Part 2:

The thugs had tied the two of them to wooden chairs, side by side, and seemed content to make small talk after that. Sherlock of course could have escaped his bonds in a few minutes, but he thought it rather more important at this juncture to find out what, (as John was fond of saying,) the hell was going on. He conveyed this to John by looking him in the eye, and John, in one of his usual odd moments of high perceptiveness, nodded subtly in response.

They would await further information before making their move.

After a tedious hour spent waiting for the wealthy megalomaniac who had orchestrated their kidnapping (obvious- the thugs had the best equipment available on the market, were extremely well-trained, and only a megalomaniac would feel the need to gather a private army and then use them to snatch Sherlock and John off the street, and then offer them very expensive whiskey once they had been settled in the basement of the expensive townhouse) Sherlock was unimpressed by the lisping American with the poor taste in food (McDonalds barely counted as sustenance,) who walked in.

His assistant bodyguard, the French-Algerian woman with the intriguing prostheses (so that was what that sound had been, and Sherlock had only had a few seconds to glance at them, but he was almost certain that she could -and had- used them to kill) who followed immediately after was a little more interesting, and by extension made her employer mildly more interesting, but really, Sherlock was annoyed about being treated like a sack of potatoes, and he had sensed the building of John's irritation over the last few hours (John's irritation was his to cause,) and really, he just wanted this imbecile to get to the point so he could start working on an escape plan before Mycroft stuck his fat nose in.

"…Richmond Valentine?" John sounded incredulous.

Sherlock frowned internally, now why did that name sound familiar…? Oh.

"Richmond Valentine as in the creator of the MFV encryption software?" Sherlock asked.

John made the slight choking sounds he sometimes made when he thought Sherlock was being incredibly dense about something that would no doubt prove to be exceptionally boring. "Richmond Valentine as in the CEO of the Valentine Corporation, one of the biggest computer tech companies in the world," John corrected reminded him.

Ah. Well considering the fact that this Richmond Valentine had seen fit to use a percentage of his billions of dollars to kidnap the two of them (and no doubt more people) this was not the irrelevant fact Sherlock might have previously considered it to be.

(Sometimes, sometimes, John had a point about pop culture. It was fortunate that Sherlock had him around to act as the auxiliary brain to remember all the dross that very occasionally came in useful for Cases, because otherwise the sheer unrelenting mundanity of it would have crushed his intellect.)

Sherlock turned his attention to Valentine, who was watching him with no little fascination. "I'd be offended that you'd never heard of me, but you've apparently heard of one of my favourite creations, and that's kinda…"

"Weird?" the body guard drawled, amusement tucked into the corners of her subtly lipsticked mouth.

"Nah," Valentine shook his head, "I was gonna say refreshing." He grinned. "I was always really proud of that one."

"It is the best product on the mainstream market, although a few years ago I did find one programme by an enterprising young hacker going by the moniker W1zardr1 that might be better," Sherlock mused, ignoring the way John subtly kicked his ankle.

Sherlock was interested to see that Valentine was unruffled by this assertion. It wasn't often that he met a genius megalomaniac that did not mind being outperformed.

"I know," Valentine said, grinning wider. "I tracked her down and hired her, and now she's working for me." And making me quite a bit of money, Valentine didn't say, but Sherlock was nothing if not adept at reading between the lines. So Valentine was a pragmatist, who would rather add an asset to his collective than destroy them. An interesting trait in a megalomaniac.

"As fascinating as this all is," John stated dryly, "is there a particular reason why you felt the need to kidnap us?"

The bodyguard stepped closer, her prostheses making a sound akin to knives sharpening (not a coincidence, Sherlock realised, and oh, what a fascinating design for a murder weapon). "You failed to return my assistant's phonecalls when she tried to set up a meeting."

John looked at Sherlock, and Sherlock ignored the faintly accusatory expression. He had been able to tell that said assistant had been lying about the purpose of the meeting, and had at the time not been interested enough to care about why. It wasn't the first time that a frustrated prospective client had resorted to drastic means to catch his attention, but he had to admit, there were only a handful of people who had ever tried kidnapping. (Mycroft, Moriarty, that Duke and Duchess who had wanted him for less interesting organs than his brain…)

"Well, you have my undivided attention," Sherlock lied smoothly. (No one ever had his undivided attention. Well not his completely undivided attention. It wasn't like Sherlock could ignore data, and there was always data.)

Valentine's grin widened to display a tooth with a gold filling (how gaudy), and he proceeded to explain Gaia theory to his captive audience.

He spoke passionately, in the manner of a man who has stood on many podiums giving rousing speeches to great applause.

He spoke of how the Earth was going to kill them all, because humans were like a virus, and how he had a plan to save humanity from extinction, and how people like Sherlock (and John, Valentine supposed, since they seemed to come as a package deal) were going to be integral in creating the new world order.

Afterwards, there was a brief pause.

Sherlock considered the many and myriad responses that he had available to him. How should he best phrase this?

"What a complete and utter crock of shit," John stated bluntly. "You are completely off your rocker."

Not the words that Sherlock would have chosen, but they made up for their crassness with their succinctness. (It did unfortunately mean that the bluffing option was off the table, but he would be damned if he let Watson die alone. Never. Not if he had anything to say about it. Ah well, better out with a bang than a whimper.)

"Whilst in utilitarian terms your logic is impeccable, I'm afraid that in every other respect I agree with Doctor Watson's assertion," Sherlock confirmed, watching as the expressions around them darkened.

The bodyguard rolled her eyes. "I suppose we shouldn't be surprised that someone who values the law and catches murderers would be disinclined towards becoming an accessory to mass murder," she commented dryly.

It really should have offended Sherlock that that comment just made John burst out laughing.

(Maybe if it was his moral compass that drove him to solve crimes it might have.

On the other hand, Valentine seemed to think he was doing something moral, so it just went to show, good intentions really did pave the road to hell.)

Instead, he just joined John in his mirth and snickered derisively. Honestly, where had they got their information?

"So you won't cooperate?" Valentine asked him, sounding crestfallen. "Well that sure is a shame. You would have come in handy for figuring out where that guy was from."

The bodyguard placed a comforting hand on Valentine's shoulder. "We could always threaten the good doctor's life," she suggested.

The laughter cut out.

"I would rather die than be used to force Sherlock to go along with your farce," John snarled.

"And when he inevitably forced you to kill him," Sherlock added, glaring, "I would become your unshakeable, unsleeping, unceasing nemesis."

"Aw," Valentine visibly drooped. "That's no fun." He turned to his bodyguard. "And I thought we agreed no blackmail. I only want volunteers for the programme, Gazzy, you know that. And no unnecessary killing. You know how much I hate the sight of blood."

'Gazzy' shrugged, unperturbed albeit mildly exasperated. "You're the boss. Alright boys," she said, addressing the assembled thugs. "You know what to do."

Before Sherlock could escape his bonds, he was injected with a sedative. Dimly, he heard John swearing, and assumed that the same thing was happening to him.

…

…

When Sherlock regained consciousness, it was in a small, white-walled cell. He quickly ascertained that he was almost certainly located deep underground, there was no way for him to view the keypad for the electronic lock keeping the door closed, and his best chance of managing his own escape would require at least one particularly incompetent guard.

He was forced to come to the unpleasant conclusion that his and John's (assuming that they hadn't just… no. They might not understand why John was so so important, but Valentine had said… no, Sherlock needed to focus on things he knew and could prove, not things that were only, at this point horrible possibilities) escape was most likely going to be dependent on how long it took Mycroft's minions to find them.

Sherlock considered his soonest estimate of that eventuality (a few days), and contemplated the fact that he was trapped in a cell which offered very little in regards to stimuli to keep him distracted from being concerned about John's welfare or what was potentially happening outside in the world whilst Valentine ran free to cause havoc, mayhem and devastation.

And he was helpless to act in any way that might stop the madman.

Ah, Sherlock realised despondently.

So this was hell.