1

Contamination

March 20, 2007

"Go. Get the virus," Peter directed Adam as he turned to wipe away the blood that had trickled down from his nose due to the incredible mental strain of prying the reinforced vault door open.

Adam headed for the entrance of warped steel, but was stopped dead in his tracks when Hiro appeared to block the way. "I must stop you, Kensei," the time traveler declared. Monroe unsheathed his katana, prepared to do away with his former friend if it were necessary for reaching his objective. Hiro began to charge in for the attack when Peter once again dutifully exercised his telekinesis, flinging the Japanese man against the wall with a wave of his hand where he was struck a heavy blow.

Adam, watching Nakamura slide to the floor with a dull thud, incapacitated, replaced his sword. He took to walking towards the vault, pausing within the entry way to turn back towards his companion. "He's going to keep at it, Peter. Unless you do something about it." The implied threat of those words sunk regretfully deep into the Petrelli. With the fate of the world in his hands he had to do what was right however unsavory the act would be. Millions of lives at stake outweighed the one.

Peter lifted Hiro from his slouched position at the wall until his feet dangled in the air and tightened the grip of his invisible bonds to crushing proportions. Monroe smiled vindictively to himself out of Peter's view within the vault as he listened to his one time betrayer's strangled cry of pain.

It's almost disappointing how easy that was, he thought as he surveyed the rows of individually locked casings. All of the Company's greatest secrets and most dangerous relics were within reach, but he only had eyes for one. A slim glass vial containing a substance appearing much like dirty water with a purple stopper was being gingerly held aloft on a stand. Hello, salvation. Adam retrieved a small gold chain of rings from the inside pocket of his jacket, stopping to release the catch so that he could pull a specific ring away from the rest.

His collection of wedding bands from all of his marriages had been the only possession that he was allowed to keep during his imprisonment at Primatech; mostly due to spending every moment of his first two weeks within confinement madly howling about needing them. Eventually everyone in earshot had been irritated and fatigued enough by the incessant screams to grant him that one wish in exchange for a solemn promise that he would keep quiet from then on. Ten rings for ten wives. Unfortunately, what had escaped his captors' attentions was the fact that only nine of them truly belonged there. The Company had arrested him during the course of his last marriage so that he hadn't been around to retrieve his final wife's wedding band. He hadn't even been allowed to tell her good-bye. Bitter memories further fueled his poisonous intentions.

From the selection of jewelry Adam passed over the nine golden rings for a peculiarly designed silver one. Monroe replaced his ring collection with care before bending the silver around so that it no longer resembled a piece of jewelry so much as a small ornate key. A key that he had lifted from the pocket of one very romantically flustered Victoria Pratt some thirty years before. Shame I had to kill her. She was a lovely woman once.

He hadn't gotten quite so close to the completed 138 virus before and Adam could only hope that no one at the Company had thought to change the locks since the 1970's. The key slid into the appropriate case's lock without a hitch, and with a deep a breath he turned it over. Miniature tumblers rolled over one another until the glass lid popped free with a tiny squeak of disuse. Adam released the breath that he had been holding and gave a Cheshire grin to nothing in particular, snatching the vial from its stand and closing the lid again. His eyes drifted back over the rest of the casings until they landed on a blinking red light behind the grate of a ventilation shaft.

"Looks like I win after all," he gloated, waving the vial of Shanti virus between his fingers for the camera to see. Monroe had known that something like the Company vault would never be left so unprotected. The second that the case holding the virus had been opened pressure sensors had sent signals throughout the building triggering a silent alarm that would page every last one of their agents around the world. Too bad that they would be too late.

"It's done." Noah glanced over at Bob Bishop who had been waiting for him to step back out of the Costa Verde house with news that Claire would no longer be out to expose the Company. Bennet knew that it would only be a matter of time before the deal that he had struck for the lives of his family would run out, but anything that could give them a head start was well worth the sacrifice.

"Good," Bishop remarked in his typically unattached tone that always felt like a pitiful cover for a sneer. "Now with Claire out of the way we have some more business to attend to." The two men began a nonchalant walk towards the Company car housing two field agents for Bob's protection should the disguise of their hostility towards one another fall. "I think that Mohinder Suresh -" Bob was interrupted by the sharp bleating of a pager. At the same time the pagers of the two awaiting agents in the car and Bennet's old spare lurking inside of a box in the house began to sound an alarm.

Claire jumped a little at the high-pitched beeping that had disturbed her state of shock at seeing her father alive again and willingly falling back into the hands of the Company. Her mother and Lyle had wandered to other parts of the house, dealing with their own turmoil by suppression and denial so that she was left alone in the room. She curiously followed the irritating noise to one of the Primatech boxes that she had been packing away in preparation for taking them on with the media. Flipping the cardboard top off, Claire pawed at the stacks of files inside until she uncovered an old and somewhat abused looking pager that had been partially melted on one side.

Bishop sighed in annoyance and pulled out the device to check the code with a weary roll of his eyes. "That can't be right," he grumbled under his breath. Bob pulled off his glasses and held the display closer to his face to squint at. "No. That's impossible."

There was a trace of panic in the other man's voice that caught Noah's attention, and if that hadn't the sight of the two agents climbing out of the car with confused expressions on their faces did. Bennet snatched the pager out of Bob's hand to read the warning. "Code Black - SV138." They exchanged a look of intense worry. "No…"

"It's Adam," Bob declared. "It has to be." Noah ran back to his house, dashing through the door to warn his family. "Agent Anderson, call in a helicopter now," he directed, immediately shifting back into the monotone authoritarian. "Tell them that Midas needs an emergency evac - ten minutes ago!" Anderson quickly nodded and whipped out his cell phone while his partner eagerly awaited orders. "Agent Michels, get to New York. Find Dr. Suresh and get him to Odessa." The young agent nodded a head of curly red hair before turning into a blurred streak of color that sped off into the distance. "God help us all," he whispered to himself, digging out his own phone and punching the speed-dial for Elle.

Angela Petrelli found herself wandering through the deserted streets of New York City. Cars were haphazardly vacated, left behind in the jumbled mess of traffic jams that they had been parked in. Store fronts with shattered windows were vacant, and paper fliers boasting notice of an emergency evacuation blew listlessly along the pavement on the breeze. There wasn't a single soul to be found, person, pigeon, or otherwise.

"Hello?" she called out to the empty monuments of man. Only the pitiless reverberation of her own voice would answer her though.

"Adam!" Angela cried out, sure that the immortal would be lurking somewhere in the shadows. "Claire!" A flicker of movement was seen from the very edge of her peripheral vision and she whirled around expecting to see some form of life. She could almost physically feel the devastation when her hopes were dashed in favor of more discarded garbage. "Peter?"

The tear remained in the process of rolling down the slope of her gracefully aged cheek when she opened her eyes to see that she was still resting safely in the back seat of her car. Bustling people of all varieties flowed down the walkways and crossed the streets in the cacophony of noise that seemed a joyous if not chaotic sign of thriving life. She might have jumped clean out of her skin when the pager in her purse gave its piercing beep if she hadn't been expecting it. Angela filtered through her possessions until she could find the device. Code Black - SV138.

"My God, what have we done?" she whispered to herself. "There's been a change of plans," Angela directed her driver who glanced back at her from the rearview mirror. "Get me to JFK immediately. And whatever you do, don't stop this car for anything."

"If you hadn't arrived Sylar would have slaughtered us all. We owe you our lives."

"Really?" Mohinder gave her a short nod to convey his gratitude. "Cool." The role of hero was an entirely foreign concept to her, but the emotional reward felt… strangely encouraging.

Elle Bishop leaned casually against the doorframe leading to the back exit for the loft, careful to avoid the broken splinters of glass from where her electric shock had caused Sylar to fall through the pane during his escape. She had just lifted her cell phone to make the call about him when her pager sounded and everyone jumped at the slight noise. "Code Black - SV138" she read off. "Crap."

"SV138?" Mohinder perked up. "The Shanti virus? What about it?"

"If it's a 'Code Black' that means that somebody got into the vault at Primatech. I don't know who would be stupid enough to try that though," she said with an awkward smile for such a ridiculous notion. And then the memory of an all too familiar charge that she had been assigned to watch over within the upper floors of the prison ward came rushing back at her. "Oh…"

"The Company has been keeping another strain of the virus in a vault?" Mohinder shook his head to clear away muddled thoughts. "When are you people going to learn?" He might have gone on longer if the trilling of her cell phone hadn't interrupted.

"Elle."

"Yes, Daddy?"

"Did you get the code?"

"Uh, huh."

"Then what are you still doing in New York?" Bob demanded.

"Daddy, I just got it like a minute ago."

"That is a minute that you could have spent calling for transport. You should know better, Elle."

"Daddy -"

"I'm leaving now for Ellesmere Island. I want you to report directly to Primatech. Those prisoners cannot escape."

"Primatech? But that's ground zero now."

"Yes it is. All the more reason to get this situation taken care of. We can't let the Company be exposed in any of this. I'm willing to overlook your recent errors in judgment if you can do your part to cover this up without any more mistakes."

"Yes, Sir," Elle replied rather deflatedly. The line promptly disconnected and she closed her cell. Three pairs of expectant eyes peered back at her.

Mohinder was the first one to pipe up. "How bad is this 138 strain?" he asked softly, having picked up on the heavy tension but not wanting to alarm the others.

"Bad," was all she could say.

"Sandra! Lyle! Claire!" Bennet called out as he sprinted for the kitchen. He flung aside the doors of the pantry closet and began tossing boxes out of the way in a hurried search for his secret stash.

"Dad? What is this?" Claire asked, holding out the pager with wide eyes for her normally controlled father's frenzy. "What's going on?"

"Noah?" Sandra called out also filing into the kitchen to see what was happening.

"Sandra, get Lyle and pack your bags. Take only what you absolutely have to. I'm giving you five minutes and then we have to get as far away from here as possible." His wife opened her mouth to protest but Bennet stopped his task long enough to wave her off. "I'll tell you everything when we're on the road, but right now we have to hurry."

"Dad, what's a 'Code Black' for 'SV138'?"

"Claire get your bag packed," Noah grunted as he frantically dug into his hiding spot and began to chuck all manner of weaponry and emergency aid kits over his shoulder.

"No!" she almost screamed at him in her already emotionally heightened state. "Tell me what is going on!"

Her father sank to his knees in the opening to the pantry and his shoulders dropped in defeat. Allowing confusion and panic to add to the situation would only cost them valuable time. "It's the Shanti virus."

"What? Like what Molly had?"

"Yes and no. It's the same virus but a different strain. Number 138."

"Why do we all to have leave? Doesn't it just affect people like me?"

Noah bit his tongue for a moment trying to think of a way to explain the problem with the virus to her that wouldn't make her concerns worse. "It will at first. But people that don't have abilities can also carry the virus helping it spread, and 138 mutates very quickly. It's only a matter of time until it starts to infect everyone else."

"And kills them…" Claire finished the thought, feeling her heart sink.

"Yes." Bennet gathered up his personal gun arsenal into a spare canvas bag holding a collection of false identities and a few bundles of cash. "The Company was keeping 138 protected in a secured vault at Primatech back in Odessa. They have contingency plans in place in case it ever got out," he rushed, shoving the stack of medical kits into her arms, "but it's probably already too late."

Claire helped him carry the supplies out into the driveway to the car where she noticed Bishop and a strange man both yelling fanatically into cell phones by a sleek black car. "Okay, but if it was supposed to be safe in this vault who could have gotten it?"

"They think it's Adam Monroe."

Bennet threw the bags into the trunk of the family car before taking the kits from Claire. He popped the latch on one to reveal a selection of loaded syringes resting within foamy insulation. "Who's Adam?" she asked, watching her father take one of the needles full of clear liquid and roll his sleeve up to thump on a vein in his arm.

"He's a 'special' like you." With the vein exposed Noah carefully tipped the needle into the blood vessel and pressed in on the plunger.

"What's his ability?"

"Claire," he stopped to take in the revolving emotions that flooded her features. Confusion, frustration, grief, and disgust for what she had just seen him do all stared back at him. "He's like you. Exactly like you."

"There's others?" Everything else fell away to surprise, and maybe just a little relief.

"Just the one that I know of," he grunted, grabbing two more syringes and closing the case again. Claire's mind had already been spinning before her father had come back home. All of the revelations that had followed in the last hour only served to lock her down in a haze of whirling possibilities. She tried to hold on to the thought that a deadly virus was set to spread over the world, but the only thing her brain seemed to want to cling to out of that was that it was because of another person just like her. For so long she had held in anxious feelings about being the only freak that could do what she could, and fears of loneliness because of it, keeping them all secret from the people around her lest they think less of her or begin to come to the same conclusions. And then, out of the blue, there was suddenly someone else that could potentially understand in a way that no one else would. He could answer so many questions.

"Why didn't you tell me about him before?"

Noah grabbed a pistol out of the bag, dropped the magazine to check that it was loaded, and handed it to her before slamming the trunk shut. "Claire," he warned, feeling her anger rise. "Adam might have the same ability, but he's nothing like you. He's - he's dangerous. He's kills people. Like Sylar," he added knowing that the name association would instantly grab her attention.

"Claire?" Sandra Bennet and Lyle stepped out of the house to see her holding a gun and Noah with two needles in his hand while Bob and the agent continued to bicker at the bottom of the drive. "Noah? What the hell is going on? You've been keeping guns in the house?"

He didn't give her time to exert the full capacity of her wrath. Bennet dashed to take his family's bags and tossed them into the back seat of the car before returning and taking his wife's arm. "Noah!" she shrieked at him when he ripped the sleeve of her blouse upward to inject her with the same clear substance that he had given himself. "What is this?"

"It's a vaccine for the Spanish Flu." Lyle gave a startled gasp when his turn came for a dosage. "It won't stop the virus, but it might slow it down. We hope."

"Virus?"

"Why doesn't Claire get one?" Lyle inquired, looking back and forth between all of them as he struggled to figure out what was happening to them.

"Her regeneration would burn it up in her system before it could do anything."

"That's right," Bob interjected, gaining everyone's attention as he sidled up to the family. "Not that it matters. I imagine you have a natural immunity against the virus which is why we'll be needing your services."

Noah lunged for the gun Claire was holding and trained the business end on the space directly between Bishop's eyes. Agent Anderson dropped his phone to bring his own firearm into play, aiming for Bennet. Bob also dropped his Company issued weapon from its holster beneath his jacket but left the threat to dangle easily at his side. "You're not taking my daughter," Bennet warned.

Bishop casually watched Sandra gather Lyle behind her back and pull Claire into her side, never for a second losing focus on what was happening before them. "We've seen how the combination of Mohinder Suresh's and Claire's blood can form a cure for the virus." Bob's eyes left Noah's to stare openly at Claire who struggled against her mother's grasp to shield them with her own body. "You can help to save a lot of lives, young lady."

"Don't talk to her," Noah warned again, cocking his pistol.

"You can't die from the virus. Your ability keeps you from even being infected by it so that you can't spread it to others. If you come with us we will do everything in our power to keep you safe from harm. You're a very valuable person to us right now, Claire. I'll treat you as if you were my own daughter."

"Don't listen to him, Claire," her father growled.

"How would you feel if people like Nathan Petrelli and Meredith Gordon had to die because of a virus that you could prevent? People like West Rosen, or even your Uncle Peter?"

"How did you -"

"We know everything, Claire." Bob gave her a plastic smile that didn't touch his eyes at all. "The Company can protect your family. We can arrange for safe passage for everyone. All you have to do is come with us."

"Dad, put the gun down."

"Claire, no. I'm not letting them take you. You could disappear down a rabbit hole and never be seen again."

"As soon as this is all over you'll be safely reunited with your family," Bob placated. "As a gesture of good faith," he put his gun away and pulled a business card from the inner pocket of his jacket, holding it out for someone to take, "there's a Company quarantine station in Quebec. It's a clean zone. Your family can stay there for as long as you need to, and all of your needs will be met."

Claire squirmed out from under her mother's arm to cautiously approach Bishop and take the card from his outstretched hand. "That's a secured line," he indicated the phone number printed on the card. "Only the top Company personnel have access to that number. If you call them and tell them that Midas sent you everything will be taken care of."

"Claire?" Her father turned to look at her with a plea in his eyes, perfectly aware of just how much sense the other man's words would be making to her.

"Time is an issue here," Bob noted, tapping on his watch face. "If the virus is released we'll only have a twenty-four hour window to contain it."

"Dad, put the gun down," she reiterated. Claire moved to his side and placed her hand over her father's trembling ones. "He's right. If I can do anything to stop this… I have to." Bennet lowered his weapon and pulled her into a tight hug. "I'll be safe. I promise." She pulled back from her father to look him in the eyes. "You have to get Mom and Lyle out of here." Noah glanced back at his wife and son and nodded in agreement.

"Don't trust anything they tell you," Sandra whispered into her ear when Claire went to give her mother a farewell hug. "Nothing."

"I won't," she promised.

"Don't… Don't die or anything," her brother mumbled worriedly when she wrapped her arms around him too.

"If anything happens to her…" Noah shared a look with Bishop that easily communicated his threatening intentions.

"If anything happens to her we may already be dead."

Let Hiro go. Go after Adam. He's using you, Peter. Let Hiro go. The time traveler slipped back down the wall of the hallway as Peter released his telekinetic grip under the influence of Matt Parkman's thoughts. Go after Adam. He's evil.

I don't think so, Peter pushed back, turning to fully face his new foe.

He wants to destroy the whole world.

You're wrong. Adam wouldn't do that.

He's going to release the virus, Matt pushed again.

He wants to destroy the virus. With a casual wave of his hand, Peter knocked Parkman onto his backside and sent him sliding down the hall away from the vault. "Don't you understand? You're on the wrong side!"

"What about me, Pete?" Nathan asked, stepping out from a side hall to address his brother.

"Nathan?" It was the first time that Peter had seen him since he had lain in a hospital bed broken, burnt, and barely alive after the night at Kirby Plaza when he had flown them away from the city saving millions of lives from Peter's explosion. Adam had seemed so sure that an infusion of his regenerative blood would help to save the Petrelli, but Peter had never imagined that Nathan would be able to walk away unscathed. Surprised eyes took in the full scope of his brother's face failing to find any trace of flaw.

"Am I on the wrong side too?"

"If you're trying to stop me from destroying that virus… Yes." Peter tensed his stance again, ready to protect the world; even from his brother if he had to.

While the others held Peter distracted, Hiro came out of his daze on the floor. Realizing that Monroe had been temporarily forgotten inside of the vault with the virus, he blinked, teleporting back to his nemesis.

Now, where's that key… Ah, yes. There you are. Adam smirked as he spied his secondary goal in another glass case on a top shelf. A large golden key hung on its stand just waiting to be obtained. Balancing on the tips of his toes he stretched forward to twist Victoria's key into the lock so that he could take the object into his possession as well.

"Kensei," Hiro called out, interrupting the acquisition. "You were my friend," he lapsed back into Japanese.

"You were more than a friend to me." Monroe felt a brief moment of pleasant surprise that he could still remember the language after not having spoken it in over two hundred years. "You were my inspiration. I was a rudderless drunk, and then you came along and taught me to be a hero."

"Only to have you become a villain."

Adam unleashed his sword, bringing the point to rest just before Hiro's throat. "I learned that from you," he venomously replied also using the teleporter's native tongue. In the hand resting covertly behind his back from view, Adam held the vial of Shanti virus, working the rubber stopper out with his thumb.

"I went to the Company. I saw Adam's history," Nathan began to explain. "Who he is, and what he wanted. Pete, he tried to release the virus."

"Do you want to know how your burns got healed, Nathan? He gave you his blood. I was there. You should be grateful."

"He used me," the older Petrelli brother whispered, realizing just how far the man in question had twisted Peter's mind.

"I've been living in this wretched world for over four hundred years now, Hiro," Adam went on. "I've seen everything there is to see now. The good. The bad. The hopeless. I've traveled to the ends of the Earth, and lived a hundred different lives with a hundred different peoples. And do you know what I've learned?" He leant forward slightly so that he could look his enemy directly in the eyes. "They're all the same. It doesn't matter where you come from, or what you believe in. People are always the same. They live, they fight amongst one another, and they die."

"And you think that gives you right to destroy them all?" Hiro glared back at him unblinking.

"I didn't start out with that idea," Adam pulled back. "There was a time when I thought they could be saved. I brought this Company together with the idea that we could use our abilities to end the struggle and the pain. I shared my knowledge. I worked alongside these people for over ten years to save lives only to be betrayed by them in the end. But it didn't matter what we did.

"War. Famine. Disease. Four hundred years later and nothing has changed. When God wasn't happy with what he created he made it rain for forty days and forty nights. He just washed it all away. And he had the right idea. Because when this virus is released those of us who will be left will be granted a second chance. And I'll be there, Hiro."

"He used me to get to you," Nathan stated as he slowly approached his brother. "Don't you see it? That he tried to manipulate you like that?"

"Nathan, he -"

"Peter, that night at Kirby Plaza when I carried you away, it was because I believe in you. You're my brother, Pete. I love you." Peter dropped his guard with the genuine truth that he could feel in his brother's words. "Can you really trust Adam?" He turned back to the vault with a pang of dread in his gut.

"Mo, I don't want to get sick again," Molly mumbled with unshed tears of fear in her eyes.

Mohinder looked back at a fretful Elle for a moment but summoned the most serene smile possible for his young charge. "Don't you worry. I won't let anything bad happen to you. We'll find a way to stop all this just like we always do."

"Promise?"

"I promise." Maya caught his anxious eyes with her own worried ones. She was about to say something when the front door to the loft slammed open with a gush of air. Elle had a charge built in her hand to ward off the new invader in an instant and shot a long arch of bright blue lightning in the direction of the entrance. A blurred streak of black and red sped out of the line of fire, coming to a breezy halt at Suresh's side.

"Are you Mohinder Suresh?" the agent quirked her head at him with open curiosity. Her neatly pressed black pant suit and loosely curled mop of vibrant red hair were barely ruffled by the supersonic speed she was capable of traveling at.

"Yes," he answered hesitantly.

"Who are you?" Elle demanded as she crossed to his side as well.

"Agent Gloria Michels. I have explicit instructions to bring you to Odessa, Texas, Dr. Suresh."

"Who's orders?"

Michels barely paused to give Elle the time of day. "Mr. Robert Bishop. There's been a mishap at the Primatech facility and we require your assistance."

"Mohinder…" Maya and Molly were looking back and forth between them all in panic. After discovering the death of her brother, a betrayal by Gabriel, and then a gunshot wound her nerves were already on edge. Being forced to wait in confusion while the neurotic blonde with static dancing on her fingertips faced off with a gun-toting red haired woman that moved too quickly to see was not doing Maya's sense of calm any favors.

Blackness flooded into her eyes and she could feel the cool misty sensation come over her skin whenever the shroud of death that she wielded seeped out into the world. An inky tear slipped over Molly's lashes as her breathing labored, and Mohinder hunched over in a tight spasm of pain. Elle's electricity faltered in her hand, but began to spread over skin, ionizing the air of the room and gaining intensity for a defensive power surge. Gloria rippled with a full body shiver and whipped out both of her Company issue pistols, training one on Elle, and the other on Maya.

"Dr. Suresh…" Michels called out when she saw him drop to his knees.

"Maya… Please. You have to make it stop."

She took a deep cleansing breath, willing herself to pull the misty feeling back inside. The black hue faded from all of their eyes and bodily function slowly returned to normal. Elle turned around and heaved a stream of electrical discharge to rid herself of the energy that had built up.

"That was… interesting." Michels returned her guns to their holsters after the blonde's angry crackling had ceased. "As I was saying, Dr. Suresh, we have to get going. Now."

"Mo, don't leave me here," Molly cried out when the agent made to grab her caretaker's arm for travel. "What about Sylar?"

"Sylar?" Gloria perked up. "Sylar is here?"

"He was. I lost him," Elle grumbled.

Michels instantly retrieved her dual pistols again and held them at the ready, vigilantly studying every nook and cranny of the room as if she expected the monster to pop out at her any moment. "Did he have his abilities?"

"He didn't earlier. But he took the blood so he's probably getting them back as we speak." Mohinder spared another disgruntled glance for the space where his case should have been. "Oh, God, Nikki."

"We're getting out of here, Dr. Suresh." Gloria continued to slowly circle about as she moved towards him keeping an eye out for the ability hunter.

"I can't. I have to get more of the blood for Nikki Sanders, and Molly…" he let his arms fly in frustration.

"That wasn't an option, Dr. Suresh."

Neighbors curiously gathered outside of their homes and out over the lush green lawns to watch the Company helicopter make an impromptu landing on the street corner. "Agent Anderson will be escorting you back to Odessa," Bob indicated the agent leaning against the car. The tall man with dark sandy blonde hair and wide brown eyes gave her an uneasy smile from his post.

"You're not coming with us?" Claire faced a lightly sweating Bishop again.

"No. I'll be meeting with the other founders at another location."

"As far from harm's reach as possible," Noah snorted.

Bob might have wanted to argue, but instead he took another look at his watch and waved them off. Bennet rested a warm hand on his daughter's shoulder while they watched him duck under the wind of the chopper's blades and climb inside. When the aerial transport lifted off Noah pressed his pistol in her hand and closed her fingers around it.

"When things like this happen people start to panic, Claire Bear. Don't go anywhere alone or without this." Next he handed her a spare cell phone with his number already programmed into it. "If anything, anything, goes wrong or gets to be too much for you to handle, you call me."

"I will. Take care of Mom and Lyle."

"I will." Claire followed him to the car where Sandra and her brother were already sullenly strapped in. She leaned in to kiss her mother good-bye with promises that they would be back together again before they knew it. "We will see you again soon," Noah vowed. Claire simply nodded because if she had said anything in that moment it might have only come out as a choked sob and she had to be a brave face for her family.

Anderson patiently waited for her to watch them drive away before he approached. "We, um, we should get going now," he motioned to black Company car. She nodded in agreement and quietly made to take the passenger's seat.

"One way or another I'm taking you, Dr. Suresh."

"What about me?"

"What about you?" Gloria asked in irritation.

"I have orders to get to Primatech too," Elle huffed.

"I was only instructed to get the good doctor."

"Of course you were," she sighed despondently.

"Look, we have a world to save, and a killer on the loose. I don't have time to keep arguing with you over this."

"Mohinder, I - I can take her," Maya started, gesturing towards the sniffling girl.

"What are you going to do if Sylar comes back?"

"I stopped him before. I can do it again," she answered confidently.

His hands were tied. Mohinder made to pinch the bridge of his nose out of habit only to flinch at the forgotten pain that resided there from the break. "Molly, do you think you can go with Maya?"

She paused to think about the situation, looking back and forth between them and agreed. "I can track Sylar. If he comes for us I'll know and we can run away."

"Alright, um…" He stopped to search for a piece of scrap in the pile of papers on his desk. Grabbing a pen, Suresh quickly scrawled out a list of information for the girls to take. "This is the address for my mother's house in India and directions on how to get there." He pulled out his wallet and handed Maya all of the cash that he had on hand and a barely used credit card for emergencies. As an afterthought he also gave her his phone. "Take this. Get as far away as you can. I'll call you as soon as I can and tell you anything I find out."

Upon exiting the loft Mohinder refused to leave with the agent until he saw that Maya and Molly had found a cab to the airport. "Everything will be alright," he promised the little girl with a kiss on the forehead. "I'll find a way to make everything good again. I promise."

Sylar kept his back to the outer wall of the loft, peering out from the corner of the alleyway at the group of people leaving. Suresh was preoccupied with saying good-bye to the young tracker and Maya while Elle and what seemed to be another Company agent chatted tensely.

"I am not a car," the redhead grumbled, crossing her arms. "Call for a transport like everyone else."

"Whatever," Elle pouted. "I guess I'll see you all back at Primatech."

He silently waited them out, watching as the women all got into cabs. The agent joined his side when Mohinder sullenly jammed his hands into his pockets, gazing after the cars. "My partner just phoned in. Claire Bennet will be joining us in Odessa within a few hours."

Sylar couldn't help but allow the smirk to curl in the corner of his mouth. His fingers flexed within his fist, knuckles popping a touch, and reminding him of just how much he had been craving that delicious ability. His own powers were slowly returning to him, but so far only the telekinesis and his natural aptitude had made a full comeback. Hopes flared that with another injection of the cheerleader's blood, or even adaptation of the regenerative ability itself would bring them all back. Invulnerability. It was such a perfect little thing to have in one's pocket; appropriate for all occasions. Had his mouth not been quite so dry he might have salivated a bit for the want of it. Thanks for telling me where she'll be.

"You are not God," Hiro contemptuously contested.

"Really? I've lived for over four hundred years. Who's to say that I'm not going to live four hundred more?" Adam leaned farther in until he was within arm's reach.

"I should have killed you. Long ago. And I should kill you now. For my father." The rubber stopper came free from the vial and Adam tilted it a touch so that a few drops of the liquid inside could be smeared over his thumb. When Hiro grabbed him for teleportation, he was ready.

All the world had gone terribly silent in the moment that Peter was sprinting for the vault door. His own heavy hitting pulse was the only sound to reach his ears. He charged through the entryway of warped steel and twisted locking mechanisms just in time to catch sight of the virus's vial falling out of thin air. In a sharp stab of panic he reached out with his telekinesis to snare the glass before it could shatter over the floor releasing the deadly plague… only to be a fraction of a second too late.

The vial's rubber stopper had been loosened to allow a few drops of the liquid incarnation of the virus to splash on the cement floor which interrupted his attention enough for the rest of the vial to slip through his invisible fingers. Glass splinters spread outward from the impact of the fall farther smearing the contaminate.

Nathan and Matt whom had been chasing after him bumped into Peter's back after his abrupt stop. "Oh no…"

"Get out! Get out of here!" Peter used his ability to blow the other men back from the vault and away from the virus. He ran out after them and proceeded to do his very best to shove the door back into place, straining with all of his might to close off the threat. Summoning Ted Sprague's ability, he did what he could to weld the metal contraption back into place for an airtight seal.

"Let me out! Let me out of here! Carp!" Hiro wearily tossed his shovel aside and slumped to his knees near the pile of fresh dirt for the grave that he had dug. "Carp! Let me out of here!" Adam's panicked cries for release from his makeshift prison carried through the earth to him. He pushed his glasses back up onto the bridge of his nose successfully smearing a streak of dirt across his face in the process. Nakamura was just about ready to teleport home when one last shriek from the buried man caught his attention.

"You'll never find the cure without me, Carp!"

To be continued...