Author's Note: I have this habit where I like writing parts of ideas for fics because I really wanted to write a particular scene without investing time and energy into a full story. This is an example of one of those, and I've been rereading my folder full of them this weekend. Surprisingly, I found that when I read this one, it seemed complete so I've decided to post it.

Please note that as of this moment of posting, we have no idea who Rum, much less their sex, which is exactly why I'm going to post this before it's revealed. I don't much like writing AUs of known existing characters, but since Rum is unknown right now (and two of the three candidates are pretty weak while the third hasn't appeared that much), I just made up a Rum.

Disclaimer: Gosho Aoyama-sama owns Detective Conan and I clearly have nothing better to do with my time than write fanfics while he's working on the canon material.

Black on Silver

It was something of a miracle that they didn't die when Chianti finally managed to land the aircraft. She had to put it down in the water because it was too unstable for land, but she was skilled and lucky enough to land close to the docks where his Porsche and her Viper were parked, so the swim wasn't extensive. Good thing too, because his clothes weren't made for swimming and the short distance to the dock was a ridiculously-difficult chore. When Gin finally managed to haul himself onto the dock, he was sopping wet and in a very bad mood, which was not helped by Chianti's loudmouthed complaints now that they were out of harm's way.

"Well, that went just fucking perfect!" she shouted with scathing sarcasm. "Not only did that bitch Curacao turn traitor at the last second, but we caused a huge, very visible scene at the Aquarium, and have now lost the newest and coolest vehicle we've ever had!"

Chianti glared at him as if the night's events were all somehow his fault, and he glared right back as he started wringing the seawater out of his long hair.

"I don't like it either," Korn said in his normal, emotionless tone.

Predictably, that seemed to set Chianti off even more and she pointed to her partner. "See?! Even Korn agrees with me!"

"Bitching at me isn't going to change anything," Gin growled in warning. In truth, he was just as angry as she was, if not more so, but that didn't mean he was going to take her backtalk for it. "Breaking the Ferris wheel from its axis at least ensured that the situation would be drastic enough that the PSB and any other agencies present would be too caught up with the resulting destruction to pursue us."

Chianti's scowl deepened, but she didn't make a move towards him or her own partner. Instead, she stomped straight back to the water's edge where Vodka was just getting out and kicked him back into the ocean. His arms flailed helplessly in midair as he overbalanced and then fell back into the water with a splash. Apparently satisfied, she strode back to Korn and crossed her arms over her chest. Gin decided to leave her alone and continued to wring water out of own clothes, his thoughts of the evening's events consuming him. The attempt to retrieve Curacao was nothing short of an unmitigated disaster, and there would surely be consequences for it. It was only a matter of time. And then there was the last thing he'd seen at the Ferris wheel before their retreat from the aquarium. He'd had but the briefest glimpse at the screen when Vodka had zoomed in on the Ferris wheel to identify where the source of the fireworks had come from. He knew what he thought he saw, whose profile he'd seen, but it was impossible. It was impossible because he had seen the man's death with his own eyes. It was much more likely he had simply mistaken the figure for another, than it was for Shuichi Akai to be back from the dead. He had made that mistake once before and it only turned out to be Bourbon disguised as him.

Vodka had just finished climbing back up onto the dock again and looking annoyed when Gin felt his phone vibrate in his pocket. Considering it was protected by waterproof casing, it did not surprise him at all that his phone was still working after having been submerged in seawater for a brief spell. It was not the vibration of a text message coming through, but that of an actual phone call, so it wasn't 'that person', but rather his second-in-command that was contacting him.

He pulled his phone out, confirmed it was Rum, and answered, "Yes?"

"Ah, Gin, so glad to hear you're alive and presumably in one piece," the woman said with disgustingly-fake concern. "And here I feared the worst after you wrecked the Touto Aquarium Ferris wheel and the new aircraft."

Gin's eyes narrowed further, but he remained silent. It would do no good to argue, especially not when his words would only sound like feeble excuses. As much as he hated the woman, she was still the Number 2 of the Organization. However, he had to admit, he had not expected Rum to be updated so quickly. Vermouth must have already informed her of the night's events.

"The Boss has already been informed of what's happened, so there's no need to recount your version of events to him," Rum said, her voice suddenly sharp and frigid, unyielding. "I'll be expecting you at the normal place tonight posthaste. You will have Chianti and Korn drop Vodka off for the night. If you delay or detour your arrival, I will know, and the consequences will not be pretty for you." She hung up without waiting for any acknowledgment form him.

Gin shoved his phone back in his pocket with rather more force than necessary and his eyes snapped to Vodka, though all of them were staring at him. "Vodka, Chianti and Korn will take you home. Rum is summoning me now."

Vodka looked worried with this pronouncement, but Chianti crowed with delight, "Oooh, you're in trouble now, Gin!"

He ignored her and spun on his heel to return to his car. There was no point in delaying the inevitable, though he wasn't happy that he was going to be dripping water in his car. It couldn't be helped though. He got into his car and started the drive to Rum's chosen meeting location. He was not worried about what would happen to the aircraft. If Rum and 'that person' were already aware of what happened, then whatever was decided would be dealt with shortly, and clearly he was not to have a part in that. Less than an hour later, Gin found himself parked outside a towering and expensive high-rise apartment. He hesitated for but a moment, glaring up at the third window from the left on the top most floor, before he got out of his car. In the last ten years since he was eighteen, he could count the number of times he had been back at this place on one hand and it gave him no pleasure to be here again. Rum was the first member of the Organization he'd ever met back when he was still a scrawny, lanky, troubled fifteen-year-old. It was Rum who taught him to be wary of women like Vermouth. Women like her.

He would need the passcode to get into the complex, so he sent her a message that he had arrived. Run's response came back almost immediately and he sneered at the three X's she left in the postscript. Damn her, she and Vermouth really were cut from the same cloth. Were it not for Vermouth's particular relationship with the Boss, they probably would have gotten along exceptionally well. Or maybe they still would have hated each other. Women were funny that way. Passcode in hand, he approached the entrance and punched it into the keypad. The doors slid open for him and he walked straight past the security desk without pausing. He knew what he looked like (and the worker at the front desk was right to suspect him), and also knew that Rum would have called down ahead of time to warn them of his expected arrival. Death trap though it was, he took the elevator all the way to the top floor. It dinged open and he stepped out onto the landing. His long strides ate up the distance to Rum's room and the thick carpet muffled his heavy footsteps. Once he stood in front of her room, Gin released a heavy exhale and knocked on the door. It opened inward and though there was very little light in the room beyond, Rum was still easy to make out from her place in the doorway. Her physical appearance was exactly as he remembered it from their very first encounter, an unusually tall woman in her 40s with a thin white skunk-stripe parting the left side of her black hair. Like Vermouth, she had not aged a day in the thirteen years he'd been a part of the Organization, and maybe even longer.

Her painted lips widened into a sinister smile as she stared up at him with those dark eyes of hers. "Ah, Gin, punctual as ever. Please, don't be a stranger. Come on in."

Her sickeningly-sweet manner and false honeyed words did nothing to mask the command in her tone. Without a word, Gin stepped into her abode and she closed the door behind him. He heard the lock click into place, but he merely continued onward into the living room to stare out the balcony window. He would not look at her any more than he had to.

Rum sighed dramatically behind him. "I never tire of how beautiful your hair is, Gin. It's only a pity the moon's not out to further accentuate that natural silver sheen of yours."

Still he said nothing and remained facing away. He felt her presence, her ominous aura, pressing on him from behind and the pressure increased with every step she took towards him. It was so strong that he felt a jolt run through him the very moment her fingertips brushed against the backs of his wrists. That sense of danger remained with him as those thin fingers ghosted slowly, tenderly, up his arms and around his shoulders while her body pressed against his back and her forehead rested between his shoulder blades, a mockery of a lover's embrace.

"To think you've grown so tall and handsome; it's a pity you don't need me anymore," she sighed again.

It took incredible self-restraint on his part not to snort derisively. He had never needed her, not since she had first offered him protection from the police for committing a murder-arson by having him join the Organization. Rum was the one who had needed and wanted him, but once he'd realized her game, he didn't continue to let her have her way.

"Is that all you have to say to me, Rum?" he said coldly. He knew what she wanted, but he had no interest in playing along with her delusions. She was not important to him in any way except as the Organization's second-in-command.

He fingers contracted like claws in anger, but he didn't even flinch. "Well. To the point as usual with you, is it? Fine," she huffed and she slid her hands from around his shoulders back down to his wrists. He didn't like her hands there. Rum wasn't applying any pressure yet, but it was the implied restriction that bothered him. That she could and would if he gave her reason to. "You've done very well for yourself and this Organization, I must admit," she said. "Your sense for those pesky, thieving rats is uncanny and your idea to retrieve the NOC list was brilliant. Three more codenamed NOCs dead by your insight in less than 24 hours and my own confidant's true colors revealed. Your intuition is spot-on as usual and the Organization was very fortunate to have recruited someone as fiercely devoted as you."

Gin continued to stare blankly out the window. This was a favorite tactic of hers. Use flattery and praise to lower her victim's guard and then attack them with their faults and mistakes. Too bad for her that it didn't work on him anymore.

"But you've been getting careless, Gin," she continued in a high-pitched sing-song voice and he could hear the danger beneath it. "The aircraft was seen by everyone at Touto Aquarium tonight, including the PSB and even the Tokyo police. You did well to divert their attention from the aircraft by destroying the Ferris wheel; it's given us time to cover our tracks and retreat back into the shadows, but it seems to me that it shouldn't have been necessary in the first place. You have been with the Organization a long time Gin, and you're a naturally cautious person. I would not have expected you to let the situation become so disgracefully visible like that."

She was baiting him and his younger self would have risen to her taunts. At twenty-eight, he knew better. Rum wasn't looking for answers, she was looking for weaknesses, and he would not give her any. She released his right wrist and, still holding onto his left, and slipped around in front of him. Both of her hands returned to hold his wrists once more.

"Look at me, Gin," she ordered.

He lowered his gaze and did so. Her dark eyes narrowed and her smile widened. A predator's smile. That too, he had learned from her.

"I recall another incident not too long ago where you were bested by some unknown force and ended up crashing the helicopter. Ironically, Vodka, Chianti, and Korn were also present with you in the aircraft at the time. Perhaps you four just shouldn't be allowed in aircrafts together anymore since you seem to break them so often."

Gin was sure the four of them in an aircraft was more coincidence than situational, but she did have a point about the unknown force. In both instances, it was the single unknown variable he had not been able to account for that had caused those two missions to go so badly.

Rum's hands let go of his wrists and grabbed the belt holding his coat closed. "This doesn't have to be an unpleasant punishment for you if you don't want it to be," she crooned as she undid his belt and tossed it aside. "Even after all these years apart, I'm still very fond of you. After all, you're a difficult man to please and it's not every woman who can say they've had you before them begging on your knees."

Pure rage flashed through his eyes before he could stop himself, but Rum caught it all the same. Her eyes narrowed maliciously. "Oh? You don't like being reminded that I was the one who broke you in and made you a man? That I was the one who taught you how to seduce and please a woman? You didn't seem to mind so much when you were using those same skills on little Sherry, now did you? I believe she was fifteen as well when you shattered her innocence. Are you certain you're as immune to my influence as you'd like to believe?"

Gin arched an unimpressed eyebrow and scoffed aloud, "What exactly do you think you're going to accomplish by bringing up another dead traitor?"

"So, it was all just fun and games with her, no strings attached?" she pressed and gripped the front of his coat, leaning in and up. "There's not some small part of you that's upset she's dead? That she betrayed and ran away from the Organization? That she ran away from you?"

A smirk of comprehension spread across his lips and Rum's hungry expression faltered for a moment. "Why so interested? Jealous that old hags like you and Vermouth stood no chance against Sherry's genuine youth? That you can't keep a hold of any young, good-looking man for long, no matter how hard you try, because we see straight through to your rotten cores?"

He knew what was coming and he knew he deserved it, but he didn't regret it in the least when it meant a win against Rum. Gin barely registered he was falling before he was slammed into the ground, the force of which stunning him momentarily and knocking the air right out of his lungs. He only managed a few unhindered gasping breaths before Rum's knee dug straight into his diaphragm. Her dark eyes were wide and furious, her expression was wild, and a manic smile stretched across her lips.

"You'll regret that, Gin," she breathed. "Oh yes… you'll regret that indeed."

The corners of his mouth widened into a predator's grin that matched the one on Rum's face. "You can try," he huffed, "But you haven't had any power over me since I was eighteen and there's nothing in this world you can do to me that will make me regret claiming a victory over you."

Her eyes narrowed to thin slits and her knee dug even harder into his chest. "We'll see about that," she said darkly.

Gin survives! Obviously! I intentionally left the explanation of some of these relationships secret while others are just subtle. Most of them are probably AU. Technically, I could extend this scene into another chapter, but I think I've already managed to imply something of what's going down next. If you feel so inclined, you are more than free to imagine for yourself how Rum will 'punish' Gin for his sass, but I'm not gonna do it for you.

On a completely unrelated note, I still love writing Chianti. She's just so energetic!