And All the Stars Fell Down
by adlyb
Disclaimer: I own nothing, except these words.
What is it makes a man? He asks himself this as Claire steps out of the deep shadows of his bedroom, only to gasp when she sees the doll splayed decoratively across his bare gray living room wall.
"You." The words tumble from her lips (the dead flesh around her mouth—the flesh that is eternal—moves only to prove that they are real) like autumn leaves, rustling softly until they reach his doll's ears.
The doll begins to move (limbs and twisting neck held by string), a dancing marionette (moving only because he wills it so).
Behind him, she speaks, and she is so close he can feel her breath trickling between those lips (the eternal breath that is both hers and now his, and he cannot be sure whether she is of his flesh or if he is now of hers) onto his skin. The hair on the back of his neck stands up, and he does not turn, except for the faintest perversion of his neck.
"What is she doing here?" she breathes, her words (the first she's spoken to him since after) as insubstantial as stardust.
"Hmm? Oh, yes." He takes a moment to smile fondly at the (carnally) familiar blonde behind him. "That's a very good question." He looks to the dolly on the wall. "Elle? Anything to say?"
He remembers an old trifling feeling he'd had for her, years ago now, and is reminded why. She's beautiful, really. Blonde and tall and lusciously curvaceous; almost Claire, but not quite. She makes a wonderful toy though, fastened as she is to the wall behind her, face painted in myriad shades of blue and red and yellow and all other colors desirable unto him.
She is about to speak, he can tell, except no words come. Then he remembers that he has forgotten to give her lips and tongue and other slick biting things when he named her Elle. He lifts a hand, tweaks it just so until language—globs of undilute words—gush from her mouth
god damn you Claire god damn you for what you did to my father let me go let me go let me go
and she thrashes against him, as if she had will of her own.
Sylar tweaks that finger back, snapping those white teeth shut and pushing the undiluted venom back into her lungs. Such a pretty doll when she doesn't speak.
"Uh-uh, Elle," he tells her, wagging his finger. "That's not what I asked. Now—shall we try again?" He raises and eyebrow at her and for a moment it's quite clear what thoughts pass through her mind. He smirks, because he knows always what his effect on women has become. He steps closer to her. "This time, try to be honest."
He smiles, because he can hear the wild slamming of her heart against her bones, the dizzy creak of her ribcage as her diaphragm pumps for air.
When he finally gives her her faculties back, she gulps, a loud smacking of her epiglottis against her throat. Her mouth works and she says nothing.
Slowly, very careful to control the volume, Sylar releases a small dose of pheromone, just enough to make her putty in his too capable hands.
"Elle? Don't you want to tell me?"
Her lips (soft and vulnerable and easily torn) parts and then she tells him. "For you. I'm here for you."
"Oh?" Such a pleasant girl, he decides.
"And for Claire."
He can feel Claire tense, can feel her eyes roving the apartment, searching.
"For Claire," he repeats.
"Because of what she did to my father..."
"I don't see how that has anything to do with me."
Claire isn't on the move yet, but she will be soon. She's trying (very, very hard) to remain unnoticed, a blemish in the background, as she searches inevitably for a weapon.
The predator in him admires her. Part of him wishes to turn, to enjoy her prowl, to watch the kill.
But Elle is speaking, and he must listen.
"…found your location… the data was sitting on his desk."
Stupid mistake, he realizes. He doesn't like to make mistakes.
"And you followed me here?"
"Yes…"
"That's a lot of trouble just to get caught, Elle."
She looks down, sullen. "It's what Peter wanted."
"Peter?"
"Petrelli. I'm only here because he asked—"
Something rams into him from behind, breaking his hold on Elle. His head snaps back fast, just before a golden foot knocks him to his knees and something cold and heavy (a silver handgun, he is sure) presses to the back of his skull. Should've paid more attention to Claire after all.
…………………………………………….
There are only moments for her to make a move. Mere moments until he realizes what she is doing and she must either fight or fly. Who'd have thought that Elle would be the one to spring her free? She supposes that sparing Elle's life was really just good thinking in the end. Well, that, and Sylar seems to have a thing for blondes.
Her eyes scan the living room, searching for a weapon. Sylar is completely absorbed in the other woman's words, and if Claire is jealous, she does not pause to think on it.
The room is full of possible weaponry. A lamp-stand behind her to the right, a fire stoker perhaps fifteen feet away. Nothing, she realizes with certain anxiety, that would obstruct Sylar. That's when she sees it. Glinting in the morning sun, a beautiful, care-worn, polished handgun, forgotten in a far corner of the room. The likelihood of this moment is so slim, she realizes. At any other time of day, the sun would not hit that corner at just the right angle to catch the rays of the sun, and she would not have had her opportunity. If Elle had not come just then, there would be no distraction. But miracles do happen.
Claire is moving, slowly, slowly, listening only dimly to the conversation. That's a lot of trouble just to get caught Elle it's what Peter wanted Peter—her hand is just clasping the hand-guard—Petrelli.
The world falls down.
The time she spends in quiet hesitation must be mere seconds—milliseconds—but it is enough for Claire to realize that if it isn't now, it will be never.
She bursts across the room, slamming into Sylar with hardened years of death on her shoulders. Incapacitating him when he's unawares is simple—he never was much of a fighter without his powers. Hoisting the gun to the back of his head, right to the special, tender part of which she's sure he's still ignorant, is easy, easy like her first swan dive off that long-ago abandoned Texas tower.
Claire's fingers squeeze tight and then he is dead upon the floor, quiet and almost beautiful in certain lights. She has no time to admire him. Soon he will stir, and she needs to know before that can happen.
Sylar's hold on Elle elapses a moment after his death, and she crashes to the floor. Claire's hand is immediately upon her, closing around her throat and pushing her up against the wall. Friction dances off of Elle's skin, burning into her palms, itching madly as her healing powers renew the singing flesh.
"What the hell do you know about Peter Petrelli?" she demands, voice harsh and low, hiding the fear she feels coiled like a snake in her belly.
"What's it to you?" Elle asks, and oh, Claire hates her, knows that the feeling is truly mutual.
"Does it matter?"
Elle eyes her, shrugs. "I guess not."
"So—I'll ask you one more time, Elle. What do you know about Peter?"
Those blue eyes—cruel at any angle—slide over to hers, and for a moment, she looks almost wistful.
Claire hears what Elle isn't saying, fills in the blanks as she speaks.
"What do I know? I know the texture of his hair (because I cut it), I know how soft his mouth is (because I kissed it), I know how he looks when he's lying (because he deceived me), and I know what it feels like when he's gone (because I love him)."
A sick feeling, because, as disturbed as Elle is, she is not of Peter's blood. What can she say for herself, the niece consumed by a perverse adoration of an uncle? She speaks, and her voice is very, very quiet. "Do you also know he's dead (because I killed him)?"
Silvery laughter. "Dead? Since when?"
Claire swallows the lump rising in her throat. "Six years now. Since…" Say it. "Since Kirby Plaza."
The tears are coming down Elle's face now—not the kind that follow grief, but the kind that follow a good joke. "Oh, you poor, poor girl. I can't imagine—thinking…" She trails off.
"Shut up, Elle." The command isn't worth very much when Elle doesn't listen.
"Oh, Claire Bennett, all grown up. I preferred you when you were a cheerleader."
Hatred is strong and it is sure and it gives Claire the clarity to grit through her teeth, "You're saying Peter's alive?"
"Sure looked that way to me, Claire."
Understanding dawns, bright and ugly. He's been hiding from her—alive—because he must know. No other options, she realizes, other than to find him.
"When? How?"
Elle looks somewhere above her shoulder. "He asked me… He told me I needed to help him save the world."
Definitely Peter.
"What's it to you, anyway?" Elle asks again, and this time, Claire is ready to answer her.
After all these years, it doesn't even make her flinch when she smacks the butt of her gun against Elle's temple. The dull crack as the metal connects with bone is only muffled by the sound Elle's body makes when she hits the ground. She stands over her. What's it to you, anyway? "Because I loved him too," she murmurs, stepping over Sylar's body on the way out.
…………………………………………….
For the longest time Claire Bennett was just a name. It had salacious connotations that made his mouth water, the same way hamburger did. For months he had wet dream after wet dream of consuming her power, of gaining her invulnerability, her immortality. There was no face attached to the name, only the nubile description of a blonde Texan cheerleader in a red uniform.
He cut a swath through the Midwest, slaughtering everything special he found along the way, until there was only Claire—perfect, plump Claire.
Their meeting did not go as expected. The rest was history.
…………………………………………….
Strange, waking up, because he is cognizant of his skin knitting back together before he is conscious, aware of the slow stretch of cranial bone as it strives to repair itself before he opens his eyes. A truly miraculous gift.
The room swims into focus, all lavenders and browns before his eyes make sense of the true shape of things. The light coming from the window indicates that it must have taken several hours for his body to repair itself. The predator in him admires her.
Sylar understands, just before he regains control over his body, what has happened. Claire (beautiful, intransient Claire) has murdered him. He marvels over their remarkably close connections—the connections they now share through blood (the blood he shed the first time he threw her against a set of lockers, her blood drawing him from the brink of death as it filtered through his veins, and then the blood of victims, the blood he smelt only yesterday when he took her the first time, his own lifeblood, now pooling admirably on the living room floor, which she has shed for herself and for many). Part of him is flattered that she has intensified their connection (after all, to whom are you closer than to those whose lives you take?), marvels that she was able to find an advantage over him. The other part (the part that is a man) is heartsick over Claire, the woman who murdered him, the woman who has, it seemed, left him after all.
He stands, testing the strength of his arms, legs, and turns. He does not expect to find her still here (she will have already fled the Eden he has tried to create for her), but he does not expect to find Elle, either.
He approaches her, finds she is still breathing. He brushes a hand over her hair, the fine, frosty strands clinging to his hand. Static electricity, he supposes. Interesting.
The wound on her head is bright, a sinuous, carmine stripe on her pale face. He lowers himself to her and, sure that she is asleep, allows his tongue to dart out, taste the flavor of it. Not like Claire's blood at all (but it will do).
A memory stirs, of that fateful day in the ally so long ago—of blood slipping through his veins, and he wonders if his blood might be as potent as Claire's.
When it doesn't work to heal the girl on the ground, he is almost disappointed. So much for experimentation.
He is just about to slice the pretty dolly's head open to get a good look at the fluff inside when her eyes flutter open.
At first she is afraid, trembling. Then she hardens and she is a beautiful porcelain piece and very much worth his time examining.
"You're not dead." A statement, not a question.
He laughs. "Of course not. My kind don't die very easily."
She nods. Looks toward the window, which bothers him, more than anything else, because her attention should be focused on him (before all others).
"So," he begins, drawing her eyes back, "Where did our lovely Claire go?"
The look she gives him is rueful. "Does it look like I know?" She indicates the tail of blood slithering down her face.
"Quite." He raises her hand, ready to kill her, exhaust her completely.
"Wait!" she yells, panic clear in her pretty voice. She rises to her knees, crawls towards him, something familiar in her eyes. "Aren't you… curious?"
"Curious," he repeats, voice flat. There is no time for women and their merciless games any longer. All he wants is to kill this woman, this former fascination, and give himself a few minutes to regroup before he finds Claire.
Just thinking of her causes a mad pulse of feelings within him—rage, lust, ownership, betrayal. He pushes her from his mind forcefully.
"There are other things I could show you… other than Claire's whereabouts." A gentle exhalation of (serpent's) breath against his too easily persuaded ear.
When Elle presses forward, he wants only the contrast she represents.
She snakes her arms around his neck and presses her mouth to his. He understands what this is, understands that this is survival for her, but… if he has the dolly all dressed up, why not play with her first?
…………………………………………….
He takes her on the floor (the dust kicking when she writhes beneath him). He is angry and frustrated and the rhythm makes his teeth grind, but Elle just delicately digs her fingers into his back, sinking them beneath the flesh and holding, holding, pressing him always forward and back.
For Elle, this is about survival and something about his dark complexion that sets her nerve endings on fire and lets her pretend, and fuck it, isn't he pretending too?
She hooks a leg over his hip, driving him deeper within her. The feeling (hot and he wouldn't be surprised if with every contraction she was zinging him because it's that good) agitates him, causes him to rock harder against her until with every pulse her head is thumping against the ground and he just doesn't care.
Neither does she, apparently, because soon she is crooning his name, chanting it between every timed thrust—Sylar-Sylar-Sylar-Sylar—and this is twisted, even by his standards. He wants to ask her, ask her, Whose your daddy now, Elle? Whose your daddy now?
Satisfaction overwhelms him when she peaks. So hard to tell with Claire whether she was enjoying it.
He imagines Claire, all languid curves and tiny fingers and toes—a paragon of hushed femininity. The thought of her naked beneath him, her sweet-sad smile pressed into his shoulder, drives him over the edge, and he comes, shouts, "Claire!" before pulling out.
…………………………………………….
Sylar had never stepped a foot outside New York until the day he killed Brian Davis. Until that moment, the snivel known as Gabriel Grey had only seen the world through snow globes and magazine advertisements. He'd never been bothered by it, though; everything of importance had been contained in his tick-ticking watch repair shop.
Better than anything he remembers the day his father left. A regular day, not stormy or dark, just… normal. Out to get a pack of cigarettes and never returning.
He'd known he wasn't coming back, of course. Had him all figured out from the moment the gear turned in his head, like he seemed to have every other person on the planet figured out. Didn't stop him from running after him, of course.
Gabriel had stopped at the door, cracking it open to peer at his father's back as he shouldered his over-coat.
"Dad?" he had called.
His father had turned, appraised him silently before speaking. "Yes, Gabriel?" Never Gabe with him, always Gabriel.
"When will you be coming home?"
"Just out for a quick pack of smokes, son. Back in half an hour, I promise." Lying, of course. Didn't make the moment any less sweet.
His father turns away again, and this time, Gabriel reaches a hand out, snags the rough fabric of his father's coat between his fingers.
"Dad?"
Impatient now. "Yes, Gabriel?"
"You'll help me fix that car when you get back?"
A faint smile crosses his father's lips. "About time to stop playing with hot-wheels, don't you think, son? You're almost eleven now." He pauses. "Here," he says as he fishes through his coat before unfastening the antique watch from his wrist. "Have a go at this. If you can fix it, I'll promise to share a secret with you."
"What secret?"
…………………………………………….
What is it makes a man? He lies awake, after, wondering. He's had Claire for less than seventy-two hours and already he's forsaken her. He feels this (this fall from Grace) and curses the woman touching kisses to his skin. Sylar doesn't like her a lot right now, even if she is a pretty piece. Roughly, he yanks at her hair, until she is forced to look at him.
"Tell me why I shouldn't kill you (bash in your head)."
Elle is slack-jawed for a moment, her reddened lips lingering just over the crest of his hip. Finally, a white, fleshy hand brushes its fingers just there. She speaks when he shivers. "Claire—you seem… interested in her."
Only the memory of just after, when Claire was still warm in his bed, pressed into him, when her sad little girl's eyes turned to him and told him she had done it because it was easy, only then did he remember the one all-important detail of her inexhaustible existence.
"You have no idea."
"Well, she's gone now…"
"Yes... And I'm inclined to blame you for it."
The fear again. He really loves it.
"Me? What did I do?"
"Peter. A very sensitive topic with her."
Unconsciously, Elle traces the dried blood on her temple. "I noticed. A little strange, to be so hung up over her uncle."
He laughs, and he cannot stop, because it's so true. Claire, his Claire, pining for an uncle dead for six years now, and him, coveting the woman he met because he incidentally tossed her into a cement wall when he mistook another cheerleader for the special one (how could he be so stupid?) and the three of them, Peter and Claire and Sylar, meeting all on one night. Unbelievable. He kicks himself for being the catalyst that drove the two of them together—or rather, the catalyst that has Claire permanently stuck on another man. He actually congratulates himself for being orchestrating the schmuck's death all those years ago in New York.
Elle sits back on her haunches, hands on her lush thighs as she watches him laugh. "That funny?"
"You'd have to be there to understand."
She doesn't want to look at him anymore, and that's fine, because he doesn't particularly want to look at her anymore either.
"You still haven't given me a reason not to slice your head open," he tells her quietly.
Her eyes bug as she thinks of some response. Comes up with, "Won't you need a lead to find her?"
He smirks, because he has her. "No, I really won't." He pauses, musing. "Her whereabouts will be… quite obvious, really. I'm a little… perturbed, actually, that she would attempt to runaway (but the predator in him is enjoying this)." To prove his point, he pulls a map off the coffee table. He closes his eyes and hones his powers. Frowns. When he does not find her in New Jersey, he moves to the tri-state region, then the Northeast, then the country. Finally, he finds a world map, panics when she is nowhere.
A/N: A short chapter, but hopefully an interesting one. Hope the syllelle! wasn't too hard to stomach. In the mean time, I'll be working on chapter 5 and finishing this little number up. Please read and review!