Chapter Text
Conan opened his eyes.
He got out from his bed and went on with his morning routine. Upon coming out from the bathroom, he heard some noises from the kitchen. Must be Oniichan making breakfast. Since they got back to live in their actual house he had insisted that he handles the cooking, saying that he's becoming better at it thanks to Aoko's teaching, and that he should give him a chance.
Conan had reluctantly agreed and, believe it or not, Shinichi's cooking did improve. Now, two months after they took the Organization down, Conan dared to call his brother's cooking 'decent'. He had to admit that Aoko is truly an amazing teacher since she managed to make the one Kudo Shinichi learn how to cook a proper, edible meal without it turning into a complete disaster.
His steps skidded to a halt when he reached the Kitchen.
Because who he found there wasn't his brother. Akai-san? Why was he here? Didn't he move out after everything ended...? Conan couldn't understand, for the life of him, what was going on.
"Oh, good morning, Shinichi-kun" Akai greeted, without even glancing at him "Didn't expect to see you here today"
Conan blinked, he looked around him, trying to locate his brother, yet faild horrendously.
"He's... Not here?" Conan said, tilting his head "When I heard the noises in the kitchen I assumed it was him, his room is empty as well" too empty, actually, now that he gave it a moment of thought. There was something wrong about it, but Conan couldn't care less about his older brother's choices regarding his bedroom. It wasn't his business anyway.
Akai's full attention was on him now, staring at him as if he had grown a second head.
"I was talking to you"
Conan paused. "Excuse me?" He felt completely lost.
After a moment, Akai seemed to brush it off as nothing. He turned to continue preparing breakfast, then addressed him again.
"Shouldn't you be staying the night at the Professor's for the new prototype antidote test?" He said, flipping a pancake on the pan. "I heard your friend will take it with you this time around, and that doing this will help in her research"
... Okay, Conan decided that it was too early for this "Sure, I'm heading there now" he wanted to check if his brother is there anyway.
He exited his house, heading to the Professor's. What the heck was he talking about? It didn't make any sense. And why would he call me by my brother's name? Is he teasing me or something?
Conan's eyebrow twitched. Oh, what a lovely start to the day. He thought sarcastically, opening the front door of their neighbour's house.
"Oniichan?" Conan called. He was so going to make him explain that to him. "Are you here?"
He heard voices coming from the lab, two people talking. He recognized one of the voices to be Shinichi's, while the other one sounded... Familiar, yet he couldn't recall hearing it before. A woman's voice.
"Roll up your sleeve, I'm taking the blood sample now" it was a teenage girl "then we'll take mine and do the test, I'll try to predict how much it will last this time"
He heard his brother humming in thought "Do you think the new information we got last week will help making it last longer?"
"Perhaps."
By that point Conan was approaching them, both of them were giving him their backs.
"Oniichan? What are you doing?" the two teenagers' heads snapped to him, startled. "And what's the deal with Akai-san? Why is he-" Conan halted when his eyes landed on the girl's face.
He found himself blinking, rather stupidly, at her.
Huh, Funny. She kind of reminded him of that photo of Shiho after ten years ─ scratch that, she looked almost exactly the same.
"... Is this lady a relative of Shiho or something?" He asked, looking around. "Where is she anyway? I didn't see her when I came."
The girl and his brother were gawking at him with wide, wide eyes. Conan tilted his head at them in askance.
Shinichi's mind wasn't as silent as his mouth, though. Did he say... Oniichan? His eyes widened even further, if possible. Could it be...?
"Say, are you..." He supposed he should make sure he's right "... are you, by any chance, Kudo Conan?"
The girl's head snapped at his direction, looking completely lost.
"... Did you hit your head? Why would you, of all people, need to ask me that?" Conan raised an eyebrow at him, he was feeling too weirded out right now to even roll his eyes.
Shinichi's expression relaxed somewhat, as he began to understand what's going on. I see.
"Oh?" he smirked at him. "Fancy seeing you here, didn't expect to meet you again merely one week after our first encounter."
Conan felt his eyebrow twitching again. "What are you talking about?" this day was getting more ridiculous with each passing second. "First Akai-san, and now you. If this is some sort of a prank-" then he paused, realization seemed to down on him.
A week? His eyes widened violently. He suddenly remembered that bizarre event from a few days ago, the day a Shinichi from another dimension came uninvited to theirs and...
... Okay, he supposed that today's weird events made more sense now.
Shinichi's smirk became wider when it seemed that Conan finally realized what was going on.
The child groaned "Oh, great." Then proceeded to bury his face in his hands. "Now I'm in another dimension and we will have to do that again so I can get back." He complained, voice muffled.
Shinichi gave him a sympathetic smile.
At that moment, Conan's eyes widened again in realization. If I'm in his dimension, does that mean that this girl is...? he lifted his head up.
"Can someone please explain to me what the heck is going on?!" She exclaimed, looking irritated.
"Oh, right" Shinichi blinked "Haibara, this is Kudo Conan." He gestured with his hand at him "My younger brother"
"Your WHAT?!" Indeed, it was the Miyano Shiho from the other dimension, Conan didn't have any doubts about it now.
"... Let's just go to the living room and sit down, I'll explain everything"
"You better" she huffed, crossing her arms in front of her chest.
Conan sighed tiredly.
Conan found out shortly after that Shinichi didn't tell anyone about his adventure through dimensions and, really, he couldn't blame him for it.
Like, who would have believed him anyway?
As it was now, he was sitting on the couch, opposite from Shinichi and Shiho. He listened as Shinichi explained everything to her, she looked absolutely baffled.
Conan wasn't able to tear his gaze away from her for some reason. So this is how she will look like in ten years? Sure, he had seen the photo, but seeing her in front of him was different.
"Kudo-kun, I swear, if this is a joke of some sort..." Shiho warned, glaring at Shinichi.
"Can confirm." Conan told her "It's not a joke, unfortunately." He let out a heavy sigh.
She turned to look at him "So this is why he suddenly decided we should tell others about this?" She said, an odd glint in her eyes. "Did you really... take Them down? And the others didn't... didn't get killed because you involved them?"
"I'm still trying to convince her." Shinichi elaborated, grimacing. "Not much luck so far."
"It's true, we took them down two months ago." Conan nodded at her "I understand you, we weren't comfortable with the idea of telling them either. The day Mitsuhiko told Ran-neechan everything seemed like a complete disaster at first ─ long story. Please don't ask ─ but we came to understand that the benefits of telling them are more than the benefits of keeping them in the dark."
Shiho didn't say anything, just listened in silence.
"If the Organization found out about us, they were going to kill them anyway, weather they knew or not." Conan continued "But them knowing made things much easier, we didn't have to lie to their faces everyday or pretend in front of them, they helped us cover our slip ups, they helped us in times of danger, they helped us keeping the secret safe, they helped us take Them down."
Shiho was speechless, what Conan was saying seemed to make more sense than she would like to admit. And, for some reason, he was more convincing than Shinichi.
He's speaking from experience. She realized, her eyes widened.
By that point Conan was standing up, he walked to her and sat down by her other side.
"You need more help, from allies who are close to you, who can support you in ways no double spy could" He took her hand in his small ones, and looked her in the eye with a glint of strong conviction in his blue ones. "Believe me, Shiho, this will give you a much bigger chance to win"
She contemplated him for a few moments, before a small smile slowly made it's appearance on her face. "I... I think we can do it, I'm still not 100% sure about this but... I suppose you have a point, since you know what you're talking about and... and I think I can trust you in this regard."
Conan nodded at her, he flashed her a bright grin and let go of her hand.
They fell in a comfortable silence, and Shinichi felt himself slumping back into the couch with a sigh of relief, glad that Conan managed to convince his partner in the end.
He smiled, realizing that the future looked a bit brighter now.
"Wait" Shiho's voice cut through the silence suddenly "Is that how you got that information about the drug? You... took it from the other dimension?" She stared at Shinichi, waiting for an answer.
"... Yeah" he replied, with a slightly nervous smile "I didn't want to tell you where I got it from because I figured you won't believe me. Sorry"
At least he didn't do something reckless to get it. She thought, that has been worrying her quite a bit.
"Oh, that reminds me" Conan started "Did you two take a temporary antidote? Since you're in your adult forms right now" That would explain what Akai-san told me earlier.
"That's right" Shinichi gave him an affirmative nod "Haibara used the information you guys gave us, which turned out to be extremely valuable"
"I think the antidote we took today will last much longer than usual" Shiho added "and that, with this information, I'm now closer than ever to developing a permanent one-" She then suddenly gasped and shot up from her seat "The blood samples! I completely forgot!"
"Kudo-kun!" She called, making a beeline to the lab "Hurry up! This should not wait for a second longer!"
Shinichi glanced at Conan, who simply shrugged and stood up to follow Haibara in a slower pace. He watched his retreating back for a bit before standing up to join them.
Turned out the antidote will last for two weeks this time.
The three of them were down in the lab. Shiho was typing on her computer while Conan and Shinichi watched her working.
"Before taking the antidote we told everyone that Edogawa Conan and Haibara Ai were going to America for a few days to visit their families" Shiho said, without tearing her gaze from the screen "We'll have to tell them that their vacation got unexpectedly extended" the other two nodded.
Shinichi frowned, pondering over something. "Say, Haibara" she gave him a non-committal hum, letting him know that she was listening "Do you... Do you think it's a good opportunity to tell them?"
Haibara paused, she stopped typing but didn't take her eyes from the screen, looking thoughtful and... Hesitant.
She gave him a small nod anyway, she still needed time to accept this, but she knew that it had to be done.
"Two weeks is a good amount of time" Conan told them "You can discuss it thoroughly in the meantime. Who you're telling, and what's the best way to tell them"
"Sounds reasonable" Shinichi agreed "We will have a lot of explaining to do, so we better be prepared." He glanced back at his friend "Is that alright with you?"
Yet Haibara didn't reply, she just resumed typing.
"Shiho?" Conan asked, slightly concerned. "Are you okay?"
"... Why do you call me that?"
It took Conan a whole second to realize his mistake.
His eyes widened in horror, then he let out a small gasp and clamped a hand over his mouth, feeling incredibly stupid for not realizing it earlier
"Oh, I'm sorry!" It became a habit after the defeat of the Organization that he hadn't really gave it much thought. "It... it didn't cross my mind that, since They are still around here, calling you by your real name could make you uncomfortable"
Haibara turned to him, blinking "N-no, it's alright" She shook her head "No harm done" It... didn't exactly feel bad.
Conan nodded slowly and averted her gaze, still feeling a bit bad about it. She studied him for a second.
"Only one more thing"
"What... is it?"
"Just wanted to thank you, Conan" He didn't expect her to land her hand on top of his head, which caused him to lift his gaze and blink at her. "For the information you gave us and the... tips you provided to help us defeat Them" she gave him a small, yet warm, smile.
Conan's eyes widened slightly, and he felt his face warming up a little. "Y-you're welcome"
"Oh, right" Shinichi said suddenly, blinking "We should send you back"
"And how are we going to do that exactly?" Haibara asked.
Conan grimaced "Trust me, you don't want to know"
She raised an eyebrow at him, but before she could say anything they heard the sound of the lab door opening.
"Shinichi? Ai-kun?" It was the Professor, who apparently was looking for them "Are you here?"
He stepped into the the lab and... came to a halt. His eyes widened violently, taking in the scene before him.
Somehow, Ai was sitting on the chair, standing beside her was Shinichi... and Conan? What the...?
The three of them turned their heads to him in perfect synchrony. They blinked once, twice, then Conan raised his hand and gave him a small wave. "Hi, Professor."
"... I need an explanation. Like, right now."
"Sure" Ai smirked "I made him myself" she said, gesturing at Conan "Doesn't he look just like Kudo-kun?" Shinichi let out a dry chuckle, while Conan stared at her.
They really are similar, huh? Conan felt his lips tugging upwards despite himself.
Looks like we'll have to go through that all over again. Shinichi placed his hands on his waist and huffed. I just hope it won't become a habit.
He wasn't very optimistic about it, though.