hvs2 Episode One: Don't Panic

by heroes vs2

They saved the cheerleader, but they only took the first step towards saving the world. Ensemble cast. Pics up two months after How to Stop an Exploding Man.

Disclaimer: Heroes belongs to NBC and Tim Kring and is being used solely for fun.

Episode One: Don't Panic

Molly Walker
New York City

When Molly wasn't looking for people, she couldn't see them. That was why it wasn't until the front door burst open that she realized someone was there—someone was coming for her. The first thing she did was grab her cell phone. It was sitting on her bedside table, sparkling from the rhinestone stickers Claire had given her last week. It was easy to make out in the rays of sunlight filtering through closed drapes.

There was no service—which was wrong, because they got service everywhere in their apartment. She shivered, concentrating on whoever was out there. Maybe it was just a robbery, maybe she could hide in the secret compartment in the back of her closet (Mr. Bennet called it their "panic room").

But she didn't see anyone, just had a moment of feedback, followed by icy certainty: the bad man was looking at her, had found her. Whoever was outside her room was there because the bad guy sent him.

She was at the window when her door crashed open, splinters of wood dusting over the small, pink-decorated bedroom. The man was huge, with cold eyes and a shaved head. And a weapon. Molly only looked at him for a second, pulling open the window and scampering onto the fire escape.

"Dammit," the man breathed out and Molly could hear it because he was still too close.

She climbed, sliding down the ladders in ways that hurt her hands, but she'd seen on tv and knew would be faster. Mohinder had told her what to do—run, get into a public area, shout about strangers and cling onto the nearest adults. But she was only halfway down and could almost feel the big man closing in on her.

Then he did, catching her thin forearm and pulling. She clutched onto a rusting metal bar, feet dangling. The man was breathing hard, smirking at her in victory.

"Molly!" Mohinder was home. She still couldn't use her powers, but could imagine him finding the door open, scrambling through their home, pulling out the gun Mr. Bennet had given him.

"C'mon, kid, we're leaving." The man pulled her to him, starting to run down the rest of the fire escape as she struggled, screaming and clawing until she managed to kick him, hard, in the groin.

He shouted in pain, she in relief as she felt his grip loosen. She pushed away from him, feet scrambling for balance, eyes widening as they took in the big man reaching for her, Mohinder pulling himself through the window above, and the too-rusted section of the landing she was on giving out, falling to the ground below her.

The last thing she saw was Mohinder, his anguished scream the last thing she heard. But it was the bad man she felt, staring at her through the darkness.

Heidi & Nathan Petrelli
New York City

The cold January wind sliced through Heidi's overcoat and burned her cheeks as she stood, trying to smile at the restless crowd of journalists. The boys were safely and warmly tucked away at school, and she envied them. And her feet hurt, which just annoyed her more. She was supposed to appreciate being able to stand, but right now, she was almost missing the wheelchair.

Nathan was at the podium, leaning against it, looking down at his notes one more time before he looked up and said, "Before we start, I'd just like to update you all on the status of the search for my brother, Peter. As you probably know, it's been two months since the day he disappeared. So far, there hasn't been any sign of him."

She watched him as he continued to speak about the search. His voice was perfectly level, his posture exact, his expression one of grave, somber concern. He looked, as he always did, perfectly appropriate.

But it wasn't right.

He was like this for the press... but he was like this at home, too. Locked down tight, perfectly political, always frowning at the right moment, laughing at the right joke. Ever since Peter had disappeared.

He seemed... broken.

The crowd suddenly roared to life. Apparently, he'd opened the floor to questions. She tuned out his answers, knowing them all by heart by now, and instead, continued watching him, with a small, fake, interested-looking smile on her face. His affect was flatter, his range of reactions narrower.

She'd been trying to decide how to bring up the subject of antidepressants for a month now.

Eventually, Sidney stepped up and closed down the session, and Nathan walked away from the mike, neatly stacking his notes. He caught her by the shoulder with just one hand and she walked off stage with him, her body clenching even at that contact. He'd barely touched her in two months.

Noah & Claire Bennet
Odessa, Texas

Every morning, now, Noah woke up staring at the roof of the Winnebago and thinking, They killed Sandra. They killed Lyle.

Every morning.

It was as fresh as when he arrived back in Odessa, and found a message waiting for him at the hotel asking him to contact the police as soon as possible. As when he walked into that morgue, saw the sheets pulled back, and saw the still, pale faces of his wife and his--goddammit, goddammit--twelve-year-old son.

Then, there in the morgue, his cell had rung, and it had been the dog hotel, asking if everything was all right, and if Mrs. Bennet would be coming soon to pick up Mr. Muggles.

He was a fool to have thought they'd be safe. Of course they wouldn't be safe.

This morning, he sat up on the bench that was his bed, the memory still swirling in his head, and put his feet down on the floor of the RV. He looked down to the end of the vehicle, past the tiny kitchenette, to where Claire was still asleep in what passed for a bedroom, with Mr. Muggles lying curled in the crook of her knees.

Sunlight burned through the thin, polyester curtains, filling the room with an orange-ish glow. Outside, he could hear a bird whistling, and the voices of other early-rising, cold weather campers parked at the Kia campground. Most of the voices, even filtered through the walls, had an unmistakeable Texas twang.

Back in Odessa--or just outside of it, at least.

He pulled his suitcase out from under the bench and set it on top of it. He opened his contacts case and put them in, then pulled on a pair of pants and a flannel shirt over his T-shirt. Presentable enough, he went outside, cringing as the brightness washed over him.

He didn't think much as he trimmed his beard and brushed his teeth in the campground bathroom. He swallowed down two more pills for the pain in his back. He looked up at his reflection. The colored contacts gave him brown eyes, hair dye had made him a dark brunette--streaked with a bit of grey--and the combined two months of not being able to make himself eat much had given him a gaunter profile. There were dark circles under his eyes. Sleep had been difficult lately. He hardly recognized himself, sometimes. Hopefully, it would be enough.

So far, he supposed it had been.

He sort of looked like Ted, come to think of it. He smiled without mirth. Given his current mission, that was oddly appropriate.

He was out to destroy the Company.

Mohinder Suresh
New York City

Mohinder didn't consciously aim, didn't process that he was pulling the trigger until it was done, until there was a very precise hole in the head of the large man on the fire escape below him. A quick jump covered the last three steps, bringing him to the body of the would-be kidnapper, giving him a clear view of the little girl in the alleyway below them.

In the two months he had known her, Mohinder had come to see Molly as a surrogate daughter. He had admitted, at least to himself, that his original interest in her had to do with the things she had in common with Shanti, but once he truly got to know her, he couldn't help but love her for herself. Molly had been an extraordinary girl: brave, caring, funny. It wasn't hard for Mohinder to become enamored with her, begging Bennet to help him find a way to keep her with him.

And now all of that was meaningless. No one could have survived that fall. Even from where Mohinder stood he could see the blood seeping onto the pavement and the complete lack of movement. The part that scared him the most, he realized was that he'd lost so many people in such a short period of time (his father, Eden, "Zane," and, in a way, Shanti, who had had found and lost all at once) that he was beginning to become numb to the process.

He moved back to the body of the intruder, patting down his jacket until he found a battered wallet. The man wasn't planning on getting caught. Inside there was a Florida driver's license, crumpled bills, a few credit cards, and a stash of business cards featuring the same name as the license. They were all for Primatech Paper.

Mohinder cursed and sat back against the stairs, listening to them creak, closing his eyes. This was something he should have been expecting, that Bennet had been half expecting from the beginning. Someone from Primatech still wanted Molly and hadn't even attempted to go through Mohinder to get her. There were no phone calls, no mysterious meetings as they attempted to convince him that giving her up would be for the best. That somehow having Molly be used as a tool was for the greater good.

Fumbling at his cell phone, his fingers hit the familiar pattern to speed dial Bennet, frowning when he didn't hear the noise of it dialing out. Opening his eyes he stared down at the display screen. No service. That was impossible, he was in the middle of a crowded city block, out in the open.

His eyes immediately began searching: the alley, the nearby windows, then the roofs. There was a figure there, wearing black and crouching low along the edge of the building across from him. Watching. The man who broke into his home hadn't been alone, whoever was with him was someone with the ability to disrupt cell phone service and probably quite a few other things. That would explain why there still weren't any sirens in the distance, the neighborhood wasn't so bad that a gunshot and two dead bodies would go unreported.

The figure waved, then turned and walked across the roof. The service bars on Mohinder's cellphone began piling up again. They weren't after him, then.

He wasn't sure if that was a good thing.

Niki & Micah Sanders
Somewhere in Texas

"Have a good day at school, baby."

Niki kissed Micah on the forehead, hugging him to her with an arm while she dispensed his lunch into his open book bag with the other. "I love you, you know."

"Yes mom. Can I go now? Sam's waiting for me." Sam, the next door neighbour's child, was indeed waiting for him, impatiently rocking back and forth on his feet outside of the screen door of their house, a hand picking at his red nose.

Niki smiled, amused, and was silently grateful for the millionth time to have such an amazing kid.

"Sure honey. Don't forget that we're having dinner tonight with the Nitwick's, so don't stay out too late playing with Sam."

Micah nodded and Niki passed him off to DL for his requisite hug. It was her big boy's first day at his new school and although he didn't seem nervous at all, Niki was anxious enough for the both of them. The usual questions ran through her mind- would he have friends? Would they pick on him? Was he too smart for them?

But no, that last one wouldn't apply here. Here, in this perfect town with these perfect neighbours (and their perfectly imperfect son) was a school that catered to kids like Micah. And for once they could actually afford it, thanks to Micah himself and Linderman.

All roads lead to Linderman, even after he's dead, apparently.

"Niki!"

As Niki ushered her son out of their house, she glanced over to see her overly perky next door neighbour and her gardening husband. Sam's parents who had greeted them the day after they'd fully moved in with a beautiful chocolate mousse cake and exclamations of how wonderful the neighbourhood, the school, their son was.

She and DL had started looking for somewhere else to live right after the Kirby Plaza event and this place, this place of money and some strange brand of happiness was so far away from their old life that neither of them could resist.

But there was something weird about it, she thought as she watched Mrs. Nitwick's husband water his petunias. Or maybe she was just so used to madness and chaos and broken fragments of thought that led to terrible places that she would never feel truly comfortable with happiness as a concept.

Noticing that Shelly was still waving, still smiling as though Niki hadn't been staring blankly in her direction for the past few minutes, she forced herself out of her thoughts and back into the present.

She smiled wanly and waved.

"DL, we have to go," she called into the house as Micah disappeared down the street.

Claire was gone when he got back--her note said "Bathroom"--so he answered with a similarly loquaitious "Camp Store" and went to get the paper. He talked a bit with the ranger about the weather and the news and then returned to the RV.

She was sitting over a bowl of Cheerios at the tiny table, reading the back of the box, when he walked in. She looked up and for a disconcerting second, between the lighting and her dark hair and eyes, she looked staggeringly like her biological uncle.

"Hey, Dad," she said.

He put an arm around her and kissed the top of her head. "Morning, sweetheart. You sleep ok?"

She shrugged under his arm. "I dunno. You know," she said, and the utter teenaged-ness of the non-answer startled a smile out of him.

"I am so enlightened," he said, drolly, as he stepped around her to get a Poptart out of the cupboard.

"So," he said, as he sat down at the table, "History and math, today, right?"

"Yes, Dad," she drawled, as she dug through the paper looking for the comics.

"It's important," he said, trying to sound reproving.

"I know, Dad," she said, obviously focused more on Foxtrot than him.

That was all right. He settled in to eating his Poptart. Claire was taking to home-schooling well. He didn't even need to nag her, really, but it lent a certain normalcy to their life that was otherwise painfully lacking. He skimmed through the front page, wishing she wasn't reading the Funnies with such a somber visage. She used to laugh loud and free. He hoped she would again, someday.

He'd just reached the back of the A-Section when she said, quietly, "So, tonight's the night, huh?"

"Yes," he said, setting down the paper.

She was staring glumly at the back of the Cheerios box again. "I wish you'd let me help."

His answer was immediate, well-rehearsed, and instinctual. "Absolutely not, Claire. It is out of the question, and I've told you before and I'll tell you again, there's no point in discussing it."

She looked up with tragic eyes and he steeled himself against it. "But what if something happens to you? What if I could have helped?"

"Claire, I've been doing this kind of thing for almost twenty years now. You... are sixteen. I'm not trying to denigrate you, sweetheart, I know you are a capable young woman, but it is just not a good idea."

"I can't even get hurt!" she snapped, slapping her open palm on the table.

He kept his voice level, and looked her deep in the eye. "Claire, there are more ways to get hurt than physical. I want you safe. That's final. And if you can't accept that, then we'll just leave, now, the Company be damned."

That did it. She slumped back in her chair. "Fine. Fine, whatever."

He was silent in the car, sitting and flipping through some notes from one of his old campaign speeches. He knew them by heart, she knew.

"Nathan," she said.

"Hmm?" he said, not looking up but for a second, "Yeah, hon?"

She sighed, then reached over and pulled the papers from his hand. "Nathan, we need to talk."

He glanced up at Sidney, in the driver's seat across the glass partition, talking inaudibly into his headset, then finally looked at her. Kind of. He was more looking past her than at her, but it was close enough for now. "What's on your mind?" he said.

"You," she said, not smiling.

He grinned a toothy, political grin at her and said, "So somber."

"Nathan, I'm serious. Something's not right. You're not all right."

He sobered slightly and said, "I'm fine, Heidi."

"You're not. You're..." She took a deep breath, then said, quietly, "Peter and your father, they both--" She stopped herself before saying the word 'depression.' "I'm worried." She reached out to touch his hand, but he pulled away smoothly, lifting his arm over her to rest behind her across the back of the seat. She pressed on, putting her hands in her lap. "Especially now, with Peter being gone so long--" With Peter probably dead, was another thing she left unsaid.

"Look--" he interrupted, pulling his arm away again and facing forward. "I know I've been a little off, lately. I mean, what do you expect?"

"I expect you to talk to me, Nathan," she said. "I expect you to let me help you. You can't--you can't be the perfect Congressman all the time, it'll kill you. Look, I know how much he meant to you--" she stopped, abruptly, horrified by her own use of the past tense, but Nathan apparently hadn't even noticed. He was still looking out the opposite window at the passing traffic, avoiding the conversation.

She reached across the space between them and gripped his shoulder. "Nathan, I'm scared for you. I'm scared for us, and for the boys. Your father, he-- and Peter tried--" Peter probably succeeded, though god knew that wasn't the thing to say now. "I can't lose you. We can't lose you. I think you need help. I just want you to be okay."

He'd turned and was watching her, his expression inscrutable. She pushed on, not sure whether his silence meant he was tuning her out or he was finally listening, but praying it was the latter. "Nathan, you haven't even cried. We haven't made love more than twice in the past two months. Can't you see what that could mean?"

He inhaled and then exhaled in a rough sigh, then reached up and took her hand from his shoulder and kissed the back of it. "All right. All right," he said. "I'll talk to someone, okay?"

"Really?" she said, and couldn't help the note of skepticism.

"Yeah," he said, looking her straight in the eye like he always did when he was lying. "Really."

She was shaking her head even as she said, "All right. Good."

She turned to her window to hide the tears in her eyes.

Mohinder packed. He couldn't think of anything else to do. It wasted time, time he now had with the knowledge that he wasn't a target and with the suspicious lack of police activity. Packing gave him an hour, the time he needed to come up with a plan. As he packed away his research and folded his clothing into ragged piles, he ran over the situation in his head, breaking it down into digestible chunks:

Someone had tried to kidnap Molly. There were two bodies in the alley beside his apartment building. An hour after the fact, there were still no sirens sounding. There was another person, another would-be kidnapper, who blocked the signal of Mohinder's cell phone. They hadn't been after the list, or Mohinder, or his research.

He shuddered, filled with self-disgust at the relief caused by that thought. This hadn't been because of him. It wasn't a fact that would bring Molly back, couldn't comfort him when faced with the knowledge he had just killed someone. It shouldn't be so easy to kill another human being. He didn't feel any remorse, just a sort of cold dread.

Molly's room was last. When he entered his knees weakened and he collapsed onto the bed, lying there for entire minutes as the Hello Kitty bedside clock clicked away the time. He struggled to sit and stare around the room, eyes lingering on each discarded piece of clothing, every toy. The multitude of picture frames lining the walls: Molly and her parents, Molly and Mohinder, Molly and Claire, and Noah, and Micah. There was even a picture of the entire group, everyone who had survived that final battle.

Mohinder took that frame apart, carefully folding the picture and placing it in his wallet. The lack of Peter was a slow, constant ache that Mohinder could feel even through the ever-spreading lassitude. He'd been a part of things from the beginning, a catalyst for it all, drawing them ever closer to that one, final point.

Not sure where he was going, he didn't pack away the handgun in the holster at his side, though the extra Bennet had given him was locked in its small safe and shoved between a sweater and a pair of trousers. The only thing of his left that was worth taking was a binder, shoved in the back of his closet, slowly unearthed as he packed. There were clippings from printed out newspaper articles, highlighted and annotated. It proved that, despite everything, the bad would always outlive the good.

When Mohinder took Molly in, it would have been too hard to keep his flimsy cover as a cab driver. He'd used connections from his university and geneticists he had often conferred with to obtain a part time faculty position at one of the smaller colleges in the city. Awkward flirting with the female head of the science department and a newly minted article in a well-read journal had been helping to solidify his position. He had been sure it was only a matter of time before they offered him something more permanent, a way for he and Molly to move up in the world.

It had given him enough of a disposable income to own a car. A cheap, small, foreign car that some of his American colleagues made fun of, but it was enough to allow him and Molly to go on weekend trips to visit the others. Now it meant he wouldn't need to hold an extremely private conversation while in the backseat of someone else's taxi.

A breathless, female voice answered the phone and he almost smiled at the genuine life that was there under the too mature tone. "Hello, Claire, may I speak with your father, please?"

She was silent for a beat, then Mohinder could hear her calling for her foster father and the rustling of a phone changing hands. "Mohinder."

"Molly's dead."

He realized he could have been more tactful, but Bennet appreciated the direct approach, immediately switching into his familiar, cold demeanor as Mohinder related the events and answered his questions.

"You can't stay there."

"I'm already leaving."

"Where are you planning on going?"

In another life, his destination would be India. To his family's home, to the academic world he had been born into, but it was too late for that. In less than a year, Mohinder had changed completely, gone from skeptic to true believer, from docile scientist into…murderer. He had nowhere to run to, but now he certainly had people to run after.

"The kidnapper had a card. With a location and a company name…Florida and Primatech."

The quick intake of breath was more telling than most words that left Bennet's mouth. "Primatech is--."

"A large organization, with lots of factions. It could have been ordered by anyone. I know."

"So, you know it will be difficult to track these people down?" A pause. "Mohinder…finding them won't bring Molly back."

"And bringing them down won't bring back your wife and son. This is about closure. I need to know—Why Molly? Why now? Why this way? We both know how easy I've been to manipulate, wouldn't trying that be more effective?"

He sighed, attention split between the aimless act of driving the car and trying to make sense. Bennet couldn't give him answers, but ranting at him was causing Mohinder's brain to kick start.

"I can't help you with this. Claire and I are going at this a different way."

"I know, I'm not upset at you. I just need some assistance."

"Listen, I'm tapped out of information, but I can put you in touch with someone who might be able to help. She'll call you soon."

"Thank you."

"Just be safe, Mohinder. We can't afford to lose anyone else."

There was no goodbyes exchanged, as if never saying the word meant never saying it that last time. Mohinder began to look at the street signs around him, eyes widening at the realization he was only ten minutes away from the airport. It was a sign he had the sinking feeling he couldn't afford to ignore. He turned down the exit when it came and began the long process of searching for a parking spot.

When his phone rang, he almost didn't notice it, the ringtone not his common one. There was no name on the display, not even the word "restricted." He answered with a cautious, "Hello?"

"Mohinder Suresh? My name is Hana Gitleman, I heard you could use some help."

Micah sighed as he watched the clock shudder before each stroke.

His first day of school here and he was already bored.

It was reminiscent of when he was at public school, although back then he hadn't been the only one who was almost delirious with boredom. After the months he'd had, the fear of his dad dying, the confusion with his powers, meeting all those other people with abilities like him and his parents and yet... here he was.

Staring at a clock and waiting for English to be over. Twenty more minutes.

It wasn't that he didn't like school. He liked the idea, the learning, the chance to gain as much knowledge as possible; the problem was that the idea rarely seemed to live up to the reality, leaving him uninterested in his teachers, annoyed with his classmates, and unhappy in general.

He watched as Sam doodled on his page, monsters that were attacking tiny stick figures with wavy lines behind them that indicated their wild flight from death. Everyone was dressed in their fancy uniforms, pristine shirts that lacked the dirt and roughness he was so accustomed to seeing. Most of the kids were actually paying attention, looks of fascination on their faces that he thought he might have seen once or twice on faces as young as his.

For all the little bad things, however, there was one very big good thing. Everything here was electronic.

He grinned a little at the thought.

The second he could get to the computer room, in ten more minutes, was the second when he could finally enjoy himself. Sam would refuse, he was sure. In the two months he'd known him, he had learned that although Sam was a rather genial person, he much preferred running around outside to the buzzing of many computers entrapped in a single room.

Like a siren call, he could feel them waiting for him. The teacher smiled when he made eye contact with her accidentally but he only blinked in response. It wasn't that he didn't care; it was just that there were more important things to be doing. And English had never been his favourite class, even if he was as good at it as he was at social studies and science. It just wasn't his area of interest.

Five more minutes.

The teacher passed out a sheet on adverbs and adjectives which he gamely started. With two minutes to go, however, he placed everything in his bag and readied himself (while trying not to look like he was readying himself).

The kids nearest to the door were just starting to pack up when he whizzed past them, the bell ringing in his wake.

"Ms. Gitleman, you're a friend of Bennet's?"

"We know each other, I'm not sure if I would call us 'friends.' We have common goals and have both suffered at Primatech's hands." She stopped for a beat. "And, please, call me Hana…or Wireless…."

"And you should feel free to call me 'Mohinder.'" He turned the key, the noise from the engine cutting out. " Is 'Wireless' in reference to your ability?"

She gave a throaty laugh. "Why, yes, Mohinder, that is so. And it is an ability that will benefit you quite a bit." Another pause. "For example, I have just booked you a flight to Orlando. I do hope you packed for the weather."

His eyebrows shot up. "That was quick."

He stepped out of his car and did a quick look around, not seeing anyone suspicious in the lot. Unloading his baggage he took a moment to unzip the suitcase already holding one gun to have the second join it.

"Perhaps it would be best if you kept a weapon on you, someone may be following you."

"Even an American couldn't take a gun onto an airplane."

"I'll get you through security, don't fear."

Mohinder shook his head, not asking how she had seen him or how she was going to fool a metal detector. It could wait, he was sure, for when they finally met. Trudging over to the baggage check area, he received a business class ticket and realized, between the time written on it and the confirmation on one of the nearby television screens, that the flight would leave in forty-five minutes.

"You're cutting it close," he huffed and Hana laughed again, an unpracticed sound, as if she were making up for times in the past when she never made such a noise. "And I'm about to go through security, so whatever your little trick is, you might want to get to that."

"I know exactly where you are. I'm going to trick the computer into not noticing any metal on you. Go straight to your gate, you'll have a little time before boarding, but not much. When you land, I'll text you the address of a safe house."

He nodded. "Will you be there?"

"I'll be there, just like I'm here, now. I'm everywhere." There was the telling sound of too much silence when she hung up on him.

Bennet trusted her, Mohinder reminded himself. Even stripped of his influence and power, Bennet was still a formidable man. And in a few more minutes, Mohinder knew that at the very least he wouldn't have to worry about being weaponless, as he was waved through without even bothering to remove his gun, watch, and any other item that would have probably set the metal detector off. Repacking his laptop into his bag, he hurried in the direction of his gate.

There was a natural hum in airports, the sound of electronics, of people talking to each other or on their phones, the clicks of typing. Halfway to his gate, the noise suddenly stopped, then picked up even louder. Mohinder's head whipped around, his body turning in a frantic circle. He took in the people staring at their phones, the way the television screens that should have been displaying flight information were now showing snow, the frantic movements of airport personnel.

And then someone slammed into him from behind, propelling him forward to what seemed to be a service hallway. "If you cooperate, Dr. Suresh," the looming figure behind him whispered just before Mohinder started his struggling, "this will all be a painless process. No broken bones, no injured bystanders." To emphasize his point he twisted one of Mohinder's arms, just enough to cause pain.

Mohinder couldn't break the grip, so he allowed himself to be lead towards the hallway. The entire terminal was in chaos, no one noticed the two of them. The pain wasn't much of a problem, but the knowledge it could get much worse kept him from acting out.

"What do you want?"

"Why you, of course. It's a shame about the Walker girl, but you're still of some use." The press of the man's body was almost familiar, like all the other Primatech brutes Mohinder had met. "You're just too good at what you do to let you go to waste, working alone for Bennet and his little ragtag gang."

They were almost to the entrance. "This is the part where you convince me I'll do so much more for humanity by helping your employers, right?"

"This is the part where you come with me regardless of what I say, because you don't want to die." The tone was filled with amusement.

People had a tendency to underestimate Mohinder. Sylar, Bennet, Thompson…in their eyes he had been weak, someone ruled by his brain and his emotions who shunned the physicality of violence in favor of the intricacies of science. This man was doing the same thing. He could use that.

"Does whoever sent you truly believe I'll cooperate with them?"

The answer came out as a sigh, "How should I know? But it doesn't matter, they've had lots of experience at making others do what they want. You'll fold and be a good little lab coat in no time."

They stepped into the empty service hallway, out of sight.

"You know the deal- Bodies on the floor, hands up, no one speaks."

Niki powered through the automatic glass doors, gun raised and black mask over her face and hair, hiding all but her eyes. DL followed after her as they fell into their well-practised routine.

"You look so hot like that," he murmured in her ear as he walked past.

"Not now, DL. We're working." She rolled her eyes.

She loved him, but seriously.

She kept one eye on all the people cowering on the floor and her other eye on her husband as he did his job. Their routine was flawless and they slipped into it with ease. They'd planned everything out perfectly, and although there were always a few things that jumped up to surprise them every time they went through this, they adjusted admirably.

There was no hesitation and she had no reservations.

"Ready?"

DL was back with the cash and she shot him a smile he couldn't see as they left the bank together, hand in hand.

This whole bank-robbing business certainly did spice things up a little.

Niki let her arm slip from his grasp, touched the bag of money in his hand briefly just to feel the solid weight of reassurance, and then slipped her fingers along DL's hip and to the small of his back. He glanced over to her as she placed a little force behind it.

It was a good day. But tonight was going to be an even better night.

They just had to get through that damn dinner with the neighbours first.

Now, deep into the night, Noah had stationed himself just inside the PrimaTech perimeter. He had a clear view from here of the back door, but he was hidden in the shadows of the stacks of pallets near the back fence.

Fifty feet from him, the outside night guard, Fred, sat in a plastic chair by the door, eating an apple. Fred had been the back-door guard for almost as long as Noah had been with the company, and since he never even ventured inside the compound, he'd never had more than an inkling that PrimaTech was anything more than what it claimed to be.

That made him an innocent, in Noah's eyes, and that made things a little complicated.

Noah cocked his arm, then threw an empty soda can off, clattering, into the darkness.

Fred jumped up immediately, his hand going to his gun, but not his radio, thank god. He peered into the darkness for a moment, then headed towards the sound, calling, "Who's there? This is private property. I'm armed!"

Noah inched closer to him, moving as slowly and subtly as possible, counting Fred's steps until the moment he was outside of the range of the backdoor security camera, but not yet in range of the perimeter cameras. Then Noah rushed him, and before Fred could even turn, Noah brought the back of his gun down hard on the back of Fred's skull.

Fred dropped like a rock.

A few minutes later, Noah had Fred trussed to the fence, mouth covered with duct tape, naked but for his boxers, wrapped in a blanket, as Noah changed into his security uniform.

"Sorry, Fred," he muttered to his unconcious, former coworker, then he walked back to the backdoor as nonchalantly as he could, knowing the cameras would only see his hat and his uniform.

He slid Fred's security card through the reader and nodded to himself when the light blinked green. A bit more duct tape prevented the door from latching behind him--the whole building would go into lockdown when the alarm went off, so he'd need an exit.

This part of the building was dark and quiet, lit now and then with a pool of light from the emergency lights. This was the "paper factory" part of the building, and as such, it wasn't actually secured beyond a few cameras here and there that were easy enough to dodge, with all the pallets of paper scattered around. The pallets never really moved, except once a year or so, when they shuffled them around to give them impression of change.

He edged through darkened hallways, then Fred's badge worked one more time, getting him into the stairwell. It wouldn't work from now on, but that was all right, there were other guards down here. Three of them. He knew their names, but he wasn't thinking about that right now. They knew the Company. They were part of it. One flight of stairs, a laser motion detector, carefully stepped over, and then he was down in the "basement." The door here wouldn't open to Fred's badge, but that didn't matter, because in just about two minutes, James should be coming through here to do his check of the stairwell. Noah pressed his back to the concrete wall and cocked his silenced gun and waited.

Two minutes later, footsteps, then a beep, then the door opened.

There was just a momentary look of shock on James' face before the bullet splattered his brains all over the far wall.

Noah moved quickly, catching the door before it closed and then bending down to unclip James' badge. He shoved James' body under the stairs with his foot, covered the door catch with duct tape again, then stepped out into the hallway, letting the door close behind him.

The indicator light glowed red, showing the door hadn't latched, and James would be expected to report in within two minutes after checking the hall, so that meant Noah had exactly two minutes before the alarms lit the place up like a demented Christmas tree. The cops would probably arrive outside and upstairs within five minutes, and PrimaTech's backup security would be there in ten, downstairs in fifteen, at most. He could feel his heart beginning to hammer, and the trembles of adrenaline.

No point in being subtle now.

He ran down the hallway, slammed to a halt in front of the hidden door that lead to the real stairwell, and swiped then badge. Then, hearing footsteps, yanked the door open and spun towards them, lunging to the side and firing his gun twice, three times, hearing the crack of the other gun and the bullets pinging around him.

It was only after he saw Lex fall to the floor that he felt the stinging pain and realized one of the bullets had grazed his arm.

Didn't matter.

He stepped into the stairwell and swung himself over the railing, climbing down along the outside of the rail to avoid the pressure sensors scattered randomly on the stairs. They were only deactivated by a timer, allowing the guards to come and go at precisely set times during the night, so the only way around them was to avoid them entirely.

Half-a-floor from the bottom, he dropped the rest of the way, his muscles on fire from the unaccustomed activity. He swiped the badge and yanked open the door just in time. A moment later, the alarms went off.

Sweat stung his eyes as he duct taped this final door and darted inside the archive room.

He didn't think, he just acted, moving fast and sure. The safe in the back was all he cared about. The rest would have been helpful, but there was no time.

He got there, and reached into the small pack he carried with him, pulling out the small, padded box that held the small block of C4 as the alarms screamed around him. He wasn't an explosives expert by any stretch. He'd never even touched the damn stuff before. But the internet could be very enlightening, and thank god, Homeland Security hadn't seemed to have noticed him yet, and he pressed the block to the safe, stuck in the wires and half-ran away, unspooling them behind him.

Then he hit the switch and the world seemed to explode around him.

He shook his head and got up off the floor and ran towards the smoke and flame and thank god that had done it, just enough. The door of the safe was twisted in just enough for his hand to fit through and close on the files inside and yank them out with adrenaline-fueled strength. then he was running back to the door, scrambling up the railings, flinging himself over them, and just as he did, the door swung open and the last guard came barrling through, and Noah acted on instinct, dropping the files and grabbing the guard's shirt and using his momentum to swing him headfirst over the railing. Then he scooped up the files and he was out into the basement, heading for the last stairwell, and there were probably cops up there, but cops were no big deal, cops were much easier to evade than PrimaTech goons--

Then he slammed to a stop.

He was surrounded.

Oh, shit, was Noah's only thought as the leader of the pack of five PrimaTech-uniformed gunmen stepped forward with his gun trained on him and said, "Well, well, well. What have we here? Mr. Noah Fucking Bennet. The prodigal son. Just for the record, they don't want us to bring you in alive."

And then, even as the PrimaTech goon's finger squeezed down on the trigger, there was a bang, and suddenly, confusingly, the goon's face exploded red and he slumped to the concrete. Then, as all of them stared, frozen and confused, there was another bang, and one of the gunmen cried out and staggered to Noah's left.

That was all it took to bring them all back to life. Noah hurled himself to his right, slamming into the gunman there, hearing the guy's gun go skittering off, even as he heard more gunshots, directed down the hall. He heard a body hit the floor, but he was more concerned with turning his own gun on the two remaining guards and firing twice, fast. They both went down, and he scrambled to his feet, turned, and took out the guy he'd knocked down as he went scrambling to retrieve his weapon. He finished off the groaning gunman against the left wall, then ran down the hall.

He was just in time to help Claire back to her feet, her shirt torn and spattered with her own blood.

"You are in so much trouble, Claire Bennet," he said, even as he yanked her towards the stairwell.

"I saved your life!" she protested.

"No talking," he said, pushing through the door and stepping over the pool of James' blood.

At the top of the stairs, he said, "There are probably police officers up there, so be careful and quiet. We can probably avoid them if we keep a good eye out."

He glanced at her, which was a mistake, because it let him see how pale and terrified she looked. He forced himself past it. Just think of the mission. "Don't shoot the police, do you understand? Do not. Surrender yourself if you have to, but do not shoot the cops. They're the good guys, ok? They aren't part of this."

She nodded, a little wildly. He squeezed her shoulder. "Good girl. Let's go."

He edged out of the stairwell door. There floor was quiet. He pulled Claire after him as he ducked behind the paper pallets and began weaving through them towards the door. He paused at the back door for a moment, and was rewarded by the crackle of a police radio on the other side. He pushed them back a bit into the darkness and waited, listening to the cop confer with his partner by radio on the other side of the door.

Claire was pressed to his side, breathing hard. "What do we do?" she whispered.

"Shh," he said, "We wait. This is our only exit."

"But what if--" She was starting to panic, he could hear her voice rising.

"Claire," he snapped, turning and gripping both of her shoulders in his hands and looking her right in the eye. "The first rule is don't panic. Stay calm. Stay calm. If you panic, you've already lost. You need to be thinking clearly."

"How'm I supposed to not panic?" she whispered back at him.

"Breathe deep, breathe slow, try to slow down your heart rate. It's ninety percent physiological. We're safe right now. Stay calm. Don't panic."

He could hardly see her in the dim light, but he could tell she'd shut her eyes, and he could hear her trying to breathe slow and deep. "Good," he murmured. "Good, that's it."

And then, outside the door, the cop's voice said, "Nothing over here. This damn place, false alarms every damn month. It's just fucking paper, for fuck's sake."

"There," he said, "See?"

"What if it's a trap?" she said.

He huffed a quick laugh. "This is just the police. It's not a trap. They probably think it was just teenagers trespassing. They'll be heading back to their squad car to get out of the cold."

She hung back when he tried to head for the door. "Are you sure? How can you be sure?"

"I'm sure," he said. "Come on, Clairebear," he said, giving her arm a gentle tug, and noticing that she was cuddling her gun to her chest like a security blanket. "Let's get out of here."

She followed him. The cops were gone and he and Claire made it off the compound just as the PrimaTech helicoptor lumbered down out of the night towards the roof.

They hit the road that night, trading driving shifts until they were all the way to Arkansas and the sun was high. Then they found a campground, parked, and slept most of the day away.

He woke before her again, and after going through his morning routine at three in the afternoon, he settled at the table and opened the files. The Company had splinter groups everywhere, like the tendrils of a large fungus, spreading throughout the world. Any one of those tendrils could grow on it's own, start the Company fresh. They had to get them all.

And these files... they were the beginning of the answer. Communications among the branches that would give clues to where they were, who they were. Some of it dated back decades, all on paper. Some was on disk, some on CD, some on portable harddrives. It wasn't the whole picture, but it should be enough to track back to some of the other branches, and from there, there would be clues leading to still other branches.

Right now, though, it was simply a migraine-inducing overload of information.

By the time Claire crawled out of bed, mumbling groggily to Mr. Muggles, Noah wanted nothing in the world more than about ten asprin and a week on a very quiet, simple island.

Claire plopped down at the table next to him. "Anything good?" she said.

He took a deep breath, then turned to her. "Claire. About last night--"

"I know, I know. Big trouble. Bad Claire. Et cetera, et cetera."

"I'm being very serious, Claire. That cannot happen again."

She tightened her jaw and looked him square in the eye. "If I hadn't been there, you would have died."

He opened his mouth, but she wasn't finished. "And then I wouldn't have any family at all. I'd be a stupid orphan, and I'd probably end up with the crazy Petrellis, and I can't--"

Then she was crying, and all he could do was pull her into his arms and hold her. "Claire. Oh, Claire. Sweetheart. Shh. Shh."

It took some time for her to calm, but when she did, she looked up at him with red, wet eyes and said, "You have to let me help. Or we don't do it at all. And we have to do it," she said. "We can't let them-- you know I'm right. Look, I'll do whatever you say, I swear, but you can't go alone, and I'll be ok. I can take care of myself."

Just then, his eyes fell on something on one of the files. "Danger to the Company, must be eliminated. So far, at large. Aliases: M.S..."

It wasn't referring to him, then. Someone else. Of course. He should have thought of that sooner. There were more Company ex-pats than him out there. Perhaps tracking one of them down was the best place to start.

"All right," he said to Claire as he reached for the file. "I won't go alone."

XXX

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