Disclaimer: I do not own Detective Conan/Case Closed.

Pairing: KaitoxShinichi

When the Fox Comes Calling

Chapter 2 - The Domino Effect

Shinichi would like to say that he realized his mistake the moment those ill-considered words left his mouth. After all, though he would never claim to be the soul of tact, he had learned to curb his tongue somewhat over the years. And he had seen more than his fair share of the nastiness that rude words could sew, intentionally or otherwise. If he had thought of all this, he might have apologized despite not feeling very sorry for the sake of peace. But alas, all he did was yank his arm from Sylva's grasp and glare at him.

There was a very awkward moment of silence before Kuro let out a bark of laughter. His cousin snarled and bared his fangs at him. "Shut up!"

And Shinichi took the opportunity to pull Ran over to where he'd seen Sonoko and usher the both of them straight out the door, believing that none of them would ever have to deal with the suspicious cousins (if indeed they really were cousins) again.

And that presumption too turned out to be a mistake.

As things were, he spent the next ten minutes suffering through Sonoko's complaints about being dragged away from the restaurant before she'd had the chance to order dessert.

"You better have a good reason," she huffed. She continued to scowl as he and Ran took turns explaining what had happened with the dog and fox hybrids who had accosted them. When they had finished, she turned her baleful glare on Shinichi.

"What is it with you and foxes anyway?"

Shinichi frowned. "What do you mean?"

Sonoko snorted. "Some detective you are. Haven't you noticed? There was that guy on our middle school soccer team and then that upperclassman who used to train with Ran at her dojo. And don't forget that waiter who just started at the café under Ran's apartment. I swear he's always watching you when we're there."

Shinichi opened his mouth then shut it again. He knew the waiter she was talking about, and he also knew that that particular fox hybrid had been watching him because the man was an undercover law enforcement agent who had been trying to recruit him, but as for the other two, he had no idea what she was talking about.

Sonoko must have read the confusion in his face because she sighed. "You really are hopeless. Honestly, we can't take you anywhere! If it's not one thing then it's another. Do you have any idea what kind of opportunity we just missed? That restaurant's strawberry shortcake won an award last year! And after we waited all that time in line too!"

Fortunately, they came upon a bakery that was offering special deals on strawberry roll cakes that a friend of Ran's from karate club had told them were divine. So they had their dessert there at the bakery instead. And the roll cake turned out to be splendid indeed—so much so that, when the girls each bought a whole one to bring home, Shinichi did as well.

With the cakes in hand, they decided it was time to head home. Ran suggested that they all head to her place where they could leave their cakes in her refrigerator temporarily so they could head to the site of the KID heist together. Sonoko agreed readily, but Shinichi declined. He wanted to go home and get at least a little time in peace before the heist. He would need his wits about him if he was going to be dealing with KID after all. He needed to rid himself of the frazzled feeling their encounter at the restaurant had engendered in him. A little reading in the quiet should help him regain his focus.

And so his chain of mistakes continued.

If he had gone along with Ran's plan then he wouldn't have been alone when he'd set out for the KID heist. He would also likely have been on one of the Suzuki family's cars because Sonoko most certainly would have called for one to ensure that she arrived at the heist location on time. If anything, Sonoko would have made sure they arrived at the heist location early so that she would have ample time to primp and preen in the hopes of capturing a certain thief's attention.

But alas, he was alone, and he was traveling on foot after disembarking from the train some ten blocks from the heist location. He was far from alone. The streets were filled with excited KID fans eager for a glimpse of the thief and his latest spectacular performance. There were so many of them that traffic was dreadful, and those who were just on their way home or looking for somewhere to eat their dinner were growing increasingly frustrated.

Even in the general mayhem of a lively city street, however, Shinichi spotted the suspicious shadow tailing a redheaded woman around the corner into a quieter side street. He is a detective after all, and he had trained himself to notice irregular behavior. Being a detective was also why he followed the two.

This might have been another turning point in his day except that he would have followed no matter what else was happening or how else his day might have gone. He had always believed and would always believe that it was better to try and help someone and fail than to walk away and wonder what awful thing you might have let happen by doing so.

Later, however, he would admit that he could at least have been more careful. If he had looked before he'd leapt, so to speak, he might have avoided being knocked unconscious the moment he rounded the corner.

Unfortunately, none of the many decisions he might have made differently that day had been made differently, and so here he was, swimming laboriously up out of the black well of unconsciousness as he tried to remember what had happened and figure out where in the world he was.

-0-

Shinichi's head throbbed. He couldn't move. Every muscle in his body felt as though it had been replaced by lead weights. It wasn't just his body though. The world itself seemed stuffed full of cotton wool. Sounds and smells alike seemed far away and indistinct—all fuzz with no defined edges.

His thoughts too were not unaffected. They came together then fragmented and drifted away like clouds on the wind. In this hazy world, he knew the muffled noises in his ears were voices speaking, but he couldn't for the life of him figure out what they were saying. The sounds were meaningless strings of syllables.

Slowly though, things were beginning to come back into focus.

His sense of touch was the first to return to some semblance of normalcy. He could feel that he was lying on a flat surface. It was padded but not exactly soft—perhaps a thin mattress of some kind. He had been laid out flat on his back, but his hands had been bound together to something above his head. The sensation of smooth metal against the soft skin of his wrists suggested handcuffs. Although frankly it wouldn't have mattered if he hadn't been tied up as he couldn't even twitch his fingers. He still felt as though someone or something else was in charge of his limbs. From the top of his head to the tips of his fingers and toes, nothing would respond.

Toes…

He wasn't wearing shoes or socks. Someone had taken his jacket too. He could feel the brush of air against his bare arms. In fact, he was positive he wasn't wearing his own clothes. Instead, the feel of the light fabric loosely draped about his body reminded him of something familiar.

A hospital gown. That was it. But…was he at the hospital? He remembered pursuing the suspicious shadow tailing that young woman, and he could guess that he was knocked out by something when he skidded around the corner, so maybe whoever had attacked him had left him there, and he'd been found by a passerby who called the hospital.

Except hospitals didn't typically restrain patients. No, this wasn't a hospital—or at least not a normal one, he decided. It was much more likely that he had been kidnapped.

Well that was a bother, but it was nothing to freak out about. Not yet anyway.

In his already lengthy career as a teenaged detective, Shinichi had been kidnapped before, so he knew that the most important thing he had to do in this situation was to stay calm and figure out exactly what was going on. If he panicked, it would be game over.

So he was secured to what might be a hospital bed in a hospital gown (he tried hard not to think about the fact that that meant someone had stripped him of his own clothes while he was unconscious to dress him in said gown). From the feel of the air and the sound of those voices, the room he was in probably wasn't very large. He could hear the distant rumble of traffic though, so they were still in the city. Somewhere busy.

With an effort, he turned his attention to the voices, trying to focus on them and force the sounds to begin making sense. It was difficult, but, gradually, they did. There were two speakers: a man and a woman.

"—initial examination is complete," said the woman. "And we've got the blood samples, so that's about everything we need to begin."

"Took you long enough," the male voice grumbled. If he could move, Shinichi's ears would have twitched. He knew that voice. He'd heard it just that morning—provided this was the same day anyway. It was the young man who'd called himself Sylva.

"You should really work on your patience," the woman replied, sounding amused. "It's a virtue you know."

Sylva snorted. "You're one to talk."

The two fell silent, and Shinichi could hear the sound of clicking keys and a soft whir of machinery. With another tremendous effort, he managed to crack his eyes open just a sliver.

As he had thought, the room was a small one. A closed curtain on one wall suggested the presence of a window. The other three walls were unadorned but for a single shut door. The furniture was equally lacking. Aside from the bed he was on, there was only a single desk. It was at that desk that a redheaded feline hybrid was typing away on a sleek little laptop.

It was the woman he had thought was being targeted by unsavory characters, Shinichi realized. Had the entire thing been a trap? That was looking more likely by the second. That, or this woman had also been up to no good, and so she had reacted badly to being followed by a detective. He supposed it didn't really matter at this point in time.

As he had thought, Sylva was standing by her chair, leaning over her shoulder to look at the laptop screen as she worked. Shinichi wondered what they were doing. The redhead had said something about an examination, which explained the hospital gown even as it brought up a million more questions. Whatever kind of examination she had done though, it apparently hadn't involved any other medical equipment. There was a suitcase on the desk that probably contained the blood samples the woman had mentioned and the related tools, but add the laptop and there wouldn't be much room left in said case for anything else.

Then the cat picked up a medicine case from where it had been resting by her laptop. It was the sort that had multiple small compartments to help users keep the medications organized.

"So which one shall we test on our little bunny here?" the red cat purred as she ran her fingers over the series of twelve compartments. "I say something from X1 to X9. We've had too much trouble gathering data on these rabbit types to risk this one up and dying on us just yet."

"Use the X4," Sylva said with a rather feral grin.

The red cat giggled. "Ah, because he spurned your advances? I didn't realize you were still so childish. But I suppose we do need the data. Just don't get carried away and forget to take notes."

Shinichi didn't like what he was hearing. It sounded as though they were planning to use him in some kind of experiment. And considering how he had ended up here, it must be an illegal experiment. The situation just kept getting worse. He really had to get out of here.

The problem was that none of his limbs wanted to move at all. They still felt like soft putty, all weight and no strength. The most he could do was twitch his furry ears and crack open his eyes a hair further—enough to see that the cat woman had stood up and walked over to the side of his bed.

Up close like this, he could see that she was clearly a few years older than he was just like Sylva. And like Sylva, her eyes were the sharp, clear, hunting eyes of a predator. The sight of those eyes sent a shudder through his body. It was fear. The fear that prey feels when under the gaze of the tiger about to pounce.

"So you're awake," she purred leaning down so that her face was mere inches from his. He could smell her spicy pepper scent that made him cringe.

"Such lovely eyes," she crooned, baring her fangs in a grin he could only describe as evil. "It's no wonder Sylva wants to keep you. Ah well, better get started then before old cranky pants looses his cool."

A pill appeared held between two manicured fingers. Before Shinichi could try to formulate a response, the cat had pinched the bridge of his nose and used her other hand to shove the pill as far down his throat as her long fingers could get it

He choked and gasped, working his throat muscles in a desperate attempt to get the pill out, but then water was being poured into his mouth while the cat woman held his jaw, keeping his mouth wide open. Having water flooded into his mouth and with his nose being pinched to block of that path for air, Shinichi could only choke and swallow both the water and the pill. Then that torturous moment was over, and his captors released him.

He immediately wrenched his head around to the side and tried to cough the pill out to no avail. It had already gone down the pipeline, so to speak.

"Don't worry," the red cat said lightly as she patted him on the head as though he was a child or a pet animal. "You're going to enjoy yourself. Just listen to Big Sister Scarlet. We won't hurt you. You're too precious."

With a last, tittering laugh, the cat woman shut her laptop and returned it to her suitcase. "Well Sylva, take notes on the timing of the stages. But other than that, just have fun. We all know you want to."

"Oh I intend to," the fox said with a leer and a low growl of anticipation that sent shudders racing up Shinichi's spine.

Scarlet picked up her suitcase then opened the room's one door. There, she paused as all three of them heard what sounded like a distant explosion. Frowning, the cat and the fox traded looks.

"I'll go see what it was," Scarlet said, earlier flippancy gone. "You stay here for now. But if something seems off, take our little bunny here and go. We'll meet back at HQ."

Sylva rolled his eyes. "I know, I know. It's probably just Jade and her blasted explosives though. Tell she'd better finish that cloaking system for the new base before she gets carried away with anything else if she doesn't want to be packed off back to HQ."

Scarlet chuckled. "You know as well as I do that Jade couldn't care less where she is as long as she has her toys. But I'll see what I can do. Anything to get out of this dump of a building." That said, the redhead slipped out of the room.

Sylva turned back to where Shinichi had given up on trying to cough up the unknown pill and begun trying to wiggle his hands out of their restraints. The detective hadn't made much progress however as, though his hands and feet were slowly beginning to respond to the instructions from his brain, he still couldn't exert any real strength. It was for that reason alone that he didn't kick the silver fox in the jaw when Sylva prowled over to perch on the edge of the bed.

He smirked when Shinichi glared at him.

"Aww, don't look at me like that. Aren't you happy to see me?"

Like hell, Shinichi thought, but he didn't bother to say as much. Admittedly, this was because he still felt like a cooked noodle, and he was afraid his voice would sound as weak as he felt. But Sylva didn't need to know that.

"Nothing to say? I'm disappointed. Whatever happened to that sharp tongue of yours?"

Shinichi half wished whatever that pill was he'd been given would just knock him out so he wouldn't have to listen to any more of this juvenile taunting. He thought again about trying to kick his silver-haired captor, but though he could move his leg a little, he couldn't lift it off the bed, let alone deliver a decent kick.

Sylva leaned forward, baring his fangs in a grin that set all kinds of alarms off in Shinichi's head. "I suppose we'll just have to find another use for that tongue of yours."

Shinichi could feel himself flushing, though he wasn't sure if it was in anger or a reaction to the heavy innuendos he could hear in the silver fox's voice. He became abruptly and unpleasantly aware of the fact that he was dressed only in a very thin and very loose hospital gown. And when he said dressed, he meant only that his arms had been slid through the sleeves. The gown itself had only been draped loosely about his person. The ties, as far as he could tell, hadn't even been secured.

And Shinichi wondered if maybe, just maybe, it was time to panic.

-To be Continued-