Sorry for the (extremely long) wait, but we finally got around to writing again. Here is the next chapter.

Conan bent down and leaned over the woman who had conveniently rocketed out of a window and landed in front of our feet.

I glanced at Conan in slight awe. I mean, obviously I'd heard of his amazing corpse magnet abilities, but to see them firsthand...

"Is... Is she...?" Ayumi's voice quivered with fear as she stared at the woman in front of us.

"Dead." Conan announced solemnly, removing his fingers from the woman's neck where he was checking her pulse.

I stared at the distorted body along with everyone else, but couldn't help muttering, "As if it wasn't obvious." That earned me a look from Conan and a full-on glare from Sherry. But if you've had rigorous training like I have, you know how to easily distinguish whether someone is dead or not. One look at this woman's crumpled figure and glazed-over eyes and you could just tell.

"Ayumi, Genta, Mitsuhiko!" Conan demanded. "Call the police." They all nodded and Ayumi whipped out her shiny, pink cell phone. Wait- why does a 7-year old have a cell phone? I guess that's a question for later.

"So what now?" I asked after Ayumi had finished her call and put her phone away.

Looking at me like I was an idiot, Sherry rolled her eyes and motioned at the house from which the body had flown. "We question them."

A large man opened the front door, peered around confusedly, and finally looked down. "Oh hello, what may I do for you children?" he asked politely, an eyebrow raised at the six (we sent the lost-cat boy home) seven-year-olds standing in front of him.

"A body just flew out of your house, mister," Conan informed him, smiling brightly.

"W-What?!"

"We already called the police," Mitsuhiko added as we all pushed past the man, who seemed too shocked to move.

"Hey, wait!" He yelled from behind us, but we were already halfway up the staircase. Locating the room with the broken window, we walked in, Conan in the lead.

Genta, Mitsuhiko, and Ayumi all gasped at the bloodstains on the floor. Conan strode forward and kneeled next to them. "These were formed by the victim coughing up blood, going by the pattern. Also, they're dry, so the victim must've been dead for a while before she was thrown out the window."

"Thrown?" Ayumi squeaked.

"Isn't it obvious? That man downstairs is clearly very strong, and there's nobody else around who could've done it," Sherry sighed.

I looked around the room. It was a small, squarish room with wooden flooring. The broken window was across the room from the door, and beside the door was a closet with a curtain drawn across it.

As I surveyed my surroundings, the squeal of police sirens corrupted my ears. It took all I had not to run, just because I had been trained to avoid such a sound.

"You all stay here." Conan instructed. "I'll tell the officers about the body." He promptly left the room, causing the three real kids to go into a fit.

"If he can go, we can go." Genta crossed his arms in protest. "Why does he always get to act like he's so much older?" The other two let out annoyed huffs in agreement and went to follow the way Conan had gone. Sherry sighed and went to look after them.

"Are you coming?" Sherry snapped at me when I showed no signs of following them. I shook my head and turned back to the room. I was a bit amused at her satisfied smile that I was not coming with her little posse of seven-year-olds.

Something about this room was off, I could tell. I've been to - well, created, if you want to get technical - enough crime scenes to know when something isn't right. That man, no matter how bulky, wasn't strong enough to toss that woman all the way to where we had been standing. Even if he was strong enough, the impact upon the woman connecting with the ground highly disfigured her body. Unless he was secretly a robot that can throw with ten times the force of the average of an average human, he had not thrown this woman.

"Little girl, what are you doing here?" A voice startled me out of my observation of the room. A tall, lanky man stood there smiling down at me.

"I'm here to solve the case." I said, trying my best to sound how Ayumi, Genta, and Mitsuhiko did when they told everyone they were detectives.

The man laughed. "What case? I live here, there isn't any case." He shook his head as if what I said was hysterical. I just sighed and pointed out the broken window. Why does no one believe little kids? Oh wait. Because they're little kids.

"My window!" The man shrieked. (At a higher octave than a man should shriek, might I add.) His face paled considerably when he actually looked out the window. "Atsuko." He whispered before jumping through the broken window. I stared wide-eyed and ran to where the man had just stood.

Through the window, I spotted him running up to the patrol cars where an annoyed-looking Conan was already standing, surrounded by his fellow 'detectives'.

"Officers! Officers, what happened!" he sobbed dramatically, loud enough for me to hear from where I was. I rolled my eyes.

A pretty, short-haired police officer exited her red FD, accompanied by a tall, tan man. I watched as they tried to console the weeping man.

Turning my attention back to the room, I found I still couldn't figure out what was wrong with it. It was a strange feeling, but finally, after another ten minutes, I gave up and left, finding Conan and the others downstairs.

They were standing beside the lady officer and tan man from earlier, who were interrogating the burly man who owned the house.

"Mr. Kawashita, what is your relation to the deceased?" The woman was saying as I strolled up and stood beside Sherry.

"My relation to Atsuko?" Mr. Kawashita flinched visibly and looked away.

"Yes?" pressed the male officer.

"We... I was her brother," he answered. "But we've always been a little... uh... well, we've never seen eye-to-eye. I despised her fiance - he's the one who threw himself out that window."

"You were the only one in the house when the body was launched out of the room, correct?" the woman detective asked.

"Yes. It can't be that you two are suspecting me, could it?" Mr. Kawashita said with a hearty laugh, though I saw his eyes flickering nervously from one officer's face to the other.

"No no, it's just standard procedure," the short-haired woman soothed. "You're dismissed; we'll call for you if we need further information."

Mr. Kawashita nodded and left the room.

I reached over and prodded Conan. "So?"

"The body was that of Kawashita Atsuko, a thirty-eight-year-old mathematician -"

"Mathematician?" I echoed, an eyebrow raised.

He shot me a glare. "Yes. She was engaged to a man named Kaneshiro Jun -"

"I saw him. He was the one who jumped out the window."

"Do you want to hear the autopsy report or what?"

I raised my hands in a surrender, smirking.

"She had been dead for about an hour before she was shot out the window. The cause of death was poison, hydrochloric acid to be exact." He winced. "Anyway, the body was in pretty bad shape because of the acid. Her clothes were slightly singed, though, for undetermined reasons. She was here with her fiance to visit her brother, but all three of them got into an fiance, Kaneshiro, left the house for a little to take a drive and cool off - Kawashita watched him leave - and the two siblings split up inside the house. Apparently when they split was the last time Kawashita saw his sister alive."

I nodded slowly. "Okay... what were they arguing about?"

Conan shrugged. "Kawashita won't say."

"Oh, who's this?" I heard a female voice say behind me. I turned and found myself staring at the female officer.

I sighed, but quickly forced on a smile. "I'm Catalina Bond." I said cheerfully. Man, was I getting tired of all these introductions. "I'm staying with Conan." I explained.

The female officer nodded. "I'm Officer Sato. Ran talked about you - don't worry." She kneeled down to my height. "I'm sure we'll find your parents in no time." She stood up when I nodded, then turned back to the male officer. Somehow I doubt they'll be finding James and Abigail Bond any time soon.

"I want to know what that fight was about." I told Conan, narrowing my eyes at Kawashita and Kaneshiro, who were both just standing, looking as if this was an everyday situation.

Conan snorted. "You aren't going to get anything out of them. The police hounded both of them for ten minutes straight."

I knew that this was indirectly some kind of challenge. "Want to bet?" I asked, but didn't wait for a response as I strode over to the two gentlemen.

I looked up at the two men, pulling out my most innocent face. "Hi." I said meekly, but loud enough for both of them to hear me.

"Little girl?" Kaneshiro asked, surprised. "What is it?" He asked gently.

"That... that lady... she's dead." I whispered, trying to sound frightened. They both nodded, Kawashita looking slightly sad and Kaneshiro looking completely distressed. Even more distressed than a damsel. "What were you fighting about?" I asked, widening my already childish doe-like eyes.

Kawashita's mouth tensed and his eyes narrowed, not telling me even though I was only a kid.

"It's not important. It's grown-up stuff." Kaneshiro cooed as if he were talking to a sick animal instead of a child.

I frowned. "My mom always says that to me. Why can't I know grown-up stuff?" I asked. That's actually quite true, though. The only mother figures I've ever had were teaching me how to knock an opponent twice your size out. See, that's little-kid stuff.

"Because you have to be a grown-up to know grown up stuff!" Kawashita growled, glaring fiercely at me.

Perfect. A smile curved up one side of my mouth before I abruptly burst into tears and began screaming.

Kaneshiro looked uncomfortable whereas Kawashita tried to act like it didn't bother him for about three seconds before he starting saying hoarsely, "Shh, kid, it's okay, it's nothing really, I didn't -"

I screamed all the louder.

Now Officer Sato and her friend were frowning over at us. "Is something wrong?" the male officer yelled over my shrill screeches.

Kawashita looked panickedly at him. "Oh, uh, yeah!" he stammered, leaning over. "Hey, kid, shut up!" he hissed in my ear.

Again, I screamed all the louder, my voice elevating in pitch and volume.

"Okay, okay!" Kaneshiro muttered, leaning over to whisper to me. "We were arguing about who would get the last piece of cake!"

I stopped sobbing abruptly.

"See? It's nothing big, right?" Kaneshiro smiled, nudging Kawashita.

"Actually, weren't we arguing about you two getting married? You wanted to wait a year, she wanted to wait a month, and I didn't want it to happen at all -"

"You idiot!" Kaneshiro half-yelled.

"Oh, okay," I said. "Thanks for telling me!" I skipped over to Conan, smiling brightly.

"I take it that went well?"

"They were arguing over the wedding date," I explained.

"Really?"

"That or who would get the last piece of cake."

He looked at me strangely.

"Anyway, what does Kanashiro do for a living?" I asked. "Lie to little girls? Or maybe he's a baker?"

"No, according to Officer Takagi, that other police officer, he used to work at a circus, but now he owns a donkey stable."

"A... donkey stable?"

"Don't ask." Conan sighed.

I turned to survey the scene in front of me. "So basically, this case is made up of a broken window, a donkey stable owner, hydrochloric acid, singed clothes, and a flying body." I looked over at Conan, who was frowning at me. "Work your magic, Cool Guy."