Author's Note: SPOILERS FOR CHAPTER 1006! Holy shit, this is a very exciting time to be following the Detective Conan manga right now! Honestly, I could care less who Rum is right now! We just had some major ShinRan (my DC OTP) AND Shinichi's face is EVERYWHERE in the news! This fic is basically my reaction and prayer for what happens!

Disclaimer: Dear god, Gosho Aoyama-sama owns Detective Conan and I can't believe I have to wait 3 weeks before the next chapter (and I'm somewhat doubtful that chapter 1007 will have what I'm hoping for because anything plot-relevant when the plot is not the focus always seems to happen right at the beginning and end of cases when it DOES appear and we're right in the middle of a new case).

The Hunt Begins

Unlike most members of the Organization, when Vodka 'got off' of work and returned home, his actual work day wasn't necessarily over and his work hours were unusual anyway. He wasn't quite sure how the Organization figured out how much his time was owed, but he lived comfortably on what he was paid, so he wasn't fussed. Regardless, he was one of the members who, even with a codename, hadn't been required to specialize in anything to maintain his usefulness.

Most of the time, he worked with his superior and partner, Gin, in whatever capacity was required of him, and usually that meant he was the driver of Gin's beloved Porsche. While Gin was perfectly happy these days to let Vodka drive while he kept his hands free to contact and direct other members in large-scale operations, it had not always been that way. Vodka would never forget the near-torturous interrogation that Gin had put him through when it had first been suggested that Vodka be his partner and that one of his responsibilities would be to drive his car when Gin was preoccupied with other assignments - namely because Gin had recently gotten pulled over by the police for talking on the phone while driving. If the car even got scratched or, god forbid into an accident, then Vodka was a dead man walking, regardless of whether it was his fault or not. That was Gin's stipulation. Fortunately for everyone involved (especially Vodka), Gin had never had to make good on his threat because Vodka was an excellent driver.

When he wasn't with Gin and didn't have other assignments from the Organization, he was always one of the ones on-call to help dispose of the bodies of unplanned murders if the perpetrator had limited resources or time to do so themselves. Perhaps it was because Vodka was not specialized in anything that he found his most important job for the Organization was to be reasonably well-informed of current events. He was always keeping tabs on the news, both on TV and online and he had an uncanny knack for being able to pick out the relevant information, which was no doubt assisted by his excellent memory and recall ability. Gin was too busy with other work to follow all the different news outlets as closely as Vodka did and he'd had to kill so many people over the years, he didn't bother trying to remember either their names or faces. Vodka didn't try to remember them either, he just simply did. Most people Vodka had known in life, even his older brother, had a hard time remembering names even if they remembered the faces of those individuals, but Vodka never had that issue. No, his biggest issue growing up had been people making fun of his large, round, and entirely too feminine-looking eyes that he now safely hid behind sunglasses, even at night (no matter how inconvenient).

His unique ability had proved helpful to the Organization on more than one occasion. Most recently, he had spotted Shuichi Akai's profile on a news report of a then-recent bank heist. While it had turned out to only be Bourbon in-disguise, they had not known that at the time and if it had been Akai, then the hunt for him would have resumed and Kir would be a dead woman now, killed for treason.

Vodka abruptly shut his eyes against the view of the news site on his laptop screen with a low groan and pinched the bridge of his nose. Even though he had woken up this morning at 9:00 and already been awake for an hour with one cup of coffee in his system, he was still extremely tired, having pulled several consecutive all-nighters this week already and had only gotten home at about 2:00 in the morning. If nothing went wrong today, then he'd probably be able to catch up on sleep no problem tonight. Once he finally got dressed, he was going to have to go out to the markets and buy more food today; he was running low on some ingredients.

He tossed back the remains of his second cup of cream-overdosed coffee (he wasn't insane like Gin and able to drink it straight black) and resumed his casual perusal of the first news site he'd opened up. He probably should wait to do this until he was more awake. Even with coffee, he knew he still wasn't retaining the information he was reading as well as he usually did. It didn't help that it had been a while since he'd had the chance to do this properly, and there seemed to be an explosion of news that had occurred in the interim. Some stories, like upcoming or recent festivals, he could tell from a glance he didn't need to look into any further and was able to skip their contents once he'd scanned the associated pictures.

Once satisfied he'd gleaned everything he could from the site, he clicked on another one he'd bookmarked. The page finished loading and Vodka jumped in shock as if he'd been electrocuted, waking him far more effectively than his two cups of sugary coffee. There, right on the front page of the website was a picture of a high school-aged teenage boy smiling at the camera with his hand in a thumbs-up pose. The headline of this first article read 'High School Detective Shinichi Kudo Solved the Case! The Rumors of His Death Were False!' Vodka stared at the screen, at the picture, completely dumbstruck. He had seen that face in-person on only two separate occasions. The first time, it was when Gin had poisoned him with Sherry's APTX-4869 after he'd been caught spying on them, and the second time, it was actually a different high school detective by the name of Heiji Hattori that was just pretending to be him.

Vodka couldn't understand it. Shinichi Kudo, like Shuichi Akai, was supposed to be dead, and yet, the news was claiming otherwise. If this was another case like with Bourbon pretending to be Akai, then this was one hell of an elaborate ruse. If this teenage detective was actually alive, then that meant Gin had somehow failed to kill him, but there had been no word of him for months and no sign he had returned home either. Determined to get to the bottom of this, Vodka quickly read the news article. The case was resolved fairly quickly, but it involved the murders of some very famous, high-profile figures in one of Kyoto's most famous locations. No wonder this news article was so big! His frantic thoughts immediately stopped as if someone had slammed on the breaks. Sensational newswriting, even if it was mostly false, was a big fad these days. While this news site didn't usually publish clickbait articles, it would still be safer for him to double-check with other sites and see what they were saying about the matter. For instance, there hadn't been any mention of it on the first website. On the other hand, it might even be on the TV news if it really was this big a deal!

He grabbed the remote and turned it on, flipping it to one of the news channels. There was no normal news scheduled to come on soon, but he couldn't be sure that one of them wouldn't do a special report on such a hot-topic case. In the meantime, he clicked through his list of saved news websites and 95% of them had something to say about the serial celebrity Kyoto murder case solved by Shinichi Kudo. Some of them mentioned two other high school detectives that helped solve it, that Heiji Hattori again and a girl named Masumi Sera, but Kudo's presence was definite and so, it seemed, were the actual details of the murder case, for there was little to no variation there.

The TV suddenly blared to life with news of a special report and it grabbed Vodka's full attention. Yes, even with the TV news, the murder case itself was well-covered, but it didn't even mention Kudo as one of the detectives, though the other two high school kids were confirmed. He was just starting to wonder if the Internet sites had all been paid-off to spread a rumor that Kudo wasn't dead when Vodka caught sight of something on the TV screen that killed and buried that thought two meters underground. Just now, the news was showing some video footage from a live broadcast taken around the time of one of the murders and there, standing in the far background behind the yellow police tape, was Shinichi Kudo upright and very much alive. Kudo was alive. Impossibly and inexplicably alive.

There was absolutely no question what Vodka's next action would be once he'd finally accepted this fact. He shut off the TV and abruptly stood up from his kitchen table, walking with purpose to his bedroom where his phone lay charging on the nightstand. He ripped the cord out and dialed a number without delay. This was far too important to leave in a simple text message.

The person on the other end picked up and the familiar voice of his partner echoed across the line. "It's me," Gin answered in his usual greeting. "What is it, Vodka?"

"Bro, you're not gonna believe this. You know that high school detective, Shinichi Kudo, that you killed several months ago with the Incomplete Detective?"

Vodka half-expected Gin to remind him that he didn't remember the names or faces of people he killed, but instead, he was met with a heavy silence. At last, Gin spoke up and his tone sounded suspicious. "For a brat that's supposed to be dead, it seems like his name has been popping up rather frequently…"

"Well, actually…" Vodka said, briefly wondering who else had mentioned that boy to Gin apart from himself at Vermouth's off-season Halloween party. "He supposedly just solved a murder case in Kyoto with a couple other detectives today. There were a lot of famous movie people involved and it's all over the news right now, both online and on the TV. The headlines are saying 'High School Detective Shinichi Kudo Solved the Case! The Rumors of His Death Were False!' and other similar variations."

"What…?" Gin said, his voice suddenly low and deadly. Despite the distance that separated them and knowing it wasn't directed at him, Vodka couldn't help the mild shudder of fear that ran down his spine. Oh, Gin was not happy, not at all.

"There's a great deal of information about the details of the case, even that he solved it with two other high school detectives, Heiji Hattori and Masumi Sera, but there's hardly anything about him. Nobody seems to know very much about what he's been up to, what he did, or where he's been, but all the sources I've reviewed are certain he was definitely not only present, but a major player in solving the case."

"I'm coming to pick you up in half an hour, so be ready. You'll have to work overtime. By the time I'm there, I want you to have ready on your laptop all the information we have available on APTX-4869, including the formulations, the trials, the results, and the victim list. If you can't access these, then find out who does, where they can be accessed and any clearance levels or passwords," Gin ordered, his icy tone forbidding any argument, not that Vodka was inclined to do so and especially not when Gin was in a murderous mood like now.

"You don't want me to start looking into Kudo, Bro?" Vodka asked.

"You can after you have completed the APTX-4869 information acquisition I have asked of you, but I doubt you'll find anything," Gin said, sounding skeptical. "If he's alive, then he rightfully guessed we would finish him off if we discovered he survived. Not only has he likely been working hard to keep it a secret, but he has also succeeded rather well until now. If we're going to find him, we have to start the hunt at the beginning and that means discovering what happened to him right after he consumed the poison if he wasn't killed by it." Then he muttered so quietly, Vodka wasn't even sure Gin had meant for him to hear it, "Even in death, that woman continues to make trouble for me."

"Understood," Vodka said, pretending he hadn't heard his brief mention of Sherry. "See you in thirty."

"Yeah…" said Gin and he hung up first.

Vodka hung up too and sighed heavily. So much for his plans for the day. He walked over to his closet and started exchanging his pajamas for his black suit. While he was changing, he decided that after he was done getting all the APTX-4869 information for Gin, he would start looking into Kudo if he had the time. Gin had dismissed the matter as a fruitless endeavor, and he was likely right. Vodka knew the Organization had already checked Kudo's house two separate times within two months of his disappearance when his death wasn't instantly confirmed. They hadn't found anything then, but they hadn't been looking for any sign of his survival after that either. It was possible they hadn't looked that hard even within those first two months, already being predisposed to believe he was dead. Now however… now they knew for certain that Kudo was alive and there was always the possibility that Vodka might find something connected to him that the Organization had previously overlooked or missed entirely. Considering who they were dealing with, Vodka didn't see any harm in being too careful.

I want this to happen so bad! It's not even that far-fetched! Vodka pays attention to the news and always tells Gin when something relevant occurs! He did so with Scar Akai and he did so again when the spiritual guy - who had claimed he had new information regarding the incident Rum had been involved in 17 years ago - was murdered. And if Gin finds out Shinichi is alive and starts actively hunting him, then it's all going to hell!