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Shinichi thought that returning to normal meant he would never have to deal with Conan again.
At least physically, he was right. The antidote reverted him to his chronological age of 22 years old, but his mind had never changed despite the shrinking. As such, when he was Conan, he was just an adult pretending to be a 6 year old.
Meaning that all of the habits he gained while being Conan for 5 whole years never fully left him, and he was learning that the hard way.
It started when he was with Heiji at a crime scene.
Shinichi was crouched down, studying the body, when he noticed something strange with the corpse's hands.
"Alele? Heiji-niichan, there's something weird here!"
Shinichi heard a snicker from behind him, and when he turned, he saw the strange faces of Heiji, Takagi, Sato, and Chiba and tilted his head in confusion.
"Awh, Kudo-kun... You miss Conan-kun so much that you decided to emulate him?" Sato beamed, unable to hide how cute she found the situation.
"I-I can't lie, you kinda nailed that..." Takagi chuckled, scratching his cheek. From beside him, Chiba nodded in a serious way.
"Perhaps not perfect though, Conan-kun's 'Alele' is far more sing-song."
"Oh true true! Kudo-kun, try it again, but really sing out the last two syllables!"
"Wait, let me get my phone for this!"
Heiji leant over to Shinichi, who was bright red and covering his face with his hands.
"Well, Kudo? Gonna sing for us?"
"Drop. Dead. Hattori."
—
When he was out with Shiho shopping for a birthday present for Ran, he knelt down to check a low shelf for a particular size and design when he looked up at Shiho.
"Do you think Ran-neechan is gonna like this?"
"...
"Snrk..."
Shinichi raised an eyebrow, before realizing his mistake instantly.
"I... I did the thing again, didn't I..."
"Perhaps you've been Conan for so long, you've forgotten how to be yourself."
Shinichi stood up straight, shaking his head. "This is just a phase, I'll get over it soon. Don't tell anyone, I already hear enough teasing from Hattori."
Shiho put her hands up in defense, but wondered if Shinichi really could break his habits before other people started noticing.
Either way, he refused to let this overtake him. Shinichi put in a conscious effort to beat back those habits as far into the back of his brain as possible.
And to his credit, he did manage to rein back those troublesome thoughts, but the longer he went without acting out, the more complacent he became.
As such, when it came around to Ran's birthday, he had foolishly thought himself cured of the Conan bug.
"Shin-chan, can you grab the streamer rolls from that box by the couch?" Kaito asked, standing on a step ladder and taping decorations to the corners where the wall meets the ceiling.
Shinichi knelt down, rummaging around in the box before finding multiple rolls in different colors.
"Ehhhn? Kaito-niichan, what colors did you need?"
"Pink and red, those are Ran-chan's favorite..." Kaito blinked, looking down at him. "What did you just call me?"
"Hm?" Shinichi looked back at him, holding the two streamer colors in his hands. "Kaito-nii— Ack!"
I reverted to Conanspeak again!!
Kaito grinned in the smug way he did when he knew he had the upper hand.
"No no, say it again, I wanna hear it."
"A-absolutely not! It was a slip of the tongue!!"
"Oh-hoh? So you often think of me as niichan? Enough to slip up?"
"Shut up! And get away from me!"
"Shin-chaaaan~"
"HANDS OFF, JACKASS!!"
Yukiko watched the boys fight from the kitchen, mixing cake batter with a sad expression on her face.
While she was happy her son was back to normal, she did enjoy him being Conan. It wasn't something that she ever thought she missed, but she loved the sound of little feet running through the house.
Perhaps she was spoiled with having two babies at once, but once the boys turned 10 she had gotten an early bout of empty nest syndrome, despite the boys never actually leaving home.
Plus, having a little child around made her feel so young—
"Ah, that's right! I'm still young!
"I'll just have another child!"
Yusaku, who was beside her preparing the fruit punch for the party, nearly dropped the ladle he was mixing with.
"Y-Yukiko??"
But she wasn't listening to him at all, mixing the cake batter with a renewed sense of enthusiasm.
Eheh, I'm so smart!
—
As time progressed, Shinichi was certain that he had finally kicked the Conan habits.
He was careful with his words, made sure that he carefully thought out everything he was going to say before saying it, and sometimes even practiced his greetings in the mirror to ensure he never slipped up again. And he was finally content. Despite the embarrassment he endured, he survived the worst of it.
Shinichi had been working on a case one day, pouring over some logbooks when he had gotten stumped, scratching his chin a bit.
Hmm… I think I can ask Heiji-niichan to confirm some of this for me… Ah, but he’s probably busy with his own cases…
Shinichi flipped through another logbook, absentmindedly reading before freezing.
“...”
He began whacking himself over the head with the logbook, grumbling ‘Stupid, stupid, stupid’ over and over.
Sato and Takagi, who had been working with him, watched in concern.
“Poor kid, he must be so upset that he can’t figure out the issue…”