Light Up

[game_byrd]

Title: Light Up
Characters: Nathan/Peter
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Explicit sexual content, incest
Word count: ~2,300
Setting: Preseason, New Year’s Eve, 1998. Peter has been 20 for a week now. Nathan is 31 and will be married within a few months in a sudden manner. For those who follow Shattered Salvation, this is background for that AU.
Summary: Nathan

Comments

[game_byrd]

I understand about the comment length. Just last night I left two kind of short comments on fic by a friend of mine, and the fic really deserved something longer ... but since I'd already said most of what was on my mind when I beta read it, my brain was kind of blank. But I didn't want to *not* comment, so I left a short one and maybe tonight or this weekend I'll be in the right place to go back and leave something longer. If not, she'll at least I know I read it. I know for myself, I'd rather have a short comment than none, but I do adore the long ones!

Peter is totally in my head, but he didn't start there. When I first got into Heroes fandom was the middle of season 4, about the episode Thanksgiving. I had to know what happened next, or what people thought was going to happen next, with the Sylar/Nathan thing. I knew Adrian Pasdar's contract had been cancelled, so in a way Sylar was going to win, but I wanted to understand that situation so badly. There's a lot of personal stuff behind that obsession for me, but I wanted to know if it was possible for someone to shed their crazy. Sylar had talked about wanting to do it, and with Nathan's help he had for weeks. Now that he was 'awake' and aware of what had happened to him, would he be able to keep up a life where he wasn't a killer? Essentially, was redemption possible, in his own heart?

I didn't find the answers I wanted in fanfic, so I started writing my own. As it turns out, I came into the fandom at a point in time where Petlar was turning softer and gentler. I gather that before season 4, it was often rough, violent, hate-sex and frequently dub-con or non-con, with Sylar being smugly, smirkingly superior and Peter sucking it up. That seriously doesn't do it for me. Like you say, it's wrong for several reasons and yeah, it breaks my heart. First, that Peter keeps coming back for the abuse and second that Sylar is so callous and inhumane as to keep dishing it out. That sort of story hits my triggers on many levels.

But I wasn't exposed to that much given my timing in joining fandom. Very soon The Wall was out and I was absorbed in writing my own long story anyway. It's called Shattered Salvation and the best place to read it is on Fanfiction.net. I've got part of it on LJ, but not all and it's tedious to click between screens to get all of it. You can find it here: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6757575/1/Shattered_Salvation

So ... I was headed towards why I choose Peter. As I said, initially I didn't. Initially I choose Sythan, and I was clear it was Sythan I was interested in, not Sylar and not Nathan (though I thought both had their good points). I wrote the first plot arc of Shattered Salvation from Sythan's POV and when I sat down to write a sequel, I decided to do it from Peter's POV. At that point, I really had to struggle to get into Peter's head. He was so good, so giving and so forgiving that I hadn't really comprehended him as a fully realized character, completely rounded with a voice of his own. Oh, I think my characterization of him was consistent before then, but I hadn't addressed and internalized his driving motivations.

It was Peter's flaws and faults that showed me what kind of man he really was, more than his heroism, more than his kindness. I started paying attention to the points in the show where he'd been petty, mean, hateful and wrathful. I started seeing him as a real person then. Instead of just idolizing him, I started to love him.

That's why I choose Peter. I have more to say, but LJ has a text limit so I'll make a new comment.