AN: My apologies in advance for all of the line breaks in this section, it's horrendous, I know. But it could have been a lot worse! Thank you for reading, favouriting, and reviewing. :)
There are cars and people going in both directions. Nothing really stands out in the smoggy morning. But, now about a block away, a unremarkable tannish car carts John Watson away in the backseat. Rice is driving, his eyes on the rear-view mirrors. He has heard stories about Holmes, and John Watson too. It is only fitting that they both go down in this.. this retribution of his. How dare his fiancée court other men. And Sherlock Holmes, despised by so many and an easy target through John, is the perfect one to frame.
After a few minutes of driving, Rice pulls into a nondescript building. It is a travel agency, Sunshine Voyages, but they have been closed for the last three months. He used to work there. He pulls out his phone, checking the time. Beatrice will be meeting him here, presumably for lunch, in less than an hour.
For a few moments, Sherlock doesn't do anything. Just stands in the cool morning and blanks. Then, it's gone, and he's angry. He throws the door open behind him and vaults up the stairs and immediately begins to pace.
Call the Yard? No, they suspect him enough already, no need to take them from guarding Rice's flat (and they could prove invaluable if he returned there). Call his brother? Unlikely, he wasn't a god, no matter how godlike he attempted to be, and there was little hope he'd have seen anything useful.
The facts were clear: Rice had been here, and he'd missed it. He'd missed it and he hates himself because John is gone, and he could have done something.
He takes out his phone and presses it thoughtfully to his lips. Options: call Beatrice, force information out of her; call the Yard anonymously and leave a tip that John's been taken; call John and see what happens.
John is on speed dial. The second number. Of two. Sherlock presses the second button and holds the mobile to his ear.
After three and a half rings and it is almost time to give up, there is a click of connection, followed by fabric noises that suggest the phone has only just been retrieved off of John. Suggesting that John must not be conscious yet. Morbid thoughts add if he ever will be again...
"Hello, Holmes." Rice says. His voice is low, throaty. Almost like he isn't entirely in control of it, or like he is lost elsewhere. "What do you want?"
John's kidnapper is inside the old Sunshine Voyages building right now, and all is silent save for muted noises of cars outside. It will be ten more minutes before... before Beatrice arrives, and he will end all of this for her. End all of the lies. And then some.
Rice paces in front of John, who is bound into a swivel chair left behind when the agency closed. Posters, fliers, and maps litter the walls, some fallen to the floor. There are a few built-in counters and tables where the computers and clients both used to sit- never cleared out after the building was reclaimed by the bank. No one will miss this building.
Sherlock nearly shouts into the phone, but reins himself in at the last moment. "Rice." He chooses his words carefully, listening to every minute detail in the background he can gather. Listening for John. He doesn't give any indication of the panic that wants to press into all parts of his brain. "Don't waste my time. Is he alive?"
He's a very good actor, brilliantly hiding the terrified bob of his throat.
Rice gives a sinister chuckle. "Oh, I don't know. I haven't checked... you know these military types." He sounds disgusted but it's probably just a factor of the situation. "Always taking orders, taking control... just taking everything that you thought was yours." He's rambling now, gesturing to an unresponding room. He switches John's phone to his left hand so he can glance at his other wrist for the time. Less than five till the hour. In the distance he hears the ringing of some errant church bells.
"Don't worry, this will all be pinned on you of course, Holmes. I couldn't believe how easy this would be- before I found out about John Watson I didn't know what I was going to do. But even the police hate you. And honestly, you already assaulted my girlfriend in the park. You're obviously more than a little misguided."
Sherlock's mind gives a tiny cry of elation at the sound of the bells, distant and yet so clear, so reliably two minutes off. He keeps Rice talking, switching discreetly to speaker as he texts Lestrade.
"Yes, that was rather brilliant of you," Sherlock says with a convincing humbleness to his voice. "How'd you do it? No one's ever outsmarted me before."
Rice in abandoned building near St Matthew's in Brixton. He has John. Please for the love of god trust me.
SH
And he's moving. He'll have to take a cab.
Rice seems to laugh, is it a laugh? Some sort of dire snort. "Oh, indulge me all you want. But I have to go... soon the lying whore will be here." He picks up the gun he's managed to get hold of just for today, and cocks then uncocks it a bit restlessly. "Your conviction will be fast."
And with that he hangs up.
Lestrade is just finishing up in a meeting when he receives the text message from Sherlock's phone. He has never heard- or rather, seen- Sherlock this urgent before. Sighing loudly, he runs a hand through his grey hair and replies, brief as usual. He doesn't know why he ever indulges the man like this.
sending a car out. hostage situation? where are you?
gl
Sherlock curses quite loudly when Rice hangs up on him, greatly disturbing two pensioners walking by. The next cab that comes by stops for him, and he rockets into the back seat.
"St. Matthew's, Brixton. An extra fifty if you're there in ten minutes or less. Ignore the speed limit."
He hits off a quick text to Mycroft that it's of national importance that the speed cameras along their route conveniently switch off. And, as the cab shoots off, he replies to Lestrade around shaking fingers.
On my way. Rice extremely unstable, not likely to negotiate. I owe you.
SH
He briefly considers trying to find some way to alert Beatrice, then realizes that the longer Rice speaks to her, the longer the window to save John. And John is most certainly the only thing that matters in this situation.
Lestrade is intensely curious about this whole matter, so he ends up in the passenger seat of the first car out of the two he ends up sending out. Sherlock Holmes or not, it is a reported hostage situation. They keep their flashing lights off and Lestrade hopes that the time wasted will be made up for in the subtlety gained by the lack of excess noise and lights. The two cars still speed enough as it is, bringing himself and four officers trained for possible siege-like and hostage situations. T minus six minutes to their arrival, Lestrade estimates.
Beatrice walks uneasily down the nearly abandoned street, looking at the address again to be sure she has it right. This certainly doesn't look like someplace Wally would hang about. Nonetheless, he'd said it was important, so she walks toward the abandoned building and presses the door open.
"Wally?"
Rice slips through the door, closing it again before Beatrice can see inside, gun still in his left hand, held casually as if either he's forgotten or he doesn't expect Beatrice to notice. "Ah, you're here!" He half-smiles, regarding her at arm's length. "I have quite the something to show you."
Beatrice backs up a step, immediately seeing the gun he is holding haphazardly in his hand. "Wally?" Her voice is shrill but quiet, eyes on the gun. She looks like she wants to bolt. This, on top of everything that's happened in the past two days? But she doesn't bolt, because she's afraid he'll fire if she does.
Wallace's eyes harden a little. "Beatrice, you have been dating other men. Plural. And you have never told any of us. Why?"
He doesn't wait for an answer because he has played out this conversation in his mind plenty off times since he found out about the sham, and he knows that she will have no answer for him. Tugging too-harshly at her arm, Rice brings her inside, and they can both audibly hear the click of his gun as he readies it to fire.
"One of the others is already dead. And look what we have here. One John Watson." His gun arm unsteadily gestures at the former soldier, the other still holding Beatrice strongly. He waits to see what she could possibly say.
This part of the plan hadn't been one-hundred-percent worked out in his mind.
Sherlock has his eyes closed in the back of the speeding taxi, blocking out the sounds of screeching tires and horns blaring in its wake as he consults the map in his head—abandoned buildings in a five block radius of St. Matthew's. The most obvious is the old travel agency, and he wonders what sort of intellect is behind Rice's madness, if he would be careless enough to be obvious.
Smart enough to attempt to pin this on Sherlock, but stupid enough to answer John's phone. Safe to assume the travel agency. He gets the cabbie to stop a half block from the agency, throws a wad of cash into the front seat and leaps out, already at a run.
Still in the police car, Lestrade sees a familiar dark-haired man practically fall out of a cab, beginning to head down the street at a remarkably fast pace. "Pull over." He orders, out of the car and intercepting Sherlock almost before they have stopped. "Holmes!' He calls out, snagging the man by an arm. "Tell me what is going on. It's not going to help anyone if you just run in there; he could even be provoked to shoot." Lestrade's face is a glare, this is serious police business. Why couldn't it have been someone else, someone less headstrong than Sherlock Holmes.
For a second, it looks like Sherlock is going to punch Lestrade, full-armed and wild. For a second, he looks panicked. He doesn't recover fast enough, and it's easy enough for even Lestrade to see. He can't stop his hand from shaking under Lestrade's grip on his wrist, but he wipes his face completely clean. He speaks incredibly fast, but precisely, like he knows how much weighs on timing and accuracy.
"He didn't kill John. He could have, easily, while I was distracted in the flat. Instead he brings him here. He mentioned Beatrice when he answered John's phone. Obviously a trap to lure her here, and expose her lies. Rice is unstable, and will likely kill them both, and perhaps himself, if we're not quick enough. I won't have that." And he wrenches his hand away from Lestrade, looking ready to bolt for the building.
Beatrice gasps loudly: the gun, John, Rice suddenly and inextricably mad. It's so much, and it takes a great effort not to give in to the weight it's pressing on her brain quite without warning, but she does. She wobbles slightly on her feet, but she gathers her strength and fixes Rice with a doe-eyed, horrified stare.
"He doesn't mean anything, Wally. Honestly. We haven't done anything, it's the truth to God." To her credit, her voice only quavers slightly.