Windfall
By Ysabet
Chapter 5: Trial
and Error
Inspector Nakamori stared, outraged, at the carefully-written card
that lay on his desk. It had been there when he had arrived for work,
tucked neatly inside an interoffice-mail envelope (complete with the police
department’s official mail-stamp). And all he could think was, *How the HELL did he manage to--
how-- AAAGH!!!*
Even Time bows before the
Princess when she is present;
The Sun hides his face
when confronted by her
beauty
As she ascends to Heaven
in a cloud of angels’ wings.
Ohayo! Hope you like the riddle,
Inspector—I’ll be seeing you soon!
XXX
KAITOU KID
A faint sploosh! marked the demise of his morning cup
of coffee as his fingers contracted around the Styrofoam; the hot liquid rained
down unnoticed through through Nakamori’s
fist and onto his pants-leg as he began, softly at first, to swear.
Well, it *started out* softly—
Outside his office,
several aids and officers paused in the hall and exchanged worried, knowing
glances; a new secretary was stopped by one of her co-workers and prevented
from knocking on the Inspector’s door before the first echoes of his rising
tirade had bounced off the walls.
… and downstairs, a
certain mail-clerk (who looked oddly familiar, but not quite recognizable to
the other workers—but hey, they were really busy in the morning, and office
personnel changed all the time, you know?) chuckled to himself at the sound of Nakamori’s shouts as he slipped away to his favorite
window-exit. Whistling the closing theme from LUPIN III, the young man headed out— he didn’t want to be late for
school, after all…..
*************************************************************
It was Wednesday morning
and the usual river of kids were streaming in through the Beika
Elementary School gates like so many backpack-laden lemmings, most of them
chattering at the top of their lungs. Genta and
Mitsuhiko were deeply involved in a philosophical
discussion:
“JACKIE
CHAN!!”
“BRUCE
LEE!!”
“JACKIE
CHAN, you baka!! *He’s* a lot better than any old—“
“NO he’s not!!
Bruce Lee could knock him into—“
“He could *not*!!
JACKIE CHAN’S the best!!!”
“No way!! BRUCE LEE!!!”
… and so forth.
Rin, walking a little
ways back behind the two philosophers with Conan, Ai and Ayumi, rolled her
eyes; “Are they ever going to stop
arguing about that?” she wondered. “They’ve been going on and on about it every morning this week…..”
Conan shook his
head. “That’s what we get for going through my video collection. I
wonder if they have any idea how old those movies are, anyway?”
“You
don’t know what you’re talking about! In Shaolin Wooden Men he threw this—“
“Stuuuupid!!
In Return of the Dragon, Bruce
Lee went up against this bunch of—“
“—baka!
When Jackie was in Snake In Eagle’s
Shadow he did this cat sort of stuff, and *he* was just—“
“—and then he did these
flying kicks, and the bad guys were—“
“—but they got squashed
because he’s so COOL, and then he—“
“—so he kicked all his
enemies’ butts BIG time in The Chinese
Connection with these nunchakus—“
Ayumi shrugged, shimmying
her backpack more comfortably into place between her shoulderblades.
“Boys can be awfully dumb.” Conan opened his mouth, looking indignant;
then he sighed, realizing just how effectively he was outnumbered (since Genta and Mitsuhiko were
currently acting as object lessons in Ayumi’s theory
on male intellectual levels).
*Thanks, guys…..* The boy shoved his glasses back
into place from where they had slid down his nose; he glanced up at the sky and
frowned just a little. Clouds were beginning to slowly make their way
across the heavens, clumping and gathering like bales of dirty wool. So
much for Recess. He chuckled a little wryly to himself at the thought of
playground-time meaning so much to somebody who should’ve been out hunting for
his first car (if things had been normal, which of course they were not), but
you took what you could get.
He squinted at the
aforementioned clouds; they didn’t look too
bad….. not bad enough to make him change his after-school plans, anyway.
And rain would actually make things work out even better, so long as it didn’t
fall too heavily.
Conan had things to do after school today.
Memories of the tail-end
of his discussion with Ayumi from a few days before ran through his mind,
interspersed with calculations and decisions…..
“Ayumi? I know you meet this ‘Hei-san’
on Friday afternoons—don’t look at me like that, I’d be a pretty poor detective
if I hadn’t figured out you had a good reason for *meeting* us at the park
every Friday and not just *walking* there with us-- Are you supposed to
meet with him this Friday too?”
“I…. no, he said he was gonna be sort of busy; he said that
if I wanted to practice, we could meet on Wednesday afternoon instead…..
But I can’t; ‘cause ‘Kaasan’s going to pick me up
from school to go to the dentist. I forgot all about that—!“
“Ayumi-kun… listen. Could I meet him *for* you?
It’s okay—he needs to know that I know about him, right? And no, I don’t
think he’ll be mad at all—I promise I’ll make sure he knows you told me his
name by accident. Please?........ I won’t go unless you say I can………”
…………..
“Please?”
“……… okay. But you HAVE to make sure he knows I
didn’t—didn’t tell on him on purpose.”
“I promise. Um…. One more thing (*sigh*); can
I-- borrow your umbrella, Ayumi-kun?”
“My WHAT??” His friend had stared at him for a few
seconds—then dissolved into a fit of giggles.
The boy chuckled again; that should work….. he could feel the
small weight of the little girl’s umbrella in his backpack—it was an old one
from when she was much smaller, kept for sentimental reasons; Ayumi had been
teased about it more than once, but defiantly still used it on rainy
days. His small grin faded considerably as he thought about just why she
had giggled when he asked to borrow it… he was going to look pretty damned
stupid with a kiddy umbrella of *that*
type—
The things he did for his
friends… and he had had to trade her one more day on his skateboard for it,
too; she was a pretty shrewd bargainer for an eight-year-old. Sulking a
little, Conan/Shinichi sent an entirely mental one-finger-salute in Kaitou
Kid’s direction; *This had better be
worth the trouble, dammit. And if you ARE planning on making problems for
me or Ran or Ayumi, I’m going to put a sleeping dart right between your—*
“Conan-kun?”
*-- eyes.* “Hm?
What?” Ayumi was tugging on his elbow.
She looked a little
worried; as they entered the main building, she leaned over a little to
whisper. “Does—have you talked to Haibara-san yet? About me finding
out, I mean--?”
He glanced back
involuntarily at the blonde girl, who had dropped a little ways behind them;
the calm, rather expressionless face of the former scientist was looking a
little paler than usual today—not exactly a surprise, all things
considered. “Yeah… I did. Last night.” It had not,
admittedly, been pretty; for once, Ai had lost her composure she had managed to
keep after her first realization up at the Mouris’
and *shouted* at him angrily
(although, thinking back, he had to admit that the anger had held a strong note
of panic as well). The worst thing about the whole conversation was that
he had no excuse, not really—he HAD
been clumsy, too many mistakes had been made, and someone who should never had
been able to figure things out had done a damned fine job of doing just that.
Conan knew Ai liked
Ayumi-kun; the somewhat chilly young woman/young girl had managed to thaw more
than a bit around the edges here and there, mostly due to Ayumi’s
determined air of friendship. Sometimes she didn’t seem to quite know how
to handle the little girl’s puppy-like playfulness (he hadn’t missed the way
‘Haibara-san’ had been gradually becoming ‘Ai-kun’), which led him to believe
that she had quite possibly never had any friends as a child.
Well, *that* had changed…..
Ayumi-kun was still
looking troubled; as they changed their shoes for school-scuffs, she ducked her
head and said quietly, “Is she—mad at me?” Beside her, Rin glanced
up and met Conan’s eyes with her own.
The boy shuffled into his
own scuffs; from the corner of his eye he could see the blonde’s rather stiff
back heading down the hall towards their classroom. “Not mad, no— she’s
just a little insecure.” He hesitated, keeping his voice down (although
that was hardly necessary, considering that Genta and
Mitsuhiko had moved into Round Two of the Great
Debate at this point: quoting lines from their favorite movies).
“You have to understand… she’s been through a lot, Ayumi-kun. She lost
her home, people she cared about, everything she knew—all because of… well,
*you* know who.” He gave her a warning look.
“But… you did too,” she pointed out, her small face
creasing in confusion. “You had to go and live with Ran-neechan—“ and she glanced at Rin, a quick flicker of
widened eyes, “—and you couldn’t go to school with your friends anymore, or
even wear your own clothes—“
At that he
chuckled. “Well, that’s not quite
true… remember that sort of stupid-looking jacket I wore a lot at first?
The blue one? That was mine when I was a kid the first time around,” he
explained. “It fit me again—I got it from my old house—so that’s what I
wore. I guess it sort of made me feel a little more like *myself,* you know?” He could hear
Rin repressing a gurgle of laughter.
Ayumi blinked, then
wrinkled her nose. “It was sort of dorky, actually… so’s
your bow-tie, but we all got used to that.” she informed him
straightforwardly. The other girl lost the battle against her laughter at
this point.
“I know, I know,” he
sighed, picking up his backpack. Over Rin’s
giggling he did his somewhat red-faced best to change the subject. “Now,
about Ai--?” They walked into the classroom; Ai was over to one side of
the class, listening silently as the teacher spoke to her with a slightly
harassed expression (Conan shuddered at the thought of having to deal with the
former scientist as a student, much less a classmate). “She wants to talk
to you, I think—“
The child hesitated;
then, the look that Conan had become so familiar with over the past year
settled in, raising her chin and squaring her jaw. “That’s good, because
I want to talk to *her* too. She’s my friend… and I have a present for
her anyway; I’ll do it at Recess.” Catching up the strap of her backpack
in one hand, she smiled at them both a little tentatively, a little
unsure.
“Conan? Rin?
Is it—easier or harder, being a kid again? I mean, was it easier the first
time? I always thought that grownups were so much smarter than little
kids….. and you *are* really, really
smart, but you still worry about stuff and get things wrong sometimes, sooooo— Is it easier? or harder?”
She tilted her head inquisitively, dark eyes curious.
Conan looked at Rin—Rin
looked at Conan; then they both looked at Ayumi and shrugged. Rin was the
first to speak. “Easier… a *few* things are easier, like… well,
schoolwork is, I guess….. and you don’t have to pay for things much anymore;
that’s kind of nice. People *do*
treat you differently when you’re a kid—you know, I never thought that much
about it before, but when you’re small they either pay a lot of attention to
you or none at all—“
The little girl looked
puzzled; she hadn’t noticed, actually. Her friend went on as they sat
down in their desks, her eyes reflective: “It’s easier in some ways
because you don’t worry about certain things that are important when you’re
older—what people think of you, for instance… the older you get, the more that
matters. It’s kind of funny, but you don’t realize how much it matters until you don’t have to
care about it any more…”
The boy settling into the
desk beside her paused as he slid his backpack off. “You always were
a clotheshorse… you and Sonoko-kun; get you two anywhere near a store and the
best thing a guy could do was run for his life—“
She stuck her tongue out
at him. “Complain, complain, complain; we only dragged you along a few
times… and we hardly ever made you try on stuff. Later on, after you, um,
started wearing a smaller size… I guess it happened a little more often then,
maybe—“
Conan slid his pack into
place on the back of his chair with a whump and a mock-sulky look. “—‘More often’…?
Try *every time you went* and you’ll get it right. It was twice as bad,
too… at least *before* I never had to go with you when you bought underwear—“
“Awp!”
Blushing, Rin attempted
to thwack him on the top of the head with her knuckles; laughing, he dodged,
then leaned back with his hands linked behind his head. “You’re still a clotheshorse, you know… I
saw all that stuff you and Sonoko brought home last weekend; I think she’s
enjoying dressing you up, just like a living doll…..”
Rin’s blush deepened a little;
she flicked back a strand of hair from her face and her smile forced a
reluctant giggle out from hiding. That shopping trip *had* been a bit excessive, and she had rather enjoyed trying
everything on and then displaying each outfit in an impromptu living room
fashion-show later, much to Sonoko’s delight.
“Well, we both saw you watching me
from the hallway when I was showing off my new clothes to Okaasan;
you didn’t seem too put-upon then…..”
Now HE blushed, muttering something indistinct; a faint smile tugged at
the corner of his mouth.
“Hey!”
They each jumped a
little; Ayumi was frowning severely at them both from her seat, hands on her
hips. “If you two’re going to do
boyfriend-girlfriend talk like a pair of grownups
I’m going to go to take a nap, ‘cause it’s booooring— mushy stuff, eeeew…..“ She leaned her head on one elbow, closed
her eyes and made mock-snoring noises. Her classmates eyed her with
surprise, then shrugged a small shrug at each other.
Ayumi cracked open one
eye, giggling a little at their expressions. “You told me about the
‘easier’ stuff; is being a kid again harder too?”
This time Conan answered,
running one hand through his hair as his blush faded. “Harder… I don’t even know where to
start. You can’t use your own name—you have to get used to a new
one. You can’t wear your old clothes, have to get used to being half as
tall as you were and a *lot* lighter and weaker… You have to learn all
sorts of new rules, too, the ones you missed recognizing the first time
around—that grownups really *don’t* pay much attention, that you’re more likely
to be disbelieved than believed just for
being a kid, that anybody below elbow-level is suddenly a second-class
citizen—“ (Ayumi opened her mouth to ask what that was, then decided to ask
later). “But… the worst bit…..” he hesitated, and both of the
listeners eyed him with varying degrees of concern as Conan’s eyes darkened
with Kudo Shinichi’s remembered unhappiness and terror.
*-- the worst-- Waking up and realizing what had
happened to me, being lost that way and not knowing if there would EVER be a
way home-- Waiting for Them to come and find me, waiting to die all over
again, this time with *company* and for good—*
“Conan…” Rin’s eyes were very gentle as she touched his sleeve with
one small hand; for the barest second another face seemed to take the place of
her child’s countenance: older, the image of a young woman who was now
nothing more than the ghost of shared memories. Her expression was
concerned as well, and the look in both pairs of eyes helped immeasurably as he
pushed away the old pain of loss.
The boy sighed, shaking
his head. “Never mind, Ayumi; sometime later, maybe.” That sort of
thing wasn’t for a child to hear—not the loneliness, not the absolute fear he had had to deal with for so many
months upon waking each morning: that somehow he had slipped up, that the
Black Organization had *found* him and would kill everyone connected to both
one Kudo Shinichi and Edogawa
Conan…..
No, none of that was for Ayumi’s ears; he had nightmares enough for them both.
*Besides,* he added quietly in his
mind, *It’s better now. No, the
Black Org hasn’t gone away; yes, I’m still a kid; no, they haven’t paid yet for
all the evil they’ve done. Yet. But I’m not alone anymore, selfish
as I am to be happy about that. It’s not so bad now.* He forced
a grin, waving away Ayumi’s worried look; the kid had
enough to think about right now anyway. “The absolute worst? Well…..” There
was a pregnant pause as both girls waited; he shrugged once, rather
nonchalantly. “There are the
school lunches… and having to deal with the Video Twins back there, too, that
can be a pain—“ He stuck a thumb in the direction of Genta
and Mitsuhiko, who were only now noisily plopping
down into their desks.
The two boys (having
caught the last sentence) looked indignant, breaking off the Great Kung-Fu
Debate to plop down on either side of Conan. Each one opened his mouth in
rebuttal…..
“Huh? Just because we—“
“Hey! We’re—“
… but a “Hmph!” from Ayumi-kun stopped them both in their
tracks. “I don’t know why you’re arguing so much, anyway—Jet Li’s MUCH cooler than Jackie Chan *or*
Bruce Lee.” She tossed her head a little and grinned at a startled Conan
and Rin, then turned towards their somewhat-harried-looking teacher; case
closed.
Mitsuhiko and Genta
each hesitated—then, as one, shrugged in either agreement or surrender and fell
silent as their day officially began.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
Sitting a little to one
side, Ai spared the rest of her small collection of friends a silent glance as
the teacher began to speak; her usually cool gaze rested for a long moment on Ayumi’s profile as the child bent over her paper, analyzing
and calculating. But… if anyone had been observing closely, they just
*might* have thought they had seen the faintest shadow of fear in that quiet, measuring look—
-- Of course they would
have been wrong, though; and Ai would have been the first to tell them so,
too. In detail.
* * * * * * * * * * * * *
When it rained during
Recess, the children tended to do one of two things: they either loitered
beneath the school walkways and overhangs bordering the playground or they took
their chances in the weather out of sheer unspent energy and a grim
determination not to waste precious non-class time in *anything* other than play.
Ai tended to read.
She sat in a small alcove
to one side of the main walkway, a one-person space shaped by the angles
between two cement supports and the building’s wall. Light rain drummed
softly on the roof overhead, its clean scent mixing with the usual smells of
playground, wet sidewalks and dead leaves from the trees nearby; normally it
would have been soothing.
Normally….. The
small ex-scientist frowned in exasperation, attempting to ignore both the
shrill chatter of voices and the proximity of the raindrops (not to mention the
nagging, incessant unease that crept around the edges of her thoughts, using
phrases like Ayumi-Know* or I-Have-To-Do-Something and I-Should-Leave) that kept prodding her
attention away from her book.
No good; she couldn’t
keep her mind on the pages in front of her. Closing the copy of ‘The Origins of Order’ that she
had managed to hide between the gutted covers of ‘Ryo’s Big Jungle Adventure', Haibara Ai leaned back with an
annoyed sigh to watch her classmates play in the early Autumn rain.
They moved so
chaotically… random dashes through the thin patter of drops, skids and splashes
of activity, without apparent motive or pattern; but she had learned
differently over the past year, was learning more so every day. Ai ran
one finger across the cheerful false cover of her book (*False, just like me,* her thoughts whispered clearly) and quoted
something beneath her breath from the contents within: “’Whenever a collection of chemicals
contains enough different kinds of molecules, a metabolism will crystallize.’”
The small figures out there in the rain—they were the chemicals and her class
was the metabolism, she supposed. Or maybe that was too narrow a
definition; Life, that was the
metabolism of course… this younger generational subset that she had so
unwillingly joined.
Idly she wondered if she
would live long enough to see it mature.
A slight shuffling noise
on the other side of the right-hand cement support made her grimace in
irritation; wonderful. Mitsuhiko-kun, probably,
or (if she were lucky) Kudo. Or Rin—she was finding life somewhat easier
to bear since the inclusion of the third adult in their own admittedly peculiar
‘subset’; it helped a little, having one more person around who could think at
a level beyond ‘Ryo’s Big Jungle
Adventure’.
“Haibara-san?”
*NOT Rin or Kudo, then; Ayumi.* She noted that the
more familiar ‘Ai-kun’ had shifted back to ‘Haibara-san’ with faint, somewhat
sour amusement; doubtless the child would keep her distance now. The
tentative friendship between them was over, then; but that was as it should be,
of course… she had more important things to think about than friendship with a
preadolescent gradeschooler, no matter how much it had eased things
occasionally over the past months.
No matter how much the
child reminded the former Miyano Shiho of her sister
at times….. Nonsense, all of it; pure useless sentiment.
Wasn’t it?
“I’ve got a present for
you.”
*What…?*
THAT wasn’t what she had expected— reserve, yes,
uncertainty and even a little fear, yes… but a present? What in the
world--? She sat forward a little, craning her head around the cement
support as curiously as any… well, as anyone with a good, solid streak of
scientific interest; she had *not*
nearly thought “as any child”. Of course not.
Ayumi-kun leaning back
against the buttress, one arm hugging her notebook to her chest and the other
clutching a slightly wrinkled piece of paper; mutely she held it out to the
blonde girl, who took it and stared in confusion.
The picture was… of
herself, apparently; done in markers or some such, it held a crude rendition of
a lab-coated, adult Haibara Ai with a flask in hand. *Not too bad a drawing, really, for someone who has never seen me like
this; am I supposed to put it up on my refrigerator or something?*
The other figure was clearly Ayumi; but why was she…?
“It’s a… I think you call
it a *contract*” said the little girl quietly. “See—that’s you, the way
you used to be—“ One small and slightly grubby finger tapped the
white-coated flask-toting shape as the child twisted around a little.
“The other one’s me, and I’ve got my mouth covered up to show I *WON’T TELL ANYBODY.*” The
emphasis on the last three words came out iron-clad and determined, accompanied
by a scowl that would have done credit to the most cantankerous University professor.
*A… contract. A contract? But—what is the
word of a child worth?* The gradeschooler who had once been Miyano Shiho felt memories, painful ones, welling up from
the cold black depths of her past:
(Two girls, sisters, clinging to each other in the aftermath
of their parents’ deaths. They knew someone had been arranged to take
care of them, but right then that didn’t matter. And they had sworn
(hadn’t they?) to do just that—to take care of each other no matter what; it
was all either of them had left.)
Still staring at the
drawing, Ai felt her fingers tighten on the paper. Such small, weak
fingers—she could do so little with them, felt so futile at times, so
damned helpless—needed so much more than she was willing to allow herself to
accept— Even the comfort of a little girl’s friendship; even that should
have been beyond what she should allow herself to take. She hadn’t been
able to keep her promise to her sister, had she?
“Ai-kun?” *So we’re back to ‘Ai-kun’ now…* she
thought curiously; her eyes seemed to be burning a little, and she rubbed at
them in irritation. *Why? And
why should she be offering this to me?*
Ai had to know.
“Ayumi-kun? A…
contract? Why?”
The little girl fidgeted
just a bit, both hands clutching her notebook even tighter now.
“Because….. you need it to feel better. You like stuff down on paper lots
better than just things people say—I guess that’s why you read all the time
instead of talking.” (Ai blinked at this rather interesting
insight.) “So I made a contract—I was listening to my ‘Kaasan on the phone, and she was talking about contracts at
work and so I asked her and she told
me about them.”
See?” Ayumi pointed
at the paper again, her eyes growing a little impatient at the other’s apparent
obtuseness. “This is you, all
grown up—and this is me, NOT TALKING
TO ANYBODY about you being all grown up. And now…..” She pulled
herself up to her knees, fishing around inside her notebook for something; a
green marker came out, and with great care the child wrote her name at the
bottom of the page.
“Now *you* sign it. That’ll make it a real contract.” She
held out the marker.
*But… but…*
Moments later Haibara Ai
stared down at her own neat calligraphy, a scientist’s careful notation without
even the faintest tinge of the gradeschooler about it. She was rather
bemused to see that she had actually written ‘HAIBARA AI / MIYANO SHIHO’, just
as if the first name wasn’t as false as her appearance.
Just as if she were both persons, not just the latter
masquerading beneath the mask of the former.
*…..but…. I…..*
Ayumi nodded, a look of
relief on that absurdly young face (had *she*
ever looked that young, the first time around?). The little girl folded
the paper and tucked it carefully inside Ai’s own book like a bookmark.
“Good. You keep that—now you KNOW I won’t tell anybody, ‘cause you’ve got
a contract. It’s sort of like a pinky-swear, only better, right, because
our names are on it? Right!” She nodded firmly, pleased. “And
now you don’t have to worry anymore, and we can stay friends.”
The child looked so much like Shiho’s sister just
then.
“C’mon!”
….. and still more than
two-thirds stunned, she found herself being tugged to her feet and out into the
light rain. “Ai-kun’s ‘IT’!!!” bellowed Genta from where
he sprawled half on top of Mitsuhiko, half in the
mud; shrieking, the rest of her classmates took off in all directions like
charged electrons. She stood there, water dripping from her bangs, not
quite sure of what to do or why she suddenly felt so shaky inside; and a few
feet away Ayumi turned back to look at her with an unexpectedly sympathetic
grin.
“It’s okay, Ai-kun; you
can play now.”
Behind her she could hear
Conan and Rin’s surprised murmur; no doubt they were
wondering why she was standing out there like a fool, getting wet. Well,
she was wondering too; but somehow (just this once) she didn’t care.
Besides, acting like one more molecule among many was good camouflage, correct?
Of course it was; her heart seemed to lighten oddly and Haibara Ai set
off after the nearest of her classmates at a dead run (and a very accurate
trajectory, to boot). Later, Conan would swear he had heard her laughing.
*************************************************************
Wednesday afternoon;
school was out, the rain was still falling softly, and the river of children
was streaming homeward. It was an odd river, composed mostly of bubbles—tall
bubbles, short bubbles, printed bubbles, plain bubbles, plastic or oiled silk
or nylon, ribbed and seamed and bobbing like floats in a current. A
watcher from above would have eventually identified the bubbles as umbrellas.
One bubble—that is, one umbrella pulled aside from a cluster of
similarly small ones, heading northwards down a sidestreet;
a second umbrella (dark blue, with a flower motif) accompanied it for a few
minutes, then hurried back to the straggling clump that was still making its
way downstream. Rain drizzled quietly from above, and all the afternoon
air was gray and soft.
The umbrella was a small
one, carried by a small, slight figure; tennishoes splashed through the rain
and dead leaves at the margin of the park, sending thin arcs of spray to
scatter across the ground from the soaked laces as they swung. The
footsteps were solid, sturdy and light on the sodden grass; they seemed to know
exactly where they were going.
And up a certain tree,
halfway across the park…..
*….. sixteen… seventeen…
eighteen, whups, almost lost ‘em… nineteen… twenty…
twenty-one……*
Hei-san was playing with
cards again. This wasn’t exactly unusual; he shuffled, dealt, flipped,
fanned, and generally handled decks of cards during at least a quarter of his
waking hours without really thinking about it—cards were part of a magician’s
stock-in-trade, as much a tool as a prime indicator of the dealer’s state of
mind. When he was annoyed, he shuffled them back and forth from hand to
hand at a rapid speed; when he was happy, he tended to make full poker-hands
(good ones, too) pop up in odd places among his friends’ belongings.
Right now Hei-san was *plotting*;
and so he was building a house of cards, delicately balanced on the palm of one
hand. Up a tree, too, ten feet or so into the air. In the rain.
Sometimes he just amazed
himself, really.
*Gotta hand it to you, Thief Boy, when you get in heist-mode
you’re pretty good. Detailed, precise, covering all the bases… pretty
damned smug about it too, better watch that…….… twenty-four…………. twenty-five…….
twenty-six, twenty-seven, watch it……… twenty-eight….. damn, I’m good…….
twenty-nine (wonder where ‘Yumi-chan is?)…..
thirty…..*
He places the next card
down delicately, adjusting his angle to block the wind; a slight movement of
color caught his attention from the corner of his eye—there was an umbrella
crossing the park. Hei-san grinned to himself,
recognizing the pattern—
*Bingo. Wonder what Aoko
would say if I told her I was meeting Another Woman? One who tends to use
a bright red HelloKitty umbrella when it
rains….. I kinda suspect she’d question my taste and then let me have it
but good with the business end of her mop.*
The umbrella was
approaching; he had left his at home today, preferring to fend off the light
rain with his nylon jacket-hood. As the short little legs beneath the red
dome arrived beneath his tree, he called out cheerfully, “Yo,
‘Yumi-chan! Didn’t think you’d make it there
for a bit—“ Carefully he balanced the last card on top of his creation (*… and thirty-two!*), leaning against
the water-slick treetrunk. “Got something to
show you here—whatcha think? Look up!”
Proudly he held it out in front of him, peering over the top with a large grin.
The umbrella tilted back
just a bit… and then hesitated,
wavering.
“I’d be glad to, but—do
you *really* want me to ‘look up’
right now?” said a rather dry young voice.
*…………ohSHIT ! ! ! ! !*
--- aaaaaaand
he was UP the tree another three or four meters without the
faintest sensation or memory of climbing; cards were still falling in all
directions like a red-and-white snowstorm, and somehow that red ‘HelloKitty’ umbrella had just managed to become the most
threatening thing in his immediate existence. *@#$#$%!!!*
The red umbrella seemed
to be snickering.
Hei-san couldn’t seem to
catch his breath— he found himself firmly ensconced in a thick spray of
autumn-red leaves, dripping and chilly but most of all *giving good coverage*. Camoflage
was suddenly a WONDERFUL concept, and he tugged his hood down as far as it
would go as his trademark Poker Face slammed down like a shield.
“DAMN you, Kudo,
what the hell’re you trying to do? Give me a heart attack??” The angry
words were out of his mouth before he could think.
The red umbrella was STILL snickering; it visibly
shook. “Sorry about that… couldn’t resist.” The calm, amused voice
didn’t sound sorry at all.
Shakily Hei-san nodded to himself, still trying to gather the
tattered remnants of his composure; he supposed he would have done the same
(numerous instances with Nakamori sprang to mind, for
instance; *I always knew those would come
back to haunt me…..*) With his heartbeat thudding like a metronome he
peered downwards through the leaves, wondering if he was high enough for his
features to be indistinguishable; probably, what with the rain and his hood and
all…..
“So—have you become a
closet HelloKitty fan, or did you just mug Ayumi for
her umbrella?” he snapped out, still angry, his pulse sounding in his
ears. “I can’t believe she’d just say ‘Hey, Conan-kun, want to pretend to
be me and go meet with my juggling instructor?’” He mimicked the
little-girl tones flawlessly, and the red umbrella shifted as if the small
fists holding the shaft had tightened.
*Goddammit, I knew this was only a
matter of time, but shit!! I
wanted to set the meeting up between us, I
wanted to be the one in control-- Kudo’s just
too @#$#!! unpredictable!! Too quick on the uptake, too hard to
outsmart….. and now he’s got me up a tree. Just flipping GREAT.*
“For your information,
she didn’t just say
anything—not willingly, anyway. The name ‘Hei-san’
slipped out accidentally, and…”
“…and you figured things
out from there.” He tried not to sound like he was sulking. *Way to GO, Kaito.
You should have used a different name, you blithering, brainless moron—then he
wouldn’t have made the connection. But nooo,
you just *had* to go and use ‘Hei-san’ all over again,
just because you sort of missed being the character (he WAS fun, except for
having to clean all the time) and because you thought ‘Yumi-chan
might feel better about a familiar-sounding name---*
“Well? Here I am,
no hang-glider, no bag of tricks—aren’t you planning on shooting me with one of
those little anesthetic needles of yours?” Heart still beating hard, he
shifted slightly and eyed the branches of the next tree over. He was
pretty sure he could make it if he was careful—and there was a nice tall pine
beyond that, and then—
A snort from below; then
one hand reached out from the umbrella, dangling something silver from a
finger. “Not today… truce.” The face of the dartgun-watch
glinted in the pewter-grey light, droplets beading on the glass.
-- he should be able to
outrun those stumpy little legs without much trouble, assuming the Shrimp
hadn’t managed to station cops all around the park’s perimeter-- *What? WHAT did he just say? Did
I just hear Kudo use the word ‘truce’?? Riiiight…
next thing I know, Nakamori-san’s gonna wish me Good
Luck on my next heist. Kudo does NOT make truces with wanted felons.*
The thief was silent, staring down; the HelloKitty
face on the umbrella seemed to grin mockingly up at him.
*…goddamned thing looks JUST like Spot, the Cat From Hell;
never noticed that before…* He shuddered, vowing silently to avoid all HelloKitty products in the future (even the Choco Pie Cookies). “Did—you just say ‘truce’? Why??”
Silence from below.
Then, reluctantly: “Because… I owe you one. I’m not happy
about it, but—I pay my debts.” The red umbrella tilted back a little,
making the HelloKitty face seem to leer
lopsidedly. “You’re not in any danger from me today—no darts, no cops, no
surveillance, nothing. I just want to talk.”
The hand tossed the watch down onto the grass, where it lay shining dully among
the cards and dead leaves.
The magician shifted
uncomfortably, feeling his Poker Face grow even more enigmatic; for some
reason, *talk* was NOT a comforting
word. Still….. no darts, no cops, no surveillance? Just—talking? That didn’t sound too
bad; of course, he’d feel a lot better if he hadn’t been trapped up a tree with
a sort of simulacrum Cat From Hell standing down below…..
“Talk, hm? And just what would you like to talk about today,
Conan-kun?” He carefully adjusted the placement of his feet a little,
settling into the crook of two branches in a way that would allow for quick
movements if necessary. “You’re not still mad about my showing up in your
hospital room, are you? Glad to see you’re feeling better, by the way…..
oh, and if you want to look up, go right ahead.”
Unless the Twerp had a telescope or a pair of binoculars on him, he shouldn’t
have a problem….. he hoped…..
But he found himself
holding his breath as he watched the boy tilt the umbrella slowly back and turn
those sharp, sharp eyes his way.
The expression on that
innocent little-boy countenance was as bland and unrevealing as his own Poker
Face, giving away nothing; the eyes, though—something was bugging Kudo, and doing a good job of it too. Hmmmmm….. He never could manage to leave well enough alone; so he decided to prod a
little. “You’re being awfully quiet for somebody who came here to talk—
and why should I hang around to listen, anyway? Correct me if I’m wrong,
but aren’t you usually trying to
catch me?“
With an annoyed grunt,
the faux gradeschooler shrugged his narrow shoulders. “You seem to have
plenty to say; and you know the old saw about giving somebody enough
rope…..” At the irritated rustle of leaves from high above, a small smirk
seemed to struggle onto the childish face, banishing the grimness that had
accompanied the admission of ‘owing Hei-san
one.’ The boy pulled his jacket a little tighter around his shoulders,
seeming to relax a little. “As for catching you…. Much as that’d make my
day, this is more important. Don’t get me wrong—I *still* have you on my own personal ‘Most Wanted’ list, but….. not
today.”
Hei-san felt the slightest
edge of his own hair-trigger nerves slacking off, just a bit; if there was one
thing he was pretty sure of, it was Kudo’s almost
painful tendency towards honesty. All that ‘Only One Truth’, etc.,
etc….. *Rrrgh.
That’s one of the hard things about being one of the Good Guys
twenty-four-seven: you have to keep your nose so utterly
squeaky-clean. I think it’d cramp my style eventually… not that being a
thief who returns his thefts is exactly a bed of roses, but…..)
Well—Miracle of miracles,
Kudo seemed to be actually willing to chat for a bit. *So let’s make the most of it!*
A small smirk began to make its way onto his face, and with the mercurialness
so typical of the famed Kaitou Kid the young thief suddenly decided to get… *playful*.
“Fine! Let’s talk,
then!” His voice took on an alarmingly cheery note, causing the boy below
him to blink. “So—nice weather we’re having, isn’t it? Seen any
good soccer games lately? How’s the schoolwork—read any good kiddy books
since I quit the Janitorial field? Speaking of which, who took my
place? Better tell ‘em there’s a leak in the bathroom over by the main
office—I tried to fix the bugger, but the toilets just kept—“
“What are your intentions
towards Ayumi?”
*Whoooo…. Sounding a bit CRANKY
there, aren’t we, Kudo? Matter of fact, you sound like a suspicious
father.*
He muffled a snicker and attemped a serious answer…
… to no avail. He
just couldn’t pass this up…..
“Well, y’know, I *HAD* intended to just teach her a few tricks,
but since she’s coming along so nicely I figured she’d make a great little Phantom
Thief one of these days; all magicians are supposed to have Lovely Assistants,
aren’t they? We’ll start small, just the occasional easy break-in and
robbery—she can follow right behind me, I can make her a cute little
mini-glider, maybe with a HelloKitty motif—and then
when she gets a bit older we’ll move up to AAAWWWWK!!!”
**bwaWHACKKK!!!***
The pinecone hit the treetrunk beside him at a rapid velocity, splintering into
a hundred soggy, sharp wooden pieces; they rained all over the place and covered
the bug-eyed thief with a scatter of turpentine-scented shrapnel. “OKAY,
OKAY!!! Jeeze, can’t you take a joke?” He irately brushed scraps
of wood from his face, wondering if he would ever be able to pry his other hand
from its grip on the bark. “Just kidding….. Man, *some*
people need to *lighten up* a little….. and I thought you said ‘truce’!!”
The figure below him
shrugged again. “I said I wouldn’t shoot you with my watch-darts—I didn’t
say anything about my shoes, did I? So: one more time. What are
your intentions towards Ayumi?”
The thief sighed, pulling
his hood a little further down. “Chill out, Kudo. I don’t mean her
any harm at all—hell, I saved her life already once, or have you conveniently
forgotten that little fact? She’s in no danger from me whatsoever.”
He laughed a little, picking another splinter of pinecone from his
collar. “I didn’t even MEAN to keep in contact with her; I just kept an
eye out for a bit, sort of making sure she wasn’t too traumatized by that bastard
Ojiwa….. She’s a good kid; I liked her—she’s
pretty damned brave, and I guess I sort of decided to watch her for a
bit. Only, she talked to me one day here in the park, and one thing led
to another….. and the next thing I knew I was giving her lessons every week.”
He sulked a little, stuffing his hands into his pockets and leaning against the
wet branches with a scowl.
“She’s a pretty
persuasive kid, y’know that? I guess you
probably do. Smart, too….. and no, I am *NOT* teaching her to
steal! Give me a break, Kudo—what the hell do you think I am? Some kind of—”
“I don’t know *what* you are,” said the boy flatly,
staring up at him with a hard, dark blue stare. “You’re no older than I
am—my real age, I mean--- You steal things and return them, make a big
flash and fuss about it, help the occasional person out without apparent rhyme
or reason, and now you’re teaching one of
my friends magic tricks…..”
Then he dropped his glare
towards the grass (which Hei-san half expected to
start withering). “And you know about me… and you’ve never breathed a
word, have you? You could have, but you haven’t. Why not?”
The low voice had
absolutely nothing childish about it at that moment, despite its timbre—just a
sort of weary curiosity; he really wanted to know. “Why haven’t you leaked it to the tabloids or something,
just to keep me busy? They’d love it—‘Gradeschooler Actually Missing
Detective Teen!’—wouldn’t that just look great on Page One of some cheesy
newspaper somewhere?” He gritted his teeth. “Mouri would *totally*
lose it over something like that…..”
Despite the almost joking
words, there was very little humor to be heard— but there was a strange something, a something that the young thief began to
realize might actually be… fear.
*Ah; NOW I see why he wanted this confrontation—it must’ve
been driving him crazy, knowing that *I* know and wondering why I haven’t done
anything about it. I’m supposed to be the bad guy, after all; it’s not
surprising, really, that he’d be on the defensive.* Self-flattery
aside and all that, he knew it wasn’t Kaitou Kid that the boy below him was
afraid of—it was exposure, of himself and Mouri Ran and whoever else was mixed
up in his bizarre little enigma. Hei-san had
never been able to find out exactly what had happened to put Kudo in such a
weird situation (or to allow his girlfriend to *follow* him, which was even
stranger), but there was no way in Hell the teenager had gotten this way
voluntarily. No doubt about that
one…..
Staring down from his
perch, he could still remember the shock of finding out…..
***
A little bird had told him, really.
It was right after the whole ‘Magician’s Club’ mess—he had
been a little shaken by that one, having been not only involved in a murder
mystery firsthand but also close enough to see the boy go about his
business. ‘Gradeschooler’….. yeah, right. Something was seriously
WARPED about that kid—his body language was all wrong, even when he was trying
his hardest; just a little too stiff, just a little too contrived. Oh, he
was good enough to fool just about everyone else, but not good enough to
fool somebody whose very life and freedom depended on being able to mimic the
voices and identities of others.
Kaito couldn’t
figure it out; this WAS a kid, not a midget or a dwarf—his proportions, weight
and development were a kid’s. It was just his intellect and attitude that
weren’t….. natural.
He’d been in disguise himself, which had made the study even
more interesting and amusing. A disguised thief studying a person who
seemed to be wearing the ultimate mask-- He didn’t know what or
who that mask concealed as yet but he knew it was there, knew *something* was
there….. even though his common sense kept trying to knock him on the head and
go ‘Hello! Little kid, right?’
So: after all the fuss was over and the players were
back at their home bases, he had sent his own private little ‘secret agent’ out
to keep tabs on the boy. He’d trained one of his doves only a few months
earlier to carry a tiny radio on one leg, something he could use (and *did* use
later on) to eavesdrop on Nakamori at critical
moments. It had been fun, the testing period—he had set the bird to
following various people (the ‘lure’ for the bird to follow had been a
centimeter-wide sticker of red paper, which had been child’s play to attach to
one of his targets’ shoulders. Even Conan’s—it had helped that the kid
was so short—a brush against a stranger on a crowded sidewalk had produced
excellent results).
It was amazing just what you learned about people when they
thought no-one was listening in. Nakamori’s
fascination with horse race radio broadcasts, Hakuba’s
irritating habit of talking to himself, Aoko’s
tendency to sing to herself as she walked…..
Most of the eavesdropping sessions had been about 80% boring
(there was nothing interesting about hearing a person walking on the sidewalk,
for instance, and when his ‘secret agent’ perched among a cluster of pigeons
the multiple cooing just about drove him nuts) and 20% informative. He
could only hear what was going on from locations where his dove could get near,
like window-ledges or outside; anywhere else, well… a bird would look sort of
conspicuous perching on the Police Inspector’s desk, he supposed.
He had been lying on the Mouri’s
own rooftop (and wouldn’t THAT blow a few gaskets if they knew!), watching as
little Conan-kun came home from playing with his friends on a Sunday afternoon;
his ‘keeper’, Ran, was inside, and the thief with the radio receiver had heaved
an irritated sigh, expecting his quarry to head upstairs as well. Maybe
he had overreacted—maybe the boy was just that, a boy and not some kind of
mutant genius.
And then the kid had gotten this sort of hesitant, almost guilty
look on his face; he had turned to look at a payphone across the street…..
Two or three minutes later, Kaito’s
eyes were half popping out of his head as through his mini-binocs
he watched the seven-year-old in the phone booth speak into the receiver via
some sort of gadget that looked like a bowtie; the voice that his dove’s
microphone picked up from its perch on the phonebooth’s
roof was NOT that of a child.
“Ran? Hey, Ran-kun? It’s me, Shinichi…..
Yeah, yeah, I know it’s been a few weeks since I called…. I know—I wish I
could. Yeah. Still caught up in this idiot case— just thought
I’d— No, I wish I *could* drop by, but I’m not in town, I’m calling from,
uh, Hokkaido--“
His jaw had dropped; so had his stomach, straight into his
shoes. WHAT the hell?! He… KNEW that voice, from the thing
with the Clock Tower. He knew it—it’d been featured in the occasional
everything’s-gone-wrong bad dream since then…..
The kid’s expressions had flickered and changed while Kaito watched; it was a weird, weird thing to see—almost
like looking at a moving double exposure, the face of someone very different superimposed
over those young-boy features. He hadn’t talked for long—the conversation
had been full of awkward pauses and falterings,
places where the gaps of silence said a lot more than they left out. And
what they seemed to say was loneliness, accompanied by equal portions of regret
and desperation. When the boy at last stretched upwards to replace the
receiver, the depression in his eyes belied his innocent face.
That face….. God, no WONDER he’d been confused about
the kid’s abilities. Kudo Shinichi’s voice-- Kudo Shinichi’s words,
his detective abilities and genius….. all rolled up and hidden inside the mask
of Edogawa Conan.
Kaito should
have been incredulous, disbelieving; he was not. He knew the truth when
it jumped up and thwacked him crosseyed, which THIS
had damned well just done. Numbly he watched the little boy cross the
street, watched that look of tired sorrow deepen and grow black for just a
second as the kid paused at the entrance; then, the small shoulders had
squared, the chin had come up, and a rather bright young first-grader named
Conan had gone bouncing up the stairs to his somewhat dysfunctional little
‘family’.
Way Bizarre.
He had done a lot more snooping around after that; what he
had found had been… odd. Apparently Edogawa Conan had just appeared
one night—he hadn’t flown in on any flights, and there was no record of him at
any Japanese hospital, insurance agency or school (three of the best places to
begin a record trace, he had found). The kid just sprang up out of
nowhere, POOF!! It was almost as odd as the records which ALSO sprang up
out of nowhere a month or so later that *did* give him a background. Kaito could recognize a good forger’s work when he saw one,
and somebody had spent some major yen on covering the kid’s back. Who?
So many questions….. not enough answers, never enough
answers. But one thing was certain: Like it or not, *believe* it or
not, a fact was a fact. Conan was Shinichi and Shinichi was Conan. Never
mind how he had gotten that way—hopefully SOMEday Kaito’d find that one out-- No, the big question was
this:
What the HELL was he doing living at his girlfriend’s house?
***
“So… Why?” The
boy’s voice was almost tired, as if he had repeatedly asked himself the same
question over and over again; all things considered, he probably had.
“Why…?” Hei-san stared down through the mist of falling rain.
*What do I tell him, anyway? I’m
the villain; villains aren’t allowed to just say ‘Well, I didn’t tell anyone
about you because I’d feel like a total louse if I did, and it wouldn’t be
fair.’ Nope; villains are supposed to be unprincipled and all that
crap. Villains are supposed to be merciless and self-centered (and
TOTALLY stereotyped)— that’s the secret of being a successful villain: you don’t
give a damn about anybody else’s secrets…..*
*Secrets; that’s the key,
isn’t it? That’s the lock that needs picking here.*
He swallowed hard, still
staring downwards. He could do this the *easy way* or the *hard way.*
The easy way would consist of tossing some sarcastic villain-ish comment at the kid—at Kudo—without giving a damn about
the guy’s obvious feelings.
The hard way….. would be
hard.
*Aw, hell. Who am I trying to kid? Like I EVER
took the easy way around anything?? Have to admit, though—I never in my
wildest dreams ever thought I’d be, well, doing THIS.* Hei-san almost smiled to himself at the idea, then cleared
his throat gently. “Kudo?” A faint lift of the head was all the
indication he got that he had been heard; the thief chose to take it as an
affirmative. “Let me ask you a question before I answer that,
okay?” The boy was still, waiting.
“Have you ever heard the
old saying about the end justifying the means?”
Nothing for a moment;
then a dark blue stare was directed up at him. “It’s a fallacy.
Murderers use that excuse all the time.” The young voice was very cold,
cold enough to freeze the air between them.
Hei-san laughed beneath his
breath. “Oddly enough, I agree
with you.” The thief listened to the surprised silence below for a second
or two before continuing.
“If I believed—really
believed—that the end justifies the means, then maybe I *would* have told
somebody about you, just to get you out of the way.” He sighed, feeling
his own burden of secrets forming a lump in his throat. “If… all I cared
about was my safety, my own ends….. then I would’ve done it. But
if there’s one thing I understand, it’s secrets; and the end DOESN’T
always justify the means.”
He swallowed again,
hearing the gulp against the soft patter of the rain all around him. It
was getting a little easier to talk now—
“Years ago, somebody I
cared for very much was murdered by people who believed that lie; it didn’t
matter to them what they did, who they killed, the lives they
shattered….. None of it mattered one fat damn to them, all they wanted
was to get what they were after-- Well, they didn’t get it then…..”
“….. and they won’t get it now, not if I have my
way.” The last half of the sentence was whispered in a voice as cold as
Conan’s had been a few seconds before.
The words seemed almost
to echo amidst the soft drip of rain.
Below, the small figure
was quiet for a few seconds; overhead, Hei-san took a
moment to bring his feelings back under control. That second of outburst
had startled him rather badly—he usually managed to clamp down on that sort of
thing. *Sometimes I get caught up
in the game of being Kid—it’s fun, as terrifying and dangerous as it can be at
times-- But behind everything I can never forget why I do what I
do. Can’t let myself ever forget that, or it all means nothing.*
*It can’t just mean nothing, or I’m no better than They
are.*
“Ah. Your father.”
He nearly fell out of his
tree, doing a sudden double take. “Wh---??”
“The original Kaitou
Kid—he was your father, wasn’t he?” The words were very quiet; a trace of
what might have been sympathy was wound through them, as fine and thin as a red
silk thread.
At the sudden agitated
shower of leaves and drops from overhead, Conan shook his head
impatiently. “Give me a break—I *do* have a brain, and the facts add
up. Kaitou Kid went missing almost a decade ago after an upsurge of
activity, which probably means he had been after a particular target—the ‘end’
his murderers were also trying for, correct? Then, eight years later, *you* showed up on the scene. I’d
say that makes you out for revenge for the loss of your father.” The
voice was still rather cool, but far less icy than it had been.
“Revenge…..” the young
man in the tree muttered, staring blankly out over the park. “It’d be
nice if it were that simple. I don’t just want to find the target—I want to destroy
it. It’s… a bit complicated.” Then he growled, scrabbling one hand
through his hair; more droplets rained down over the boy, who ignored
them. “But you know what, Kudo? You want to know the *main reason* why I do what I do?”
It felt oddly good to finally talk
about it to somebody, even an enemy— if that’s what Kudo was—
“It’s not because they
took my dad away from me… and yeah, you’re right, he was the original.
It’s not because one day almost ten years ago a little boy came home from
school and found out he’d never see his father again; it’s not even because a
good man died—and he WAS a good man,
no matter what he did for a living….. Revenge? Well, maybe that’s
why I started out doing what I do, but… now…..” He ground his teeth, the
words coming harder as anger flamed up inside, the anger that never quite went
away.
“Now….. the bastards that began this whole thing… if I let them
get away with what they’ve done, I’m no better than they are. My father
wasn’t their only victim. And if you know anything at all about me, you
know I don’t let people get hurt if I can
help it.”
Conan— Kudo—
nodded. “I know. If you did, we wouldn’t be having this
conversation.”
Hei-san spared a slightly
startled glance at the boy below him, then nodded thoughtfully. “Yeah,
well….. I’ve got my standards too.” He sighed, wiping drops of what
might be either rain or sweat from his face; it was hard to tell. After a
moment he laughed a little wryly. “Y’know, I’ve just told you things
nobody else has ever heard before—if
you wanted to find out who I was, you could probably do it with some heavy
fieldwork. So if I really *was* the villain I’m supposed to be, this is
where the blackmail threats would start—right,
‘Conan-kun’?”
*And you know what? I could really make you sweat,
Kudo; I really could. I could wring you out and hang you up to dry, if I
wanted to… you’ve got more than just you to protect now—*
*And I admit, it’s tempting, if only because you’re the only
person to ever beat me at my game. But I won’t. I don’t do
that sort of crap. I wonder if you know how lucky you really are,
though…..*
He became aware of the
gulf of tense silence below him and shook his head ruefully. “Time for
you to give ME a break, Kudo—didn’t I just say
that nobody gets hurt? Quit worrying; I’m not going to rat on you—OR your
cute little girlfriend, either. So chill out.”
Hei-san was aware of a deep
breath being released from below; he studiously ignored it, considering that a
wisecrack right now would probably be
risking another pinecone (just as carefully placed as the last one had been,
too—he wasn’t idiot enough to think that Kudo had MISSED what he had aimed
for…) He spent a moment or two settling his own breathing; this hadn’t
exactly been the sort of conversation he had envisioned when he had planned
their little confrontation…..
What was that old saying
about ‘the best-laid plans of mice and men’?? *Should’ve been more something like ‘the best-laid plots of Phantom
Thieves and Detectives…..’ Hell if I ever thought we’d be having a
fairly reasonable conversation with each other, even if one of us is up
a tree and the other one’s under a HelloKitty
umbrella.*
A faint grin began to
creep across his face, dispelling the tension that had been residing there for
far too long. *Must be ‘Yumi-chan’s influence on me—seems like I’m back to the
level of playing “Cops and Robbers” all over again.* “Now, back to
the main point of today’s discussion group…” he prompted the silent form below
him; “We’ve covered MY end of this little topic— what about you? Planning
to drop by the park next Friday with a few squad-cars, helicopters, police
battalions and armored tanks?” He smirked down through the leaves.
The boy below him raised
an eyebrow. “You think pretty highly of yourself, don’t you? The
answer’s ‘No’….. though I’ll be damned if I can say why.”
“Tsk,
tsk… little boys shouldn’t swear, y’know—“
The look he received in answer spoke entire volumes.
Hei-san chuckled and leaned forward a bit, propping
his chin up and wiping away a trickle of water that had seeped past his
hood. “I’ll tell you why, Kudo, and you can make of it whatever you feel
like. We’ve got something in common—a little girl neither of us wants to
see get hurt or upset. And you—“
he waved a hand at the boy, sprinkling him with droplets “you owe me one, as you pointed out yourself. Who opened that
storage room you were in? Who yanked ‘Yumi-chan
out of the way? Who—“
A highly annoyed snort
from below made him stop, as Hei-san’s common sense
circuits cut in. *Better not point
those little details out too much, or he’ll get even grouchier than he
is. Don’t wanna give him an ulcer—or a reason
to kick another pine-cone my way either, for that matter* “Anyway,
this isn’t really about Ayumi
completely, is it? It’s a territory thing—you want to see how many blocks
you can set up in front of me and I want to see how many I can leap
over.”
He laughed at the boy’s
face; the look of outrage sat rather peculiarly on the childish features.
“Well, I’m
flexible—but only so far. I’ll keep your secret, but as for
Ayumi-chan--? Don’t ask me to stop teaching her—it’d break her heart, and
besides…” He laughed a little, feeling somewhat embarrassed. “… I’d
miss her too. Even Phantom Thieves need the occasional friend.”
*We both have double lives, Kudo, but you have company in
yours. It’s sort of a tradeoff—I get time to be my normal self at school
and all that, but I’m pretty much on my own here. You, on the other hand,
have to be Conan all the time—but you’ve got Rin-kun and a few other people who
know who you really are. I don’t want to give up my little apprentice,
and I won’t give ground to you, dammit!*
*Now—the question
is: Is this a stalemate, or can we work this out?*
Silence again; they
seemed to be doing a lot of that. The sky was beginning to lighten
somewhat as the thin rain lessened from a drizzle to a mist. Already the
shadows were starting to lengthen towards late afternoon, but Hei-san realized with an internal start that they had been
talking for a fairly short time, really. *Heh; feels like it’s been hours.* The boy below him was
beginning to look a little less surly; a thoughtful look was replacing the
outrage, and the thief felt a distinct sense of relief. An angry Kudo was
not a good thing.
“So…” he prompted—
“So…” said Conan at
precisely the same time--
They stared at each
other, nonplussed; then the thief in the branches overhead grinned down.
“’Women and children first’….”
The boy snorted, but eyed
him with a certain gleam of amusement. “One more question—“ (the
thief above him opened his mouth) “—and if you say whatever smartass comment
you’ve got on the tip of your tongue, I’ll send another pinecone after you—”
(The thief closed his mouth.) “Good. Okay: WHY should I trust
you not to involve Ayumi? If you do
get caught, what happens to her then? Or had you thought of that?”
The thief sighed, a
little of the humor that had crept back into his face leaking away. “Yes,
I *had* thought of it—it’s why I’m using ‘Hei-san’ as
my name, really. IF I get caught—note that I say ‘IF’—‘Yumi-chan doesn’t know me as Kaitou Kid; all she knows is ‘Hei-san’, and that’s how I plan on things staying.
Believe me, Kudo, I will *NOT* get her into trouble. She’s a sweet kid
and I like her—you don’t need to worry on her account.” He studied the
figure below him. “One more thing-- Ayumi trusts me, y’know; maybe you should trust *her* judgment, hm? After all,” he added rather pointedly, a slightly
wicked light in his own eyes, “I’m trusting YOU on her advice…..”
Well, that wasn’t quite true—he *had* been watching Kudo
for some time now and thought he had a pretty good grasp of the guy’s
character. But a little embellishment didn’t hurt in this case.
Hesitation; Hei-san could see it in the narrow shoulders below him, the
indecisive frown and the way the boy’s fists tightened on the shaft of the
umbrella. *If I wanted to, I could
just stop showing up on Friday afternoons… if I wanted to, and if I really
thought ‘Yumi might be in any danger from meeting
with me, I would. But I don’t want to, and I honestly don’t see a
problem—IF the Shrimp here’ll hold off calling in the
entire Metro Police Force down on me. It’s a real risk, but--*
*Hmmm….. what about…..*
“Look—I realize I’m
probably being stupid, but-- I’ll tell you what: Let’s make this
park a sort of ‘neutral ground’, okay? You don’t want to upset Ayumi-chan, and
neither do I, so-- I won’t bring Kid business into the park… and Kudo Shinichi
can stay separate from Edogawa Conan, as far as I’m concerned. What do
you think?”
The small figure under
the HelloKitty umbrella looked up, raising both eyebrows this time. For a
second Hei-san thought he would refuse…..
And then he nodded, a wry
and unchildlike smile crossing the young face. “I said ‘truce’ earlier,
and… I guess that can stand—for the moment, at least, and *only* when you’re
not in… ‘active’ mode? For Ayumi-kun’s sake, if
nothing else—“
Hei-san blew out a relieved
breath. “Suites me. When I’m here, I’ll just be ‘Hei-san’—and you’ll just be Conan-kun, her friend—who’ll
stay safely on the other side of the park, okay? And no funny business
with the darts or those little radios, either. OR binoculars.”
The boy rolled his eyes,
then nodded. “No funny business, fine.” Then he glared up at the
thief with a sharp look. “But steal ONE thing while you’re here and all
bets are off.”
The young man in the tree
looked hurt. “I do *not* steal during off-hours, Kudo; it’s against the
Phantom Thief Union Rules, y’know…..”
Conan snorted, tugging
his glasses off and attempting to wipe the drop-spotted lenses on his shirt
tail. He shivered; although the majority of the rain had stopped, the
fine mist that had replaced it tended to creep inside jackets with easy, making
everything a little too cool and damp. “Okay… so Kaitou Kid never enters
the park or Ayumi’s life; if you can do that… the
truce can stand. Here, at
least—“ and he aimed a sudden, startling grin as wicked as any of the Kid’s up
at the figure in the tree above him, who jumped slightly. “Anywhere else
that you show up, though—that’s a different matter entirely.”
Hei-san blinked down at him,
slightly unnerved by that grin. “Agreed—and I’ll keep quiet about your
past here or elsewhere; fair enough.” *That’ll
work—I get to keep my little apprentice, and Kudo can stop worrying about
whether or not I’m gonna blow his house down around his and his girlfriend’s
preadolescent ears. Heh; if he’s like this now, how bad is he
going to be when he hits puberty all over again? Horrible thought…*
“Got any more questions? It’s getting late and I need to head out—without any watchers, of course…..”
The boy below him gave
him an entirely too innocent smile. “Of course.” He shoved his
glasses back up his nose with one finger. “There IS one more thing I’d like to ask, purely out of curiosity… if you
don’t mind?”
Hei-san gave him a slightly
suspicious look; Kudo was being polite, and it made him nervous. “What?”
“WHY do you keep using my voice?” The question
was almost plaintive.
The thief in the tree
blinked. “Huh??--- Oh. Right.” *Now, how do I put this? I could just tell him that I decided to
mimic his ‘Kudo’ voice to put Ayumi at her ease….. Nah, screw it.
You don’t start off a truce with a lie.* “Um, don’t quite know how to
tell you this, but… apparently we sort of sound alike. I noticed it
during the Clock Tower incident, back when you were, er…..”
Hei-san’s voice trailed off as he searched for the
proper adjective; the scowl he was getting suggested that short jokes would NOT
be welcome. “…. er, taller?” He grinned
down through the leaves at the boy, who raised one eyebrow and chuckled.
Conan closed his umbrella
with a snap! and a rustle of nylon;
the rain had finally stopped. “Guess I’ll be on my way, then. I’ll
keep my end of the bargain and expect you to keep yours as well—you won’t have
to worry about my watching you leave or tracing your location, nothing like
that. Fair enough?” The boy shook raindrops from his hair as he
stooped to pick up his wristwatch from the ground; they glinted in the dim rays
of the sun that were just beginning to break through the clouds overhead.
Hei-san nodded. “Works
for me. I’d shake your hand but I’d really rather keep my anonymity just
now, since I don’t have my hat and monocle and it’s daylight; wouldn’t want to
give you an unfair advantage…..” The boy shrugged, a small smile tugging
at one corner of his mouth; as he turned to walk away, he chuckled again.
“What’s so funny?” demanded the thief above him, beginning to plan his descent.
Conan glanced back over
his shoulder at the figure above and behind him. “Just the bit about our
voices being alike—it’s kind of funny, but we *look* pretty much alike too—or we would, if I hadn’t shrunk.”
He propped the closed umbrella on his opposite shoulder.
The thief in the branches
froze. “And… you would know this *how*?” he asked carefully,
his heart full of dread…..
The boy smirked, still
looking back; his eyes gleamed with amusement in the late light of
afternoon. “Let’s just say that most little kids tend to have excellent eyesight—and those leaves
didn’t really cover as much as you probably thought they did.”
Hei-san’s mouth dropped
open. *OooooShit.*
“Should’ve kept your hood
pulled down better, too…..”
And with that he walked
away across the rain-wet grass, whistling. It was quite a while—nearly an
hour, in fact—before the thief in the tree behind him was able to climb down
without shaking.
*************************************************************
Thursday afternoon…..
Slouched at his desk,
Inspector Nakamori Ginzo
frowned down at a building plan and chewed irritably on his moustache.
This had not been his week,
not at all; in fact, as weeks went, he was beginning to think it qualified for
the Grand National ‘Bite Me’ Award. As his eyes traced possible entrances
and exits on the blueprints, he mentally chalked off a list of private and
personal grievances:
One: The current Kaitou Kid riddle was being a pain in the
wazoo…..
Two: He had been up too late, scratching his head over
said riddle, and his eyes were gritty with the lack of sleep……
Three: This building was ALSO going to be a pain— asinine
modernistic architecture, full of angles and weird little alcoves-- posting
guards was going to be a nightmare…..
Four: He was in the process of quitting smoking. That ALONE was cause enough for the
entire Kaitou Kid Task Force to start shaking in their uniformed shoes…..
He growled, rubbing at
his temples with one hand and wondering if Aoko would
*really* notice if he snuck just one cigarette— Nahh,
scratch that; his daughter had a nose like a bloodhound, and she’d catch the
scent on his jacket even if he took it off. Hell, she’d figure it out
even if he stripped butt-naked and smoked a half a cig in the men’s john!
WHY had he picked *this* week
of all weeks to quit?
*Rrrrrrrrrrgh!!!* The Inspector
tried desperately to think of something else.
For instance….. *Let’s see-- I can post two men by the
back left entrance on the inside, two outside-- Two more in charge of
general surveillance, a handful around the perimeter outside, a couple—no,
better make that a half-dozen—in the courtyard between the East and West
wings….. Looks like their usual security’s just your basic college rent-a-cop
roaming unarmed types—they’re practically screaming ‘Target Here!’ for Kid.*
*Three-story building, only one opening onto the roof…..
skylights over the main exhibit hall, open courtyard with a fountain and some
sort of ornamental walkway from the third-floor East to the West
overhead….. Huh. And as for the target…..*
It had taken some major
mental sweat, but Nakamori was pretty certain he had
at least sorted out the basic facts of the riddle. The exhibit opening on
the following day at the local University was just the sort of thing Kid liked—lots of entrances and
exits, and lots of nice, shiny jewels to scoop up. It was one of the
international ‘traveling ehibits’, moving from
college to college; historical things, for the most part. THIS one just happened to be a
multi-cultural jewelry exhibition.
‘Even Time bows before
the Princess when she is present’…..
*Time, time… he always indicates *when* he’ll strike.
I’ve missed that in the past, but practice makes perfect—and he loves to use
obvious things. There’s a clock right over where the main exhibit cases
will be-- and I doubt he’ll show up in the daylight. So—when does a clock
look like it’s bowing?*
Nakamori grinned; it was not a very nice
grin. *When both its hands are
hanging down. Six-thirty p.m.*
And as for the
‘Princess’….. that part was almost *too* easy. The glittering
crème-de-la-crème of the whole show was an icy, glittering thing of diamonds
and silver: a nineteenth-century tiara that had once belonged to a
Princess of Belgium. It would rest in all its glory in a spotlighted,
specially-made revolving case right below
the clock.
What could be more
obvious?
As for the rest of the
riddle…..
The Sun hides his face
when confronted by her beauty
As she ascends to Heaven
in a cloud of angels’ wings.
Sunset—he had checked the
time, and it was listed as six-twenty-eight p.m., which was off by a minute or
so, but… hell; it made sense, or as much sense as Kid’s riddles ever made-- Nakamori
was fairly proud of his logic on this one.
He gnawed on his
moustache again; that last line, though….. angels’ wings? What angels? It wasn’t
Christmas-time, so that reference was out… he had looked at every possible
tag-end of info on the hall and there was nothing even remotely connected with
angels there—no statuary, pictures, stained-glass images, nothing. No
slang phrases associated with a certain door – no college professor’s nicknamed
‘angel’ or any variations thereof (although that line of investigation had
produced some amusing results; he wondered if the Dean of Agricultural Studies
was aware that his students called him ‘Weevil’ behind his back). Nothing
to do with angels…..
That bothered him. Kid never put anything in his riddles without a
reason—even that goddamned ‘April Fool’ greeting with the Black Pearl case had
indicated that the whole thing was a feint, not that he had realized it at the
time.
*Rrrrgh; need a SMOKE!!* And his @#$#@!!
nicotine patches were itching, to
make matters worse. Nakamori was about three seconds away from shredding the
blueprints in front of him (the second set that day), when a polite knock on
his office door made him jump. He looked up with a scowl on his face and
a faint, evil hope in his heart that whoever-it-was was somebody he could yell
at.
No such luck—it was just
his lunch being delivered. The young office aide edged in the door, tray
in hand and a look of trepidation on her face. The news that the
Inspector was attempting to break his smoking habit had circulated with all the
speed of a thundering herd of wildebeest, sending various office personnel off
on day-long errands just in case their paths might have to cross. Nakamori had a reputation already, and this little addition to his usual temper was like pouring salt on a
wound.
The aide carefully placed
the tray on the corner of the disgruntled man’s desk with all the air of a
lowly Second Wife presenting her firstborn child for her husband’s approval; at
Nakamori’s grunt, she edged thankfully out of the
office—
“What’s THIS??”
--almost out of the office, that is. The aide swallowed
nervously. “Ummm, Sir? It’s your-- your lunch?”
“No, THIS.” He
waved a small white envelope at her; she hadn’t noticed it—it had been tucked
away beneath the lidded bowl, half-hidden by the paper napkins. The aide
indicated her ignorance with a sort of combination
terrified-grimace-and-headshake, and then at his grumbling “Oh, never mind—“
scurried out of the office. The door swung quietly shut behind her with a
distinctly relieved click.
He turned the offending
piece of paper over in his hands; it was small, not even a real envelope—just a
folded bit of paper that had been taped shut. Something small, flat and
brightly-colored fell out when he tore it open, accompanied by a thin slip of
paper…..
Chew on this—it’ll help
stop the cravings. Best of luck quitting smoking!
KAITOU KID
*?????* He turned the object over and read the label: TENSAI LABS -- NICOTINE GUM. The
wrappings peeled easily away in his slightly shaky fingers to reveal what
indeed looked to be a pack of chewing gum of some sort; a faint, minty scent met his nostrils.
*RRRRGHHH!!!
@#$#@@%!!! If I ever get my hands on him I swear I’ll--- hrrm; Nicotine gum?*
*Nicotine…..?* His eyes widened; the pack of gum
suddenly looked very appealing.
*(Wonder if it really works?)*
Suspiciously the Inspector unwrapped a stick. No puncture marks, no
apparent booby traps or odd stains (and poison was emphatically NOT the Kid’s
style anyway). He sniffed it with care; no smells of atomic-level hotsauce or anything else of the sort—just spearmint.
Wondering if desperation had finally snuffed out his remaining gray cells, Nakamori slipped it into his mouth.
He held his breath, fully
expecting the worst; it didn’t happen. *Hrm; minty.
Not too bad, either…..* The Inspector chewed cautiously.
*Nicotine gum… Obviously there’s no possibility I
could be even remotely grateful to Kid for anything whatsoever, and obviously
any contacts from him have to be reported per procedure and all that crap,
right?*
He closed his eyes as a lovely, lovely gum-induced chemical rush swept sweetly
through his bloodstream, slowly clearing the fog from his thoughts and at least
a little of the homicidal adrenaline from his nerves. *Yeah, guess I’ll have to report this…..
sooner or later. Later sounds good. Got more important things to
think about anyway.* The Inspector carefully tucked the precious pack
of gum away in his inner lapel pocket.
Nakamori Ginzo
leaned back in his chair and stretched wearily; the springs beneath the leather
seat squeaked as he tilted his head backwards to rest on his clasped hands,
allowing his eyes to drift shut in exhaustion. The last day or so had
been a combination of the usual irritation and outrage generated by a Kid
“calling card” and the general excitement and mostly unacknowledged glee
produced by the same. Not that he *wanted*
Kid to attempt a theft (Hell, no!)—the bastard was too goddamned good at what
he did for that—but Kid’s capture was the Inspector’s chief goal in life, after
all.
His capture, though….. *not*
his death. And that little
thought brought him back to something that he had been considering for several
weeks now, ever since that hideous mess-- the one his mind persisted in
thinking of as the Dog-Collar Heist.
That had NOT been a
normal Kid encounter, no, not at all…..
* * *
It had been such a stupid target—some brainless English
aristocrat several centuries past had been rich enough and bone-numbingly
moronic enough to ornament his favorite hunting-dog’s collar with an impressive
array of large stones. They weren’t anything incredibly valuable, just an
assortment of beryl and rather low-grade topaz for the most part—but for some
reason Kid had been interested. The usual riddle had been delivered, Nakamori had sweated it out (he’d only been able to work
out the target and date of attempt that time), and then he’d spent the entire
evening camped out in the bushes outside the collar owner’s overly-ostentatious
mansion, scratching at insect bites and chain-smoking one cigarette after
another.
Kid had shown up as promised and snatched the goods (the
Inspector winced as he recalled that once more his men (and himself) just hadn’t
been quick enough) and had been merrily dodging the usual scream-and-leap
attacks from his uniformed foes as he charged for the nearest wall, obviously
intending a quick vault-over and exit-----
----- when a flurry of SHOTS rang out. Nakamori’s head had jerked around so fast he had nearly
gotten whiplash looking for the shot’s source; his men all *knew* not to shoot;
who the flaming Hell had had the gall to ignore HIS orders?!? He had
snarled and staggered to his feet (a leap of his own had sent him nosediving into a bush), wheeling around and yelling
himself blue in the face—
---and his men were suddenly falling, they were falling or
throwing themselves down around him with shouts and screams---
Kid had dropped and rolled before the shot’s echoes had even
begun to fade; for half a second or so Nakamori had
almost thought he would be arresting a corpse (he’d found himself to be
annoyingly relieved to see that the thief was still alive and apparently
unhurt). Rising to his feet, the familiar white-clad figure had looked
upwards towards the roof, and the Inspector had involuntarily followed his line
of sight.
Two figures were silhouetted against the sky, lying in true
sniper pose at the edge of the roof; Nakamori had
drawn a sharp breath at the gleam and jerk of a weapon as another report rang
out, then another— He had shouted something inarticulate as Kid had
suddenly slammed himself sideways, smashing the Inspector once again face
downwards into the dirt—
He had screamed with rage—his MEN were being HIT—
GODDAMMIT, he needed to get UP!!!
For the space of a few seconds there had been nothing but
echoing gunfire and shouts and the cold roughness of dirt and grass against his
face (and that weight against his back, a human weight that had acted as a
living shield; he had had to acknowledge that later). Then a cry from the
rooftop and a final flurry of shots had led to silence, and the weight had
suddenly been gone.
Spitting out blades of grass and crumbs of earth, the
sputtering and infuriated Inspector had risen to his knees; he was hurting—one
shoulder was numb, and he had a gash across his forehead where he had struck
something hard and sharp, a rock or something. He hadn’t been so
battered, however, that he had missed the fact that someone had just tried to
gun Kid down. Someone who was emphatically NOT a member of the police
force, and they apparently didn’t give a damn about who else they hit—
No, that was wrong, it was wrong and he knew it deep
in his bones—they *HAD* been trying to hit the police as well, himself
especially. *Clean sweep, they want Kid and the person who knows the most
about him dead* he had thought numbly, heart pounding with rage and
shock. This was NOT part of the usual routine…..
Kid was leaning against the wall, breathing hard, his head
hanging down; for once he wasn’t cracking jokes or making flippant
remarks. Nakamori had choked as the mansion’s
floodlights clearly revealed the black singe-mark scorched across the length of
one sleeve; the bullet had just barely, barely missed his arm, traveling almost
delicately across the cloth and past his neck to impact in the stone
wall. If the thief hadn’t been so goddamned fast, he *would* have been a
corpse.
And he had knocked him out of the way.
Then Kaitou Kid had looked up, and Nakamori
had found himself meeting that piercing, mostly-hidden gaze. The shouts
and outcries all around them had seemed to recede into the background, and the
Inspector had heard the Phantom Thief’s whisper as if it had been right beside
his ear:
“Nakamori-san—there are bigger and
more dangerous fish in the sea than me—and you’ll be seeing them again.
I’d watch out, if I were you; no one here was supposed to leave this place
alive tonight.”
For the barest flash of a second they had continued to stare
at each other through the dark and the shouts and the glass of a monocle’s
lens—
—and then Kid had been moving, streaking past the cops (who
had been converging on the figures on the rooftop anyway). Fifteen
seconds later he was so far gone that he might not ever have been there at all,
except for the two dead snipers (one by a policeman’s bullet, one by his own
gun), four wounded cops, one missing jeweled dog-collar, and one severely
shaken Inspector Nakamori Ginzo.
Two days later the collar had been returned, safely fastened
around the neck of a stuffed toy dog (along with a box of chocolates marked
‘For The Wounded’) and delivered to Nakamori’s own
home doorstep by an anonymous hand. There had been one other thing:
a small note, tucked beneath the collar, folded into the shape of an origami
shark. The note had contained only nine words but they had been quite
enough to make the Inspector sit in his living room for the next hour or so,
smoking cigarette after cigarette mind working furiously…..
They’re after you too
now. Watch your back…… KID
* * *
That had been when he had
started really thinking about
things. Not the normal things associated with Kid either—the game had
changed, and new players had entered in. Or had they been there all
along? And if they had, WHY did they suddenly show their hands so—so
goddamn blatently
*now*, after so many heists?
Just who *had* he pissed off lately, that they
should want him as well as Kid dead?
Nakamori knew he had a tendency
towards tunnel-vision; sometimes it was even useful, allowing him to narrow
down his search on a crime or criminal to a level of accuracy that some of his
more easygoing colleagues envied. He was no Sherlock Holmes or Sleeping
Kogoro (he had met the man, and frankly he thought he was a blithering moron)…
but you didn’t make the rank of Inspector by being a total incompetent,
either. Nakamori had an excellent record of
captures and successful cases; it wasn’t as if catching Kaitou Kid was his only occupation…..
Maybe that was why his
consistent escapes rankled so much. But he’d be damned if he let some
gun-toting bastards take down *his* favorite target.
So: why the sudden
visible presence of a third party and the attempted murder? Several
possibilities had sprung to mind, the first being that Kid had fallen afoul of
a business partner or two-- kaitous, as a class
of thief, had often worked in the past for the highest bidder. But… he
always returned what he stole (for whatever insane reason of his own), so THAT
was probably out. Another possibility was that a past theft had yanked a
gem-owner’s chain so badly that they had decided to gun him down in revenge—but
that theory had its own problems; the annoyed party would have to know where he
would strike next…..
If they didn’t have
access to his notes (and Nakamori was fairly certain
that they hadn’t gotten hold of the dog-collar one—it had somehow managed to
find its way inside his personal, desk-delivered newspaper two days before the
heist), then there had to be a link between the gems.
That damned dog-collar…..
It hadn’t been
particularly valuable at all; a lot of Kid’s past thefts hadn’t. The gems
stolen had ranged across the gamut from amber to diamond and everything in
between—the only obvious link was that they were gems. A little thought and any number of chain-smoked
cigarettes produced Link Number Two: they were, without exception,
*old*. Every one of them had been an antique—no new gems, nothing freshly
cut. The Black Star, the Green Dream, the Golden Eye (why did famous gems all have such stupid
names?)—every one of them was a historical treasure. Even that idiot
dog-collar…..
But there were a
He needed a motive,
too—those snipers had been well-hidden and organized, and one of them had taken
his *own life* when escape had proved impossible. What kind of incentive
made *THAT* option attractive??
Too many questions….. and
if the next heist ended in a bloodbath, he had just better hope that he went
down with his men before the guilt killed him. Of course, considering
Kid’s little message, that was a
possibility.
Most of all, the
Inspector needed the next link. So he started looking…….
Nakamori loved the Internet—he
flat out loved it. He didn’t USE it himself, not beyond the local office
LAN for his emails and so on, but he could set a handful of the
data-and-research crew downstairs a topic and they’d come back to him in a day
or so with a chunk of accurate, verifiable info that he could stare at, doodle
on, and draw diagrams against (he was big on writing down his thoughts, even if
nobody else could read his handwriting). Sitting at his desk, he chewed
on his moustache and began to go over the Kid-related research topics he had assigned.
Sure enough, there it was…..
One of the brighter geeks
down in Research had popped out a sort of ‘biography’ of every target Kid had
gone after during his career, listing the histories and past owners of the gems
as well as any common points. At the time he had read through it, wincing
at the occasional painful memory, and then shuttled the file away into his own
personal database. Beyond that, he hadn’t given it another thought.
Well, apparently someone else had. The file had been
hacked, he was sure of it… because, staring at the words on the screen before
him, he had suddenly had an—well, you could harly
call it an ‘idea’ as such; more of a line of conjecture or a suspicion,
really. There was this faint memory nagging at him from when he had read
the file before about all the annoying, stupid *legends* that gems seemed to
collect…..
Legends.
Myths. Fabled properties…..
Nakamori growled to himself, just
under his breath, and wished violently for a cigarette. He popped another
stick of gum from its wrapper and reached for the phone on his desk.
***tap-tap-tappa-tap………. beep***
“Research? Nakamori here…..”
* * *
Two hours later the
Inspector stared at the results on his desk; they had been in the report all
along—he just hadn’t *looked* at them the right way, and (more to the point) he
hadn’t read far enough into the file. There before his eyes lay a rather
peculiar graph, compiled by somebody down in Research who had apparently had a
little time on their hands and a speck of imagination.
It charted the so-called
‘magical’ properties of Kid’s targets. AND it was so damned bizarre that Nakamori was absolutely
certain that it had never been done before… or at least not in any official
capacity.
*Legends and myths, goddamned myths and legends…..
Every one of them, every @#$#@#!! gem stolen from about a year before he
disappeared and since he reappeared. Every flaming one has some
stupid-ass myth associated with it. Never mind the occasional painting or
baseball—he’s mostly stolen gems, and…..*
*Legends. Legends that this gem can heal
wounds, that gem can bring the dead to life, and the other gem
can extend your youth indefinitely. Total bullshit, of course; no chunk
of shiny rock can do shit like that.* Of course, whether or not the legends were
true didn’t actually matter when you got right down to it; catching a perp depended on understanding what THEY thought was real,
not what YOU did. If they believed that God only allowed them to wear
bright red socks on Tuesdays, then you went looking for people wearing bright
red socks on Tuesdays whether or not it was logical.
Nakamori rubbed at his temples;
his head hurt.
Something else occurred
to him then, and with a slowly sinking heart he tapped away on his keyboard to
check it….. *DAMN. I was
right. That’s why they targeted me, isn’t it? Everybody knows that
Kid steals gems, but— Aw, SHIT.* The file had been stored in
his *personal drive*. Wonderful—the file properties listed HIS name as
the owner and originator—
The Inspector stared at the
tiny bit of data that had apparently sent two snipers out with *his* name
inscribed on their hit list alongside Kid’s. *Goddamn. Hit the jackpot, didn’t I?* This one little
fact, listed under his name and in his files, had made him a threat to Somebody
somewhere, someone so terrifying that one of the assassins had actually killed
himself rather than be taken prisoner and interrogated. *That* thought
led to ugly considerations regarding just why
they had been afraid to be taken into police custody…..
He felt sweat beginning
to bead on the back of his neck. If he couldn’t trust his own fellow
cops, if the sniper had been afraid that someone within the department would
get to him, then—
Nakamori stared at the file; the
facts stared him right back in the face.
There was a certain thing
about identifying links—you could predict a trend. If the file actually HAD been hacked (and he was more certain
of it now than ever), then whoever-the-hell-they-were could possibly predict
Kid’s next target even without the note—after all, the thief had been working
exclusively in Japan ever since his reappearance, and there were only so many
unusual gems with rumored mysterious properties on display…
Frowning, he turned his
attention back to his previous notes, flipping through the growing pile of
paper on his desk. Tomorrow’s target--- what about it, did it have any myths associated with it?
One more call down to
research had *that* little line of inquiry being followed up….. he would see
the results today before he headed home or somebody would find their ass in a
sling. There was no way in hell Nakamori was
going into the situation on the following day unprepared…..
*Just hope that goddamned Kid is prepared too-- I’d rather
see the bastard get away than end up shot dead.* The Inspector
popped another stick of nicotine gum into his mouth and chewed, wishing
violently that he hadn’t flushed all his cigarettes down the john. This
was turning into a very, VERY long day…..
*************************************************************
Halfway across town,
other people were making their preparations for the heist as well.
“You want to be a hero with the axe about to fall,
You’d do it for the love and for the glory, for it all…”
Kuroba Kaito
sang the English lyrics half beneath his breath as he approached the University
building; he had run across a little-known American group called Cats Laughing on the Internet (weird
bunch of folks—they were all authors of one sort or another), and their songs
tended to stick in a person’s head.
“You want to dress in black and lose your heart beyond
recall,
Hunt a dream through rain and thunder on your honor, for it
all—“
He grinned to himself,
kicking at a pebble as he walked; the stone ricocheted off a nearby pole back
into his path, and he veered slightly so as to pick on it again—he’d been
moving that little bit of rock steadily along for the last two blocks, just for
fun. Those lyrics….. *It
should be ‘white’, not black-- Got a heist tomorrow!!* Kaito gave the pebble a particularly intricate little kick
this next time, shooting it along to ping off of two poles and a Do Not Park sign; it plopped down neatly into the
center of a tiny sidewalk flowerbed, scarcely disturbing a leaf as it landed.
*Heist, heist, heist….* His thoughts danced in
anticipation; this was always how he was just before a job—full of
anticipation, nerves on edge in a way that was half-uncomfortable,
half-thrilling… Kaito knew it was mostly
adrenaline, a chemical high that made his muscles tighten and his thoughts turn
predatory.
He loved it—he
absolutely LOVED it; it was such a *rush.*
He shivered deep inside.
Somewhere deep in the
back of his mind the young thief knew that what he was doing was—how did it
go? Oh right, reprehensible, illegal, immoral and just plain wrong… but when he had his plans worked
up and his goal targeted, somehow Kuroba Kaito seemed to recede into the background behind Kaitou
Kid—and that was how it had to be, really. Doubts and misgivings would
only screw him up and get him killed, especially now.
Oh yeah—ESPECIALLY now,
since the Boys in Black had finally made their move. *That* had been unexpected….. Kaito’s
grin faded as he recalled the last time, all the shooting and commotion and the
smells of gunpowder and blood—
*Bastards. They HURT people that time, almost killed
some of ‘em. Nakamori… no doubt about it, they
were aiming for him as well as for me. I don’t know why— he must’ve found
out something that makes him a threat-- I just hope he’ll pay attention
to that warning I sent him. He probably will; no matter how much he slips
up in some things, he’s not fool enough to disregard the facts.*
The attack had shaken him
badly; for days afterwards he had seethed inside, sick at heart that somebody
had gotten *hurt* during one of his
heists—Hell, both of the snipers had died.
He hadn’t really wanted that (had he? A small part of him deep inside
wasn’t at all sure), but what was done was done. What really
bothered him was the poor cops who had gone down with bullets in their bodies—none
of the had been killed, but if he had had his way none of them would’ve gotten
hurt in the first place. And Nakamori—
He still remembered
seeing the flash on the rooftop as the rifle-barrel had shifted slightly to the
left; in that frozen, fleeting second he had known they weren’t aiming for him, and all he could think of was *NOT AOKO’S DAD--!!*
All humor gone now, he
sighed and scratched irritably at the back of his head, being careful not to
upset his wig (his on-campus persona had dark auburn hair, freckles, a fair
skin and brown eyes; the contacts were a bit itchy too, though the wire-framed
glasses were okay. ‘Ken Takinada’ tended
towards sweatshirts and faded jeans and stood a good inch-and-a-half taller
than one Kuroba Kaito,
high-school student). This next heist could very well be as much of a
problem as the last, and he knew it. But at least Nakamori
was prepared this time.
There was nothing Kaito could really do but keep his eyes open, really.
As he reached the
building that housed the jewelry exhibit, the exhilaration began to bubble back
up inside him; there was something so—so—Hell, he needed a word here: exciting? thrilling? No, not quite right,
but something like that—about planning a heist. Walking around, going
about his business like a good little innocent bystander… and all the while
knowing that tonight *this* would happen *here*, and *that* would happen
*there*…..
And nobody else but him knew. Not yet, in any case.
If he couldn’t find a
word, someday he’d have to make one up, just to fit the feeling of anticipation-nervousness-confidence-fear-euphoria
that came with simply being Kaitou Kid, several hours before pulling a
job. And, of course, there was that newly added flavor of *terror* as well, brought about by
snipers’ bullets….. He had to keep that in mind as well; it was too
damned easy to get cocky.
Oh well…..
He shrugged to himself,
shifting the strap of the nylon camera-bag on his shoulder—it kept getting
tangled with his backpack—and slipping his camera out. It was an older
model, one that had belonged to his dad; a pretty good piece of equipment,
really, just the sort of thing a guy with a photo journalism major might be
using, nothing flashy or unaffordable… it never hurt to have the right
props. It never hurt to have a specially-designed camera that took photos
from no less than *four apertures* at
one time, either—straight ahead as usual, but also straight up and to either
side as well. You just had to load the film very carefully, aim
correctly, and keep your thumbs out of the pictures.
‘Ken Takinada’
shoved his glasses up his nose, stepping back a bit to get a proper picture of
the building for what he would have assured any askers was a somewhat boring
assignment that he really didn’t want to be doing anyway, not when he could be
out taking pictures of something more interesting. But a grade was a
grade, right? So Ken snapped one or two pictures, then plunked up the
steps into the cool interior.
Glass cases in the main
room and in the left-hand wing, all filled with the fine gleam and glitter of
polished stone and metal—European, Asian, you name it. Not a bad exhibit
at all; ‘ethnicity’ was big this year, so a lot of unusual cultural groups were
being covered by this display: Lithuanian, Romany, Egyptian, East
Indian….. Ken edged his way through the moderate crowds, taking the
occasional picture and scribbling down notes on the exhibit flyer he had picked
up on the way in. Nobody paid him much attention, which was fine with
him; he just wanted to take his pics and go do
something more interesting.
Besides, he had already
seen it all before….. at about
Nope.
Ken wandered over to the
main prize of the exhibit, which sparkled importantly on its glass-enclosed
pedestal: The Rose Tiara, a fanciful nineteenth-century piece of
gaudiness that had once graced the coiffure of a Belgian Princess before the
First World War. It was a pretty thing, as such things went; the leaves
and flowers were shaped out of silver and heavily encrusted with diamonds, all
centering and surrounding a single, several-karat stone in the center.
Pretty, if distinctly gaudy….
Now what would make the
best shot? Ken surveyed his angles, frowning just a little. He drew
back a step or two, raising the camera…..
***c-c-c-click!*** He grinned to himself; the camera sounded
like it was working perfectly today.
Fifteen minutes later the
young student had enough pictures to satisfy even the toughest professor (not
to mention a lovely, well-lit compendium of how the cases were placed).
He even had a couple of excellent shots of Nakamori,
staring nervously up at the clock over the main display. Two hours and
seventeen minutes to go….. The exhibit would officially close for the day
at
Taking a final picture of
the artfully-laid-out arrangement of cases (and a couple of rather crooked
views of the central skylight overhead, plus the east and west exit-doors) Ken
spared a glance for the neglected right-hand wing of the exhibit hall.
Not many people in there this afternoon, but it wasn’t really a very exciting
exhibit, was it? And it had been going on for the past two weeks, too—if
you were really motivated by astronomy you might find the collection of
tektites, meteorites and other natural space debris exciting, but it wasn’t as
downright sparkly as the gems that
took up the bulk of the building’s first-floor space.
Nope, not much to see
there—and there weren’t many guards, either. Nice skylight overhead,
though….. in fact, it matched the one in the left-hand wing exactly.
Carefully stowing his
camera away with a satisfied air and a pat, Ken wandered over past several
watchful policemen into the part of the exhibit which held the older, less
flashy gems: a set of Victorian mourning jewelry all done in jet, a fine
display of Navajo turquoise, the dowry of an East Indian princess…..
He smiled at that last,
admiring the way the light gleamed off the central pendant—it was a nice bit of
work, an emerald set in silver, shaped like a teardrop. Maybe it wasn’t
the clearest stone in the world—there was a definite haze to the center—but the
Akuti’s Eye, as it was called, was kind of pretty,
wasn’t it? You could just imagine it hanging in the center of its
original owner’s forehead. She had supposedly been a foreign noblewoman
of some kind according to the stories; her green-eyed, exotic beauty had
attracted the attention of the local Maharaja, and eventually she had ended up
as his wife. The pendant had supposedly come with her from her home
somewhere or other, and there were all *sorts*
of rumors about it….. like, for instance, the one that said that it could heal
all ills and even make a man live forever…..
Not that these rumors
were easy to find; in fact, they weren’t even online anywhere. But if you knew who to talk to, well—it was
amazing just what you could find out. And being able to sneak into
certain private libraries didn’t hurt, either.
*But you know, people depend too much on computers
nowadays—it wouldn’t kill them to crack open the occasional book when they do
their research, now would it? For instance, if they had taken the trouble
to check things out REALLY carefully they might have discovered that ‘Akuti’ means ‘Princess’ in Hindustani’.* Ken smirked at that, then
frowned a little and cocked his head to one side; huh. Whoever had set up
the exhibit hadn’t been very careful, had they? He could see a slight
stain underneath the pendant, marring the whiteness of the velvet
backing. How tacky; what were they trying to do, make it look like
he was stealing from second-class exhibits? Didn’t they CARE about
appearances?
Muttering under his
breath about clumsy, cack-handed museum personnel (after all, a photographer
wants only the best shots, right?), Ken shrugged and headed for the exit.
On the way, the occasional surreptitious glance showed him nothing
unusual-looking at all about the overhead lights, which was, of course, just as
it should be. Nope—nothing unusual or noticeable there at all! No
fingerprints, no funny wires, no odd attachments, no teeny little
heat-sensitive explosive cartridges…..
Ken grinned slightly,
adjusting the set of his glasses as he thudded down the outside steps.
There was a nice little ramen place just off campus, close enough to get a bite
to eat at before things got moving—he’d have to make it fast, since he still
had to lay out his photos (and wasn’t it nice that they were self-developing,
just like the old Kodak ones? His dad had really known his stuff).
Under his breath, the young man hummed the chorus to the song he had been
singing earlier while the words ran through his mind:
“For it all—for it all—what you’re aching for—
Where the magic’s real and you’re like a fire in the sky,
Where the deal calls for a sacrifice, and you know you
cannot die…
For the edge the best ones live on, for it all.”
He hurried his pace a
little, thinking about ramen noodles and emeralds.
*************************************************************
Several kilometers away,
a little girl propped her chin in her hands and her elbows on her balcony rail;
half-drowsy with the long, bright day behind her, Ayumi idly watched as the
streetlights below flickered and came on. Her roses were really doing
well; already there were new buds at the tips of the branches, and the
fragrance of the blooms that had opened over the last few days was strong
enough to overcome the city-scents of exhaust and warm asphalt.
She yawned; behind her
the bedroom door creaked open. “Ayumi-chan? I’m leaving now…
Are you sure you don’t mind my going off this weekend?” Her mother
sounded worried, and the child turned to enter the room, sliding the door shut
behind her. “If there was any way I could get out of this trip, I would,
but my office doesn’t have anyone else they can send—“
Ayumi shook her head with
another yawn. “It’s okay, ‘Kaachan… will you
bring me back something nice?” Her mother laughed, nodding resignedly
with a roll of her eyes. “Is Rita-kun here yet? and can I stay up late to
watch that movie I asked you about, pleeeeeze?
You *said* that if I cleaned my room
yesterday, you’d let me—“
Her mother held up a
hasty hand to forestall her daughter’s entreaties. “Yes, I said so, and
yes, I’ve told Rita you can stay up—but you have to go RIGHT to bed afterwards,
okay?” Rita-kun was the teenaged daughter of an American family living
three doors down; she often stayed with Ayumi when her mother’s business took
her out of town. The easy-going young woman got along well with the
child, quite often allowing her to stay up a bit later than the usual with
nothing said.
The little girl nodded,
hugging her mother around the waist; “I promise. Have a good time, ‘Kaachan, and bring me a GOOD present, please?”
Her mother chuckled and
leaned down to drop a kiss on top of her daughter’s head; she tickled the
little girl’s neck, making her jump. “And what would you call a ‘good’
present, ‘Yumi-chan? Maybe some chocolate, or a
new book?” The child squirmed, giggling and trying to tickle her mother
back; the taller woman laughed again, her own giggles sounding remarkably like
her daughter’s as she attempted to evade the small fingers.
“Nooooo….
Can you bring me--- something about magic?” The child dodged backwards,
still laughing; her mother paused with one eyebrow quirking up at the odd
request.
“Magic? You
mean—oh, like that little coin-trick you showed me?” Her daughter had
apparently learned it from one of her friends; Yoshida Miiri
had been suitably impressed (and actually a little surprised at her child’s
ingenuity). “I suppose I could see if there are any magic shops around
the Convention Center… and if I can’t find you a kit or something, maybe I can
find you a book on beginner’s tricks. How does that sound?”
The little girl beamed at
her. “Bingo!”
Her mother cocked her
head to one side, slightly surprised and amused. “’Bingo’ Where on
earth did you get THAT expression? From school?”
Her daughter just giggled
again, hopping up on her bed and laying back with her hands clasped behind her
dark head. “Can’t tell you…. It’s a secret.” she teased, propping one
ankle up on her opposite knee in a most unladylike fashion. “Have fun, ‘Kaachan… Oyasumi!”
“Oyasumi,
‘Yumi-chan.” The woman left the room, picking
up her light suitcase from the hall as she went.
From the living room the
little girl could hear Rita discussing the weekend’s schedule with her mother;
the door opened and closed. Ayumi yawned a third time, reaching around
under her pillow to pull out a slightly dog-eared library book; rolling onto
her stomach she propped herself up and began to read half-aloud: “’The Disappearing Knot Trick—Step one…..’”
When ‘Kaachan
came back, she planned to surprise her—that’d be fun! And maybe she’d
even be able to surprise Hei-san too…..
“’First, you’ll need a length of cotton rope and a
handkerchief…..’” As she turned the page, the brightly-colored clock beside
her bed ticked quietly on. The time was
*************************************************************
Two kilometers west, a
young woman worked on her homework at the kitchen table; now and then she would
stop to think about a question, and when she did her fingers would occasionally
wander up to the silver pendant hanging around her neck. The delicate leaves
and stems were soothing to trace, and if she occasionally drifted off into
other thoughts than Economics, she had reason.
She stretched a little,
leaning back in her chair; Aoko had been hard at work
for the past hour or so, and she was nearly done. *Economics….. WHY would anybody want to be an economist,
anyway? Boring job.* From where she sat she could see Kaito’s house out the window—partially obscured, of course,
by the white fuzzball that currently occupied the
window’s narrow ledge above the sink.
“Spot? Get down
from there—you know you’re not
supposed to be in the kitchen…..” The kitten merely blinked at her and
began to wash a paw with the supreme indifference native to Felis Domesticus. With a sigh, Aoko stood up and reached for her pet, who adroitly avoided
her fingers and leaped sproing-poing-pounce!! onto her
scatter of papers, knocking her pencil off the table. The pencil became
the next cat-toy, batted across the floor as the laughing girl tried to catch
her kitten. Scooping up the errant feline as well as her writing
implement, Aoko plopped down cross-legged onto the
floor to stroke Spot’s soft fur with a gentle hand.
“Purrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr…….” She smiled to
herself, glancing up at the window again; from here she could see Kaito’s rooftop, and it reminded her of *another* rooftop
the previous week.
Kaito had purred like that too, almost, even
though he had done nothing really but sit there beside her with a goofy grin on
his face. The memory made her warm both on her cheekbones and deep
inside.
For a few moments more
they sat there, the girl and her cat; then Aoko
sighed, rising to her feet to finish her homework. Dinner soon; she was
getting hungry. Spot jumped from her arms to the floor, glancing
meaningfully towards the cabinet where the kitty-crunchies
were stored, then giving what some might have construed as a sigh (that is, if
cats sighed). He waved his tail impatiently, then turned his attention to
sharpening his claws on a table-leg.
The clock over the
kitchen table read
*************************************************************
Nakamori checked his watch,
checked the watch of the officer behind him, and *then* checked the clock hanging overhead for the umpteenth time
that evening; still a few minutes to go. *@#$%!!* Chomping angrily on another stick of gum (he’d
already sent an office clerk out to buy several dozen packs that day), the
Inspector began to go down his mental checklist: Guards in place, cameras
ready, exits sealed…..
His watch read
*************************************************************
Halfway across the city,
Edogawa Conan paused, frowning, as he typed in a last command on his
keyboard. Leaning over the back of his chair and resting her chin on his
shoulder, the little girl behind him gave an indignant snort. “Shinichi,
are you--- You’re *hacking*
again! I thought you said you were going to stop that—“
He shot her an
embarrassed and slightly contrite look over one shoulder, sliding his glasses
off and tossing them onto the desk beside the mousepad.
“I know, I know, but… this is about Kid, and--, well, look—“ Rin peered at the screen, her scowl gradually changing
to an astonished gape.
“….. Shinichi? Is
this… really Inspector Nakamori’s personal notes--? If you get caught,
you’re going to be in SO much trouble—“
The boy in the chair
shook his head. “See this?” One finger tapped at the screen,
indicating three lines; at first glance they made very little sense. “If
this is what I think it is,
*he’s* the one in a lot of trouble. You see—“ and his eyes darkened,
“—from what I can tell, I’m not the first person to hack into this file.
Somebody else got here first—“
Himitsu Rin blinked, then
leaned a little forward to read:
“’Even Time bows before the Princess when she is present…..’”
The tiny numerals at the
right-hand corner of the monitor read
*************************************************************
And in a quiet little
alcove two roofs over from the building where the display was being held…..
The jacket went on,
buttoned carefully over the dark blue shirt; pockets were checked for various
paraphernalia and equipment, then settled into place with a shake of the
shoulders.
Crimson tie. Cardgun. Smoke-bombs. Flash-grenades.
White gloves, almost
ghostly in the dim light of sunset, made sure that the glider-pack on the
shoulder was working correctly; a thin, billowing cloak of tightly-woven silk
was adjusted almost reverently to its wearer’s satisfaction.
Top hat, monocle and
4-leaf-clover charm; a Poker Face slid into place with an almost audible snap. The shadows seemed to gather
close around, wrapping its wearer in a friendly, familiar embrace, cool and
sweet with the promise of the evening…..
Showtime.
***********************************************************************************************************************************
To be continued…..
Ysabet’s notes: This chapter is freaking HUGE. I was going to
chop it into two, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it—it would be like
chopping my kid in half! Sorry there wasn’t any peacocks, but they sort
of got away—don’t worry, they’re still lurking around.
Next chapter: The heist, lots more Ayumi, lots more Aoko….. and a few surprises. Maybe those damned
peacocks as well—who knows? This fic has taken
on a life of its own, and I am not responsible for any upcoming
weirdness. Really. It’s NOT my fault—my early plotlines have all
changed, and my original cast has mutated. What can a poor author do but
tremble in fear and nod a lot?
Many, many thanks, by the way, to Becky, Icka,
Hauntress, Magik and Loqui for beta-reading this monster!