AN: I had to fudge the time line a little, so the events that are depicted in The Second Coming and I Am Become Death will occur, just at a latter date then in the series. Also, it was implied by Angela Petrelli in The Butterfly Effect that if Peter had not gone back in time then Sylar would not have been able to take Claire's power. This story follows that assumption (up to a certain point).

AN 2: This story will be divided into Section Numbers (Section One, Section Two…), and each Section Number will cover the number of years that is indicted at the top of the first chapter for the Section Number in question.

AN 3: One more thing. This fic will contain severe Nathan and Tracy bashing, and Peter bashing to a lesser extent as well. Just thought I should warn you.

Disclaimer: The only thing that is mine is the general plot and the events and characters that do not occur/appear on Heroes. Everything else belongs to their respective owners. No money is being made.

Section One: Chapter One

2008 - 2019

If you told Claire Benet two years ago that the world would not only know about the existence of those like her, but her biological father would be the one to revel the news by flying on live TV, she would have been overjoyed.

As it so happened, that is exactly what occurred.

When Claire saw Nathan demonstrating his power in a news room surrounded by cameras, accompanied by Peter and Matt Parkman she had stared in wide eyed amazement at the screen. Without a second thought or even bothering to pack a bag she had drove to the airport and hoped on the next flight to New York, pausing only to send a quick text message to her mom and dad to explain where she had gone. As Claire sat in her cramped seat next a fat, bald guy who was trying to flirt with the attractive Asian woman next to him, she watched Nathan's video feed over and over. She was so proud of her biological father, thinking that he had changed the world for the better. Claire had thought that now that the world knew about those who possessed powers they could help people. She thought that they would be accepted by society (after the initial fear had passed, of course), possibly looked up to, maybe even given positions were their powers would be put toward good use.

She had been stupid, and also dead wrong.

PART TWO

If you were to see Claire today, you most likely would not recognize her as the same girl that had been on the plane that day, so full of pride and hope for a better future. You would not recognize many things about her.

She looks older for one thing, about 19 or so.

Claire is not that naïve teenager incapable of defending herself any longer. She has spent four years working for one of the many organizations known as Pinehurst, and has been trained in every defensive art you can conceive; karate, boxing, stealth and tracking, knifes, guns and tasers, just to name a few. She can tell you where all of the major arties are on a human being, and weather it takes longer for someone to die if they are shot in the stomach or stabbed through the lung. She knows how much force is required behind a roundhouse kick to break a femur, and how much pain the average human body can withstand before the brain turns off their sensory input.

Once Claire would have done anything for her family, for she had held unconditional love for them, despite their many faults. Now, seeing as her mom and brother were both dead, the only person that Claire can say that with absolute certainty about is her dad, Noah. Her grandmother, Angela had died a few years ago, but they had never been very close and the only thing that Claire had ever received from her had been looks of disappointment and constant put downs. Claire has not seen her biological mother, Meredith Gordon, since meeting her briefly at the age of 15, and as for Nathan and his wife, Tracy… well let's put it in polite terms and say that Claire held as much love for them as she would a stray dog. The only one Claire was uncertain about was Peter, whom she hasn't seen or even heard from ever since he went on the run only one month after the revelation. Once Claire would not have hesitated to protect him with her life, but now, if it came down to a choice between his life or hers… she honestly dose not know.

Her hair is still blonde, but instead of wearing clothes of soft pastels or bright and vibrant tones Claire is wearing sleek black leather, the slandered uniform for all Pinehurst employees.

She is also leaning against a building in New York, doing nothing as she watches an entire family with black bags over their heads being loaded into a truck. It is not that Claire does not care, especially when the small girl is knocked out with the butt of a gun, but Claire knows that when it comes down to it, she could just as easily be the one with a bag over her head. All it would take was for her biological father, President Nathan Petrelli, to decide that she was too much trouble and take away his protection. If that happened Claire would instantly be classified as an illegal (someone with an inborn power), which thanks to the worldwide law that had been passed three years ago, meant that she had as little rights as the African American slaves once had. She would be hunted as ruthlessly as a rabid animal, and upon being captured she would be drugged, chained, and have her identity stripped away as one of those black bags were forced over her head. In all likely hood she would then be taken to where all of the captured illegal's ended up, a facility known as "the Camps", places that made Nazi Germany look like a tropical vacation spot. Claire would face torture, brutal experimentation, and living conditions that would make a rat turn away in disgust.

You might say that that Claire wasn't giving Nathan enough credit, that he loved her and would never allow something so terrible to happen to his only daughter. Claire on the other hand knew that she was nothing more then an inconvenience to Nathan, and that his "love" only extended far enough to give her a choice the day he became President: Pinehurst or the Camps. Whatever else Claire may have been, she was far from stupid. She choose Pinehurst.

You might also say that the entire world could not be of the same mindset regarding those who were born with a power. For surly not everyone thought of people like Claire as "filthy disgusting animals", and didn't bat an eye when people were seized from their homes in broad daylight. In some regard you would be correct. There were still those who thought that what was happening was sick and wrong, and in the beginning there had been protests and riots. When those people started disappearing, when they would come home at night to find their family gone or dead in their beds word had spread as quickly as wildfire, and in no time at all those protesters had been silenced. What they had done instead was establish underground railroads right under the public's nose, giving those who were being hunted a chance at a safe and relatively normal life. The majority of the public however, including every government leader the world over agreed with the former view and wholeheartedly supported the Camps (Claire privately suspected strong telepathic influence). The only concession that the leaders had made was to place at least three Pinehurst organizations in every country. The original plan had been for those who chose to have a power injected to work for the facilities in order not to be confused with those who had been born with a power, and to hunt "dangerous terrorists". Somehow the underground railroads had gotten involved, turning Pinehurst into the only place were "illegal's" could hide out in the open, every documentation claiming that they had had their power synthetically injected. More often then not Pinehurst was the only choice between being "off limits" to the government, or facing the camps.

So this is Claire Bennett now. She knows how to kill, and has killed many times. She has seen terrible things occur and has committed many terrible acts herself. She dresses in black, holds loyalty only for herself and her father, and knows that there is only two things standing between herself and the Camps, one of which is instable at best.

Why had she ever wanted this revelation of her kind?

She doesn't have an answer.

PART THREE

If you had asked Claire who she would have thought would be assigned as her partner, never in a million years would she have thought it would be him. When she learned that she was supposed to train in the one who was to work beside her she thought, you've got to be kidding me. When Claire was informed that her partner was an ex-serial killer had wondered if the higher ups had lost their minds. After turning around to face her new partner for the first time her thoughts had consisted of a rather hysterical …. No, it's not possible….. Crap, now I need to make out a will.

Standing in the doorway, wearing blue jeans, a white shirt, and a leather jacket was Sylar.

Sylar.

The man who was known for cutting off skulls and stealing powers, who had almost killed her at her High School, and whom she had seen killed by Hiro Nakamura over three years ago.

Needless to say her overall reaction was less then stealer.

"I didn't know that the human voice could reach that pitch. I'm impressed." Sylar comments as he follows her out of the building, ignoring the stares and sniggers from the surrounding cubicles.

Claire says nothing in response as she clenches her hands into fists, concentrating on controlling the urge to knock him to the ground and hold her knife to his throat.

They are in the parking lot before Claire whirls to face him, Sylar instantly halting and putting hands in his pockets as Claire keeps her hands poised over her knife and gun. Sylar opens his mouth to speak, but Claire beats him to it. She doesn't know what Sylar expected her voice to sound like, maybe he thought it would be fearful as she faces the man who was once her worst nightmare, or perhaps he had expected the whiney one of a spoiled teenager.Judging by the slight widening of his eyes, it definitely was not the calm, yet somehow lethal tones of one who was well accustomed to carrying out threats.

"Let's get something straight, Sylar. We've been assigned together as partners, which means we are not allowed to kill each other. Which is convent for you, I'm assuming, seeing as I can't die. You could put a knife in my heart and you wouldn't get in trouble for it. But if I ever see your finger rise to cut off my skull, I will kill you. Do I make myself clear?"

"Crystal." He says, his voice serious and his face expressionless as if he wants her to know that he does not doubt the sincerity of her threat in the least.

Claire gives a curt nod and continues to walk across the parking lot, not wanting to spend a second longer in his company that day then she has to.

They began Sylar's training the next day, Claire choosing to instruct the lesson sans defensive powers. If Sylar had thought it would be easy to overpower her, then he was wrong. Claire has him flat on his back in five seconds, her fake training gun pointed straight at his head. Claire expects him to be angry that he was made to be the weak one instead of her, but surprisingly he isn't. Sylar only tightens his shoulders, gets a steely expression on his face and rises to his feet, motioning for her to go again.

And so it continues. Claire teaches him everything that she has been taught over the past four years. She teaches him how to break bones without damaging the internal organs, how to deliver a fatal and non fatal stab wound, how to aim and fire a gun, which injury will cause the slowest possible death, and how to turn something like height or strength against your opponent. It's doesn't always come out in Claire's favor of course, for Sylar is much taller and stronger then her, and she receives as many broken and bloody noses, black eyes, and pulled muscles as she gives him. Claire instructs Sylar on how to break someone's hold, how to stalk a suspect without being noticed, and how to "bag and tag" someone without leaving evidence behind.

She takes him to the exercise room in order to up his endurance and stamina, whereupon she learns that he can complete five miles on the track and four rounds on the agility course before doubling over, gasping for air. She makes him work harder.

Claire isn't all that eager to take him out into the field with her, mostly because she doesn't trust him not to murder their targets, but she has to regardless of her personal preference. For the first few months Claire deliberately puts him in situations where he would have the prime opportunity to kill, such as choosing a target that has an ability that Claire knows Sylar doesn't possess. To her surprise he never does, even though his entire body is tense, there is a predatory gleam in his eyes, and it looks like it's costing him his arms and legs to refrain from taking what he so desperately wants.

Claire also puts them in scenarios where their lives are in danger, such as nearly drowning or facing off with a guy who can shoot venom out of his eyes. This isn't done so much to see if she can trust Sylar to have her back, or if her will try to murder their suspect, but rather a test of Claire's own to see when Sylar will realize the dangers of this job, and if he will then take her power for himself.

After a full year of working with him Claire trusts him not to kill her, and by a year and a half Claire knows that he will have her back out in the field, and that he will not try to slice open her skull and take her power.

Despite that Claire can't bring herself to call him "Gabriel", no matter how much he asks, proves that he feels honest regret for killing those whom he had, or denies his identity as the psychopathic killer known as "Sylar", claiming that he "doesn't want to be that person anymore."

It isn't until their second year as partners when they are doing nothing more then sitting on a bench in Central Park, watching the pigeons and people fly by that the name "Gabriel" slips out. When her partner hears her calling him by the name that he had been trying so hard to prove to her that he deserved, he smiles. It is the first real smile that Claire has seen from him. Oh sure, she's seen his "Sylar is still in there somewhere" smile, his "nervous smile", and his "this is a fun training session" smile, but this is the first time that Claire has ever seen such a genuine, unrestrained, happy smile from him. Right then and there Claire decides to keep calling him Gabriel, after all he has more then proven that he deserves it, and if a simple name can make him smile like that… well, Claire doesn't see any reason to not to call her partner whatever he wants to be called.

PART FOUR

Friendship is something that feels new to Claire Bennett. She hasn't truly had a friend since Zach back in High School, and that friendship had been short lived, to say the least. Claire doesn't really have any friends at Pinehurst despite working there for three years, just colleagues. So when Claire begins to feel friendship for Gabriel it doesn't register until about two years of having him as her partner.

Claire and Gabriel begin to train together more frequently, they go to movies, and play cards. He helps her fix her computer and learns how she takes her coffee, and she learns that he loves to play chess and read Charles Dickens. Gabriel sleeps on her couch after missions that leave them both exhausted, and when Claire falls asleep in unfamiliar surroundings she trusts Gabriel to have her back. Claire makes him stir-fry for dinner when he's feeling down and he makes Cheesecake for her birthday. They have both witnessed each other kill entire families, children, even animals out in the field without batting an eyelash, and have been privy to the personal aftermath.

Claire has given Gabriel her blood on more then one occasion as he lays on the ground, near death from a severed artery or falling from a 12 story building.

"Don't look so worried. You know you'll never be able to get rid of me, Claire." He will say, even as he coughs up blood and bits of bone or his spine straightens itself from it's disgusting U shape.

Gabriel tells Claire about his childhood; how he had been abandoned by his father and was physcogcially abused by a mentally unstable mother, and how he had become a watch maker because he had still been trying to please Martin Gray. In turn, Claire revels to him what it was like to grow up with a father whose word you were constantly questioning, her mother and brother's deaths, and how she had been abandoned and unwanted by her biological parents.

Claire learns that Gabriel accidently killed his mother, is just as fond of tea and fruit as she is of coffee and chocolate, and Gabriel comes to know that her fondness for birds equals his indifference to them.Gabriel revels how he had been approached by Chandra Suresh, how her dad and his "female partner" had manupititled him into killing when he had been trying so hard to control himself, and how he had fallen in love with the "female partner". Claire tells him how she had almost caused the death of a quarterback in High School who had attempted to rape her, how she had only ever had one real friend in her entire life, and discovers that they both hate carrots and blackberries.

Gabriel tells Claire about all the people his Hunger compelled him to kill, how he had briefly been captured by the Company and had began a relationship with the same "female partner" that had tricked him into killing his second victim, and he learns that Claire loves bananas, strawberries, and books by Stephan King. Claire comes to know exactly how he had been lead to believe that Arthur and Angela Petrelli were his parents, that he had almost killed a woman he had loved, because he and Peter had spent "eight years" together inside of his head thanks to a crazy telepath Gabriel now considers him to be his brother, and that he had been sold as a child to the people whom he had grown up thinking were his parents.

In time, Claire tells Gabriel about all of the people she has been forced to kill while working for Pinehurst, and Gabriel tells her that one of the reasons that he is fighting so hard to control his Hunger is because he is afraid of turning into an unfeeling, heartless monster, just like his biological father.

When Claire finally realizes that she and Gabriel have become friends, she knows that there is no one whom she'd rather have next to her on a stakeout or would allow to sleep on her couch.

TBC