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Mastermind.
"Moriarty!" The dying driver yelled out with the last of his strength; upon hearing the name, Sherlock gently lifted his foot and he looked through the window thoughtfully. He was certain the shooter who had injured the driver, who was already dying, was already long since gone, but the detective wasn't concerned about that.
At the moment Sherlock didn't care who the shooter was, right now he was more interested in the criminal 'sponsor' who'd been paying money to the driver's family so they lived comfortably after his long-overdue death. It was an interesting matter; a criminal who actually paid money in such a unique, special way, but the thing which impressed and amazed Sherlock the most was how the murders were not of people who were important in a government, scientific, or business sense of the word, they were just ordinary, stupid, dull-witted and mundane people.
The police and Sherlock himself had gotten the case wrong. They had believed they were dealing with a serial killer who had researched his victims, knew their secrets, and they had something to link them together. That was the reason why Lestrade had come to him because he and his colleagues knew even before their ridiculous lies at the news conference they had nothing. But Sherlock had done his research into the victims. He had hacked their computers, and he had not discovered anything that even remotely linked the previous murders.
The answer was so strange it was horrifying but simple.
The taxi driver had chosen his victims, taking his time to put some distance between himself and the deaths, knowing if he killed too many people it would be extremely simple for the police to track their movements, and pin their deaths on him. But Sherlock had known the moment the taxi driver had met him and took him away from Baker St, and away from Lestrade and his idiot police officers, the taxi driver was not the only one responsible for the murders. The driver was smart, but Sherlock knew it would take a unique mind to commit a number of murders that were senseless. Why would a taxi driver commit murders? But the driver had told him someone was sponsoring him, someone who had promised the driver a fortune for each murder, supplying the poison pills in a bottle as well, but why?
Why would a criminal be so altruistic?
But more importantly, Sherlock was fascinated; he knew if he had followed the same path of life, and became a criminal like the driver's sponsor, he would do it in a creative, unique way mirroring the Consulting Detective role Sherlock had invented for himself, and if he had any thought then he would likely have come up with a similar set of criteria for a series of murders, but what was in it for this Moriarty?
Sherlock was not looking at the window opposite the one he was looking out from, he was looking out into the night sky. A serial killer was one thing; they were rare enough, but a mastermind. A true mastermind. That was something that was truly unique, once in a lifetime.
Sherlock had no idea where and when they would meet, but he knew without a doubt the game had begun. Or maybe, it had already begun, but he hadn't seen the signs but there had been moments where he had wondered if some of the crimes he had investigated had been more well organised than the capabilities of the criminals who'd committed them.
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