Schadenfreude
Through her rifle scope, Chianti watched Kir interviewing Domoto Yasuki, and her patience was wearing dangerously thin. "What the hell is taking so long, Kir?!"
The same scene reached Gin through the camera hidden in Kir's brooch, and he fed his orders to her over the communicator. "Good, Kir. Now take DJ to the designated spot."
"Yes — just like that." With everything unfolding precisely according to plan, even the perpetually expressionless Korn allowed a faint smile to cross his face.
Behind Gin, Cointreau leaned forward a touch, watching the surveillance screen with idle curiosity. It struck him as odd that no unexpected incident had occurred yet.
Sure enough — this mission was never going to go smoothly.
As if on cue, passersby began recognizing Domoto Yasuki and swarmed around him, throwing a fresh tangle of obstacles into Korn and Chianti's line of fire.
"I've got him. Can I fire?" Even with the crowd pressing in around the target, Korn kept Domoto Yasuki steady in his crosshairs as he asked Gin for permission.
To Korn's disappointment, Gin stopped him. "Wait, Korn. Too many bystanders in the way. Hold your fire until DJ is seated on the bench."
"Why not let them take the shot after all?" Cointreau had given up on the monitor; he leaned back against the car seat and folded his arms. "So there are a few more people around than planned. With skills like Chianti's and Korn's, I doubt they'd miss."
He sighed inwardly. No one had even lifted a finger to interfere with this operation yet, and already an accident had cropped up. If they didn't strike before that protagonist got moving, the accidents would only multiply — and by then, the assassination might very well collapse into failure.
Gin turned his head slightly toward him. "Why do you say that? Did you notice something?"
"Nothing in particular. Just a hunch." Cointreau arched an eyebrow, his tone offhand. "I'm only offering a suggestion. You're the one in charge — the decision is yours."
Gin mulled it over for a while, but in the end gave no order to fire. The original plan had already accounted for every factor; it remained the course least likely to go wrong.
"Kir, why haven't you moved yet? Get DJ onto the bench, quickly." Gin began pressing her to pick up the pace.
Kir did as she was told, stepping in front of Domoto Yasuki to steer him toward the bench for the interview. Before long, Gin was watching with a smile as the man came within arm's reach of it.
Then the next accident struck. The people around Domoto Yasuki began raising their umbrellas one after another, screening the target's body from view.
Seeing it play out on the screen, Cointreau instinctively stretched a hand out the car window to feel for rain.
No drops met his palm at first — but a few dozen seconds later, he felt water beading against his skin. It was raining now.
Cointreau: ...
By this point, he had already guessed the truth. The "rain" over Domoto Yasuki's position was plainly not real rain at all — it was man-made. Gin might well have caught the anomaly, but the genuine downpour that followed right on its heels had bailed the other side out, burying the strangeness of that first shower.
The heavens themselves were looking out for the protagonist, huh.
Which meant that if he ever meant to cross Edogawa Conan — the protagonist — he would have to be far more careful, and keep a much sharper eye on details and coincidences. So Cointreau warned himself.
Rain was falling, and the umbrellas were up. The odds of a clean hit had plummeted; the assassination had already failed, and all that remained was to activate the second plan.
Gin had no patience to watch the rest of the useless surveillance footage, and shut off the monitor then and there.
What he didn't know was that if he had left the screen alive just a moment longer, he would have seen a small boy pick up the shoe Kir had dropped — and perhaps, from there, discovered how closely that child was tied to one Mouri Kogoro, and begun to suspect that Kogoro had learned something and was shadowing Kir. As it was, Gin switched the screen off too soon. He saw nothing at all.
On the other side of the city, Conan — having been spotted by Kir, and having sensed that something about her was off besides — had failed to retrieve the transmitter and listening device he'd planted on the sole of her shoe.
And it was precisely because of that that Conan and Jodie learned, through the bug, of the Organization's follow-up assassination plans — giving them time to arrange people in advance and block the hit, and, while they were at it, to plot the interception of another codename-bearing member or two, in hopes of prying more information about the Organization out of them.
Of course, to guarantee Mouri Kogoro and Mouri Ran's safety, Jodie and Conan had Professor Agasa and Haibara head back first and bring Ran and the others to the professor's house; Jodie would also send two or three FBI agents over shortly to guard them.
The plan went off without a hitch: they successfully cornered an Organization member and left them incapacitated.
What no one had anticipated, however, was that the person they caught was not Vermouth at all — it was Kir.
What was worse, Gin discovered the transmitter and bug beneath the shoe Kir had swapped out, and — sure enough — his suspicion came to rest on Mouri Kogoro. He reported it to the Boss and prepared to abort the operation and change targets.
Perched on her motorcycle, Vermouth pulled off her helmet with one hand and peeled away the disguise she had prepared in advance. "Change targets? Then... where is this next target?"
"The next target..." The corners of Gin's mouth curved faintly as he delivered the revised order in a low voice. "Beika-cho, 5-chome — the Mouri Detective Agency. Mouri Kogoro."
From the back seat, Cointreau arched an eyebrow with keen interest at the name Gin had just spoken. He found himself genuinely curious what Vermouth's face would do at the sound of "Mouri Kogoro."
She was bound to be shocked — surely.
Then again, Vermouth had seen Edogawa Conan with her own eyes at the Haido Park parking lot, so she ought to have braced herself somewhat. With that child's capacity for action, it was only natural for the people around him to get dragged in.
Even so, Cointreau hadn't expected it to happen this fast — for Gin to lock onto Mouri Kogoro in a single stroke. The man had yet to spare any attention for Conan, the true "mastermind" behind it all, but Cointreau had the feeling that at this rate, sooner or later his gaze would come to rest on that boy.
The only question was how the protagonist meant to weather this crisis — and how Vermouth planned to talk Gin out of it this time.
Before long, Vodka pulled the car up beside Vermouth and took her aboard, and the group sped off toward Beika-cho.
Once in the car, Vermouth caught the faintly gloating glint in Cointreau's eyes and couldn't help shooting him a glare. Only after a glance at Gin seated up front did she swallow the barb on the tip of her tongue.
Hmph. Her Cool Guy might be in danger, and not only had Cointreau refused to lift a finger — he was actually savoring the show. Fine. She would simply wait and see what face he made when his hard-won princess found herself in danger.