Don't own Detective Conan.

Don't own Cover Art.

Forgotten King

It was an unusually quiet day at Teitan High School.

The students at this point were used to hearing the not unusual sounds of a police siren going off, or the shouts of other students as they bustled here and there to different classes. But this time, there was an overwhelming silence that fell over the school, and there was a good reason for it, too.

The queen of the school was being asked out.

It was from this declaration of love that the silence had originated, everyone holding their breath as they awaited her reply. They didn't have to wait long.

"I'm sorry, but I do not feel the same." Her voice was cold, but not harsh. That didn't stop the influx of whispers and giggles that arose from her response, the spectators falling on the boy like rabid wolves.

"How sad –"

"Poor Katsuyu –"

"Heh, can't believe he thought –"

"What a loser –"

The whispers continued for a while longer, before the boy couldn't take his peers' comments any longer. "How can you say that?" He asked her, his voice pleading and sad. "How can you know that you don't feel the same?"

Blue-grey eyes glanced at him before dismissively looking away. "I can say that because I know that I feel no attraction toward you, Oume-san. Now please leave me be; classes will begin soon."

"No!" he burst out, anger begin to take over in place of sadness. "I can't just accept that! You can't be this cold-hearted of a person!"

"Cold-heartedness has nothing to do with my rejection," she retorted calmly, ignoring the agitated shifting from her friends nearby. "I simply do not feel toward you any of what you feel toward me."

Katsuyu growled, making an aborted movement toward her. "You're such a frigid bit –"

"Haibara."

The murmurs that had been building hushed immediately. The crowd parted as a figure walked up, his presence marked as people tucked their thumbs into their pockets.

After all, no one wanted to upset the "Beika no Kuro Karasu".

Teitan High had an unusual hierarchy.

It was considered unusual mostly due to the fact that the top of the social ladder was occupied by a group of friends that each controlled a different part of the school.

The first was Yoshida Ayumi, captain of the cheerleading squad and considered the princess of the school by just about everyone. She was kind, and sweet, and nearly every boy in the school had a crush on her.

The next two, Tsuburaya Mitsuhiko and Kojima Genta, were on the opposite ends of the highschool spectrum and were Ayumi's most loyal knights. Genta was captain of the football and rugby teams, while Mitsuhiko was captain of any of the academic teams that the school produced. Despite this, they were close friends if rivals in love for Ayumi's affection.

The second in command for their ragtag group, Haibara Ai, was the undisputed queen of the school. Despite being only a second year, she was known to be taking University-level science courses and was being apprenticed by the forensics division of the local police. She was calm, cool, and incredibly mature, which was probably why any boy who didn't have a crush on Ayumi had a crush on her instead.

And then there was the last person, the one currently approaching the spectacle taking place outside of their shared classroom. His blue eyes flicked from person to person behind large glasses, making many of them shiver as they felt as if every secret that they carried had just been read from them like a book. His hands were tucked into his pockets in a lazy manner, and his uniform was impeccable with the exception of two accessories; a black band tied around his right arm and a silver bullet hanging from a black cord around his neck.

There was no enigma quite like the one and only Edogawa Conan. He spent the entirety of every class working on either University-level coursework or whatever cases the Beika police sent him. Ten years of stumbling into various cases, be it murder, kidnapping, or something else, has earned him the gruesome title of the "Beika no Kuro Karasu", the Black Crow of Beika. The kinder said that he had been turned into a human by the Shinigami to help the souls he ferried, the less kind that it was he himself who led to the deaths, souls attaching to him as he walked by.

Either way, no one was foolish enough to say such things to his face, especially with his reputation. While not part of any particular club or team, Conan would regularly practice alongside the swim team and track team, training his body to be a better detective. His routine put him on good terms with both teams, and his friendship with Mitsuhiko, Ayumi, and Genta made ostracizing him completely an exercise in futility.

The two other reasons few thought to be cruel to him were his eyes and his mind. After ten years, everything the teen had witnessed had cooled his eyes, making them calculating gems that scanned everything and told him even more. It wasn't uncommon to see Conan invited to events typically restricted to teachers, if only because he already knew about what they were meeting for, and was often seen giving various staff gifts for their upcoming wedding/baby shower/retirement party.

As it was, everyone watching the scene stepped back as Conan approached, not wanting his attention on them for too long. He barely gave them more than a cursory glance though, his eyes returning to the girl in front of him immediately after leaving her form. Ai, the girl in question, met his gaze head on, turning away from Katsuyu even more in an unconscious show of her attention.

Conan looked at the boy a few feet away and narrowed his eyes slightly. 'Hmm…second string basketball player, average grades, three fairly close friends, and…a pet dog. Rather average high school student, all in all; and he just confessed to Haibara, from the crowd and his body language.'

The teen then blinked and dismissed the other boy in front of him, returning his gaze to his friend and partner. 'And…unaffected. Today is par for the course it seems.' "We'll be late for class," he said instead, and Ai nodded, shifted her bag and joined him in heading back into the classroom, their three friends following after waving goodbye to their other friends. They sat in their usual seats, Conan and Ai in the middle row and in the aisle closest to the door, and Ayumi, Mitsuhiko and Genta in the desk beside them with Ayumi in front of Mitsuhiko and Genta.

"You're starting to get quite the reputation for yourself, Ice Queen-san." Conan began pulling out a cold case file, opening and skimming it with bored blue eyes.

Ai didn't say anything at first, laying her head on his shoulder and reading the file alongside him. After they finished reading through it the first time, Conan gave her the files on the evidence found and proceeded to read through the situation again, making notes in a journal. Ai then gave him a flat look. "I couldn't care less what the others think. All they see is a "queen" to rule over and thus a school to command. They barely know me as a peer, let alone a person."

Conan hummed in agreement, giving her his pen as her hand hovered over it, letting her make her own observations in the notebook.

"Besides," she whispered in his ear, taking advantage of how everyone avoided looking at the Beika no Kuro Karasu. "Why would I need a prince to take care of me, when I have you?"

And so they sat, the Ice Queen and Forgotten King, in their own little world.

Wow, whoever said that you write more stories the closer you get to finals...had a point. Weird.

This story has actually been in my head for years but, with my returned interest in the Detective Conan series, woke up and wouldn't leave me alone. So I wrote it. Hope you guys liked it.

Notes:

Hiding their thumbs when Conan appeared: In Japan, if you pass a cemetery or funeral, you hide your thumb to protect your parents from a similar fate, as the thumb is considered the "parent finger". I feel like, since Conan has witnessed so much death, the high schoolers would get rather superstitious around him.

Black Crow: I'm not sure how true it is, but an episode of Detective Conan mentioned that black crows are believed to ferry the souls of the dead. As he always appears soon after a crime has taken place, I could see people thinking that he had appeared to help the soul pass on.

Conan's silver bullet: A reference to the nickname Vermouth gave him. He wears it as a type of trophy to show that he defeated the Black Organization.

Please review.

Ja ne!