#tbhb

The way he ended up in this situation is a farce in itself – that much he knows from how Hattori mocked the hell out of him on the phone when he had to explain the context behind one of Ran and Kazuha’s conversations that stupid Osakan had caught word of. He wouldn’t have needed said Osakan’s opinion to think that, of course, but it only serves to corroborate what he already deducted.

It was just a run-of-the-mill criminal case in Beika: suspicious death near a river, three suspects without any alibi and possible motives all around, foul play clearly involved. Truth be told, it was almost insulting how easy it was for Shinichi to untangle the whole thing and straighten it into a single timeline to take everyone along for the side with Uncle’s cigarette-laden voice.

Or, well, it’d have been, if he hadn’t fallen straight into the cold waters below when trying to showcase something to Inspector Megure.

Instead, it very much had the opposite effect: not only did it then take Inspector Sato around fifteen minutes to deduce what he was trying to hint at, it also threw the whole situation for a loop because, for all of his athletic prowess, Shinichi had trouble swimming with the heavy winter gear Ran had dressed him up in and drowning became a possibility much too fast to his liking.

Ran did save him from the waters, at least, but not before he was thoroughly soaked and had to stew in his own juices for a little while. There was no hiding behind the bushes to pretend to be Sleeping Kogoro either, so it was a long, drawn-out time session of whodunnit – one Shinichi was very frustrated not to be participating in and very satisfied to leave.

If it had stopped at an uncomfortable half-hour spent watching not-that-sharp-witted detectives (and Inspector Sato) try putting together a puzzle that wasn’t that complicated because nobody had noticed the clue left by the riverbank, Shinichi wouldn’t be stewing in his frustration and pile of blankets. No, that’d have been too easy, and someone in the skies above has something against him, he’s certain of it.

It’s a cliché. It’s such a cliché and he’s certain hypothermia isn’t supposed to do that to you aside from, well, hypothermia – but Shinichi has fallen ill after a dip in the water and it pisses him off.

Yeah, okay, he’s caught what can honestly be called a nasty cold, but this doesn’t mean Ran isn’t going overkill with it. He loves her, he really does, including when she gets protective over him (even when she doesn’t know it, courtesy of his current form); but this really is too much.

Ran’s always been like that, though. Once she gets into caring mode, there’s nobody that can stop us. Not even a tsunami could, Shinichi is certain: if he, or her father, or Sonoko, or Kazuha was trapped in the midst of a deadly flood, a wall of water heading for all of them, Ran would swim back to them, put them to safety, and only then maybe think of saving herself. It’s nerve-wracking to be around her, sometimes, when you know she’ll absolutely destruct herself if it means saving someone.

Long reasoning short, it’s not surprising that she’d bury him under a bazillion blankets too much for a simple cold; so imagine one where his voice, usually so childish and disgustingly high-pitched for a teen (let alone impossible to take seriously, let’s be real there), has almost gone instinct on him and where he can spike a fever whenever his body feels like it’s not doing enough damage to the virus inside it. Delightful, really.

It’d be more delightful if it didn’t feel like being smothered in a thousand heavy blankets by the strongest arms in the world – but what can Shinichi say? That he doesn’t like the attention? That’d be a lie. He couldn’t even say that without breaking into a terribly tense smirk. That’s ridiculous.

Ridiculous, but also somewhat humiliating. And also, he’s dying from blanket overdose.

Time to do something about it, he supposes.

“Raaaaan,” he takes on his whiny little snotty brat voice (even if it sounds more scratched than Prof Akasa’s dust-covered records that he still uses, for some reason), “do I really need all those blankets?”

She turns around in half a second (Shinichi refuses to think for even a second this fever and the mucus in his brain are slowing his mind, he’s more than above that) and rushes in a swift run, hair flowing behind her and picking all of the daylight in the room.

“You’ll be cold if you take them off!” She replies without a single grain of reluctance. “And you need to be warm!”

“But… I’m way too hot, Raaaaan…”

Instead of getting at least one blanket off him, out of three (a meltingly comfortable plaid, a scratchy blanket Uncle keeps in his office for some reason and Ran’s favourite, he can tell by the fragrance, it’s very pleasing), she kneels in front of the couch with a worried frown that’s both endearing and infuriating.

“Let me see,” she tells him in that voice she always gives the Detective Boys, always gives Conan.

Maybe it’s because having a head cold is making him snappier, but he can’t jive with that tone as well as he usually does. Most days, he can just bypass the infantilization of it all to focus on what matters (Ran paying him her upmost attention and spending all her time with him).

Ran does what she tends to do when confronted with someone with too red of a cheek: she puts her left hand on her forehead, palm against skin, and the back of her right on someone else’s forehead. Strands of his hair, soaked with sweat, are clinging to the base of her fingers, but she doesn’t complain, doesn’t as much as frown in disgust or discomfort, not even slightly.

“Your fever’s gone down a little,” she concludes with a slightly less concerned voice and alleviated features, much to his own relief. “But we need to keep it in check!”

“I know, Ran, I knooooow.”

She gets back up and stares at the pile in front of her, tilting her head left to right and back to left, a pout on her lips.

“On second thought, if you’re feeling better, maybe we could take off a blanket… Do you feel too hot, Conan?”

He vigorously shakes his head to the point of dizzying himself. This would be embarrassing if he wasn’t too busy trying to get himself a little freer, and also, dealing with a stupid head cold that has turned everything about his sharp senses into nothing but meaningless mush.

“I see,” Ran muses, fingers dancing on her chin before she finally goes for the top blanket – the scratchy one Kogoro keeps in his office. “Is it better?”

He nods again and, to his pleasure, it’s both cooler on his overheated skin and bringing a smile to the girl he’s officially dating when not obligated to be in a six-year-old’s literal shoes.

“That’s good, then! Do you need anything else?”

Shinichi hesitates on that one. Ran’s pretty much been hovering him nonstop for two days, and it’s starting to show on her face. Not so deep down, he knows he doesn’t need much: he has water near him, there is no painkillers he can take for a couple more hours, his eyelids are drooping again and he’s, at the end of the day, a teenager used to living alone.

However, being Conan has a couple perks; most importantly, if he wants to be a needy brat who just has to have big sis Ran by his side during a boring Sunday while sick with a killer head cold, then he gets to be that brat all over again. Ran can barely say no to Conan, much more than she’d be with Shinichi, and there just have to be perks about his current situation. Moreover… Faded memories of frankly lonely days spent wasting away in bed or on the couch with barely any attention other than Prof Akasa’s have left him wanting for more, and if usually he can keep it at bay with a passion for crime mysteries, now, it’s a whole other story. A distraction is always welcome.

All in all, with a dashing uniform vote from all of his sides, Shinichi decides being whiny as Conan is the best use of his stupidly boring sick day.

“Can you stay with me?” He asks, sniffling, as miserable as the most cliché Victorian child possible.

As always, to his upmost happiness, Ran’s face softens and she gives him the sweetest smile as she comes to sit next to him.

“Of course I can do that, Conan,” she replies with words like honey. “Anything else?”

“No, that’s good enough.”

He lets his head droop on her shoulder and falls asleep right here and there.