Shortest time between updates everrrrrr. Also, I've gone back through all the older entries and fixed up a few formatting and grammar issues, since they were bothering me. But nothing plot-wise changed.
Takes place during "Building 26".
The kid was annoying.
He wasn't annoying like El- like the lightning girl had been annoying, with mannerisms or petty complaints. Nor was he annoying like Peter Petrelli could be annoying, with constant good-guy bluster and an inability to see past the obvious. No, this teenager had his own particular fashion of getting on Sylar's nerves- the way he refused to take anything seriously, even when he knew better. The way he apparently knew exactly which buttons to push.
For example- the lying. He wanted to hate the kid for lying, just as he hated everyone else in the world, but couldn't quite bring himself to despise him completely. The kid had an imagination, at least- he could credit him with that. If tales were going to be told, Sylar would prefer for them to be creative ones.
Also, the kid seemed to have no sense of self-preservation at all. He could kill him- and he would, if the kid sung along with the car's radio in his horribly off-pitch voice again- and yet the kid didn't care. He had even mentioned the fact that Sylar was a serial killer (which he wasn't- in principle, anyway) in an almost cheerful manner, which certainly no sane person would do.
The kid was a nuisance. He talked too much. He always wanted to drive faster. He sucked at browsing for stations on the radio, though his taste in music was decent. He quoted far too many old movies. He seemed oblivious to the cardinal rule that one did not insult diners, or the waiters at them, until one had left the premises. His handwriting, though wonderful to behold when it was used to convey information that Sylar desperately needed, was just the brand of chicken-scratch that he despised the most.
Also, the kid was not very good at making fast and sneaky exits.
Also, the kid was very inconveniently not immune to bullets.
Also, Sylar was not used to looking after someone other than himself.
And that was stupid, because he didn't care about the kid. He didn't care if the boy got killed, really. He only cared about himself. And now that he had the information, the kid didn't matter at all.
… but it would be slightly unfair to let the kid get shot when he himself could take the bullets without getting killed. Even if the kid was a pretty bad actor, the agents were apparently just oblivious enough to fall for it. And Sylar was pretty sure that guilt, an annoying side effect that had tagged along with the late arrival of his conscience a few months ago, might start nagging at him later if he didn't pay the kid back for saving his life.
He even had a logical reason- he didn't want to let the group that was trying to take him down get any kind of victory, and by taking action, he could secure valuable information. Certainly that logical reason was why he got a vindictive kind of pleasure out of taking down the agents.
Anyway, it was a little bit relaxing to have someone to talk to who wasn't trying to kill him. Someone who his father had known.
And despite all of his annoying traits, Luke was a pretty good listener.