"I leave you alone for five minutes and she gets away."
Nika's Russian accent was always particularly pointed when she was angry. Moriarty opened his eyes to see her standing over him. He blinked hard and rubbed his neck where it was tender. He should have seen that coming. Another mistake. They were a dime a dozen these days.
"You never have anything nice to say, you know that?" he rasped. He sat up and rested his back against the foot of the bed. Samantha invaded his mind. That woman. Would he ever be rid of her?
"Why is she here?" Nika barked.
"To torment me, why else?" he drawled.
Nika folded her arms, expecting further explanation.
"She's British intelligence now," Moriarty sighed, "I know the Iceman's handy work anywhere."
"So? What does this mean?"
"It means the Yakuza have been very naughty, dabbling their affairs in the UK."
"I meant what does it mean for us?" Nika crouched to his level. He glanced at her. A gash split the corner of her lip from her struggle with Samantha. There was a tiredness in her sea-coloured eyes he hadn't noticed before.
"I don't know," he admitted, "All I know is that whatever was in that safe was worth killing the head of Yakuza and sending British intelligence for. We may be juggling more balls than we anticipated."
Nika sat next to him, her head tilted back against the bed.
"I am going to die, yes?" she said dejectedly.
"You doubting my abilities again?" Moriarty growled, though he was beginning to doubt himself and he knew she could pick up on that.
"She's here," she replied bitterly, rolling her head to look at him, "She will beat you. She always does."
Anger crackled like static in his brain. He was sick of this feeling of powerlessness.
"Then leave," he spat.
"What?"
"If you really don't think I can help you then why bother stick around?"
Nika lapsed into a silence.
"Does she have what we need?" She said after a moment, her tone indicating defeat in that moment.
"I don't know," he admitted. He didn't find anything on Samantha's person, nor was there anything in the safe as she had told him. Did she know the safe was empty or was she too led on a wild goose chase? Either way, she played him for a fool. She will beat you. She always does. Nika's harsh words lingered like a bad aftertaste just thinking about it.
"Call Jirou," he said suddenly, "Have him arrange a meeting with Rin. We upheld our end of the bargain to our ability so I expect she will uphold hers."
"Optimistic," Nika noted.
"What else can I be?" Moriarty sighed.
Samantha sat at the kitchen counter, holding an ice pack to her swollen cheekbone. She had been sitting there a while despite the fact her face had turned numb and the ice had mostly melted. She ran tonight's events over and over in her head. Firstly, Ishikawa had, either knowingly or unknowingly, led her to a dead end. If it was knowingly, there would be a good chance that her only lead had taken the opportunity to up and vanish. That would potentially call for extraction and end the mission. Not good. If unknowingly, she would either have to further search for whatever was in that safe or find an alternative lead.
And then there was Moriarty. Admittedly she never knew what became of him after their last encounter back at the lake. She had been entirely disconnected from her old employer and so just assumed they had taken care of him. There was no way he was just operating business as usual without the agency knowing about it. And why did he need the information she was looking for? What was his involvement with the Yakuza?
And lastly, how the hell was she going to explain all this to Mycroft? Would he pull her out of the mission if she told him that Moriarty was here? Did he already know Moriarty was here? She pushed thoughts of paranoia from her head before they could have the chance to form. She had to focus.
As if he knew she was thinking about him, Mycroft's number lit up on her phone. She sighed and answered the call on loud speaker.
"Hey," she said, tossing the ice pack into the sink.
"I was wondering when you would check in," replied Mycroft.
"Sorry," she said, carefully testing the bruise on her cheek with her fingers, "Things sort of didn't go as expected."
"Oh?"
There was a long moment in which Samantha contemplated telling him about Moriarty. She decided against it despite her better judgement.
"The safe was empty," she sighed, "There was nothing there. I don't know whether Ishikawa was lying or just ignorant."
"So we've no leads?"
Samantha paused again.
"I assumed you would have new orders," she said, cautiously. She didn't want to give Mycroft the impression that this case had run cold.
"Why would I?"
"It's your case," she ventured.
"No. It's your case. Now do we have a lead or do I need to pull you out?"
Samantha chewed her thumbnail. Damn. This was exactly what she was afraid of.
"Why? Do you have another case you need me for?" she prodded.
"Not for the foreseeable future, no."
Great. Shipped back to London with nothing to do and nothing to show for it. How long would it be before she could get work again? She needed to think fast.
"That's fine," she said casually, "I think I might have a lead anyway. I'll start following up on it in the morning."
A silence followed.
"Samantha..." Mycroft intonated suspicion, "Is there anything you want to tell me?"
"No," she said too quickly, "I mean I'll let you know more details when I do. For now I'm sort of working on a hunch."
"I don't pay you to follow your hunches, you know."
"Mycroft," she reasoned, "You can trust me. I'll get back to you as soon as I can. If it turns out to be nothing I'll call for an extraction."
There was another pause. Did he suspect she wasn't being entirely truthful? She wouldn't put it past a Holmes, that's for sure. All she could do was rely on misdirection and hope for the best.
"Do you want these guys caught or not?" she sighed, "If I recall, you were the one that talked me into this in the first place with your impassioned speech about the good of the country and all that."
She heard Mycroft draw a breath just then.
"I want to hear back from you in twenty-four hours," he said.
"Forty-eight," she bounced back, "I have no idea how deep this rabbit hole will go."
"Fine. But if you find yourself in too deep we'll pull you out and have special-ops take care of it."
"Understood."
The line closed.
Samantha let out a long sigh of frustration.
"I don't pay you to follow your hunches, you know," she mimicked Mycroft in an exaggerated accent. "We'll have special-ops take care of it."
Special-ops her backside. This was her mission and she was going to finish it. There was only one thing she needed to do before she could proceed and further though. She had to find Moriarty.
