Fic: Brink
Title: Brink
Fandom: Heroes
Characters/Pairing: Sylar/Heidi
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1,617
Summary: In the aftermath of an explosion, Sylar plays God.
Notes: Post-5YG fic. The terrorist attack premise is blatantly stolen from the first Sylar/Heidi fic I ever read (and to my knowledge, the first one ever written), A Different Kind of Special by cazrolime. (Can we call it an homage instead of plagiarism? :p)
Pain. A dull, intermittent throb, pulsing in her chest, running up to her skull.
Hazy light, winking above her, choked with debris and dust. Otherworldly.
The far-off wail of a siren-no, lots of sirens. Hundreds. Getting closer by the decibel. A bitten-off cry, a nearby scream, descending into a hacking, bloody gurgle.
Blissful blackness fades into her vision, a falling curtain, but it doesn't linger. She can't decide whether or not she wishes it would.
Have to get out, she thinks. Can't stay here. Have to…move…
The wisp of thought trails off, seems to elude her, and she grasps at it vaguely. The darkness fades in again, but this time she pushes it away, her self-preservation instinct rising from its pain-dulled dormancy. She starts by moving her right leg slightly, then her left. So far, so good, and relief rushes through her. She wouldn't be able to handle paralysis, she knows. Not again, not ever again.
Her right arm twitches, then lifts, and it's only then that she becomes aware of her left arm and shoulder, pinned beneath a fallen chunk of jagged concrete. Gingerly, she tries to flex the muscle, and is rewarded with a burst of agony that flares all the way up her shoulder and into her chest. The resulting scream is almost worse, like her breath is being ripped from her body by a force she can't control, taking her lungs and her marrow and everything else with it.
The black returns, this time wholly welcome, and she knows no more.
The next time she regains consciousness, all is quiet save for a strange…whistling every time she breathes. Rattling. Sloshing. She recognizes the sound, remembers the stirring of barely-suppressed panic when Simon caught pneumonia one bitterly harsh winter. She remembers sitting by his side as he wheezed through drug-induced sleep in a barren, sterile hospital room.
I'm going to die, she realizes. Choke to death on my own blood.
She feels heavy, so heavy, and the world begins to spin gently around her. It seems almost like the surreal haze just before succumbing to sleep. And then she hears a voice calling her name, deep and masculine and far away. Light opens up above her, glowing brighter, and her face grows slack as she lets herself relax. Is it God? she thinks drowsily, her eyelids fluttering. Or maybe an angel…
He calls her name again, that same voice, and then there's movement above her, a flash of darkness interrupting the widening stream of illumination.
She frowns, a tingle of fear working its way past the sense of peaceful resignation. Darkness…angels aren't supposed to be dark…
She's fairly certain they aren't supposed to curse, either, but the one above her suddenly is as he takes in her condition. "It's pretty bad, isn't it?" she mumbles, fighting to keep her words from slurring, swallowed up in the rising swamp of her lungs. Her eyes narrow in an attempt to focus on the formless dark shape, trying to distinguish features. For the first time, she realizes it's not just the omnipresent dust that's hindering her vision, but her eyes refusing to sharpen. "Am I…going blind…?"
His fingers touch her face, then curl around to gingerly press at the back of her skull. Her eyes aren't too blurry to see that his hand comes away stained with crimson.
"Guess that would explain it," she murmurs, and lets her head fall back, lolling to one side, her eyes drifting closed. She wonders almost dreamily which one will kill her first, the head wound or her rapidly failing lungs.
"Heidi." His hand is on her face again-no, both hands-and his voice is sharp, piercing through the thick, comfortable fog settling around her brain. "I need you to stay awake."
Something in his voice catches hold in her brain, and she forces her eyes back open with a Herculean effort. "You…you're…"
"Not what you expected?" he says almost dryly, and her breath catches in her throat at the same time realization hits.
"Sylar," she whispers, wants to shake her head in disbelief. The universe has it out for her. Of course it would be him, the last person she would ever want to be present during her dying moments. The only one with the ability to know her location just by thinking about her.
"Hold on just a little longer," he says. His tone changes, and she realizes he's pleading with her. She suppresses a sudden urge to laugh, knowing it would only lead to a decidedly unpleasant coughing fit.
His hand finds hers amidst the rubble, squeezes it roughly. "I'm going to lift this debris off of you now."
She glances to the side, her eyes scanning the concrete block immobilizing her. It's big, far too big for one man to lift on his own. "You have super strength?"
"Telekinesis works just as well," he says. She can just make out the flash of his smile before it fades. "It’s going to hurt, Heidi."
"Of course it is," she whispers. She wouldn't expect anything less from him.
He lifts one hand, a blur of shadowy movement in the dust-choked light, and she holds her breath, her eyes closing and muscles tensing involuntarily. A jolt of pain ripples through her shoulder and chest even as the pressure lightens, and she bites back the moan rising in her throat. By the time the debris is finally lifted clear of her body she's shaking and gasping for breath, her face pale with both pain and blood loss.
A crashing sound reaches her ears, dimly, as Sylar lets the bloodstained piece of concrete clatter to the ground. Then he's next to her again, kneeling beside her, his hands brushing over her body. She senses rather than sees him; her eyes seem clouded over by a strange, colorless mist, and she's so dizzy…
Vaguely, she feels herself floating-no, being lifted. Arms cradling her, a hand supporting her head, fingers splayed in the matted mess of her hair. Then after a moment there's ground beneath her again, but this time it's solid and firm, a sharp contrast to the shifting, unsteady mass of ruined rubble. Her hand reaches out weakly, brushing the surface, and she smiles at the softness of grass under her fingers.
Sylar's palm cups her face suddenly, pressing against her cheek and jolting her out of her reverie. Though his touch is almost rough with urgency, his skin is oddly soft, not harsh and calloused like she'd expected. The hands of an artist, a craftsman, not a killer.
Her eyes flutter open, fastening on his with an effort. "Are you going to stalk me in the afterlife, too?" she asks, barely able to force the words out, every breath an act of labor.
His thumb skims over her cheek before his hand leaves her face. "Maybe. But you’re not going there just yet."
She frowns, watching as his left hand balls into a fist, index finger extended, pointed at his other wrist. A strange whirring sound reaches her ears, and then a red line appears in his skin, thin at first before growing wider, deeper and jagged.
"What are you doing?" she whispers, her eyes widening as she makes out the vein pulsing in his wrist beneath the skin laid open, blood beginning to gush out freely like a grisly fountain.
"Just wait a second," he responds absently, face taut in concentration.
Extending his arm, he holds his wrist over her body. Before she can recover from her shock enough to wrench away in protest, his blood is spraying over the open wound in her chest, mixing with hers.
But just as quickly as it began, the blood flow slows to a trickle and then stops as vessels and skin knit themselves back together, healing with an unnatural quickness. Heidi's breath catches in her throat, a fraction of the fog clearing from her mind.
She watches as Sylar repeats the process, this time enlarging the hole in his wrist by ripping at his flesh with his own fingernails, as though he's dissatisfied with the speed of his telekinetic slice. Heidi feels the warm splash of sticky fluid over her chest and abdomen before an indescribable sensation begins to spread throughout her body.
Her breath comes in shallow gasps, and she lifts trembling hands to clutch at the torn, bloody ruin of her clothes, pushing the shreds of fabric aside to run her fingers over her skin. Her hands brush over her shoulder, down her arm and across her stomach, searching for injury and finding none, the mangled skin and shattered bone disappearing as though by the hand of God. She sits up halfway, bracing herself with one fist planted on the ground, and draws a deep breath-deep as she possibly can-reveling in the heady rush of unhindered oxygen filling her lungs.
She lets her gaze flicker up to meet Sylar's, and watches a slow smile spread across his face. "It worked," he whispers. "You see, Heidi? I can give life, too."
She closes her eyes, shielding herself from the mingled relief and triumph in his expression, and tries not to wonder who had to die to give him that ability. Tries not to think that if he hadn't killed some innocent victim to take it, she would still be sprawled in the debris like garbage, coughing up blood, spending her last moments shrouded in fear and darkness. "Thank you," she whispers instead, her eyes still squeezed tightly shut.
"Come on," he murmurs in return. "Let's get you out of here."
She doesn't fight him when he gathers her up, pressing her tightly against his chest, and launches into the sky.
Fandom: Heroes
Characters/Pairing: Sylar/Heidi
Rating: PG
Word Count: 1,617
Summary: In the aftermath of an explosion, Sylar plays God.
Notes: Post-5YG fic. The terrorist attack premise is blatantly stolen from the first Sylar/Heidi fic I ever read (and to my knowledge, the first one ever written), A Different Kind of Special by cazrolime. (Can we call it an homage instead of plagiarism? :p)
Pain. A dull, intermittent throb, pulsing in her chest, running up to her skull.
Hazy light, winking above her, choked with debris and dust. Otherworldly.
The far-off wail of a siren-no, lots of sirens. Hundreds. Getting closer by the decibel. A bitten-off cry, a nearby scream, descending into a hacking, bloody gurgle.
Blissful blackness fades into her vision, a falling curtain, but it doesn't linger. She can't decide whether or not she wishes it would.
Have to get out, she thinks. Can't stay here. Have to…move…
The wisp of thought trails off, seems to elude her, and she grasps at it vaguely. The darkness fades in again, but this time she pushes it away, her self-preservation instinct rising from its pain-dulled dormancy. She starts by moving her right leg slightly, then her left. So far, so good, and relief rushes through her. She wouldn't be able to handle paralysis, she knows. Not again, not ever again.
Her right arm twitches, then lifts, and it's only then that she becomes aware of her left arm and shoulder, pinned beneath a fallen chunk of jagged concrete. Gingerly, she tries to flex the muscle, and is rewarded with a burst of agony that flares all the way up her shoulder and into her chest. The resulting scream is almost worse, like her breath is being ripped from her body by a force she can't control, taking her lungs and her marrow and everything else with it.
The black returns, this time wholly welcome, and she knows no more.
The next time she regains consciousness, all is quiet save for a strange…whistling every time she breathes. Rattling. Sloshing. She recognizes the sound, remembers the stirring of barely-suppressed panic when Simon caught pneumonia one bitterly harsh winter. She remembers sitting by his side as he wheezed through drug-induced sleep in a barren, sterile hospital room.
I'm going to die, she realizes. Choke to death on my own blood.
She feels heavy, so heavy, and the world begins to spin gently around her. It seems almost like the surreal haze just before succumbing to sleep. And then she hears a voice calling her name, deep and masculine and far away. Light opens up above her, glowing brighter, and her face grows slack as she lets herself relax. Is it God? she thinks drowsily, her eyelids fluttering. Or maybe an angel…
He calls her name again, that same voice, and then there's movement above her, a flash of darkness interrupting the widening stream of illumination.
She frowns, a tingle of fear working its way past the sense of peaceful resignation. Darkness…angels aren't supposed to be dark…
She's fairly certain they aren't supposed to curse, either, but the one above her suddenly is as he takes in her condition. "It's pretty bad, isn't it?" she mumbles, fighting to keep her words from slurring, swallowed up in the rising swamp of her lungs. Her eyes narrow in an attempt to focus on the formless dark shape, trying to distinguish features. For the first time, she realizes it's not just the omnipresent dust that's hindering her vision, but her eyes refusing to sharpen. "Am I…going blind…?"
His fingers touch her face, then curl around to gingerly press at the back of her skull. Her eyes aren't too blurry to see that his hand comes away stained with crimson.
"Guess that would explain it," she murmurs, and lets her head fall back, lolling to one side, her eyes drifting closed. She wonders almost dreamily which one will kill her first, the head wound or her rapidly failing lungs.
"Heidi." His hand is on her face again-no, both hands-and his voice is sharp, piercing through the thick, comfortable fog settling around her brain. "I need you to stay awake."
Something in his voice catches hold in her brain, and she forces her eyes back open with a Herculean effort. "You…you're…"
"Not what you expected?" he says almost dryly, and her breath catches in her throat at the same time realization hits.
"Sylar," she whispers, wants to shake her head in disbelief. The universe has it out for her. Of course it would be him, the last person she would ever want to be present during her dying moments. The only one with the ability to know her location just by thinking about her.
"Hold on just a little longer," he says. His tone changes, and she realizes he's pleading with her. She suppresses a sudden urge to laugh, knowing it would only lead to a decidedly unpleasant coughing fit.
His hand finds hers amidst the rubble, squeezes it roughly. "I'm going to lift this debris off of you now."
She glances to the side, her eyes scanning the concrete block immobilizing her. It's big, far too big for one man to lift on his own. "You have super strength?"
"Telekinesis works just as well," he says. She can just make out the flash of his smile before it fades. "It’s going to hurt, Heidi."
"Of course it is," she whispers. She wouldn't expect anything less from him.
He lifts one hand, a blur of shadowy movement in the dust-choked light, and she holds her breath, her eyes closing and muscles tensing involuntarily. A jolt of pain ripples through her shoulder and chest even as the pressure lightens, and she bites back the moan rising in her throat. By the time the debris is finally lifted clear of her body she's shaking and gasping for breath, her face pale with both pain and blood loss.
A crashing sound reaches her ears, dimly, as Sylar lets the bloodstained piece of concrete clatter to the ground. Then he's next to her again, kneeling beside her, his hands brushing over her body. She senses rather than sees him; her eyes seem clouded over by a strange, colorless mist, and she's so dizzy…
Vaguely, she feels herself floating-no, being lifted. Arms cradling her, a hand supporting her head, fingers splayed in the matted mess of her hair. Then after a moment there's ground beneath her again, but this time it's solid and firm, a sharp contrast to the shifting, unsteady mass of ruined rubble. Her hand reaches out weakly, brushing the surface, and she smiles at the softness of grass under her fingers.
Sylar's palm cups her face suddenly, pressing against her cheek and jolting her out of her reverie. Though his touch is almost rough with urgency, his skin is oddly soft, not harsh and calloused like she'd expected. The hands of an artist, a craftsman, not a killer.
Her eyes flutter open, fastening on his with an effort. "Are you going to stalk me in the afterlife, too?" she asks, barely able to force the words out, every breath an act of labor.
His thumb skims over her cheek before his hand leaves her face. "Maybe. But you’re not going there just yet."
She frowns, watching as his left hand balls into a fist, index finger extended, pointed at his other wrist. A strange whirring sound reaches her ears, and then a red line appears in his skin, thin at first before growing wider, deeper and jagged.
"What are you doing?" she whispers, her eyes widening as she makes out the vein pulsing in his wrist beneath the skin laid open, blood beginning to gush out freely like a grisly fountain.
"Just wait a second," he responds absently, face taut in concentration.
Extending his arm, he holds his wrist over her body. Before she can recover from her shock enough to wrench away in protest, his blood is spraying over the open wound in her chest, mixing with hers.
But just as quickly as it began, the blood flow slows to a trickle and then stops as vessels and skin knit themselves back together, healing with an unnatural quickness. Heidi's breath catches in her throat, a fraction of the fog clearing from her mind.
She watches as Sylar repeats the process, this time enlarging the hole in his wrist by ripping at his flesh with his own fingernails, as though he's dissatisfied with the speed of his telekinetic slice. Heidi feels the warm splash of sticky fluid over her chest and abdomen before an indescribable sensation begins to spread throughout her body.
Her breath comes in shallow gasps, and she lifts trembling hands to clutch at the torn, bloody ruin of her clothes, pushing the shreds of fabric aside to run her fingers over her skin. Her hands brush over her shoulder, down her arm and across her stomach, searching for injury and finding none, the mangled skin and shattered bone disappearing as though by the hand of God. She sits up halfway, bracing herself with one fist planted on the ground, and draws a deep breath-deep as she possibly can-reveling in the heady rush of unhindered oxygen filling her lungs.
She lets her gaze flicker up to meet Sylar's, and watches a slow smile spread across his face. "It worked," he whispers. "You see, Heidi? I can give life, too."
She closes her eyes, shielding herself from the mingled relief and triumph in his expression, and tries not to wonder who had to die to give him that ability. Tries not to think that if he hadn't killed some innocent victim to take it, she would still be sprawled in the debris like garbage, coughing up blood, spending her last moments shrouded in fear and darkness. "Thank you," she whispers instead, her eyes still squeezed tightly shut.
"Come on," he murmurs in return. "Let's get you out of here."
She doesn't fight him when he gathers her up, pressing her tightly against his chest, and launches into the sky.