Case Closed Fan Fiction ❯ The First Woman In The World ❯ 9 ( Chapter 9 )

Two Hundred Years Ago

“To President Madison of the 21 states,” Ushi said.

“Who still wields less power than you,” Eta joked. “Why, someday you may even dare to assassinate people in his position.”

“Working on it,” Ushi commented, turning to the rest of the world news. “Well, look at this. Napoleon's certainly wasting no time. The French have clearly been having far more fun since the revolution.”

“Which was quite fun itself,” Eta laughed, remembering with relish the first act of the revolution, the storming of the Bastille. The energy of it- of a long-oppressed people finally finding themselves in power by the wonderfully anarchic means of mob rule and violence- had been intoxicating, and the entire country had grown drunk on it. “Aside from the guillotining, although you have to hand it to them, it really was painless. I'm sure the good doctor thought proudly of it in his last few seconds of consciousness.” Eta, having been guillotined herself five times, felt quite capable of answering the most popular question about guillotines; does the head maintain consciousness after death? She would say it did- she could even remember the sickly smell of the basket- though she wasn't entirely certain whether that was down to her own special capabilities or not.

“I'll agree it's one of the more painless methods of death that I've experienced,” Ushi allowed. “However, experiencing death at all is not exactly a hobby of mine.” A young servant slipped in through the screen door, whispering in Ushi's ear and passing him a note. Ushi read it dispassionately, then scribbled something on it and handed it back.

“Aren't we a man of the world,” Eta said with a smile.

“A man who owns the world, certainly,” Ushi chuckled, “or at least its shadows. Look at this, Eta. This came from the other side of the continent. Campillo's telegraphy designs may never have made it commercially, although I hear someone else is working on a new version as we speak, but by snapping up the designs and refining them, we now have a private, unique method of communication.”

“You and your little helpers,” Eta said with a chuckle. “Your personal criminals, who make things happen from the shadows of the world. It's like running a company...”

“A black organization,” Ushi said with a smirk. “A shadowy syndicate.”

“But even your shadowy friends cannot find the Pandora, eh?” Eta said, injecting sadness into her voice- false sadness. She had still not told Ushi that she could not care less if they never found the Pandora- if they became normal, mortal, human. If they stopped spreading evil throughout the world. If they died.

Eta sometimes felt as if she were drifting apart from the world, but that was not true, she knew; it was humanity which she no longer belonged to. Over the past 9,800 years, she had come to know the world well. No matter how much it changed, she and Ushi had traversed its surface hundreds- no, thousands of times. She must have walked every inch of earth in the world, breathed the air of every land, drunk every drop of water circulating throughout the world. Even as nature slowly and insistently gave way to humanity, she could still feel as it changed. She could feel as the balance of the world changed. The balance between land and water, air and earth, life and death, good and evil.

She could feel evil spreading out into the world, destroying the balance of justice.

Those who say just one person can't change the world never met someone like Ushi.

As communications and international relations grew all the time, Ushi had taken advantage of this to connect his criminal contacts around the world, forming a vast spider's web of crime and evil. She wouldn't say that the very existence of crime was down to Ushi, but he had organized it, streamlined it, nurtured it, expanded it. Crime didn't exist because of Ushi, but it wouldn't have the scope and influence that it did without him.

The spider in the shadows, tugging at the strings of its web, a thin, almost invisible web that spread throughout the world, encompassing and controlling it.

The balance of the world was tipping towards injustice. But there was a reason they called Nature a mother. Not just that one. It was because she was always in control. She would right the balance. Eta could feel it coming- those who would right the balance, and draw the light together until it destroyed the darkness.

People are candles. So many languished in darkness, unlit because what is on candle against the dark?

It is light. It is enough to hold back the darkness. And hundreds of candles, burning with the power of a supernova, chasing the shadows out of even the darkest corners of the world...

All it took was someone to light them.

Eta floated in the void. She didn't know quite where she was, floating around a small red sun. There were shadows around her, but every so often they would flit off- or be pulled off- into the shadows beyond the little orb of light around the sun. But nothing pulled Eta, and it was warm and comfortable near the sun, so she couldn't be bothered leaving.

After a time, though, she was alone, and it grew a little too warm. She shifted backwards, away from the heat, but it only grew hotter, brighter, burning and blinding her. Suddenly, the darkness was cool and inviting, but when she tried to reach it, she was blocked by a crystal cage. Eta floated all over, battering at the cage with her fists, but it was all around, unbreakable, keeping her near the sun. Then she looked up.

Far above, slowly falling down, was a silver coin. It turned over and over as it fell, heads on both sides. As it fell, it span faster and faster, until the heads merged into one, and it just kept turning faster, warping and changing as it fell. The faces faded as the coin warped into the shape of a bullet, shooting towards the cage.

It crashed through the crystal cage, curiously soundless- not so much as a tinkle as it silently smashed the cage apart. It fell past the sun and warped back into a coin, shining bright, illuminating the darkness. She pushed the burning red sun away, willing it to be consumed by darkness, feeling herself being consumed by the coolness. But the coin would be consumed too! Darkness was pressing in around the light...

Then there was another light.

A figure flew past, formed of whiteness, of light, like an angel. She reached out, taking the shining coin in her hands, and held it close, smiling so beautifully. She and the coin shone, and lights shone everywhere, little lights, lonely lights, but as they pulled together, orbiting around the angel and the coin, their lights were enough to obliterate the darkness entirely, and ravens screamed and cawed as they died...

The dream had warped and changed over the millennia as new images came to fit it- the coin had once become an arrowhead, before becoming a bullet, the coin itself ever changing in size and shape- but the essence was the same. And the faces.

The face on both sides of the coin, the face of the angel... those were her children. The ones that drew the candles together and ignited them, the ones who destroyed the crystal cage and rent the darkness...

Her beautiful daughter with her chestnut hair and sky-blue eyes, her brave son with his dark hair and eyes like the bluest depths of the sea...

“I will find you, I swear,” she promised. “And I will protect you. I swear it.”

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This and every chapter hereafter was released alongside chapter 78:Pandora.

I think Kaito and co might have been reassured to see that last paragraph, KageNoNeko… XD

That chapter was five hundred years ago, Pretztailfan95. Back then, Christians harmed EVERYBODY, including other Christians. After Henry VIII, every monarch was either Protestant or Catholic, and whichever they were the other half of Christianity was mercilessly hunted, tortured and generally burned at the stake… until the sides flipped again with a new monarch. And Jews got put through the wringer at all stages of history. Hell, the Protestant/Catholic violence is still going on in Ireland and Glasgow… so basically, Eta has every right to be scared XD Nagging is what a lot of Christians do these days, but blowing stuff up and shooting and killing each other is still the MO of a lot of Christians, as it is in every religion throughout history…

I do not claim to own any of the characters in Meitantei Conan. They are the intellectual property of Aoyama Gosho. All characters, couples and locations, if Canon, will be faithful to the manga, so if you're into fics with weird pairings like Shinichi and Heiji, the back button is at the top there. The fic may not make sense if you have not read up to chapter 698, which you can do at a site called (read between the lines) O/n/e/ma/n/g/a, but I advise you to buy the official Tankoban novels (up to volume 30 are out in English at the time of writing) so that Aoyama-sensei can afford to continue gracing us with his imagination. Now, I hope you enjoy the fic! (If you don't, please see my previous comments re the back button).