Fic that isn't bandom! Heroes, Peter/Claire, Peter/Claire/Nathan
I've been going through the privated/flocked entries on my old LJ and scrounging up old fic. I'll be posting it over the next few weeks, but there still shouldn't be an epic amount overwhelming those of you who have this journal friended. ♥ There's a few bandom-centric drabbles and chatfic/not!fic snippets that'll be posted, as well as a few Heroes things, starting with these two I wrote somewhere around 2007. I was a little hesitant about posting them at first, but hey, it's old fanfic! How is anyone supposed to embarrass me twenty years from now if they can't remind me of a time when I wrote shitty fanfic and eschewed quotation marks?
The first is Heroes/Watchmen fusion, and the general idea was to put some of the season 1 characters into the aftermath of Watchmen. Peter/Claire, ~720 words. Warning: contains incest.
Nix and Nix's Children
If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.
- George Bernard Shaw
The city's got the right name - New York. Nothing ever gets old around here.
- Ralph Stephenson
Grandmother and granddaughter are walking, arms linked, through the desolation that was once New York City; twenty years of government officials blathering on and on about clean-up and restoration and rebuilding, and no one's done a thing. There are skeletons everywhere they look, but it's somehow not as eerie as the other side of the city, the side that survived the blast. It's been completely abandoned, and the empty streets are haunting: the skeletons are horrifying but otherworldly, while the abandoned streets are entirely mundane, and horrifying in a different way. The displays in shop windows wear mid-eighties fashions, and Claire imagines a version of herself born ten, twenty years earlier, walking down these sidewalks in those clothes. She wonders if her power would have saved her from the shockwave and thinks that it mightn’t; still, she imagines waking up in a city filled with bodies, and she shivers.
Angela veers to avoid stepping on two interlocked skeletons on the sidewalk and stumbles. Her granddaughter steadies her before she can fall. "We shouldn't be here," Claire says. "It's not safe."
"You'll be fine."
She will. "You might not be."
And Angela laughs suddenly, sharply. "This city can't hurt me," she says. "Even a monster knows its mommy."
*
Uncle and niece are flying; rather, he is flying and she is on his back, legs and arms circled around him, chin on his shoulder. In another universe, the night sky might have been brightened with millions of lights underneath them, city hustle and bustle unfolding on the ground beneath. But they are the only thing between dark and dark, and she whispers in his ear, "I hate this city. Let's go home."
Home is, for her, small-town Texas, and his is the same, if she's there. They don't go home. He lands on the top of a building with crumbling features. "Peter," she starts to say, but a quiet noise distracts her. There are two pigeons resting on a ledge, and she smiles to see them.
"Life, even here," Peter says; he's grinning when she looks at him, and she wraps her arms around him.
*
Mother and eldest son are arguing quietly so the kids won't hear; the children in question are seventeen and thirty, but Angela and Nathan have spent the last twenty years having quiet late-night fights, and old habits die hard. "It was necessary," she hisses. "It was half of one city or the whole world. It was 0.07% of the population, that's all-"
"It was mass murder," he replies, "and it didn't solve anything."
"You didn't try to stop us."
"I didn't know-"
"You knew as well as I did," she says, and there is something triumphant in her expression when he lowers his eyes.
Peter is standing across from the door, arms crossed, when Nathan opens it, and he wonders at the idiocy of trying to keep secrets from a mind-reader with enhanced hearing.
*
Father and daughter aren't speaking to one another; elder brother and younger brother are saying less.
Angela clears her throat, and somehow the sound is a trigger. Peter storms out of the room, and Claire follows him, pausing only to shoot an angry look at her family.
*
Mother and eldest son are at the window, watching uncle and niece; Angela shakes her head when Nathan opens his mouth. "You have no right-"
"He's my brother," Nathan says, "she's my daughter, for God's sake. How can you just let them..."
"We helped kill so many people, Nathan, and you want me to tell you they're wrong?"
*
Uncle and niece are oblivious; the latter is, at least, and Peter can hear the voices, but he's ignoring the words. "We can fix their mistakes," he says, and Claire snorts.
"Two people can't fix all this."
"We can try," he insists, and he is grinning again. His optimism is infectious, and she begins to smile back. "We have to," he says, and Claire realizes that he's right. If this city is Angela's child, it's their kindred, and blood is blood. Family is family.
They kiss this time. Peter thinks he hears Nathan saying something to their mother, but Claire's eyes close, and somehow the sound of her eyelashes touching her skin, nearly imperceptible even to him, manages to drown everything else out.
*
Inappropriate Heroes storytime, part 2: vague Peter/Claire/Nathan based on random prompts from heroes50, set after the season 1 finale, title from Placebo's 'Post-Blue', ~540 words. Again, warning for incest.
it's in your family tree
1. (wish)
Pennies in the fountain, nickels, dimes; she'd put in her whole wallet if she thought it would work.
Every evening she waits for the first star to shine bright. Wish I may, wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight.
Come back, Peter.
2. (need)
He bites down on her shoulder, hard enough to break the skin, hard enough to bruise; it's gone in seconds, but he isn't, and oh, God -
3. (dream)
- and Claire wakes up.
4. (search)
We'll find him, Nathan promises, and Claire nods, echoing his words, making the same promise.
He calls her from every new city, country, continent. She calls him from the pay phone at the mall, West's cell phone, her private line. Nothing? Nathan always asks first, as if Peter is going to suddenly appear at the pretzel shop across from the pay phone in an L.A. mall.
Nothing. Nothing?
We'll find him.
12. (father)
She calls him Dad once, just once, when she is hanging up the phone. He pauses, doesn't say anything, hangs up the phone.
She never says it again.
13. (brother)
Claire is always aware that Nathan and Peter share something she will never be a part of, because while she knows either one would die for her - Peter has, for Christ's sake - they would die without each other, with each other.
We're your blood too, Peter told her once, and she smiled at him, but it's not the same. He has to know it's not the same.
28. (death)
Another day, another accident. A fall from her window: head, meet concrete.
She wakes up minutes later, and wonders where all the king's horses and his men are, and why Peter hasn't put himself back together again.
43. (breath)
Exhale, white puff of frozen breath.
Winter is here in New York City.
His brother isn't.
44. (sacrifice)
A memory: he is glowing, and she is wondering how she's supposed to pull the trigger, and then Nathan is there; she watches them fly, watches the explosion in the sky.
She watches them and wonders how it's possible to lose something you never knew you had.
48. (quiet)
The phone calls don't come as often anymore, and when they do, they are small talk and desperation. They've given up searching.
There is nothing left to say.
49. (safe)
He is alive, and he remembers, and there is no time for words, not at first. He pulls Nathan in first; their lips touch, and all Peter can hear from Nathan's thoughts is alive, alive, alive.
Claire is hanging back, watching, uncertain; he pulls away from his brother and looks at her for a moment, smiling, and then she is in his arms.
50. (home)
His head is on Nathan's shoulder, and her head is on Peter's; there is a hand on her hip, and she isn't sure which of the two it belongs to, and she smiles and wraps her arms around them both.
I told you we'd find him, she says, and Peter laughs.
More like I found you.
Does it matter? Nathan asks, and it's learly a rhetorical question, but Claire shakes her head anyway, holding them tighter.
The first is Heroes/Watchmen fusion, and the general idea was to put some of the season 1 characters into the aftermath of Watchmen. Peter/Claire, ~720 words. Warning: contains incest.
Nix and Nix's Children
If you cannot get rid of the family skeleton, you may as well make it dance.
- George Bernard Shaw
The city's got the right name - New York. Nothing ever gets old around here.
- Ralph Stephenson
Grandmother and granddaughter are walking, arms linked, through the desolation that was once New York City; twenty years of government officials blathering on and on about clean-up and restoration and rebuilding, and no one's done a thing. There are skeletons everywhere they look, but it's somehow not as eerie as the other side of the city, the side that survived the blast. It's been completely abandoned, and the empty streets are haunting: the skeletons are horrifying but otherworldly, while the abandoned streets are entirely mundane, and horrifying in a different way. The displays in shop windows wear mid-eighties fashions, and Claire imagines a version of herself born ten, twenty years earlier, walking down these sidewalks in those clothes. She wonders if her power would have saved her from the shockwave and thinks that it mightn’t; still, she imagines waking up in a city filled with bodies, and she shivers.
Angela veers to avoid stepping on two interlocked skeletons on the sidewalk and stumbles. Her granddaughter steadies her before she can fall. "We shouldn't be here," Claire says. "It's not safe."
"You'll be fine."
She will. "You might not be."
And Angela laughs suddenly, sharply. "This city can't hurt me," she says. "Even a monster knows its mommy."
*
Uncle and niece are flying; rather, he is flying and she is on his back, legs and arms circled around him, chin on his shoulder. In another universe, the night sky might have been brightened with millions of lights underneath them, city hustle and bustle unfolding on the ground beneath. But they are the only thing between dark and dark, and she whispers in his ear, "I hate this city. Let's go home."
Home is, for her, small-town Texas, and his is the same, if she's there. They don't go home. He lands on the top of a building with crumbling features. "Peter," she starts to say, but a quiet noise distracts her. There are two pigeons resting on a ledge, and she smiles to see them.
"Life, even here," Peter says; he's grinning when she looks at him, and she wraps her arms around him.
*
Mother and eldest son are arguing quietly so the kids won't hear; the children in question are seventeen and thirty, but Angela and Nathan have spent the last twenty years having quiet late-night fights, and old habits die hard. "It was necessary," she hisses. "It was half of one city or the whole world. It was 0.07% of the population, that's all-"
"It was mass murder," he replies, "and it didn't solve anything."
"You didn't try to stop us."
"I didn't know-"
"You knew as well as I did," she says, and there is something triumphant in her expression when he lowers his eyes.
Peter is standing across from the door, arms crossed, when Nathan opens it, and he wonders at the idiocy of trying to keep secrets from a mind-reader with enhanced hearing.
*
Father and daughter aren't speaking to one another; elder brother and younger brother are saying less.
Angela clears her throat, and somehow the sound is a trigger. Peter storms out of the room, and Claire follows him, pausing only to shoot an angry look at her family.
*
Mother and eldest son are at the window, watching uncle and niece; Angela shakes her head when Nathan opens his mouth. "You have no right-"
"He's my brother," Nathan says, "she's my daughter, for God's sake. How can you just let them..."
"We helped kill so many people, Nathan, and you want me to tell you they're wrong?"
*
Uncle and niece are oblivious; the latter is, at least, and Peter can hear the voices, but he's ignoring the words. "We can fix their mistakes," he says, and Claire snorts.
"Two people can't fix all this."
"We can try," he insists, and he is grinning again. His optimism is infectious, and she begins to smile back. "We have to," he says, and Claire realizes that he's right. If this city is Angela's child, it's their kindred, and blood is blood. Family is family.
They kiss this time. Peter thinks he hears Nathan saying something to their mother, but Claire's eyes close, and somehow the sound of her eyelashes touching her skin, nearly imperceptible even to him, manages to drown everything else out.
*
Inappropriate Heroes storytime, part 2: vague Peter/Claire/Nathan based on random prompts from heroes50, set after the season 1 finale, title from Placebo's 'Post-Blue', ~540 words. Again, warning for incest.
it's in your family tree
1. (wish)
Pennies in the fountain, nickels, dimes; she'd put in her whole wallet if she thought it would work.
Every evening she waits for the first star to shine bright. Wish I may, wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight.
Come back, Peter.
2. (need)
He bites down on her shoulder, hard enough to break the skin, hard enough to bruise; it's gone in seconds, but he isn't, and oh, God -
3. (dream)
- and Claire wakes up.
4. (search)
We'll find him, Nathan promises, and Claire nods, echoing his words, making the same promise.
He calls her from every new city, country, continent. She calls him from the pay phone at the mall, West's cell phone, her private line. Nothing? Nathan always asks first, as if Peter is going to suddenly appear at the pretzel shop across from the pay phone in an L.A. mall.
Nothing. Nothing?
We'll find him.
12. (father)
She calls him Dad once, just once, when she is hanging up the phone. He pauses, doesn't say anything, hangs up the phone.
She never says it again.
13. (brother)
Claire is always aware that Nathan and Peter share something she will never be a part of, because while she knows either one would die for her - Peter has, for Christ's sake - they would die without each other, with each other.
We're your blood too, Peter told her once, and she smiled at him, but it's not the same. He has to know it's not the same.
28. (death)
Another day, another accident. A fall from her window: head, meet concrete.
She wakes up minutes later, and wonders where all the king's horses and his men are, and why Peter hasn't put himself back together again.
43. (breath)
Exhale, white puff of frozen breath.
Winter is here in New York City.
His brother isn't.
44. (sacrifice)
A memory: he is glowing, and she is wondering how she's supposed to pull the trigger, and then Nathan is there; she watches them fly, watches the explosion in the sky.
She watches them and wonders how it's possible to lose something you never knew you had.
48. (quiet)
The phone calls don't come as often anymore, and when they do, they are small talk and desperation. They've given up searching.
There is nothing left to say.
49. (safe)
He is alive, and he remembers, and there is no time for words, not at first. He pulls Nathan in first; their lips touch, and all Peter can hear from Nathan's thoughts is alive, alive, alive.
Claire is hanging back, watching, uncertain; he pulls away from his brother and looks at her for a moment, smiling, and then she is in his arms.
50. (home)
His head is on Nathan's shoulder, and her head is on Peter's; there is a hand on her hip, and she isn't sure which of the two it belongs to, and she smiles and wraps her arms around them both.
I told you we'd find him, she says, and Peter laughs.
More like I found you.
Does it matter? Nathan asks, and it's learly a rhetorical question, but Claire shakes her head anyway, holding them tighter.