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The Not-So-Average Girl

"You're sure you're all right?" Peter looked at Claire as the trio gathered around each other in his apartment, the older man anxiously examining Claire's bloodstained chest while trying not to look at anything in an inappropriate manner.

"I'm fine," Claire smiled back at Peter (Kim wasn't sure if her friend was trying to flirt with Peter or not, but in this situation she wasn't going to judge either of them so long as they were happy). "The bullet came out while we were talking to Isaac; I don't even feel sore any more."

"The bullet came out?" Kim looked at Claire with new surprise. "How does it do that?"

"Another case where my body shouldn't really be doing this?"

"From what I know, anyway," Kim nodded. "I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm glad that your body does all that, but realistically you'd expect the bullet to stay in your body unless someone else took it out…"

"So many rules to this crap," Peter shook his head in exasperation. "And now we've lost Claude…"

"Lost him?" Claire looked at Peter with new intensity. "Is he-?"

"He's alive; he just decided he wasn't interested in teaching me any more," Peter explained. "We were nearly caught by this guy in glasses and that group who nearly cornered us in the club a couple of nights ago, and…"

"Let me guess, Claude decided to cut and run?" Kim shook her head in exasperation. "Why am I not surprised?"

"Tell me about it," Claire nodded. "I mean, considering how long it took you to talk him into helping you in the first place… you've got a handle on everything by now at least, right?"

"I… think I've got the basics, anyway," Peter nodded, flexing his hand to generate a temporary glow of green fire before he put it out with a burst of ice energy. "I'm not saying I've completely got a handle on it now, but at least Claude gave me something to work with while I'm learning the rest of the ropes."

"Which is more than most of us have had since this all started," Kim pointed out. "I mean, Ron and Hiro went on that whole trip to Vegas and we still haven't heard-"

A ringing phone prompted the three to jump up for a moment, before Peter walked over to his own phone and answered it.

"Hello?" he said cautiously, before he smiled in recognition. "Oh, hey, Ron; let me just… put on speaker."

"Speaker?" Ron's voice said as Peter tapped the button on his phone and put it down on the table in the middle of the room. "Why'd you need-?"

"Maybe because we're here as well, Ron?" Kim smiled at the phone.

"KP!" Ron's voice grinned at the other end of the line. "How's my favourite ass-kicking cheerleader doing?"

"Better than I'd expected," Kim replied, deciding to get the most obvious detail out the way. "To start with, it turns out that Claire wasn't the only person at our school to have an ability."

"She's not?" Ron asked. "Then… hold on, you've got something?"

"It's not particularly flashy, but we've worked out that I've got a kind of 'enhanced survival instinct'," Kim explained. "Basically, whenever I'm in a dangerous situation, such as if I'm… about to be hit by a car or something like that, my brain just automatically goes into overdrive and helps me work out the best way to survive it."

"Neat," Ron said in approval.

"Thanks," Kim smiled; whatever else she and Ron might be going through right now, it was good to know that she could still count on him to be there for her. "So how's everything going with you?"

"It's… well, we've had our ups and downs, but we're making progress," Ron replied. "Ando got a bit caught up in trying to help this girl who was just using him to steal some money from a guy working for the State Gaming Commission, but Hiro and I managed to catch up with him before anyone did anything they'd regret."

"Nice job," Peter put in.

"Any progress with Hiro's powers?" Claire asked.

"Still proving elusive right now, but at least he's showing some nerve without them," Ron observed. "I mean, the guy stood in front of that girl when she was pointing a gun at Ando and it only ended with everyone still alive because the gun misfired; you can't tell me he's not a hero after that."

"Quite," Kim exchanged an approving smile with Claire and Peter before she looked back at the phone. "Any idea when you'll get that sword?"

"Just another day or two to actually get to Vegas, and then we're set," Ron affirmed. "Basic plan is that we deliver the painting and then we try and track down the sword in their collection if we can get the guards to leave us alone; once Hiro's got it… well, hopefully he can just beam us all out there."

"'Beam you out'?" Kim smiled. "Ron, I'm pretty sure you'd be the one to tell me that's Star Trek; aren't we dealing with X-Men here?"

"Good pop culture insight, KP, but so long as you know what I'm talking about we can have a bit of leeway," Ron replied. "Anyway, how's things at your end?"

"Well, we've worked out that I was helping Peter use his abilities because he was copying my own ability to make it easier for him to access his full 'rolodex'," Kim explained. "He's been training with this invisible man we met-"

"There's an invisible man?"

"You probably won't meet him; he already moved on because he decided it was too risky for him to stick around and help us," Peter explained. "Anyway, he was able to help me work out a few techniques for how I could access other abilities without Kim giving me a boost or the original owner being right beside me, and also gave me a few pointers about my own limits; I'm always going to be a bit weaker than the… what do you think; the original?"

"Let's just say the source," Kim put in. "I mean, you're not taking anything from anyone full-time, so 'donor' doesn't work."

"Fair point," Peter nodded at her.

"In other words, you can't beat the person you're copying, but you should be able to match them if you're face-to-face with them and know what they can do?" Claire asked.

"From what he told me, yeah."

"That… OK, that makes sense," Ron replied with a thoughtful tone in his voice. "Just… if that's true, how could you have beaten that Haitian guy with his own ability?"

The surprised look Peter exchanged with Claire and Kim made it clear that none of them were sure of how to answer that particular question.

"…Good point," Peter nodded at the phone in surprise. "You… how did we miss that?"

"Master of the superhero genre here, Supes; I like to think I'd have complained about that kind of power inconsistency even if I'd lived back in the sixties."

"What do the sixties have to do with anything?" Claire asked.

"Superman alone had all kinds of freaky powers back then that didn't really make sense and often just showed up in one or two issues; he could wipe peoples' memories with a kiss, do some sorta ventriloquism thing to make people think Supes or Clark were in the other room to help sell the secret identity bit, hypnotise people to forget something they shouldn't know, stuff like that."

"…Yeah, that memory-wipe-kiss idea is just a bit weird," Kim nodded, before she looked at the phone. "So you're saying that there has to be a reason why Peter's ability worked differently when we were facing that guy?"

"Which is something we'll have to work out when we're not dealing with the imminent destruction of New York," Peter said firmly.

"Fair point, well made," Ron nodded. "I'll get back to you once we've got the sword; stay cool until we can all get back together, 'kay?"

"Well," Kim smiled as Ron ended the phone call, "good to know he's keeping it together over there."

"And he's still giving us some… interesting points to think about," Claire added as she looked over at Peter. "I mean, we know that you were able to overpower the Haitian… is there a reason that you were able to do that, or was it just luck?"

It was a small detail, but the thing that really stuck out for Matt right now was how calm Ted was compared to their last couple of meetings. He still looked anxiously at his hands as though waiting for any sign that his power was going to go haywire all over again, but so far it seemed as though the dark-skinned man's ability to suppress abilities was working just as advertised.

Granted, Matt was basically brought down to normal right now as well, but given the chance to have a bit of peace in his head he could take a slight risk when so far Bennett in particular seemed to be willing to cooperate. Ted still seemed to be a bit jittery about this whole situation, and Doctor Suresh kept looking around as though he couldn't believe this was his life right now, but Bennett and Audrey seemed to have already established a certain cordial respect for each other, their talk so far putting Matt in mind of some past cases where police captains of multiple divisions had coordinated big operations.

"So you've actually got a colleague who can create illusions?" Matt looked at Bennett in surprise. "How detailed are we talking here? Full on… I want to say 'holodeck'?"

"Not that elaborate, as far as I know," the other man nodded as the makeshift team sat around their current hotel room. "I've seen and heard reports of her changing her appearance or the appearance of others, but I've only heard rumours that she can change the way people perceive their immediate surroundings, and even then she has to be operating within a confined space and in their physical presence, such as being in the same room with her target."

"Good to know," Audrey nodded, before she looked over at Mohinder. "Out of curiosity, did your dad's work say anything about any abilities we definitely won't have to deal with?"

"Such as?" Mohinder asked.

"…This is where I realise that I maybe should have read a few more comics when I was a kid," Audrey groaned as she slapped a hand against her forehead before she looked over at Bennett. "Guess what I want to know straight off the bat is if there's anyone at your old place of employment we should be worrying about straight away? As in, they have some ability that could hit us from a distance?"

"Most of our empowered agents are only a direct potential threat if we're explicitly facing someone in the field, so we should at least theoretically be safe enough if we can stay on the go," Bennett confirmed before he sighed grimly. "Of course, if we're going to stay under the radar long-term, we need to deal with the tracking program."

"Tracking program?" Audrey repeated, looking intently at Bennett. "What tracking program?"

"The company uses two tracking systems," Bennett explained. "One involves injecting low-level radioactive isotopes into the bodies of those they've examined, allowing us to keep track of identified subjects that's tracked by various standard technical systems. From what I've heard, the other system could theoretically allow my superiors to find anyone they're looking for so long as they have specific details such as their name or picture. If we can get to the New York office where the system's located, we might be able to use it to find Sylar's current location and then disable it to ensure that they can't track us in turn."

"…You give the impression of a man who has put some thought into taking this organisation out of the picture before now," Mohinder observed.

"When you realise that your daughter would be at risk of becoming essentially a laboratory experiment, it encourages you to consider all the available possibilities."

"Fair point," Matt nodded in acknowledgement at the other man.

"Your daughter has an ability?" Sprague asked, looking at the other man in surprise. "What can she do?"

"…She heals," Bennett said after a brief pause.

"She heals?" Mohinder repeated curiously.

"As in I had a video tape of her jumping off an old tower about three storeys high and getting back up a moment later while resetting her own arms without any pain even when there was a rib or two poking out of her shirt."

"Ouch," Audrey winced.

"Whoa…" Ted said, his voice low as he looked at Bennett. "…What else can she heal from?"

"I have reason to believe there's very little she couldn't recover from, so long as her body's given the chance to put itself back together."

"And that's before you factor in what else she could be capable of," Mohinder put in, a thoughtful smile on his face. "Depending on how her healing ability works-"

"We can take a look at that once we've dealt with the superpowered Ripper making his way across the continent," Audrey cut the scientist off, a briefly apologetic expression on her face as she looked at the scientist before she looked back at Bennett. "I take it you can't provide evidence that this tracking system exists beyond your word?"

"Should I take that personally?"

"Just confirming that we're only going to be able to deploy what we've got here if we try to go after your former employers," Audrey observed as she shook her head. "This is going to take a lot of paperwork to justify once I get back in touch with the Bureau…"

When Simone found the folder outside the door of her apartment, she wasn't entirely surprised; Isaac had always tried to apologise through his art whenever he'd done something particularly stupid, whether missing a date or appointment because he was high to messing up a commission because he became focused on another piece of work. What was surprising was that she opened the folder to find the first item in it was a sketch of what seemed to be a glowing man with a Post-it on the front saying 'CALL ME' in Isaac's handwriting.

"What…?" Simone asked herself, as she glanced over the other five pictures in the folder. One depicted Hiro, Ando, and Ron standing in a room with all kinds of pictures hanging around their heads, apparently attached to a complicated set-up of strings. Another showed what looked like Kim Pierce confronting a man who Simone was fairly sure was meant to be Peter's brother, and the third one showed Hiro holding a sword while a thin man in black held the blade in his bare hands. The fourth sketch depicted what looked like Peter and the man in black facing each other in an open area that could have been a pavement or a park of some sort, while the fifth showed Kim and Ron talking with a young dark-skinned boy as they sat around a table. Lost for any better response to this odd gift, Simone picked up her phone and did as Isaac's note had requested.

"They arrived?"

"Your six latest sketches?" Simone said, looking uncertainly at the picture of Peter facing the man in black. "What's the point of this?"

"They're moments that need to happen," Isaac replied, his tone solemn. "I know that you have no reason to believe me after… well-"

"After you nearly killed a teenage girl?"

"…I deserved that," Isaac acknowledge. "But the point is that, from what I've put together so far, those few moments have to happen for the future to line up in a manner that will let us stop the explosion… and make sure everything after that is fine."

"I thought you said you just painted the future-"

"But I've been getting a greater sense of the wider context of that future the more I paint it," Isaac clarified. "If I'm right, it's still possible for Peter and his friends to come together and stop the man in black… and maybe stop the explosion as well."

"Explosion?" Simone repeated, her mind drawn back to that disturbing image on the floor of Isaac's loft. "You still think that's-?"

"It's too big an event for me to just ignore," Isaac explained. "There's still enough leeway there that we might be able to stop it and what I'm painting is just… maybe we could call it the 'echoes' of what could have been, but if we can-"

"We?"

"Peter may not want to work with me directly, but he's getting a team together because of what I showed him in my paintings; maybe I won't be on it myself, but I'll have given them all a chance to do something good," Isaac said, his tone unusually solemn. "Do what you can to help them, Simone; make sure that I did this one good thing for everyone… and make sure the redhead meets the kid."

Simone's response was interrupted when Isaac terminated the call at his end, leaving her staring uncertainly between the silent phone in her right hand and the sketches spread out on the table under her left.

If she'd known that Isaac was currently staring at a picture of his own corpse back in the loft, she would have been even more disturbed than she was already.