Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it
Disclaimer: I don't own 'Heroes', 'Firefly', or any of their respective characters; the plot is mine, and that's it
Feedback: Much appreciated
From the Ashes
As Claire saw Mal and Zoe come down from the cockpit to join the rest of the crew in the hold, she allowed herself a slight smile as she checked her pistols for ammunition one more time; she'd loaded a significant amount of ammunition into her coat pockets to limit the possibility of her running out during the raid (Spread out around her various pockets to limit the possibility of excess weight anywhere slowing down her movements), but she still wasn't entirely used to relying on anything other than her sword when things got ugly.
"Comin' up on the target," Mal said briefly as he looked around at the rest of the group; as when they'd prepared themselves for the raid on Niska's stronghold, Jayne was practically laden down with weapons, while Kaylee and Simon simply held more conventional smaller firearms. Inara, as when they'd fought off the Reavers at Mr Universe's facility, was using a large, specially-designed longbow as her weapon of choice (Mal personally thought she was just gorram insane; seriously, sayin' that guns were beneath her was all OK in normal situations, but arrows against psychopaths with superpowers? Give him a gun any day; hell of a lost faster against the kind of whackos they seemed to run into on a day-to-day basis…). "Y'all ready?"
"As we'll ever be," Claire replied briefly, nodding at Mal as she spoke.
"I've got the infirmary ready in case the… Subjects… need any treatment," Simon added, looking over at Mal as the captain took up his position at the front of the assault force. "I've laid out a few of the drugs I used to stabilise River back in her worse days, in case they've done something similar to these people, as well as the usual post-raid drugs and equipment."
"Bandages and painkillers, huh?" Mal asked, raising an eyebrow as he smiled slightly at the ship's medic.
"As always," Simon replied with a brief nod.
"Right then," Mal said, as he turned his attention back towards Claire, "you're up now, Bennet; time to do your techno-thing and shut down the defences. Just hope you know what you're doing…"
"Trust me, Captain," Claire smiled, as she pulled the Device out of her pocket and began to access the station's security system, "you want something electronic taken out, you're not going to find a better tool for the job than this; the man who built it was an absolute genius when it came to technology."
"Really?" Kaylee asked, looking at Claire with an inquiring smile. "Where's he now?"
"Six feet under, unfortunately," Claire replied briefly, smiling slightly at Kaylee's briefly dejected expression- to say nothing of the brief relief that flashed across Simon's face in the process- before she raised a hand to halt any further questions while continuing to tap away at the controls on the Device with the other. "Don't ask me for more information right now, please; I'll be grateful to answer any questions later, but right now it's hard enough trying this as it is without you talking to me…"
Nodding briefly, Kaylee subsequently remained silent, although the eager gleam in her eyes as she studied the Device was all Claire needed to know that this particular matter was far from over (Not that she wouldn't mind the opportunity to talk about Micah, of course; she liked being able to pass on stories about the best people she'd ever known to others, even after they'd been dead for so many years, as a way of giving them their own form of immortality). Pushing those thoughts to the side, Claire focused on the task in front of her, rapidly pressing buttons as she studied the screen before her. She was almost within range of the target… it was just a few more moments to go… another few vital firewalls to penetrate…
Then the three most beautiful words in a hacker's language- 'Security System Disabled'- appeared on the Device's screen, and Claire almost couldn't stop herself from punching the air in glee; even if she didn't exactly look it, she was over six hundred years old by now, and she was not going to start acting like a giddy schoolgirl who'd got a date for the prom (Although, now that she thought about it, she hadn't had a date for the prom; she'd actually missed most of her prom due to them having to stop the distribution of a 'cure' for their condition created from the Haitian's blood that would have killed a significant percentage of the 'Special' population).
"I'm in the systems," she said, looking over at the crew with a broad smile on her face. "And…"
She paused for a moment to tap the necessary command into the Device, and then spread her arm with a slight flourish as the doors to the space station opened before her; she'd had to slightly tap into Serenity's systems to get the door open at this end, of course, but she felt that the extra drama was worth the oh-so-slight effort such a feat had required.
"We're in," she said simply.
None of her new crew needed to hear anything after that; as though her words were a pre-arranged signal, Mal, Zoe, Jayne and River all charged through the door, weapons blazing as they took out the few guards located in that part of the satellite, the group clearly functioning as a well-oiled team of attackers. Claire wasn't entirely surprised to note that Mal and River were each taking particular care to watch the other's back while simultaneously trying to avoid drawing attention to it; really, the similarities between her and Peter back in the day were so uncanny it was almost ridiculous…
Ridiculous, of course, up to the point where it reminds me of what I've lost, Claire thought to herself, unable to restrain the familiar wince of pain as she remembered the loss of the man who'd meant so much to her and who she'd never been able to express that love to.
Shaking such thoughts out of her head, she checked her weapons once more and hurried out after her new allies, leaving Kaylee, Inara and Simon to guard Serenity until they had accomplished their current mission. As she hurried into the corridors of the satellite, she quickly pulled out the Device and called up the map of the satellite's interior once again, and was relieved to note that, so far, all the systems had indeed been deactivated by the virus she'd entered into the system earlier.
It was official; Micah's powers just became more and more impressive with age. Even afterhe'd been dead for over half a millennium, his last little gift to her just refused to stop impressing her when it came to tackling the technical jiggery-pokery, and God she had watched far too much science-fiction with Hiro when it had been reduced to the two of them and Micah in the old days…
"Get down!" a voice suddenly yelled from off to the side, Claire barely having time to register who had just spoken before Zoe shoved her out of the path of oncoming gunfire; she'd been so caught in her old memories of the few leisure moments she'd spent with her last couple of friends in the original group that she'd forgotten that she was still in a dangerous situation.
Shaking her head in a self-critical manner, Claire reached into her holsters, pulled out a pistol, and fired a couple of quick shots at the men who had just fired at her, striking them both in the chest- they weren't even wearing body armour; either their opponents didn't think the soldiers here would need it or they just hadn't cared enough to spend that amount of money- and sending them collapsing to the ground. She could have easily managed two well-placed head shots even on her worst day, of course, but she didn't particularly want to attract any more attention to herself by being too precise; her aim may come from years of training rather than artificial programming like what River had endured, but it still wasn't something she was keen on having to explain to the crew at a time like this.
"Thanks," she said finally as she turned to look at Zoe, only for the grateful smile to fade as she saw Zoe staring coldly at her.
"What the hell is wrong with you, chwen; did you go totally shiang jingsomewhere along the line?" Serenity's first mate asked, glaring slightly at Claire in a frustrated manner (Claire had to remind herself that Zoe was simply naturally assuming that she was the older one here based on her physical appearance and didn't mean to insult Claire's far greater experience in combat; spending so long watching people die tended to give you a shorter temper at times). "We're in a major firefight here, and you're goin' around with your head in the clouds? Got a death wish or somethin'?"
For a brief moment, Claire was tempted to respond with 'Something'- after all, an inability to really die in the first place would account for her complacent attitude right now- but decided against it.
"Sorry about that; it's been a little while since I've been in this kind of situation," she said, before offering her new friend a reassuring smile as she noticed Zoe's suddenly sceptical expression; clearly she was wondering at the wisdom of having somebody join them on something like this when they were apparently out of practice. "Don't worry, I could shoot five of these idiots down before they even had time to draw their guns; even if those idiots had managed to fire, I would have been fine."
Given the sceptical look that remained on her face after that statement, Zoe clearly doubted the Claire was being totally honest with her about that, but nevertheless seemed to accept her explanation as Mal, River and Jayne hurried back from further along the corridor to join them.
"We got through the first line of guards, but the door to what that map says is the main research area's shut, an' it ain't opening up any time soon," Mal said, looking briefly over at Claire as he spoke. "Don't suppose that techno-thingy of yours would be able to get us through that particular hurdle, would it?"
"That 'techno-thingy' happens to be a constantly-updating marvel of technology; you could at least show it some respect, Captain Reynolds; I'd appreciate it if you showed it some respect," Claire stated, glaring briefly at him before she shook her head and smiled slightly at him. "But… well, let's go and I'll see what I can do, shall I?"
With that said, she walked past the rest of the group and began to walk along the corridor before her, Serenity's crew close behind her as they kept their weapons raised, studying their surroundings in case of further attacks.
Despite her hatred of all things Company/Academy-related, Claire had to admit that they continued to be fairly impressive when they wanted to be. Now that she wasn't occupied with her thoughts or looking out for guards, she could take more time to appreciate the work that had gone into her surroundings; with the security systems disabled, it really didn't look that bad.
However, the effect was significantly ruined by the fact that the metal walls, no matter how elaborately they were decorated, reminded her somewhat of that 'Haitian-style' cell they'd used to try and contain Sylar and Peter (The 'Haitian pills' they'd made him take after the events of Kirby Plaza were more effective, but the need for him to take them willingly meant that they were far from being a reliable means of controlling him when he was being held captive).
Fortunately, the 'Haitianium'- as Hiro had called it at one point; none of them had ever come up with anything better, so they continued to call it that for convenience's sake- only seemed to cover one wall, which at least reinforced the idea that they were in the lab where Subjects Alpha and Omega were being kept- nobody would want to risk two people as powerful as those two were rumoured to be being able to use their powers-, but virtually guaranteed that Claire wouldn't be going into the rooms. The Haitianium had never been totally effective at suppressing her healing ability in the past- Mohinder had theorised that it was because her ability was constantly 'on' while others had to make a conscious decision to use their powers; since she couldn't turn her power off normally the Haitianium wasn't able to do it either-, but given that it had been over five centuries since she'd last encountered any of it, she wasn't going to take any chances that the stuff had been improved over the years; she'd just have to stay at the door of the room as much as possible and hope for the best.
Finally, they reached the door- another Haitianium construction, Claire noted; these guys clearly didn't take any chances in their work- with a keypad on either side of it and clearly securely locked to contain whoever or whatever was on the other side.
Examining the locks, Claire shook her head slightly as she pulled out the Device.
"These guys really don't seem to put much effort into keeping things secure," she said, sounding almost pitying as she began to tap away at the controls on the Device with a slight smile on her face.
"Simple?" Jayne repeated, looking over at her incredulously. "What the hell d'ya mean, simple?"
"Look at the system here; they're not even using alternating command codes to make the door that difficult to hack," Claire explained, smiling slightly as she continued to tap at the Device. "I mean, theoretically you could get through this thing just by entering every possible four-digit combination in existence until you hit the right combo; it's really childishly simple to hack it with a simple brute force approach, when you get down to it."
"'Simple'?" Jayne repeated, looking at Claire incredulously as numbers ran over the screen on the Device at such a rapid rate that Claire could barely process one before another one was showing. "What are you, a gorram math genius on top of everythin' else?"
"You pick up a lot of knowledge if you're willing to take the time to do so, Mr Cobb," Claire said simply as more and more of the numbers for the codes that were all that stood between them and their targets appeared on the screen of the Device. "My point is, they don't seem to have taken that much effort to make this place hard for a real expert to get into…"
Her voice trailed off as she glanced over at Mal, the implications of her statement clear.
"They want us to go inside there?" Mal said, indicating the door with his pistol as he looked sceptically at Claire. "And you still want to go in there?"
"I've always felt that the only way to tackle a trap is to spring it, Captain Reynolds; if nothing else, if you know it's a trap, you can sometimes turn it to your advantage," Claire clarified, smiling over at the captain in a reassuring manner as the last few numbers slid into position on the Device's screen. "After all, if we know we're expected, it's not like taking us by surprise is going to be an entirely practical possibility; just so long as we stay alert, we'll be fine."
Jayne opened his mouth as though he was about to say something, but Claire cut him off. "No, River won't be able to give us advanced warning; her psychic abilities will most likely be weakened or shut down the second we enter this room. Its walls are composed of a rare material that negates the abilities of most superhumans who enter it; it takes a great deal of effort to overcome its effect, and River…"
She paused for a moment, as though trying to think of a better way to say what she was about to say, before she turned and looked at River apologetically. "Well, to be frank, you can't really concentrate enough to get through it."
"Understood," River said, clearly unconcerned about Claire's statement. "Stay alert with the other senses and don't trust the gift; easy."
Claire didn't bother responding to that last comment of Claire's as the door opened before them, revealing a large room that resembled a combination between a science laboratory and a training room. Tables on one side of the room were equipped with straps that made their intended purpose of holding someone down clear to even the most casual observer, with scientific and medical equipment gathered around them that made even Mal's inexperienced eye wince, while the other side was clearly dedicated
"Odd set-up," Jayne said at last as he took in his surroundings.
"Empty, too," Mal noted, glancing over at an increasingly-confused Claire as she looked around herself. "Any ideas where they've gone?"
"I was sure our contact said they were here…" Claire whispered trying not to show her anxiety as she took in the empty room around her; if she started to panic, she would be serious trouble…
"You know," a voice said from behind the group, making Claire's blood run cold as soon as it reached her ears, "if I wasn't actually trying to be inconspicuous this time around, I might take offence at that."
It had been over five hundred years since she'd last heard that voice, but Claire would never forget the voice of the first man she'd ever met who wanted to kill her.
"Sylar?" she half-yelled, half-screamed as she spun around to face her first ever enemy, her eyes wide with shock as she took in the man once known as Gabriel Gray as he stood nonchalantly against the wall beside the door they'd just entered by, his arms folded and a slight smirk on his face as he stood dressed in the grey uniform of an Alliance officer.
"In the flesh," Sylar replied, spreading his arms as he grinned at her before he lowered one hand as though presenting someone to his right. "And may I present my new partner in this endeavour; everyone here calls him 'Subject Alpha'- I'm Omega, of course-, but I'm pretty sure you know him by another name…"
For a moment, the air where Sylar had indicated shimmered, as though it had suddenly become very hot there for some reason…
Then Claire saw someone appear- evidently they had been invisible before now- in the area that Sylar had indicated, with his hair trimmed to a length that it hadn't been since he'd recovered from his Haitian-induced amnesia, his expression a cold one that she'd never seen on his face even when he was pitted against the man now standing beside him, and wearing the same style of uniform as his old enemy, and she nearly stopped breathing from shock.
It can't be… she thought in shock.
But she knew that it was; nothing, not even Candice Wilmer's illusions (Based on Micah and Niki's descriptions of Candice's attempts to manipulate them and what she'd seen of them after Sylar had acquired Candice's power), had ever seemed as real to her as this.
"P… Peter?" she whispered softly.
For a moment, Claire could only stare at the incredible sight of the man she had loved and lost so long ago, standing casually in front of her with his arms folded, a blank expression on his face that gave away nothing regarding how he felt about seeing her again…
Then he suddenly thrust one hand out in front of him and blasted her in the chest with a brilliant burst of electrical energy- Claire had never liked that Elle woman-, sending her flying backwards into the wall behind her, and Claire knew that the situation was far worse than she'd ever expected.
AN: OK, I know that several people guessed it before now, but here you have it; the who of Subjects Alpha and Omega has finally been revealed! As for the how they're here- given that the last time Claire saw them she thought that both of them had been killed-… well, that's going to take a bit longer to come out, but it will eventually; give it another couple of chapters