Fanfiction: Heroes: The Apple Doesn't Fall....
Title: The Apple Doesn’t Fall…..
Characters/Pairings: Sylar/Elle, Noah Gray +ensemble
Rating: R
Wordcount: 1,672
Warnings: Violence (Light gore). Darkfic. Character Death.
Disclaimer: Heroes belongs to Tim Kring, NBC et al
A/N: A very dark turn on the prompt “Poison fruit from a poison tree.” Very AU. Thanks goes to dragynflies for the encouragement and Beta. You rock! Thanks also goes to cruiscin_lan for further betaing and feedback. You also rock! Originally written as a fic for acinogan for heroes_exchange. I’m also using this for the “Children” prompt over at 100heroesfics
Summary: The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and if that tree has bad soil, trouble is probably on its way. Sylar and Elle were pretty much the definitions of bad trees.
They say history repeats itself. Bad parents create bad children who then become bad parents who create more bad children. It’s cyclical. Unavoidable. No matter how hard they try to prevent it, if they’re damaged to begin with, it’s pretty likely that anything they touch will become damaged as well.
The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and if that tree has bad soil, trouble is probably on its way.
Sylar and Elle were pretty much the definitions of bad trees.
Elle was raised by a parent who had, once upon a time, just been a shy young boy. But Bobby grew up into Bob, and Bob was not the idealist his younger self had been. He knew that sometimes, to get things done, he would have to go to lengths others would never resort to. And that was okay. When his daughter accidently caused a fire that killed his wife, he saw opportunity. She had power; it just had to be cultivated.
So he locked her up inside the Company. Kept her away from the outside world, only to focus on training, becoming the perfect soldier. But that kind of isolation isn’t good for anyone. It twisted Elle. She was desperate for attention, selfish and self-centered. She was a grown up version of Veruca Salt: when she wanted something, she expected to get it. And not later, not in a few days or weeks - she wanted to get it now.
She was special because she could spark and make people hurt. She liked making people hurt. She liked teasing and sparking and seeing just what she could get away with. When her father or anyone else scolded her, her response was often just a pout, or maybe a laugh.
Sylar was born as Gabriel Gray, though he hasn’t been Gabriel in years. He was the son of Samson and his wife, though he doesn’t remember them - not on a conscious level, at least. Sometimes, he has nightmares about witnessing his mother being killed in front of his eyes. But that’s not quite right, because he knows how his mother died.
He was raised by Martin and Virginia Gray. Two people who were as ordinary as they came. Perhaps that’s what made him hate them so much. A watchmaker and a woman who collected snow globes. While his father was preparing him to take over the family trade of making watches, his mother was planting dangerous thoughts into his head.
He was special. He was meant for more than this. If he wanted to, he could even be president. Every time he killed someone, he could hear his mother’s words ringing in his ears, egging him on. She had set him on this journey. She had chosen this path for him, and now there was no turning back, so to speak. Not that he wanted to turn back, not anymore. He liked who he was. There was power in being Sylar. Control. He was the strength to counteract Gabriel’s weakness.
All parents damage their children.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Two people like that, so jaded and messed up, probably never should have reproduced. Noah Gray was an accident that neither one of them had planned for, that one neither wanted to take real responsibility for. By the time they had found out, though, it was too late for an abortion. And although Sylar and Elle discussed using his telekinesis somehow to get rid of it, it was too risky. What if it killed Elle too?
After the baby was born, their relationship became more strained. Neither one of them wanted to stay home and take care of a child. It wasn’t their style. It wasn’t in their nature, in their blood. They were used to traveling, always moving, always going from town to town. Killing who they wanted, stealing what they wanted, and living by no one’s rules but their own. A kid in the picture made this increasingly difficult. It kept crying and whining, and just constantly getting in the way. It always wanted to be fed, or changed, or something equally demanding. Even the name, Noah, was a reflection of how much they disliked the child and its existence.
After a few years or so, neither one of them could take it anymore. The kid was cramping their style. And yet, they couldn’t kill it. Even they had their limits. So they did the most cliché thing possible: they put the kid in a car seat and left him on Peter’s doorstep. Of all the people they knew, Peter was the least likely to fuck him up.
Peter was less than pleased when he found the child on his porch. He wondered how long it had been out there, screaming and crying while he finished a long night shift as a paramedic. There was a small note, basically just giving the kid’s name and a short explanation of why the two killers no longer wanted him. He briefly thought of chasing Elle and Sylar down, trying to force them into being good, responsible parents, but he realized that if they had left the kid here, giving it back would probably be the worst thing he could do for the boy.
He raised Noah as his own. And for years, Noah had no idea who his parents were. All he knew was that Peter was his father, and he supposed that was enough. Peter couldn’t see how things work or light up the sky, but he cared. He tried to keep him away from his grandmother. Angela always looked at Noah with disdain, as if she knew something he didn’t.
One night, when he was fifteen, they were spending the night at the Petrelli mansion (he hated staying there. It was cold and alien, much like Angela herself) Noah woke up to the sound of Peter and his grandmother talking. No, not talking - arguing. Angela talks about a dream she had, how he was going to be worse than either one of his parents. Worse than Sylar and Elle.
Noah froze as he heard those names. Sylar. Elle. He had heard those names before. Claire and her father - his namesake - often mentioned them in disdain. How they could never catch them, never stop them. A couple of serial killers who didn’t care for anyone other than themselves.
And then suddenly, he saw it so clearly - his mother shocking him when he cried, his father using telekinesis to change his diaper, the two of them both avoiding touching him physically as much as possible. The decision to drop him at Peter’s is what came to him next. It was so easy for them to abandon him. They didn’t even care.
And Peter had lied to him, making him believe he was something he wasn’t. But he would show them. He would show them all just what he could do.
Noah Gray’s powers manifested that night. Angela had been right to be afraid. Noah was able to negate powers like the Haitian. But unlike the Haitian, when he negated people’s powers, it increased his own physical strength by ten-fold. This left both Peter and Angela rather powerless as he attacked them, ripping both of them to shreds with his bare hands. They may not have been his real family, but they had lied to him nonetheless, and for that reason alone, they deserved to die.
It took him a few months before he finally tracked down Sylar and Elle. Though they had learned to clean up their tracks pretty well as far as their killing sprees went, there were still patterns you could find if you just knew what to look for. They almost always went after people with powers, usually impressive ones.
Noah was waiting for them at the home of their next victim. He had already taken care of their victim by the time the two got there. His hands were drenched in blood as he greeted his parents with a smile that was anything but kind. They didn’t recognize him, which made enough sense. They hadn’t seen him since he was three. That had been eleven years ago. He wasn’t the doe-eyed little toddler they had left on Peter’s doorstep anymore.
Sylar tried to choke him with his telekinesis, causing Noah to laugh as Elle tried futilely to shock him. He explained to them that they were powerless now, just like he had been when they had abandoned him. His grin only spread across his lips further as he watched realization sink into their features. At least they had the decency not try to explain their actions, or defend them.
Elle spoke first. She said that now that he was older, he could come travel with them again. A child had been too much work, is what she explained. Sadly, those were the wrong words to say. She was the first one to die. His hands ripped into her chest, splattering blood all over his clothes. As he was destroyed her small body, Sylar let out a cry before punching his son in the face to get him to stop.
This was the wrong move to make. Noah turned on him, remembering the conversations from Noah Bennet and Claire once more. The only way to defeat his father for good was to make sure he couldn’t come back to life. So he did the first thing he could think of, he grabbed Sylar’s head and twisted it with a disgusting snap before ripping it completely off, severing his spinal cord. There would be no Sylar could recover from that.
He dropped the head and looked over his two parents’ corpses with a satisfied smirk on his lips. Virginia Gray had created Sylar. Bob Bishop had created Elle. Sylar killed Virginia, and Bob too. Elle betrayed her dead father by ending up with Sylar. Sylar and Elle had created Noah, and he ended up killing them both.
Parents damage their children. And some children return the favor.
Characters/Pairings: Sylar/Elle, Noah Gray +ensemble
Rating: R
Wordcount: 1,672
Warnings: Violence (Light gore). Darkfic. Character Death.
Disclaimer: Heroes belongs to Tim Kring, NBC et al
A/N: A very dark turn on the prompt “Poison fruit from a poison tree.” Very AU. Thanks goes to dragynflies for the encouragement and Beta. You rock! Thanks also goes to cruiscin_lan for further betaing and feedback. You also rock! Originally written as a fic for acinogan for heroes_exchange. I’m also using this for the “Children” prompt over at 100heroesfics
Summary: The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and if that tree has bad soil, trouble is probably on its way. Sylar and Elle were pretty much the definitions of bad trees.
They say history repeats itself. Bad parents create bad children who then become bad parents who create more bad children. It’s cyclical. Unavoidable. No matter how hard they try to prevent it, if they’re damaged to begin with, it’s pretty likely that anything they touch will become damaged as well.
The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and if that tree has bad soil, trouble is probably on its way.
Sylar and Elle were pretty much the definitions of bad trees.
Elle was raised by a parent who had, once upon a time, just been a shy young boy. But Bobby grew up into Bob, and Bob was not the idealist his younger self had been. He knew that sometimes, to get things done, he would have to go to lengths others would never resort to. And that was okay. When his daughter accidently caused a fire that killed his wife, he saw opportunity. She had power; it just had to be cultivated.
So he locked her up inside the Company. Kept her away from the outside world, only to focus on training, becoming the perfect soldier. But that kind of isolation isn’t good for anyone. It twisted Elle. She was desperate for attention, selfish and self-centered. She was a grown up version of Veruca Salt: when she wanted something, she expected to get it. And not later, not in a few days or weeks - she wanted to get it now.
She was special because she could spark and make people hurt. She liked making people hurt. She liked teasing and sparking and seeing just what she could get away with. When her father or anyone else scolded her, her response was often just a pout, or maybe a laugh.
Sylar was born as Gabriel Gray, though he hasn’t been Gabriel in years. He was the son of Samson and his wife, though he doesn’t remember them - not on a conscious level, at least. Sometimes, he has nightmares about witnessing his mother being killed in front of his eyes. But that’s not quite right, because he knows how his mother died.
He was raised by Martin and Virginia Gray. Two people who were as ordinary as they came. Perhaps that’s what made him hate them so much. A watchmaker and a woman who collected snow globes. While his father was preparing him to take over the family trade of making watches, his mother was planting dangerous thoughts into his head.
He was special. He was meant for more than this. If he wanted to, he could even be president. Every time he killed someone, he could hear his mother’s words ringing in his ears, egging him on. She had set him on this journey. She had chosen this path for him, and now there was no turning back, so to speak. Not that he wanted to turn back, not anymore. He liked who he was. There was power in being Sylar. Control. He was the strength to counteract Gabriel’s weakness.
All parents damage their children.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Two people like that, so jaded and messed up, probably never should have reproduced. Noah Gray was an accident that neither one of them had planned for, that one neither wanted to take real responsibility for. By the time they had found out, though, it was too late for an abortion. And although Sylar and Elle discussed using his telekinesis somehow to get rid of it, it was too risky. What if it killed Elle too?
After the baby was born, their relationship became more strained. Neither one of them wanted to stay home and take care of a child. It wasn’t their style. It wasn’t in their nature, in their blood. They were used to traveling, always moving, always going from town to town. Killing who they wanted, stealing what they wanted, and living by no one’s rules but their own. A kid in the picture made this increasingly difficult. It kept crying and whining, and just constantly getting in the way. It always wanted to be fed, or changed, or something equally demanding. Even the name, Noah, was a reflection of how much they disliked the child and its existence.
After a few years or so, neither one of them could take it anymore. The kid was cramping their style. And yet, they couldn’t kill it. Even they had their limits. So they did the most cliché thing possible: they put the kid in a car seat and left him on Peter’s doorstep. Of all the people they knew, Peter was the least likely to fuck him up.
Peter was less than pleased when he found the child on his porch. He wondered how long it had been out there, screaming and crying while he finished a long night shift as a paramedic. There was a small note, basically just giving the kid’s name and a short explanation of why the two killers no longer wanted him. He briefly thought of chasing Elle and Sylar down, trying to force them into being good, responsible parents, but he realized that if they had left the kid here, giving it back would probably be the worst thing he could do for the boy.
He raised Noah as his own. And for years, Noah had no idea who his parents were. All he knew was that Peter was his father, and he supposed that was enough. Peter couldn’t see how things work or light up the sky, but he cared. He tried to keep him away from his grandmother. Angela always looked at Noah with disdain, as if she knew something he didn’t.
One night, when he was fifteen, they were spending the night at the Petrelli mansion (he hated staying there. It was cold and alien, much like Angela herself) Noah woke up to the sound of Peter and his grandmother talking. No, not talking - arguing. Angela talks about a dream she had, how he was going to be worse than either one of his parents. Worse than Sylar and Elle.
Noah froze as he heard those names. Sylar. Elle. He had heard those names before. Claire and her father - his namesake - often mentioned them in disdain. How they could never catch them, never stop them. A couple of serial killers who didn’t care for anyone other than themselves.
And then suddenly, he saw it so clearly - his mother shocking him when he cried, his father using telekinesis to change his diaper, the two of them both avoiding touching him physically as much as possible. The decision to drop him at Peter’s is what came to him next. It was so easy for them to abandon him. They didn’t even care.
And Peter had lied to him, making him believe he was something he wasn’t. But he would show them. He would show them all just what he could do.
Noah Gray’s powers manifested that night. Angela had been right to be afraid. Noah was able to negate powers like the Haitian. But unlike the Haitian, when he negated people’s powers, it increased his own physical strength by ten-fold. This left both Peter and Angela rather powerless as he attacked them, ripping both of them to shreds with his bare hands. They may not have been his real family, but they had lied to him nonetheless, and for that reason alone, they deserved to die.
It took him a few months before he finally tracked down Sylar and Elle. Though they had learned to clean up their tracks pretty well as far as their killing sprees went, there were still patterns you could find if you just knew what to look for. They almost always went after people with powers, usually impressive ones.
Noah was waiting for them at the home of their next victim. He had already taken care of their victim by the time the two got there. His hands were drenched in blood as he greeted his parents with a smile that was anything but kind. They didn’t recognize him, which made enough sense. They hadn’t seen him since he was three. That had been eleven years ago. He wasn’t the doe-eyed little toddler they had left on Peter’s doorstep anymore.
Sylar tried to choke him with his telekinesis, causing Noah to laugh as Elle tried futilely to shock him. He explained to them that they were powerless now, just like he had been when they had abandoned him. His grin only spread across his lips further as he watched realization sink into their features. At least they had the decency not try to explain their actions, or defend them.
Elle spoke first. She said that now that he was older, he could come travel with them again. A child had been too much work, is what she explained. Sadly, those were the wrong words to say. She was the first one to die. His hands ripped into her chest, splattering blood all over his clothes. As he was destroyed her small body, Sylar let out a cry before punching his son in the face to get him to stop.
This was the wrong move to make. Noah turned on him, remembering the conversations from Noah Bennet and Claire once more. The only way to defeat his father for good was to make sure he couldn’t come back to life. So he did the first thing he could think of, he grabbed Sylar’s head and twisted it with a disgusting snap before ripping it completely off, severing his spinal cord. There would be no Sylar could recover from that.
He dropped the head and looked over his two parents’ corpses with a satisfied smirk on his lips. Virginia Gray had created Sylar. Bob Bishop had created Elle. Sylar killed Virginia, and Bob too. Elle betrayed her dead father by ending up with Sylar. Sylar and Elle had created Noah, and he ended up killing them both.
Parents damage their children. And some children return the favor.