At first: I'm sorry that my English isn't the best, but I'am from Germany...

So, this is my first story on this fanfiction side. I know this time of the year doesn't fits perfect to the story. I've writed it for my Sherlock Advent calendar for the german fanfiction website. A friend of mine and my cousin translated it for me because I wanted to submit it to the 'The Art of Deduction' book, but it have not made it into the final book :(

So, now I publish it here

Disclaimer: I don't own something except the idea of the story

If somebody find some mistakes he can tell them to me :)

RED BLOOD IN WHITE SNOW

He hated the winter with its icy coldness. The untouched and seemingly innocent snow. He hated Christmas, so beloved by all, with all the simulated festiveness. He hated all this and would loathe it from deepest soul till the end of his days. The incident that formed the basis of that all happended many years ago. Nevertheless it had left such deep scars on his soul that he never would be able to forget about it. Actually he had banned himself from remembering that calamitous day a long time ago. But today it was different, today he couldn't help it. Everything he did and saw awakened his memories. The nearly cruel coldness, the steely greyness of the sky, the serried white snow, the cries and quarrells of playing children that reached him from the outside, the common happiness in the city, the colourfully decorated houses, the smell of home-baked christmas biscuits. He noticed all this marginally while sitting in a comfortable armchair in one of his many houses. Looking silently into the twitching ingle in front of him. It wrapped the living room in a flaring light, it seemed as if light and shadow figures scampered everywhere through the room. It also drove away the biting cold. It was abnormally silent in the house, solely the sizzling noise of the fire and the regular breaths of professor James Moriaty could be heard. The thick, expensive curtains were drawn across the windows, such as in order to lock the world out. Jim Moriaty looked like mesmerized into the flames, which at a closer look seemed to have various colours. Red, orange, yellow, all of them in many different shades. The fire seemed to be a vivid creature. Destructive but of fascinating beauty.

His thoughts were far away from this backdrop. Back then - on that day which had broken something inside of him - he was 13 years old and lived in an orphanage in the suburb of London with his little sister Ann. Yes, he once had had a sister. But she only lived up to the age of nine. She died on a day on which children should be happy - at Christmas.

They already had been living in that orphanage for years. They neither knew if their parents were dead or if they marooned them nor they knew their family name. He had come up with the name "Moriaty" only a bit later himself. Jim could remember that day as if it was just yesterday. He still saw Ann in front of him. Full of anticipation for Christmas on December 24th jumping up and down, which made her two dark brown tresses swirl. Her big, brown eyes flashed agitately. The clothing she was wearing was mouldy and too large, just like the clothes of the remaining children.

The orphanage was ancient and not too wealthy. This year there was a christmas dinner donated to them by a beneficent community, something very special. Often, however, they had difficulties to plug the many muzzles, at such times they went to bed hungry mostly. Especially Jim, who gave his own food to his sister. At least until he began to steal all kinds of food in shops. It really wasn't difficult, nobody had ever caught him, and so he coped with getting rid of the pangs of hunger finally. Three days ago he became a thief again. He had stolen an inornate dolly from a toy store. With her black hair, bright skin and red lips, she reminded him of Snow White and he knew only too well how much his little sister loved fairytales. In no case he got a bad feeling when stealing. In his opinion the store owner possessed enough stuff and money so that they could hardly mind if something disappeared from their shelves every once in a while.

Jim already was chuffed about the facial expression of his little sister when giving her the present. But this no longer should happen.

He just came from the kitchen duty he was distributed for, back to the room, which he had to share with 4 other kids. The window stood open, so cruel, biting cold penetrated into the room, which made him shiver all over. He quickly stepped to the window to close it. Just as he heard quarreling voices from outside. Instantly he identified the voice of his sister: "No, he isn't!"

He immediately got straight about whom they were talking, it only could concern him, Jim. He wasn't simply unpopular amongst the other children. No, he was hated by most of them. Many feared him also. They cursed at him. He always had been a genius, but just as his intelligence, his unscrupulousness, overestimation of his own capabilities and his caprice knew no bounds. Already back then he was completely different from everybody he knew. And his anger towards the foolery of humans was unmeasureable with the exception of his sister. She was the most significant thing on earth to him and the one and only person he had ever loved. The only one deterring him from ging insane. Now there could be heard loud voices again. This time it was the voice of boy: "Oh, really? He's a sick psycho. He should be locked away."

This voice he knew only too well. His name was Peter Stevens. You could say that he was Jim's most hated adversary at the time. Many times they had clashed and that had ended with a broken arm and a tooth knocked out for Peter and a bleeding nose and a black eye for Jim once before. Now Jim hunkered far over the window so as to be able to look on the street on the right side. There were three persons: Ann, Peter and another boy called Kevin Kingsley owning an unbelievably low IQ. They still quarreled.

The next moments passed like in slow motion. Jim hadn't had time time to react. Peter hustled Ann onto the road, the little girl toughly struck her head on the pavement and broke down torpidly. Exactly in this moment a rickety car with high speed turned around the corner. Later they told him the driver had been drunk and hadn't seen Ann.

The car came closer while Ann, still dizzy, couldn't move away early enough. Peter and Kevin stared completely shocked at the speeding car. Not a second later it was over, Ann closed her eyes - forever. Red blood in white snow.

Snow still trickling down on the little figure. Jim exclaimed a desperate, useless cry that couldn't change the situation at all. Then he sallied out of the house towards the road. It rustled in his ears. The sky above them had the bleak colour of steel. By now the road was full of people. Some of them called the ambulance with their cell phones, others milled around flutteringly, some cried, others tried to help the little girl. But it was hopeless. Expeditiously Jim rifled through the crowd, mumbling sounded around him while hot tears ran down his cheeks. He couldn't repress them easily, although he was good at repressing his feelings normally. Marginally he noticed the smell of freshly baked christmas biscuits and the colourful decorated houses around him. But he only minded all the red blood in the white snow and his sister looking so little and innocent. He fell to his knees next to his sister unable to talk or to move.

At that time he understood that the world never would be fair and that therefore it was completely insignificant if he himself was fair or not. In that moment he irrevocably secluded himself from the rest of the world and the insanity joined him as permanent attender. Since this incident he had never been crying and he didn't believe that he ever would cry again. But shortly after the first sorrow, something else pushed itsself into his emotional world: anger, raging, blind anger that mused revenge. And that revenge he should get as three weeks later Peter Stevens and Kevin Kingsley died in mysterious ways in an accident during a climbing group arranged by the school. He didn't have to pay attention to the driver - his name was Jeremias Smith - no longer himself. A few days later he drove into a tree in a drunken stupor, he was killed instantly.

This was the beginning of the long list of victims conjured up by professor Jim Moriaty's actions.
In this moment he settled back into his armchair. His face, lighted by the crackling ingle, still was motionless.

Yes, he hated winter with its icy coldness, the untouched and seemingly innocent snow. He hated Christmas, so beloved by all, all the simulated festiveness. He hated all this and would loathe it from deepest soul till the end of his days.

I hope you enjoyed it. And I hope that you review it :)

Thanks :)