Chapter Text
One day, a Saturday night like any other, Shinichi Kudo became an adult. Or it should be more correct to say that he became an adult once again.
Couples, friends and coworkers walking down the Tokyo boulevards were totally unaware of the turmoil in the detective's (adult) heart. Cherry blossoms, smashed on the soil by the crowd on the street, created the perfect welcome mat for the poor forgotten high schooler. Forgotten, at least for now. Because people were about to discover everything. Those children peacefully playing soccer near the river, those lovers just walking hand in hand, those old couples who were staring at that beautiful sky during that starry night, soon everyone's lives would change. But he was giving them one more night to enjoy that calmness.
It was Sunday morning when the whole Japan rose up. No one would have expected that, during such a peaceful weekend, newspapers would have reported such sensational news:
"SHINICHI KUDO DESTROYS THE BIGGEST MAFIA IN THE WORLD"
"KARASUMA GROUP VS SHINICHI KUDO"
"CIA, FBI, PSB AND HEISEI HOLMES SAVE JAPAN"
"BURN KARASUMA: HOW MUCH EVIL WAS HE?"
And Japan discovered, just like that, that for decades, almost a century, they had been manipulated by a shadow group which everyone was unaware of.
Mothers found out who had kidnapped their children, husbands discovered who had raped their wives, brothers discovered who had killed their sisters. Drugs, prostitution, corruption, murder, there was nothing that group hadn't been guilty of. And it was not only Japan that had been a victim, although the country was the epicentre of that media earthquake. The whole world was shaken.
Foreign newspapers emulated Japanese ones and created sensational headlines such as:
“WIE EIN GYMNASIAST HAT DIE WELT GERETTET” (how a high-schooler saved the world)
“LES SERVICES SECRETS SE SONT SACRIFIÉS POUR NOUS” (secret services sacrificed themselves for us)
“LA MAFIA GIAPPONESE ALLO SBARAGLIO, NON GRAZIE ALLA POLIZIA!” (japanese mafia in jeopardy, not thanks to the police)
The contents of the articles were more extraordinary than the titles themselves: they spoke of how the decades-long efforts of various world agencies had finally been successful thanks to the central direction given by the young detective Shinichi Kudo. Names of the agents had been censored for privacy reasons, as each of them had done unspeakable things to get to the inner circle of the Organization, but Shinichi's name was thrown around everywhere. Everyone loved him.
Shinichi Kudo had certainly become the most famous detective of all time, even Holmes was one place behind him in the ranking.
Yet, he was not as happy as he had expected, because he knew that, even if he had played his part, there was still one more step that needed to be taken: a gigantic trial, perhaps the biggest ever.
It was clear that all citizens expected only one thing from that trial: justice. They wanted to see all those criminals on the gallows, regardless of their hierarchies. There were small fish and big guns, but no one had to escape. Japan wanted revenge.
Unfortunately Shinichi had just completed his revenge and he didn't wish for more. The biggest problem was that Japan's revenge would probably be detrimental to some people he loved.
Ten names came out from a list (which, in Shinichi's opinion, wasn't that much updated) regarding the internal circle of the boss: Rum, Gin, Vermouth, Chianti, Korn, Vodka, Kir, Bourbon, Curacao and Sherry. Yes, Sherry. Shinichi's partner in crime, or justice. The fact that Curacao was dead, and therefore not judgable in court, and that two other names referred to spies, meant that all the hatred of Japan was about to focus on the other seven members. Sherry included.
Shinichi's initial fear when the list came out was that Shiho would have ended up in prison for a few years, just because that list wasn't updated and very few people knew about the help she had given him to take down the Organization. Reality turned up even harsher and a new possibility came to life: the enraged Japanese citizens wanted death penalty for everyone on that list.
Shinichi discovered in that occasion that he had, unconsciously, sent many people to death. Because when he prevented a criminal from killing himself, he was actually somehow leading him to death anyway, since his country had death penalty as a possible sentence to murder. Discovering such a cruel truth made him spiral into self-doubt. All his certainties collapsed and he wondered what was the difference between him and a killer.
A doubt arose in the detective's tired mind: perhaps justice and law weren't as compatible as previously thought. Maybe sometimes, in order to help people you love, you have to go against the law.
He thought of Kaito Kid and all those people he had helped with his heists; he thought of Hidemi, who had had to kill her own father for her mission; he thought of Shiho, who hadn't even had a choice. And that was the moment when he understood that he had changed forever. Yes, maybe it was partially due to his fight against a big bad Organization, but he knew that there was something deeper in its heart that had shifted a bit. And that shift probably regarded the blurred line he drew to decide whether a person was a detective or criminal.
Outside the Palace of Justice in Tokyo there was an angry crowd shouting "to death" at the girl who had helped him for about a year. He wondered if he still wanted to live in a world that saw everything in black and white. He realized he had already made his choice.
Shinichi realized before the beginning of the trial that his priority was Shiho's safety. He would have lied to the authorities, falsified the evidence, all to save her (and his morality).
However Shinichi wasn't enough to save the scientist from a terrible destiny. He needed allies. And a lawyer. And Shinichi happened to be the best friend of the best japanese lawyer's daughter. Eri Kisaki was not a prosecutor, though, nor a defense attorney, she dealt mostly with civil cases. That didn't mean she wasn't able to handle a criminal case. One who would either destroy her whole career or give her eternal fame.
But first, Shinichi had to tell Ran the truth, and that would have probably been the easiest part of a long series of mechanizations, all to save Shiho.
"Shinichi, I can't believe it... are you really here?"
Ran stood near her house door gazing at him, as if he was to disappear at any moment. She had read the papers, understanding the gravity of the case Shinichi had been involved in, but she wasn't sure he would have actually come back to her.
Shinichi was trembling by how ashamed he was due to what he was about to tell her, but he still decided to step forward and hug her. He couldn't believe he was finally in front of her in that body. He had missed physical contact more than anything else. Feeling her so warm, alive, in his arms, was like being inside his most coveted dreams.
"Yes Ran, it's me, it's really me, I'm here" his voice broke, moved.
Ran was unable to reply and sank into his embrace. She wet Shinichi's jacket with her infinite tears. She too had dreamed of that moment. Her best friend had just returned from a pitch-black nightmare and she wanted to be there for him.
"Ran, we need to talk..." Shinichi tried to start the speech he had previously prepared, but he got immediately silenced.
“Please, not now, we have all the time in the world, now I just want to have you with me for one night. No cases, no sudden disappearance in the middle of the evening. Let's eat something and then spend the night here. I don't want this to be just a dream" Ran reflected over her words for a while and then blushed suddenly "I didn't mean spending the night here in that sense!"
"I know, I know" Shinichi couldn't help but laugh, knowing his friend well. He hugged her even tighter.
A minute passed, then two, but neither of them wanted to break apart. They both wanted to be sure that they were not hallucinating, that that hug was real, that the other person was really in front of their eyes.
Then Ran turned back and stepped into the apartment, motioning for him to sit on the sofa with her. He accepted the invitation and closed the door. When he finally sat down, he reached for her hand, trying to hold it firmly. Ran smiled.
"I'm sure you won't be so happy to spend the evening with me, once I tell you the truth" Shinichi muttered, placing his lips on her shoulder.
"I doubt it," Ran reassured him, but her words seemed weak "But if you are so sure about it, then tonight I'll be the one to tell you something, then tomorrow morning you will be the one doing the storytelling, is it ok with you?"
"No pressure?"
"No pressure."
They remained silent for a while, then she got up to prepare some tea, while he remained seated. His mind was clouded and distant, reminiscing old memories. In the last year that house had been his home, but neither Ran, nor Kogoro, knew about it. It had been so long since the last time his legs had not dangled from a chair due to his small stature. He wasn't sure that after their conversation they would have wanted him back in that house. Even though he felt that that apartment had started to be a bit his house as well.
"Ran" he called "I actually have to tell you something. Now."
He wasn't about to tell the whole truth, but he had to start from somewhere.
"Tell me," she said, continuing to prepare the tea with false nonchalance, when in reality she was very agitated.
"I love you, please know that I will always love you" he took a breath, the delicate part had still to arrive "but I don't think what I feel is still romantic love"
Ran didn't drop the cups, nor did she fall, she simply stood still. The teapot began to whistle, but she didn't notice. The silence between them was full of tension. But Ran had to stay strong, she had always been and she wouldn't break down over something she already knew.
Shinichi knew that something was wrong from her lack of emotion. The Ran he knew would have kicked him, or cried, or destroyed something, not just stand there like a statue. He had to say something.
“I have loved you platonically since the first moment I met you. It was love at first sight." he was moved and his voice came out higher than expected.
Ran poured tea in the cups and brought them to the table. She could no longer pretend nonchalance and she slumped on the sofa next to the detective. She felt her tears were about to return. Maybe that was why Shinichi didn't love her anymore, maybe it was because she was a crybaby.
"That day, when I saw you protecting Sonoko, I realized that I wanted to be with you for the rest of my life." he reminisced.
"We were just kids."
"I know, but when you meet a soul mate, you recognize them immediately" well, with Ai it had been quite a shocking first meeting, but still noteworthy "Since then I have never stopped loving you, but during this case... I discovered a world that I couldn't let you touch and, despite this, I was still so selfish. I kept contacting you even though I knew it would have put you in danger"
"But doing so you made me happy" she tried to calm him down.
“I shouldn't have done it anyway. You don't know how many times a viewfinder was pointed at your head because of me, I still have nightmares about it."
Ran realized that Shinichi felt a huge sense of guilt, for a guilt that she had never attributed to him. She felt even sadder than before. Her friend was suffering right now and she still couldn't grasp the full depth of that emotion. It was as if they came from different universes.
“I still love you” she felt like telling him “and I'm not telling you so to make you feel even worse, nor to blame you for your change of heart. Shinichi, you must understand that you will always be loved, there will always be so many people who love you, even if you are too dense to realize it. In this precise moment the whole world loves you"
Shinichi let out a bitter laugh. He couldn't give two shits about that last sentence. People were inconstant beings. Today they loved him, tomorrow who knows.
"They love me because I came across something I would have gladly avoided."
The conversation stopped and Ran realized she had just reached the line that Shinichi did not want to cross yet. She squeezed his hand tightly and looked at the cups. There was still something she wanted to know, without pressuring the detective any further.
"Have you fallen in love with someone else?"
She didn't ask him out of jealousy, on the contrary, she hoped the answer was positive. Ran loved her Shinichi so much that she hoped he had had someone else by his side during that very hard time. Ok, maybe she was just a tiny bit jealous, but no one could hold it against her after what Shinichi had put her through.
"I've never betrayed you." the detective answered seriously.
"I didn't ask this." she replied gently, stroking his palm and Shinichi sighed.
"There is a girl... You will hear about her often, you will even meet her often. Actually, you have already met her" he stopped and thought about what to say "I don't even know what love is anymore, to be honest, but I know that if I were in trouble I would call her, as I have already done in the past"
"It sounds like love to me."
"I also called Hattori in times of difficulty and I don't think I'm in love with him"
Ran laughed heartily for the first time that day. She recognized that feeling in her friend's voice: it was embarrassment. He probably hadn’t expected that they would have touched that matter.
"So... what makes this girl different from Hattori?" perhaps, in a way, she was asking him what made her different from Ran as well.
"Oh, Hattori would hate this comparison, he's terrified of her," he chuckled, then turned serious “Ran, she is different from all the people you have met so far. She has lived her whole life in a world that ruined me as soon as I tried to just reach it. You are strong, and I will never doubt that, but... I don't think you would be strong enough for that world"
And Ran understood what he meant. She still cried sometimes when she saw a corpse, even after all the murders she had witness. She was phisically strong, but emotionally she was always one moment away from crumbling down.
"Was she the one who introduced you to that world?" she asked him, feeling for the first time a certain hatred towards that girl.
"No! Indeed…" he was fast to deny, but then his mood turned playful "Maybe, yes, it was thanks to her"
"Thanks to her?" Ran couldn't believe his words.
"Yes, hadn't she introduced me to that world, I would have died, she saved me!"
Shinichi was thinking about how the APTX had actually saved his life. Had Gin just shot him in the head, he wouldn't be here to tell this story. The conversation reached a stalemate as Ran couldn't understand what he was trying to say, but she felt calmer. Shinichi hadn't been alone, that was the important thing, regardless of the circumstances.
The tea was cold by now, but neither of them cared that much.
Shinichi thought about how Shiho would have never left that tea untouched.
"Thank you very much for this concession, Bourbon"
Rei had to admit that he had been compromised. He didn't even remember the precise date he had joind the Organization. Hell, he couldn't even remember the precise year. His life had been the Organization. He seemed to have nothing else outside. As Bourbon, he had seen the rottenness of the rottenness of society and he had carried out unspeakable acts by himself. Acts that were certainly likely to be deleated from history by the PSB; as Amuro Tōru, instead, he had made deep friendships that he didn't even know if he could continue keeping. After all he wasn't Amuro anymore.
But who was Furuya Rei? Did the PSB want to put him to stamp documents in the central office? Would they discharge him? Did they really trust him? He had so many questions and was strangely scared. He hadn't felt fear in the Organization for years, since he was not allowed to have such a feeling in that kind of work. But now, with such an uncertain future, he almost hoped the Organization had never disappeared. Especially seeing how Sherry was being treated.
Sherry, Hell's Angel's daughter. The woman for whom he had entered that hell. He hadn't been able to save Elena, or Scotch, or Akemi, so at least Shiho… he had to get her out of that world. Even if it were his last act as a public officer.
"Kir will probably make it to the top of the CIA" Shiho told him abruptly.
"The PSB will give me a handshake and a kick in the ass at the most" Rei replied bitterly.
He used to say that his true love was Japan, but he wasn't sure anymore. He didn't feel reciprocated. Japanese citizens shouted "Burn all Karasuma's members!", they cared little about how much Rei had suffered to be able to defeat that mafia. People were angry, not smart. He didn't know if he still wanted to sacrifice himself for them. It’s not like anyone would have thanked him or apologized to him.
"You have a lot of weapons in your arsenal, you know, right Bourbon?"
Absorbed in his thoughts, he had not noticed that his interlocutor had managed very well to read his mind. He couldn't expect less from the woman he was about to betray Japan for.
"I made sure you stayed with Dr. Agasa instead of jail before the trial, I think I've already shown that I’m compromised"
"I'm grateful for that, but just think about the fact that Kir was in a relationship with Vermouth and nobody cares about that"
"That was her job in everyone's eyes, my action is dictated by personal gain" Rei confessed.
He had told her about Elena, and how she had been a second mother to him. Actually, she had been his only mother. This made Shiho his younger sister. Even if he didn't think she would have ever called him nii-san. Deep down he would have liked it, but he had to remember that to her he was the man who had locked her up in a compartment full of bombs.
“I have to tell you the truth, Bourbon, I have no respect for Japan or the PSB. I helped in the destruction of the Organization, but I am treated exactly like Gin" she spat out that last name.
And Rei agreed. For once, he too had considered the FBI superior. The FBI who was asking for her to be spared. Shiho adored Jodie, who had given her courage after the fight with Vermouth during the Halloween party, who she was starting to look up to the same way she looked at Akemi. And although she still did not have a good relationship with Shuichi Akai, she was indebted to him. She no longer considered him as the killer of her sister, but as the man who had remained in Japan to protect her in the shadows. Even Akai had done more than him, Rei thought ashamed.
"At least the public doesn't know your real name"
"Is there a way for it to stay that way?" the girl asked hopefully.
Rei thought about it. What she needed was a good lawyer to keep it hidden during the court trial and a lot of money to keep it hidden from the newspapers. They would all continue to condemn Sherry, but Shiho wanted to keep her anonymity at least. Otherwise it might have been better staying Ai Haibara.
"Eri Kisaki and Sonoko Suzuki, those are who you need."
They had dinner; Ran told him about the latest high school gossip that he had never heard as Conan, so Shinichi listened enraptured and amused by how in a year his class hadn't changed at all. The professors would have liked to fail him, but the whole Japan would have probably turned against them just for proposing that idea.
After dinner they slept in Ran's bed hugging each other and Shinichi noticed how he was so used by now to sleeping with her like Conan, that it didn't have any physical effect on him. He felt more brotherly affection than sexual passion.
The next morning they both woke up due to noises from the street and looked into each other's eyes.
"Are you still here?"
"I'll never go away"
But the air was tense and hopeful at the same time. They had reunited, but it was time for the truth. They ate breakfast in silence, exchanging a few smiles and caressing each other with infinite sweetness. Then she cleared the table and sat next to him as she had done the night before. It was as if yesterday's conversation had never stopped.
Even with the air so heavy, Shinichi felt support from the girl. Now he was just waiting for Kogoro to return, not to have to repeat that painful story twice.
Finally, he heard clinking of keys and the creaking of a door. Shinichi stood up, to bow as usual to his friend's father. Kogoro did not move from the door and stood staring at him.
It didn't seem real that he had in front of him the detective who had made his daughter so sad. He would have liked to kick him, but after reading the newspapers he had changed his mind. A doubt had assailed him: was that boy at 18 already more brilliant than him? Kogoro didn't think he could have ever defeated an entire mafia on his own in less than a year.
He felt envy and admiration for the young high school student, but above all, before his anger, he did not want to admit it, but he was extremely happy that the boy had returned safe and sound from that horror adventure.
Without any restraint the elder walked towards him and hugged him. It was a tender, short and embarrassing hug, so much that Kogoro had to clear his throat almost immediately to ignore his embarassement.
"So you're finally back, huh, meddlesome detective?"
Shinichi felt immense joy. That person, who had been almost like a father to him all that time, actually cared about him, even if he was pretending the opposite, failing miserably. The fact that Kogoro loved him as Shinichi and not just as Conan made him immediately feel better.
“Well Occhan, I see you're glad to see me” he replied amused.
“Occhan? How dare you? Only Conan can call me that!"
"About Conan" Ran intervened before Shinichi could sink into his treacherous mind "Unfortunately he had to leave for America a few weeks ago, but I hope he'll be back soon! He was always talking about you, you know, Shinichi? "
"He won't come back," Shinichi said in an oracular and peremptory tone "Conan will never come back."
Kogoro and Ran were shocked by those words and their level of concern immediately raised up to the sky. Had something happened to Conan while Shinichi investigated his case? There couldn't have been a child in the middle of it, but, knowing Conan, it couldn't be ruled out either.
"Explain yourself kid!" Kogoro yelled, regretting almost immediately, seeing the high school detective's face darken.
"I'm here to talk to you about this" he took a breath, he wanted to continue, but the words didn't come out "Sit down, please" he whispered.
Ran understood that the fateful moment had come. Shinichi wanted to tell them the truth, but he couldn't find the courage. She squeezed his hand so hard it hurt, but he didn't seem to notice. Kogoro took his place in front of them, sensing as well the importance of the moment.
A few minutes passed without anyone saying anything, then Shinichi was finally able to say a few words.
"Do you remember Tropical Land, Ran?" he asked him, even though it was more of a whisper.
"Yes Shinichi, that's when you disappeared," she replied with equal delicacy.
"That day... that day..." he took a breath and looked at the void to detach himself from the story, not to be too emotionally involved "That day I saw two men dressed in black smuggling an entire briefcase full of money and I followed them. Unfortunately, I made the biggest mistake of my life and I didn't notice an accomplice who came up behind me and hit me. He was Gin, the other was Vodka."
He took a break. No matter how hard he tried to feel nothing, it was impossible for him. For others it was just a story, for him it was the worst moment ever. He closed his eyes trying to calm his breath without either father or daughter pressing him to continue.
“Gin, Vodka, they were among the ten published names” Ran thought aloud.
The interruption managed to help the detective who nodded.
"Gin didn't just hit me, but made me drink a deadly poison... It was a drug called APTX4869, created by the chief scientist of the Black Organization, Sherry." Shinichi laughed without taste, an empty and sad laugh.
"Deadly?" Ran asked worriedly.
Kogoro was also terrified, if the poison was deadly, how could the young detective still be among them? Ran shed a few tears and Shinichi wondered if he should continue the story. The most shocking part was yet to come.
The high school student could not resist and burst into tears in front of the astonished eyes of father and daughter.
"Forgive me, please forgive me"
"Shinichi, what are you saying, it's not your fault!"
Ran hugged him, but the boy couldn't calm down, he just wanted to disappear from there, erase his past, not repeat the same mistakes.
Then he suddenly calmed down. Erasing the past was not possible and he had to focus on the good that came out of it. Shiho. He thought. Shiho, Shiho, Shiho, Shiho. He repeated that name in his head until he was completely calm. He had to do it.
"The poison didn't kill me, of course, but it had a very different effect..."
"What do you mean?" Kogoro asked worriedly, but in a way he already knew what the boy was about to reveal.
"That drug... made me 10 years younger."
Confessions had been made. A dead silence had spread through the air. Shinichi didn't have the courage to look the other two in their eyes. They weren't so stupid that they wouldn’t understand the allusion. Who knows how angry they were inside of them. Would they kick him out? Beat him up? He felt he deserved everything.
At first he had been a real pervert with Ran. He had forced her to confess, he had bathed with her, he had slept with her with dirty thoughts in his head. He deserved any reaction.
What he heard was only the echo of a cry and his shirt getting wet. He whirled around and saw Ran crying bitterly. He never wanted to hurt her like that, he wanted her to get angry, to hit him, not to get sad.
"One question"
That voice broke the spell. Kogoro looked at him with a grim, twisted face. That man did not know what to feel exactly.
"Tell me the truth" again a pause "Kogoro the sleeper is Conan Edogawa, right?"
Shinichi was appalled by that question. He had not expected that it would have been the first thing they would have asked him after the revelation. But Kogoro must have felt humiliated. At the age of 40, all his success had turned out to be a lie. Ran wasn't the only one who was suffering at that moment.
“I'm sorry, I'm so sorry” he couldn't look up.
"How?" whispered the older detective.
"Doctor Agasa gave me some gadgets: a voice changer bow tie, an anesthetizing watch, enhanced shoes and much more"
Kogoro felt like a failure. No, he was a failure. He had bragged so much about his successes without realizing that something like the "detective in trance" could only be science fiction. Did he really think that his unconscious self revealed itself when he was asleep, while awake he couldn't solve the simplest cases? He knew he was delusional.
Even for Ran it was an excruciating pain to know that all the success of her father did not belong to him and that now, having Conan left, probably her father alone wouldn’t solve anything.
"I'm not worth anything, huh?" Kogoro murmured.
"No!" Shinichi shouted "It's not your fault, it's my fault!"
"And what fault would a child have" Kogoro raised his voice, but, at that word -child-, he composed himself "when it’s his guardian to be incompetent?"
Shinichi was flabbergasted. He didn't understand, was Kogoro angry with himself? Not with him? But he had been the one who fooled them for a year, sleeping in disguise under their roof. Didn't they feel ridiculed? Mocked?
"Shinichi" Ran's faint voice came forward "Continue the story, please, how did you get yourself back?"
"I met Sherry"
Blood in the veins of the other two froze. She was one of the ten people publicly mentioned and convicted.
"What did she do to you?" Ran screamed in terror.
Shinichi laughed, this time genuinely. The idea that Ran might be afraid of Shiho hadn't even occurred to him.
"She enrolled at the same elementary school as me."
Ran froze, she couldn't process everything correctly at that moment, but remembering the conversation from the day before something became clear to her.
"Are you talking about Miss Kobayashi?" Kogoro asked.
"Ai Haibara," Ran said. "Isn’t she the person we talked about yesterday?"
Silence was assent and Ran understood that she had hit the mark. But she could not imagine how that little girl, so grim, but also kind, could be such an important mafia woman.
"Shiho Miyano, this was her real name" replied Shinichi taking courage "She was never asked whether or not she wanted to participate, she was born in the Organization, it was not her choice to become Sherry, please don't blame her"
"If you are here now, it means that she helped you, right?" Kogoro asked hesitantly, he didn't know what to think.
"Yes, she has become my most trusted partner in a short time, together with Hattori"
"I would like to know much more about the resolution of the case" Ran interrupted him "But for now there is only one thing that worries me... Shinichi, are you okay?"
No, he wasn't okay, but he didn't have the right to say it, not when she must have felt so betrayed. He had to be strong. He was a victim, but he had made Ran one too.
"Yes, it's over now," he smiled falsely.
"My boy, it's never over," Kogoro replied promptly, unmasking him immediately.
"Aren't you angry?"
"Conan was a brother to me" Ran smiled at him, still with tears in his eyes "Now you are my brother as well"
Shinichi was baffled, he didn't think he had heard right. She couldn't really have said it. But Kogoro matched his daughter’s words.
"And to me he was a son," he said with tears in his eyes.
"Don't you feel cheated?"
"For what?" Kogoro raised his tone "For not telling us what you couldn't tell us?"
"For suffering in silence all this time, feeling so alone despite being surrounded by people you loved?" Ran whispered to him.
It was amazing how she understood everything, she was amazing. His best friend, the one who had been his girlfriend, now his sister. One of his soul mates.
And Kogoro had also been a surprise, from the way he had beaten him, he would never have expected such solidarity from him. Perhaps time as Conan had made him discover so many good things, apart from the bad ones. Yes, there was Shiho, but there was also his new family. He had learned to build bonds, which he had never been particularly brilliant at before. He had never seen it that way until then.
“You know young man, maybe you can start calling me Occhan too” Kogoro said embarrassed “And don't think I'll let you go and live in that grim looking house all alone! You stay here, Conan belongs to my family! "
Shinichi felt immensely grateful and closed his eyes, thanking the entity who had sent such spectacular people to his side.
"Dad don't worry about that" Ran said playfully "He has his Shiho to keep him company"
"Huh? What are you saying, Ran! Hey Ran, come back here! "
Ran and Shinichi started chasing each other, playing around like two children. Maybe it would be all right. Ran still loved him and that was the important thing.
That evening an official email and a personal message were sent to the lawyer Eri Kisaki.
"Hiroshi Agasa, Shiho Miyano's momentary guardian, formally asks the lawyer Eri Kisaki to represent his protégé in the case -Karasuma vs. The State-"
“Mom, Shinichi is back. There are so many things we need to tell you. But please, mom, I need you. Please make sure Shiho Miyano doesn't get convicted. I'll explain everything to you later. "
Eri was a lawyer, therefor she considered laws the most important thing in a citizen's life. Yet, at the plea of her daughter to help a woman who had charges such as "attempted massacre" and "murder" in her criminal record, she could not say no.