Chapter 60- Twins
Sylar let out a small sigh of boredom as he leaned on the bar next to Spock who was as rigid as he could be without being accused of being a cardboard cutout. His foray into enemy territory did not pan out as he had planned. He was hoping for a little exotic adventure, but the Klingons seemed just as boring as the ship's crew minus the barbaric fights that occasionally graced the monitors. He knew they were a primitive bunch, but really- so much aggression over such trivial matters was a little sophomoric in his book. Obviously evolution worked at its own pace and in the case of the Klingons it was that of a snail stuck in molasses.
"Can I buy you a drink?" He asked half sarcastically to his guardian. He almost knew the outcome, but wasting his time and breath seemed better than doing nothing.
"I do not believe you possess credits with which to make a purchase." Spock gently retorted. "It should be me making the offer as I have the proper currency."
"Even better." He mumbled disinterested. "What does a man like you drink anyway? Something hard I would imagine. You seem the type to be able to handle your liquor."
"I am unable to be influenced by alcohol."
"That makes two of us." Sylar smirked. "But you can at least pretend to fit in. I think you are drawing more attention than I would if I used any of my powers. Don't worry, I can teach you some of the tricks of the trade."
"You wish to educate me on the skills required to deceive others?' Spock asked. Sylar couldn't tell if he was intrigued or offended. "I politely decline. That is a lesson I do not care to learn to the degree with which you practice."
"Oh," Sylar replied confidently raising an eyebrow, "I didn't say you could be as good as me, but I can show you enough so people won't mistake you for a hat rack." Spock relaxed his stance slightly and decided his charge was making sense. "That's better." Sylar commended. "Now, let's start with what to drink. If alcohol isn't your thing, drink what you like but in a bar you should at least have something in your hand- even if you never take a sip."
"Your logic is sound. I will request a Vulcan brandy. What would you enjoy?"
"I'm not familiar with the menu, but it doesn't matter." He shrugged. "No matter what it is, it won't kill me or get me drunk so just order whatever's popular. Even if it tastes like swill, I don't have to actually drink it and since I'm not paying for it, I'm not out anything."
Spock averted his dark eyes and suppressed a small smirk. "Again, your logic is correct." He complimented before placing his order with the bartender. When he handed Sylar the same he had ordered, he asked, "Correct me if I am mistaken, but wasn't it something of a taboo for a man to buy another man a drink in an establishment such as this in your timeframe? It did have a sexual connotation, did it not?"
Sylar paused with the glass halfway to his lips and it was a good thing he did: he would have choked otherwise. He slowly placed his glass on the bar and folded his hands in front of him to collect his thoughts before he quietly responded. "I don't know your sexual preference, but I will tell you mine just so we are of the same understanding here: I have no problem with gay men, but I don't swing that way. If you do, it's cool, it just won't be with me."
Spock looked confused until he raised an eyebrow slightly. "So I am correct and you believe my inquiry to be an innuendo to entice you into having sexual relations with me because you believe I mate with males. Fascinating."
"Whatever." He sighed draining his warm brandy in one massive gulp. It sank slowly into his stomach, leaving a slow burn that he found strangely comforting. "As I said, I don't care what you are into. The only way you will garner my interest is if you have an ability I can collect. If you do, then we'll talk."
"Vulcans can mind meld, but I am uncertain if it is a skill you can cut from my head." He deadpanned. Sylar had to admire the man's fatalistic humor since both knew he could at least try if he wanted to.
"Mind meld." He echoed. "What's that? Fusing brainwaves with another person?"
"Yes, of sorts." Spock admitted. "But it is more than just the sharing of thoughts, it is also total freedom of emotion and memory."
"No thanks. I experienced something like that with Peter and it was unpleasant to say the least." He had since recovered somewhat, but he shuddered to remember the dirty, oily, messy conscience Peter stuck him with. Emo bastard.
Spock's eyes danced playfully as he quietly said, "It is just as well, it was not an offer. As you stated, you have no wish to be intimate with me."
Sylar chuckled. "Forgive me, I am usually a better judge of character."
"All that was said was in jest, so there are no amends to be made." He glanced up at the screen at the latest matchup and internally began counting the seconds until a polite exit could be made. Jim had a habit of dragging him into unsavory bars on Earth, but this was definitely not tolerable. A small, disturbing thought niggled at the back of his mind that it was only a matter of time before something went terribly wrong. That could have been the result of previous experiences- nearly every excursion he could ever remember taking with Jim ended in some kind of catastrophe- or it could have been his human intuition. Either way, it was foreboding and he didn't like it one bit.
"So did you ever get any answers about how our powers work?" Sylar asked nonchalantly. "I would like to think something came of it after the dog and pony show I went through."
Spock nodded because he could understand Sylar's point of view. It wasn't like he asked to be brought to the future and he did have quite the negative history involving research. He deserved answers. "I was able to correlate willful use of an ability with changes in brainwave patterns. This might explain part of the equation. As to how you are physically able to create electricity or thermonuclear fields is yet to be determined."
"And Suresh?"
"He believes he has identified a potential mutation in your genetic code that may have altered your make-up substantially from that of ordinary humans, but I am unaware of any further developments in his research."
"Yeah," He muttered miserably to himself, but not so low that Spock's sensitive ears couldn't hear it clearly. "The mysterious mommy gene."
"Regardless of the genesis, it is more information than was available prior to your arrival, correct?" Spock knew a can of worms when he saw one and he dared not open that particular one.
"I guess, but I never really cared about how it all worked to tell you the truth, so long as it works and I can gather them at will." Sylar stated swirling the few remaining drops in the bottom of his glass.
"That is unexpected." Spock mused. "I would have thought that the need to know, to figure it all out would be consuming for you. Is that not the basis of your innate ability: to figure out complex systems?"
"Yes, but not everything is worth navel gazing over."
Spock was amused by the euphemism. Humans had such colorful and sometimes confusing ways of expressing themselves. "have you ever pondered what your intellect could do for you- and for all of humanity if you only applied yourself?"
Sylar paused and glanced up at the pointed eared man. "You sound like my high school guidance counselor. She always asked me what I wanted to do with my life and the answer then is the same as it is now: whatever will get me ahead. I suppose I could cure cancer or figure out how to balance the national budget if I wanted to, but what do those things have to do with me? I will never die of disease and the economy will fall as all great empires do sooner or later. China, India, Rome, Brittan- all ruled the world for a time but the bigger they are the harder they fall. Why should I intervene?"
Spock placed his glass next to Sylar's and replied, "Either you stand and fight for all that is just and right or you cower into oblivion and if you are fortunate, become a footnote in the pages of history. One man's actions can change the entire course of evolution."
Sylar slowly smirked as he lightly ran his fingers over Spock's abandoned glass. "You still believe that even after you witnessed the destruction of your planet and all of your people? You still hold on to the hope that if you just try harder you can somehow make up for failing…" his eyes grew distant and he almost whispered, "your precious mother?"
Spock immediately resumed his rigid stance. How soon he had forgotten what the evolved humans- Sylar in particular- were capable of. It was a sudden reminder to never let his guard down again. "I did not fail her." He said sternly.
"But you didn't succeed in saving her either." He coldly retorted. It was like it was all a game to him. "But you wanted to so badly, didn't you? She was the one person who loved you for who you were. But hey," He gave a small sarcastic smile, "that's what mothers do, right?"
"I assume you learned this from your infantile, overbearing adoptive mother since your biological mother sold you like a common commodity." It wasn't usually his style to be so direct, but when you mess with the bull, you get the horns. Besides, he thought outright strangling him on the bar would have been cliché.
Suprisingly, Sylar laughed. "I see Bennet's been airing my dirty laundry for you. Yes my adoptive mother was infantile. She lived in a fantasy world of figurines and snow globes and my adoptive father was hardly the prime example of what a man should be- at least for the time that I knew him before he left us. Even my real father is a pathetic asshole- but at least he had the courage to embrace what he was: a hunter and a killer. He is the one that sold me, not my mother. She died trying to protect me; I know because I watched him kill her. If that isn't the extent of what a mother will do for her child, then I don't know what is."
Spock nodded in agreement because he often replayed the scene of his own mother's demise in his own mind over and over again and he wondered: did she purposely let go to save him from falling over the edge as well if Chekov couldn't beam them up in time? If so, it was risky and irrational to sacrifice oneself on a hunch- but it was also utterly human and she certainly was.
"I don't know about you, but I could use another useless drink." Sylar proclaimed pushing himself away from the bar as he headed toward the other end where the bartender was. He spotted Uhura and Claire talking amongst themselves- girl talk he surmised- and he kept his distance a few bodies away. "Vulcan brandy." He requested when the bartender came to him. "And put it on that guy's tab." He added pointing to Spock. While he waited, he let his mind wander to future possibilities. Since the timeline had been changed, presumably the evolved humans had been saved, which meant that his alternate self was probably walking around the galaxy that very minute. He wondered where he might be and he also wondered if he would recognize himself after all the intervening years and the myriad of experiences he had gained. Would he look any older? After all that time, would his hunger be just as strong? How many powers would he have? Hundreds? Millions? Where would future Peter and Claire be? Would they still be mortal enemies?
He turned again to Claire just in time to watch her spill her drink all over a Klingon woman and he would have laughed at the way she blanched pure white if the situation wasn't so serious. Before he knew what he was doing, he had closed the gap just in time to hear the woman ask, "Well?"
"I…" Claire stammered.
"I accept." Sylar replied smoothly with a gracious smile. Even as the words left his lips he realized why he had done it: if the damn empathy residue came from Peter, it would react strongest in Claire's defense. Damn him.
"You cannot accept a challenge on behalf of another!" The woman yelled. "If she will disgrace herself, let her!"
"Who exactly is the coward here?" He asked tilting his head. "If you are afraid to fight someone more your size, then I would say it is you."
"Sylar!" Uhura hissed. "You don't know what you are getting yourself into!"
She was right, he didn't. But he did know that getting her out was more important because in the end, if they were all going to get out undetected, it was better that he be center stage as the one with perhaps the most control, the best pretender and showman, and most importantly nothing to lose but hopefully a little blood and certainly a lot of dignity.