"Alright, Officer Yamamura, please pull yourself together and focus on the search. We're counting on you to lead the way; after all, you're the local expert who knows these woods best."
Dr. Agasa let out a quiet sigh of relief as he saw the children's encouragement finally taking effect.
Hearing this, Yamamura's despair vanished instantly. A smug smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. He shoved his hands into his pockets and turned slightly to the side, striking what he clearly thought was a heroic pose. "Dr. Agasa, please—there's no need for such formalities from now on. You can just call me… Asan."
"Asan...?"
Conan's face twisted into a look of pure, unadulterated exhaustion. This guy has watched way too many hard-boiled detective movies.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the forest...
Relying on the Great Detective's tracking glasses, Tsuneo had successfully located the missing boy.
"Are you so exhausted you can't even speak?" the repairman asked as he approached.
"My throat is so dry... When I first realized I was lost, I spent a long time shouting for help," Mitsuhiko croaked. He kept his back turned to Tsuneo, his hands held together as if cradling something precious. He gestured with his head toward his backpack. "Tsuneo-san, please... could you help me get the things out of my bag?"
Following Mitsuhiko's instructions, Tsuneo polished off two more of the bamboo leaf rice balls before taking the remaining leaves down to a nearby stream. He dampened them slightly and carefully lined the bottom of a small insect cage.
"There... that should do it!"
Mitsuhiko carefully aligned the gap between his palms with the opening of the cage.
Two shimmering, glowing insects flew inside, one after the other. Only once they were safely tucked away did Mitsuhiko finally wipe the sweat from his forehead and take a long, desperate swig from his water bottle.
"You came all this way just to catch these things?" Tsuneo asked, still chewing on a piece of rice ball.
"I'm finally starting to feel human again..." Mitsuhiko sighed contentedly. "Fireflies and fireworks... they're the most important memories of summer, aren't they?"
"If you'd lost your life out here, people certainly would have remembered this day forever," Tsuneo remarked, giving the boy a sharp, corrective knock on the head.
"I heard the Detective Badge going off, so I knew I'd be okay eventually..."
"Mitsuhiko!"
"Tsuneo-san!"
The shouts of Genta and the others were growing louder. Ten minutes later, the two groups finally reunited in a small clearing.
"Mitsuhiko, we were worried sick!" Ayumi said, her voice full of relief.
"Cough, cough... I'm sorry." Mitsuhiko's throat was still scratchy, but he offered a sincere apology to the group.
"Your badge was working fine, Mitsuhiko! Why didn't you answer us?" Genta asked, looking annoyed. "I thought you'd run away from home! You scared the life out of me."
"I think I know why," Conan said, stepping forward. He glanced at Tsuneo—who was still finishing a rice ball—and picked up the insect cage. "It wasn't that someone was chasing Mitsuhiko. It was Mitsuhiko who was chasing someone else, right?"
Conan had piece the puzzle together: the focused, watchful expression on the bus; the adult ticket purchased at Beika Station. Mitsuhiko hadn't been lost in thought—he had been tailing someone.
"Yeah. For several Sundays now, I've been waiting at the station to ask people where I could find fireflies. But most of them were environmentalists; they were afraid I'd do something to harm the habitat, so they refused to tell me," Mitsuhiko explained after another drink of water.
The people he had followed were conservationists who visited the mountains on their days off. Knowing that fireflies only survive near the cleanest water, Mitsuhiko had eavesdropped on their conversation and decided to follow them.
"And so, on the very last Sunday of summer break, you finally made your move," Tsuneo said, having finally finished the last rice ball.
"That's right. I got to the bus stop early this morning and followed them all the way here. After I got lost in the forest, I managed to catch these two..." Mitsuhiko nodded. He hadn't responded to the badge because he was terrified that the movement or the noise would startle the fireflies he was holding in his bare hands.
He had held onto that hope until the very moment he received the signal from his friends.
"Geez, if you wanted to catch fireflies, you could have just asked us to come along," Genta said, clapping a hand on the boy's shoulder. "Going alone is way too dangerous. The police said there's a literal serial killer loose in these woods!"
"You don't see fireflies in the city much these days," Officer Asan remarked, peering into the cage with a touch of nostalgia.
"He probably remembered what Ayumi and Haibara said," Conan noted. He recalled the two girls mentioning during the last fireworks festival how they wished they could see real fireflies in person.
Mitsuhiko lowered his head, his face turning a bright, embarrassed red.
"So, you did all this just to create a surprise for us?" Haibara asked, a soft smile gracing her lips.
"Mitsuhiko, they're beautiful! Thank you," Ayumi added with a bright grin.
Asan looked at Mitsuhiko and couldn't help but sigh in admiration. "Kids these days... they really know how to play it smooth!"
To think, at such a young age, he already knew how to manufacture romantic, lifelong memories.
Conan stared at the officer. Are you even here to do a job?
Meanwhile, Tsuneo was silent. He was staring up at a massive, leafy tree about fifteen meters away.
"Tsuneo-san, what are you looking at?" Ayumi asked curiously, following his gaze upward.
"Aah!"
A split second later, she let out a piercing scream.
Perched high upon a thick branch was a man with long, shoulder-length hair. It was Ki'ichiro Numabuchi. His eyes were deeply sunken, framed by dark circles that made his high cheekbones and hollow cheeks look even more ghastly. Standing there in the shadows, even without an expression, he looked like a mountain demon.
"I-It's Ki'ichiro Numabuchi?!" Asan stammered, clearly just as terrified as the children.
Thud.
With a light sound as he hit the ground, Numabuchi proved to be as agile as a bird. The moment he landed, he bolted in the opposite direction.
"He's fast!"
Tsuneo didn't hesitate. He took off like a shot, disappearing into the dense foliage in pursuit of the killer.
"How can a man hide in a tree like that without making a single sound? He's like a monkey," Dr. Agasa said, still reeling from the shock. They had been standing right there for at least ten minutes, and if Ayumi hadn't looked up, none of them would have noticed he was there.
"It makes sense. I heard he used to spend his childhood jumping from tree to tree in these woods," Asan said, watching Tsuneo's retreating back. "But those two... they're both running like they have wings!"
"Aren't you going to chase him?" Genta asked, his face a mask of confusion. If Conan hadn't held him back, Genta might have tried to run too. "Asan, why are you still standing here?"
"Well, it's pretty obvious I'd never catch up to them, isn't it?" Asan replied with surprising self-awareness.
Beside them, Haibara had her fingers pressed to her chin, her brow furrowed in deep thought.
"What is it?" Conan asked. He noticed her expression was unusually grave. Numabuchi was dangerous, but with Tsuneo on his tail—and the fact that the man was still wearing handcuffs—there shouldn't be much to worry about.
"It's strange... Numabuchi was right there, and yet I didn't sense a thing," Haibara murmured, her eyes filled with confusion.
"Sensed? You mean... is Numabuchi one of them?" Conan reacted instantly.
The only people Haibara could "sense" were those connected to the Black Organization.
"Ki'ichiro Numabuchi..." Haibara glanced at the boy detective. "He's a discard. Someone the Organization threw away. He was almost made into a lab rat... just like you."
Conan felt a chill run down his spine.
Just like me...
-------------------------------
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