Disclaimer: I own nothing.

University AU. Note: 1) Sherlock's backstory in this first chapter is completely of my own making and not in any way related to the show Sherlock or the writings of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. 2) Westwood University is not a real university; I made it up because it's easier to invent a school than to research a real one.

I plan for this fic to be very long, just so you know when you're getting in to it now. I have a great deal of plans for it. Who knows how far I'll take this, but this could end up being twenty or more chapters, depending on how excited I get. I will probably update really quickly, but if I don't, there shouldn't be more than a week between chapters. If I take longer, feel free to nag me with a PM and tell me to hurry up!

Lastly, it's rated M for smut that starts in chapter 14. Sorry it's so far, but you'll get there.

Anywho, that's all. Enjoy!

Sherlock Holmes was, as a grievous understatement, an unusual person. But, to be fair to him, he never had much chance to be otherwise.

Sometimes, there are cases of peculiar human beings born to quite ordinary families—the black sheep. It was quite common, actually. But Sherlock, he was a bit of a different story. It was as if he had an entire family of black sheep and he turned out some weird silver colour, an anomaly amongst anomalies.

Everyone in the Holmes family was different in their own way.

Mr Holmes had just been plain strange in general, I suppose you could say. He was socially awkward to the extreme (maybe that's partially where his children got their social ineptitudes) and he was completely obsessed with World War II era aeroplanes. He was a professor at a local university and he kept himself locked up, playing with his miniature models of these aeroplanes. In many ways, he was much like a child, when he was alive (he died when his younger son was three).

Mrs Holmes had been uncanny in a completely different way. She was kind and accepting in a way that rarely existed in the world, almost to the point that it made other people uncomfortable, because she was accepting of everything. If a murderer came to her door, she would gladly let him in for a cuppa—though, of course, she wasn't totally stupid, so she would keep said person away from her children. But she thought anyone—and I do mean anyone—could change, and even if they could, she didn't really seem to think most people needed to.

But then there were the Holmes boys. Mycroft and Sherlock. One might think that, startlingly acute minds as they had, they might have come from great minds themselves, but they didn't. One might also think they came from cold, unfeeling parentage, considering that neither of them were ever ones for sentiment, but their parents had been nice enough. It's rather a mystery how the two boys ended up as they did.

Mycroft was cunning, had a hunger for power even from a young age, and also knew when to smile even when he didn't want to and how to put on an act—because he never really cared about anything. He thought it was a waste of time, a weakness, to love. He was a politician at heart. And he was smart. Oh, he was clever. He knew just what buttons to press to make people do what he wanted, and he knew just what it was they wanted just by looking at them.

But then there was his younger brother, Sherlock. Mycroft was clever, sure, but Sherlock Holmes… He made Mycroft look like a moron (admittedly, Mycroft was cleverer than Sherlock at the start, but he didn't develop his brain the same way his younger brother did). The boy's mind was hardly even an organ anymore. It had become a machine, or maybe an alien organism, with how far advanced it was compared to others. He was arguably the most intelligent person on the planet. But he was also insensitive, selfish, a show off, oftentimes cruel. So, on that account, he and Mycroft were much the same.

But the difference there was that Sherlock was not always that way.

Sherlock had deleted the information somewhere around the age of thirteen, but if he hadn't, he would remember the exact day that he changed. The exact moment. He was eleven, his older brother eighteen. Mycroft had always been the way he was, to a point. Probably he would never change either. But Sherlock… his heartlessness had a specific cause, and because of that, there was room, if only a little, for redemption.

Sherlock didn't actually mean to irritate his classmates, or hurt their feelings. It was hard for him to understand that there was always a double-standard in place for him: other people could say their opinions if they wanted, but Sherlock had to hold his in.

Because Sherlock saw too much. He could tell things about his classmates, just by looking at them. There were clear signs. He thought it was obvious and never could figure out why other people didn't see what he saw.

And he hated it. Because he couldn't keep himself from seeing things, he just did. He didn't try. And he never knew what things he was supposed to be able to tell and what things were too much. That was a common trait in any child: not knowing when to keep their mouth shut. But for Sherlock, it was a much more severe problem. He made people uncomfortable because he knew so much about them. Sometimes he even tried to hide it, but the school was small. They all knew about his little talent and would poke at him until he admitted what he saw, and once he did, they would be insulted and hate them for it. He would try to tell them that was the precise reason why he hadn't planned on telling them at all, but they still acted as if it was his fault.

Everyone in his primary school hated him. He wanted so badly to relate to them, but they all knew that he knew things, and they didn't want to deal with that. So they shunned him, and the bigger, dumber boys hit him, partially because he had said at least one thing to insult all of them, but also because they were jealous that they couldn't be clever too.

Sherlock, to a point, was used to being treated horribly. But how could he bring himself to not care? He tried and tried, but always, it hurt him that the other kids just called him freak all the time, said they detested him. What kid even knows the meaning of the word detest anyway? But the children would teach themselves words like that just so that they could tease Sherlock. It was a game and they all thought it was loads of fun. Watching Sherlock get punched by the bigger kids was one of the biggest treats they could get after school was out.

Maybe Sherlock would have given up and hated them for it long ago, if it weren't for one thing. His mother. The days he came home hurt, she would look at him with sympathy in her eyes, but she would tell him that what those kids said didn't matter, because Sherlock was the most precious thing in her whole world, and he was special in a way that the children coveted. She insisted this over and over again, and in this, Sherlock could find peace in his oddities. As long as his mother was around, he could survive the bullying, because one person on the planet cared, and that's all he really needed.

So one day, he went to school as he always did. The children were cruel, that was nothing different. His mum told him she loved him when she dropped him off, said not to worry about what other kids think, that they surely have problems of their own to make them unkind and that Sherlock would do best trying to be nice to them back.

But things became different quickly. Because that day, he took his first good look at Mary Toddsworth. She had never been completely horrible. She didn't pay him much mind, actually. She only had one or two friends, two girls who didn't seem to be present that day. Sherlock, out of boredom, paid attention to her that day. He watched her interactions with others, saw how she acted on her own.

His conclusion was: Mary had three older sisters, two of which still lived with them and the other was attending Oxford University on scholarship. Her mother died at a young age so she lived with her father, who had a low income job and was sexually abusive.

So all he did was go up to her and try to engage in small-talk about her sisters, and then tell her that if she needed any help, because her father was a bad man and her mother was obviously not around to help, she could tell a teacher, or Sherlock could do it for her, if it made her uncomfortable.

He was trying to be nice, but she didn't appreciate it. She just screamed, and a teacher came running, looking at Sherlock expectantly, because he got into trouble by saying too much a lot. He really thought he'd judged the situation correctly this time, but it seemed he'd been wrong.

Mary told the teacher that he was being mean, and when he tried to argue that he wasn't, they were taken to the office. First they listened to her part of the story while he sat outside, and then she glared at him as he walked into the office to tell his part.

"Mary says you were being mean to her," said Ms Green, the principal. He knew she was in an especially rotten mood today since she had a row with her brother over the phone and her husband was out all night drinking again.

Sherlock, however, was feeling too indignant to just say sorry and get the punishment he had in store in peace. Instead, he argued. "I only wanted her to know that she wasn't trapped with her sexually abusive father, and that I wanted to help! How is that mean?"

"Sherlock," Ms Green said, hardly seeming to have heard him at all, "Mary said that you knew many things you had no business knowing, like about her sisters and mother and financial situation. She's afraid you found her diary and read it. Have you been going through her things?"

"I didn't read her diary," he squealed. "I could tell by looking at her!"

Ms Green had obviously both been expecting and dreading this answer. She became irritated. "Sherlock, how could you possibly know about any of that?"

"I just do."

"How?" she insisted.

Maybe he hated his gift sometimes, but if someone asked him to tell how he knew things, he couldn't help but tell them animatedly. And once you got him going, there was no stopping him.

"Mary has several older sisters, judging from the state of her obviously hand-me-down clothes. It could be that she has one sister that's just much older than her, which is obvious from how some of the clothes items are at least ten years out of fashion, but two things told me otherwise: the clothes were very worn at the knees, like it would be for a child who plays a lot of sports, but neither Mary nor her university-aged sister enjoy that kind of rough-housing, judging from her older sister's academic scholarship and Mary's hands, which have no callouses or scars from playing, so there must be another sister. Also, she is wearing three items: black trousers, pink shirt, blue jacket. The jacket's the oldest item, the one that clued me off to the oldest sister. But then the black trousers with the worn knees—though they don't fit correctly, making them also hand-me-down—are much newer, which means there's another sister, the sister who likes sports. And then there's the pink shirt, which doesn't match the type of style of the other two items, which implies there's a more feminine sister that wears more pink than the other two. Thus the three sisters. And if she wears all hand-me-down clothes, of course she's poor. I knew her sister was at Oxford from the small pin Mary has on her backpack, so that was obvious, and she had a scholarship because there's no way she could afford to go there otherwise because of their lack of funds, and I knew about the dead mother from the locket that she wears around her neck that has obviously been worn by Mary for at least five years, judging by how worn it is, but was owned by an adult woman that she cared about dearly, considering that even though it's got the wear of a child, she holds it and polishes it frequently with her shirt. I only assumed it was a mother because how else could the father get away with molesting her unless there was no mother around to stop it?"

Ms Green just gaped at him, seeming to be at a loss for what to say.

Finally, she said in a hushed voice, "Why do you keep saying those things about her father? It's rude!"

"But it's true! Haven't you noticed the way she flinches if any adult male gets near her? It's not just with abrupt motions, and she has no bruises or scars from past injuries, so it's not physical abuse. If anything, she gets more nervous if they try to put a hand on her, even a comforting hand on the back. She pales and fidgets and she subconsciously grips the top of her jeans, as if trying to keep them up. All that considered, her father rapes her, probably frequently."

She looked lost for words again, but then looked furious. "Sherlock Holmes," Ms Green hissed. "You will stop this nonsense right this instant!"

"Nonsense? Don't you want to help her?" asked Sherlock, appalled. Sure, he had figured it out in an unorthodox way, but Mary was in trouble and nobody cared just because Sherlock was the one to figure it out.

"Sherlock, you need to stop this. Making up stories about your classmates to make yourself feel important."

"I don't make it up. Everyone always says the stuff I say is true."

"Maybe to indulge you, but—"

"But it is true! I don't make it up, I s—"

"Sherlock!" she yelled, truly losing her temper. Sherlock went silent for a moment. "Haven't you noticed you've got no friends? Don't you want to have friends, Sherlock?"

This stopped Sherlock. Of course he wanted to have friends. "What am I supposed to do, not be myself?"

"Not be a know-it-all, yes."

"They all tell me to say what I've seen," Sherlock said quietly. "I'm not shoving it on anyone, they ask."

"Because they're treating you like a spectacle, Sherlock," she said. Her voice had changed to something a bit softer, as if she thought her cruel words were meant to help rather than hurt the boy. "They think you're a freak and they make you be a freak over and over again so they can make fun of you for it. Stop being such easy bait."

Sherlock swallowed and, like he often did to keep from getting too upset, thought of his mother. She knew he didn't make it up, and she didn't think he was a freak.

"I shouldn't have said it," Sherlock said, knowing these were the words he needed to say to get out of the office. "I'm sorry."

"Good," Ms Green said. "Apologise to Mary and go back out to lunch. Detention will start tomorrow."

He walked to the door, but then added, "But, please, will you just look into the problem with Mary's father?"

"Sherlock…" Ms Green warned.

"Nevermind," he murmured, walking out of the office.

The rest of lunch was hell. Everyone had heard what he'd did from Mary, and so the boys came over and beat him up again and everyone watched and laughed. Sherlock just did what he always did. It's okay, he'd think to himself, I'll see mum soon and I'll feel better.

But Mycroft was the one who picked him up from school. Other than the fact that he never picked up Sherlock, he read on Mycroft's face something was wrong with his mum.

"What happened?" he asked immediately when he got into the passenger seat.

Maybe an older brother would usually sugar-coat the whole thing, but Mycroft wasn't sensitive to that type of thing and Sherlock wasn't the type that needed to be babied.

So he immediately told Sherlock that their mother had been shot in a convenience store. No reason, just a random act of violence. She died of her injuries.

The next long while went in a blur for Sherlock. But all he could think, over and over, was that his mother had said being kind made a difference.

His mother was the kindest person in the whole world and that hadn't made any difference for her.

It was like a steel wall had been erected over his heart, towards people in general. He was better than all of them anyway. How had he never noticed? He was clever, that was all that mattered. Why had he always hated his gift? It was his greatest asset and the only thing in the world that mattered.

That was the first day Sherlock deleted something from his mind. And what he deleted first was compassion. Then his social filter. Then any positive feelings he had towards people—it was all wasting space in his head, that miraculous head that could do so much. But how much more would it be able to do when he emptied if of everything useless? The possibilities were endless.

And that was when the true Sherlock Holmes was born.

Sherlock lived with Mycroft after that, even though he was insufferable most of the time, because it was better than living in foster homes or an orphanage. In fact, Mycroft decided to move away to London shortly after their mother died. Sherlock didn't mind at all—he'd had just enough time to be horrible to the children who were horrible to him before he left to satisfy him.

And each day he forgot more and more about his mother's kindness, everything she had taught. He didn't delete her entirely, for there were fond memories with her, but now that she was gone he realised she was a hare-brained and silly woman. He kept just enough of her in his mind that if he needed to remember her for something, he could. But why he would need to, he didn't know.

He went through high school with as many friends as he had in primary school, except he preferred it that way. People were only ever three things: dull, dim, and distracting. He didn't need to waste his time on them. In fact, he quite enjoyed irritating them and did it as often as he could.

Then Sherlock got a full-ride to Westwood University, a prestigious achievement. Not that he'd been expecting any different, considering his perfect marks in everything. And, of course, you needed an extra-curricular for universities to think you're special, but Sherlock was in the orchestra in high school—it was frustrating to deal with the other students so frequently (especially Anderson, the idiot that played clarinet that he despised so thoroughly that he deleted his first name from his mind every time he heard it), but he enjoyed violin enough to suffer through it. So, with the perfect marks and his extra-curricular that the teacher—though he disliked Sherlock immensely—had to admit he was spectacular at, Sherlock had easily gotten into Westwood. He heard Anderson was going too, as a Biology major, but he sincerely hoped that wasn't true.

Sherlock was excited to go, but there was one problem. They had no single dorm rooms, which meant he was destined to have a roommate. Sure, he'd lived with Mycroft his whole life, but they tried as much as they could not to associate with each other in any way. But some ordinary, painfully boring, idiotic person living in the same room as him? He shuddered at the thought…

But also was unwillingly curious as to what the person might be like, for some reason.

And Sherlock didn't know it yet, but his dorm-mate was going to change his life forever.

I sincerely apologise for that corny last line, but I didn't know how to end it climatically.

Now will be the first of many times that I will be an annoying nag and ask that you review what you think so far. Review every chapter if you like, I don't care. I just like to know what people are thinking. You can also give ideas of what you'd like to see in future chapters, but I'm not guaranteeing they'll actually happen. Anywho, hope you enjoyed, and please review! (See, that's already the second review request and we haven't even gotten to chapter 1. I'll count them all as they appear for you.)