Shinichi had wanted to accompany Gin and Vodka to the shopping centre where Sherry was last seen. As she was the lead scientist he depended on her to create the antidote. Sure, the organisation had other capable scientists, but the APTX was her speciality. With her gone, he might never get his former life back. Additionally, finding and retrieving Sherry as quickly as possible was of utmost importance for the organisation itself. She knew too much and if that knowledge were to fall into the wrong hands, it could threaten its whole existence. Every second mattered now and he felt the desperate urge to do something. But his father had ordered him to stay in the headquarters for now, citing that it was too dangerous.

So he waited begrudgingly. He paced through the meeting room he was told to wait in, his glance constantly switching from the door to the clock and back. It felt like an eternity until they finally returned. To his surprise, Vermouth arrived together with Gin and Vodka. They nodded to acknowledge his presence and immediately began turning on the several laptops and screens the room was equipped with. Apparently, Vodka was well versed with technology and they waited while he hacked into the security system so that they could watch the security footage. On-site they hadn't found a single trace of the sisters and they needed to find out how they had been able to escape.

They watched the two women enter different stores, pick out clothes to try on and talk to each other. They also listened to their conversation that had been recorded by the wiretap. Everything seemed normal until they got to the last store. They must have disabled the wiretap as the recording suddenly stopped. On the video they had seen them enter the changings stalls. It was a fairly large store with ten changing stalls in a separate area. Unfortunately that meant that they could only see who entered the general area and not the specific stalls. Minutes passed and Vodka even fast-forwarded the footage. However, they never saw the two women leave.

The most obvious theory was that they used a secret exit to leave without being seen. Which turned out to be impossible. Vermouth had dug up a floor plan of the whole shopping centre and there were no hidden doors or ventilation vents in that area. There was always the possibility that the floor plan was incorrect, but Vermouth had disguised herself as maintenance staff to check it herself and hadn't found anything. It appeared like they had simply vanished.

"They must have messed with the security footage." Vodka said irritated after they had replayed that part for the third time.

"That wouldn't explain how they could get past the four organisation members following them." Gin pointed towards the screen where they could see two of them hovering next to the exit of the changing stalls. "I've interrogated Chardonnay. She swears that they couldn't have gone past them without them noticing."

"Maybe they helped them for some reason," Vermouth said and grabbed a cigarette. "I wouldn't put it past Chardonnay."

"Do you question my interrogation methods?" Gin hissed.

Shinichi tuned out their conversation, focusing entirely on the security tape still playing on repeat on the screen. He had the nagging feeling that he was missing something, something quite obvious as his subconscious had already picked up on it. But he couldn't put his finger on it. What was it? His eyes scanned the display and got caught on a woman. Where had she come from?

"Can you rewind it one more time? 20, no, rather 40 minutes before they enter the store, please."

Vodka looked surprised by his request and glanced towards Gin for confirmation.

"Why?" Gin asked.

"Do you see the woman in the red cardigan?" Shinichi said and pointed towards her. "I don't remember seeing her enter the changing stalls."

That was enough for Vodka to do as he had asked. The four of them stared at the footage, now focusing entirely on all the other people who were at the store at the time of the mysterious disappearance. They were mostly women and neither of them needed more than ten minutes to try on the clothes they had picked out. The woman he had pointed out earlier was nowhere to be seen. She never entered the changing stall or even the store. Not only that, they even noticed a second woman who seemed to appear out of nowhere. Both of them left the stalls a few minutes after Sherry and her sister had entered the area.

"So they disguised themselves?" Vodka asked. He had zoomed into the footage and created screenshots so that they could see the women in question better.

"Look at their faces, they look completely different." Vermouth leaned closer to the screen. "I know the Miyano sisters. They have neither the necessary skills nor did they have enough time to disguise themselves like this."

"But they have a similar body shape." Shinichi wasn't ready to dismiss this theory completely. His instinct was telling him that he was on the right track. "There are two women we never saw before leaving the changing area in which Sherry and her sister disappeared. This can't be a coincidence."

"What if they had entered the stalls even earlier?" Vodka asked hesitantly. He seemed to know that this idea was improbable.

Gin, who had been quiet the last few minutes, finally spoke up. "The shoes. They are wearing the same shoes." He grabbed the computer mouse from Vodka's hand and opened a second tab so that they could see footage of the sisters and the other two women at the same time. He was right.

"But when and how did they learn to disguise themselves this quickly?" Vermouth couldn't keep the scepticism out of her voice.

"You tell me. Aren't you the expert in this area? Did you help them?" The atmosphere in the room changed with Gin's accusation.

"Have you lost your mind?" It was the first time Shinichi had seen Vermouth this heated. Her face showed no hint of her usual flirtatious nature. She leaned forward, placing her free hand on the table and glared at Gin. "Why the hell would I help them? You know how much I hate them."

"Aren't you an actress?"

"What about you? Weren't you the one who allowed them to meet-up today?"

"Well, if they didn't have enough time to put on a disguise, could it at least have been enough to take one off?" Shinichi interrupted them before they could reach for their weapons.

"What do you mean?" Gin snapped, not taking his eyes off of Vermouth.

"I got the idea when you accused Vermouth of helping them."

"Which I did not." She stubbed out the cigarette with more force than necessary.

"I know, but maybe someone else helped them. If these women had disguised themselves as Sherry and her sister, they could have switched places earlier in a different store. Chardonnay and her team would follow the decoys and they could escape without anyone noticing. In the last store they could have simply taken off their disguises to make it seem like they disappeared."

Silence filled with room as the others considered this new theory.

Vermouth was the first to speak. "It could be possible. But who would have helped them? And how did they arrange it?"

"No idea. It's just a theory. We should probably check the footage from the other stores to verify it before thinking about the logistics."

No one objected to his proposal. Vodka quickly hacked into the security footage of all the other stores in the shopping centre and downloaded it. Each of them grabbed a laptop to watch the footage, only talking to clarify who would check which store. After he couldn't see anything suspicious in the footage of the sixth store, Shinichi began to wonder if he might have been wrong and what other methods the sisters could have used. His thoughts got interrupted when Gin suddenly slammed his hand on the table.

"I should have killed her two years ago," he growled. Before they could ask what he meant, he turned his laptop around and replayed the video. They all watched intently how the two sisters left the changing rooms of a small store that was empty except for the staff and the other organisation members. They followed the sisters out of the store. A few minutes passed and then - without anyone entering them - two women left the same changing rooms, one of them accompanied by a man with long black . They wore different clothes and had woollen hats on, but Shinichi still recognised Sherry. He didn't recognise the man, but judging by the gasp that escaped Vermouth it was obvious that she knew him.

"Who is this?" Shinichi asked curiously as they watched the trio leave through a staff door.

"Shuichi Akai." Gin's voice was filled with loathing. He didn't elaborate and instead stood up. Shinichi turned towards Vermouth with a raised eyebrow, hoping for a more in-depth explanation.

"He's an FBI agent who had infiltrated us a few years ago. He had gotten pretty close to the top. We only realised that he's a rat because one of his colleagues messed up."

"Inform Rum and Anokata," Gin said, his hand already on the door-handle. "If the FBI is involved, we have to act fast."

Dai - or Shuichi Akai as he was really called - had driven them to an apartment building in an inconspicuous residential area. He led them to an apartment on the seventh floor. It was sparsely furnished, but surprisingly big with two bedrooms, a spacious living room and a fully equipped kitchen.

An older man with grey hair, a moustache and glasses greeted them inside. He had a gentle smile and introduced himself as James Black, also an FBI agent.

"I'm glad our operation went smoothly and we were able to get both of you out safely."

Akemi bowed. "Thank you so much for your help. You have no idea how grateful we are for everything."

"It's alright. I believe the help can be reciprocated." He now turned towards Shiho. "I believe you can offer us plenty of confidential information about the organisation, Miss Miyano."

"Shiho is fine. And I will tell you everything I know." She had never been particularly loyal to the organisation and after everything that happened, she couldn't wait to see them burn to the ground.

They boiled some water to make tea or coffee respectively and sat down in the living room. There were two couches opposite of each other with a coffee table covered in files and newspapers in between them. Now that they weren't monitored anymore, Shiho could finally explain what had happened that required this rescue operation. She told them about the conversation between Gin and Vodka she had overheard. Her suspicion that they had planned to kill Akemi was confirmed by her. Apparently she was supposed to participate in a Billion Yen robbery that was cancelled the same day Shiho met the boy for the first time. The relief she felt for having trusted her instinct and helped saving Akemi was immeasurable.

The conversation quickly focused on the boy. The initial concern about the presence of a child in the organisation turned into disbelief when she explained that it was a shrunken teenager. She could understand them. If she hadn't seen the shrunken mouse with her own eyes, she wasn't sure that she would believe it herself. It seemed so inconceivable.

She reached for the hidden flash drive and put it on the coffee table. "I've copied everything we had about the apoptoxin on this stick. If you don't believe me, you can let one of your own trusted scientists examine the data."

Shiho continued to share her observations regarding his strange behaviour and the way he was treated - the effort for the antidote, the order not to harm him, the books, Gin training him and his lack of fear, that he had met Anokata. It increased the FBI agents interest in the boy even more. "I believe that someone high up in the organisation cares a lot about him," Shiho said at the end of her monologue.

"So if we find out who he is, we might get more information about the organisation through their connection. What do you know about him?" James asked. His expression had turned more serious

"Not much, unfortunately. He introduced himself as Conan which is obviously a fake name and he told me that he is 16 years old."

"Which could also be a lie," Akai said immediately.

"I don't think he lied about that. He seemed genuine."

"So did I when I was undercover."

Shiho glared at him. He might have helped them escape the organisation for the moment, but that didn't mean she had to forgive him for what he had done to her sister. Mentioning it in such a flippant manner didn't improve her opinion of him. Akemi was almost killed because of him!

"This might be true for some people, but lying about his age could negatively impact the creation of the antidote. I don't think he would take this risk," Shiho said coldly and crossed her arms in front of her.

"His age alone won't bring us far," Akai said, ignoring her slight jab.

"I think it's a decent starting point. If a child appeared out of nowhere, a teenager must have vanished at the same time," James said. He had written down everything Shiho had told them about the boy and was now looking at his notes. "You said that you first met him at around 1.30 am. on January 13th, 6 hours after he had been administered this poison."

"That means that he was poisoned on January 12th, approximately at 19.30 pm," Akai continued the thought of his superior.

"I can try to request access to all missing person's reports from that day onwards," James said.

"But if he really is connected to someone in the organisation, they wouldn't report him as missing," Shiho remarked.

James thought about her objection for a few seconds. "We still can't be sure that he is connected to anyone. I mean, Gin and Vodka apparently tried to kill him. But even if he is, he could have some concerned friends that don't know anything about the organisation. It's a long shot, but we don't have any other leads at the moment."

Akai stood up, walked over to the window and peeked through the curtains. "There is still a point that doesn't make sense. Gin isn't the type to use a poison. He prefers his gun."

Shiho would never admit it aloud, but he was right. Gin's affinity to shoot first and ask questions later was well known. He would never pass up a chance to shoot someone. Maybe he didn't really intend to kill the boy. Though, he couldn't have known about the poison's side-effect. She racked her brain to remember every conversation she had with the boy. He must have mentioned something.

"OH!" she exclaimed. "They couldn't shoot him. There was too much police close-by who could have heard the shot."

"Are you sure?" James asked.

"Absolutely. Conan told me himself when I asked him how he had ended up in this situation. I was on the first night, he wouldn't have had time to come up with a fake story yet."

James grabbed his laptop and began tipping. "With this information we can probably narrow down the location. I don't think the police department would disclose the whereabouts of their police officers on that day, but we can search for events that typically have a heightened police presence."

"The Tokio Spirits had an important match on the 12th," Akai said while looking down on his phone.

"The vice president gave a speech that was met with a huge protest," James added.

"Wait, why would they intentionally schedule something at a location that had a lot of police closeby? I don't know what Gin and Vodka were doing that evening. No matter what it was, it would be an unnecessary risk." Shiho knew how much the organisation valued discretion.

"Maybe they hadn't expected the police to be there." They all turned their attention towards Akemi. During the whole discussion she had remained quiet and had instead thumbed through the different newspapers. It seemed like one article had caught her attention and she began reading it out loud.

"Grand re-opening at the Tropical Land

Visitors of the popular amusement park can finally enjoy its famous roller-coaster again. After the gruesome murder that took place last week, the ride had been closed by the police for investigation. With all the evidence gathered and the involved train replaced, the roller-coaster will start operating again tomorrow.

Even though the police had been called immediately, it was Shinichi Kudo who managed to solve this murder. The 16-year old High School Detective, whom many people regard as 'Sherlock Holmes Of Our Time', happened to be on the same ride as the victim. But since this case it became quiet around the Saviour of the Japanese Police."

Akemi looked at them with wide eyes. Shuichi was the first to react. He walked over to where she was sitting on the couch and looked over her shoulder, scanning the article for further information.

"It doesn't seem like the organisation is responsible for the murder," he said.

"No, but the murder happened on January 12th." Akemi pointed to a segment of the article. "The victim was beheaded. I'd imagine that would require several police officers.

"An amusement park would certainly be an unusual place for a transaction," James said. "However, because it seems so absurd it could be the perfect cover-up."

"I think you are missing the most important part," Shiho whispered. She had taken the newspaper from Akemi's hands to read the whole article, but one of the accompanying pictures had caught her off guard. Her heart began beating faster. Despite the 10-year age difference she couldn't deny the similarities between the smiling teenager in the picture and the boy that had sat in her laboratory. "He looks almost identical to the shrunken boy."

"Who?" the three others said in unison

"Shinichi Kudo." Shiho couldn't take her eyes off the picture. "And he's 16 years old."