(no subject)
Title: Define Dangerous
Characters: Sylar, Claire.
Spoilers: Up to Season 2.
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 2745
Chapter: 25/?
Previously: Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11, Chapter 12, Chapter 13, Chapter 14, Chapter 15, Chapter 16, Chapter 17, Chapter 18, Chapter 19, Chapter 20, Chapter 21, Chapter 22, Chapter 23, Chapter 24
Summary: While escaping the Company, Sylar meets up with someone from his past. Together, they must piece together some semblance of normality after years of captivity. Future AU.
Sylar stalked off in the direction Elle pointed, following cold, gray corridors lined with bare pipes. His powers pulsated and danced in his hands. They were set on a hair trigger now, readying to discharge at a moment's notice. He was going to do some serious damage to this building and the people in it by the time this was all through. He was going to find Claire and then he would make every single one of Primatech's employees pay for daring to take his girl from him.
His thoughts screeched to a halt, derailed by two words that now replayed in his mind. Sylar didn't know when Claire become 'his girl'; he never thought of her in those terms before.. or maybe he did, he couldn't remember. It felt like she had always been there by his side, although he knew it was only a little over a week now.
He turned a corner and came face to face with a young man armed with a taser gun. It was a pitiful sight, the lightweight of the company pitted against Sylar's abilities. He wasted no time throwing him across the hallway, smiling at the satisfying sound of the boy's head hitting the wall with so much force that his skull cracked open. That was easy enough but Sylar was sure there would be more of them coming soon.
He picked up the pace, needing to find Claire before sirens alerted more of the company to his presence. He could face them one at a time but wanted to be gone before the whole calvary appeared. The numbers on the doors were descending and he knew it wouldn't be long before finding the one that read 'Subject 126: Claire Bennet'.
“Stop where you arrrck--” A guard rushed up from behind. He didn't even have time enough to finish announcing himself before Sylar closed his telekinesis around his throat, cutting off his windpipe and breaking his neck. His command cut off into a gurgling noise as all sound from his mouth was silenced forever.
Sylar glanced behind himself for a brief second, watching in annoyance as another one died and fell to the floor. He felt no remorse for the life he'd taken, the man simply chose the wrong side to stand on in this war. Besides, Sylar was sure the company would have done the same to him given half the chance. “I don't have time for Primatech's bullshit right now. Okay?”
His feet stopped in their tracks as he came across the right door. Claire's name was written across a label that hung on the door. A manila folder that was also labeled with her name sat in a file holder beside the door. If nothing else, the company was organized and meticulous about keeping records.
He picked it up and thumbed through it, wanting to know what she'd been through. If they hurt her in any way, each and every scientist working on her case would pay with excruciatingly long and painful deaths. He couldn't make that much out of the statistical records, so he put them back and turned the handle of the door.
It was locked good and tight. He wouldn't be able to get in without a keycard and a thumb print scan from someone with high enough access. Without either of those, Sylar went the tried and true route. He ripped the door off its hinges with a strength only a handful of other humans possessed.
The door flew off its hinges and fell over to the side. Stepping over the wreckage, he entered the small, claustrophobic room. Claire was huddled in the corner, her knees pulled up to her chest and her head tucked in tightly.
She was all he saw, with her tiny, fragile body pushed as far away from the door as she could get, holding off reality the best she could. Claire didn't seem to notice he'd arrived, so he stepped closer and joked. “Who do I have to kill around here to put that lovely smile back on your face?”
Claire didn't respond. Instead, she pulled herself tighter and whimpered. He took another step, starting to get a little scared. It was a fear that was unusual to him but one he'd learned to live with during their time together. A fear for another person's well-being, for Claire's safety.
“You're starting to worry me, Claire. Say something, anything. Recite the fucking phone book for all I care, just let me know that you're all right.” He knelt beside her and felt her pull away. She still wouldn't look up. “Did they hurt you? I swear to god, I'll kill them all if they dare lay one finger on you.”
She raised her eyes to his face but they were vacant, dead inside. She looked just like she had when he rescued her the first time, as if she'd never even started the healing process during the past few days. He cursed under his breath and tried to hold her, to make things better but she recoiled away.
“They showed me what you did.” Her voice was faint, broken. His eyebrows knit together, not understanding. Claire stood abruptly and he followed her movements, standing beside her as she began pulling photos from the wall. “They showed me what you are. They said I shouldn't pretend that someone like you might save me.”
In his need to make sure that Claire was okay, Sylar completely missed the way the company decorated the room. Only now did he notice the hundreds of photos posted on the walls, covering every spare inch with graphic police photos and some photos that could have only been taken by the company themselves. People lay torn in pieces, mutilated with their heads sawed in half, brains dripping out, blood spilling from the open cavity that used to be their skull.
He stood there transfixed in breathless awe and took in the sight of his handiwork. There were photos there that made even his stomach roll over, things he never wanted Claire to see. Corpses displayed with their insides hanging out, pieces strewn across the rooms in the photos haphazardly. He didn't look at her, he couldn't. All Sylar could see was his past and how futile a search for a future with her would be. “This is why I was handing you off to Peter. I don't want this for you.”
“But Peter doesn't want me, does he?”
Sylar could hear the tears in her voice, but he still couldn't turn around. Some say hell is being confronted with the deeds of your past, played out over a big screen where people have to sit and watch it all play out again, unable to do anything to stop what's already been done. Sylar figured this room, with its confined quarters and hundreds of grisly photos came a close second. Especially with Claire crying beside him while he was unable to comfort her.
This was all done for Claire's benefit he was sure. Two photos lay on the floor already, ripped and torn into shreds, as if she didn't want to believe at first. She was struggling with his past even more than Sylar was now. Her hands thrashed at the pictures, snatching them from where they lay taped to the wall and threw them down on the ground. “How many? How many people did you kill?
“I've lost count.” It was the truth. He remembered each and every one of his special victims, their powers flowed through his veins even now. He took those with him wherever he went. Though the others, the ones he killed simply because they were in the way of getting to the people with advanced abilities, some of them he couldn't even remember killing but the company kept careful tabs. They were meticulous.
“You lost count,” She laughed, harsh and cold against the silence. “You destroyed people's lives and you just, what.. lost count? I heard stories, bits and pieces.. I even saw you kill Jackie.” Claire came into Sylar's view, resting her hand on a photo of a woman with her eyes' pulled out of their sockets and bleeding from several nails stuck through her head. She looked still alive, barely. “But I guess that was before you learned of more interesting torture methods.”
He didn't know what to say, but he tried. He tried for her sake. “Claire, I--”
Claire ignored him and pulled a random photo from the wall, shoving it in Sylar's face. “What was her name?!”
He knew she would only grow angrier if he couldn't produce answers, so Sylar searched the photo but couldn't recall her name. He wracked his brain, dredging up any piece of information he could put with that face. A name, a place or a power.
Even with all his photographic memory, there were some things he hadn't felt the need to remember because they were so insignificant at the time. Then there were others his brain forced him to repress. He couldn't be sure which category the girl in the photograph was in. By the looks of the devastated crime scene, he assumed it was the later.
Giving her as much information as he knew, Sylar whispered. “Her name was Sarah.”
“Sarah.” Claire studied the picture in her hands, her anger dissipating slightly. Her fingers traced the lines of the woman's face, her red hair that matted to her blood drenched forehead. Claire's ire came back once more as her finger touched the part of the photo where a deep neck wound, where the girl was nearly decapitated and her spinal column could be seen. “Do you know if Sarah had any family? Or if Sarah's friends miss her? Do you know if Sarah had ever been in love or gone backpacking through Europe or skinny dipped in the moonlight?”
“No.”
“So, basically you don't know a thing about her or what you've destroyed here.” Claire ripped up the photo, tossing the pieces to the floor like confetti. Another broken girl with her hopes dashed away. She brushed her hands briskly together, as if wiping dirt away. “She was just another girl, in your way.”
Sylar hung his head, unable to say anything to answer for anything he'd done. He couldn't go back in time and change the past, as much as he wanted to right now.
“Did you fuck her too?” Claire asked of the torn up photo. Sylar shot his head up at the harshness in her voice, the slight reference to what they did the night before. “Or was I the only lucky one you were going to fuck and then kill? Or, well, hand me over to the company, which is pretty much the same thing, isn't it?”
He shook his head, vehemently opposed to that idea.“Claire, I was never going to--”
“Shut up!” She violently brushed streaming tears away from her cheeks. He closed his mouth and sighed as she went through the room, studying each photo intently. She finally stopped on one of an older woman in a small apartment. Its labeled read 'Virginia Gray'. “They say you even killed your mother. She sort of looks like you. Did you love her? All little children are supposed to love their mothers, aren't they?”
All his life, Sylar searched for an answer to that very same question. Even when he was just Gabriel Gray, simple watchmaker living in a small Queens apartment and living a simple life. Especially during those days, actually. His devote Christian mother warned him that it was a sin to dishonor your parents. You were supposed to hold them in high regard, listen to their wisdom and become exactly what they wanted you to be. Still, Claire wanted the truth and she would get it.
“No, Claire, I hated her.” He closed his eyes. Those words hurt even though he knew them to be true. “I've never cared about anyone until you. There was no one until you.”
“Liar!” She spat back, bringing her fists in the air to strike at him. Sylar held her arms, struggling to calm her down. Claire screamed when he grabbed his hands around her wrists, fighting with every last strength left in her. “Prescott told me about your little deal. You told them where I was to save your own ass. And then you slept with me for one last fucking hoorah before running away! What? Are you here to gloat now?”
“You're working with only half the story, Claire.” Sylar told her, still holding her in place as he stared her down. “I told Prescott I would give you up. That's true. He had a needle to my neck filled with a poison that would have killed me in seconds. What the hell else was I supposed to do? I only told him what he wanted to hear so I could buy myself some time. Maybe I even thought I would have the guts to give you back to the company at that time but not after last night.”
“Why? What was so special about last night?” She asked sarcastically, giving absolutely no weight to what they did together or what happened between them. Her face scrunched up as she spit out the words like the event they were alluding to was meaningless.
“Claire, I never slept with anyone I actually cared about until last night. It was.. intense.” Sylar paused, wishing he could have told her that before she fell asleep in his arms, before everything had gotten so completely screwed up. She drooped a little in his arms, the fight leaving her as confusion set in. His words left his mouth before he could stop himself. “I never wanted to feel that vulnerable with anyone because that's when they hurt you.. that's when they tell you that you're not good enough for them. But then I did.. with you.. and things were different."
Claire lowered her arms and shook her head, starring at the floor where torn pictures were scattered about their feet. “But Elle said that you said I wasn't any good in bed.”
“Elle's a lying sack of shit.” Sylar was really beginning to hate that electric bitch. From thoughts of Elle, sprung thoughts of the rest of the company. They didn't have much time here. Claire could go back to smacking him after they left the building. She could curse and scream and kick him around as much as she liked. First though, he needed to get her to safety. “I know you don't trust me, but we need to get you out of here and..”
“And you're all I've got.” She finished for him.
Ever since they started out on the road together, he had been nothing more than her last resort. It was good enough for him. If he got to be anything to her after everything he did to the world, it was more than he truly deserved. That fact was drummed into his head now, after being in this room and having the past brought back up in such a vivid display of cruelty. With this many disasters all executed at his hands, Claire should hate him forever. It was only fair.
“Peter's here too. I talked him into letting you stay at his house.” Sylar finally replied. Distant sirens began to fill the air. He knew they were coming, given enough time. Claire jumped at the sound and grabbed his hand, linking her fingers with his. Then as she became accustomed to the noise, she backed away again, careful to put some distance between them. “You'll be happy with him, with your family. And I'll leave you alone. You'll never have to see me again.”
Claire paused, looking back over the room only last time. She hugged herself tightly as she asked. “Do you think you've really changed, Sylar? You told me in Texas that things were different.. that you were different. Was that the truth?”
Sylar shoved the cell door back in place telekinetically, so neither of them would ever have to see the insides of that room again. It would always be there though, even if the room was just in the back of his mind, a place in his brain to hide all the emotions he repressed and memories he never wanted to think about again. “I don't know.”
..to be continued..
Characters: Sylar, Claire.
Spoilers: Up to Season 2.
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 2745
Chapter: 25/?
Previously: Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11, Chapter 12, Chapter 13, Chapter 14, Chapter 15, Chapter 16, Chapter 17, Chapter 18, Chapter 19, Chapter 20, Chapter 21, Chapter 22, Chapter 23, Chapter 24
Summary: While escaping the Company, Sylar meets up with someone from his past. Together, they must piece together some semblance of normality after years of captivity. Future AU.
Sylar stalked off in the direction Elle pointed, following cold, gray corridors lined with bare pipes. His powers pulsated and danced in his hands. They were set on a hair trigger now, readying to discharge at a moment's notice. He was going to do some serious damage to this building and the people in it by the time this was all through. He was going to find Claire and then he would make every single one of Primatech's employees pay for daring to take his girl from him.
His thoughts screeched to a halt, derailed by two words that now replayed in his mind. Sylar didn't know when Claire become 'his girl'; he never thought of her in those terms before.. or maybe he did, he couldn't remember. It felt like she had always been there by his side, although he knew it was only a little over a week now.
He turned a corner and came face to face with a young man armed with a taser gun. It was a pitiful sight, the lightweight of the company pitted against Sylar's abilities. He wasted no time throwing him across the hallway, smiling at the satisfying sound of the boy's head hitting the wall with so much force that his skull cracked open. That was easy enough but Sylar was sure there would be more of them coming soon.
He picked up the pace, needing to find Claire before sirens alerted more of the company to his presence. He could face them one at a time but wanted to be gone before the whole calvary appeared. The numbers on the doors were descending and he knew it wouldn't be long before finding the one that read 'Subject 126: Claire Bennet'.
“Stop where you arrrck--” A guard rushed up from behind. He didn't even have time enough to finish announcing himself before Sylar closed his telekinesis around his throat, cutting off his windpipe and breaking his neck. His command cut off into a gurgling noise as all sound from his mouth was silenced forever.
Sylar glanced behind himself for a brief second, watching in annoyance as another one died and fell to the floor. He felt no remorse for the life he'd taken, the man simply chose the wrong side to stand on in this war. Besides, Sylar was sure the company would have done the same to him given half the chance. “I don't have time for Primatech's bullshit right now. Okay?”
His feet stopped in their tracks as he came across the right door. Claire's name was written across a label that hung on the door. A manila folder that was also labeled with her name sat in a file holder beside the door. If nothing else, the company was organized and meticulous about keeping records.
He picked it up and thumbed through it, wanting to know what she'd been through. If they hurt her in any way, each and every scientist working on her case would pay with excruciatingly long and painful deaths. He couldn't make that much out of the statistical records, so he put them back and turned the handle of the door.
It was locked good and tight. He wouldn't be able to get in without a keycard and a thumb print scan from someone with high enough access. Without either of those, Sylar went the tried and true route. He ripped the door off its hinges with a strength only a handful of other humans possessed.
The door flew off its hinges and fell over to the side. Stepping over the wreckage, he entered the small, claustrophobic room. Claire was huddled in the corner, her knees pulled up to her chest and her head tucked in tightly.
She was all he saw, with her tiny, fragile body pushed as far away from the door as she could get, holding off reality the best she could. Claire didn't seem to notice he'd arrived, so he stepped closer and joked. “Who do I have to kill around here to put that lovely smile back on your face?”
Claire didn't respond. Instead, she pulled herself tighter and whimpered. He took another step, starting to get a little scared. It was a fear that was unusual to him but one he'd learned to live with during their time together. A fear for another person's well-being, for Claire's safety.
“You're starting to worry me, Claire. Say something, anything. Recite the fucking phone book for all I care, just let me know that you're all right.” He knelt beside her and felt her pull away. She still wouldn't look up. “Did they hurt you? I swear to god, I'll kill them all if they dare lay one finger on you.”
She raised her eyes to his face but they were vacant, dead inside. She looked just like she had when he rescued her the first time, as if she'd never even started the healing process during the past few days. He cursed under his breath and tried to hold her, to make things better but she recoiled away.
“They showed me what you did.” Her voice was faint, broken. His eyebrows knit together, not understanding. Claire stood abruptly and he followed her movements, standing beside her as she began pulling photos from the wall. “They showed me what you are. They said I shouldn't pretend that someone like you might save me.”
In his need to make sure that Claire was okay, Sylar completely missed the way the company decorated the room. Only now did he notice the hundreds of photos posted on the walls, covering every spare inch with graphic police photos and some photos that could have only been taken by the company themselves. People lay torn in pieces, mutilated with their heads sawed in half, brains dripping out, blood spilling from the open cavity that used to be their skull.
He stood there transfixed in breathless awe and took in the sight of his handiwork. There were photos there that made even his stomach roll over, things he never wanted Claire to see. Corpses displayed with their insides hanging out, pieces strewn across the rooms in the photos haphazardly. He didn't look at her, he couldn't. All Sylar could see was his past and how futile a search for a future with her would be. “This is why I was handing you off to Peter. I don't want this for you.”
“But Peter doesn't want me, does he?”
Sylar could hear the tears in her voice, but he still couldn't turn around. Some say hell is being confronted with the deeds of your past, played out over a big screen where people have to sit and watch it all play out again, unable to do anything to stop what's already been done. Sylar figured this room, with its confined quarters and hundreds of grisly photos came a close second. Especially with Claire crying beside him while he was unable to comfort her.
This was all done for Claire's benefit he was sure. Two photos lay on the floor already, ripped and torn into shreds, as if she didn't want to believe at first. She was struggling with his past even more than Sylar was now. Her hands thrashed at the pictures, snatching them from where they lay taped to the wall and threw them down on the ground. “How many? How many people did you kill?
“I've lost count.” It was the truth. He remembered each and every one of his special victims, their powers flowed through his veins even now. He took those with him wherever he went. Though the others, the ones he killed simply because they were in the way of getting to the people with advanced abilities, some of them he couldn't even remember killing but the company kept careful tabs. They were meticulous.
“You lost count,” She laughed, harsh and cold against the silence. “You destroyed people's lives and you just, what.. lost count? I heard stories, bits and pieces.. I even saw you kill Jackie.” Claire came into Sylar's view, resting her hand on a photo of a woman with her eyes' pulled out of their sockets and bleeding from several nails stuck through her head. She looked still alive, barely. “But I guess that was before you learned of more interesting torture methods.”
He didn't know what to say, but he tried. He tried for her sake. “Claire, I--”
Claire ignored him and pulled a random photo from the wall, shoving it in Sylar's face. “What was her name?!”
He knew she would only grow angrier if he couldn't produce answers, so Sylar searched the photo but couldn't recall her name. He wracked his brain, dredging up any piece of information he could put with that face. A name, a place or a power.
Even with all his photographic memory, there were some things he hadn't felt the need to remember because they were so insignificant at the time. Then there were others his brain forced him to repress. He couldn't be sure which category the girl in the photograph was in. By the looks of the devastated crime scene, he assumed it was the later.
Giving her as much information as he knew, Sylar whispered. “Her name was Sarah.”
“Sarah.” Claire studied the picture in her hands, her anger dissipating slightly. Her fingers traced the lines of the woman's face, her red hair that matted to her blood drenched forehead. Claire's ire came back once more as her finger touched the part of the photo where a deep neck wound, where the girl was nearly decapitated and her spinal column could be seen. “Do you know if Sarah had any family? Or if Sarah's friends miss her? Do you know if Sarah had ever been in love or gone backpacking through Europe or skinny dipped in the moonlight?”
“No.”
“So, basically you don't know a thing about her or what you've destroyed here.” Claire ripped up the photo, tossing the pieces to the floor like confetti. Another broken girl with her hopes dashed away. She brushed her hands briskly together, as if wiping dirt away. “She was just another girl, in your way.”
Sylar hung his head, unable to say anything to answer for anything he'd done. He couldn't go back in time and change the past, as much as he wanted to right now.
“Did you fuck her too?” Claire asked of the torn up photo. Sylar shot his head up at the harshness in her voice, the slight reference to what they did the night before. “Or was I the only lucky one you were going to fuck and then kill? Or, well, hand me over to the company, which is pretty much the same thing, isn't it?”
He shook his head, vehemently opposed to that idea.“Claire, I was never going to--”
“Shut up!” She violently brushed streaming tears away from her cheeks. He closed his mouth and sighed as she went through the room, studying each photo intently. She finally stopped on one of an older woman in a small apartment. Its labeled read 'Virginia Gray'. “They say you even killed your mother. She sort of looks like you. Did you love her? All little children are supposed to love their mothers, aren't they?”
All his life, Sylar searched for an answer to that very same question. Even when he was just Gabriel Gray, simple watchmaker living in a small Queens apartment and living a simple life. Especially during those days, actually. His devote Christian mother warned him that it was a sin to dishonor your parents. You were supposed to hold them in high regard, listen to their wisdom and become exactly what they wanted you to be. Still, Claire wanted the truth and she would get it.
“No, Claire, I hated her.” He closed his eyes. Those words hurt even though he knew them to be true. “I've never cared about anyone until you. There was no one until you.”
“Liar!” She spat back, bringing her fists in the air to strike at him. Sylar held her arms, struggling to calm her down. Claire screamed when he grabbed his hands around her wrists, fighting with every last strength left in her. “Prescott told me about your little deal. You told them where I was to save your own ass. And then you slept with me for one last fucking hoorah before running away! What? Are you here to gloat now?”
“You're working with only half the story, Claire.” Sylar told her, still holding her in place as he stared her down. “I told Prescott I would give you up. That's true. He had a needle to my neck filled with a poison that would have killed me in seconds. What the hell else was I supposed to do? I only told him what he wanted to hear so I could buy myself some time. Maybe I even thought I would have the guts to give you back to the company at that time but not after last night.”
“Why? What was so special about last night?” She asked sarcastically, giving absolutely no weight to what they did together or what happened between them. Her face scrunched up as she spit out the words like the event they were alluding to was meaningless.
“Claire, I never slept with anyone I actually cared about until last night. It was.. intense.” Sylar paused, wishing he could have told her that before she fell asleep in his arms, before everything had gotten so completely screwed up. She drooped a little in his arms, the fight leaving her as confusion set in. His words left his mouth before he could stop himself. “I never wanted to feel that vulnerable with anyone because that's when they hurt you.. that's when they tell you that you're not good enough for them. But then I did.. with you.. and things were different."
Claire lowered her arms and shook her head, starring at the floor where torn pictures were scattered about their feet. “But Elle said that you said I wasn't any good in bed.”
“Elle's a lying sack of shit.” Sylar was really beginning to hate that electric bitch. From thoughts of Elle, sprung thoughts of the rest of the company. They didn't have much time here. Claire could go back to smacking him after they left the building. She could curse and scream and kick him around as much as she liked. First though, he needed to get her to safety. “I know you don't trust me, but we need to get you out of here and..”
“And you're all I've got.” She finished for him.
Ever since they started out on the road together, he had been nothing more than her last resort. It was good enough for him. If he got to be anything to her after everything he did to the world, it was more than he truly deserved. That fact was drummed into his head now, after being in this room and having the past brought back up in such a vivid display of cruelty. With this many disasters all executed at his hands, Claire should hate him forever. It was only fair.
“Peter's here too. I talked him into letting you stay at his house.” Sylar finally replied. Distant sirens began to fill the air. He knew they were coming, given enough time. Claire jumped at the sound and grabbed his hand, linking her fingers with his. Then as she became accustomed to the noise, she backed away again, careful to put some distance between them. “You'll be happy with him, with your family. And I'll leave you alone. You'll never have to see me again.”
Claire paused, looking back over the room only last time. She hugged herself tightly as she asked. “Do you think you've really changed, Sylar? You told me in Texas that things were different.. that you were different. Was that the truth?”
Sylar shoved the cell door back in place telekinetically, so neither of them would ever have to see the insides of that room again. It would always be there though, even if the room was just in the back of his mind, a place in his brain to hide all the emotions he repressed and memories he never wanted to think about again. “I don't know.”
..to be continued..