Hi! This is the first chapter of a longer fic...exactly how much longer remains to be seen! :o I'm going to alternate chapters between Watson and Sherlock's perspectives, and some chapters will be told from both. Being a girl from the US, I don't really know a whole lot about the British school system, so this will be a lot of guesswork. Feel free to message me if you have any suggestions/criticism/want to say hi! *This fic is totally AU!* Disclaimer: I don't own Sherlock, or any associated characters, and any relation to real towns or schools is utterly fictitious!

Chapter One

Saturday, 28 August

Rainy. Currently taking the train north from London. Expecting to reach Newcastle School within the hour. Am currently seated in train carriage across. Businessman across the way is married, on his way to Lerwick to see his lover. Wedding ring inside his left sock.

Sherlock inserted his ballpoint pen between his teeth, chewed the hard plastic for a moment, and then capped it. He closed the little leather-bound notebook and carefully stashed it inside his leather schoolbag. No use in keeping it out much longer—doubtless the students at Newcastle would assume it to be some sort of girlish diary into which he poured his darkest desires and most secret dreams.

The thought was wholly unappealing.

The train pulled into Lerwick Station at high noon; Sherlock lingered in the carriage for a moment, allowing the other travelers to filter out before him. He noticed a rowdy group of teenage boys swaggering off: they, too, had come from London and were quite possibly Newcastle students. A gaggle of young girl were in the process of carrying on an emotion reunion mid-platform when Sherlock disembarked and collected his luggage. There were two suitcases and a duffel bag, barely enough to hold his numerous belongings. A childhood of being shipped from boarding school to boarding school ought to have taught him otherwise, but Sherlock was not a light packer.

He sidestepped the shouting, giggling girls and trekked across the station. The rain had eased up to a slow drizzle, and before he had crossed Lerwick's high street it had stopped altogether. A sunburst brightened the day, sudden and unexpected, but there were low, ominous clouds to the east. No doubt rain would set in again before nightfall.

Lerwick was a tiny town, Sherlock discovered: a cheerful high street lined with small shops, and behind that rows of houses and flats. Everything was bright and quaint and welcoming in the sunlight, but it did little to dispel Sherlock's mood, which was entirely not bright and cheerful. He lugged his bags halfway up the road before consulting the map—a computer printout from the school's website—that directed him to continue half a mile north. Orientation would be held at five o'clock that evening, so Sherlock decided to take a short rest and have a look around. Best to be aware of one's surroundings.

Gentle green hills rose up around the village, some of them dotted with sheep. There were low hedges and fences, and distant trees, and a sense of clean wholesomeness. Newcastle School lay outside the village itself, on a flat area at the top of a hill. Sherlock had read online that the campus was fairly large, and boasted a football field. There was a rugby team, which was doing well, and a football team, which must not have been. The school webpage had seemed to avoid mention of the football team, which in Sherlock's experience was usually quite a talking point for most boarding schools.

Sports. Sherlock held a certain measured distaste for the games, and for those involved. He simply didn't see the point of spending hours upon hours racing around a field or a pitch or a track, muddying yourself and becoming sweaty, all for the sake of chasing down a trophy or some praise from your classmates. It was the cold, hard facts that could carry one through life, not the notion that there was no gain without pain, or that there was no "I" in "team". He planned on staying well clear of the footballers at Newcastle. Probably the rugby players, too. Sherlock found them boring—usually just ordinary boys and girls who enjoyed psychical exertion as a hobby.

He stood by the side of the street for a while, catching his breath, and then hiked up to the school. There were many cars and busses entering Newcastle grounds, and Sherlock felt foolish for not getting a ride. He hauled his belongings up a long paved drive, until he reached the school itself. It was beautiful—there was no denying that. The front was built in a Gothic style, large and imposing, but the rest of the building was plain brick. He spent the next several hours standing in various lines of jittery teenagers and harried parents, waiting to receive a rooming assignment, and then to collect information about orientation, and then to find his houseparent. The boy's dormitories were located to the right of the school cafeteria. With some difficulty, Sherlock pulled his bags to the doorway of 25A. He did not bother knocking, presuming that the room would be empty. It wasn't, of course, and—

"Hey!" A heavy-set teenage boy stood in the corner, struggling to pull on a pair of gray uniform pants. Upon Sherlock's entrance, he let out a mad shout and hauled them up, jumping in place to get them over his waist. "The hell're you?

Sherlock pushed his bags into the room, glancing around. It was very small and spartan—two metal-framed beds, a wooden set of drawers, and a closet. The walls were cinderblock, painted gray. A single window overlooked the front lawn.

"Who're you?" The heavy-set boy buttoned his pants hurriedly, glaring at Sherlock in an accusatory manner.

"Sherlock Holmes. Your roommate."

"Oh." A thin smile. "I'm Bart Wiseacres."

Bart extended a hand, but Sherlock declined it with a thin, humorless smile.

"Pleasure," He said cooly, and began to unpack his bags. Bart, it seemed, had already crammed his things into most of the drawers, leaving Sherlock to fold his street clothes into the very back of the closet. He hung his uniforms on a few metal hangers, and folded the remainder into the top drawer while Bart watched suspiciously.

"You're not some kind of neat freak, right?"

Sherlock did not dignify this with an answer, mostly because he knew that he was, perhaps, a little too persnickety about organization. Instead, he focused on his uniforms, bought new from a retailer in London. The shirts were white, the pants gray. There were dark blue blazers, which Sherlock liked, and gray sweaters, which he did not. There were also uniform vests, which were very ugly. Bart had one tossed on the top of his bed.

"Where are you from?" Bart queried, flopping down on his bed. "London?"

"Yes." Sherlock said.

"This your first year?"

"Yes."

"You like it so far?"

"I've been here barely three hours."

"Oh." Bart pressed his lips together. "Uh, I'm going to go out for a while. Nice to meet you, uh, Sherlock." And he left. After a while, the houseparent came by. Mr. Addams was a very old, very deaf fellow who didn't seem to understand Sherlock's name.

"Samuel Holmes?"

"Sherlock Holmes, Mr. Addams."

"What was that, boy? Seamus Holmes?"

"Sherlock!" Sherlock said loudly. Several passing boys stopped to stare. Sherlock cast them cold looks, and they moved away.

"Sherlock?"

"Yes."

"Huh." Mr. Addams checked Sherlock's name off on a small clipboard. "Bit of a funny name, that."

"Yes." Sherlock said. He went back to the room and unpacked his microscope and petri dishes and telescope and biology charts, then decided to have a walk around the school grounds. The rest of the students were changing into uniforms, so Sherlock followed suit. He decided to wear a gray cardigan and hoped that he looked smart, not daft. He took a walk around the campus, avoiding the large groups of congregating students. They all seemed to have friends here. A group of boys was running around on the football field, chasing a ball. Their screams and whoops carried on the still, warm air. Sherlock pushed his hands into his pockets, and detoured back to the dormitories. Orientation would start soon. Yet again, Sherlock Holmes would be attending another elite boarding school away from home. Yet again, he would be at the head of the class. Yet again, he would be the friendless outcast, the social pariah. It wasn't very much to look forwards to, and Sherlock returned to the room feeling decidedly gloomy.

...

Bart was a horrible roommate. Sherlock found this out very quickly. It was only a matter of days before Bart began to leave his things strewn around the room, his bed hopelessly unmade, and his sweaty socks on the bathroom floor. He often neglected to flush the toilet, and kept pornographic magazines in the bottom dresser drawer. Sherlock discovered this one day when he went realized that there was potential space being unused, and opened the dreaded bottom drawer only to find a plethora of girly magazines with names like 'Playboy' and 'Romp' and 'Xposed' spilling out, busty bikini-clad girls sprawled across the cover. One flipped open, revealing an image of a youthful, spray-tanned girl completely naked, participating in a heartfelt exchange of fluids with a hulking man. Sherlock shoved them back into the drawer, his nose wrinkling with distaste. Unlike his fellows, Sherlock had never found such magazines remotely attractive. The idea was almost grotesque—all of that bare flesh, the girls wearing those sappy grins, attempting to appear youthful and teasing. Bart was certainly a less-than-ideal roommate.

Sherlock was, of course, at the top of his class. He barely studied, finding the courses painfully easy. After flying through his homework, Sherlock would take lengthy walks around the campus, trying to familiarize himself with the place. It was beautiful, and became even more so as summer progressed into autumn.

One cool night, he was crossing the football field with a stack of library books beneath his arm, headed for the dormitories. It was cold and dark, stars glinting icily in the dome of the heavens. A group of boys in football uniforms were kicking a ball around, shouting and waving their arms. A Year Twelve boy booted it madly, and the ball sailed through the air, coming to a rest at Sherlock's feet.

Hopelessly inept at sports, he contemplated leaving it there and strolling away. A blond-haired boy, a fellow fourth year, was jogging towards him, wearing the red-and-white Newcastle football uniform. His pleasant, open face was flushed, but he was smiling. Sherlock recognized him as John Watson—they sat in the same row during Biology.

"Here." Sherlock kicked the ball; his foot struck its side weakly, and the football bounced a few sorry feet. John smiled: he looked tired and sweaty, and his cleats were muddy, but there was a happy air about him nonetheless.

"Thanks." His breath clouded the air. John Watson turned and dribbled the ball away effortlessly, as if it were attached to the sides and tops of his muddy white cleats. Sherlock watched him go, then turned and walked back to the dormitories alone, under a vast cold sky.


How did you like it? Did you find it too long? Next chapter will be up soon! Please review and tell me what you think!