His dreams were surprisingly peaceful, all of no real significance but not the usual troubled replays of his past crimes and childhood traumas. He found that occasionally he would wake up to find that Claire had contorted herself into some bizarre position, wrapping herself around him in her sleep. The last time when he woke he found her head resting on his chest, a mass of tousled blonde hair tickling his chin and her arms wrapped tightly round him. His eyes fell to the bedside alarm, it was 6am, how much longer did he have here? A few hours? Three tops. His stomach churned, it would be such a wrench to leave, to go from this Claire, the one who clearly adored him, back to the,"old" Claire who still hated his guts. And then there was Noah, he had years to wait for him. Before the tears could really sting his eyes Claire stirred. He could tell she'd not opened her eyes yet but she stretched out her limbs lazily, not bothering to remove herself from his chest.

"What's up?" she mumbled, her voice still groggy from sleep.

"Umm... nothing, how'd you know I was awake?" he kissed the top of her head as if to greet her good morning.

He felt a mischievous smile spread across her face, her eyelashes fluttering against his skin,"Come on, it's me! I can hear you thinking" she coo'ed.

"That's a new one" he chuckled brushing a stray strand of hair out of her eyes as she propped her head up to look at him. God she was beautiful.

"I don't need any powers to know there's something wrong. Something is different, I can tell..." she paused, her eyes scrutinising his every feature,"...are you unhappy?"

He sighed and shook his head,"I'm not unhappy Claire, really I'm not. I'm amazingly happy, but I wonder if it's right? After what I have done, to all those people...to you. Do I even deserve you and Noah?"

In an instant Claires eyes clouded in the dim light of the morning. She sighed as though she was tired of this topic of conversation but she was clearly sympathetic.

She spoke in hardly more than a whisper,"Baby you have to stop thinking like that, I forgive you, I forgave you a long time ago", he took a moment to analyse her statement, cursing himself for even doubting her honestly. His lie detector never so much as rumbled, she really meant it.

He averted his eyes momentarily from her face staring up at the ceiling, as if the human puzzle that was Claire Bennett was all too baffling for him.

"But how can you? I just don't understand..." he trailed of. I don't understand being a phrase that he wasn't much accustomed to.

"Sylar took my teenage years away from me, and I hated him" she sounded gravely serious and at the moment he caught a glimpse of the old Claire, venom dripping from every syllable.

"but, if you're asking if I would trade my husband and my son to have those years back, then no I wouldn't change a thing. No Sylar equals no Gabriel and no Gabriel equals no Noah...and that's a thought to horrible to consider, even for me" she paused as if checking that he followed her reasoning. He started at her, something like a smile threatening to escape his lips,"...so ya know...SHUT UP!" She rolled her eyes trying to lighten the mood but the intensity in the room was hard to escape.

He grabbed a hold of her and kissed her passionately trying his hardest to note every detail down to memory, the taste of her lips the smell of her skin. He barely noticed as she took his hand to her breast, pressing it down over her steady eternal heartbeat. Breathless from her kisses she looked up at him,"Feel that?" she sighed her eyes narrowing as though she were almost annoyed. He nodded in acknowledgement, his breath tight in his throat not wanting to taint the moment with too many words. Claires tone was low and matter of fact,"It's yours".It was such a simple statement and one that could have been overblown and contrived were it not delivered with that trademark conviction that Claire had in her voice when she really really meant something. He searched for a fitting retort, something equally profound and moving but he found no words he could come up with did the moment justice and so returned to kissing her hungrily, biting down and nibbling on her lips, holding on so tightly to her that any normal woman would have been left bruised, but she was no normal woman and she never would be, even without her healing powers Claire would always be so much more, to him at least.

And then in spectacular moment ruining style the radio alarm clicked on, blaring out music obnoxiously,

"I'll be there till the stars don't shine, 'till the heavens burst and the words don't rhyme and when I die you'll be..."

**BANG**

The radio alarm bore the full brunt of Sylars wrath as he used his telekinesis to raise it in to the air and fling it against the bedroom wall. Claire suppressed a giggle amused by his sudden outburst. She had clearly grown used to his temper over the years.

Snuggling close until his chest hair tickled her nose she sighed,"Spoil sport! And during that song too!"

Before Claires statement had even registered he shot back,"Bon Jovi was all the more reason for that radio alarm to meet it's end!"

In an instant she rose off of his chest and on to her haunches, the look she shot him was unmistakable, he knew that face well. Claire was pissed.

"What?" he sat himself up in their bed, pulling the covers around him, suddenly feeling rather exposed and vulnerable.

"That song, you HATE that song?" she spat, pointing to the now rather silent radio alarm on the floor.

Oh shit. That song clearly held some kind of significance to Claire, but it was more than that, the tears welling in her eyes now told him that she wasn't just annoyed that he had,"forgotten" their song, she was suspicious. She knew something was amiss.

"No...no of course I don't, how could I hate..." before he could dig himself of of this ever bottomless hole he appeared to be getting into she cut him off with another question.

"What's my favourite movie?" there was an urgency in her voice.

Before he could even draw breath to try and wing it with a guess she fired him another.

"What year did we get married, what date?" she sobbed slightly edging her way off of the bed, hands grasping around behind her trying to locate her night dress.

"Claire, please calm down, I can explain..." he begged lurching forward to try and get hold of her, instinct telling him that if he could just make her listen...

"What date is Noah's birthday?" Claire was visibly shaking now, the fear in her eyes broke his heart, it wasn't meant to be like this. He was supposed to have a nice trip to the future and then go back to his miserable old life. He was not meant to scare the proverbial out of his future wife while he was there.

"Claire, it's me, it' Gabriel just let me explain!" his eyebrows raised high up his forehead as he pleaded with her to listen.

"His birthday Gabriel, what date was our son born?" she persisted, a few tears flowing freely down her flushed cheeks.

Exasperated he clamped his hands over his face and shook his head, what had he done?

"You don't know do you? You don't know what song we had our first dance to, you don't know what date we got married and you don't know when our little boy was born..." she was now standing by the foot of the bed, unwilling to be any closer to him."...so who in Gods name are you and what the HELL have you done with my husband?" she pointed an accusing finger in his direction, fear giving way to rage.