It might be a hyperbole to call it the worst dream in the history of humanity . . . But not by much.
[] [] []
Rutherford is back.
He's . . . oh, god. He's back.
This fact, of course, dictates that Sylar must destroy him. So he does—again, and again, and again. And each time, the bastard springs back like the villain in a horror film. Sylar's attempts on his life grow increasingly less gleeful, more teeth-grindingly frustrating, and he's wearing himself out trying to smash the man into a bloody pulp with one of the stair railings when Claire suddenly makes her presence known.
"Rob!" she cries. "Oh, my god, Rob . . . Look, I know you never got to read my letter—"
Here she shoots Sylar a scathing look.
"—so I think you should know, this isn't your fault. I love you. If I lived forever, I'd always love you. I love too many . . ."
And she runs on, reciting her morbidly sappy suicide note, while Sylar, slightly breathless by this point, turns once more to Rutherford and gives him a good kick in the ribs.
"God, will you just die already?" he yells, swinging the railing up once more.
"I'm afraid he can't die, Mr. Gray," says an accented voice from behind him.
Sylar whirls in shock to find Chandra Suresh, in the flesh, standing there primly in the middle of the sitting room, a copy of Activating Evolution grasped before him.
Son of a bitch, will nobody stay dead?
Sylar screws up his face, unsure what to do. He feels like his brain is locking up. After a second, he decides to continue beating a dead horse-or, rather, a very live Texan.
"Oh, yes, he can," he growls, bringing the rail down over Rutherford's head. The man's skull splits, and so does the rail, the longer portion rolling noisily beneath the couch.
"Oh, no, he can't," Chandra replies in a tone of implacable assurance. "You see, Gabriel—"
"My name is not-!" Sylar begins, brandishing a paltry four inches of oak.
"Mr. Rutherford possesses the ability to regenerate his cells, just as our lovely Claire here—"
"You think I'm lovely?" Claire interjects.
Sylar can actually feel his mind cracking like the face of a clock.
"He can't regenerate!" he shouts. "Good god, Dr. Suresh, look at him! He's nearly sixty!"
But, yes, look at him—Rutherford's skull is knitting back together before their eyes.
"It's not at all uncommon for abilities to remain dormant for years, manifesting suddenly during episodes of extreme physical stress or emotional upheaval," Chandra responds calmly, beginning to thumb through his book. "Indeed, some individuals may never know their true potential. We can only speculate on what astounding abilities may have eluded their owners as well as the scientific community as a whole. It's all here in chapter eleven."
He extends the open book toward Sylar. A little scrap of paper flutters out of it.
"Oh, there it is!" exclaims Claire happily, grabbing it. "I thought he burned it."
Sylar turns away, head in his hands, muttering profanities and doing his utmost to retain little bits of his sanity. It feels like a losing battle.
When he faces the mad scene before him once more, part of it has dissipated. Chandra is gone. Disturbingly, so is Claire.
"Where the . . ?"
"She left with the old man," says Rutherford, now seated comfortably on the couch.
"Wh-?" Sylar spins to face the stairs, then Rutherford again. "She—left—she—what?"
"They looked happy. I think we may have seen the last of her," Rutherford sighs. "Of course, I'll have to stay here in case she comes back." He runs his hand over the couch, looking about as if he's settling in.
"Over my dead body!" The ironic proclamation comes out rather weakly, since Sylar's still processing Claire's inexplicable elopement.
"Hey, come on, fella," Rutherford says jovially, standing. "I know we got off to a rocky start, but look! I brought your clock back!"
And he drags the hulking grandfather clock out as if from cartoon hammer space.
"Actually, I was hoping you might fix it for me."
"I can't—I don't . . . have time . . ." Sylar murmurs in disbelief. What's happening to his life?
"Don't kid yourself," says the other man. "Time is all we've got."
Sylar stares at the clock. It's a beautiful piece, and he put such painstaking work into breaking it, and now he's going to fix it, undo everything, not because he wants to but because it's all he's good for, because it's fate.
Gabriel Gray's fate. Hunched over a lifeless piece of machinery, the ticking accompanied by the sound of his own dying heart.
"Now, would you look at that!" Rutherford cuts into his thoughts.
Sylar's head jerks up, and to his and the other man's amazement, the clock is hovering in the air, held there by an invisible force emanating from Rutherford's outstretched hand.
"That's another new one!" says Rutherford in pleased wonder. "And I didn't even have to kill anybody!"
Sylar desperately wishes for death.
[] [] []
When he wakes up from that nonsensical piece of pure infuriation, all desire for further rest has been thoroughly annihilated. He rises from bed, tugs on a pair of draw-string pajama pants and shambles downstairs, zombie-like.
"I made coffee," Claire's sullen voice drifts from the kitchen.
Well, she's still here. For now. And apparently speaking to him.
"Fabulous," he replies without looking at her. He snags a ceramic cup from across the room, without any real aim and half-hoping it smacks into her head as it zips through the air. After pouring a cup of coffee, he takes a tentative sip and grimaces.
"This is ice cold," he grumbles.
"Well, I made it at four A.M," she admits. After their argument, when sleep was impossible.
Sylar rolls his eyes and rubs at the bridge of his nose with his free hand, while the other sears red-hot and steam begins to whirl up from the dark brown liquid.
"You look godawful," Claire observes bluntly. The bed-head he's sporting doesn't bother her—he wears it well—and there's nothing at all unpleasant about his state of shirtlessness. But he's got shadows like dark gray smudges beneath his eyes, and his entire air is one of bad-tempered fatigue.
"And a good-morning to you, too," he answers with listless sarcasm, sipping his coffee as he wanders out of the room.
Claire huffs, annoyed, before following him.
"Didn't sleep, huh?" she attempts, injecting a minor sunny quality into her tone.
"I slept fine," he lies.
"I couldn't sleep a wink," Claire persists.
"Strange, being that the couch is so cozy."
"Sylar . . ." With a weary sigh, she steps forward and clasps his arm. He turns partially, frowning at her.
"I'm trying to make up," she tells him exasperatedly.
It's not an apology—somehow, he feels he deserves one—but it mollifies him, nonetheless.
"Whatever you want," he says, facing her more fully. "I guess . . . I shouldn't have . . . burned your bookmark."
Before I got a chance to memorize it.
"It's okay."
Because she still remembers it.
"So, whose number was it, anyway?" He affects a casual tone. Only curious.
"Just an acquaintance," Claire replies—honestly, for the most part. "Not even a friend, really."
"An acquaintance," he echoes, nodding. "What's it's name?"
"It?" She raises an eyebrow.
"Well, you didn't specify gender."
Is that really the reason, she wonders, or does he simply view ordinary individuals as sub-human?
"It's name is Joshua," she answers. He's not getting a last name, not even if he asks.
His eyes flicker down, settling on his coffee.
"Hmm."
There's a roiling boil developing behind his ribs, as he struggles not to bombard her with demands for a description. How old is he? What's he look like? How does he look at you?
Sylar chokes these and other questions back with coffee.
"It's funny," he remarks. "You're here two weeks, and you're already making friends. Me, I've been living here around fifteen years now, and you're the first soul I've had through the door."
Good lord, thinks Claire. Fifteen years? Who does he talk to? Son of a bitch, who does he sleep with?
Well, you, lately, responds a needling internal voice.
That's not what I meant.
But what is she doing pondering his sexual habits in the first place? Claire kills that train of thought, slightly shamefaced. Thankfully, Sylar doesn't seem to realize he just let slip an intensely personal bit of information.
"Goes to show you popularity never really dies," he says. "Once a homecoming queen, always a homecoming queen."
Claire blinks at his flippant allusion to what was without any doubt one of the most traumatic days of her life. Sylar, oblivious, blows lightly on the surface of his coffee.
"You know, I never did get that crown." Or tiara . . . sash . . . Whatever the hell they were going to give her. Probably a big bucket of pig's blood if Jackie had her way.
Poor Jackie.
"Well, I'm sure it would have looked charming on you."
Can't he even say, Woops, didn't mean to make a crack about that time I lopped your friend's head off? And then threw you into a wall hard enough to break your face? And then chased you around a dark auditorium? And then dropped your uncle off the top of the bleachers? Geez, it's kind of a serious matter now that I think about it?
Something like that?
Guess not.
Since he isn't being tactful, Claire decides to skip the lead-up.
"What happened with Rob?" she asks—gently, because she doesn't want tempers to start flaring up again.
An unpleasant smirk lights Sylar's face. Rutherford truly won't stay gone, will he? Just keeps worming his way back into their life.
Lives. Sylar reminds himself to use the plural tense.
"Nothing, really," he answers. "I assume he's back in Texas by now."
Sharon's probably trying to coax him out from under the bed with a cookie.
He laughs quietly, crushing it with another sip, but not quickly enough.
"What'd you do to him?"
"Nothing," he says again. When she still looks suspicious, he grins and reiterates: "Nothing. What would I do to him—and why? Unless he starts manifesting latent abilities, I wouldn't look for his scalp lying around anytime soon, Claire."
"Well, what did he want?"
What does she want him to want, exactly? Does she hope he stumbled in bursting with apologies and renewed vows of fidelity?
"A divorce," Sylar says frankly, hoping it stings a little.
She nods. Swallows.
"Right. Well. That was sweet of him, wasn't it?"
Her voice is tight, and suddenly he regrets his abruptness. He doesn't want her to dislike him for making her feel this way, despite the fact that Rutherford is the one at fault. Don't shoot the messenger might be a popular adage, but when the messenger shows up with bad news, you've got to whale on somebody.
"I scared the living hell out of him," he adds belatedly. If that helps.
Her eyes snap back to him.
"What? How?"
"Oh . . ." He lets the half-empty cup float out of his and, spiraling it around in the air with his index finger. "Ordinary, unexciting telekinesis."
Remembering what she said about his occasional showing off, he sends the cup whirling off to settle on some solid surface. But he feels better now. Wishes he could replay the entire scene for her.
"Just imagine it," he says, strolling around behind her. Boldly, he rakes his fingertips softly along her cheek, pulling her hair away from her face. Has he done this before? Did she shudder then? Why did she shudder? Revulsion?
"Rutherford, floating, mired in the air as if in quicksand," he illustrates for her, speaking close to her ear. "Unable to move . . . unable to run. Which is what he wanted to do, of course. Run like a coward."
He's too near her. She should walk away, but she faces forward, visualizing it all as he wishes.
"He was so frightened . . . He practically groveled," he continues, a hint of a blissful sigh escaping his lips and tickling her earlobe. "I think he regretted his stupidity. That's a lot to regret, you know. He's probably still processing it."
There's a second, no more, when Claire reclines into him, her back hitting his front as she takes in the image. It passes.
"But . . . did you hurt him?"
"No . . ." he insists, a bit too hesitantly.
She draws away from his warmth, turning to face him at last.
"Nothing invasive," he amends under her probing stare. "He needed a little persuasion at one point. I gave him a . . . squeeze, that's all. Believe me, Claire Bear, he left in the same sorry condition he arrived in."
There's a small pause as she mulls it over.
"Give me your phone," she commands. "I want to call him."
"Call him?" he echoes incredulously, laughing. "No, that isn't happening."
"I just—I just want to hear his voice, see if he's really okay."
"What's the point? He's going to die, Claire—and probably sooner rather than later. Are you going to call him every day for the rest of his life, see if he's still kicking? Find out if he's had a stroke? If he's senile yet?"
That might not be a bad idea, come to think of it. Personally, Sylar can't wait for him to knock off for good.
"Why don't you trust me, Claire?" he asks softly. "What, I kill you one measly little time, and you never forgive me for it?"
It isn't that. Not really. She knows him too well, that's all.
"I just want to call him," she requests once more. "Please."
Grimly, he retreats for a few minutes, returning with his phone, which he pitches to her.
"You know, I had a nightmare like this," he muses aloud while she dials her former home number. "At least, I think it was about this . . . Hm. You went away, and Rutherford never did. Literally. That was the gist of it, I think. It was awful."
The line begins to ring. Sylar perks up suddenly.
"Chandra was there, too," he remembers. "Kind of pleasant, seeing him again. Too bad he didn't bring Mohinder along."
"Hush," she says absently.
Sylar lifts his eyebrows but lapses obediently into silence. He watches her face closely. After a moment, her eyes drift close, and she retracts the phone from her ear, ending the call.
"Satisfied?" he asks.
"All too," she replies, putting the phone in his palm. "She answered."
"Oh." He sends the phone away to rest near the abandoned coffee cup.
Claire runs her fingers through her hair, smoothing it, trying to appear unbothered.
"Well . . . I need to, um . . ." She shakes her head to clear it. "I need to get looking for an apartment, like I said."
"What?" he says roughly.
"What?" she repeats, non-plussed.
He exhales sharply, angrily.
"You said we were making up."
"Yeah, well, that's what the fight was about. Just because we make up, that doesn't nullify my plans."
"I don't see why not."
"Look . . ." Claire squeezes her eyes shut for a moment and takes a steadying breath, trying to obliterate her desire to give him a good thunk in the forehead with the heel of her hand. "You're taking this too personal, okay? I'm not—"
"How can I not take it personally?" he retorts. "You've been living here, you've been sleeping in my room—"
"God, I told you—"
"I was nice to you!" He spits it out as if relaying some ghastly feat. I swam in a sewer for you might be spoken in the same fashion.
"Was it that hard, Sylar?"
Not with you, he thinks. That's the point, isn't it?
"Never mind," she mutters when he doesn't respond. "Can I just finish what I started to say—please?"
He stares at her, waiting. Scowling.
"I'm not cutting you out of my life or anything," she explains. "I'll still be around. I mean, I'm leaving your home, not New York. You're . . ." Claire casts her eyes on the floor. "You're kind of the only . . . the only . . ."
She can't get it out. It's too pathetic. Too wrong. All the same, comprehension is visible in his eyes.
"God, this is high up on the list of low points in my life," she adds, mainly to herself. "And there have been a lot of them."
So he's the only friend she has. Well, that's not surprising. It was bound to happen one day. Still, his chest seems to swell with a burst of pressure at her admission.
Then, he remembers what their discussion is about, and that happy feeling pops like an overheated balloon.
"If you leave, I'm not speaking to you again."
The words tumble off his lips, and for a moment he wishes he could retract them. He imagines the only way he could seem more childish is if he took her to the playground, shouted You're not my friend anymore! and flipped her face-first down the slide.
On top of which, it's a complete and utter lie. Even now, he's mentally sifting through the local apartment buildings, mapping out routes. If she dares to leave, he plans to follow her around like a puppy. A slightly rabid one.
Claire's mouth tightens. That's not what she expected him to say. What she did expect, she isn't quite sure. Should he have been flattered? Perhaps merely pleased to discover she considered him more of a friend and less of a monster these days?
"Have it your way," she tells him, going to the staircase. "You think I'm the one you're punishing? You haven't had company over in fifteen years."
His nostrils flare. He shouldn't have told her that so idly.
Upstairs, Claire enters the bedroom for what she expects to be the last time, packing her things into the suitcase he brought from her house. She's hunched over the bed when she feels his shadow fall across her, and she glances over her shoulder to find him leaning in the doorway, watching her every motion with dark, agitated eyes.
"Don't worry," she says, "I'm only taking what came with me from Texas."
He rolls his eyes, stepping into the room.
"Oh, take it all," he says. Slipping his arm into the closet, he brings out the olive green dress she wore the last time they went out to dinner. "Does this look like something I have any use for?" He tosses it across the bed. "Anything you leave behind is just clutter."
"Thanks," she responds sarcastically. My god, isn't he generous? Then her tone changes, and she lifts her eyes to his face even as she folds the dress to tuck it into her suitcase. "Really—thanks. For making Rob go home."
"Go to hell," Sylar snaps in place of Sure thing, Claire—what are friends for? And he disappears, hitting the shower.
When he emerges later, she's already gone.
So much for snowglobes.