Author's Note: To be honest, I'm actually part of the "Sherlock is not a sociopath, do your research!" camp, but for the purposes of this fic, I'm not worrying about it. Please enjoy!
xxRegretteRienxx
"Psychopath," said his classroom teacher, when he yet again asked why he wasn't allowed to dissect the class's pet rat. He knew scientists did it all the time in order to learn, so why was Mrs Simms preventing him from learning?
"Excitable," countered his parents, and it was left at that.
"Psychopath," said the child psychologist he saw years later. He kept talking about death, dying, decomposition; not interacting 'properly' in social contexts.
The diagnosis changed everything: how everyone treated him. It ruined his self-esteem, sent him on a terrible, unmatchable, spiraling journey of self-discovery, of drugs.
His eventual clean-up had returned his previous passion for the macabre.
"Psychopath," said the first policeman to let Sherlock look at a crime scene. Standing just within the tape, Sherlock's buzzing excitement at knowing, solving, was thwarted by that familiar jolt of insecurity.
He never smiled at a crime scene again.
"Sociopath," said his independent research: he had invaded Bart's libraries (the security systems were laughable), interrogated lecturers (they really had no idea who their students were), and cross-referenced with the latest DSM – being conferred in Berlin at the time (Mycroft was occasionally useful).
"High-functioning," said the qualifier, and Sherlock felt an unfamiliar expression tug at his face. The weight left his shoulders.
What did those others know? They only had pitiful human brains.