Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it

Feedback: Much appreciated

AN: Well, there's still a little while to go before we learn the identities of Subjects Alpha and Omega, but, following my decision to incorporate the events of Season Two into this story, I thought that it was time for at least one of the bad guys to make an appearance before I show the crew preparing for their attack on the Academy (As well as showing how River and Claire match up in a fight)

From the Ashes

In a darkened room in a space station that officially didn't exist, a man whose existence was little more than shadow and rumour to around ten percent of the population of this galaxy, utterly unknown to eighty-nine point nine percent of the population, and only known for a fact to exist by the remaining point one percent, stood in a darkened room and studied the screen before him.

If people had known about the sheer range of companies that this man had created were overseen by one man, they might have wondered how he ever managed to cope with the sheer range of tasks that he did on a day-to-day basis. After all, he was the final authority for no less than five of the most powerful organisations currently in existence in this galaxy, and was thus responsible on a daily basis for making numerous decisions that could aid or ruin lives on several planets if he made the wrong choice, and yet, despite everything he had to deal with on a regular basis, he still managed to keep all his employees satisfied.

Of course, he generally preferred it when he was working on projects on the… to put it simply… not-so-legal side of things, but that wasn't to say he didn't put just as much effort in his more legal operations as well. After all, the Academy program was certainly a highly interesting avenue of research into others like himself, to say the least, but it wouldn't even be possible without the finances brought in by his earnings in Blue Sun and other such areas.

It was always tedious having to rely on mere humans to conduct his research, but with his kind having significantly weakened themselves to avoid detection during the exodus, he supposed he should just be grateful that anybody still had access to powers after everything they'd gone through.

He just couldn't understand why they'd done it; he'd always known that most of the other people in the world with 'abilities' were idiots, but why hadn't they used their powers to establish their authority over the rest of the crews in the ships rather than simply hiding in the shadows? After all, it was hardly like they were going to execute anybody inside the ships; they were attempting to rebuild the human race on a different planet, and thus needed every available human being that they could find. If they'd wanted to, he and those like him could have taken complete control of the colony ships during the flight; the only reason he hadn't done so was that he'd doubted even he could hold his own against an entire shipful of people if he'd tried to establish his authority.

He may have been powerful, but against multiple opponents, when all he had to fall back on was himself?

He may have been hard to kill, but it wasn't impossible for him to get tired, and he definitely did not want to find out what would happen if he was thrown out of a spaceship into a vacuum, particularly when there wouldn't be anybody to even try and recover his body afterwards.

Still, those days were long behind him now; dwelling on the past would accomplish nothing. As the situation currently stood, he now possessed resources and power like nothing he could have imagined controlling back when he had first began his ascent to power; the fact that he'd had to eliminate a various assortment of 'lesser beings' to accomplish his goal was such an irrelevant matter he barely even thought about it any more.

Plus, with his two latest… acquisitions, for lack of a better term… he was coming ever closer to the moment when he could at last step out of the shadows and claim the authority that was his by right.

No longer would he be forced to skulk in the shadows like he had something to fear from those who were less than him; from this point onwards, he would be the one with the power, not the fools whose only authority came from some idiotic political system.

He was superior to any human being in existence; it was time for the world to acknowledge that fact.

"Sir?" a voice said from the door to his office.

Glancing over towards the door, the man smiled as he saw the figure standing there. The man's name was Doctor Mark Denning, and he was the closest thing the man had to a friend in his employ; Denning served as the head of the so-called 'Academy' program, and was one of the few people in the man's employ who knew what he was capable of.

"Yes, Doctor Denning?" the man replied, raising a curious eyebrow. "What's the situation?"

"Well… we've just received news from our surveillance teams tracking Miss Bennet," Denning replied, looking slightly uncomfortably at his superior. "She… well, she's made contact with Captain Reynolds, sir."

The man blinked.

"Captain Reynolds?" he repeated, looking critically at the man before him. "As in, Captain Malcolm Reynolds? The man who aided River Tam in releasing the Miranda Wave? The man who convinced our most efficient Operative to defect? The man who practically single-handedly held Serenity Valley until he was ordered to surrender? You have allowed Claire Bennet to make contact with the most dangerous man alive?"

"Uh… no disrespect intended, sir, but isn't that a slight exaggera-?" Denning began, only to be suddenly interrupted as his superior suddenly drew a sword from its traditional place at the bottom of his desk, the blade being held against his throat in a matter of seconds.

"Be grateful that you have proven your loyalty to me over the years, Denning," the man stated grimly, as he stared resolutely at the man before him. "If you had been anyone else, I would not have hesitated to send this blade the necessary extra few inches required for you to part company from your body."

After a moment's silence to ensure that Denning had absorbed what he had just said, he sat back down and returned to the sword to its customary place.

"However," he continued, as though nothing had happened- after all, why should he deign to explain his motives for his actions to his inferiors-, "you are not somebody else, so I shall make this clear to you; since the Miranda Wave was initially broadcast, Malcolm Reynolds has become, to many, the personification of the Independent ideal, and River Tam has become an example of why the Alliance should be opposed. If they join forces with Claire Bennet, they may pose a significant threat to this installation; Subjects Alpha and Omega are efficient, but Alpha's continued resistance to our methods of… persuasion… could be a problem if Reynolds and Bennet mount an assault on this facility."

Denning opened his mouth, clearly about to object to the idea that anyone would dare to attack the Academy, but then he registered the expression on his superior's face and decided to keep his doubts to himself.

"The odds of their success are slim, of course," the man said as he looked at Denning, "but trust me; if there is a way into this facility, Bennet will find it. Step up Subject Alpha's programming sessions, and insure that he and Subject Omega can work together effectively; I wish to be prepared for when the crew of Serenity arrive."

"Understood," Denning said, nodding briefly at his employer before he turned around to walk out of the room, leaving his superior alone with his thoughts.

In many ways, he supposed that it was inevitable that he would have to face Miss Bennet again eventually. After all, she had proven to be one of his most resilient opponents from the moment that they had first met right up until the present; the possibility of them never encountering each other was slim to none, given their chosen professions.

Besides, he had to provehis superiority to her if he was ever going to get anywhere in life; she was the only person he'd ever encountered with abilities like his, and he had to defeat her if he was going to prove once and for all which of them was the greater of the two.

Admittedly, he had won a couple of prominent victories over her, but the fact that she still lived despite all that continued to frustrate him.

Of course, he thought to himself, as he spun his chair around to stare at the wall behind him, I do have a couple of trophies of my last couple of victories over her…

As he pressed a hidden switch located on the side of his chair, the man smirked slightly as a panel in his wall opened, revealing his two most valued possessions, the possessions that he had never permitted even his closest employees to witness.

One was the upper half of an arm, clearly belonging to a young woman, that had been neatly severed from its original owner just above the elbow. He had taken it during his last fight with that group of so-called 'heroes'- why they wasted their lives protecting those who should be their slaves he could never understand-,

The other was the perfectly preserved body of a slightly short Japanese man, his face lined with age and scars even as his body's physique made it clear that he had long remained in excellent shape. It had taken the man who now stared at the body a great deal of time, effort and money to acquire the body before departing from Earth-That-Was, to say nothing of the technology necessary to keep it preserved as well as it had been since then…

But it was worth it.

This man had ruined his plans and his life on the three occasions where they had fought; something that no other person in existence had truly accomplished.

(Admittedly, the girl had done so as well, but she shared his own ability; it would only have been expected that she'd have more opportunities to oppose him, even if she was younger than him.)

If he could not triumph over the man before him in life, he could at least do so in death, keeping the body before him as a reminder that he would always triumph in the long term even if his enemies succeeded in the short term.

Pouring himself a glass of his favourite wine- really, wine-making skills had gone significantly into decline since they'd left Earth; he was always grateful that he'd managed to smuggle a few bottles of his favourite brands along on the ships with him when he'd left-, the man known to many as Adam Monroe raised his glass at the long-deceased yet well-preserved body of Hiro Nakamura, a smile on his face as he studied the man who'd three times prevented his attempts to gain the power that was his right.

He only wished that Hiro had lived long enough to see this particular stage of his latest plan; he'd have liked to see that idiotic Japanese fanboy defeat his latest soldiers…

AN 2: OK, if anyone's wondering how Adam acquired Hiro's body- and just to make sure everyone remembers, Hiro just died of natural causes so his body's still totally intact and relatively undamaged-, he basically stole the body after Hiro's funeral and had it cryogenically frozen, subsequently transporting it during the Exodus to the new solar system down among the assorted terraforming tools while keeping it frozen to ensure it would remain in good enough condition for him to gloat over when he got to the new solar system; with the amount of cash he possessed he found it relatively easy to avoid questions about what was down there in the first place. As for how he got out of the grave he was left in at the end of the series, or who the 'soldiers' he's referring to are (Beyond being the ones known as Subjects Alpha and Omega, of course)… you'll just have to wait and see