Naeko Miike

Naeko Miike (三池 苗子 Miike Naeko) is a character in the anime and manga franchise Detective Conan.

Background
Naeko Miike is Chiba's childhood friend. They both attended Teitan Elementary together where they both joined the school broadcasting commitee (although Naeko only joined because Chiba did). She then moved after her sixth grade summer. She works in the traffic department of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police District directly under Yumi Miyamoto.

Personality
Naeko is an extremely hardworking girl who bears great dedication to her work. However, she also possesses the notable trait of being very shy, which has ruined many of her chances to confess to Detective Chiba about her true identity as his former classmate as well as her feelings for him. A running gag consists of Naeko always hiding her face and blushing heavily when she sees Detective Chiba. She also has a friendly streak, in which she befriended her senior, Yumi Miyamoto, soon after she recently transferred to the latter's Division as well as Miwako Sato a short time after that. It is implied that she is quite observant, as shown when she noted and told Sato that Wataru Takagi was quite popular amongst women (though withholding the information from Sato herself that Takagi's popularity did not come close to matching the level of Sato's own impact around men).

Appellations
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Video Letter of First Love (Manga: 741-742; Anime: 624)
When Naeko moved away, Chiba wrote down his feelings in a love letter. Naeko wrote her response on the side of a VHS in the committee storage room, hoping Chiba's sweating habit would cause the message "I like you, too" to show up on his hands after grabbing the tape. Unfortunately, Chiba couldn't find the right tape and never got the message.

On the day of his elementary school reunion, Chiba returned to the school and searched for the tape again. With the help of Conan and the Detective Boys he finally finds the message and heads for the reunion. Unfortunately Naeko doesn't show, and he hears from a former classmate that she said she is "now with the one she loved". Depressed, Chiba immediately leaves and finds a lady traffic cop giving him a ticket. When the officer offers to forget about the ticket since he is a fellow officer, Chiba scolds her for offering to ignore Chiba's illegal parking. Chiba leaves with the ticket, but then wonders how the girl knew he was a detective. The officer turns out to be Naeko, who has just been transferred to the police headquarters in Tokyo (working under Yumi) and looks forward to working with the one she loves.

The Joint Investigation with First Love (Manga: 790-792; Anime: 659-660)
Naeko makes her second appearence during a case involving threats that were placed in cars along with Yumi. Ironically, one of the victims happens to be Chiba himself. Naeko hides behind Yumi and continues to blush in front of him. However, Chiba remains oblivious to the fact that she is his childhood first love. She is forced into investigating the car cases with Chiba as Ayumi's, Mitsuhiko's and Genta's plan to get them to confess their love to each other. Soon after, a crash occurs and they find a man on the floor with another threat in the person's car. While everybody is investigating the current act of vandalism, Naeko helps out by giving information on the other cases. Meanwhile, Ayumi, Mitsuhiko and Genta continue to get Chiba to realize who Naeko really is, but he gets distracted by Conan, who keeps finding more evidence and Yumi who won't allow Chiba to steal her latest friend from her. Chiba comes close to finding out when a gust of wind blows Naeko's hat off, but is interrupted. Naeko feels like he doesn't remember her at all and calls him a dummy. Naeko continues to help with the investigation and they are able to find the culprit. Soon after Naeko takes Chiba home when Chiba remembers that he's seen her before. Naeko, thinking that he realizes she's his first love, is about to say that Chiba is correct when he says that it was from the time where she gave him a parking ticket. Naeko becomes embarrassed that she assumed wrong, but Chiba reveals to himself that he has a feeling who Naeko really is.

The Life Threatening Broadcast of Love (Manga: 804; Anime: 681)
Naeko is first shown with Yumi in the Police Car where they meet Takagi, in which she guesses that he is going on a date with Sato to a hot spring for one night, and expresses surprise when Takagi denies so in a serious manner. Later at the police station, she teases Sato about the possibility of Takagi traveling to meet Sato's parents to ask for her hand, and introduces herself to Sato again when the latter forgets her name (much to her dismay). She voices out that she does not believe Takagi is committing a love affair when the trio discusses the reason behind his visit as he clearly stated that it was not a date and asks about Wataru Date when Yumi and Sato mentions the deceased police officer, to which she also considers the possibility Takagi visiting Date's parents. When the discussion hits the final result that Takagi can only be visiting a woman, Naeko remarks on Takagi's popularity with women, slightly sparking Sato's ire.

Detective Chiba
Chiba and Naeko were childhood friends and attended Teitan Elementary together were they both joined the school broadcasting committee (although Naeko only joined because Chiba did). When Naeko was to move away, Chiba wrote down his feelings in a love letter. Naeko wrote her response on the side of a VHS in the committee storage room, hoping Chiba's sweating habit would cause the message "I like you, too" to show up on his hands after grabbing the tape. Unfortunately, Chiba couldn't find the right tape and never got the message.

On the day of his elementary school reunion, Chiba returned to the school and searched for the tape again. With the help of Conan and the Detective Boys he finally finds the message and heads for the reunion. Unfortunately Naeko doesn't show, and he hears from a former classmate that she said she is "now with the one she loved". Depressed, Chiba immediately leaves and finds a lady traffic cop giving him a ticket. When the officer offers to forget about the ticket since he is a fellow officer, Chiba scolds her for offering to ignore Chiba's illegal parking. Chiba leaves with the ticket, but then wonders how the girl knew he was a police officer. The officer turns out to be Naeko, who has just been transferred to the police headquarters in Tokyo (working under Yumi) and looks forward to working with the one she loves. Despite this, Chiba is unable to identify Naeko as his childhood love, and Naeko has taken to hiding away in embarrassment upon seeing Chiba, though it is shown that Chiba has a slight feeling that he knows Naeko from before, even remembering that Naeko had spent a lot of time together with Sakurako when they were young.

Finally in episode 974 Chiba understands that Neiko actually is his childhood friend.

Sakurako Yonehara
Sakurako is Naeko's childhood friend and former neighbor. They are presumably close even back in their childhood days as Chiba, upon recognizing Sakurako, recalls that the latter always had Naeko by her side. Sakurako has also given Naeko the nickname "Nae-chan", and called her for help when she discovered a corpse at the house she was working at, showing that the two has kept in contact throughout the years.

Character popularity

 * Naeko ranked 9th in the Digest Book 60+'s "Cutest Detective Conan characters" poll, with 71 votes.

Name origin
Her name is a reference to the Japanese novel and TV series, Mikeneko (Calico Cat) Holmes.