There's only one truth!

A child, or are they? They may have the body of a kid, but they have the mind of a 17 year-old genius. chances are, he's way smarter than you. Associated with AmaranthRPG.

[amarciasfinest]

@notyouraveragebrat

☆ | “Hm? What do we have here?” Pascal spoke, looking around a bit. Her eyes suddenly set upon a uh.. kid? Was he a kid? His aura gave off a more mature vibe than the technician herself had! Either way, she was surprised to see a kid out of nowhere… literally– or it was just that she wasn’t paying enough attention.

“Can I help you?” She soon asked, feeling a little awkward, she wasn’t very good with children… so to speak.

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

Everyone always thought he needed help. He was a child, therefore he must need assistance, right? Right.

Wait no, that was very very wrong. He was no child, but here Conan was stuck in this useless body and creating confusing situations like this. Oh how he wanted to sigh in annoyance, but he held it inside and instead put on the smile of a sweet innocent child. Or, at the very least, the appearance of one as well as he learned to do.

“A-ah, I’m just a kid. I’m Conan Edogawa! Who are you, miss? And I’m fine, I think? Just walking around.”

Totally not investigating this strange world or anything. Not at all. Totally not suspicious.

[kurobastard-blog]

He snickered again at Edogawa’s flimsy excuses, wondering how he had ever managed to trick anybody like that back on the other side. But he didn’t dwell too long on the subject; wondering how he hid his intelligence would lead him to question why the brat was so keen on acting so dumb, and he didn’t need to start wondering about Inconvenience #1′s motives or personal life too much.

That was a messy road that led to nothing but him caring about the kid’s well-being. Ugh.

     “No, no, I’ll live. My throat’s just a little sore, is all.”

That was a stupid move, he had to admit, but it was easy enough to cover it up (albeit with a lame, transparent excuse that tantei-kun would see right through). Suspicious, perhaps, but it was better to be suspicious for having a secret than for having a noticeably unique verbal tic.

     “I’m not really used to being down here, so the       air is messing with me a little bit. Weird, huh? I       have lived here for ages, but I barely ever come       into the city for too long- but that’s enough about       me, really.”

He grinned again, attempting to change the topic.

     “How about you, Conan-kun? You haven’t been       here long, right? What did you do before you got       here? If you got along with Hattori-san, you must       have had some pretty exciting adventures, huh?”

Smooth, Kuroba.

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

     What was with this guy’s weak excuses and snickers? He seemed weird. Not bad just… strange. His throat couldn’t be that sore, since he was speaking perfectly fine before that and even now. There should have been some sort of signs beforehand. Conan really just needed to let it go, but for some reason, he just couldn’t.

    “Okay, if you say so, mister…”

    He obviously didn’t believe a word this Kaito said. He wanted to object a bit more, but the spotlight was turned to him.

    This could be potentially bad, but maybe he could use this to his advantage- no, probably not. And he said he was looking for his parents, but truth was he didn’t even live with his parents before living here. Great.

    “No, I only just got here. Before here, I, uh, helped my uncle with his detective business and sometimes Hattori-niichan!"

    Well, it wasn’t wrong.It just wasn’t completely right.

    “I usually just assisted with trivial information I saw on the television though. I’m just a kid after all. Did you watch the news, mister? He appeared quite often on the news as the Sleeping Kogoro! He sure wound up near a lot of dead bodies.”

    Actually, Conan sure wound up near a lot of dead bodies and did all the work. Mouri just happened to be there... and get the credit.

[dynxmism-blog]

A [d a r k] expression like that didn’t deserve to be on such a [c h i l d i s h] face. Nor, on any face, really. But [e s p e c i a l l y] not Kudou’s. So, he decided to drop the whole [d y i n g] thing for now (though he couldn’t help [c o n s t a n t l y] mulling it over in his mind) and continue to talk about the more [i m p o r t a n t] things.

                              “So, there’s at least one thin’ we can do rather than sit on our asses an’ do nothin’. First thin’s first, after we eat, we’ll see if there’s a cure fer yer, eh… affliction.”

Afterwards, what else [m o r e] was there to do? How could they [p o s s i b l y] figure out the information they wanted? Heiji had already tried the offices; they weren’t much [h e l p] in that regard. (Perhaps, though, they could ask about [r e s t o r i n g] Kudou’s body back to him, but… otherwise, they were pretty much at a [d e a d] end.)

                              “Ah, here we are! Smell that? Ain’t nothin’ like home, but it’s close enough. C’mon.”

He opened the door for his little friend then stepped into the store. He asked a table for two, quietly happy they’d gotten a more [i s o l a t e d] spot in the corner. (After all, they were dealing with more or less [s e n s i t i v e] information.)

                              “A’ight. So, let’s assume we really are dead.”

He began talking as [s o o n] as the waiter had left. He’d already placed drink and food orders, taking the [o b l i g a t i o n] of ordering for Conan rather than letting him order for himself. (Which, honestly, was more a habit of [l i v i n g] and showing the other around than rudeness.)

                              “What’re we gonna do? Do we got much a choice other than just ta… do whatever? I ain’t really ta ‘ccept this place as home ferever. Got any idea what we should do?”

{Of course, he found himself looking for [d i r e c t i o n] from Kudou. Not because he wasn’t capable of doing so himself, but sometimes the other had an [i n s i g h t] Heiji failed to consider. It was [w i s d o m], the only [a d v a n t a g e] the East Detective had over him.}

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

    Find a cure. Yes, he had mentioned it, but he wondered if it was possible. It sure would be nice. The cons of this body sure outweighed the pros, plus he was over the whole being a child during his original childhood. Conan wasn’t so fortunate to be a person who looked back at their childhood with a wish to return to it.

    And now he was stuck as a child for eternity. Maybe. Let’s hope not.

    “Have you met anyone that could have any possible information about stuff like that here, by chance?”

    It was a slim chance, but it was a chance. Talking about this was a better conversation than the horrible memories that were bouncing around his mind, and would be much more productive. He did think that eventually, a conversation about that would have to take place, but not now. Conan didn’t usually like waiting with these sort of topics, but he had to sort everything out in his head.

    “Mmmhmm! It sure does!”

    More out of his own habit from living, the slightly more childish attitude returned as soon as their waitress began to guide them to their table. It wouldn’t do much good if a waitress heard them having such a serious conversation. It would get at least one of them a strange look. Then again, most of the looks he got was strange, so what else would be new? It was preferable to being cooed at like those old ladies had. As soon as she was gone, he sighed in annoyance.

    Old habits die hard.

    Conan hardly cared about being ordered for. He was kind of used to it by now, and so long as he didn’t get a kiddie meal it was fine. Anything was better than dinosaur shaped chicken nuggets or something off the kids menu. It was just another thing he was far too used to.

    “I don’t really want to accept this either.” Once he was sure that nobody was in earshot, his more serious tone returned. “However, if this is the afterlife, chances are we can’t so easily return from it. We’ve both dealt with enough cases to understand that the dead don’t just… come back.”

    As far as what to do, even Conan was slightly stumped, but he wasn’t going to let that stop him from discovering the truth. He’d been confused since arriving here. If only he had memories of what happened to him. He felt that if those were still intact, maybe he’d have a better idea of what to do.

    “I know you’ve been doing some research since coming here, right? What sort of stuff have you found out? We can continue going from there. And since coming here, you haven’t run into a single person you know?” His reactions from earlier made him think not, but Conan wanted to be sure. “Don’t you think in the afterlife, we’d see at least one person from our murder cases after a while?”

    It did seem weird that Hattori wouldn’t have ever seen someone he had witnessed die. The amount of bodies they were around was an astonishing amount after all. Conan didn’t know much about this place though, so maybe not. He’d just have to find out on his own.

[kurobastard-blog]

          “Five….right, of course. They’ve got to be around            here somewhere. Well, I don’t know how to get            home, but there’s got to be a way, if we try hard            enough!”

He couldn’t help but scoff inwardly; there was no returning from the dead. Both of them knew that all too well. If it was possible- well, then KID would still be alive, in both senses of the term.

(Or maybe just the first sense, if his father had never died and Kaito never taken up the mantle. Logistics were tricky, and he didn’t want to dwell on them for too long. They drudged up bad memories.)

He listened to Edogawa talk, resisting the urge to grin widely, sharply, as his tone turned more mature. That was some really fancy language you were sporting there, Conan-kun.

          “Direct contact? Normal humans? Well, aren’t you a            bright young man to be using words like those. I didn’t            know there was such a thing as an abnormal human.”

Although….he had locked himself away for quite a while, so the whole talking skeleton gambit was new to him. He would probably have to go dig around for more information later, when he wasn’t babysitting a kid who honestly didn’t need to be babysat.

          “Well, I’ll protect you if I can, but that would probably             just involve running away!”

A loud laugh, followed by a cough, covering up what would have been a more KID-like kekeke.

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

    “The best bet would be with any of those magic users, or the monsters, but-“

    Whoops.

     Had he slipped up already? That sure didn’t take long. He’d been here for what, a day? And here he was using adult language and tripping up already. After being a child for so long, you’d think that he’d have gotten used to this by now but no, he hadn’t.

    And he was 99% positive the T.V. excuse wouldn’t work here.

    “A-ah, well that was just some stuff Hattori-niisan was saying! He, uh, was talking about how strange this place was! He’s been here for a while, so we were talking about it! I just picked up some stuff from him.”

    Smooth.

    Beneath his glasses, he raised a brow at that laugh of his. After dealing with a lot of liars and criminals, he knew the ‘cut yourself off with a totally inconspicuous cough before they catch onto you’ trick. At the moment, he couldn’t think of a good reason as to why you’d hide a laugh of all things. So, he’d let it slide. For now. Maybe he was just sick?

    Wait, how could dead people be sick?

    “You okay there, mister? Do you need a drink?”

[dynxmism-blog]

Heiji [b e l l y l a u g h e d] at the story of the old ladies; a laugh more genuine and [p u r e] than any other that escaped his lips since he arrived. God, how [w o n d e r f u l] it was to have Kudou back.

                              “A’ight. It’s this way.”

He turned on his heel and started walking at his normal pace towards the [n e a r e s t] Okonomiyaki store. His favourite was a bit ways away but he figured quality wouldn’t [m a t t e r] at the moment. For now, there were more [i m p o r t a n t] things to worry about; today was a grand leap forward towards the [t r u t h], even if it only produced more [q u e s t i o n s] than answers.

                              “So, motorcycle accident, huh? What a stupid way to go.”

Provided that he was [d e a d], at least,

                              “You really remember me dying, huh? If that’s the case, then…”

The first possibility to be crossed off the list was that someone had [r e v i v e d] Heiji for the sole purpose of trapping him in this place. What would be the [p o i n t]? They clearly wouldn’t get any ransom money for it; they didn’t seem to have much [m a l i c i o u s] intent.

The second possibility remained that he wasn’t revived at [a l l]. He assumed he’d been given a proper [f u n e r a l  s e r v i c e], which meant that he had been buried. Even if the person had dug up his body, there was no possible way to [r e a n i m a t e] a corpse, especially since his body would have been at least a few [d a y s] old.

All that remained was that he was [d e a d]. It seemed so [i m p o s s i b l e], but it was also the [o n l y] possibility. Deductive reasoning was his [s t r o n g  s u i t], after all.

                              “If I’m dead, then that means yer dead, too. Does that mean they got ya?”

He didn’t need to elaborate which [‘ t h e y ’] he was talking about. It was… quite an [u n c o m f o r t a b l e] thought. It seemed like everything was [o v e r] before anyone knew it had [b e g u n]. It was like they didn’t even have a chance to [l i v e].

{Perhaps that was the [t r u t h]; Heiji and Kudou were [b a r e l y] adults (well, Kudou was back to being a kid again, he supposed) and their lives were [o v e r]. He’d never have the chance to [s u r p a s s] his father and Kudou never got to take down the organization that [t h r e a t e n e d] Japan. Just like that, everything they [k n e w] and [l o v e d] and tried so [d e s p e r a t e l y] to save was just… [G O N E]. It seemed, [v e r y  s l o w l y], that reality was [s e e p i n g] into his mind…}

                              “Oi, if ya’re dead, why ain’t ya back in yer old body again? Er… Well, why ain’t ya Kudou Shinichi? Why are ya still Conan?”

Of course, he meant the question rhetorically, but it [c r o s s e d] his mind. They were [s o u l s], why did they have a [p h y s i c a l] manifestation of who they [u s e d] to be?

Heiji unveiled a [g r e a t] grin, leaning to the side and pointing a finger at the [t i n y] child by his side.

                              “Hey, hey, does that mean ya’ll be a seven-year-old ferever? Good luck with that tiny body o’ yers, Kudou. It’ll be like that for an eternity.”

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

     Well Hattori laughed, which should have been a good sign about his state of being, but Conan didn’t exactly like being laughed at about those old ladies. Oh well.

    Conan kept up beside him, despite the difference in their height, quite easily. He didn’t know a thing about the world around him, so he was eying things in the environment as they walked. He took in the shops, the world, and the people or non-people as that was occasionally the case. It was probably a good idea to get some sense of direction around here, and he really had no idea where he was or where they were going.

    “The evidence showed it was likely that the criminal caused you to have that accident. If only I had found you quicker, I-“

    Conan had to force himself to stop that train of thought out loud. Hattori didn’t need to hear his self-hatred and how he messed up. That wouldn’t do him any good now, would it? No. It was probably better to cut that off for now. Just stop.

    Not that he could stop the ongoing train of thoughts about how he could have saved his friend. Would any of this have happened had he been quicker, smarter, or more efficient? What if he had just been Shinichi Kudo? If he didn’t have this damned ‘curse’, maybe he could have saved Hattori.

    “More than likely.”

    He didn’t need to even ask who they were. It was pretty obvious, and it truly was an uncomfortable thought. If it was them, then what would happen to Ran and Mouri? Would they discover Haibara? Were the Detective Boys, Agasa, and the rest of his friends in danger?

    He was starting to feel sick to his stomach with worry.

    “I’m not sure who else would have gotten me. It may have been some criminal Mouri was handling, but I had been looking into some leads a few days prior to my loss of memory. Most likely, they caught me and I died that way. Or perhaps I made a move and slipped up somehow. As it is right now though, I suppose I’ll never know.”

    Why wasn’t he Shinichi? That was a good question. Maybe people came here in the state they were back in life, but then wouldn’t that mean Heiji would be bruised and beaten up? Nobody around them, not even Conan himself, had any sort of wounds like that either. It could represent their form from before they lost their memories in which case that would be accurate.

    Either way, it was a nuisance. Wasn’t there some way to turn to normal? There must be.

    …right?

    “Oi, maybe there’s a cure or a way to turn back here that wasn’t at home. I don’t think I can take acting like a kid for an eternity though… great.”

    He did wonder if there was a point in continuing this act. Why bother? For now, it was to be safe in case there were people from his life who had known Conan, or maybe they had followed him here. It would also save himself the trouble of explaining his situation to every person he spoke with. Conan was pretty sure going oh hey, I’m a 17 year old who got shrunk down into a child so I’d appreciate you not babying me wouldn’t go over well in conversation.

[amanews-blog1]

Send me ✖ and my muse will tell yours two truths about themselves and one lie.

They won’t tell your muse which is which!

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

“Well, that didn’t last long...”

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

OOC;; Sorry for the lack of responses yesterday and well, none today. I’m kinda around but I hurt my wrist and typing is kinda awkward and painful, so it’s less the preferable right now! My sincerest apologies! I’ll try and get to stuff tomorrow for both this char and Papyrus, but don’t keep me to that. I also may stick around to reblog memes and such before Saturday ends, but we’ll see.

I never actually did an intro (whoops, I totally meant to) so I’m also just gonna add a tiny thing here saying hello, my name is Shiro! Some fandoms I’m in are Dangan Ronpa, DCMK, Undertale, Persona/SMT, and Tiger and Bunny. I like cats and mimicking their lifestyle. Feel free to talk and plot with me!

[kurobastard-blog]

          “Kaito Kuroba- it’s nice to meet you, Conan-kun!”

Sugary sweet, and he had to physically hold back a grimace, smiling instead. Well, he wasn’t surprised that the kid had found Hattori, considering they were drawn to each other like corpses were drawn to them (There was a small hope that nothing too tragic would happen here; after all, they were all dead already, right?). Ah well, though, hopefully he wouldn’t have to actually bring Edogawa over to tantei-han’s. He was probably still upset at Kaito for his casual remarks when they had first met.

Really, some all detectives just needed chill.

          “If you know Hattori-san, then we’re probably from            the same world, huh? What a crazy coincidence!            I can’t say I know a lot of people here, but three’s            company, or so they say.”

Not that Edogawa and Hattori were exactly welcome compan, but they were better than….well, they were better than the other strange creatures that called Amaranth home. Which led him to wonder….

          “You haven’t had to deal with any of those scary            scary monsters, have you? I don’t really have            anything to protect us with-”

An absolute lie, but his cardgun and its holster were carefully concealed underneath his jacket, and he wasn’t planning on showing them off to tantei-kun any time soon,

          “-but we’re in the city, so we shouldn’t be bothered            by them too much.”

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

     In this form, he was far too young to recognize that name, but there was no denying that he did. Shinichi however knew that to be the last name of a famous magician, one that his mother and father had spoken about. It’s not like he had any proof yet that the two were related anyway.

     “Five,” he corrected, but internally rolled his eyes at himself. What a child. “My parents are also here… right? But that’s good! Hattori-niisan wants to get home, so more people to look the better! Do you know how to get home, mister?”

     Conan was pretty sure they couldn’t get home. Although confused about this place, he was more accepting then his friend that he was one of those dead bodies now. What really sucked is if they were dead, he was probably stuck here for eternity as a child. Maybe there’d be some magical way to return to normal, but that was risky and not something he had yet encountered.

     “I haven’t really come into direct contact with any of them though, just some weird skeleton from afar. He was going on about fonts and spaghetti, I think. He was… different. Some of the normal humans also seem kinda odd.”

     That was putting it lightly.

     “I sure hope you’re right. I don’t think I could protect myself.”

     Conan was also quite capable of defending himself and making an escape, but it’d be for the best to not show that side of himself. Can he even die again? That’d be another question for later.

[kurobastard-blog]

Oh, brother. Kaito guessed that either Edogawa was keeping up appearances in public, or just plain didn’t recognize him; either way, he was both grateful for and disturbed by the childish facade of his. It gave Kaito a reason to keep up his cheerful, child-loving attitude (granted, it wasn’t as though he hated children in real life, they were just often…..nuisances), and also let him take some of the edge off of his paranoia.

As long as they were playing pretend, he could deal just fine.

         “Eeeh? Where we are?”

His pity for the kid was only half-faked. He really did feel for tantei-kun, considering the fact that he was stuck in the afterworld without anybody he knew (unless he had run into Hattori, at which point he felt even sorrier for Edogawa for having to deal with Detective #3 - wait, maybe that was his own anti-detective bias talking), but at the same time, Edogawa’s parents - in his observations - were more absent than Kaito’s own mother, and he had to wonder if they even existed…..and if they did, how they would feel about being used as scapegoats.

          “Well, this is Amaranth. It’s….a special place.”

Casual attempts to avoid the concept of death, going along with tantei-kun’s innocent little child routine.

          “Were your parents with you before? They could be            around here somewhere. Want me to help you look            for them?”

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

    “Special place? Is that why there’s all those scary monsters…?”

    Great. Another person treating him like a baby. This may prove to be useless like usual.

    Luckily, Conan hadn’t had any direct contact with some of these stranger beings that didn’t really exist where he was from (or so he believed they didn’t anyway) but he’d seen them from afar. It was hard to ignore some of them, like a screaming skeleton for example. Conan wasn’t really scared of them though, but he figured an actual child would probably be terrified of them.

    “Uh, no. I just woke up and was alone here. Hattori-niichan helped me for a bit, but we got separated. Would you help me, mister? Yay!”

    The chances of finding said parents were about 0%. They were probably back in the real world, and if they were here Conan would have easily discovered them by now. They’d be a burden right now anyway, and would make an easy connection between his current body and Shinichi Kudo. Did this guy even know who that was? It was a possibility if he was from Japan.

    “Oh, and I’m Conan Edogawa! What’s your name mister?”

[kurobastard-blog]

@notyouraveragebrat !!

There were two problems with spotting a familiar figure in a place such as Amaranth. The first problem was, obviously, the off-chance that somebody would recognize him from his past life as KID, and try to do something absolutely terrible (sarcasm duly noted) like try to arrest him.

The second problem was, well, the thought of anybody he knew dying.

It didn’t help that this particular familiar figure was one of the more….competent hurdles he had to jump in his lifetime. For something (somebody?) to somehow kill the seven-year old that he had managed to taze and/or throw off of buildings on several occasions and still survive? That was somewhat nerve-wracking.

          “Hey there, kiddo.”

But first, he had to approach the kid, with an air of nonchalance and non-recognition.

          “You lost? Somebody as young as you shouldn’t be            wandering around a place like this alone, you know.”

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

     With big, childish eyes he stared up at the person who stopped him, tilting his head in confusion. He wondered if this was someone with a big heart who had felt the need to take care of a lost child in this confusing world, but there was something that felt odd about this guy. Conan couldn’t quite put his finger on it though. Maybe he’d find out, and he’d certainly try to.

     So far, he didn’t recognize him as the phantom thief who plagued his previous life. That was good for one of them at least.

     “Ne, I am a little lost.” What came with not recognizing him though came the childish tone of voice he tried so hard to keep up. “Do you know where I am? I can’t find my parents...”

     A lie. Probably an obvious lie to this guy, but Conan couldn’t know that yet. Maybe this guy would have some answers he didn’t have already. Seeing what he could find out probably wouldn’t hurt.

[dynxmism-blog]

The first part reached his ears and everything [a f t e r] that almost seemed to fade to [n o i s e] for a brief moment.

                              “Wait, what? Whadaya mean I’m dead? I ain’t dead; I’m standin’ right here.”

That much was [t r u e], right? If Heiji was really [d e a d], he wouldn’t feel so… [a l i v e]. He could breathe and eat and touch and sleep and feel and [t h i n k] and none of that would be possible if he was dead, right? He hadn’t considered himself much of a [r e l i g i o u s] person, more taking to science and fact than [f a i t h] but… could it be?

He should his head and put a hand to it, listening [q u i e t l y] and thinking hard as Conan tried to recall the past. But, as Heiji expected, he couldn’t [r e m e m b e r]. A whole two days missing from memory, just like most of the [o t h e r] people here. Well, except for one girl…

[H a b i t u a l l y], he put his finger to his bottom lip, resting a thumb against his chin, trying to piece the [p u z z l e] together in his mind. But, no matter how he placed the pieces, he always came to the same [h a r r o w i n g] conclusion. He frowned, [f o r l o r n], then stood straight once more.

                              “Well, it ain’t gonna do much good just ta stand here, thinkin’. How ‘bout some’hin’ ta eat? Bet ya ain’t had a bite since ya got here, amiright?”

He offered a chummy grin, despite their [o b v i o u s] circumstances, simply because he was reassured with the familiar conversation of an old [f r i e n d].

{Even if the appearance of said old friend might have [c o n f i r m e d] his deepest fears, but at least he wasn’t [a l o n e]. No, his deepest fears had been facing [e t e r n i t y] without those he loved by his side. He always thought losing [o t h e r s] to death had been terrifying, but knowing now that death may [t r u l y] part him from them was beginning to chip away at the carefully built wall around his emotional [s a n i t y].}

                              “They got Okonomiyaki here, too, eh? Ain’t nothin’ like home but it’ll do.”

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

    That… was a fair point, and seemed to be true from his current perspective. Conan had confirmed it for himself. Heiji wasn’t some sort of ghost in front of him. He was a physical being. It wasn’t some weird, mystical force that had lifted him up, and it wasn’t his imagination. Heiji had picked him up and held him, was speaking to him as if he was alive.

    So what was the truth? It could just mean that Conan was also dead. That was also likely considering the dangerous situations he got himself into daily.

    And that would explain the lack of Ran and Mouri. He was sure that given the time he’d been here and how clear he’d been making his presence, Ran would be around scolding him for running off again or something along those lines. There had also been some... strange things around here to say the least.

    Great. He was just getting himself more and more concerned about everything. Conan really hoped that Ran was safe.

    “That’s true, but I also trust that memory. It’s very vivid. So I’m just not quite sure right now.”

    He’d only been having nightmares about it for months, thinking back on that moment and questioning everything he can about it, and was forced to watch so many people who cared about Hattori become upset by it all. As his friends broke down in front of him, he did his best to put up another mask for them. It was hard – no, impossible to think that such a hard time in his life was fake or false in some sort of way.

    With the topic of food regaining his attention, Conan tried to push all that negativity aside or at least hide it from Hattori. Perhaps a lack of substance was making thinking harder than it had to be.

    If they really were dead, well… they’d have eternity to figure this out.

     “Ah, just some candies from some old ladies who seemed to be worrying about me. Oi, I think they wanted to adopt me, but I managed to get away with my face still intact.”

    As he thought back to a few hours ago, he rubbed his cheeks with an annoyed gaze. Darn old ladies and their pinchy fingers.

    “That sounds good enough for me. Now that I’m thinking about food, I’m starving.”

    He was happy though, even if his face didn’t show the true amount of his joy, to eat with his good friend again. It had been so long. Too long.

[dynxmism-blog]

                                      As he watched Conan, [s c r a m b l i n g] for words and nerves, his smile [f a l t e r e d] faintly. Mostly, he was offended by the [l a c k] of returned enthusiasm to their reunion, but he considered that maybe the [c i r c u m s t a n c e s] were not quite as they seemed. He settle for the [l a t t e r] possibility; the idea of Conan [n o t] being excited to see Heiji would just depress him.

                              “Huh? How is what possible?”

He was greeted with [s i l e n c e], blinking when the finger touched his forehead. His expression turned from excited to annoyed, then [c o n c e r n e d] as the child began to speak again.

                              “Yeah. I been here fer a while. ‘Pparently, the entire place is called Amaranth.”

Gently, he returned Kudou to the ground and crouched beside him, lowering his voice to a [w h i s p e r]. He was unsure who could hear them, but now that Heiji found his usual [p a r t n e r  i n  c r i m e] (er, well, in [p r e v e n t i n g] crime), he could finally bounce his deductions off of the East Detective and hopefully come to a [c o n c l u s i o n] of some kind.

                              “They’re claimin’ that th’ people here are dead, an’ that this is the afterlife. But, we know better than that, don’t we, Kudou?”

He nudged the boy’s arm gently with his elbow and chuckled [i m p i s h l y].

                              “I guess they kidnapped ya, too, huh? Lemme guess; ya can’t remember a thin’ before ya woke up. It’s Saturday now, so what was the last day ya remember?”

He shifted his weight [s l i g h t l y], leaning back on his heels.

                                      “An’, while yer at it, what’s the last thin’ ya remember? Could be useful in helpin’ us find out what the hell’s goin’ on. The sooner we get this figured out, the sooner we can get home, right?”

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

All the tiny pieces of what Hattori had just said to him put together a sort of conclusion Conan didn’t exactly want to reach, but he had no plans about running away from the truth. In the long run, that wouldn’t do either of them any good.

This did explain the sad looks some people had given him. Most people probably didn’t really want to tell a child that they were dead now, would they?

“A few months ago, we were working on a case together and you had caught sight of the culprit, so you rode off to chase after them. I lost all contact with you, and you weren’t answering your phone, and I-I…”

Conan was still trying to keep his cool, but it was a powerful memory that shook him up every time he thought about it.

“I didn’t find you in time. You had died in a crash. That was… only a few months ago. That’s why it’s a bit unbelievable to see you again. But I... I’m sorry.”

He was sorry for a lot of things; not being able to save him, to not be able to save him from this place, for letting him be here alone, and a million other things. Conan wasn’t quite sure how to put it all but... he was so very sorry.

“I don’t think getting home will be so easy.” If they could even get home. If Hattori was dead like he remembered and this was the afterlife which seemed impossible from what he knew yesterday but he couldn’t deny what he’d seen so far chances were slim they could get home. “But, last I remember was it being Thursday. I had just gotten out of school and was walking home before... before…”

He thought hard about it, but had no luck. He couldn’t remember. It just became a massive blur after that. Chances are if he died or was kidnapped, it happened shortly after that, or perhaps on the Friday.

“It’s no use. I can’t remember.”

[dynxmism-blog]

He’d been here long enough that he’d almost [f o r g o t t e n] the amount of days he’d been here. [A l m o s t].

The [u n f o r t u n a t e] part being that he couldn’t find his way [o u t] of this place. He hadn’t had much time to really [t h o r o u g h l y] explore a lot of the World Pieces or even the Core. Though, he found, he had been [e n j o y i n g] himself quite a bit since he’d arrived; made a few [f r i e n d s], found few [a n s w e r s] and many [q u e s t i o n s], even bought himself a katana and a phone.

{But he would never stop his search for [h o m e] again. Though, he would note the [o d d i t y] that he hadn’t seen a [s i n g l e] murder investigation since he arrived.}

He yawned, picking out all the restaurants within walking distance in his mind and [r a t i n g] them by his preference. His favourite one was quite [f a r] from Spiral’s End, which was an unfortunate case but he would have to deal until he got himself some kind of [v e h i c l e]…

His clothes pressed against his body in an oddly [f a m i l i a r] way, the hem of his shirt tugged upon like a [c h i l d] was trying to attract his [a t t e n t i o n]. And, by nature, the [o n l y] child who came to mind was…

“Ku–”

At first, he had looked to the [a i r] behind him, at his height, as though he expected [K u d o u  S h i n i c h i] to be standing there. Then his gaze fell to the child’s height and the [i n s t i n c t u a l] reaction to grin with pure [e x c i t e m e n t], his entire expression lighting up with [d e l i g h t] as his mind registered the [f a m i l i a r] face.

“Kudou!”

He reached down and [i m m e d i a t e l y] picked the other up with both his hands, raising him into the air. And while he was certain Kudou probably [h a t e d] being picked up, he couldn’t help himself in the [z e a l o u s n e s s] of absolute [e u p h o r i a]. In these passed few months of [u n f a m i l i a r] places and new [f a c e s], he couldn’t contain the [j o y] this reunion had brought him. God, how he had [m i s s e d] Kudou Shinichi! (Even if he was [s t i l l] in the body of Edogawa Conan.)

{Heiji had been too [c o n s u m e d] by [h a p p i n e s s] notice the [s h o c k] on the child’s face.}

“What’re ya doin’ here!? Did ya finally find me? Have ya come ta take me back to Osaka!?“

He knew he could [c o u n t] on Kudou to find him. He knew, from the very [b e g i n n i n g], that Shinichi would [f i n d] him…!

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

How could this be happening? How was he alive? Was this reality or was this some sort of prank? So many questions were running through the tiny detective’s brain that even if he did have an answer, there was another question already shoving that one away. Unfortunately though, he had absolutely no answers so it’s not like it really matters.

It felt like it had been so long since Hattori was taken from him everyone that this felt so surreal.

“Wait, H-Hattori, how is this possible? Why are you… how…?”

He was still shocked about this all, but Conan couldn’t deny that this was reality. The familiar feeling of being picked up by his friend felt all too real. This couldn’t be a joke, right? Hattori was right there.

At least Hattori seemed happy. In his normal nightmares, when he would see his dear friends face, he would never be happy the way he was when he was alive. He was always screaming and angry, blaming Conan even though Conan was aware he would never actually do that and never had his normal upbeat attitude that Conan missed more than he thought he ever would.

With little thought to his actions, Conan reached out and poked at Hattori’s forehead, just to verify for himself that this was a physical, human being. His other hand was rubbing his own eyes, before looking again.

The expression ‘you look like you’ve seen a ghost’ would sure apply to Conan right now.

Keep calm. Don’t freak out. Act normal. Or at least as normal as you can since you just touched his face. This was all easier said than done, but he was trying to keep his panic down. He was trying to keep a straight face for his friend, but his gaze was slightly more watery than usual. Something was totally just caught in his eye.

“I just woke up here a few hours ago. I don’t really know about anything here or where I am. I don’t know how to even get to Osaka from here. Have you been…”

He was trying to find the right words. Conan didn’t really think saying dead was going to go well with Hattori, so he’d have to ease into that topic or slip up and get himself into a bad situation. Yet for all Conan knew, maybe he wasn’t actually dead or he was just going insane. That required further investigation.

“…stuck here? Do you even know where this is?”

[notyouraveragebrat-blog]

@dynxmism

Even in this strange, new world people were treating him like a child. Not that this surprised Shinichi Conan in the slightest, but it didn’t make it any less irritating. Here he was, trying to get information about where he was, but most of what he got was some cheek pinching, baby-talk, and tiny bits of information. There were the odd bits of information about Spirals Tower and having a partner, and then some mutterings about someone else asking the exact same questions.

So far he had gathered these clues about that said person; dark-skinned, had a thick accent (he asked if it was Osakan, but most people didn’t seem to know what that was), wore a baseball cap, and seemed to be in his teens.

“But… that’s impossible.”

Of course, memories of his best friend, Hattori, came flooding back to him. It was impossible not to think about him with that information. It described him perfectly. This was an impossibility though. An event that could not come to fruition. Maybe a few months ago, but not anymore.

It still weighed heavy on Conan. The death of his friend.

It didn’t take Conan long to be next to him, grabbing onto the back of his shirt like the needy child he truly was at this moment. It would have been better if he could just grab his shoulder and force his attention towards him, but he was much too short for that and all gratefulness for his size was gone. Conan could just barely see it from this angle, but those features… it had to be him!

“H-Hattori…?” He had to make sure. Was it really him? “How… are you…?”

[kanchokid]

thinkin about murder

[s0lnier]