Detective Conan 770

Chapter 770

01

Text: Kudou Shinichi appears!?
Title: File 770 Sera's Careless Deduction

02

Toshiko: You've solved the case...?

Toshiko: So you determined that it really was a suicide?
SFX: Slide
Megure: No...

Megure: Uesumi Teigo-san's suicide was a trick.
Megure: That's why we had you come here to the 6th floor using the elevator that wasn't running during the incident.

Margin: Sera claims to have solved the case, but...

Megure: He said the murderer used the elevator to fake the suicide.
Sera: He? But...
Takagi: Oh, you'd rather we gave your name, Sera-kun?

Conan: Anyway, could you explain your reasoning?

03

Conan: We'll be on the lookout to see if you got anything wrong.

Sera: Sure.
Sera: Make sure you watch closely!

Sera: I'm going to demonstrate the trick as I explain it!

Woman: But why are we here?
Man: Even if it was a murder, wouldn't it have taken place on the roof?

Sera: As I said before, Teigo-san's shoes and coat left on the roof were just meant to make it look like a jumping suicide.
Sera: They were meant to keep anyone from realizing the 6th floor of the annex was the true scene of the crime.

04

Sera: Hirukawa-san...
Sera: You used them to hide the fact that you used the elevator and the wheelchair to throw Teigo-san from the building!!

Woman: W-wait a second!!
Man: When he fell, Hirukawa-san was in the car with us down in the parking lot!

Toshiko: That's right. How was I supposed to control the wheelchair and the elevator from there?
Sera: Easily!

Sera: If you hit the elevator buttons and left...
Sera: Teigo-san and the electric wheelchair he was in would automatically be taken from the 2nd floor to the 6th floor. He would be dropped off there and the wheelchair alone would return to the 2nd floor.

Sera: Of course, you would have to have a long fishing line with a number of rubber bands on the end to do it.
Man: Fishing line and rubber bands?
Toshiko: Why don't you tell us...

Toshiko: what this magical trick was that allows someone...
Toshiko: to automatically be thrown to their death?

05

Sera: First, you went to meet Teigo-san here on the 6th floor and made sure you got him dead drunk!
Sera: I hear he was always drunk, so he must like alcoholic drinks.
Sera: If you brought him some expensive drinks, it would be simple to get him drunk, wouldn't it?

Sera: Once he passed out, you put him on the electric wheelchair he had borrowed making sure his legs were up on the seat and put it in front of the elevator.
Sera: You opened the door to the elevator that was stopped on that floor and put the rubber bands connected to the end of a long fishing line around the mirror on the wall inside the elevator.

Sera: Then you pressed the 1st floor button from outside the elevator bringing the empty elevator down allowing you to measure the length needed to get from the 6th floor to the 1st.
Sera: You then finished your preparations by calling the elevator back to the 6th floor, measuring off a length of the fishing line about 30 cm shorter than the distance you just measured, and attaching that length to the area between the front wheels of the wheelchair!

Sera: You made sure the fishing line wouldn't catch on anything as it reeled in, got in the elevator with Teigo-san and the wheelchair,
Sera: pushed the wheelchair out of the elevator facing towards the elevator at the 2nd floor, set it to run, closed the door, and headed down to the 1st floor.

Sera: When you reached the first floor, you ran into this boy here!
Sera: It seems you told him not to get on the elevator because it was for the annex only...
Sera: but you just didn't want him to get on the elevator.

Sera: If he had, he would have seen an odd string hanging from the mirror inside...
Sera: with the other end heading out the other door.
Sera: Also...

06

Sera: It would have been clear that you had...
Sera: pressed the buttons for the 2nd and 6th floors!

Man: The 2nd...
Man: and 6th floors?
Sera: Well, a picture is worth a thousand words...
Sera: so let's test it out!

Sera: Okay, inspector?
Megure: Chiba-kun!
Megure: Are you ready?
Chiba: Yes!

Chiba: I've pressed the buttons for the 2nd and 6th floors...
SFX: Beep
Chiba: and the elevator is on its way!

Sera: When the elevator reaches the 2nd floor...
SFX: Whirrrr
Sera: an electric wheelchair set to run forward will be waiting at the door.

Sera: When the door opens, it goes in...
SFX: Slide
Sera: and it runs into the door on the other side of the elevator.

07

Sera: As I'm sure you know, the annex elevators have doors on both sides.
Sera: The 3rd floor and above use the opposite door from the 1st and 2nd floors.

Sera: So the wheelchair that entered on the 2nd floor...
SFX: Slide
Sera: will exit on its own when it reaches the 6th floor.

Sera: Then the paint cans and cardboard boxes around the elevator...
SFX: Bump
Sera: guide the wheelchair's path.

Sera: This puts it on a path parallel with the wall...
SFX: Whirrr
Sera: straight for the window Teigo-san broke a few days before.

Sera: And the wheelchair's footrest hits the wall below the window...
SFX: Bump

Sera: allowing inertia to send Teigo-san...
Sera: straight out the-

08

SFX: Bump bump

Sera: H-huh?
Megure: Hey, he isn't going to fall out like this.

Sera: M-maybe he was shaken off and out the window when the wheelchair returned to the 2nd floor...
Takagi: B-but according to your reasoning...
Takagi: the murderer sent the wheelchair back to the 2nd floor after Teigo-san's death.

Sera: D-did I say that?
Conan: What, he didn't actually know it all?

Conan: But this is a problem. I can't exactly call in Sonoko and put her to sleep at this point.
Conan: And aiming for Detective Takagi or Inspector Megure with the tranquilizer would probably turn out badly later.

Conan: The only person that can convincingly suddenly show up here and reveal the truth...
Conan: but still be explained away later is...

09

Sera: I-I know, she used her car!!
Sera: She brought Teigo-san here on the wheelchair and then used fishing line attached to her car to pull him out when she backed up.
Takagi: Sorry, but nothing odd was found on Hirukawa-san's car.

Megure: First of all, if she had a string attaching her car to him, she could just leave him at the window instead of using the wheelchair.
Sera: That's true...

Sera: It looks like...
Sera: I was careless.

Toshiko: That was an interesting trick...
Toshiko: but it was just a desktop theory.

Sera: I'm disappointed in you, officers.
Sera: How could you take this youth's groundless ideas seriously?

Shinichi: It was the paint cans.

10

Toshiko: Eh?
Shinichi: The murderer used the two paint cans over there to throw the victim out of the wheelchair.

Takagi: Th-that voice...
Megure: Kudou-kun!?
Conan: That's right! I called Shinichi-niichan about the case and he figured it out!

Sera: Kudou...
Sera: Shinichi...

Megure: A-and? How were the paint cans used?
Takagi: Sh-Shinichi-kun?
SFX: Run...

Conan: There's a bunch of dried paint under the window, right?
SFX: Hide
Conan: There should be a mark from something being placed there.

Shinichi: Put the paint cans on their sides on those marks.
Shinichi: Do they match up?
Megure: Oh!

11

Megure: They fit perfectly!!
Shinichi: Then hold the paint cans in place with your feet...
Shinichi: and bring the wheelchair back and send it towards the window again!

Megure: Umm, take the wheelchair and...
Sera: I'll do it.

Sera: Is this a good place, Kudou-kun?
Shinichi: Well, I'm not there, so I can't really tell you...

Sera: Oh, that's right!
Sera: Well, here goes!

Shinichi: Good, this will be when the wheelchair...
Shinichi: headed for the window after leaving the elevator.

Conan: It headed for the paint cans that were held in place by the spilled paint.
SFX: Whirrr

Shinichi: The footrest hit them...
SFX: Bump

Shinichi: and slid underneath the paint cans.
SFX: Slide

12

Shinichi: The back wheels lifted up...
SFX: Throw
Shinichi: and the armrests hit the wall.

Shinichi: The motion...
Shinichi: throws the victim out of the window!

SFX: Catch
Shinichi: And then, once the murderer has confirmed that the victim falls to his death before her eyes...

Shinichi: she claims to see a strange figure on the roof to give a reason to head there.
Shinichi: To get to the roof, the elevator stopped on the 6th floor has to be lowered to the 1st floor.

Megure: Chiba-kun, send it back down!
Chiba: Yes, sir!
SFX: Beep

Shinichi: As it does, it pulls on the fishing line tied to the area between the front wheels of the wheelchair...
Shinichi: causing it to turn around and head for the elevator.
SFX: Turn

13

SFX: Bump
Shinichi: It then strikes the elevator door!

Shinichi: Then, because the fishing line is 30 cm too short, the rubber bands connected to the mirror in the elevator are stretched until they snap.
SFX: Snap

Shinichi: This meant there was nothing left...
Shinichi: when the murderer got back on the elevator!

Shinichi: When everyone reached the top floor...
Shinichi: she just had to come up with some reason to be the last person off the elevator...
Shinichi: so she could hit the buttons for the 6th and 2nd floors.

Shinichi: By doing so, the wheelchair travels into the elevator at the 6th floor and gets off at the 2nd floor.
Shinichi: When the police spotted it later, it would just look like a wheelchair that was running for some reason in a place unrelated to the crime.

Shinichi: By the way, the reason the paint cans were no longer in their places when Conan-kun and the rest of you got there...
Shinichi: was most likely because the wheelchair's initial impact knocked them free of the dried paint...
Shinichi: and then they were knocked away when the wheelchair turned around.

Shinichi: Of course, if fibers from the victim's clothes are found on her clothes, this will be settled.
Shinichi: To get a grown man into a wheelchair, a woman would have to hold him fairly tightly to her body.

Shinichi: Although, if you're willing to testify that you, the daughter of one of the fraud victims, and the man behind the fraud reconciled your differences and hugged each other in joy, that would change things.

Toshiko: Hmph.

14

Toshiko: I'd rather come clean than give such a sickening false testimony!
Toshiko: I put that man on the wheelchair and threw him down to hell!

Megure: So was the ghost scare due to you testing out this trick over and over?
Toshiko: No. All I came up with was putting the paint cans down to throw him out the window.
Toshiko: I wasn't the one that tested it over and over.

Toshiko: When I came to his room another time...
Toshiko: he was the one that showed me the empty wheelchair come from an empty elevator.

Takagi: Th-that was the victim's trick!?
Toshiko: Yes. He hung up the phone he had used to call his friend who set the elevator running...
Toshiko: and then said that his plan was to drive the media and all the guests in the annex away with an "old man's ghost".

Toshiko: That was why I put him on that wheelchair.
Toshiko: I wanted to show him...
Toshiko: how painful it was for my father to come to his room in that wheelchair..
Toshiko: day after day.

15

Box: Afterwards, Uesumi Teigo-san's hidden bank account was found and the rest of the fraud group was arrested based on the flow of money.
Headline: Fraud Group Arrested!!
Box: The suspected leader of the fraud group was charged while dead...
Box: and the fraud case ended along with the murder case.

Box: And...
Ran: Ehh!?

Ran: Shinichi solved that case!?
Sonoko: Yeah! I asked Detective Takagi and he told me everything!
Sonoko: Conan-kun called him and he had the thing solved in no time.

Sonoko: Of course, it would've been nice if he called his lovely wife too, right?
Ran: B-by the way, Conan-kun said that Sera was a detective, too.

Ran: He said we would meet again when he left.
Ran: I wonder what he meant?
Sonoko: Who knows.

Sonoko: Maybe he had a thing for you, Ran.
SFX: Slide

Teacher: Let me introduce you...
Teacher: to your new classmate,
Ran & Sonoko: Eh?

16

Teacher: Sera-san!

Ran & Sonoko: Ehhhh!?

Ran: Th-that's a skirt!!
Sonoko: Sera was a girl!?

Margin: An unexpected schoolgirl detective! Is she following Conan's movements?

Sera: My name is Sera Masumi!
Sera: Nice to meet you!
Text: Next Issue: A new series!!
Box: To be continued in Issue 18.