"Really clever, entirely thorough," Sherlock says, rubbing his hands together approvingly. He and Anabelle stand in the doorway of Luke Madder's room, which is now unnervingly similar to Sherlock's at 18, with all the signs of sure-to-blossom genius apparent. They even thought to write math problems on Luke's wall, in a replication of his hand. Anabelle's room, in addition, now looks suitably average. "What's next on our list?"

"Um, actually – " Anabelle begins. Just then, the Professor passes the pair of them on the way to his office.

"Ah, Mr. Holmes, have you finished yet? I finally have a free moment, if you'd like to take a step into my office," he says, giving Sherlock a friendly clap on the back. Sherlock turns to ask him why, precisely, Sherlock would have any reason to 'take a step' into his office, but he's already disappeared down the hallway. Sherlock instead verbalizes his thoughts to Anabelle.

"Why would he want you? I wouldn't know." She releases a nervous laugh, immediately stirring Sherlock's suspicions. "But the Professor rarely does things without reason, so perhaps you should follow him."

"We should continue working, don't you think? What is our next task?" Sherlock asks again.

"Actually," she says, "there isn't any other work to be done."

"None? But you said we'd be staying here for at least a week, perhaps two." Sherlock frowns, then freezes. Oh. Oh. "You told your father, didn't you? That I have…" Aspergers, he thinks. "The Professor is a psychologist. He thinks we came here so that we can all discuss my mental health, doesn't he? Wait, no. No. He only invited me into his office, meaning... We came to New York so that he can give me therapy sessions." He spits out the words.

"My father isn't a therapist, Sherlock," Anabelle says slowly. "He's a psychology professor with a… special expertise in dealing with sociopaths. If anyone can recognize Antisocial Personality Disorder, he can. If you're not willing to explore the possibility that you fall somewhere on the autism spectrum, you could at least realize that there's no way you're a sociopath. It was just an offer."

"Well, I decline," Sherlock says shortly.

"But Sherlock – "

"Ah," he hisses softly, "and therein lies the problem. When did you start calling me by my first name? The day you decided I must have Aspergers." He forces out the word. "It was then, was it, that the formalities were stripped away? And why, Dr. Madder, should that be? Maybe because an autistic man is no different from a child to you? You thought you could lead me to New York without telling me why, but I have no intention of being compliant."

"Sherlock, stop it," she says, frustration beginning to leak through her voice. "I don't think of you as a child at all. Rather, you're the most painfully stubborn man I've ever known. I knew that if I told you about why we were coming here, you'd never get on the plane."

"Because I'm not interested in speaking to a professional."

"And why not? Why are you so reluctant to help yourself? Don't you see that you need some type of – "

"Therapy? Because I'm what, Dr. Madder? Eccentric? Heartless? Focused? Emotionless?"

"Because you're lonely," she says. "I read Sigerson Bøler's blog, Sherlock. You update three times a day. As soon as John is out of jail, should you somehow get him to read your website, he will have a lot to catch up on. And I just thought that this might help you with your issues socializing."

"You thought it gave you an excuse not to inform me of our exact itinerary," Sherlock says, "which is exactly why I have avoided a diagnosis. If my clients thought I fall on the autism spectrum, they would cease to take me seriously. I have always theorized this. Thank you for providing me with the evidence." Sherlock sighs. Quite suddenly, the fight is drained out of him. He feels heavy, exhausted, like he's just tried to run through water. He says, "Get out, Dr. Madder."

"Are… Are you packing?"

"Packing?"

"To go?" she says. "Are you leaving now?"

"No," he blinks, "I'm going to take a nap."

"A nap? Now?"

"Yes. Now please, get out," he says. Anabelle looks like she wants to object, but after being accused of treating him like a child, she surrenders. She leaves, letting him slam the door after her. Satisfyingly, he can hear her jump outside, startled by the noise. Then he turns to Luke Madder's bed and collapses.

"Mr. Holmes?" The Professor pokes his head into the bedroom, his rumbling voice rousing Sherlock. Sherlock groans to consciousness, catching a mouthful of the pillowcase beneath him. "Are you sleeping?"

"Clearly," Sherlock mumbles, taking the pillowcase out of his mouth.

"It's only three o'clock in the afternoon. I'd appreciate it if you could nap later, if you're at all in the mood to start talking. I don't know when I'll next get free time this week. Are you ready for a session?"

"No sessions," Sherlock says sleepily.

"No sessions? But I thought you flew across the country to speak to me?"

Ah. So the Professor thinks he knows. Well, that makes things better, doesn't it? It extinguishes the mental image Sherlock had had of the two laughing at him behind his back. At least he has the respect of one Madder.

"Your daughter neglected to tell me the purpose of our being here, actually," Sherlock says, now truly awake. He turns on his side so that he can look at the Professor standing in the doorway. The Professor does not seem at all taken aback by addressing an adult who refuses to get out of bed.

"She didn't? But she told me that you two talked about everything, and –" he pauses, then finishes tiredly, " – and now I look like a fool for believing her. I'm sorry, Mr. Holmes. She's made me look unprofessional, hasn't she?" And all at once, Sherlock's humiliation vanishes. If the Professor feels like a fool, then Sherlock doesn't have to. "Well, then, if you never knew, I can't imagine you're interested now, are you?"

"Not at all," Sherlock says.

"I'll leave you to sleep, then."

"Yes, that would be – " Sherlock suddenly rolls on his back and jolts up. "Wait." Something has just sparked in his sleep-muddled brain.

"Yes?" The Professor's hand lingers on the doorknob.

"You were Moriarty's camp counselor, yes?"

"I was," he confirms. "Why do you ask?"

"Could you… Could you tell me about that? About him? It's important," Sherlock says.

"Well, under normal circumstances, I would have to refuse… He was a patient of mine, you see. My first and only. It ended in failure, obviously. And normally I would keep that information confidential, but I suppose if the patient is dead, it can do no harm." The Professor walks into the room, closing the door behind him. He pulls up a chair from Luke's desk to the bed. Sherlock lies back down.

"He told me," Sherlock begins, "that I was him."

He expects an immediate denial from the Professor. Instead he says, "And do you see any truth in that?"

"I can't be certain," says Sherlock. "I thought I was willing to do anything to find the intellectual stimulation I need, but I would never kill myself. I would never…" Hurt John.

"Then it sounds like you're not him, to me," says the Professor.

"What was he like?" Sherlock asks, staring at the wall to his side, tracing imaginary patterns in it with his eyes. "Tell me everything."

"Jimmy was…odd," the Professor begins. "But, then, it was a camp for children with superior intellect. They were all odd. He was by no means the oddest. And unlike many of the children there, Jimmy Moriarty did not want for emotional nourishment. His mother was a hardworking, softhearted woman. He was, however, lacking in all else. He was cadaverous in complexion, stooped, thin-limbed and small. His social skills were naught, nor did he, at the time, seem interested in improving them. He preoccupied himself with solitary activities. I have noticed that intellectually-talented youth often spend their time alone, so this was not a concern to me. The concern stemmed instead from his utter unresponsiveness in the face of those who tried to induce conversation in him. Whenever someone spoke to him, he would simply fix a stare on them, and remain wordless. He had disproportionally large eyes, and rather than making him look cute as it would on another child, they gave him a sinister air. Black and fathomless, leaving the impression that some demon was inside him, clawing to get out. A monster blinked through the skin of that boy. But I sound melodramatic, I'm sure."

"No," says Sherlock earnestly. "I've seen them myself."

"Then you understand."

"Yes," he says impatiently. "Continue."

"Well, he was rejected from the camp almost as soon as he entered it."

"He was aggressive?"

"Oh, exceedingly so, but we would not find that out until later. No, it was a matter of bureaucracy, mainly. He scored far too high on the 'psychoticism' section of the Eysenck Personality Test. The other professors worried he could be too dangerous to have around the other children. They were going to send him to a correction facility. In those days, you see, it was believed that children with Conduct Disorder, or children who showed signs of developing Conduct Disorder, could be helped through special programs made for callous children. In fact these programs have proven to be detrimental, as I predicted."

"So you prevented him from going to one. But how did you get him into your camp? Or was it him?" Sherlock thinks suddenly. "Did he intimidate the professors somehow?"

"Oh, no." The Professor chuckles. "The thought of little Jimmy intimidating anyone in those days is laughable. It was me. I take full responsibility for my part in making that monster. I was, in those days, something of a hippie. 'All you need is love' is the line, isn't it? Well, I had that mentality, not realizing, of course, that Jimmy had already been shown plenty of love from his mother. Although he was never permitted into the camp as an official student there, and therefore never given a dorm room for the summer, he was allowed to take classes as a sort of unofficial student. He lived in this house, in the room next to this one, for seven weeks."

"Not eight, meaning he was sent home early," Sherlock states. "Why?"

"It was Luke. Just as he is now, Luke was...a friendly child. He had lived his whole life with his adoptive sister's eccentricities, and so he didn't find Jimmy so strange. He used to speak to Jimmy all of the time. The four of us ate breakfast together each morning, and he would talk ceaselessly to the boy, although Jimmy never responded. Jimmy would stare and stare, with those eyes…" The Professor shivers at the recollection. "It was chilling, but Luke never allowed it to faze him. It was easy to imagine that Jimmy was actually a deaf, he seemed to comprehend so little of what was said. He was always listening, though. And evidently, Luke's attempts at friendship caught Jimmy's interest in the worst of ways.

"Luke would pick Anabelle and Jimmy up from their camp every day. One day, Anabelle stayed late. Jimmy and Luke waited for her out front. According to Luke's testimonials - which I have no reason not to believe - Jimmy eventually made the suggestion that she had gone swimming. He was well aware that the pool was closed at that time, with no lifeguards or adults present, but Luke didn't know better. Jimmy led Luke into the pool area, caught him off guard, and shoved him into the deep end. My son, you see, couldn't swim.

"Fortunately, a professor found the two boys in time. She said that when she arrived, having heard splashes and screaming from across the camp, Jimmy had pulled up a chair to watch. And he was just staring, a spectator as my son struggled… It was, likely, the first time that summer he ever smiled.

"Jimmy never showed remorse. When asked why he tried to drown my son, he answered that he had 'been curious to see what would happen.' He knew, I think, that I would hush up the incident and any subsequent legal action – "

"Hush it up?" Sherlock interrupts. "Why? You were a concerned father, I don't understand."

"'All you need is love.' Or so I thought." A bitter laugh sounds from his lips. "I didn't want Jimmy arrested, the label 'criminal' placed on him so young. I thought that by letting him off the hook, I was giving him a second chance. Needless to say, though, I didn't let him near my children again. He was sent back to Dublin, where the scholarships he had received to attend a prestigious boarding school were taken back. He attended public school instead, and for two years I believed that his weeks in America had had no effect on him."

"But they did," Sherlock says. "You heard from him again, clearly."

"Yes, of course. Two years later, when Jimmy was fourteen – and now going by the name James – I received a call from his mother. Mrs. Moriarty apologized for bothering me, but her son was in critical condition at the hospital, and she had no way to pay for the medical bills. I paid them, of course, but not before getting the truth out of her. She confessed that Jimmy had tried to kill himself. He planned a way that was…bizarre, unusual, and gruesome. Only a genius boy would have been able to come up with the mechanics of it, would have been able to manage all of the logistics involved in what had been, I think, sincerely intended to be his suicide. It was pure luck that it failed.

"I flew to Dublin at once to speak to him. He wouldn't see me while he was in the hospital, so I went to his home instead. And can you guess what I found when I went there?"

Yes, Sherlock knows exactly what he must have found. It seems obvious, considering. The Professor answers his own question before Sherlock can. "I found a tiny version of me. There was Jimmy, fourteen years old in a bespoke suit. His posture was perfected, and his frailty had been replaced by some muscle. He even wore the same brand of cologne I had worn during his summer in my home. It's funny, now, to think about theMoriarty, criminal of the century, being impressed by a mere professor. But he was. Of course, I never managed to influence him the way I wanted to. I wanted him to understand the dynamics of a functioning family, the benefits of charity work. Instead, I think, he was impressed by my ability to get people to listen to me. He must have wanted that, and thought wearing suits would give him it. I don't think he ever considered that people listen to me because they like me.

"For someone who had just attempted suicide, he seemed overjoyed to see me. He was proud, I think, of the changes he had made. I got his mother to leave the living room, and sat him down. I was so young and clueless – I had no idea what to say that would convince this boy to climb his way out of depression. But I had brought myself all the way to a grimy flat in Dublin, not to mention the thousands of dollars I'd spent, so clearly I had something to say. I began by complimenting his way of dress. He giggled at me. It was the strangest laugh, Mr. Holmes, like someone possessed. He rolled his head to and fro, just once, and brought his fingers to his lips. His lips curled and his eyes sparked and he leaned forward, and told me, in a whisper, that his way of dress wasn't the only thing that had changed. I said, 'What else has?' He told me that he'd finally learned how to do it. 'Do what?' I asked, although I should have seen it coming. It was a textbook case, after all. 'Hurt people,' he answered.

"With surprisingly little prodding, I got him to tell me all the things he had done in his two years of public school. The way he'd so cleverly – that's his adverb, Mr. Holmes, not mine – hurt his peers, and even some of his teachers. And, finally, he told me about how he… He murdered someone, Mr. Holmes." The Professor closes his eyes. "The swim captain at his school. Carl Powers, I think that was his name. He was someone's son." A moment passes, during which the Professor doesn't move, and Sherlock has the tact to not point out that of course he was someone's son, all boys are. Instead he waits, and soon the Professor continues.

"I sat there and listened. I should have known then that there was no hope for his recovery, none at all. I should have had him arrested, done all in my power to have him tried as an adult in court. He confessed murder to me, Mr. Holmes, and then do you know what he did? He looked at me, earnestly, and he seemed so young in that moment, even younger in his fine clothes. He said, 'You won't tell anyone, will you, Professor?' 'Everything you tell me is confidential.' That's what I said. I should have been tried with him, Mr. Holmes.

"I left that night. I don't know why he thought I wouldn't tell anyone, but he never seemed to fear that I would. And I never did, not until now. I returned to New York City and kept my children under the impression that I had left to teach a class in Europe. I never told them what happened. I should have, I should have warned them, but I didn't."

"You said you made a monster," Sherlock points out.

"And so I did," the Professor answers.

"That's not making a monster, Professor. That's abetting one," says Sherlock. He's not trying to comfort the distressed man, he's searching for something that seems to be missing. "You're a professor, you'd be precise with your diction. How did you make Moriarty, Professor?"

The Professor sighs and goes back to closing his eyes. "It was that same night. After hearing about Carl Powers, I told Jimmy that true gentlemen never hurt others. Christ, I was such a FOOL!" The old man slams his arm out, hitting nothing, punching air. He takes a deep breath, huffs it out. Sherlock puts his fingertips together, remaining calm. A moment passes and Sherlock can sense the Professor's heartbeat returning to normal. "My apologies, Mr. Holmes."

"Just continue," say Sherlock. The Professor does.

"I…I made a joke. I told him that hurting others was beneath him, because we gentlemen don't like to get blood on our suits. Looking back, it's obvious I was in shock. Or I hadn't actually believed him, maybe. He seemed so pathetic to me, so utterly alone. It was impossible to imagine him doing anything dangerous. And yet isn't that always the most dangerous type? I didn't think he even heard my joke, he didn't laugh. Just stared. As always. Now I know better."

"He heard you," Sherlock says. "So… It was you who inspired him to become a consulting criminal."

"Yes. A gentleman never hurts others – he gets followers to hurt others for him, according to Jimmy's logic. He twisted every lesson I ever taught him. I never would have believed this before Jimmy, but some people are neurologically-wired only for evil. It's up to people like me to spot the warning signs. Instead I made a joke." The Professor's voice is hard, bitter. Self-hating. But then suddenly it turns even harder, and he looks straight at Sherlock. "Which is why, Mr. Holmes, you will understand if I don't want you around my daughter."

"What?" Sherlock sits up, taken aback.

"I have done my research on you," the Professor says, crossing his arms. "I realize you possess an incredible skill. But I'm not interested in anyone who suspects he may have Antisocial Personality Disorder. If you truly believe you are a sociopath, then I'm going to have to ask you to leave my house."

"I… I may use that label for convenience's sake," Sherlock says. "It's not entirely accurate."

"Convenience?" The Professor sneers. It's discomforting to see someone so paternal suddenly look so hard, and to see that hardness directed athim, Sherlock. "And what could possibly be convenient about portraying yourself as devoid of human feelings?"

"It is…useful," Sherlock says carefully.

"Useful how, Mr. Holmes? If you don't want to answer, then you can leave without giving me an explanation."

"I'm not leaving," he says hurriedly. "It's just a label, I – "

"But it's not just a label. Anabelle told me you were diagnosed. Are you lying to me, now?"

"I was diagnosed, yes, but only because I wanted to be. I displayed the symptoms of a sociopath to my therapist because I needed the label," he explains.

"What you're telling me is that you manipulated someone very well, as a sociopath would, and that, like most sociopaths, you do not mind the term 'sociopath.'"

"I'm not a sociopath!" Sherlock says angrily. "I use the label because it protects me. I need an excuse for my inabilities to socialize normally, and for my fascination with topics considered dark by the general public. Being a sociopath blinds others to my inabilities."

"Ah, so this is a heartbreaking story of a young man who wishes to hide his vulnerabilities. Why should I believe you, Mr. Holmes? That's exactly what a sociopath would say, if I threatened to take my daughter away from him. Is she some sort of prize to you? The fruits of your labor?"

"Actually, I'm not entirely sure I like her all that much," says Sherlock truthfully. The Professor laughs.

"Forgive me if I don't believe you," he says.

"I'm only working with her because her knowledge of Moriarty's criminal web will prove useful to me once the decision in Gruner and Moran's trial is reached. We're just work partners," he explains.

"Is she aware that you're just work partners?"

"Yes, of course. Our relationship is strictly professional."

"Nothing with Anabelle is ever strictly professional. She loathes the very word. If all you intend to take from her is her knowledge of Moriarty, then make that clear now, because if not she will give much more," says the Professor. "And should she do so to no purpose, or worse – only to feel anguish in the face of your callousness – I will not make jokes with you, Mr. Holmes, as I once did with Moriarty. The Madders are no longer a family that can be preyed upon."

It dawns on Sherlock, suddenly, why the Professor is doing this. Why he's turned so hard. Sure, it has everything to do with his past with Moriarty. But this is also one of "those conversations" that people always talk about, isn't it? The ones in crap telly? The hurt-my-daughter-and-I'll-hurt-you conversation?

Sherlock's wanted to have one of these conversations his entire life. Not this one specifically, but one of those conversations, one of the normal kind. He'd nearly forgotten about them. But he feels, somewhere deep inside, a little thrilled.

He should mention this on the blog. John would find it funny.

"She's not my girlfriend," he says, feeling a bit like John. We're not a couple. "And she's thirty years old. I'm certain she can handle the likes of me."

"Age isn't a factor when it comes to sociopaths."

"I'm not a sociopath!" Years of claiming he is, quite freely, and now he's denied it twice it one conversation.

"What proof do you have, Mr. Holmes? Because I would love to believe you. I would."

"Proof? What do you want? My life story?" Sherlock offers mockingly, through gritted teeth.

"Why, yes. That seems appropriate, considering the circumstances." Sherlock stares at the Professor. The Professor folds his hands in his lap and puts on the air of someone anticipating a good tale. "Please, Mr. Holmes," he says, prompting Sherlock with a gesture of his hand. "Proceed."

Notes: Everything I mention in this story about Moriarty's life has become entirely headcanon for me. xD edit: I've recently learned that apparently hospital bills aren't something one would have to worry about in Ireland. But, because I'm American, I'm just going to forget that little fact. :)