Chapter 3 "Her Mistake"
Claire knew Sylar's real name. She had heard her Father say it. Gabriel Gray. He lived in Queen's and that was all she knew. She stopped at a phone booth and looked for his name. She knew it was a long shot. But much to her surprise she found it. She ripped the page out of the phone book and folded it into her pocket. Sylar was going to pay for killing her husband. When she got closer to the apartment her heart started to beat faster and she felt butterflies in her stomach. Claire shook the feelings away and kept walking closer to the apartment, still with the black wig on. She fingered the gun that was in her purse, just to reassure herself. She was five apartment complexes away when she saw him walking down the street. He wore a gray suit and he looked... happy. She took the gun out of her purse and brushed by him, and then she pivoted around so that she was behind him. She put the gun against his head.
"Make one sound, and I'll pull this trigger. I know where your kill switch is, right behind the head." She said between gritted teeth.
"I have no clue what you're on ma'am, but you're making a mistake."
"Shut up, Sylar! Don't play games with me." She said angrily, pushing the gun harder against his head.
"Oh for the love of God, I'm not Sylar!" He exclaimed. Which Claire realized was out of character for him to say. She kicked him behind the knees and he fell down.
"Get up and walk over to that alley." She spat at him. 'Sylar' did as he was told. Claire patted him down and found that he had three guns. She gave him an angry look.
"I'm a federal agent ma'am. Look in my jacket pocket, that's where my ID is." He looked up into her familiar eyes.
"I know all your tricks Sylar, don't even try. You're going to pay for killing my husband." She said, her voice quivered at the end.
"Look, I'm sorry that Sylar killed your husband, but he's not me." He tried, desperately to explain.
"Shut up!" She yelled and screwed on a silencer to her gun.
The night before
3:15 am
Gabriel listened to every tick of the clock. His daughter was past her curfew and he was getting worried. Suddenly the door burst open. He could hear Jenny crying. He got up from the lazy boy and ran to the entrance. What he saw scared him to death. She was covered in blood. He rushed over to her.
"Jenny, what happened?" He said, cradling her in his arms as she collapsed into them.
"I'm... so... s-sorry daddy. I... d-didn't mean to... it... it was...as acc-accident." She said between sobs.
"Shh, calm down, baby. What happened? Are you hurt?" He looked her up and down and couldn't find anything wrong with her. He picked her up and shut the door and brought her to the living room.
"No." She shook her head.
"But I did something horrible. You'll nev-never for-forgive me." She sobbed, putting her head on to his chest.
"What happened?" He said stroking her hair.
"This b-boy, Jamie. He's the captain of the football team. I liked him, thought he was c-cute. He tried to do stuff to me." She sobbed. Gabriel felt his heart plummet.
"Did he hurt you, baby?" She shook her head.
"No. I pushed him away. But, HE WENT RIGHT THROUGH THE WALL." She said hysterically, like she couldn't believe it. Gabriel and Noah had never told Jenny about people with abilities. They had both agreed to wait to tell her until after high school. Obviously, that wasn't the best decision.
"Where did the blood come from?" He asked calmly. He didn't want the blood to be his daughter's.
"He came back and tried again. But then it was like something possessed me. I kicked him to the ground and I grabbed the sharpest thing I could find. And... and I hit him over the head with it... repeatedly." She sobbed. Gabriel soothed his daughter.
"It's okay, baby, we'll tell them it was self defence." She shook her head.
"That's not all." She continued.
"I couldn't get my mind off of his... brain. It was like it was a piece of a puzzle and I needed to fix it. I looked at his brain and it was like everything just clicked." Gabriel's stomach clenched. He didn't think that any of his children would get his ability because usually children of parent's with abilities developed new powers. His ability had been a curse and he had never wanted his children to have that ability. He rocked Jenny in his arms.
"Shh, it's okay. Daddy'll fix it. Everything's going to be alright."
"No, it's not. I'm a freak." She sobbed.
"I killed him and I took his ability." She ran her hand through Gabriel's arm. He knew that would happen
"Get up." He said suddenly. She did as she was told though she was terrified that her Father would agree with her and kick her to the curb. But to her surprise her father levitated his coffee cup into his hand. She put her (still bloodied) hands over her mouth in shock.
"How did you-"
"It was the first ability I took. His name was Brian Davis. He just wanted to get rid of his abilities. I took the first thing I could find and smashed it over his hand." Jenny looked over at her Father in surprise. Looking at her Father now she couldn't imagine him killing anyone.
"I've got numerous abilities, most of which I killed for. For a while I was the most wanted serial killer in America." Jenny gasped, fresh tears rolling down her cheeks.
"It's because of you I did that?" She whispered looking at him disgustedly.
"I'm so sorry baby." He said trying to hug her. She pushed him away.
"Does Noah know? Does he have this curse?" She asked looking at her bloodied clothes.
"Noah knows, yes. I told him last night after he asked me about it. No, he doesn't have my- our ability. He absorbs people's powers and keeps them... without killing. It isn't as strong as the way we get ours..." He shrugged.
"I haven't killed in over twenty years Jenny. The hunger is always there and sometimes it gets so unbearable that Grand-Pa Noah has to put me in a cell until the urge goes away. Your Mother was the reason I stopped and you and Noah are the reasons why I'll never kill again."
"Was mommy like us?" She asked hopeful.
"She was, so we thought, immortal. She had spontaneous regeneration. She could get stabbed in the heart and survived it. The only way to kill us is by stabbing us where our kill switch is. In the back of the head. I don't know where mine is anymore because I changed shape so much that..." He stopped. This was too much information all at once for her.
"You can't die?" She asked. He shook his head.
"Not unless you get my kill switch."
"Oh." She said. She looked around herself in a daze. She was in shock.
"I... I have to go wash up." She said, rushing out of the room.
Early in the morning Gabriel called Noah to come and talk to his sister. She was still in shock. When Gabriel had seen her in the morning she had scrubbed her hands so hard that they were raw. He had put Polysporin on her hands and wrapped them up in a tensor Band-Aid.
Noah was late and that wasn't like him, especially when it came to a family emergency. Just like the night before he had a horrible gut feeling. He called Noah's cell but there was no answer. Gabriel looked up at Jenny who was sitting curled up in a ball on the sofa. He bent down at eye level with her.
"Jen, I'm just gonna go for a walk around the block to see if Noah's on the way. Is that okay?" Her unfocused eyes locked with her Father's. She nodded and mumbled something. He kissed her cheek and ran down the stairs to go outside. He walked rapidly out of the building. Not too far away, in an alley, Gabriel saw Noah talking to a black haired woman. Gabriel sighed in relief and slowed his pace.
"Noah." He said waving and smiling at him. He saw, as if in slow motion, his son slump against the wall. He stared at him in horror and ran at full speed, flying over cars to get to his son. The black haired woman looked confused. Blood was seeping out of Noah's chest, right next to his heart.
"No, no, no." He kept saying over and over again as he put pressure against his son's chest. He looked up at the black haired woman who was still there looking confused.
"Call 9-1-1, get help!" He yelled at her. Gabriel hadn't noticed his face was wet until a tear fell down on his son's cheek.
"Noah, can you hear me? It's dad, you need to wake up." He said encouragingly. The woman ran out of the alley. She came back shortly after.
"I called for help. You have five minutes to tell me where your kill switch is before I kill him, Sylar." Gabriel's eyes widened. He recognized that voice. Dread, hope, despair and love filled him. He looked up into her green eyes, past the barrel of the gun.
"Claire?" He said, choking over her name.
5 minutes earlier
"Look at me! I'm not him! I have green eyes, lighter hair and less bushy eyebrows!" He yelled out desperately. Any other time he would have laughed at himself for saying those things.
"Those things can easily change, Sylar. Contacts, hair dye..." Noah reached for his back up gun tied to his ankle. The woman saw this and fired her gun. Noah felt the warmth of his blood on his chest. The world spun before he slumped against the wall and lost consciousness.
"Noah." She heard someone yell out, but she ignored the voice.
Once 'Sylar' had collapsed against the wall she realized her mistake. This wasn't Sylar, because if it was he would've used his powers against her and not with a man made contraption and second he wouldn't be lying on the ground dying. She stared down at the innocent boy's body. She felt horrible. She just killed an innocent man. She heard someone run towards them but she was frozen to the spot. He knelt down next to the boy.
"No, no, no." He kept saying, as if those words could bring this young man back to life. He pressed his hands against the boy's wounds. Claire stared at them in shock. The man looked up at her. She stared at his face in shock. Sylar.
"Call 9-1-1, get help!" He yelled out desperately, tears falling down his face. Claire had never thought that Sylar would ever look desperate for anything, never mind the fact that he was crying.
"Noah, can you hear me? It's dad, you need to wake up." Claire reeled at this new piece of information. Sylar was a Father? No wonder she had confused the young man for him. Sylar couldn't age, that's why they looked almost identical. Claire ran out of the alley, needing air. She took out her cell and called for an ambulance. She was about to run away when a thought stopped her. Wes. She needed to avenge his death. She took out her gun and walked back into the alley. Now, she had a bargaining chip. She looked down at Sylar as she pointed her gun to his head.
"I called for help. You have five minutes to tell me where your kill switch is before I kill him, Sylar." He looked up at her with pleading eyes, and then they turned to shock.
"Claire?" He asked. He had so many emotions in his voice that she couldn't identify all of them. Shock, hope, disbelief...
Gabriel couldn't believe it. Claire, his wife, was back. She wasn't dead. Then he realized that his Claire had a gun in her hand and had shot their son.
"Claire?" He asked again, this time with disbelief and outrage. She stared down at him coldly.
"Why... why did you shoot Noah, Claire? For God sakes, he's our son!" He yelled out angrily. Claire stared at him in shock. He must've been mad to think that she would ever have a child with him.
"Tell me or I'll kill him." She said, turning the gun toward Noah.
"What happened to you, Claire? Where have you been all these years?" He asked confused, desperate and pleading. Claire took a step closer, the gun now inches away from Noah. Gabriel stared into Claire's eyes, desperate to see any flicker of the Claire he used to know. Noah coughed blood and took a deep breath. Both Gabriel and Claire looked at Noah. The bullet slowly came out of his chest. He was healing. Gabriel telekinetically pushed the gun out of Claire's hand and pinned her against the wall.
"Dad?" Noah croaked.
"Yeah, Noah, I'm here." He said softly.
"What happened?" He asked, confused. He almost sounded the way he did when he was ten when he fell off the monkey bars at the park. Gabriel hugged Noah tightly.
"Ow." Noah said weakly.
"Sorry." He mumbled.
Claire still pinned to the wall yelled out: "Hey! Get me down! I swear to whatever God there is that I'm going to kill you!"
Her wig fell to the ground and her blonde locks pooled out around her shoulders.
"Mom?" Noah said in disbelief. He looked over at his Father. He nodded.
Both the Gray boys stared at Claire in confusion and shock.
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