AN: Sorry I took so long on the update - it's harder to have to think for yourself without putting in spoilers! lol. Hope everyone is making it through the hiatus with sanity intact - mine's kind of touch n' go, especially on Monday nights :S Thanks for all of the reviews, they really keep me going. It's really great to know that people are still into reading this little brainstorm o'mine :) So please R&R - Remember, ReviewsBrains. ;)
CHAPTER 9
"WE CAN BE HEROES"
THE PETRELLI FAMILY
HYDE PARK, NEW YORK
Nathan Petrelli smiled genuinely for the first time in weeks as he sat in his office, talking to his daughter. He'd been terrified when Meredith had called, but now that had all changed. Mom was right, he mused again. He had gotten the feeling that she was even before he had left for Kermit, Texas, but had acted heartless when he'd met his former girlfriend. After she'd told him that Claire had left, he had changed his mind about meeting her - he told himself that it was for the best. How wrong he had been.
"Meredith lied to you," she told him. "I didn't leave, I was hiding outside. It was me that threw that rock at your window - sorry about that."
He smiled. "It's all right, I understand you were upset with me, and you had every right to be. So, Peter tells me you've got a special talent off of the cheerleading field?"
Claire smiled and reached for the letter opener on her father's desk. She plunged it into her forearm and pulled it out roughly, leaving behind a nasty gash. Nathan raised his eyebrows at her, looking confounded before grinning as the skin healed over, leaving it looking just as it had before.
"That's incredible," he remarked, still amazed at how perfectly the wound had healed.
"Any more incredible than you flying or Meredith setting fires with her bare hands?" Claire replied with a grin.
Before Nathan could say anything, his phone began ringing on his desk. "Hang on, I should take this. Hello?"
"Mr. Petrelli, your brother," Mohinder began on the other line.
"He's fine, Doctor. He's here at my place, now." Nathan told him. "Are you all right? He told me you were pinned to a ceiling."
"Well, I'm not in perfect condition, but I'm alive. What about Sylar? Has he said anything about him?" he asked.
"Nothing specific," Nathan replied. "Perhaps you should meet us here? I'm in Hyde Park."
Mohinder paused, "Yes, I'll meet you there."
Nathan gave Mohinder his address and let out a sigh as he hung up the cell.
"Is everything all right?" Claire asked.
He sighed deeply and replied, sounding exhausted. "The man that tried to kill you at your homecoming, this, Sylar, is here, in New York. He's the one that Peter was running from when he came here."
Claire frowned - this was too much drama, even for a teenager.
SYLAR
NEW YORK CITY
There was the list, all his. He felt a sense of fulfillment, reading the names of those closest to his current location - Isaac Mendez - a precognitive painter; Nathan Petrelli - flight; Peter Petrelli - empath. There were sure to be others, but these ones he knew how to reach. The closer, the better, he thought, picking up the piece of paper with Isaac's address and phone number on it, memorizing the lines with one glance.
Sylar smiled to himself as he traversed the city streets he'd known as Gabriel Gray. The city was no place for him then. Mild mannered, glasses wearing, time piece restoring Gabriel Gray had been replaced by Sylar. Not Gabriel Sylar, not Sylar Gray - Just Sylar. Gabriel Gray had been so unassuming, so inconsequential - now, here he was, able to mold the future of the entire human species. I can be a hero, he mused as he smiled slyly to himself. 215 Reed Street...
Meanwhile...
Isaac Mendez set down his brush and pallet on his work bench and stared at the canvases as the mist faded from his eyes. There were five paintings in all, four of them depicting himself as Hiro Nakamura had described him - very much dead. Then, on the fifth canvas, was a man standing over Isaac's corpse, blood dripping ominously from his hand. The man who cuts off heads, Isaac narrowed his eyes at the figure. He's coming for me.
Mohinder Suresh paid the cab driver the enormous sum that it had taken to get from New York City to Hyde Park before stepping out onto the driveway of the address that Nathan had given him. He walked gingerly up to the front door and rang the bell. The door opened a few seconds later and Peter Petrelli stood on the other side.
"Suresh," he greeted him, inviting the man in. "I'm so glad you're all right!"
He smiled slightly. "I could say the same of you. Where is Sylar?"
Peter led Mohinder up to Nathan's office where the three of them sat down around the desk. "He got away, Mohinder. I flew out of the window, literally, to get away. I was hoping that you had gotten away by then.
They filled each other in on the events of the last several days - About Mohinder and "Zane", Peter meeting Claude, and about Claire's escape and her adoptive father being "the man with the horn rimmed glasses". Peter also detailed the death of Simone Deveaux in Isaac's apartment.
"I should go back there," he said, his voice soft but even. "Isaac and I don't see eye to eye, and he's probably just going to try and shoot me again, but maybe I can talk some sense into him after he empties his entire clip into me and realizes that I can't die."
Nathan let out a derisive snort. "I don't think you have to worry about that one, Pete. I made that anonymous call before I left for Vegas - Isaac is probably behind bars by now."
"He's not," Mohinder interjected. "Sylar tried phoning him not long before Peter found me - his phone was busy."
"How can that be?" Nathan puzzled aloud. "I told them that I'd heard gunshots coming from his apartment!"
"Mr. Bennet, the horn rimmed glasses guy - He's had Isaac in his pocket all along. Maybe he had him clean up his mess for him?" Peter suggested. "I'm going back there. If Mohinder is right about this, he might already be dead."
Peter picked up his coat from the chair where he'd left it and put it on, leaving the office without another word. He walked down the stairs of his brother's estate and suddenly heard a voice call out behind him.
"Hey," Claire said. "Where are you going?"
"It's time to go play hero again," Peter replied, smiling slightly in hopes of erasing the hint of fear in her voice. "I'll be back before dinner."
Claire watched as her uncle became invisible and then saw the front door open and close, as though of it's own accord. Some family is right, she told herself.
