Korgano:

Written for the prompt - Solar.

(Warning: this fic is based heavily on an episode of ST:TNG called Masks hence its sort of nuts :P Enjoy!)

It was night but the sky was bright as the clouds burned, churning with both fire and lightning as they had for many nights before, raging along with the man who dwelled high above the city he had ravaged.

New York stood still; smoke still rising in places where the self appointed god had directed his wrath but the streets had long since ceased to bustle, bereft of all signs of life now that the people who had once inhabited the great city had fled.

Three months previously a great battle had waged, one that had carried the hopes of all who were left and left them all broken, waiting for the inevitable spread of destruction and death that followed such a loss.

Peter Petrelli, their last and seeming only hope, was dead, and the man who killed him, ablaze with triumph and the glut of new powers he had received, remained in place at the scene of his victory, taunting the heavens from atop the remains of what had once been the Deveaux building, now all that remained of uptown New York.

Peter had gone, armed with his own vast array of powers and the remaining few with abilities who were brave enough to face the man turned monster.

Sylar.

Mohinder stood at the base of the gracefully ornate tower, head tilted to the rolling, blazing skies above it, his mouth dry as he took his first few steps up the fire escape, well aware that the almost omnipotent killer would be able to hear his drawn out approach. His heartbeat alone would have set him apart from the lingering spectres as it was, pounding in fright as his feet somehow carried him closer to the man he'd fled the continent to avoid roughly two years before.

Steady clang after clang heralded his slow, tortuous trip to the top, his feet seeming to numb with each new set of steps upwards, muscles screaming from their sudden overuse. He tried counting the stairs as he went, attempting to distract himself from the gnawing disquiet rippling through him.

The last time he'd seen Sylar, Mohinder had been running, literally, for his life as fireballs rolled through long passageways, chasing the last of the living Company employees from the building, Mohinder directing his team out towards the exits, coughing and wondering if this time it was truly too late to escape.

Sylar had hunted them down, from place to place, wreaking his vengeance on those stupid enough to try and tame him, seizing powers as he went.

Mohinder had stumbled, choking on the smoke, tumbling to lay momentarily dazed and shaking on the floor, gasping as he tried to force his heavy limbs up and onwards, only to find himself pulled, puppet-like, to stand on his own two feet once more, an invisible shove to his back urging him forward.

"Quickly now, Dr Suresh," a deep voice had mocked from the flame engulfed end of the corridor and, turning, Mohinder had gaped to see the killer visibly holding back a bank of flames with one outstretched palm, the other hand still hovering over what appeared to be the shattered body of Robert 'Bob' Bishop. "…Run, Mohinder." Sylar continued his smile brightly twisted in the flickering light, "I can't hold it forever."

And so Mohinder had fled, not just the building but the country itself, at first unable to understand why the murderer had spared him before beginning to fear that the man still had plans for him and removing himself to where Sylar's powers had still yet to reach. He had remained in hiding for a long time, too long it seemed, his whereabouts known only to Noah Bennett and then to none when he too had fallen, literally torn apart in his efforts to give Claire time to get away.

Where Claire was now, no-one knew. Peter had erased her memory and sent her as far away as he could, determined to save the last remaining member of his family and, seeing that Sylar had only achieved his longed for immortality by killing Peter, it was possible that she lived on, blissfully unaware and carefree, just as her father had always wished for her.

Mohinder's stomach turned and twisted on itself as it had ever since he had realised that the lack of contact with Noah's band had meant more than his heightening security measures, guilt roaring through him when he realised just how far he'd run from his old life that he could have left behind so many, to die for him, one by one until he was all that was left.

He stopped briefly, eyes flickering shut with regret at his own cowardice. He'd told himself it was sensible, self preservation for the good of everybody, removing himself before Sylar could reveal his reasons for keeping him in the game.

He opened his eyes, breath catching briefly in his chest. He had reached the last few flights that would take him up to face the man who haunted his dreams, who had ripped away the last few people dear to Mohinder's heart as though they were simply the tissue paper carefully cradling his ultimate prize – power beyond measure and the ability to wield it for all time.

Mohinder swallowed, painfully. Facing Sylar when he had been deranged and powerless had been bad enough, facing him now that he was a self-avowed God was likely to be more terrible than he could possibly imagine.

He straightened his spine, steeling himself as best he could, drawing in as deep a breath as he could before releasing it in one long, slow gust and continuing upwards.

He was ready for this, or at least as ready as he could be. He'd put his affairs in order, visited the beach where now both his Father and Mother's ashes had been swept away by the tide, sent letters of regret and love and lost opportunities to both Mira and Molly, sorry for the love he still had and the life he never could have given them.

He placed a shaking hand on the railing and carefully swung a leg over to straddle the low wall where fire escape became balcony, pulling himself through to stand and let himself openly marvel at the wreckage laid open to his gaze from this height.

He wet his lips, blinking back the burning in his eyes as he surveyed the devastation, almost overlooking the dark figure sprawled on the floor, facing where Mohinder now stood, stock still as they each blinked in turn and locked eyes.

"…Mohinder?" Sylar spoke with something akin to incredulity, tilting his head as though trying to get a better look at his visitor, his shock white skin glowing in stark contrast to the blackness of his hair and eyes, reflecting the colours of the roiling, burning skies above them.

"Hello Sylar." Mohinder had expected to feel his terror peak upon facing the killer once more; instead it felt almost natural, as though each step back to him had been mapped out long before. "Are you surprised to see me?"

"No," Sylar smiled, eyes dark with a sort of triumph, "How could you be dead when I knew I hadn't killed you? I was, however, under the impression that you were hiding with your tail between your legs somewhere in Europe these days – or is this the mark of your glorious return to the fold? Tell me," Long legs braced against the concrete, easing the killer upright 'til he leaned, back against the low wall, his head and shoulders dark against the blazing sky, eyes glittering with scorn, "Was it my snuffing out that pathetic spark Petrelli that brought you back here or the bespectacled, powerless oaf? Because, I've got to tell you, I'd have killed them long before now if I'd only known it'd bring you out again."

Swallowing against the bile and fruitless fury that bubbled within him, Mohinder walked slowly forward, hunkering down as he reached the psychopaths still out-flung feet, the reclining form shifting, unsettled, seeming to vibrate with each new breath inwards and out. "No." Mohinder said, simply, calmly. "I came back to see you."

Sylar looked at him, disturbingly intent on his Mohinder's carefully blank face before one side of his mouth twitched and then curled upwards displaying the smooth crocodile smile that still lingered in the geneticists dreams.

"Of course you did," he chuckled, voice low and smugly delighted, "I've reached the pinnacle of the human evolutionary scale Mohinder, I've become… more. More than you, your father, even my own mother could have dreamed…"

He closed his eyes and sighed, the sky reddening and racing as the bliss rolled out of him in waves, Mohinder gasping as lightning struck several places at once nearby, the wind whipping at them both as the black eyes flickered wide once more, locked on the stunned and silenced man fittingly kneeling at his face.

"The sky," he breathed with pleasure, "I feel it, it wants me to control it, I can feel it reaching down for me… it takes all of me, almost everything I've got just to stop it from plucking me off of the earth and swallowing me whole." He laughed, something like tears shining in the dim, red light, "I, I'm so tired Mohinder. I spend all day fighting it… torn between the earth and the heavens…" His breath came quick and shallow, fingers lifting, sending debris spiralling across the horizon, whirling funnels that reached from ground to the sky, "I'm a part of it all now, all of it… better than human… more than… more than a god…"

Mohinder lurched forward, yanked upon by invisible clutching fingers, stumbling and choking on newly risen fright as he toppled to lie crumpled against the killer's side, Sylar gripping his shirtfront, gaze boring into Mohinder's skull.

"Mohinder," Sylar whispered, voice grave, his eyes wild, "I'm the sun."

Mohinder stilled, hands clenching briefly at his sides before falling slack. "The sun." He repeated softly, settling on his haunches as Sylar released his death-grip on his shirt.

"I know you think I'm crazy," Sylar laughed, a hollow sound that seemed to make the wind whistle closer to where they were huddled against the low wall, buffeting the lone peak amongst the circling clouds. "I know you think that I'm a monster, but don't you see Mohinder? Each step has brought us together, time and time again for this, for just this… it's Fate. Chasing each other, running in the same direction, just on different paths and they all led here…"

A shudder coursed through him then, interrupting his words and Mohinder blinked, dispelling the air of inevitability that had settled over him during Sylar's fervent discourse.

"Here being where, precisely?"

"I don't know…" Sylar's eyes flickered shut, crossing his arms over his torso as though cold, "I don't know anymore… I thought I was waiting for something, the next step… anything." One eye opened, briefly, blearily fixing on Mohinder's grim countenance before closing again. "Maybe I was waiting for you."

Mohinder expelled a long slow breath, his own eyes closing for a beat.

"You knew I'd come." His voice wobbled, causing him to clench his fingernails tight into his palms, hating the weakness as much as the sense of fate.

A slow, almost regretful smile spread across Sylar's face. "What's the sun without the moon to chase it across the sky?" He murmured gently, eyes popping open, bright now, alert and oddly regretful. "I thought I was alone here, I thought I wouldn't have to share the sky with you…"

"And here I thought you enjoyed the chase," Mohinder murmured, suddenly curious, "Would you really rather be alone?"

Sylar's head rolled listlessly on his shoulders, his energy seemingly depleted. "No." he murmured, "I just never thought you'd catch me… Was going to come find you…"

"And what then, Sylar? Kill me?"

Sylar favoured Mohinder with a scathing glance. "Kill you? What would become of us then, Mohinder? There I'd be, peerless and alone for all time while you lay rotting in the earth? No… I, no." He shook his head, firmly. "I'm not done with this, us, not yet."

"I suppose I should be touched that I play such an apparently major part in your future plans but really," Mohinder eased back off his haunches, grimacing as the blood flow shifted through his aching thighs, settling himself shoulder to shoulder at the killers side, "what else is there? You've run and I've caught you. I've run and you've caught me but now? Now this," he gestured expansively, "this is all there is left… there's no point in running anymore. This is it."

Lightning struck nearby again and Mohinder winced, watching as Sylar pressed his lips together, a tight, trembling line, as he visibly clenched his jaw. "This can't be all there is now, I've… I waited, this is the time, my time and, and I, I'm just… I'm just…" he ducked his head, a harsh sob ripping out, resurrecting long banished memories of duct tape restraints and shattered cups.

"Just what, Sylar?" Mohinder queried almost tenderly, his building pity for the monster settling itself in layers over years worth of rage and hate.

"Tired…" The word was ground out between clenched teeth, impotent fury and grief warring against each other, etched into his face as clear as the tear tracks left in the fine dust settling over them as the winds swirled and howled.

"I'm so tired Mohinder… all the running, the killing… all for what? These… my powers… they…" He shivered once, convulsively, casting wild eyes upwards as though wary of being overheard, "they're too much now – no one to fight, nothing to do but keep from being torn back up into the sky and it's so hard, I, I just wanted… I wanted…"

"To be special." Mohinder put a hand up, smudging the tear lingering on Sylar's cheek with the pad of his thumb.

Sylar nodded jerkily, wet lashes squeezing tight, jaw set as he visibly sought to regain control of his wayward emotions.

Mohinder sighed, a wave of fatigue rolling over him like lead, ignoring the impulse to lean sideways into the killer and huddle against the chill settling in his bones.

"Do you remember what it was like when we first met?" He blurted, voice lifting as though in laughter though the words were like copper on his tongue, colouring as low laughter burned in his ears.

"Sorry Doc, did I miss our anniversary?"

Mohinder shook his head, unaccountably sad as he rolled back the years in his mind.

"You were a murderer, still are obviously, and I was out for vengeance and somehow we were each still so full of drive and…"

"And hope." Sylar finished softly. "You gave me hope."

Mohinder grimaced, recalling when Sylar first spoke those words. He'd also given him curare and a spinal tap but something kept him from dispelling the soothing cloak of nostalgia that the killers words had enveloped them in.

"You gave me purpose." The utterance burned his throat and eyes as it spilled out over his lips and Mohinder sensed rather than saw Sylar turn his head.

"What?" The word was dry and withered, barely reaching Mohinder over the scant inches that lay between them but in it Mohinder heard the words he'd once seen scrawled time and time again in blood upon a hidden wall and a longing for the one thing they both needed, the thing Mohinder had come all this way to offer.

"Finding Zane, realising your deception and then hunting you, racing you to people who had no idea of their role in our world – it gave me a life, a purpose. Not the one I would have chosen but once I took even one step down the path my Father tried to keep me from… I could never go back."

Sylar's eyes were downcast, his face impassive. "Would you?"

"Would I what?"

Black eyes suddenly bored into Mohinder's own deep brown. "Would you go back, if you could? Change your path, do things differently?"

"Yes." Mohinder breathed, his own eyes fluttering closed.

"What would you change?" Sylar's voice was hesitant and Mohinder had to suppress a smile at the barefaced vulnerability.

"I'm not sure," he sighed, "Perhaps come here with my father, perhaps never come at all." He hesitated, swallowing as his throat thickened around his continued reply. "Perhaps nothing quite so big… a different step versus a different path."

Sylar's smile was slow and almost longing. "I'd like that, same direction, same path but maybe a different destination…"

"Would you do it then? Would you go back, if you could?"

Sylar pulled a face, his lip curling in disdain. "I tried, but it changes too much, even one visit back into the past alters the present, lost a few powers with just one trip, took about 5 to put them all back."

"I don't mean actually return to the past… I mean." Mohinder placed a hand on Sylar's, trying to imbue his words with all the power he could muster. "What if I said I could start us over again?"

Sylar quirked a single dark brow even as he body trembled under the Indians warm touch. "Is this a reincarnation thing?"

Mohinder laughed, a quick bark of mirth that surprised them both into sitting dead upright. "No, I, no. I mean… what if you could start over, from here, as we are now?"

Sylar trembled and the building shook beneath them.

"What are you saying, Mohinder?"

Mohinder reached slowly into his pocket, aware of Sylar's eyes on him ready to deflect any weaponry he might produce, hissing as his gaze fell on the syringe he drew forth. "I'm saying," Mohinder said, putting out his empty hand to tap beneath Sylar's chin, bringing his eyes and attention back up to his face, "that I can start the clock again… for us both."

Sylar sneered even as the shudders wracking his body forced him to settle back against the low wall, bursts of heat and light briefly bursting from his hands and shining in his eyes. "I'm not into suicide pacts Mohinder, sorry to disappoint you."

"This isn't about death Sylar… I made this – this is my cure."

The dark eyes remained on him, unblinking, almost unfocused as he took steady, deep breaths in and out through his nose before letting his focus shift from Mohinder to the needle clutched in shaking Mohinder's grasp.

"They were calling it Rebirth at the lab – it, it started out as a way to help children who displayed harmful abilities in early life, not erasing powers so much as simply burying them, letting them slowly emerge at a later date when best judged by their families or even themselves…" Mohinder swallowed, mouth dry with sudden apprehension, "I… I changed it just… just for you."

Sylar's lip curled in a sneer, heavy with rejection but his eyes seemed to be narrowed, burning, on the syringe. "Changed how?"

"It forces the ability into retreat, the body… rejects it, for want of a better word until no trace remains…"

Sylar snarled and the sky lit up once more. "That's their cure!" He bellowed, earth, sky and building all shaking and blazing all around them. "I don't WANT…"

"But to be permanent it has to be administered daily!" Mohinder yelped, hands lifted to shield his eyes from the rippling light above him, "Without renewal, the body starts producing the cells exactly as it had when your ability first manifested itself – you would only have your own, your ability Sylar! Only yours…"

Mohinder broke off, panting as the lights dimmed and Sylar's head dipped to his chest once more.

"I would… it would be like…." The killer mumbled brokenly to himself, sentences lost between his lips and the material of his shirt, "Just mine…?"

"You could start again," Mohinder began soothingly jerking back as Sylar's head shot up again, his smile and eyes too bright for sanity.

"You said that – said it before, said take a different path, different steps, same place though… same journey… What… what would you do, Doc?"

Mohinder let a laugh slip, tears smarting at the corners of his eyes. "What would 'I' do? With the chance for rest, peace – a new beginning?"

Sylar's eyes were heavy on him now, large tears reflecting his own as they pooled against dark lower lashes, seeming to still his very breath in his chest better to hear Mohinder's quiet reply.

"I would take it – with both hands outstretched."

The killer's eyes fell shut then, his entire body abruptly registering the weight of choice upon his soul before slowly, deliberately lifting both hands, outstretched, palms already cupped and quivering in anticipation of Mohinder's gift.

"Then I'll take it, gladly." He whispered, eyes far away even as he seemed to look deep into Mohinder's soul. "And when it's done we'll walk away…"

"Yes." Mohinder sighed, eyes flickering shut with relief, "We'll start afresh."

"And then," Mohinder's eyes flew open at the all too familiar sound of dark mirth rolling from those cruelly turned up lips "I'll find you, once again."

"Yes." Mohinder whispered again and pushed the needle into Sylar's waiting flesh, eyes low at the soft hiss emitting from the lips of the now dwindling god as the cool liquid was pushed into his veins. "You should feel slightly groggy," Mohinder's voice was soft, a leftover effect from years of telling stories at Molly's bedtime, "There's a sedative incorporated into the shot."

Sylar's smile was lazy, easy as he let himself recline back against the floor once more, face lifted to reflect the calmer, cooler tones now scattered through the sky.

"Bed rest, Doctors orders, right Doc?" He slurred with a breathy chuckle.

"Certainly," Mohinder agreed evenly, his eyes locked on Sylar's slackening visage, "Sleep has amazing restorative powers – rest now and you can rise once more… begin the hunt again…" His voice was lower now, softer than a whisper as he leaned closer, a hand stealing to his other pocket.

"Begin the hunt again…" Sylar murmured, so quiet now that Mohinder might have missed his words if not for his proximity, "Yes… I am …eager… for… that…"

Mohinder watched as the pale man's breathing levelled out, sliding deeper into blissful oblivion as he slipped his second syringe into the juncture of throat and chest, heart seizing behind his ribs as the unconscious man jerked once then twice before laying still and quiet, the light simply blinking from the sky.

"As am I." Mohinder whispered as the shadows swallowed up all that he could see and, lifting a hand through the darkness to carefully rest it against the chest now stilled forever, he wondered dimly if the sun would ever rise again.

Fin.