Chapter 2: Eyelet
As predicted by her father, Claire's night shifts had been more boring than anything else. There was a relatively minute amount of prisoners to watch, mere eighteen people in total and none of them looked like they were going anywhere. The Company even made a few of their agents redundant as there was no evidence of anybody else threatening out there with abilities who they would've needed to hunt down.
Resources were much focused on the area of research more than ever, with separate departments under the instruction of Dr. Mohinder Suresh, dealing with trying to recreate powers, as well as for the "cure" for them and a little unit focusing on the wellbeing of the whole population and making sure what Peter saw in the future does not happen.
At night though, there were not many employees in the building, bar for security and the head of research, who preferred to work at this time, when there were no interruptions and he could use his own special powers freely, leaving Claire to whatever she chose to do up in the control room.
And what she chose to do, was watching old security camera tapes, namely fast forwarding every second that has been recorded on the watchmaker since he was brought to the facility. Whether she was as obsessed with the man who took her ability as the killer had been with her before, she only contemplated for a second. There wasn't much to think about as she realized herself somewhere that she was maybe taking the scrutinizing Sylar to the extremes. But if there was anything suspicious and indicating a possible plan of the serial killers that she could find on the tapes, she would detect it and deal with it before it got out of hand. Her preoccupation could've sounded alarming to some as far as her mental health was concerned, for her, it was well founded caution.
She did end up a bit disgusted with herself however when going through and fast forwarding endless hours of tape with Sylar sick, most often physically, then passing out from the effort over and over again. She soon had to see that whatever suspicious sign she was looking for, it wasn't on the recorded material. She idly ran through another tape, then took it out the player with shaking fingers. Something wasn't right with what she was doing, something wasn't right with what she was feeling.
She closed her eyes and paused for a long moment to sort out and recognize her own, hidden thoughts. There was a part of her that was rejoicing in her arch enemy's suffering, that was for sure, a part that urged her to watch more, enjoy it more. "Before the night is over, I'm going to prove to you, one by one, that you're all monsters, exactly like me." Sylar's voice echoed in her mind. What she was feeling might be understandable, but it was so wrong. If she wasn't like him, why can't she stop herself?
She glanced up at the monitors. Most of the prisoners were sleeping as they should've been, with Daniel McKay, the evolved human in cell 11 hitting his head into the wall repeatedly as usual. Sylar lying far away from his bed, his body wrecked with dry heaves even when unconscious. Nothing unusual, so much so it was hard to say whether it was a recording, or it was happening there and then. If somebody replaced the live feed with old footage, nobody'd notice.
Claire stood up from her desk determined and marched down to the cells to find Sylar exactly the same bad shape she saw him on screen a minute ago. Nothing was amiss, and yet something told her, compelled her to go inside.
Not wanting to disobey company policy and risk being told to go away and never come back, the young woman ordered a couple of the guards to go with her and cover her. She couldn't say she was much concerned about these safety rules however and stepped to the captive without wavering. He looked more undead, than alive, she determined a little diverted, but his quivering bottom lip, dripping sweat and elaborate, difficult breathing gave him away.
This time, his eyes didn't flutter open till Claire's palm was already firmly placed on the upper part of his stomach, but even than they were nothing, but cloudy.
"The truth is..." He tried, "ugly, Claire, don't you think so?" He managed, panting, obviously a lot less in control than he would've wanted to be.
"Making people's own private freak show public always is."
"Only this isn't to do with your own private freak show, is it, Claire? It's to do with monsters." You could see he was struggling to as much as maintain eye contact.
The still teen something didn't need his confirmation on his well being. His muscles rippled under her touch, his insides radiating a continuant pain. Claire winced involuntarily and removed her hand, as if startled, "you prefer spanking? Nothing's inevitable, so I think it could be arranged." She wanted to make sure he understood her, that out of principle, she'd refuse to be associated to be called a monster in any way, that even though on impulse she would've wished nothing more than to hurt him the way he hurt her or at least gladly take the opportunity not to care, she had to retain her hero integrity by not being like him. She placed her palm lightly on his upper arm instead, making him blink at her hazily once more. "There's one thing you want from me that you'll never have. And that is to prove to me we're all monsters," she said unwaveringly.
It was only on her way to Mohinder that she realized her voice softened by the last sentence. She kept her ground, and yet she reassured him as a by product that she will try to do something about the torture his captors put him through.
tbc
