The Case of the Assassin and the Fox
A/N: This is prompt response for the F*ck 2016 fanfiction charity event on tumblr. Check it out, linked on my tumblr, user phoenixreal. Make a donation and a fanfic author writes what you request. Not a bad deal!
First draft as usual. Typical warnings. Yaoi. Violence. You know the drill.
Chapter One
Whispers in the Shadows
Kakashi Hatake sighed deeply as he stepped into the airport and looked around. He hated England. He hated London even more. In fact, if it weren't for the fact that Jiraiya himself sent him on this stupid mission, he wouldn't be here. For a retired man, he certainly had more work than he had before he was retired. He glanced about, instincts kicking in to check the area. No one was paying him untoward attention. That was good. Granted, he didn't look like he was out of place. He was quite unremarkable, save the scar that ran down over his left eye. That eye looked quite normal, however. Of course, it was anything but. The prosthetic implanted there served several functions, only one of which was giving him a sort of vision. It was a recording device as well, a little piece of technology he'd picked up in the experimental division of the Uchiha's Sharingan Corporation. Of course, with experimental technology, there were issues. If he activated it, it took a lot of effort to be able to use it. For this reason, he only activated it when he needed it. The rest of the time he either kept it inactive, and blind, or he covered it to reduce the amount of information it received.
That led to why he was here, he thought as he adjusted the gray suit jacket he was wearing. He felt exposed without his mask, but there wasn't much to be done about that. He glanced at his wrists, making sure the jacket sleeve and dress shirt cuff covered the tattoos on his arms completely. Walking around public areas in London with a mask would be quite conspicuous. He was walking by the giftshop when he spun on his heel and nearly skipped back. Well, that looked like… He grinned and tried to look casual as he went into the shop and spun the bookrack around. He pulled several books off and smiled as he put them down on the counter.
The shop girl looked at him. "Is that all today, sir?" she asked, blushing slightly.
"Hai, I mean, yes, I wasn't expecting such reading material out in the open!" he said with a grin.
The girl's tag read Marcy and she tried very hard not to look at the books she was checking out. They were four sealed books from the "adult" shelf. Generally, when she checked out this sort of thing, it was easy to tell the interest of the buyer. However, this guy… One of the books was about a heterosexual couple, which she'd actually read and it was super hot, but the other three were different. One was a lesbian novel, another was a gay erotica, and the last one was…well, it was a whole lot of different stuff in one book.
"Well, that's why they're in plastic wrap," she said as she rang him up. "So, you know, kids can't look through them.
He handed over a credit card and Marcy blinked. It was completely black card with no imprinted name on it, but when she ran it, it didn't pop a request for signature or PIN like normally. She frowned and started to say something, but she realized the guy had already pulled the seal off one of the books and was reading it with his other hand out for his card. She just handed it to him and watched him leave. She walked out to the door and watched. He was reading while he was walking, completely not looking where he was going, and not even coming close to bumping into anyone.
"Hey Marcy, what's up?" her boyfriend Jesse said as he walked up to her.
"Just a guy who really likes to read porn," she muttered and smiled at him. "Off in ten, so wait at the coffee shop!"
Kakashi was pleased. He hadn't packed any of his manga. Granted, this didn't offer the visuals, but it was still pretty good. The writing could have been better, but sometimes that was the fun of it. He stopped as he got to the curb and waved down a cab, eyes never leaving the pages.
"Where you headed?" the cab driver asked.
"Take me to a hotel, doesn't matter which one," he said with a dismissive wave of the hand not holding his book.
The cabbie looked into the mirror and shook his head. Strange foreigners.
-oooooo-OOOOOO-oooooo-
"I'm not interested," Sherlock said as he waved a hand at his brother.
"Sherlock, really, I just was hoping that you could…" Mycroft said with a groan.
"No!" he sniped and turned on his heel and disappeared into his room, leaving Mycroft in the living room with John.
"Would you speak to him?" Mycroft said. "I believe this is important to Her Majesty.
John arched a brow. "Yeah, I'll try," he said and shook his head. "No guarantees, though. You know how he gets. Here, give me the file."
Mycroft nodded, handing the file to John. "Thank you, John, you've always been the reasonable of the pair of you, especially since he came back from his death. He has been rather incorrigible since then."
John rolled his eyes and opened the file. He flipped through pages as Mycroft left. It was some sort of security alert of a person of interest crossing into the United Kingdom. It was a ping on a name that was considered a possible alias for a known Yakuza assassin. The photo that accompanied it showed a tall man with silver white hair and gray eyes. In the photo, he was smiling at a shop girl as he purchased some books.
"What dullness did he bring me?" Sherlock growled as he flopped into the seat next to John.
"This guy," he said as he pushed the file toward him.
Sherlock looked at the photo. "A Japanese man with a fetish for explicit pornographic reading material. That is nothing terribly odd," he said and rolled his eyes. "Why do they think he's an assassin? He looks positively droll."
John glanced at him. "Well, he came into the UK on a passport that was flagged. The name 'Ryuu Hakuma'. Odd sounding name. Anyway, but they seem to think that this passport has been in the UK when there were other deaths that may be assassinations."
Sherlock rolled his eyes yet again. "I do not play attack dog for my brother."
"All he wants you to do is let him know if you come across anything," John said with a sigh.
Sherlock's phone beeped then with a text message. He nodded as he read and grinned. "At least a seven," he said as he got up and disappeared into his room. He emerged dressed and was putting on his coat. "Well, John, come on, now! We have a corpse!"
John shook his head and grabbed his own jacket. "Of course we do," he muttered as they headed down for a cab. Sherlock relayed the information to the cabbie and they arrived in a few moments. Sherlock got out and headed into the scene followed by John. It was a rather suburban looking house.
Lestrade was standing in the room and sighed when Sherlock came in. "I'm sorry to bother you, Sherlock, but this one is more than a little odd."
Sherlock put a pair of gloves on and knelt at the body. It was a man in a business suit lying on his back, eyes fixed on the ceiling. Sherlock looked over the body and the area and then looked at Lestrade. "This looks like natural causes…" he said.
"It does. Until we get him back to the morgue. Then we find trace amounts of a rapidly degrading poison. This is the third one." Lestrade stood up with a sigh and looked at him. "No idea how anyone got in or out, the house was locked, no open windows. So figured you love a locked room murder."
"Were the others similar?" Sherlock asked with a frown.
"Yeah, one was in a high rise, and the other one was in an office. All three of them were businessmen, but they all worked for different London companies," he said with a sigh as he glanced around the room.
"Can I see the photos of the other two?" Sherlock said and turned back.
Lestrade opened the file and handed Sherlock the two sheets on the others. "They don't resemble each other. And they didn't work in the same company. The only link is that they were most likely poisoned with the same thing?"
"Of course, they were assumed natural causes, but Molly got the last one in time to catch the poison before it was completely gone," he said as he glanced at him.
"Perhaps my brother was right about that assassin."
"Assassin?" Lestrade asked.
"Don't bother, but keep this man's death under wraps. Something is happening, and it won't hurt to hold off the announcement of his death until I've looked into it further."
Sherlock turned on his heel and left, John on his heels. "What was that?" John asked as they walked quickly out of the scene and he hailed a cab again.
They got into the cab. "You seem to be confounded." John was worried because confused Sherlock worried him.
"I've never seen a crime scene so clean. I've never seen one that offered no clues for me to work with. An assassin is the only thing possible, right?" he asked, glancing at John.
John nodded. "What's the plan?" he asked.
"I'm going to check with my underground network and you are going to work. Aren't you on at the clinic today?" Sherlock asked with a frown.
"Ah, yes, but if you think…" he started.
"No, go do your real job. I'll meet you at the flat in the morning. I should have found something out, I would think," he said as he told the cab to stop and let him out. John watched him go with a curious look.
-oooooo-OOOOOO-oooooo-
John stretched as he stepped out of the clinic. It was almost midnight and he was exhausted. He frowned and thought a trip to the pub might be in order. Just a pint or two, of course. He walked down to the one closet to the clinic and had a couple by himself. A couple women hit on him, but he turned both of them down. His mind was elsewhere. Ever since he broke it off with Mary, he hadn't really found himself interested in women. He was happy in the flat with Sherlock, and honestly, as mad as he was at him for the death hoax, he was happy he was back in his life. He put a tip down and headed out to the sidewalk to hail a cab.
The sensation of being stabbed with a syringe, as familiar as it was, was unexpected as he passed out into someone's grip.
John's first thought on waking up was his head was killing me. His next thought was he heard voices.
"Dr. Watson," came a voice near him. He looked up and locked eyes with a man he definitely didn't know. "Glad you decided to join the waking world."
"Who…where am I, what's going on?" John stammered, realizing his ankles were handcuffed to the legs of the chair he was in and his hands were handcuffed behind him.
The man in front of him spun a chair around and sat down. He was a man of medium height with long stringy black hair. He had a pair of beady looking dark eyes and he seemed to have some sort of ornamental eyeliner around his eyes. He smiled at him.
"I'm known as Orochimaru, Dr. Watson. And I find the fact that your companion is on my trail to be quite distressing. For that reason, you were abducted to keep Mr. Holmes in line," he said with a smile morphing into a half sneer.
"On your trail? What does that mean? We don't have a case right now other than the dead businessmen…but that's you?" he said with a frown. "You killed them?"
"Oh, no, I don't kill anyone personally," he said and stood up with his hands tucked at the small of his back. "However, I did have them killed. The three of them were problems that needed to be eliminated. Terrible when you have customers that can't keep their mouths shut, isn't it? So because of one of them, I'm dodging a man sent to kill me."
"Why is someone after you?" John asked.
Orochimaru smiled and turned toward him. "I stole something from an old friend when I left Japan. They aren't happy about it."
"Stole a something?" John asked with a frown. "Like money?"
"Oh, much more valuable. Blood is thicker than water, as they say here, isn't it? And what I took cannot ever be replaced," he said with a smirk. "Of course, it is far more valuable to me than anything else, but for that reason, my old friend will do anything to get it back."
"I don't understand. I mean, I understand why you abducted me, that's obvious. But I don't understand why you're going on about this."
Orochimaru sighed. "You westerners," he muttered. "Aizukotetsu-kai. Have you heard this word?" he asked as he began to roll the sleeve on his robe up. John's eyes widened a bit.
"You're Yakuza."
Orochimaru nodded, revealing the extensive tattooing covering his arms. "Yes. The Aizukotetsu-kai is a federation of several…I think you'd say 'families' from Kyoto. I was raised from infancy to lead alongside two other orphans that were taken in by the Oyabun. However, I always felt somewhat left out. We never agreed even though we were supposed to each take over the largest sub factions of the Aizukotetsu-kai. One of us used to say we always had a three way gridlock. It was so true," he said with a sigh. He paused. "But I wanted more. I wanted to ascend the ranks beyond the Aizukotetsu-kai. I wanted more. Alas, you know what happens when people try to reach too high," he said as he held up his right hand. He took off the glove he wore and John saw his two smallest fingers had been replaced with a prosthetic meant to hide that they were missing.
"I suppose one of us had a crisis of conscious. She couldn't handle it, mostly because she was stubborn, but also because she had the heart of a doctor. I had enough, and ended up surpassing our other friend. He was contacted by a family friend, and took in a child, and said that he couldn't, in good conscious remain a party to what I was trying to do, which was attempting to unite and take over the Aizukotetsu-kai. He turned on me to the Oyabun, and I barely escaped with my life. I came to the United Kingdom, mostly because it was the easiest location to get to unnoticed. So while, I technically am Yakuza, I wouldn't say I'm an active member, since they think I'm dead," he said with a slow smile.
John stared at him. "They sent an assassin to kill you, you said that. If they think you're dead, why would they do that?"
Orochimaru smirked. "Well, the Yakuza think I'm dead. My old companion, Jariya, knows better. He knows me. He sent an assassin, to kill me and retrieve what I stole."
"What did you steal?" John asked.
Orochimaru glanced behind him. "Sasuke?"
From behind him, a younger man with black hair stepped out. He was wearing a robe like shirt and a pair of wide legged pants. He had glaring eyes.
"I don't see why we don't kill him," he said. "He's useless to us. A liability. I don't understand why we don't eliminate him like the others."
"But Sasuke, he's a doctor, remember?" Orochimaru said. "And didn't you say my favorite pet was ill?"
Sasuke wrinkled his nose. "Yes."
"Good, then he is useful, hai?" he said as he turned to him.
Sasuke snorted. "Whatever. How are you going to make sure he doesn't try to escape?"
"Well, the good doctor here won't do that."
John glared at him. "And why wouldn't I?"
"You'll see," Orochimaru said as a man John hadn't seen unhooked his ankles but clipped the rings together, keeping his ankles bound to each other. He could shuffle walk, but that was about it. He looked back at the man who had brilliant red hair as he dragged him. John looked around as they came out of what must have been a small room and into a hallway.
There was a blonde man leaning against the wall. "Sasori, who's the ugly Brit?"
"Deidara," Sasori said with a smirk. "Be nice. He's a doctor."
The blond snorted and crossed his arms over his chest. "He's ugly."
Sasori shook his head and shoved John forward. Orochimaru led as the small group moved down the hallway. John looked around. It was some sort of old, large house. It didn't look like a brownstone or row housing, in fact, it almost looked like some of the finer estate houses he'd seen. He saw at least four doors in this hallway so far and he could see the top of a stairwell at the end. The younger man with dark hair walked in front of them and punched in a code at the door. He stepped away to stand beside it. John flinched as the red haired man reached down and unlocked the handcuffs on his ankles, then the ones on his wrist.
John rubbed the sore skin on his wrists and followed Orochimaru into the room. He looked around and realized it was a very fine bedroom. He heard rather ragged breathing as he came into the room and he stepped around to see an obviously feverish young man lying in the bed. John moved without thought, the doctor's instinct as it were taking over as he moved close to the boy and felt his face.
"And now Dr. Watson realizes why he won't try to escape, doesn't he?" Orochimaru said with a rather haughty tone to his voice.
John turned and stared at Orochimaru. "I need a stocked doctor's bag, an IV kit, saline, antibiotics, and possibly more once I have the tools to assess him. And get me something to cool him down. Now. Ice packs."
"You aren't in charge," the red haired Sasori said as he glared at John.
"Look, I'm the doctor here. And I'm going to be a doctor and you people are damn well going to provide me with the tools to do my job. So get me the tools I need. Now." John's voice had taken the hard edge that he rarely used.
Orochimaru smiled. "Sasori, get the doctor what he needs. I'll leave you to it, Dr. Watson," he said and turned on his heel and left.
John sighed and sat down on the bed. It was covered in plush bedding and pillows. He got a look at the boy now. He was in his late teens, perhaps his early twenties. He was obviously of Asian descent, having the almond shaped eyes. His hair, though, was unusual because it was blonde and fine. He leaned close and opened one of his eyes and was equally surprised that he had blue eyes. He was completely unconscious, though. John reached and ran his fingers over thick scars that ran down each of his cheeks. They looked precise, though, as though someone had done it on purpose. They were old, though.
He checked his pulse, finding it high. He felt around his stomach and growled under his breath. He went to the door and pounded on it until the dark haired boy named Sasuke opened it.
"What do you want?" he asked.
"I need equipment to run blood tests."
"We don't have any, figure out what's wrong with him without it," Sasuke said with a roll of his eyes.
John stared at him. "Look, I need to know for sure if he's got what I think he's got."
"Not my problem. I'm to bring you any medication you need. I'm not your errand boy, teme."
John looked back. The symptoms matched. If he was wrong… He didn't think the treatment would do any harm. "Fine, I need anti-malarial meds. I'm pretty sure he has a Malaria infection. Hurry with it. And the rest I asked for," John said as he turned and shut the door himself.
If he was right, it was Vivax, which was good and bad. It wasn't the deadliest Malarial infection, however if he had his strains right, it was the one that could lay dormant in a person for years at a time before appearing. It was pretty prevalent in Asian countries, he thought.
He sat down on the bed and felt the boy's head. He was burning up. He sighed and looked at the window. He frowned and got up to see what was outside. He found the windows were barred on the outside, and from where they were, all he could see was trees. No help there, he thought to himself. He heard the boy mumble behind him and he turned back, grabbing a glass of water that was sitting on the beside.
"Hey, here, sit up and drink," he said as he turned his head toward him.
His eyes fluttered and he winced and said something in Japanese that John had no clue about.
"I…I don't speak Japanese," John offered, guiding the glass to the boy's chapped lips. He took it in shaking hands and tried to sip it but fell back when he'd gotten a small amount. He turned and stareda t John.
"English?" he asked then.
"Yeah, English, sorry, all I speak is English," John said apologetically.
"Who…" he started and then put his hand to his head with a grimace.
"My name's John, I'm a doctor. I'm here to help you. You're very sick," he said with a gentle smile.
He nodded. "Happens now and then," he muttered and turned on his side, gagging slightly as though his stomach was trying to void.
"Yeah, figured that was the case," he muttered, sure now he was right. "But I'm going to help you. I know what it is, and I can treat it."
"Hmm, good, my head hurts so much…" he said and turned teary eyes on John.
John reached out and put a hand against his face. "I know. You've got a bit of menegitis right now, but I'm having them bring me something that should fix this for good. How long have you had episodes of this?"
He shook his head. "Since he took me from my home," he said. "Four years, I think, I don't know how long…" he muttered and pulled the covers up on him as he started to shiver. "Worse this time. Lasting longer…my head…"
"Do you remember being bitten by mosquitos or something before then?" John asked as he ran a hand over the boy's sweaty forehead.
He shook his head. "I don't know. I…played outside a lot when I was a kid, always covered in bites, but never made me sick…just got sick one day after we left Japan," he muttered as he shuddered. "I'm so cold now."
John nodded. "Well, it sometimes takes a while before you get sick."
The door opened and he saw Orochimaru standing there. "Sasuke says you believe he has malaria."
John nodded. "Yes, his spleen is enlarged, quite a bit, and he's showing symptoms of menegitis, so there's some swelling on the brain, hence the headache he has."
"He's had episodes of this for the last few years. He's never needed medical intervention before to recover from them."
John rubbed his forehead. "Look, you asked me what was wrong with him. I am guessing here unless you're going to let me send for blood work. I can't tell for sure. This is my best guess according to his symptoms. And yes, there are times Malaria shows up and goes away, they're called relapses. And this one could have been hanging around for years before his first round of sickness. However, this is a serious relapse, and he needs treatment now, especially for this fever."
Orochimaru nodded. "I'll send the equipment you need," he said and turned and left.
John sighed and looked at the boy who watched Orochimaru's every move, he noted. He reached out and put a hand against his face. "I'm going to help you."
He looked at John with a look that was somewhere between sadness and fear. "Then just let me die," he whispered as he faded into a semi-conscious state again. John had no idea what to think as he stared at the boy.
-oooooo-OOOOOO-oooooo-
Sherlock arrived home to an empty flat. He thought that was strange, considering that John should have been there. He looked around the flat and sat down on the sofa in confusion. It was almost seven am. He worried immediately because John was nothing if not consistent and reliable.
"Where are you, John?" he muttered under his breath.
"If you knew that, you'd be there too," a voice said behind him.
Sherlock turned and stared because there was a man in his flat. He was wearing a deep gray long sleeved shirt and pants with gloves. He had on shoes but they looked very soft. His lower jaw was covered with a gray mask and he had a bandana or something over his forehead with a weird leaf engraved into a metal plate. It sat crooked and covered his left eye, though. It left most of his face covered. He was just standing there with his hands in his pockets of a flak jacket that was an olive green color.
"Who are you and how did you get in here?" he asked as he stood up. However, fear wasn't a thing he felt, and perhaps he should have considering that the person in front of him had managed to get into his flat without a sound and walk up behind him.
"Kakashi Hatake," he said with a slight bow. "Good to meet you, Sherlock Holmes."
"You know me?" Sherlock said and narrowed his eyes.
"Science of deduction, fascinating, really," he said and Sherlock thought he yawned, but he wasn't sure under the mask.
"You are the assassin that my brother came to me about."
Kakashi nodded. "Well, retired, but you know. Some cases bring out even those of us who have given up a life of subterfuge," he said with a shrug.
Sherlock, dressed in his blue dressing gown and pajama pants walked up and looked at him. "Why are you here? You know where John is?"
"Suspect, but I don't know," Kakashi said and looked at Sherlock. "That's why I came here. Figured you would want your doctor back, and I'm here to kill the man that has him."
"Kill him? Did you kill those three men?" he asked as he walked past him into the kitchen.
Kakashi followed. "No, actually, the man I'm after did that. They made the mistake of not paying up when they were supposed to. You don't stiff an ex-Yakuza on a drug deal. That's a bad way to end," he said as he picked up the skull on the fireplace and looked at it.
"You are ex-Yakuza as well," Sherlock observed as he handed a cup of tea to his guest.
"Hai," he said as he nodded thanks to Sherlock as he took the cup. "It isn't a very good job for longevity. Assassination is a dangerous game," he said as he smelled it. "Nice blend," he said. "Jasmine Green with a hint of…mint."
Sherlock sat down on the sofa and stared at him. "I find it disconcerting to speak to someone with his face covered completely."
"I imagine, it hides most of the tells that your deductions depend on. Facial expressions might be masked, or they might be faked. Depends on the skill of the person wearing a mask. I find most are put off by only seeing one eye of a person, as well."
"You speak impeccable English," Sherlock observed.
"And I understand you speak rather impeccable Japanese, which will come in handy in our pursuits," he said as he sat down in the chair next to the sofa.
"Our pursuits?" Sherlock asked.
Kakashi reached up and pulled the mask off his nose and mouth, revealing nearly nothing to Sherlock, other than he had a small mole on his lower left jaw. His lips were narrow and pale, and when he sipped the tea, Sherlock noted his teeth appeared in good condition.
"Of course. I know the man we are both pursuing. You know London. We are both looking to retrieve people he has abducted. Combining our work is the most efficient use of our abilities."
Sherlock wanted to say something against that…but honestly, he couldn't. He simply lifted his own teacup and nodded.