I wish I could say that I found out before all the rest of them (even if most of them already knew the dirty little secret) before Peter most of all, so I could have been the one to out them all, pull away the mask of a friend to reveal an enemy and be the one to save them all with something we should have seen from the very start.
But sadly I was the one that they (he) were able to fool the best.
"How's my girl?"
Ever since we came back from the war that had taken the life from all of us (sadly my life will go on forever and ever) it was as if I had two fathers, the father I had never truly known until now and the one that had been my side for it all.
"Peachy, collage life isn't all it's cracked up to be Nathan, how are you?"
"Getting ready to become the most important man in the world, so just perfect, Claire-bear."
(the second father, who now has a bad habit of eavesdropping on me and the man he fears will someday replace him, doesn't like him calling me that one single bit, which is why Nathan always ends each call like that 'Claire-bear')
Each and every part of this new and improved Nathan should have sent sirens off, the calls filled to the brim with 'love' and 'claire-bears', the fact that he talked to me more then Peter, and that now after all the secrets he wanted to whole wide world to know he had a daughter.
But instead I believed with all of my heart that the man before me was one hundred present my father.
"Goodnight, love you."
"I love you too, Claire."
(do I regret saying those three-little-words to him, him who would later be unmasked as my greatest fear and enemy? Not one bit, because I would have never gotten the chance to say those words, after all he's gone)
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After all the 'I love yous', the surprise visits to the collage (the one place where I got to be normal), and blushed cheeks when I call him 'dad' for the very first time, the real world came crashing head first into all of us, the people that didn't know that the man, father and brother they loved was not as he seemed.
"How could you do this to me, dad? I l-loved him, so much and your telling me now that the man I've come to love is Sylar?"
Peter, the one that got the most pain out of this (he who was beginning to think, yet again, that his brother no longer loved him) reacted in the very same way, the tears that rolled down my cheeks matched his but his anger was so much more massive because he got the show it with all of his shiny new powers.
And you can guess who got all of the electric bursts of hate, the reason for it all, Sylar who was still smiling at us in Nathan's face but thanks to one Matt Parkman was back to his old tricks once again.
"You son of a bitch! You killed him, how could you?"
"It was easy, Pete, as easy as killing you."
As this was all playing out, once again the two of them facing good vs. evil ready to put an end to each other while I watched it all, helpless just like all those times before, but this time it was going to go very different,
"No! Stop, please don't hurt him."
In that moment all I wanted was for all of this to come to end (and this time not in flames and blood, as always), wanted that leering face the one that still haunted my nightmares, dead or alive, to become the face of the loving father but it clear that the whole thing had shattered and all that was left was for the rest to break apart.
"And why would I do that Claire?"
It's clear that he doesn't remember a thing about his second life, life as someone good, not pure as snow but not a bit of evil in his heart, doesn't remember becoming my best friend, my father and then taking it away in just a few seconds.
So the last thing he remembers is the epic battle, the one that ended in ash, and that last words he had spoken to me (before sending me across the room like a volleyball) 'you could be my first, first lady'.
"If you don't hurt Peter, or the rest of them that did this do you, I'll come with you and become what you wanted me to, your f-first lady."
"Deal, Claire-bear, deal."
(this may be the worse thing I've chosen to do in my never going to be normal life, but it was for them, for dad, for Peter, for my family and that was enough for me)
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