ─ not as terrified as they had been before, surprisingly enough. Following her gaze, he met with the guy who had just arrived with Loid, cautiously moving closer to them.

Noticing his shock, he placed a finger in front of his lips, telling him to keep him quiet, and proceeded to walk around the shopping cart, settling right behind Anya. To his further confusion, and unlike anything he could have been expecting to come from one of those guys, the man began to undo the knots that kept her immobile.

Conan could barely keep himself from gasping.

Loid-san?! he cried in his mind. Then, the guy that was brought in…

Ah, I get it.

As Loid freed Anya and swiftly moved towards him, a smirk returned to his lips. They, Loid and this man named Nyugen, or whatever, had swapped places, he realized. That was pretty clever, he would give him that. He did not even think of questioning the way the man seemed to hesitate, ever so briefly, yet assumed that the sight of his nearly loosened ropes might have been a puzzling one to meet.

It hadn't even taken Loid a second to snap himself out of his shock, and promptly plucked him off the shopping cart to set him back on the floor, mouthing something along the lines of 'can you walk?' on his way. A nod was sent back to him, and swiftly, Loid picked Anya up.

By the time he had settled the girl on his arms, Conan had already rushed ahead, expecting him to follow close.

Predictably so, Anya started to wail the moment they stepped out of sight. Loid tried, in every way possible, to soothe her, to convince her she would be alright now, and that there was no reason to be scared. Which, naturally, didn't work. He was still disguised as one of his kidnappers, after all.

Her crying dropped to a mere sniffle by the time they had gotten to the exit. Only then did Conan stop running, coming to a rest right next to where the girl had been placed on the ground.

Together, they watched Loid pluck out a scrap of paper and jot something down on it.

"Listen up," he began, crouching down right in front of them. "My friends and I are pro tag players. Whenever we spot someone with potential, we immediately challenge them to a game."

Conan's eyelids slid down. Is that the best he can think of? They were supposed to be children, he thought, but they weren't born yesterday. But he kept it down in favor of paying attention.

Loid was pointing somewhere else, giving them directions to the closest police station.

"If you can get this to a police officer, you win the game." Ever so gently, he placed the note in a bewildered Anya's hands. Then he turned back to Conan, nodding. "Got it?"

Certainly, he did get it, yet, that didn't seem to be what the spy was intending to get him to understand. The contents of the note Anya was carrying were all too clear for him, or rather, the intentions behind it all. He wanted them to go to the police, probably so that they could be settled into another orphanage, leaving them both out of the dangers that being involved in that mission implied.

Or so Conan wanted to believe.

"Pa-" Anya tried to stutter.

"All right, go! Hurry!"

Startled, the girl did as she was told, taking off running like she had been just told. Conan, for his part, took a few steps forward, glanced over his shoulder, and met eyes with the man who had just let them go.

Loid was a little surprised to see him smirk suddenly. "You better return right here in one piece," he said. "I bet it won't take longer than ten minutes."

Unable to make anything out of it, the agent nodded, which made the boy's smile even bigger. Adding nothing else, the boy spun on his heels, and hurried his way to catch up with the pink haired little girl.

As he watched the boy go, his initial surprise was smoothed out. He turned around, tearing the mask apart from his face as he made his decision.

He had some business to take care of.

Thus, he completely missed how the girl stopped in her tracks, twirling around once more, her big, emerald eyes unable to leave the door that the man had just disappeared from.

Or how a tight grip seizing her wrist almost pulled her off balance, encouraging her to keep on running. Startled, her gaze flickered back to the front, and he saw the back of someone's head, a dark tuft of hair poking out of his skull. The boy kept on running, not even pausing once to send a single glance over his shoulder.

A frown took over her features, digging her heels against the ground. This time, it was time for Conan to skid to a stop, all but stamping his head into the pavement, then surprised, slowly turning to finally look over the little girl.

Her bitten lip, her stubborn, fiery gaze made Conan halt. Yet did not loosen the grip on her hand.

"W-We…" she started to stutter, visibly troubled for some reason. "If… If we go there… We… Papa…"

Conan studied her carefully, and her trembling, tearful form. Looks like she knows, he thought. If we deliver that message to the police, we…

This forged family will cease to exist. That was a given, it had been like that in the beginning. Their artificial bonds that connected all of them were far too weak to persist, he had been aware of it from the beginning. That it was a matter of time until this fragile farce crumbled down into pieces, shattered beyond repair, no matter how hard this little girl cried and prayed for things to go back to normal.

Normal, what a funny thought. There is nothing normal about this.

Releasing a deep sigh, the boy turned fully.

"Now, did you really think we're going to listen to an old man we barely know?" A warm smile made its way to his lips, and all of a sudden, Anya's eyes had opened wide with surprise. "There was a dead body back there, wasn't there?"

She blinked owlishly. "Then…"

"Let's look for a phone booth. There's a murder to report."

Ten minutes. That was exactly how long it had taken Twilight to take out every single enemy in sight and threaten their boss, Edgar, not to ever bother him again. Ten minutes, and suddenly, the sound started to filter through the silence ─ police sirens were making their way to his ears, and while it did surprise him at first, it did not really confuse him.

Calmly walking over a dead body lying on the floor, it suddenly made sense why the police would be called. A murder was a murder, so if the police came across that scene, there was no avoiding an investigation, no matter how deeply rooted this organization was with Ostania's government.

At least it would give him enough time to escape.

"You better return right here in one piece," the boy had said, throwing in the time lapse of ten minutes somewhere in his words. Here, of course, meaning the same backdoor he had used to set the kids free.

Finally standing outside, and fortunately out of sight, Twilight could not help but ponder about it all. If that boy had called the police at the right time, and had predicted they would first strike from the other entrance, then that could mean he was timing everything out. So that he, Twilight, could escape from there mostly unnoticed.

He was a smart kid, he would give him that. Too bad he would have been of great use for Operation Strix.

But I'm not involving children in this, he had long decided it. Besides, those two must have already…

It didn't take him two steps before he had to pause, bewildered by the sight that met him far ahead. First, there was pink, peeking out from behind a corner. Large, round green eyes found their way to him, and immediately, the girl was rushing towards him.

"Papa!"

Anya had already latched onto his legs by the time a second child walked out, albeit much calmer. His sharp blue gaze also fell onto him, studying for a few seconds, before smirking.

Thus, became the train of incoherent stuttering and excuses he, a grown man and skilled spy, began to shoot at a pair of grade schoolers he did not expect to see again. Conan missed most of it, because really, did it even matter? There was something about going out to shop, or some other similarly fabricated terrible lie.

Then it was their turn to explain.

"We were playing tag with some old guys," said Anya.

"And stumbled on a murder," finished Conan, absolutely unbothered by it all. But that's just a normal day in my life.

Anya peeked from where she was pressing her face against Loid's legs, shooting him an odd look.

"O-Oh, I see…" If he really did see, it was a mystery to Conan. One he couldn't care less about. "Did you… have fun?"

His features dulled. Is he serious?

"It was a little scary," muttered Anya, hiding her face in the older man's leg. "I wanna go home." Her hands curled into fists, clenching onto Loid's pants as if he were about to vanish if she held onto him any lighter. "To our home, Papa."

Surprised at first, Loid stared back at the little girl clinging to him, and for a moment, he said nothing, neither did he move. Just watched her, nuzzling against him in a desperate, also heartbreaking, search for comfort.

Finally, he yielded, placing a hand on top of her hair.

"Let's go home, then."

Then Anya grinned brightly. So brightly that Conan feared he would go blind, just by looking at it ─ but contagious, all at the same time. He barely was conscious of the smile that had settled onto his own lips, stretching further across his face as he watched, for a distance away, as the little girl and the spy started their journey back home.

The Forgers are nothing but a pretense, reflected Conan, hands sliding inside his pockets, content to see Anya smile once again, despite everything she had just gone through.

Loid is nothing but layers upon layers of deception. Anya is just a tool he's gonna discard the moment she stops being useful to him. And I'm a bit of both.

"But that apartment is far too dangerous, so let's move," he could hear Loid say. "I spotted a poisonous snake there yesterday."

"I don't like snakes."

Seeing it like that, it's obvious. We aren't a family. Not even close.

But…

Abruptly, Anya's steps halted, confusedly glancing around, looking for something in particular she could not find. Conan's head tilted slightly, mentally wondering what was up with her this time around, until she twirled around, and their eyes met.

Before he knew it, she was running back towards Conan. He caught a glimpse of Loid's smile before she dug her fingers into his wrists, using both hands, and started to drag him around.

"Let's go, let's go home!" she exclaimed happily. "Let's go home, Niichan!"

Whatever confusion might have stricken Conan, he wasn't allowed any time to process it. He was quickly pulled back to the middle, squished in between a cheery Anya and a mildly amused Loid, and wondered if that was what his life was going to be like from now on.

It might be a pretense… But maybe, just maybe…

Despite himself, Conan smiled.

This might be the kind of pretense I could get used to.