Sherlock ended the call and lifted his scarf from the coat rack.
"Sherlock?" Lestrade crossed his arms.
"Have to go, Lestrade" and with that Sherlock headed out the door with a stride, trying to hide his panic.
"But you haven't even finished the case yet."
"It was the sister's friend" he called as he left.
Lestrade tried to work out if he was just saying that to leave early or if it really was the sister's friend, so he decided to ignore Sherlock's deduction and get his team to go over the case once more.
As the cab approached the flat, Sherlock noticed John pacing up and down the front gate and Mrs Hudson was stood with two cups of coffee in each hand. John stopped pacing and ran towards the cab, embracing Sherlock in a tight hug the moment he stepped out. Sherlock pushed him away and walked straight to the flat, keeping his stride up.
"I need to know exactly what happened, John." Sherlock's work voice was on now.
"No, no we're not doing it like this, Sherlock."
"What?" Sherlock stopped and turned to look at John, his eyes piercing into him.
"You're not treating me like a victim of one of your cases. This is our son!"
Sherlock paused for a moment. "We're wasting time, just tell me what happened."
After John had explained that he had no idea how they had gotten in, that he hadn't heard anything after Sherlock left, Sherlock sat down putting his hands together in a praying position and resting them against his chin. John stared impatiently at his boyfriend.
"You can't be thinking! There's nothing to think about yet! We have to get out there and find our son!" There were tears forming in his eyes now.
Sherlock shot up, frustrated at John for interrupting his thoughts. "Oh yes because we're going to go out there and look for someone when we have no leads as to where they might be or who might have taken them or even if they're still alive!"
"I can't believe you." John walked out of the room and slammed the door behind him.
Mrs Hudson looked at Sherlock with disappointment.
"What?" Sherlock asked, having no idea what he had done wrong.
"Hamish has just gone missing and you're treating it like a case, like you have never even met him before! I thought you were better than this, Sherlock."
"Emotions don't get you anywhere when it comes to solving cases, Mrs Hudson. As my brother once said: caring is not an advantage."
Mrs Hudson also joined John and walked out on Sherlock, leaving him alone with his thoughts.
Sherlock grabbed his tools from the kitchen and carried them to Hamish's bedroom. The first thing he searched for was fingerprints, brushing dust off of the sides of the crib, however all he found were prints belonging to himself, John and Hamish. Whoever kidnapped Hamish wasn't worried about leaving prints, or else he would have wiped them, which would have wiped off all the other prints along with them. Sherlock should have known better than that, his enemies are smart, they wouldn't be stupid enough to leave prints, or any form of DNA, it'd be pointless even trying to look.
Just as Sherlock was leaving the bedroom, he noticed something poking out between two books on the bookshelf beside the door. He slowly approached the shelf, feeling a slight notion of fear as he thought of what it's contents could be. Sherlock convinced himself to stop being so foolish and snapped the paper up in his hand. He unfolded it and froze in place as he laid his eyes on its contents. It was not what he had expected it to be, it was a picture of the three of them - Sherlock, John and Hamish - sitting together in the grass at Hyde Park. They were all smiling, Sherlock's hands were wrapped around John's waist and John was holding Hamish close to him. The poses were Mrs Hudson's idea, Sherlock wasn't all for it at the time, but looking back at it now he couldn't help but smile at the idea of them looking like an ordinary family.
John was lying in bed trying to fall asleep, but it was impossible to put his mind at rest as he thought of what could have happened to his son. There was a creak and a strip of light entered the room as the door slowly opened.
"John?"
"Don't you think you've said enough."
"No."
John sat up and switched the lamp on so that he could see Sherlock's face. It had a remorseful look to it.
"I apologise."
"For what?"
"For what I said earlier, you're right."
John was a little bewildered by that. Sherlock never admitted he was wrong, in Sherlock's mind, he was always right.
"What did you just say?"
"You're right. I shouldn't be treating this like a normal case."
Sherlock stopped for a moment to judge whether or not he was forgiven.
"I just... I want our little boy back, Sherlock."
"I know, I'm going to get him back, John, believe m-"
Sherlock focused on the painting hanging above their bed.
He lifted his arm and pointed towards the framed painting.
"Was that always there?"
"What?"
"That" he jumped onto the bed and ripped the piece of paper that was edged in the slit of the frame "when did this get here?" he unfolded the paper.
"I didn't notice it."
John watched Sherlock's eyes widen as he read the note.
"What is it?"
"An introduction" his voice was no more than a croak "we're part of a brand new game."