I (don't want to) see dead people
Title: I (Don't Want To) See Dead People
Characters: Sylar, Cole Sear (aged forward about five years)
Crossover: Sixth Sense
Genre: Gen
Author: Game_byrd
Word count: ~2,000
Rating:PG
Setting: Season 1, July 2006 (which makes it pre-season for everything except "Six Months Ago")
Summary: Sylar is stalking a special, whose power would have very, very bad consequences for someone like himself. Written for heroes_faves Crossover Challenge.
There were two specials in the Chicago metro area that Sylar had memorized from Chandra's map. One - a man named David, he'd already killed just the day before. The other was who he was after now - Cole Sear, a boy in his early teens. Sylar rang the doorbell of the shabby tenement, thinking through plans. It was the middle of the day in July. If there were more people at home than his target, then he'd pretend to be lost and perhaps ask to use their phone - anything to get inside and case the place. If there was no one home at all, he'd slip in and do the same. If he were really lucky, then the only person here would be the one he had come for.
No one answered, but it was still Sylar's lucky day. He used that wonderful, all-purpose telekinetic ability to tumble the lock and open the door. He stepped inside, not even breaking stride when he saw a boy standing in the middle of the tiny, cluttered living room, looking at him apprehensively, a video game paused on the small television set. The teen was white and about the right age. He had straight blond hair in a sort of He-Man mop cut, but that's where the resemblance ended. He was lanky and pimple-faced rather than muscle-bound and handsome. Sylar figured he could take the kid with his bare hands, not that he intended to stoop that low. The door shut behind Sylar.
"Cole Sear?" he asked. He'd known it was a child and while he wasn't thrilled about that, the Hunger didn't generally give him a choice. This time, though, he'd killed only the day before. The Hunger wasn't driving him like it had for his other kills. He was still processing his latest acquisition and his presence here was almost entirely voluntary, for once.
The boy nodded, glancing back and forth across the room. That little lapse in attention was odd and earned a momentary raised brow from Sylar, but that was all. Sylar rarely toyed with his victims and in this case, his target's youth made him even less of a candidate than usual for that treatment. Something Sylar would only consider later was how the kid didn't even ask who he was, why he was there, or how he'd gotten in through the locked door. He had no questions at all, like someone else had already given him all the answers he needed.
But Sylar wasn't thinking of that yet. Now he moved immediately to business, wrapping his telekinesis around the teen and shoving him against the nearest wall. Three framed photographs clattered to the floor around him as the boy gasped and Sylar throttled him to prevent any other noise. The kid looked upset, but not surprised or disbelieving. He took Sylar's abilities as a matter of course, which was weird.
That gave the killer pause. Sylar spent a moment listening. He had the oddest impression that the two of them weren't alone here. It probably had something to do with how Cole kept looking off to the side or around the room rather than at Sylar alone. He did look at Sylar - of course - but his attention was divided. Sylar didn't hear any noise of other people in the place. It was his very, very lucky day. Seeing no other reason to wait, he moved forward, raising his hand, finger extended.
Two arms lengths away from the boy he hesitated, but only because he was considering where he wanted to make the cut. This was usually when he had his victim's complete and total attention. There was often screaming and even though Sylar muffled it by keeping his target's mouth shut, what they were trying to do was apparent. But not with Cole - apparent with him was that he still seemed distracted. His eyes went to Sylar's left and lingered for several seconds, before flitting across Sylar, pausing briefly on that extended finger and then going to Sylar's right, where he looked for several more seconds, his face blanching for a moment. Then he looked over Sylar's shoulder, past him, towards the front door.
Sylar swallowed, experiencing that odd sensation that there was someone right behind him, breathing down his neck. Gooseflesh tickled across his forearms and a shiver threatened to run down his spine. He had not searched the place. There might be someone else here. Even though their encounter had so far been very quiet … and he had heard nothing … the kid's reaction in the face of imminent death was not right. Sylar lowered his hand a little, flexing the fingers of his other hand and redoubling the grip that held Cole to the wall. He slowly, very slowly, turned his head to the left - empty. He looked back to his right - also empty. He looked behind himself, still with deliberate slowness - no one there either. He looked back at the boy, eyes narrowing as he examined him, trying to figure him out.
There had been a picture of a younger, cuter version of this child on Chandra's map with a red stickpin in it. Underneath, it had said merely 'parapsychic.' Parapsychic meant mental phenomena for which no adequate scientific explanation existed. In a world with specials, it was damnably vague - a useless label. Sylar had assumed it meant some sort of mental ability, perhaps something akin to telekinesis. But really, he had no idea.
The killer gave another lingering look around the room. Something was off - he could feel it; he was sure of it, and he'd learned to trust his intuition. After a moment, he realized that everything red in the room had a subtle glow to it. Even the red link of the set of rainbow-colored metal rings Cole wore as a necklace was glowing. Something prickled along Sylar's skin and the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. It was an awareness, like a sixth sense he didn't know he possessed, or perhaps some electrical field he was only now detecting.
Nothing … else … happened, so he released the boy's throat, letting him take in much bigger breaths than he'd been allowing before. To Cole's credit, he didn't scream. To Sylar's bafflement though, the first thing Cole did once he had his breath back was to look to Sylar's left and say in agitation, "No, I can't!" and then to his right and voice with frustration, "Well- well- then what do you think I should do?" A few seconds later he scoffed, rolled his eyes and said, "Like that's going to help!"
Sylar looked to each side carefully again, studying the space there. He was reluctant to carry on without understanding what was happening here. Invisibility? Invisible friends? What did parapsychic mean, anyway? Under other circumstances he might think the kid was crazy, but here he was, holding him to the wall with the force of his mind, intending to take a supernatural ability from the teen. He looked back to the boy and said, "You have an ability, a gift. What it is that you can do?"
The boy frowned at him, like Sylar had interrupted an important conversation. "I see dead people," he snapped. He looked around the room unhappily and concluded, "Like the ones you've killed."
Sylar's eyes widened as he immediately realized all the implications of that ability for a serial murderer such as himself. Most of the implications were very, very bad. He took a small, cautious step backwards, like he didn't want to be contaminated. His mouth became dry and he swallowed roughly. But maybe the kid was lying? He grasped at that straw of hope. "You see them … here?"
"Yeah," the boy said sullenly, eyes darting off to the left and his face changing briefly to exasperated and apologetic before he looked back to Sylar with uncertainty.
Sylar's eyes narrowed again in doubt. Maybe it was all an act? He couldn't help the creepy feeling of being watched by his victims, silently judged. Did they follow him around, manifesting wherever he went? Did they talk to each other, welcoming in the newest member, that man he'd killed yesterday? "What do they look like?" he asked with sick curiosity. He couldn't help it - he was endlessly curious.
"They …" Cole looked to Sylar's left and he grimaced. "They all have the top of their heads cut off. They say you did that and …" He looked back at Sylar and his expression was not so much afraid as disapproving. He looked back to his left like he was sizing someone up and said, "He's white, little shorter than you, a guy, brown hair I guess." Cole was not particularly good at giving descriptions and that one was so general as to cover millions of people. Sylar was unconvinced, though the bit about cutting open their heads meant a lot. Cole frowned and then looked to the right. "This other guy is-" he paused like someone had interrupted him. "The one near the door says his name is Trevor. He looks kind of Goth."
That was convincing. Sylar blinked several times, peering at the front door, right where Cole was looking, but he saw nothing there. The evidence of his eyes did nothing to dispel the very real sense that Trevor stood there, haunting him - a specter, a ghost that Sylar could, as he was now, safely ignore. But how would that change if he took Cole's ability? Would he ever be able to sleep again? Would their voices ring in his head for the rest of his life, accusing, damning, an endless litany of grievances and complaints? What sort of misery would taking this ability bring on himself?
He looked back at the kid, who met his eyes steadily, as one who has seen the face of death for years might do. He'd been aged beyond his few years by what he'd seen and been forced to deal with. Sylar asked, "What do they do - these dead people that you see? How does it work?"
"They ask me to help them."
"And do you?" Sylar tilted his head.
"Usually." Cole squirmed a little against the wall, not so much trying to get away, but instead expressing his discomfort with the continued immobility.
Sylar ignored the wriggling. He'd let Cole go when he wanted to and not before. "What happens then?" Were there secrets to the afterlife, to heaven and hell, to be discovered here?
"I don't know. They just disappear." Cole managed to shrug.
A sense of crushing disappointment added itself to all the other things Sylar was feeling. Cole had no answers to the ultimate meaning of life or death. His ability was no gateway to greater knowledge of the spiritual realm. The logical conclusion was that the ghosts did not disappear if they weren't helped, and the thing it seemed Sylar's victims were most likely to want was revenge. Sylar would be eternally plagued by a bunch of spiritual forces he would be powerless to affect … if he took this ability.
He released the boy, turning and leaving abruptly. He had nothing else to say to him. The Hunger was not driving him today. Curiosity was not going to kill this cat. It was Sylar's lucky day, indeed.