Chapter 5: Tepid

Weeks later

Claire's normal security check round at the beginning of her shift always ended with a routine visit into room 06 these days. And that at the orders of no other than the company's chair person herself, Angela. Since Sylar's anti formula doze ended up reduced twice after all, as minuscule as the reduction was, the board decided it was imperative that they could be confident every day that his abilities didn't go out of the facilities' control. To ensure this, Claire was required to reevaluate his physical condition regularly, using her special ability.

For certain, a simple task like that she could achieve in no more than a couple of minutes, but over time her and Sylar kinda developed their own little routine regarding the daily encounter. The existence of such personal modus operandi put both of them a little more at ease with the situation. Claire didn't have to put much thought into who she was seeing, Sylar didn't have to be told to do anything and remind himself he was the one in a subordinate status.

He wouldn't lie down for Mohinder or anyone's experiment, he made it as hard as it was mere humanly possible for anyone to give him the formula shots, and he didn't have to give in to Claire either. Knowing the exact time she arrived every night, he lay on his back his bed voluntarily as if by chance, his shirt undone casually and ready.

The blond strolled into the room in a yellow mini dress, yet another sexy outfit he'd never seen her wearing before. It left him wondering if she was dressing for him, if it had given her a boost of confidence to look her best, or if she was taunting him.

Could've been the latter, Sylar contemplated when Claire leaned over him without a word as usual, giving him a good view at her décolletage. Of course such young girls could be totally unaware of what effect their half dressed appearance could have on a grown man growing more erect by the second.

Claire didn't seem happy with the results of her insight into the killer's body as she sat by next to him and continued with a more thorough examination, sliding her palm higher, than lower on his stomach. Her face was blank, focused and professional, never giving away any sign of her ever concentrating on anything else than was her job, or what she's seen as her personal duty.

Just like a number of times before, but not always as it sometimes wasn't required, the small woman picked up the towel that was next to him on the bed, then went over to the sink and fumbled with the water temperature till she got it just right, cloth pleasantly warm. In a manner that resembled as if they would've both been robots, she went about setting the towel on his most painful area she knew exactly where it was and that emotionless way was the only one that was possible and worked, for both of them.

Her hand lingered on the top of the towel a few seconds longer than was necessary to place it, but her fingers wanted to establish that the wet piece of cloth had indeed brought some release to the tortured prisoner. As far as she was concerned, the easiest means of keeping the killer quiescent was putting a steel rod through his head and keeping it there and him in stasis till the end of the next century, at least. She didn't however, pull the shots around here. With Sylar's shapeshifting ability, that was voted out as a possibility and the anti formula favored.

Claire pulled a notebook and a pen out her bag next and without one word so far she choose a spot by the wall not too close to him, but not to far, where she sat down with her legs folded under her and started scribbling as if it was the most natural thing in the universe.

It didn't faze Sylar either, it wasn't the first time. Holding on to the soothing cloth with a hand, he turned to his side to face her, "new one?"

"Uhm," Claire affirmed and aligned something in her notes.

"What's the title?"

"Fate: Fact, or Fiction?"

Sylar couldn't help, but laugh, "smashing essay topic. I think it's one of Mohinder's favorites though. You should ask him."

Claire gave him a "right, don't bullshit me" look. "It was your dictation that gave me the top mark on the essay on whether Waiting for Godot is an existentialist play."

He shook his head in incredulity at her latest request, but in essence, he didn't mind showing her how clever and educated he was at all, "well as long as you don't ask me to do Hummurabi's Laws, the Allegory of the Cave or God forbid, Biomedical Ethics?!? Tell me Claire, what made you take up Philosophy at College?"

The petite blond shrugged, "the good versus evil debate has something to do with it. That and the fact that what I learn now will still probably be valid a couple of hundred years down the line?"

He was impressed by her answer, but didn't want to show it. "So what do you think? Do you believe that we are all free to do whatever we want and that we alone create our luck, or are we fated to follow some decided path and no matter what we do we are foreordained to live out our life accordant to someone's design?"

"What I think, or you for that matter, doesn't count. You know how professors are. They wanna know what you can conclude from theories, not what anybody in their right mind would believe."

"Okay, Claire, are you ready?"

She raised her pen, armed, "make it about a thousand words as usual."

"Those who genuinely accept the whole concept of destiny are the ones who have it easy. They can look at any situation and say that the outcome, whatever it may be..."

tbc