Title: Denial is a Friend
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Alternate ending for 3x16. Noah finally reflects on his grief over Elle's death.
Spoilers: 3x16
Disclaimer: Heroes is not owned by me, but by Tim Kring. I'm simply borrowing these characters for non-profit entertainment.
Noah Bennet didn't want to admit it. He still couldn't face it. Two months after the fact and he still couldn't even say the words.
Elle, his former partner and often his only friend, was dead. To make matters worse she had been killed by the hand of virtually the only killer he hadn't yet been able to stop. Even now when he could just taste the bittersweet nectar of revenge he knew he couldn't go after Sylar. Not now, not if he wanted to keep Claire safe from him and Danko.
When Sylar had said it the night Primatech burned to the ground he hadn't wanted to believe it. He couldn't. But then Sylar wouldn't lie about a kill like that, especially when he then knew Elle had more than slightly helped create the monster he had become. Part of him even envied the bastard. He'd had what Noah still cursed himself for having wanted.
Now his daughter was terrified of him, his wife had thrown him out of the house and the only friendly face he wanted to see was the very one he knew was lost to him forever.
As he drained his third scotch, he saw her face again. His fourth scotch quickly followed. It was the first time he had been able to let himself grieve and it was only because it was the first time he had been left alone long enough to where he had been able to think about more than Nathan's sickening plot.
He took his glasses off and rubbed his sore, tired eyes. But he wouldn't cry. He was too numb, but the idea that she would never turn to him when she was in need again, knowing he hadn't been this alone since before he joined The Company only tightened the knot in his gut.
Five minutes later his fifth and final scotch of the night was as gone as his will to remember any part of this night. Elle was dead, but he wouldn't say goodbye. He had already lost too much and even if he had lost her too at least he still had denial as his friend. The only one he knew would be with him until the day he finally died himself.
The End