Chapter Text
It was never a particularly eventful noon in London. The pitter-patter of gentle rainfall on the pavement cast a backdrop that drowned out much of the general happenings of the public. Normally gentle rain would do little to overshadow a bustling cityscape, but compared to the begrudging norm of London’s daily life it seemed to blend right in. A couple walked out of a nearby Tesco, undoubtedly married if the rings on their fingers was anything to go by, their attention focused on anything but themselves. Opposite of them across the street, a man in a long, grey trench coat hurried along, seemingly walking with purpose while he yelled something incomprehensible into the other end of his phone, a coffee cup in his other hand. The entire scene was very mundane, very nondescript, and nothing more pleased Agatha Christie so much as staring into the streets at midday, taking in how orderly it all was. Yes, there were moments of conflict in the daily scene: occasional grade schoolers causing trouble, or the occasional shoplifting, quickly followed by the police taking action. But these moments were commonplace, so much so they were predictable, and Christie took great joy in predicting them whenever they happened. It made it all the more fun whenever something happened out of the ordinary.
It was one such noon, a particularly rainy day in London, that such a piece of extraordinary news reached her. She had been up to her usual routine, gazing out of the Order of the Clocktower’s headquarters past the roof of Westminster Palace when one of the informants of the Queen herself burst into the room bearing news. She knew at once this was urgent, if the Queen herself was informed before she had, the Queen’s very life could be at stake. At first, she was apprehensive of what she heard. The Armed Detective Agency being terrorists? It sounded almost too absurd to reasonably believe. Sure, they had made rash and rather dangerous decisions in the past, but they had always come through despite their dubious methods. However, the evidence seemed too damning to discard without notice. And yet, this turn of events strangely excited her.
As unassuming as it may seem, war was not unfamiliar to Agatha Christie. She had served as a devout nurse servicing the soldiers of the Royal Army, her ability was proven time and time again to be invaluable. Her work made her privy to many different faces, with all different kinds of ghosts behind their eyes. The hidden and twisted inner worlds of these injured soldiers fascinated her, she would see hundreds of them daily carried through the hallways of the medical wards on stretchers, all kinds of mangled and deformed. Through the years she came to see patterns in her work, patterns she came to appreciate even past her years as a nurse. Familiar bullet wounds to the same organs, the same hands blown off, the same limbs, the same areas to be treated across hundreds. Warfare was a strategic game, one where the most effective moves were learned and repeated with pinpoint precision. The soldiers’ injuries reflected this, and Christie came to find a sense of order in her work treating the same kinds of wounds again and again. The same stitches and the same surgeries, time and time again, a perfect routine that allowed her to perfect her craft, and she was proud of it. It made it all the more fascinating when there was a case of injury she had no idea about.
Every now and then, there was a soldier with a seemingly normal injury or condition, but upon further investigation Christie would find strange anomalies: their skin not reacting to treatments how they should, stitches mysteriously vanishing without trace, or perhaps even medicine having no or adverse effect at seemingly random. These were the cases that she was most intrigued by. It was the unnatural, the strange, and the mystery that hid within the plain sight of daily mundane and orderly activities that drove her. It instilled in her a deep urge to uncover the true nature behind the mundane, to tear open the sick and twisted visages of reality that lay obscured behind plain sight, and the case with the Armed Detective Agency was no different. A private agency dedicated to fighting crime, so hell-bent on upholding righteousness they seamlessly got away with atrocity. A marvelous and ingenious case, really. If anything, she had to commend them for that, and she would stop at nothing to tear open their outer shell to find what lay beneath, even if it would mangle them in the process. She dismissed the Queen’s informant promptly and made a note of his message and strode back to the window from which she conducted her daily London crowd watching, holding up her skirt before comfortably seating herself on the patterned cushion chair at the edge of the window. She reached for the cup of tea set atop the nearby coffee table–still warm–and gently blew the wafting fumes away before cautiously taking a sip. If this was a matter to be dealt with regarding much caution, she may as well start now. She ran through the details of the Detective Agency in her mind, carefully matching the patterns with the best possible choice. This is a matter of much interest, she thought. Their next move will surely bring some much-needed spice to our operations. Her mind narrowed in on one detective in specific, a particular detective known to be among the best in the entirety of the Western world, well known for both his brief relation with the Armed Detective Agency’s best, as well as his uncanny ability for deduction based on scientific observation alone, as well as his uncanny Special Ability. Agatha Christie promptly pulled out her phone, dialing his number. It rang exactly three times, then a calculating voice on the other end rang through the phone speakers.
***
Just off one of the busiest streets in London lay a rather unsuspecting side street, not particularly flamboyant or noticeable (as noticeable as something could be in the grey that is London, anyway) but home to some truly influential figures. For one it featured none other than Harry Houdini, one of the world’s most famous illusionists and showman, famous for his acts and magical machinations of misdirection during the past decades, though after his time in the war his lifestyle had become much more quaint and homely, becoming somewhat of a writer focusing on the art and science behind illusion, as well as in his interests in hobbyist model-making of airplanes and aviation. But perhaps the most notable of the figures residing within this street was none other than the brilliant detective working for the Order of the Clocktower within the shadows, hiding behind a veneer of normalcy and standard life, lounging within his decorated study, lined wall-to-wall with awards and recognitions for a variety of crimes he had solved, both legal and less-than-legal, hidden within the antique furniture and violin, within the halls of a two-bedroom London apartment. In the top floor of 221b Baker Street, lounging on a rocking chair made with a distinct rich leather, smoking a pipe, sat the best detective of the western world, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. He wore a long khaki trench coat that folded around the creases of his legs, haphazardly lazing on his chair as he rocked back and forth, and a plaid khaki hat on his head. His phone was in his hand, ringing. He waited exactly three times before picking it up. “Good afternoon, Dame Agatha,” he responded. “How may my excellence be of service to you this time?”