"You have got to be kidding me! All this government cooperation and we still have to go down the street to get food." Rose joked, shaking her head.
"I can assure you, if the government did provide some sort of dining option, you would still be going down the street for food. Though, you did seem more happy with the vending machine candy bar, than the food Angela Petrelli provided." Sylar remarked as they exited the elevator.
"Well," Rose said "there was a better chance the candy bar wasn't poisoned."
The tour was over and surprisingly, everyone would live to tell about it. Rose and Sylar had gathered their belongings and were heading out the door. They stopped on the curb.
"Peter should be here soon with the car," Sylar supplied "it takes a while to bring it around, especially at this time of day. Traffic, you know."
"Yeah, while I'm not complaining because the placement is convenient, I don't get why New York is where you guys chose to place headquarters."
"Well, it was between here and Odessa, Texas. We thought it would be good to choose a place that had sentimental value to the group, I guess."
"Well," Rose said "Odessa, Texas certainly wouldn't allow you to blend in. Besides, think about how much dirt would have compacted in your lungs in three just months."
"As opposed to the smog?" Sylar questioned.
"True, true," Rose conceded.
Just then Peter pulled up in a Cadillac 300 bathed in a smoky grey color. Rose went ahead and let her mouth drop open. "Oh seriously? I have been killing to ride in one of these." She smiled back at Sylar, punching his arm. "Pun SO intended. Shotgun."
Rose skipped off to the car, opening the passenger side door and sliding sensually inside. "Hello, baby. I have been waiting to touch you for sooo long." She whispered seductively.
"Ummmmm…… hello," Peter said staring at her, as if she had grown a second head.
"Oh, not you, the car." Rose replied, then started running her fingers over all of the glorious gadgets she could get her fingers on. All at once, the air conditioner blasted on; the radio began flipping through stations and changing out with CD and Mp3 player modes, the GPS came on and started blasting through all the variations of maps of their location it could produce. Through all the bleeps and bloops, the other two passengers of the car were voicing first, their confusion then their protests. Once they realized she was the cause of the demonic possession of the car.
"Could you please just….. control yourself,? We are in the middle of traffic." Peter demanded.
"Why? You can drive the car just fine, I'm not messing with any of those parts."
"It's distracting! Though, I appreciate that you didn't try to take over the actual piloting of the car." Peter responded, giving Rose a less than honest smile.
"Oh, it's not that I didn't try, but the computer suggested the car be in the proper settings, for those applications. You know, not in motion." Rose smiled angelically at Peter, who tried to keep his focus on the road.
"So, you can communicate with actual computers, too. Any idea how you came across that power?" Sylar asked from the backseat.
Rose turned to face him, making some silly gesture she hoped would pass for a Chinese sensei move. "All in good time, grasshopper."
The car pulled up to the restaurant's valet parking attendant and it's passengers climbed out. After forlornly watching the car pull away, Rose turned and entered the restaurant with the other two.
"You know, it's been years since I've been here." Peter said, looking around the waiting area that was decorated with high priced art, set into walls of dark but subtle colors.
"Why did you stop coming ?" Rose asked curiously.
"I guess, maybe I just got pinned down with school. I hardly ate out ever during those years. Also, my parents used to love this place. Communication wasn't too good back then, so I probably didn't want to risk an encounter."
"I heard about Arthur's dismay at your choice in nursing." Rose said softly, almost as if she were saying it more to herself. Hearing her, Peter turned and was about to say something when….
"Personally, I don't get the draw of this place." Sylar butted in. "The only time you would see me here, was on valentine's day with my special lady. Even then, the lady better be pretty damn special."
Rose rolled her eyes, "Well, aren't you just the man every girl dreams of."
"I'm realistic, which is something that many women appreciate."
Rose chuckled, "Yeah, but those girls don't get let out of the asylum on Friday nights."
"May I help you?"
The group turned to see a young hostess standing before them, with a helpful smile on her face.
"Table for four, please" Peter requested.
"Four?" Rose demanded. She dreaded finding out who that fourth member might be. Just don't be Angela and this meal can actually have a chance at being pleasant.
"Yeah, Claire said if she got out at a decent hour and we were still here, she would swing by." Peter answered, before returning his attention to the hostess as she led them to a secluded booth in the back of the dining area.
"You mean, we could actually be here that long?" Sylar asked.
"Oh buddy, " Rose joked " we could be here all night long. This crowd knows how to make some mean martinis."
Sylar rolled his eyes as they began arranging themselves into the small nook where their table was placed. Rose took the seat that backed up against the original wall of the restaurant, while the boys sat on either side of her, their backs to the walls making up the nook.
"Will you be wanting the curtain open or closed?" The hostess asked, her hand hovering next to the string that held the curtain in place.
"Open, please." Peter responded politely. The hostess nodded and headed back to her station.
"So, what's good here?" Sylar asked, examining the menu.
"Chicken Parmesan." Both Rose and Peter answered.
All three of them looked up. Peter looking curiously at Rose, while Rose stared back at Peter and Sylmar switched off ,looking between the two.
"The filet it is." Sylar finally said.
Just then, the waiter approached the table to take drink orders. Peter and Sylar, being the gentlemen they were, allowed Rose to go first.
"I would like a Grey Goose vodka martini, shaken not stirred with a twist of lime."
"Excellent. And for you, sir?" the waitress asked, turning to Peter.
"Ummm….the same thing." He answered weirdly, never taking his eyes off of Rose.
"I'll have……water for now please, thanks." Sylmar told the waitress.
"Awww, you don't want to play with us?" Rose asked, pouting her lip.
"I can't enjoy the benefits of alcohol," Sylmar answered. "My kidney regenerates to fast for it to take effect."
Rose then turned to Peter," Shouldn't you have that same problem? You did inherit Claire's ability, right?"
"Not necessarily, I ran into some trouble a while back. Now, I'm only able to tap one ability at a time." Peter answered.
"So what's your ability this week?" Rose asked.
"Flying."
"Flying? But that was Nathan's ability……..and he's dead, so how.."
"There's a kid on staff," Peter interrupted "he has the same ability and he's been really generous in allowing me to use it. So, you said that you would answer some questions for us."
"Fire away, Gentleman." Rose said as she imitated a salute at them.
"How old were you, when you left Linderman's care?" Peter began.
"I actually never left his care. He's been providing for me all my life. I just wasn't as present in his life anymore or at all, actually. Though, he did still sometimes beg for me to come home, on holidays. I never saw him again."
"How old were you, at the time?" Peter asked again
"I was 19."
"What happened that made you feel like you had to leave?"
"I just realized that there were no limitations as to what our parents were willing to do. No one was off limits. Parents are supposed to protect their children. Be there for them, if they need help. Not find ways to manipulate them to their biggest advantage. You have to admit, at the end of the day our PARENTS, weren't really parents at all."
"I don't believe that," Peter challenged. "I have some pretty good childhood memories."
"I will give you this, your parents weren't as bad as some of the others. It also helped that it took so long for your powers to manifest, what with the eclipse and all. It might have just saved you from an entirely different childhood."
"My mother may be a lot of things, okay." Peter started " But I can't see her throwing me or Nathan to the sharks."
"Right, she wasn't planning on you blowing up half of New York City and possibly yourself, just so she could get her other son into the Whitehouse. Must have been one of those dreams I have." Rose countered.
Peter stared at her coldly while the waitress set their drinks down and took their orders. Sylar tried his best to appear, to the waitress, as if there wasn't tension mounting between the group.
Once the waitress was gone, Rose sighed," Look, low blow, ok? I'm sorry. I know you and I have had relatively different experiences. And I can't expect you to think of your mother as this horrible monster because in reality, she's not. She provided for you and protected you, hell, she supported you when you told her you wanted to be a nurse. Ok, that's one face of the coin, your side, if you will. Now on the other side are people that your parents, my parents, basically that whole group, saw as expendable." Rose paused sadly for a moment. "And sometimes that way of thinking didn't exclude their children."
"Elle," Sylar spoke up.
Rose turned to him. "Yes, Elle. I can honestly say I may never, in my whole life, despise someone the way I did Bob Bishop."
Peter sighed "But Elle had to be contained. Not that I didn't have some sort of affection for the girl, but she was not all right in the head."
"And, what, you think she just magically woke up one day, criminally insane?" Rose asked.
"No, of course not. I'm aware that Bob's parenting techniques might have played a part in it." Peter answered shifting uncomfortably in his chair.
"Elle wasn't criminally insane."
Rose and Peter turned to Sylar as he spoke. "She was broken. She wasn't a maniacal schemer, who plotted to kill innocent people. She did what she thought would gain her praise and acceptance."
"Exactly." Rose agreed. "She had been in and out of the Company since she was four. She and I would play together while, our dad's attended their meetings with the rest of the group. She thought it was the coolest thing that I could do what she could. It made her feel less alone, I guess. You know, all the work they did on her to see how much voltage she could produce; none of it was used to help her control her ability. Bob Bishop was too concerned with proving that his little girl was top ranking among this generation. So, during a rather stressful round of testing, they got Elle to produce such a large amount of voltage in her body, that she was out cold for three whole days, basically, a zombie for weeks, afterwards. No emotion. No response to stimulation of any kind. She ate when they told her to." Rose laughed cruelly. "They actually had to have someone take her to the bathroom periodically, because if they didn't, she would go wherever she was at the time and wouldn't even notice it."
The whole table fell into silence as Rose tried to reign in her emotions.
"They brought her to the house, once. Trying to see if maybe interaction with me could produce anything." Rose continued.
"Did it?" Sylar asked a little breathlessly.
Rose took a large gulp of her martini. "Oh yeah, but not the reaction they were hoping for ,I'm sure. See, we used to do this thing when we saw each other. Sort of our own secret form of greeting." Rose lifted her hand and let a single jolt of blue electricity shoot from her palm. "Like every other time, I did it. As soon as she saw the electricity, she started screaming. Pretty soon the screams turned into heart wrenching sobs, God it was awful. Bob Bishop just stood there reprimanding Elle over her sobbing, telling her 'that this was not appropriate behavior.' Slowly, but surely after that though, she became more like her old self. Her mother was worried sick, though. From what I could tell she and Bob had been fighting about it, constantly. So, she took Elle to spend the week at her mother's. Something happened while she was there. I don't know what but when she came back to the Company headquarters, mom and grandma were dead and she was a permanent resident at the facility."
"She could never recall any of that." Sylar interjected.
"No, a couple of weeks after she had been back , I came to see her like I did most afternoons, when dad was checking on things in the facility. She was a completely different person and when I brought up anything about the testing or the disappearance of her mother, she had absolutely no idea. A week afterwards, I met a young man everyone called The Haitian."
"Yeah, he's still around." Peter said.
"I was just a kid, but I knew that guy was bad news, I avoided him like the plague. All the while, I kept thinking, if they would do this to their own kids, what kind of chance does a stranger have against them?"
"Do you think the Haitian ever took away your memory?" Peter asked looking at her sympathetically.
Rose smiled proudly, "Nope, bastard's powers don't work on me." Then she added bitterly, "couldn't repress a damn thing. I guess I owe the ability of being able to block others from my mind, to him. I can't suppress others from using their ability when it's not directed toward my mind, though."
"So, once you left the Company and your father, did you keep in touch with Elle?" Sylar asked.
"Yes, though not in the traditional way. I would talk to her, through a mental connection, her mind."
"And she could answer back?" Peter asked.
"Yeah, only problem was, I had to establish the connection for it to work. Neither of us wanted the Company to be able to track me through her, so she kept it a secret that she was in contact with me. When I found out she had joined forces with Arthur Petrelli, I flipped. Begged her to leave; said that I would find a way to get her to me. She wouldn't leave, though. We know what happened after that…."
"And this whole time that you were with your father, with Linderman, you never once met me or my brother?" Peter asked.
"No."
"Lie." Sylar blurted.
"Damn it, I forgot about that one." Rose hissed, glaring at Sylar.
"So, we have met ?" Peter said "Why don't I remember you?"
"It was only briefly." She replied.
She could feel Sylar beside her drawing in a breath to deflect that one, too. But this time she was prepared for it. Sylar felt a hitch in his throat and began coughing. Please, don't. I swear I will explain myself to you but you CAN'T call me on this one. Please, this would only hurt him. After several seconds Sylar nodded to show he agreed with the request she had just projected in his head. Then all of a sudden the irritation in his throat stopped.
"You ok, man?" Peter asked, with a worried expression.
"Yeah, renegade ice cube." He said, referring to his throat.
"I knew your brother better." Rose continued. "We had some pretty good time's, him and I. That's probably why you don't remember me, I was just another one of Nathan's many girlfriends."
Another lie, Sylar noted, this was certainly getting interesting.
"It would have stuck in my mind that you were Linderman's daughter." Peter countered.
"I'm pretty sure it wasn't brought up all that much, besides, your mother HATED me." Rose explained.
Ah, finally a truth. "And why is that?" Sylar questioned.
"She caught me and Nathan together."
Both men at the table choked in surprise. Sylar considered for a moment, what sort of secret Rose was hiding, that would lead her to use Angela Petrelli catching her in the act as a cover up. Though, to give her credit, that would no doubt make an enemy of the queen bee.
"I would have thought you would have been a little young for him." Peter said. "That's what, a four year difference?"
"Perhaps he wasn't exactly…..well informed, on my age." Rose explained.
Yup, another lie, though, this one was a given since it rode in on the tail feathers of the one just before it.
Finally, their dinner arrived and they were careful to stick to small talk while they ate. Claire had called Peter to inform him that she would probably not be leaving the office until midnight at the earliest; due to the number of reports she needed to go over. Peter agreed to meet her in her office to relieve Bennett of guard duty, as soon as they were finished at the restaurant.
Once outside, in the restaurant's small courtyard, Peter turned to his companions, "You sure you guys don't need a ride back? I would hate for you to be stuck without transportation."
"Actually, I have a power for that, too." Rose replied.
"You do?" Peter asked.
"Yeah, see, I go and stand all the way over there on the curb and then I lift my arm like this." Rose explained, as she demonstrated the move. "Then out of nowhere this yellow car comes cruisin' up. Sometimes, it's a car; sometime's a van….."
"Yeah, yeah. I get it." Peter interrupted "So, I have one more question for you, before I go. Claire told us about your odd meeting ,in her office that night. You told her you had an ability you thought would be very helpful; in protecting her."
"Yeah, I think I do." Rose answered.
"Can I see it?" Peter asked.
"Sure'" Rose shrugged "but let's find somewhere a little more secluded to do it."
Rose led them down the street until they came to the entryway of an alley. Moving along with the alley, they found a small space in the buildings that was probably a dumpster area at one time. The lingering scent, also pointed to this conclusion.
"Okay," Rose began "Peter, I want you to come stand by me and Sylar stand across from us but a few yards back. Good. Now, Peter you get to be Claire and Sylar you're the big, bad attacker."
"Ok, what do you want me to do?" Sylar asked.
"Shoot some of that blue magic our way." Rose explained.
"Are you crazy!" Peter protested "Let's not forget, I'm NOT Claire. I don't have the ability to heal right now."
"Chill, daddio! This is what I'm supposed to be demonstrating, right? How effective I can be at not letting the bad guys win?"
"This had better work." Peter grumbled.
"That's the way to be a sport." Rose joked "Alright, Sylar, whenever you are ready."
For thirty seconds they stood there, frozen with anticipation. Then, Sylar stretched out his hand. As soon as the blue bolts lit up the alley, Peter tensed and felt………..nothing. The electricity was grinding up an invisible wall. Once Sylar ended his attack, Rose relaxed and turned to Peter. "So, are you sold yet?"
"That's incredible." Peter remarked. "And would be very helpful in this job description."
"I'll let you think on it." Rose said "See you tomorrow."
Peter headed out ahead of them, towards the restaurant to retrieve the car. Rose turned back to Sylar, who practically had drool running down his chin.
"You reciting your twelve steps?" Rose asked him.
"What?" Sylar asked shaking himself out of his reverie.
"You know, the twelve steps recovering killers say to themselves to get them to turn away from temptation." Rose offered.
Sylar rolled his eyes, "I think that's Alcoholics Anonymous you're referring to."
"Hmmm…" Rose shrugged "Maybe. Come on, let's get out of here, I know this great Irish pub that doesn't get much business on Wednesdays."
"I told you earlier," Sylar said following her out "I have nothing to gain from alcohol."
"Humor me, " Rose smiled " it just might make your night."