[Detective Conan] A Game of Mutual Rescue That Began Five Years Ago

Also known as "The Dead Save Each Other" and "Officer Furuya/Morofushi Can't Believe This"

Rei Furuya's friends died young. After years of dutiful undercover work, he had finally managed to become a bottle of liquor valued by the organization.

Then one day, a call came in.

"Zero, is that you?" The voice was so familiar.

Alone in his private office, Rei Furuya felt a bolt of lightning crash through his heart. His reason and caution told him it couldn't be that person, but his intuition was blaring, telling him that this was the person he wanted to see again, the childhood friend he cared about.

But that person had been dead for two years!

His usual caution kept his voice steady. "Heh, trying to fool me with the voice of a traitor who died years ago? And what is this 'Zero'... Who are you?"

"What do you mean, a traitor who died years ago?" The voice on the other end sounded confused. "Didn't we agree to go to my place and learn how to cook together?"

Something was wrong. This feeling was clearly...!

But how could that be?!

"..." Rei Furuya's hand froze. His mind went completely blank, and he had no idea when he hung up.

He gripped his phone so hard his knuckles turned white and the veins on the back of his hand stood out. He stared as if he could bore a hole through the screen, his thoughts in turmoil.

By a strange coincidence, in another world, Hiromitsu Morofushi's friends had also died young. After years of dutiful undercover work, he had finally managed to become a bottle of liquor valued by the organization.

Then one day, a call came in.

"Hiro, is that you?" The voice was so familiar.

Hiromitsu Morofushi set down his spatula and picked up the phone. A buzzing filled his ears, and he even wondered if he was dreaming.

But it was impossible! He had watched that person die in his arms!

So it could only be a scammer, and one who seemed to know his real identity.

Suppressing the stirrings of his intuition, he instinctively put on a smiling mask. He had no idea how pale and stiff his smile was as he spoke in a calm, detached voice. "You've got the wrong person. Who are you?"

His cover in the organization was very different from that of the traitor back then, so it made sense that the caller didn't recognize his voice.

"..." The voice on the other end faltered. "Maybe I did get the wrong person. Sorry."

...Something was off...

That quick response, that tone... It had to be him...

But what was going on?!

Hiromitsu Morofushi hung up on reflex. He stood there dazed for a while, until the smell of burning food snapped him out of it and he hurried to turn off the stove.

Neither of them thought this was a trivial matter or that they were suddenly imagining things. Still, each used their own resources to investigate the situation.

As it turned out, both phone numbers were out of service.

Rei Furuya/Hiromitsu Morofushi, breaking into a cold sweat: So it really was a scammer.

But how did this scammer know my identity? And how did they know about my relationship with Hiro/Zero?! Should I cut my losses and abandon my undercover mission?

But after a day spent in anxious uncertainty, the ghost call came again in the middle of the night.

"Why haven't you been answering my calls? Did something happen?"

Rei Furuya/Hiromitsu Morofushi answered and decided to take a chance on his intuition.

"What date is it where you are?" x2

"It's [date], [year], Zero/Hiro. Did you forget to wear your watch/bring your phone?" The voice on the other end sounded helpless.

"..." Rei Furuya/Hiromitsu Morofushi fell silent.

That date was about five years in the past.

The call was coming from five years ago.

After hanging up, Rei Furuya/Hiromitsu Morofushi spent a long time dazed and questioning his entire life. In the end, though, he accepted that his worldview might really have been shattered, and started guiding his childhood friend to save him, or rather, to save the bento lunches their spirited classmates from five years ago were never meant to eat, since they had all become black-and-white photographs.

They had five years. Whether it was a parallel world or the past of their own world, they would save them!

Who could have guessed that after the two of them saved the world of "five years ago" in their separate worlds, they would wake up the next morning with an extra, nonexistent set of memories, and all their friends would be alive again, remembering only the altered timeline?

Only then did they understand: the worlds they had saved were each other's.

Theme: Every person is a star.