Heroes fic: Director's Cut
Still working on my brother's birthday fic; I have the Home Depot catalog open, and am cackling. Heh.
In the meantime, Heroes fic. Spoilers through ep 2.3. Matt, Mohinder, Niki, S2, undoubtedly will be joss'd to heck and gone nearly immediately. BYO subtext for everyone over the age of consent. Thanks to Celli for encouraging me to go here and beta'ing, the Horsechicks for reading, and Kaj and Tori for the quick 'cooool' read-through.
Summary: Matt knows when it started, but he's not sure how he didn't stop it.
Director's Cut
by Christina K
copyright 2007
Matt knows when it started, but he's not sure how he didn't stop it.
Hey. You. Parkman.
A quick whip of the head toward Niki, curled up on the floor in front of their couch, limp and wrung out from crying. Mohinder's kneeling next to her, trying to dry her tears over her late husband. They'd come back to the apartment after a day at the labs, frustrated and depressed, and Matt had ordered pizza, told jokes, and tried not to listen too hard to the brewing tension underneath their cheerful talk. Molly had gone to bed half an hour earlier, after showing off her latest spelling test to Niki as well as Mohinder and Matt. The argument about her abilities had started as soon as Molly's door shut, and ended in Niki's breakdown.
"What?"
Shhhhhhh. She'll hear you. No talking. Just listen.
The other voice. The second woman, who'd been in the room with Niki when the guy he'd been bodyguarding was killed. Mohinder had said Niki had 'problems', but never gone into details. Nice academic understatement there, Mohinder.
They're both going to end up dead, if this keeps up. Tests and tests and the organization watching their every move. They'll never let her leave. You know that. Not her, and not Mohinder.
Matt's jaw clenches, and he looks away.
Someone's going to have to deal with Bob. Are you going to stop me, when I make my play?
Niki collapses against Mohinder's shoulder, not crying now, just exhausted.
Or are you going to protect your little girl? And your good buddy Mo?
He thought he was just waiting until Mohinder left the room to talk to her.
"Not cool, Niki."
"What?" Scrubbing at her face with the paper towel that Mohinder gave her, a puzzled look, totally innocent. "I didn't mean to cry all over him, it's just been so hard--"
"Suggesting stuff when Mohinder can't hear it. Or should I be calling you some other name? Crazy chick?"
There was the smile of the woman who'd thrown him out a window.
Shhhh. You'll wake my sister. Then her face blanked out again, and then she was smiling hesitantly at Mohinder, behind Matt. "I hope I didn't wake up Molly."
It kept up, a few days later. I don't need an alibi. I just have to not be arrested.
"I'm a cop, you know," he told Mohinder within Niki's hearing. "There's got to be a way to get them legally."
Right. And I'm Gypsy Rose Lee.
"No witnesses, no weapons, no survivors to testify. You said it yourself, Matthew. D.L.'s killers, the organization, they all have to be brought down from within."
And oh man, doesn't he regret that now.
Mohinder ducks into his room to get his coat before taking Niki back to her apartment, and Jessica regards him narrowly, her reflection in the hall mirror hard and wary. You haven't told him.
"I'm going to."
Another smirk. And have him work that much harder on taking away my abilities? Good. Can't have him falling down on the job, can we?
He's about to say something when Mohinder walks back into the room, and it's Niki's smile, Niki's expression again. Sweet with an hint of little-girl-lost that has Mohinder's eyes lighting up. Matt's always liked women with more of an edge, but he gets what Mohinder sees in her. As well as vice versa.
He tells Mohinder about the conversations, the whispers, Jessica, as soon as he gets back from dropping her off.
Mohinder doesn't get it.
"Clearly, she's in need of some psychotherapy, but that doesn't change what we're trying to accomplish." He's putting away the dishes as Matt washes them, with Molly doing her homework at the table. "Niki's the strong one now. Jessica's just a whisper. And as soon as her strength is under control, or eliminated, she'll no longer be a target for the organization. She and her son can live a normal life. It's what she wants."
"You make it sound like being Superwoman is the problem. It isn't. It's Jessica. She's evil."
"I think you're over-stating the case. Jessica is gone. Maybe you heard an echo of her, but she has no agency. Niki is in control, and she loves Micah. She just wants to protect him."
"Any way she can. And if she thinks you're going to successfully take away her ability to get revenge for D.L. -- hey, listen to me." Mohinder's being so blind, his mind already focused on the formulations for Niki's treatment tomorrow, and wondering about the perfume she wears, that Matt has to grab his arm, force him to focus on the here-and-now. "She's playing you, man. Maybe not Niki, but Jessica is only lying low because she has to."
"Precisely. Matthew, you worry too much." Mohinder claps a hand on his shoulder, smile confident. "Trust me. I know what I'm doing."
Which doesn't stop Matt from watching her every time she visits. Interested and patient with Molly, talking about Micah with Mohinder, nervous around Matt.
"I'm sorry, the mind-reading thing just kind of... freaks me out."
"It's fine. I don't do it if I don't have to."
Liar.
Matt's chin lifts, but the person looking out of Niki's eyes is still trusting, and there's no goddamn point in telling her Jessica isn't as dead as she thinks. Mohinder would flip out, anyway. He's already given his opinion as her physician and friend. "It would be interfere with her treatment and the progress she's making. Why reinforce her worst fears? The last of Jessica will fade when Niki feels more in control."
Just be ready, Parkman. You won't be an accessory, I promise. I'm better than that.
"I'd do anything to protect Mohinder and Molly," he says instead, still watching her. "So I get why you're doing this. But I don't get why you want your ability gone. It'd be like missing a hand, now, if they took my telepathy away."
"It hasn't done anything but bring me pain," Niki says, wistful and sad. He's seen this movie. This is about the point where Barbara Stanwyck plugs Fred MacMurray full of holes.
Except he can't get to Jessica to handcuff her. She's in lock-down inside Niki's mind, and there's no way to ferry her to an executioner.
"You don't worry about Jessica coming back? Of what might happen if you don't have the strength to fight her?"
"I always worry. That's why I have to do this." Niki stares at him, hurt blue eyes looking betrayed at his insensitivity. Do you think I'm a monster? Niki's thoughts can't be mistaken for Jessica's, not for a second. "I can do this now. I'm strong enough to live without this freakish edge over the rest of humanity. Jessica can't stop me."
"Right."
She wouldn't believe you even if you told her, you know.
It goes on like that. For weeks. Running DVD commentary from Jessica every time Niki's at the apartment, being Mohinder's new best friend, playing mommy to Molly because her own kid's halfway across the country. Being nervous and yet trying to be Matt's friend too, trying so damn hard that he would like her, damnit, if Jessica would just shut the hell up. Stop insinuating. Hinting. Murmuring poison that he's trying to ignore every other second she's around.
Matt finally snaps when Jessica whispers, If they get rid of me, and you, and Mohinder, what happens to Molly? Do you think they'll try to hook her up with Micah, the way they pushed me and D.L. together? You think she'd get a chance to say no?
"Shut. It. Now."
"What?" Niki almost cringes, which has always struck Matt as ridiculous. I didn't do anything! Her reactions when startled are an abused kid's, all flinching back and holding still. She could rip Matt apart without the effort it takes to flip her hair back, and she acts scared of him. At least Jessica isn't in denial about herself.
"Look. I'm sorry. But Jessica... she's still there. And she's constantly talking to me. At me, more than to me, and--" Niki's expression is enough to have him clamping his jaw shut, hating himself. Mohinder's just walked back in, staring from Matt to Niki, and could this get any worse?
"Matthew?"
"I'm sorry, Mohinder. I had to. I just couldn't take it any more."
"Damnit, you could have warned me--"
"He told you about this?" Niki's voice is rising on a note of pain. "That she's still here? God, why didn't you tell me?"
"I didn't want you to suffer a setback. And it doesn't matter." Mohinder catches her flailing hands, concerned but still calm, a helluva a lot more calm than Matt feels, even while inside his head Mohinder's saying, Brilliant, Matthew. You know she doesn't deserve this! It isn't her fault! You couldn't have let me break it to her, if it had to be done? And Niki's thoughts are stuck on No no not again God why me why can't she just die? Why can I kill anyone everyone except her?
Mohinder's hugging her now, and Matt folds his arms in self-defense, watching Niki burrow into Mohinder's embrace. "You're going to be all right, Niki. You can do this, you're the one in control, aren't you? You won't have to worry about her again. You're a good person, you have to believe that. I won't let anything happen."
"You have to sedate me, the next time I'm in the lab. You can believe it, but I don't have that luxury." She smears tears away with the back of her wrist. "This is too important, Mohinder. You don't understand how much she scares me."
"If you insist. A mild sedative."
Jessica is silent, and Matt would give a week's worth of take-out to know what she's thinking of the two of them. But maybe she's going to be more careful now.
Which is good, right? It should be okay now, shouldn't it?
Bob's death two days later looks like an accident. Even to the organization.
Mohinder knows better, and blames himself. Matt and his partner catch the investigation. They can't prove anything is wrong; hell, his partner has no idea anything is wrong.
Matt thinks of Micah. Of Molly. Of all the good Mohinder can do, if his career isn't destroyed. The organization still wants him to work with them. Niki too. They can still fix those bastards, once and for all. All the same things he'd been thinking before, really.
Niki's crying on their couch again, like she did just a few months ago. Mohinder is trying to comfort her, but she's sobbing like her heart will break, sick at what Jessica did.
I told you I could do it. See? Jessica's voice is a purr. You did everything I wanted, Matty. We all get our happy endings now.
Matt sits down next to Niki, and meets Mohinder's eyes. "It wasn't you," he says quietly. "You couldn't have stopped this. Either of you."
And maybe he should have stopped this, and maybe he should have arrested her, and maybe he should have taken care of it himself, arranged an 'accident' for Niki before it ever got to this. Maybe he shouldn't be reaching out to hold her other hand.
Jessica's fingers curl into his, and she gives him a soft, pleased smile.
In the meantime, Heroes fic. Spoilers through ep 2.3. Matt, Mohinder, Niki, S2, undoubtedly will be joss'd to heck and gone nearly immediately. BYO subtext for everyone over the age of consent. Thanks to Celli for encouraging me to go here and beta'ing, the Horsechicks for reading, and Kaj and Tori for the quick 'cooool' read-through.
Summary: Matt knows when it started, but he's not sure how he didn't stop it.
Director's Cut
by Christina K
copyright 2007
Matt knows when it started, but he's not sure how he didn't stop it.
Hey. You. Parkman.
A quick whip of the head toward Niki, curled up on the floor in front of their couch, limp and wrung out from crying. Mohinder's kneeling next to her, trying to dry her tears over her late husband. They'd come back to the apartment after a day at the labs, frustrated and depressed, and Matt had ordered pizza, told jokes, and tried not to listen too hard to the brewing tension underneath their cheerful talk. Molly had gone to bed half an hour earlier, after showing off her latest spelling test to Niki as well as Mohinder and Matt. The argument about her abilities had started as soon as Molly's door shut, and ended in Niki's breakdown.
"What?"
Shhhhhhh. She'll hear you. No talking. Just listen.
The other voice. The second woman, who'd been in the room with Niki when the guy he'd been bodyguarding was killed. Mohinder had said Niki had 'problems', but never gone into details. Nice academic understatement there, Mohinder.
They're both going to end up dead, if this keeps up. Tests and tests and the organization watching their every move. They'll never let her leave. You know that. Not her, and not Mohinder.
Matt's jaw clenches, and he looks away.
Someone's going to have to deal with Bob. Are you going to stop me, when I make my play?
Niki collapses against Mohinder's shoulder, not crying now, just exhausted.
Or are you going to protect your little girl? And your good buddy Mo?
He thought he was just waiting until Mohinder left the room to talk to her.
"Not cool, Niki."
"What?" Scrubbing at her face with the paper towel that Mohinder gave her, a puzzled look, totally innocent. "I didn't mean to cry all over him, it's just been so hard--"
"Suggesting stuff when Mohinder can't hear it. Or should I be calling you some other name? Crazy chick?"
There was the smile of the woman who'd thrown him out a window.
Shhhh. You'll wake my sister. Then her face blanked out again, and then she was smiling hesitantly at Mohinder, behind Matt. "I hope I didn't wake up Molly."
It kept up, a few days later. I don't need an alibi. I just have to not be arrested.
"I'm a cop, you know," he told Mohinder within Niki's hearing. "There's got to be a way to get them legally."
Right. And I'm Gypsy Rose Lee.
"No witnesses, no weapons, no survivors to testify. You said it yourself, Matthew. D.L.'s killers, the organization, they all have to be brought down from within."
And oh man, doesn't he regret that now.
Mohinder ducks into his room to get his coat before taking Niki back to her apartment, and Jessica regards him narrowly, her reflection in the hall mirror hard and wary. You haven't told him.
"I'm going to."
Another smirk. And have him work that much harder on taking away my abilities? Good. Can't have him falling down on the job, can we?
He's about to say something when Mohinder walks back into the room, and it's Niki's smile, Niki's expression again. Sweet with an hint of little-girl-lost that has Mohinder's eyes lighting up. Matt's always liked women with more of an edge, but he gets what Mohinder sees in her. As well as vice versa.
He tells Mohinder about the conversations, the whispers, Jessica, as soon as he gets back from dropping her off.
Mohinder doesn't get it.
"Clearly, she's in need of some psychotherapy, but that doesn't change what we're trying to accomplish." He's putting away the dishes as Matt washes them, with Molly doing her homework at the table. "Niki's the strong one now. Jessica's just a whisper. And as soon as her strength is under control, or eliminated, she'll no longer be a target for the organization. She and her son can live a normal life. It's what she wants."
"You make it sound like being Superwoman is the problem. It isn't. It's Jessica. She's evil."
"I think you're over-stating the case. Jessica is gone. Maybe you heard an echo of her, but she has no agency. Niki is in control, and she loves Micah. She just wants to protect him."
"Any way she can. And if she thinks you're going to successfully take away her ability to get revenge for D.L. -- hey, listen to me." Mohinder's being so blind, his mind already focused on the formulations for Niki's treatment tomorrow, and wondering about the perfume she wears, that Matt has to grab his arm, force him to focus on the here-and-now. "She's playing you, man. Maybe not Niki, but Jessica is only lying low because she has to."
"Precisely. Matthew, you worry too much." Mohinder claps a hand on his shoulder, smile confident. "Trust me. I know what I'm doing."
Which doesn't stop Matt from watching her every time she visits. Interested and patient with Molly, talking about Micah with Mohinder, nervous around Matt.
"I'm sorry, the mind-reading thing just kind of... freaks me out."
"It's fine. I don't do it if I don't have to."
Liar.
Matt's chin lifts, but the person looking out of Niki's eyes is still trusting, and there's no goddamn point in telling her Jessica isn't as dead as she thinks. Mohinder would flip out, anyway. He's already given his opinion as her physician and friend. "It would be interfere with her treatment and the progress she's making. Why reinforce her worst fears? The last of Jessica will fade when Niki feels more in control."
Just be ready, Parkman. You won't be an accessory, I promise. I'm better than that.
"I'd do anything to protect Mohinder and Molly," he says instead, still watching her. "So I get why you're doing this. But I don't get why you want your ability gone. It'd be like missing a hand, now, if they took my telepathy away."
"It hasn't done anything but bring me pain," Niki says, wistful and sad. He's seen this movie. This is about the point where Barbara Stanwyck plugs Fred MacMurray full of holes.
Except he can't get to Jessica to handcuff her. She's in lock-down inside Niki's mind, and there's no way to ferry her to an executioner.
"You don't worry about Jessica coming back? Of what might happen if you don't have the strength to fight her?"
"I always worry. That's why I have to do this." Niki stares at him, hurt blue eyes looking betrayed at his insensitivity. Do you think I'm a monster? Niki's thoughts can't be mistaken for Jessica's, not for a second. "I can do this now. I'm strong enough to live without this freakish edge over the rest of humanity. Jessica can't stop me."
"Right."
She wouldn't believe you even if you told her, you know.
It goes on like that. For weeks. Running DVD commentary from Jessica every time Niki's at the apartment, being Mohinder's new best friend, playing mommy to Molly because her own kid's halfway across the country. Being nervous and yet trying to be Matt's friend too, trying so damn hard that he would like her, damnit, if Jessica would just shut the hell up. Stop insinuating. Hinting. Murmuring poison that he's trying to ignore every other second she's around.
Matt finally snaps when Jessica whispers, If they get rid of me, and you, and Mohinder, what happens to Molly? Do you think they'll try to hook her up with Micah, the way they pushed me and D.L. together? You think she'd get a chance to say no?
"Shut. It. Now."
"What?" Niki almost cringes, which has always struck Matt as ridiculous. I didn't do anything! Her reactions when startled are an abused kid's, all flinching back and holding still. She could rip Matt apart without the effort it takes to flip her hair back, and she acts scared of him. At least Jessica isn't in denial about herself.
"Look. I'm sorry. But Jessica... she's still there. And she's constantly talking to me. At me, more than to me, and--" Niki's expression is enough to have him clamping his jaw shut, hating himself. Mohinder's just walked back in, staring from Matt to Niki, and could this get any worse?
"Matthew?"
"I'm sorry, Mohinder. I had to. I just couldn't take it any more."
"Damnit, you could have warned me--"
"He told you about this?" Niki's voice is rising on a note of pain. "That she's still here? God, why didn't you tell me?"
"I didn't want you to suffer a setback. And it doesn't matter." Mohinder catches her flailing hands, concerned but still calm, a helluva a lot more calm than Matt feels, even while inside his head Mohinder's saying, Brilliant, Matthew. You know she doesn't deserve this! It isn't her fault! You couldn't have let me break it to her, if it had to be done? And Niki's thoughts are stuck on No no not again God why me why can't she just die? Why can I kill anyone everyone except her?
Mohinder's hugging her now, and Matt folds his arms in self-defense, watching Niki burrow into Mohinder's embrace. "You're going to be all right, Niki. You can do this, you're the one in control, aren't you? You won't have to worry about her again. You're a good person, you have to believe that. I won't let anything happen."
"You have to sedate me, the next time I'm in the lab. You can believe it, but I don't have that luxury." She smears tears away with the back of her wrist. "This is too important, Mohinder. You don't understand how much she scares me."
"If you insist. A mild sedative."
Jessica is silent, and Matt would give a week's worth of take-out to know what she's thinking of the two of them. But maybe she's going to be more careful now.
Which is good, right? It should be okay now, shouldn't it?
Bob's death two days later looks like an accident. Even to the organization.
Mohinder knows better, and blames himself. Matt and his partner catch the investigation. They can't prove anything is wrong; hell, his partner has no idea anything is wrong.
Matt thinks of Micah. Of Molly. Of all the good Mohinder can do, if his career isn't destroyed. The organization still wants him to work with them. Niki too. They can still fix those bastards, once and for all. All the same things he'd been thinking before, really.
Niki's crying on their couch again, like she did just a few months ago. Mohinder is trying to comfort her, but she's sobbing like her heart will break, sick at what Jessica did.
I told you I could do it. See? Jessica's voice is a purr. You did everything I wanted, Matty. We all get our happy endings now.
Matt sits down next to Niki, and meets Mohinder's eyes. "It wasn't you," he says quietly. "You couldn't have stopped this. Either of you."
And maybe he should have stopped this, and maybe he should have arrested her, and maybe he should have taken care of it himself, arranged an 'accident' for Niki before it ever got to this. Maybe he shouldn't be reaching out to hold her other hand.
Jessica's fingers curl into his, and she gives him a soft, pleased smile.