Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It's raining today. The streets walkways that snake through Yongen-Jaya are like narrow veins; one forks off into two and ends abruptly and it's hard to tell where there's going to be a dead end or an impasse. Each little branch is concave so that the rain water pools in a point and runs toward the storm drains.

The whole thing is flooded with people carrying their umbrellas and protective plastic bags used for shopping. A man smokes off to the side of Cafe LeBlanc, the shoulders of his dark business suit splattered with rain.

The cafe bell rings and a woman steps out. She is wearing a white blouse that fits snugly and is tucked into her black pencil skirt, her hair is a white gray, though it's not clear if this is dyed or something genetic.

If it is dyed, it's a damn good dye job that she bothers to keep up with.

"Thanks for the drink," she says over her shoulder. Her left heel is back slightly to hold the door open and as she lets it go someone yells from inside.

"Hey, we're not done here yet!"

She continues down the narrow alley-like sidewalk as distant thunder rumbles over the city. The trains will be filled up today, despite the incident with the crash months ago, people won't want to be out in this weather. As she forks her way through the crowds and passes countless storefronts selling everything from second-hand items to pharmaceuticals a strange wave of something passes over her. She quickens her pace, her heels splashing through the deepest part of the alley as she squeezes between two passing people and banks hard to turn for the station.

Over the patter of the rain there's a misstep in the pattern of the footsteps behind her and someone pauses and then sets out behind her as she enters the station.

At the bottom of the steps she slips into a little nook off to the side of the entrance to the station and presses her back against the wall in an attempt to stay in the shadows.

The Tokyo District Special Investigation Department wasn't the kind of hands on group that usually had to involve themselves with the rough-and-tumble day to day parts of investigation, she wasn't going to let herself be intimidated. Even if there was some truth to the rumor that a person was behind the Mental Shutdowns.

The stranger stepped into view, chiseled chin and a dark crop of unruly hair reigned in by a cap. His eyes were gray-green and he looked to be European or American -- Caucasian with thin, pale lips. He also looked to be wealthy, no matter where person was you could pick that up on them. His style of dress, the way in which he carried himself...he was from money or high status, or he thought he should be.

She clutches her cellphone in hand, waiting for him to give her an excuse to make the call to the police, but the man stops right past where she is hiding and without turning to face her speaks her name. "Prosecutor Niijima?" his Japanese is good. If she hadn't seen his face she would have guessed he was native. "I'm not the one you should be worrying about," he says.

"How do you know who I am?" she asks.

The man plucks the cap off of his head and some of his hair tries to cling to the inside causing it to stick up in a mess. His face is familiar now that she's looking right at him and she's heard his voice on the phone before. His name comes to her almost at the exact moment he says it.

"I'm Sherlock Holmes, we spoke in the past?"

She sticks her hand out. "Sherlock-Shi," she gives a little bow of her head. He kept a blog online for years that she took an interest in, though her English isn't great and the translation engines online back then left something to be desired. Then a year ago an Irish criminal was known to be in Japan. The criminal had been a remnant of some network that Holmes was hunting, a Sebastian Moran.

Sherlock bows in return. "There's no need," he says slipping the hat back on.

"How did you find me?" she asks.

Sherlock hands her a damp piece of paper, a card from a hotel advertising an upscale restaurant that has something English scribbled on it. She studies the words long enough to know get the gist before he says it. "The Mental Shutdowns, as you call them, they're not an accident. They're targeted."

"What makes you so sure?" Sae asks.

"Let's go somewhere that we can talk?" he says.

Sae nods and the two of them strike off to find somewhere to sit.

Junes Department store, in an effort to be associated with more cultured things, has small coffee shops inside that are meant to invoke the kind of Westernized sensibility of a Starbucks or a bookstore coffee shop. Sae could admit that they didn't have the rich taste of LeBlanc going for them and their coffee often smelled burnt, but they were usually empty and quiet inside this time of day.

An instrumental version of the Junes theme song played on a loop, though the coffee shop seems to have beeb built to mostly drown it out. Sae and Sherlock sit at a small round table near a plate glass window looking out into the Shibuya district streets.

She takes a sip from her overpriced bottled water and a bit of lipstick clings to the top of it. "What did you find?" she asks.

"Information that I had stored away. I didn't know it at the time, but my brain would draw the connection years later."

"I don't follow."

"Between 1999 and 2009 a series of cases of something known as Apathy Syndrome or Mass Lethargy Syndrome were reported in and around Tatsumi Port Island, victims of it often lost their will to speak or interact. Some of them went on to commit suicide. It would make sense that if someone found a way to weaponize the cause of that, they could disable targeted people, even people they didn't have readily access to."

Sae leaned forward onto the table, jostling her bottle of water so she was forced to catch it. "How do you surmise that someone is triggering them and what are the connections to the targets?"

"The connection between the targets might require us to know the type of person who could do this. The The Kirijo Group had a research lab near Tatsumi Port Island and those cases didn't begin until there was an explosion killing several researchers on that island," he says.

"It was a while ago, but I remember reading something about that. What happened to those cases?" Sae asks.

"They stopped in late 2009 or early 2010 abruptly and nothing like it has happened again with any kind of note until here. Someone involved with the Kirijo Group or who had access to their work is using whatever that incident uncovered to murder people."

"This isn't substantial enough to go to my bosses with," Sae says. "Did Scotland Yard send you because something trigged this discovery or--"

"Scotland Yard doesn't send me anywhere. I am an independent investigator who takes cases they would have never solved and works them out."

Sae sighs. "This is compelling and, now that you mention it, the cases you're talking about from 2009 do look remarkably similar to what's happening here. But we would need hard evidence that there was something else."

Sherlock stands up from the chair, his body is lanky and slender, though not in the awkward way. He buttons his suit coat over his white shirt -- he's not wearing a tie -- and slings his overcoat around, slipping his arms back into their sleeves. "The evidence I have fills up two small boxes. I've stowed it in my hotel," he says. "It was too much to carry and it seemed like the kind of thing that someone could be killed for."

Sae grabs his arm. "You're serious about this, aren't you?"

"No, I regularly fly to halfway around the world to meet women I barely know with theories that I am not serious about."

She didn't know what it was about the way he said that, but it upset her. She was quiet as they made their way back to this hotel, it was Shibuya Excel Hotel Tokyu. It was one of the places that it seemed like a Western would pick and it was directly connected to Shibuya Station with a view overlooking Shibuya Scramble Crossing.

The room was all beige and brown with a table set near the window. The wall behind the head boards of the bed was mauve and had a fibrous pattern to it. Sherlock surveyed the room as they stepped in. "As expected," he says.

"What?" asks Sae.

"This room isn't rented in my name. I placed it under a mister Haggart Batt. I tucked the files away here in case someone suspected something and came looking for them." Sherlock crawled up to the edge of the bed pulled out a small knife which he used to pry open the black board that kept things from sliding under the bed. He then extracted four stacks of file folders and baggies of evidence.

"That's...really clever." Sae said. "Why did you come here to investigate this though. You said it yourself, this is really far for you to travel for a case."

Sherlock starts to stack the files on neatly in a row so they can be more easily divided up. "Toxicology reports, autopsies, background checks -- the victims of these mental shutdowns don't have any pathogen or influential narcotic in their system. You could claim it's a threat against family or the promise that their loved ones will be cared for if they do it, but there's no evidence of that," he glances over his shoulder at Sae and she sees a hunger in his eyes that wasn't previously there. "I look at the average mundane case that I catch wind of and do you know what I see, boring. But this is a massive puzzle that people haven't even found all of the pieces for yet, let alone begun working out. This is the greatest pleasure in life."

She didn't know what to say to that.

They started to spread the files out on the dresser and bed and the table, Sherlock read through bits of them as they worked. "The May 1999 explosion that killed several people was mostly blamed on Eiichiro Takeba, one of the head scientists with the Kirijo Group."He flipped that paper face down into a waiting pile.

Sae took to her stacks of various articles and clippings and some of what looked to be government paperwork. She pauses to look at some scribbling that claims Hitler was alive in well in the 90s and shakes it off. "Some of this stuff is of questionable realism."

"We wouldn't know where to look if we didn't look anywhere," Sherlock says. He throws open another folder. "A woman here might have answers for us, she was in the Kirijo Groupas a researcher and her name appears on a roster of...she committed suicide a couple of years ago."

"Suicide? What was her name?"

"A Wakaba Ishika..." Sherlock says.

Sae nearly pounces on him, crawling over his shoulder to get at the folder he's holding. "That's a definite connection. The coffee shop that I visited earlier, LeBlanc, the man there was involved with Wakaba Ishika and is the legal guardian of her daughter. What are the odds that one of the first connections we would have to the Kirijo Groupwould have recently killed themselves?"

"Highly improbable, especially from a woman with a history of no metal illness. It's noted here." Sherlock says.

She still draped over him, her elbows pressed flat against his chest as she dangles her midriff over his shoulder. He smells delightful -- she didn't think that she would get to know that about the British detective from the TV who's blog she read years ago. "You're--you're as good as--"

"Shh," he grabs her face with his palm, holding her mouth shut. "Listen to that," he whispers.

Sae Niijima listens to the sound of nothing. It's just silence. "I don't hear anything."

"Right, perfect silence. We're in the middle of one of the busiest cities in the world on a Monday evening."

Outside the streets of Shibuya were silent. No people, no cars, no movement of any kind. Sae went to the window slowly. "How could this--" Sae starts.

Something creaks outside of the door like weight on the floor and Sherlock dives off of the bed and pushes Sae to the floor beside the dresser. A bullet rips through the door and then another and another.

The door explodes inward to reveal a figure who seems to be clad in oil. He wears a mask that has a long bird-like beak protruding from it and he's carrying a pistol. Sherlock springs up from spot hunched against Sae, grabbing the pole of the floor lamp and expertly knocking the gun in the figure's hand to side.

There's an explosion of plaster as the gun goes off. Sherlock's ears are ringing, but he brings his elbows up to shield his face and bobs to one side before swinging a right hook into the side of their would be assassin's chest.

The killer is caught off guard and stumbles back hitting the wall next to the bed. He catches hold of the lamp as Sherlock drops it and smashes it into the Detective.

Just as Sherlock drops to the side Sae is there and kicks the black figure in the chest. He stumbles back out of the room and his the door opposite theres and she follows this attack up kneeing him in the groin. Sae and her sister were the daughters of a police officer. For that reason he knew how dangerous the world could be and insisted that his children know how to defend themselves.

The figure is jostled and falls to his knees and his cellphone falls out, in his rush to get it he hits the screen with his thumb. There's no discernible app running, just some kind of picture with a black eye on a red murky background. Something in the air changes and the figure is charging down the hall running.

Sae goes back to check on Sherlock and call the police, but as she shuts the door she notices there's no bullet holes. The wall where the gun went off is fine too. But she could smell the plaster and gun-smoke in the air.

The lamp that had hit Sherlock was swung with some kind of inhuman strength, but she was sure that they had experienced all of that when she got a look at his side. There were small lacerations where the lamp had pounded into him. She pressed at the skin over his ribs to check for any sign of breakage. He winced slightly, but it seemed like a minor bruise.

Sherlock strips the rest of the way out of his shirt. "We are most assuredly close to something." He has difficulty getting the shirt up over his head and Sae steps in to help him.

"Let me help," she says. There was a scar on his chest where it looked like he had been shot some time ago, Sae doesn't question it and tries to ignore him shirtless in front of her while at the same time trying not to think about what she's witnessed with their killer. "What was that--it was almost like he was covered in living shadows."

"Some kind of next generation camouflage?" Sherlock says wincing. "There's been talk about that sort of thing for some time, though someone who would have it has powerful benefactors."

"Well, as you can see, I don't frighten easily." Sae says in a firm tone. "Still, we should get you to a hospital," she says.

"I survived being shot, I shall survive this," he says.

There's a long time where only the sounds of the traffic outside in Shibuya and the pulsing of the air conditioner can be heard. She helps Sherlock back into his shirt and buttons it up for him. Her fingers nimbly work at the top button for a moment and she pauses.

"It's unlikely that this will allow me to break the case," Sae says. "The people behind this are connected to one of the largest conglomerates in the world and have enough money to employ an assassin using top secret military technology -- if they don't have my job then they will suppress anything I put out there."

"So it's your plan to give up then," Sherlock turns away from her to finish messing with his collar.

"No, I know the truth now, this isn't just some fluke incident outbreak. This is targeted and that means I know what I'm looking for. If need be I can stack the deck against them, justice is just a series of rigged victories masquerading as proven truths. Now we just find the culprit."

Sherlock picks up one of the papers off of the bed. It's a picture of Wakaba Ishika with a photocopy of her suicide note pinned to it. "Whatever she was working on will tell us who our suspects are..."

"I have to go," Sae says. "They've just collared a huge criminal because he confessed to his crimes and there's bound to be a lot of work to do there. Plus I'd like to let my sister know I'm okay."

"You're talking about Kaneshiro?" Sherlock asks. "I read the news when I first arrived. These Phantom Theives supposedly made him confess."

"Still haven't figured that one out," she says. "But I can't just let vigilantism and lawlessness run loose in my city." She writes her phone number and e-mail on a piece of hotel stationary with a nearby pen. "You're going to want to move your files, your hiding place was compromised."

She suspects that Sherlock would like to as if she needs to be walked back to the station, but the look on his face tells her he through the better of it.

Chapter Text

When the door opens, Makoto looks up from the notebook that she's writing in. Her white school shirt is untucked and her hair is pulled back into as much of a ponytail as length will allow. "Hey sis," she says from her spot on the floor in front of the coffee table. She shifts on her knees straightening her posture and leaning back into the side of the couch.

There's a report blaring in the background on the TV about the Phantom Thieves of Hearts that causes Sae to pause as they show footage of the confession by a gangster that several task forces had been unable to take down. "Hey," Sae says, lowering her head. "You haven't noticed anything strange lately, have you?"

"You mean something to do with these cases you've been working on?" asks Makoto. "No."

"This is a little different--something happened earlier today." Sae says.

Makoto looks at her waiting for the rest of the story.

"It's nothing really, just remember to be aware of your surroundings and if you see someone that looks suspicious, get someplace safe and you call me."

Makoto gets up and winds her way out from behind the couch to face her sister. "But, I'm not sure I under--"

"I just need you to be safe, I can't have you--just be safe..." Sae wraps her arms around Makoto's shoulders, awkwardly squeezing her in for a hug. She holds her tight for a short few seconds before there's any response. "What--what's going on? Is everything okay?" Makoto asks in a small voice.

"Yeah, it's just, there's a lot on my mind. But look, I picked up some dinner." They were just instant noodles, but it was something that Makoto had secretly loved from the time that she was little. She often came off as more buttoned up than she truly was, but Makoto knew how to eat and these noodles had driven away some of the worst moods.

Tonight it seemed that things were different. All of the stress of what had happened and whatever was going on with Makoto lately seemed thicker than any food could cut through. They must have just needed time alone to clear their heads.

"It's getting late, why don't you go ahead and get ready for bed," she says stepping back.

With a nod Makoto is gone off into the other room. Sae retrieves the remote from the cushion of the couch and turns the TV off. When things were stressful she usually unwound with a cup of coffee or a jog, neither of those seemed appropriate, especially after someone had tried to attack her earlier tonight. Something told her that they wouldn't try again, at least not now.

Sae's room was barren, at one point there had been decoration and picture of idols that she admired and posters from the movies she liked, but now it was just plain white walls and a single picture of her, her father, and Makoto on the bedside table holding her phone charger cable in place during the day.

Before their father died she had been someone. She had things she liked. She went on real dates and had free time with people who she knew from places besides work and laughed with in front of ramen places.

Who were her friends now?

She changed out of her work clothes and took a quick shower. it might be a weird practice, but she hated working out already with work all over her still. She needed to wash that away so she could truly relax.

It was still drizzling when she got outside after her shower, she didn't even bother to completely dry her hair. Her clothing was simple enough, a formfitting shirt with short sleeves that stopped just past her shoulders and a pair of tight pants that ended just above her ankle.

The rain had chilled everything and the streets smelled fresh and revitalized. Small streams of water rushed along side the sidewalks and roared down the drains as the city drainage fought to catch up with the remains of the deluge earlier. But it was peaceful now, most of the people who would have been milling about had cleared out and the lights from the buildings reflected up off the concrete causing everything to glow.

She started down sidewalk in front of their building, passing the man who watched the entrance. He waved to her as she darted past and she nodded back, not wanting to break her stride.

They didn't live far from the heart of Shibuya and the shops and night life there meant there would almost always be people of all types around. It made her feel safer to have others, witnesses, in case this black clad assassin showed up again.

She checks the time on her cellphone as she stops under the glowing blue reflection of a sign on a building side. Everything around her goes red as the sign changes and to show a Coca-Cola ad. There's a flicker of lighting in the distance.

"There's more coming," she says in a voice so small that she's not even sure she's speaking out loud.

Sae is out in the streets longer than she expects and soon the thunder is audible and it rumbles deep in her chest each time it happens. She's been jogging, not paying attention to where she is or what's around her and that's when she glances up from the lit sidewalk to see the hotel where Sherlock and she were attacked earlier.

She walks into the lobby and nods to the man at the front desk. "Good evening, ma'am, may I help you?"

"I was here with a man earlier, I've come back to speak with him."

The desk attendant nods and goes back to whatever it is he is doing on the computer at his desk as she presses the button to call the elevator. Sherlock had two rooms, one where he kept the files and another actually registered under his name. She figured that he would probably stay where the files had been or maybe she was just unlucky and she would be unable to find him.

Third floor, she returns to the room from before to knock on the door and almost immediately her phone chimes.

Is that you, outside? - SH

Yea. She texts back.

Sherlock pulls the door open a split second later. She didn't know what she expected -- she couldn't picture the detective in sleep clothes: shorts, underwear, those soft loose pajama pants that men often wear. None of those things seemed like the kind of things that Sherlock Holmes would wear.

She figured he was just born in a suit that somehow grew with his body. It seemed more plausible than a relaxed look Sherlock.

He was still in his clothes from earlier, sans coat. His hair was still damp, flattened against the sides of his face in slicked together tendrils. There was a half-finished glass of dark liquor clasped between his hand as he waved her in. "By all means, Investigator, come in. I'm eager to see what you have on the case. I knew you would return with something."

She takes a seat on the chair by the window as he glances her over. He climbs onto the bed, perching in a squatting position and pointing at her. "Out for a jog?"

"It clears my head," Sae says. "But this isn't about the case. Well, not exactly anyway." It looks like Sherlock is going to say something before she cuts in and continues. "I never get to talk to anyone who does this. Everyone I work with hates me. Being the woman in the office means I get to be the friendly pushover or the insufferable bitch. I chose the latter because I have a sister to look after..."

"People hate me, but that's mostly because I am reminding them how constantly wrong they are," Sherlock says. It's a wonder we've lasted this long as a species."

There was no humor in his tone, but Sae laughs. "It's hard being smarter than everyone," she says. "You know, they let some kid come in, this Akechi Goro, and help work the case. They take his word more serious than mine and he's no older than my sister."

Sherlock points to another glass on the dresser near her that is flipped upside down on a napkin next to a bottle of scotch. "Pour a glass," he says. "John's not here to drink it with me. I'm going to need someone's assistance."

Sae pours the glass and takes one quick gulp from it downing half of her glass in an instant. And then she tells Sherlock about her life. About how she's restricted from the kinds of things that she really wants to do because of Makoto and how the loss of their parents shouldn't necessarily be the end of her youth, but it already has been that.

And while she does this she pours another glass. And another. And still another.

After a while Sherlock is laying on the bed with his eyes shut, though he responds to her every few seconds to let her know he hasn't fallen asleep. When the bottle died off she moved to sit next to him on the bed, her weight pressed right in next to his midriff.

There had been a lot of news about Sherlock Holmes a few years back. A report saying that he died and then another saying he hadn't. Then there was one claiming he killed a man and then that too changed. Sae had heard he was cold and didn't care about others, but maybe somewhere along that journey he learned to pretend really well. Or maybe...

Sae halts her current thought and turns to Sherlock. "I need you to answer a question for me and even though it's you, I will know you're lying."

Sherlock opens his eyes, Her change in tone and energy wasn't lost on him. He eyed her with anticipation.

"Do you find me, attractive. British men find Japanese women attractive, right?" she asks.

"All men find all women attractive, in my experience," he says not giving a direct answer.

Sae turns her body more toward him. "If I kissed you right now, would you get offended, mad, or in trouble with your girlfriend -- or boyfriend, it feels like it would be a girlfriend."

In her drunken state she didn't have that buttoned up demeanor that she had exhibited earlier in the day. Couple that with the fact that it was later than she was used to being up and she was downright wobbling from side to side to try and sit up straight.

"This is a completely new line of questioning..."

Sae turns so that she's up on the bed next to him and lifts one leg over him to sit straddled across him, her legs open across his lap and her legs running back along the sides of his. She gets down close to his face so that her white-gray hair is dangles down over the sides of his cheeks enveloping the two of them in their own little privacy curtain. The air between them is heavy with the smell of liquor and sweat.

"What would you do if I got close...like this?" Sae says, her cheeks redden furiously and there's a small smirk on her face. She waits for a moment before kissing him off to the side of the mouth. "This isn't meant to be serious. We live a world apart, but we almost got assassinated earlier and it made me think--I've been on a bit of a dry spell."

Sherlock finally spoke, his voice a soft rasp, like he couldn't believe the words coming out of his own mouth. "We can't have that."

Sae rolled her weight back so that it she was balanced on his lap more. She felt the moment that he went hard under her weight and she wastes no time taking advantage of her positioning. She snakes her hand down the front of his pants and under the waistband of his boxer briefs. Her hand finds it's target and she makes slow, short strokes as she watches his face from where she rests off to the side of him.

They lay like this for a long time. As things progress her pace quickens and he bucks against her. Sherlock works his hand up under her shirt and uses his position to force her shirt higher until her bra is exposed. Sae lets out a sigh and throws her hands around behind her back to help him with the bra. She forces her shirt up over her head following that and he's at her breast nibbling softly around the center and making hungry little, guttural noises.

He's on his back then and she's taking his cock into her mouth. She's rough and fast with no regard for spit or, apparently, breathing. Sherlock grips her hair, curling his fingers up in the white-gray strands. She pulls back for a moment and runs her thumb over the purple head of his cock.

"We need to finish you off, this looks painful." She takes him fully into her mouth again and it's only a few moments before he cums in her mouth.

Sae and Sherlock never actually get down to proper intercourse. She straddles his face while he sucks and licks furiously at her until she cums until the muscle spasming hurts.

They lay in the bed half naked and in their own filth and just talk until the early morning. She will occasionally reach down and play with him, thumb the soft head of his dick and run her hand up and down the length of it.

"Will your sister be okay by herself?" he asks, his breathing begins to pick up slightly.

"There are many days when she wakes up without me there--she won't notice anything different," she says. "I'm basically her ATM," Sae says quietly.

It's clear that Sherlock doesn't know what to say to that. Finally he speaks. "My flight is supposed to leaving later today. I could--"

"It's better if we don't dwell on it too much, this was good."

"Yeah."

Before long Sae is sleeping and Sherlock slips out of the bed to wash his face and throw on a button up shirt and a pair of knit trousers. He grabs his phone and heads out into the street. He's not sure where he's going, just yet, but he knows for sure it's there.

He holds his iPhone up, checking the home screen and scrolling to the side to find the desired app. Red and black image of an eye with a star for its pupil. Of course this was different from the other times. Port Island was triggered by a time change, every night at midnight the world just froze. Inaba wasn't so much triggered as it was that you entered a television. Things changed in each incident and there was evidence that this had happened before, further back. The Velvet Room and the Shadows. Something was sending them places and wherever they appear death and destruction followed.

Sherlock pressed the eye-app and held his phone up to his mouth, clearing his throat. "Sae Niijima."

A robotic female voice comes out of phone. "Match found."

Sherlock nods to himself. "Of course there is."

Each of these instances of these other worlds seemed to go by its own rules. Sherlock makes sure that he is clear of any other people before he touches the app on his home screen and there's a pop in his chest, like a change in pressure.

The area of Tokyo that he stands in now is a mirror of a real world location. This far from one of the subsections controlled by a wayward shadow things looked more or less normal, but the way things look normal in one of those gritty David Fincher movies. Everything is too high contrast and stylized just a bit too much.

He looks down at himself, his clothes changed the last time, but that was when he was very near that flying fortress, the one that he could have only was controlled by the crime lord. Best guess was that when an area's controlling shadow saw you as a threat your clothing changed.

Sherlock had found himself in a full face mask of a stoic face with a small wedge in the bottom missing for the mouth and chin, the mask was split down the middle with one white side and one black. His suit, which he had been wearing then, changed into a white cloak with red lining and a white suit with flourishes of embroidery in black and gold adorning it.

Though it's hard to admit, Sherlock doesn't understand everything happening here and it seems that things are more dangerous than just him losing his own life. He had been too late to the last instances. In Port Island he knew there was something going on in a tower that took up residence in the center of the city, but it was too much of a slog to climb. And in Inaba the murderer was brought to justice just days after he arrived. He had time to explore the other world, though he felt that there was some risk he might be discovered if he lingered too long.

This time he had been confronted in his dreams of all places. He only believed that it had happened because after that dream he saw the door with the small eye patch wearing girl sitting atop it in an alley way as people walked right through and past her.

The man, Igor, he had called himself instructed Sherlock that his participation was not required. That he would leave at once lest he risk those he loves.

Usually this would have been a challenge for Sherlock, but with his friends and brother so far separated from him he knew he would just have to do what this Igor said. He'd have to find another way into that other world, hopefully in London.

And he would have to leave things up to those who he assumed were working the case, the Phantom Thieves.