So, third and final story in the Chances 'verse. Strongly recommend reading in order. Haven't got an exact on chapter number, but it'll be short. Also, DC/MK are still not mine.

1
Declaring

A near-gleaming, flawless headstone with an engraved name and epitaph still sharp-edged and new had the most intricate flower arrangement the gardener for the old cemetery had ever seen. He'd seen hundreds, over the years, and during those years he'd learned many, many meanings of both flowers and arrangements, but this one…

Three red and three white rosebuds, woven together in alternating colors around a single white chrysanthemum, a further weaving of locust-tree leaves, thin aspen branches, and asphodel hiding still-thorny stems that a closer look revealed tiny blood-spots on some of the sharp points. Around the base of the woven leaves was another weave, a wreath holding the first message upright. Marigold and mourning bride, close in to the base of the leaves, and then further down and a little wider, more. Black-eyed Susan, syringa, birdsfoot trefoil, yarrow, and purple columbine. Message upon message, and the old man hadn't known what half of them meant.

Red-and-white together meant unity, but they weren't full-bloom roses. They were buds. So. Love and purity? Love and loyalty? He wasn't sure. White chrysanthemum: truth. So, truthful purity of love or truthful loyalty of love. Aspen, asphodel, and locust leaves—lamentation, regret that follows to the grave, and love beyond death. A heartbreaking beginning.

Marigold and mourning bride, grief and loss of all.

Black-eyed Susan for justice, syringa for memory, trefoil and yarrow for vengeance and war, and purple columbine for resolve to win.

He had carefully not looked at the name, the first time, when he'd taken a picture of the arrangement to look up what he didn't know—it had been too purposeful, too strange to be anything but a message. Now he did, and he suddenly understood.

The name on the stone was "Kudo Shinichi", and the kanji was for "one truth"*. The chrysanthemum's meaning expanded.

The seventeen-year-old boy had been in the paper, murdered trying to save his seven-year-old cousin, who was still missing. The message made a tragic sense.

I love you, Shinichi, and now that you've been taken from me, I will bring those who killed you to justice. You will be avenged. I will win for you.

Whoever had left it was intending to track down the killers (who either still had the seven-year-old or had killed him, too) and had loved—still loved—the high-school detective.

The old gardener looked at the most intricate message he'd ever seen written with flowers and offered up a prayer to Inari that whoever had left it was granted success.

xxxx

"What should we do, James?" Jodie Starling rubbed at her face, looking away from the horrible words in the paper. Edogawa Conan was missing, had been missing for two weeks. "The Boss…"

"What can we do?" James Black closed his eyes, "Two weeks… you know Conan-kun. If he'd been able, he would have escaped or at least gotten a message out by now. Since he hasn't…"

"He's either hurt or…" she couldn't say it.

"Shin de*," a new voice joined in, heavy and solemn, the Japanese a startling change from the English they had been speaking.

Two guns were out and aimed at—nothing? "What the-"

A white-clad form dropped down from the ceiling in a fluttering trail of cloth, and two guns dipped slightly in sheer surprise.

"Kaitou… Kid?" the gaping was understandable, considering, and Kid was in no mood to joke.

"Edogawa Conan is dead," he stated, still in Japanese even though it was obvious he had understood the English. "I… was not fast enough. However… he made it clear we have a common enemy, and I would see his mission completed."

"If… why didn't you report it? Why didn't you bring him back!?" Jodie reached out with both hands, not expecting to make contact, but Kid didn't even attempt a dodge.

He let her grab white cloth, let her cling and shake him, his voice low and harsh as he replied. "There wasn't—it was—it was like he was burning up from inside, and his skin started steaming, and… there was nothing left."

Jodie's fingers went numb, and she stumbled forward. Kid caught her by the shoulders, steadying her with a too-tight grip, and James made a choked sound behind her, gasping out horror-filled words. "They forced that on a child?"

Shuuichi had written a report on it; an untraceable poison—not because the poison itself disappeared, but because it caused a body to literally self-destruct, becoming little more than vapor and lingering protein residue. It only worked if introduced into a live body, and Shuu had called it 'disturbing' to see even in lab-mice with a mention that it looked painful.

Jodie managed to look up in time to see Kaitou Kid's expression—what of it could be seen—twist in pained grief. Kaitou Kid was showing an emotion other than superior amusement, not even trying to hide it. That was…

"Boss said you were a big help sometimes, when he ran into cases where people were trying to frame you or use your heists for something," she pushed back her grief to deal with later, trying to steady her voice and partly succeeding. Conan would have heard the thief out, if nothing else, and even Shuu probably would have taken the time to listen. How could she do less?

Kid released her shoulders, letting her stand on her own, a melancholy smile quirking his lips, "We made an unstoppable team."

"You really… cared about the Boss, didn't you?" Jodie asked quietly.

Kid's smile became a little more sad, a glint of tired grief mingling with remembered amusement in his visible eye. "He was… the only one who ever kept up with me. The only reason he never caught me was that he didn't think I was dangerous enough to deserve the treatment he gave killers. I would have counted him my dearest friend if he'd have let me get away with it… but those soccer balls of his hurt."

Jodie managed a smile, wanting to ask more, but Kid shook his head, "That's not why I'm here, though. Tantei-kun told me where to get everything he'd compiled on the Crows. I have… quite a bit here, as well as what I've learned of 'my' branch. I think it's information you could use… but I would also like to offer my services in bringing them down."

"You…"

Kid's expression shuttered, a cool smirk (not quite the one from heists, but one that was as concealing) sliding into place, his eyes suddenly becoming as distant and unreadable as the moon he so often emulated. "I will clip those black wings, but you have a right to have a hand in striking them from our sky as well."

Jodie nodded, feeling James' hand drop heavy on her shoulder, a weight that was less comforting than unifying. Edogawa Conan, undersized eight-year-old who had known all too much about what they were facing, who had appeared from nowhere two years before, who had lined out plans that had Akai Shuuichi stop and listen and use those plans, who disarmed bombs and took down murderers, who had knocked a military helicopter that the Black had somehow acquired out of the sky with a launched spotlight, who had always seemed utterly unstoppable…

… was dead. The best chance they'd had, even better than Akai had been by the man's own admission. But…

He'd somehow managed to give them Kid to take his place.

Maybe… maybe they still had a chance, even with the bright-burning spirit of their greatest hope snuffed out.

"Tantei-kun can't settle his debt, FBI-san," Kid stated, soft and sad and inescapably gentle. "But Tantei-kun was as much family as blood, and so his debt passes to me. And I will not leave that debt unpaid."

Family?

"Who… are you?" She didn't expect an answer, not really.

"The son of one they took. That one—was Tantei-kun's godfather. As for the rest… Tantei-kun did not tell you, and so I will not. Other than that…" he tossed something at her, and she caught it on reflex, to look down at something small and…

A memory stick. Did that mean…

Jodie looked up, a question on her lips, only to find Kid gone.

"What is it?" James asked behind her.

Jodie turned and handed him the stick, "I think… it's information."

xxxx

* Not accurate to canon. I don't actually know more than somewhere around five kanji, but it's been pointed out that Shinichi's name is written as 'new one' in the actual series.

*Shin de (i masu) roughly translates to 'is dead', from what I understand.