Heroes fic: Lord of the Rats, part 1 (WIP, rated R for language)
I'm probably going to regret this, somehow, but I feel compelled to post at least this little bit before it's completely jossed, later this evening...
Lord of the Rats, part 1
Author: sabaceanbabe
Rating: R for language
Characters/pairings: Peter Petrelli, Nathan Petrelli, Sylar
Spoilers: all of season 1, speculation for the beginning of season 2
Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine and I'll give them back when I'm done. No copyright infringement intended. I have no money; please don't sue.
Author's note: This was to be for LJ's "Heroes Big Boom" challenge, but I couldn't make the deadline. This is a work in progress, so if you don't want to wait a few weeks or so in between "chapters," feel free to wait until it's all done. I'll get there eventually. Thank you so much to lizardbeth_j and mamaboolj for the beta, and I hope you ladies will be willing to continue with that as I continue with the fic. :)
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Sharp pain shot through her midsection; it felt as though she was being torn in half, but she would not scream. Once the pain subsided, although it never left her completely, once she could force her fingers to relax enough that she could release the wheelchair's arms, she said to those who surrounded her, "Stop. Something's wrong." Her voice was calm; she would allow nothing less.
Instantly, the tiny caravan came to a halt. For several moments, no one moved, waiting for her to say more, to tell them what they should do. The tableau remained unbroken until a light voice, hovering between that of boy and man, asked, "Are you okay, mama?"
Carefully, she turned her head to look at her son. Her firstborn son. Nathan looked right back at her, worry plain on his face. As she watched, he masked the emotion, exerting a control over his features that grown men would envy, and yet he was only twelve years old.
For him, she permitted her own features to relax into a small smile and she reached out a hand to gently stroke his cheek. "I will be, Nathan, my love." As though to prove her words a lie, another spasm pulled at the muscles in her abdomen. Had she not been sitting, the strength of it would have doubled her over. "I will be."
"Angie?" Dallas' eyes widened as another powerful contraction visibly rippled beneath the thin silk of her dress. "What...?"
She couldn't answer him. White mist descended over her vision and cotton muffled the voices of the startled hospital staff as they swung into action. Angela Petrelli, who had given birth only two days before to a tiny boy she and her husband had named Peter, was again in labor. There had been no indication that this would be a multiple birth, nothing on either x-rays or ultrasound.
As she slipped further away, Angela whispered, "My God. Twins..."
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Frigid fire burned in his gut, a fire that should have been pain, but he turned it into something else instead. Something more useful. Diamond anger glittered in his heart and a rich velvet hatred consumed his brain.
The last vestiges of Gabriel Gray soaked into the pavement and left only Sylar behind.
Sylar lay on the hard concrete, still as death, and stared at nothing tangible while his dreams and desires burned to ash in what should have been the wake of a nuclear conflagration. A conflagration for which he'd worked and planned and of which he'd suddenly been cheated.
The wheels turned in his mind like the gears in the finest watch, replaying over and over the far-off explosion. An explosion that should have been close up and personal.
Cheated. He'd been cheated and made a fool of by the Petrellis and that little Japanese man. They would pay.
He blinked once, twice, but no one noticed. Sirens sounded in the distance, came closer. Even as the others in the plaza came closer, whispered to each other in shocked voices, none yet willing to come near where Sylar lay, still bleeding, either to help him or to finish him off.
Bleeding. He blinked again. Bleeding this much couldn't be a good thing. He should stop. Sylar turned his attention inside and exerted pressure on the severed blood vessels, forcing capillaries and veins to close. His body would heal slowly, with time, since he'd been cheated of the cheerleader's power (something else to lay at Peter Petrelli's feet), but he could still combine his natural ability at fixing things with his acquired control over the physical until the bleeding stopped. Maybe with time, he could learn to use it to mimic the girl's power.
Sirens blared. An ambulance stopped in the plaza, not close enough for Sylar to worry about, but within his line of sight. A flurry of activity followed and he exerted more effort, made himself invisible. He didn't want to be noticed, didn't want to risk the others scattered about Kirby Plaza painting him as the villain in this little drama.
More nearby movement drew Sylar's gaze. Paramedics lifted a man onto a gurney and wheeled him into the ambulance, but that wasn't what truly interested Sylar. Instead, he focused on a cockroach that ambled across the pavement only an inch or so beyond his nose. If he concentrated, tuned out the others' voices, he could hear the susurrus of the roach's feet as it shuffled across the concrete.
It trundled along, unconcerned, and stopped when it reached a manhole cover a few feet away from where Sylar lay. Antennae waggled and Sylar could almost swear that the thing beckoned him.
More sirens, more voices, more flashing lights in the plaza all combined to push him to move. Sylar tried to sit up, but couldn't quite manage it. The pain was too intense; he couldn't tune it out. Reaching out toward the beckoning insect, he dragged himself slowly to the manhole cover. The roach skittered back at his approach, but it didn't leave.
Sylar was too weak physically to lift the damn cover, so he used what little strength remained to nudge it with his mind. It moved, but dropped back into place when he stopped pushing. With a deep breath, he tried again. This time, he pushed the cover up and off, reached out a hand to keep it from clattering on the pavement. He wanted away, and he wanted to remain unnoticed.
Carefully, he lowered himself into the sewers below New York City. No one would find him there. No one would even look for him, not with all the other things they had to think about right now.
Sylar smiled and reached for the cover to pull it back into place, but he paused when he heard a little girl's voice, quite clearly for all that she was several yards away.
"Please don't die, Officer Parkman. You're my hero."
Sylar felt his blood pressure rise. Her hero. He should have been the hero here. Parkman, huh? He remembered the name from the list. Parkman, Matthew, a Los Angeles cop who could read minds. A useful ability, that. Once Sylar had taken care of Peter Petrelli, who he was sure had survived exploding, he'd have to look into making the acquaintance of Officer Matthew Parkman...
***
The first thing Peter noticed was the cold; he was chilled to the bone. The second thing was that something poked him -- or rather several somethings poked at him -- all over. He felt a warm puff of air on his right ear, heard a sniffling whuffle.
Peter opened his eyes only to be greeted by a profound darkness. He blinked several times, but there was nothing wrong with his eyes; it was simply a very dark night. No stars, no moon, no streetlights, not even the far-off glow of city lights reflecting off accumulated pollution. The air was thick, tangy with potential rain, and the dirt beneath his left cheek was cold and slimy.
The whuffle sounded again, this time accompanied by a wet nose that sniffed at his hair.
"Shit!"
Startled, Peter scrambled to escape whatever it was, in the process earning several scratches and at least one puncture in the exposed skin of his hands. Sliding in mud, the best he could manage was to turn over onto his backside and crab-walk drunkenly away.
Sitting on his ass on the cold, wet ground, Peter stared into the lush darkness. A cow lowed nearby, answered by another and then another.
"A pasture," he said aloud as the momentary panic gave way to amusement. "I'm in a damn cow pasture."
A flash of lightning split the sky, briefly exposing that it wasn't exactly a cow pasture, but some farmer's long-since-harvested cornfield. Two or three fence posts lay on the ground maybe ten feet away, which explained the cows in the cornfield.
The skies chose that moment to open up, dumping on him what felt like five-gallon buckets of ice water, and causing the half dozen or so nearby cows to voice their objections. Peter threw his head back and laughed, deep and loud, which caused further bovine protest.
But torrential rain and a bunch of cows were the least of his problems. The thought sobered him instantly as the things that had brought him here, wherever here was, slowly came back to him.
Claire as she ran from him, her thoughts a jumble of mistrust and betrayal...
Mr. Bennet -- no, Noah. He'd said to call him Noah. Noah, as he'd told Peter that he'd put him down himself and not to worry, that he was a pretty good shot...
The rush of adrenaline and nausea when Sylar appeared in Kirby Plaza...
His own fists, the sick thud as he'd struck Sylar over and over...
The fire and ice that ran through his veins and set every nerve ending to singing with power as Ted's unsought legacy ignited within him...
Hiro's sudden appearance in the Plaza and the surge of hope the Japanese man had instilled in Peter as he ran Sylar through...
The horror as Peter realized that it didn't matter, that it wasn't Sylar who was the danger to them all...
And then, worst of all, the awful panic as Peter tried to control the nuclear reaction within himself. The sight of Claire, gun pointed right at him, just as he'd begged her to do, but unable to pull the trigger...
And then, just like when Peter was a little boy, Nathan had been there, hand outstretched, to rescue him...
The ascent into the sky at his brother's hands and the despair when Peter realized that there was no controlling the nuclear cascade that had already begun, and then...
"Nathan," he whispered.
***
Something chewed at his stomach. No, not chewed... Gnawed. Right where that little joke of a man had run him through. Sylar opened his eyes.
He sat in water; it had soaked into his jeans and through his boots and he could just see the shimmer as it lapped against the opposite wall, just a few feet away. Tilting his head to get a better idea of his surroundings, he felt his skull slip on the slime that coated everything. His lip curled in distaste as he bent one knee; the movement sent several creatures skittering and squeaking away, although one or two seemed reluctant to leave their meal. Grimacing at the thought, he curled into himself to protect the again-bleeding injury from further abuse. "Fucking rats."
One of the little bastards hadn't run as far as the others; it sat on its haunches and watched him with beady little eyes that glittered in the dim light filtering down from the world above. Sylar hissed at it, but it simply stared at him, impassive.
The face-off didn't last long; the damn thing wasn't worth the effort and Sylar returned his attention to his stomach. The wooziness and nausea he experienced now told him that he had lost a lot of blood. He couldn't heal the damage. Much as he hated the idea, he had to find help before he made things worse.
How long he'd been in the sewers, he didn't know, but it had been pitch black when he'd stopped to rest and now it wasn't. There were no electric lights in use down here, not that he knew of, so it must be sunlight that allowed him to see what little he could in the murk. He held himself very still and concentrated, but he heard only water as it dripped from pipes suspended overhead. Water and rats.
Reaching further, he was surprised at the effort it took to hear things beyond the sewers. A man and woman arguing heatedly. The coo and scratch of pigeons as they searched for a meal. Requisite blare of a car horn in the distance, quickly followed by another horn, higher pitched and irritating. Still further away, a clatter of metal wheels against metal rails as commuters made their way to or from work.
Sylar was not displeased -- the character of the sounds and the relative peace above meant that it must be fairly early in the morning. Had it been later in the day, the sounds would have had a more frenetic pace, a more intense energy. Either way, morning or evening, there was less chance of him being seen when he pulled himself up through a manhole cover.
Moving slowly, he rolled to his knees. Water splashed and he caught a glimpse over his shoulder of two "v" shapes rippling swiftly away. More rats. But still the brave one remained, hunkered down on a ledge only a couple of feet away; it looked as though it waited for something.
He pushed himself to his feet, clutching at his stomach. His gaze remained on the rat. "What do you want?"
It squeaked at him and it amused Sylar to think that the rat had just replied to his question. Experimentally, he splashed water at it. The sunlight from above was a little stronger now -- strong enough that Sylar could see the glistening drops as they passed through the rays before splattering on the little rat. And still, it didn't run away. He took a step toward it, causing the water around his ankles to swell outward in a small wave. The rat just raised its head and sniffed at the thick air.
Crouching in front of the animal, Sylar drew close enough to pick out details -- the thing had white whiskers and a white streak in the fur over its beady left eye. At least, he assumed they were white; it was still too dark to pick out colors.
He held out one hand. This time, the rat reacted with something approaching alarm, although not nearly as strongly as the others had. Rather than running away, it merely backed off a couple of inches. Cautious, but not frightened.
Sylar grinned. "Funny how so many people are afraid of me, but you aren't. Were you someone's pet?" He shook his head and, one hand trailing along the grimy sewer wall to steady himself, he headed past the rat, toward the light.
***
His teeth chattered so hard Peter thought he might break a tooth as he picked his way carefully across the field. It'd be pretty damned ironic if I survived the explosion and fall, only to break my neck, tripping over a cow. Of course, even if something like that happened, it wouldn't kill him. Not unless he managed to sever his head in the process.
The rain had slowed to an unpleasantly icy drizzle and the wind had picked up a bit with the approaching dawn. The light level hadn't increased much, but Peter could see the shapes of trees in the distance, even if he couldn't yet make out any details.
Sometime during the night, he had managed to lose his wallet and his watch, so he had no identification, no money, and no credit cards. Once he figured out where he was, he might have to hitchhike home. Peter had to smile as he buttoned the three little buttons of his sodden shirt -- it and the t-shirt beneath were all that stood between him and the increasing wind. Claude would've told him to screw hitchhiking and just take the money he needed to get home, but Peter couldn't see himself as a pickpocket. For that matter, maybe he should just fly home.
Color slowly bled into the landscape around him and the drizzle faded away to nothing before he reached the limit of the field through which he trudged. Reflexively, he looked at his wrist, noted again that his watch wasn't there. It came to him that it was 6:43 am; there wasn't a doubt in his mind that the time was accurate. He frowned. He knew the exact time? Could that be an aspect of Hiro's power? It certainly wasn't something he'd known before, not that he'd noticed, anyway. There were so many things he just didn't know about how his own power worked, let alone the powers he'd absorbed or would absorb in the future. It'd be nice if he could simply look at someone and know whether or not they had a power. Then he could run the other way, not have to deal with learning how to control something new.
If he'd been able to control the damned radiation...
His last sight of Nathan had been distorted by waves of heat, by the glow of his own hands and body, but he knew his brother had been burning, all but melting, and the wind of their headlong flight had only made it worse. Peter stumbled on the uneven ground and fell to his knees. His vision blurred as tears filled his eyes.
If he'd been able to control the damned radiation, Nathan would still be alive.
On his hands and knees on the cold, sloppy ground, Peter Petrelli threw back his head and howled. He didn't care who heard him. In spite of everything Peter had done to avoid disaster, he'd been the one to cause his brother's death... The pain was too great to contain. All the grief and horror, the frustration and rage, ripped through him as the radiation had ripped through him hours before.
Time passed. The sun rose, still hidden behind racing clouds, and gave its light to the world below, but not its heat. Exhausted, Peter collapsed again to the ground, drier now thanks to the autumn wind that continued to blow in the wake of the previous night's storm. Too tired to even close his eyes, he simply lay where he was and stared at nothing.
***
Sylar hurt. There was no other way to put it. His stomach burned. His head pounded. It didn't help that the few people he encountered stared at him as though they'd never before seen a guy soaked from the waist down and covered in blood; it was New York, for God's sake.
God, he fucking hurt. Sylar crossed the street, only stumbling once as he wove his way between parked and double-parked cars. Stopping to catch his breath, he leaned against a wall, its bricks dark and pitted with age. A sign further up the road read St. Stephen's Parrish Clinic - all are welcome. They'd patch him up and then he'd get back to his apartment and shower, make plans to find and dispose of Petrelli. The one who'd flown away with Peter was probably dead, victim of a noble sacrifice to save his brother, but Peter himself was somewhere and Sylar would find him.
He pushed off from the building, lurched out into the light pedestrian traffic only to be knocked back a step by a burly guy in a sweat jacket who muttered, "Watch it, asshole," and kept going. Eyes narrowed, Sylar glared back at him, contemplated giving the man a hearty shove, but he was too weak and so let it go.
The iridescent glow of several television screens in a pawn-shop window, contrasting in varying degrees of brightness with the darkness of the backlit building, caught his attention before he reached the clinic. Sylar caught a glimpse of his own face, repeated across half a dozen screens. He turned fully toward the curve in the road and the shop window that followed the new angle, toward the newscast repeating in high-definition surround sound. The image on the screens, one of which was at least three feet tall, was a still shot of himself, scruffy and drugged, wearing a set of rumpled white scrubs. The background of the photograph was the cell in Texas where Bennet had thought he could keep Sylar contained. A feral smile stole across his face, but faded as he listened to the story, muffled though it was by the safety glass that comprised the pawnshop window.
"A manhunt is underway for escaped mental patient Gabriel Gray, a.k.a. Sylar, who is suspected in several gruesome murders nationwide and, most recently, in the attempted murder of police officer Matthew Parkman of the LAPD. Last seen in Kirby Plaza in midtown Manhattan, Gray is reported to have been seriously injured during a scuffle with several private citizens who came to Officer Parkman's aid. Emergency rooms and urgent care facilities city-wide have been put on alert."
Suddenly, the morning seemed a little less bright. Eyes wide, Sylar turned away from the clinic. He dropped his eyes to the dirty street and, head bowed, shuffled away, back toward the safety of the sewers. If anyone seemed to pay too much attention to him, he'd just fade from their sight, leaving them to wonder if they were hallucinating.
Fuck, fuck, FUCK! That son of a bitch Bennet had screwed him good. No one else could have provided that picture of Sylar, looking deranged and dangerous, to the news people. And now it was all over New York that he was an attempted cop killer. Not only could he not visit anywhere that he might be able to get stitched up, but the fucking cops were looking for him, too. Sylar was under no illusion that he'd be given a chance if he was caught. A suspected cop killer? They'd shoot him on sight and come up with a plausible defense after they were sure he was dead.
"Excuse me." A breathless whisper from the back of an alley startled him. A sound he shouldn't have been able to hear, but of course he could. Sylar stopped and turned back, stepped into the mouth of the alley.
A woman stood at the other end. Sunlight just beyond provided enough back lighting to obscure her features, except for an odd red reflection from her eyes. She took a step forward and the reflection quickly disappeared.
Sylar's first instinct was to flee. The only reason he could think of for someone to stop him in the street at that precise moment was that damning newscast. She must have recognized him. Before he could turn and run, though, he stopped himself. If she recognized him from that story, then why would she call to him and then come toward him like this? She was just a little thing, he saw now, skinny and pale, wearing ragged jeans and a faded flannel shirt.
He stood his ground and she stopped in front of him. Looking up at him, she lifted a hand as though she wanted to touch his face, but then dropped it back to her side. Sylar frowned and the light of fear lit her light brown eyes, but instead of darting back into the alley, as he expected, she took a deep breath and said, "You're hurt."
The whole situation was becoming surreal. What had been light foot traffic before -- and no moving vehicles of any kind -- had virtually disappeared, leaving only Sylar and this odd girl with the mousy brown hair. He laughed, afraid that, if he let it, the laughter would descend into hysterics.
"Yes. Yes, I am," he said to her, wondering what the fuck was going on.
She swallowed hard, her eyes darting left then right. "I can help you?"
He laughed again and she flinched. "What makes you think I need your help?"
Her eyes darted toward the direction of the pawnshop and then back to his face. "The police are looking for you." Her eyes never met his, but she suddenly reached out and took his hand, sticky with blood from his reopened wound. Her hand was warm as she led him into the alley.
***
to be continued...
Lord of the Rats, part 1
Author: sabaceanbabe
Rating: R for language
Characters/pairings: Peter Petrelli, Nathan Petrelli, Sylar
Spoilers: all of season 1, speculation for the beginning of season 2
Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine and I'll give them back when I'm done. No copyright infringement intended. I have no money; please don't sue.
Author's note: This was to be for LJ's "Heroes Big Boom" challenge, but I couldn't make the deadline. This is a work in progress, so if you don't want to wait a few weeks or so in between "chapters," feel free to wait until it's all done. I'll get there eventually. Thank you so much to lizardbeth_j and mamaboolj for the beta, and I hope you ladies will be willing to continue with that as I continue with the fic. :)
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Sharp pain shot through her midsection; it felt as though she was being torn in half, but she would not scream. Once the pain subsided, although it never left her completely, once she could force her fingers to relax enough that she could release the wheelchair's arms, she said to those who surrounded her, "Stop. Something's wrong." Her voice was calm; she would allow nothing less.
Instantly, the tiny caravan came to a halt. For several moments, no one moved, waiting for her to say more, to tell them what they should do. The tableau remained unbroken until a light voice, hovering between that of boy and man, asked, "Are you okay, mama?"
Carefully, she turned her head to look at her son. Her firstborn son. Nathan looked right back at her, worry plain on his face. As she watched, he masked the emotion, exerting a control over his features that grown men would envy, and yet he was only twelve years old.
For him, she permitted her own features to relax into a small smile and she reached out a hand to gently stroke his cheek. "I will be, Nathan, my love." As though to prove her words a lie, another spasm pulled at the muscles in her abdomen. Had she not been sitting, the strength of it would have doubled her over. "I will be."
"Angie?" Dallas' eyes widened as another powerful contraction visibly rippled beneath the thin silk of her dress. "What...?"
She couldn't answer him. White mist descended over her vision and cotton muffled the voices of the startled hospital staff as they swung into action. Angela Petrelli, who had given birth only two days before to a tiny boy she and her husband had named Peter, was again in labor. There had been no indication that this would be a multiple birth, nothing on either x-rays or ultrasound.
As she slipped further away, Angela whispered, "My God. Twins..."
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Frigid fire burned in his gut, a fire that should have been pain, but he turned it into something else instead. Something more useful. Diamond anger glittered in his heart and a rich velvet hatred consumed his brain.
The last vestiges of Gabriel Gray soaked into the pavement and left only Sylar behind.
Sylar lay on the hard concrete, still as death, and stared at nothing tangible while his dreams and desires burned to ash in what should have been the wake of a nuclear conflagration. A conflagration for which he'd worked and planned and of which he'd suddenly been cheated.
The wheels turned in his mind like the gears in the finest watch, replaying over and over the far-off explosion. An explosion that should have been close up and personal.
Cheated. He'd been cheated and made a fool of by the Petrellis and that little Japanese man. They would pay.
He blinked once, twice, but no one noticed. Sirens sounded in the distance, came closer. Even as the others in the plaza came closer, whispered to each other in shocked voices, none yet willing to come near where Sylar lay, still bleeding, either to help him or to finish him off.
Bleeding. He blinked again. Bleeding this much couldn't be a good thing. He should stop. Sylar turned his attention inside and exerted pressure on the severed blood vessels, forcing capillaries and veins to close. His body would heal slowly, with time, since he'd been cheated of the cheerleader's power (something else to lay at Peter Petrelli's feet), but he could still combine his natural ability at fixing things with his acquired control over the physical until the bleeding stopped. Maybe with time, he could learn to use it to mimic the girl's power.
Sirens blared. An ambulance stopped in the plaza, not close enough for Sylar to worry about, but within his line of sight. A flurry of activity followed and he exerted more effort, made himself invisible. He didn't want to be noticed, didn't want to risk the others scattered about Kirby Plaza painting him as the villain in this little drama.
More nearby movement drew Sylar's gaze. Paramedics lifted a man onto a gurney and wheeled him into the ambulance, but that wasn't what truly interested Sylar. Instead, he focused on a cockroach that ambled across the pavement only an inch or so beyond his nose. If he concentrated, tuned out the others' voices, he could hear the susurrus of the roach's feet as it shuffled across the concrete.
It trundled along, unconcerned, and stopped when it reached a manhole cover a few feet away from where Sylar lay. Antennae waggled and Sylar could almost swear that the thing beckoned him.
More sirens, more voices, more flashing lights in the plaza all combined to push him to move. Sylar tried to sit up, but couldn't quite manage it. The pain was too intense; he couldn't tune it out. Reaching out toward the beckoning insect, he dragged himself slowly to the manhole cover. The roach skittered back at his approach, but it didn't leave.
Sylar was too weak physically to lift the damn cover, so he used what little strength remained to nudge it with his mind. It moved, but dropped back into place when he stopped pushing. With a deep breath, he tried again. This time, he pushed the cover up and off, reached out a hand to keep it from clattering on the pavement. He wanted away, and he wanted to remain unnoticed.
Carefully, he lowered himself into the sewers below New York City. No one would find him there. No one would even look for him, not with all the other things they had to think about right now.
Sylar smiled and reached for the cover to pull it back into place, but he paused when he heard a little girl's voice, quite clearly for all that she was several yards away.
"Please don't die, Officer Parkman. You're my hero."
Sylar felt his blood pressure rise. Her hero. He should have been the hero here. Parkman, huh? He remembered the name from the list. Parkman, Matthew, a Los Angeles cop who could read minds. A useful ability, that. Once Sylar had taken care of Peter Petrelli, who he was sure had survived exploding, he'd have to look into making the acquaintance of Officer Matthew Parkman...
***
The first thing Peter noticed was the cold; he was chilled to the bone. The second thing was that something poked him -- or rather several somethings poked at him -- all over. He felt a warm puff of air on his right ear, heard a sniffling whuffle.
Peter opened his eyes only to be greeted by a profound darkness. He blinked several times, but there was nothing wrong with his eyes; it was simply a very dark night. No stars, no moon, no streetlights, not even the far-off glow of city lights reflecting off accumulated pollution. The air was thick, tangy with potential rain, and the dirt beneath his left cheek was cold and slimy.
The whuffle sounded again, this time accompanied by a wet nose that sniffed at his hair.
"Shit!"
Startled, Peter scrambled to escape whatever it was, in the process earning several scratches and at least one puncture in the exposed skin of his hands. Sliding in mud, the best he could manage was to turn over onto his backside and crab-walk drunkenly away.
Sitting on his ass on the cold, wet ground, Peter stared into the lush darkness. A cow lowed nearby, answered by another and then another.
"A pasture," he said aloud as the momentary panic gave way to amusement. "I'm in a damn cow pasture."
A flash of lightning split the sky, briefly exposing that it wasn't exactly a cow pasture, but some farmer's long-since-harvested cornfield. Two or three fence posts lay on the ground maybe ten feet away, which explained the cows in the cornfield.
The skies chose that moment to open up, dumping on him what felt like five-gallon buckets of ice water, and causing the half dozen or so nearby cows to voice their objections. Peter threw his head back and laughed, deep and loud, which caused further bovine protest.
But torrential rain and a bunch of cows were the least of his problems. The thought sobered him instantly as the things that had brought him here, wherever here was, slowly came back to him.
Claire as she ran from him, her thoughts a jumble of mistrust and betrayal...
Mr. Bennet -- no, Noah. He'd said to call him Noah. Noah, as he'd told Peter that he'd put him down himself and not to worry, that he was a pretty good shot...
The rush of adrenaline and nausea when Sylar appeared in Kirby Plaza...
His own fists, the sick thud as he'd struck Sylar over and over...
The fire and ice that ran through his veins and set every nerve ending to singing with power as Ted's unsought legacy ignited within him...
Hiro's sudden appearance in the Plaza and the surge of hope the Japanese man had instilled in Peter as he ran Sylar through...
The horror as Peter realized that it didn't matter, that it wasn't Sylar who was the danger to them all...
And then, worst of all, the awful panic as Peter tried to control the nuclear reaction within himself. The sight of Claire, gun pointed right at him, just as he'd begged her to do, but unable to pull the trigger...
And then, just like when Peter was a little boy, Nathan had been there, hand outstretched, to rescue him...
The ascent into the sky at his brother's hands and the despair when Peter realized that there was no controlling the nuclear cascade that had already begun, and then...
"Nathan," he whispered.
***
Something chewed at his stomach. No, not chewed... Gnawed. Right where that little joke of a man had run him through. Sylar opened his eyes.
He sat in water; it had soaked into his jeans and through his boots and he could just see the shimmer as it lapped against the opposite wall, just a few feet away. Tilting his head to get a better idea of his surroundings, he felt his skull slip on the slime that coated everything. His lip curled in distaste as he bent one knee; the movement sent several creatures skittering and squeaking away, although one or two seemed reluctant to leave their meal. Grimacing at the thought, he curled into himself to protect the again-bleeding injury from further abuse. "Fucking rats."
One of the little bastards hadn't run as far as the others; it sat on its haunches and watched him with beady little eyes that glittered in the dim light filtering down from the world above. Sylar hissed at it, but it simply stared at him, impassive.
The face-off didn't last long; the damn thing wasn't worth the effort and Sylar returned his attention to his stomach. The wooziness and nausea he experienced now told him that he had lost a lot of blood. He couldn't heal the damage. Much as he hated the idea, he had to find help before he made things worse.
How long he'd been in the sewers, he didn't know, but it had been pitch black when he'd stopped to rest and now it wasn't. There were no electric lights in use down here, not that he knew of, so it must be sunlight that allowed him to see what little he could in the murk. He held himself very still and concentrated, but he heard only water as it dripped from pipes suspended overhead. Water and rats.
Reaching further, he was surprised at the effort it took to hear things beyond the sewers. A man and woman arguing heatedly. The coo and scratch of pigeons as they searched for a meal. Requisite blare of a car horn in the distance, quickly followed by another horn, higher pitched and irritating. Still further away, a clatter of metal wheels against metal rails as commuters made their way to or from work.
Sylar was not displeased -- the character of the sounds and the relative peace above meant that it must be fairly early in the morning. Had it been later in the day, the sounds would have had a more frenetic pace, a more intense energy. Either way, morning or evening, there was less chance of him being seen when he pulled himself up through a manhole cover.
Moving slowly, he rolled to his knees. Water splashed and he caught a glimpse over his shoulder of two "v" shapes rippling swiftly away. More rats. But still the brave one remained, hunkered down on a ledge only a couple of feet away; it looked as though it waited for something.
He pushed himself to his feet, clutching at his stomach. His gaze remained on the rat. "What do you want?"
It squeaked at him and it amused Sylar to think that the rat had just replied to his question. Experimentally, he splashed water at it. The sunlight from above was a little stronger now -- strong enough that Sylar could see the glistening drops as they passed through the rays before splattering on the little rat. And still, it didn't run away. He took a step toward it, causing the water around his ankles to swell outward in a small wave. The rat just raised its head and sniffed at the thick air.
Crouching in front of the animal, Sylar drew close enough to pick out details -- the thing had white whiskers and a white streak in the fur over its beady left eye. At least, he assumed they were white; it was still too dark to pick out colors.
He held out one hand. This time, the rat reacted with something approaching alarm, although not nearly as strongly as the others had. Rather than running away, it merely backed off a couple of inches. Cautious, but not frightened.
Sylar grinned. "Funny how so many people are afraid of me, but you aren't. Were you someone's pet?" He shook his head and, one hand trailing along the grimy sewer wall to steady himself, he headed past the rat, toward the light.
***
His teeth chattered so hard Peter thought he might break a tooth as he picked his way carefully across the field. It'd be pretty damned ironic if I survived the explosion and fall, only to break my neck, tripping over a cow. Of course, even if something like that happened, it wouldn't kill him. Not unless he managed to sever his head in the process.
The rain had slowed to an unpleasantly icy drizzle and the wind had picked up a bit with the approaching dawn. The light level hadn't increased much, but Peter could see the shapes of trees in the distance, even if he couldn't yet make out any details.
Sometime during the night, he had managed to lose his wallet and his watch, so he had no identification, no money, and no credit cards. Once he figured out where he was, he might have to hitchhike home. Peter had to smile as he buttoned the three little buttons of his sodden shirt -- it and the t-shirt beneath were all that stood between him and the increasing wind. Claude would've told him to screw hitchhiking and just take the money he needed to get home, but Peter couldn't see himself as a pickpocket. For that matter, maybe he should just fly home.
Color slowly bled into the landscape around him and the drizzle faded away to nothing before he reached the limit of the field through which he trudged. Reflexively, he looked at his wrist, noted again that his watch wasn't there. It came to him that it was 6:43 am; there wasn't a doubt in his mind that the time was accurate. He frowned. He knew the exact time? Could that be an aspect of Hiro's power? It certainly wasn't something he'd known before, not that he'd noticed, anyway. There were so many things he just didn't know about how his own power worked, let alone the powers he'd absorbed or would absorb in the future. It'd be nice if he could simply look at someone and know whether or not they had a power. Then he could run the other way, not have to deal with learning how to control something new.
If he'd been able to control the damned radiation...
His last sight of Nathan had been distorted by waves of heat, by the glow of his own hands and body, but he knew his brother had been burning, all but melting, and the wind of their headlong flight had only made it worse. Peter stumbled on the uneven ground and fell to his knees. His vision blurred as tears filled his eyes.
If he'd been able to control the damned radiation, Nathan would still be alive.
On his hands and knees on the cold, sloppy ground, Peter Petrelli threw back his head and howled. He didn't care who heard him. In spite of everything Peter had done to avoid disaster, he'd been the one to cause his brother's death... The pain was too great to contain. All the grief and horror, the frustration and rage, ripped through him as the radiation had ripped through him hours before.
Time passed. The sun rose, still hidden behind racing clouds, and gave its light to the world below, but not its heat. Exhausted, Peter collapsed again to the ground, drier now thanks to the autumn wind that continued to blow in the wake of the previous night's storm. Too tired to even close his eyes, he simply lay where he was and stared at nothing.
***
Sylar hurt. There was no other way to put it. His stomach burned. His head pounded. It didn't help that the few people he encountered stared at him as though they'd never before seen a guy soaked from the waist down and covered in blood; it was New York, for God's sake.
God, he fucking hurt. Sylar crossed the street, only stumbling once as he wove his way between parked and double-parked cars. Stopping to catch his breath, he leaned against a wall, its bricks dark and pitted with age. A sign further up the road read St. Stephen's Parrish Clinic - all are welcome. They'd patch him up and then he'd get back to his apartment and shower, make plans to find and dispose of Petrelli. The one who'd flown away with Peter was probably dead, victim of a noble sacrifice to save his brother, but Peter himself was somewhere and Sylar would find him.
He pushed off from the building, lurched out into the light pedestrian traffic only to be knocked back a step by a burly guy in a sweat jacket who muttered, "Watch it, asshole," and kept going. Eyes narrowed, Sylar glared back at him, contemplated giving the man a hearty shove, but he was too weak and so let it go.
The iridescent glow of several television screens in a pawn-shop window, contrasting in varying degrees of brightness with the darkness of the backlit building, caught his attention before he reached the clinic. Sylar caught a glimpse of his own face, repeated across half a dozen screens. He turned fully toward the curve in the road and the shop window that followed the new angle, toward the newscast repeating in high-definition surround sound. The image on the screens, one of which was at least three feet tall, was a still shot of himself, scruffy and drugged, wearing a set of rumpled white scrubs. The background of the photograph was the cell in Texas where Bennet had thought he could keep Sylar contained. A feral smile stole across his face, but faded as he listened to the story, muffled though it was by the safety glass that comprised the pawnshop window.
"A manhunt is underway for escaped mental patient Gabriel Gray, a.k.a. Sylar, who is suspected in several gruesome murders nationwide and, most recently, in the attempted murder of police officer Matthew Parkman of the LAPD. Last seen in Kirby Plaza in midtown Manhattan, Gray is reported to have been seriously injured during a scuffle with several private citizens who came to Officer Parkman's aid. Emergency rooms and urgent care facilities city-wide have been put on alert."
Suddenly, the morning seemed a little less bright. Eyes wide, Sylar turned away from the clinic. He dropped his eyes to the dirty street and, head bowed, shuffled away, back toward the safety of the sewers. If anyone seemed to pay too much attention to him, he'd just fade from their sight, leaving them to wonder if they were hallucinating.
Fuck, fuck, FUCK! That son of a bitch Bennet had screwed him good. No one else could have provided that picture of Sylar, looking deranged and dangerous, to the news people. And now it was all over New York that he was an attempted cop killer. Not only could he not visit anywhere that he might be able to get stitched up, but the fucking cops were looking for him, too. Sylar was under no illusion that he'd be given a chance if he was caught. A suspected cop killer? They'd shoot him on sight and come up with a plausible defense after they were sure he was dead.
"Excuse me." A breathless whisper from the back of an alley startled him. A sound he shouldn't have been able to hear, but of course he could. Sylar stopped and turned back, stepped into the mouth of the alley.
A woman stood at the other end. Sunlight just beyond provided enough back lighting to obscure her features, except for an odd red reflection from her eyes. She took a step forward and the reflection quickly disappeared.
Sylar's first instinct was to flee. The only reason he could think of for someone to stop him in the street at that precise moment was that damning newscast. She must have recognized him. Before he could turn and run, though, he stopped himself. If she recognized him from that story, then why would she call to him and then come toward him like this? She was just a little thing, he saw now, skinny and pale, wearing ragged jeans and a faded flannel shirt.
He stood his ground and she stopped in front of him. Looking up at him, she lifted a hand as though she wanted to touch his face, but then dropped it back to her side. Sylar frowned and the light of fear lit her light brown eyes, but instead of darting back into the alley, as he expected, she took a deep breath and said, "You're hurt."
The whole situation was becoming surreal. What had been light foot traffic before -- and no moving vehicles of any kind -- had virtually disappeared, leaving only Sylar and this odd girl with the mousy brown hair. He laughed, afraid that, if he let it, the laughter would descend into hysterics.
"Yes. Yes, I am," he said to her, wondering what the fuck was going on.
She swallowed hard, her eyes darting left then right. "I can help you?"
He laughed again and she flinched. "What makes you think I need your help?"
Her eyes darted toward the direction of the pawnshop and then back to his face. "The police are looking for you." Her eyes never met his, but she suddenly reached out and took his hand, sticky with blood from his reopened wound. Her hand was warm as she led him into the alley.
***
to be continued...