Broken Glass [sequel] - Any Other Night - 7/9 - The Breakdown
Author: motsureru
Title: Broken Glass [sequel] - Any Other Night - 7/9 - The Breakdown
Rating: NC-17 Overall
Spoilers/Summary: Season 1. A continuation after Season 1, Sylar/Mohinder-centric
Notes: Thanks to hugh for beta work~
Word Count: 3,614
Teaser: “If you look back, you’ll be looking down a barrel.”
.7 The Breakdown
“What’s the password?”
“Uhh… I need to use the bathroom?”
“Incorrect. Another try?”
“…I need to brush my teeth? Mohinder, c’mon, move it.” Sylar gave a soft laugh and reached to Mohinder’s hips, holding onto them affectionately. There were mixed tones of scolding and amusement in his voice, and his eyes twinkled with that slightly feral expression.
“Incorrect again.” Mohinder grinned a little wider. “The correct password was ‘razor.’ You need to shave. Your face- it’s getting frightening.” He persisted in holding onto the door frame to block the man’s path, but suddenly, Sylar was pushing his body by the hips; Mohinder gave a small yelp as he tripped awkwardly backwards until he felt the sink hit his behind. Rather quickly, Sylar’s lips were close to his, those eyes peering down at Mohinder suggestively.
“You want me to shave? You don’t like the stubble? That’s not what it sounded like…”
“Sounded like?” Mohinder raised an eyebrow, leaning his palms back against the sink. “When?”
The grin on Sylar’s lips was handsome, almost suave. He tilted his head down and pressed his chin against Mohinder’s throat, dragging it slowly up against the flesh. It elicited a sharp gasp from Mohinder, and he jumped, squirming. “S-Stop that! Sylar!” Mohinder began to laugh from the ticklishness, pushing at the man’s biceps.
Sylar chuckled, the sound rumbling in his throat and chest. Mohinder felt those arms slipping around his waist, pulling him tighter into an embrace. He tilted his head to look towards Sylar, shivering at the touch of lips on his shoulder. “Hey, come on, we have to get going. Just shave and- ow! Did you bite me? Stop!” Mohinder laughed softly and leaned back further to get a look at Sylar’s face.
Suddenly, he saw crimson- slow, languid streaks of blood moving down Sylar’s temple like thick raindrops on a window. A line moved horizontally across his forehead, dripping dark red color over Sylar’s eyebrows and into those piercing eyes. Blood on black.
“You don’t want me to stop,” -came the hushed reply.
Mohinder sat up sharply in bed, covers thrown back. There was a thin sheen of sweat gathered on his skin, beading and sliding slowly down the back of his neck. He swallowed, breathing heavily, and buried a hand in his curls. Staring at his sheets through the darkness, Mohinder let his heart pound for a few moments, wondering if he’d woken Sylar.
‘What’s wrong, Mohinder?’ He imagined the words penetrating the room. But only silence came. Was Sylar still asleep, even after that? Mohinder peeled the covers back from his legs and took a deep breath. What sort of message was that dream meant to be? Visions of what could have been? Visions of what was to come? The ‘What if?’ question in his mind was far too broad to reconcile.
As he stood to fetch a glass of water, Mohinder glanced to the bed next to him, expecting to see Sylar’s outline muffled by shadows. But the mattress was flat. A rush of adrenaline took through his body as Mohinder quickly reached for the lamp, switching it on.
Light divulged that the bed was empty.
Mohinder spun around, glancing this way and that for Sylar’s belongings. Shoes, coat- gone. Suitcase- sitting idly in the far corner. Where was he? Gone to get a drink? Gone for a walk? Gone for…
Betrayal. Sylar had left to kill, surely. He’d lied again and left Mohinder in a state of disbelief and bitter disappointment, all his days and affections a sham. He should have expected it. He should have known he’d be disposed of, once the time suited. But all the things Mohinder had wanted to believe in… were they dripping death as lucidly as his dream?
Mohinder nearly tripped over himself rushing to his suitcase. He yanked on a pair of pants and practically ripped the sleeves of the shirt he pulled on. As he fumbled for buttons to close, Mohinder looked for his shoes, hurrying towards the door.
It was the door he nearly collided with; as he stood reaching for his shoes, the wooden object swung open with a powerful slam, crashing into the wall with an acute ferocity. Mohinder jumped in surprise- but his feet never met the ground again, as he felt his body swung backwards through the air until it smacked soundly into the wall. The gush of cold that followed his swelling pain and the resounding close of the door made Mohinder’s eyes widen and finally meet with the figure standing before him.
The sight of Sylar, all menacing stance and dark eyes, was one Mohinder was already familiar with.
He stalked across the room with a strange, disoriented look to his deadly gaze. He looked pale, cold, but a red color had worked its way high up into his cheeks from the freezing temperature of the outdoors.
“You,” Sylar breathed out as he closed the distance between them.
Mohinder struggled from his position pinned to the wall, muscles tensing and straining against Sylar’s familiar, unseen force. “S-Sylar…! What have you done?!” he gasped, face contorting in some blend of fear, anger, and confusion. The sense of control he’d had over the last weeks was slipping rapidly out of his grasp.
A sound not unlike a growl came from Sylar’s lips, and his left hand suddenly shot up to Mohinder’s throat, trading his mind’s power for the brute force behind his palm. “What have I done? WHAT HAVE I DONE?!” he shouted coarsely in return.
Mohinder could feel the ice of his fingers, the way his knuckles trembled despite their strength. This was different. This was incredibly different. Sylar’s face looked pained, looked troubled. His throat sounded as though his words tore from it when he spoke. He carried none of the confidence and cool regard of intentions past.
“I don’t understand it,” Sylar hissed, breathing heavy and uneven, as though he’d run directly back to the motel from whatever ungodly task he’d given himself. His free hand reached up and grasped Mohinder’s curls tightly, his teeth gritting in frustrated despair. “I don’t understand it! It should be fine! It should be normal! It should be natural! What have you done to me?! You’ve changed something!” Sylar was screaming now, and Mohinder’s body jerked forward and then back again in his grasp, striking the wall violently.
Remaining silent in spite of the pain radiating through the back of his skull, Mohinder watched with wide eyes, in awe of the breakdown he was witnessing. Something had happened… Sylar had tried to do something and failed. He had- Mohinder drew in a sharp breath, bracing himself for the pain of Sylar’s grip, the bruises his throat was going to endure. He could feel Sylar’s hands beginning to shake harder, almost uncontrollably. Panic was setting into the man’s dark eyes, and Mohinder stared, amazed at how utterly helpless a person nearly choking him could appear.
But words were softening. “How could you…? How… I… This is what I am- what I was meant to-” Sylar dragged in hitching breath between his lips, fingers slowly easing. He lowered his head faintly, eyes looking somewhere past Mohinder, down into some inner depth he could scarcely comprehend.
Mohinder swallowed, palms pressed against the wall. He felt his body dropping until his toes touched the carpet once more. “Sylar…” he whispered, staring into an expression that was slowly devolving into hopelessness.
Sylar released Mohinder entirely, pulling back hands that hung in the air, fingers curled as if to present to his eyes the blood that didn’t grace them. His eyes were stinging; his head bowed to hide it. “You… you did this… this is…”
He was like a terrified child whose lack of understanding could only be met with violence to defend his ignorance, as he knew nothing else. But such habits could be outgrown. Mohinder believed in that. Lifting his hand, Mohinder reached forward and touched his palm cautiously to Sylar’s cold hair, to his temple, untouched by the crimson of dreams. “…This is the first day of the rest of your life,” Mohinder murmured softly.
Tears began to overwhelm Sylar’s eyes, and his knees fell to the floor, shoulders slumped in defeat. “I’m…” No matter how he reasoned it in his mind, it came back to the same conclusion: Mohinder had robbed him of the only ability that formed his very being now; the ability to kill was gone. His fear of losing Mohinder had become greater than his determination to be the persona that had given him all that he had. ‘Sylar’ had given him power. Given him abilities and a person who appreciated them. But which was more important? He needed them both. One gave him the other.
“Are they dead?” -Mohinder’s voice interrupted his thoughts. “…Sylar, did you kill them?”
It took only a second for the irrational rage to resurface in Sylar’s body, attempting to ignore weak tears. His face shot up, glassy eyes narrowed and furious. He stood again, pushing Mohinder back, this time with his hands. “You did this! You corrupted me! You ruined it! It could have been perfect- it could have- if you’d just-” Sylar’s mind fumbled recklessly through unreachable explanations, any kind of justification as to why Mohinder had changed his method of thinking, made him feel remorse, regret, and even sympathy for his victims. For the first time in his life, he feared consequences.
But Mohinder was not one to stand submissively by and take the blame for another’s sins. Not anymore. His expression twisted into an angry scowl. “What? I’m to blame? What did you think was going to happen? Was this all some kind of game to you?” This time Mohinder shoved Sylar back roughly against his shoulders in return, and Sylar stepped away from the strength of it, eyes wide and baffled by the force of Mohinder’s resolve. The sting of the Sylar’s influence was something Mohinder felt now, too. The time for shock was over.
“What? You think you can have it both ways? Murder and me? Are you insane? Did you learn anything at all? That’s not how it works!” Mohinder shouted, stepping forward to push the man again. “I got to have a chance at a normal life or a chance to help you. I made that decision weeks ago, Sylar. But apparently you haven’t come to accept reality any more than you’ve come to accept the fact that being ‘evolved’ means nothing!”
Sylar stepped further back, lips parted but unable to come to words.
“You have to choose,” Mohinder continued, finger pointing in accusation now. “THAT’S a choice you don’t get to make. I promised I wouldn’t turn you in. I did promise you that. I won’t turn you over to Bennet, but I will walk away and never look back. I don’t have the mind to be used by you again. So what’s more important to you? No one’s going to pat you on the back for spilling blood.” Mohinder hissed the words vehemently, his own emotions caught up in a flurry of honesty and exasperation.
The expression on Sylar’s face almost made Mohinder regret those words. The anger had drained away, and what was left were large brown eyes staring despondently into Mohinder’s livid features. He opened his mouth to speak, but again nothing sounded. Sylar’s hands dropped to his sides. He walked the few ungainly steps it took to let his form collapse on the side of the bed, staring down at the floor. Several moments of silence passed. Finally, Sylar put his face in his hands.
Mohinder’s thoughts flickered back to the hospital, when Sylar’s stubbornness and anger had given way to that childish side, the reticent one that struggled with being controlled by another person’s demands. Mohinder wondered if this was just that; Sylar, being forced to come to terms with everything he had run from: normalcy, connection, consequence. As long as he was ‘Sylar’ as the world knew him, Sylar never had to face any of these things. There was no one there to keep him in check, no one to scold him whose opinion he might take seriously. No one had ever made him responsible to himself for his actions. A poignant feeling of pity stung in Mohinder’s chest.
“Sylar,” Mohinder finally breathed, turning towards him and bending down to touch his knees to the carpet. He gazed up past his dark curls into the bearer of such misery. “What are you really angry at?” Mohinder pressed, voice soft but expression still serious.
Dragging his fingertips slowly away from his face, Sylar swallowed, looking down into Mohinder’s steady eyes. “I don’t understand anything anymore. I thought I did… It didn’t need fixing… I understood it all… until you… you changed it. I- I don’t even know what you changed,” Sylar whispered, voice disbelieving. He shook his head.
Mohinder found himself frowning at that, a sliver of bitterness creeping back into his emotions. How false were they? These days together… “Was this a game to you? Getting into my bed, making me-” The man stopped. Sylar had never ‘made’ him do anything. If he said those words, he would be on Sylar’s level, trying not to take blame for his own feelings. “Were these moments lies, just like before?” Mohinder continued, voice becoming strained in just bare enough a way that only Sylar might be able to hear the struggle behind it.
Fingers curled tighter, like fists, and Sylar’s expression contorted with them. “I think I wanted them to be. I really… I thought I was in control, Mohinder… I thought I could stop myself from needing you like this- continue on like I had been before. This is too honest.” Sylar looked up to him, fear resurfacing. “I never meant to be this honest with you. I didn’t even realize it happened…”
“You couldn’t kill them?” Mohinder asked quietly, reaching up to take one of Sylar’s tense hands and cover it with his own. Because of me...?
The darkness that entered Sylar’s eyes gave them a distance, made a fragile bridge into the persona that was desperately trying to ascend. “I wanted to… I needed to…” he breathed, sucking in air through clenched teeth like the very thought aroused him.
“You never needed to,” Mohinder corrected rigidly. “This is why this has happened to you- you made yourself believe that murder was all you needed. But you’re human, Sylar. Evolved and stronger and probably a hell of a lot smarter than the average person, but you’re still human,” Mohinder insisted, squeezing that hand. “You need, you want, you hurt, you make mistakes. Sometimes you come out on top and sometimes you don’t. But, in the end, you’re no better or worse than the rest of us. Everyone deserves a chance to live.”
“But the stronger ones- the smarter ones- the more successful ones are valued more,” Sylar interrupted, shaking his head in defiance. “That’s obvious.”
Mohinder frowned at that. “Everyone still deserves a chance. That’s not just people with powers. You never gave yourself- Gabriel Gray - the opportunity to see what life is about. Don’t you see that? That’s why this is so difficult for you to come to terms with.”
Sylar gave a cynical smirk, looking away. “What is life about? Isn’t that a loaded question?”
Scowling, Mohinder reached forward with his other hand and yanked Sylar’s gaze back by the jaw to face him. “It’s about this! The push and pull, the experience- the self-discovery. If life weren’t frightening and difficult, it wouldn’t be worth it! What would life be without taking risks?” Mohinder’s hand fell away, resting on Sylar’s knee. “I… I’ve taken my risks. I’m sitting right here.”
“You wouldn’t be if I gave up on this months ago,” Sylar countered, tone an accusation. His voice rose, tightened with each word. “If I were Gabriel Gray, satisfied with exploring the world as a watchmaker, you wouldn’t be here right now. You wouldn’t be pleading with me- you wouldn’t be sharing a bed with me- you wouldn’t even have known my name or my face or cared to! So how can you tell me that I should have taken a different path, if what’s here right now is so important to you!”
“How can you say that I wouldn’t have!?” Mohinder argued in return, fighting back the urge to yell again. “How can you say that I might not have stumbled in to interview my father’s failed Patient Zero and liked the kind smile or honest curiosity of a watchmaker? How can you say I might not have shared a cup of tea with you and fallen in love with what I saw? You can’t say any of that! The ‘what if’s don’t mean anything because we’re here right now, Sylar! It’s gone! All we’ve got is what’s in front of us and I can’t stand to see you ruin it when you have better things you could be!”
Mohinder fell abruptly quiet, catching his breath in shaky lungs. He pulled his hands away from Sylar and pushed them into his hair, standing up so he could turn his back and pace across the floor.
Silence passed. He’d said the one word that people like them should avoid at all costs.
“If I didn’t care,” Mohinder finally stated, keeping his words as calm as possible, the tremble in his voice to a minimum, but his back to Sylar. He spoke to the words to the empty air in front of him, feeling more as if they were being said to himself. “I wouldn’t even be bothering with words like this. But I’m not willing to carry on with the kind of danger it takes to be with you if this is for nothing. If you’ve ever been fully honest with me, be honest now. If I walk away from this, I’ll never make the mistake of coming back.”
Sylar stood from the bed, watching, listening to the tension in Mohinder’s shoulders gather. He stared in silence at his back, feeling the weight of those words closing in around his chest. Suffocating. This decision was everything. Could Sylar see himself waking up tomorrow, alone, unable to think straight and unable to kill, with nowhere to go and no one to go to? Could he run for the rest of his life towards murder with no destination, destined for what Mohinder had once called a futile endeavor? A painful knot formed in Sylar’s throat.
Stepping forward, Sylar rest his hand upon Mohinder’s shoulder, making the man jump. Sylar took in a slow mouthful of air, and in an insecure, self-conscious movement, his arms wrapped around Mohinder from behind, cheek pressing into the man’s black curls.
“Don’t go,” Sylar finally breathed.
The relief that washed over Mohinder was surprising even to himself. The feelings he’d invested in Sylar were something even Mohinder had almost become frightened of; as always, he’d put himself in the worst possible position he could be in. Now he was in- in something, in love?- with the worst possible person. But Mohinder would accept that he was a flawed person, just as Sylar was. Mohinder could learn to tolerate his own flaws, just as he was trying to accept Sylar’s, now.
“Is this really what you want?” Mohinder asked quietly, touching his palm lightly over Sylar’s arm about his waist. “There’s no turning back. You’ll never get a second chance, if you wrong me now. If you look back, you’ll be looking down a barrel.”
Sylar turned Mohinder in his arms easily, and the determined expression on his face seemed not unlike the one he got when the faces of watches were peeled back and dissected at his mercy. The man lifted a large hand and placed it over Mohinder’s cheek, turning his jaw possessively.
“I’d be wronging us both to walk away. Let me try to love you. Let me try to be real, Mohinder. I am what I am.”
Mohinder gazed hard for a long time up into those eyes, and then at last his own features softened. “I still believe in giving you a chance. In seeing what you can do, what you can be.” This was the promise that needed sealing. Mohinder tilted his head up and placed a sound, meaningful kiss on Sylar’s lips. Sylar did not return it; he seemed to simply watch, in admiration, of what Mohinder was capable of. Perhaps he was trying to understand what forgiveness was.
“Let’s sleep,” Mohinder finally suggested, smiling faintly. “That’s enough thinking for tonight.”
With a small nod, Sylar released Mohinder from his arms, his hand sliding away from the man’s face. When Mohinder turned and began to unbutton his shirt (half of which was misbuttoned in his earlier rush anyway), Sylar observed in silence, trying to quiet the thoughts that still swirled in a flurry through his mind. He glanced for a second to the side, at their mussed beds and the clock that read 3:47 A.M.
When Mohinder paused before stripping off his pants, he happened to catch that fleeting gaze towards the beds. He interpreted it as regret, finally noticing the division there was to be had in the twin set. Words might not have been the only comfort the stricken man needed tonight. Even one touch might offset the tilted balance of stability.
“You can try to fit in my bed tonight,” Mohinder began with a quirk to his lips, somehow enjoying Sylar’s confused expression when he looked up. “On one condition.”
Sylar’s brows furrowed, and he tilted his head slightly in questioning.
Mohinder smiled wider.
“In the morning, you shave.”
Comments and crit please. ^^
And for those of you who have been posting on mylar_fic lately, I apologize that I've been too busy to leave comments!
Graduate school applications own my soul...