A/N: March 15 2014: I've touched up this story a bit and finally added a new chapter. Expect regular updates. Thank you for your patience, and please review.
I do not own BBC's Sherlock or Creep by Radiohead, nor do I make any profit from this story.
After "disposing" of the frog carcass out the window, (defenestration from this floor proved to be a good way to dispose of things I did not wish to be caught with or, in this case, smell for too long) I glanced around my room. Finished experiments and irrelevant books gathered on every available and unavailable surface to the point of imminent collapse. Bored, I thought, throwing myself onto my bed with enough force to push it flush against the wall. I watched the dust attempt to settle after my movements. My hand reached out under my pillow in search of any distraction and curled around a forgotten metal object.
The gun wasn't the first I had stolen. There had been my father's rifle, mummy's small handgun, and a few off a low-rank copper or two. Guns are fascinating in themselves (much more dull in the hand of a common criminal). The security guards at this establishment have less than half of my IQ, so it was no problem to slip in (I say slip) and grab a spare.
Curled up on my bed, I turn the gun in my hands, examining it with more detail. The feel of it surprised me. When you read stories or watch any amount of crap telly, guns are described as being made of cool, almost cold metal, usually pressed up against the head of a hostage or being held in a gloved hand waiting to go off and cause damage, mortal wounds - heartbreak. The gun felt almost warm to me.
I knew how they worked. I had taken them apart before, put them back together. The first was father's, I had done something wrong and he obviously noticed. Not good. The gun in my hand came apart in my mind: Trigger, bullet, barrel, pin and target made a circuit in my brain like an animated poster, bang.
The bullets themselves are fascinating in nature. A tiny piece of moulded metal that rips through flesh and bone like tissue paper if fired from the right weapon. Pressed to a temple, a pistol means death. Half a second between living and not living - I wonder if it would be painful to die in such a manner... I placed the gun to my head towards the right side - not quite touching my skin - as I thought.
I could feel the cold now. The irrepressible shiver my body gave, a fight-or-flight response stopped in its tracks. This wasn't something new, this happened almost every night since I got the gun. I stole it of a whim, to break a streak of boredom and to practice some lock-picking. I hadn't planned on using it or waving it about in a school. The safe containing the gun wasn't exactly Fort Knox and in less than two minutes I had a gun wedged in the back of my pants and the thrill of not-too-boring chasing me back to my room.
My empty room.
I was probably the only boy in St. Bart's boarding school with a room all to myself. Roommates tended to request others, any others, to share a room with when they got paired with me. Why? I used to ask that, maybe the first semester I was sent here, but it became glaringly obvious without the help of certain individuals and their limited vocabulary.
Freak, they said. Weirdo and Creep were thrown in casually between punches and shoves, in with the occasional Fag. One particularly unintelligent oaf called me a Pirate one day. I didn't understand that one.
After three years of death threats and insults thrown at me, along with violence and largely indifferent adults, I had confirmed an early deduction: I was a freak. A weirdo. No one could do what I do, no one else could meet a complete stranger and tell their life story in a single glance. No one, no one normal, had such a fascination with the murdered and the murdering. No one else was called a disease and a threat to others by their private mentors, their teachers and counselors.
No one was like me. This society wants their children to believe in being unique and embracing who you are but when they are faced with someone actually different they're on the offensive with no turning back.
My mind traveled down a road some would consider dangerous. What would it feel like? I wondered, What would it feel like to just, pull the trigger? Would it hurt? Would my nerves have time to send a pain signal to the brain that was about to be destroyed? I had examined a victim of a head shot before, I knew, in minute detail, what exactly my head would look like. A small bullet hole in the front, a trail of blood and powder burns around the wound. The back of my head would be half blown off, blood and brains would be scattered over the blankets and up the wall, dotting the almost-white. It'll leave a stain, I thought, All that would be left of this action would be one more grave in an over-populated world and a painted-over stain on a wall.
I did not, however, wonder if they would miss me. My teachers would forget me after the gossiping died down as if I had simply moved – perhaps I'd be brought up in a conversation years down the road, my name forgotten. My brother would show up to the funeral, if they held one, out of family obligation, and mummy might mourn for a bit (if only to gain the sympathy of her high-class friends). I didn't have any friends to leave behind. But I didn't want to die, either. I didn't want to miss anything important and, if I was honest with myself, I didn't want to let my genius go to waste.
The gun got heavy and fell an inch, sliding against my skin. I opened my eyes, startled to know that they had closed of their own accord, and glared down the side of the pistol as if it had personally made them shut. I knew I needed sleep. Four days was about my limit at this point. I sighed, letting gravity take over and drag my gun down to the bed, my body to the mattress. I consented to my eyes sliding shut and drifted off, gun in hand tucked under my chin for the night.