"Don't move!"
"Everyone out of the vehicle! Now!"
Even an officer as dim-witted as Yamamura could tell that something was deeply wrong with this couple.
In the driver's seat, the man—whose keys had been snatched away—was currently unleashing a torrent of abuse at Professor Agasa. As for the woman in the back, though she had been keeping herself tucked under a blanket, it was clear there was nothing actually wrong with her legs.
"Phew…"
Agasa, clutching the car keys tightly, scampered as fast as his legs could carry him until he was safely behind the wall of police officers.
"Dammit! All of you, back off, or I'll kill him!"
Seeing the police closing in, the woman grabbed Conan by the collar and pressed a black handgun against his temple.
"I've been wondering from the start," Conan said calmly, looking out the window toward Yamamura. "Why would normal people be so eager to invite strangers into their car? Unless, of course, they had a very specific motive, right?"
If there were children and an elderly man in the car, the chances of slipping through a police checkpoint undetected increased significantly.
"R-Right…" Yamamura replied, momentarily speechless.
Does this kid not even fear a gun?
"Since your legs aren't actually injured, I take it the accomplice who is bleeding is hiding in the trunk?" Conan reached up and tapped the barrel of the gun pointed at his head.
The sound was hollow. It was a plastic toy—something even Genta or Mitsuhiko wouldn't be afraid of.
"Go! Get them!" Yamamura barked from the safety of the rear, waving his own service weapon. The other officers charged forward like a pack of hungry wolves.
Sure enough, when they popped the trunk, they found the third member of the jewelry heist crew, his thigh bleeding profusely. With that, all three of the robbers currently dominating the news cycle were successfully apprehended.
"Shinichi, I honestly thought they were just car thieves…" Agasa said with a sigh, brushing the melting slush from his coat.
The man's driving had nearly caused several accidents; it was terrifying. It was obvious he wasn't used to a left-hand drive import. He couldn't even tell the difference between the '2' and the '5' on the inspection sticker, and he hadn't the slightest clue how to operate the wipers or the turn signals.
"Professor, I've gotta hand it to you. You reacted fast," Conan said, a small smile playing on his lips as he tucked his stun-gun wristwatch back under his sleeve.
He had actually been stunned for a moment—he hadn't expected the Professor to be so agile.
"Well, you did keep kicking the back of my seat with your toes…" Agasa muttered.
The moment they had approached the checkpoint, the Professor's mind had been racing, trying to figure out how to snatch the keys and bolt. That roll out of the car door just now… I must have looked quite dashing, he thought to himself.
Daylight broke over the city.
The "grandfather and grandson" duo finally returned to the Agasa residence.
"Look at that. They're both still alive," Tsuneo remarked, looking up from his breakfast as the two walked through the door.
Agasa: "..."
Conan: "..."
"Hehe…" Haibara sat nearby, watching the morning news. She cast a distinctly unfriendly gaze toward the pair.
The news was reporting that the jewelry thieves had been caught in Gunma during the early hours of the morning. The two of them had even been caught on camera by reporters as they stood outside the police station. The report mentioned that the pair had seen through the suspects' identities from the start and had even "voluntarily" boarded the vehicle to assist.
"Nothing beats a bowl of hot soup in weather like this, right?" Agasa said, trying to change the subject as he sat down at the dining table.
"Professor, your dark circles are massive," Tsuneo said flatly.
On the other side of the room, Haibara was currently lecturing a certain Great Detective. Faint phrases like "unarmed, overweight old man" drifted through the air.
"I'm still young!" the Professor shouted, feigning indignation.
Haibara glanced toward the sofa, let out a yawn, and decided she didn't have the energy to keep scolding them. Last night, she had pulled a wiretap out from behind that very sofa. Even with Noah's Ark keeping watch, finding such a thing so unexpectedly was enough to make anyone's blood run cold.
"That software?" Conan walked over to Tsuneo and looked up at him. It was still bothering him.
"As you saw, there's no mystery to it. It's just something related to Artificial Intelligence," Tsuneo replied between mouthfuls.
"A person has to be driven to a certain level of madness to come up with a scheme like that—the so-called 'path to living in a virtual world.' Death is death. Even if a machine possesses your memories and your logic, it won't be you. Compared to that kind of 'grafting' technology, focusing on the research for the APTX cure is the only real work that matters. That other stuff? It's just a distraction."
"The fire in Beika last night… that didn't have anything to do with you, did it?" The detective decided to skip the AI topic for now, gesturing toward the television screen.
"What do you mean 'nothing to do with me'?" Tsuneo shot the detective a sharp look. "Do you have any idea how hard it was to steal that much gasoline?"
In Tsuneo's mind, if one head was worth roughly three to five million, and there were over twenty people… rounding it up, he was owed at least a hundred million, right?
"Steal… gasoline?"
It wasn't just Conan; everyone in the room looked at him with confusion.
"The fire was incredibly fierce last night. By the time we extinguished the flames, there was nothing left but ruins," Yuya Kazami reported, shaking his head.
Amuro Toru frowned at his subordinate's reaction. "No one was found under the safehouse?"
"No. We found seven corpses in total. Based on the forensics, one man used a shotgun to kill the other six in succession before turning the gun on himself." Kazami handed a photograph of a man's face to Amuro.
The man must have known the Public Security was waiting outside. He was ruthless enough to take his own life along with the rest.
"Calvados… I actually knew the guy." Amuro's eyes narrowed. He hadn't expected to find a mid-tier fish in this mess. He was a sniper for the Organization. It looked like those six small fry were likely being given preliminary training by him.
"Furthermore, the sheer volume of firearms and ammunition in that safehouse was staggering," Kazami continued after a brief pause. "Not just handguns—sniper rifles, fully automatic rifles, grenades… it was a complete arsenal."
"To be expected. It's just a shame about our undercover agent who had just successfully infiltrated the lower ranks." Amuro had no doubts about the Organization's capacity for arms smuggling; he had reported as much before the operation.
Now, the intelligence personnel the Organization had deployed within Tokyo had likely been wiped clean by Public Security. That undercover agent's mission was effectively over.
"By the way, the gasoline used to start the fire seems to have been siphoned from cars along the street. Several owners came in to report the thefts this morning, but we've suppressed the records," Kazami added.
"Heh." Amuro suddenly let out a short laugh.
"Mr. Furuya?" Kazami asked, his face serious. He didn't understand what his superior found funny.
"When it comes to the situation of these men, I suspect there is only one person in the entire Organization who truly understands what happened…"
In a dark, secluded corner of the city.
Gin held his phone, having just dialed nearly twenty different numbers in a row.
Seeing the deathly, ashen expression on his leader's face, Vodka didn't dare breathe a word, let alone approach him. He sat in the Porsche, eyes fixed firmly on the floor.
Something big happened. But this time, I really don't want to ask…
Big Brother's face is whiter than his hair right now!
"Vodka!"
"Yes!" Hearing the call, Vodka scrambled out of the car instantly.
After a long silence, Gin shifted his gaze away from his subordinate and said coldly, "Forget it. Let's go."
Sometimes, he wished he had someone with a functioning brain to talk to. But… forget it.
(End of Chapter)
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