Girl Band, a heroes fanfic

Title- Girl Band
Author- Victoria
Rating- PG
Pairings- some C/G, references to lots of other pairings
Summary- Hiro is throwing a party. Daphne is bored, Gretchen is lonely, and they get to talking. The results is more awesome than the world is ready for. Slight crack. Dedicated to the posters on Daphne's wall!

A/N- I don't know how Daphne's alive. As far as I'm concerned, she, like Elle, Meredith, DL, and Isaac, is not dead. They will never die as long as there is FF! Anyway, this was inspired by all the posters Daphne had up on her wall, and I started thinking about how that reminded me of my music-obsessed friend, and that made me wonder if maybe Daphne was the same way, and... well... when I saw the South Park-ified Gretchen + guitar on Wikipedia, this fic was born.

"It'll be fun," Claire assured her. "I promise."

Gretchen sighed. It was very hard to argue with Claire when she looked like she did right now, all tight jeans and shining with that inner light she had. "Fine," she said. "I'll go. But if they're all as goody-two-shoes as your uncle, I swear to god I'm finding the nearest person who can fly and making them bring me straight home." As she thought about that, she said, "Speaking of which, how exactly are you planning on getting to Tokyo?"

"Peter said he'd give us a lift."

She groaned. "Lovely. You know, the world needs more men like him, but don't you ever get sick of his Messiah complex?"

"His what?" Claire asked, genuinely confused.

Gretchen sighed again. "I suppose I shouldn't be surprised you hadn't noticed- you're practically the same. Honestly, Claire, if it weren't for your dad, you'd probably be as idealistic as he is."

"As who is?" Peter said, appearing at that exact moment out of thin air.

"Holy--!" Gretchen gasped. "You have got to stop doing that! What if I'd been naked?"

Peter turned a little pink, but chose not to reply to that, instead saying, "Look, we'd probably better go. We're already late as it is. Hiro will be wondering where we are."

Claire sighed. "We'll be there in less than a second if you just teleport us. As in, now."

The empath nodded and placed his hands on their shoulders. He closed his eyes and Gretchen remembered at the last moment to take a deep breath before the universe winked out around her. Teleporting always left her breathless if she didn't. When the world came back again, she was standing on a balcony on the top floor of one seriously tall building. All around and beneath her, the sparkling city of Tokyo stretched out in every direction.

"I never get used to that," Gretchen muttered. "This whole world has officially gone insane."

Before either Claire or Peter could reply, however, a round-faced Japanese man Gretchen had only met on a few occasions bounced out onto the balcony. "Peter-san!" he cried. "Cheerleader! Gretchen!"

"Hiro," Claire said warmly, greeting the time traveler with a friendly kiss on the cheek. Peter shook his hand.

"Come inside!" he said excitedly. "Everyone is here!" He hurried back inside, waving them in after him. Gretchen hesitated- this was the world of the superpowered, not for her- but Claire took her hand and lead her inside.

Gretchen had to admit, for the nerdiest man imaginable, Hiro really knew how to throw a good party. He even had some half-decent music playing.

People were dancing- lots of people, most of whom Gretchen didn't know. She could pick out Peter dancing with a blonde woman he had introduced as Emma; completely ignoring the fact that it was a fast song, they were slow-dancing, staring into each other's eyes soulfully. And Claire's biological mother was standing by the bar, chatting up Dr. Suresh. Across the room, Ando was dancing with a woman Gretchen thought might be Hiro's sister. Officer Parkman was having a drink with his wife. A pair of kids were sitting in the corner, hunched over the boy's laptop and giggling. The infamous Elle was pouting and sparking as she tried to convince her boyfriend, the reformed ex-serial killer, to dance with her, clearly without much success.

But there wasn't a whole lot to interest Gretchen, she had to admit. None of these people knew her as anything more than Claire's girlfriend, and none of them were interested in her- she'd never helped them save the world and she'd never stopped an exploding man. So here she was while Claire talked to some flying ex-boyfriend, people watching and trying not to be jealous.

A rumbling noise, like an explosion, ripped through the air outside. All the occupants of the room froze, and the music stopped. Peter, Hiro, and Claire found each other at the center of the dance floor almost by instinct. Gretchen leapt to her feet and hurried across the room towards them.

"Samuel?" Claire guessed.

"Samuel," Peter confirmed tiredly. "I should have felt him earlier, but--"

"But you were distracted. Isn't that how it always happens?" Claire asked irritably. "Why tonight? Couldn't world domination wait until tomorrow?"

Hiro chuckled. "Will the three of us be enough?" he asked, glancing around the room at the assembled heroes.

"The fewer the better," Peter said. "Samuel will draw on our powers and get stronger if we send more. Even having me go in is a bad idea, but--"

"But you can't sit around and do nothing," Claire said, finishing his sentence yet again. "We get it, Peter. Alright, the three of us, then. Everybody else, have fun, enjoy the party, and we'll be back in ten minutes, okay?"

Gretchen was busy marveling at how matter-of-fact everyone in the room was about a rampant terrakine destroying the city when Claire cut through the crowd to reach her. "Be careful," Gretchen warned.

Claire chuckled. "Yeah, I'll be fine," she said. "Like always." She planted a soft kiss on Gretchen's lips, then sprinted out the doors onto the balcony and hurled herself over the edge without a second thought. Peter sighed and followed. Hiro closed his eyes and disappeared.

Tapping her fingers impatiently on the table, Gretchen waited for Claire's return. Though the party continued mostly uninterrupted, you could tell from the tense looks on every face that no one was ignoring the sounds of a pitched battle outside. It was going to be one dead party until the world's greatest heroes returned, that was for sure.

"God, this sucks," said a voice from right beside her.

Gretchen jumped about four feet and twisted around to see a twenty-somethings woman sitting on the other side of the table with her chin resting in one hand. Her first thought was that she wanted to steal the woman's hair- it was an amazing mass of platinum blonde spikes.

"N-no kidding," she stuttered, surprised by the woman's presence. "Um... where did you come from?"

The woman grinned. "Depends. I just nipped out to see what was going on downstairs. They're doing fine, don't worry. It was just a matter of pinning down Samuel's precog and his speedster-on-a-leash and getting him out of the way so he had fewer Specials to power him up. I took care of that for them. That's where I was three seconds ago."

"So you... teleport?"

"Hell no!" the blonde exclaimed. "I'm a speedster." She stuck her hand across the table and Gretchen shook it awkwardly. "I'm Daphne Millbrook. Fastest woman alive."

Gretchen smiled. "Gretchen Berg. I'm--"

"--Claire's girlfriend. Yeah, I know. I keep up."

"I'll bet," Gretchen muttered.

They lapsed into uncomfortable silence for a few minutes. Then the song changed, and it was some horrible pop song from the nineties. "Oh my god!" Gretchen groaned. "And just when I was thinking that Hiro knew how to threw a good party! What kind of brain-dead DJ did he hire?"

Daphne looked similarly disgusted. "No kidding! Seriously, is it so hard to play a little Panic! at the Disco? I mean, I understand that most good music is sort of hard to dance to, but come on!"

"You like Panic! too?" Gretchen asked.

"A better question is who doesn't like Panic!" Daphne said.

Gretchen grimaced. "Sadly? Claire. Apparently she had to dance to Nine in the Afternoon once, and she heard it so many times she went sour on it."

"How do you go sour on Nine in the Afternoon?"

"I don't know, but she managed it. Claire is many wonderful things, but she has lousy taste in music." Gretchen sighed sadly. "When we first met, I thought maybe she and I could form that band I always wanted to be in. But she has basically no musical talent, so that fell through."

"Oh my god, you always wanted to be in a band too?" Daphne asked excitedly.

Gretchen nodded. "Only all my life. You?"

"Definitely. There's just something about it, you know? I wouldn't even care about hitting the big time or anything. It's just enough to be able to play a few local gigs, to get up there and send your words out into the world and know that all those people standing out there were hearing it and feeling it right along with you."

"Amen to that!"

Daphne was suddenly grinning widely. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"Depends," Gretchen said shrewdly, leaning across the table intently. "What do you play?"

Daphne shrugged. "Guitar. It was the only instrument I could learn when I was a kid. I... well, I had cerebral palsy until my ability manifested, and guitar was the only thing that didn't need strong feet or lungs."

For the first time in their conversation, the speedster looked abashed and uncomfortable, and Gretchen almost regretted asking. But her elation was growing and she couldn't hold onto the regret very long. "Perfect!" she said. "I'm a drummer!"

"Are you actually any good, or are you one of those posers who just owns a drum set for the sake of being able to say that?" Daphne asked.

Gretchen grinned. "Oh, I'm good. I was in my high school's jazz band four years straight. And between you and me, that's saying something. I've been playing since I was just a little kid."

Daphne's expression was serious, but her eyes held a smile and she leaned intently across the table. "So... are we seriously thinking about doing this?" she asked.

"I am."

"Me too," the speedster confirmed. "So... what kind of sound would we be going for?"

Gretchen was now looking as intense (and that was saying something) as Daphne. "Well, I always had a sort of set idea for the style, and that was actually the reason no one would ever work with me. See, I was sort of going for a crossover sound, not quite one thing, not really the other. I want a lot of musicality and powerful melodies, but it also has to be really loud and intense and something you can headbang to at the same time."

"Like... sort of like Muse meets The Killers goes death metal?" Daphne suggested.

"EXACTLY!" Gretchen exclaimed, almost leaping out of her chair in excitement. "You get it! You understand my vision!"

Daphne smirked. "Oh yeah. I get it. It's exactly what I had in mind, too."

"Oh my god," Gretchen said. "I think I just got chills."

Daphne rolled her eyes.

"And, um, lyrics are important," Gretch said. "No lame songs about nothing."

"Duh."

Gretchen sighed. "It's a shame we can't get our hands on a drum set and stuff- we could really liven this party up. I mean, god, even cover songs with basically no rehearsal would be better than the trash this guy--" She gestured at the DJ. "--Is playing."

"And who says we can't get a drum set?" The speedster leapt out of her seat, then gave Gretchen a wink, and disappeared in a whooshing blur. Gretchen rose to her feet as well, but before she had more than taken a few steps, Daphne was back. "Come on!" she exclaimed. "I've got something to show you!"

She disappeared again, and Gretchen called, "Where? Daphne, where'd you go?"

The speedster popped back up. "Oh, sorry," she said. "I forget not everybody can do that, sometimes..." She shrugged unapologetically. They walked at a normal pace to a small side room off to the side of the penthouse ballroom Hiro had rented for the occasion. Inside, Gretchen found a pristine set of Mapex drums, complete with top-quality Zildjian cymbals. Her breath caught a little bit as she stared at the set.

"Where did you get this?"

Daphne grinned. "I... borrowed it."

"And by borrowed, you mean--?"

"I mean whatever you think I mean."

Gretchen nodded in (skeptical) understanding. "Right. Don't ask if you don't want to be lied to. Got it."

Daphne jerked her head towards the set, then pulled the strap of a brand-new, red-laquered electric bass over her shoulder. "So what do you say we rehearse a little, then fire Hiro's crappy DJ?"

As a horrible electronica remix of a pop song that had been bad in the first place had just come on in the other room, Gretchen nodded. "So tell me, do you know anything by The Donnas?"

The music cut out in a squeal of feedback. Daphne had pushed the DJ out of the way and taken hold of the microphone. "Alright!" she yelled. "Who here was sick of that bullshit this idiot has been playing?" She was met with total silence except for one enthusiastic cheer from Molly, but she wasn't too bothered by that fact. "Well, I tell you what- for the last half hour, Gretchen and I have been preparing something for you guys. 'Cause let's face it, if we had to listen to the crap that guy was spinning, we'd all go crazy. It's bad enough to have to wait around for our little trinity of world police to get back from their Battle Royale, but doing that AND listening to bad music? No thank you."

She blurred for a second, and when she resettled, the DJ and his equipment had been unceremoniously transported to a far corner, and in his place, the drum set and a small "borrowed" sound system had been set up. Gretchen hurried up onto the stage and took her place behind the drums.

Daphne threw her fist into the air. "We are Scarlet Rhapsody, and this is All Messed Up by The Donnas!"

And with that, she slammed the first chord, and Gretchen came in seconds later with a driving rock beat. The brunette leaned into the microphone mounted on top of the bass drum and began singing, half-shouting the lyrics she had known by heart for years.

Well, I must've had too many Diet Cokes
'Cause I'm laughin' at all your stupid jokes
You gotta stop spinnin' my head around
You turn me inside out and upside down...

Now I'm all messed up
I don't know what to do
'Cause I'm all messed up
All messed up on you.
All messed up on you
All messed up on you.

You know, I didn't mean to get so addicted
It's just like Miss Cleo predicted
All I wanna do is call you on the phone
You got me higher than the ozone!

Now I'm all messed up
I don't know what to do
'Cause I'm all messed up
All messed up on you.
All messed up on you
All messed up on you.

The assembled heroes, their sidekicks, and a few not-really-heroes-but-they-were-there-so-what-the-hell were loving it. Gretchen's voice was powerful and captured the raw lyrics perfectly, and Daphne's wicked guitar skills were evident in every chord. Even Emma appeared to be enjoying the performance. At that moment, a trio of people appeared on the balcony outside, and hurried inside. Gretchen spotted Claire's petite blonde form and smiled as she launched into the next verse. But, meeting Claire's eyes over the heads of the crowd, she pointedly altered one word.

Now I just can't get you outta my head
Why don't you just get in my bed?
When I first saw you on your big wheels
Girl you know you had me head over heels!

Now I'm all messed up
I don't know what to do
'Cause I'm all messed up
All messed up on you.
Now I'm all messed up,
All messed up on you!

Daphne blasted the final note, and ringing silence reigned in the room for a full three seconds. Then everyone burst into wild cheers. Gretchen could see Claire smiling broadly and giving her a thumbs-up, and grinned herself. It seemed she had finally attained some notoriety in this creme de la creme of heroes...

Almost everyone had gone, and those few guests who were still left were hurrying out as quickly as possible- Sylar and Elle were always the last to leave these things, and nobody wanted to be anywhere near them when they got the idea they were alone. That wasn't an image anyone needed in their heads.

"Sorry we fired your DJ," Gretchen said to Hiro.

The time traveler grinned. "It is okay, Gretchen," he said.

So she was Gretchen now, and not Friend of Cheerleader. She smiled as Claire hugged him. "It was a great party, Hiro," Claire said. "Even with Samuel's little interruption, it was great." The man practically glowed, he was beaming so happily.

"Please, please, let's get out of here," Peter begged them. "I do not want to be here any longer than absolutely necessary if Sylar's still here."

"You're our ride," Gretchen said. "You could just grab us and teleport any time you wanted."

"But... that would be rude," the empath said in utter confusion.

Gretchen rolled her eyes, but she was smiling. "Alright, fine. Give me just one second." She had spied a familiar spiky blonde head over by the bar, making casual conversation with Parkman. "Hey Daphne!" she called. The speedster was suddenly standing next to her, and she jumped.

"Huh, Gretch?"

"You wanna get together, say, next week to rehearse?"

Daphne grinned. "You bet."

Gretchen smiled. "I'll get started writing a few heart-wrenching songs, okay?"

The speedster nodded. "Awesome. See you Thursday!" And then she was gone.

Gretchen turned back to Claire and Peter. "Okay, let's go," she said.

Peter dropped them back in their dorm, and Gretchen was amazed to realize that, though it was almost dawn in Tokyo, evening was swiftly falling here in Virginia. They had dropped a day. But Gretchen wasn't too upset- the ruby sunset outside was beautiful, and set a perfect mood for what she had in mind now.

It seemed that Claire was thinking along the same lines, because as soon as Peter had disappeared again, she captured Gretchen's lips with a fiery kiss. When they finally came up for air, Claire was giving her a sultry smile. "So," she said seductively, "I've got you head over heels, is that right?"

"Something like that," Gretchen said, giving her a nervous smile. Even after two years together, Gretchen still couldn't acclimate to the effect Claire had on her. With a moan that was almost a snarl, Claire attacked her again, and pushed her back onto one of the beds...

Because I just couldn't end it without throwing in a little C/G!!! Anyway, I really wanted Daphne to be the drummer- can't you just picture her being one of those insane drummer girls? But I realized that growing up with cerebral palsy wouldn't have allowed her to easily learn to play the bass drum, which requires your feet. So that's that. Reviews = love.