Heroes Fic
A holiday gift Heroes fic for decadentdream. She asked for it on her wishlist. I'm sorry it's a day late. Happy holidays decadentdream!
Title: If decadentdream wants to name it, then that's what will happen! Let me know please. :]
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: It can be Zach and Claire or Zach/Claire, depending on how you read it.
Spoilers: Through Fallout.
Warnings: None.
Summary: Every day Claire patiently sits down and helps him fill in the gaps.
Notes: Again, this is for decadentdream. Happy Holidays!
She sits down with him every day and tries to fill in the gaps.
"Okay," she says the first day, "how much do you remember?"
He honestly thinks about that for a second because what he remembers is so different from what she terms reality. What he remembers is being suddenly and harshly alienated from her because she wanted to play the popularity game. What he remembers is never talking to her again until that day she called him and starting babbling about body snatching. What he remembers is not what she wants to hear.
"Nothing." He says. He sees her fists clench and her eyes glisten ever-so-slightly and he is angry, even though he doesn't know her. Because as much as he doesn't, as much as he has not spoken to her since sixth grade, he is beginning to believe he does know her after all.
***
She takes a deep breath on the second day and says she'll start with discovering her powers. He raises an eyebrow because he may be into sci-fi but he's not stupid.
She takes this in stride. She grabs a hammer and hits her left pinky finger. Twice.
His first reaction is a string of cuss words, followed by amazement. Awe. Because her finger is straightening itself out, the rapidly forming bruise is disappearing just as rapidly, her nail is growing back for God's sake.
The scariest part is that the entire incident -- hammer and all -- does hardly anything to spark his memory. He has no sudden epiphany (oh you're Claire) no flood of memories. Yes, her story feels vaguely familiar, but it doesn't trigger his real memories of the time.
And he can't help but think -- what if this is all some huge practical joke? Some enormous scenario all rigged so that she and her friends could have a nice laugh when he finally admitted he believed?
And what if he starts to believe?
***
They sit down on the couch on the third day and she starts to talk about jumping off the bridge.
"I had to know." she says, shrugging nonchalantly.
"So you jumped off a bridge?"
She nods, shrugging again, and he shakes his head in disbelief.
And yet this girl sitting before him so calmly looks like she might jump off bridges, just to see what would happen. Her face is set -- calm, composed, but determined -- and her eyes are focused. She is going to make him believe, no matter what. She is going to make him remember. She is going to tell him this fantastical story, this ridiculous, unbelievable story, and she is going to make him believe.
A girl like that might well jump off a bridge, just to see if she could put herself together again.
She glosses on through the fire, perhaps afraid that if she paints herself the hero he won't believe. She moves on to the newspaper articles, and to Jackie.
He smiles cynically when she explains Jackie taking the credit because it is so like her.
If nothing else convinces him, that just might.
***
On the fourth day she does not sit immediately. Instead she paces for a few minutes, her eyes focused with barely concealed rage on something he cannot see. But he waits, because he has learned to wait. He trusts her enough to wait.
She does sit down, and it doesn't take long before she has taken one very deep breath and launched into the story of the bonfire, and Brody.
She tells him the whole story, right down to waking up in the morgue, and he is angry. Furious even.
Because even though he doesn't know this girl, even though he hasn't talked to her since the sixth grade, even though she's become someone he wouldn't waste his time knowing (popular, snobby, and full of school spirit), he is angry for her.
He knows her at least well enough to be angry on her behalf.
***
The fifth day is another one of worried looks from her, of pacing and lip biting. But she finally sits down and tells him part of her story she doesn't seem to want him to hear.
Part of her story that involves crashing a car (with someone else in it) into a concrete wall. On purpose. As in, purposeful murder. Willful murder.
He recoils from the idea of it, from the idea of not just wanting to kill someone but actually following it through, knowing that you would be okay but that they wouldn't wake up to see another morning. She watches him worriedly, tries so hard to explain herself.
"I just -- well he would have done it again Zach. Not to me, to someone else. To lots of someone else's. Again and again and again. And I didn't have a mark on me! I couldn't prove a thing!"
He can see where she is coming from. That is plain. This kid had committed an atrocity, and would be doing the same thing again.
But he still can't reconcile the idea with his idea of what was right.
He is comforted, at the end of the day, by the idea that if she were lying she wouldn't have told him at all.
He wants to believe her story. He wants to believe that he knew this girl. That they were friends. And he finds that it is easier to do each day.
***
When they sit down on the sixth day she begins to tell him the story of homecoming, starting with being forbidden to go. He grimaces because homecoming was important to her.
But she hasn't told him that. Not expressly.
But it was. He remembers that.
He remembers that.
He grins and she looks at him, one eyebrow raised. "Huh?"
"Oh," he says, "nothing."
She gives him a puzzled look but continues.
"So I was sitting in my room and I got a text message --"
He can't help it now, because suddenly he knows. He knows what happens next.
"I was texting you," he says slowly, "I was under your window texting you."
He begins to speak more and more rapidly, picking up speed as he talks, as he remembers. "I was throwing rocks at your window and you didn't hear me so I texted you!"
She gives an excited, shrill scream, which she cuts short when she remembers that they are living in Isaac's apartment with six other people and those kinds of living conditions don't lend themselves to loud noises.
But she jumps up and hugs him and it doesn't feel strange to hug her back.
He reminds himself later, as he is sitting on the couch trying to absorb everything, to make sense of it, that he would not feel comfortable hugging a complete stranger.
He must have known her.
He'd like to know her again.
***
He doesn't like to remember the seventh day because it is all about her being in danger, her almost dying, her watching people's heads open up, about her scared and lonely, about her in a police station, frightened to death (if she could die) and he doesn't like that. At all.
On the eighth day the story begins to wind down. She begins to tell him about coming home from the police station, about her dad promising to keep her safe. And she begins to pause.
If he thought she had a hard time telling the story of the bonfire, well, this is another thing altogether. Sometimes she is barely talking above a whisper, and suddenly he knows what this is. This is about how he lost his memory. He leans in, tension gnawing away at his stomach, because he wants to know. If this is all true, the whole story, then why can't he remember any of it?
"And then my dad promised to...to take care of Lyle. So that he wouldn't -- he wouldn't threaten my safety, or whatever. And when he came home dad didn't come in. He left again...right away. And Lyle. Lyle didn't remember my powers. He didn't even remember how he got home."
And Zach understands. He doesn't need her to say it, which is good, because she doesn't seem up to it right now, considering the fact that she's crying.
It's a good thing he knows her well enough to lend her a shoulder, and comfort. That's what she needs right now.
Title: If decadentdream wants to name it, then that's what will happen! Let me know please. :]
Rating: PG
Characters/Pairings: It can be Zach and Claire or Zach/Claire, depending on how you read it.
Spoilers: Through Fallout.
Warnings: None.
Summary: Every day Claire patiently sits down and helps him fill in the gaps.
Notes: Again, this is for decadentdream. Happy Holidays!
She sits down with him every day and tries to fill in the gaps.
"Okay," she says the first day, "how much do you remember?"
He honestly thinks about that for a second because what he remembers is so different from what she terms reality. What he remembers is being suddenly and harshly alienated from her because she wanted to play the popularity game. What he remembers is never talking to her again until that day she called him and starting babbling about body snatching. What he remembers is not what she wants to hear.
"Nothing." He says. He sees her fists clench and her eyes glisten ever-so-slightly and he is angry, even though he doesn't know her. Because as much as he doesn't, as much as he has not spoken to her since sixth grade, he is beginning to believe he does know her after all.
***
She takes a deep breath on the second day and says she'll start with discovering her powers. He raises an eyebrow because he may be into sci-fi but he's not stupid.
She takes this in stride. She grabs a hammer and hits her left pinky finger. Twice.
His first reaction is a string of cuss words, followed by amazement. Awe. Because her finger is straightening itself out, the rapidly forming bruise is disappearing just as rapidly, her nail is growing back for God's sake.
The scariest part is that the entire incident -- hammer and all -- does hardly anything to spark his memory. He has no sudden epiphany (oh you're Claire) no flood of memories. Yes, her story feels vaguely familiar, but it doesn't trigger his real memories of the time.
And he can't help but think -- what if this is all some huge practical joke? Some enormous scenario all rigged so that she and her friends could have a nice laugh when he finally admitted he believed?
And what if he starts to believe?
***
They sit down on the couch on the third day and she starts to talk about jumping off the bridge.
"I had to know." she says, shrugging nonchalantly.
"So you jumped off a bridge?"
She nods, shrugging again, and he shakes his head in disbelief.
And yet this girl sitting before him so calmly looks like she might jump off bridges, just to see what would happen. Her face is set -- calm, composed, but determined -- and her eyes are focused. She is going to make him believe, no matter what. She is going to make him remember. She is going to tell him this fantastical story, this ridiculous, unbelievable story, and she is going to make him believe.
A girl like that might well jump off a bridge, just to see if she could put herself together again.
She glosses on through the fire, perhaps afraid that if she paints herself the hero he won't believe. She moves on to the newspaper articles, and to Jackie.
He smiles cynically when she explains Jackie taking the credit because it is so like her.
If nothing else convinces him, that just might.
***
On the fourth day she does not sit immediately. Instead she paces for a few minutes, her eyes focused with barely concealed rage on something he cannot see. But he waits, because he has learned to wait. He trusts her enough to wait.
She does sit down, and it doesn't take long before she has taken one very deep breath and launched into the story of the bonfire, and Brody.
She tells him the whole story, right down to waking up in the morgue, and he is angry. Furious even.
Because even though he doesn't know this girl, even though he hasn't talked to her since the sixth grade, even though she's become someone he wouldn't waste his time knowing (popular, snobby, and full of school spirit), he is angry for her.
He knows her at least well enough to be angry on her behalf.
***
The fifth day is another one of worried looks from her, of pacing and lip biting. But she finally sits down and tells him part of her story she doesn't seem to want him to hear.
Part of her story that involves crashing a car (with someone else in it) into a concrete wall. On purpose. As in, purposeful murder. Willful murder.
He recoils from the idea of it, from the idea of not just wanting to kill someone but actually following it through, knowing that you would be okay but that they wouldn't wake up to see another morning. She watches him worriedly, tries so hard to explain herself.
"I just -- well he would have done it again Zach. Not to me, to someone else. To lots of someone else's. Again and again and again. And I didn't have a mark on me! I couldn't prove a thing!"
He can see where she is coming from. That is plain. This kid had committed an atrocity, and would be doing the same thing again.
But he still can't reconcile the idea with his idea of what was right.
He is comforted, at the end of the day, by the idea that if she were lying she wouldn't have told him at all.
He wants to believe her story. He wants to believe that he knew this girl. That they were friends. And he finds that it is easier to do each day.
***
When they sit down on the sixth day she begins to tell him the story of homecoming, starting with being forbidden to go. He grimaces because homecoming was important to her.
But she hasn't told him that. Not expressly.
But it was. He remembers that.
He remembers that.
He grins and she looks at him, one eyebrow raised. "Huh?"
"Oh," he says, "nothing."
She gives him a puzzled look but continues.
"So I was sitting in my room and I got a text message --"
He can't help it now, because suddenly he knows. He knows what happens next.
"I was texting you," he says slowly, "I was under your window texting you."
He begins to speak more and more rapidly, picking up speed as he talks, as he remembers. "I was throwing rocks at your window and you didn't hear me so I texted you!"
She gives an excited, shrill scream, which she cuts short when she remembers that they are living in Isaac's apartment with six other people and those kinds of living conditions don't lend themselves to loud noises.
But she jumps up and hugs him and it doesn't feel strange to hug her back.
He reminds himself later, as he is sitting on the couch trying to absorb everything, to make sense of it, that he would not feel comfortable hugging a complete stranger.
He must have known her.
He'd like to know her again.
***
He doesn't like to remember the seventh day because it is all about her being in danger, her almost dying, her watching people's heads open up, about her scared and lonely, about her in a police station, frightened to death (if she could die) and he doesn't like that. At all.
On the eighth day the story begins to wind down. She begins to tell him about coming home from the police station, about her dad promising to keep her safe. And she begins to pause.
If he thought she had a hard time telling the story of the bonfire, well, this is another thing altogether. Sometimes she is barely talking above a whisper, and suddenly he knows what this is. This is about how he lost his memory. He leans in, tension gnawing away at his stomach, because he wants to know. If this is all true, the whole story, then why can't he remember any of it?
"And then my dad promised to...to take care of Lyle. So that he wouldn't -- he wouldn't threaten my safety, or whatever. And when he came home dad didn't come in. He left again...right away. And Lyle. Lyle didn't remember my powers. He didn't even remember how he got home."
And Zach understands. He doesn't need her to say it, which is good, because she doesn't seem up to it right now, considering the fact that she's crying.
It's a good thing he knows her well enough to lend her a shoulder, and comfort. That's what she needs right now.