A New Day at Midnight

Part 11/19

Another week passed and still there was no sign of Peter.

Despite his continued captivity, Mohinder found that the routine of being forced to work for Peter's friends differed little from the routine of working for the government of his own free will. He still sat at the computer for hours on end, trying and retrying passwords in endless staccato streams. It was just that now he had to share his space with the tools of Isaac's work and tolerate the feeling of always being watched by the ever-vigilant Claude.

Claude, Isaac and Matt were the only people Mohinder saw on a regular basis, though wandering as he did occasionally among Isaac's paintings, he got the feeling that this underground resistance was much larger than he could have imagined from what little he had seen. So many people, and they were all caught in scenes of violence far more graphic than the ones Mohinder had seen in Peter's rough drawings. A cheerleader screaming in horror at some unseen threat, a blonde woman trapped inside a mirror while an evil double smirked at her predicament, people with the tops of their heads cut off. That these pictures in any way represented reality chilled Mohinder. That Peter was a part of it disturbed him all the more.

In this respect, one painting stood out from the rest. It stood out anyway, being that it wasn't the original work but instead a reproduction. But in it, the young cheerleader that featured in so many of the pictures stood over Peter's prone body, a torn homecoming sign hanging in the background. Peter's eyes were vacant, he was covered in blood. He looked dead. Was this the past? Something Isaac had drawn long ago, something that had already happened or been prevented? Or was it the future? Was this the kind of fate Peter would be met with if he came back to the people in this loft?

Haunted by thoughts like these, Mohinder tended to avoid this particular piece but when he found Claude standing in front of it one afternoon, visible and contemplative, he felt compelled to stand with him. They both gazed at the image in silence and Mohinder wondered at the sentiment he saw in Claude's eyes.

"So tell me," Claude said when the silence had gone on long enough, "are you really this daft with passwords or are you messing about with us, putting on a show until your government friends come to the rescue?"

Mohinder lifted his shoulders. "I'm afraid I'm just that daft," he replied. "A year I've been working on my father's file and I've come up with nothing. It's quite pathetic."

"It really is," Claude agreed.

A pause followed in which they both stood transfixed by Isaac's work.

"What happened to the original painting?" Mohinder asked, cocking his head to the side.

"This one looks like a photo someone took to show a potential buyer or something."

"Nathan Petrelli destroyed it," Claude said flatly. "At least, that's what I heard. I wasn't around then. But the story goes he was so rattled seeing a picture of his dead brother that he ruined it to try to stop Peter from going to Texas to save some high school cheerleader he didn't even know."

Mohinder blinked. "So Nathan Petrelli knew about Peter, then? About his…ability?"

"'Course he did," Claude said as if this should have been obvious. "Why do you think he was trying so hard to convince people all the time that Peter was barking mad? So they wouldn't find out and come with the bloody pitchforks and torches, that's why."

"He was trying to protect Peter," Mohinder said.

"He was trying to protect himself," Claude corrected. "Even if they didn't figure out about Nathan, nobody's going to vote someone with a freak like Peter in their family into Congress. I don't care who's pulling the strings on that one, there's only so much you can make up as you go along."

"What was there to figure out about Nathan?" Mohinder asked.

"Christ, Peter really didn't tell you anything, did he?" Claude said. "That's good, I suppose. Shows the boy is learning some discretion. Took long enough. Nathan would be proud, that's for bloody sure."

"I don't understand," Mohinder said.

Claude rolled his eyes. "Nathan Petrelli could fly," he said, flapping his hands like wings as if to illustrate to a mental incompetent exactly what flying involved. "What kind of geneticist are you that you don't know that freaks like that run in the family? If Peter has it, Nathan would have too."

It was Mohinder's turn to roll his eyes. "Pardon me, but I'm still coming to terms with the fact that Peter can draw the future," he said. "It might take a little more time for the exact minutiae of it all to sink in."

Claude cocked an eyebrow. "Well, if you're still trying to get over Peter being able to draw the future then wait until you find out what else he can do," he said.

"What are you talking about?"

Claude sighed. "Peter can draw the future all right," he said. "But only because he knows someone else--namely, that long-haired junkie over there--who can draw the future. He can also fly, turn invisible, and read minds, among other things. Oh, and he can heal himself." He nodded toward the painting. "Do you follow?"

Mohinder looked again.

"He fell down the stairs," he said. "The day I met him, he fell down the stairs and hit his head. He should have cracked it open. But he was fine. There wasn't even a bruise afterward."

"Clumsy idiot," Claude murmured almost affectionately.

"You're telling me this…," Mohinder began, but couldn't finish the sentence.

"Is perfectly real," Claude said, finishing for him. "He died that night. Died a coupla times, actually. Killed him myself once, back when I was trying to teach him how to control his powers. Threw him off a building to try to get him to fly but he ended up just getting impaled on a taxi cab. Luckily he managed to channel Claire, otherwise I wouldn't have gotten to punch him out just moments later." He grinned, clearly pleased with the memory. He pointed at the cheerleader in the picture. "That's her, there. Claire. He met her that night. Also met a man called Sylar. Don't suppose you know anything about that."

Claude's tone suggested that his invisible spying had showed him exactly how much Mohinder knew about that.

"Peter knew Sylar?" Mohinder said, his voice hollow, his heart like a stone in his belly.

"They weren't in cahoots, if that's what you're thinking," Claude said, annoyed. "Sylar was going after Claire. Peter saved her and got himself killed in the process. Temporarily, of course."

"But he never said anything," Mohinder said. "When I told him what happened to my father, he never said anything about knowing Sylar."

"I don't think coming face to face with a violent serial killer is anything anyone would want to brag about," Claude said. "Especially considering Peter didn't exactly win that fight. Then again, that is the night the government apprehended Sylar so it wasn't a total loss. Guess they're good for something after all. From time to time."

"You said that Peter can do all those things because he draws his powers from other people," Mohinder said. He remembered what little he'd been allowed to see of his father's research before it had been taken away and classified. "Sylar did that. All his powers he got by taking them from others." He felt his brow furrow. "So Peter is like Sylar."

"Well, when Sylar wanted someone else's power he had to kill them to get it," Claude said. "Whereas all Peter had to do was stand next to someone and not even for a prolonged period of time." Sarcastic, he added, "Oh, and there's also the fact that Sylar is a psychopathic serial killer who liked to rip off the tops of people's heads. I think it's fair to say there's a small difference. I don't blame you for not being able to spot it."

Mohinder ignored this. "I just want to understand. You said Nathan Petrelli destroyed the original piece because he was trying to prevent Peter from going to Texas to save his own niece--Nathan's daughter."

Claude's expression was dry. "Nathan didn't know Claire was his daughter at the time. Christ, can't you keep up? Do I need to draw you a diagram or something?"

Mohinder remembered as Claude said this that Peter hadn't known about his niece until shortly before Nathan had died. Apparently he'd saved Claire's life believing her to be a stranger to him, not knowing they were related. If he hadn't, as Claude had said, been able to spot the difference between Sylar and Peter before, he could see it clearly now.

"What happened to Claire?" Mohinder asked.

Claude grew serious. "The government took her," he said.

"Why?"

"Same reason they killed Nathan," Claude said. "To get to Peter, most likely."

The blank look on Mohinder's face clearly dismayed Claude.

"Oh don't tell me you actually bought that hysterical rubbish about Nathan Petrelli and his family being killed by one of us," Claude said. "Not knowing what you know. About what Nathan could do."

"If I remember correctly, Nathan Petrelli supported the idea of harsh punishments for the illegal use of special abilities," Mohinder said. "Or so he said."

"Aye, a traitor to his own kind you might say," Claude said. "But he betrayed the government big time when they found out Peter was quickly becoming a central figure in the resistance. They told Nathan to turn his brother in or else. When he wouldn't do it, they decided to change tactics. They killed him hoping it would deter Peter from further activism. And guess what? It worked."

"Then why take Claire?" Mohinder asked. "If Peter's already doing what they want him to do, why do they need to use her to get to him?"

"Because now they know what it is Peter can do," Claude said. "They figured it out or someone told them. Who knows? Point is, Peter's something of a rare specimen and they want to take him in for studying. Try to see if there's a way to replicate what he can do."

"You mean inhibit," Mohinder said. "They want to inhibit his powers, not replicate them."

"That's what they'd have you believe," Claude said. "They want to cure all people with special abilities for the protection of the general public. Yeah, right." He sounded close to spitting. "What they want is a way to understand and copy what it is we do so it can be taken away from the likes of us and given to people who are more worthy. Unfortunately, a lot of us tend to get killed in the process because it's not like they know what the fuck it is they're doing. But I think the government feels that if they could understand Peter and what he does the death rate might go down because they wouldn't need to do the testing at all anymore. All they'd need to do is have freaks like us stand in a room with the chosen ones and let them absorb our powers. Of course, if Peter gets killed in the process of figuring all this out, then it's two birds with one stone as far as they're concerned. You follow?"

Mohinder nodded reluctantly, knowing what Claude was saying and yet not entirely convinced that it wasn't just the product of a paranoid and eccentric imagination. A conspiracy theory. "How do you know all this?" he asked.

Claude's face darkened. "I used to work for them back in the day," he said. "Not unlike you, I guess. See, before things got really ugly I was something of a mole. I helped them find and bring in people like me and then one day I wasn't useful anymore and they tried to dispose of me. Now I work for the other side and, as irony would have it, our current mole is the same man who was my partner in the business way back when. Unfortunately, as convolution would have it, he's also Claire's adoptive father--yet another twist in the Petrelli family soap opera. His people won't let him near Claire. They're afraid he'll get squeamish and ruin their plan to lure Peter in."

"They're torturing her, aren't they?" Mohinder asked, remembering the picture Peter had drawn of the girl on the table, the agonizing scream being ripped from her as blood pooled on the floor.

"Peter got his ability to heal from Claire," Claude said. "Let's just say it's not entirely unlikely that they want to see how something like that works. Which probably means inflicting a lot of wounds and measuring how long it takes before they're fully healed."

Mohinder swallowed with difficulty. "What is it you expect Peter to do if he does come back?" he asked.

Claude shrugged. "Don't know, exactly," he said. "Peter was always an idiot about these things. Back before Nathan died, he would have gone rushing after Claire like he did the first time. Blind stupidity and all. These days…" He shrugged again.

"These days he's trying very hard to live as a civilian," Mohinder guessed. "And I ruined it for him by discovering the truth."

Claude sighed. "Maybe Peter needed it to be ruined for him," he said. "You don't understand how it was. I mean, the kid literally tossed himself off a building to prove to his brother he could fly. What he lacked in intelligence and planning skills, he made up for in passion. Then Nathan was killed and he fell to pieces. Ran away to fuck knows where and I let him go. A year with him away and don't think the others have forgiven me for that, either."

It sounded to Mohinder like it wasn't just the others who hadn't forgiven Claude for letting Peter go, but he was careful not to say so. Instead, something else Claude had said lodged in his mind and he found himself casting a glance out the window, seeing the gray early November day outside.

"A year," Mohinder repeated. "It's been a year since Nathan Petrelli died."

"Almost to the day," Claude said.

An image flashed in Mohinder's mind: a crudely drawn graveyard with a headstone bearing the name of Petrelli. A patch of flattened grass, two figures standing in the distance: one drawn more lightly than the other as if it were a ghost. Or an invisible man.

"I think I know where Peter is," Mohinder said.