A New Method of Persuasion

"The author would like me to say a few words," Heiji coughed into his hand, "the first being she doesn't own anything. The second thing for those who were so conccerned about the Shonen Tantei and myself need not be concerned. Thanks to Kudou we're all alive and well. We just won't be making an apperance this chapter."

"Good for you Hattori," Hittocere smiled, "well enjoy the chapter guys!"

A/N: There are a grand total of, well at least probably 32 characters in this chapter, of which I have had to painstakingly make up at least 27 of them. Using an excel spreadsheet and a lot of random stuff from the top of my brain. Gin and Shinichi are of course the main characters of this, but there are 23 people, not including the cops, who will be flitting in and out of this chapter, so please have patience with me. This has been a massive pain in my collective plot cogs, and a lot of familiar names made appearances. So points and shout outs to each name you can recognize, and there are a few freebies in there if you've been paying attention.

PART TWENTY SIX- CASE OF THE TAIL WAGGING THE DOG

GIN

Gin was concerned, and it wasn't about the detective, which surprised him. No, he had a feeling that had been troubling him since word reached him of Numabuchi's escape. When he escaped their custody Gin had the suspicion that he had an inside accomplice inside of the organization. He was no longer in a position to counter it before it got out of hand due to his being out of the main base of operations, he told Vermouth not to transfer this assignment regardless of his condition, but of course she did so just to piss him off.

He was here now to pick up the pieces, but he was also smart enough to realize that they would probably try to frame this murder on him. It would kill two stones with one, only they hadn't taken the boy detective into account for their scheme. Kudou Shinichi, the modern age Sherlock Holmes would get to the bottom of any case, and he already knew that Gin didn't intend on killing this rouge agent. The detective was also out investigating without him, as long as he laid low while the detective looked into everything things would be fine.

As 'Edogawa', the Fox had enough plausible deniability (because those stupid policemen thought the brat was too young to think or do such things), that nothing would be blamed on him, and through Gin's research he also knew that the Fox knew more than enough police officers who would listen to him.

With the meddling Fox working murder cases as often as he did—and with such undeniable successes in the field—he would get the benefit of the doubt under most circumstances, despite his appearance. So, all should go according to Gin's plans, as long as the boy detective didn't attract too much attention on his own. He mentally went through a list of agents who could take out a target under these circumstances.

Vodka had done what he could by getting him the address and time, the rest was up to Gin, and by default, the boy detective. Speaking of which, that had better be him at the door, otherwise there were going to be two bodies found here this weekend.

SHINICHI

The boy detective found himself severely puzzled, he had been gone for several hours, and he had yet to catch sight of the blond. None of the guests or staff looked particularly suspicious… well, there was something suspicious, but not of the criminal sort. The groundskeeper was definitely chasing after the cook, and it was not as one sided as the cook wanted the rest of them to believe. The young woman that signed in the guests was the old man's granddaughter. The whole scheme of things was so intertwined it took about twenty minutes of observation to figure out, the guests were another matter.

There was a group of businessmen that had been sitting in the dining room when he walked by, their discussion was so heated that Shinichi was surprised no one was coming to blows. The arguments were so varied that had he been a normal child he wouldn't have been able to keep up with the changing topics. He doubted that Ran would have been able to keep up either. There was an older woman that kept pinching his cheeks, she also had a distinct English accent underneath her very clean Japanese.

There was a couple that was so deeply engrossed in themselves he doubted they would have noticed Gin walking by on a bad day with a semi automatic rifle in plain sight in hand. That left the nature enthusiast, he wasn't the cheek pinching horror that was the older English woman, but close enough. He specialized in Fungi and bugs, and Mitsuhiko would have been in heaven with the man's conversation. Shinichi preferred chemistry and was rather bored by the whole ordeal.

He walked back to the room, his mind deep in thought. There was no one in particular that would commit this crime… Wait, had he just walked in without knocking for a second time that day? Sure enough there was the sound of a pistol being cocked, Shinichi sighed to himself, he would need to stop doing that if he wanted to live past the age of 17 for a second time.

"Sorry, just lost in thought," the shrunken detective announced, "how's the arm?" The resulting clicks told him that assassin hadn't been expecting company. Shinichi realized there was probably more to this than Gin had told him, he didn't expect the assassin to tell him either.

"You were gone longer than I expected, did you find out anything useful?" the blond questioned, Shinichi sat down on the plush chair. The blond raised an eyebrow, it sent a shiver down his spine. The mini detective felt his cheeks flush, he hadn't gotten nearly as much information as he wanted, but it was about as much as he normally had before the case occurred.

"Not really, just a bit of background on everyone here," Shinichi sighed, he wondered how gruesome this would get, and when it would begin. Kami sama, he was already getting wound up for the blood curling scream, the assassin looked at him probably noticing just how tense he was.

"Pathetic," Gin muttered, he must have had an inkling of who was involved. Shinichi was tempted to ask, but from the expression gracing the assassin's face he probably wouldn't give him a straight answer even if he did ask. He pouted, hoping the man wouldn't get to overly annoyed at the expression, but he couldn't help it. This was frustrating.

"I just spent most of the day surveying the area and the people here. I recorded every car and matched them up to perspective owners based on observations. I also discovered that the cook and the groundskeeper have a quiet affair going on, probably because the granddaughter of the proprietor doesn't approve two men being together," Shinichi rambled, he missed the amused expression crossing the blond's face, "I would say the majority of the information I gather about a case is during the case not before. Seeing as you didn't provide any place to start I did a preliminary investigation, the results were more or less fruitless." He flopped backwards onto the chair in irritation.

"Perhaps I spoke to soon Fox," the blond murmured, "but we shall see later. For now you should go down to the lobby and retrieve dinner. I have no intentions of walking down those stairs any sooner than necessary." Shinichi had to almost fling himself upright to get out of the overly plush chair. He looked over at the assassin, he looked almost as tense as Shinichi had earlier. He was at the door when he realized that he had no idea what the assassin would eat, let alone want.

"Did you want anything in particular?" Shinichi found himself asking cautiously. The assassin picked up a book, seeming to ignore the question. Just as Shinichi was about to shut the door there was a soft answer.

"Something with some spice," the reply was so quiet, but clearly audible. Shinichi was left on his own again, his gut rumbling and his 'murder' senses tingling. The shrunken detective descended the first staircase in relative ease, the second was a bit more complicated… The old English woman was going down to dinner as well, and Shinichi wanted to pass on his cheeks being forcibly removed from his jawbone yet again.

He managed to slip into the dining room without too much fuss, mostly because a group that seemed to have just arrived. Full of mostly women, most of which Shinichi thought looked familiar, playing dumb he decided to eat amongst their group. The assassin hadn't really told him when he was expected back, and as long as he was gathering information he didn't expect to be in too much trouble.

"Um, pretty young ladies…" Shinichi paused in what seemed like hesitation while he pulled on his best Conan face, "may I eat with you all? My guardian is feeling unwell tonight, and I really don't want to eat all by myself." Maybe he was chumming it just a bit, but flattery was always the best way to young women's hearts. Or so Ran told him times ago… Or was it his mother when she taught him how to divest people of their candy when her sweet tooth kicked in? He mentally shrugged, it didn't matter so long as the method worked.

As Shinichi made his way back to the room from dinner he went over the new arrivals. The six girls he had sat with were part of a girl group, their names were Reika, Miku, Tsukiko, Aiko, Sayuri, and Nayomi. With them were three men, their manger, the drummer, and an upright bass player. The boys had eaten at a table by themselves, so Shinichi hadn't gotten much for information about any of them. Except that the drummer was Sayuri's older brother, and Reika's older brother was the cook. None of that was particularly important, but the two other men… They had made him nervous, despite the fact he was surrounded by several witnesses he wanted Gin a little closer than three floors away.

One looked to be a journalist, upon further investigation Shinichi found out his name was Tanaka Masuru. With some special bribing for the girls, most were huge undying fans of the Night Baroness, they walked upstairs with him. He was also given six nosebleed worthy thank you hugs. He walked up the final set of stairs, avoiding the eyes of other guests and snuck into the room he where Gin was. He was careful not to squish the dinner that Reika had carried most of the way for him. The assassin looked up at him, it was the third time he hadn't knocked today, and the pistol was pointed his direction.

"They have arrived, those ones you were talking about," Shinichi passed over the plate. Gin moved the pistol aside to take the plate, glancing back at the laptop he was looking over. He looked at it with a raised eyebrow, and Shinichi wondered if maybe he didn't like it or something.

"So it seems, now we only have to wait for them to make a mistake," Gin remarked, Shinichi nodded. The blond looked at the food skeptically for a moment before trying a bite. One of his eyebrows raised, Shinichi wondered what was wrong, "it's still warm…"

"Of course. I asked the chef, and he agreed to make something for you when I finished. At first he wasn't going to, but Reika convinced him it was in his best interests to do as I requested," Shinichi smirked, "his sister was one of the girls I was sitting with at dinner. I arranged for my mom to introduce their group to a good producer later. They happened to be very big fans of hers. It wasn't a problem." The blond looked back to the food with a softened expression, being as tired as he was, and Shinichi wandered off to get ready for bed.

GIN

He was surprised that the Fox had actually brought him warm food, and it was spicy like he requested. He was amazed at how well it tasted, the cook was competent at his art at least. He started on the dish before he was finished reading through Sherry's new proposal for the next antidote, it had altered the stability of the current one, and perhaps made it a permanent solution to this problem. Gin agreed with the theories she was using to edit the drug, but it still didn't fix the problem. It attacked cells at a cellular level, the simplest solution was an antivirus that removed the drug, at least that's what the assassin thought.

Sherry and he had actually gotten in such a spat over it that Vodka and Vermouth had to separate the two. Sherry later recanted the statement, only after testing his theory. That was when she suggested taking Shinichi here as backup, Vodka would not have been useful. He likely would have set off alarms and concern, were he to do the things that the Fox was well practiced at. His observational skills weren't as high either. Even if he didn't know who he was watching, the Fox could identify when something wasn't what it claimed to be.

It surprised him when he looked down to find he had finished eating without realizing it. He could taste the remnants of the dish on his lips. It had been a long time since he eaten his food without realizing it, but he supposed it wasn't a bad thing. He got up to thank the Fox, making his way towards the room. He found the Fox passed out in one of the beds. It seemed that the day had taken its toll on the child sized detective. He washed the plate off and looked at the clock, it was later than he expected, but still early enough to catch people off guard.

He made his way to the door, placing the plate aside there for later and slipped on his shoes. Key in hand he made his way into the hallway, slipping the key into his pocket securely before making his way downstairs.

TWO PLOTTING SUSPECTS FOR YOU:

It was quiet outside, well besides the chirping bugs, and the two of them were glad. There were things to discuss, and people to avoid. The journalist was smoking again, a grimace crossing his face. His associate was shaking almost like a leaf, his face pale and his eyes searching about hurriedly. The journalist wasn't much better, but he knew the situation would only degrade from here if they didn't get it under control soon.

"Chosokabe, we don't know if it is actually his car, and wouldn't he normally be out surveying the area if he was here to interfere? Relax," the journalist remarked tapping his cigarette against the provided ashtray lazily. "besides if it is him, perhaps we can use this event to get rid of him for good."

"What are you saying Tanaka? That we set him up?" Chosokabe whispered, his eyes bulging to resemble a Shi Tzu's. "Impossible, he'd kill us before we got the chance!" He was damn near hysterical, the journalist placed a hand against his temple.

"Nobu san, take a deep breath and settle down. If he is here your current hysterics are only going to draw his eye sooner. Relax," Tanaka repeated, "And, no one is infallible. Not even that cold bastard, I heard the boss got to him and no one's seen him since. His subordinates have checked in and the favorite claim he's just pissed, but I heard he's been injured. That's why no one has seen him at HQ." The other man calmed considerable at that comment, he was still wringing his hands though.

"Perhaps we could, but are you sure it would work? I mean… we don't really know his methods do we? That's the only real way we could set him up. We know what he looks like, and his overall personality, but not his style," Chosokabe spoke as quietly. The nervousness draining out gradually as he thought over the idea, "as exciting as the idea of putting him behind bars is, we have no way of guaranteeing he'll stay there." The journalist smiled, flicking his cigarette ash at the dish again.

"Leave that to me…" Tanaka spoke with a smug look, "I'll make a run for the necessaries, and I'm sure that some people will lie given a little positive incentive. You know what I mean?" The other man shuddered suddenly, and pointed behind the journalist. Tanaka slapped his hand down quietly, and turned to see the end of someone's long blond hair going around the corner. "Well I guess he is here, do you suppose he'll catch on to our little game?"

"I certainly hope not, I want to live through this process!" Chosokabe whispered, before sneaking away from the table to head back to his room. "Go distract him, he's not expecting you to be here!" The journalist nodded, putting out the last of his cigarette before following after the blond.

SHINICHI

When Shinichi heard the scream at just after sunrise he was already heading for the door, the blond assassin wasn't in their collective rooms. He raced down the stairs, avoiding the startled and grouchy guests that were blocking his way, at the door to the dining room he found Gin leaning against the frame staring at the woman the scream initiated from, only… it wasn't Gin. The man had the right pose, the right everything almost… except something wasn't right here. The child sized detective couldn't place his finger on it at the moment, but soon… Soon he would figure it out.

"What's wrong," he asked running towards the stunned errand girl. She was white as a sheet and quivering, Shinichi looked down and felt the blood drain from his face. It was the creepy twitchy man from yesterday, face smooth, and every muscle uncommonly still. Shinichi's small hands reached for one of the man's wrists, he was cold to the touch and not a single spark of life. He looked over at the doorway to see that 'Gin' had disappeared, he saw the cook from earlier kneeling with his coworker now. "Call the police, he's dead."

DOORS AFFECT OF MEITANTEI CONAN (We are going to run through a couple of points of view now. The timing will vary through each view)

SASAKI REIKA'S TELLING

When Conan ran past her earlier she hadn't been overly concerned, she followed after as best she could in her heels. She saw an unfamiliar blond standing at the entrance to the dining room. She barely caught Conan give the man a second glance before running in to help Ohayashi san, Reika supposed that this must have been the guardian that wasn't feeling well. She took a look at the man's face, she decided that Conan was trying to be nice about it, the man looked agitated and pale. She had just looked into the dining room when Conan yelled for someone to call the police.

She delegated that to Teru before he could object, and he spent the next five minutes giving the police directions to the lodge. During that time the blond had disappeared, for when she turned back he was nowhere to be seen. Conan was containing the crime scene, and trying to keep Ohayashi's granddaughter from tears. She eventually made her way out of the room to where the rest of the guests were waiting. Reika, now joined by Hiroto kun and Hatsu kun supervised the area. The bass player was stationed at the kitchen door, and Hiroto kun watched as Conan looked over the body without disturbing anything.

Katsume kun didn't show up until the police did, and Reika shook her head wondering what their manger was up to. The journalist that had shown up just before them was currently missing, so was the man he was speaking to. What really confused Reika was the blond sitting on the couch on the far side, he looked identical to the man she had seen earlier and she could see Conan speaking with him at the moment.

Only there was something different, when it was her turn for questioning Reika was still pondering it. It bothered her enough that her questioning took longer than it should have. The police finally asked what was on her mind, because clearly they weren't getting the answers they were expecting.

"It's just… something was odd about Ishida san… I can't place it, but I know there's something different between him right now," Reika explained, "Conan kun must have noticed to, he did a double take when he went in to help Ohayashi san. I just can't remember what it is…"

"Well if you remember don't hesitate to tell us," the kindly inspector instructed her. He allowed her to leave, and started up a hushed conversation with his collogues as she left.

OHAYASHI MIKI'S (the Proprietor's granddaughter) TELLING

The police arrived in a timely manner, when her grandfather escorted the officers in where they were waiting. She had been observing the actions of everyone, including the child who had determined the man was dead. He was a peculiar child, when the police greeted the child by name she was suspicious. It soon came to everyone's attention that this boy was the student of Meitantei Mouri Kogoro, if anyone could solve this murder it was him. The inspector and his detectives found evidence that pointed to the guest that arrived with the boy, the man registered as Ishida Yashuhiro. The boy looked confused, Ishida did not however, he sat calmly through their questions, but refused handcuffs.

Everything was going by so quickly, but that's when the boy surprised them all. He asked what evidence they had against Ishida, laying it before the boy created the greatest headache for them all. She couldn't hear the entire case, or the facts that the boy was bringing up. All she knew was that the kid had successfully bought enough time and evidence to get his guardian of the moment out of police custody. When they walked by she realized that perhaps she wasn't the only one fooled by his size and manners.

"You could have warned me," the boy stated in irritation, "good thing these men were stupid and uninformed. Otherwise this might have taken a lot longer." The blond shrugged, he still didn't seem surprised that he had been accused of murder. His expression was hard, and it terrified her because it looked like he was capable of murder.

"There was no point, you still have to solve the murder," the blond's voice rivaled the sound of gravel it was so low. "There is still something very wrong here, we need to check the body again." Miki couldn't believe what she was hearing, these two sounded like they dealt with death all the time. With Mouri's young assistant it seemed likely that he dealt with it all the time, but what did this blond do?

Before she could find out more one of the officers stopped her, they wanted to hear her testimony again. She followed them to dining room where they had originally questioned everyone.

"Ohayashi san, please walk through the events you witnessed with us again. Be very clear, and don't leave out any details," one of the detectives asked her. She nodded sitting down near the entrance. Her grandfather was speaking across the room with a different set of officers. The child was speaking with the inspector, the seriousness there on both of their faces. The blond was nowhere to be seen.

"I was starting the morning shift, I was looking over the tables making sure that all of them were set up and prepared for breakfast today. I didn't see anyone in here, I actually tripped over his arm and that was how I found him lying there," Miki spoke softly, "his face was pale, comparable to the whiteness of a sheet. I screamed and was just frozen in that spot. A couple minutes later that little boy had us call the police saying that he was dead." The police nodded, it was the same story as before after all.

"Now we need to ask you something very specific. Ishida san, who passed you with Conan kun, did you see him at all before we brought him into this room for questioning?" the detective asked. Miki thought about it, it hadn't seemed odd at the time, seeing as she had just screamed.

"Yes, I saw him leaning against the doorframe looking in when I heard Conan run towards me. But…" she didn't really know why this bothered her, "he wasn't wearing the same outfit. The one from then was darker, and his hair was loose." The police exchanged looks, was this what Conan had mentioned? The inconsistencies on the blond's looks and whereabouts?

"We have one final question for you Ohayashi san. When you say you saw him leaning against the doorframe, can you show us how?" the detective asked with a masked expression. As soon as Miki showed them, the patrolman took off running. She was so utterly confused she nearly ran into the blond as she was turning around, he pulled back at the last minute. The scowl gracing his face as he twisted one arm out of her way, Conan was already there looking worried.

"Daijoubu?" he asked hesitantly. Miki backed away as he growled out his answer.

"Does it look like I'm fine?" the kid looked down shaking his head. He didn't seem surprised, "don't ask me stupid questions, I am not in the mood." He walked off towards the officers, and Conan gave her a soft knowing smile.

"You missed his arm right?" the child asked quietly, she nodded confused. The boy didn't elaborate as he followed after the blond. There was a giant commotion outside the front doors, followed by the loud crash of something breaking by the parking lot. Miki looked out the window, it was a strange man with an egg shaped head. He was holding the back of his head and grinning like an idiot. He was making his way towards the front doors of the lodge, so Miki pulled the one closest to her open as the man tripped over the threshold. He landed with his arms spread as if he landed in a pool doing a belly flop rather than as he had simply tripped.

"Never fear, Yamamura Keibu is here to save the day!" the strange man clamored out enthusiastically as he rose to his feet. Several of the officers already present groaned quietly. Conan kun had stopped mid step with a semi mortified look on his face, Miki herself was just confused. Wasn't that other polite man the inspector on the case? Conan was racing off shaking his head with a frown before she could ask.

TO BE CONTINUED IN PART 27- INSPECTOR WHO?

It should be fairly obvious by now that my favorite scheme for naming chapter titles is song titles. This one is a Rin and Len Kagamine song. The title is the rough translation, and here's a link if you want to know why I picked it this time, v=oBsN1xn0FZc. I don't foresee a lot of time for Shinichi and Gin to truly interact this chapter, and thanks to that song Shinichi now has a new problem to deal with as he's running around trying to figure everything out.