A/N: Sorry about the incredibly long wait, and I could give all sorts of
excuses for it, but I won't because I'm sure if you're reading this, you
just want me to finish the story. But, one quick note before I start: this
is the last chapter of Murder in the Shadows. Just in case you were
curious. Now, on with the story!
***
As the sun slowly rose over the towering buildings of central London, the back door of one of the shops opened and a middle-aged woman stuck her head out and frowned. There were gathering rain clouds on the horizon, and that meant rain, and rain meant few customers. She sighed and grabbed her garbage from inside, and heaved the bag out and around to the front of the building so the workers could pick it up. As she rounded the corner, she let out a shriek and the bag fell from her hands. Sitting up against the shop was the body of a young man covered head to toe in river mud.
Trembling, the woman approached it slowly, and prodded the boy gently. To her surprise, he wasn't hard and cold, and was definitely alive. Her heart went out to him and she kicked her bag to the side of the road and pulled the boy into the building through the front door and laid him out on a large wooden table.
She heard the sound of her husband coming down the stairs and she rushed over to him, "Look! I found a boy outside our door! He looks half- frozen, the poor dear. Please, can you drop him off at the hospital on your way to work?"
The man leaned over Jon and blinked, his eyebrows raised in surprise, "And you're sure he's alive?"
"Yes, I'm sure."
The man poked Jon's arm and the boy stirred a little and blinked his eyes open. He struggled to sit up and realized that he was surrounded by people. Strange people that he didn't recognize. Jon let out a little squeak of surprise and rolled off of the table trying to escape, only to fall face first onto the hard ground. He let out a small gasp of pain as the woman ran over and kneeled down beside him, "Don't move! You're going to be all right! My husband is going to take you to the hospital..."
Jon shook his had violently, shuddered, and said hoarsely, "No, I don't wanna go...Let me go..." Everything was spinning and the ground kept lurching around, and it was hard for him to keep his balance.
The woman frowned, helped Jon up, and sat him down on the table, "I will not just let you go back outside! You'll die of something or another, and I would feel responsible! You're in my house now, and I insist that you go to the hospital!"
The man grabbed his wife's arm and pulled her away, "Listen, I think there's something wrong with this boy...I'm calling the police..."
But Jon had heard, leapt shakily off of the table, and tried to run towards the door. That was the last thing he needed, to be bothered by the police. All he wanted was to go home, why wouldn't they just let him go home...
The man jumped for him and grabbed him by the shoulders. Jon tried to escape and managed to kick the man several times before he was slammed against the wall with his hands behind his back. The man turned back towards the woman, who looked scared now, and nodded to her, "Go call for the police. I'll hold him here..."
Jon struggled some more as he was pressed against a wall for the second time that week, but could only wait for the police to come and no doubt arrest him. But he wouldn't go easily...Than again, did he ever? The thought made him grin to himself, and he was caught off guard when a rougher hand grabbed him from behind and pushed him to the ground.
Jon peered up into the face of a very large cop and felt his courage wither a little. The couple stood back a little as the policeman picked Jon up by the collar and stood him up, and asked him gruffly, "Who are you, and what happened to you?"
Jon stammered, but closed his mouth, his usually quick mind moving to sluggishly for him to think of a lie. He stared blankly at the tall officer and a wave of nausea washed over him, and he shuddered and fell to the floor, trying desperately not to hurl.
The man looked down at him in surprise and with a quick motion grabbed Jon's arm and hoisted him up, more gently this time, and pushed him outside the door. The officer turned back to the nervous couple and nodded, "I'll take him from here..."
The two nodded and watched as the man closed the door behind him, put Jon in the cabby, and set off at a quick pace for Scotland Yard.
***Scotland Yard***
Detective Lestrade was sauntering down the hall of the police headquarters, enjoying the early morning air, when two nurses rushed past him and sped down an adjacent hallway. He raised an eyebrow curiously and followed them. There were often nurses and doctors running around when a prisoner was ill, but there was no one there that was sick, or so he thought.
He walked into the side-room they had disappeared into and blinked in surprise. There was a cot open and a boy was lying in it. A very familiar looking boy, but it was hard to tell who it was because of the layers of dirt caked onto him. Lestrade peered around the room and caught sight of an officer, and he cleared his throat. The officer turned in surprise and nodded towards the detective, who asked, "Who is this?"
"I'm not sure sir. I found him down a business street bothering a couple people. He's not doing to good though..."
Lestrade took a step closer, and turned to the nurse, "What are his injuries?"
One of the women stood up, straightened out her white blouse and shook her head, "Well, for the moment, he is unconscious. He is covered in small, shallow cuts and bruises, and he seems to be ill. He is soaking wet, and chilled to the bone, but something you might be interested in is a bullet wound in his left leg..."
She pointed it out to him, and suddenly, Lestrade remembered where he had seen the boy before. He turned to the officer and said firmly, "Take him to the hospital immediately and see to it that he is well cared for. I will meet you there after I go pay a friend a visit..."
The man nodded, and helped the nurses carry the boy outside while Lestrade walked out with them, but turned down another hallway, his mind buzzing. When Dr. Watson had taken Striecher in, he had seemed very upset about something, and Lestrade had inquired to the reason why he was so sad. Watson had told him that Jonathan, their young accomplice, had fallen off of a pier after being shot by Moriarty. But he had made it some how, barely, but still...the detective figured Watson should still know the good news.
***221B Baker Street***
Watson sighed and peered out the window out towards the darkening sky and the cold winter air. Holmes had already seen three different clients that morning, but none of them had captured his attention and so his thoughts had been left to drift. Holmes frowned, turned away from his current client, an elderly man who wanted advice on who was stealing his money, and stared at his friend, "Watson? Would you like something to drink? You are excused if you wish to retire to your room."
"No, no...I am fine Holmes, please continue. I am sorry for the distraction."
Holmes glanced doubtfully back at Watson, shrugged, and turned back to the man, and was about to suggest that he keep a better watch on his maids when their front door was slammed opened and something stepped inside. Holmes sighed, highly annoyed at the distraction and turned to face Lestrade with a scowl, "Excuse me detective! I am rather busy at the moment! I do have other clients than Scotland Yard you know!"
Lestrade ignored the exasperated edge on his voice and settled himself down on the couch after closing the front door gently behind him, "I shall wait then..."
Holmes frowned, quickly finished up with the old man, who thanked him heartily, and quickly took his leave.
Holmes then turned sharply to Lestrade, who was leaning back on the couch nonchalantly and said, "Now, what is it that you wish to see me about that was so important that you couldn't have called or given notice before you arrived?"
"I am sorry that I interrupted your work Holmes, but I have some rather good news for both you and doctor Watson here from the last case that you completed for us."
Holmes sat up rather excitedly and Watson peered at the officer curiously. Holmes leaned closer, "Did Striecher give you any information on Moriarty's whereabouts?"
"Well...no, not yet. But we did manage to find someone who you lost..."
Holmes raised an eyebrow suspiciously, "There is no way that Moriarty would have allowed himself to be captured by a force as incompetent as the London police, so I am not quite sure who you are referring to."
Lestrade scowled at the good-natured taunt, and shook his head, "No, I'm sure your not. It was the last person I expected to find in a cell in Scotland Yard anyway. Actually, one of our men was patrolling the business district when a couple called in saying that someone was bothering them, so he went to check it out and found someone that I think you would be interested in seeing again..."
Holmes frowned, "All right, all right, just come out and say it all ready!"
"We found Jonathan."
Watson did a double take and stared at Lestrade, "You...you found his body or, do you mean that...?"
"Yes, we found him. Alive."
Watson leapt up excitedly, "You must take me to him! Where is he?"
"The hospital...he is in pretty bad shape, but they think he'll live..."
Watson smiled and followed Lestrade out the door to the cabby, then realized that Holmes was not with them. He ran back up the stairs to the door and stuck his head inside, "Come on Holmes, you are holding us up!"
"I am very happy for you Watson, but I have a lot of work to do and I would rather stay here."
"I know that you want to see Jon too, almost as badly as I do, so you might as well come with us!"
Holmes set down the newspaper he had begun to read in annoyance, "I do not Watson! But...I will come, but only out of pure curiosity of how he survived falling from the dock..."
Watson grinned as Holmes walked briskly past him into he cabby and followed the detective in, and the three made their way to the hospital.
***
Lestrade left them at the front of the hospital saying that he had some business to attend to before noon, and Watson and Holmes made their way through the twisting hallways of the large hospital until they came across the room that the nurse had said Jon was in. Watson entered carefully, then walked quietly over to the cot where Jon was sleeping. As Watson stepped nearer, Jon frowned and slowly opened his eyes, then tried to quickly sit up as he saw who it was.
The doctor bent down and gave Jon a quick hug, who in turn, froze in surprise than blushed a deep scarlet and shrugged Watson gently off. Holmes just pulled up a straight-backed chair and waited patiently for Watson to finish so they could leave.
Jon grinned over at him, "What...I don't get a hug from you?"
Holmes scowled, "...No."
Jon nodded knowingly and turned back to Watson, "So what happened? Did ya catch my dad yet?"
Watson shook his head, "No, he managed to escape again. But I was just about to ask you the same thing! What happened to you after you were shot? Holmes and I thought you were dead!"
"Ya so did I...I think that the river I fell into was still enough that after I went under, I was able to swim upstream a little bit. But I hit some rapids and wasn't able to get any air, so I passed out. When I woke up, I had been washed up onto some riverbank, and so I crawled up it and found myself outside some buildings. I went up to one and fell asleep up against it. In the morning, some lady found me and took me into her house, but her husband called the cops. I was taken to Scotland Yard, and then somehow I ended up here! I'm still haven't figured that part out."
Holmes nodded, "Well, it sounds like you have been busy, but unfortunately, so am I. I am afraid that I need to go now and finish another case. I will meet you outside Watson." The detective stood up and walked over to the door, "Oh, and Jon...if you ever need any more lessons on how to be a decent detective, you know where to find me..."
Jon nodded, "Thanks, I might have ta look into that..."
Holmes left and Watson turned to him, "So, how is your leg?"
Jon lifted up his cover, glanced at it, and showed it to Watson cautiously, "They put some bandages on it, but it still hurts..."
Watson nodded, "Yes. It probably will for a little while longer, but soon, you won't even realize it was ever there. I know from experience."
"It better go away...it's very annoying..."
"Listen Jon, if you ever need a place to go to, our house is always opened to you to spend the night at, no matter what Holmes says."
"All right...thanks..."
Watson nodded again and clapped Jon gently on the shoulder before leaving and following Holmes out the door, closing it softly behind him.
Jon sighed and leaned back against the wall, smiling happily, and for the first time in his life, felt that someone actually cared about him. Someone cared about Jonathan Moriarty. With that thought in mind, he closed his eyes, and drifted off to sleep in his warm bed, ready for whatever tomorrow brought to him.
A/N: Yay! Aww, I made it a happy ending! I surprise myself...*ahem* anyways, please review and tell me what you thought of it, this chapter or the whole story. Thanks much!
***
As the sun slowly rose over the towering buildings of central London, the back door of one of the shops opened and a middle-aged woman stuck her head out and frowned. There were gathering rain clouds on the horizon, and that meant rain, and rain meant few customers. She sighed and grabbed her garbage from inside, and heaved the bag out and around to the front of the building so the workers could pick it up. As she rounded the corner, she let out a shriek and the bag fell from her hands. Sitting up against the shop was the body of a young man covered head to toe in river mud.
Trembling, the woman approached it slowly, and prodded the boy gently. To her surprise, he wasn't hard and cold, and was definitely alive. Her heart went out to him and she kicked her bag to the side of the road and pulled the boy into the building through the front door and laid him out on a large wooden table.
She heard the sound of her husband coming down the stairs and she rushed over to him, "Look! I found a boy outside our door! He looks half- frozen, the poor dear. Please, can you drop him off at the hospital on your way to work?"
The man leaned over Jon and blinked, his eyebrows raised in surprise, "And you're sure he's alive?"
"Yes, I'm sure."
The man poked Jon's arm and the boy stirred a little and blinked his eyes open. He struggled to sit up and realized that he was surrounded by people. Strange people that he didn't recognize. Jon let out a little squeak of surprise and rolled off of the table trying to escape, only to fall face first onto the hard ground. He let out a small gasp of pain as the woman ran over and kneeled down beside him, "Don't move! You're going to be all right! My husband is going to take you to the hospital..."
Jon shook his had violently, shuddered, and said hoarsely, "No, I don't wanna go...Let me go..." Everything was spinning and the ground kept lurching around, and it was hard for him to keep his balance.
The woman frowned, helped Jon up, and sat him down on the table, "I will not just let you go back outside! You'll die of something or another, and I would feel responsible! You're in my house now, and I insist that you go to the hospital!"
The man grabbed his wife's arm and pulled her away, "Listen, I think there's something wrong with this boy...I'm calling the police..."
But Jon had heard, leapt shakily off of the table, and tried to run towards the door. That was the last thing he needed, to be bothered by the police. All he wanted was to go home, why wouldn't they just let him go home...
The man jumped for him and grabbed him by the shoulders. Jon tried to escape and managed to kick the man several times before he was slammed against the wall with his hands behind his back. The man turned back towards the woman, who looked scared now, and nodded to her, "Go call for the police. I'll hold him here..."
Jon struggled some more as he was pressed against a wall for the second time that week, but could only wait for the police to come and no doubt arrest him. But he wouldn't go easily...Than again, did he ever? The thought made him grin to himself, and he was caught off guard when a rougher hand grabbed him from behind and pushed him to the ground.
Jon peered up into the face of a very large cop and felt his courage wither a little. The couple stood back a little as the policeman picked Jon up by the collar and stood him up, and asked him gruffly, "Who are you, and what happened to you?"
Jon stammered, but closed his mouth, his usually quick mind moving to sluggishly for him to think of a lie. He stared blankly at the tall officer and a wave of nausea washed over him, and he shuddered and fell to the floor, trying desperately not to hurl.
The man looked down at him in surprise and with a quick motion grabbed Jon's arm and hoisted him up, more gently this time, and pushed him outside the door. The officer turned back to the nervous couple and nodded, "I'll take him from here..."
The two nodded and watched as the man closed the door behind him, put Jon in the cabby, and set off at a quick pace for Scotland Yard.
***Scotland Yard***
Detective Lestrade was sauntering down the hall of the police headquarters, enjoying the early morning air, when two nurses rushed past him and sped down an adjacent hallway. He raised an eyebrow curiously and followed them. There were often nurses and doctors running around when a prisoner was ill, but there was no one there that was sick, or so he thought.
He walked into the side-room they had disappeared into and blinked in surprise. There was a cot open and a boy was lying in it. A very familiar looking boy, but it was hard to tell who it was because of the layers of dirt caked onto him. Lestrade peered around the room and caught sight of an officer, and he cleared his throat. The officer turned in surprise and nodded towards the detective, who asked, "Who is this?"
"I'm not sure sir. I found him down a business street bothering a couple people. He's not doing to good though..."
Lestrade took a step closer, and turned to the nurse, "What are his injuries?"
One of the women stood up, straightened out her white blouse and shook her head, "Well, for the moment, he is unconscious. He is covered in small, shallow cuts and bruises, and he seems to be ill. He is soaking wet, and chilled to the bone, but something you might be interested in is a bullet wound in his left leg..."
She pointed it out to him, and suddenly, Lestrade remembered where he had seen the boy before. He turned to the officer and said firmly, "Take him to the hospital immediately and see to it that he is well cared for. I will meet you there after I go pay a friend a visit..."
The man nodded, and helped the nurses carry the boy outside while Lestrade walked out with them, but turned down another hallway, his mind buzzing. When Dr. Watson had taken Striecher in, he had seemed very upset about something, and Lestrade had inquired to the reason why he was so sad. Watson had told him that Jonathan, their young accomplice, had fallen off of a pier after being shot by Moriarty. But he had made it some how, barely, but still...the detective figured Watson should still know the good news.
***221B Baker Street***
Watson sighed and peered out the window out towards the darkening sky and the cold winter air. Holmes had already seen three different clients that morning, but none of them had captured his attention and so his thoughts had been left to drift. Holmes frowned, turned away from his current client, an elderly man who wanted advice on who was stealing his money, and stared at his friend, "Watson? Would you like something to drink? You are excused if you wish to retire to your room."
"No, no...I am fine Holmes, please continue. I am sorry for the distraction."
Holmes glanced doubtfully back at Watson, shrugged, and turned back to the man, and was about to suggest that he keep a better watch on his maids when their front door was slammed opened and something stepped inside. Holmes sighed, highly annoyed at the distraction and turned to face Lestrade with a scowl, "Excuse me detective! I am rather busy at the moment! I do have other clients than Scotland Yard you know!"
Lestrade ignored the exasperated edge on his voice and settled himself down on the couch after closing the front door gently behind him, "I shall wait then..."
Holmes frowned, quickly finished up with the old man, who thanked him heartily, and quickly took his leave.
Holmes then turned sharply to Lestrade, who was leaning back on the couch nonchalantly and said, "Now, what is it that you wish to see me about that was so important that you couldn't have called or given notice before you arrived?"
"I am sorry that I interrupted your work Holmes, but I have some rather good news for both you and doctor Watson here from the last case that you completed for us."
Holmes sat up rather excitedly and Watson peered at the officer curiously. Holmes leaned closer, "Did Striecher give you any information on Moriarty's whereabouts?"
"Well...no, not yet. But we did manage to find someone who you lost..."
Holmes raised an eyebrow suspiciously, "There is no way that Moriarty would have allowed himself to be captured by a force as incompetent as the London police, so I am not quite sure who you are referring to."
Lestrade scowled at the good-natured taunt, and shook his head, "No, I'm sure your not. It was the last person I expected to find in a cell in Scotland Yard anyway. Actually, one of our men was patrolling the business district when a couple called in saying that someone was bothering them, so he went to check it out and found someone that I think you would be interested in seeing again..."
Holmes frowned, "All right, all right, just come out and say it all ready!"
"We found Jonathan."
Watson did a double take and stared at Lestrade, "You...you found his body or, do you mean that...?"
"Yes, we found him. Alive."
Watson leapt up excitedly, "You must take me to him! Where is he?"
"The hospital...he is in pretty bad shape, but they think he'll live..."
Watson smiled and followed Lestrade out the door to the cabby, then realized that Holmes was not with them. He ran back up the stairs to the door and stuck his head inside, "Come on Holmes, you are holding us up!"
"I am very happy for you Watson, but I have a lot of work to do and I would rather stay here."
"I know that you want to see Jon too, almost as badly as I do, so you might as well come with us!"
Holmes set down the newspaper he had begun to read in annoyance, "I do not Watson! But...I will come, but only out of pure curiosity of how he survived falling from the dock..."
Watson grinned as Holmes walked briskly past him into he cabby and followed the detective in, and the three made their way to the hospital.
***
Lestrade left them at the front of the hospital saying that he had some business to attend to before noon, and Watson and Holmes made their way through the twisting hallways of the large hospital until they came across the room that the nurse had said Jon was in. Watson entered carefully, then walked quietly over to the cot where Jon was sleeping. As Watson stepped nearer, Jon frowned and slowly opened his eyes, then tried to quickly sit up as he saw who it was.
The doctor bent down and gave Jon a quick hug, who in turn, froze in surprise than blushed a deep scarlet and shrugged Watson gently off. Holmes just pulled up a straight-backed chair and waited patiently for Watson to finish so they could leave.
Jon grinned over at him, "What...I don't get a hug from you?"
Holmes scowled, "...No."
Jon nodded knowingly and turned back to Watson, "So what happened? Did ya catch my dad yet?"
Watson shook his head, "No, he managed to escape again. But I was just about to ask you the same thing! What happened to you after you were shot? Holmes and I thought you were dead!"
"Ya so did I...I think that the river I fell into was still enough that after I went under, I was able to swim upstream a little bit. But I hit some rapids and wasn't able to get any air, so I passed out. When I woke up, I had been washed up onto some riverbank, and so I crawled up it and found myself outside some buildings. I went up to one and fell asleep up against it. In the morning, some lady found me and took me into her house, but her husband called the cops. I was taken to Scotland Yard, and then somehow I ended up here! I'm still haven't figured that part out."
Holmes nodded, "Well, it sounds like you have been busy, but unfortunately, so am I. I am afraid that I need to go now and finish another case. I will meet you outside Watson." The detective stood up and walked over to the door, "Oh, and Jon...if you ever need any more lessons on how to be a decent detective, you know where to find me..."
Jon nodded, "Thanks, I might have ta look into that..."
Holmes left and Watson turned to him, "So, how is your leg?"
Jon lifted up his cover, glanced at it, and showed it to Watson cautiously, "They put some bandages on it, but it still hurts..."
Watson nodded, "Yes. It probably will for a little while longer, but soon, you won't even realize it was ever there. I know from experience."
"It better go away...it's very annoying..."
"Listen Jon, if you ever need a place to go to, our house is always opened to you to spend the night at, no matter what Holmes says."
"All right...thanks..."
Watson nodded again and clapped Jon gently on the shoulder before leaving and following Holmes out the door, closing it softly behind him.
Jon sighed and leaned back against the wall, smiling happily, and for the first time in his life, felt that someone actually cared about him. Someone cared about Jonathan Moriarty. With that thought in mind, he closed his eyes, and drifted off to sleep in his warm bed, ready for whatever tomorrow brought to him.
A/N: Yay! Aww, I made it a happy ending! I surprise myself...*ahem* anyways, please review and tell me what you thought of it, this chapter or the whole story. Thanks much!