Not a normal KID

The new Kid

It was the last day of school before the holidays and nearly every student that entered the classroom that morning was secretly hoping that he could walk out of it again as soon as possible. The students of Teitan elementary weren't any different in that regard.
"Hey Conan! Do you have time after school? We're going to find ourselves a case!" The chirpy voice belonged to a little dark-haired girl that had cornered her friend with the help of her two other friends, who stood equally proud behind her. "The detective boys are going to solve another crime! Hooray!", the over motivated kids chorused and high fived while their friend, Conan, was desperately trying to find an excuse so he wouldn't have to tag along. He managed to catch Ai's gaze and couldn't hide the look in his eyes in time that was openly screaming 'help me', but all he got in return was an evil smirk, so wide it could've split her face in two. Then she turned back to stacking schoolbooks on her desk as if nothing happened. Lucky her. She was absolutely compassionless. And she had a valid excuse: The Professor and her had already packed their suitcases and would be on their way to a science meeting and ten days of vacation after that as soon as school ended. While Conan himself would've to spend the holidays at home.

And they would be the worst holidays he'd had in a long time for various reasons. First of all, Ran had been invited to go on vacation with Sonoko, so she would be gone almost the whole holiday. Kogoro had been warned by her that she'd have his head, if he left Conan home alone to go on vacation without him or dropped him off at some stranger's place, but she didn't need to worry, her father had in fact just lost all of the money he'd recently gained when he was out gambling two days ago. Not that he'd told his daughter that, but she'd find out soon enough when she'd come home and check the finances after her little quality time with Sonoko. Shinichi was NOT looking forward to the drama that would surely follow her discovery. He'd have to make sure to not be at home when it happened.

Back to his present predicament, he'd no excuse to avoid the detective boys during this holiday. Ran wasn't home, Ai and the Professor weren't in town, his parents weren't planning to visit, Kogoro was stuck at home and would probably spend days and nights going from bar to bar, spending more of the little money he had left on alcohol and come home only to fall asleep on the couch in the agency and explode at the slightest sound when he woke up completely hung over. His only way out would've been vacation in Osaka at his best friend's house. But Hattori just had to come down with the flu when he was needed most. To put it short: there was no hope for him. He'd have to spend the holidays tiptoeing around the apartment and agency, trying not to disturb Kogoro and get his eardrums demolished by the man's yelling and his head and other body parts damaged by his fists. It also meant, as mentioned before, that he was freely available to Ayumi, Mitsuhiko and Genta for the whole duration of the holidays.

If he would've been one to regularly write a diary today's entry would've been:
'Dear diary,
I'm doomed. Please kill me.
Shinichi.'

"Conan? Hey! Conan!", Ayumi waved a hand in front of her friends face to make him snap out of his thoughts without success. A merciless slap on the neck from Ai did the trick though. "Ow! What was that for Ai!" "Didn't your mother teach you to listen when someone's speaking with you? Ayumi was talking to you." Conan, a hand still protectively lying on his reddened neck, shot the fellow shrunken teen a murderous glance before he gave Ayumi a sugary sweet smile. "I'm sorry. What were you saying, Ayumi?" "She asked you to hang out with us after school!" "Yeah, and when you didn't answer she asked you if you were alright and proceeded to call your name while you were completely spaced out!", Genta and Mitsuhiko rudely butted in since they were getting impatient. And probably also because they didn't like the way that Ayumi was practically melting on the spot under Conan's smile. "Yes, I'm fine and no, I've got no plans for today, we can hang out.", Shinichi replied and hoped that none of the kids, including Haibara who'd just tease him about it, noticed how his smile nearly turned into a grimace. "Perfect! It's so much easier to encounter a case when you're around!", Ayumi squealed and bounced off to her seat, Genta and Mitsuhiko following her after giving Conan a tell-tale look that was clearly warning him to not disappoint her. Shinichi could've sworn he'd heard Ai snicker at Ayumi's remark, though when he turned around to stare her down her pokerface was firmly in place. "You're enjoying this.", he stated grimly. A smirk snuck onto her lips. "I find it very entertaining, that's for sure." "Yeah, good for you. Enjoy yourself. And your vacation.", Conan grumbled moodily, knowing he was being rude. Haibara just ignored his tone of voice. "Why, thank you. I'm sure I will!", she chirped and sauntered of, leaving him standing like a lost puppy in the corner of the classroom.
Luckily nobody noticed his embarrassing abandonment, because just then the teacher entered the room, giving him an opportunity  to quickly settle behind his desk while the class was distracted.

"Good morning class!", the teacher greeted like every day, and as always the students greeted her back, all of the real kids very enthusiastically, Ai much more calmly and Conan just grumbled an inaudible 'morning'. The usual, nothing was amiss. The teacher gave a little speech talking about the holidays up ahead and asking the children to concentrate nonetheless, because then time would pass faster and such, while Shinichi was trying very hard to not fall asleep on his desk, because he was already bored to death before the first five minutes of the lesson were over. His, uh, Conan's school record was perfect (his 'own' was far from it to be honest), even though he felt as if his brain cells were dying every minute he spent in elementary school.

Then something unexpected happened and caught his attention. In fact, the teacher kept talking instead of starting the lesson as he'd expected. "Well, I'm sure you're all still aware that our class is one student short since Taro had to leave the school last month, because his family moved to Gunma." The class nodded and Taro's former friends looked at bit crestfallen at the reminder. "Of course we won't forget about him, but it's become time to welcome a new student to our class!"

At that the door opened and a kid stepped through the threshold, turned and closed the door behind itself without sparing the people in the room as much as a glance. The teacher motioned for it to come stand next to her and it walked over, eyes glued to the ground. Standing in front of the class and finally raising his head, the students were able to get a better look at their new classmate. The new kid was a rather short boy about Conan's height with messy dark red-brown hair that had grown a bit longer than it might've been intended to be, indigo eyes and what looked like a tiny brown birthmark beneath his right eye. Actually, he also looked very similar to Conan facial feature wise. He was wearing a blue oversized sweatshirt with rolled up sleeves that was so large, that it nearly covered the dark blue shorts the boy also wore. The weirdest thing were his shoes though- they looked like shiny dark blue dress shoes for little girls, flat but elegant. The boy somehow seemed to be radiating an aura of sad calmness. "Why don't you introduce yourself to your new classmates?", the teacher smiled and the boy nodded, before he pulled the corners of his mouth up into a solemn smile and opened his mouth to speak. "Hello everyone. I'm Kai Ishikawa. Nice to meet you."