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"Hey Conan, are you having a birthday party or something?"

Ayumi's voice coming from behind him caused Shinichi to jump up slightly in his seat. He turned to her and saw that she was looking at the phone book he'd brought with him, which was half-opened on his backpack to advertisements for various magicians. I'm trying to track down some of the people on this old menu that Kuroba gave to Hakuba yesterday, actually. Shinichi was having no luck so far, though, and he suspected that most of the magicians listed on it had probably either retired or changed stage names. The other questions he had were the doves and crows by the stage names. If the crows meant what he thought they meant, what exactly did the doves mean? And what about the five people on the list that didn't have a dove or crow by their stage name? He then realized that Ayumi was still patiently waiting for a reply from him. "Uh, no, I'm not having a party. I'm trying to find some magicians, actually." Shinichi didn't want to get any more specific than that.

"Oh! Are you trying to help solve the magician kidnappings?" Ayumi asked brightly, her face lighting up as she sat down next to Shinichi. "I wanna help, too!"

"Help with what?" Mitsuhiko wandered over after he put his backpack down in his own seat.

"We're gonna help solve the magician kidnappings, Mitsuhiko!" cried Ayumi happily as she pointed at the menu Shinichi was holding.

Wait just a minute. What's this 'we' business? Shinichi realized that it was already too late to try and head things off at the pass, though- Genta was heading over to his desk as well, having seen the rest of the Shonen Tanteidan gathered around. Well, they have helped me figure out more than a few cases in the past. Plus, he'd learned from experience that once the Shonen Tanteidan decided to check something out, there really wasn't a lot that you could do to stop them. Shiho's knowing half-smile as she was organizing her desk across the aisle wasn't exactly helping things, either.

"Hey, where'd you get this menu from, Conan?" asked Genta as he picked up the photocopied menu and began studying it while turning it around at various angles. "It looks like a bunch of doves and crows and weird names, and it's real old-lookin'."

Shinichi chose to duck the question of where exactly he'd gotten it from. "It's some magician's stage names. Magicians that might know something about the kidnappings," he continued as the group studied the menu with an almost rapturous awe.

"Hey, do you need any more phone books to look through, Conan?" Mitsuhiko had finally torn his eyes away from the menu and noticed the phone book on his friend's backpack. "My mom and dad usually keep theirs for a long time before they get rid of them."

An idea suddenly formed in Shinichi's mind after the other boy finished asking the question. Maybe there is something these guys can help me with that won't put them in danger after all. "Actually, yeah." He looked at the group, meeting each one of their eyes in turn. "And you guys can help, too. Can you all ask your parents for any old phone books they might have sitting around? And be sure to let them know that the older they are, the better. Then we can meet up and start looking through all of them tomorrow after school." With any luck, they might be able to find an older phone book that would have contact information for at least one of the magicians on the list.

"Agasa-hakase will have some phone books buried somewhere as well, I'm sure," replied Shiho coolly as she finished taking her seat next to Shinichi. "Perhaps we should check the library for information as well?"

"Oh, good idea Ai-chan! But I don't know if our library here has old phone books." Ayumi's brow knitted in thought as she looked down at the ground.

"Haibara-san probably means the big library on the way home from school, Ayumi. The one that has all the steps and the big fountain and stuff, and the really tall shelves." Genta turned to Shiho. "Right?"

Shiho nodded and then pointed to Shinichi's backpack, which seemed to be moving. "I think that your phone is ringing."

What's Ran doing calling me this close to the start of class? "Hello, Ran-neesan."

"Conan, what exactly did you carry to school with you in your backpack this morning? Because it sure wasn't your binder that has your homework in it," Ran half-laughed. "Your binder is still sitting here on the table, but your backpack looked as big as it normally does."

"Oh! I forgot to tell you last night. I took all my homework out of my binder and put it in my backpack by itself because I needed a phone book today."Shinichi was fervently hoping that Ran wouldn't want to know why he needed one, though he supposed he say that they'd been doing a school project about alphabetization or something if he had to.

"Well, alright. As long as you have your homework with you, that's fine. Have a good day, Conan!"

"I will, Ran-neechan." He hung up the phone just as the class bell began to rang and the kids scrambled to their seats.

"Snake was right there, in the van! You even had him at gunpoint! What do you mean that you didn't kill him?"

Gin felt a wave of annoyance wash over him, though he carefully controlled it like he always did. He was beginning to wonder just how many times he was going to have to explain what had happened at the van last night to Him (amongst other Black Organization higher-ups) before they understood that things had been out of their control. Well, they'd been under control at first, but that had rapidly changed. "Like I said already, everything was going exactly like it should have." He took a long, calming drag on his cigarette before continuing. "Snake was on the van with Kuroba like we predicted he would be, so we went ahead with the plan. We shot out the tire and forced everyone out of the van, or at least we were starting to force everyone out and up against the side of the van so that we had a clear shot at Snake, when all of a sudden this damn thick, black smog came out of nowhere."

"Surely it didn't come out of nowhere. Try to remember the direction that it floated in from; could someone in the van have set it off?" His voice was a strange mixture of culture and gruffness, and Gin often found himself wondering what exactly the man who possessed it looked like. Their leader was always very careful to not be seen, however, and usually held his gatherings in a room with lighting designed to leave him completely in the shadows; this meeting was no exception.

Gin shut his eyes momentarily, sending his mind back to when the smoke had first started interfering with his vision. "It came from behind us," he said flatly after reopening his eyes. "After it got too thick to see and it was clear that things weren't going right, I gave the order to sweep." This, of course, was the main reason why he'd been called in before the boss today- the incredibly disastrous 'sweep' he'd ordered last night and performed along with Vodka. It was a tactic that the Organization severely frowned on in the first place (they much preferred to subtly eliminate their targets and not leave a mess behind,) and that combined with the fact that the sweep had gone so badly wrong meant that he was currently up to his fedora in scalding hot water. Gin also realized idly as he smashed his butt out in a nearby ashtray that he had just polished off his third cigarette, and they weren't even ten minutes into the meeting. That, generally, was a Bad Sign.

"Yes. The sweep you ordered last night." Gin could see faint outlines where his bosswas subtly moving around. "We need to talk about that sweep, you and I." Gin could hear papers rustling, though how their leader could actually see anything in the pitch darkness was anyone's guess. "We know for a fact that there's at least one witness still alive and under very heavy police protection at the hospital. Why wasn't he finished off? And for that matter, why wasn't a body count done? We probably have more than our hospitalized survivor still running around out there."

"I'm tellin' ya, the cops were right there. They must have been tailing the van like we were, but on a different road." Gin shook his head and took a sip of almost scaldingly hot black coffee. "Vodka and I barely had time to empty our clips before we heard the sirens." He leaned forward, thinking back to last night again. "That, and the damn black smog was the other problem. We couldn't even see half a foot in front of our faces."

"Which is a big part of why we're wondering what in the world you were thinking even ordering the sweep in the first place." This was followed by a light, derisive snort. "Sweeps aren't of any use if you can't see who you're trying to kill." The shadows shifted again. "You left a vast wealth of firearms evidence behind as well; we had to get rid of two perfectly good and rather expensive semiautomatic machine guns this morning thanks to your lack of thought."

"We really didn't have a choice." Gin could feel himself rapidly losing his temper, but he kept his tone even and respectful. "How were we supposed to know that Kaitou Kid arranged for himself to be followed by the police?"

"Because he's Kaitou Kid." After a few moments of silence, the Black Organization's leader let out a disgusted-sounding harrumph. "He does have that 'No One Gets Hurt' policy of his, and those idiots are out there kidnapping and hurting magicians right and left thinking they could possibly be him. I'm sure that it doesn't sit well at all with Kuroba."

"Well, he's dead now, so that really doesn't matter." Gin took another sip of coffee. "I'd be expecting to see Kuroba Kaito's funeral notice any day now."

"You shouldn't be expecting that. In fact, I'm certain that he's still very much alive."

Gin blinked, wishing that he could make actual eye contact with the other man and not just stare into shadows. "Why are you so sure of that? I saw his foot laying there in the back of the van as we were peeling out, and there was nothing in the news about Kaitou Kid being taken to the hospital."

"Magicians specialize in illusions." The soft rolling of a wheeled office chair filled the room, followed by a drawer opening. "And before you ask, no, I'm not referring to Kuroba Kaito."

"What are you talking about?" If it had been anyone else but his boss, Gin would have had them up against the door and been beating the information out of them already.

"Let's just say that Kaitou Kid is being helped by someone- or rather, a group of people- that he probably doesn't even realize are his allies yet." This was followed by what sounded like the scratching of a pen on paper. "And I think it will be in our best interests to not interfere with that aid, at least until Snake and the rest of the traitors are finally drawn out of hiding."