Chapter 21: Natural Causes
As Shinichi was trying to decide what he should look at first, Ran came upstairs to get him for dinner. When he tried to protest, she gave him a very stern look: one that he knew from experience meant that if he didn't come on his own two feet, she would literally drag him to the dining room herself. Only now he was small enough for her to carry him instead of pulling him by the ear or the collar.
He sighed as he slid off the chair and followed her downstairs.
It's fine, he told himself. The files aren't going anywhere. Not even Kid would pull a prank as tasteless and cruel as deleting them.
"We're having katsudon tonight," said Ran, interrupting his thoughts. Shinichi's stomach growled in response, and an embarrassed flush crept up his cheeks.
"Sounds great," he mumbled as Ran stifled a chuckle.
She steered him to the dining room, where the table was already set. Subaru was there, too, already seated and waiting for them. Ran gingerly sat next to Shinichi, using him as a buffer between her and the disguised FBI agent. She still wasn't comfortable with him, it seemed, though if he was offended, he didn't show it. He merely smiled politely, raising his glass in greeting.
"When you're finished eating, I have something to discuss with you, Shinichi-kun," he said casually, glasses glinting in the light as he took a sip from his cup. "At your convenience, of course."
Shinichi perked up. If he wasn't saying anything during dinner, then it meant the discussion involved the FBI. Ran wasn't privy to any of his dealings with the American organization, and the disguised agent was content to leave it that way.
He didn't miss the way Ran flinched when the man said Shinichi's name, though. She was probably still blaming herself for his identity being revealed the way it had. He would have to clear that up with her later—it was his own fault for not paying attention to who was in the room before he started talking.
Dinner continued in mostly amiable silence, though Ran was a little stiff. She ate quicker than usual and promptly excused herself, then disappeared into the kitchen. Subaru chuckled, but said nothing about her behavior. Shinichi pulled his gaze from the doorway and redirected it at the agent.
'You have news?" he asked in a low voice. Subaru glanced at the door before he reached up to his neck and clicked off the voice changer hidden there, giving his report as Akai Shuichi rather than the fictional grad student he'd become.
"Yes and no," he said, tone serious. "In order to keep the investigation as quiet as possible, I could only enlist the help of a few people in Washington D.C.—where FBI headquarters is located." Shinichi nodded thoughtfully.
"I can't imagine much ground was covered, then," he said, trying to keep his tone as neutral as possible. Akai hummed.
"More than you'd think," he offered, piquing Shinichi's interest again. "But you are right. Due to the limited number of people, only six states have been searched so far; all of them surrounding the capital, of course." Shinichi blinked.
"Really?" In spite of his efforts to school his emotions, he still sounded more eager than he'd intended.
Out of fifty states, six didn't sound like all that much, but with Shinichi's knowledge of the country's geography, he could estimate that the states in question amounted to two or three Japans (depending on which six states, of course). It was a fantastic start, all things considered.
"Don't get too excited," warned Akai. "I'm afraid nothing came out of it."
"… Nothing…?" asked Shinichi. Wasn't that a good thing? The man nodded.
"Keep in mind, Shinichi-kun," he said, "that the states in question were the ones around the United States capital, where a good many government agency headquarters are located. I doubt anything is going on; but if it is, people as shrewd as the culprits in your case definitely wouldn't do anything that suspicious so near that area."
Shinichi frowned at that, disappointment sinking in. If that was the case, then they still didn't know whether or not they were facing an international problem or a local one. Still, progress was progress, and no news was good news until proven otherwise. The fewer hiding places for the perpetrators, the better.
"Alright," said Shinichi as he turned his thoughts over in his head. "Just… keep me posted." Akai just smiled and gave a slight nod before reaching back up to turn on the voice changer, and with a click, became Subaru once more.
With that out of the way, and dinner finished, Shinichi went back up to his room. With a fresh mind, he chose to deal with the traffic footage first. He could look at the footage later, but since two-week-old files were automatically deleted by the program (something he understood as a space-saver, but that wasn't convenient for him), he set to work saving the oldest footage to a hard drive. He could delete it himself at his leisure once he'd gone through it and determined it was of no value to him. He returned his attention to the reports.
The reports appeared to be arranged by date—with the most recent cases listed first. That was very helpful, since it meant he didn't have to arrange them himself. He pulled up the oldest case (he assumed it was the oldest, since it was last) and froze, staring intently at the date. It was nearly twenty years ago, before he was even born.
Hori Kenzo, from Nagano, was twenty-three when he disappeared and came back. He died two months later from a heart attack.
Araki Jun, forty-two, disappeared from Omiya two years later. A week after returning, he suffered a circulatory collapse and passed away before the ambulance could arrive.
Shinichi frowned as he pulled up files, his frustration growing with each mouse click. Aneurism, lung collapse, heart failure, stroke, cardiac arrest, hypertension, liver failure, hernia…
None of the people kidnapped more than ten years ago were still alive, all of them having succumbed to various different circumstances. Which was unfortunate, because it meant that Shinichi couldn't question any of them, even if Kid's reports were beautifully detailed.
That was another issue, too. The fact that they were all dead was suspicious, but he couldn't figure out a reason for why that could be. They all died from different things, so it had to be some sick coincidence, but he still couldn't put it out of his mind completely. After all, most of the people afterwards were still alive.
Shinichi suppressed a groan and rubbed his temples. The deaths, he decided, were unlikely to be the work of the kidnappers. The causes were all too extensive and random. There were only a very few ways to induce a death by natural causes, after all, and an even fewer variety that looked like natural causes on the outside. More importantly, there wasn't any reason to kill off their victims. Doing so only put them in danger of discovery. He heaved a sigh, feeling for all the world like he was doomed to failure in this search.
Shaking his head to clear it, he looked at the first victim again. Perhaps Nagano, the city where the first person disappeared, held some clues. It wouldn't be exactly related to anything from that case, unfortunately, since it was twenty years ago, but… Well, it was as good a place to start as any, especially since as far as he could tell, it was the start of all this. If he was very careful with what he said, he might be able to enlist the help of Yamato Kansuke. The one-eyed inspector seemed to like Conan to some degree, and somehow instinctually understood that the child was more than he let on, even if the man didn't understand why that was, exactly.
Shinichi smiled to himself. Kansuke was perfect for this job. Asking for a favor wasn't likely to arouse suspicion in the man, as long as he could concoct a believable reason for his interest in a twenty-year-old closed case. The inspector's personal pride virtually guaranteed no one else would know about it if it was something he thought he could do himself. He wouldn't tell Morofushi about it, since that would be like admitting he wasn't capable of doing a favor for a child (even an unusually intelligent child). He wouldn't tell Yui, either, for the same reason, since she was likely to bring it up to Morofushi.
He frowned again. Not having Morofushi help would be a considerable waste, but the tactician-like inspector was much too sharp and inquisitive for Shinichi's comfort. There were already too many people like that in his life. Kansuke was just as sharp, of course, but he was more straightforward than the other man, and much less likely to ask too many questions or go digging on his own to satisfy any sort of unrelated hunches: specifically, hunches related to the shrunken teen.
He sat back in his chair and sighed as he looked up at the ceiling. He really needed to be in Nagano in person, since he didn't even know what he was looking for, but the city was just far enough that going without a chaperone would be a huge hassle. Kogoro was out of the question and Agasa was busy. He might have considered asking Subaru to go with him under different circumstances—going in a car would be much faster than a bus or train, and cheaper than a cab. But he wasn't too keen on exposing someone in disguise and undercover to someone as perceptive as Kansuke, even if he wasn't likely to ask too many questions beyond surface level curiosity.
He could ask Haibara for an antidote and go as himself, negating the need for a chaperone altogether, but… He needed Kansuke's help, and the man knew Conan, not Shinichi.
I should probably call him first, thought Shinichi, to make sure he's actually free to help me, and then plan accordingly. If the man wasn't even free, then all Shinichi would need to do was persuade Haibara to give him an antidote. Then he could investigate by himself, with the only hurdle being the lack of police presence to make people more willing to speak to him. Or, perhaps, get into places he couldn't without an officer. He didn't anticipate the latter, but with unknown circumstances, it was hard to tell for sure.
A soft knock at the door interrupted him as he pulled out his phone. He looked up. Ran stood in the doorway holding a tray laden with what looked like snacks. He blinked.
"I made some daifuku," she said, holding up the tray. "Since you seem pretty busy, and it doesn't look like you'll be getting any sleep soon."
"… Didn't we just eat?" he asked with some surprise. His stomach decided to protest that statement, and he frowned. Ran gave him a knowing smile.
"It's past ten o'clock," she said as she stepped into the room. "We ate four hours ago." She walked up next to him and set the tray down. Besides the daifuku, there was hot tea as well. "What have you been looking at so intently?" Shinichi flushed with embarrassment at her indifferent demeanor—she was very used to this kind of behavior from him, and he wasn't sure if that was a good or a bad thing. But she didn't comment on it, and he greatly appreciated that.
"It's the records Kid gave me," he said as he sat back in his chair so she could see the screen. She leaned forward with interest. He'd pulled up the oldest one again to confirm the location. Ran's eyes grew very round when she spotted the date.
"But—this is from twenty years ago!" she exclaimed, voice rising in growing panic. Shinichi nodded solemnly as he reached for one of the daifuku on the tray she'd brought.
"I know," he said gravely. "This is much bigger than I thought." He scrolled up to the top and zoomed in to the location. "So, we have a case that's twenty years old in the biggest city of Nagano prefecture. Finding any clues is probably a lost cause at this point…"
"You were planning on going there?" said Ran incredulously.
"I'm still planning on it," he said calmly as he picked his phone back up and scrolled through his contacts list. "Since this is the first recorded case, it would be unwise not to check it out, even if it's just the general area the victim lived."
He took a bite of the daifuku as Ran took a deep breath to calm herself. He nibbled as he stared at his phone, debating whether to call or message the inspector. He opted to message—he wasn't too keen on getting yelled at on the off chance that the man wasn't still awake. He quickly typed up an innocuous inquiry and hit send before going back to the unfinished snack in his other hand.
"So you're going to Nagano," sighed Ran as she pinched the bridge of her nose. "When?"
"Tomorrow, since it's Saturday," he said as he finished the last bite of his snack. A muscle below Ran's eye twitched. Shinichi frowned. "… What's wrong?"
"Er… Who're you going with?" she asked cautiously. Shinichi grimaced.
"No one at the moment," he admitted. "I just messaged Yamato-keibu, so his reply will determine whether I should keep looking for someone or just persuade Haibara to give me an antidote and go by myself."
"Yamato-keibu?" she said slowly. "If you can't get anyone here, why not ask Yui-san to come get you, since you're talking to Yamato-keibu?"
"Because she'll want to know why I'm going, and then tell Morofushi-keibu about it at the very least, if not the entire division. Yamato-keibu won't tell anyone if he can help it," he explained. Ran frowned, humming thoughtfully.
"Why don't you take me?" she asked, making Shinichi blink in surprise at her willingness.
"… Well, you'd have to pretend to be me, since we'll probably be with the inspector. He'd recognize you, too, and might figure out something's not quite right."
"That's nothing we'd need to worry about," she said matter-of-factly. "Since he was in that avalanche accident before you got really famous, and was out of the hospital after you disappeared, he won't know your adult face. And he doesn't really seem like the kind of person that would care too much about someone not directly related to his day-to—day activities."
Shinichi mulled that over. She did have a point… And he wouldn't' need to resort to uselessly pleading for the antidote from Haibara, which would save him a lot of time and pain.
"I don't mind, but why are you volunteering?" he asked. "It's not a guarantee that you won't be recognized, and I know you don't like pretending to be me." Ran's expression looked a bit guilty.
"I just…" She averted her eyes, fiddling with the hem of her shirt. "I don't want to be alone in the house with that guy…"
"'That guy'… You mean Subaru-san?" he asked. She pressed her lips into a thin line. "If this is about our identities, then—"
"No, no! That's not it!" she said quickly, waving her hands in front of her. "I-it's not that, I just… He feels kind of… off. Even when I first met him something about him felt off—I could never pinpoint what it was, so I just ignored it since I didn't have to see him every day, but now…" The corner of Shinichi's mouth tugged upward—she really was much more perceptive than everyone gave her credit for.
"Then I guess we're going to Nagano," he said. "I should probably give these files to Haibara before we leave, though. Preferably tonight."
"Why? What's the hurry?" asked Ran. "You're the one that puts most of the information together, right?"
"There's just something bothering me about the earliest cases." His phone buzzed in his pocket.
"And you can't ask the victims themselves?" she asked as Shinichi looked at the messages on his phone. "We're going to Nagano, right? You can ask the first guy."
"We can't," he said, after confirming the received message. "He had a heart attack shortly after he came back, and died. The ones that came after are all pretty similar: they all died from natural causes."
"What?!" she breathed, blood draining from her face.
"Relax. I don't think the deaths are related—I just wanted a second opinion. Haibara might see something I missed." He held up his phone and waved it. "And since Yamato-keibu said okay, we can at least ask him if he knows something about the first case. I doubt it'll be much, though, since besides living in a small village away from the city, he was only a teenager at the time."
"… Somehow, I can't really imagine him as a teenager," muttered Ran. Shinichi snorted.
"Me, neither." He turned back to the computer and transferred all the files to a separate thumb drive, and then stretched. "At any rate, since I want to leave early, we'll need to go ahead and sleep." He grabbed the drive in one hand and another daifuku in the other before sliding off his chair. "I just need to get this to Haibara, and then I'll turn in right after."
"O-okay," he heard Ran say as he left the room. He felt a little guilty about rushing out like that, but the sooner Haibara checked the files, the more at ease he would be.
He couldn't help but feel like every step forward put them four steps back. It was even more frustrating than trying to deal with the Black Organization—at least with them, he had a few faces and names. They were codenames, but it was still more than what they had with Ran's case.
He was finished with the snack by the time he got to the professor's house, and handed Haibara the drive, giving her a quick explanation of what was bothering him, as well as his plans for tomorrow. She pursed her lips, expression grim, as she listened to him.
"I'll look into it," she promised when he finished, "but unless I have something like the victims' medical histories, I doubt I'll be of much use." Shinichi shook his head.
"For right now, we can only use what we already have—it will have to be enough. While I'm out tomorrow, I'll see if I can dig up any more information, but I'm not getting my hopes up." He turned to leave. Haibara put a hand on his shoulder.
"Be careful, Kudo-kun," she said, voice low. "I have a bad feeling about this." Shinichi flashed her a reassuring grin.
"Don't worry," he said. "We won't be alone. The worst that can happen is we won't find anything." With that he left, suppressing his own bad feelings about all this. He just hoped they could glean something from this venture, even if it was seemingly insignificant at the time. But hope was all he could do, and that left a bad taste in his mouth.