Title: The Golden Child
Author: devilishlysas
Rating: PG-13/NC-17 (depending on the Chapter)
Spoilers: All seasons up to Brave New World finale
Summary: Set in the near and distant future; post events of Brave New World. Claire has become famous and infamous after exposing her ability and so the rest of the 'specials' to the world.
Disclaimer: I don't own Heroes or its characters (and just knowing that makes me cry inside) :P
Word count: lots knowing me (ongoing)
Chapter 1: Infamous Part 1
The tunnel seemed longer every night she mused, trying to keep the megawatt smile fixed onto her face, it's only what they expected after all... her fans. Everyone seemed to have emerged from the woodwork, just to congratulate her on another great, 'no amazing' night, or so they kept telling her; anything so that she had to acknowledge them, smile and glance their way. Satiate their need to touch her, as though that would somehow make her more tangible, more real, it's was a familiar trend and one she feared she'd never grow accustomed to, something she couldn't let herself.
One hurried foot in front of the other, not quite running but wishing like hell that she could Claire made it to her dressing room, one frantic look to the security guy standing there and attempting to look inconspicuous surrounded by flowers and pink and he'd hurriedly ushered the small crowd out of her way. Locking the door with a small sigh of relief she dropped her forehead against it and simply stood that way, breathing in and out... sanctuary, for a few moments at least.
"Doesn't get any easier I see." The voice is as a familiar and almost comforting as it is haunting.
Not daring to turn around and face the ghostly apparition, she closed her eyes and used the door to keep her upright for a few moments longer.
"Being adored like this... revered, worshiped and held to such dizzying heights." There was a bite to his words and Claire felt her whole body tremble. If he was here now, it could only mean one thing and she couldn't face that, wouldn't.
"Not that I can imagine what that feels like..." he continued as though his words hadn't left a gaping hole in her chest already. "Not that any other freak like us could. No, the rest of us aren't as special as Claire-fucking-Bennet."
Her fists curled as anger and agony ripped at her, slowly, hatefully she turned to face him, knowing even as she did it, that he was the only one that could have said this to her, the only one who'd dare... the only one who'd even talk to her at all... Sylar.
Her argument died on her tongue as she watched amusement and rage dance across his face, his whole visage slumped and coiled, waiting to strike.
"Peter ?" she asked quietly, knowing better than to speak his name but needing to confirm it anyway.
Sylar sprung to his feet, slamming into her and wrapping a hand around her throat, her feet left the floor and she kept her eyes fixed on his face, seeing the monster shining back and knowing absolutely that Peter was gone... and the monster was loose again in his soul.
It was strange, Peter's death wasn't what effected her, not really, it had been a long time since she'd seen her Uncle, longer still since she'd spoken to him... or rather since he'd spoken to her. All of her family had turned on her, frozen her out and cut her off. Even her mother had found it too much of a strain to remain a part of her life, what with the media hounding her whenever she so much as poked a head out of the house. A very public creation of an apparent rift between them and her continued distance was the only thing that kept the wolves from her mother's door now.
"You still smell the same." Sylar murmured, his grip not loosening an inch as he buried his head in her hair, inhaling and crushing his body closer than he'd ever dared to hers. Briefly Claire's eyes flickered to the camera's that dotted her room, never unmanned.
"Disabled." He muttered, not even breaking his stride as he nuzzled her ear, his breath coming just a shade too fast. "Can you believe it," he laughed, "I actually have you all to myself... until someone knocks of course, which with you will probably be in mere moments. Never alone are you Cheerleader." Claire searched his eyes as he drew his head back around to stare balefully at her, rage simmered there and she felt she deserved every inch of his ire... of all of theirs
"Tell me Claire," he whispered, sliding a leg deliberately between hers and using it to hold her up, forcing his black jean clad leg beneath her skirt to brush harshly against her barely covered crotch. "Why is it do you think that you were accepted whilst the rest of your kind were rejected?" he posed it to her rhetorically so she kept her mouth wisely shut. He could hurt her if he chose to, she knew that, he was the only one who could and right now he had every reason in the world to want to make her suffer, why give him another?
"Why were you the angel... and the rest of us the demons?" he shook her violently, closing his vice like grip until her vision began to dance with black spots, her painless lungs starting to struggle.
"The golden child." He hissed the term of endearment he knew she hated the most, because it had been 'their' name for her, the specials who hunted her.
It had been a shock, one she was sure she'd never get over when the first violent response came to her little stunt with the Ferris wheel. But the source had been so unexpected that she'd merely stood there, letting it come, letting the flames envelop her attempting to burn her to nothing but ash. In that moment it had all changed, live on camera, with her defending her decision to reveal herself and so all of them to the world to a crowd of bewildered human beings. But nothing could change as quickly as public opinion... the mob mentality. As one 'normal' human beings had turned on the 'specials' deciding they were dangerous and uncontrollable, a bad element who'd turned on the only one of them that had tried to come out and let society know about this danger in their midst's.
The riots... the camps they came up so quickly, the Company's abandoned serum emerging almost from the woodwork to keep them depowered, helpless. But never forgiven, or trusted. They were different, abnormal and dangerous... not in the least bit human. Just like Sylar said, demons.
She'd never really understood why she was exempt from the rest of mankind's rage, every negative comment that arose was squashed by a tide of violent almost fanatical denial; until even the media stopped printing it even in jest. They placed her so high on a pedestal she couldn't even see the ground they'd used to bury the rest of her kind.
Claire had tried of course to change the flow of public opinion, to convince them that others like her weren't all murdering, unstable bullies with more power than sense. But her every word in defence of the people that were still trying to kill her for making the world aware of them in the first place, only made the world hate them that much more for ever trying to hurt someone who was trying to help them. It was a catch-22 and she was trapped, as much in a cage as the rest of her species. The worst of it had come when the embittered 'specials' had tried to hit her with the serum, before unleashing an explosion that had levelled an entire city block... incinerated they said as she emerged from the ashes, reforming blackened and broken, but healing before the eyes of the world. The scientists had told her the serum was ineffective on her because she was so special, her ability prevented the drug from altering her DNA, which meant her ability could never be suppressed, just like Sylar's stolen version, because in reality he was just like her, which was why he'd never been caught and why Peter had never been found.
If they had hated her before, the specials, then they despised her now, because she was untouchable, unkillable and utterly unable to suffer for any of it... or so they thought, Sylar knew better.
"They used to hate me as much as they hate you now... they think I can save them you know." He whispered, as if telling her some shameful secret. "That I'm the only one that can destroy you, make you suffer the way they have." He chuckled darkly and she closed her eyes, waiting for the blow. It had always amazed her that her little secret, the vulnerability in the back of her head had never gotten out; it seemed that whilst her family might have come to hate her for the world she had created, they couldn't kill her for it.
Lips pressed firmly over hers and she opened her eyes in shock not able to understand his actions as his tongue swept into her mouth, forcing her to taste him.
"Claire." He sighed breaking away from her unresponsive lips and dropping his forehead against hers. "Like I could hurt you." He muttered sighing wearily like he'd give anything for the opposite to be true. "The rest of them, they're shadows Claire... dust, we're eternal." Her eyes widened as he kissed her again, insistent and hard, until she couldn't help put let her lips slide open to his tongue as he explored her mouth, lavishing attention over every inch until she was breathing heavily, feeling somewhat light headed, but that could just have been his continued death grip on her throat.
"Kill me." She whispered against his lips, pressing gentle butterfly kisses there and feeling the effect her body was having on him, as the hard length of him pressed against her stomach. Maybe it was wrong to manipulate him like this she considered briefly, as she let her mouth drop to his neck, nipping and suckling at the slightly salty skin there. But then it had been a long time since she was the innocent little Cheerleader; after 21 assassination attempts, dozens of lovers and hundreds of public appearances later, she was something else entirely now.
"So I can be the monster again?" he laughed throatily, the sound reverberating through her chest. "I'd finally be the hero Claire to a whole world of specials and a monster to the rest of the world." His dark eyebrows rose in amusement, "Is this what it feels like to be you?" Claire pulled away from him as he finally released her from his grasp, seemingly immune to her attempts to manipulate him, despite his body's reaction to her. Staring hatefully she shoved at his chest, surprised when he actually stepped back and moved aside to take up his position on her plush leather sofa once more.
"If you're not here to finally put me out of my misery, why are you here?" she snapped, stalking to the dresser and wrapping the robe around her mostly scantily clad stage outfit, doing her best to ignore the eyes of the reformed serial killer that seemed to follow her, the feral glint lingering in them as he ran his tongue over his lips as if savouring the taste of her left there.
"So a singer?" he ignored her question posing his own rather more mocking one.
Claire rolled her eyes, mildly embarrassed. "Not my idea." She murmured as if that was validation enough for her new found career.
Sylar smirked at her and she felt her stomach clench at the memory of that look and all it brought with it. "Well no, not to be rude, but it was rather too brilliantly manipulative a move for you my dear." Claire glared at him, trying to decide whether to be insulted or vindicated.
"The governments I assume?" his grin widened at the mildly insulted look she'd settled on. "Team Claire at its finest I'll bet." He sunk back into the cushions, raising his arms to lock behind his head and staring now with obvious amusement that barely masked the all too familiar rage she could see hidden there. "Genius really. How to get Claire Bennet out to the people as often and in as many forms as possible... why not make her a pop sensation!" the laughter that rattled out of his chest now was pure. "Your voice, your face, your words and image, out in the public domain twenty four hours a day, beamed and printed right into their homes, offices, cars, out on the street. Nowhere to escape you; ever. And in case that wasn't enough, to satisfy the world's insatiable need to be near you, to see you, be connected to you in some way, they can come and watch you in the flesh in a seemingly endless stream of live performances." He leant forwards dropping his hands and bringing them together to clap slowly and sarcastically. "And the best part... the part that the monster I used to be really admires!" Claire looked away not able to meet his eyes. "The government earns a fortune from all of this, which funds... dun dun dun" he mocked, even as his expression darkened, "the systematic hunting and destruction of your own species."
Claire collapsed back onto her desk, perching on the edge before her legs gave out on her, staring at him open mouthed and wishing once more that this man, this monster sent into this world seemingly only to make her suffer, would simply die.
His barking laughter at her expense drew tears to her eyes and she felt her body's natural ability battle the nausea that threatened whenever she thought about how they had put her to use... how they still were.
"What do you want me to say?" she asked quietly turning her shining eyes on him as he sat lazily on the couch clearly enjoying throwing the horror of what her life had become in her face like this. "There's no apology that could make it go away, nothing that could undo it, or change it. I'm trapped. Just like the rest of you. And if you won't kill me then I'm going to have to simply learn to live with this."
"I think I remember giving you a similar speech not so long ago... as I recall you threw it back in my face." He reminded her deftly of the night he'd emerged beside Peter and expected her to merely accept his reform... how they both had, on nothing more than pretty words and one night of heroics.
"You could always kill yourself." Sylar posed shrewdly, going back to the original conversation and Claire narrowed her eyes at him.
"You know I damn well can't." She hissed. Only he would, no doubt a secret he'd kept from the others only fuelling their belief in her selfishness.
The smirk slid off his face as he got smoothly to his feet, stalking to stand inches in front of her, glaring down... was that pity she saw there? It stirred something unpleasant in her.
"How many times have you tried Claire... really tried to take your own head off hmm? Or to stick something in the back, put a bullet straight through?" Claire flinched and his lips quirked as if she'd answered aloud. "I mean really tried. Not just your little attempts to hurl yourself from great heights or throw yourself in front of moving vehicles?" His hand grasped her cheek and drew one smooth thumb across her slightly parted lips, ignoring her attempts to wrench her skin out of his reach.
"How many?" he pressed, knowing full well the answer.
"I hate you!" she hissed, hating that he could always dredge up the very worst in her for all to see.
"Not your fault." He added quietly, his fingers grasping her chin tilted her head back as he leant forward, staring down at her lips as he traced patterns across her face with his index finger. "Your ability prevents such perverse things as thoughts of suicide." She shuddered at the memory, of the despair it had brought to know that her freak show of a life could deny her even an end. "Did your hands tremble Claire... did your whole body rebel against you when you raised that gun to your head?" Claire closed her eyes and he pressed ghost like kisses to the lids, tracing the path of her silent tears.
"How many times have you tried and failed?" she threw back, not daring to open her eyes.
"Just the once." He admitted, "Right after I buried Peter."
The sob that tore from her throat was guttural and she felt her whole body convulse with the pain of it.
"Shhh." Sylar soothed, placing a hand against her cheek and drawing closer to her body than anyone these days dared. "Poor Claire-bear." He continued softly, "Look what the world does to us, what it makes us into."
"Why are you here?" she asked through tears, barely able to get the words out past the harsh lump in her throat. "To torment me?" she guessed, as he grasped her hands catching them and holding both of her much smaller ones in his own, pressing them to his chest. There was a reason she never let anyone get this close, just in case they reminded her just why she hated herself... hated the whole goddamn world. "Was this Peter's last wish?" she breathed, hating that the man who had once been her hero, her family and who had come to hate her so much. She knew he'd been behind more than one of the more inventive attacks on her life, but she suspected more as a statement than an actual attempt to end her.
"Oh I don't need to do that Claire, I'm sure you torment yourself enough for the both of up just by waking up in the morning to this happy little world you helped build." Sylar snorted at her and dropped her like she was infectious the scornful look on his face holding almost as much disgust as she used to level at him. He couldn't even stand to look at her now it seemed.
"You encouraged it." She hissed, reminding him of the night from the Ferris wheel, 'Brave New World' he'd called it, surprising her forever by being the only one that had supported her decision.
"Yes... but apparently I'm still psychotic, I just hide it better these days, I suppose that should have been a warning to you, having me as the moral compass." Put like that Claire had absolutely no response, she'd never even considered that and it floored her now that he clearly had and had never mentioned it, none of them had.
"How did I become you?" she breathed quietly, ignoring the tremble to her voice and the violent shake to her hands.
"Public opinion." He replied eyeing her shrewdly. "That's all good and evil really is anyway."
"I'm not evil." She replied certain she couldn't be that, the things that had been done in her name perhaps, the things she had caused to pass definitely, but not in herself.
"That's history's place to judge. Besides I wouldn't worry about it Claire, it's not like we ever have to face the music before those pearly gates." There was something close to despair in his tone and she felt the loss of Peter between his sanity and his monster acutely.
"We still have to face the mirror Sylar." She reminded him needlessly.
"And each other." He added coolly, refusing to allow their connection to fade. "But then I guess that's the same thing as a mirror really isn't it." His lips curled cruelly up at her, "I told you we were alike."
Claire refused to accept that so she remained silent, waiting as it stretched between them.
"How did he die?" she asked finally desperation for some contact with the family, the people she'd left behind winning out. It was unlikely he'd answer; he and Peter had always had a... complicated relationship. They loved one another she thought, like brothers, enemies, friends, lovers? She wasn't certain on that last part, but she suspected; they had never spoken about what had happened to them in that time where years had apparently passed trapped inside a nightmare and no one had dared to ask.
"Old age." Sylar replied finally his lips pursed as he watched her intently as she moved to perch on the sofa, leaving him to tower over her instead, claiming the room, as was his tendency. "Cancer." He clarified, "Best I could do for him was null the pain in the end. By the time we'd found out it was too late to have him take your ability..." he trailed off, the unspoken words heavy between them, that Peter wouldn't have taken hers anyway, even if it was Sylar offering.
"He died cursing me actually." Sylar added almost indifferently, but she wasn't fooled, there was raw pain there that was yearning to be unleashed... perhaps that was why he'd come here, to tear into something that not only deserved it, but couldn't die from his rage. "I acquired Hiro's ability some time ago, not long after this all started actually. Peter seemed to think that it was my duty to use it, to go back in time and stop you from taking your one giant leap for 'special' kind. Of course with Hiro's death shortly after I became the only option, I think it was the one argument that never really went away for us, but he never did tell the others that I had that ability. That's something I suppose."
Claire blinked. "If you could undo this... all of this, then why don't you?"
Sylar rolled his eyes, sighing at her as if she was extremely dense, "Because Claire, I'm not God... oh I like to pretend, sometimes I'm certain I'm as close to God as either of us are ever going to get. But in my heart of catholic little school boy hearts, I know I'm not. Time is what it is, we make a choice that choice is forever. Because once you change one thing... you get cocky. You try to change another and another, always convinced that you know best, that what you're doing is the right thing. What's right is letting fate take its course."
"Coward." Claire snarled at him, cutting to the heart of the issue and enjoying the way he flinched as if struck.
"You think so?" he quirked on large dark eyebrow at her; seemingly amused rather than annoyed at her assessment. "I try to be a good man Claire... these days at least. Peter was my rock, he helped me fight the hunger; overcome my demons, for a time. But it's never gone, not really, who I was, that monster, it's always their lurking beneath the surface, just waiting for that moment, that one shining opportunity to take back what it had. To rip the life I've created for myself away, to murder the man Peter helped me to become."
"Time travel was that moment?" she asked curious despite herself.
Sylar smile was terrible in its ferocity. "Just think Claire, the temptation to go back, to change things... and I don't mean that one event that lead us here. Imagine I went back further, stopped myself from ever killing that first victim, or that I went back to that day at Homecoming, showed myself the real Cheerleader. Just imagine what I could have been if I let the monster out again."
Claire lowered her eyes from his, wondering how it was he even resisted, why he bothered.
"I ask myself that sometimes too Claire." He admitted, clearly reading her mind.
"Is that why you're here?" she asked aloud, feeling the spark of understanding. "So that I convince you not to... that this is somehow better?" the hysterical laugh that bubbled out of her chest set his teeth on edge, but she couldn't help herself. "I think you may have come to the wrong place Sylar." She chuckled, collapsing back into the sofa and staring amusedly at him, realising that it was probably the first time she'd genuinely laughed in over two decades.
"By all means, go back to Homecoming, slice open my precious little head, take the brain and leave my body for the crows." She grinned darkly at him, "I'll even pack your bags for you. Give you a send off with pompoms, I'm sure I've got some around here I could dig out."
"Shut up." He snarled, losing his famous eloquence with his anger.
"Better yet. Go back to Kirby Plaza, let Peter blow the entire of New York to Kingdom come, let's trust in Angela and the rest of the company's plan. Lord knows it was years in the making, maybe they had the right idea, understood the best way to introduce us all to the world. Or..." she mused, "Go save Arthur, let him put Nathan in the Presidency, turn the whole world into people like us. Now that... that was a plan; the right way to do this, because they were never going to accept us, not when we were in the minority... not unless their names were Claire-fucking Bennet, as you so gently put it."
Her lips clamped shut at a gesture from him and she felt quite satisfaction in seeing the monster dancing behind his dark eyes... listening.
"You really are a politicians daughter." He hissed, "you can twist anything can't you, get your own way with merely a flash of that bright white smile, a few cutting words. Angela was right about you, you really are a Petrelli... born if not bred."
Her mouth opened and she took in a sharp breath, flexing her neck muscles as she sat upright to watch him more closely. This was probably the longest, most meaningful conversation she'd had in years, most people these days just nodded avidly at whatever she had to say, some Government types would occasionally try to give her a direction or two, always formerly and with the utmost respect of course. But no one actually spoke to her, had a conversation, god knows she couldn't remember the last time someone had actually openly disagreed with her.
"You could still kill me you know." She pressed the issue one last time, sensing it would be her last chance to make her case, now when he was angry enough to entertain his monster, even for the split second it would take. "You want to be the hero so much," she arched one imperious eyebrow at him, sliding to her feet to stand in front of him, reaching out a hand to touch his chest and admiring the smooth tone of the muscles she felt there. "Why don't you save me. I was innocent once, just like you, I didn't have to become the monster. Do us both a favour Sylar, do for me what no one ever did for you, and put me out of my misery."
Sylar's hands rose and captured hers, dragging her closer, until the heat of his stare almost blistered her, the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end as electricity seemed to energise the very air around him. "The funny thing is Claire, without Peter around I just don't feel all that heroic." His eyes narrowed as he kept his gaze fixed entirely on her. "I've always been selfish Claire, I'm not willing to let you go... not yet. I'm going to need someone else to keep me on the straight and narrow, Peter held me there for 25years..." his smile was sad and his eyes hooded, "you've got the responsibility for an eternity." He leant forwards and caught her lips in a chaste kiss that made her stomach sink and her knees weak, he wouldn't kill her, perhaps she didn't deserve an end to her suffering after all.
Pulling away he left her standing mutely, her eyes on her feet, shoulders slumped.
"Look on the bright side Claire." He added his hand on the door knob, as he turned back to glance at her, forcing her against her better judgement to meet his eyes one last time. "You've got a higher body count now than even I managed, you're the perfect sponsor." He gave her that bland smile and tipped his head to her, the whole thing an almost exact replica of the moment he'd last shattered her world and left her blooded and broken on her own coffee table. She felt the same now, exposed, defiled, hopeless and raging as he walked away from the wreckage.