Chapter 29: Found Footage

Whatever Haibara thought she found, she never disclosed to the two detectives. When pressed, she'd snapped irritably at them—whatever it was, she was at her wits' end trying to figure it out.

Heiji tried to convince Shinichi to take one more day from school, but didn't push back too much when the boy flat-out refused, instead asking if he could start looking at the traffic footage in Shinichi's absence. Shinichi relented and told him what to look for—focusing mainly on red minivans. If they could catch the van that took Ran just one more time, they might be able to spot patterns specific to those particular kidnappings. Heiji saluted him before he went to the professor's house to wait for the children.

The other Shinichi was left alone to ponder his existence.

Heiji hadn't said anything, since he knew his best friend's emotions were still raw from grief, but he sort of felt sorry for the clone. It wasn't something he could portray in words just yet, since he was still trying to figure out his own feelings about this whole mess, but…

He shook his head. It's not like it was important. What was important was knocking out a chunk of the footage. So, he set to work, noting with mild amusement that Shinichi hadn't changed the screensaver or background from Kid's meddling since he'd last been there. He frowned.

The last time he had been on Shinichi's computer had been right after the building collapse that had put Ran in a coma. He was ninety-nine percent positive that the boy hadn't looked at any of the footage he'd pulled back then. A part of him itched to go over Gin and Vodka's footage, but… well, Shinichi wanted him to focus on Ran's case. The footage had been saved; it wasn't going anywhere. He set to work, determined to make as much progress as possible.

xXx

Shinichi had expected it, but being mobbed by his classmates and his teacher was more than a bit overwhelming. He still hadn't been able to school his expression, so the response Heiji had predicted naturally happened.

He was bombarded with comments like "Ai-chan said your cousin woke up," and "why aren't you happy he's awake?" To which he and Haibara both explained the fake situation, effectively shutting everyone up in a blessedly short amount of time. The only things that bothered him were the nearly constant gazes of sympathy and pity being directed at him.

He did his best to tune them out, instead once more mulling over what he already knew. He mentally tacked Heiji's revelation onto the growing list of questions without answers. He rested his chin in one hand, the other using his pencil to trace circles over and over in the margins of his worksheet, not caring if he was scolded for it later.

Ran went missing—was still missing, officially—and came back looking like him, despite him not having been kidnapped. Now she was him (like the kidnappers probably meant her to be) and according to Not-Him, Shinichi's DNA and memories had most likely been acquired during his stay at the hospital before the cultural festival. He frowned at that thought.

He'd been Conan at the hospital, but she was obviously seventeen, not seven. He blinked a few times, then blanched as he realized that whoever had taken his DNA probably had him listed as a child in whatever system they used to file that information away.

He glanced fearfully at Haibara, who was calmly doing her schoolwork. She didn't seem to have realized that their identities were compromised. Should he tell her? He chewed on the end of his pencil, frown deepening.

If they knew Ran was supposed to be a child, they wouldn't have let her go. It had been several weeks, and no one was tailing Ran or himself, save for Kaito Kid. Why? Was that something they didn't check thoroughly?

He shook his head. That couldn't be the case, else they'd have been caught long ago. And now that he was thinking of it, why even risk taking samples from the hospital when they had plenty of people by kidnapping them? How many more samples had been taken from the hospital? Who had taken them in the first place, and were they hospital staff or intruders?

When the initial panic died down, he decided to look into that branch of questions. After so many months, he probably wouldn't find anything conclusive, but since the rest of the investigation had basically turned up similar results, it couldn't hurt to check. Worst case scenario, he wasted some time on a dead end.

He closed his eyes and coasted through the rest of the school day on autopilot, mostly thinking of ways he could procure the information he wanted from the hospital. When school let out, he trudged home with no interference from the Detective Boys. He wasn't sure if Haibara had said anything to them or not, but he found he didn't particularly care. He didn't even realize the scientist was with him until she tapped his shoulder. He blinked, finding them alone.

"Yes?"

"Kudo-kun, what's wrong?" asked Haibara in a hushed voice. "You've been anxious ever since third period." Shinichi flinched. So, she'd noticed that.

"… I'm thinking about Beika Hospital," he admitted. She tilted her head.

"… Beika Hospital…" she said flatly. "Why does that have you so anxious?" He looked around the street before answering.

"Because, according to the clone's testimony, I was still Edogawa Conan when my DNA was taken."

Haibara paled considerably after processing what he'd said.

"No," she whispered, eyes widening in panic. Her gaze darted everywhere, desperately trying to find assailants that didn't exist. "No, no, no, no!"

"Haibara," he said firmly, planting a hard grip on her shoulders. "No one's after us. I've checked."

"You can't possibly know that!" she hissed, wrapping her arms around herself in a tight hug.

"Look," he said, gently steering her down the street so they could retreat to the safety of the professor's house, "whoever these people are, they're not with the black organization—I confirmed as much in Nagano. It's been a few weeks since Ran returned, but I've seen no movement from anyone. There's nothing suspicious besides the case itself.

"If they know something, they can't exactly act on that knowledge, since it would probably put their operations at risk. And if they don't know anything," he said, jaw setting in determination, "then their records are either compromised or they work in different filing systems from the ones doing the kidnapping."

They were in front of the professor's house by the time he finished talking. Haibara didn't exactly look convinced, but she was at least a little less anxious.

Before she could disappear into the lab, he grabbed her wrist and said, "I'll be on the lookout in case something changes, but remember that the more paranoid you look, the more suspicious you are to others." She gave him a flat, unimpressed glare.

"Work on you own reactions first, then I'll consider it." The door slammed shut, leaving Shinichi chuckling mirthlessly on the porch.

"Touché," he muttered before turning to look at his house. He could see Heiji sitting near his bedroom window where his computer was, and wondered how far the Osakan had gotten. Had he been there all day…?

Quit stalling, he scolded himself. He knew he was delaying having to pass Not-Shinichi's room, and he hated himself for it. They didn't know how long this would last, and acting like a petulant child would not help solve anything or change the fact that Ran was currently gone. So, he straightened his shoulders and walked purposefully to his house.

Subaru was nowhere in sight, which seemed par for the course recently. He went upstairs, crushing the anxiety in his chest down so it wouldn't show on the surface. He stopped at the top, and relaxed immediately on seeing the door to the clone's room was closed. And if he quickly rushed past said room, no none was there to witness it.

He swiftly entered his room and ditched his backpack before heading straight to the computer. Heiji only briefly glanced at him and muttered a quick "welcome back" as he continued to stare at the screen in front of him. The beginnings of dark circles framed his eyes.

"Find anything?" asked Shinichi. Heiji rubbed his eyes and blinked a few times.

"Uh… maybe…?" He opened a folder that hadn't been there before school. It had lots of folders inside. "I saved all the oldest footage by city," he explained. "Took maybe fifteen minutes. Since then, I've been goin' through, city by city, pullin' out all the footage with red minivans." Here he opened a folder named "Beika", which had more folders inside.

"Good idea," said Shinichi. He was a little disappointed the Osakan hadn't actually found anything, but considering the sheer amount of footage… "How far have you gotten?"

"Maybe halfway," came the tired response. "I was gonna start siftin' through the minivan footage when I was done sortin', but it's takin' a lot longer than I thought." Shinichi nodded as he stared thoughtfully at the screen. He gave Heiji a pat on the back.

"You can stop now," he said. "Ill do the rest. Take a break." He received a grunt in reply as the taller boy stood up, making way for Shinichi to sit. He climbed into the chair, ignoring the loud yawn and shuffling behind him.

"Stealin' yer bed, dude," said Heiji. There was a soft thud just before Shinichi turned around. Heiji was sprawled unceremoniously on the mattress, already out cold. He blinked, mildly stunned at the speed in which Heiji could fall asleep, before turning back to the computer in front of him to finish sorting the footage.

I'm not sure if I should be impressed or confused at his ability to take things in stride, he found himself thinking. On one hand, Heiji could come off as too laid back, which didn't really paint him in a good way at times. On the other hand, it let him get past some emotional blocks that Shinichi himself was currently having trouble with.

As he sifted through the footage, he grudgingly settled on being impressed. Heiji had just accepted Shinichi's situation immediately after learning about it. From there, learning there was another shrunken person didn't phase him that much. It took him less than an hour to come to terms with Ran's situation when he learned about it, and he didn't seem too put off with recent events, either. He just accepted there were two Shinichis now, even if he was rooting for Ran's recovery.

I bet if one of us had turned into an animal, he'd still end up being cool about it, he thought with a small chuckle. At least it was efficient. And as emotional as Heiji tended to be, it was more than a little surprising. He nodded to himself. Heiji was pretty impressive in that regard, though he would never admit that to anyone out loud.

For the first time since the clone woke up, Shinichi found himself feeling like a small weight had been lifted from his shoulders. It wasn't much, but it was just enough for him to get over moping about what he couldn't control. He would get through this.

Sifting through a few terabytes of video footage seemed easier now, even if he was still going at it by ten o'clock at night.

He didn't' stop until he felt a tap on his shoulder.

He turned around, preparing to tell Heiji to leave the footage to him for the night, but his words died in his throat when he found Not-Shinichi standing behind him.

A small voice in the back of his head that sounded suspiciously like Heiji told him he should really write a dissertation on why silence got so loud at times. He immediately ignored it, fighting the urge to laugh at its absurdity.

"What do you want?" he snapped, doing his best to keep an uncomfortable scowl from his face. "I'm busy."

Not-Shinichi's gaze flicked briefly at the computer screen before it returned to rest on Shinichi's face. His expression was detached, but determined.

"I don't know if you noticed, but I'm basically in the dark here," he said, words steady in a way Shinichi recognized from when he himself put on a brave face. It was unnerving. "The professor gave me a very brief gist of things, but I would at least like to know the details." Shinichi scrubbed his hands across his face, momentarily displacing his glasses.

"Right," he said as he slipped off the chair. "You can look at my notes if you want, and I can answer any questions you might have that they don't cover." He walked out of the room, the clone following behind. "But until your wound has been healing for a few more days, I don't recommend anything more than just skimming over the file." He glanced up just in time to see a sheepish grimace cross the other's face, which he chose to ignore.

They walked in strained silence; the house seemed to stretch unnaturally before them, and Shinichi wished that his room was closer to the library, or that he'd kept his notes in his room. He shook his head at that last thought, reminding himself that Ran would have been furious if he'd holed himself up in his room the way he did in the library.

Down the stairs, through the hall, and into the library they went; the tension between them might have snapped something if it had taken them any longer.

Shinichi led his clone to his father's desk, where most of his notes of the case were kept. They were strewn across the surface, having been abandoned for school that morning.

"All the information is there," he said, tone clipped, as he gestured at the desk. "I need to keep looking through some traffic footage, so if you need me I'll be upstairs." He left without looking back.

As Shinichi climbed up the stairs, he checked his watch. 10:30 PM. He still needed to go to school, but he just… wasn't tired, at least not in any way that sleep could help. Heiji was awake and back at the computer when he reached his room.

"Y'got a lot done," he said when he heard the door close. "I think I can finish pullin' the van footage tonight." He glanced at Shinichi. "Y'know, ya still haven't looked at the Nagano footage I pulled for ya," he said quietly.

"I've been busy," Shinichi said as he climbed up to sit on the edge of the bed.

"Y'got a spare computer?"

"Yes."

"Then you should look at it while I finish this," he said, and tossed something to Shinichi. He caught it and looked down at a USB thumb drive. He looked back up to see Heiji giving him a pointed look.

"… Fine," he said with a sigh, and slid back off the bed.

Rather than go to another room with a desktop, he elected to pull out his seldom-used laptop. He wouldn't admit it, but he really didn't want to be alone at the moment. At least if the clone came looking for him, Heiji's presence might make the interaction a tad more bearable.

With laptop in tow, Shinichi climbed back onto the bed. He opened and powered it on, staring over at the screen Heiji was watching as he waited. When the computer was on, he reluctantly turned his gaze in front of him. He stared at the thumb drive in his hand for a few seconds before jamming it into the USB port.

Two folders greeted him:

-Jane Doe

-Kudo's Asshole Crows

He nearly choked.

He stared at the Crows' folder for longer than he cared to admit, his insides twisting as he thought back to that encounter. In the end he ignored it in favor of the Jane Doe footage, quickly opening the folder even as he told himself it wasn't just so he didn't see the other one.

He carefully combed over the footage, following the woman backwards to where she was hopefully dropped off.

The task was grueling enough to keep his mind off things, at least.

It was past midnight when he finally discovered the drop-off itself. He bit back a curse as he watched it. True to the other victims, Jane Doe was brought back in the middle of the night. The problem here was the incredibly low visibility of the actual return. The streetlights in the area appeared to be broken, and the vehicle itself was just a dark blur.

The worst part was that the side street was located next to a busy road, and the turnout was in in the camera's blind spot. Without knowing what the car looked like, he couldn't' follow it to wherever it went, or track it back to where it came from.

He settled instead for examining the location itself. She'd been dropped off in front of another apartment complex, this one clearly in use. He frowned and sped up the footage a bit, stopping only when another person appeared and untied her. The lighting was better, so Shinichi looked at the time stamp. 6:47 AM. Jane Doe had been tied up and unseen for roughly five hours.

He watched as the two people exchanged words he couldn't hear, Jane Doe apparently waving off the man's concerns. She appeared to be trying to quickly get rid of him. When he reluctantly walked away and disappeared back onto the main street, the woman sighed deeply. She stared up at the apartment building for a long time before she slowly turned and walked away. Shinichi followed her through the footage just in case she stopped anywhere; she seemed to be wandering aimlessly, not even bothering to look at her surroundings. When she walked into the building she died in, he scratched his head.

If that other apartment was her home, why didn't she stay there…? He wondered as he navigated the videos back to the other building. He jotted the address down to save for later. If he couldn't get Kansuke to tell him about the Jane Doe, he would need to go back to Nagano to poke around that apartment himself.

A lump formed in his throat at the thought, and he resolved himself to go alone if it came down to that.

"Oi, Kudo," came Heiji's voice, cutting thought his thoughts. He looked up to find his friend staring at him from his place at the computer. His eyes sparkled with excitement, effectively gaining all of Shinichi's attention.

"Yes?"

"Come get a look at this," he said, a grin slowly spreading on his face. Shinichi set his laptop aside, a forgotten hope taking root in his chest, and slid off the bed to look at what Heiji was so excited about.

"So I just finished sortin' out the van footage, right?" he began as Shinichi got close. "An' I accidentally clicked on one of th' other files." Shinichi peered up at the screen. The video was paused angled towards an alley. His breath caught in his throat. Heiji hit "play."

A dark vehicle turned onto the street, slowing down just enough to dump what looked like a tied up body in front of one of the buildings. Shinichi's heart leapt to his throat as he looked at the time stamp: 1:15 AM. He gripped Heiji's arm to steady himself.

"F-follow it!" he managed to breathe out through the overwhelming tightness of his chest. "Hurry!"

Heiji dutifully clicked through the footage, following what appeared to be a blue sedan. Since Heiji was the one tracking it, Shinichi allowed himself to check the date on the cameras.

It was from two nights ago.

He swallowed hard, redirecting his attention to the car on the screen. He recognized some of the surroundings as being from Haido prefecture. His pulse roared in his ears as adrenaline flooded his system. He wasn't even sure if the car was related to Ran's case, but the fact that they dumped a bound body in front of a residential area in the middle of the night strongly indicated they were the same.

"SHIT!" yelled Heiji when he clicked into the next camera, only to find they lost the car. "Shit, shit, shit!"

He went back and checked all the nearby cameras, but the car had completely disappeared. Shinichi's grip on Heiji's arm tightened as he realized the car had entered a blind spot. He felt numb as he stared at the screen, the reality sinking in.

As amazingly useful as Kid's system was, it wasn't without limitations. Even if every street camera was available, it didn't change the fact that not every street had a camera. The cameras themselves were usually only placed in high traffic or accident-prone areas; the harsh reality being that anyone with enough knowledge could essentially travel completely unseen if they were so inclined.

"Where is this?" asked Heiji after he calmed down from his outburst. He scowled at the screen that was devoid of their quarry. Shinichi squinted.

"Looks like Shibuya," he said as Heiji clicked out to check the camera map, verifying it was indeed Shibuya. They both sighed.

"Guess now I gotta pull out all the blue sedan footage," grumbled Heiji. "Now I got twice as much work ta do."

Shinichi narrowed his eyes and took the computer mouse from Heiji. He rewound the footage, clicking through until he got a good view of the back of the car.

Gotcha.

"No," he said triumphantly as he zoomed in on the license plate. "We just need to see if it's possible to pinpoint this plate number in the system Kid gave us."

Heiji's grin was feral.

"It's not gonna be easy," he said as he rolled up his sleeves, "but I'll make it happen."

Now we're getting somewhere, Shinichi thought as he allowed a smirk to cross his lips. If they could actually make it work, he'd need to get the minivan's plate number from Takagi. Fake or not, it would undoubtedly show up on video.

Something tugged at the back of his mind—something still felt off, but he couldn't place what it was. He shook his head. This was a big lead, and nothing was going to spoil it for him. Things were finally starting to look up.