Forget Me Not 17/22(?)
Title: Forget Me Not
Author: Bunny
Rating: T
Disclaimer: Yeah, I only wish I owned it all…
Summary: Set around Shadowboxing; Claire discovers an amnesiac Sylar wandering around and takes it upon herself to help him.
A/N: Finally! Birth time! When I started this fic the scene between Sylar, Claire, and Matt back in chapter 8 & this birth scene were the two that popped into my head when I started this fic. So utterly excited I finally got to this point! Anyhoo, have a Happy Christmas & a Happy New Year if I don’t get anything up before then. <3
So…ready for the angst?
Chapter 17
Well no one told me about her, how many people cried
But it’s too late to say I’m sorry
How would I know, why should I care
Please don’t bother tryin’ to find her
She’s not there.
~ She’s Not There; Zombie
As Sylar’s eyes opened his vision remained blurred along the edges. Muffled voices greeted his ears. His appendages were heavy like lead. As this last detail became aware to him, he attempted to use an ability, any ability, but he discovered he was too drugged to anything.
Drugged? Was he drugged? Struggling to fight back towards reality, his head rolled back. Looking up with his fuzzy eyes he could just barely make out what appeared to be an IV bag hanging above him. Or it was a floating jellyfish. The idea tickled him to the point where he giggled.
“He’s waking up, sir,” obviously stated a man with a heavy voice. “Should we sedate him more?”
“No,” answered another with a lower tone of voice. “We are running out of time and we need our answers now.”
“Hey, look at us,” instructed states-the-obvious with a vicious face smack. To make him look at them he pulled Sylar by the hair. Blinking past the black dots the hit induced, from what he could tell they were in a cement room. Judging by the leaky pipes it probably belonged to some sort of sewer. Or a pasta plant. Yet another idea that tickled him to the point of giggling.
The captors before him were both of average build, had darker hair, had tattoos budding out from beneath their shirt were of various designs, but a red octagon on the inside of both their elbow indicated a high probability of a gang. Or a brethren of buccaneers. Alliteration. As he giggled again he had just enough sense to wonder what was being pumped into his system.
“Give him more of the other kind.”
“It might kill him again.”
“Clearly not a problem,” snapped another voice from behind him. Despite not watching Sylar could tell more was administered into him as his arm began to burn, a harsh sensation that worked its way to his heart and though the rest of his body. His mind was still unbearably twisted, but his alertness skyrocketed with the pain. “See, he can take it.”
“How honest are you feeling, Mr. Gray?” inquired the man with the lower voice. Sylar clenched his teeth together in response, more at the fact he knew his name over the pain. “You may call me Mr. Foxtrot, the man next to me is Mr. Tango. There are a few men behind you, but their introductions will come as they become necessary to the conversation.”
Mr. Tango leaned in close, enjoying the opportunity to burst anybody’s personal bubble. “Where have you hidden your mate?”
Sylar only let out a hum of confusion, amused at how the vibration felt on his tongue. What the hell did they put in him?
“Two weeks ago she was at her residence, maintaining the same habits she had performed for months. And now she has disappeared without a trace. So this begs the question, where have you hidden her?”
“We can only assume that your relatively easy capture is a ruse in order to protect her, probably while she delivers,” added Mr. Foxtrot. “Or is her labor complete and you are distracting us while they go to a safe place.”
“So again, I ask the question,” asked Mr. Tango, “where have you hidden your mate?”
Sylar rolled his head to the side trying to get a better look around while he pondered the request. The damned drug was blocking his capacity to process what was being asked. His inability to make sense of the most basic question sent him giggling again.
Mr. Tango stepped back with a frustrated grunt, waving a hand for someone to come forward. “Mr. Zulu, visual references, please.”
Another man walked forward, his appearance similar to the two men before him. In his hand was a small stack of colored photographs. Mr. Zulu grasped Sylar’s hair in his hand, forcing him to look up close at the pictures. “Here she is, just two weeks ago. At her normal residence, completely unawares of any of us. Then suddenly, poof! She disappeared without a trace, along with her neighbor.”
Sylar sobered up just enough at the images on the photos. They were high zoom surveillance photos of Claire, the word ‘mate’ suddenly clicking in his mind. Claire on the street, Claire at the grocers, Claire getting out of a car, Claire by the window in her apartment.
The part that stuck out to him most would be the very large bump protruding from Claire’s stomach in every picture.
He couldn’t help himself.
He laughed.
Hysterically.
It started off slow and relaxed, but soon moved to manic uncontrolled noise that sounded strange even to his ears.
Mr. Zulu turned back in disgust. “This is getting us nowhere.”
Replacing him, Mr. Foxtrot landed a solid blow across Sylar’s face, but it did nothing except increase the laughter. “Where have you hidden her?”
Several more hits came in contact with his body when all of a sudden an explosion let off from behind, sending him and everyone else crashing into the opposite wall. The impact caused the IV to pop away from his arm, the intense burn fading due to his rapid metabolism. The chair Sylar was still tied down to had fallen so he was forced to stare at the wall they had been blasted against. While he felt his powers gradually returning, he could hear various shouts and gunshots from behind him.
Allowing the weak ones to be picked off before he had a turn, he focused on unwrapping the tape with his mind, thinking about what he had learned.
Claire, without question, was pregnant. That realization alone was one he was having issues dealing with. Why hadn’t she said a word about it? Her lack of confidence wounded him, made him feel physically ill. He knew the unsettling sensation in his gut wouldn’t let up any time soon. Who’s child was it? The thought of someone else touching her made his stomach lurch in jealousy before coming back to the moment. These crazy individuals honestly seemed to believe the baby was his, but how was that possible? He snorted and formed a smirk as he finished with the tape on one wrist, concluding that since he had been made aware of abilities anything was possible. If it were possible, he would finally have a family to call his own.
Using the now free hand, Sylar unbound the opposing hand followed by his ankles. How could he have missed such a large detail? It bothered him that he had obviously looked over it the last time he saw her. She behaved oddly, kept her distance, and appeared worn out. He should have pushed harder. And for that matter, why was Claire’s pregnancy a commodity?
Since the last of his inquiries could be answered in the present, Sylar rose finally properly observing his surroundings and who were left standing. They were in a sizeable side room of an old, underground electrical or sewer tunnel. Where the door probably had been was now a large hole in the wall from a small explosive, bits of dust and cinders still falling. Two of the men with the red tattoos had died in the blast, five more had been shot to death, and the remaining four were shooting at their attackers. There had only been ten of the other type of men. Despite their element of surprise, currently only two stood alive. They were easily noted by a deep blue triangle tattoo on their hand. Sylar couldn’t help but feel these marks to be annoyingly cliché.
When another man from the surprise blue triangle group went down Sylar flexed his fingers so he might easily control the men who remained. The alarm and panic that graced their faces only fueled his actions. With a quick flick of the wrist all five were slammed into wall. Mr. Tango, three other red octagons, and a blue triangle regarded him with complete fear. Sylar lowered his head and smirked. He’d make sure they were afraid of him before getting his answers.
“It’s my turn for questions, and I think I’ll start with…” he took an extra few seconds to ponder, taking pleasure in allowing the future victims to sweat. Settling on one from the red octagon group, he pointed to the fourth man from the left. “You.”
He allowed the man down to stumble to his knees just in front of him. “I don’t want to go first, make him go first.”
“What do people call you?”
“I-In the sect I go by Mr. Juliett,” he stuttered out, a vein bulging out of his head. Sylar raised both eyebrows at the name choice. “I know, it sucks!”
“Mr. Juliett, I am going to ask you a few questions. If you answer my questions honestly, you live. For any untruthful answer I will rip out your heart and use you as a puppet to talk to the next colleague. Do we understand each other?”
Sucking his lips in tightly all he could do was nod. Sylar looked up at the others stuck to the wall awaiting their response. At their delayed affirmatives he turned his attention back to the man before him.
“Question the first, why is it you want Claire?”
“W - we - we want her baby - your baby, not her,” he reasoned, as if that would make things better. “We hoped to wait until she gave birth so we could simply have the baby. We figured it was less m - messy.” A burning fury unlike any he had felt before simmered inside, but Mr. Juliett had told the truth.
“Very good,” he stated, his voice sounding an easement that did not reflect his true agitation. “Question the second, why do you want…my…child?” Saying the words aloud for the first time felt foreign, almost unreal if the baby was really his, but this was not the time to consider that.
The man forcibly frozen into place still shifted his eyes around at anything but him. “It was our goal t - to…Um, I mean, we… they, being my now former group, want the baby to, uh, die.” Sylar froze at this new information. In the past 10 minutes he had been through an emotional rollercoaster including confusion, betrayal, happiness, despair, excitement, anger. At this newest bombshell, the knowledge that someone already wanted this child dead, left him full of an uncontrollable amount of hate. “But never me! I never wanted to do the sacrifice, to ingest the blood of the infant, I was just doing what I was told!”
His vision shimmered and Sylar gave a hollow smile at the excuse to kill Mr. Juliett. Releasing the man he simply stood there blank faced, allowing the coward to make the first move. At last realizing he was back in control of himself, Mr. Juliett gasped in delight and began to run to the makeshift exit in the wall.
He didn’t make it three steps before Sylar punched his back, sending the man’s heart flying across the room. It slapped into Mr. Tango’s face before falling to the floor, covered immediately by the other man’s vomit. Before the dead man fell, Sylar gripped his chin. Turning his victim's face towards the other four men pinned he manipulated the mouth so it appeared he was speaking.
“Now, who wants to share next?”
***
Hiro Nakamura had been a voluntary prisoner at the Sullivan Brothers Carnival for months. And he was tired of it. Sick of being Samuel’s errand boy for the smallest time manipulations, of performing quick hops to far off places for the obscure object, and all the while receiving nothing in returning except splitting headaches.
He was no closer to discovering the temporal location of Charlie than the very first day he had arrived.
Reflecting on this fact for the millionth time in the past months, Hiro kicked the dirt was he walked through the deserted pathways of tents. Stopping suddenly he shook his head. A hero doesn’t get discouraged like this. He always looked to the future (metaphorically speaking in this case), focused on how they were going to make things better, and that the hero always prevailed in the end. A hero never gives up.
Waking from his internal pep talk, he saw the man he had been avoiding approach him quickly with an excited stressed face and outstretched arms. “Hiro, my brother, just the man I was looking for. You are going to save the day for all of us today.”
Hiro pointed to his nose. “Me?”
Samuel threw an arm over his shoulder to briskly lead him in the direction he had just come from. “There is a pregnant woman here, an old friend of yours I believe, who needs to give birth. The problem is, her ability and the child’s ability aren’t allowing that to be a possibility.”
Hiro’s eyebrows quirked up in worried confusion. “Huh? But… I don’t know anything about childbirth…”
The carnie leader let out a brief loud laugh. “No need to worry about that. All we need you to do is convince her this is the only way to save her infant and then freeze her long enough for another brother to complete the process.”
They approached a tent where nearly every member of the family stood outside of, watching it intensely for something to happen. From within Hiro could hear a woman crying out in pain, begging incoherently for something. As Samuel pulled the tarp back to allow him in, an excited murmur rattled through the crowd as they pushed forward slightly to try and see in. “Please, please, patience,” he requested easily with a calming hand in the air. Yet another tarp separated the much louder noises and when it was pulled to the side Hiro blinked in shock.
There were a handful of people hovering in the darker areas near a table bathed in a spotlight that settled in the center of the ring. The part that shocked him was seeing Claire Bennet laying on the table dressed in a very loose all white dress. Her wrists and ankles were lightly bound down to the edges, allowing for some movement as she writhed on the hard surface. Dark circles were evident beneath her eyes despite the red puffiness of her cheeks and tear tracks. Her face scrunched as her body tensed up again, letting out a cry of pain. The bit he couldn’t help but focus on was the large pregnant stomach which pointed towards the ceiling.
“Cheerleader…” breathed out Hiro taking in the sight, the ties around her appendages evidence enough immediately supporting the idea that she did not want to be there.
“She’s in labor, but she isn’t dilating and her gift won’t allow a C-section,” explained the leader with a hint of a nervous edge. “This is why you must stop time to her so Martin here,” he gestured to the appropriate man standing next to the table, “can pull the child out with limited damage to both mother and baby. But you must persuade her to have a little faith in all of us, which should put the baby at ease.”
“And if I refuse?” he resiliently questioned.
This declaration momentarily startled Samuel, before he concluded darkly, “Then the baby dies, and Charlie can’t have that.”
Hiro gulped as he moved forward. Just for a few seconds the pain had apparently subsided as the blonde was left panting heavily. As he approached nearer she turned towards him, sweat drenching her face and hair. Her eyes squinted in confusion before she hissed in pain, “Hiro?”
“Hello, Cheerleader,” he greeted with a small bow when he was close enough.
“You have to help me, we have to get out of here, please! This isn’t right!” she pleaded, pulling even harder against her ties. The extra effort apparently doubled her pain as she froze in place, yet another yell ripping from her lips.
He took a half a step backwards at the sight of her convulsing. Samuel suddenly appeared right beside him, nudging him just a little nearer. “Now, Claire, you need to calm yourself, we talked about this.” The mini episode passed as she glared daggers at him while panting heavily. “This is the best option for your great child. Now relax and just breathe -”
His advice was interrupted as a loogie splattered across his face having come from Claire. “Screw you!” she screamed. “Just wait until her daddy finds out about this, you’ll all be sorry! Now let me go!”
As another spasm rippled through her Hiro reached down to grasp onto her hand, watching as Samuel wiped the spit from his face. “Get it done,” he pointed to Hiro taking a few steps back into the dimmer light. Everyone present was keeping their distance.
Out of pity for the girl on the table he gripped tighter to her hand and scrunched his eyes up to stop time for her. It only gave him a headache while she continued to moan in pain. “Hiro, what are you doing here? We have to leave,” she whispered in a raspy voice, conflict running through him from her desperation. “Please, I don’t want them to get a hold of her ever, they can’t.”
“But they need to help you get the baby out,” he explained calmly, hushed low enough that only Claire could hear him.
Immediately her eyes grew wide with fear as she shook her head back and forth vigorously. “No, no, that is not going to happen. I’ll go somewhere else -”
“There’s no time,” he added sympathetically. “Your baby will die.”
Claire bit her lip and turned her head away as fresh tears flowed. “Why didn’t he show up?”
Hiro tilted his head in consideration. “Who?” The only response was a head shake in the opposite direction from him. “Please allow me to help you, it would be my honor. I do not wish for anyone to be in pain like this.”
“But didn’t you know, Hiro, all births are just like this,” she joked with a small grin before choking back another scream. He lost circulation to his hand for a few moments when she gripped tightly. Once she was back in control she nodded. “Don’t let them take her away from me,” she instructed, relief hitting Hiro. “I’ll let you do whatever as long as I get to hold her as soon as she’s born.”
“I swear it,” he promised. Noticing her relax just a bit he asked, “What will she be named?”
She blushed slightly looking down to her stomach, “I don’t have one yet,” she admitted. “Now what do you need me to do?”
He nodded, finally getting down to business. “Right, only relax and trust me. Allow me to use my power to help you.”
With obvious effort Claire took several calming breaths, nodding when the tension left her. Hiro jumped at the chance, freezing her in place with considerable effort. Ignoring the sticky wet sensation dripping from his ear he nodded to indicate she would remain still.
The man, Martin, stepped up into the well lit circle. Taking a few calming breaths of his own, his hands phased into her stomach. Not expecting this to be the procedure performed, Hiro blushed and turned his head slightly away. A bead of sweat rolled down Martin’s head as he continued to work. After perhaps ten minutes he began to tug upwards. A few tugs later, suddenly a screaming infant girl phased through her mother and was born into the world.
When the screaming child was handed off to Samuel, Hiro released his hold on Claire. She choked on a gasp of pain as her stomach immediately reshaped to her smaller form before his eyes. Nearby a laughing Samuel lifted the baby up for all in the room to see. “Our answer!” he announced in tears.
A cheer of success rippled amongst the people in the tent and reaching to those outside. “Let her see,” demanded Hiro. When he got no recognition for his comment, he put on a serious face and stated louder, “She needs to see the baby.”
“Please,” asked Claire, still trying to reach up against her restraints. “Where is she?” Samuel finally took notice. While he approached, Claire continued to give muttered pleas. Instead of presenting the daughter to her, he placed the baby in a basinet of sorts just off to Hiro’s left.
With free hands he clapped onto Hiro’s shoulders, “You have shown dedication to this Family. With what you have been willing to do, the lengths you have gone to; you have earned a place in our new world.”
Hiro scrunched up his eyes at the implication, taking a side eye at the squirming newborn. Lifting his arm he played with the healthy little girls hand that gripped onto his on instinct. From the corner of his eye he could see Claire struggling to lift her head to just get a glimpse of her.
“Now you are a different story,” he expanded, taking a knee near her and leaning in close. “You and Sylar have done nothing to support us, caused us nothing but trouble; with the exception of the miracle child you two produced.”
Sylar? Pushing up his glasses Hiro reevaluated the dark hair on the baby, sensing the power rolling off of her. Great Scott…
“Give me my daughter,” she stated firmly, jerking against her bonds to make a point.
“She’s our daughter now,” he clarified.
“How dare you!”
“Families look after and protect one another. You have shown no loyalty to this Family therefore you have no place here,” he explained as she continued her vocal protests. “We will move on, provide well for her, but you will remain behind.”
Claire’s screams and struggles redoubled in their effort as she desperately moved to become free. Samuel stood, took time to pat Hiro on the shoulder once more, and returned to address his brethren with a wave of his hand. The group of people started to clear out and pack up the makeshift hospital.
The scene before Hiro moved in a sort of slow motion. Everything he believed in up to this point came into question in his head. Beyond a shadow of a doubt he knew what was about to transpire in front of him was wrong.
Heroes never give up on their quests. His current quest was to save Charlie, from wherever Samuel had placed her in time. But given the situation before him, he knew he was going to have to reevaluate his quest. This mother, his friend, deserved to be with her baby. Any action he did at this point would compromise his original intent. He was going to lose Charlie, but it would have to be done.
Sighing to himself he realized he lost her months ago, but just was too stubborn to admit it. Losing love, again, seemed to be a theme among his favorite idols. Did Cyclops not lose Jean Grey on several occasions? Didn’t Captain Picard give up Nella Daren for the greater good? Hadn’t the Doctor sacrificed his people, his loved ones, to save the universe? Fate determined he would follow in their footsteps, take this sacrifice for the good of others.
Taking a deep breath Hiro took Claire’s wrist in his right hand and the baby’s arm in his left. “Hiro, what are you doing?” she asked quietly.
At her silence Samuel cast an eye over, suddenly panicked by Hiro’s pose. He let out a shout of protest and the man who pulled the child from Claire lunged to stop him, but it was too late. Hiro felt his ability charge quickly and they popped out of there. However as he felt his power pop them away, something in his head simultaneously popped leaving a numb feeling inside his head.
He also realized his left hand was curiously empty.
***
In Noah’s apartment Peter leaned to face out of a window, his fingers nervously tapping away at the glass. His niece had been missing for 5 hours. If she hadn’t received adequate medical help by now it was likely her baby was dead. Sick of staring out into the blinking lights of night his fist connected with the window jam. “Why are we just standing around waiting for something to happen?” he snapped beginning to pace, an activity he had been repeating off and on ever since they had arrived.
With a locked jaw Noah stood from his position in front of the computer. “I’ve called in some favors, it would be reckless to do anything at this point.”
Upon discovering Claire’s disappearance, he and Noah had searched the hospital with no sign of her. Angela returned to her home to see if she could learn anything, while the other came to Noah’s apartment with similar goals. So far, all that occurred was waiting with very little action. And Peter was becoming extremely frustrated with that.
“You could keep me in the loop, you know,” he stated, crossing his arms. “I don’t see why you’re mad at me.”
From Emma’s position on the couch she hadn’t been able to completely see the exchange between him and Noah, but it was obvious she had picked up on the rise in tension. The heat pack held against her neck was removed momentarily as she observed the nearly hostile exchange. Peter didn’t blame her or Sweetie for Claire’s disappearance, but only wished both had cleared out for awhile.
Sweetie returned with a replacement heat pack for Emma, taking a seat on the couch and wrapping a comforting arm around her shoulder. Out of all of them, the older woman seemed to be taking her vanishing the hardest.
“You’re damn right I’m mad at you,” exclaimed Noah standing. “You knew she was pregnant and you said nothing!”
His head snapped back in shock at the unexpected accusation. “She asked me not to, I was respecting her wishes.”
“She’s a teenager,” he objected.
“She’s an adult,” argued Peter. “Are you mad at me because I kept her pregnancy a secret or because she didn’t confide in you?”
“And yet when she told you the paternity you grew violent and all but threatened her,” he yelled, stepping closer.
“And I apologized for that,” reasoned the other man. “But you’re telling me you wouldn’t have given the chance?”
Before the argument could escalate anymore, they were distracted by a pop noise from the corner. All four turned their attention to the two individuals that appeared suddenly.
A pale Hiro stood holding Claire’s hand as her body landed on the floor. She detached herself from him and crawled up to her knees, looking around desperately. Hiro on the other hand smiled at everyone in the room with a slight bow, his eyes glazed and dark with blood trickling out of both nostrils. “Where is she?” asked Claire still looking around. That was when Peter took in her physical appearance. She wore a loose fitting white gown and her wrists and ankles showed open sores that healed as time passed, but the baby bump had disappeared.
“How could you have left her there?” demanded Claire panicked. Hiro’s only response was to instantly crumple to the floor. She leaned over to him, grasping his unconscious form and shaking him. “I want my baby! Why didn’t you take her too! Where is she!”
Emma moved to be at the prone man’s side, but was hindered from helping him from the hysterical girl that was in the way. Peter went to attend to Hiro as well as the girl’s father held her back. “Give her back to me! I have to find her! Take me back there! I have to go back! Please!” She started to scream incoherently, distraught by whatever trauma had been performed.
“Now, Honey Child, you need to calm down,” instructed Sweetie, placing a soft hand on her shoulder. “Things are going to be better, you just have to come back to the moment.”
Peter glanced over at them just in time to watch his niece roll out of her father’s grasp and tackle Sweetie to the ground. He left Hiro to pull her off. “Claire! Stop!”
“It’s your fault! All of it!” she screamed, digging her fingers into the older woman’s neck. “I would have her if it wasn’t for you! You took her from me!”
As Noah attempted to stop her, Peter dug through his med pack for a tranquilizer. Given her gift he loaded triple the average dose into the syringe, jabbing the needle into her upper arm. The effect was almost instantaneous; soon Claire was crumpled in her father’s arms with tear tracks caked onto her face. Noah stroked her hair back while Sweetie choked and gasped for air.
“What the hell was that about?” demanded Peter, looking at the woman on the ground. She continued to cough as she shook her head in ignorance.
“We have to get him to a hospital,” instructed Emma with authority.
Before assisting the other unconscious person, Peter placed a hand to her bare forearm. He could only feel the one power inside her. The baby, a little girl from her ravings, was now gone with no trace.
Now the question that would plague them was; where she was now?
Author: Bunny
Rating: T
Disclaimer: Yeah, I only wish I owned it all…
Summary: Set around Shadowboxing; Claire discovers an amnesiac Sylar wandering around and takes it upon herself to help him.
A/N: Finally! Birth time! When I started this fic the scene between Sylar, Claire, and Matt back in chapter 8 & this birth scene were the two that popped into my head when I started this fic. So utterly excited I finally got to this point! Anyhoo, have a Happy Christmas & a Happy New Year if I don’t get anything up before then. <3
So…ready for the angst?
Chapter 17
Well no one told me about her, how many people cried
But it’s too late to say I’m sorry
How would I know, why should I care
Please don’t bother tryin’ to find her
She’s not there.
~ She’s Not There; Zombie
As Sylar’s eyes opened his vision remained blurred along the edges. Muffled voices greeted his ears. His appendages were heavy like lead. As this last detail became aware to him, he attempted to use an ability, any ability, but he discovered he was too drugged to anything.
Drugged? Was he drugged? Struggling to fight back towards reality, his head rolled back. Looking up with his fuzzy eyes he could just barely make out what appeared to be an IV bag hanging above him. Or it was a floating jellyfish. The idea tickled him to the point where he giggled.
“He’s waking up, sir,” obviously stated a man with a heavy voice. “Should we sedate him more?”
“No,” answered another with a lower tone of voice. “We are running out of time and we need our answers now.”
“Hey, look at us,” instructed states-the-obvious with a vicious face smack. To make him look at them he pulled Sylar by the hair. Blinking past the black dots the hit induced, from what he could tell they were in a cement room. Judging by the leaky pipes it probably belonged to some sort of sewer. Or a pasta plant. Yet another idea that tickled him to the point of giggling.
The captors before him were both of average build, had darker hair, had tattoos budding out from beneath their shirt were of various designs, but a red octagon on the inside of both their elbow indicated a high probability of a gang. Or a brethren of buccaneers. Alliteration. As he giggled again he had just enough sense to wonder what was being pumped into his system.
“Give him more of the other kind.”
“It might kill him again.”
“Clearly not a problem,” snapped another voice from behind him. Despite not watching Sylar could tell more was administered into him as his arm began to burn, a harsh sensation that worked its way to his heart and though the rest of his body. His mind was still unbearably twisted, but his alertness skyrocketed with the pain. “See, he can take it.”
“How honest are you feeling, Mr. Gray?” inquired the man with the lower voice. Sylar clenched his teeth together in response, more at the fact he knew his name over the pain. “You may call me Mr. Foxtrot, the man next to me is Mr. Tango. There are a few men behind you, but their introductions will come as they become necessary to the conversation.”
Mr. Tango leaned in close, enjoying the opportunity to burst anybody’s personal bubble. “Where have you hidden your mate?”
Sylar only let out a hum of confusion, amused at how the vibration felt on his tongue. What the hell did they put in him?
“Two weeks ago she was at her residence, maintaining the same habits she had performed for months. And now she has disappeared without a trace. So this begs the question, where have you hidden her?”
“We can only assume that your relatively easy capture is a ruse in order to protect her, probably while she delivers,” added Mr. Foxtrot. “Or is her labor complete and you are distracting us while they go to a safe place.”
“So again, I ask the question,” asked Mr. Tango, “where have you hidden your mate?”
Sylar rolled his head to the side trying to get a better look around while he pondered the request. The damned drug was blocking his capacity to process what was being asked. His inability to make sense of the most basic question sent him giggling again.
Mr. Tango stepped back with a frustrated grunt, waving a hand for someone to come forward. “Mr. Zulu, visual references, please.”
Another man walked forward, his appearance similar to the two men before him. In his hand was a small stack of colored photographs. Mr. Zulu grasped Sylar’s hair in his hand, forcing him to look up close at the pictures. “Here she is, just two weeks ago. At her normal residence, completely unawares of any of us. Then suddenly, poof! She disappeared without a trace, along with her neighbor.”
Sylar sobered up just enough at the images on the photos. They were high zoom surveillance photos of Claire, the word ‘mate’ suddenly clicking in his mind. Claire on the street, Claire at the grocers, Claire getting out of a car, Claire by the window in her apartment.
The part that stuck out to him most would be the very large bump protruding from Claire’s stomach in every picture.
He couldn’t help himself.
He laughed.
Hysterically.
It started off slow and relaxed, but soon moved to manic uncontrolled noise that sounded strange even to his ears.
Mr. Zulu turned back in disgust. “This is getting us nowhere.”
Replacing him, Mr. Foxtrot landed a solid blow across Sylar’s face, but it did nothing except increase the laughter. “Where have you hidden her?”
Several more hits came in contact with his body when all of a sudden an explosion let off from behind, sending him and everyone else crashing into the opposite wall. The impact caused the IV to pop away from his arm, the intense burn fading due to his rapid metabolism. The chair Sylar was still tied down to had fallen so he was forced to stare at the wall they had been blasted against. While he felt his powers gradually returning, he could hear various shouts and gunshots from behind him.
Allowing the weak ones to be picked off before he had a turn, he focused on unwrapping the tape with his mind, thinking about what he had learned.
Claire, without question, was pregnant. That realization alone was one he was having issues dealing with. Why hadn’t she said a word about it? Her lack of confidence wounded him, made him feel physically ill. He knew the unsettling sensation in his gut wouldn’t let up any time soon. Who’s child was it? The thought of someone else touching her made his stomach lurch in jealousy before coming back to the moment. These crazy individuals honestly seemed to believe the baby was his, but how was that possible? He snorted and formed a smirk as he finished with the tape on one wrist, concluding that since he had been made aware of abilities anything was possible. If it were possible, he would finally have a family to call his own.
Using the now free hand, Sylar unbound the opposing hand followed by his ankles. How could he have missed such a large detail? It bothered him that he had obviously looked over it the last time he saw her. She behaved oddly, kept her distance, and appeared worn out. He should have pushed harder. And for that matter, why was Claire’s pregnancy a commodity?
Since the last of his inquiries could be answered in the present, Sylar rose finally properly observing his surroundings and who were left standing. They were in a sizeable side room of an old, underground electrical or sewer tunnel. Where the door probably had been was now a large hole in the wall from a small explosive, bits of dust and cinders still falling. Two of the men with the red tattoos had died in the blast, five more had been shot to death, and the remaining four were shooting at their attackers. There had only been ten of the other type of men. Despite their element of surprise, currently only two stood alive. They were easily noted by a deep blue triangle tattoo on their hand. Sylar couldn’t help but feel these marks to be annoyingly cliché.
When another man from the surprise blue triangle group went down Sylar flexed his fingers so he might easily control the men who remained. The alarm and panic that graced their faces only fueled his actions. With a quick flick of the wrist all five were slammed into wall. Mr. Tango, three other red octagons, and a blue triangle regarded him with complete fear. Sylar lowered his head and smirked. He’d make sure they were afraid of him before getting his answers.
“It’s my turn for questions, and I think I’ll start with…” he took an extra few seconds to ponder, taking pleasure in allowing the future victims to sweat. Settling on one from the red octagon group, he pointed to the fourth man from the left. “You.”
He allowed the man down to stumble to his knees just in front of him. “I don’t want to go first, make him go first.”
“What do people call you?”
“I-In the sect I go by Mr. Juliett,” he stuttered out, a vein bulging out of his head. Sylar raised both eyebrows at the name choice. “I know, it sucks!”
“Mr. Juliett, I am going to ask you a few questions. If you answer my questions honestly, you live. For any untruthful answer I will rip out your heart and use you as a puppet to talk to the next colleague. Do we understand each other?”
Sucking his lips in tightly all he could do was nod. Sylar looked up at the others stuck to the wall awaiting their response. At their delayed affirmatives he turned his attention back to the man before him.
“Question the first, why is it you want Claire?”
“W - we - we want her baby - your baby, not her,” he reasoned, as if that would make things better. “We hoped to wait until she gave birth so we could simply have the baby. We figured it was less m - messy.” A burning fury unlike any he had felt before simmered inside, but Mr. Juliett had told the truth.
“Very good,” he stated, his voice sounding an easement that did not reflect his true agitation. “Question the second, why do you want…my…child?” Saying the words aloud for the first time felt foreign, almost unreal if the baby was really his, but this was not the time to consider that.
The man forcibly frozen into place still shifted his eyes around at anything but him. “It was our goal t - to…Um, I mean, we… they, being my now former group, want the baby to, uh, die.” Sylar froze at this new information. In the past 10 minutes he had been through an emotional rollercoaster including confusion, betrayal, happiness, despair, excitement, anger. At this newest bombshell, the knowledge that someone already wanted this child dead, left him full of an uncontrollable amount of hate. “But never me! I never wanted to do the sacrifice, to ingest the blood of the infant, I was just doing what I was told!”
His vision shimmered and Sylar gave a hollow smile at the excuse to kill Mr. Juliett. Releasing the man he simply stood there blank faced, allowing the coward to make the first move. At last realizing he was back in control of himself, Mr. Juliett gasped in delight and began to run to the makeshift exit in the wall.
He didn’t make it three steps before Sylar punched his back, sending the man’s heart flying across the room. It slapped into Mr. Tango’s face before falling to the floor, covered immediately by the other man’s vomit. Before the dead man fell, Sylar gripped his chin. Turning his victim's face towards the other four men pinned he manipulated the mouth so it appeared he was speaking.
“Now, who wants to share next?”
***
Hiro Nakamura had been a voluntary prisoner at the Sullivan Brothers Carnival for months. And he was tired of it. Sick of being Samuel’s errand boy for the smallest time manipulations, of performing quick hops to far off places for the obscure object, and all the while receiving nothing in returning except splitting headaches.
He was no closer to discovering the temporal location of Charlie than the very first day he had arrived.
Reflecting on this fact for the millionth time in the past months, Hiro kicked the dirt was he walked through the deserted pathways of tents. Stopping suddenly he shook his head. A hero doesn’t get discouraged like this. He always looked to the future (metaphorically speaking in this case), focused on how they were going to make things better, and that the hero always prevailed in the end. A hero never gives up.
Waking from his internal pep talk, he saw the man he had been avoiding approach him quickly with an excited stressed face and outstretched arms. “Hiro, my brother, just the man I was looking for. You are going to save the day for all of us today.”
Hiro pointed to his nose. “Me?”
Samuel threw an arm over his shoulder to briskly lead him in the direction he had just come from. “There is a pregnant woman here, an old friend of yours I believe, who needs to give birth. The problem is, her ability and the child’s ability aren’t allowing that to be a possibility.”
Hiro’s eyebrows quirked up in worried confusion. “Huh? But… I don’t know anything about childbirth…”
The carnie leader let out a brief loud laugh. “No need to worry about that. All we need you to do is convince her this is the only way to save her infant and then freeze her long enough for another brother to complete the process.”
They approached a tent where nearly every member of the family stood outside of, watching it intensely for something to happen. From within Hiro could hear a woman crying out in pain, begging incoherently for something. As Samuel pulled the tarp back to allow him in, an excited murmur rattled through the crowd as they pushed forward slightly to try and see in. “Please, please, patience,” he requested easily with a calming hand in the air. Yet another tarp separated the much louder noises and when it was pulled to the side Hiro blinked in shock.
There were a handful of people hovering in the darker areas near a table bathed in a spotlight that settled in the center of the ring. The part that shocked him was seeing Claire Bennet laying on the table dressed in a very loose all white dress. Her wrists and ankles were lightly bound down to the edges, allowing for some movement as she writhed on the hard surface. Dark circles were evident beneath her eyes despite the red puffiness of her cheeks and tear tracks. Her face scrunched as her body tensed up again, letting out a cry of pain. The bit he couldn’t help but focus on was the large pregnant stomach which pointed towards the ceiling.
“Cheerleader…” breathed out Hiro taking in the sight, the ties around her appendages evidence enough immediately supporting the idea that she did not want to be there.
“She’s in labor, but she isn’t dilating and her gift won’t allow a C-section,” explained the leader with a hint of a nervous edge. “This is why you must stop time to her so Martin here,” he gestured to the appropriate man standing next to the table, “can pull the child out with limited damage to both mother and baby. But you must persuade her to have a little faith in all of us, which should put the baby at ease.”
“And if I refuse?” he resiliently questioned.
This declaration momentarily startled Samuel, before he concluded darkly, “Then the baby dies, and Charlie can’t have that.”
Hiro gulped as he moved forward. Just for a few seconds the pain had apparently subsided as the blonde was left panting heavily. As he approached nearer she turned towards him, sweat drenching her face and hair. Her eyes squinted in confusion before she hissed in pain, “Hiro?”
“Hello, Cheerleader,” he greeted with a small bow when he was close enough.
“You have to help me, we have to get out of here, please! This isn’t right!” she pleaded, pulling even harder against her ties. The extra effort apparently doubled her pain as she froze in place, yet another yell ripping from her lips.
He took a half a step backwards at the sight of her convulsing. Samuel suddenly appeared right beside him, nudging him just a little nearer. “Now, Claire, you need to calm yourself, we talked about this.” The mini episode passed as she glared daggers at him while panting heavily. “This is the best option for your great child. Now relax and just breathe -”
His advice was interrupted as a loogie splattered across his face having come from Claire. “Screw you!” she screamed. “Just wait until her daddy finds out about this, you’ll all be sorry! Now let me go!”
As another spasm rippled through her Hiro reached down to grasp onto her hand, watching as Samuel wiped the spit from his face. “Get it done,” he pointed to Hiro taking a few steps back into the dimmer light. Everyone present was keeping their distance.
Out of pity for the girl on the table he gripped tighter to her hand and scrunched his eyes up to stop time for her. It only gave him a headache while she continued to moan in pain. “Hiro, what are you doing here? We have to leave,” she whispered in a raspy voice, conflict running through him from her desperation. “Please, I don’t want them to get a hold of her ever, they can’t.”
“But they need to help you get the baby out,” he explained calmly, hushed low enough that only Claire could hear him.
Immediately her eyes grew wide with fear as she shook her head back and forth vigorously. “No, no, that is not going to happen. I’ll go somewhere else -”
“There’s no time,” he added sympathetically. “Your baby will die.”
Claire bit her lip and turned her head away as fresh tears flowed. “Why didn’t he show up?”
Hiro tilted his head in consideration. “Who?” The only response was a head shake in the opposite direction from him. “Please allow me to help you, it would be my honor. I do not wish for anyone to be in pain like this.”
“But didn’t you know, Hiro, all births are just like this,” she joked with a small grin before choking back another scream. He lost circulation to his hand for a few moments when she gripped tightly. Once she was back in control she nodded. “Don’t let them take her away from me,” she instructed, relief hitting Hiro. “I’ll let you do whatever as long as I get to hold her as soon as she’s born.”
“I swear it,” he promised. Noticing her relax just a bit he asked, “What will she be named?”
She blushed slightly looking down to her stomach, “I don’t have one yet,” she admitted. “Now what do you need me to do?”
He nodded, finally getting down to business. “Right, only relax and trust me. Allow me to use my power to help you.”
With obvious effort Claire took several calming breaths, nodding when the tension left her. Hiro jumped at the chance, freezing her in place with considerable effort. Ignoring the sticky wet sensation dripping from his ear he nodded to indicate she would remain still.
The man, Martin, stepped up into the well lit circle. Taking a few calming breaths of his own, his hands phased into her stomach. Not expecting this to be the procedure performed, Hiro blushed and turned his head slightly away. A bead of sweat rolled down Martin’s head as he continued to work. After perhaps ten minutes he began to tug upwards. A few tugs later, suddenly a screaming infant girl phased through her mother and was born into the world.
When the screaming child was handed off to Samuel, Hiro released his hold on Claire. She choked on a gasp of pain as her stomach immediately reshaped to her smaller form before his eyes. Nearby a laughing Samuel lifted the baby up for all in the room to see. “Our answer!” he announced in tears.
A cheer of success rippled amongst the people in the tent and reaching to those outside. “Let her see,” demanded Hiro. When he got no recognition for his comment, he put on a serious face and stated louder, “She needs to see the baby.”
“Please,” asked Claire, still trying to reach up against her restraints. “Where is she?” Samuel finally took notice. While he approached, Claire continued to give muttered pleas. Instead of presenting the daughter to her, he placed the baby in a basinet of sorts just off to Hiro’s left.
With free hands he clapped onto Hiro’s shoulders, “You have shown dedication to this Family. With what you have been willing to do, the lengths you have gone to; you have earned a place in our new world.”
Hiro scrunched up his eyes at the implication, taking a side eye at the squirming newborn. Lifting his arm he played with the healthy little girls hand that gripped onto his on instinct. From the corner of his eye he could see Claire struggling to lift her head to just get a glimpse of her.
“Now you are a different story,” he expanded, taking a knee near her and leaning in close. “You and Sylar have done nothing to support us, caused us nothing but trouble; with the exception of the miracle child you two produced.”
Sylar? Pushing up his glasses Hiro reevaluated the dark hair on the baby, sensing the power rolling off of her. Great Scott…
“Give me my daughter,” she stated firmly, jerking against her bonds to make a point.
“She’s our daughter now,” he clarified.
“How dare you!”
“Families look after and protect one another. You have shown no loyalty to this Family therefore you have no place here,” he explained as she continued her vocal protests. “We will move on, provide well for her, but you will remain behind.”
Claire’s screams and struggles redoubled in their effort as she desperately moved to become free. Samuel stood, took time to pat Hiro on the shoulder once more, and returned to address his brethren with a wave of his hand. The group of people started to clear out and pack up the makeshift hospital.
The scene before Hiro moved in a sort of slow motion. Everything he believed in up to this point came into question in his head. Beyond a shadow of a doubt he knew what was about to transpire in front of him was wrong.
Heroes never give up on their quests. His current quest was to save Charlie, from wherever Samuel had placed her in time. But given the situation before him, he knew he was going to have to reevaluate his quest. This mother, his friend, deserved to be with her baby. Any action he did at this point would compromise his original intent. He was going to lose Charlie, but it would have to be done.
Sighing to himself he realized he lost her months ago, but just was too stubborn to admit it. Losing love, again, seemed to be a theme among his favorite idols. Did Cyclops not lose Jean Grey on several occasions? Didn’t Captain Picard give up Nella Daren for the greater good? Hadn’t the Doctor sacrificed his people, his loved ones, to save the universe? Fate determined he would follow in their footsteps, take this sacrifice for the good of others.
Taking a deep breath Hiro took Claire’s wrist in his right hand and the baby’s arm in his left. “Hiro, what are you doing?” she asked quietly.
At her silence Samuel cast an eye over, suddenly panicked by Hiro’s pose. He let out a shout of protest and the man who pulled the child from Claire lunged to stop him, but it was too late. Hiro felt his ability charge quickly and they popped out of there. However as he felt his power pop them away, something in his head simultaneously popped leaving a numb feeling inside his head.
He also realized his left hand was curiously empty.
***
In Noah’s apartment Peter leaned to face out of a window, his fingers nervously tapping away at the glass. His niece had been missing for 5 hours. If she hadn’t received adequate medical help by now it was likely her baby was dead. Sick of staring out into the blinking lights of night his fist connected with the window jam. “Why are we just standing around waiting for something to happen?” he snapped beginning to pace, an activity he had been repeating off and on ever since they had arrived.
With a locked jaw Noah stood from his position in front of the computer. “I’ve called in some favors, it would be reckless to do anything at this point.”
Upon discovering Claire’s disappearance, he and Noah had searched the hospital with no sign of her. Angela returned to her home to see if she could learn anything, while the other came to Noah’s apartment with similar goals. So far, all that occurred was waiting with very little action. And Peter was becoming extremely frustrated with that.
“You could keep me in the loop, you know,” he stated, crossing his arms. “I don’t see why you’re mad at me.”
From Emma’s position on the couch she hadn’t been able to completely see the exchange between him and Noah, but it was obvious she had picked up on the rise in tension. The heat pack held against her neck was removed momentarily as she observed the nearly hostile exchange. Peter didn’t blame her or Sweetie for Claire’s disappearance, but only wished both had cleared out for awhile.
Sweetie returned with a replacement heat pack for Emma, taking a seat on the couch and wrapping a comforting arm around her shoulder. Out of all of them, the older woman seemed to be taking her vanishing the hardest.
“You’re damn right I’m mad at you,” exclaimed Noah standing. “You knew she was pregnant and you said nothing!”
His head snapped back in shock at the unexpected accusation. “She asked me not to, I was respecting her wishes.”
“She’s a teenager,” he objected.
“She’s an adult,” argued Peter. “Are you mad at me because I kept her pregnancy a secret or because she didn’t confide in you?”
“And yet when she told you the paternity you grew violent and all but threatened her,” he yelled, stepping closer.
“And I apologized for that,” reasoned the other man. “But you’re telling me you wouldn’t have given the chance?”
Before the argument could escalate anymore, they were distracted by a pop noise from the corner. All four turned their attention to the two individuals that appeared suddenly.
A pale Hiro stood holding Claire’s hand as her body landed on the floor. She detached herself from him and crawled up to her knees, looking around desperately. Hiro on the other hand smiled at everyone in the room with a slight bow, his eyes glazed and dark with blood trickling out of both nostrils. “Where is she?” asked Claire still looking around. That was when Peter took in her physical appearance. She wore a loose fitting white gown and her wrists and ankles showed open sores that healed as time passed, but the baby bump had disappeared.
“How could you have left her there?” demanded Claire panicked. Hiro’s only response was to instantly crumple to the floor. She leaned over to him, grasping his unconscious form and shaking him. “I want my baby! Why didn’t you take her too! Where is she!”
Emma moved to be at the prone man’s side, but was hindered from helping him from the hysterical girl that was in the way. Peter went to attend to Hiro as well as the girl’s father held her back. “Give her back to me! I have to find her! Take me back there! I have to go back! Please!” She started to scream incoherently, distraught by whatever trauma had been performed.
“Now, Honey Child, you need to calm down,” instructed Sweetie, placing a soft hand on her shoulder. “Things are going to be better, you just have to come back to the moment.”
Peter glanced over at them just in time to watch his niece roll out of her father’s grasp and tackle Sweetie to the ground. He left Hiro to pull her off. “Claire! Stop!”
“It’s your fault! All of it!” she screamed, digging her fingers into the older woman’s neck. “I would have her if it wasn’t for you! You took her from me!”
As Noah attempted to stop her, Peter dug through his med pack for a tranquilizer. Given her gift he loaded triple the average dose into the syringe, jabbing the needle into her upper arm. The effect was almost instantaneous; soon Claire was crumpled in her father’s arms with tear tracks caked onto her face. Noah stroked her hair back while Sweetie choked and gasped for air.
“What the hell was that about?” demanded Peter, looking at the woman on the ground. She continued to cough as she shook her head in ignorance.
“We have to get him to a hospital,” instructed Emma with authority.
Before assisting the other unconscious person, Peter placed a hand to her bare forearm. He could only feel the one power inside her. The baby, a little girl from her ravings, was now gone with no trace.
Now the question that would plague them was; where she was now?