Sweet Charity: Heroes, "Blood and Formaldehyde"
Dear superkappa, I finished your Sweet-Charity fic! I hope it's everything you wanted :)
Blood and Formaldehyde
Heroes. Elle/Sylar, one-sided Elle/Claire.
Rated PG-13 for language and sex.
Warnings: Voyeurism, one-sided femslash.
Summary: It was a hell of a lot easier to hate Sylar when he actually allowed people to call him Sylar.
Notes: The title and italicized lyrics are from “Fake Palindromes,” by Andrew Bird.
----
My dewy-eyed Disney bride, what has tried swapping your blood with formaldehyde? Monsters?
----
You don’t have to die to be filled up with formaldehyde. Living will do that just fine. Claire watched her father die, watched her mother beg for his life and for her own. She watched the man who pretended to be her father (DNA meant everything to Mohinder, but it was jack shit to Claire) hide the details of their deaths under the all forgiving language of vague bureaucracy. “Accidental” and “noble sacrifice” cover every sin.
Every death, every loss, every day Sylar went free was another drop of poison in Claire’s blood. Soon the formaldehyde sucked every living drop from her veins. She should have known that if she wanted to live forever she would have to be pumped full of preservatives.
A lot can change in four years. Peter went rogue, Mohinder dropped off everyone’s radar, Nathan became president. Elle married Sylar. Even Sylar changed (though Claire didn’t want to admit it). He was all shy smiles and bashful redemption. Elle ate it right up--everyone did. Except Claire. All she saw was the man who killed her bio mom, the man who ripped open her skull, the man who caused everyone so much misery and pain. It made her stomach sour and her teeth clench. But she tolerated him. She told everyone it was because at least he was trying. She told herself it was because he wasn’t killing anymore (that she knew of). She ignored the voice in her mind that told her it was because Elle loved him, and Claire didn’t want to lose Elle.
----
Nearly everyone came to pay their respects to Claire’s parents. It was a shitty day--rainy and muddy and cold--but Claire was glad. She didn’t want to bury her parents while the sun shined. Claire and Lyle stood side by side in the funeral home, receiving the strange mix of mourners. Peter, sporting a new wound across his face, told her that Nathan was busy with the campaign. Claire figured that was code for “my spin doctor told me not to come.” She didn’t care either way. Hiro and Ando came, lingered in the back, and left early. Matt Parkman showed--flanked by Daphne and a little girl Claire assumed was Molly.
Even Elle came--beautiful, poised Elle. She was dressed in a stylish black dress and four inch heels; the bump created by the baby was barely visible, so it was easy for Claire to ignore it. The hackles on the back of Claire’s neck rose, telling her that Sylar was lurking somewhere nearby, but he had enough sense to remain hidden.
After the service, one of Elle’s shoes got stuck in the mud outside the funeral home. Claire automatically moved to help her; she took Elle’s hand and tugged until the heel came free with a soft popping sound. Elle smiled and Claire dropped her hand and rubbed her suddenly sweaty palms on her black pants.
Elle hugged Claire, “you’ll see me again,” she whispered. As she pulled away, Elle zapped Claire lightly, laughing when the other girl flinched. Waving, she hobbled out to a waiting car, carefully avoiding spots of mud. Lyle emerged from the funeral home to stand next to his sister.
“Why do you even like that bitch?” Lyle asked (predictably, given his history with her). Claire didn’t know how to answer him.
----
Three days after the funeral, Sylar and Elle arrived on Claire’s doorstep. Claire knew without asking that they needed a place to stay.
“Your father said we could.” Sylar looked like it pained him to ask the cheerleader for help, but Elle just looked tired.
Claire moved to slam the door shut. “Sorry, my dad’s not here right now. Why don’t you try him at the Elm Street Cemetery?”
Quick as a flash, Sylar wedged his foot in the door. “Listen to me, you little--“
“Gabriel.” Elle’s voice, soft and warm, interrupted him. The older blonde turned to Claire. “It’ll just be for a couple days,” she offered. It was as close to ‘begging’ as Elle Bishop got.
‘A couple days’ turned into a couple weeks, which turned into a couple months. Elle and Sylar got comfortable in Claire’s house--the house she once shared with her parents (before they died) and her brother (before he went to college.) Claire started spending more and more time at Knox’s place. When they got into too many shouting matches, she started renting a room at a seedy motel outside of town. Questionable stains aside, Claire thought it was nice to have her own space again. She dyed her hair black--she was tired of being the blonde cheerleader.
Claire started timing her visits to the house when she knew Sylar would be gone. Knox asked Claire why she didn’t fight for her home--why she lay back and let Sylar steal it from her. She didn’t want to tell him the truth, so she fashioned a pretty lie. “My parents are gone,” she said, shrugging. “Who cares about a stupid building?”
----
Sometimes Claire spied on them. She didn’t make it a habit or anything, but sometimes she hid under their bedroom window. Sometimes she just listened to their night-noises (the gentle inhale, exhale of Elle’s breath; the adorable sounds she made when she changed positions).
Sometimes she listened to Sylar and Elle fucking (because Claire is pretty sure Sylar is incapable of “making love”). Claire would lean against the side of the house, close her eyes and imagine what she would do to Elle--how she would make her feel.
She imagined stroking Elle’s soft skin, imagined sliding her shirt over her head and kissing her way up to Elle’s breasts. She imagined Elle whispering “Claire” instead of gasping “Gabriel.” She imagined burying her face in Elle’s neck, her fingers in Elle’s pussy, pressing the other woman into the sheets and driving her mad with pleasure. She loved to listen to Elle come, but she hated the noises Sylar made. Claire closed her eyes and pretended. She pretended Sylar was dead, that Elle loved Claire, that there was no one in the world except the two of them. In the dead of night, it almost felt true.
----
It was a hell of a lot easier to hate Sylar when he actually allowed people to call him Sylar. It was easier to hate him when he was the killer who opened her skull, not the guy who stole Elle and knocked her up. (Elle liked to use prettier words like “marriage,” and “starting a family.” Claire called it like she saw it.)
Claire still called him Sylar, because she didn’t want anyone to forget who he used to be. She called him Sylar because, deep down, she didn’t think he had actually changed. “He’s an addict, Elle,” she would hiss in the other woman’s ear. “Alcoholics want booze and Sylar wants powers--he’s never going to get better.”
Elle’s smile was sad. “What happened to you?” she asked, pulling her arm from Claire’s grasp. “I think you killed your inner cheerleader.”
“I didn’t kill her,” Claire wanted to shout. “Sylar did.”
Too bad inner cheerleaders don’t regenerate like her toes.
----
Elle called Claire when she went into labor, but Claire, instinctively knowing it was time, hit the ‘ignore’ button on her cell phone. The voice message was filled with moans and curse words as Elle ordered Claire to meet her at the hospital. Claire told herself that she didn’t have anything else to do on a rainy Sunday afternoon, so she hotwired a car and drove it to the hospital.
Labor was hard and long, but Claire stayed for the whole thing. It was the first time she had been in the same room as Sylar for months. Elle, oblivious to everything except her pain, screamed, cried and threw things (ice chips, plastic cups, a telephone) at the nurses. Claire took one hand and Sylar gripped another--they took her frustration, her pain and her fear, absorbing it all into their skin, along with her trademark blue sparks. The doctors, to their credit, didn’t ask questions.
At long last it was over, and the baby was out (Claire thought he was ugly--a loud, wrinkly thing--but Elle’s eyes were shining and that was enough for Claire). She left the tiny delivery room, giving the new parents some time alone. She found a vending machine and tried to decide whether she was hungry, and if she was, whether she wanted pretzels or a Hershey bar. She didn’t hear Sylar approach.
“She wants to see you,” he said, startling Claire. She grabbed her pretzels and shoved past Sylar.
When Claire poked her head into the hospital room, Elle smiled and held the infant out, inviting Claire to hold him. There was nothing Claire wanted less than to hold the infant offspring of Sylar. The kid was probably going to grow up to be the next Charles Manson. Claire made a face and started to refuse, excuses already coming to mind--“I’m really not good with kids,” might work, or “I’d probably drop him or something.”
“I named him Noah,” Elle said softly. There was a note of apology in her voice, like she had infringed on something personal and private--something only Claire had a right to experience. Later, Claire told herself that this was the moment she fell in love with Elle. She didn’t want to admit that she fell in love with her years ago.
----
200,000 people died in Costa Verde. 200,000 people extinguished in one agonizing second. As Claire pieced herself back together in the crater that used to be her home, she thought things could be worse. Elle could have been in the house. Elle could have died. Claire’s bones regrew and reset, muscle formed, skin knit together on top of it all and Claire practiced speeches in her head.
“Noah died before the explosion. He didn’t feel anything. It was an accident, I swear. It wasn’t my fault.”
Claire knew this was her chance--she could blame Sylar for the whole thing (it was, after all, his nuclear explosion that demolished everything within a ten mile radius), but she couldn’t bring herself to tell the woman she loves that her husband blew up their child.
----
A lifetime later, he tracked her down. Claire wondered how he found her--she moved to Japan to help Hiro run his company as he got too old to take care of the day to day affairs. Sylar found her in the market place, wondering if there was anything she could cook for dinner that didn’t involve fish or tofu.
“Claire.” She stiffened at the sound of his voice (she hadn’t seen him since she was 22, but that voice still sent shivers down her spine). Claire tried to run, but his hand was on her arm in a heartbeat.
“Please don’t be afraid,” he murmured, pulling her into an alley. Claire wasn’t afraid, not really, but she was still cautious. After seven years of fighting him and seventy years of hiding, caution was the only thing she had left.
They had tea in her favorite tea house--Sylar poured it gently, offered her a cup first, thanked their waitress in halting, but coherent, Japanese. He looked her over carefully, smiling. “Your hair is blonde again,” he pointed out. He looked pleased for some reason.
“Where’s Elle?” Claire asked without preamble or subtlety.
Sylar raised one eyebrow and Claire wondered for the first time how much Sylar knew (or suspected) about her feelings for his wife. “Dead,” he said simply.
“Did you kill her?” Claire’s voice was harsh with the accusation and Sylar’s eyes widened with surprise.
“You really hate me, don’t you?” he asked softly.
Claire shrugged as if to ask what did you expect? “You didn’t answer the question.”
“No, I didn’t kill her. She was never the same after Noah...” he paused and swallowed hard. “After Costa Verde. She seemed to fade away from me. Her heart gave out twenty years ago--the doctors said it was due to complications from prolonged electric shock.”
Claire couldn’t help the smiled that formed. “Figures.”
“So I went to find you.”
“Me? What could you possibly want with me?”
Sylar’s leaned closer, his eyes intent on Claire. “Because we are two of a kind. Everyone around us will grow old, the world will fade away, but we will be the same. Forever.”
Claire pulled away, finally realizing why Sylar had combed the earth looking for her. He wanted a companion--a replacement for Elle. A better Elle than the true Elle, because Claire’s golden hair would never turn grey and her breasts would always be firm and high. Her heart would never give out, leaving Sylar alone again. But as far as Claire was concerned, he deserved to be alone.
Claire stood, making her decision in a moment. “We won’t grow old, but we’ll never be the same.” As Claire left the tea house--left Sylar, sitting alone, she realized that veins filled with formaldehyde weren’t all that bad. Feeling nothing beat the hell out of feeling pain.
----
” She’s got an old death kit she’s been meaning to use, she’s got blood in her eyes for you.”
Blood and Formaldehyde
Heroes. Elle/Sylar, one-sided Elle/Claire.
Rated PG-13 for language and sex.
Warnings: Voyeurism, one-sided femslash.
Summary: It was a hell of a lot easier to hate Sylar when he actually allowed people to call him Sylar.
Notes: The title and italicized lyrics are from “Fake Palindromes,” by Andrew Bird.
----
My dewy-eyed Disney bride, what has tried swapping your blood with formaldehyde? Monsters?
----
You don’t have to die to be filled up with formaldehyde. Living will do that just fine. Claire watched her father die, watched her mother beg for his life and for her own. She watched the man who pretended to be her father (DNA meant everything to Mohinder, but it was jack shit to Claire) hide the details of their deaths under the all forgiving language of vague bureaucracy. “Accidental” and “noble sacrifice” cover every sin.
Every death, every loss, every day Sylar went free was another drop of poison in Claire’s blood. Soon the formaldehyde sucked every living drop from her veins. She should have known that if she wanted to live forever she would have to be pumped full of preservatives.
A lot can change in four years. Peter went rogue, Mohinder dropped off everyone’s radar, Nathan became president. Elle married Sylar. Even Sylar changed (though Claire didn’t want to admit it). He was all shy smiles and bashful redemption. Elle ate it right up--everyone did. Except Claire. All she saw was the man who killed her bio mom, the man who ripped open her skull, the man who caused everyone so much misery and pain. It made her stomach sour and her teeth clench. But she tolerated him. She told everyone it was because at least he was trying. She told herself it was because he wasn’t killing anymore (that she knew of). She ignored the voice in her mind that told her it was because Elle loved him, and Claire didn’t want to lose Elle.
----
Nearly everyone came to pay their respects to Claire’s parents. It was a shitty day--rainy and muddy and cold--but Claire was glad. She didn’t want to bury her parents while the sun shined. Claire and Lyle stood side by side in the funeral home, receiving the strange mix of mourners. Peter, sporting a new wound across his face, told her that Nathan was busy with the campaign. Claire figured that was code for “my spin doctor told me not to come.” She didn’t care either way. Hiro and Ando came, lingered in the back, and left early. Matt Parkman showed--flanked by Daphne and a little girl Claire assumed was Molly.
Even Elle came--beautiful, poised Elle. She was dressed in a stylish black dress and four inch heels; the bump created by the baby was barely visible, so it was easy for Claire to ignore it. The hackles on the back of Claire’s neck rose, telling her that Sylar was lurking somewhere nearby, but he had enough sense to remain hidden.
After the service, one of Elle’s shoes got stuck in the mud outside the funeral home. Claire automatically moved to help her; she took Elle’s hand and tugged until the heel came free with a soft popping sound. Elle smiled and Claire dropped her hand and rubbed her suddenly sweaty palms on her black pants.
Elle hugged Claire, “you’ll see me again,” she whispered. As she pulled away, Elle zapped Claire lightly, laughing when the other girl flinched. Waving, she hobbled out to a waiting car, carefully avoiding spots of mud. Lyle emerged from the funeral home to stand next to his sister.
“Why do you even like that bitch?” Lyle asked (predictably, given his history with her). Claire didn’t know how to answer him.
----
Three days after the funeral, Sylar and Elle arrived on Claire’s doorstep. Claire knew without asking that they needed a place to stay.
“Your father said we could.” Sylar looked like it pained him to ask the cheerleader for help, but Elle just looked tired.
Claire moved to slam the door shut. “Sorry, my dad’s not here right now. Why don’t you try him at the Elm Street Cemetery?”
Quick as a flash, Sylar wedged his foot in the door. “Listen to me, you little--“
“Gabriel.” Elle’s voice, soft and warm, interrupted him. The older blonde turned to Claire. “It’ll just be for a couple days,” she offered. It was as close to ‘begging’ as Elle Bishop got.
‘A couple days’ turned into a couple weeks, which turned into a couple months. Elle and Sylar got comfortable in Claire’s house--the house she once shared with her parents (before they died) and her brother (before he went to college.) Claire started spending more and more time at Knox’s place. When they got into too many shouting matches, she started renting a room at a seedy motel outside of town. Questionable stains aside, Claire thought it was nice to have her own space again. She dyed her hair black--she was tired of being the blonde cheerleader.
Claire started timing her visits to the house when she knew Sylar would be gone. Knox asked Claire why she didn’t fight for her home--why she lay back and let Sylar steal it from her. She didn’t want to tell him the truth, so she fashioned a pretty lie. “My parents are gone,” she said, shrugging. “Who cares about a stupid building?”
----
Sometimes Claire spied on them. She didn’t make it a habit or anything, but sometimes she hid under their bedroom window. Sometimes she just listened to their night-noises (the gentle inhale, exhale of Elle’s breath; the adorable sounds she made when she changed positions).
Sometimes she listened to Sylar and Elle fucking (because Claire is pretty sure Sylar is incapable of “making love”). Claire would lean against the side of the house, close her eyes and imagine what she would do to Elle--how she would make her feel.
She imagined stroking Elle’s soft skin, imagined sliding her shirt over her head and kissing her way up to Elle’s breasts. She imagined Elle whispering “Claire” instead of gasping “Gabriel.” She imagined burying her face in Elle’s neck, her fingers in Elle’s pussy, pressing the other woman into the sheets and driving her mad with pleasure. She loved to listen to Elle come, but she hated the noises Sylar made. Claire closed her eyes and pretended. She pretended Sylar was dead, that Elle loved Claire, that there was no one in the world except the two of them. In the dead of night, it almost felt true.
----
It was a hell of a lot easier to hate Sylar when he actually allowed people to call him Sylar. It was easier to hate him when he was the killer who opened her skull, not the guy who stole Elle and knocked her up. (Elle liked to use prettier words like “marriage,” and “starting a family.” Claire called it like she saw it.)
Claire still called him Sylar, because she didn’t want anyone to forget who he used to be. She called him Sylar because, deep down, she didn’t think he had actually changed. “He’s an addict, Elle,” she would hiss in the other woman’s ear. “Alcoholics want booze and Sylar wants powers--he’s never going to get better.”
Elle’s smile was sad. “What happened to you?” she asked, pulling her arm from Claire’s grasp. “I think you killed your inner cheerleader.”
“I didn’t kill her,” Claire wanted to shout. “Sylar did.”
Too bad inner cheerleaders don’t regenerate like her toes.
----
Elle called Claire when she went into labor, but Claire, instinctively knowing it was time, hit the ‘ignore’ button on her cell phone. The voice message was filled with moans and curse words as Elle ordered Claire to meet her at the hospital. Claire told herself that she didn’t have anything else to do on a rainy Sunday afternoon, so she hotwired a car and drove it to the hospital.
Labor was hard and long, but Claire stayed for the whole thing. It was the first time she had been in the same room as Sylar for months. Elle, oblivious to everything except her pain, screamed, cried and threw things (ice chips, plastic cups, a telephone) at the nurses. Claire took one hand and Sylar gripped another--they took her frustration, her pain and her fear, absorbing it all into their skin, along with her trademark blue sparks. The doctors, to their credit, didn’t ask questions.
At long last it was over, and the baby was out (Claire thought he was ugly--a loud, wrinkly thing--but Elle’s eyes were shining and that was enough for Claire). She left the tiny delivery room, giving the new parents some time alone. She found a vending machine and tried to decide whether she was hungry, and if she was, whether she wanted pretzels or a Hershey bar. She didn’t hear Sylar approach.
“She wants to see you,” he said, startling Claire. She grabbed her pretzels and shoved past Sylar.
When Claire poked her head into the hospital room, Elle smiled and held the infant out, inviting Claire to hold him. There was nothing Claire wanted less than to hold the infant offspring of Sylar. The kid was probably going to grow up to be the next Charles Manson. Claire made a face and started to refuse, excuses already coming to mind--“I’m really not good with kids,” might work, or “I’d probably drop him or something.”
“I named him Noah,” Elle said softly. There was a note of apology in her voice, like she had infringed on something personal and private--something only Claire had a right to experience. Later, Claire told herself that this was the moment she fell in love with Elle. She didn’t want to admit that she fell in love with her years ago.
----
200,000 people died in Costa Verde. 200,000 people extinguished in one agonizing second. As Claire pieced herself back together in the crater that used to be her home, she thought things could be worse. Elle could have been in the house. Elle could have died. Claire’s bones regrew and reset, muscle formed, skin knit together on top of it all and Claire practiced speeches in her head.
“Noah died before the explosion. He didn’t feel anything. It was an accident, I swear. It wasn’t my fault.”
Claire knew this was her chance--she could blame Sylar for the whole thing (it was, after all, his nuclear explosion that demolished everything within a ten mile radius), but she couldn’t bring herself to tell the woman she loves that her husband blew up their child.
----
A lifetime later, he tracked her down. Claire wondered how he found her--she moved to Japan to help Hiro run his company as he got too old to take care of the day to day affairs. Sylar found her in the market place, wondering if there was anything she could cook for dinner that didn’t involve fish or tofu.
“Claire.” She stiffened at the sound of his voice (she hadn’t seen him since she was 22, but that voice still sent shivers down her spine). Claire tried to run, but his hand was on her arm in a heartbeat.
“Please don’t be afraid,” he murmured, pulling her into an alley. Claire wasn’t afraid, not really, but she was still cautious. After seven years of fighting him and seventy years of hiding, caution was the only thing she had left.
They had tea in her favorite tea house--Sylar poured it gently, offered her a cup first, thanked their waitress in halting, but coherent, Japanese. He looked her over carefully, smiling. “Your hair is blonde again,” he pointed out. He looked pleased for some reason.
“Where’s Elle?” Claire asked without preamble or subtlety.
Sylar raised one eyebrow and Claire wondered for the first time how much Sylar knew (or suspected) about her feelings for his wife. “Dead,” he said simply.
“Did you kill her?” Claire’s voice was harsh with the accusation and Sylar’s eyes widened with surprise.
“You really hate me, don’t you?” he asked softly.
Claire shrugged as if to ask what did you expect? “You didn’t answer the question.”
“No, I didn’t kill her. She was never the same after Noah...” he paused and swallowed hard. “After Costa Verde. She seemed to fade away from me. Her heart gave out twenty years ago--the doctors said it was due to complications from prolonged electric shock.”
Claire couldn’t help the smiled that formed. “Figures.”
“So I went to find you.”
“Me? What could you possibly want with me?”
Sylar’s leaned closer, his eyes intent on Claire. “Because we are two of a kind. Everyone around us will grow old, the world will fade away, but we will be the same. Forever.”
Claire pulled away, finally realizing why Sylar had combed the earth looking for her. He wanted a companion--a replacement for Elle. A better Elle than the true Elle, because Claire’s golden hair would never turn grey and her breasts would always be firm and high. Her heart would never give out, leaving Sylar alone again. But as far as Claire was concerned, he deserved to be alone.
Claire stood, making her decision in a moment. “We won’t grow old, but we’ll never be the same.” As Claire left the tea house--left Sylar, sitting alone, she realized that veins filled with formaldehyde weren’t all that bad. Feeling nothing beat the hell out of feeling pain.
----
” She’s got an old death kit she’s been meaning to use, she’s got blood in her eyes for you.”