Case Closed Fan Fiction ❯ When Pandora's Box Is Opened ❯ Some Things Never Change ( Chapter 30 )

Chapter Thirty

Some Things Never Change

“Happy New Year indeed,” Miwako muttered.

“So what happened?” Takagi said, looking away from the nasty body as the coroner re-covered it. Miwako showed him her notebook.

“We got called half an hour ago,” she said. “The first people coming to the shrine for their New Year's visit found the body. We haven't got a positive ID yet, but the coroners are still searching his possessions. Other than that, we think it's a young male.” Takagi shuddered. Miwako could understand why. The main reason that there had been no positive ID was that the man didn't have much of his head left.

“But at the moment, this looks like an accident, right?” Takagi said. “Look, there's a box of fireworks nearby, and the sparkler on the ground... Looks like he was just setting off some New Year's fireworks and didn't get away in time.”

“There's a good chance of that,” Miwako said. “There's a half-empty bottle of sake as well. If he was drunk, it's very likely he had an accident... he probably looked into the tube to see if it was working. That would explain how he managed to blow his own head off.”

“What happened, Sato-keiji?”

“Hey, it's the kids and Ran-kun,” said Takagi said in surprise. Ran was standing at the edge of the police tape with a worried expression, the five children crowded around her feet with expressions varying from curiosity to Ai's usual boredom and Conan's usual disturbing expression of deep thoughtfulness. “Hey, what are you guys doing here?”

“I was taking the kids for our shrine visit,” Ran said. “Has something happened?”

“We think it was just an accident with fireworks,” Sato said.

“Umm, keiji-san... have you identified the victim yet?”

The two turned to face the worried-looking miko of the shrine, who had insisted on praying over the unidentified body. As Takagi remembered, she was Mochizuki Asuka, twenty-five, owner of the shrine. “We're just looking through his belongings right now, Miko-sama...”

“Sato-keiji!” the coroner called. “We have his wallet here! It's got his driving licence inside.”

“So who is he?” Miwako asked. The coroner flipped the wallet open.

“Kimura Mitsuro, twenty-four,” The coroner said. “There's business cards for a carpentry business as well.” Asuka let out a scream of anguish and fell to her knees.

“Mitsuro?!” she screamed. “No, no...”

“You know the deceased, miko-sama?” Takagi said. She nodded, tears streaming down her cheeks.

“Y-yes,” she sobbed. “He was... my boyfriend. Mitsuro... Kami above, then he didn't come back because... because...” she collapsed into incoherent sobs.

“Didn't come back?” Miwako said. “Miko-sama... when did you see him last?”

“W-we were watching th-th-the fireworks together,” she sobbed. “H-he said h-h-he had a surprise for me and l-l-left,-and then he d-didn't come back...”

“This was at midnight?” Miwako asked. “That was eight hours ago. Didn't you wonder why he didn't come back?” Asuka shook her head.

“W-we'd been fighting r-r-recently,” she said. “H-he was wanting t-t-to go to Hokkaido and h-he wanted me t-to move there with h-him, b-b-but I don't w-want to leave the s-shrine... i-it's been i-i-in our family for g-generations... I-I thought he w-w-was just t-trying to s-spite me...” she started sobbing heavily again.

“Quite the opposite, it seems,” Takagi said, taking something from the coroner, who was emptying the dead man's pockets though leaving the remnants of his head covered. “Look.” It was a little jeweller's box with a diamond ring inside. “I guess he wanted to surprise you with fireworks and the ring, but...”

“Was he drinking?” Miwako asked. Asuka looked at her in surprise, shaking her head violently. “H-he never d-d-drank! Never!”

“Hey, get away from there!”

Miwako and Takagi turned as the coroner yelled angrily. Ran was hastily pulling Conan away from the dead man. “Really!” she was complaining. “Don't sneak into accident scenes!”

“But I was surprised,” Conan said. “This guy's really tough!”

“What do you mean?” Takagi asked.

“His hands!” Conan says. “Ran-neechan said we have to wear gloves when using big sparklers like that or we'll burn ourselves, right? But this guy's got no gloves and his hands are fine!”

Miwako narrowed her eyes, crouching down to pick up the man's hand. It was indeed unburned- in fact, it was completely smooth and clean. “But I thought...”

“Sato-san?” Takagi asked as she picked up the sparkler.

“Look,” she said, “it's burned down to the bottom, only a couple of centimetres above the handhold. If it burns down that far, the proximity of that kind of heat would burn your fingers without protection. The grass isn't burned, so he was holding it until it burned out. At the very least, he should have ashes on his hand from the sparkler, which I'm guessing was used to light the firework. But the kid's right- there's nothing.” She frowned. “Yeah, he's right,” she thought. “He always is...”

“But then he didn't light the firework, right?” Ayumi said thoughtfully.

“No, someone else did,” Ai commented. “This could well be murder.”

“Murder?!” Asuka shrieked. “Why would anyone murder Mitsuro?!”

“Mitsuro? Kimura Mitsuro?”

The speaker was an older man, his thinning black hair with occasional silver streaks placing him in his fifties or so. He was also wearing what looked to be a very expensive suit under his long coat, and his watch and the rims of his glasses were all gold. Asuka took one look at him and shrieked angrily.

“You!” she yelled. “You were the one he was arguing with just yesterday! I saw you yelling at him!”

“Can you please explain to us your relationship with the deceased...?” Takagi said.

“Call me Sasaki,” the man said. “So Kimura's really dead?”

“We're investigating for murder,” Miwako said. “So if you please, Sasaki-san?”

“Oh, I get it,” he chuckled. “You wanna know if I had a motive for murder. Sorry, But what I got is the opposite. I'm his loan shark. He owed me big money- he borrowed it to set up that lame-ass carpentry business of his. I ain't getting that money now, am I?”

“I see,” Sato said. “Hey, do we have a time of death yet?”

“It's a little difficult due to the damage done by the firework,” the coroner said.

“It's probably between midnight and one,” Takagi pointed out. “Everyone was setting off fireworks then, and this is pretty close to the shrine, so that's the only time the miko wouldn't have noticed the noise of the firework going off.”

“Unless she did it,” Sato said. Asuka glanced up in absolute shock.

“Me?!” she screeched. “Why would I kill Mitsuro?”

“Satoshi-kun might have an idea,” Sasaki said calmly.

“Satoshi?” Takagi said, stepping back from the body that he and Ran were trying to keep the five kids- especially Conan- away from. “Who's Satoshi-san?” Asuka looked suddenly terrified.

“He's an employee of mine, Fujiwara Satoshi,” Sasaki said, “and from what I can tell from his emails, he's also her other boyfriend.”

Asuka was finally speechless.

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“Maybe we should go to another shrine,” Ran said. “There's not really a public shrine nearby, but some people go to the Higurashi Shrine a little way away...”

“But we want to know who the murderer is!” Ayumi said.

“Yeah!” Genta agreed. “We're the Shonen Tantei-Dan! We have to catch the bad guy!”

“So, any theories?” Ai said quietly to Shinichi, who had given up trying to get to the body and was instead sitting a little way away from the interrogation of the miko and the moneylender. “And why were you so desperate to get to the body?”

“There's something about that body that's been bugging me, but I can't put my finger on it,” Shinichi said grumpily. “Anyway, so far it looks to be Mochizuki-dono or Fujiwara-san. They both have a motive, she's got no alibi since she claims to have been waiting for Kimura-san alone and he seems to be out of contact. I wouldn't peg the moneylender, since he's got a stronger motive for Kimura-san being alive, otherwise, as he pointed out, he doesn't get the money.”

“Since the other boyfriend's vanished, he seems to be the prime suspect,” Ai said calmly. “This seems to be a pretty open-and-shut case. No need for your mental powers, Meitantei.”

“P-please!” Asuka cried. “Satoshi wouldn't- I mean, It's not like that- why are you reading his emails anyway?!”

“I'm his boss,” Sasaki said calmly. “It's my legal right to make sure my employees ain't slacking off. Imagine my surprise when my clerk turns out to be emailing his girlfriend, telling her to leave her boyfriend because his business is only getting by on massive loans that he ain't repaying.”

“I'm afraid that our main suspects are you and Fujiwara-san, miko-sama,” Takagi said. “Unless you can explain why he's vanished, or provide an alibi for yourself, we'll have to take you down to the station for questioning.”

“No way!” Asuka screeched. “Yes, I hated that bastard- he told me to sell the shrine so he could pay off his loans! But I would never kill him, I was just going to dump him...!”

“I think it must be the other boyfriend,” Mitsuhiko said thoughtfully. “Why else would he vanish unless he was hiding from the police?”

“This guy's bloodstream's thick with alcohol, Sato-keiji,” the coroner called. “He really did drink this stuff.”

“So it's likely that the murderer got Kimura-san drunk, brought him here and blew his head off with the firework,” Sato said thoughtfully. “The lack of gloves or burns shows that he didn't light the firework himself. Takagi-kun, can you put out a warrant for Fujiwara Satoshi?”

“Hey, what are you guys doing?”

Shinichi was pulled out of his desperate memory-picking in surprise at Ran's yell. Genta and Mitsuhiko were quickly backing away from the gate to the shrine.

“We're bored of waiting,” Genta groaned. “This isn't a mystery. We wanna get our New Year's fortunes and go eat soba!”

“Yeah, but you can't break into a shrine to do it, Genta-kun,” Mitsuhiko reprimanded him. “It's a holy place!”

“Is that what's bugging me?” Shinichi thought, watching the miko yelling at the cops. “She seems pretty devoted to the shrine. I've seen her around here the past couple of years, and she doesn't seem to do much else... she certainly keeps it in great shape for such an old shrine. If she lives here alone, she must devote a lot of time to it. If she's putting that much work into it and dumping her boyfriend over it, would she really allow it to be polluted by murder? Besides, there's nothing she would gain from his death that she wouldn't get out of simply breaking up. Unless she's lying, they were already separated and he was blackmailing her for something...”

His frown deepened. “The missing Fujiwara-san is bugging me as well... if he murdered a guy for her, why would he leave her to take the rap? And if he was certain that it would come off as an accident, why would he run? That just makes him look more suspicious...”

“That's your own fault, Genta-kun!”

“But it stiiings!”

“Huh?” Shinichi said, glancing over at Genta as the larger boy cradled his hand to his chest. Mitsuhiko was shaking his head and Ayumi was helping Ran to find a bandage in her bag.

“He gave himself a blister trying to pull the gate open,” Ai said.

“It's because you don't do a lot of hard work,” Ran said, applying the plaster.

“Yeah, it's your punishment for being lazy,” Ayumi giggled.

“No, no,” Ran said soothingly as Genta glared and Mitsuhiko sniggered. “If you don't do a lot of physical work, then your hands stay soft and blister easily. Look.” She held up her hand.

“Hey, your skin's all hard!” Ayumi exclaimed.

“That's from doing karate,” Ran said. “Doing tough things like that toughens your hands up.”

“Hands...?”

“That's it!” Shinichi hissed, suddenly shooting past the surprised police who were starting to move the body, unzipping the body bag and grabbing the dead man's hand before anyone had realized that he had moved.

“Conan-kun?!” Ran yelled. Shinichi ignored her, pressing the hand.

“I see,” he thought. “That's what was bugging me...” His gaze focused on the wrist.

“Conan-kun!” Takagi said, picking Shinichi up and pulling him away. “You have to leave the body alone. We need to send it to the morgue for a more thorough autopsy...”

“Ran-kun, you'd better get them out of here,” Sato said. “We're just cleaning up the crime scene anyway...”

“Awww, but we want to see you catch the murderer!” Mitsuhiko complained.

“We've put out the warrant for Fujiwara-san,” Sato said. “He'll be taken to the station, not here...”

“He didn't do it and neither did I!” Asuka sobbed. “Stop blaming us!”

“Her faith is touching,” Ai said calmly as Takagi set Shinichi down next to her, “but there's no-one else it could be...”

“But there is,” Shinichi said quietly.

“What?” Ai said, wearing an expression of very faint surprise.

“I think we've been making a terrible mistake...”

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Dedicated to my brother, who betad the murder for plausibility. Given how awkwardly this seems to have come out, though, he might not want his name on it... ^_^;

And while I'm at it, Happy Birthday to my Kaa-chan! *huggles*

On a better note- OVA 9 IN ENGLISH SUBS! Bow to Mietzewhite! Now I'm crying even more... T_T

XD I lmao'd when I thought up that moment, HaibaraDaiFan. I figured it was about time Heiji and Kazuha got a little romance too! MARIO KART RULEZ! I own the world on it, literally XD Bug me all you want. I SHALL NOT BE MOVED! XP

That was Eta and Ushi, FaithlessGirl. As for who THEY are... *wants to know how to do an evil face smiley*

It's Sunday, Mel72000- chapter day!

XD I had a hard time deciding who Hakuba would play, Pretztailfan95, since there's no detective characters... in the end I went with Mario since I figured he sees himself as number 1. :P I couldn't think of any character for Kaito to be... he just has to be himself XD Got the video! XD my ass hurts from laughing it off so much... XDXD *falls over again* that's just epic ;) I loved Hakuba's face and Heiji's crazy dance and Shinichi screwing up and Kid... just being Kid XD It was SO CUTE! *squeals for some hours* I'm not going anywhere this summer, so I'll be WRITING WRITING WRITING WRITING... *ad infinatum* XD A life? Where can I download one of those? XD *thinks she uses the laughing face smiley too much* Of course! All the fics are good, but you actually continue and finish your fics, which would automatically make them better, on top of the fact that yours are funnier. :) I love anything that makes me cry or laugh `till I'm crying :P HEARTGOLD IS MIIIIINE! The Pokenoobs are so screwed when I get back to Johto... *geek* OMG English subs! I know I squealed about it already, but ENGLISH SUBS! Hmm... the eyes do look a little slimmer... actually, he just seems to have gotten BIGGER. Like Jacob Black growth spurt or something. (I say that because before the Twilight movie came out, somehow I always visualized Jacob as Heiji. Shinichi was Edward, Ran was Bella, Kogoro and Eri were still her parents, Yuusaku and Yukiko were Carlisle and Esme, Shiho was Rosalie and Kazuha was Alice... no, I don't have manga on the brain... XD) But seriously... when ARE Genta and Mitsuhiko's voices going to break? :? Ayumi was so cute, though. :) Kogoro will never change, methinks. Sonoko was so freaked out about her appearance in the fifth movie, but she seems fine with it now... EPIC RESPONSE-FIVE!

I want your friend's secret, Silver Shadowbreeze! I can dodge everything BUT blue shells! Evil things... I liked `em better in MK64, When they shot along the ground and ENDED everyone between them and their target, which if you were at the back was everyone. XD I'm not stalling, it's simply that the meeting cannot happen now... TBH, it wasn't really intended to be such a major point in the fic, relative to some of the other shit that's going down...

Woot! *dances with Ziraulo* go? Try and stop me!

Found ya, Kolidescope! *is now stalking you on DA* Love the Pikatrainer and Ashchu pics, and I WANT THOSE FANSKWRLS! XD They're so cute! Especially the Kid one, of course ;P Good plan. That way, once I have HeartGold, I will OWNZ UR ASS! XD Half of my fics and scenes come out of images that I want to draw, but I just can't... I have no art skillz like you do T_T I can manage bad stickmen and that's it. So I write. :) Eta and Ushi? They're... Eta and Ushi. I'm sure it isn't hard to get a vague idea of their pasts, but you'll never guess the truth :) (I hope... :P)

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 694, 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 29 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).