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Chapter Text

Watching his life-long BF as she vaulted around the old quarry, wearing her usual sleeveless green top and tight dark trousers, Ron Sinclair still had no idea how Kim Pierce could pull all those moves off. The initial paces were simple enough, and even the mid-air flips weren't that far beyond what he'd come to expect of the other cheerleaders, but somehow he couldn't picture any of the other girls on the squad neatly running up that pile of rocks without ever missing a single step, Spinning on one foot like a ballet dancer on fast-forward, star-jumping/cartwheeling through the air, a few long-distance jumps…

Seriously, more than once Ron thought he was going to see his best friend break something when she took an unexpected jump, but then she just grabbed a tree branch or some piece of the old mining equipment around this quarry and suddenly she was out of the air and back in contact with something solid.

Ron had always admired his best friend's abilities, even if he couldn't hope to copy any of them himself, but he had no real idea how she was able to do all that. She always matched the other cheerleaders when they were performing during the games, but for the last few months, when she did this kind of practise on her own, she seemed to be pushing herself to a point far beyond anything she'd been capable of before.

Looking down at a faint chittering sound, Ron smiled as he saw Rufus sitting on his leg, the naked mole rat eagerly munching at a chip he'd taken from the bag in Ron's hand.

"Cheese and onion good to you, pal?" Ron asked, smiling as Rufus looked up at him and chirped a response. He appreciated that naked mole rats were far from conventional pets, but with his father's fur allergies making it impossible to get something more normal like a cat or a dog, he'd settled on Rufus ever since the little guy had turned up in this very quarry when he and Kim had started coming here to hang out when they were kids. Kim had speculated that Rufus had escaped from some kind of laboratory, as apparently naked mole rats showed a surprising resistance to diseases for an animal of their size, coupled with his missing lower teeth suggesting he'd been subjected to some kind of surgery. Kim had been concerned about it at first, but after a few days had gone by with no news of a break-in, she had soon decided that it wasn't worth reporting one missing rat to anyone, and Ron had comfortably adopted Rufus as his pet.

Admittedly, Ron tended to keep Rufus in the pocket of his cargo pants rather than get him an actual cage because Rufus slept so much and it was safer than trying to explain to his parents why he had an East African rodent as a pet, but Rufus never seemed to mind the occasionally bumpy sleeping environment, and he was actually surprisingly easy to feed. After he had seen Kim's research on naked mole rats, Ron wondered if that lab theory explained Rufus's greater-than-predicted ability to get around in daylight and cope with the range of temperatures he encountered up here, considering how naked mole rats were meant to stay underground.

It was a puzzle, but so long as Rufus seemed happy to spend time with him, Ron had long ago decided not to worry about the fact that he had an odd pet that was strangely intelligent and didn't set off his dad's allergies.

"What's the sitch?"

"Mmm?" Ron looked up at Kim, smiling apologetically at his friend as she had evidently finished her training to sit down beside him. "Just… thinkin' 'bout Rufus; wasn't it our 'anniversary' recently?"

"We did find him four years ago, but I'm pretty sure that the exact date was three weeks before now," Kim pointed out with a brief smile.

"Really?" Ron looked at Rufus with a new sense of regret. "Uh… sorry I missed that, buddy."

He knew that it was impossible, but when Rufus looked up at him and squeaked a response, Ron could almost swear that the naked mole rat was talking to him…

"Anyway," he looked up at his friend with a smile, "getting back to the present, great moves out there, KP."

"Thanks," Kim smiled sitting down beside him with a thoughtful expression.

"Something up?"

"How did you-?"

"You got your serious face," Ron shrugged. "What's the sitch, KP?"

"Not exactly a sitch- it's definitely nothing bad, you know- but I just…" Kim replied, looking thoughtfully around the quarry for a moment before she turned back to Ron. "Have you ever felt like you're too good at something?"

"…You're kidding me, right?" Ron looked at Kim with a smile that was only half-teasing. "KP, you're talking to the guy who still needs you to double-check his math homework-"

"What about Home Ec?"

"Y'know, you did pick up on that pretty quickly-"

"But only after I watched you do it; you knew what you were doing pretty much the moment you got your hands on everything, but I had to… well, you had to talk me through it and it still didn't quite make sense to me," Kim shrugged. "But what I just did… I mean, I've tried going through the routines with some of the other girls on the squad, and it always feels like I'm a few steps ahead of them."

"Well, you're good," Ron shrugged. "I mean, you can't exactly complain about being hot, popular, and good at what you enjoy doing, right?"

"Maybe not, but it's just… is it weird if I feel like I'm cheating?"

"Cheating?" Ron repeated. "KP, I know for a fact you'd never even think about using drugs or anything like that, and I don't think those kung fu lessons your dad insisted you take give you that much of an edge-"

"I never said it made sense, Ron, but I just…" Kim shook her head with a frustrated sigh. "I don't even know what's getting to me right now; I think I just needed to vent or something…"

"Well, that's what I'm here for, KP," Ron smiled at her. "I mean, hey, you never ditched me even when I turned into the class loser; I'm not going to dich you when you have some kind of mid-school crisis."

"Ron," Kim smiled at him, "you're not the class loser-"

"Feels like it sometimes," Ron muttered, his good mood faltering at that self-reminder of his own issues.

"Ron," Kim put a hand on his shoulder, turning him around to look at her. "You've been there for me since you tried to stop those bullies back in pre-K; you might be a bit weird, but you're my kind of weird."

"Ah… thanks?" Ron smiled back at her.

"You're welcome," Kim grinned at him, before she stood up and stretched. "Anyway, we'd better get back; still got that report to work on, remember?"

"Right…" Ron shrugged, as he stood up and walked off after Kim, pausing only to scoop Rufus back into his pocket as they fell into step beside each other. Once they'd carefully navigated their way out of the quarry, the two friends fell into a comfortable pace alongside each other, occasionally talking about the upcoming report and other minor details of life in Odessa. The outer buildings of the city were just starting to come into view when they heard a sudden explosion, prompting both of them to glance at each other before they ran anxiously onwards.

When they reached a path looking out over the city, they each relaxed somewhat as they confirmed that Odessa itself was fine, even as hey also saw the cause of the explosion. They had no idea how it could have happened, but it looked like a train had come off its tracks, with at least one carriage blazing away with such intense heat that the two teens could already feel the heat from their current position on the hill. Running down to the bridge, Kim and Ron briefly registered a grey-haired man in a dark jacket walking away while talking on a phone, but their attention was more focused on the train below, as the fire department were already working to put out the blaze.

"Damn…" Ron whistled as he took in the crash below them. "That would be so cool if it wasn't real…"

"Yeah, I-" Kim began grimly, before her eyes widened and she pointed at something near the train. "Look!"

Following Kim's gaze, it took Ron a moment to see through the blaze of heat around the crashed vehicle, but once he realised what she was pointing at everything fell into place. Among the firefighters trying to control the blazing inferno were two figures who definitely weren't members of the fire department, one of them a man in what looked like a uniform that likely marked him out as one of the staff on the train, and the other a shorter figure with long blonde hair and wearing the distinctive red-and-white outfit of an Odessa High cheerleader.

"Whoa…" Ron said, still staring incredulously at the girl as she left the man with the firefighters and then ran off down the road, moving with an ease that made it clear she hadn't been affected by her own close proximity to the fire. "That… that was…"

"Yeah," Kim nodded, understanding Ron's questions about what they'd just seen.

She appreciated hat someone from her school- and most likely someone she knew, based on the cheerleading outfit- had just done something to help whoever was in that train get to safety, but that didn't answer the bigger questions of how someone could have run into a burning train and then run out of it that quickly.

Kim might be overthinking things, but something about what they'd just seen…

"Nuts!" she said, snapping her fingers.

"What?" Ron looked back at her.

"There's meant to be a solar eclipse in a couple of hours, remember?" Kim looked urgently at him. "Dad had Jim and Tim preparing those peephole camera things for it for most of the last week; they'll be so disappointed if we don't get there for the main event…"

"Right; good point," Ron nodded before he glanced at the burning train below them. "So… we get back to that later?"

"Definitely," Kim nodded, surprising herself with the ease at which she'd made that decision.

Seeing a cheerleader run away from a burning train wasn't something to be worried about in itself, but the fact that the cheerleader in question looked like she'd been in the train when it was on fire and had managed to get away from it…

Kim might not be as keen on following her parents into the sciences as her brothers were, but she still had an inquiring mind, and that scenario raised more than a few questions that she'd appreciate learning the answers to.

Chapter Text

Standing in line with the other cheerleaders, Kim wondered what the point of this impromptu meeting was.

The eclipse yesterday had been relatively straightforward, but it was still pretty cool to see something on that scope, even if her father and brothers were the ones who were more interested in the science of the whole thing. She and her mother had appreciated being included, and even Ron had been impressed in his own confused manner, but in the end, it had been an interesting spectacle that had been and gone, and now it was back to daily life in Odessa.

Of course, ever since she'd seen the reference to a 'Mysterious Good Samaritan' in the local paper this morning, Kim had been fully aware that 'regular life' was going to have its problems, but she was left torn between worrying that she and Ron had been caught out and were in trouble for not mentioning it earlier and wondering if this assembly was to identify the 'guilty party' who'd been involved in the train crash, even if she had no reason to believe anyone had seen anything clearly enough to realise that the 'Samaritan' was a cheerleader. She and Ron had each promised each other that they hadn't said anything about the crash to anyone else- mainly because they didn't want to attract awkward questions about why they'd been in a position to see anything like that in the first place- but it wasn't like they could guarantee that none of the fire department would have seen what had happened either…

"Girls!" the sheriff said, as the cheerleaders stood in the amphitheatre, lined up in a row in front of the principal, the sheriff, and a man who'd identified himself as the fire marshall. "This isn't a… criminal investigation. Nobody here is in any kind of trouble. Quite the contrary. There just happens to be a very grateful man lying in the hospital who'd like to thank one of you for... saving his life yesterday."

"I've never seen anyone so reluctant to be called a hero," Principal Marks observed from behind the sheriff, glancing over at the marshall. "You're sure it was one of our cheerleaders?"

"The uniform said Union Wells High," the marshall said, squinting along the line before he pointed at the end of the group. "I'd have to say it was… her on the end."

"That's Claire Bennet," the principal said, as Kim followed the direction of the fireman's finger to a short blonde girl at the end of the line; she knew Claire to say 'hi' to, but Kim wouldn't say that that the two of them were close.

"Claire," the sheriff looked curiously at the girl in question, "where'd you go yesterday after cheerleading practice?"

"I, uh…" Claire began hesitantly.

"It wasn't her," Jackie Wilcox said, stepping forward from her position beside Claire. "It was me. I was taking a shortcut home from school, and… I saw the wreckage of the train… wreck. And… I just had to help."

"Why didn't you say something?" Principal Marks asked.

"I guess I didn't want all the attention, you know?" Jackie said as she kept wringing her hands. "That's not why I did it."

The nonchalant way she said that affirmed to Kim that Jackie was lying. Kim could say for a fact that she and Jackie weren't friends, but unlike with Claire, where she'd just never had a reason to register the other girl outside of practise, Kim knew that Jackie had a particular chip on her shoulder. It might be petty to judge a girl based on her actions in high school, but when Jackie always did her best to take a fairly prominent role in the cheer routines, Kim had her doubts that the girl was even capable of being quiet about anything that showed her off in a good light.

Looking over the rest of the squad as they cheered for Jackie after the sheriff announced her as an honorary firefighter, Kim's eyes fell on Claire Bennet, who had walked up to talk quietly to the sheriff about something.

Jackie could take credit for the rescue if she wanted, but even if Kim didn't have any evidence she could use to prove it to anyone else and didn't even know enough to tell herself she'd cracked this yet, she was sure that the cheerleader who'd been at the train yesterday had been shorter than Jackie, and she was also sure that Jackie never wore her hair loose like the girl yesterday had done anyway…

After nearly a decade in his current position, Ron had concluded that the greatest downside to being the 'loser' who was nevertheless the closest friend of the most popular girl in the school was that you got all of the attention without any of the benefits.

It wasn't that he especially minded not having to worry about everything Kim had to deal with- he had tried to help her on a few of her school activities, such as the yearbook, and he had no idea how she coped with all that pressure- but there were times when it sucked being on the outside with everyone. He'd managed to get a few extracurriculars on his record with such moments as his role as an extra tutor in Home Ec, as well as acting as a general assistant for Kim on some of her own extra activities, but it was never enough for anyone to really notice him in a positive light…

"Hey there, squeeb," a familiar voice called out to Ron before elbowing him sharply in the back, sending Ron crashing into the locker in front of him.

"Gil," Ron said, rubbing his forehead as he turned to look at the lanky, dark-haired bully who was giving him a trademark smirk. "What's up with you now?"

"Just testing the waters, squeeb," Gil shrugged, the bully demonstrating his usual self-confidence despite Ron's awkwardly disdainful glare. "Y'know, when I'm taking the school to a good place, I was thinking about the look of it all, and I realised I'm missing a good bit of eye candy."

"Uh… OK," Ron looked at Gil in confusion. "And you're telling me about this because…?"

"What's the deal with your little redhead?"

"KP?" Ron looked at Gil incredulously. "I'm- you seriously think you could get Kim Pierce to do anything with you?"

"Why not?"

"She actually has a brain."

"Eh, everyone gets those urges," Gil shrugged dismissively. "And considering how wild that girl can be on the field, there's got to be some really freaky stuff going on when she lets rip-"

"Hey!" Ron said, deliberately ignoring the angry chattering from his pocket as he stepped forward to glare at Gil. "Don't talk about her like that?"

"Why not?" Gil retorted with a mocking grin. "Don't like getting your face rubbed into it?"

"Don't like- what are you even talking about?"

"Don't like getting your face rubbed in the fact that you've been FriendZoned by a hottie?"

"OK, she's not- I don't think- we're friends, OK!" Ron insisted, fighting to ignore the small part of himself that even he wasn't willing to admit might have thought about trying for something more at some point in his existence…

"You are such a squeeb, you know?" Gil grinned mockingly at him. "You get all the right bits in there to make something of yourself, and all you are in the end is a pathetic squeeb who missed every shot he ever had."

"Yeah, well… at least I know what I am!" Ron countered, feeling ashamed at the retort even as he made it.

"And what does that mean?" Gil smirked.

"It… well…" Ron waved his arms for a moment before he stuck them in his pockets, fingers briefly brushing against Rufus's head as the mole-rat reached up from the lower pocket. "Gil, really, what's the point of this? I mean, are you really impressing anyone with it?"

"Like you're not trying to act tough by taking it?"

"Actually, I'm just dealing with it; you're the only one who's making a big thing about this," Ron responded, before he turned back to lean against his locker. "Look, just forget about any idea of making KP 'arm candy' and move along before you make yourself look like a bigger idiot…"

The sensation of being slammed against the locker door was never a pleasant one, but Ron had become used enough to it by now that he could just take it and wait as Gil walked sullenly down the corridor, attracting his usual mix of impressed glances and disapproving stares.

Under normal circumstances, Ron liked to think that he would have felt sorry for the guy, but when Gil's attempt to get over his issues involved making Ron the target of his various jokes, Ron lost most of the sympathy he might have had for Gil, and moments like throwing Ron into the lockers just reinforced Ron's dislike of him.

Like Ron, Gil occupied a relatively uncertain place in the school hierarchy, but in his case it was more to do with his own abilities rather than who he was friends with. Gil was the star of the school's swimming team, but apart from that particular detail he never had much else going for him, and that wasn't saying that much considering the limited opportunities for the swim team to really stand out in this school. He was smart enough to do well in various classes, including biology and technology, but Gil didn't do overwhelmingly well in either of them, and swimming was his only real strength in terms of his athletic ability, so he hovered on the edge of most of the accepted social groups without ever belonging to any of them. Ron had tried to talk to him when their parents sent them both to the same summer camp a few years ago, but although he'd agreed to trade his Arts & Crafts with Ron's swim time because Ron had been uncomfortable at how choppy the river had been, Gil had never even thanked Ron for the switch and just kept teasing him for being too afraid to get into the water in the first place.

I wasn't a good swimmer back then; he doesn't have to keep rubbing my nose in it…

"What's the sitch?"

"KP?" Ron turned to smile at his friend as she walked up to him, out of her cheerleading uniform and back in her usual green top and blue trousers. "Just Gil being Gil."

"Sorry about that," Kim smiled at him in understanding. "Nothing else noteworthy about today?"

"Nada apart from the news this morning; how about you?"

"Both a bit more and a bit less than you'd think," Kim explained, shaking her head in amusement as she and Ron fell into step alongside each other. "We were just changing for some lunchtime practise when the sheriff and the fire marshall showed up trying to find out who helped save that guy from the burning train yesterday."

"Really?" Ron looked at her in surprise as the two of them began walking to their next class.

"And of course, Jackie Wilcox swiftly took credit for it and now they want her to be the Grand Marshall of the Pioneer Day Parade."

"Huh," Ron raised his eyebrows. "That's… kinda cool…"

"Which is why I don't think she's the one who saved that guy."

"Huh?"

"Ron, Jackie's got one of the biggest egos on the team; if she did save someone from a fire, even if she was willing to put herself at risk like that, she'd have stayed on the scene to tell her name to everyone and get the word out as soon as she could, not run away once the guy was safe and wait until someone else came to ask the team about it," Kim explained. "Besides, I never saw her asking about what happened to the guy she 'allegedly' saved; anyone willing to dive into a blazing train to try and get someone out would probably want to be sure they'd done it for a good reason."

"Good points," Ron conceded, looking curiously at his friend. "So if Jackie's out, and I know it wasn't you… who do you think did it?"

"I'm… not sure," Kim shook her head apologetically. "Jackie basically got everyone's attention after she took credit for the rescue, and then everyone spent more time working out what they were going to do next to 'honour her heroism'…"

She shook her head and sighed. "Well, it's probably not a big deal; we've got that game coming up in a day or two, so we should probably be focusing on that."

"Good call," Ron shrugged. "I mean, hey, whether or not Jackie did or didn't do it, so long as the guy's alive and nobody else wants to take credit for it, what's the big deal?"

Kim had to concede that Ron had a point, but she still couldn't entirely shake the feeling that she'd missed something about everything that had happened on that field during practise.

Why do I keep remembering Claire getting knocked over…?

Chapter Text

Kim might doubt that Jackie had anything to do with the train rescue, but without any clear evidence to favour an alternative candidate, it hadn't taken long for Kim to settle back into her usual school routine and let Jackie enjoy her new celebrity status. With the big game coming up, Kim had concluded that Jackie would screw up her own lie on her own soon enough, and had decided to just focus on looking forward to the planned celebratory bonfire if their team won the next big game, and once the event became official, even Ron was eager for the chance to go to the party.

Unfortunately for Kim, it seemed as though it was taking longer for Jackie to give up on the idea of using the 'rescue' for her own reputation than she'd expected. Jackie had spent most of the previous school day talking about how she was going to use the entire incident as part of her upcoming campaign for class president; everything she said about running on a platform of moral, mental, and social advancement through good deeds sounded good on paper, but Jackie had never shown any interest in doing good deeds before people started asking about the train crash and Kim doubted she'd suddenly decided to start now. Kim had thought about running herself, if only to limit the chance of Jackie getting it, but with all her other school activities, she couldn't find the time to think about how to come up with an effective campaign message on top of everything else.

Frankly, after a long day at school that also featured her and the squad performing some particularly challenging cheer routines, Kim was physically and psychologically exhausted. The bonfire itself seemed set to be a fun event, particularly since the team had won their best game of the season and left them all in high spirits, but right now all Kim wanted to do was sit down and enjoy a quiet talk with Ron.

Granted, the cars gathered around the central bonfire made a fairly good 'barrier', and Kim appreciated that her uniform attracted attention- she had thought about changing, but with the rest of the squad still wearing theirs she felt the need to show solidarity- but she and Ron had found a good spot at the rear end of a van that at least gave them some privacy while still able to appreciate the view.

"Y'know something, KP?" Ron looked at Kim with a thoughtful smile as he indicated where Jackie was currently talking to another group of students about her 'heroic rescue' near the centre of the event. "That is why I never got to be popular."

"Because you're not a lying bitch?" Kim asked (she briefly wondered if there'd been alcohol in her drink to make her that loose-lipped, but decided not to worry about that; if there was any alcohol here, it was a small amount, and she wasn't going to be the one to kill the party mood this early on).

"Because I can't just get people to like me whatever," Ron observed, shaking his head slightly as he looked around the circle of students. "I mean, we have all these people here, and seriously, you want to bet most of them have bought Jackie's story?"

"Even after knowing her for so many years?" Kim finished, smiling at Ron in understanding. "For what it's worth, even if I can't understand how they're buying it, I can get how she did it; some people are just good at selling themselves… hopefully not in that way."

"…Yeah, that is a scary mental place," Ron observed, shuddering slightly at the thought. "I mean, she's hot and all, but some things-"

"Wrong-weird," Kim said firmly, not wanting to discuss the idea of Jackie having sex. "I still can't believe nobody's realised it doesn't work; she hasn't even asked how the man she allegedly saved is doing."

"How's the guy doing, anyway?"

"I asked Mom about it; he might not be dead, and it's not exactly a crime, but she has some inside info about the whole accident as the medical examiner," Kim explained. "The guy's still not ready to leave the hospital, but he's coping as well as you'd expect from someone who was caught in a fire."

"Cool," Ron smiled, before his grin faltered. "Y'know, that's the good thing about your parents; they always tell you stuff."

"It's not like your parents don't tell you things, Ron-"

"I get that, but firstly, your parents always had the more interesting jobs, and secondly, mine seem like they just wait until the very last moment to tell me anything that I might find interesting and give me occasional snippets that they have to know I'll find boring," Ron shook his head in frustration as he leaned against the truck and stared up at the sky. "I mean, I told them I wanted a pet for ages and they never told me about Dad's allergies until I was actually in the pet shop…"

"In their defence, you never actually told them you were after a pet until you were just outside the shop in the mall," Kim observed.

"Yeah, but it's not like I didn't give them enough clues," Ron observed, turning back to face Kim. "I get that they could be worse, considering that they're not actually abusive, but they just basically leave some money out for me each month and then leave me alone when they're not suddenly throwing my life out of whack…"

Kim could only stand beside Ron in awkward but companionable silence as he spoke about his parents. His relationship with his family might not actually be a bad one, but ever since she and Ron became friends back in pre-K she'd probably been over at his house a dozen times while he came over to hers at least twice a week, and meals with his parents were always awkward in a best-case scenario. She wasn't even sure if Ron ate at home when he wasn't eating with her family or at the local fast food restaurants, even if she'd never been able to bring herself to ask him that question directly; hearing about his poor relationship with his parents when he brought it up was fine, but asking him something that explicit felt like it would open up issues she wasn't sure how to handle.

"Why can't my parents be more like yours?" Ron sighed as he glanced over at Kim, breaking the awkward silence with a pained expression on his face. "I mean, your dad told you everything he was legally allowed to tell you about those personal trackers he was creating for the space program, even when he could have just told you all squat, but my mom only told me we'd have to move when she'd already found the new house."

"It's not as though you actually minded about the move; you said yourself the new house is an improvement-"

"Maybe not, but I still would've liked to be told about it earlier than the weekend before the moved," Ron said, shaking his head as he slumped against the truck and slid down to the ground, his gaze shifting upwards once again. "I mean, they don't even know anything about Rufus; what does that say about our relationship?"

"That's your own-" Kim began, before Ron sat sharply up, his hand over his pocket. "What?"

"Rufus!" Ron urgently patted his pocket. "He's gone!"

"Gone?" Kim repeated, looking anxiously from Ron to their surroundings, particularly anxious about the people still pacing around them; Rufus might be fast and the area might be fairly open, but it would only took one misplaced foot to crush Ron's pet, and that was assuming nobody decided to move their car. "Where would he-?"

The question essentially answered itself when a series of squeaks was heard from off to their right. Looking in that direction, Kim and Ron's eyes widened as they saw Rufus chittering anxiously at them, pointing urgently at something off to the side of the bonfire.

Exchanging glances, Kim and Ron hurried after the naked mole rat, not even questioning the strangeness of the situation; Rufus might be an odd pet, but when he looked that anxious about something it was bound to be worth checking out. They were briefly unnerved when Rufus led them to the outskirts of the party and out to the bleachers, but that discomfort was replaced by shock when they ran around the hill and found themselves looking at Claire Bennett, lying on the ground behind the seats, clearly dead, with a short white branch sticking out of the back of her neck that must have come from the nearby bloodstained tree stump.

"Oh God," Ron said, hands beginning to flap as he anxiously hopped from one leg to another, unable to take his eyes off Claire's body. "She's dead she's dead she's dead somebody killed her somebody here killed her somebody at our school is killing people-"

"Ron," Kim said, forcing down her own feelings as she looked over at her best friend, trying to coolly assess the scene based on the rare occasion her mother let her look at a crime scene report (always without photos, naturally). "Firstly, from what I've seen of some of Mom's old reports, I'm pretty sure this looks more like an accident than an explicitly intended murder, and second…"

As she stared at the body of her fellow cheerleader, Kim couldn't explain what impulse prompted her to stop talking, crouching down to more closely examine the branch sticking out of the back of Claire's head.

There's something…

The cheerleader who ran away from the train…

Claire's reaction to Jackie's stories…

That moment when Brody ran into her at practice a few days ago…

As though a 'click' had gone off in her mind, Kim reached out and yanked the branch out of Claire's head. Ron's awkward yelp at her action shifted mid-way to a self-strangled scream as he clapped his hands over his mouth when Claire sat sharply up, the wound in the back of her head already healing.

"Holy sh-" the blonde began, before she realised that Kim and Ron were standing over and Kim still held the bloody branch in her hands. "What-?"

"Easy!" Kim hissed, tossing the branch aside and waving her hands urgently at Claire. "I don't… we didn't… look, I have no idea what just happened to you, but maybe we should get out of here before we start talking about it?"

"Get out of-?" Ron began, frantically patting his pockets before he relaxed as he felt Rufus in one of them, only for Kim to grab his flapping arms.

"Ron," she looked firmly at her friend, "whatever just happened here, I think we can all agree that… well, let's keep this to ourselves until we're somewhere a bit more private?"

"…Thanks," Claire nodded tentatively at the other two before she indicated a path off to the side of the main football field. "This is a shortcut to a back entrance; if we go along this way for a bit, we should hit the main road, and then we can pretty much walk away from here."

"Good call," Kim nodded, as Claire took a moment to collect herself before walking briskly along the path she'd just indicated. Kim and Ron exchanged brief glances, but with no other clear solution to the situation that had just presented itself to them, they soon walked after her, the trio continuing in silence until they finally reached the road.

"OK," Ron turned to look at Claire once they'd confirmed that nobody had followed them from the party, "so what was-?"

"Tomorrow."

"Tomor-?"

"I get it," Kim cut Ron off as she looked at Claire. "We'll just get back home now and we'll… talk this over outside Ron's house tomorrow morning; it's closer to school than mine, and I'm pretty sure it's closer than yours."

"Yeah, I… I'll look up the address when I'm home," Claire nodded briefly at Kim, a haunted look in her eyes that the other two could only just make out in the darkness. "So… talk to you tomorrow?"

"Sure," Kim nodded at the other cheerleader in tentative understanding, hoping that she wasn't making a mistake.

Maybe Kim was being a coward, but she was a kid who'd just seen someone she knew dead; even if she and Claire weren't exactly close friends, they still knew each other enough for that to be uncomfortable. Anne Possible's work for the police might have helped Kim acknowledge the reality of death, but it wasn't like she saw any of the bodies her mother analysed herself, and she'd certainly never heard about her mother being called in to analyse someone she knew.

If what had just happened had been hard for Kim to cope with, she didn't want to think about how Ron was reacting to it, and the idea that Claire had literally been apparently dead a few minutes ago was probably something the other girl was going to need time to take in before she felt up to talking about it to anyone else.

As the trio walked home in silence, Kim couldn't stop herself shooting the occasional glance at Claire, hoping that whatever had just happened wouldn't leave Claire too shaken; maybe it was selfish on some level, but Kim wanted to know what had just happened for more reasons than just wanting to understand something that incredible…

Chapter Text

Walking up to Ron's house, Kim wasn't entirely surprised to realise that a part of her hoped that Claire wouldn't be there. As much as she wanted to know more about what had happened last night, at the same time she recognised that learning anything more about Claire's impossible survival would force her to face up to some serious changes in her future that Kim wasn't sure she was ready to face.

God, I haven't even graduated high school yet and I've already been face-to-face with a dead girl who came back to life; how many people can say that? Seriously, how many people would want to face that on its own?

Still, as much as a part of Kim wanted to give into her fears, the rest of her knew that she couldn't do that. She wasn't sure if she had actually saved Claire's life or just sped up an existing process by pulling that branch out of her head like that, but she was definitely interested in learning what had happened to her fellow cheerleader, and she knew that, for all his protestations of cowardice, Ron was just as curious about this new turn of events.

When she rounded the corner and saw Ron standing in front of the house, she smiled gratefully at her old friend, but she had only just settled into position to wait when Claire came out of the house, moving so briskly that Kim wouldn't be surprised to learn that the other cheerleader had been waiting at the window for both of them to get there.

"Hey," Kim said, nodding tentatively at the girl who had been dead just the previous night. "So… how are you?"

"Fine," Claire said as she started walking towards the school, leaving Kim and Ron to exchange glances before hurrying after her.

"So…" Kim looked uncertainly at Claire, after the other girl showed no sign of wanting to start the conversation herself. "How long have you… I mean, what was that about?"

"I don't know," Claire shrugged.

"You don't-?" Ron looked at her in surprise.

"I know that just… that I'm not normal, believe me, I just don't know why it happened to me," Claire clarified as she looked at him, a bitter edge to her voice. "For the last few months, I just… I mean, maybe it started earlier and I just didn't know it, but I only realised then that when I got hurt, I just… I heal."

"You heal?" Ron repeated.

"In seconds," Claire nodded, shooting a grim smile at Ron. "I've broken pretty much every bone in my body, stabbed myself in the chest, shoved a two-foot steel rod through my neck, jumped off an old scaffolding, and I don't have a scratch on me."

"Ouch," Ron said, Rufus nodding in sympathy as the naked mole rat poked his head out of Ron's pocket, each clearly lost for a better response.

"And you don't… burn either, right?" Kim asked, looking tentatively at the other cheerleader.

"Burn?" Claire repeated, looking curiously back at Kim.

"As in when you're burnt you heal quickly?" Kim clarified. "So… that was you who saved that guy on the train, right?"

"How-?" Claire began as curiosity shifted to shock.

"Of course!" Ron snapped his fingers before slapping his head in exasperation. "God, how did I miss that? No wonder you were running away from that fire so quickly; you pretty much got over the burns-"

"You were there?" Claire turned to look sharply at Ron.

"We were just passing by and saw the accident from a road further up," Kim clarified, stepping urgently between Ron and Claire. "We weren't exactly in a position to do anything about it, and we only saw you from a distance, but I guess I… when I saw you lying there, I just…"

She shrugged. "It clicked, I guess.

"It 'clicked'?" Claire looked at Kim uncertainly. "You found me with a branch in my head and you just… you worked out that the girl at the train was me?"

"Well, I'd noticed you acting a bit off around Jackie every time she started talking about her 'rescue', and then I thought I saw something off after that time Brody ran into you on the football field…" Kim shrugged as she looked at Claire with a new sense of curiosity. "What did happen there?"

"Brody broke my neck when he ran into me and I got it back into place before anyone else noticed what had happened," Claire clarified.

"Ouch," Ron winced at that image.

"Yeah," Claire said, rubbing her neck at the memory before pausing as her fingers traced the area where the branch had been just a few hours ago. "What I don't get is why I stayed conscious at that point; I mean, doesn't a broken neck just kill you?"

"Not always," Kim said. "I mean, from what I've read in some of my mom's old books, you'd need to be extremely lucky- and 'lucky' depends on how you define surviving something but still being left permanently paralysed- but it's possible to do just enough damage to a neck to avoid killing someone straight away…"

She looked at Claire with a more uncomfortable expression. "Actually… I mean, I hate to bring this up-"

"Go ahead."

"Well… it looks like you don't just heal, but your body also knows when to heal itself," Kim clarified. "I mean, if you broke your neck, your body could have just started knitting itself back together while your head was still twisted around…"

"Oh man, you could've been Torque!"

"Torque?" Kim and Claire looked at Ron.

"Nightwing villain in DC comics," Ron clarified.

"Nightwing?"

"The original Robin's name when he moved on from being Batman's partner," Ron clarified. "Torque was a corrupt cop who tried to trigger a gang war and got his head twisted backwards by one of the mob bosses he was manipulating; he only just survived because his airway wasn't damaged, but he needed some seriously screwed up physical therapy to save his life afterwards, and that's on top of him having to learn how to walk all over again because they couldn't turn his head back around."

"…Yeah, that sounds gross," Kim nodded, before she frowned at Ron. "Wait; if his head was jammed backwards, how could he walk?"

"He had some physical therapy to teach him how to use his body in that state and was given these freaky mirrored glasses that let him see what was going on 'behind' him."

"Right…" Kim said, looking uncertainly at Ron before glancing back at Claire. "I think we can all agree we're just glad that didn't happen to you, right?"

"Yeah."

"OK then, getting back to the real issue right now…" Kim swallowed slightly as she looked apologetically at Claire, "I get that this is… going to be a tricky question, but… how did that even happen?"

"Huh?"

"Well, the way you fell on that branch…" Kim shrugged, hoping that her tentative memories of whatever few details her mother had shared about her work were accurate. "I'm not saying someone set out to kill you, but you couldn't have done that to yourself, so how did it happen?"

"I'll tell you later."

"What?" Ron looked at Claire in surprise. "Look, we want to help-"

"And I… I appreciate that," Claire said, turning to squeeze Ron's shoulder as she gave him a brief smile, giving Kim a similar grateful grin before her expression became more solemn. "It's just… I need to sort something out for myself before I decide what I'm going to do about that."

"I…" Kim began, before she paused and looked at Claire with a new sense of contemplation.

As much as she wanted to help her friend, she had to recognise that she and Claire had only just started talking about anything more detailed than cheer routines; since everything Kim had seen so far suggested that Claire's apparent attacker hadn't actually intended to kill her, she apparently wasn't dealing with an unrepentant killer, so it was really up to Claire how she chose to handle things at this point.

"All right," she nodded at Claire. "Just… we're here if you need us, OK?"

"Got it," Claire smiled back at Kim. "I… appreciate that."

It was a small moment, but as Claire smiled at her and Ron, Kim felt that they had made a crucial step forward in their new expanded relationship, even if none of them exactly knew what they were dealing with.

Chapter Text

Walking into the school, Claire wondered why she'd resisted the idea of telling anyone else about her healing for so long.

She didn't resent the friendship that she'd formed with Zach as a result of asking him to help her, but there was still only so much that Zach could even understand about what she was going through considering his position in the school hierarchy. While Claire didn't like to think of herself as 'popular' in the sense of being in a superior position in the school, and she always found it a little hard to really bond with anyone since Jackie became more cocky, Zach was used to being alone just because that was who he was. Even if she recognised that it was self-centred, she had a bit more trouble adjusting to the scope of what might happen to her if her secret got out than someone like Zach might, so it was easier for her to act like nothing had changed.

Ron Sinclair might be in a similar position to Zach- even if he was far more 'on the outside' than Zach ever was- but he was close friends with Kim Pierce, who was popular enough that she should be able to help him avoid going too far. Claire admitted that she and Kim hadn't been particularly close before last night, but they'd been friendly enough that she felt she could trust the other cheerleader with her secret.

As for Claire herself, she liked to think that she was coping with everything that had just happened as well as anyone in her position would be. Her mother had noticed she was a little off that morning after the previous night's events, but with her growing practice at hiding any injuries (even if that was mostly just hiding that they'd been inflicted in the first place) it hadn't been hard for her to just claim that she was tired after the party the previous night had been drawn out for longer than she'd expected.

She'd considered telling Zach what had happened, but when she hadn't even decided what to do about it and Kim and Ron already knew what had happened even if they didn't know who did it, she wasn't comfortable sharing out that kind of information. Brody had been a bit… physically aggressive… during their encounter, but Claire didn't want to condemn him for that when she for all she knew he'd just left her body in a drunken panic and Kim and Ron had 'saved her life' (assuming how long she was dead made a difference to anything) before he could tell anyone official what had happened.

God, I was dead last night and now I'm working out what I should be holding Brody responsible for…

She could at least tentatively assume that last night's events had confirmed for her that she would be vulnerable to serious injury if her body couldn't heal around whatever had hurt her, but that left her morbidly wondering how far that went. Could she basically kill herself for good if she shot herself and the bullet stayed in her head, or would it be something like that freaky guy in The World is Not Enough whose senses were damaged when the bullet got stuck in his brain but stayed alive for a while after being shot?

OK, so she probably wouldn't eventually die from it like that Bond villain would, so long as the thing didn't get lodged somewhere that affected something important like her ability to breathe, but it still raised some disturbing possibilities…

Stop this! she told herself in frustration.

She could try and distract herself by thinking about how she'd just come back from the dead, but right now she just wanted to get in and act like nothing had happened; hopefully Brody would just assume he'd knocked her out last night, feel guilty about what he'd done, and everything would go smoothly…

As she put her books away for lunch, Claire wasn't sure if she should be pleasantly surprised or subtly anxious at how easy the day had been so far. She'd had a brief moment of concern when Jackie and Brody ran into her in the corridor on the way to their next classes, but even if Brody had looked a bit surprised to see her, Jackie seemed to have accepted her claim that she'd left because she had too much to drink. She'd briefly thought about mentioning that Kim and Ron had taken her away, but if Jackie hadn't noticed them leaving Claire didn't think drawing attention to them would be the best idea.

Looks like this all worked out…

Her thoughts were interrupted when she closed her locker door and found Lori Trammel leaning up against the locker alongside hers, looking anxiously at her.

"Oh, hi, Lori," Claire nodded at the other girl; as with Kim, she wasn't exactly close to Lori, but they were friendly enough.

"Hey," Lori said in a low voice. "I saw you go off with Brody Mitchum last night at the bonfire."

"So?"

"So… what happened?"

"Nothing," Claire shrugged, wishing people would just give her a reason to stop thinking about this; Kim and Ron were already only tentatively accepting her excuses for the condition they'd found her in. "Nothing happened."

"I went off with Brody Mitchum once," Lori said, a bitter edge to her voice. "'Nothing' happened to me too."

The idea that this had happened to someone else was a particular shock to whatever tentative plans Claire had been making regarding Brody. When she followed Lori's gaze to look at Brody as he 'flirted' with another girl who clearly didn't seem that interested in his attempt to kiss her, Claire's eyes narrowed grimly.

Not only did this suggest to her that Brody wasn't actually that bothered about what he might have done to her- even if she was fine, Claire felt that a good person would have shown more concern about someone who'd been hurt the night before- but added onto Lori's latest revelation…

Suddenly the fact that she couldn't prove what Brody had done to her last night was a very real problem, which would require a particularly drastic solution.

She just had to make sure that Kim and Ron believed that she didn't know what to do about the Brody situation right now, and then she could get on with her own plan; something told her that her new associates (she wasn't sure she was at the point where she could call those two 'friends') wouldn't approve of some of the options she was considering right now…

I can't believe it was that easy, Claire thought to herself as she sat in the driving seat of Brody's car, driving home from school that evening.

She'd deliberately stayed behind after school to 'force' Brody into a position where he would have to give her a ride home, waiting in the amphitheatre until he passed by so she could claim that she'd been working on banners for the upcoming Spirit Week celebrations and her planned ride had gone home without her. She had been taking a chance asking him to let her drive, but considering that he had already raped at least Lori, had nearly done the same to her, and was apparently already lining up his next 'target', Claire guessed that Brody was so used to being in control that he wouldn't expect what was about to happen.

"Don't you think it's weird that neither of us remember what happened the night of the bonfire?" she asked, as she shifted the car into gear and picked up the speed.

"Must have been some night," Brody said, sounding slightly apprehensive.

"Yeah, must have," Claire responded, as the car sped up, to the point of cutting through a red light. Claire briefly heard Brody protest at her cutting the light, but she wasn't too concerned; she hadn't seen any cars coming, and if something happened she had tested her ability enough by now to be sure that she could recover from anything that might happen to her.

"You know how to drive a stick-shift, don't you?" Brody asked.

"There's a lot of things that I know," Claire said, her tone cold. "Like what you did to me."

"What'd I do to you?" Brody said, before his apprehension was replaced by a subtle arrogance. "I knew it; I knew this would happen. You get drunk, you come on to me, and it's my fault?"

"You're a liar," Claire said, unable to believe that story was the best thing Brody could come up with.

"Can't rape the willing, Claire," Brody retorted; Claire had to wonder if he actually believed that or was just trying to justify his behaviour to himself. "You wanted it as bad as I did. Stop the car."

"Did I want it as bad as Lori Trammel?" Claire retorted, easily waving aside his weak attempt to take the wheel; clearly he wasn't so far gone that he didn't recognise trying to take control in this situation was a bad idea.

"Lori Trammel is a slut," Brody said dismissively.

"Is that what you're gonna say about me?"

"I already do."

It was the smug tone in his voice that really convinced her that the Brody Mitchum she'd wanted to kiss before last night had never truly existed.

"You're just gonna keep at it, aren't you?" Claire said, unable to believe she'd ever found this boy attractive even as she kept her gaze on the road ahead of herself.

"You should let it go, Claire," Brody said, smugly settling back in his seat. "There's nothing you can do about it."

The worst part about that statement was that Claire knew he was right. If Lori hadn't told anyone the truth about what had happened to her before now, it was likely that Brody was careful not to leave any clear evidence of what he had done, even without her abilities basically compromising any chance she had of using herself as evidence.

Still, if she couldn't get at this guy through the legal system, her ability might give her another option…

"I can do this," she said, stepping her foot down on the gas pedal and heading into an outstretched bit of pavement, vaulting the car briefly into the air before it smashed directly into the side of the building

This was going to hurt for the next few minutes, but she could at least attribute her escape to a fluke; she strongly doubted that Brody was going to be that 'lucky' when the ambulance got here…

Chapter Text

"Hey," Kim said as she reached the reception desk, looking anxiously at the woman on the other side. "I'm looking for Claire Bennett; I'm a friend of hers."

"Down that way," the nurse nodded down a corridor, Kim nodding in thanks as she hurried long the indicated path.

She'd heard about the car crash when her mother had received the report as part of her duties, but even though Ann had been quick to assure Kim that nobody was dead, once she'd learned that the car was driven by two students at Kim's school she'd answered Kim's questions about who was involved in the accident. While Kim knew that Claire would be all right, as soon as school was over she'd hurried over to the hospital on her own, leaving her bag with Ron so that he could drop it off at her house and make a start on his own homework, too distracted by her concern for her friend to even make it to the cheerleading meeting that Jackie had arranged.

Cheerleading might be something Kim enjoyed, but right now she was more concerned with making sure that Claire was only in hospital because she needed a check-up rather than because she'd found something her ability couldn't fix…

As Kim passed by a tall man wearing a simple brown suit and glasses with a thick upper rim, accompanied by a tall dark-skinned bald man in a short-sleeved blue shirt and trousers, she suddenly found herself stumbling to the side of the hall, nearly hitting an abandoned gurney before she managed to catch herself. She was surprised at her sudden moment of clumsiness, but when the man in glasses turned to look at her Kim smiled reassuringly at him and continued on into the hospital, soon confirming to herself that whatever had just happened had passed by.

She appreciated that it was a minor thing, but when she couldn't recall ever tripping like that before, she felt she was entitled to be a bit surprised…

"Hey," she said as she walked into Claire's room, finding the other girl already changing into her clothes.

"Oh, hey," Claire nodded at her. "How are you?"

"I'm good," Kim nodded, looking tentatively at her friend. "How about you? I mean, obviously you couldn't get hurt, but I was worried that-"

"They just needed to take a check to be sure that everything was still fine," Claire explained with a slight smile. "I mean, it's not impossible for someone to get through a crash like that without getting hurt, but it's just…"

"And how did that even happen, anyway?" Kim asked. "I mean, I saw you and Brody talking a bit at the party, but- oh God."

"You worked it out, huh?" Claire said, her smile faltering as she took in Kim's horrified expression.

"He killed you?"

"To be fair to him, he didn't plan to kill me," Claire clarified with a grim smile before her expression faltered to a more solemn one. "But when I learned that I wasn't the first girl he'd tried to-"

"He raped someone else?"

"At least one of the other girls on the squad," Claire nodded grimly. "And when I saw him already flirting with someone else…"

"You decided to just… do this?" Kim asked, indignantly waving a hand at Claire as the girl finished dressing. "You went and nearly killed someone-"

"Look, what was I going to do?" Claire protested. "I couldn't use myself as a witness because there's no actual evidence that he even did anything because I heal so fast, and if Lori hadn't confessed to anything earlier I don't think I could talk her into testifying now! There was nothing else I could actually do to stop him-"

"You didn't even try to ask us for help!"

"Us?"

"Me and Ron," Kim clarified. "I get that you're dealing with a lot and we haven't exactly been close friends before now, but we wanted to help you deal with what happened to you, and you… you can't just do something like that!"

"Even when I know he's guilty-?"

"I'm not saying that there was a better solution, but you didn't even try to talk it over with us and see if we could think of something else!" Kim insisted. "Look, I know it's not the same thing as actually doing the job, but my mom's a medical examiner, and she's told me that quite a few of the crimes she's called in for basically only reached that stage because the guilty parties decided it was better to take justice into their own hands than bother trying to rely on anyone else to handle it. If you just start thinking that nearly killing someone is the best solution to every problem, how long until you decide that it's best to cut straight to that the second you just suspect someone's guilty even when it turns out later that they weren't?"

"I wouldn't-!"

"Hey, I don't think you would be that cruel either, but I'm trying to make a point here," Kim cut Claire off, sitting down on the bed to look reassuringly at the other girl. "I can understand why you wanted to do that to Brody, but it's just… two wrongs don't make a right."

"Bit cliché," Claire replied, even as her sullen tone made it clear that there was no malice intended.

"True, but that doesn't mean it doesn't work," Kim countered with a slight smile. "Besides, if you start doing things that way, what if someone finds out that you're responsible for what happened to… whoever you went after and decides to try and kill you in return? I get that you haven't found a way to kill yourself yet, but if someone else works it out-"

"I get your point," Claire nodded, looking a bit pale at the implication of Kim's words, sitting in silence for a moment before she looked curiously at her fellow cheerleader. "You think it's worth trying?"

"I think we lose nothing by trying to be the better person," Kim replied with a thoughtful smile. "It's like this show I saw once; sometimes the best thing we can do is live as though the world's the way we want it to be, so that we can eventually help the rest of the world realise that."

"Could take a while."

"We're young, hot and ambitious; we've got time to make our mark," Kim smiled at Claire before returning to a more serious expression. "Seriously, Claire, I understand wanting to hurt Brody for what he did to you, but we… well, we have to be the better person."

"…I can get that," Claire nodded thoughtfully, smiling tentatively at the other girl. "You're… you like that kind of thing?"

"Huh?"

"Standing up for people."

"Well… I guess hearing about some of the things Mom sees at work just… got me thinking about it," Kim shrugged.

"Oh… you mentioned that she's a medical examiner, right?"

"Yeah, for the local cops," Kim nodded. "I mean, she doesn't tell me a lot about her job for obvious reasons, but some of the things that come up…"

"You heard enough to realise that people suck?"

"More like I've heard enough stories about how people suck to know that I don't want to just become another one of those crappy people," Kim explained. "I'm not saying it's a perfect way to live, and maybe we'll find some cases where… well, to be blunt, where the extreme option is the only way to stop it, but if we don't try and find a better way to deal with problems before things get so far that the only solution is basically 'kill them all', than all we're doing is justifying hitting other people because they hit us first."

"…Good point," Claire sighed, shaking her head before she finally stood up from her bed and indicated the door of the room. "Well, I think I've got… something to do; care to join me?"

Nodding in acknowledgement, Kim followed Claire as they walked through the hospital until they reached a glass-walled room. Glancing inside, Kim saw Brody lying in the bed, a bandage around his head along with one of those thick foam collar things around his neck, tubes coming out of his nose and casts around his arms and legs, clearly battered but still alive as far as Kim could tell based on the beeping machine beside him.

"Hi, Brody," Claire said, Kim standing back to silently watch her friend face her latest demon. "I know you probably don't wanna see me right now or hear what I have to say. But I have to say it. What you did to me ... what you tried to do, was wrong. But what I did to you was wrong too, and I'm sorry. I think that everyone deserves a do-over at least once in their lives…"

It was clearly a hard speech for Claire to make, but Kim appreciated the strength it must have taken to make that kind of admission after the difficult couple of days she'd spent since that dark day when Kim pulled that branch out of her head.

It's always harder to face our demons-

"I-I don't know you," Brody said, interrupting Kim's train of thought. "Who are you?"

"Brody?" Claire said uncertainly. "It's me, Claire."

"Why do you call me Brody?" the boy said, before his gaze shifted to Kim. "And who are you?"

Claire and Kim's uncertain glances at each other confirmed that neither girl had any idea how to react to this latest twist, but the mood was suddenly broken when the two girls heard familiar voices spelling out Brody's name. Turning around to look out of the room's glass window, they watched in silence as the rest of the cheer squad entered Brody's room, the other girls grinning enthusiastically before Jackie entered the room and fixed her gaze on Claire and Kim.

"I was just leaving," Claire said.

"And I was here to visit Claire," Kim added, hoping that nobody would question why she'd missed whatever meeting had prompted this impromptu routine when she'd been more concerned with establishing why Claire and Brody were absent then planning what to do about it.

"I'd ask you to stay, but this is for Brody," Jackie said, looking coolly at Claire. "And since you're the reason he's in the hospital, it wouldn't be appropriate."

"You don't know what happened."

"I know you were driving," Jackie said. "Were you drinking too? Was she drinking, Brody?"

"I… I… I don't know any of you," Brody said, looking uncertainly at the rest of the squad, his body turned as much as possible in its battered condition. "What's happening here? Who are all of you?"

Looking back at Brody one last time, Claire stared back at Jackie for a moment before she and Kim slipped out of the room, leaving the squad to stare uncertainly at the battered boy in the hospital bed while the two new friends exchanged anxious glances at each other.

"I don't suppose he could have just lost his memory in the accident?" Claire asked.

"And be awake this soon?" Kim shook her head. "My mom may work with the dead, but I read enough of her files to have picked up some ideas about how cranial trauma affects people, and that includes when it might cause this kind of amnesia; if Brody was injured enough to cause memory loss to the extent that he doesn't even remember his name, I don't think he'd be awake this soon."

"And I'm pretty sure I heard him say something when we were being brought in," Claire added. "I mean, I was trying to make everyone think I'd taken a more serious hit in the crash than I did, so I couldn't really pay attention, but he was definitely talking when we got here."

"Which makes it unlikely he sustained amnesia-inducing head trauma," Kim nodded. "So, no way to be sure if I'm right, but enough details to make it at least really strange that Brody's suddenly lost his memory of his identity but can still talk and understand everything else?"

"But what could do that?"

"That's where I'm stuck," Kim nodded, shrugging apologetically at her friend before she turned her attention to the corridor ahead of them. "But I have a feeling we'll figure it out soon enough…"

Chapter Text

If there was one thing Kim truly hated, it was discovering that she couldn't do something.

Granted, it wasn't a feeling that she experienced very often, but that was what made it so unnerving for her when she realised that she couldn't do something. Right now, she wanted to be there for Claire when her friend prepared to meet her biological parents for the first time, but the yearbook committee had an emergency meeting to accommodate Brody being taken off the football team, and Kim had been asked to attend it as the only person any of the others trusted to make that kind of decision.

Still, even if she recognised that she had other commitments, the idea that she couldn't be there to help a friend who had already had a rough week really didn't sit right with her…

"It's probably best you don't come along, anyway," Claire smiled reassuringly at the other two as they walked away from school. "It's going to be difficult enough trying to bring up the whole… well, how do you ask someone if they're a freak when they'd probably lie about it like I do?"

"OK, Claire, firstly, you're not a freak, you're just… different," Kim corrected, the implications of that term unnerving her for more reasons than she could be sure.

"And hey; nothing wrong with never being normal!" Ron grinned at her.

"Easy for you to say," Claire said, smiling slightly at Ron even as she was touched at the boy's support. "Don't you keep your pet in your pocket all the time?"

"It works for us," Ron shrugged, before he turned back to Claire. "Anyway, what's the problem? Just ask them what happens when they cut themselves?"

"Which could come across as being bitter that they gave me away," Claire observed.

"Are you?" Kim suddenly asked, looking curiously at her fellow cheerleader. "I mean, you've never really spoken about how you feel about the adoption issue…"

"It's… I mean, I'm curious about it, and it's a little weird, and I'm a little sad, but… I mean, I love my parents," Claire shrugged, lost for a better way to express herself.

"But you can't stop yourself wondering what it would be like if they'd kept you, huh?" Ron observed. "I mean, I've never been there myself, but I've always kinda wondered what I'd be like if… well, if my parents were more invested in me…"

"Invested in you?" Claire repeated curiously. "What does that mean?"

"Well, I don't mean that they're abusive or anything like that, but it's just… well, I guess it's like they never really got the hang of being parents," Ron explained, looking around for a moment as though worried someone would hear him. "They never even tell me what's going on in our lives until they're pretty much just about to do it…"

"And this isn't the time to start getting down about the 'rents, Ron," Kim cut in with an encouraging smile at her old friend before she looked back at Claire. "Anyway, we should probably split soon; some people on the Committee wanted my opinion on our plans for Homecoming and Ron's got that make-up class he needs to get out of the way."

"Can't you call it 'catch-up', KP?" Ron said with exaggerated exasperation. "I still haven't lived down that Halloween costume from second grade; I don't need people thinking I wear make-up…"

"Nobody thinks that, Ron," Claire grinned at him, briefly wondering what the Halloween costume thing was a reference to before she recalled what class Ron had to 'make up'. "On the topic of the class, I still can't believe you need to get back the credits for that gym class; it's not like that thing was even your fault-"

"How do you know that?" Ron looked urgently at Claire, eyes wide and panicked. "We don't even have that class together!"

"Word… got around," Claire said, smiling slightly at Ron's mortified expression; evidently the 'pants incident' had been more embarrassing for him than the story suggested. "Hey, at least they'll let you take it as a swimming session; you said yourself you're good at that."

"Yeah…" Ron said, before his eyes brightened and he reached into his pocket. "Oh, that reminds me; here."

"Rufus?" Kim and Claire said in surprise as Ron passed the naked mole rat to Claire, who took him in her hands almost automatically.

"Well, he can't really do anything while I'm at that catch-up session and he'd just get bored at the homecoming thing, so I figured maybe he could tag along while you're meeting the biologicals," Ron shrugged as the naked mole rat seemed to grin at the blonde. "I mean, at the very least, he's good for emotional support."

"Right…" Claire said, studying Rufus for a moment before she gave him a tentative smile. "You… OK with that?"

Claire appreciated that she didn't know much about rodents, but she was sure that the way Rufus chattered at her in apparent response to her question wasn't exactly normal.

"Thanks?" she said uncertainly, as she slipped Rufus into her bag and looked back at Kim and Ron.

"You know," Kim put in, "as long as we're talking about parents, are you thinking of telling… well, your current parents about this?"

"No," Claire shook her head. "My dad would unspool. He's a really simple guy. He'd never be able to wrap his mind around something like that. It would break him."

"Parents can surprise you," Kim observed with a brief smile. "But it's your call in the end."

She glanced at her watch. "Anyway, we'd better get going; we've got to get to… everything."

"Break a leg… or whatever the expression is in this context," Claire smiled, as the three split up to head for their next classes. Waving at Kim and Ron as they headed off to their current activities, Claire took a moment to make sure Rufus was secure in her bag before she hurried off to find Zach; even if she couldn't explain to herself why she was keeping things with Zach separate from her new friendship with Kim and Ron, it couldn't hurt to get someone else's perspective on the meeting that was about to take place, and with school out he'd be going in the same direction as her to get home…

As he finished changing into his swimming trunks, Ron briefly reached out to check his pocket before he remembered that he'd left Rufus with Claire earlier; he spent so much of his time with the naked mole rat that it felt weird not having him along.

Pushing that thought out of his mind, Ron turned around to head for the pool, raising his eyebrows in slight surprise when he got there and found that there was nobody there. It wasn't like he particularly needed supervision while he was swimming, but he was fairly sure there was some kind of rule against leaving pupils alone in this situation…

After studying the water for a moment, Ron shrugged and climbed into the pool; he was a fair enough swimmer, and it wasn't like he was going to do anything difficult-

He gasped in shock as he felt someone grab his leg and haul him under the water, barely able to take one last gulp of air before he found himself underwater facing some other kid who was actually wearing one of those black masks people always seemed to use in bank heists in films. For a moment Ron could only stare in shock, but when the other kid grabbed his shoulders in a manner that made it clear he was trying to force Ron to stay underwater, Ron put his confusion aside to try and force his attacker to let him go.

For a moment Ron struggled, fighting the urge to breathe even as his lungs began to ache as he fought against his strange attacker, his vision dimming even beyond what he had come to expect from when he found himself underwater without goggles, before he felt one of his fists strike something. The impact didn't make his attacker let go, but it gave him enough focus to lash out with a kick that made the other figure back off enough for Ron to swim to the surface. He took a gasp for air before his unknown attacker grabbed him around the waist and pulled him back down, but this time Ron was prepared enough to hit his attacker in the chest with his knee. The other boy was able to regain his control before Ron could get too far away, placing one hand against Ron's chest as he grabbed Ron's shoulder with the other, as though trying to pull him down.

For a moment Ron panicked at the sensation of being pulled underwater again, but he soon forced his mind back to the practical matter of survival, grabbing the other boy's wrists to pull his attacker's hands away. The moment that his opponent had lost his grip, Ron curled up his legs and kicked out at his attacker's chest, forcing the boy back while pushing Ron towards the edge of the pool. Spinning around, Ron hauled himself out of the pool, just as a door opened to reveal the gym teacher walking in from the boy's changing room to look at the pool in shock.

Glancing back, Ron saw his attacker get out of the pool and run for the girl's rooms, a black mask over his head like he was some cartoonish bank robber along with his dark trunks. The teacher tried to move after Ron's attacker, but he ran into the changing room before the teacher could catch him. Ron could see that the teacher might be able to follow his attacker, but if the girls' changing rooms were anything like the boys', they were probably laid out in such a way that the attacker could avoid being caught long enough to get out. Once the attacker got out of the changing rooms, Ron was sure he wasn't the only one who realised that there was no way the attacker would stay in that changing room once he got away, even if they didn't know where he'd go after he got out.

"Are you OK, Sinclair?" the gym teacher said, choosing his priorities to look anxiously at the remaining student. "I heard someone yelling about fire outside the building, and when I got back to the door someone had jammed it shut; I honestly thought I'd be right back-"

"It's… it's cool," Ron said, waving a reassuring hand at the man as he looked at the door on the other side of the pool.

He couldn't be sure who had just attacked him, but he was still fairly sure he recognised the stiff finger on the other boy's left hand when it had been pressed against his chest; the accident had been the main reason Gil had never liked shop class, ever since Gil hit his own hand with a hammer when he got distracted during a woodwork project…

OK, so it's not evidence, and I don't even know why he did something that stupid in the first place, but at least I know to keep an eye out for him doing something that stupid later…

In the end, what really confused Ron about this whole experience was why Gil would have tried to attack him in such a complicated manner in the first place. He wasn't going to kid himself that he and Gil were friends, it was certainly warm enough outside that Gil could have hidden his clothes somewhere outside so that he could change into his swimming stuff and then run inside the building without anyone seeing him at this time of day, and it was quiet enough that he might manage to avoid being seen by anyone until he could get dressed and get off the school grounds, but that didn't explain why he'd bother hiding in the pool to play what Ron had to believe was just a really sick joke.

Gil might have just dived underwater when Ron left the changing room, but Ron hadn't seen anything on the surface to suggest that someone had just ducked into the water when he entered the pool, so how had Gil managed to hold his breath that long and still had enough air to keep Ron underwater all that time?

Chapter Text

Claire had never really thought about having a pet of her own, and a naked mole rat had certainly never been her top choice, but she had to admit that there was something strangely reassuring about Rufus's presence during that awkward meeting with her biological parents.

She didn't know if it was just the whole awkward issue of meeting their biological daughter for the first time, or the implications that the two of them hadn't spent any time together since Claire's birth ended their previous relationship, but Claire couldn't shake the idea that they'd been deliberately trying not to tell her something. She'd tried to open up the question of their medical history in case it led to anything about her own ability, but when they'd felt awkward enough bringing up her 'bio-mom's' diabetes or her 'bio-dad's' family history of cancer, Claire had felt fairly safe assuming that they didn't know anything about her rapid healing. She'd had a brief moment of hope when her 'life-mom' (just calling her 'adopted' in that context felt a bit insulting) had mentioned some old fears about her having some kind of chromosomal disease as a baby, but when her mother didn't seem to know much about it she'd decided that it must just have been one of those moments where the doctors were being overly paranoid.

Rufus had been a comfort after it had all been over, allowing her to talk to someone about her disappointment even if he couldn't say much in return, but she just wished that she understood what had made Rufus so… the best term she could come up with was 'jittery'… that evening. He'd calmed down once she'd managed to sneak him a few pieces of cheese from the fridge before bed, but he still kept looking at her and making urgent squeaks as though he was trying to make a point before he'd settled down for the night.

She regretted that she hadn't been able to give Rufus back to Ron yet, but when she'd gone into school there'd been rumours flying around about some event that had happened at that 'catch-up lesson' he'd had that evening that had meant he'd had to stay away from school that day. Claire had thought about giving Rufus to Kim, but Kim had pointed out that she wasn't going to see Ron any earlier than Claire was, so she had kept the mole rat for another evening once school was over.

Granted, she was having to wear an old pair of cargo pants to give herself a big enough pocket to give Rufus somewhere to stay or raise all kinds of questions about why she was wearing a jacket or something more conspicuous (her blue hoodie had a decent pocket, but Rufus would have been too obvious there), but having the rat on her was strangely comforting…

"You know," Claire said as she opened the door to find Zach outside her house, "I get that you're sort of socially slow, but you know you're supposed to call someone before you come over."

"This you're gonna want to hear right away," Zach said as he walked in, an urgent expression on his face as she shut the door behind him. "I found the tape."

"What tape?" Claire asked, surprising even herself as she checked her pocket to feel Rufus was still there.

"The tape of you trying to kill yourself twenty times; I found it," Zach said in a low voice. "Look, I was looking for my PSP under my bed, right? And there it was. You're safe."

Taking the small recording device from her friend, Claire stared at it for a moment before she punched Zach in the arm out of a lack of a better response.

"I thought this was supposed to be good news?" Zach protested.

"Well, I can't believe you had it this entire time!" Claire countered as she waved the small tape in his face. "Why didn't you look there before?"

"I did," Zach affirmed. "I tore the whole room apart. I must've checked the bed, like, fifty times."

Claire was prevented from asking further questions when her mother came down the stairs, putting Mr Muggles on the ground and walking between the two.

"Good morning, Mrs Bennet," Zach said, as Claire placed a hand over her pocket to make sure Rufus didn't leap out in a panic (not that she thought Mr Muggles would attack Rufus, but the rat had no way of knowing that). "Good morning, dog."

"How are you, Zachary?" Mrs Bennet asked in a low voice as she walked past him.

"I'm all right," Zach smiled. "Claire keeps punching me, though."

Claire followed that up by punching Zach in the arm again, using the distraction to slip the tape under a jacket on the nearby kitchen counter.

"Your dad's plane's gonna be late," Mrs Bennet said to Claire. "I won't be home until 8:00 or so. I am trusting you to hold down the fort."

"Because Lyle never listens to me," Claire rolled her eyes.

"Well, he will listen to you today because he knows what a big day it is for Mr. Muggles," Mrs Bennet said, as she picked up the dog in question and let the little furball lick her face. "Thank you. And he doesn't want to stress us out. Whew, does he?"

"Sure," Lyle said, from where he had been reading a magazine behind them.

"Will you two help me out to the car?" Mrs Bennet asked, passing Mr Muggles to Claire before Claire could do more than awkwardly button the pocket holding Rufus and hope that would be enough to stop him doing anything that might attract attention to his presence. "Your dad left the sprinklers on last night, and I don't want to get his paws all soggy."

As Claire carried the dog out while Zach grabbed the dog supplies, she supposed that she couldn't exactly complain about the way things stood. She might still have no idea where her 'ability' came from, but she had three good friends who knew that she wasn't normal and accepted her regardless, any evidence that she wasn't normal was contained once again, and she certainly couldn't complain about the family she'd ended up with even if it left her with these apparently unanswerable questions about her past.

Loading up Mr Muggles' supplies and watching her mother leave was almost an automatic reaction, Claire waving after the departing car before she headed back into the house to get the videotape somewhere safe; however Zach might have lost track of it, she'd feel better if she was the one who knew where it was right now.

"Lyle!" she called out, noting a discarded pizza slice on the kitchen counter, "you better not think I'm cleaning up after you; we just got rid of all those ants!"

Discarding a used napkin that was lying on a plate, Claire picked up her jacket, only for her eyes to widen in horror when the video tape was no longer lying under it. Hurrying into the den, Claire's eyes widened in horror as she saw Lyle watching the tape of her jumping from the tower, before she dived for the camera.

"Shut it off!" she yelled at her brother, as the two began struggling for the device. "Lyle! Give it to me! Give it to me!"

Even as her brother released his grip on the camera, Claire knew that he was still watching the video, which currently showed the time she was hit by a car, until she finally took the tape out of the machine.

"It's amazing what you can do with special effects these days, huh?" she said, already aware that it was a desperate excuse.

"That was all special effects?" Lyle said incredulously.

"Yeah, what else would it be?" Claire asked.

In response, Lyle grabbed a stapler and jammed it into Claire's hand

"Ow!" Claire yelled, cradling her hand as she pulled the staple out. "What is wrong with you?"

She knew even as she spoke that the injury caused by the staple would confirm that everything Lyle had just seen the moment it healed, but she didn't want to risk getting metal poisoning or something like that if she left this thing in her hand for too long. As soon as Lyle saw the wound vanish, he turned and ran out of the house, grabbing the videotape from Claire before she could stop him.

Damnit, Claire thought as she hurried after Lyle. If Kim were here, she'd have grabbed him before he even reached the door…

"Lyle, give it to me!" she yelled desperately after him as she ran out of the house after him. "Lyle! Lyle, get back here!"

Claire tried to ignore the awkward attention of a neighbour looking up from working on her garden; she could only hope that anyone watching this would just assume that she and Lyle were in the middle of a more typical teenage spat between siblings rather than something that could literally destroy Claire's life if it fell into the wrong hands.

"Don't let him get away!" Claire called over at Zach, relieved as she saw that her friend hadn't gone that far down the street after helping her mother. Turning back around, Zach virtually jumped off his bike and blocked Lyle's path as he ran for the edge of the garden, only for Lyle to run back to the house, subsequently diving into the car when Claire and Zach cut off both of the other directions he might have taken.

"Come on!" Zach said, as Lyle locked the car before turning to Claire. "Why would you want to kill him again?"

"Because he found the tape and then he stapled me," Claire answered indignantly.

"Help!" Lyle yelled from inside the car as a neighbour passed by mowing the lawn. "Somebody help me! My sister's a freak!"

Claire could only grunt in frustration as she slammed a hand against the car window, suddenly wishing that she had more than Zach and Rufus here; she wasn't sure what else Ron and Kim could do right now, but a little extra help wouldn't hurt…

"Come on, you can't stay in there forever!" Zach said, bouncing briefly on the back of the car before taking up position against the passenger door while Claire waited on the driver's side.

"Just give us the damn tape," Claire said; the neighbour Lyle had called out to earlier had apparently decided teen sibling drama wasn't his concern, but that wasn't going to last forever.

"I'm gonna put this thing on YouTube," Lyle yelled. "Make, like, a million bucks!"

"YouTube's free, you idiot!" Zach protested.

"You're not helping," Claire glared at Zach before turning back to her brother. "Lyle, no one can see what's on that tape!"

"Are you an alien or something?" Lyle asked. "Is he an alien too?"

"Yeah, yeah-" Zach began, before a frustrated chittering from Claire's pocket cut him off as they both looked curiously at Claire. "What was-?"

"This isn't helping," Claire cut him off, wondering what Zach was thinking with that particular 'joke' before she turned back to her brother, hoping that they'd forget about Rufus if she kept their attention on the current situation. "Just… get out of the car, please?"

"I'm not coming out until Mom and Dad get home!" Lyle responded.

"No, no, no," Claire protested desperately. "You cannot tell them. Lyle, please; they cannot find out about this!"

"Why not?" Lyle asked.

"Don't you get it?" Claire insisted, finally voicing the reason she'd never brought up her abilities to her parents. "If they found out, Mom and Dad would think it was a mistake to ever adopt me! We wouldn't be a family anymore. Please."

After a few moments of apprehension, Lyle finally rolled down the window and gave Claire the tape.

"Thank you," Claire smiled at him

"Whatever," her brother said as he got out of the car, even if he accepted the tentative hug Claire gave him afterwards.

Claire wasn't going to kid herself that this sorted all of her current problems, but at least Lyle seemed to accept that telling their parents about her abilities would be a bad idea.

She just needed to work out if she wanted to tell anyone else that Lyle knew or keep this particular development between her and Zach…

Chapter Text

"You're serious?" Kim looked uncertainly at Ron as they sat in the living area. "You think Rufus felt there was something off about Claire's biological parents?"

"Hey, you've never doubted Rufus's instincts now-"

"You've never actually told me something this… well, this big before," Kim countered. She appreciated that Ron hadn't had much time to talk with Claire after she'd returned Rufus to him during lunch, since Ron had a make-up test he had to study for that afternoon and Ron obviously couldn't have Rufus out in public for long, but even if Kim accepted Rufus's apparent intelligence this was still bigger than anything Ron had asked her to believe from him. "Look, I'm not saying that Rufus isn't… we both know he's not exactly a normal naked mole rat, but there's a difference between… I don't know, convincing me that he can talk-"

"I said that I got what he meant, KP, I've never said that I thought he could talk."

"OK, I'll go with that, but seriously… you're telling me he knows when people are lying?"

"It's not like that, KP," Ron shook his head as Rufus nodded urgently while pointing at Ron, as though the rat was trying to confirm that his owner was right. "He's not saying that they were lying to her, it's more that… well, you know animal senses, right?"

"That's more dogs than rats, isn't it?"

"Rufus is still pretty good with his nose, and he's sure that there's more to those guys than they were telling her," Ron said. "They just… he's sure they didn't smell like they could be Claire's parents."

"Yeah…" Kim looked tentatively between her friend and his pet for a few moments before settling her gaze on Ron. "It's not that I think you're lying, Ron, but this is… I mean, we can't just give Claire something like that to deal with when we don't even know it's true."

Rufus squeaked indignantly at Kim, who looked at him in a manner that somehow conveyed her own apology and her own uncertainty at this bizarre situation. "Rufus, it's not I doubt you, but you have to admit this isn't something we can just…"

She shook her head and looked over at Ron. "Look, it's Homecoming tomorrow, and we can't exactly do anything about this even if Rufus is right; do we really have to tell Claire that Rufus thinks those weren't actually her bio-parents? For all we know… I dunno, maybe her life-parents have just been through a lot since they gave her up and the stress means they smell off?"

"Point," Ron nodded at her as he looked apologetically at Rufus before turning back to Kim. "Yeah, you're probably right, KP; worst case scenario, maybe somebody just screwed up the paperwork and those people just thought they were Claire's parents…"

"That works," Kim nodded at Ron with a thoughtful smile. The two were prevented from making any further speculation when Kim's mother walked into the kitchen, already wearing a long coat with a grim expression on her face.

"Mom?" Kim looked at her mother anxiously. "Everything OK?"

"Just… got a call about a particular case they want another opinion on out in Midland," Anne said, looking awkwardly at her daughter, maternal instincts clearly warring with her old promise to be honest with her daughter. "A waitress at a diner out there… well, it's a brutal one."

"Oh," Kim looked sympathetically at her mother; considering some of the things her mother had seen in her line of work, for Anne Pierce to call something bad meant that it would have to be very bad. "I… I'm sorry."

"Thanks, Kimmie," Anne smiled back at her daughter before she glanced at her watch with a sigh. "Anyway, I'll be up there for a day or two to properly fill out all the paperwork, so I'm afraid I won't be here for the homecoming game."

"Don't worry about it," Kim smiled at her mother. "It's not going to be a big thing for me anyway; I don't even have a date right now…"

She fought down the initial disappointment she felt at that particular detail. She appreciated that she had been more occupied with Claire's problems rather than finding a date, and homecoming wasn't as big a deal as prom, but it was still sad to realise that she was going to miss out on that part of her high school experience.

Still, at least we'll have fun…

There were times when Anne disliked being so good at her job.

She appreciated that she had worked hard to earn a reputation in a challenging field, and she also recognised that she had chosen to live in a smaller town rather than a bigger city to give her children a chance at a simpler life, but she had to recognise the mixed benefits of that approach. Most of the time she only had a few simple cases to deal with, such as standard muggings gone wrong, but when anything really weird happened anywhere in the area, she was practically obligated to go out and investigate it herself rather than just trusting the local M.E. to do. It had been a while since there'd been such a case, but now that she was faced with the first major call-out she'd had in almost a year, she wished that she could have had a bit more time to watch Kim actually going to homecoming.

OK, I wouldn't have to do much, but it's the principle of the thing.

On top of her discomfort at having to leave her family on such short notice right now, with graduation getting ever closer, Anne had to confess to some concern about what Kim was going to do with her life when she left school in the next year. Her daughter was smart and skilled, but she sometimes worried about what Kim was actually going to choose when it came to college, since she hadn't actually shown specific interest in any one of her subjects over the others. Anne had faith that her daughter would do well in whatever she chose to do, but Kim's problem was working out what she actually wanted to do, rather than just enjoying her lessons for the sake of them.

Still, even if she was concerned about Kim's long-term prospects, Anne approved of how her daughter was coping socially. Kim had been in a range of social groups and been involved in a wide variety of school activities since she'd been old enough to take part in that kind of thing, but Anne had to admit that she approved of how Kim had held on to her friendship with Ron; the boy might have his share of personal quirks, but at least he was loyal to his friends and had a genuinely good heart.

Whatever Kim's going to do in the future, she's going to have a good friend in her life no matter what she does.

For the moment, her priority was to focus on the case she'd been called out about. From what she'd heard, the waitress had died in a horrifying manner, but she had to admit to some degree of academic curiosity; if the crime scene descriptions were accurate, how could someone have removed the top of the victim's head without causing any damage to the brain…?

Chapter Text

Claire had no idea why everyone in her life had been acting oddly the last few days, but at this point she'd settle for someone giving her a straight explanation. She appreciated that Kim and Ron's strange moments were limited to them occasionally looking at her in a curious manner, as though they weren't sure if they should tell her something even they were having trouble working out, but the way Zach kept smiling at her as though he had some big secret he was waiting for her to find out, coupled with how often her dad had been 'called into work for an emergency'…

Seriously, what kind of emergency can anyone have at a paper company?

In a strange way, it was a relief when she walked into the amphitheatre with her tray and saw that the other students were still mixed up into their traditional cliques. For a moment she thought about trying to rejoin the rest of the cheerleaders, but when she saw Kim sitting off to one side of the main group with Ron, she shifted her steps towards the two and sat down beside them.

"Everything OK?" Kim looked at her.

"Just…" Claire shrugged as she indicated the rest of the squad, particularly as Jackie glared over at her.

"Her royal Fakeness again, huh?" Ron smiled, prompting what Claire could have sworn was an affirmative chitter from his pocket.

"Let's just say if I'd stayed over there any longer I'd have lost my appetite," Claire affirmed.

"Why do you think I don't hang out with the rest of the squad that much?" Kim pointed out.

"I'm starting to get that," Claire smiled at the redhead as she sat down beside them. "Is it just that we're weird, or that we grew up faster?"

"Me, I say that the important thing is that we're all just ourselves," Ron shrugged. "There's a reason I say 'Never be normal', after all."

"'Never be normal', huh?" Claire smiled at Ron. "I suppose I can see the appeal, although I'd guess you never expected you'd meet somebody who could take it this far?"

"Not that it's a bad thing, y'know-" Ron began anxiously.

"I get that," Claire nodded reassuringly at him before she looked at the school outcast with a thoughtful smile. "You know, you might have a reputation as an oddball around here, but you're all right."

"That's Ron," Kim smiled, reaching over to give him a brief one-armed hug. "He's got his own way of doing things, but I wouldn't have him any other way."

"Hey!" Zach said, hurrying over to the trio with a slight grin.

"What?" Claire looked up at Zach, wincing internally as she realised that she hadn't even looked for him when she was getting her lunch; Kim and Ron might be good friends, but she didn't want to neglect the boy who'd been there for her when she'd just learned what she was capable of.

"The principal's posting the homecoming queen announcement," he explained, indicating where the principal and a couple of other teachers were taking a sheet of paper to a nearby notice board

. "Aren't you gonna go see if you won?"

"What's the point?" Claire said, wondering what had prompted Zach to have such an interest in homecoming of all things.

"You do know you're a finalist, right?" Ron pointed out to the blonde.

"Yeah, I never even went for it myself because I was busy with… well, other stuff, but you definitely got on the ballot," Kim observed, before she gave Claire an encouraging smile. "Go on, check it out; what can it hurt?"

Resigned to going along with the eager looks she was receiving from Zach in particular, Claire got up and headed for the board to check the results, trying to ignore the blank stare of Brody as he sat in his wheelchair with his former teammates. She didn't blame herself for his amnesia, considering Kim's points about its unnatural state, but she did recognise Kim's argument that her response to Brody's attack had been a bit too extreme.

"Kinda nervy for someone in your position to be running for homecoming queen," Jackie put in as Claire ended up walking alongside her.

"My position?" Claire repeated, not wanting to pull ahead or back away in case it gave Jackie more potential 'ammunition' against her.

"You know, pariah?" Jackie said, actually stifling a small laugh. "You hospitalized the MVP, annihilating any hope of us actually winning the game. You're not deluded enough to think you're actually gonna win?"

"No delusions," Claire shook her head briefly at Jackie's expressed incredulity. "It's a popularity contest, and you've made it very clear that I am no longer popular."

"It's more than a popularity contest," Jackie corrected her in a tone that Claire might just have considered using on a mentally handicapped person if she was being particularly cruel. "Being selected homecoming queen is about serving your school. God, Claire. I didn't think you were that shallow."

"Says the girl who's just a cheerleader?" Claire observed as they gathered in front of the list. "If any of us are 'serving the school', I'm pretty sure Kim does more for this place than either of us."

"Which leaves her so overstretched she doesn't really connect with anyone else to the point where she'd have a serious chance at this," Jackie countered. "Seriously, the only person who can put up with her is that big-eared loser…"

Jackie's voice trailed off when she finally got close enough to see the list, and Claire's own eyes widened when she realised what had caught Jackie's attention.

She had no idea how it had happened, but that was her name under 'Homecoming Queen'…

Even when she heard the cheering students from around her, led by Zack with Kim and Ron rallying a bit more support from other parts of the student body, Claire still couldn't quite believe what had just happened.

How had she managed to win something she'd never even entered…?

"Can you believe that?" Ron grinned at Kim as they walked away from school, ready to change before the homecoming dance later that evening.

"Which part?" Kim grinned back at him. "The part where Claire won without even running her own campaign, the part where Zach ran a whole campaign on her behalf appealing to everyone who isn't a fan of the popular kids, or the part where Claire punched Jackie for what she said to Zach?"

"Probably the first two, really," Ron shrugged. "I mean, I'm not saying I'm a fan of beating people up, but can you honestly say Jackie didn't earn it?"

"After taking credit for Claire's rescue?" Kim chuckled slightly. "Yeah, she definitely had that coming. I mean, I'm still waiting for the moment when something will happen where Jackie ends up publically humiliated as a liar in front of everyone, but that punch'll do for now."

"Oh yeah," Ron grinned, before he looked curiously at Kim. "How come you never tried that?"

"Huh?" Kim looked at Ron.

"Zach's campaign strategy," Ron clarified. "I mean, I can get behind his whole idea of people voting for Claire because they're voting for the outsider, but… well, don't take this the wrong way, KP, but you're just as much of an outsider as she is these days, what with you hanging out with me over the rest of the squad and stuff like that, so why…?"

"Probably because that I'm not exactly an active outsider," Kim clarified as she smiled thoughtfully at Ron. "I mean, I take part in all these clubs and help organise all these school events because I want to help people, but it means I'm more of… well, I guess you could say I'm in everything rather than being outside something."

"Where Claire's been kind of outside everything since… well, probably since she realised what she could do," Ron nodded thoughtfully at her. "Yeah, guess that makes sense… hey, is that why you're not taking part in the cheer routine this year?"

"Bingo," Kim nodded with a slightly grim smile. "That's the price I pay for trying to be there for Claire, I guess… I mean, I don't mind that or anything-"

"I get what you mean," Ron nodded. "It's… well, kinda weird to think about all that, I guess."

"Yeah, it's not every day you meet someone with… well, superpowers, I guess," Kim said, falling into a thoughtful silence for a moment before she looked at Ron with a brighter smile on her face. "So, shall we meet up later?"

"Huh?"

"I mean, I get that it'll probably be a bit awk-weird, and I'm not saying it has to be as anything more than friends, but since things with Claire kept me a bit busy lately…" Kim shook her head and looked apologetically at Ron. "Sorry, that probably sounded a bit… look, I just meant that, since we're both going to this dance this evening without anyone else, so we're not the dateless wonders hanging out at the side-"

"We… go together?" Ron asked, looking at her in surprise. "To Homecoming?"

"Just as friends, as I said," Kim assured him with a brief smile. "We both need to get home and change, and I should probably check how Mom's doing with her latest case, but I'll meet you at your house in a couple of hours?"

"Uh… sure," Ron nodded at her.

"Cool," Kim smiled at him. "We can pick up Claire before it all kicks off; see you!"

As she ran off down the street towards her house, Ron smiled after his friend for a moment before his eyes widened as he pulled Rufus out of his pocket.

"Uh… did that sound like we're going on a date, or is it just me?" he asked his pet. Rufus chittered uncertainly in response, looking at Ron in a manner that could have been incredulous or enthusiastic at the prospect.

"I mean, OK, she said all that stuff about how this is just us as friends, and I get that, but it's just… we've never done anything this… adult-y as friends," Ron continued, setting off towards home as he continued speaking to Rufus. "Should I be… I dunno, it's not like I never thought about it, but it's… I mean, KP's…"

He trailed off, realising that even he wasn't sure where he was going with this.

As he'd said to Rufus, it wasn't as though he'd never noticed that Kim Pierce was attractive, but he'd been her friend for so long… had he ever actually registered that she was becoming a woman? It wasn't like he didn't think of her as being better-looking than the other cheerleaders, but most of that was because the likes of Jackie Wilcox treated him like something they wanted to scrape off their shoe…

Forcing that increasingly-awkward train of thought to the back of his mind, Ron turned his attention to the matter of the upcoming dance; he didn't want to look as though he'd put too much effort into getting dressed up for something that was just him and Kim meeting up as friends, but at the same time this deserved a little more than his usual jersey…

"Nice," Kim nodded in approval when she joined Ron outside his house. Kim was wearing a sleeveless long dark blue dress with a modest neckline while Ron was wearing a dark blue shirt with a dark version of his usual khaki pants, wanting a suitable pocket for Rufus even if he was keeping to the theme of the evening.

"What can I say?" Ron grinned at his friend as they began to walk towards Claire's house. "Just because I don't bother dressing up doesn't mean I don't know how."

"And the fact that you know this year's Homecoming Queen probably doesn't hurt?"

"Hey!" Ron said, suddenly looking uncomfortably at Kim. "Uh… you know that's not a big thing, right? I mean, I didn't even tell the 'rents we were going to this thing together-"

"I get that," Kim smiled, before her expression faltered slightly. "Mom's still not back from her latest case, and I decided… well, Dad doesn't need to know what we're doing here, right?"

"Yeah…" Ron nodded, once again struck at the contrast in his and Kim's relationships with their parents. It wasn't as though his parents didn't care about him at all, but when Kim's parents appreciated being kept up-to-date, Ron's seemed to expect him to tell them about anything important without sharing anything with him until they had a clear reason to share it with him…

"Huh," Kim commented, looking at her phone in surprise.

"What?"

"Claire's dad grounded her."

"What?" Ron repeated in surprise. "Why would he-?"

"She didn't say," Kim said, displaying the text message to Ron. "I mean, I don't even know what Claire could have even done to make her dad ground her tonight…"

She stared at the phone for a moment before she put it back in her pocket and looked resolutely at Ron. "Let's go."

Ron didn't have time to ask what his friend was talking about before Kim began to walk briskly down the street, moving as quickly as she could given the relatively restrictive design of her dress. As he hurried after her, Ron saw Kim pull out her phone and send off another few texts, apparently exchanging messages with someone at the other end until they reached Claire's house. Ron didn't even need to ask what they were doing before Kim led him around the back of the house, where the blonde was waiting at her window with a thick hardback book to one side, as though she'd been reading it before their arrival.

"You really think this is a good idea?" Claire looked at Kim in surprise.

"What can I say?" Kim shrugged. "No one grounds the Queen."

"Yeah," Ron said. "Besides, you already proved what you're standing for when you hit Jackie like that; backing out now just leaves it open for her to take the throne, and nobody wants that."

"My dad would pitch a fit," Claire said, albeit in a manner that made it clear she was going to go along with their proposal.

"He'll probably only find out once the dance is over, and the worst he can do is ground you again," Ron observed. "Come on, I think we all deserve this after everything else you've been through the last few weeks."

"…I do deserve this," Claire said, smiling in agreement before she assumed a more serious expression. "And… thanks."

"So not the drama-" Kim began.

"It is," Claire affirmed. "And not just because you came here; I mean…"

She paused for a moment before looking at Ron with a smile. "I guess it's like you said at lunch, Ron; we all need to learn to just… never be normal sometimes."

"Exactly," Kim nodded, reaching up to squeeze Ron's shoulder. "It's time to defy expectations and be who we are, and who you are right now is the homecoming queen who can heal from anything they throw at her, so let's get you to your kingdom."

"Just let me lock up and change, and I'll be right down," Claire nodded at the two with an ever-expanding grin. As she turned away, she picked up the book that had been by her side to put it away; Kim briefly caught the word 'Evolution' on the cover before it was taken away from the window, but decided not to think too much about that in favour of the upcoming party.

If Claire wanted to do some research on her ability, that probably wasn't a bad idea, but Kim couldn't think of a reason why that couldn't wait until tomorrow…

Chapter Text

Even as he walked into the school, Peter wasn't sure if he could even explain to himself why he was doing this.

He freely admitted that part of it could just be his own frustration at Nathan's continued attempts to control his life rather than accept that Peter was his own person who wanted to help others in his own way, but there was a difference between taking a career path he wouldn't approve of and going somewhere when all available evidence suggested he was going to die there…

And when did my life reach a point where I can believe a man painted the future and consider that 'evidence' of anything?

Still, even if Nathan could say that he had been trying to hide the painting from him to protect him from himself and his 'delusions of grandeur', but as far as Peter was concerned, he'd had enough of his family trying to control his life. Everything that had happened since he first flew might have been more like something from a comic book than what he thought he knew about the world, but Peter felt like he was finally where he was supposed to be for the first time in…

Did I ever know where I was supposed to be before now?

He wasn't going to kid himself into thinking that Simone totally bought this whole thing herself- she probably just showed him the picture to stop him obsessing over trying to find a new copy of it, and he wouldn't be surprised if she was expecting him to find nothing out here- but so far he'd already had that interesting meeting with Hiro's friend Ando, even if it hadn't been particularly useful.

How does a time-traveller get stuck six months in the past?

Still, whether or not he had any help right now, Peter had found where he was meant to be, and he was almost certain that the cheerleader the older Hiro had told him about would be here; the only thing that mattered now was finding her.

So long as he didn't think about the full content of what was in that painting Simone had shown him, and focus on finding the cheerleader he was here to save before quarter past eight, he could do this…

It was like Hiro had told Ando; if someone was too afraid to use their power, they didn't deserve to have it. Peter might be limited to sharing powers with other people rather than possessing any true power himself, but didn't that mean that he had to be at least as good as the people he 'shared' with?

Pausing in front of the trophy display case, Peter's eyes were immediately drawn to a large banner overhead, proclaiming 'JACKIE, YOU'RE OUR HERO'. The display below the banner included a newspaper article with the headline Odessa Honors Local Hero, which included a photo of a young blonde in a cheerleader outfit who could have been the one he'd seen in Isacc's earlier painting; Isaac was good, but comics were always a little 'off' when copying real people…

Peter stepped back from the display case just in time to back into someone. Turning around, he found himself looking at two girls and one young man, the young man wearing a dark shirt and trousers with large pockets while the redhead was wearing a dark blue dress and the blonde was in a blue hoodie and khakis.

"Sorry!" he said apologetically.

"No prob," the young man nodded.

"Claire here just… wasn't looking where she was going," the redhead said, smiling over at the blonde, who moved to pick up a bag that she'd dropped.

"I'm sorry," the other girl looked at him as she adjusted the bag over her shoulder.

"Don't worry about it," Peter said, before he indicated the trophy display before them. "Hey, do you… do you know this girl, Jackie Wilcox?"

It was probably a bit of a leap, but when he didn't know anything else for certain beyond that he was looking for a blonde cheerleader, it made sense to start with the girl who already had a particular reputation in this town.

"Uh, yeah," the blonde said, her smile faltering as she looked at the display. "Half-time show starts in about five minutes; she'll be out on the field."

"Why do you want to know?" the redhead asked, looking curiously at Peter. "Are you a reporter or something?"

"Alumni," Peter said, hoping that a basic story would attract less follow-up questions. "I'm just curious."

"You know, between you and me, she's not that special," the blonde said, almost moving down the corridor before turning back to look at him. "Just your average teenage girl."

"So average it's boring," the young man put in.

"She rushed into a fire and saved a man's life," Peter said, looking curiously between the three kids (and when had he reached a point where teenagers were 'kids'?). "Sounds kinda special to me."

"Yeah, you're right," the blonde smiled. "I'm jealous. She's our town hero. Me? I don't win too many popularity contests."

"Hey," Peter said, feeling a need to say more as the two girls started to walk away and the boy moved in another direction. "It gets better."

"What?" the blonde asked, as the three turned to look at him.

"Life after high school," Peter smiled encouragingly at them. "It gets a lot better."

The blonde girl just smiled at him before she left, but the redhead gave him a brief nod before she joined her friend.

It had been a brief talk, but now he had to focus on finding where the cheerleader he'd come here to save actually was, when he still had about ten minutes before the deadline in the painting…

"So," Kim smiled at Claire as they finished changing into their cheerleading outfits while Ron waited outside the changing rooms, "that guy was cute, right?"

"What guy?" Claire asked, obviously feigning ignorance.

"Hey, I'm not judging," Kim raised her hands in understanding. "He might be a bit older, but there's nothing wrong with that-"

"Will the nerviness never cease?" Jackie said, walking up to the two girls, the rest of the squad gathering around her. "I thought you were grounded?"

"It didn't take," Claire shrugged. "How's your eye?"

"Nothing I can't cover up," Jackie retorted, opening her locker to re-apply her make-up as the other girls left. "We need to talk in private-"

"Anything you want to say to me you can say in front of Kim," Claire countered, aware of the redhead taking up a defensive stance behind her.

"Your call," Jackie looked at the third girl for a moment before turning the full focus of her glare onto Claire. "I think you're a menace. And I'm not just talking about you punching me over your boyfriend, the girlfriend. I'm talking about you in general. We used to be BFF's. What happened?"

"I got perspective and decided I had to accept who I am," Claire said.

"When you've been trying to be me since second grade?"

"Only fair," Kim shrugged. "You are trying to be her these days."

"How do you figure?" Jackie chuckled incredulously at that statement.

"Your little 'hero moment' at that train?" Kim folded her arms and glared at Jackie. "That was Claire; I saw it, and she has it on videotape."

Jackie froze for a moment as she looked at the other two, before she turned around and began putting stuff back in her locker, remaining silent in a manner that said more than words ever could.

"You know," Kim said as she stared at Jackie's back, "my best friend has said it's better to be yourself and happy than popular. It took me a while to really get what he means by that, but I think he's right."

"Sounds like a loser to me," Jackie said as she shut her locker, only for the locker lights to suddenly turn off as soon as she started to walk away.

"Public sch-" Jackie began, before Kim slapped a hand over her mouth.

"Quiet," the redhead hissed at Jackie, reaching over to grab Claire's wrist. Once she was sure that Claire was looking at her, Kim jerked her head towards one end of the small 'corridor' they were currently in, but froze in apprehension when she heard something go by at the end she'd just indicated.

"Did you hear that?" Claire asked.

"Hear what?" Jackie said, rolling her eyes at the other two.

"Look," Kim hissed urgently at Claire and Jackie, ignoring the part of her mind telling her to just get out of here and leave Jackie to make her own mistakes, "let's just get out of here and then start worrying about-"

"What is your problem?" Jackie glared at the other two. "Just because you're freaks doesn't mean I want to get lumped in-"

"This isn't the time!" Claire hissed. "Can't you hear it? There is something in here with us-!"

"And I repeat, what is your problem?" Jackie impatiently slapped Claire's hand away as the other blonde reached for her. "You're seriously making us miss your own coronation? Look, if you don't want the crown, I'm more than happy to-"

Jackie's words were cut short when someone grabbed her by the neck and slammed her against the lockers. Claire and Kim moved to help, but the man waved a hand and suddenly both girls were flying through the air without anything touching them. Kim vaguely registered Claire hit a concrete wall, but even as her friend struck the wall with a sickening crunch, Kim was already adjusting her flight through the air so that she hit the wall feet-first. She wasn't even thinking when she kicked herself off against the wall and rolled along the ground, moving back to her feet in time to see Jackie's attacker…

For a moment, Kim thought it was just a cut Jackie had sustained in the initial attack, but then she realised that there was far too much blood for that to be the case. When she noticed the man drawing his finger through the air, she initially assumed he was making some kind of mental plan, but it soon became clear that somehow he was cutting into Jackie's head with a finger that was at least a foot away from her.

Sheer terror was the only thing that stopped Kim joining Jackie's terrified screams, muffled as they were by the man's hand over her mouth as he held her up. As more blood streamed from Jackie's head, with her skull now seemingly sliced open from the front, the sound of bone shifting drew Kim's attention away from the horrific sight before her to see that Claire was getting back to her feet, adjusting her head and left arm in a manner that suggested they'd taken the brunt of her initial impact with the wall, along with a bloody face that was still knitting itself back together…

The sudden silence from Jackie's direction prompted Kim and Claire to look back, and they both immediately wished that they hadn't; the man was once again gripping Jackie by the throat rather than the lower half of her face, but the twisted state at the top of her face made it clear that Jackie wasn't going to live much longer with cranial trauma like that. What made it worse was that both figures were looking at Kim and Claire in that moment, and while Kim had just had a lucky break, Claire's face was clearly healing from being practically flattened against the wall.

"Run…" Jackie rasped weakly, even as her assailant dropped her to the floor. Kim reached out to grab Claire's hand, but swiftly turned around to run away when she realised that the other girl had already moved away as the terrifying figure stalked towards them, his attack on Jackie either over or interrupted. Panic seemed to fill Kim's mind as she ran desperately after Claire, all possible thought of trying to fight this man overridden by the all-consuming thought of getting away from this psycho who could cut people without touching them…

Even when he started to run towards the scream, Peter wasn't sure if he was just caught up in his own idea of destiny or if he genuinely thought he could help, but either way it didn't take long for him to find what he was looking for. When he saw the two girls he'd spoken to previously running out of the changing rooms, one of them covered in blood and the other one with more than a bit of splatter on her face and chest, it wasn't hard to realise that they needed help even if he had no idea what was going on.

"You OK?" he asked, hoping that they understood what he meant. The blond glanced back just as a man stepped into the darkened hallway, face hidden by a black cap that cast his face further in shadow, wearing a simple dark jacket and trousers, his whole manner giving an impression of pure malice.

"We have to get out of here!" the redhead said, looking anxiously between Peter and the new arrival.

"Go!" Peter said, moving the two girls behind him while he turned to face the other man. Standing at the end of the corridor, Peter tensed himself for whatever the other man might have to offer, but even he was surprised when the other man raised a hand and locker doors from further down the corridor flew off their hinges towards him-

Wait.

Peter didn't know how, but even as the doors flew in his direction, he could see what the other man was doing… and he could also see how to do it himself. With an ease that he hadn't felt even when he was finishing Isaac's painting in the other man's loft, Peter raised his hands and sent the locker doors flying back towards the other man. His opponent managed to crush a few of the doors mid-air- Peter didn't know what he was up against, but doors didn't crumple when hit by thin air- but a couple of them hit the other man, even as a couple of the doors struck Peter in turn. Wincing at the brief impact, Peter thrust one hand out towards the other man, trying to force his opponent back, but was met with a similar motion and equal force from the man in the shadows.

After a few moments as the two strained against each other at a distance, Peter gave up on that strategy and turned around to run along the corridor, unsure if he wanted to catch up with the two girls or make sure they'd managed to get away. When he reached a large door at the end of the corridor, Peter ran outside and found himself in an amphitheatre, the blonde and the redhead scrambling up the stairs before they turned to look at the opened door.

"Run!" Peter yelled at them both, even as he hurried over to the bottom of the stairs, waving a hand in the direction of the stadium he'd seen earlier. "Get to the stadium; find people! He doesn't want to be seen; you'll be safe there! Go!"

The two girls looked at him for a moment and then ran off towards the stadium, leaving Peter to run to the centre of the amphitheatre before he turned back to face the door as the dark-clad man emerged from it. As though drawing on some knowledge he didn't realise he possessed, Peter thrust out a hand and watched in awe as a burst of ice struck his enemy, freezing one side of the man's body. The other man waved his free hand at the ice and it suddenly seemed to explode into nothing, but Peter lashed out with another attack from that strange new telekinesis (thank goodness he'd done some extra reading before coming here) before he ran for the top of the amphitheatre; he had a plan to stop this guy, but he needed to get him into just the right place…

Waiting at the top of the stone seats/steps, Peter took a deep breath as he prepared for what was about to happen; he had already made his choice by coming here, but the knowledge of what was about to happen… the painted prophecy that was about to be fulfilled…

Then the other man was standing right next to him, and Peter didn't have time to think; he just grabbed his enemy by the shoulders and he hauled the other man over the edge of the amphitheatre. As Peter fell, he tried to use his new power to force his opponent to a position underneath him, but was surprised to find that latest ability suddenly harder to access; the guy who had it was right in front of him, but it was as though it had suddenly become a lot harder to tap-

He felt a sickening crunch as he hit the ground before his opponent, and the world went black.

Considering the circumstances that had driven them away, Kim wasn't sure what had prompted her and Claire to go back towards the amphitheatre. Maybe it was just some morbid sense of curiosity about the whole situation, or maybe she didn't like the idea of leaving her fate in the hands of someone she'd only just met, but either way, after she and Claire had been running for a few moments, they came to a halt, glanced at each other, and ran back the way they had come, heading for the other side of the school amphitheatre.

When they ran around the corner to the main door of the Physical Education Centre, both girls saw what could only be the second-worst thing they could have imagined; the mysterious man who had just helped them escape from a psychopath, lying on the ground with his body twisted in a manner that it was clearly never meant to be in, and no sign of their attacker.

"Oh no," Claire whispered, staring at the man's body in shock.

"No…" Kim said, joining Claire as they hurried over to the man's body, anxiously looking over their saviour, lying in a pool of his own blood, his neck and legs in particular twisted in a manner that made it clear he was-

The man suddenly sat up, coughing as he twisted his neck back into position, a strange crunching sound filling the air as he moved his legs into position. Claire and Kim each knelt down beside the man as he panted with exertion, unfolding his legs so that they were straight before he turned to look at the two girls.

"You…" Claire stared at the man in awe, eyes wide with exhilaration as the bleeding cut on the man's face healed as they watched. "How did you…?"

"Where is he?" the man said, looking carefully around himself.

"No idea," Kim said, looking grimly at their strange saviour. "The guy ran away before we got here."

"Police," the man said, as sirens filled the air. "Go get some help-"

"Correction," Kim said, reaching out to grab the man's arm. "You are going to come with us so we can get you somewhere safe."

"What-?" Claire looked at Kim in confusion.

"Look," Kim looked between Claire and the unknown man, "I've read enough of my mom's files to have an idea about how this is going to go down; if the police are here already in these kind of numbers, they must have some idea of what just happened, and if they find someone in your state, they're going to focus on arresting you rather than finding someone else."

"They'd arrest him?" Claire indicated the man incredulously.

"He's covered in blood without a scratch on him and he could match the description of whoever just attacked us; if we leave him here, he is going to get arrested, and I'm not going to let that happen when he just helped save our lives," Kim said, helping the man to his feet and placing an arm over her shoulder. "Let's just get him somewhere out of the way and… well, we can work out what we're going to do next later."

"…Sounds good," the man said, nodding tentatively at Kim even as Claire followed her example and put the man's other arm over her shoulders. "Just need a little time… somewhere to think…"

"What's your name?" Claire looked at the man as they began to walk.

"Peter," the man replied.

"I'm Claire," Claire replied, giving him a soft smile.

"Kim," Kim added, grinning slightly as she noticed the way the two were smiling at each other. "Kim Pierce."

"Are you the one?" Peter looked at Claire in particular. "By saving you, did I save the world?"

"Her?" Kim looked at Peter in surprise, before she shook her head. "Look, we'll talk about this later; right now we have to just get you somewhere you can clean yourself up, then we can work out what to do next."

Kim was fairly sure she remembered an old house or two nearby that might be a safe place to take Peter until they could clean themselves up, and she was definitely going to call Ron before he started getting the wrong idea about whatever had just happened…

Chapter Text

When Ron got the text message from Kim about what had been happening in the school before the police cars showed up at the playing field, the only challenge had been getting away from the stadium without anyone else coming after him. His parents had chosen to stay at home rather than attend the game in the first place, so it had at least been easy enough to slip away from the Pierces and claim that the text had been from his own parents letting him know they'd come to pick him up, but that left him with a few moments of worry as he tried to work out what had happened to his friend. The police showing up at least suggested something serious was going on, but faced with waiting to try and find out after however long it would take to give them answers, or trying to get in touch with Kim to get a direct answer, it wasn't really a choice as far as Ron was concerned.

OK, so this is a hell of a lot bigger than anything KP and I have ever gotten caught up in before, but at least I know she's OK, and she wouldn't send me something like this if she didn't have a reason for it…

Frankly, Ron was relieved that Kim had sent him a message to a familiar landmark. They might not be traditional rule-breakers, but the two of them still had their own secret places since they were little, and they had found an old house a couple of streets away from the school that they used as a meeting place when they wanted to spend some time alone. They'd stopped going to it that regularly in the last couple of years as things became more difficult at school, but the address was still fixed in Ron's memory. With Rufus still in his pocket, he walked briskly from the school to the old house, where he found Kim and Claire standing anxiously around an older man in a bloodstained fawn coat, sitting at an old desk with a solemn expression.

"Who-?" the man looked up as Ron walked into the building.

"Ron, this is Peter; he helped us," Kim said, indicating the man sitting at the desk, dried blood on his face and clothes but not so much as a scratch on his body. "Peter, this is Ron Sinclair, my best friend."

"Hey," Peter nodded at Ron.

"Uh… hi," Ron responded with a brief nod of his head, lost for what else he could say to this unknown bloodstained man.

"So… you know about Claire?" Peter said, indicating Claire with a tentative nod. "Her… ability, I mean?"

"Well, there wasn't much point trying to hide anything after Kim brought me back to life while he was there," Claire observed.

"Brought you back to life?" Peter looked at Claire in surprise.

"He knows?" Ron asked in confusion.

"She had a tree branch stuck in the back of her head after she fell on it," Kim clarified, looking briefly at Claire to apologise for the blunt description. "I pulled it out, and… well, here we are."

"Ah," Peter nodded in acknowledgement, giving Claire a similarly apologetic glance even if the blonde didn't seem that bothered. "So… you don't heal if something's in the wound?"

"Apparently not," Claire said, her expression briefly haunted before she looked at Peter with new curiosity. "So now that Ron's here… what are you doing here?"

"And what was that guy doing here?" Kim asked.

"And what guy are we talking about?" Ron cut in, looking in confusion between the two girls and the stranger. "I mean, I just got a message that someone attacked you and I was going to find you here-"

"Someone killed Jackie because she was claiming to be the hero cheerleader and then he tried to kill us before Peter showed up," Claire clarified.

"Ah," Ron said, before he processed what had just been said and looked at Claire and Kim with new shock. "Hold on, someone killed Jackie?"

"Took the top of her head off with some freaky… telekinesis," Kim said grimly, before she turned her attention back to Peter. "And you still haven't explained what you meant about that whole 'save Claire to save the world' thing?"

"Right…" Peter said, looking awkwardly between the two cheerleaders for a moment before he sighed. "This is probably gonna sound nuts, but… I know a guy who can paint the future."

"Paint… the future," Kim repeated, uncertain if she should take this seriously even after witnessing what that other man was capable of.

"And I met a guy from the future-"

"You met a guy from the future?" Ron repeated with an enthusiastic grin as Kim and Claire looked between the two males in escalating confusion. "As in he had a time machine?"

"As in he had the ability to… a friend of his told me he can 'bend time and space', so this guy can basically travel in time on his own."

"Huh," Ron said, nodding slightly even as he couldn't restrain his broad grin. "I have no idea if that's more or less cool than having a time machine, but it's still cool."

"And that's where you got… that message?" Claire cut in, looking tentatively at Peter. "About saving me?"

"Well, the time-traveller told me that I had to save the cheerleader to save the world, and the paintings…" Peter sighed before he reached into his pocket, pulled out his phone and showed it to the others. "Well, look at this."

Looking at the image on the small screen, Claire, Kim and Ron winced at the image that was almost certainly meant to be Peter, lying on the ground just as the girls had seen him before he'd 'woken up' from his death.

"Ouch," Ron winced as he looked at the screen. "That had to hurt."

"Believe me, it looked worse in person," Kim said, before she turned to Peter. "So you know a guy who can paint the future and a guy who can travel in time, and you can heal yourself like Claire-"

"I can't."

"What?" Claire looked at him in surprise. "But we saw you-"

"I don't heal," Peter cut her off, before giving Claire a brief smile. "At least, not until I met you."

"Huh?" Ron asked. "Could you… clear that up?"

"I'm… I don't know how to explain it, but when I'm near someone else with abilities, I can do what they do," Peter explained, shrugging slightly as he looked between the three teenagers. "That's how I was able to hold off the guy who attacked your school; once I got close to him…"

"You copied him…" Ron nodded in understanding, an awed grin spreading across his face before he looked at Peter with a new sense of anxiety. "Uh… what could the other guy do?"

"Move things without touching them, make things blow up with a flick of his fingers, and I'm fairly sure he has some kind of freezing ability."

"Ah," Ron said, wincing at the imagery. "That… doesn't sound good."

"And you didn't see what he did to Jackie," Claire added, shivering in disgust at the memory.

"Right," Kim nodded thoughtfully as she looked at Peter. "So I take it you don't know who he actually was…?"

Peter and the three teens looked up at the sound of footsteps from outside the house, Peter quickly getting to his feet as he took up a defensive stance in front of the three teenagers. The door opened to reveal an unfamiliar dark-skinned bald man wearing a loose shirt, but any sense of relief was lost when his gaze fixed on Claire in particular.

"Hold it," Peter said, moving to stand between Claire and the new arrival as he held up one hand. "Who are you?"

"I am here for Claire Bennett," the man replied, his eyes widening slightly as he looked at Peter as though he couldn't believe he was saying this.

"Why?"

"I was sent by her father to learn what she has witnessed and erase her memory if she knew about Sylar's powers."

"Sylar?" Peter repeated.

"The man who killed the cheerleader-"

"Wait a- are you saying my dad knows about this?" Claire stared at the man incredulously.

"He shouldn't?" Peter asked, one outstretched hand still focused on the other man even as his gaze shifted to Claire.

"Kim's mom's the one who works with the police; Dad just works at a paper company!"

"Yeah!" Ron insisted. "Why does Claire's dad know anything about… all this?"

"Primatech hunts and monitors those like us to control and contain the most dangerous," the unknown man replied.

"Primatech?" Peter glanced at Claire. "That's your dad's company, right?"

"Yeah…" Claire said, looking shakily at the man. Peter waited for a moment in case Claire had anything else she wanted to say, but he soon turned his focus back to their unexpected 'prisoner'.

"Why are you telling us all this in the first place?" Peter asked, before he looked between the man and his outstretched hand with dawning understanding. "Am I… making you do this?"

"Using the power of persuasion," the man replied, now looking at Peter with escalating confusion. "But this… should be impossible; I negate powers-"

"Negate?" Kim repeated, looking urgently at the other man. "You mean you shut them down?"

"Which means… whoa," Ron looked at Peter with new awe. "You're copying him and beating him with his own power; you seriously rock, Petey!"

"That… should not be… possible," the other man said, gaze still fixed on Peter, his shoulders visibly tensing as though he was trying to fight through Peter's control.

"Clearly it is," Peter responded, his own gaze resolute as he stared at the other man. "Where can I find out more about Sylar?"

"Local police," the man said, briefly moving his mouth as though trying to bite it shut before he continued talking. "An FBI agent… is tracking Sylar… her files…"

"Got it," Kim nodded, before she walked up to the man and struck him in the face with a powerful punch.

"Hey!" Claire yelled at Kim.

"Look, he was clearly fighting to get past whatever Peter was doing to him and I don't want to think about what could happen if he pulled that off if he was telling the truth about erasing memories," Kim said urgently. "Our best bet right now is to figure out what we're dealing with, which means getting into the station and trying to find that FBI agent he mentioned who might have files on that 'Sylar' guy."

"Hold on; are you seriously suggesting that we break into-?" Ron began.

"No," Peter said firmly. "I'll go in; you three-"

"We're staying with you," Claire cut him off.

"You can't-"

"I just found out that my dad knows about superpowers being real and knew something about the existence of a superpowered serial killer; I am not going back to that house with those secrets!" Claire said firmly. "We need answers…"

She trailed off and looked apologetically at Kim and Ron. "Sorry, I just… you don't have to do-"

"You're our friend, Claire," Kim nodded at her in understanding. "Whatever's going on here… well, I'll try and let Mom and Dad know, but if you want me to stick around, I'll be here."

"And you can't count me out of this!" Ron insisted urgently. "I mean, we just met a freakin' superhero and escaped a confrontation with a real-life supervillain-!"

"Uh… I'm not-"

"Seriously, dude, you came all this way to stop someone you knew nothing about from killing a girl you'd never even met; we're definitely dealing with a supervillain, and if you're not a superhero, I don't know who is!" Ron said earnestly.

"Uh… look, if you don't want us to help-" Kim began.

"No, if you… well, I'd appreciate your help, but I don't want you to feel like you have to do anything," Peter looked at the three with a tentative smile. "I mean, this isn't exactly something you signed up for… I mean, you're just-"

"I just saw a man cut off the top of a girl's head without any kind of weapon and then try and kill me and my friend by throwing us into a wall from at least a metre away; we are way beyond being 'kids'," Kim cut in.

"And besides, you came here to save my life; if you need help, we're there," Claire said firmly, before she looked over at Kim. "So if someone was visiting the police about some big serial killer, where would we find them?"

Chapter Text

"You're sure this is gonna work?" Peter looked uncertainly between the police station in front of him and Kim as she stood alongside him. Since they didn't know how much Claire's father knew about the situation with Sylar at the moment, or even what her father knew about Sylar specifically, they were just hoping that he didn't know about Peter's interest in this situation yet. Claire and Ron had agreed to stay near a friend's house- not wanting to get directly in touch with anyone in case it put them in more trouble- while Kim and Peter put Kim's plan into action.

"Trust me, I've gone here with my mom more than once; I know my way around like it was my own place," Kim assured him, reaching over to adjust the suit she'd managed to retrieve from her father's wardrobe. With her parents still occupied keeping an eye on her brothers while waiting at the stadium to be 'released' by the rest of the police investigating the recent attack, it had been easy enough for her to sneak back to her house and 'borrow' a suit to give Peter a more professional look for this part of the plan. "Look, that guy mentioned that there was someone from the FBI here with files on Sylar; visiting agents would stay near the interview room, so all you need to do is get to the main room, find whoever has them, do your little 'command' thing to give yourself time to copy the files, and get out so we can look over them ourselves."

"Without anyone realising I've done it?"

"Hey, you managed to get that guy to tell you what he was doing, and you've no idea where you got that power; if you can pull it off then, you can do it here," Kim smiled encouragingly at him before she grabbed his phone from his pocket and tapped in a number. "Oh, and here's my number; call me if you need any help once you get inside."

"Uh… thanks," Peter said, still lost on if he should be touched or apprehensive at this teenage girl's faith in him. Deciding that his best chance would just be to go along with it and hope for the best, he walked up to the door and headed into the station, nodding politely at the few officers gathered there as he walked further into the building.

A part of Peter still wasn't entirely sure if this was a good idea, but at the same time he had to admit that he couldn't deal with this situation on his own. He might have saved the cheerleader the future Hiro had told him about, but that didn't mean he could just walk off and leave her, particularly not when they had a chance to find out more about whatever they were up against. He somehow doubted that the files would give them anything like a full list on Sylar's powers, but maybe they could find a clue or two about what he might have acquired if they were lucky…

As he walked further into the station, Peter took care to find a balance between nodding politely at the other officers around him, recalling some of the advice their father had tried to give him and Nathan before it became clear that Nathan was the 'ambitious' one of the two. When dealing with a new situation, so long as someone looked like they were belonged somewhere, most of the time people wouldn't question their presence, which made it easier to talk others into giving you what you were after.

Granted, Peter didn't think his father had ever intended him to apply these lessons to what basically amounted to breaking and entering, but the core idea of taking control of a situation by feigning control was still valid. Once he was in the main area, relatively few of the desks were actually manned, and any officers still sitting here were clearly working hard at their paperwork. Scanning the area, Peter's eyes focused on a slightly overweight man talking with a thin blonde woman at the back of the room, both dressed in plain clothes while the woman had a badge on her belt that Peter recognised from TV shows as an FBI badge.

"…what now?" the man asked, looking urgently at the woman. "I mean, why would someone like Sylar even have accomplices? Aren't serial killers usually solitary?"

"It all depends on what they're actually after," the woman replied. "Even if it's all in their own heads, these guys often want something out of their sprees; could be trying to satisfy some warped vendetta, or think they're going to get something if they get enough of a certain type of victim. Add in all this freaky crap that's been happening on this case, and I've got no way to be sure 'bout anything; Sylar couldn't have gotten away on his own if he was leaving that amount of blood, but I'd rather not speculate when we're still working things out…"

"Excuse me?" Peter said, mentally crossing his fingers as he walked up to the duo. "You're working the Sylar case, right?"

"Yeah…" the man looked at him curiously.

"How did you hear that name?" the woman asked, looking at Peter with a new intensity.

"It… came up," Peter said, already regretting that he hadn't been able to do much more background research before doing this; he admitted that he hadn't heard much about Sylar before now, but how well-known was this guy outside of law enforcement?

"Came up where?" the woman said, looking intently at Peter. "And who are you?"

"I just-" Peter began, before he froze as he felt something 'click' in his head.

He couldn't explain what it was, but suddenly, as he looked at the man and woman before him, he could suddenly understand the deeper context of what they'd been talking about. They'd found the trail of blood that Sylar- Peter noted that the woman in particular referred to him as 'Sylar' while the man still seemed to be more tentative about that name- had left after he'd walked away from Peter's fallen body, but then two other sets of footprints had appeared on the scene and apparently taken Sylar away. While Peter guessed that Sylar had used him to cushion the fall, and maybe his telekinesis had helped protect the other man somehow, he briefly wondered if those other footsteps could have anything to do with the company that other man had mentioned, but swiftly decided it wasn't worth thinking about too closely; after what he'd seen the killer do, he wouldn't believe that Sylar was dead or out of the picture until he'd explicitly seen the man's body.

Peter couldn't explain even to himself where this sudden sense of insight had come from, but when the overweight man turned to look at him with a particularly intense stare, Peter's focus shifted back to the reason he'd come here.

"I need to see all the files you have on Sylar."

"H… here," the woman said, reaching over to the nearest desk and picking up a set of files that she passed to Peter, her body twitching slightly as though she was trying to resist his command.

"Uh… thanks," Peter said, looking awkwardly at the files for a moment before he glanced around the nearly-empty room and came to a decision. "Both of you; go to the interview room, and sleep."

It was a bit of a strain to issue that command, but Peter was relieved when the man and the woman nodded jerkily and obeyed his orders, each of them heading for the small room off to the side of the station. Peter followed them just closely enough to hear the 'click' as the lock slid into place before he headed for the nearest photocopier, pulling out papers from the files to look over them as quickly as possible; it wasn't likely that anyone would use the interview room this late at night if 'Sylar' was the priority investigation for this department, but he couldn't afford to wait too long. Looking at the contents of the files, he soon decided not to worry about the photographs in favour of copying some of the files on the crimes themselves; he could read over the papers in more detail and just glance over the photos right now.

From what he could tell as he skimmed over the files, there was some doubt about the identity of Sylar's first victim; the earliest one on record was someone named Trevor Zaltan, but apparently the cranial damage had been so precise there was some speculation that Sylar must have killed at least one other person before that. Before he came to Odessa, the latest victim report was on the Walker family; apparently Sylar had just walked into the Walker family home and killed the father and mother, while the young daughter had escaped him by hiding in a closet. On top of the Walkers, the files listed over a dozen other victims between New York and California before he circled around to Odessa, but while only a few victims had their brains removed in the manner that had apparently become Sylar's trademark, there were other cases where the victims had been impaled with household objects and their bones broken without any actual trace of physical contact.

The guy's telekinesis probably explains that at least, even if it doesn't explain why he's doing this…

When he noted the case report on the Walker family stated that Sylar had only killed one of the Walkers with his traditional M.O., Peter took a closer read. According to this file, Sylar had taken the top off James Walker's head and then frozen his body, but he'd just impaled Walker's wife with cutlery, and he'd apparently completely missed the Walker's young daughter Molly.

And Kim and Claire told me he was trying to take off the head of that other girl because he thought she was the one who'd saved that guy in the fire…

There were still a few gaps in his knowledge of the situation, but Peter thought he had an idea what was going on here. He wasn't exactly an expert, and he was still working his way through the book Mohinder's father had written, but he guessed that there was something in the brain that was in some way different depending on if a person had powers or not, or even what powers they had, and Sylar had worked out some way to copy other abilities if he could get access to the brain.

It wasn't a perfect theory, and Peter had no idea what Sylar could get out of a brain that would let him copy other abilities- the files didn't even seem to indicate whether he actually took anything from the brains or not- but it fit the basic facts. From what he remembered of Doctor Suresh's book, people couldn't 'naturally' have more than one ability, and if Sylar could just copy abilities like Peter did, he wouldn't have been trying to chase the girls down to try and kill Claire, and he definitely wouldn't need to attack people like this.

With his new idea in mind, Peter took another look over the list of Sylar's past crimes. It didn't specify where the killer's name had come from, but assuming Peter was right about the brain thing being key to Sylar taking other peoples' abilities, Sylar had at least tried to copy the abilities of half a dozen people or so by this point, and there might be more depending on how long it had taken anyone to identify his 'trademark' or refine his method. Based on what he and Peter had used against each other in their fight, Sylar definitely had at least three powers- telekinesis, freezing, and whatever the man used to blow up the ice Peter had thrown at him- but it was possible that he could have others that just weren't of obvious use in a fight.

He had no idea why Sylar would want to gather more abilities, but looking at the scale of the man's past crimes, Peter was certain of one thing; he was not going to let the three teenagers he'd just met become Sylar's next victims.

As soon as the printer had made its last copy, Peter folder the copies and put them in his inside jacket pocket. Walking back to the interview room door, Peter opened it and looked in to see the man and woman sleeping on either side of the main table, just as he had instructed.

"Wake up and forget that I was ever here," he said, giving the command a suitable mental push. He waited in the door just long enough to see the two respond to his commands and start to stir back to consciousness before he stepped back out of the room. Making sure he had all the papers in his pockets, Peter walked briskly out of the station, fingers crossed that his last little gambit had paid off.

He'd managed to command that other man with relative ease- at least, he could be fairly sure that he'd been getting honest answers to his questions- but this had felt different for several reasons beyond the fact that he seemed to be tapping a different power. When he'd been conducting that interrogation, he'd been able to ask questions and get answers, but this time around, he felt as though he was making a conscious effort to force the two to do what he wanted them to do…

The moment when he'd read the agents' minds at least reinforced his theory that he'd just tapped into some new ability, but he couldn't be sure if that had anything to do with the way his 'persuasion' had felt so different this time around…

"Well?"

"Well?" Peter looked at Kim, who had walked up to join him as he left the station.

"Did you get the files?"

"Got the files, made copies, and I think I convinced the investigating agents not to remember that I'd been there," Peter said, shaking his head slightly as they walked along the street, before he looked curiously at Kim. "Did you just…?"

"Did I what?" Kim asked.

"Nothing," Peter shook his head; he could clearly see that Kim wasn't cheering at the success of their latest plan, so asking if she was wouldn't help her opinion of him.

"OK…" Kim looked thoughtfully at him for a moment before she shrugged. "So let's get back to Ron and Claire before we start talking about this."

"Good call," Peter nodded, even as he began turning over the implications of everything he'd read so far.

He didn't know why these ideas were coming to him so much more easily all of a sudden- he didn't think of himself as stupid, but he'd never been a very tactical guy- but based on everything he'd read about Sylar, he could be fairly sure that the man was going to go after Claire again. Considering that this guy had killed quite a few people in a manner that made it clear he hadn't even tried to copy their powers, Sylar had no problem with causing collateral damage, which meant that he would probably go after Kim to get rid of any other witnesses, and from what he'd seen of the guy so far, Peter had a feeling that getting Ron to leave the girls alone after all this would be an exercise in futility at best.

Just because I don't know where Sylar is now doesn't mean he's going to stay gone for long, which means getting the girls and Ron somewhere safe before that guy comes after them.

Whoever Sylar really was, Peter's first priority had just become keeping those three kids safe, which would mean getting them all out of Odessa and away from the last place Sylar had encountered the girls…

In other words, he reflected grimly as he looked at Kim walking alongside him, I just took responsibility for three teenagers.

This was far from what he'd been expecting to deal with when he came to Odessa, but if he couldn't let Claire get killed when he thought he was going to die saving her, he definitely couldn't leave her in danger if there was anything he could do to stop it.

Chapter Text

"Y'know," Ron said as he sat on the floor and stared at the files Peter had retrieved from the station, "if this was anything other than real life, it would be kinda cool."

"Cool?" Kim looked at her friend incredulously, looking up from another file. "We're talking about a psychopath with superpowers who seems to be going around on some freaky… collection spree!"

"Collection spree?" Claire looked at Kim, the three teens gathered around the files on the floor of the empty room in the abandoned house they'd been squatting in for the last few hours.

"He's going around collecting all the powers he can track down and putting them in one place; I'm not saying it's not extremely wrongsick, but it'd still be kind of cool if he wasn't murdering people, right?"

"Except that we know another guy who could have done all that without killing people," Kim jerked her head at Peter as he stood by the door of the room, before she turned to look apologetically at him. "Sorry, I'm not saying you're like this guy-"

"Yeah, he's like the evil knockoff… you-wannabe!" Ron affirmed eagerly.

"The 'me-wannabe'?" Peter looked at the young man with a slight smile.

"Hey, I'm not saying you inspired this guy or anything like that, but there are similarities, what with him having to work at the power-copy thing while you can just do it," Ron noted, before he sighed and shrugged awkwardly. "So… I mean, we've become the targets of a nutcase who's cut a killing spree across the country trying to get more oomph, and what do we know about him?"

"Not much," Kim shook her head as she held up a few papers. "I mean, I'm only working from whatever insight I've picked up from Mom's work, but there's nothing in these files to suggest that anyone knows anything about Sylar as a person, and the only thing we can add to the list that the FBI don't know already is that he's after abilities. The only way people have been able to work out that he's responsible for these crimes is the fact that he does that whole 'cut the skull in half' thing to at least one person at every crime scene; we don't know how he's finding these people, we can't be sure what else he can do, and we're not even sure where he is now…"

"Which means you can't stay here."

"Excuse me?" Claire and Kim looked sharply at Peter.

"Huh?" Ron asked.

"Look, whatever happened to Sylar after he… killed me, from what we saw of that guy's abilities, I for one am not going to think he's dead until I've seen the body."

"And maybe not even then," Ron put in. "I mean, this is full-on superhuman stuff; based on the comics, even the guys who don't have enhanced healing as a thing are really difficult to kill."

"…Right," Peter conceded, nodding tentatively at Ron before he continued addressing the teen trio. "Anyway, my point is that we can't be sure what happened to this guy after he left the school, but if there's a chance he's alive, based on these files, we have to at least assume he's going to try and come after Claire again."

"And considering what he did to some of his victims here, they probably didn't all have powers, which makes him an equal-opportunity psycho killer…" Ron said, his already-tentative smile faltering even further as he spoke. "So you think Sylar'd want to go after me and Kim as well?"

"When this guy killed a husband and wife and it seems like he only spared their twelve-year-old daughter because he didn't know she was there?" Kim observed grimly. "Yeah, I think we're on his hit list now."

"And with my dad involved in this with that… mind-wiping guy, we can't be sure what he's going to do to us if he finds out we know," Claire said grimly.

"You think he'd-?" Peter began.

"I don't think he'd hurt me, but if he's got that memory-wiping guy… maybe he'd just wipe Kim and Ron's memories and leave them to get killed by Sylar?" Claire said, looking anxiously between the others for a moment before she looked at Peter with a new sense of hope. "So… do you have a plan for how we're going to get out of this?"

"Well… you're all under eighteen, right?" Peter said, looking between the group and returning their confirming nods with a nod of his own. "OK, so all we need to get you on a flight back to New York is photo ID and at least one adult; I assume you've all got your student IDs on you or at least know where they are?"

"Right here," Kim confirmed as she pulled out her wallet and displayed the card in question, Ron and Claire following her example.

"Right," Peter nodded. "I can see about getting us tickets, and if I can tap that… persuasion thing again, that should help make sure we're not going to have too many questions until we can get on the plane and get back to-"

"Hold on; you're serious?" Kim looked urgently at Peter. "We can't just ditch school like this-"

"KP, we're potentially being hunted by a psycho superpowered killer who wants to take Claire's head to bits and kill us just because we saw him; I think there are more important things than school right now!" Ron cut his friend off, before he looked at her with a more hopeful yet tentative expression. "Besides… this is something big, right? Aren't you the one who's always wondering what you're going to do with yourself?"

"Well… yeah, but there's a difference between wanting something to do after leaving school and going out to…" Kim began, before she trailed off and looked around the room with a slight sigh. "OK, I guess this is kinda cool; it's just…"

"Not having a choice, huh?" Peter smiled over at her. "I can get that; it took me a while to find what I wanted to do myself without my family trying to control my life."

"What do you do, anyway?" Claire asked.

"Hospice nurse at the moment, but my last patient died a week or so ago and I haven't been sent to anyone new since," Peter explained. "I've been thinking I'd see about re-qualifying as a paramedic to get back into the thick of things, but… well, this whole thing with Sylar came up, and I obviously had bigger priorities."

"This was that important to you?" Claire looked at Peter in surprise. "When you didn't even know me?"

"I had to save a life," Peter smiled.

Maybe it was a bit self-centred of him to appreciate the way that these kids were looking at him like he could save their lives, but after so long with Nathan and his mother thinking of him as an embarrassment, and the way Simone had doubted him…

Simone?

Peter was surprised to realise that this was the first time he'd thought of Simone since he met these kids. It wasn't that he didn't still care about her, but after he'd spent so much time basically fighting to convince her that the idea of people having powers could be real and how important it was for him to find the cheerleader…

Peter appreciated that it sounded petty, but when Simone had spent so much time doubting something that had become so important to him, it was actually… nice… to find himself with people who had faith in him and his ability to protect them.

All I need to do now is live up to that…

Maybe he was over-thinking this, but like Ron had pointed out, in comics it took a lot to kill off superhumans, and with the amount of powers Sylar had it would probably be best to be cautious. If they could lay low for a couple of weeks somewhere Sylar probably didn't know about, they might be able to work out a way of actually dealing with the killer, or at least find out more about that company Claire's father worked for. Peter might not have the family's interest in business, but he'd picked up a few tricks and contacts over the years; maybe once he was home he could look into the official name of the paper company and trace its history from that…

"OK," Kim nodded at Peter, drawing him out of his thoughts as she looked down at herself with a slight smile. "I guess it's a good thing I dropped off my homecoming dress when I was picking up that suit for you; probably don't want to be too sharply dressed for a getaway, right?"

"Oh yeah; no point getting away if we just stick out like that guy in xXx."

"Who?" Claire looked over at Ron.

"Spy film; opening scene featured a spy basically go from an aerial jumpsuit to a tuxedo and then try and get away by sneaking through a punk rock concert," Ron shrugged. "Good film, but that really stood out as a screw-up moment; he stood out like a sore thumb when the bad guys came looking for him."

"Good thing we're not going to be doing that, then," Peter said, glancing down at the borrowed suit he was still wearing. "I'll send this back to your house from the airport; maybe we can include a note to reassure your parents you're safe…"

Simone appreciated that it came across as petty, but it was almost disturbing to realise just how far her father had spread his money.

She had always known that he had a range of business interests, of course, but when she actually started looking at them, it was hard to even work out what she should sell and what she should keep. She wasn't a stupid woman by any means- apart from her recent taste in men, considering that whatever she had with Isaac and Peter was just becoming really complicated even without their apparent powers- but she knew that she would never have her father's head for work, so it was best to streamline what she could and put those companies in the hands of more interested men.

She had arranged a business lunch with Robert Bishop, who was apparently one of her father's key financial advisors, but so far she had been waiting for fifteen minutes and Bishop hadn't shown up yet. She'd been surprised that the meeting had been arranged in a restaurant in a mall, but the place had a decent reputation and the food at least seemed good; she just wished that Bishop would actually get here…

Glancing out of the restaurant, Simone raised a curious eyebrow when her eyes focused on a particular figure walking along the main corridor. She wasn't sure why this woman in particular had drawn her attention, but it could have been the sheer strangeness of seeing someone wearing a hoodie with the hood pulled almost completely over their head when inside a busy mall…

Simone's thoughts shifted abruptly when the hooded figure stopped almost directly outside the restaurant, pulled a shotgun out of their backpack, and fired the weapon into the air. The mall was suddenly filled with screams as people started to run away from the gun-wielding figure just outside, while Simone and some of the other restaurant guests dived to the ground to escape the attack.

"Everyone stay down and nobody gets hurt!" the figure yelled, revealing a deep female voice that even Simone could speculate was put on. "I'm just here for the gold!"

Glancing up from behind her seat, Simone saw that the woman was standing in front of a jewellery store, the gun now held in one hand as she studied the window displays. Simone had just started wondering why the woman was only standing there when the figure turned around, grabbed the edge of a stone bench in the middle of the mall, and-

Simone felt like her brain had just frozen in shock.

The woman who was robbing a mall in broad daylight, the woman who couldn't be any bigger than Simone was, the woman right outside… had just picked up a thick stone bench, practically tearing it from the floor, and used it to break the window in front of her like the bench had just been a baseball bat.

Holy shit, Simone thought, staring incredulously as the woman tossed the bench back towards its original place, walked through the broken window and began scooping handfuls of rings and watches into her backpack.

Hearing Isaac talk about how he could paint the future and Peter's talk about 'destiny' was one thing, but seeing a woman who couldn't be any larger than her swinging around something that big…

"Freeze!" a male voice yelled, as a security guard came running down the mall towards the thief as the woman stepped away from the store window, the backpack now clearly weighed down with the stolen items.

"Bad call," the woman said in her strange deep voice, following the statement up by aiming her shotgun at the approaching guard and firing it. The guard managed to duck to avoid the blast- from what Simone recalled from films, those things weren't meant to be great at aiming and were fairly heavy to carry one-handed- but somehow, in the moment when Simone's attention was on the guard, the woman had moved up right next to him and followed it up by punching him with such force that-

Simone fought down the urge to scream or throw up as she saw the guard's head twist completely around from the force of that blow, before the thief- the killer ran out of the building, leaving Simone to stare at the rest of the people in the mall with a gradually dimming sense of dread.

Whatever the Hell just happened here… why do I suddenly think I've been judging Peter and Isaac too harshly?

Chapter Text

"We couldn't have found something a bit classier than this?" Ron asked as he followed Peter and the girls onto the plane. "I mean, we want to get out of here fast-"

"And we want to do that without drawing attention to ourselves," Peter cut the teenager off. "I know that you probably want to travel in style, but you need to remember that I'm not James Bond or Bruce Wayne; I can't just throw money at everything and get a fancy flight on short notice."

"He's right, Ron," Kim smiled over at her friend as they headed for their seats. "Peter's already pushing it by convincing the airport staff to put down false names on those records without real passports; he can't just make money out of nothing and expect to avoid awkward questions."

"Man, can you imagine how cool it would be if you could do something like that?" Ron smiled wistfully. "Wonder if there's some guy out there with the Midas Touch or something…?"

"Wasn't that meant to be a bad thing?" Claire smiled over at Ron. "As I recall, Midas couldn't even eat towards the end."

"Sure, but that's only if you can't turn that particular ability off…"

Peter let his mind drift as he watched the three teens talk amongst themselves, smiling thoughtfully as he observed their casual banter. He still had some doubts about the scale of what he was doing, but he had to appreciate how the group were coping with their decision. Claire had refused to leave a note for her parents after what that mind-manipulator had told them about her father, feeling that she couldn't even trust her mother in case she had some knowledge of her husband's agenda, but Kim and Ron had left notes explaining to their parents that they were safe and had just been called away due to some urgent issue relating to the attack at the school. It wasn't a perfect excuse, but it should at least buy them some time to work out what they were going to do about this situation.

The most difficult part of their departure had been when Claire had tried to call another friend of hers from school, going to the trouble of finding a public phone in the airport to make the call, only for the boy to respond in a manner that made it clear he had no idea what she was talking about. Claire had tried to brush the whole topic off once it was clear that the boy genuinely didn't remember anything, and she had assured Peter and the others that she didn't blame them for not getting to him before then, but it still hurt to realise that he'd failed one of his new…

What are they to me?

Looking at the teenage trio sitting alongside him, Peter was suddenly lost for the best way to define what they were to him. Thinking of them as his 'charges' was the most obvious term, but he had to appreciate that Kim in particular had made some valid points when he was infiltrating the police station to steal the FBI files about Sylar that made it clear they weren't just kids who needed his help. They might be young, but Claire and Kim had shown an aptitude for thinking on their feet when Sylar attacked them, and Ron had shown an admirable dedication to his friends despite his fear…

Whatever they were to him, Peter had made up his mind to protect these kids; he just needed to get them to New York, and then they could work out their next move.

He just wished that he knew how he'd been able to convince everyone to go along with his 'requests' since he met that memory-erasing guy. He could guess that it might be some kind of 'evolution' of his abilities that allowed him to tap into the powers he'd copied without the person he was copying in the area, but that didn't explain where he'd acquired the ability to basically compel others to obey his orders.

On top of being unsure where he'd acquired that ability in the first place, Peter was surprised to realise that he had actually felt differently each time he tried to actually use that power. When he'd been confronting that memory-erasing man, it had felt as though he was somehow bypassing a lengthy debate to convince the other man to answer his questions, but when he'd told those two cops to give him what he was looking for in the station, it was more like he'd reached out to plant the command in their heads rather than cutting to the end of an argument. When he'd convinced the airport staff to accept the cover identities and ignore the rat in Ron's pocket, it had felt like a strange combination of the two previous sensations, as though he was persuading them of one thing while encouraging them to ignore something else…

Lost in thought, Peter's eyes drifted shut…

He was in the middle of a New York street, cars all around him but none of them moving and nobody sitting inside. For a moment as he looked around, Peter couldn't see anybody else in the city, before he saw Claire, Kim and Ron running towards him, pausing a couple of feet away. As he continued to search his surroundings, Peter saw to his surprise that the three teens weren't the only people in his dream, which was a strange mix of familiar and not-so-familiar faces…

The man who'd introduced himself as Ando standing beside another Japanese man who looked like a younger version of Hiro (probably the 'present' version, now that Peter thought about it)…

Simone and Isaac were glaring at him from an alley…

The cops he'd 'compelled' to get the files on Sylar were standing to the side of the street…

Nathan and Mohinder were looking at him from another part of the street in a probing manner that he didn't like…

A dark-skinned man trying to protect a young boy while a blonde woman stood between them and Peter, one arm raised as though ready to fight while the other was held out as though trying to protect them…

A man with a scraggy beard and shabby clothes was laughing as he looked at Peter; for a moment Peter could swear he was looking up at the man, but then it was clear the bearded man was just on the street…

A young woman in a hoodie with a gun in one hand and her free fist raised to fight…

A figure whose appearance was a strange blur…

A dark-haired man whose face put Peter in mind of something he'd seen in an old Dr Who episode, particularly with the man's hairy hands…

A dark-clad man with a narrow face and piercing gaze that Peter wasn't sure he'd ever forget…

A man with fair hair and a round face who somehow gave an impression of great age…

Feeling a sudden heat, Peter looked down to see that his hands were glowing a brilliant gold colour, the glow spreading across the rest of his body… Kim and Claire were running towards him… Hiro, Ron and the fat cop were moving forward more cautiously… Isaac was dragging Simone away… Mohinder, Ando and the female cop didn't seem to know what to do… Nathan and that family seemed to be torn between moving towards him and getting away…

Sitting sharply up, Peter glanced anxiously around himself, only relaxing when he realised that he was still in the plane as the three teens looked at him anxiously.

"Are you… OK?" Claire looked tentatively at him.

"Just… dozed off, I guess," Peter shrugged, looking anxiously at the three teens. "Was I… is everything OK?"

"We… had a quiet flight, but you were really shaking it up there; you must've been having a serious nightmare," Kim looked anxiously at him. "Like Claire said, is everything OK?"

"It was… weird, anyway," Peter said uncertainly. "You let me fall asleep?"

"We were up in the air and you've been through a lot; KP thought you needed the break," Ron shrugged.

"That said," Kim pointed out, looking at Peter with a surprising air of authority for a teenager, "now that you've had that rest, I was thinking that we need to work out our next move pretty fast; we can't just hide away and hope this Sylar guy doesn't find us when we don't even know where he is right now…"

"I actually had an idea about that," Peter said, glancing around the plane for a moment before he looked back at the kids. "Let's just… wait until we're home, OK?"

Peter tried to ignore the way he felt so reassured when all three of the teenagers showed no objection to the way he was basically inviting them to consider his home theirs for the immediate future.

He might still not know for sure what he was going to do about the Sylar situation, but the easy faith these three had in him…

It might come across as playing to his ego, but it was inspiring in a way that Nathan had probably always tried to be but never managed to pull off properly.

It was the one loophole Noah Bennett had always hoped he'd never have to use.

Everyone in the Company was aware of the existence of the self-styled 'Team Go', of course; the concept of siblings developing abilities was obviously a popular belief, but it was surprising how diverse families could be when manifesting abilities. For all the research the Company had done into superhuman genetics, nobody could explain how Bob Bishop's ability to create gold led to his daughter being able to generate electricity. Noah himself had witnessed Nathan Petrelli flying away with no sign that he'd acquired that ability through some variation of his father's power, and it definitely had nothing to do with his mother's ability.

With all those questions to consider, the Company kept the Gough siblings on a tentative 'retainer', primarily asking the siblings to keep themselves available for tests and demonstrations of their abilities, even as it was basically an open secret that they were used for other purposes. Noah was aware of the rumours that came up whenever the Haitian was called away from him to deal with business in other parts of the Company, but he had always told himself that his partner's skills just made him uniquely suited to deal with particularly powerful or dangerous superhumans.

Now here he was, prepared to resort to those same tactics in the name of working out what had happened to his daughter. It wasn't as though he hadn't bent the rules before, but there was still a considerable difference between erasing a few memories and dispatching five people for a mission that he knew would end with him wiping their memories.

Still, if the Gough siblings could find Claire and get her home safely (and maybe work out how Kim Pierce and Ron Sinclair fit into this mess), it would hardly be the worst thing he'd had the Haitian do for him outside of their usual Company business…

Chapter Text

"So," Ron looked around the rest of the group, sitting uncertainly in Peter's apartment the day after their arrival in New York, "where do we go from here?"

"Well," Kim said, sitting forward to look around the table in a thoughtful manner, "right now, our biggest problem is that we've got no idea who 'Sylar' is or any real clue about this superhuman-hunting organisation that Claire's dad's apparently a member of, right?"

"Right…" Claire nodded thoughtfully.

"So," Kim smiled, "with that in mind, we need to find more about those people before we can do anything else."

"Which gives us something to start with, anyway," Peter pointed out, looking sympathetically over at Claire. "Sorry to bring this up, but since we know your dad has something to do with this, maybe that company he officially works for is some kind of… cover company for whatever group he works for?"

"That… makes sense," Claire nodded tentatively.

"OK," Peter continued, still looking at the young blonde with tentative regret at having to bring up such a difficult topic. "If your dad's employed by this conspiracy, maybe we can trace whoever's behind this by working out who actually owns that company?"

"Trace the guy in charge and maybe find out who's pulling the strings?" Kim smiled. "Sounds like a plan."

"And how do we do that?" Claire asked.

"I… might know someone who can help."

"Someone you don't want to talk to?"

"It's… not because she's a bad person or anything like that," Peter said, looking awkwardly at the three teenagers. "It's more that… well, I worked for her dad as he was dying, and then we… OK, 'dated' might be a strong word, but we were… involved… after he died…"

"And it didn't go well?" Claire asked, a curious expression on her face that Peter wasn't sure how to interpret.

"Things with her and her last boyfriend are… complicated," Peter shrugged, suddenly uncomfortable at the idea of talking about how things had turned out with him and Simone. "Actually, Isaac was part of the reason I was able to find you guys."

"He's got an ability too?" Ron asked with a new eager grin.

"He can paint the future."

"Huh," Ron said after a brief pause. "I can't decide if that's cool or lame."

"Painting the future could be lame?" Claire looked at Ron.

"Well, at least Dream Girl could just see the future in her dreams; what kind of power means you need tools to use it properly?" Ron asked. "I get that it's useful to know the future, but if he runs out of paint or anything he's kind of in trouble…"

"The point," Peter cut in firmly, "is that Simone inherited most of her father's business deals after he died, which means she might have the kind of contacts we need to work out who actually owns… Primatech Paper, you said?"

"That's it," Claire nodded.

"OK," Peter said in a resolute manner. "The point is that Simone mentioned she had a few business matters to sort out after her father's death, so I'm not sure exactly where she is right now, but if we go to Isaac's place he might be able to help us find where Simone is."

"Seems workable to me," Ron grinned.

"I second that," Kim affirmed, Claire nodding in agreement.

Doctor Mohinder Suresh had no idea how to react to the discovery that his father's work had something to do with the killing patterns of a serial killer. He had found it difficult enough to consider the idea that his father had been murdered for his work, but the concept that someone could take that work and use it to kill others…

He appreciated that his father couldn't have known the scale of what he was going to unleash when he came to America to conduct his research, or even that it might inspire something like this in the first place, but it was still a harrowing thought.

"I have to admit," he said as he looked between the two agents, "I'm glad the Bureau finally decided to take me seriously."

"Too many people from that list were showing up dead or missing," the woman said. "There are enough people not on the list to deter the casual investigation, but my colleague and I… we've been running a few new avenues for our current case, and we think this one's worth checking out."

"That said," her colleague observed, a wry smile on the larger man's face, "you're confirmed to have been in India or other parts of the country when some of these people died, or we might have been having a very different conversation."

"How fortunate for me, then," Mohinder observed

"Your father put this all together?" the woman asked, glancing around the apartment and indicating the map on one wall.

"Yes, he was a geneticist," Mohinder nodded. "All the people on the list share a unique genetic marker that he was able to map and track using the Human Genome Project."

"And you think… Sylar… got this list from your father before he killed him?" the woman asked, looking at the man in a manner that Mohinder couldn't entirely interpret; on the one hand, she was clearly the senior agent, but she seemed to be looking for the other man to offer her something during this interview…

"Yes," Mohinder nodded, once again wishing he'd taken his father's theories more seriously when he was alive; being able to talk to Doctor Chandra Suresh directly could have given him so much more to work with in terms of providing evidence…

"Name's clearly an alias, and without anything more to work with, we're pretty much stuck for how to find the guy," the woman continued. "We found evidence that he might have been interrupted in an attack in Texas a few days ago, but we've got nothing about where he might have gone since then."

"That said," the fat man said as he reached into his jacket, "we did find something on another name from the list. Sarah Ellis?"

"Yes," Mohinder nodded, even as he wondered why they were bringing up Miss Ellis in particular. "I tried to locate her in Los Angeles, but she wasn't at any of her known addresses, and no, I've never met her before."

"Are you sure?" the man asked, as he took out a photograph and handed it to Mohinder. Looking at the image, Mohinder was shocked to see a mug-shot of the woman he knew as Eden McCain; she had longer hair in the photo, but it was definitely Eden.

"That's Sarah Ellis?" he said. "I know her by a different name; Eden McCain. She, uh, lives across the hall right there. She's been gone for a few weeks. Is there a problem?"

"She turned up yesterday," the woman said, looking apologetically at the Indian doctor. "What was left of her, anyway."

"What?" Mohinder said.

"She was found in Lake Ramsey in Sudbury," the woman explained. "She had a gunshot wound to the head; local law enforcement called it a suicide."

Mohinder could only sit down, stunned at the news.

"The, uh… last I heard from her, she said she had something to confess to me," he said uncertainly.

"She was a friend of yours?" the man asked.

"I… I don't know what she was," Mohinder said.

"Right…" the man shook his head before he looked at the woman. "He didn't know about any of that."

"But she had to have something to do with everything we're tracking," the woman nodded, looking thoughtfully at Mohinder. "I'm not sure how this all fits together… but you're the earliest dated record we've got of Sylar's existence, and this list of your father's is the best sign we've got of what he might be looking for."

"What are you saying?" Mohinder asked.

"Doctor Suresh," the woman looked solemnly at him, "I'm Special Agent Audrey Hanson, and this is my colleague, Officer Matt Parkman; we're officially requesting your assistance on the Sylar task force."

"Really?" Mohinder looked at Agent Hanson in surprise. "There's a task force?"

"Unofficially, anyway," Agent Hanson clarified, as she looked thoughtfully at Parkman (and why was he an officer rather than an agent?) before turning back to Mohinder. "I won't say I'm totally sold on the idea of why Sylar's after these guys, but if this list gave him his targets… we might have something we can work with to track him…"

"What does it say about our lives when the guy who's our best chance of finding who we need isn't even here?" Ron asked, looking around Isaac's apartment. From Peter's tales, he had expected to find a gallery of prophetic paintings, but it was as though someone had completely emptied the place since Peter's last visit, clearing out the room of everything but a large mural on the floor. The painting in question was relatively vague, making it hard to determine the proper scale of the image it was depicting, but considering future Hiro's warning about 'save the cheerleader, save the world', Peter had more than a few worrying ideas about what was being destroyed in that blast.

Add in what he remembered about one painting showing an apparent exploding man, coupled with his recent dream about his skin burning with power, and Peter had even more worrying ideas about what was actually going to cause that explosion in the first place…

"I think…" Peter began, looking tentatively around the room for a moment before he grabbed a pad of paper that must have been left behind by whoever took Isaac's paintings, although a quick flick through the pad was enough to confirm that it was empty. Grabbing a couple of pencils from the table, Peter closed his eyes for a few moments, and then began to sketch with both hands, his eyes disturbingly blank as the others watched him work.

"That's… really creepy, right?" Ron asked, looking over at Kim and Claire as they took in Peter's suddenly blank eyes.

"Yeah…" Claire nodded, looking uncertainly at Peter as he worked, sketching two different images on the two pages in front of him, before she glanced over at Kim. "Do you think… I mean, can he see us like this?"

"I'm not sure," Kim shook her head, waving her hand in front of Peter's eyes even as he worked away at the two pictures, gaze shifting between them as he worked. "More to the point, how can he do this, anyway? I thought he said he needed to be near someone else to copy their ability?"

"Maybe being in Isaac's studio makes up for the fact that this Isaac guy isn't here himself?" Ron shrugged. "Besides, he already did that whole thing where he got that memory-erasing guy to talk to us, when I know none of us can do that… make people talk thing he was doing then…"

"So… he can do more than he thinks?" Claire looked thoughtfully at Peter. "Well… that's good, right?"

"If he can use it properly…" Kim observed.

Lost for anything better to say, the three teens just stared at Peter in silence before he took his hands away from the sketchbook, his eyes returning to normal as he displayed the images to the other three. The picture on the left-hand-side of the book showed two Japanese men- one tall and the other shorter and somewhat chubby- standing in what looked like a museum, and the right-hand one showed a bearded man standing on a street corner, wearing a dark hooded jacket with long brown hair that looked like he hadn't had a haircut for a while, a sign saying 'Giraffe' just visible on the wall behind him.

"Huh," Peter said, looking at the two drawings with raised eyebrows before he looked up at the other three. "I did these?"

"Yeah," Ron nodded. "Any ideas?"

"Well…" Peter squinted at the sketches for a moment before he nodded, holding up the two men at the museum. "The drawing style makes it hard to be sure, but I think this is Hiro and Ando."

"Hiro?" Kim asked. "As in the time-travelling guy you told us about?"

"The guy whose future self told you to save me?" Claire added.

"Yeah…" Peter nodded to the two girls before he turned to the other picture. "And this one… I don't know what it's about, but I know the location… and I think I've been dreaming about this guy…"

"Dreaming about him?"

"It's… I'm not sure if it's just something I haven't clearly tapped, but I've had a couple of dreams since this started that gave me the idea that I could fly before Nathan revealed where I got it from… and I was definitely dreaming about this guy before we got here."

"OK, so shall we check these out?" Ron grinned. "I mean, you must have done these sketches for a reason, and if you're dreaming about this guy on top of that he's got to be important to something, right?"

"…Well, I already went all the way to Texas because of a picture and a message from a time-traveller; at least now I can just walk it," Peter said, looking between the group. "OK, Claire, you and Ron get to the museum and see if you can find Ando and Hiro; it might do him some good to know that we managed to save you. Kim, you're with me; we'll look for the other guy."

"You know where he is?" Kim asked even as she and the others got to their feet.

"I recognise the street, anyway…"

The only downside about being in New York right now as far as Claire was concerned was that she was here under circumstances that didn't let her indulge her desire to be a tourist. She agreed with Peter that everything he'd done had been to keep her safe, but it was still hard to be in New York and not have time to go anywhere…

Still, even if she couldn't go into it, she was at least able to see the Empire State building from the outside, and now she had a chance to check out the Museum of Natural History; she didn't have to be an academic to appreciate the scope of what this place contained. Walking along the street, she noticed Ron sharing her enjoyment of the view around them, the two teenagers looking upwards to take in the high buildings all around them that they had each seen in such a variety of films and TV shows over the years…

The sound of two people talking in rapidly in a language that Claire vaguely recognised prompted her to turn around and look in the direction of the voices, just in time to see two men walking down a side-street, the contrasting physical states of both men making a clear impression even after Claire's brief glimpse. Grabbing Ron's arm, she ran down the street towards the two men, until she was close enough to confirm that the two men were Japanese dressed in casual clothes, the shorter man even wearing glasses.

"Hiro Nakamura?" Claire called out, looking curiously at the shorter man as he turned around to look at her.

"What?" the man asked, as he and his friend looked anxiously between Claire and Ron. "Who are-?"

"I'm Claire Bennett," Claire smiled reassuringly at him. "I… think Peter told you about me?"

"Peter Petrelli?" Hiro asked tentatively, before he smiled more encouragingly at her. "You the cheerleader?"

"That's me," Claire nodded. "And this is Ron Sinclair; he's a friend."

"Friend?" the other man looked curiously at Ron.

"Just a friend; I'm not… Claire and I… we're not like that," Ron shook his head, momentarily awkward before he looked curiously at the two Japanese men. "What are you doing here?"

"We are…" Ando began, before waving his hands uncertainly.

"We seek this!" Hiro said, pulling a rolled-up piece of paper out and unrolling it to display the image of a short figure that seemed to be Hiro, holding a sword in his hands and facing what looked like a tyrannosaurus rex.

"You're… going to fight a dinosaur… with a sword?" Claire asked. "I mean, Peter told us you could travel in time, but-"

"Sword key!" Hiro grinned, indicating the weapon in his hands in the picture. "It sword of Tazeko Kensei."

"Who?" Claire asked.

"He was a… isn't there some legend about him back in Japan?" Ron asked.

"You know?" Hiro asked, looking at Ron with a new grin.

"I had a bit of a thing about ninjas and that when I was a kid and heard a few stories about their history," Ron shrugged. "Kensei wasn't a major favourite of mine, but he came up in a few tales; he had some kind of… sacred sword that let him control his focus or something like that, right?"

"Yes!" Hiro nodded enthusiastically. "He great leader with sword!"

"And is there a reason this sword should be his?" Claire asked uncertainly as she indicated the painting.

"Legend inspire me; sword help me," Hiro explained. "Sword my sacred object; help me focus power."

"Huh." Claire exchanged a tentative glance with Ron, before they each shrugged. Neither of them had any better ideas about how to deal with the continued threat posed by Sylar, and if Hiro thought that the sword could help him use his powers…

"Have you thought about checking the museum?"

"Museum?" the two Japanese men repeated.

"Maybe it's a long shot, but Peter did a sketch of you two in the museum earlier; it's how I recognised you," Claire explained. "If… well, I don't know how Peter can paint the future in the first place, but maybe whatever gives him that kind of insight thought it was important for us to see that you'd go to the museum, so mabye there's something there that can help you?"

"Peter did sketch?" Hiro looked at her eagerly. "Like Mister Isaac?"

"Yeah," Ron nodded.

"But… Isaac gone," Ando put in. "Peter tell me… he only copy when near…"

"He seems to be getting a bit beyond that," Ron shrugged uncertainly. "We're still working out how that part of his ability actually works…"

"Who cares how he's doing it?" Claire pointed out. "The point is, if he sketched you all at the museum, maybe there's something there we should check out?"

As Peter led Kim along 26th street, he wasn't even entirely sure what they should be looking for at this point. The bearded man had been distinctive enough in the dream, but it was a different matter to look for someone in a crowded street when all they knew was that he was likely going to be in this area at some point…

"Giraffe Hotel?" Kim said, looking at the sign on the wall. "You think this is it?"

"I haven't stayed here myself, but my family have put up a few visitors here when they've been organising events and we needed more rooms," Peter explained. "It's fancy without being too expensive- Hey!"

Kim turned to look in the direction that Peter was staring, but all she could see was a group of people walking along the street, before Peter suddenly charged into the group and seemed to grab something-

"Peter!" Kim yelled, as she ran into the group, looking urgently for her suddenly-vanished friend. She heard a voice yelling about something, but when Peter's voice suddenly called out "You-!" before a loud thud, she reached out and grabbed something she couldn't seen, only to find herself looking between Peter and what appeared to be the bearded man he'd sketched earlier, the bearded man holding Peter against the wall as Kim held Peter's jacket.

"Nobody sees me!" the bearded man yelled. "Do ya hear me? Nobody sees me! I'm invisible!"

Chapter Text

"Who are you?" the bearded man yelled at Peter, his focus so completely on Peter that he apparently hadn't registered Kim yet. "How can you see me?"

"I-I-I don't know!" Peter yelled desperately. "I just do what you can do!"

The man stepped back and released his grip on Peter, letting the younger man land on his feet.

"Fantastic," the man said, tone practically heavy with sarcasm. "One of those… and who's this?"

"Kim Pierce," Kim said, still holding on to Peter's arm as she glared at the other man.

"One of those?" Peter repeated, looking at the man with new urgency. "What do you mean? You know someone else like me?"

The bearded man was just turning around when Kim reached out and grabbed him by the arm, gaze fixed coolly on their new acquaintance.

"You are not walking out on us!" she said bluntly. "Peter's been trying to work out how this works for weeks, and you're the first person we've met who might know anything useful-"

"And why should I care?" the man said, looking Kim up and down with a scornful expression she didn't really like. "And who're you to him, anyway? His bit on the side?"

"Ew!" Kim said, before she glanced over at Peter. "Sorry, that came out- it's not that you're not-"

"I get it," Peter smiled briefly at Kim before he looked back at the other man with a firmer glare. "Look, we need help; there's some psycho serial killer hunting people like us who seems to be taking his victims' abilities, and I'm pretty sure something's going to cause an explosion that could destroy most of the city-"

"Then you'd better get out of town, huh?" the shaggy man countered.

"Excuse me?" Kim glared at the man incredulously. "Peter saw you in his dream; who the Hell are you?"

"No one," the man said bitterly. "I'm the Invisible Man; I'm Claude Rains. Now get away from me; forget you ever saw me-"

"When we're the only people who can see you?" Kim countered.

"Only because you're touching him- and what do you even need my help with?" the invisible man said. "You're copying me well enough-"

"Look, I'm still trying to get a proper sense of everything I'm capable of here!" Peter protested. "Copying people when I'm right next to them is one thing, but I'm still not even sure where I got this… making people talk thing I tapped a while back, and then I had some trouble during that first fight with Sylar…"

"Hold on; you had trouble?" the man looked sharply at Peter. "As in you're still learning about this?"

"Which is why I said I need help," Peter insisted, seizing on the opportunity. "We can't just-"

"You're saying that you had trouble fighting some psycho with powers when you should have been able to match the other guy but you're still tapping into abilities you didn't know you'd copied?" the man looked at Peter with a new level of interest before turning to Kim. "Were you there when he had it easy?"

"I…" Kim paused, thinking back for a moment to realise that the man had a point; the way Peter talked about his past efforts to use his powers back in New York, and comparing it to how he'd held his own against Sylar, it seemed as though he'd genuinely had an easier time of it when he was near her. "Yeah, I was… I mean, I was with him when he used that persuasive ability he mentioned… but so what?"

"You find school easy?"

"Uh… Home Ec's tricky, but I'm pretty much straight A.s in my other subjects-"

"You particularly fast?"

"Not… I mean, I do OK in races, but it's nothing that-"

"Just got to test something," the man said, before he stepped back and gave Kim a hard shove, pushing her into the middle of the road just as a large truck came around the corner, simultaneously shoving Peter back against the wall behind him.

"Kim-!" Peter called out as he saw the young teen directly in front of the approaching truck, one hand already reaching out to try and move Kim to safety-

As soon as she saw the truck coming towards her, Kim jumped sharply upwards, literally flying towards the truck, and grabbed its front grill with the tips of her fingers. Peter could only watch in awe as Kim moved with the kind of speed they'd probably have to do in slow-motion in an action movie, vaulting herself off to the side as she scrambled around to the side of the truck and then pushed herself away from it, landing back in front of Peter as though she'd never been away.

"What the…?" Peter looked at Kim in surprise.

"I… I did that?" Kim looked at her hands and back at the still-moving truck that had just kept moving down the street; she wasn't sure if the driver would have even registered their near-miss, considering the size of that thing.

"Yeah…" Peter nodded tentatively before he looked back at Kim. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"That the invisible guy was… testing me?" Kim said, her tone just as tentative as Peter's own. "You think… I have an ability?"

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Ron looked uncertainly at Hiro as the four of them walked through the museum, trying to remain discreet. "I thought you said your powers weren't in good shape right now-"

"With sword, all fine," Hiro said with an enthusiastic smile, glancing over at a display about dinosaurs before he moved on down a corridor.

"But… explosion!" Ando looked urgently at Hiro even as he indicated Claire and Ron. "We all only have month!"

"Wait; explosion?" Claire looked urgently at Hiro. "You mean… that painting on the floor of Isaac's loft? That's actually going to happen?"

"Saw it in future," Hiro nodded. "One month from now, New York go boom unless we stop it."

"…Yeah, I'm definitely not in favour of that," Claire nodded, before opening the map she'd picked up at the entrance and looking over it. "OK, so if we're here, then the Japanese exhibit should be… this way."

It took the small group a few minutes to make their way through the museum properly, each of them pausing at least once to take a brief look at another exhibit, such as the dinosaur room, but eventually Hiro stopped in front of a suit of black Japanese armour, set in one of several glass cases with similar suits, the short man's attention captured by the black-handled sword on the figure's back with a strange gold symbol on the hilt.

"OK," Ron nodded tentatively as he glanced around the room. "Security's a bit tight; I'm not exactly comfortable with the idea of breaking into a glass box in the middle of a public museum…"

"On any level," Claire added. "I didn't exactly leave home to become a criminal."

"If I not have powers… museum explode," Hiro said, keeping his voice low as he looked at the case. "Good deal."

"Stealing?" Ando said.

"I'm really not comfortable with…" Claire began, before she sighed and shook her head. "God, this is such a mess."

"One weapon; save world," Hiro said firmly.

"Eh," Ron shrugged. "Look at it this way; we're getting that sword out there to do what it was meant to do."

Lost for better options, Ron, Claire and Ando moved around to carefully take up position around the room, as Hiro stood in front of the case. Glancing back, Ron saw him close his eyes and concentrate, but he opened his eyes after a few seconds and shook his head apologetically as Ando looked anxiously at him. Hiro squeezed his eyes tightly shut as he pressed a hand against the case, and then…

Ron wasn't sure exactly what happened after that. He was fairly sure it wasn't exactly stopping time, as he could just about see Hiro moving, but the short man was… he didn't know how it worked, but it was like Hiro was moving really fast. Ron just had time to work out that Hiro must have slowed time down for some reason when the case door opened and the blur that seemed to be Hiro had moved away from the case. As the alarms started to blare around them, Ron moved quickly out of the exhibition wing with Claire and Ando, heading down the stairs and out of the museum as quickly as possible. As soon as they were outside the building, Ron and Claire followed Ando as he ran for Hiro, who was standing in a car park off to the side of the museum and panting.

"You got it?" Claire asked Hiro, the Japanese man grinning eagerly as he nodded at the blonde girl before he exchanged hurried words with Ando. Glancing back at the museum, Hiro raised his new sword in a dramatic manner, but his mood faltered when he drew the weapon out of the scabbard and revealed that it was just a short wooden 'stick' with a small metal plate on one side.

"Is that a fake?" Ron looked anxiously between the weapon and their new friend.

"Linderman?" Hiro said, looking uncertainly at the plate on the fake sword before his shoulders slumped in frustration. Shaking his head, he muttered something in Japanese and turned back towards the museum, leaving Claire and Ron to look over at Ando.

"He take it back," Ando explained solemnly.

"Right," Claire nodded thankfully at Ando. "So much for the sword being his… whatever…"

"But… but how can I have any kind of ability?" Kim looked incredulously at Peter as they walked along the street. "I mean, time travel and painting the future and flight and telekinesis all make- I mean, they're dramatic and obvious, but that was… I was just… couldn't it just be adrenaline or something?"

"No," Peter shook his head, keeping his voice low as he looked around to make sure nobody was listening in, his words carefully chosen as though he was still working it all out himself. "I may have studied medicine only up to a point, but I still picked up a bit about how the body copes in dangerous situations. Maybe you could duck out of the way of that truck if you had enough notice, and I'm not going to deny that you're in great shape, but there's no way you could be psychologically capable of avoiding that truck the way you did if you didn't have some kind of ability."

"Psychologically capable?"

"You saw the truck, managed to grab it without getting hurt while it was moving and you were starting from a standing position, and jumped off it before it got too far away from me," Peter explained. "Physically you're obviously capable of it, but from a few of the more advanced books I read… well, I don't think the regular human brain's capable of processing everything you'd need to pull that off in the time you had to actually do it."

"Point…" Kim said, nodding thoughtfully for a moment. "Actually, if we're thinking of that… when Sylar tossed me and Claire away while he was killing Jackie, I managed to stop myself actually hitting the wall…"

"You stopped yourself hitting the wall?"

"I did this whole… I spun around mid-air and basically kicked myself away before I hit it and broke my neck…" Kim said, shaking her head as she realised how implausible it was when she actually stopped to think about it. "But… why would Mr Raines be asking about me because-?"

"No, that part… makes sense," Peter cut her off. "Think about it; he was asking about what I could do and then he started asking you questions, right?"

"Right… so?"

"Well, I'm not sure how that stuff about your school performance ties into anything, but we've seen enough to be sure that, whatever your ability actually is, you seem to just… know how to survive threatening situations… which means that when I'm near you…"

"You're copying my ability," Kim finished for Peter, smiling at her friend in new understanding. "And when you're copying me, my whole… how to stay alive thing is helping you basically 'fill in the blanks' for your own ability?"

"Makes sense, right?" Peter smiled at her. "That's why I'm doing so much better when I'm near you then when I'm alone; when I'm copying your ability, it basically makes it easier for me to tap my own… well, it's like my body knows what I can do better than when it's just me."

"Whoa…" Kim said, looking at Peter with a new warm smile. "So… as long as we're together…"

Her smile faltered. "That's… not really practical, is it?"

"No," Peter shook his head. "Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the help, but this way… you're basically my training wheels, Kim; I can't expect to rely on you to be there for me all the time."

"Yeah, I get that," Kim nodded in grim understanding. She might like to think of herself as being capable, but in practical terms, there was no way she and Peter could stay together for the rest of their lives just so that he could always be at his best.

It wasn't that Peter was a bad guy or anything, but she just… well, she was going to want her own life away from him at some point, right?

"OK, so what do we do now?"

"What we did last time," Peter smiled, reaching into his pocket and pulling out the sketchbook he'd used earlier. "See if we can find him."

"Now?"

"Well, we're pretty sure I'm in trouble if I can't work out what to do next, and we both agree you can't spend your life being my training wheels; we already know this way worked once, so there's no harm trying it again, right?"

"Worth a shot, anyway," Kim nodded as Peter pulled a pencil out of the same pocket, walked up to a nearby wall, closed his eyes, and began to sketch. For a moment Kim was startled when he seemed to vanish, but only needed a moment to think on it before she walked up to where he'd been and held out a hand to grab Peter's jacket, smiling as he came back into view, still sketching away in the book. A few moments later, Peter's eyes lost their blank state and he glanced at his latest work.

"You know where we're going?" Kim looked curiously at her friend.

"I've got an idea," Peter said, as he turned the book around to show the pictures to Kim, one of them showing Claude on a rooftop with various buildings in the background. "It's this other picture that's worrying me."

Taking in the other half of the sketch, which showed a glowing humanoid figure, Kim had to admit that it didn't inspire a great deal of confidence.

Sheila Gogh had no idea how she let herself get dragged into these things.

She appreciated that she and her siblings had a standing arrangement with this company to explore what their abilities were capable of, and she certainly wasn't complaining about how they'd taught her to channel her powers to enhance her strength rather than just shooting fireballs, but she still resented being sent out like this. Her brothers might enjoy getting the chance to go out and take down a few 'criminals', but she'd prefer it if she felt like she had some kind of control, rather than just dealing with whatever the people at Primatech told her to do.

Still, at least the current task was a bit more interesting than being treated like a blunt instrument who could only hit things. Tracking a missing teenage girl was fairly low-key, but Bennett had suggested that he was keeping a few things about the girl quiet even from his own superiors, which had given Sheila more reason to be interested in what she was digging up. They'd already managed to track down school records that reported a couple of other students had 'gone missing', and while a check revealed that the kids' parents had apparently reported their absence, the fact that these two were in Claire Bennet's year at school raised a few possibilities for Sheila…

Seriously, why am I letting myself get caught up in this? I break bones, I don't crack cases; this isn't really my area!

The problem was that she knew her brothers would take this kind of assignment more seriously and end up making some kind of mess in the process; at least if she was able to keep an eye on everything, she could keep them on the right track. The 'Wegos' (as Henry in particular liked to call the twins) had managed to make a few quick rounds to question the people at the big game to confirm that nobody had seen the Bennett girl since she went into the changing rooms, at about the time when Sylar (whoever he was) had gone after that Wilcox girl, but there was no clear reason to believe that she'd been another of the psycho's victims. Michael had run a few online searches and managed to find some last-minute flights purchased on that night that might include groups matching Bennett's description. There were apparently a couple of other students missing, but even Henry had to concede that they couldn't be certain if three students going missing on the same evening was just a freaky coincidence, as much as he wanted things to tie together that easily.

Still…

She still felt out of her depth, but the more she dug into this mess, the more she had to wonder what she'd actually find when Claire Bennett turned up again. The man might say that he was just looking for his daughter, but he'd already missed an assignment to meet up with a 'Doctor Suresh' who'd apparently been doing some digging into people with abilities.

This particular 'case' might not be something Sheila liked doing normally, but there was still something about this situation that kept on inspiring her interest. Why would Claire Bennett have run away from her family so suddenly… and if Michael and Henry were right, why would Bennett have run off with two other students that Bennett couldn't remember even visiting her house before Homecoming?

Walking onto the roof of a building, Kim chose not to question how Peter had been able to get inside something this big that easily, particularly not when he placed a hand on her shoulder and she could suddenly see Claude standing by a battered pigeon-coop in the middle of a seemingly abandoned balcony level (Kim chose to assume nobody rich enough to own a place like this would leave it in that kind of state).

"I told you not to follow me," Claude said even as he kept his head in the coop.

"Look," Peter looked indignantly at Claude, "right now, the entire city is in danger from some kind of explosion in the future, we have a super-powered serial killer after people like us-"

"Then you'd better leave town," Claude cut him off.

"No," Kim said firmly, even as she took care not to lose contact with Peter; she didn't want to embarrass herself and start talking to thin air. "We're not just going to leave the whole city of New York to get blown up because you say we shouldn't be bothered!"

"Look, I know this building," Peter said. "I took care of the man who owned it before his death-"

"Should that matter to me?" Claude countered.

"You don't think that's a bit strange?" Kim protested. "Peter works right next door to the place where you keep your birds?"

"I don't keep anything," Claude corrected eve as he opened one of the doors on the other side. "I let 'em out once a day, they come back. Sounds like free will to me."

"We're not here for a philosophical debate," Kim said firmly. "Look, what I can do… I'm basically a survivor, right? I'm helping Peter use his abilities because when he copies my ability it helps his 'fill in the blanks'?"

"Seems like you're doing pretty well without me-"

"But it's not practical," Peter said. "Kim can't just be my training wheels for the rest of her life; I need to learn how to control this."

"What are you talking about?" the invisible man said as he crouched down to open another door. "It can't be controlled."

"There has to be some way," Peter said. "If we don't, New York explodes, OK? I explode."

"An exploding man?" Claude looked sceptically at him. "Where'd you get that idea?"

"Things coming together," Kim waved a dismissive hand. "The point is we think Peter's been focusing on you for a reason; maybe you're the one who has to teach him how to stop this?"

"There's no such thing," Claude said as he closed the coop door and looked up at Peter. "No teaching; no Sunday school for the special. What I can do, you can't learn. You wake up in the morning, it's there. If you've got thin soup, then that's your supper. Sorry, mate; that's the way it is."

"We're trying not to die," Peter said, grabbing Claude by the arm as the other man moved to walk away. "There has to be something you can do-"

Claude cut Peter off by turning to grab him by the shirt, glaring warningly between Peter and Kim.

"I could just kill you both myself and solve that problem right now," the invisible man said bitterly. "Maybe that's why you dreamt me."

With those words, the man shoved Peter away from him and turned around. "Don't bother looking for me. However you did it this time, I'm not going to stick around here much longer."

As the invisible man vanished from view again even before he reached the door, Peter and Kim could only exchange grim glances.

No matter what they wanted to believe about Claude's role in their lives, they couldn't ignore the fact that he clearly didn't want to help them, which meant that even if they managed to find him again they probably wouldn't have any more luck getting him to help…

Chapter Text

When Simone walked into Isaac's loft, she wasn't sure what she'd been expecting to find. She'd spent the last couple of days trying Isaac's phone and getting nothing, and she almost hadn't dared to try and get in touch with Peter because she wasn't sure what she wanted to hear from him, but ever since she'd seen that theft in the mall, she felt that she had to do something…

"Hello?"

Simone was so shocked to hear someone talking to her in the loft that she almost walked into one of the railings around the loft. Coming to an abrupt halt, she assessed the group of people standing before her, which consisted of two Japanese men and a couple of blonde teenagers, all of whom were looking at her in surprise.

"Uh… hi?" she said tentatively.

"Hi," the blonde girl replied. "Are you… a friend of Peter's?"

"Peter?" Simone repeated in surprise. "Peter Petrelli?"

"That's the guy!" the young man grinned, before he looked over at the others. "That is Peter's surname, right?"

The chubbier Japanese man nodded enthusiastically at him.

"You're… why are you looking for Peter in Isaac's loft?" Simone asked.

"Well, we were looking for Isaac earlier and he wasn't in, but we all had some stuff to do, so we'd arranged to meet up back here once… well, once we'd done it," the girl explained. Her awkward expression put Simone in mind of some of her father's old business associates, on the few meetings that she'd been allowed to sit in on, when the other party had wanted to tell her father something they weren't comfortable revealing to him for some reason.

Actually, now that she looked at the girl properly…

"Hold on… you're the cheerleader, aren't you?" she asked tentatively. "The one Peter thought he had to save?"

"Hey!" the blond boy said indignantly. "He did save her!"

"Peter Petrelli hero!" the chubbier Japanese man nodded eagerly. "He great man… he Superman!"

"Right…" Simone said uncertainly before she looked at the blonde girl; she'd work out what that guy meant about comparing Peter to Superman later. "So… what's your name?"

"Claire Bennett," the girl replied. "This is Ron Sinclair, and these two are Hiro and Ando."

"Hey!" Ron said indignantly. "Don't forget Rufus!"

"Ruf-?" Simone began, before Ron reached into his pocket and pulled out a small pink thing that put Simone in mind of a hairless rat.

"Rufus," Ron explained. "He's a naked mole rat; KP thinks he was some kind of research subject before he broke out of a lab."

"Right…" Simone said, deciding not to question why a young man had a pet naked mole rat (was that actually a real thing?) in his pocket before she turned to the Japanese men. "So, Hiro and Ando… what are your full names?"

"Nakamura and Masahashi," Hiro answered, indicating himself and his friend with an eager smile before his expression became more solemn. "We seeking sword-"

"Hold on," Simone held up a hand as she looked urgently at the two older men. "Hiro Nakamura? Ando Masahashi? Is this some kind of Punk'd bit?"

"Punk'd?" Hiro repeated in confusion.

"This help?" Ando said as he pulled a comic book, titled 9th Wonders, out of a backpack, and opened it to reveal a six-panel spread of Hiro concentrating on something, followed by him yelling something out in the middle of what looked like Times Square.

"Whoa, you guys are in a comic book?" Ron grinned at the other two before his expression faltered. "I can't decide if that's cool or creepy."

"You had this in your bag?" Claire asked as she looked over Ando's shoulder to read the comic herself.

"Mr Isaac gave us," Hiro grinned as he took the book from Ando and showed it to Simone. "We met him earlier; he send us here while he paints."

"So… this is all you?" Simone said, staring uncertainly at the comic. She certainly recognised Isaac's artistic style, and there was a similarity between the people in the comic and the young men in front of her. "Isaac mentioned you once or twice when I was looking over his stuff, but… you're real?"

"Yes," Hiro said, flicking back through a couple of pages to indicate earlier parts of the story. "I worked there, at Yamagato and we fly here, and w-we drive that car everywhere. Blue Nissan Versa. It parked nearby. I'm just like Mr. Isaac draw me… except my face not so round."

"And we looking for this sword," Ando added, opening the tube Hiro was wearing on his back and pulling out a large piece of paper, which he unfolded to reveal a sketch of what seemed to be Hiro wielding a sword against a Tyrannosaurus Rex.

"The sword," Simone repeated, shaking her head with a bemused smile. "The world is going insane, so I might as well just quit fighting it; Isaac paints the future, you need a sword, and saving you saved the world… why is that, anyway?"

"She heals," Ron explained. "From everything."

"Literally," Claire commented. "Ron and I started hanging out when his friend pulled a tree branch out of my head, and I've even managed to put my own head back on straight after someone broke my neck."

"Uh… right," Simone looked uncertainly at the younger woman. "That's… cool?"

"Not when we're dealing with a guy who we're pretty sure is stealing powers from other people and almost made Claire here his next victim," Ron said with a bitter edge to his voice.

"Which is what we think Peter had to save me from," Claire finished.

"Ah," Simone said tentatively.

"And now we stop explosion," Hiro added.

"Explosion?" Simone looked anxiously at him.

"Just… well, we have a few different sources that tell us there's going to be some kind of big problem coming up in the future, and Hiro's pretty sure he needs to have this sword to help him get proper control of his powers," Ron explained with a brief shrug. "We've worked out that the sword he's looking for is owned by some guy called 'Linderman', but we're pretty much-"

"Linderman?" Simone looked at them with a new sense of confidence. "As in Daniel Linderman?"

"We didn't exactly get a first name-" Claire began.

"But who is that guy?" Ron asked.

"A client of mine," Simone explained with an incredulous grin. "Huge collector; he buys every painting of Isaac's that he can. If you think he's got the sword, I can get you to where he's likely to keep it."

"Where that?" Ando asked.

"Vegas," Simone grinned. "Get your car together; you're going back."

"To Vegas?" Ron said, following up Simone's grin with his own as he looked at the two Japanese men. "Can I come?"

"Time travel," Audrey repeated, looking at Mohinder with every bit of self-restraint she'd learned in her career, as the three of them sat around Mohinder's table. "Someone can actually travel in time because of these… abilities your dad wrote about?"

"I will stress that I'm basing this purely on second-hand evidence, but… looking back… I have no reason to believe that the man was lying to me," Mohinder replied; there was a slightly shameful edge to his manner as he spoke, but he didn't give Audrey the impression that he was lying. "I don't have exact details, but it's something to consider, certainly."

"What kind of… other abilities are we talking about here?" Matt looked curiously at Mohinder. "I mean, you've heard of a guy who can travel in time; what else is there?"

"That depends," Mohinder looked at Matt with a slight smile. "What can you do?"

"Me?"

"Well, I've heard of a man who can fly, a man who can paint the future, and based on the crime scene reports you've shown me at least one of our victims likely had the ability to generate intense cold, but what can you do yourself?"

"What makes you think-?" Audrey began.

"The fact that he's on this task force to start with," Mohinder observed. "No offence, Officer Parkman, but I did some reading, and while your record isn't bad, it doesn't show any sign that you had a more conventional insight that would justify your presence here, so what can you do?"

"…He's a telepath," Audrey said.

"Audrey…" Matt looked over at her.

"Hey, if he's going to be on the team, we might as well start being honest."

"Telepathy?" Mohinder looked at Matt with new interest. "Fascinating…"

"Up to a point," Matt shook his head in grim resignation. "I'm still working on actually controlling anything to get more than whatever everyone's thinking right now, and that's before you start on how I can't work out how to turn it off…"

"Ah," Mohinder said. "My condolences."

"…Thanks," Matt said, sighing in frustration as he bent his head over the table. "It's had its uses, but we're still working on finding an actual lead on this Sylar guy…"

He sighed again in exasperation, prompting a sympathetic look from Audrey. She'd picked up enough in the rare moments when Parkman talked about his private life to establish that his marriage was having trouble even before he started helping her with the current case, but the best she could do to help that was make it clear to his official superiors that he was proving to be a useful asset to her current investigation.

It was a small step, but at least when he next went home he'd be able to confirm he was making a good impression…

A knocking on the door drew Audrey's attention from her current thoughts. The agent looked curiously at the doctor, but when he shrugged uncertainly, she got up and walked over to the door, opening it to reveal an unfamiliar man in a smart fawn suit.

"Hello," she said briefly.

"Hello," the man replied. "I'm looking for Doctor Suresh; is he in?"

"Doctor?" Audrey turned back to look at her new colleague.

"Yes?" Mohinder said, standing up to join Audrey at the door. "Nathan Petrelli, correct?"

"You yelled at my car a couple of weeks back," Petrelli observed, before looking at Audrey. "And who is this?"

"Special Agent Audrey Hanson," Audrey replied, studying the man for a moment before deciding that the doctor deserved at least some kind of cover story. "I'm with the FBI; Doctor Suresh is assisting me with a case."

"Really?" Petrelli looked between them in surprise before his gaze moved to Matt. "And you are?"

"Matt Parkman," the cop confirmed. "I'm… working on the case too."

"I… see," Petrelli said, before looking back at Mohinder. "Well, if you're busy, I'm… sorry to bother you, but I need to talk with you about… my brother; I don't suppose you've seen him"

"No," Mohinder replied. "Should I have?"

"He's been… strange… ever since you spoke with him, and the last I heard of him he was… taking a very unusual trip," Petrelli said, looking uncertainly at Matt and Audrey for a moment before focusing back on the Indian doctor. "Could you explain… what the hell's happening to him?"

"In what sense?" Mohinder asked, looking briefly at Audrey and Matt before he turned back to Nathan. "And if this is about Peter's abilities, I should mention that these two are aware of those details; the case I'm consulting with actually relates to the topic."

"It does?" Petrelli looked at Audrey with new concern. "How does-?"

"I can't discuss information relating to ongoing investigations," Audrey cut the man off. "If your brother's got something to do with this case, what exactly do you want Doctor Suresh for?"

"Peter… he's not been himself," Petrelli said, looking uncertainly at the others before deciding to focus on Mohinder. "If you know anything about his condition, would you be able to fix it?"

"Hold on; 'fix it'?" Matt stood up to glare at Nathan. "You came here to ask Doctor Suresh about 'fixing' your brother because he has something other people don't? Because he isn't like other people?"

"This is for his own good-"

"To make him like everyone else?" Matt interrupted. "You know what that reminds me of? Those jerks who act like it's OK to beat up the guys they saw coming out of a gay bar."

"What?" Petrelli looked at Matt in what at least looked to Audrey like genuine indignation. "I don't want to hurt my brother-"

"You just want to make him feel like there's something wrong with what he is," Matt cut him off. "I'm not saying these abilities are always easy, but the way you're… does it even matter to you what your brother can do, or are you just concerned about the fact that he isn't like everyone else?"

"Easy, Parkman," Audrey said, deciding to maintain a more professional appearance before turning back to Petrelli, even as she privately wondered how her life had reached the stage where she was defending someone's right to be capable of weird crap. "That said, my partner's got a point; if you have some kind of issue with your brother just having abilities in the first place, I'm not going to help you try and 'fix' him like some kind of 'scare 'em straight' camp."

"And… I'm not going to go that far," Mohinder looked at Petrelli, his initially tentative expression becoming more firm as he addressed the other man. "If your brother comes to me on his own accord to ask for help, I will see what I can do to help him control his abilities, but I'm not going to try and… force him to become something just because you don't like it."

Petrelli looked around the room for a moment, but soon nodded at them with a slight curl to his mouth that Audrey didn't like before he walked back out the door.

"OK," Audrey turned to look at Mohinder, "thanks for not going into detail there, but is that guy going to be a problem?"

"Considering that he has shown no signs that he's manifested yet, unlikely."

"Manifested?" Matt looked at Mohinder in surprise. "He's on this list?"

"And his brother Peter," Mohinder nodded. "Peter has… well, even he wasn't sure what he could do exactly, but Nathan Petrelli appears to have shown no sign of anything yet."

"Should we keep an eye on him?"

"Unlikely," Mohinder shook his head. "Based on Sylar's targets so far, not only is he some distance from New York, but with Petrelli's current campaign for election, I feel that he would be too high-profile."

"He's trying to get elected?" Matt looked at Mohinder in surprise.

"Makes sense on the Sylar front, anyway," Audrey nodded; she vaguely remembered hearing 'Petrelli' somewhere, but she didn't pay much attention to local politics if they didn't impact her work. "Sylar's always gone after low-key targets so far, like a family at home or a waitress at a diner; whatever he can do, not sure he's ready to face the kind of heat he'd get for going after a senatorial candidate."

"Quite," Mohinder nodded. "And with Peter also apparently off the radar, at least we can rule out a couple of people as Sylar's likely next targets…"

"OK," Kim said, as she paced uncertainly around Peter's apartment (the place was surprisingly large for a man who had confirmed he was between jobs, but she guessed that was more of a family matter rather than him having some nest egg he'd used up already). "If Mr Invisible's not an option, what's our next call? We try and… wean you off me?"

"You're not a drug I'm addicted to, Kim, and stop acting like-" Peter began, before he cut himself off with a sigh. "Sorry; I just… I know that you've been through a lot the last few days yourself, and I do appreciate the help, but it's just… God, I don't know."

Peter groaned as he sat down on the couch, looking up at the ceiling in exasperation. "We need some kind of target beyond 'stop this explosion', and our best lead just isn't giving us anything…"

The sound of a door opening prompted Peter to stand up, Kim falling into a cautious defensive position beside him as another man walked into the room. Kim quickly worked out that she was looking at the brother Peter had mentioned- the resemblance was slight, but how many people would just walk into Peter's apartment like that if they weren't close to him already?- but that left the question of what he was doing here.

"You haven't been answering your phone," Nathan said, looking at Peter with restrained surprise. "I've been looking for you for days… and who the hell is this?"

"Kim," Kim replied, already certain this man wasn't getting her surname any time soon; judging by the glare he gave her, Kim got the impression he was already blaming her for something.

"She's a friend," Peter said simply, moving carefully to a position where Kim was behind him and away from Nathan. "What are you doing here?"

"Trying to help you."

"How?" Peter said, Kim keeping herself ready for whatever the older man might be about to suggest.

"I'm… trying to talk with Doctor Suresh," Nathan explained (to his credit, he at least seemed slightly awkward about what he was saying). "He might be able to work out a way of curing-"

"'Curing'?" Kim cut Nathan off with a cool glare, her low opinion of Peter's brother falling significantly further. "You're going to 'cure' Peter of being able to copy other peoples' abilities? And what, if you can 'cure' him you'll find a way to 'cure' others from their own dangerous abilities? Is this at least about trying to help him, or is this just about saving your own reputation to be sure you don't… screw up your own campaign because of some kind of anti-mutant crap?"

"Anti-mutant?" Nathan repeated.

"You can fly and you've never bothered to read X-Men?"

"You told her?" Nathan glared at Peter.

"It came up after I helped to save her friend, and we are not making this about Kim," Peter countered. "We're working on something-"

"And how long is that going to take?"

"Longer if you keep stepping in and acting like Peter's some idiot kid who needs you to hold his hand everywhere," Kim retorted.

"What Peter does could be dangerous; if I can find the right doctors, maybe he'll be able to fix this-"

"Yeah, 'cure', 'fix', 'mend'; I'm hearing a lot of terms that I really don't like," Kim cut Nathan off with a bitter glare, giving Peter an apologetic glance for taking over the argument before she turned her attention back to Nathan. "You know, whatever else Peter is, I'm not saying his abilities don't have problems, but that's just what he is; acting like you can 'fix' him is just… I mean, it sounds to me a lot like the idea of getting someone to 'pray the gay away'."

"I'm not going to let Peter ruin his life-"

"I'm right here and I can speak for myself, Nathan," Peter glared at his brother. "And I'm not going to let myself be some damn guinea pig when I've got other things to worry about."

"You can't just run off, Peter."

"What are you going to do, call the cops on me?" Peter retorted.

"I could have my mentally ill brother detained for his own safety."

"You what?" Kim joined Peter in glaring at Nathan.

"I get that you think you're helping, but this isn't the kind of situation you can just fix," Peter said, his tone a cool firm one that Kim couldn't recall him ever showing before. "And we're getting out of here."

Grabbing Kim's arm, Peter ran towards the kitchen, only to be taken by surprise when he was pulled to the side by another figure. He was about to fight the new attacker off when he turned around and realised that he had been grabbed by Claude, who placed an urgent hand over his mouth while shooting a glare at Kim, who was still holding onto Peter's arm. For a few moments the three stayed in silence as Nathan ran through the apartment, looking uncertainly out of the window before he moved back out of the apartment, leaving the trio to exchange uncertain looks for a few moments before Claude stepped away from them.

"He's gone," the invisible man said, nodding at the other two as he walked up to Peter's fridge.

"Thanks," Peter said, deciding to say nothing as the other man took a bottle out of the fridge and twisted the cap off. "Help yourself."

"This your place?" Claude asked as he indicated an area that seemed to be a library.

"Yeah," Peter said.

"Guy with family connections like yours could do a lot better," Claude mused.

"Left the family business," Peter replied. "I'm a nurse now."

"Nurse who's an empath; very cute," Claude said as he studied the beer in his hand.

"Empath?" Kim repeated. "Isn't that some whole thing about sensing emotions from Star Trek?"

"One version," Claude nodded. "This one just means he meets people and copies 'em if they do somethin' interestin'."

"And what exactly am I?" Kim asked.

"Best term is natural survivalist; you automatically learn everythin' you need to know to keep yourself alive."

"Really?" Kim looked uncertainly between Claude and Peter.

"Well… that makes sense," Peter nodded as he looked at her. "It's like we guessed; you automatically know how to stay alive in trouble, and when I'm near you, your ability helps me just… know how to use my own abilities so that they can keep me alive."

"Another part of the whole gig; when she's in danger, fight-or-flight response goes through the roof."

"Right; good to know…" Kim nodded, before looking tentatively over at Claude. "So, that… I mean, I guess it explains why you were asking about my marks in class, but if I'm meant to be able to learn everything, why do I have trouble with Home Ec.?"

"Trade-off," Claude shrugged as he took another sip of his beer. "You've got a whole bunch of crap brewin' in your head all at once, some things just get left to the side because you don't need them as much."

"I don't need Home Economics?" Kim shook her head in confusion. "Geography and English are considered more essential to my survival than knowing how to cook?"

"Could be useful for you to be able to work out where you are with some knowledge of geography, and English gives you various ideas about how people tick that could help you talk your way out of a crisis, but seriously, when do you need to know how to cook?" Claude pointed out. "Either you're here in the city and you can get a half-decent meal with a phone call or a quick trip to the supermarket, or you're out in the wild and have to focus on just finding some kind of animal or plant you're fairly sure won't kill you."

"…OK," Kim nodded once again. "That's… a gross way to look at it, but I get it."

"And talking of getting things, maybe you could clear up what you're doing here?" Peter said, looking impatiently at Claude. "Considering that you're the one who said we shouldn't look for you any more?"

"Yeah, well," Claude said as he examined an old inhaler on a shelf before turning back to Peter. "I'm not very much of a people person, but I'm certain I'm not gonna let you kill 'em all. You seem pretty sure about that pending apocalypse of yours."

"Unless we can stop it," Peter affirmed.

"Without her?"

"We're already agreed that me being his 'training wheels' for the rest of our lives isn't really an option," Kim said, exchanging a brief glance with Peter to reassure each other that they weren't doing this because they didn't like each other's company. "If you don't want me here while you're training Peter… I'll leave."

"You're going to be going through a lot," Claude observed with a slightly mocking smile. "You might want to reconsider dying; hell of a lot easier."

"I can handle it," Peter said firmly.

"You realise that if this is goin' to work, she can't stick around?" Claude indicated Kim as he finished the beer.

"We get that," Kim nodded. "Just… drop me off, let us stay in touch, and then you can… get on with it."

"Fair enough," Claude nodded as he indicated the door. "Come on; I'll steal us a cab and we can get on with this."

It wasn't the most ringing endorsement in Peter, but at least it was a step in the right direction in terms of helping Peter get a better handle on his abilities.

Chapter Text

"You're going to Vegas?" Kim stared incredulously at Ron.

"Hey, Hiro and Ando are going to need someone to help them talk with people while they're over there," Ron shrugged as he waved his hands around the empty loft, Claire having left to do some quick shopping with Simone while Hiro and Ando prepared for their next trip. "C'mon, KP, you've got to admit that I'm not really helping anyone right now-"

"We all want you here, Ron; do you really think Peter couldn't have made you stay behind if he thought you…" Kim began, before she shook her head and smiled slightly at her friend. "OK, that doesn't really work; we both know Peter's not that big of a jerk, even if his brother's a dick."

"Dick?" Ron looked at her with a teasing smile.

"The man's trying to 'cure' Peter of his ability because he's worried about how that might make him look bad; I think 'dick' is completely appropriate."

Kim knew on some level that this talk was just her and Ron's attempt to avoid facing the reality of the situation, but when they were about to be parted for the first time in as long as Kim could remember- apart from that summer camp Ron had been on a few years back- she felt that they were entitled to avoid thinking about the scale of what they were about to do. She appreciated that Ron wanted to find some way to contribute to the current situation, but that didn't make it easy for her to accept that her friend wanted to leave her in the middle of this crisis. She and Ron had experienced the ups and downs anyone would expect of such an unconventional friendship as they realised how they better fit into certain social circles in school, but they'd always been sure that the other would be there for them.

The idea of facing a difficult situation where Ron wouldn't be there for her…

"Look, KP," Ron smiled at her in understanding, "it's gonna suck being away from you, but I just… I need to prove myself here even if you and Peter don't think I need to. I mean, Ando's stuck with Hiro even though he can't do anything himself; we've still got a couple of weeks before that explosion Hiro told us about, so maybe spending them with them will help me work out what I can do in this."

Kim wished that she could tell Ron that she had faith in him, but she had to appreciate that Ron had a point; he was stuck in the middle of a situation where it seemed as though everyone else around him had some kind of ability even before she learned that she could do something. Considering that he'd already had an interest in the guy who owned the sword Hiro was looking for, at least if Ron went off with Hiro he'd be doing something he enjoyed, and he made a valid point that he might be useful as a more 'local' face than the other two at the very least.

"I… I get it, Ron," she smiled tentatively at him at last, wanting to show her support despite her regret. "It's… I mean, I'll miss you, but… well, Claire and I can probably find something to do…"

"That's the spirit, KP," Ron grinned at her as he gave her a thumbs-up. "You hold down the fort here and we'll be back with a time-travelling ass-kicker in a few days, or maybe even minutes."

"No harm in hoping, right?" Kim grinned back at Ron, once again envious at her friend's ability to focus on the positives regardless of the challenges they had to overcome in the process. "Where are Hiro and Ando anyway?"

"Just waiting outside in their car; Simone's sorting out the travel details, but they thought it'd be best if we stayed low-down until we know more about what we're dealing with here," Ron explained.

"That makes- hold on, they're already ready to leave?"

"Well, they told me they were just going to meet Simone at the shops to pick up the food, but then… I wanted to say 'bye' before I just headed off…" Ron said, shrugging awkwardly before Kim leaned over to give him a reassuring hug.

"It's fine, Ron," she grinned at him; Ron could be impulsive, but she'd never call him insensitive. "You know what you've got to do, so get going and get Hiro that sword."

"Badical, KP!" Ron returned her grin, briefly patting his pocket to confirm that Rufus was in it before he turned and ran out of the loft, heading down the stairs. Walking over to lean against the wall, Kim looked out of the window with a wistful smile as her friend got into the car with the two Japanese men, but her smile faltered as she looked back around the now-empty loft.

It wasn't as though she and Ron hadn't spent time apart before, after all; it was just that this was the first time she'd been so completely cut off from everyone she knew. Claire was a good friend so far, but Kim hadn't exactly spent much time with her before everything happened, and now Peter had gone off to train…

She felt like she was losing basically everyone she had known before this mess started, and on top of all that, Kim couldn't even risk calling her parents to assure them that she was safe. Unlike with Claire's dad, Kim had no reason to believe that either of her parents were involved in that company the mind-erasing guy had told them about, but at the same time she didn't want to put them at risk by getting in touch with them. If this company could somehow track superhumans, she had to assume that they could track regular communications like phones and e-mails, which meant that they could find her and Claire if she got in touch with her parents.

She knew that it was the only way to keep her family safe, but she really hated having to keep them in the dark; the moment she knew it was safe, she was going to tell them everything…

Shaking her head to force the nostalgia aside, Kim sat down to think about her next move; so long as she and Claire were staying discreet, they shouldn't have to worry about that Sylar guy finding them if he showed up again, but that still left the question of that explosion Hiro had told Peter about.

If the explosion is what we're focusing on right now, the main question is if we're dealing with a bomb someone planted as part of some bigger agenda, some superhuman with uncontrollable abilities who just went off in the wrong place at the wrong time, or something in between…?

Looking at the new material she had been provided for her case, Audrey didn't know if she should consider this an orgy of evidence or just appreciate the obvious good luck. The part of her that had been in law enforcement for a good few years by now wanted to be suspicious of the fact that the doctor she'd just brought in as a consultant had this much information on the killer she'd been tracking for months, but the rest of her had to appreciate that the current situation meant that she was dealing with a very specialised field.

"So," she looked at Mohinder with a thoughtful stare, "your father came all the way to America to study people with abilities? If I'm missing something here, I apologise, but why wouldn't he just study them back in India?"

"To be blunt, it was easier for him to find people with abilities over here because America has better facilities for that kind of large-scale research, and he'd already burned most of his personal bridges with the academic community back in India," Mohinder explained. "My mother told me that he also had some experience with America from past research projects over here, but I can't find any records of that visit, so I wouldn't like to swear to anything."

"What made your father choose this as his research focus?" Matt asked. "I mean, it's a fascinating idea, but what made him study it?"

"I…" Mohinder began, pausing in awkward thought for a few moments before he spoke again. "I had a sister."

"Had?" Audrey repeated, the expression on his face making her feel guilty about bringing up the topic.

"She died when she was… I was barely two years old," Mohinder explained. "I never even knew about her until I returned my father's ashes to my mother; from what my mother told me, my sister had some kind of ability herself, but she… died when I was young."

"How young?" Matt asked.

"She was five… or so I'm told; like I said, I don't fully remember it," Mohinder explained, his expression sorrowful for a moment before he continued. "In any case, my father apparently believed that her death was a consequence of her having an ability of some kind herself."

"People get sick because they have an ability?" Matt asked.

"I don't know more than that about her at this point, but my father… well, just because I don't have all the facts that led him to that conclusion yet doesn't mean that I doubt him."

"Let's just focus on Sylar for now and we'll work that out later," Aubrey said. "From these tapes, you think Sylar was your dad's first test subject? Which means he'll have access to this list?"

"He'll have access to it up to a point, anyway," Mohinder said. "From what I've been able to determine from my father's notes about Sylar in the last few days before his death, I'm assuming that Sylar managed to acquire a copy of at least some of the list without my father knowing, but it would appear that my father at least suspected what had happened at some point and tried to deal with the situation on his own."

"Quite," Audrey nodded. "I'd say your dad should have tried to call us, but to be blunt, I'm not sure anyone would have believed this crap if he tried to get us in early enough."

"Hey, you believe him now-"

"Because I've seen enough to realise there's more freaky crap going on than anyone else is ready to face, but it took meeting the mind-reader and the man with the radioactive hands, and maybe seeing evidence of a guy throwing ice around for me to get this far," Audrey pointed out before she looked back at Mohinder. "No offence, but from what we've seen, your dad wouldn't have had anything to show us if he'd come here when this all started; at best we'd have gotten good agents killed while trying to get ahead of this guy because we didn't know what he could do, but now we might be able to work together and come up with some kind of plan before Sylar can get too far."

"Which starts with working out why this guy is going after other people with abilities in the first place," Matt said. "Any ideas on that front?"

"A couple," Mohinder nodded. "From what my father has written, he speculated that Sylar's true original ability was… relatively simple; something that people can't do normally, but not something to inspire a great deal of interest."

"Like what?"

"He didn't say, but based on the potential powers my father identified in his book, he speculated that there may be people out there whose ability is nothing more than the ability to always know where north is, or being able to breath underwater."

"Interesting, but not exactly reading minds or blowing stuff up, huh?" Audrey nodded (she couldn't believe she was taking this kind of talk seriously).

"Precisely," Mohinder nodded. "In any case, my father speculated that Sylar was able to work out a means of taking, or possibly just copying, the powers from others, which involved somehow analysing something in their brains to determine how his victims' abilities worked."

"I… see," Audrey nodded thoughtfully. "Well, guess that explains why all these corpses are missing the tops of their heads…"

"So what do we do now?" Matt asked. "Try and catch Sylar out?"

"Probably our best bet right now," Audrey nodded before she turned back to Mohinder. "If he's tracking his victims based on this list he got from your father, is there any way we can work out who might be the next target?"

"More importantly," Matt pointed out, "if this guy has all these abilities, is there any way we can actually stop him?"

The silence that filled the room after that comment said more than Audrey was comfortable with. She was used to cases where the only option was to kill the murderer because they wouldn't surrender, but what would she do if she was dealing with a man who had this much personal power? Parkman was good, but there was only so much they could do with a guy who could read minds against a man who could freeze people solid and cut off the tops of their heads…

Chapter Text

"So… you only just found out about all this?"

"Well, there's really a lot of things I only 'just' found out about," Kim replied, smiling at Simone in what she hoped was a reassuring manner; she liked helping people, but there was something unnerving about looking at this well-dressed older woman and feeling that she was the one who had more control of the situation. "I only found out what Claire can do about a month ago, we met Peter barely a week ago, and I literally just learned that I have an ability yesterday-"

"That's what I'm talking about," Simone cut in, looking at Kim with new urgency. "How do you feel knowing that you're… look, don't take this the wrong way, but you're not…"

"Normal?" Kim finished for Simone. "Maybe not, but Ron has a simple philosophy on that front; 'Never be Normal'."

"Really?"

"He has a naked mole rat as a pet; he's always danced to his own beat."

"A… naked mole rat," Simone looked at Kim in a bemused manner. "That's… a real animal?"

"We think the little guy escaped from a lab or something; Ron needed a hairless pet because of his dad's allergies, so it all worked out and we've never really looked into it," Kim shrugged as she indicated the loft. "Besides, considering that your boyfriend can paint the future, my little trick isn't exactly flashy; all I can really do is 'know how not to get killed'."

"And… what else can people do?" Simone looked at Kim with new curiosity. "I mean, I get that Hiro can travel in time… if he wasn't having his problem… and Peter can copy other people… but what else is out there?"

"Aside from me and Isaac?" Kim smiled. "Well, we've already encountered a guy who can negate the powers of others-"

"Excuse me?" Simone looked at her in surprise. "There's a guy out there who can… his only power is to shut down other people's abilities?"

"And apparently erase people's memories," Kim added, nodding in understanding at Simone's uncomfortable grimace. "Yeah, that freaked us out too… still, we also met a guy who can make himself invisible, and Peter seems to have encountered someone who can… make people do what they tell them to do."

"He 'seems' to have met someone?"

"He used the ability to make the power-blocking guy talk but even Peter didn't know where he got it from," Kim explained. "I mean, he maybe only tapped it back then because he was using my ability to help him work out the blanks…"

"Could you… do you think superhuman strength could be a thing?"

"Strength?" Kim looked at Simone curiously. "I mean, probably, but… why that ability in particular?"

"It's just… I was meant to have a meeting with a client in a shopping mall a few days ago, but while I was waiting in the restaurant…" Simone's face twisted for a moment, as though trying to find the best way to voice something she was still struggling to accept was possible. "Some figure in a hoodie broke into a jewellery store opposite the restaurant I was in and lifted a stone bench off the floor as a distraction."

"A stone bench?" Kim repeated.

"OK, maybe not stone, but… whatever they use for those things in malls," Simone said. "It was all just… I mean, I was so busy freaking out about everything else…"

"And now you're worried that there's someone else out there on a crime spree with their ability?" Kim said, looking at Simone with new intensity. "What else can you tell me?"

"Seriously, can't you give us just a little break?" Ron looked urgently at the parking attendant. "We're only a couple of minutes over; how's that fair?"

"Rules are rules," the man said, although Ron had to concede that the man at least looked slightly apologetic. "Do you want the car back or not?"

Sighing in frustration, Ron took out some of the money he'd received from Simone to cover their expenses and exchanged a few points for the car keys. As he walked back to join Hiro and Ando, he tried not to think about the frustration in Hiro's eyes as he looked at a nearby clock; he guessed that the older man was trying to get his powers working again and hadn't had any luck.

"How's it going?" he asked tentatively.

"Power gone; need sword," Hiro observed, his speech tentative as though he wanted to be sure every word was correctly chosen. "It focused Kensei's power; will do same for me."

"And… any idea how we'll get it when we're just three guys?" Ron asked. "I mean, I'm all for sticking it to the man, especially with what we've heard about this Linderman dude, but-"

Hiro and Ando froze and grabbed Ron by his shirt, practically slamming him against a pillar as they looked anxiously at something further along. As soon as the two had released their grip, Ron glanced around the corner to look at whatever had caused their panic, and saw a man standing near his friends' car, the man making a call on his phone with a particularly grim expression on his face.

"Take it you don't know that guy?" Ron asked, hoping that his initial apprehension was just him being overly paranoid after the girls' close call with Sylar.

"No," Ando confirmed.

"Not look friendly," Hiro added apprehensively.

"Oh no," Ron whispered, looking back at the man as the unknown figure pulled out a gun and began to walk towards them. "This isn't good…"

"Run!" Hiro yelled, as he turned to run back the way they had come, only for a dark van to come around the corner with a loud screech as its tires came to a halt. Looking anxiously around, Ron tried to work out where they could go next, but he only ended up running into Hiro and Ando as they all tried to move off in a different direction. Ron could only look apologetically at the other two as men from the van practically hauled Hiro and Ando to their feet and dragged them into the van, only pausing for a moment before they grabbed Ron and did the same to him.

With Hiro, Ron and Ando sitting on one side of the van, they could only watch awkwardly as the men climbed into the van and closed the door behind them before driving off, maintaining a prompt but even pace through the city streets. The other men were all wearing a similar outfit of dark jackets and trousers over what looked like wool sweaters, which must have been rather warm in this weather but didn't explain what they were doing or why nobody was talking to them.

"So," Ron looked over at his apparent fellow prisoners with a weak smile, "at least we've gotta be on to something if someone's trying to stop us, right?"

"Good view," Hiro grinned back at Ron. "This how we roll."

"Can we get off it?" Ando asked, looking anxiously over at Ron and Hiro before he turned back to the other men. "Where are they taking us?"

Noticing the bag at the feet of the man who seemed to be the leader of the group, a gun sticking out of it in a manner that seemed almost 'designed' to taunt them with the idea that they wouldn't be able to grab it before this man turned it back on them, Ron was suddenly unsure if this had been a good idea…

The more time Peter spent with Claude, the more he found himself wondering if this had been a good idea. He and Kim had each agreed that relying on her to control his powers wasn't a practical long-term solution, but so far he wasn't sure if Claude actually knew anything useful and was being a bitterly eccentric 'mentor' just because, or if the invisible man was just improvising.

"I don't see how petty theft is a useful part of training," he finally observed after Claude grabbed a scarf from a passing man; he had been prepared to excuse Claude grabbing food from other people, since it seemed unlikely a man who spent his time being invisible had any kind of job, but clothing was at least close to crossing the line.

"There's a lot you don't see," Claude countered nonchalantly. "You've no idea how to use these gifts of yours properly."

"And you do?"

"Right now, your abilities only show up as a reflex; you're basically just defaulting to 'flight or fight' in a tight spot," Claude observed. "Making it a conscious choice, using something beyond just what you can use right that minute, that's what makes you more than poodle."

"And insulting me is going to help?"

"Hey, you're the one who's going to blow up the city unless I can get you housebroken," Claude retorted, pausing to stop a clothes rack being pushed along the street, settling into place as the man pushing the rack realised that it had stopped. "So you've absorbed all these abilities; you're invisible with me, you've flown with your brother, you got telekinesis from this Sylar psycho, and you copied Miss Survivalist, along with that… making people obey you thing you can't explain."

"I just meant that I don't know where I got that from-"

"We'll work that out later," Claude cut Peter off (Peter was starting to wonder if 'invisibility' was the right term for what they were when people were just walking around them like that; shouldn't passers-by still be able to hear them?). "Point is that you have the powers, but right now your body doesn't know what to do with them; your whole system's jumbled around like cards in a shoebox, and far as you're concerned, those cards are dowsed in plutonium and piling up to a critical mass. What we've got to do is teach you how to pull 'em out, one at a time, and actually choose what one you're using, 'stead of just goin' with whatever your body picks."

"That's a bad thing?" Peter asked.

"What if you're facing someone dangerous enough that you'd instinctively want 'em dead but you consciously want to keep 'em alive to interrogate?"

"…Bleak, but good point," Peter nodded.

"Glad you approve," Claude responded, as he stepped away from the rack and they began walking again. "You've been lucky so far, but packing that much power in one body could get ugly if you lose control of it…"

"Like what?"

"Could be the bomb you're worried about is a bit closer than you think."

Peter almost asked what Claude meant by that, but shoved it down as soon as an explanation came to his mind; if he could tap multiple abilities at once, he didn't want to risk his body thinking he wanted it to do something like that…

"OK," he said anxiously, focusing his mind back on track. "What's today's lesson?"

"Seeing if you can hold onto an ability without Miss Training Wheels or any of your other benefactors hanging around," Claude said, grabbing a handbag from a passing woman and shoving it into Peter's chest. "Remember to breath."

As the invisible man walked away, Peter fought to hold on to the sensation of what it had felt like when he started compelling that man to talk when he had been explaining everything to Kim, Claire and Ron; the way everything had just fallen into place, the way he'd just felt that he could make the other man do what he wanted… the way he'd felt like he was moving past some kind of barrier to grab a shield and a tool, and now he was reaching out for a different kind of shield…

The sound of the woman screaming prompted Peter to turn his focus away from his own internal search to realise that the woman was looking at him in outrage. Lost for better options, he handed the bag back to her and ran down the street, cursing himself for not setting some kind of ground rules for these lessons. It didn't take long for him to find his way back to his current 'mentor', who was waiting nonchalantly against a wall with a cool smirk.

"Thanks for that," Peter glared at the other man, as he felt a tentative 'tingle' that at least suggested to him that he was invisible again. "I could have been arrested, you know."

"A little more focus, you'd have had some cash and fresh lipstick," Claude countered. "I never said it'd be easy; in fact, I think I repeatedly said it'd be crap-"

"Hey, I'm here to learn how to control what I can do, but I didn't ask to start a career as a purse-snatcher," Peter protested. "Besides, you've been doing this for fifteen years; cut me some slack trying to get a handle on this in five minutes."

"You'll learn," Claude shrugged. "We just gotta figure out what's holding you back… maybe it's just you worrying too much."

"Worrying too much?" Peter repeated. "If this is about Kim, she's just a friend-"

"And you've got her friends, your mother, your brother… seriously, it's a wonder you haven't sunk under-"

"What; you think I'm too attached to people?" Peter cut Claude off.

"You spent your life being the little brother who got pats on the head and told that you're not fit for the outdoors, and now you've got a bunch of kids looking to you to be the hero; you need to get the picture that it's easier bein' on your own."

"What?" Peter glared at Claude, suddenly unable to believe he was even hearing this. "You're talking about… those people are important to me-!"

"When you need someone holdin' your hand every step o' the way?" Claude retorted, pausing in front of one of Nathan's campaign posters. "How can you not want to punch that face every time you see it?"

"Nathan… look, I'll admit that I'm never sure if he cares because he cares or because it'd screw up his campaign if I had a meltdown or something like that, but at least he always tries to help!" Peter retorted, suddenly scrambling to find a way to articulate something he'd never really thought about himself. "I'm not saying he gets it right, but when he could just try to cut me out completely, at least he's putting in some kind of effort to be there-"

"Because it suits the damn campaign," Claude shook his head.

"He's not like that, and you don't know him-!"

"Don't need to," Claude said dismissively. "I spend a lot of time moving around peoples' homes, and believe me, you get to know people if you see them when they think they're alone. You see them for what they truly are; selfish, deceitful, and gassy."

"And that's your big truth about the world?"

"Sooner you learn it, sooner we get that collar off your neck," Claude responded with a firm glare as he pointed at Peter. "People suck, friend; every last one of them. Never forget that."

"Not all of them."

"Oh, right; there's a girl."

"That's not what I meant," Peter said, suddenly determined to keep Simone away from this man. "Maybe you've met a few crap people and let them define your experience, but I've met people who are a lot better than that! Hiro's come back from the future to save the world, Kim put her life on the line to save someone she only just got to know, Ron's going all over the country to help strangers-!"

Peter suddenly grabbed Claude's arm and found himself standing in the middle of a darkened locker room, watching as Kim and Claire flew towards the wall while the dark-clad figure of Sylar held another unfamiliar girl in front of him. With Claude standing beside him, it was easy for Peter to confirm that he was still invisible, but looking at Sylar as he cut open that girl's head as she screamed…

For a moment Peter was tempted to try and save her, but forced himself to hold back. He didn't know much about time travel, but he'd given himself a basic crash course after being visited by the future Hiro by reading a few online plot summaries, and one thing most stories agreed on was that it was a bad idea to change anything when you knew how things had gone originally. The future Hiro may have had more experience to work out how to change the past without making things worse, but Peter couldn't be sure how he'd change things if he saved Jackie Wilcox. At the very least what he'd heard about her suggested he'd find her harder to get along with than Kim, Claire and Ron, even if he'd probably have to keep her safe just because she'd probably want to come along to stay away from Sylar, and that was before he tried to think about how stopping Sylar's kill would affect how this psycho would react to anyone else.

I barely stopped the guy when he had the satisfaction of a kill and couldn't be sure what I was doing; if I stop him now, maybe he'll be so angry that he tries that bit harder and kills me in the past…

Peter hated doing something this selfish, but this was so complicated that he couldn't afford to try anything else. Keeping a careful hand on Claude's arm to make sure that the other man didn't do anything, they watched as Kim vaulted off the wall and back onto her feet while Claire healed her broken neck, followed by Jackie making a desperate plea for the other two girls to run…

As Jackie's body fell to the ground, the killer turned to look more directly at Kim and Claire before the two girls ran for the locker room door. When Sylar turned away from Jackie's body, the moment he faced their position, Peter tightened his grip on Claude's arm and the two of them returned to the New York street they'd been standing on moments ago.

"What… was… that?" Claude looked at him in shock.

"I… that was Hiro's power…" Peter said, looking at his hands with a thoughtful smile. "I was trying to make a point… I was remembering Hiro… and suddenly… that was Kim and Claire…"

His thoughtful smile shifted to a firmer grin as he looked over at Claude. "And if you think humanity's just selfish at its core, how do you explain that? Jackie Wilcox was just a self-centred girl who tried to pretend to be a hero, but the last thing she did was try to warn other people to get away from a psychopath-!"

Claude jumped to the side in shock when Peter thrust out a hand and sent a sign displaying the menu for a nearby takeaway place flying through the air with a telekinetic burst.

"Huh," Claude observed, looking tentatively at the nurse. "That's interesting…"

"It's… I was thinking about that killer… the way he just…" Peter began, before he looked up at Claude with wide-eyed inspiration. "You were wrong… I don't have to forget the people I'm close to; I have to remember how they made me feel!"

Looking down at his hands, Peter flexed his fingers, smiling as ice formed over their tips; it took a bit of focus, but if he thought of the chill he felt when facing that killer, he could tap the ice instead of the telekinesis…

He needed to keep his mind focused, but even if he didn't want to rely on Kim's presence, he could still remember how it felt to tap Sylar's different abilities when he was with her; he just needed to get back into that state of mind and focus.

"I… I think I can do this," he said, grinning in contemplation as he flexed his fingers and cracked the fragile ice that had formed around them. "We just need to work on keeping my focus…"

"That's… something to be going with, anyway," Claude nodded, looking at Peter with a thoughtful expression as though he wasn't sure how to feel about this development.

It might not have been in the same manner as he'd initially expected, but the invisible man had given him some interesting ideas about how to make this work; all he had to do was keep up his focus and get a sense for each ability…

Ron had never had a head for languages, but he'd never regretted that more than in the current situation. Ando had been decent enough to clarify that the man who'd 'abducted' them was Hiro's father, who seemed to want Hiro to come back to Japan, but after that Ron was reduced to just watching them talk to each other in Japanese and wonder what they were going to do about all this. Hiro had already turned down the offer of two first-class tickets back to Tokyo in favour of focusing on their mission, but after his father had ripped up the painting and gone on some big speech about what Ron assumed were his plans for his son, Ron wasn't sure what he should expect next from this guy.

Ando seemed to be shooting appreciative looks at a young woman that Ron assumed was Hiro's sister, and so far the father just seemed to be basically treating Ron as nothing more than the guy who was there rather than any real part of the current situation, but that didn't make him feel particularly comfortable. Ron could easily imagine that many of the school bullies had gone after him just because he was there; he wasn't sure how to deal with the guy who had already treated his son so harshly just because Hiro wasn't doing what the guy wanted.

"So… what's going on here?" he asked, looking uncertainly at Hiro as his sister walked off after a brief conversation.

"My father want me home," Hiro said. "Offers promotion; wants me there to help company."

"Uh… no offence, but weren't you just working in a cubicle?"

"Symbolic; shareholders doubt control of company when no control of me," Hiro clarified, before looking thoughtfully after his sister. "But I have other idea."

"What?"

"Just wait," Hiro said, saying something to Ando before he walked back over to his father and sister. The young woman's initial small faltered as Hiro continued talking, looking authoritatively at his father before Kimiko countered with her own observations, her voice rising as she glared at her brother, before Hiro looked at his father with an encouraging smile.

"So… what just happened?" Ron asked.

"Hiro list bad ideas for company future," Ando grinned. "Sell Kimiko as replacement by making her share own ideas."

"Ah," Ron nodded in understanding. "Nice job."

It didn't solve the problem of the damaged painting, but at least they were still on course to find Linderman and get that sword Hiro was looking for…

Standing cautiously outside the door leading to the mall security room, Kim wondered if this was actually a valid plan. She had taken precautions to confirm that she wouldn't be recognized if anyone caught her doing this, and she was ready to run if anything went wrong, but so far her theory seemed to be paying off; so long as she timed everything just right, she just seemed to know where to go and when to move to stay out of sight.

Guess this survival instinct thing is really working for me; I can't even be caught if I'm being careful…

As the door opened, Kim waited for the man to walk out before she slipped past him, relieved to find nobody in the corridor on the other side. Moving briskly down the corridor, she turned into the door at the other end, relieved when she only found one security guard sitting there as he studied the monitor screens. Before the other guard could properly take her in, Kim grabbed him by the neck and lightly squeezed his carotid arteries on either side of his neck, waiting until he slumped in the chair to release her grip.

Perfect, Kim thought as she checked his pulse and felt it still beating steadily; she had read that it was possible to do that from her mother's books, but she'd still been a bit anxious about putting it into practise. Checking over the cameras and the attached computers, it didn't take Kim too long to identify the camera that must have been recorded the event that Simone was talking about; there was still a bit of repair work taking place around the bench in question on the camera. Bringing up the camera files on the computer, Kim tracked down the recording for the date in question and copied the file onto a memory stick she'd picked up for the purpose, relieved that the man had left his computer on when she'd knocked him out.

It wasn't a perfect plan, but if there was someone else with abilities out there in New York at the moment, Kim felt a certain tentative 'obligation' to find that person and either warn them about Sylar or stop them doing anything too stupid. The whole 'trying to rob a jewellery store' thing was worrying, but it wasn't like Claire and Peter hadn't done stupid things while getting a handle on their powers, so it was still possible that the girl had just decided to react badly to the whole thing…

With the download complete, Kim checked over the system to make sure there were no cameras for the corridor just outside- they probably assumed that this area was safe enough since it was always occupied- and ran back out in the main mall, timing her exit so that she joined a small group walking through the mall in a manner that would hopefully stop the camera picking out her in particular.

No obvious answers, but I've got something more to work with; I'll check over it when I get back to the loft…

She didn't know what her next move would be, but at least she felt like she was doing something practical here while her friends were tackling the bigger picture.

Chapter Text

Studying the video footage she'd acquired from the mall as she sat in the loft, Kim still wasn't sure if it had been worth the effort she'd put into acquiring it. It was useful to confirm that there was another superhuman criminal out here that was doing something dangerous with their powers, but without any more information she didn't exactly have anything useful to be going along with.

And when did my life reach a point where I'm actually thinking about trying to track down the woman who marches into a crowded mall with a gun and can lift up a stone bench with her bare hands?

The only thing Kim felt comfortable deducing about the figure was that it was female, based on what she could see of the chest and the sound of the woman's voice, but that didn't exactly narrow things down that much…

"Here," Simone said, walking up to her and handing her the small bag. "You're sure this is it?"

"We don't want to do anything that will give… whoever's tracking us anything more they can use," Kim explained as she took out the small phone and turned it on. "This isn't meant to do anything more than let me make a quick call to some people."

As Simone nodded in understanding, Kim dialled in the number she'd practically memorised since she was old enough to understand the concept, hoping that she had remembered the schedule correctly.

"Hello?"

"Hi Mom," Kim said.

"Kim?" her mother replied incredulously. "You're-?"

"I'm safe, Mom," Kim smiled warmly as she spoke, fighting back the pain and discomfort in her chest. "I'm with… friends; we're doing something important-"

"You're not even eighteen yet, Kimberly Anne Pierce; you can't-!"

"I'll be home as soon as I can, Mom," Kim cut her mother off before she could hear anything else. "I just wanted to let you know… this is important, and I'm safe."

She terminated the call and quickly turned the phone off. She wasn't sure if the Company could track phones or not, but if that Mission: Impossible film was any example, it would take a certain amount of time to trace a signal, and she had to hope that turning that phone off would make it harder for them to trace it afterwards.

"Your mom?" Simone looked at Kim with what Kim was sure was a copy of her own earlier uncertainty.

"Just had to let her know I'm still alive," Kim replied, hoping that her exaggerated nonchalance would come across as more casual than she felt; she didn't want Simone to start thinking she was out of her depth. "Getting back to the bigger issues, have you managed to find anything more about Primatech?"

"…Not really," the older woman shook her head apologetically, even as her sceptical stare made it clear she didn't buy Kim's attempt to deflect attention. "I'm looking through my father's records, but nothing's really… I mean, you have to keep in mind that this isn't my speciality, but I picked up some things from my dad, and there's nothing in his papers obviously linking him to the company…"

"And there's nobody you can talk to about this?"

"Not without it becoming more… obvious we're doing this," Simone said tentatively. "Do you think I should-?"

"Not yet," Kim shook her head as she indicated the painting on the floor. "The issue right now is Sylar and this explosion; it's… well, we might have to worry about that company, but we're not going to get anywhere obsessing about it when they're not after us yet."

"And you're still worried about this company even though they probably don't even know you're… well that you know about them?"

"Should I just not worry about something just because it hasn't affected me yet?" Kim countered.

Simone was spared answering that question when Claire walked into the loft, a solemn expression on her face.

"Hey," the other girl said dejectedly.

"Everything OK?" Kim looked anxiously at her friend as the blonde cheerleader sat down beside her.

"It was… it's been tricky," Claire shrugged. "I was doing some reading at this Internet café down the road…"

"Anything interesting?" Simone asked.

"I was looking for anything on my parents."

"Your parents?" Simone looked at her in surprise. "I thought that-?"

"I was adopted," Claire clarified. "I was looking for anything on… well, I just suddenly wondered if maybe the reason Dad never brought my real biological parents to meet me was because they were dead and he was trying to spare me or something…"

"Your real biological parents?" Simone looked at Claire uncertainly.

"I met a couple of people who claimed to be my parents a while back, but… well, I'm fairly sure they weren't the real deal," Claire shrugged (Kim thought about mentioning Rufus's support, but decided that a naked mole rat wasn't the kind of source someone like Simone would believe). "Anyway, I started looking for deaths around that time, and I…"

Her voice trailed off as she reached into her jacket and pulled out a piece of paper, evidently a print-out she'd made in the library, which she handed on to Kim. Taking the paper, Kim glanced over it, nodding in solemn understanding as she took in its contents.

"Well?" Simone asked.

"There was a fire in an apartment house around fourteen years ago in Kermit, Texas," Kim explained. "According to this article, a woman named Meredith Gordon was killed in the explosion, along with her eighteen-month-old daughter, Claire."

"And you think that's you?" Simone looked at Claire.

"Well… it makes sense, doesn't it?" Claire observed, a slight tremor in her voice. "The name matches, I'd have been that old when the fire happened, and if there was a fire, I could have recovered from any damage if my ability kicked in…"

"You could survive something like this?" Simone looked at the photo of the destroyed apartment in surprise.

"I've seen Claire break her neck and she was standing up again in a few seconds; the only thing she can't heal from is if something stays stuck in her brain," Kim explained, before she looked back at Claire. Lost for anything better to say for the moment, Kim held out her arms and let Claire fall into her embrace, holding the other girl close for a moment as Claire's body shook, as though still trying to decide if she should start crying or not. After a few moments, Claire sat back and looked awkwardly at the other two women, a shameful expression on her face.

"Sorry…" she began tentatively.

"Don't," Simone looked at the young blonde with sympathy. "If you can't feel sad when you learn that your mother's dead, when can you?"

"And… well, look at it this way," Kim smiled encouragingly. "If Meredith Gordon was your mother, maybe we could… find some of her relatives?"

"When they didn't want me after the fire?"

"Right…" Kim trailed off, looking uncertainly at the other girl for a moment as she tried to think of a better response, before she smiled tentatively. "Actually, you know what? If Simone's willing to help us out, I think I have something that might take your mind off that."

"What?" Claire looked at her.

"Up for a small concert in New York by Kelly Clarkson?"

"Kelly Clarkson?" Claire repeated incredulously.

"I was looking through a few New-York-based online forums, and found this reference to some club where she's apparently putting on a show for the next few nights," Kim explained as she reached into her pocket and pulled out a note where she'd scrawled the address of the club in question. "I'm not saying we can get legitimate tickets easily at this kind of short notice, but if we pool our resources… well, you can't get hurt and I always just know how to do something I really need to do; maybe something will occur when we get there?"

As she sat in her apartment later that afternoon, Simone wished that she could talk to someone about how completely lost she felt in the current situation. On the one hand, she felt that she was on one level 'obligated' to object to the idea of Claire Bennett and Kim Pierce trying to sneak into a concert at a local club, considering that she was the closest thing they had to a legal guardian while Peter was away doing whatever he was doing right now, but on the other hand, she didn't exactly feel comfortable trying to make either of those girls do anything they wouldn't want to do.

After all, it wasn't like sneaking into a concert was going to hurt anybody, and considering what else they could have done with their abilities, that was actually fairly tame. She didn't actually think either of the girls were lying to her about the potential threat they were facing from this 'Sylar' person they'd mentioned, but it was still hard to accept that they were dealing with something this warped…

A knock on her door provided a welcome break from her thoughts, but she found herself with something she genuinely hadn't been expecting when she opened the door.

"Isaac?" she stared at her former lover in surprise.

"Hey," Isaac said, the drug-using painter looking surprisingly put together as he stood outside her apartment. "Can I assume you're glad to see me?"

"You look… you look healthy," Simone said, looking him over in surprise.

"I just got back, and thought I should check in with you," Isaac explained. "I was in a clinic sponsored by… well, they helped me deal with my drug use."

"They did?" Simone looked at him in surprise.

"Yeah," Isaac smiled. "I don't need the heroin any more; I can paint without it."

"Well… I'm glad for you," Simone said, before she swallowed anxiously and decided to try and tackle the question that had been bothering her since she accepted Peter's story. "So… what do you know about that exploding man picture?"

"You mean Peter."

"Peter?" Simone repeated in shock. "What makes you-?"

"I don't always understand what I'm painting after the fact, but repeated paintings make it easier for me to interpret the image," Isaac explained. "Since I started to get a clearer picture of what I'm doing… well, Peter's definitely got a part to play in that explosion."

"…And you think he's going to cause it?" Simone said incredulously.

"It fits," Isaac said. "They told me about-"

"They?"

"The… clinic that helped me," Isaac continued, and Simone decided to appreciate that he at least looked slightly ashamed at what he was saying now. "They have… experience at dealing with people with abilities, and they're worried that Peter… well, that he'll lose control-"

"Which is why he's working on how not to do that," Simone interjected, fighting down her instinctive fear at that particular idea. Peter's powers were terrifying in principle, but after hearing how determined he'd been to protect Kim and Claire from their attacker she felt an immediate need to protect him from Isaac's accusations. "You've met Peter, Isaac; do you honestly believe he wants to do something like… well, like that?"

"I painted it-"

"And maybe you're wrong, have you thought about that?" Simone retorted. "I thought I knew what was going on in the world before… well, all this, but I'm trying to accept that there are things I don't understand; maybe you should do the same thing?"

"Peter is dangerous," Isaac said.

"Give me better proof than a few paintings," Simone said, closing the door between her and the painter before he could see her nagging doubt.

She didn't believe that Peter was actually going to destroy New York on purpose, but if Isaac had been getting some help to control his painting so that he could do it without the drugs…

Could he have been working with that company Peter and the others were worrying about?

And if they had helped him get over his addiction… even if she didn't agree with what Isaac's paintings were apparently telling him… maybe the Company itself wasn't as bad as Peter and the girls thought it was?

Peter still wasn't sure if he was actually getting anything out of Claude's training he couldn't have reached on his own, but he had to appreciate that it was probably easier to get the right 'kick' to deal with these abilities if he had someone else pushing him on rather than trying to do it all himself. He at least felt like he was making progress in getting a clearer understanding of what he was capable of when he was caught up in the heat of the moment, as opposed to needing a moment to focus when he was on his own, even if it was still a challenge to choose the right power.

It was slightly uncomfortable to realise that most of his offensive abilities at the moment all came from Sylar, but it wasn't like it was his fault that the killer was the only person with those kind of powers he'd met so far. It was tricky to actually 'cycle' between the three abilities he'd seen Sylar use so far, but telekinesis seemed to be the easiest one to tap and had the greatest potential. When he tried to blow things up, it seemed like there was a limit to the size of things he could destroy (which probably explained why Sylar hadn't just tried to blow him up with it), and it seemed like the freezing power just generated a burst of extremely cold air rather than outright creating ice.

As for the rest of his abilities, Claude had explicitly asked him not to test that power-negation ability on him as he apparently preferred his invisibility for some unexplained reason, and Peter didn't want to risk tapping into Hiro's time-travel power in case he got himself stuck somewhere like Hiro apparently had. Flight was proving surprisingly difficult to get his head around, and the 'compulsion' ability was harder to tap when he didn't know who he'd actually acquired it from, but Kim and Claire's abilities were relatively easy to maintain now that he knew the trick. On a suggestion from Claude, he'd ever found that he could use his own ability to 'track' Claude without actually looking at him, focusing on sensing where Claude was in relation to him based on his sense of Claude's ability.

Might be tricky to do that in a crowd, but at least there's a chance I'll be able to find out where I got a new talent from if I start doing anything strange…

His mind drifting, Peter found himself making a few idle sketches, only realising that he had tapped into Isaac's power when he actually looked at the papers in his hands. He smiled slightly when he found himself looking at Kim and Claire in what looked like a nightclub, pleased to see the girls having fun, but that smile faltered when he saw a group of five people paying particular attention to the girls.

He appreciated that he wasn't a comic book aficionado, and he definitely wasn't sure how much of Isaac's style came from his training or his ability, but based on the way Peter had drawn those five watchers, he was suddenly concerned for the girls' safety…

Chapter Text

"Intuitive aptitude?" Audrey looked at Mohinder uncertainly. "That's what your dad decided Sylar had?"

"According to what I was able to uncover from my father's research, anyway," Mohinder explained, cursing his father's complicated filing system. "He apparently initially assumed that the man who came to call himself Sylar was actually powerless, but after Sylar demonstrated telekinesis, he became curious about the sudden change in circumstances and was able to identify Sylar's first victim."

"First victim?" Matt asked.

"Brian Davis," the Indian professor explained.

"Davis?" Audrey repeated in surprise, looking at a piece of paper on the scientist's desk. "That's not on the list…"

"It's possible that you didn't register him because Sylar was still refining his methods at that point," Mohinder put in.

"That makes sense," Matt observed. "I mean, it's like in Silence of the Lambs, right? The first victim was missed because the guy basically hadn't developed his trademark?"

"That's… one way to look at it," Audrey nodded, before looking back at Mohinder. "So your dad worked out that Sylar… took this guy's ability?"

"Or copied it somehow," Mohinder observed. "It's unclear how my father came to this conclusion, but he speculated that Sylar made contact with Davis and was able to work out how to replicate his power through detailed analysis of his brain, which he's since refined to a swifter process."

"That still requires him to kill people?" Matt said.

"One of the first things you learn in this kind of work," Audrey said grimly. "Give someone a taste for blood and they're going to want more very quickly."

"Particularly with the likely side-effects of Sylar's original ability to take into account."

"There can be side-effects with this kind of thing?" Matt asked.

"Only in some cases," Mohinder clarified. "As with everything, evolution can occasionally throw up an anomaly before they get it right; there are going to be some abilities that turn up more problems than they solve."

"Like how I can't turn this off?" Matt indicated his head.

"If some of my father's theories are correct, you… should be able to work that out, actually," Mohinder observed with a tentative shrug. "I wish I could give you more of an idea about how to do that, but keep in mind this is all second-hand speculation at best; even my father only had a few ideas about what you might be capable of rather than how you could control it."

"Right…" Matt shook his head, before he sighed and looked at the agent and the doctor. "So, getting back to Sylar, why would his original ability have side-effects? I thought you said he would have started out just knowing how things work?"

"And what if that comes with a need to know how things work?"

"…Which could translate into a need to know how other people have abilities even if that involves killing them to work it out," Audrey nodded in grim understanding. "Bit of a stretch, but it's not like anything about this case is conventional."

"OK, so if this Brian Davis guy was Sylar's first victim, does that help us work out where he's going?" Matt asked. "I mean, if we've got a copy of Sylar's list, could we use that to predict his next target?"

"Unfortunately, that depends on factors like when Sylar acquired the list and how much work my father did on it since then, neither of which we can be sure of," Mohinder explained. "It's possible Sylar left some people alone because their ability wouldn't be of interest to him, they may have moved since my father first found their details, or Sylar caught them and nobody else knows what happened to them…"

"In other words, our best bet right now is trial and error and hope we can find someone on this list before Sylar does," Audrey shook her head. "Well, we've only got so many leads we can follow here; what do you think?"

"Well," Mohinder said, looking more thoughtfully at his father's notes, "assuming that Sylar is following a relatively coherent pattern based on my father's list, it couldn't hurt to find out where his next likely target actually is…"

Peter had never found parties a comfortable experience even when he was a teenager, and it just felt even more awkward now that he was older. He appreciated that the crowd was big enough that he didn't stand out, and he also recognised that he wasn't that much older than some of the people here, but after everything he'd experienced the last couple of weeks…

As he took a beer to at least look like he was there to enjoy himself rather than waiting on the sides like some creep, Peter looked around the club with a wistful smile. He might find the whole experience a bit off-putting, but after spending the last few days with only Claude for direct company, it was kind of nice to see people actually living for a change.

The invisible man had accepted Peter's tentative explanation that he was following up on a lead he'd sketched, with the understanding that Peter was going to handle this alone if there was anything to the drawing and that he wasn't to bring any problems he might find anywhere near Claude. The former nurse would like to think that this was a kind of test on the older man's part, in the vein of 'throw him in and hope he floats', but from everything he'd seen of Claude, Peter guessed that it was more likely that his 'teacher' was just letting Peter get this out of his system because he thought it would be a waste of time.

A thought suddenly came to him, and Peter's eyes quickly scanned the large group of people standing around the club before he noticed a few sitting somewhat off to the side at the bar, as though they weren't sure who to talk to in here. The notion wasn't one he was entirely comfortable with, but if he just gave them a little push to get out there… he wasn't going to use this one very often, but he had to know how it worked…

"Hey," he said, moving to sit down beside one of the guys sitting at the side of the bar, thinking back to that incident in the police station when he'd last tapped this power. "Can you just…?"

What is this guy doing…?

Peter's voice trailed off as he realised that the man's lips hadn't moved when he heard those words. As the man continued to stare at him, Peter was suddenly struck by the strange sense that the club around him had just become louder even as the music had become harder to hear-

God, could this girl just get the picture?

Why do I do this to myself; there's never anyone worth talking to here…

-if aliens ever came to Earth, this is one thing they'll never understand-

Now this is the way to close off the week!

Just need a chance to talk to him properly and I'm sure I can-

"Thoughts…" Peter whispered to himself, ignoring the stares he was receiving from the man he'd been talking to earlier as he looked around the club. "I'm reading minds…"

This was why it had felt so different using that 'compelling voice' power in the police station; he hadn't been using that power at all, he'd been using the telepathy he must have picked up from…

That fat cop, Peter thought to himself; he didn't know where that idea had come from, but the thought somehow just felt right. That even explained why it had felt so different when he'd made the cop and the agent leave him alone in the police station; he hadn't been tapping that still-unidentified 'give people orders' ability, he'd somehow turned the man's own ability against him-

"…Kelly Clarkson!" a voice said, drawing Peter's attention away from his thoughts. Glancing up at the stage as he moved away from the bar to escape the pointed stares of the man he'd been talking to, Peter was surprised to see that the young American Idol winner was genuinely standing on the stage of the club, already singing 'Since U Been Gone' to the enthusiasm of the other club attendants.

Peter wondered briefly how a place like this club could afford a star like that, but decided not to worry about that; he had to focus on the bigger question of where Claire and Kim were in this. Unlike the paintings that had brought them together, this time his sketch hadn't included a convenient clock, but that left him with no idea if Claire and Kim were even here yet; in this crowded area, it wouldn't have been that hard for him to miss them-

He slammed against the wall as he felt something spasm in his body, followed by a twisting sensation between his legs that felt like something was being forced inside it. Looking down, he tried to work out what had just hit him, but was shocked to find that he seemed to have not only shrunk by at least a few inches, but his hands had just become smaller… his chest was…

"Oh God," he said, shocked to find that his voice had changed as well. Reaching up to his head, he grabbed his suddenly longer hair and held it out in front of him, only to find that longer hair had suddenly become some bizarre mix of blonde and redhead that made him feel like he was wearing a wig made from Claire and Kim's hair. "What the Hell-?"

"OK," two identical voices, as Peter's arms were grabbed and forced down to his sides. "Don't know who you're trying to fool, but-"

"Shut up," Peter said, praying that he'd guessed right about what had happened as he focused on his own appearance and Sylar's telekinesis; he didn't have time to deal with anyone trying to hold him back. As he felt his body return to its original size and shape, his captors suddenly lost their grip as though taken aback at the shift, giving him the chance to throw them back with a burst of mental energy. Shaking his head as he focused on his own appearance, Peter hurried into the crowd of people in front of him, trying to duck down as much as possible; if he could just stay lost in the group, maybe he could-

"You really think you're going to get away that easily?" another voice said.

"What-?" Peter began, turning around to look for the source of the voice before he spotted something out of the corner of his eye… ducking down past his collar?

Barely believing that he was seriously considering this even as he reached up, Peter grabbed the whatever-it-was from his back and held it up in front of him, revealing that it was literally a tiny man.

"Huh," was all Peter could say as he looked at the small man, who was twisting indignantly in Peter's fingers. He remembered that there were comics about superheroes who could shrink like that, but even after everything else he'd encountered, it was still hard to believe some of the things people were capable of now.

And now I can do this too…

"Hey!" the man yelled in protest as Peter stared at him, the ex-nurse tentatively surprised at the sense of actual weight in something this small. "Put me down, you-"

When Peter felt his own perspective start to shift as he stared at the other man, he quickly tossed the little figure away, focusing his thoughts off the tiny man and back to Claude. He didn't know what was going on here or if these people were the threat his picture had indicated would be going after Claire and Kim, but he had to get away from everyone who was after him and try to find the girls before-

"Peter?"

"Claire!" Peter smiled, giving the blonde girl an impulsive hug before stepping back to look anxiously around. Claire was clearly dressed for a night out, even if the slightly larger clothes suggested she'd had to raid Simone's wardrobe for the outfit, so at least he had reason to believe she was here on her own choice, but he still had to focus on his reasons for being here. "Where's Kim?"

"She's just over-" Claire began, before Peter felt his body spasm again. He grabbed Claire by the shoulders as he stumbled forwards, but was shocked when he realised that his body had shrunk and his hands suddenly felt hot. Claire screamed in pain and shock, Peter pulling back his hands to reveal sudden burns on her shoulders that had basically destroyed part of the blouse she was wearing.

"OK," a new voice said, Peter spinning around to see a tall woman with dark hair and piercing dark eyes, holding up a warning hand that briefly let out its own green glow. "Gotta admit, that's new."

Oh crap… Peter thought to himself, struggling to return to his own appearance as his body felt like it was trying to remould itself with every moment he stood in the club. A shrinker, some girl with flaming hands, and this damn shapeshifter…

Shapeshifter!

Peter didn't know where that idea came from, but as soon as the explanation had occurred, he was suddenly inspired to test one of Claude's other theories. He closed his eyes for a moment to try and focus before he found himself facing Kelly Clarkson as she stood on the stage, the American Idol winner looking between him and the new arrival in shock before she turned and ran from the stage… becoming thinner and taller…?

Putting on a burst of speed he was fairly sure wasn't part of a power he'd acquired, Peter charged through the crowd and grabbed the fleeing young woman as she left the stage. Spinning her around to look the woman in the eyes, he saw the woman's features seem to settle, but his eyes widened in surprise as he realised who he was looking at.

"Camille Evans?" He took in the figure in confusion. He recognised the woman from some of the socialite pages he'd ended up browsing in the past when he was at some of those parties their parents always insisted on dragging him and Nathan to, but the idea that she had some kind of shape-shifting power…

He felt like something had kicked him in the stomach when he almost flew off Camille's fallen form and hit the ground, his body twisting and reshaping itself as everyone else in the club fled the chaos on-stage. He could vaguely hear Camille yelling something, but judging by her hostile tone he decided it wasn't worth listening to that even as the rest of his consciousness fought to find some sense of stability; his hands were blazing a bizarre green flame, his arms felt like lead, his back felt like his spine was trying to force its way out… God, his whole body felt like it was trying to tear itself apart!

Shapeshifting… shrinking… that green flame thing… God, what else did I just absorb-?

His thoughts were interrupted when something grabbed his head and he suddenly felt a mouth pressed over his, followed by a sensation of his body suddenly calming itself down. For a few seconds he let himself be overwhelmed by the sudden sense of peace, as though his body had been burning and had just been doused in cold water…

His eyes widened as he took in what was now in front of him; Claire's blonde hair was practically covering his face as she kissed him.

"What the-?" he almost spat out, pulling away from the kiss as he looked incredulously at the girl.

"Look, I'm sorry if I crossed a line there, but that was the only thing I could think of!" Claire protested. "Your body just seemed like it was trying to tear itself apart; I thought that if I gave you a reason to focus on me, you'd… well…"

"I'd calm down," Peter finished for her, smiling at the blonde in embarrassed understanding. "Well… thanks-"

Further discussion was interrupted when he heard a loud yell from off to the side of the club. Turning around, Peter briefly noted that Camille Evans was still lying near a door, a panicked expression on her face as she took in the scene before her, but the sound had come from Kim as she engaged in hand-to-hand combat with the green-handed woman Peter had seen just before he blacked out.

"Who-?" he began.

"No idea," Claire shrugged, before she glanced around and swallowed. "OK, this could be a problem…"

Turning his head to follow Claire's example, Peter quickly saw what she was concerned about. The club seemed to have been emptied of civilians (and what kind of life had he lived where he was thinking of people as 'civilians' if they didn't have powers?), but that shrinking man was looking at him in a very foreboding manner, standing alongside another tall man that looked like he was ready for a fight. What truly disturbed Peter was that there was a large group of identical men gathered behind the first two men, as though one man had created a mass of copies of himself…

"Whoa!" a familiar voice yelled. Glancing back at the source of the voice, Peter saw Kim jump desperately away from the woman with green fire in her hands, pausing just long enough to kick the fallen socialite/heiress in the head before she leapt over to stand beside Peter and Claire.

"Can I suggest you get us out of here?" Kim glanced over at Peter. Peter was spared from asking what she meant when he took in the group standing in front of them; he still didn't know what the fourth member of the group could do, but if they were dealing with a guy who could copy himself that much, he and the girls definitely couldn't afford to stay here. Praying that Kim's presence would be enough to give him the right push to master this one, he took hold of their shoulders, concentrated-

"Close," Kim sighed, relaxing as she, Claire and Peter found themselves back inside Peter's apartment, Peter looking anxiously around himself before he sank down into a chair.

"You teleported?" Claire grinned at Peter. "Like that… Hiro guy?"

"It's one I'm still having trouble with, but… well, I can tap Kim's ability on my own, but being near her makes it easier," Peter smiled over at the redhead before turning back to Claire. "And… thanks for your own help."

"Hey; you're my hero," Claire grinned at Peter. "What kind of person would I be if I didn't save you?"

"Not that it's not great to see you, but what were you doing there anyway?" Kim looked curiously at Peter as she sat on the edge of his chair. "I mean, I thought the show would be a good chance to take a break, and then…"

"I… did a sketch of the two of you in trouble in that club," Peter explained, sitting forward in the chair as he stared at his hands, flexing his fingers as a faint green glow surrounded them. "Oh God… what did I do…?"

"You were just there to help-"

"And what if I just made things worse?" Peter looked urgently up at Kim. "I was having trouble with what I'd absorbed already, and now I've got… God, maybe five new abilities all at once?"

"Maybe five?"

"I'm not sure if one of those guys had any kind of ability or if he was just some kind of supervisor, but I definitely took in shapeshifting, shrinking, and whatever that green fire and copying yourself thing was," Peter said, before he groaned and slapped his head in frustration. "Oh, and it turns out I absorbed telepathy a while back on top of everything else…"

"You what-?" Kim began before Peter teleported away mid-sentence, leaving the girls to look uncertainly at each other.

"Well, that didn't go well, did it?" Claire sighed.

"That's probably putting it mildly," Kim nodded. "Sorry about that; I really thought we'd just have a chance at a quiet night out…"

"Hey, it's not your fault," Claire patted Kim reassuringly on the shoulder.

"This isn't just because you got a chance to kiss-?" Kim began, looking at her friend with a teasing smile.

"Th- that was just to get him focused!" Claire protested. "It just made sense; he's using my power, he's not hurting himself and his body can fix anything that's wrong-"

"OK, let's not get into that," Kim shook her head in understanding. "Come on, let's get out of here and get back to the loft before Simone gets worried."

Kim and Claire could each tell that the other was concerned about the close call they'd just had down at the club, but until they knew for a fact that someone was after them, there was no point worrying about that when they already had the threat of the explosion and Sylar to focus on.

Personally speaking, Kim was really concerned about that woman with green flames on her hands. Contrary to what she'd glimpsed of Sylar, who seemed to just use his abilities to power his way towards Peter, that woman had actually known what she was doing in a fight; Kim was just grateful that her mother had signed her up for martial arts class as a self-defence opportunity years ago…

Sheila had to give her brothers credit; when they knew what to focus on, they could actually do a decent job.

Things at the club had been trickier than expected when they had gone there to check out that possible impostor, but at least they'd been able to complete the original assignment. Sheila had been fairly sure that she wasn't dealing with the real Kelly Clarkson even before the Company confirmed that the original signer was rehearsing elsewhere, but she'd still had to be sure that she wasn't just dealing with some more natural lookalike trying to make a quick buck.

And then that damn empath showed up…

If there was one kind of ability Sheila really hated, it was empaths. They could collect an entire damn rolodex of abilities just walking down the wrong street if they were so inclined, and it took a ridiculous amount of emotional focus for them not to just blow themselves up in the process. This guy at least seemed like he didn't want to do that, but Sheila still wished she'd caught a clearer look at that blonde woman who'd stepped in to calm him down; the girl's hair had just covered her face every time Sheila had been in a position to look at it…

Still, she had to admire the way that redhead had handled herself. She didn't know if the girl had some kind of photographic reflexes or was just that good, but it had been a long time since Sheila had fought someone whose hand-to-hand skills were that good without a more obvious physical ability.

Her getting away with the empath and that blonde girl was a bit inconvenient at the moment, but the situation hadn't been a total loss. Finding out that the shapeshifter was a famous rich heiress had been a bit of a surprise, but at least they could call back and confirm-

A sudden beep from her phone prompted her to glance at the screen and swear at the information displayed.

"Problem?" Henry asked, as he finished tying up their new captive.

"Pretty much," Sheila nodded grimly. "Sounds like there's been a break-out on Level Five back at the Company."

"Level Five?" one of the Wegos said anxiously (God, Sheila needed to work out which was which again; why did they have to like psyching everyone out?) "Who?"

"Let's just get back there ASAP and work on getting the bastard back on lockdown, OK?" Sheila said, putting the phone away and looking over at their prisoner. "Might as well take her along as well."

"But what about-?" Henry began.

"Bennett's kid isn't going anywhere fast even if she did come here, and I'm not putting our reps at risk because of some sketches made by a recovering addict," Sheila interrupted him firmly. "We're getting back there and responding to that break-out now; clear?"

She'd deal with Noah Bennett's reaction to them ditching his pet project later; anyone able to get out of Level Five was a bigger problem than some missing kid.

Chapter Text

Walking up to Zane Taylor's apartment, Mohinder wondered if he'd made the right choice to do this on his own. His argument had made sense when he'd presented it to Officer Parkman and Agent Hanson, as he didn't want to make the man uncomfortable by showing up at his door with strangers when Zane Taylor was apparently already disturbed by his ability, but the closer he came to the door the more he wondered if it was just because he wanted to feel like he was doing something.

He appreciated their faith in his theories, but the fact remained that since he'd met his two new colleagues Mohinder felt that they had been the ones contributing to his understanding of Sylar's motives and planning their next agenda. Making contact with someone else with abilities may not be something he was completely qualified for, but he was the person best qualified to at least offer some kind of answers to whatever questions this man might ask about how he had such abilities in the first place.

He wasn't entirely sure if he agreed with their insistence not to mention his colleagues to the man he was about to meet at first, but with a serial killer already known to be active, he supposed taking a few extra precautions was reasonable…

Pushing his doubts aside, Mohinder finally reached the door and knocked. He waited for a moment before the door opened, revealing a tall man with dark hair and five o'clock shadow, wearing a dark T-shirt with a logo on it for 'Ramones', along with pale Chinos.

"Zane Taylor?" Mohinder said.

"Yes," the man said. "You must be Doctor Suresh. Come on in."

As he walked into the apartment, Mohinder noted the large splotches on the plastic-covered floor, as well as a lack of furniture that would be unusual even in the poorest districts back in India; he would have attributed the current state to some kind of decorating project if it wasn't for the lack of painting equipment.

"Can I get you some tea?" the man said, heading into what Mohinder assumed was the kitchen.

"Sorry it took me so long to get here," Mohinder said.

"No, it's no problem," Zane said, before leaning out of the kitchen. "Is Earl Grey OK?"

"Yes, that'll be fine," Mohinder said, walking over to the leather chair that was one of the few things in the room. "You, um ... sounded rather alarmed on the phone. You seemed to have calmed down some."

"I had a kind of epiphany about it this morning," Zane explained as he walked out of the kitchen, a slightly shell-shocked expression on his face. "Are you familiar with Abraham Maslow, the peak experience?"

"I'm afraid not," Mohinder replied.

"It's, um… a single moment that takes you out of yourself. Makes you feel very tiny or very large. To some extent, one with life or nature or God."

"I see…" Mohinder said, already struck by the anomalies; Zane Taylor definitely hadn't sounded this in control when he initially called…

"Like seeing all the pieces of a puzzle fit together," Zane continued. "All this time, I was trying to fight it. Deny it. But there is no shame in having this ability, is there?"

"None whatsoever," Mohinder smiled; the apparent personality shift was suspicious, but he had a chance to make a positive first impression. "It would be like denying you have brown eyes."

"Right," Zane said, sounding more uncertain once again. "So, um ... I guess that you… You want to see my ability."

"Yes!" Mohinder confirmed. "I mean, I'm quite anxious to document it."

"You might want to step back," Zane said, as he placed a sheet of plastic on the table and put a toaster on the sheet. "That looks like a nice jacket."

As Mohinder watched, Zane held his hand over the toaster, and then the structure wavered and rippled as though it was plastic melting in the sun. Mohinder was about to ask what was happening when the metal toaster collapsed into a puddle on the table right in front of him.

"My God…" Mohinder whispered; Matt's telepathy and Peter's apparent mimicry were more obviously impressive, but the idea that a man could change the state of matter just by willing it…

"You want to see it again?" Zane asked, prompting a chuckle from Mohinder.

Regardless of the reason for Zane's change of personality, the doctor was cautiously optimistic about this meeting; maybe Matt and Audrey's concerns had been for nothing…

"You're kidding me, right?" Sheila looked incredulously at Bennett, the two sitting in one of the man's more private offices for a briefing while her brothers were off for another one of their training sessions. "The heads of this company had a psycho powerhouse like Sylar on lockdown after he's killed God knows how many people, and they didn't kill him immediately?"

"Our illustrious supervisors decided that it would be better to work out how he was copying all those abilities in the first place rather than just eliminate him," Bennet said. His tone was relatively controlled, but Sheila had to appreciate the grim edge to his manner; the man might tow the company line, but he had enough of his own initiative to recognise when some things were just a bad idea.

"Pricks," Sheila muttered. "And that's how he killed Eden?"

"He didn't kill Eden himself, but he did… well, she was in a position where it was kill herself or risk Sylar taking her ability," Bennett said, nodding at her in solemn understanding. "They stepped up precautions after that and prevented any of your department getting close to him, but… well, Eden's sacrifice guaranteed he didn't get anything useful."

"Got to admire Eden for the effort, anyway," Sheila said, feeling the inadequacy of those words even as she hoped Bennet understood the sentiment behind them. She had always felt slightly uncomfortable around Eden, considering how the woman could have easily made Sheila do basically anything if she just said the right words, but she'd appreciated that the woman's heart had always been in the right place despite her rough upbringing. She'd never seriously thought that the woman would 'rape' her mind or anything like that, but… well, the idea was enough to make her worried.

"Seriously, though," she continued, getting the conversation back on the most relevant detail, "they kept that brain-slicing guy in Level Five and he's the only one who managed to get out?"

"The psyche team speculate that his ego probably helped us there," Bennett mused with a grim smile. "All other doors on that level were locked when Sylar got out, nobody else in there has seen any news of his activities so didn't grasp the significance even if they knew he was there, and most of the other patients were asleep when he actually left his cell. Either Sylar didn't see the other prisoners, or his ego led to him assuming that they were just standard prisoners or empowered prisoners who couldn't have anything worth taking if they were still here."

"Makes sense," Sheila nodded, even as she privately hoped that she'd never have the chance to see Sylar in action. The idea that anyone could take powers from others was disturbing on its own, but the way this Sylar guy killed them in the process was really sick; at least empaths like the guy from the club could choose whether or not to tap the power and left the other guy alone. "So what happened then?"

"I managed to track him to my house-"

"Your house?" Sheila's incredulity shifted to shock. "Why would- how would he-?"

"He stole my wallet and went after Claire while I was stuck in the cell," Bennett explained, before he looked at Sheila with a more pointed expression. "And on that topic, where is she?"

"Hey, don't complain about us doing a second-rate job on second-rate intel, pal," Sheila countered, falling back on her usual defensive stance. "We followed a possible lead and then had to take a detour on a more official job; is it our fault that you wanted this little search kept away from the higher-ups?"

"I need to find my daughter-"

"And speaking as the woman who was once the bratty teen herself, when a kid runs out on you and doesn't come back after a few days, she's got a freaking plan and she's not going to just come back when things get rough before she's ready to show up," Sheila countered. "We got a call on another rogue that we had to check out, and we captured a shapeshifter who was impersonating celebrities who could have been a problem. If you've got a problem with the way I'm doing things, make the case official so that we can find your kid ourselves, but otherwise just get out of the way and let us do our jobs at our own pace."

"…Fair enough," Bennett conceded, before he looked more thoughtfully at her. "You think Claire left with a plan?"

"Y'know, I get that Henry doesn't give the greatest impression of our family's ability to do more than hit stuff in interesting ways, but I do read the files," Sheila smiled at him. "Your daughter doesn't strike me as the type to just bail out because she's protesting against something, which means she bailed for a reason."

"Well… I suppose that's something," Bennett nodded in understanding. "You say you saw an empath in the club?"

"Looked like it, anyway; his body seemed to be ready to turn on itself before that girl stepped in," Sheila explained. "No idea how many powers he'd have had to take in before then for me, Mike, the Weegs and Camille to push him that far that fast, but give him credit, he seemed to get himself focused pretty quickly."

"Which at least gives you a legitimate reason to focus on New York."

"You really think she's there?"

"I have… a source… who's given me reason to focus on that area," Bennett said, with that edge to his tone that always made Sheila wonder if the guy had some really subtle power that even the Company's brains hadn't dared try to crack yet. "Shall I let you know if any further leads turn up on Sylar?"

"Let's see, do I want to have advance warning if I'm about to risk running into a guy who'd happily crack open my skull to find out what makes me tick?"

"Point," Bennett observed. "I'll do what I can at this end."

The more time Sheila spent on this extra assignment from Bennett, the more certain she was that there was a reason he was looking for his kid this way beyond simple fatherly concern, but at the same time…

She prided herself on being more rational and less 'in-your-face' than her brothers- sometimes she kept expecting Henry to start sprouting some of those heroic clichés that should have stopped being a serious thing back in the sixties- but something in Bennett's manner made her sure that he wasn't showing all this interest because he had some creepy ulterior agenda.

The man might be a bit of a creep, but he wasn't a pervert; until she had reason to believe otherwise, Sheila was going to trust Bennett that he was just a concerned parent looking for a daughter dealing with some unknown issue.

Kim liked to think that she was a good person, but she hadn't given much thought to the idea of trying to help people beyond 'be nice to everyone' before she pulled that branch out of Claire's head. Now that she was in a position where she was one of a few people who seemed to be prepared to stop the destruction of New York, looking back on the days when she and Ron had played 'superhero' when they were little, she had never realised just how hard it could be at times. Comics might feature the heroes making an effort to maintain their civilian lives on top of trying to fight their latest villains, but it wasn't until you had to face that kind of situation yourself that you realised how hard it was just to find something to do in the first place. She and Claire couldn't exactly go hunting for supervillains when they didn't really have any 'offensive' powers themselves, and they didn't even had any idea where to look for whatever was going to blow up the city in a few weeks.

All this advance notice of possibly the most devastating terrorist attack in years, and we don't know where to look for anything useful…

"Do you think we should… talk to his family?"

"His family?" Kim repeated as she looked at Claire, the two sitting uncertainly in the still-empty loft. "Whose family?"

"Peter's," Claire clarified, looking awkwardly at her. "I get that he's been basically on the run from them since this all happened, but they're still… I mean, if his father died just last year, then they've probably got a lot to deal with on top of his brother's election; maybe they'd feel better knowing he's safe-"

"Good intentions, but speaking as the girl who met his brother, I wouldn't recommend it," Kim shook her head. "That guy wanted to 'cure' Peter like his ability's something to be ashamed of, and from what I've heard the older brother was their mother's favourite, so it's probably safe to assume she'd be on his side with this kind of crap."

"So not worth it?"

"I get the sentiment, but if we try to talk to them I'm immediately foreseeing us getting sent away as 'meddlesome kids' who won't let his family 'help' Peter, and screw the idea that we might actually know what he wants to do with himself better than they do."

"Right…" Claire sighed as she looked up at the ceiling. "Damnit; what the Hell are we doing here?"

"Keeping away from Sylar and working out who's going to destroy New York-"

"But are we getting anywhere? Keeping away from Sylar's easy enough, but we don't even know what's going to cause the explosion, Peter's the only one of us who can actually do anything if we get in trouble, and the only time we went out of this loft we had to rely on Peter to save us from some quartet of superhumans we still don't know anything about-"

"We're still learning here, OK?" Kim cut Claire off. "You can't just dive in there and expect everything to fall into place; you can't be hurt, but that doesn't mean you can't be captured or anything like that."

"…OK, point," Claire sighed as she leant back against the wall. "I just… I thought when we met Peter we were finally part of something rather than just being a bunch of freaks and loners- no offence-"

"None taken," Kim nodded.

"Thanks… anyway, now it's like everyone new we've met has something interesting they can do and Peter's actually getting some training and I don't even feel like-"

The sudden ringing of a phone cut Claire off mid-sentence, the two girls exchanging confused looks before they hurried for the phone in question. For a moment their hands hovered over the receiver, each unsure what to do next, before Claire took it off and held it just between her and Kim's ears.

"Hello?" she said.

"Hola, Claire," Ron Sinclair's familiar voice said. "Is KP there?"

"Ron!" Kim smiled in relief before she looked at the phone in confusion. "How did you get this number? Actually, how did you even know there was a number?"

"I asked Simone about it while she was helping Hiro and Ando sort out a new car," Ron replied. "I thought it couldn't hurt to know who to talk to if we needed to keep you guys up-to-date."

"So it's all going OK?" Claire asked.

"Had a bit of a close call when some woman tried to talk Ando into helping her get out of a casino with stolen chips, but Hiro and I blew her cover before she could get Ando to do anything too stupid," Ron replied, sounding very satisfied at the story.

"Nice," Kim nodded in approval, noting Claire's frustrated expression at this further news that other people were making more of a difference right now. "It's… kind of quiet here right now; Peter's found a guy who's helping him get a better grip of what he can do, but it's still taking time for him to master everything."

"Hey, he's the only human I've ever heard of who's packing more powers than Superman; if anyone needs help keeping track of everything, it's him," Kim's old friend replied with a smile. "Chillax, KP, the guy's a full-on hero who's already fought off a supervillain; he can handle a crash course at Xavier's."

"Yeah," Kim agreed, sharing a smile with Kim and pretending not to notice the wistful edge to Claire's own expression. "We'll… let him know it's going well at your end when we see him again, OK?"

"Cool," Ron replied. "Gotta go; lot of ground to cover yet."

"And there's someone else making an impact-" Claire sighed as Ron ended the call.

"Which he and Ando are doing without abilities," Kim grinned encouragingly at Claire. "C'mon, just because you can't do anything offensive with your ability doesn't mean you have to just sit around and mope."

"Hey!" Claire glared at Kim, even if the slight smile on her face made it clear she wasn't that offended.

"I call it as I see it," Kim retorted teasingly, before she stood up and flexed her shoulders. "So… shall we practice?"

"Practice?" Claire repeated.

"Well, my powers aren't immediately offensive, but I do have the advantage of having spent time learning around sixteen different styles of kung-fu over the last few years," Kim explained with a thoughtful smile. "I'm not saying that it's going to be easy for me to pass that experience on, but if you're interested… shall I show you a few tricks?"

"Seriously?" Claire grinned, her initial dejection forgotten.

"We've got a big space and nothing else to keep ourselves occupied; let's get to work on teaching you how to kick ass."

"I'm very interested in how you control this… ability," Mohinder observed as he looked at the different coloured spots on the floor around the room. Zane's ability was one of the odder ones he'd seen- telepathy had its obvious evolutionary advantages, but what benefit was there in converting solids to liquids?- but he wasn't going to question it when he was still so early in his work.

"Well, it's, like…" Zane shook his head, as though trying to find the right analogy, "riding a bike for the first time; it's a little wobbly, and then I discovered something. A kind of peace. A sense of purpose that can only be described as destiny."

"I'd like to take a DNA sample," Mohinder said.

"From me?" Zane asked. "OK. Um, sure."

"Just swab it on the inside of your mouth," Mohinder said, handing the man a DNA swab before the kettle in the kitchen started to whistle.

"The tea," Zane said. "If you'll excuse me for a second."

"Of course," Mohinder said as Zane walked off, even as he found himself wondering about that; had the kettle been left on for that long…?

"I just swab it on the inside of my cheek?" Zane called back.

"Yes, that's right," Mohinder said. He briefly wondered if Zane had some objection to the idea of giving those kind of samples, but reminded himself that the man's DNA had been on record with the Human Genome Project in the first place; it was possible that he was just uncertain how to talk about something this strange.

"There you go," the man said, walking out of the kitchen to hand him the now-sealed swab. "DNA sample."

"Thank you," Mohinder said, taking the swab and putting it in a plastic bag. "You know… you should be careful who you talk to about this ability, Zane. There's some people who might not understand… who might want to hurt you."

"Why would anybody want to hurt me?" Zane asked.

"I don't know yet," Mohinder said; there was no way he was going to tell a stranger about Sylar this early in their association. "But I do know this; there are others out there like you."

"Really?" Zane asked with eager interest. "How many others?"

"Dozens, and those are just the ones I know about," Mohinder said. "With more time and research, I could find hundreds, thousands!"

He exaggerated his feelings on that topic to better sell it to this man, but he was being honest about just how many he believed he could find if he had the resources necessary to carry out a search like that.

"But," he added, exaggerating his uncertainty, "you're the first one who's returned my phone calls. But I am going to find them. All of them."

"I could go with you," Zane stood up. "I could help you. Think about it. These people could need convincing. Who better to do that?"

As Zane looked at the partially-melted phone on the table (how did Zane control when to stop something melting?), Mohinder had to concede that Zane had a point. Matt might be willing to serve as the team's current 'token superhuman', but with his relatively passive ability, it could be useful to have someone with a power that he could demonstrate to others that couldn't be easily dismissed as Matt doing advance research and a bit of 'cold reading'…

Chapter Text

"You think that Zane is Sylar?" Mohinder looked at Audrey incredulously as the three of them sat in a small diner.

"There was a body found in that apartment a few hours after you left it, and police reports positively identified it as Zane Taylor," the FBI agent nodded.

"How did-?" Mohinder began.

"The same M.O.," Matt nodded grimly. "Top of the head removed and the brain… well, it had been picked at, certainly."

"Which means that Sylar can do what Zane could do," Mohinder sighed. He found himself hoping that Zane's ability only worked on inorganic compounds; Sylar had only focused on taking or analysing his victim's brains so far, but if he chose to 'step up' and had the ability to do something like that to his targets…

"I've got some of my contacts at the agency keeping the reports quiet so the news doesn't go blaring it out and tip the guy off that we might know about him," Audrey said, her grim expression making it clear that she wasn't comfortable with the situation. "If he thinks you don't know about him, that might just give us an edge in working out how to stop this dick before he kills anyone else."

"I… might have an idea on that front already," the Indian doctor nodded tentatively. "Zane- Sylar- suggested that he could join me in trying to make contact with other people with abilities as part of my research."

"You agreed?"

"Keep in mind that when I accepted that offer I didn't know he was anything other than a young man with an ability he was trying to adjust to," Mohinder said defensively. "My point is that I didn't tell 'Zane' about you or my concerns about Sylar; if we can find another person with an ability, we might be able to… well, set a trap?"

"Set a trap?" Matt repeated. "You mean we use a person as bait?"

"Could work…" Audrey nodded carefully.

"You're not serious?" Matt looked at her in shock. "We've seen what this guy can do-"

"We've seen what he can do when he at least has some idea what he's up against and has no reason to think anyone's going to fight back," Audrey corrected him. "If we can set up a situation where we know who he's going after and he doesn't know we're waiting for him, we might be able to catch him off-guard."

"With all the powers he has to have by now?"

"We know he can't do what I do or he'd have probably already worked out that you're working with us," Matt pointed out. "Add in that whatever happened in Odessa saw him apparently get hurt, and we have to assume he's still got human vulnerabilities; the trick is hitting him hard enough so that he can't defend himself."

"Got to be worth a shot, right?" Audrey shrugged as she looked at Mohinder. "Trust me, I'm not happy that we're going to have to put someone else at risk than you are, but right now it's our best bet if we're going to smoke him out."

Mohinder looked solemnly at the FBI agent for a moment, but finally nodded in grim understanding.

"Very well," he said. "How shall we do this?"

"Hah!" Peter yelled, ducking under a swipe from Claude's improvised staff and firing a quick burst of green fire at the weapon. Claude ducked around the blast and countered with a kick to Peter's chest, only to overshoot when Peter shrank down just enough for the blow to pass over his body, following the dodge up by lashing out with a burst of enhanced strength that sent the invisible man staggering back.

"…Nice job," Claude said, rubbing his chest as he looked at Peter in grudging admiration. "You really got all those just last night?"

"Ran into them all in a club," Peter nodded, looking thoughtfully at his hand as he generated the green flame from that dark-haired girl had used when fighting with Kim. "I think that's why it's so easy for me to tap them all at once; I met all four of them at the same time, so I think of the same emotions when I'm trying to tap their abilities."

"Four?"

"Well, the fourth guy had some ability to make copies of himself, so… well, I'd rather not try to tap that one," the former nurse shrugged awkwardly. "I don't know how much independence any clone I created that way would have, but I think we've got enough trouble making sure I get my head around these abilities without adding even one more me to the mix."

"Good call," Claude nodded. "So long as you know how not to tap that particular gift when you don't want to, that's probably the main thing right now."

The invisible man looked Peter over with a surprisingly serious grin. "Got to admit, you're already better than the other empaths I've met before; hard to be sure how you're matching up in terms of strength, but you've definitely got them beat for variety."

"Strength?"

"Thing you've got to realise about copying powers is that they're never going to be quite as strong as the original one," Claude explained as he leant against the wall with a thoughtful smile. "Never got an exact figure, for obvious reasons, but it's always been agreed that anyone just copying an ability can match the other guy when they're in the same room, but you're not going to be able to do everything the original owner can do with it when you're away from him; generate less electric oomph, can't move quite as fast as the original speedster, that kind of thing."

"Huh," Peter nodded at that bit of information, raising his hand to generate a brief green blaze before he snuffed it out. "Well, that's something to keep in mind."

"Don't use it as an excuse to get cocky," Claude observed, his smile shifting to a more solemn stare. "Just because you can't pack the same level of power as the original on your own doesn't mean that you couldn't tap a fair portion of the wrong power if you lose your focus; we still need to be sure you know what you're doing with all this."

"Good point," Peter nodded, moving into a new combat stance while trying not to think about a problem with Claude's description.

The idea that he could only equal the people he copied at best made sense, and it made even more sense that he found it easier to copy their power when he was right next to them… but if that was the case, how had he been able to beat that Haitian guy when he was tapping into the other man's negating ability? He understood that Kim's ability made it easier for him to access the powers he'd copied (he still wasn't sure who that 'giving orders' thing had come from), but he didn't think that would make him more powerful than the original owner…

"This is about Miss Evans, right?" Bennett looked curiously at Thompson as he walked into the other man's office.

"Good guess," the other man nodded.

"Hardly a guess; she's the only new prisoner in Level Five right now, and you and I are the senior operatives on-site right now," Bennett said, folding his arms as he looked at his colleague; he didn't like being kept away from his search for Claire or Peter Petrelli, but the best way to avoid attracting attention was to keep acting as normal. "So what's she capable of?"

"Well, she's no Sylar, but she's an interesting specimen, certainly," Thompson observed with that slight smile that Bennet doubted anyone in the company could interpret fully. "She has a uniquely malleable bone structure, and she can even reshape her internal organs as appropriate for the person she's impersonating. There appear to be certain limits in terms of how far she can change her size, but how much of that is an actual limit and how much it's just psychological we don't know."

"Psychological?" Bennett repeated, curious despite his current personal concerns.

"Miss Evans prides herself on her appearance above all else; some of our on-staff psychiatrists speculate that she can't, for example, make herself fatter because she just doesn't want to be fat rather than because she can't change herself that way. That said, there are also some theories about her actual limits; research seems to indicate that she's only able to turn into people she's met in person, but there's some question about if she could become someone if, for example, she saw a photograph of that person with someone she'd become already."

"Which would allow her to compare a known form to an unknown one and imitate it without direct experience," Bennett nodded in understanding. "But your point is that she can't just imagine someone to look like; she always needs to imitate an existing template?"

"As far as we can tell so far," Thompson said. "With that in mind, I had the idea that it might be interesting to see what would happen if she and Miss Wilmer had a chance to compare notes in terms of their adaptability."

"You think she's worth recruiting?"

"I think she's worth testing, certainly," Thompson nodded. "She's not a candidate for permanent residence in Level Five, but whether she has the right mentality to be an asset is another matter."

The situation with Isaac Mendez's paintings were still his priority, but Bennett had to concede that this kind of mystery was one reason he'd stayed with the Company this long; in a grim way, it was morbidly fascinating to see what people could be capable of once they manifested…

Standing alongside the man he was increasingly starting to suspect was Sylar, Mohinder wondered if it would have been better to remain in ignorance. Matt and Audrey had each assured him that it would be safer to avoid doing anything to tip the man off that they might know about him before they were ready to stage their trap, but the idea that he might be standing right next to the man who'd killed his father…

Even as Zane/Sylar 'confirmed' that he was ready, standing outside Smither's Garage, Mohinder wasn't sure if he was going to be ready for what was coming up; actually trying to set a 'trap' like this wasn't something he'd ever trained for…

"Excuse me!" he called out, trying to force down his fears as he walked into the garage, eyes quickly falling on the woman welding at the back of the building beside a battered car. After Mohinder repeated himself, the woman lifted her welder's mask to reveal that she was wearing earphones under it, smiling apologetically at the visitors.

"Oh," she said as she removed the earphones. "Rap music; can't stand it, but it's the only thing I've found that cancels out the… can I help you?"

"We're looking for Dale Smither," Mohinder asked.

"You found her," Dale said.

"O-of course," Mohinder nodded. "I'm Mohinder Suresh, and this is Mr Taylor."

"Zane," the other man said, still demonstrating a strangely shy manner that Mohinder couldn't entirely believe was faked. "Actually, it's just Zane."

"I left you several messages this week," Mohinder said, as the woman walked over to another desk and removed her gloves.

"Yeah, I got 'em," Smither said.

"I believe I can help with what's happening to you; I'm sure you have lots of questions."

"Yeah, only one," Smither tossed her gloves down and turned to look at him. "How'd you find me?"

"You gave blood eleven years ago," Mohinder explained. "Signed a consent form to have a sample used in a program called the Human Genome Project."

"You dialled the wrong number," the welder said.

"Look," the man who may be Sylar or Zane said. "I know what you're thinking right now, that you've got nobody to talk to, nobody that understands what you're going through. But that's not true. I-I understand."

"Yeah?" Smither looked sceptically at him.

Mohinder and the other man exchanged brief glances, after which the other man emptied out a glass jar full of nails and dropped a wrench into it. He held his hand over the bottle for a moment, and then the wrench melted into the jar, Zane looking at the mechanic with a casual expression.

"Damn," Smither said. "That was my best wrench… so there really are others, huh?"

"Yes," Zane nodded. "I'm proof of that."

"That's why we're here," Mohinder affirmed; whatever his other motives were, he was genuinely interested to meet with Dale and learn what she was capable of.

"I-I…" Smither began, sitting down on the edge of the bench. "I thought the headaches at first were gonna kill me. I'd lie awake at night thinking that my head was gonna explode. A cockroach crawling across my neighbour's floor was like a marching band parading through my house."

"I'm sorry," Mohinder said. "It must be quite the burden."

"Burden?" Smither looked at Mohinder with a grin. "Hell, no; this is the best damn thing that ever happened to me. Now that I've learned to control it, I'm like… Superman or something. I can hear rain coming from forty miles away. I can even hear someone's moods; the tiniest changes in a heartbeat."

She turned to look at 'Zane' with a curious intensity. "Yours, for instance. It's racing kind of fast. You nervous about something?"

"Um, no," the other man replied tentatively. "I'm just excited to meet somebody like me."

"Well," the woman observed, "if you've come to try to take it away from me, you're gonna have a hell of a fight on your hands."

"I can assure you we only want to help," Mohinder affirmed. "Uh, I'd like to perform a few tests, some questions, really, that's all. Shouldn't take more than a couple of hours."

"I'm kinda backed up today…"

"We can come back in the morning."

Even as Dale nodded in agreement, Mohinder could see the expression on the face of the man he had been introduced to as Zane Taylor. If he didn't have a reason to suspect otherwise, he might have passed it off as a new superhuman grateful to have evidence that he wasn't alone, but with Agent Hanson's information about the body discovered in Zane's apartment…

"What's this all about anyway?" Peter looked curiously at Claude as the invisible man took a pigeon out of the coop. Standing around on a rooftop at night talking about pigeons wasn't something he'd ever seen himself do, but it was frankly the most normal activity he'd had during the day; even eating had involved testing a couple of his abilities, eating a sandwich or snack while trying to keep time frozen and then rewinding it a few seconds so that the sandwich was still there (not something he'd use that ability for regularly, but it was a good way to practise that particular power right now).

"What's what?" Claude asked, closing the door and walking to the other side of the coop.

"The birds," Peter clarified. "I mean, you… you sort of hate everything, everyone. Except you treat these pigeons like they're family."

"Charles Darwin bred pigeons when he was working out his theory of evolution," Claude replied as he put the pigeon back and closed the door. "Married up various permutations to get maximum potential."

"When you say 'maximum potential'… are we talking about me or Sylar?"

"Considering what I've heard about the bastard so far, I'm inclined to think you," Claude said with a thoughtful smile.

"You used to care, didn't you?" Peter said, indicating the city spread out before them. "About all this?"

"All right, sharing time's over," Claude said. "Time to get-"

The invisible man let out a yell and fell forwards, the sound of electricity crackling through his body as Peter moved forwards to catch him. Looking up, Peter saw the quartet he'd met at the club the night before, accompanied by an unfamiliar man in glasses and the dark-skinned man who'd tried to question him and the others the night he had saved Claire from Sylar, standing by the door to the roof wearing what had to be infrared goggles.

Seeing the dark-skinned man raising another taser gun towards him, Peter quickly launched a green fireball at the man while trying to focus the man's own ability on his colleagues. Judging by the way the woman generated a small green flare in her palm and looked at it with a growl on her lips, Peter had a feeling he wasn't going to be able to shut them all down for long, but the surprise was enough for Peter to grab Claude in his arms, thankful for whoever had given him enhanced strength, and leap off the building, focusing on Nathan as he flew into the night.

He didn't know if whoever those people were had been after him or Claude, but for the moment his apartment was the safest option he could think of. When he reached his building, he opened the window and slipped inside, laying Claude on the sofa to take a quick check. His teacher didn't seem to have anything more serious than being temporarily knocked out, so he'd give the man a little time before he started being concerned about this turn of events.

After preparing himself a quick cup of coffee to keep himself refreshed after that close call, Peter tried to keep himself occupied by reading a book, but he couldn't relax his mind enough to concentrate on the words on the page. After waiting for a couple of hours, Peter was starting to have to fight off the urge to sleep when he heard a groan from Claude, relieved to see the invisible man slowly blinking his eyes open and sitting up.

"How you feeling?" Peter asked, looking anxiously at his mentor, only to be met with a punch to the face and being slammed into the wall before he could react.

"You knew they were after you!" the older man yelled at him.

"Who?" Peter protested. "Hey, I told you I ran into those guys at the club-!"

"When I thought it was just a bad bit of luck for you to find a family of powerhouses all at once, not that it was part of some goddamn… coordinated strike!" Claude yelled. "I was invisible all those years because of them, and now you've brought the bastards right to my door!"

"And I just saved your ass from them-!" Peter protested as he knocked Claude back.

"You've no idea what you've done," Claude looked bitterly at him as he got up from a chair and began to frantically look around the apartment. "Your mate, that painter; he took the girl to the roof, so he must have been able to work out we were up there."

"Isaac?" Peter repeated, suddenly recalling the lack of contact from Isaac even after Kim and Claire had started using his loft as a refuge. "You think they got to him?"

"You don't know where he is right now; odds are they got him," Claude said. "That's how it worked in my day; you drop off the face of the earth for a few days, wake up with a memory hole, a killer headache, and a souvenir." Peter was saved from asking what kind of 'souvenir' Claude meant when the man showed him a distinctive scar on the back of his shoulder. "And this is just if you're lucky."

"So… what do we do now?" Peter asked, trying to collect himself as Claude turned for the door.

"We?" Claude turned around to look bitterly at him. "You watch your own back. I do what I always do; disappear."

"I need your help; we're getting somewhere with this-!" Peter tried to grab his arm.

"You should have thought of that before you brought your baggage to my roof," Claude countered, shrugging his arm free and storming for the door. "You might want to consider if you're protecting or hurting those kids while you're at it."

The kids…

Peter's blood ran cold at the thought of what might have happened to the girls.

If Isaac turned the Company in their direction… God, if he'd gone back to the apartment and found them...

As he carefully made his way into the garage, Sylar smiled at the thought of how easily his whole plan had just fallen into place. The decision to pose as Zane to meet with Doctor Suresh's son had been an impulsive move by any standard, but so far it seemed to be paying off in terms of helping him add more names to his list. He appreciated that he couldn't make a regular habit of doing this- Suresh might be gullible, but even he'd notice if everyone they met on his father's list kept dying after they met- but he couldn't resist the possibilities of acquiring such a useful ability as this one. He'd get past any side-effects easily enough once he properly understood just how to make it work- Smither was only having trouble because she wasn't meant to have it- and then…

His smile faltered when he entered the garage and saw no sign of the woman he'd come here to assess. The garage had officially closed an hour ago, but the woman gave every sign of being one of those people who lived for their work- something that he could almost 'respect', considering he'd been the same before he realised their potential- and the fact that she wasn't here now…

The sense of something striking his back left his body juddering in shock, and Sylar didn't even have the time to curse at himself for not keeping his usual telekinetic shield up before he hit the ground.

Chapter Text

"I have to go on record as saying that I'm officially not comfortable doing things this way," Audrey said as Mohinder tightened the straps around Sylar's arms and legs as the serial killer's unconscious body lay slumped in a chair in their current 'safehouse'.

She was still amazed that the planned sting operation had worked out as well as it had in the end. Dale naturally hadn't expected to become part of a sting operation, but she'd gone along with the proposed plan easily enough. While Dale waited in her house, Matt and Audrey had taken up position by the door, Matt using his own ability to keep an 'eye' out until Sylar arrived to go after Dale. The serial killer had been so focused on his intended target, supposedly in the garage, that he hadn't noticed Matt and Audrey come up behind him and take him down with an amped-up taser, Once Smithers had been warned to keep an eye out in case Sylar came back, Audrey had been able to call a friend from the bureau and get the address of a holiday home belonging to a friend of that friend, explaining that she was dealing with a difficult case that she couldn't afford to interrogate officially until she knew what she was dealing with.

It was a difficult balance, but even if she recognised the practical need not to take Sylar to the police station until they're worked out how they were going to deal with him long-term, that didn't stop her feeling uncomfortable about ignoring everything she'd been taught about making a legitimate arrest…

"Your objection has been noted," Mohinder nodded at her as he set up the IV. "I sympathise with your dilemma, Agent Hanson, but you have to acknowledge that we don't have a better means of keeping him under control considering the powers he's likely absorbed by now."

"He's right," Matt nodded at Audrey with a grim expression. "Believe me, I'm not comfortable about this either, but if those crime scenes were half as disturbing in reality as they were in the files…"

"Yeah, I get it; just doesn't mean I like it," Audrey looked grimly at the trapped killer. "This is going to be a lot trickier than I expected…"

"If it helps, I can promise you enough time to think it over," Mohinder nodded at her. "This IV is delivering a low level of curare into Sylar's body; it won't be enough to kill him, but it will induce a mild paralysis of the brain that should stop him from properly controlling his abilities even if he regains consciousness."

"…Suppose I can deal with that," the FBI agent nodded.

"So how do we do this?" Matt looked at their prisoner. "I mean, in terms of turning him over to the authorities?"

"That's… a good point," Audrey sighed in frustration as she looked at their prisoner. After what she'd learned from Matt and Mohinder, there was no question that Sylar had committed multiple crimes that deserved imprisonment at best, but the problem lay in working out how to actually prove any of this in a court of law. Even if she could make anyone else believe in the existence of… superpowers… without just letting Sylar wake up and potentially kill whoever was in the room with him as a demonstration, then they'd need to work out the best way to keep him from breaking out while he was on trial without human rights lawyers getting up in arms about 'cruel and unusual punishment'…

"Is he truly human any more?"

"What?" Audrey and Matt looked sharply at Mohinder to see the man looking coldly at Sylar.

"Taking powers from others to enhance his own nature… he's essentially little more than a parasite," Mohinder said, his tone grim and his eyes cold. "There's only one true way to stop a parasite; kill it before it kills again."

"…Tell me you're kidding," Audrey looked coolly at the Indian doctor. "You're not seriously talking about-?"

"Can you honestly tell me that your superiors at the bureau are capable of holding a man like Sylar?" Mohinder asked. "We already know from crime scene reports that he can freeze objects and impale people multiple times without needing to touch them himself; we can't be sure what other abilities he might possess-"

"But we can't just jump straight to murder as a solution!" Matt protested. "Audrey's right; we have to be better than-"

The cop's protests were cut short when the main door was suddenly kicked open and a man staggered inside, looking desperately around before he saw Matt and Audrey.

"You're here!" he said, sighing in relief.

"Ted?" Matt and Audrey said simultaneously.

"Who?" Mohinder asked.

"He was an early suspect in the Sylar case," Audrey said.

"What?" Sprague looked at her indignantly. "You said-!"

"Doctor Suresh is helping us investigate the Sylar case," Hanson cut Sprague off. "What are you doing here… and how the Hell did you find us?"

"I was… I met this woman," Sprague explained, looking awkwardly between the three while giving every impression he was trying to deliberately not look at the man in the chair behind them. "She said that she could help me find information about the man with the glasses and whatever company he's working for, but I thought that… well, I thought that Officer Parkman could help me confirm…"

"OK, that explains what you're doing here, but doesn't explain how you got here," Matt said.

"Hana… she has the ability to access electronic data," Sprague explained, looking uncertainly at the Indian doctor and the FBI agent before he looked back at Matt. "She managed to track you down based on your recent messages, and then she's been helping me trace your phone here… seriously, who is that guy?"

"Sylar," Audrey answered.

"Seriously?" the radioactive man looked at the unconscious man incredulously before he turned back to Matt and Audrey. "You thought I was that guy?"

"The doctor's death suggested a similar M.O. to Sylar's cases, and you are aware that you're still wanted by Homeland Security?"

"Because they think I'm a terrorist, which you know I'm not-!"

"Can I… clarify something?" Mohinder cut in, looking curiously at Ted. "I take it from my… colleagues' comments that you have an ability yourself?"

"I… generate radiation," Sprague replied with a bitter edge to his voice.

"Really?" Mohinder looked at the new arrival with a smile.

"Which led to him killing his wife and her doctor because he couldn't control it," Matt said before either man could say anything else.

"Ah." Mohinder's smile quickly shifted to regret. "You… have my condolences; I lost my father recently myself."

"Uh… thanks, I guess," Sprague said, before he looked at Sylar. "So… what's the big deal with this guy?"

"He killed my father and used his research to find others like yourself," Mohinder explained. "He was able to use my father's research to track down people with abilities, and he…"

"He kills them and apparently takes their abilities for himself," Audrey finished, before she fixed Sprague with a firm glare. "So stay calm and stay away from him, OK? I'm still undecided about whether I should treat you as anything more than a particularly unstable nuke, but I know I don't want what you've got in the hands of this son of a bitch."

"…Fair enough," Sprague nodded at her, before he looked back at Mohinder. "But… if your father knew something about… what I am-"

"We'll… discuss that later," Mohinder nodded awkwardly at Sprague. "Right now, we still have to work out what we're going to do with Sylar here…"

There were times when even Bennett was amazed at how much he could achieve when he was pushed to it. He'd failed in his attempted mission to capture Peter Petrelli and Claude Raines even with the Haitian and the Gogh siblings backing him up, and he'd still managed to respond to the Company's latest call for his services when they'd found Sylar's latest location after intercepting a phone conversation about the escaped killer. A part of him was grateful that they'd called after his failed attempt to capture those two, so at least he didn't have to choose between his own plan and the Company's request, but it still frustrated him that he'd been recalled to the Sylar case before he could finish his own project.

Like with the Gogh siblings, it was a matter of popular debate among some circles just how the Company kept track of phone calls on matters like this, but all that mattered was that they had found some report that the killer had been captured by an FBI agent in Montana. He'd been on a flight to Montana barely an hour after he got the call, and from there he and the Haitian just had to follow the phone's GPS to wherever the agent was keeping the killer. The call had apparently been intercepted so that the FBI as a whole were currently unaware of Sylar's capture, which at least meant they wouldn't have to worry about anything more than an FBI agent or two, but Bennett would be lying to himself if he didn't admit to feeling a certain shame about the idea that they would be potentially sabotaging the woman's arrest.

Anyone who caught Sylar has to know something about what he's capable of; the only problem with this scenario is that they'd have no way of explaining to the bureau how to keep him locked up without sounding crazy.

He particularly regretted that he'd been unable to respond to Lyle's call about Sandra being taken to hospital, but he'd been able to honestly answer that he was trying to follow up a lead to Claire's location. He'd only managed to get the answering machine (he'd never gotten around to memorising Lyle's mobile number, and he obviously didn't carry his personal phone on business; he had to set up some system where calls to that number were sent to his company-issued phone in case of emergencies), but hopefully his son would check the messages in time to understand why he wasn't there…

When the car came to a halt outside the house that the phone had been traced to, Bennett glanced over at the Haitian as he took out his gun.

"Be ready," he said firmly. "If Sylar's in there…"

The Haitian simply nodded, silent as ever, but Bennett had been working with him long enough to see an edge of apprehension in his eyes. He regretted that he hadn't been able to get the Gogh siblings to accompany them for back-up, but he couldn't risk Thomson asking questions about what they had been doing in New York with him in case it led to anyone else getting too interested in Claire's disappearance.

Tightening his grip on his gun, Bennett walked briskly up to the house, only to pause when he realised that someone had already forced the door open. Only slightly calmed when he noticed that the door had been forced open from the outside, he marched into the room and found himself faced with a particularly unexpected group of people. The blonde woman wasn't familiar, but he was fairly sure he'd been responsible for testing the two men for abilities at some point, Doctor Suresh was easy enough to recognise, and the only reason he needed a moment to recognise that Sylar was in the chair behind them was that he wasn't used to seeing the man unconscious.

"Who the Hell-?" the blonde woman said, pulling out a gun with the ease that could only come from professional training.

"Stay back!" the bearded man said, raising his hands as he glared at Bennett, only to stare at his palms in shock. "What the-?"

"My colleague here is keeping things on an even playing field," Bennett said; he couldn't immediately recall what that man had been capable of, but judging by the way he'd raised his hands Bennett would assume that it was some kind of offensive ability that it would be best to keep neutralised for the moment. "Now then, since I'm sure we all want Sylar to not be allowed to go free, might I suggest that I be the one to take him into custody-?"

"Not a chance," the woman with the gun said firmly. "This asshole's my prisoner, and he's staying in my custody."

"My company has experience at keeping people like Sylar contained-"

"Which would be why he's still walking around?" the fat man cut in, looking at Bennett with a particularly intense glare. "And the reason why Zane Taylor is dead?"

"Zane Taylor?" Bennett repeated.

"He could turn objects to liquid before Sylar here cut his head open, copied his power, and took his identity to try and find more victims," the fat man said. "And then he was going to kill Dale Smithers for her enhanced hearing before we stepped in and caught him ourselves, so where the Hell were you then?"

"Sylar's escape was a mistake-"

"And we're expected to just hand this guy over to you and trust that you won't repeat that kind of mistake?" the woman asked. "No chance in Hell; he's staying here until-"

"Mohinder… can kill me…?" another voice said. Spinning around, the six were all shocked to see Sylar looking tentatively up at them, a subtle smile on his face even as his posture gave the impression of intense weariness. "Like father… like son…"

"My father was not a killer-" Mohinder began.

"When he kept… leading me to them…?"

"He didn't know what you were-"

"When we were making so much progress… why would he stop?" Sylar grinned. "He told me so many things… things about your sister Shanti… things he thought you were too fragile to know about…"

"Shut-!" Mohinder began, only for the woman to grab his arm before he could strike Sylar.

"Hit him like that and you might just dislodge that IV," she pointed out grimly. "He's trying to provoke you; don't let him."

"And… you are?" Sylar looked at her with a thoughtful grin. "I feel like… we've met before…"

"Been hunting you for the last few months," the woman shrugged as she turned back to look at him. "Got to admit, after everything you've done, I was expecting someone bigger."

"Size… isn't everything… detective-"

"Agent," the woman countered. "I'm with the FBI."

"My mistake," Sylar smiled at her. "Credit… where credit's due…"

"Save it," the woman said before she turned back to Bennett. "So you're… what, tracking people who manifest these powers?"

"You seem remarkable casual about this," Bennett observed, even as he tried to consider how he could turn this twist to his advantage; he'd been recruited for his own tracking skills when he had nothing left after Kate's death, but this woman clearly had her own life that she didn't seem likely to give up…

"I had a few run-ins that left me with a more open mind," the woman replied, her expression calculating as she looked at him and the Haitian. "So you say that your colleague here can keep things on an even playing field… what do you do?"

"The same as you and Doctor Suresh, I believe."

"So… you don't have an ability yourself?" the larger man looked at Bennett in surprise.

"I know what I'm doing," Bennett replied. "You'd be surprised how many people get complacent because they can do something others can't."

"Really?" the other man indicated Sylar. "He doesn't exactly seem 'complacent'-"

"Shut up!" the bearded man yelled, suddenly shoving his way forward and grabbing Bennett by the jacket to practically throw him against the wall. "I don't care about why you were 'tracking' me, I just need to know if you're the sick fucks who did this to me in the first place!"

"I had nothing to do with-" Bennett began.

"What was it, some kind of sick experiment?" the bearded man continued, further reinforcing Bennett's opinion that the man was losing his grip if he wasn't even listening to their counter-argument. "Are you the reason I killed my wife?"

"Ted!" the other man yelled, stepping forward to grab his shoulder. "You can't just-"

"You've got some psychopath tied up because he's trying to… what, take abilities from other people and you're just going to accept this shit?" the now-identified Ted looked at the other man even as he kept a grip on Bennett. "He did something to us-!"

"I did nothing more than keep track of you," Bennett replied, even as he privately acknowledged that he would probably be more panicked without the Haitian here to even the odds. "Your ability is natural; we just keep track of manifestations-"

"Stop lying-!"

"He's not lying," Doctor Suresh interjected, looking sympathetically at the man who was apparently Ted. "My father's work has confirmed that the genetic sequence that gives people abilities is completely natural; there is no way that any company could have turned you or others into what you are now."

"…He's telling the truth," the other man put in, looking between Bennett and Mohinder before focusing on Ted. "They all are."

"…They… they are?" Ted stood uncertainly back from Bennett, staring tentatively at his temporary prisoner. "But… my wife…"

"It was a tragic accident," Bennett looked at the man with new sympathy. "Believe me, I know how you feel; my own wife is in hospital right now because of… well, it's not anything I did to her on purpose, but-"

"It's… it's still rough," Ted looked awkwardly at Bennett. "I… you really didn't…?"

"No," Bennett nodded in confirmation. "We had nothing to do with you becoming what you are now-"

"Whereas…" Sylar's voice suddenly cut in, "Doctor Suresh's father… had everything to do… with what I am…"

As their gaze turned back to Sylar, Bennett barely bit back a curse when he saw that the IV drip that had been sticking into Sylar had been removed; the man must have regained enough control of his abilities to remove the feed. Bennett raised his gun to fire, but Sylar suddenly raised one hand and Bennett was sent flying up against the wall, along with the other people in the room. For a moment Sylar just glared at the group, his outstretched hand visibly shaking even as his remaining straps slipped off his limbs, but he soon stood up and glared at them all.

"See you… around," he said, a particular edge to his voice as he looked at Sprague and Doctor Suresh before he released a burst of what Bennett could only consider blue energy from his hand, and suddenly Bennett felt a chill along his wrists and ankles. Looking around, he wasn't entirely surprised to see that his outstretched limbs were now covered in frost that was holding them against the wall, with his fellow 'prisoners' in a similar state. Turning his attention back to Sylar, Bennett was prepared to face Sylar's particular brand of death, but was surprised to see the killer just turn around and head for the rear of the house, likely making for a back door of some kind.

He briefly wondered why Sylar had allowed them all to live, but considering the villain's condition, he would guess that Sylar had concluded that he wasn't yet strong enough to hold down all six of them, particularly when he couldn't be sure if any of them had an ability that he might find useful to acquire…

"Mr… Ted?" he turned his attention back to their current situation. "From what you said earlier, can I assume you have some kind of… offensive ability?"

"He… generates radiation," the fat man replied.

"And it's Sprague," the bearded man clarified bitterly. "Ted Sprague."

"Right," Bennett nodded, taking a moment to think this over before deciding to just hope that Sylar had left. "Mr Sprague, I need you to release a quick burst of energy-"

"Are you crazy-?"

"My colleague can inhibit your ability to limit the amount of energy you can release in one burst; if you don't try it, we could develop frostbite before anyone else finds us," Bennett said urgently. "At least try it before you dismiss it!"

"All… all right…" Sprague said. The other man was too far down the wall for Bennett to see what he was doing at this angle, but a glance to one side allowed Bennett to see that the Haitian had closed his eyes and had a very measured expression on his face, making it clear that the other agent was trying to moderate just how much of Sprague's power he was suppressing rather than just letting his own ability do its usual thing. After a minute or so, there was a brief thumping sound, and he looked over to see Sprague on his knees on the floor, looking uncertainly at his now-damp forearms. The others began trying to talk to him all at once, but Bennett simply waited in silence until Sprague had melted the others' bonds, even if he was the last one the man turned his attention to.

"So-" Bennett began, only to find himself facing the barrel of a gun held by the blonde woman.

"Under normal circumstances, after hearing some of what you said to Sylar, I want you to be clear that I'd be arresting you for unlawful detainment at best," the woman said, before she groaned in frustration and lowered the gun. "But considering the kind of things we're dealing with right now… I'm willing to give you the benefit of the doubt."

"And I'll do the same for you," Bennett replied, already abandoning the idea of asking the Haitian to wipe the memories of everyone present; if they had captured Sylar for any length of time, they must have at least some idea of what they were doing. "Noah Bennett."

"…Audrey Hanson," the woman replied, shaking his hand before she indicated the other men. "I gather you already know Doctor Suresh, but this is Officer Matt Parkman, originally of the Los Angeles Police Department; he's been… helping me track Sylar."

"I see," Bennett said, looking at Parkman in thought before the memory came to him. "You… read minds, correct?"

"…Yeah," Parkman replied, looking at him in a probing manner that Bennett had a feeling he should be worried about even with the Haitian present, before he turned his attention back to the empty chair. "So now that Sylar's gone, what do we do next? Go after him?"

"Given Sylar's track record at evading pursuit and our lack of a plan for what we do when we do catch up with him, I'd advise against that," Doctor Suresh observed. "Our best bet is to anticipate his next move and try and catch him before he can make further progress."

"And… how do we do that?" Mr Sprague asked, clearly uncertain about his own next move even as he looked at Parkman and Hanson in particular as though they would be able to give him the answers.

"I have an idea or two," Mohinder said, before he looked at Bennett in a very firm manner. "But I would require your own promise that you let us handle Sylar; as Mr Parkman has already observed, your company's track record at keeping him contained is… not the best."

"Not to mention that I'm not keen on the idea that your bosses might decide to lock up Matt and Ted for what they're capable of," Agent Hanson said.

"Both… fair points," Bennett nodded at the doctor and the agent.

He couldn't entirely believe that he was about to do this, but he couldn't deny that both made good points; the company had already failed to stop Sylar once, so there was no harm in trying to go after him again with new allies.

Besides… with everything he was doing to keep Claire away from them, did the company truly deserve his loyalty any more? So long as the Haitian didn't show any objection to the new agenda, these people deserved help catching Sylar, and they'd already done comparatively better than the company considering what they'd been starting with…

Chapter Text

Standing in his studio loft for the first time in a few weeks, Isaac was only half-aware of what he was doing as he worked away at his latest painting. He still hadn't quite gotten his head around exactly how he was able to paint the future without heroin when he'd spent so long only able to tap this particular skill when he was on drugs, but it was becoming easier to slip into the appropriate 'head-space' whenever he tried to do this.

It was a little frustrating that most of his work right now ended up focusing on Peter Petrelli even when he wasn't actively looking for the other man, but he supposed that was the price of dealing with someone who was going to be this important to the future. If the man was going to destroy New York in the next couple of weeks, finding Petrelli was probably the most important thing he could do with his time right now. He had been trying to give his subconscious the proper incentive by arranging some of his other recent paintings around the loft as he worked on his latest 'project', but he didn't even know if it was making any kind of difference. He still couldn't entirely understand exactly what some of these earlier paintings meant, such as that one where a figure that seemed to be Peter was standing in a club and seemed to be shifting around in some way or another, but he had faith that he'd understand the meaning eventually.

As he sank into the right headspace for a new sketch, he spent a few minutes zoned out- it really was easier to paint when he was tapping his abilities- before he stepped away from his easel. After taking the traditional moment to clear his mind of the trance state, he took in what he had just done. The latest painting was another sketch of Petrelli, but where his recent work had depicted the man in various locations around New York, now Peter was…

Oh crap.

When he turned around and found the man in question standing in the middle of the loft, the cold glare on his face matching the one in the painting, Isaac once again cursed the relative vagueness of that particular 'gift'.

"Why'd you do it, Isaac?" the former nurse said.

"How'd you get in here?" Isaac asked, trying desperately to find some sense of control in this situation.

"What'd they give you?" Peter ignored his question. "Money? Drugs? What's a Judas get these days?"

"I was trying to stop you," Isaac countered; from what Simone had told him, Peter wasn't exactly a psychotic, so it was possible he could still talk him down. "You're dangerous. You said it yourself. Without them to help, you'll become that-"

"I had help," Peter countered, ignoring the artist's attempt to indicate the glowing man picture as he glared firmly at Isaac. "I was learning to control it. You scared away my best chance of working out how to stop that!"

A brief flash of guilt crossed Isaac's mind, but his mind moved to a more defensive approach when he was suddenly slammed against the worktable.

"What are these marks, huh?" Peter said, pulling the collar of Isaac's shirt to reveal the marks that had been left there since he was found by the Company. "What do they mean?"

"They're nothing!" Isaac pushed Peter away urgently as he got back to his feet. "They mean nothing-!"

"Don't lie to me!" Peter yelled, a strange edge to his voice as Isaac found himself flying through the air to crash into a set of paintings at the other end of the loft without the other man ever touching him. When the artist got to his feet, he saw Peter looking scathingly at a painting of Isaac and Simone on the roof of her father's building, before he looked back at the other man.

"Is that why you sent them after me?" the nurse asked. "Because you wanted to take me off the board? I wasn't even- I've got bigger things to focus on right now than that!"

"You stole her from me!" Isaac yelled, ignoring his past efforts to justify his actions as he glared at the former nurse before he calmed himself and moved to his desk, keeping his back to Peter. "But I did it to save New York, to stop the bomb… I can do it right now."

As he grabbed the gun from under a set of rags, he turned around to aim it at Peter, a sense of purpose clear in his mind. "With just one bullet, I can be the hero."

In response to his proclamation, Peter's body seemed to ripple like water before he vanished from the room right in front of Isaac's eyes.

Isaac could only stare in shock at what had just happened; he'd guessed from Bennett's reaction that Peter had some kind of ability to avoid being seen, but had he actually turned invisible or-?

"You're not a hero, Isaac," Peter's voice said, as paint cans began flying off another desk towards him. "You're just a junkie; you couldn't even save yourself."

Moving to the middle of the room, Isaac looked urgently around himself, trying to spot some clue as to where Peter had gone; even if his opponent had somehow turned invisible, he still had to be here, so if he could just spot some kind of clue…

"That's why she left you, Isaac," Peter's voice said, as that painting he'd done of Hiro and the dinosaur fell over. "I'm sorry things didn't work out, but it had nothing to do with me!"

"Show yourself!" Isaac yelled, turning anxiously around, trying to find any sign of the invisible man in his loft, some sign of the man who was such a defining threat he'd been dominating Isaac's work for weeks-

The sound or a door opening prompted Isaac to turn around and fire a couple of desperate shops, only for his eyes to widen in horror when he saw a young blonde girl fall to the ground, clutching at the bleeding hole in her chest as a redhead of the same age grabbed her arm.

"Claire!" Peter's voice called out, the redhead yelling the same name as the other man suddenly reappeared in the loft and hurried towards the girl. Isaac could only stare in shock at the sight, unable to accept that he'd just shot an innocent girl, before he tossed the gun aside and ran towards the trio-

The sharp pain in his face only properly registered when the artist found himself staring up at the ceiling, a sharp ache in his nose. Dazed and shaken at what had just happened, it took Isaac a few moments to work out what was going on around him, but when he sat up and looked back at the door, he wondered if he had started hallucinating.

The girl he'd just shot… she was standing up… Peter and that other girl on either side of her… blood all over her shirt… and showing no sign that the bullet had caused her any kind of real harm.

"Wh… what?" he said, only realising that his nose was broken when he rubbed it.

"I heal, asshole," the girl spat indignantly at him. "And I liked this shirt!"

"You… you wha-?" Isaac tried to speak.

"She heals," the redhead repeated, her own expression cold and fixed as she walked up to Isaac, arms folded and eyes narrowed in a cold manner. "Y'know, like how you paint the future and Peter can do basically everything everyone else can do? Claire's 'thing' is that she heals from everything, which includes getting shot by an idiot!"

The girl slapped him roughly, but Isaac couldn't even bring himself to fully register the attack, mind racing to try and take in everything.

"Peter… he does everything?"

"If I've met someone who can do it first," Peter clarified with a cold stare. "And before you ask, that doesn't include blowing myself up."

"But… the painting-"

"Yeah, putting aside the fact that you don't know that's Peter in that picture, have you even bothered to learn what he can actually do, or did you just decide he's dangerous and not bother to take a closer look at what's going on here?" the girl shook her head as she glared at him. "And what are you even…?"

Her voice trailed off as she seemed to look properly at some of the paintings scattered around the room, focusing on his sketches of Peter, before she turned to look at him with an almost amused expression on her face. "You're getting a bit obsessive, you know that?"

"What- I don't choose what I paint when I do this-!" Isaac began.

"How do you know?" the redhead cut him off with a cool tone. "Do any of us understand how this all works? I mean, I know that when I'm in danger my mind races to work out a way to save myself before I've even stopped to consciously think about it, and I know that Claire's body can make sure she only heals herself when everything's in the right place, but I can't explain how any of that works any more than you can explain how you paint the future!"

"I painted the cheerleader without knowing why-!"

"Maybe because Sylar getting Claire's ability was such a big thing we had to be warned about it, but what about now?" the redhead continued. "Like I said, have you ever stopped to think that maybe you're doing what artists normally do and have just been… putting too much of yourself into your work?"

"…What?" Isaac looked at the girl in new confusion.

"Look, I get that neither of us are psyche experts, but my mom works with the police, and we've talked about psychology more than once when going over some of her case notes, and that's on top of a few interesting details I've picked up from my English courses," the girl explained, displaying a sense of control that Isaac wasn't used to seeing in any teenager. "One thing that came up is that artists always end up projecting some of their own thoughts and beliefs into their work, even if they're trying to be relatively objective, picturing certain characters a certain way for all kinds of reasons. I'm not saying that you're doing it on purpose, but has it occurred to you that maybe your ability's focusing on Peter right now because you have issues with him? I mean, I agree with you that something bad's going to happen in the future, but do you have any kind of evidence that Peter's involved in that beyond the fact that you've been painting him a lot?"

Lost for a better response, Isaac indicated the picture of the glowing man that he'd come to increasingly identify as Peter.

"…That's it?" Peter looked sceptically at the painting before he turned back to Isaac. "You do realise that nobody can tell who that's meant to be, right? Do you have any evidence that it's me doing… whatever that is… beyond the fact that you've maybe done that painting with a set focusing on me?"

"Well… it made sense-" Isaac began defensively.

"Speaking as the girl you just shot because you were so eager to believe Peter was the bad guy, it does not make 'sense'," the blonde said indignantly. "If you want to stop this-"

"Stop what?"

Isaac felt like hitting something when he turned around and saw Simone standing in the door, looking between Isaac and the blonde's bloodstained chest with a growing expression of horror.

"Isaac… what did you do?" she looked anxiously at him.

"I… it was…" Isaac began, before he shook his head and sighed in self-loathing. "It was a stupid accident."

He had briefly thought about accusing Peter of being responsible for this, but even an idiot could see that making that kind of accusation in this context wouldn't help his case.

"An accident," Simone repeated, looking from the bloody spot on the blonde's chest to Isaac. "You shot Claire by accident? What are you even doing with a gun?"

Isaac simply stood in silence, lost for anything he could say that would even begin to justify what he'd been trying to do.

"I… think we'll be leaving now," Peter said, his arm about the girls' shoulders (the blonde must be Claire, but Isaac wondered who the redhead was). "We'll… see you."

With that said, Peter and the two girls vanished from the loft, leaving Isaac to face Simone's bitter glare.

"You know," she said at last, fixing him with a look of contempt he couldn't remember ever seeing on her face even when she found him high on the floor, "whatever your other problems were, I could always assure myself that you were a good man… until now."

"I… I'm sorry," he said, still feeling the inadequacy of those words,

"You do realise that if you'd done… whatever you just did to anybody else, they'd probably be dead right now?" Simone said, walking over to take the gun from his unresisting hand. "I don't even know if I want to know where you got this, but I do know you're not keeping it!"

Isaac didn't bother trying to protest as she walked out of the room with the gun, leaving him to sink to the ground as he looked at his latest painting in horror.

Could they all be right?

Was he just… projecting his issues with Peter into his paintings? He could blame the other man for him losing Simone, but she had made her choice, and right now Peter seemed to be more interested in helping those girls than doing anything with Simone…

As much as he hated to acknowledge it, Simone had a point; whatever he'd been trying to tell himself, he hadn't been tracking Peter solely because he thought the other man would be a threat to the city, but more because he wanted him to be a threat to the city because it justified his hatred of him.

There was a bigger problem out there right now, but what was he going to do about that explosion when the man he'd been convinced was going to be responsible had just made a very compelling argument to confirm that he wouldn't be?

Chapter Text

"You're sure you're all right?" Peter looked at Claire as the trio gathered around each other in his apartment, the older man anxiously examining Claire's bloodstained chest while trying not to look at anything in an inappropriate manner.

"I'm fine," Claire smiled back at Peter (Kim wasn't sure if her friend was trying to flirt with Peter or not, but in this situation she wasn't going to judge either of them so long as they were happy). "The bullet came out while we were talking to Isaac; I don't even feel sore any more."

"The bullet came out?" Kim looked at Claire with new surprise. "How does it do that?"

"Another case where my body shouldn't really be doing this?"

"From what I know, anyway," Kim nodded. "I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm glad that your body does all that, but realistically you'd expect the bullet to stay in your body unless someone else took it out…"

"So many rules to this crap," Peter shook his head in exasperation. "And now we've lost Claude…"

"Lost him?" Claire looked at Peter with new intensity. "Is he-?"

"He's alive; he just decided he wasn't interested in teaching me any more," Peter explained. "We were nearly caught by this guy in glasses and that group who nearly cornered us in the club a couple of nights ago, and…"

"Let me guess, Claude decided to cut and run?" Kim shook her head in exasperation. "Why am I not surprised?"

"Tell me about it," Claire nodded. "I mean, considering how long it took you to talk him into helping you in the first place… you've got a handle on everything by now at least, right?"

"I… think I've got the basics, anyway," Peter nodded, flexing his hand to generate a temporary glow of green fire before he put it out with a burst of ice energy. "I'm not saying I've completely got a handle on it now, but at least Claude gave me something to work with while I'm learning the rest of the ropes."

"Which is more than most of us have had since this all started," Kim pointed out. "I mean, Ron and Hiro went on that whole trip to Vegas and we still haven't heard-"

A ringing phone prompted the three to jump up for a moment, before Peter walked over to his own phone and answered it.

"Hello?" he said cautiously, before he smiled in recognition. "Oh, hey, Ron; let me just… put on speaker."

"Speaker?" Ron's voice said as Peter tapped the button on his phone and put it down on the table in the middle of the room. "Why'd you need-?"

"Maybe because we're here as well, Ron?" Kim smiled at the phone.

"KP!" Ron's voice grinned at the other end of the line. "How's my favourite ass-kicking cheerleader doing?"

"Better than I'd expected," Kim replied, deciding to get the most obvious detail out the way. "To start with, it turns out that Claire wasn't the only person at our school to have an ability."

"She's not?" Ron asked. "Then… hold on, you've got something?"

"It's not particularly flashy, but we've worked out that I've got a kind of 'enhanced survival instinct'," Kim explained. "Basically, whenever I'm in a dangerous situation, such as if I'm… about to be hit by a car or something like that, my brain just automatically goes into overdrive and helps me work out the best way to survive it."

"Neat," Ron said in approval.

"Thanks," Kim smiled; whatever else she and Ron might be going through right now, it was good to know that she could still count on him to be there for her. "So how's everything going with you?"

"It's… well, we've had our ups and downs, but we're making progress," Ron replied. "Ando got a bit caught up in trying to help this girl who was just using him to steal some money from a guy working for the State Gaming Commission, but Hiro and I managed to catch up with him before anyone did anything they'd regret."

"Nice job," Peter put in.

"Any progress with Hiro's powers?" Claire asked.

"Still proving elusive right now, but at least he's showing some nerve without them," Ron observed. "I mean, the guy stood in front of that girl when she was pointing a gun at Ando and it only ended with everyone still alive because the gun misfired; you can't tell me he's not a hero after that."

"Quite," Kim exchanged an approving smile with Claire and Peter before she looked back at the phone. "Any idea when you'll get that sword?"

"Just another day or two to actually get to Vegas, and then we're set," Ron affirmed. "Basic plan is that we deliver the painting and then we try and track down the sword in their collection if we can get the guards to leave us alone; once Hiro's got it… well, hopefully he can just beam us all out there."

"'Beam you out'?" Kim smiled. "Ron, I'm pretty sure you'd be the one to tell me that's Star Trek; aren't we dealing with X-Men here?"

"Good pop culture insight, KP, but so long as you know what I'm talking about we can have a bit of leeway," Ron replied. "Anyway, how's things at your end?"

"Well, we've worked out that I was helping Peter use his abilities because he was copying my own ability to make it easier for him to access his full 'rolodex'," Kim explained. "He's been training with this invisible man we met-"

"There's an invisible man?"

"You probably won't meet him; he already moved on because he decided it was too risky for him to stick around and help us," Peter explained. "Anyway, he was able to help me work out a few techniques for how I could access other abilities without Kim giving me a boost or the original owner being right beside me, and also gave me a few pointers about my own limits; I'm always going to be a bit weaker than the… what do you think; the original?"

"Let's just say the source," Kim put in. "I mean, you're not taking anything from anyone full-time, so 'donor' doesn't work."

"Fair point," Peter nodded at her.

"In other words, you can't beat the person you're copying, but you should be able to match them if you're face-to-face with them and know what they can do?" Claire asked.

"From what he told me, yeah."

"That… OK, that makes sense," Ron replied with a thoughtful tone in his voice. "Just… if that's true, how could you have beaten that Haitian guy with his own ability?"

The surprised look Peter exchanged with Claire and Kim made it clear that none of them were sure of how to answer that particular question.

"…Good point," Peter nodded at the phone in surprise. "You… how did we miss that?"

"Master of the superhero genre here, Supes; I like to think I'd have complained about that kind of power inconsistency even if I'd lived back in the sixties."

"What do the sixties have to do with anything?" Claire asked.

"Superman alone had all kinds of freaky powers back then that didn't really make sense and often just showed up in one or two issues; he could wipe peoples' memories with a kiss, do some sorta ventriloquism thing to make people think Supes or Clark were in the other room to help sell the secret identity bit, hypnotise people to forget something they shouldn't know, stuff like that."

"…Yeah, that memory-wipe-kiss idea is just a bit weird," Kim nodded, before she looked at the phone. "So you're saying that there has to be a reason why Peter's ability worked differently when we were facing that guy?"

"Which is something we'll have to work out when we're not dealing with the imminent destruction of New York," Peter said firmly.

"Fair point, well made," Ron nodded. "I'll get back to you once we've got the sword; stay cool until we can all get back together, 'kay?"

"Well," Kim smiled as Ron ended the phone call, "good to know he's keeping it together over there."

"And he's still giving us some… interesting points to think about," Claire added as she looked over at Peter. "I mean, we know that you were able to overpower the Haitian… is there a reason that you were able to do that, or was it just luck?"

It was a small detail, but the thing that really stuck out for Matt right now was how calm Ted was compared to their last couple of meetings. He still looked anxiously at his hands as though waiting for any sign that his power was going to go haywire all over again, but so far it seemed as though the dark-skinned man's ability to suppress abilities was working just as advertised.

Granted, Matt was basically brought down to normal right now as well, but given the chance to have a bit of peace in his head he could take a slight risk when so far Bennett in particular seemed to be willing to cooperate. Ted still seemed to be a bit jittery about this whole situation, and Doctor Suresh kept looking around as though he couldn't believe this was his life right now, but Bennett and Audrey seemed to have already established a certain cordial respect for each other, their talk so far putting Matt in mind of some past cases where police captains of multiple divisions had coordinated big operations.

"So you've actually got a colleague who can create illusions?" Matt looked at Bennett in surprise. "How detailed are we talking here? Full on… I want to say 'holodeck'?"

"Not that elaborate, as far as I know," the other man nodded as the makeshift team sat around their current hotel room. "I've seen and heard reports of her changing her appearance or the appearance of others, but I've only heard rumours that she can change the way people perceive their immediate surroundings, and even then she has to be operating within a confined space and in their physical presence, such as being in the same room with her target."

"Good to know," Audrey nodded, before she looked over at Mohinder. "Out of curiosity, did your dad's work say anything about any abilities we definitely won't have to deal with?"

"Such as?" Mohinder asked.

"…This is where I realise that I maybe should have read a few more comics when I was a kid," Audrey groaned as she slapped a hand against her forehead before she looked over at Bennett. "Guess what I want to know straight off the bat is if there's anyone at your old place of employment we should be worrying about straight away? As in, they have some ability that could hit us from a distance?"

"Most of our empowered agents are only a direct potential threat if we're explicitly facing someone in the field, so we should at least theoretically be safe enough if we can stay on the go," Bennett confirmed before he sighed grimly. "Of course, if we're going to stay under the radar long-term, we need to deal with the tracking program."

"Tracking program?" Audrey repeated, looking intently at Bennett. "What tracking program?"

"The company uses two tracking systems," Bennett explained. "One involves injecting low-level radioactive isotopes into the bodies of those they've examined, allowing us to keep track of identified subjects that's tracked by various standard technical systems. From what I've heard, the other system could theoretically allow my superiors to find anyone they're looking for so long as they have specific details such as their name or picture. If we can get to the New York office where the system's located, we might be able to use it to find Sylar's current location and then disable it to ensure that they can't track us in turn."

"…You give the impression of a man who has put some thought into taking this organisation out of the picture before now," Mohinder observed.

"When you realise that your daughter would be at risk of becoming essentially a laboratory experiment, it encourages you to consider all the available possibilities."

"Fair point," Matt nodded in acknowledgement at the other man.

"Your daughter has an ability?" Sprague asked, looking at the other man in surprise. "What can she do?"

"…She heals," Bennett said after a brief pause.

"She heals?" Mohinder repeated curiously.

"As in I had a video tape of her jumping off an old tower about three storeys high and getting back up a moment later while resetting her own arms without any pain even when there was a rib or two poking out of her shirt."

"Ouch," Audrey winced.

"Whoa…" Ted said, his voice low as he looked at Bennett. "…What else can she heal from?"

"I have reason to believe there's very little she couldn't recover from, so long as her body's given the chance to put itself back together."

"And that's before you factor in what else she could be capable of," Mohinder put in, a thoughtful smile on his face. "Depending on how her healing ability works-"

"We can take a look at that once we've dealt with the superpowered Ripper making his way across the continent," Audrey cut the scientist off, a briefly apologetic expression on her face as she looked at the scientist before she looked back at Bennett. "I take it you can't provide evidence that this tracking system exists beyond your word?"

"Should I take that personally?"

"Just confirming that we're only going to be able to deploy what we've got here if we try to go after your former employers," Audrey observed as she shook her head. "This is going to take a lot of paperwork to justify once I get back in touch with the Bureau…"

When Simone found the folder outside the door of her apartment, she wasn't entirely surprised; Isaac had always tried to apologise through his art whenever he'd done something particularly stupid, whether missing a date or appointment because he was high to messing up a commission because he became focused on another piece of work. What was surprising was that she opened the folder to find the first item in it was a sketch of what seemed to be a glowing man with a Post-it on the front saying 'CALL ME' in Isaac's handwriting.

"What…?" Simone asked herself, as she glanced over the other five pictures in the folder. One depicted Hiro, Ando, and Ron standing in a room with all kinds of pictures hanging around their heads, apparently attached to a complicated set-up of strings. Another showed what looked like Kim Pierce confronting a man who Simone was fairly sure was meant to be Peter's brother, and the third one showed Hiro holding a sword while a thin man in black held the blade in his bare hands. The fourth sketch depicted what looked like Peter and the man in black facing each other in an open area that could have been a pavement or a park of some sort, while the fifth showed Kim and Ron talking with a young dark-skinned boy as they sat around a table. Lost for any better response to this odd gift, Simone picked up her phone and did as Isaac's note had requested.

"They arrived?"

"Your six latest sketches?" Simone said, looking uncertainly at the picture of Peter facing the man in black. "What's the point of this?"

"They're moments that need to happen," Isaac replied, his tone solemn. "I know that you have no reason to believe me after… well-"

"After you nearly killed a teenage girl?"

"…I deserved that," Isaac acknowledge. "But the point is that, from what I've put together so far, those few moments have to happen for the future to line up in a manner that will let us stop the explosion… and make sure everything after that is fine."

"I thought you said you just painted the future-"

"But I've been getting a greater sense of the wider context of that future the more I paint it," Isaac clarified. "If I'm right, it's still possible for Peter and his friends to come together and stop the man in black… and maybe stop the explosion as well."

"Explosion?" Simone repeated, her mind drawn back to that disturbing image on the floor of Isaac's loft. "You still think that's-?"

"It's too big an event for me to just ignore," Isaac explained. "There's still enough leeway there that we might be able to stop it and what I'm painting is just… maybe we could call it the 'echoes' of what could have been, but if we can-"

"We?"

"Peter may not want to work with me directly, but he's getting a team together because of what I showed him in my paintings; maybe I won't be on it myself, but I'll have given them all a chance to do something good," Isaac said, his tone unusually solemn. "Do what you can to help them, Simone; make sure that I did this one good thing for everyone… and make sure the redhead meets the kid."

Simone's response was interrupted when Isaac terminated the call at his end, leaving her staring uncertainly between the silent phone in her right hand and the sketches spread out on the table under her left.

If she'd known that Isaac was currently staring at a picture of his own corpse back in the loft, she would have been even more disturbed than she was already.

Chapter Text

The only thing Peter hated about his current situation was the knowledge that the girls were completely depending on him to keep them safe. He was aware that both Kim and Claire were stubborn, strong-willed, independent girls who'd done just as much to help him cope with the mess their lives had become as he'd done to help them, but it didn't change the fact that he was the only person with abilities that could actually be used to defend them if things came down to a fight with someone. Claire's healing ability had already been confirmed to have limits that could kill her for good if someone hit her in the right place, and Kim's own ability would only keep her alive for so long if she was facing something suitably powerful.

Peter had never considered himself a violent person, and he wasn't about to start stalking the streets looking for 'villains' to fight, but the fact that he was able to do so much now… In a way, it was simultaneously awe-inspiring and humbling. He had seen and heard of so many amazing things in the last few weeks alone, but the idea of that imminent future explosion just cast a dark shadow over everything, and as for Isaac's latest paintings…

As much as he appreciated Kim and Claire's faith in him, once he was sure that the girls were resting back in his apartment, Peter had tried to make contact with Mohinder to get his own input on the situation. Calling the Indian doctor's apartment had just put him through to an answering machine, which could mean anything from the other man being busy to him actually being away, but the way Peter saw it, he would lose nothing by paying the man a direct visit to try and talk with him about everything he'd found so far.

Once he reached the apartment, he was surprised to find the door unlocked, but his initial apprehension shifted to more specific anxiety when he found the apartment dark, various drawers open and books scattered around the room as though someone had been searching for something. A brief check was enough to satisfy him that Mohinder himself wasn't here, but before he could take a better look at what was going on here, Peter suddenly found himself face-to-face with the man he'd fought back at Claire and Kim's school.

"I remember you," the man who was apparently Sylar said. Peter raised his hands to try and defend himself, but then he was slammed against the wall by a telekinetic burst, Sylar grabbing his chin to examine his face.

"You're like me, aren't you?" the killer said, tilting Peter's head as though he was looking at a specimen in a lab. "I'd like to see how that works."

Peter was spared protesting the idea that he and this psycho had anything in common when Sylar raised his finger and began to draw a line across Peter's forehead. For a moment Peter could only scream in pain at the sense of something digging into his skull, trying to force its way past the skin and bone, but when he focused on his memories of Claire, the pain decreased almost at once, Sylar's shock at the sight of Peter's healing wound giving Peter the focus to force his opponent back with his own telekinesis, now far stronger than it had been during their last bout. As the killer hit the bookcase at the other end of the room, the bookcase fell over, temporarily pinning Sylar to the ground as Peter fell to the floor in a crouch. As Sylar forced the bookcase off him, Peter quickly turned invisible; he had a rough idea of what Sylar's offensive capabilities were from the last time they fought, so his best bet right now was to give himself a chance to think without leaving Sylar alone in the room.

"Interesting," Sylar said, looking around the room. "I can't wait to try that one."

Peter resisted the urge to say anything else to his enemy; from what Claude had told him about how his ability worked, he doubted Sylar would be able to access his current 'rolodex' even if he could find a way to take Peter's ability, but he wasn't going to get into that kind of 'debate' with a psychopath.

Taking advantage of the brief interlude in the fight, Peter assessed the apartment as quickly and carefully as possible. As far as he could tell, Sylar wasn't carrying anything new, as he wasn't wearing a jacket and there was no sign of a bag, but there were enough books and papers lying around that it was possible Mohinder had left something-

When he saw Sylar start to levitate pieces of glass from the floor, Peter knew he had to act. Hoping that he'd worked out how to tap particular abilities correctly, Peter ducked down, placed one hand on the floor, and focused on a sense of cold as intently as possible. To his relief, the floor under his hand turned blue with ice and then spread across the rest of the floor, crystalizing over the fallen books and papers while heading for Sylar's shoes.

"What-?" Sylar looked down in surprise before Peter waved a desperate hand at his enemy. He was surprised when there was a sudden explosion in front of Sylar's chest, putting him in mind of clips he'd seen of fight scenes from that Power Rangers show, but he didn't bother questioning it when the attack knocked his opponent off his feet, causing him to lose telekinetic control of the glass. Sylar roared in outrage as the glass shards broke on the ground, but before he could start getting back to his feet his body was already being covered in ice, pinning him to the ground as Peter got back to his feet and cast a wider blanket of frost around the room. With the ice spread across the floor, Peter quickly fired a couple of blasts of that 'explosive' power at the books and papers around the apartment, but when Sylar got back to his feet with an outraged roar, Peter quickly recalled the surprise that he'd felt during that mysterious meeting with Hiro's future self and teleported out of the apartment, leaving Sylar with battered papers and books ruined by ice and 'explosions'.

Peter didn't like the idea of leaving Sylar free like that, but it wasn't like he knew someone who could lock the killer up given what he was capable of so far, and he wasn't comfortable just killing the other man in cold blood when he still knew so little about him. Maybe it was a childish attitude, but when Peter had two young women looking at him like he was the hero, was it such a bad thing to feel like he couldn't bring himself to kill someone? If he was sure that Sylar was going to kill someone else if he wasn't stopped right that moment, maybe it would be different, but so far he still had the choice…

Peter shied away from the part of his mind that suddenly wondered if he would have been that controlled if Sylar went after the girls again. His father and brother might have been soldiers in the past, but while Peter respected their choice, he'd never been comfortable with the idea himself, and right now, the more powers he gained, the more it seemed important to set himself some kind of limit.

As he drove through Las Vegas, Nathan wondered if other potential senators had to put up with this much potential crap during a political campaign. He knew that sometimes potentially unsavoury deals were necessary to get into a position of authority, and he'd been prepared to tolerate Linderman's backing, but the idea of actually acting against him like this…

Still, as he got out of the car in front of Linderman's hotel, so far the plan all seemed to be going smoothly enough. The morning meeting with the bureau's agents at the campaign office had been an unexpected twist, but their excuse should be enough to deflect attention, and at least the current plan was straightforward enough. Once Linderman was out of the picture thanks to his efforts, Nathan's campaign might have just the boost it needed to make up for his current lagging in the polls, and then-

"Mr Petrelli?" a familiar accented voice said. Turning around, Nathan was surprised to see that short Japanese man- Hiro, he was fairly sure- sitting dejectedly in front of a casino, a sandy-haired teenage boy Nathan hadn't met before sitting beside him.

"Pete?" the new boy said, looking up with a grin before his expression shifted to confusion upon seeing Nathan. "Uh… you're not Peter?"

"He flying-!" Hiro began as he eagerly leapt to his feet, before Nathan slammed a hand over Hiro's mouth with a warning glare.

"Quiet?" the unfamiliar boy asked.

"Quiet," Nathan nodded, urgently leading the two into the casino, hoping that the boy wasn't so young that this would get difficult if anyone caught them together. "What's all this about?"

"Long story short, we're trying to get something from this Linderman guy so that it can give Hiro's powers a jump-start," the boy said, before holding out his hand with a grin. "By the way, Ron Sinclair; if you're Mr Petrelli and you're not Peter, I take it you're his brother?"

"You know Peter?" Nathan looked curiously at the now-named Ron even as he shook his hand.

"Guy saved the lives of my BF and our new friend a few weeks back; we bonded," Ron grinned at the older man. "Seriously, what's it like being the brother of the most powerful guy alive?"

"…I can honestly say I've never thought about it that way," Nathan replied, lost at the implications of what he'd just heard. He supposed that he could consciously acknowledge that his brother's apparent ability to copy other people's powers made him particularly powerful, but actually hearing someone call Peter 'the most powerful guy alive' made it feel that much more real…

"Yeah, well, for what it's worth, he's a good guy to be trusted with that kind oomph," Ron grinned at Nathan before his expression became grimmer. "But right now, Hiro and I need to get inside that building and get… what we're after, and they're not letting us in."

"I… see," Nathan looked thoughtfully at the two men before his gaze focused on Hiro; thoughts of Peter being the most powerful man alive would be given due attention later. "I have to confess, when I first met you, I thought you were nuts."

"It's OK," Hiro nodded. "I thought you were mean, but I know. You pretend you do not care about anyone, but you care too much."

"This is… really important to you, huh?" Nathan observed thoughtfully, deciding not to get too caught up in that particular detail.

"It is important for everyone."

"Well… follow me," Nathan nodded, hoping he wasn't about to make a mistake as he led the two young men to a particular corridor near the rear of the building. The men in front of him didn't look familiar to Nathan, but judging by Hiro and Ron's reaction they were known to the young men, which gave Nathan further incentive to take point.

"You know who I am?" he looked at the security guards that had come to greet them.

"Of course, Mr Petrelli," the guard on his left replied.

"My friends here are making a delivery from me to Mr Linderman," Nathan indicated Hiro and Ron. "Something he's expecting."

"Well, I didn't realise-" the guard began, his reaction making it clear that he'd been more than acceptably rude to Ron and Hiro earlier.

"You look like you've been around long enough to know what happens when Mr. Linderman doesn't get something he's expecting?" Nathan cut him off. "Or do I have to paint you a picture?"

"They can take it to the curator," the guard said after an awkward chuckle.

"Does that work for you?" Nathan looked at Hiro.

"We'll take it from here," Ron nodded. "Thanks for the help… Mr Petrelli."

"Is this a bad time to realise that I've not actually done the dangerous stuff yet?" Ron whispered uncertainly to Hiro as they waited in the ascending elevator.

"You join me in original theft-"

"That was just walking into a museum and… OK, you had a better idea what you were going to do then; I was just following your lead," Ron observed. "This? We're marching into the stronghold of a guy with potential mob ties with the goal of stealing something from his private collection; I think I'm within my rights to be a bit worried about that!"

"Stay calm," Hiro grinned. "Backup plan, remember?"

"You're sure about that?"

"All in order," the Japanese man nodded as the elevator opened. "We will be fine."

Looking at the private museum on the other side of the door, Ron wondered what it said about this 'Linderman' guy if he had this many of Isaac's paintings in his collection with more traditional artwork like lion statues and old-looking paintings. He could probably pass it off as just an interesting coincidence, but when he saw pictures of things like the possible explosion of New York and a man flying that was almost certainly Peter, it created an unconventional mix even before Ron saw a picture of what looked like him, Kim and Claire at the moment they learned about Kim's ability…

Realising that he'd fallen behind Hiro, Ron hurried to join his friend as Hiro lifted the painting tube off his back in front of a table at the other end of the room, where a man was studying what looked like a scroll.

"There are so few Dead Sea fragments left in the world," the man said, grabbing the painting tube before Hiro could put it down. "It would be a pity if you crushed this one."

"Interesting… mix," Ron said, uncertainly indicating the collection of pictures around them.

"Mr Linderman has eclectic tastes," the man who Ron was going to guess was the curator of this place said. "I take it you brought the new Mendez?"

"This one is very special," Hiro said, offering the tube to the other man. As the curator opened the tube and unrolled the painting, Ron winced when he took in the scale of the damage Hiro's father had caused when he'd torn the painting up. On the bright side, from what Ron knew of artists and their weird tastes, Hiro's idea to deliver it despite the damage wasn't exactly the worst idea in the world…

"This painting is ripped," the curator said. "And repaired with Scotch tape."

"It's an art thing," Ron shrugged. "C'mon, you know how weird some of this stuff can get, right?"

"…Is there something else?" the curator asked, shooting a glare at Ron before he apparently decided to ignore that comment for the moment.

"I need receipt-o for delivery," Hiro replied.

As the curator walked off into the back room with the painting, Hiro ran around the desk to examine the man's computer as soon as the door was closed.

"Anything?" Ron asked as Hiro tapped away at the keyboard for a few moments, before a sound from behind prompted Ron to turn around. He saw a large thing that he could only think of as a chest of drawers, reaching up to the ceiling of the room, with a stepladder on wheels alongside it.

"Got it," Hiro grinned, running over to the ladder, only for Ron to feel something grab his arm before he could go to join Hiro.

"There are seven hundred and fifty-four members of the security team in this hotel," the curator said, looking disdainfully up at Hiro as he dragged Ron over to his new friend like a disobedient child. "All of them with the instructions to drop what they're doing and come running if I press this button."

Just as the other man held up a small black thing that made Ron think of a pager, a security guard walked up behind him, grabbed the pager-thing out of his hand, and struck the older man on the back of the head with such force that it knocked him to the ground.

"Ando?" Ron asked.

"Bingo," the other man said, pulling off his mask to confirm his identity. "Classic mistake."

"To be fair, those masks are probably useful for something, but in the meantime, maybe we should just get what we came for and get out of here before he wakes up?"

"Good call," Hiro nodded, as he drew the sword from the drawer and held it up in a manner that Ron guessed was intended to evoke those original Star Wars posters with Luke Skywalker brandishing the lightsaber. "We have sword; we go now."

"Go?" Ando and Ron repeated.

"We all go," Hiro said resolutely as he placed a hand on Ando's shoulder and managed to grip Ron's wrist with his forefinger and thumb without losing his hold of the sword. He closed his eyes, seemed to be concentrating hard, and Ron suddenly had the strange sense of movement without physically moving himself-

Nathan wasn't sure if he should be making a big deal about what Hiro and that kid were doing here, but either way he doubted that it would seriously impact his own plans for the day. Linderman's art collection was kept in a separate building from where he was going to meet the man, so it could hardly make a difference if one item went missing from that collection around this time.

He just wished that he could be sure that the FBI agents who'd roped him into this were going to be there for him. He understood the importance of discretion, but there was a difference between staying quiet and giving the impression that they'd basically leave him hanging out to dry if this went wrong…

"I'm back in my room," he said, lowering his head to the small radio in his lapel pin. "I'll be on the floor in an hour."

He turned around the corner and froze in shock when he saw the blonde he'd slept with during his last visit to Vegas sitting in a chair. He knew that she was at least an associate of Linderman considering her role in that blackmail video back when he'd first met Hiro, but he wasn't entirely clear how willing a part she played in this whole mess-

"Wearing this could get a person killed," the blonde said, standing up and pulling the wire out of his shirt before she aimed the gun at his chest.

"OK, it's all right," Nathan said, voice low as his mind raced for a good way out of this. "Easy."

"Listen to me," the blonde said urgently. "I don't know how much time we have before she comes back."

"Who?" Nathan asked, confused at this unexpected conversation.

"Jessica," the blonde replied. "The woman that they sent after you-!"

As soon as the gun was lowered, Nathan tackled the woman and pinned her to the bed, forcing himself to forget what had happened the last time they'd been in such a position.

"You picked the wrong day to screw with me," he said firmly; even if everything else was going against him, he wasn't going to go down quietly.

"Linderman knows about the wire and the FBI," the woman said.

"You know the FBI can hear everything we're saying-"

"No, they can't; they're dead," the blonde cut him off. "Linderman knows that you turned on him."

"Did you come here to kill me, or warn me?" Nathan looked uncertainly at the woman as he tried to condition how to respond to this latest turn of events.

"Just trust me," the blonde said, everything about her pleading as she looked up at Nathan.

Peter might be the one better at relating to people, but Nathan liked to think he at least knew when someone was being completely honest with him about something, and this woman seemed to be that. Stuck for a better option, he stood up and walked away from the bed, leaving the woman to stand up herself once he'd confirmed that the gun was a safe distance away.

"Linderman hired her to kill the FBI and keep you in line."

"Who?" Nathan asked, lost as to how this woman could know so much about Linderman's activities or how she could know anything about Linderman's assassin when the FBI agents hadn't mentioned such a woman.

"Let's just say I owe her," the blonde replied with a frustrated shrug. "He's gonna offer you a deal. If you go in there, you have to take it."

"And I spend the rest of my life with his boot on my neck?" Nathan observed. "No thank you."

"Then run," the woman looked at him with new desperation. "Get your family and run. You said that you had kids. Two boys?"

"I can't do that," Nathan replied quietly as he looked out of the window. Putting aside what it would cost him personally, he couldn't force his kids to live a life on the run like that…

"You don't have any other option," the blonde said.

"Yeah, I do," Nathan countered as he turned back to face her. "I could kill him."

"…Then knock me out," the woman said, picking up the previously-dropped gun and looking resolutely at him.

"Why?" Nathan asked.

"So that Jessica knows she's not in control any more."

"Who is Jessica?"

"You want this gun?" the blonde retorted, her fixed expression making it clear she wasn't going to answer that question as she held the weapon up to his chest. "Do it."

Lost for better options, Nathan punched the woman in the face and stood back as she fell to the ground. He took a moment to make sure that the woman at least seemed to be in a comfortable position on the ground, before he slipped her gun into his inner jacket pocket and walked out of the room.

Whatever Linderman knew about his deal with the FBI, it might still be possible to get out of this mess with at least one clear achievement under his belt…

Chapter Text

Nathan's hope that killing Linderman would be simpler than spying on him began to falter basically the moment the guard that led him into the elevator took him to the lower levels rather than to Linderman's office. As much as Nathan's ability made him uncomfortable, in an upper-level office Nathan could have just shot Linderman and flown out of the window; it couldn't have been that hard to find somewhere in Vegas he could go to make up a suitable story long before the man's staff could come up with a plausible explanation for how a man could shoot their boss and then escape from right under their noses. Underground limited his options from the beginning, particularly when he would have no idea what to expect from this shift of location in the first place.

When the doors opened onto the kitchen, Nathan stayed silent as he was led through the busy kitchen, constantly scanning the people around him in what even he knew was a weak attempt to work out if any of them might be a problem, until he walked around a corner and saw figure standing in front of a chopping board. Amid the white chef's outfits and the blue uniforms that were likely worn by the waiters, this man's smart grey shirt stood out almost as much as his thick head of white hair.

"Mr Linderman," Nathan said as he walked up to the other man, fingers crossed that he could still get out of this mess.

"Do you enjoy vegetables, Mr Petrelli?" Linderman replied as he turned around and put the knife down, the other people in the room filing out of the kitchen as though responding to some cue.

"I've been known to eat zucchini when the mood strikes, but not as a rule," Nathan replied, lost for a better response as Linderman continued to work on a dish of some sort. "You know, you can probably hire someone to do that for you."

"I like to cook; it's my meditation," Linderman explained. "One aims for perfection in one's life, but one doesn't find it very often. For me, this is about as close as it gets."

A brief chuckle was accompanied by him holding up a small dish, some kind of pastry hanging over the sides of a ceramic bowl. "Voila! A pot pie. Wholesome, warm, healthy. That's, of course if you can live without the cream sauce. Personally, I can't. I mean, what's the point?"

When the older man turned to put the pie in the oven, Nathan took a glance around to confirm that they were alone; he couldn't make the kind of easy escape he'd planned, but he still had options.

"You know," Linderman said as he walked over to a nearby oven and set it, "people can sleep, they can gamble, or they can even make love when they're miserable, but I think that most people eat when they're happy. I like to see people happy. Are you happy, Nathan?"

"Not especially," Nathan said; if Linderman wasn't going to be direct, he could talk around the topic himself. "I guess I have a few issues that… plague me."

"Oh dear, I'm sorry to hear that," Linderman said, looking thoughtfully at Nathan. "You see, I think there comes a time when a man has to ask himself whether he wants a life of happiness or a life of meaning."

"I'd like to have both."

"It can't be done," Linderman chuckled as he shook his head. "Two very different paths. I mean, to be truly happy a man must live absolutely in the present, and with no thought of what's gone before and no thought of what lies ahead. But a life of meaning, a man is condemned to wallow in the past, and obsess about the future. My guess is that… you've done quite a bit of obsessing about yours these last few days."

Nathan took the gun out of his pocket as he stared at Linderman, a cold resolve settling into his mind; regardless of the risk, he was going to do something decisive after coming this far.

"Now you can't have any of my pot pie," the older man glanced down at the gun, disturbingly nonchalant about the situation. "I won't hold it against you. Lots of men have tried to kill me."

"Then I'll be the last," Nathan said, aiming the gun at the older man.

"Of course, you can pull that trigger, Nathan. You'd be taking both of our lives, seeing as you'll be dead within moments. Or… I could offer you something."

"I'm not interested in anything you have to offer me," Nathan replied, the gun steady in his hand.

"I think you are," Linderman replied, thoughtfully stroking his beard. "I think there are things you need to hear. Things that I know about."

"Too late for that," Nathan retorted.

"That you can fly, for instance?" Linderman asked. "Or about your brother Peter's interesting little boosts lately? And all those others out there like you."

The news that other people knew about the strange circumstances he and Peter had been experiencing so far raised some disturbing questions, but Nathan wasn't sure how he should feel about this revelation coming from Linderman. As the man had pointed out, quite a few other people had been revealed to have abilities recently, so it wasn't implausible that a man with Linderman's connections was aware of them…

"I can offer you more than just information, Nathan," Linderman said as he walked towards the younger man, Nathan briefly embarrassed to find himself backing away even as he kept the gun trained on Linderman. "You'll win your election, I'll see to that. And two years from now, through a series of fluke circumstances, you will find yourself in the White House. A heartbeat away from the presidency. A life of meaning, Nathan. Think about it. The choice is yours."

When Linderman turned his back, Nathan was honest enough to keep the gun raised and contemplate doing what he'd come here to do in the first place, but the older man's words kept shifting through his mind.

…Heartbeat away from the presidency…

If he could achieve a position like that… nobody would say that Peter was the most powerful man on the planet again…

"Japanese feudalism, Renaissance, Baroque, Mayan, Persian, twentieth century," Nathan observed as he followed Linderman into the man's museum, looking at the wide range of artwork assembled on the makeshift walls. "You must bring all your first dates here, huh? What do you do with all this?"

"I protect it," Linderman replied in a wistful tone. "I shield it from a greedy and dangerous world."

"You push the cultured façade long enough, people forget you're a criminal," Nathan nodded, trying not to feel jealous at the sight of a picture of what had to be Peter flying; he didn't even like his ability that much, what did it matter who got depicted using it…?

"When my day of judgment comes, Nathan, I'll be remembered as a humanitarian," Linderman countered as he walked off to a set of plants on display. "I care about the world. I just want to save it. To heal it. And to do that, I need you."

"What could you possibly know about healing?"

Turning back to the plants, Linderman reached over to take hold of a leaf from a dead-looking plant, rubbing it thoughtfully with his fingers.

Nathan only just stopped himself showing his shock when he saw the plant apparently come 'back to life' before his eyes, and he wasn't sure if he was more shocked at this demonstration of a new power or at the fact that he was facing a notorious criminal who had the ability to heal others so easily.

"A few things," Linderman said, his voice soft as the dead flowers began to regain their colour.

"…I know this man," Nathan said, looking around to try and find something else to focus on; the painting style made it hard to be completely certain, but that definitely looked like Hiro shoving a girl out of the way of some kind of avalanche of boxes.

"Well, great," Linderman replied, tone louder and more confident compared to his earlier solemn declarations. "If you see him, tell him I want my sword back."

"…He took a sword?" Nathan said, hoping the impulsive bluff would work.

"I think it would be simplest if we didn't lie to each other about the extent of our knowledge," Linderman retorted. "I'm aware that Mr Nakamura took it from me, and I know that you gave him help getting inside."

"He said… he needed it to save the world," Nathan said, feeling stupid even as he said the words but unable to stop a brief incredulous smile. "A lot of people seem to be saying that these days."

"Well…" Linderman chuckled, as he began walk through the paintings again, "we all have our roles to play in the events to come. You know, this isn't just a collection of art; this… is a road map. These artists envisioned a brighter future. Peace, prosperity…"

"That's your idea of a brighter future?" Nathan indicated the painting that appeared to show the destruction of New York, a brilliant fiery orange explosion at the heart of the familiar skyscrapers, the Empire State Building on one side and the Chrysler Building on the other.

"What if I were to tell you that it was?" Linderman leaned over to whisper to him.

"I'd say you were a lousy humanitarian."

"I was a lot younger than you when I discovered my power," Linderman explained, as they stood solemnly in front of the explosion picture, Nathan intrigued at the chance to hear Linderman's story despite himself. "And there were others too, like me, who discovered theirs. We were all confused. And we found each other. Together, we tried to make a difference to the world. And for a while, we did. It was beautiful. And then, some of my… friends… they lost their way. They used their powers for personal gain, and all the good that we'd done was… well, it amounted to nothing. And I learned that healing one person at a time was just not enough. We needed something… something to pull it down on course. Something big."

"And that's what you think this is?" Nathan indicated the painting.

"People need hope, Nathan."

"An explosion of that magnitude would destroy half the population of New York City like that," Nathan countered, snapping his fingers as he walked away from the painting.

"There's six and a half billion people on the planet," Linderman countered. "That's less than point zero seven percent. Come on, that's an acceptable loss by anyone's count."

"By anybody's count?" Nathan repeated.

"Look, I said people needed hope, but they trust fear."

"This is crazy," Nathan countered, not entirely comfortable with the way this argument made such grim sense.

"This tragedy will be a catalyst for good… for change," Linderman continued. "Out of the ashes, humanity will find a common goal; a united sense of hope couched in a united sense of fear. And it is your destiny, Nathan, to be the leader who uses this event to rally a city, a nation, a world. Now you look deep into your heart. You'll know I'm right."

"Look," Nathan said, trying to focus on the practicalities of this situation as Linderman turned away, "I don't mean to toss a wet blanket, but if you haven't noticed, I'm down in the polls. I'm not gonna get elected to Congress, let alone the White House."

In response, Linderman pulled out another metal display with a new painting on it.

"Do you think I'd leave that to chance?" the older man said. Walking around to look more directly at the painting, Nathan saw a figure that seemed to be himself, standing in a roo that was clearly the White House Oval Office, his arms folded and a grim expression on his face.

"If you know all this…" Nathan looked uncertainly at a black sketch of what appeared to be the exploding man, "then you have to know that there are people out there trying to stop it."

"Mr Nakamura and his associates have been taken into account," Linderman said. "As I said, we all have our roles to play."

"And mine is to let this happen?"

"Let what happen?" Linderman countered with a slight chuckle. "The actual explosion is not something we intend to set off; we're merely ensuring that the chain of events that will lead to it taking place unfold as they should. We have enough experience of prophecies to know that they will happen regardless of what we do once they've been made, and one as clear as this is hard to misinterpret no matter the medium."

"The medium?"

"Whether they're prophetic dreams or paintings of the future, the essential details of such visions have always come to pass, and I think we can agree that destruction on this scale is a relatively unambiguous vision."

"…Someone can dream the future?" Nathan looked at the older man incredulously. "That's an actual thing? As in, you know it works?"

"The ability itself is rare, and I'm informed that the dreams are of questionable accuracy as they obviously use dream-imagery on occasion where paintings such as this are more exact, but such abilities do exist," Linderman smiled. "Regardless of their source, one thing remains certain about this topic; the day after your election, that explosion will give you the chance to shine."

Looking at the painting of what appeared to be himself standing in the White House, Nathan couldn't deny that the image was a tempting one.

Peter Petrelli… Superman…

Nathan would never admit it out loud to anyone else, but the thought of his brother having that kind of 'respect' when he just got lucky with some weird genetic lottery Nathan didn't entirely understand…

Peter meant well, but he was too idealistic; no matter how powerful he allegedly was, he'd never fully understand how the world worked well enough to effect any meaningful change…

"If… this explosion," Nathan began, as he turned to look at Linderman. "You've got evidence that it's going to happen?"

"Without question."

"And this kind of prediction is never wrong?"

"There isn't much leeway for how to interpret that, is there?" Linderman indicated the painting of the explosion behind them. "We already know that you're destined to make it to the White House, Nathan; all we have to do is ensure that history takes its appropriate course to get to that stage. We've done some research of our own to confirm the details of how the explosion will occur in the first place, and we have been presented with some… interesting candidates that can cause such a disaster."

"But my family will be safe?"

"Removing dear Heidi and your sons from the city beforehand is a simple enough prospect, I assure you," Linderman gave him a warm smile.

"What about Peter?"

"He'll be safe-"

"We both know that's not what I was referring to," Nathan cut the older man off. "If you know about all this, you know what he's capable of."

"Indeed," Linderman nodded. "But power is only part of what he will require to do anything to affect our plans. You, your father and I have all been soldiers, and we understand the necessity of ruthless pragmatism; idealists like Peter have their place in the world, but they'll never be able to do what has to be done to save humanity from itself."

"You're sure that I can still win the election?"

"I have an agent or two taking steps to guarantee your final victory."

"Then…" Nathan looked at Linderman with a grim expression for a moment, before he nodded. "Let's save the world."

"Indeed," Linderman nodded at him in turn. "You've made a good call, Nathan; I have a feeling your father would be proud of the change you're going to make."

"Let's just get on with it," Nathan said; even if he agreed with the plan, the less said about what would have to happen to get to that point the better as far as he was concerned. The fundamental point of people rallying behind a tragedy made sense, but he had no interest in thinking too much about the extent of what would have to happen to get there.

Looking at the painting of Hiro, he suddenly wondered what had happened to Hiro and Ron's efforts to get that sword, but pushed the thought to the back of his mind; he had more immediate priorities than what two strange young men had done with an old sword.

He'd gone from a potential senator to a prospective president in a few minutes; he needed time to consider what he was going to do once the explosion had happened…

Chapter Text

When Ron opened his eyes after experiencing that strange twisting sensation in his gut, the sight of an open-air balcony where they'd just been standing in an enclosed museum area was enough proof for him that Hiro's powers had been restored. For a moment, he grinned in glee at the proof that his friend was once again capable of time travel, but that smile faltered as he took in what was in front of them.

As far as he could tell, they were standing on the roof of a building in New York City, as the skyline evoked memories of what the place had looked like during his recent visit, but it seemed as though there'd been some kind of massive explosion since the last time he'd been there. The roof that he was standing on in particular was filled with all kinds of rubble, as though nobody had even bothered to clean up after whatever explosion had caused this devastation, and the wider city was now 'filled' with devastated buildings. There was sign of reconstruction in a few areas, but it didn't take a genius to see that this whole area had been basically abandoned, leaving nothing more than a massive graveyard that Ron was prepared to bet most people were staying in just because they'd either been extremely well-paid or literally had nowhere else to go.

Glancing over at Hiro and Ando, Ron saw expressions of equal shock on their faces as they took in the sight, which at least affirmed that he wasn't alone but didn't do anything to explain what had happened.

"Wh… what is this?" he asked.

"Future," Hiro said solemnly. "We fail."

It was the simplicity of that statement that really disturbed Ron. After everything Hiro had put himself through on what anyone else would have dismissed as a fool's quest to save the world from something they didn't even understand yet, the idea that he could just think of this as a failure…

"Uh… this is time travel, right?" he suggested tentatively, after Hiro and Ando had exchanged brief words in Japanese that he didn't understand. "I mean, can't we just… go back and give this another go?"

"Not like that," Hiro responded as he looked at his sword with a new intensity. "We fail once; must learn how we fail to undo this."

"OK, that… makes sense," Ron conceded with a tentative nod. "So we… what?"

"Mr Isaac!" Hiro said, mood suddenly shifting from grim to hopeful as he stood back up.

"The painter guy?" Ron asked, even as Ando said something to Hiro in Japanese. Hiro just nodded briefly at Ron as he replied to Ando's question (at least Ron assumed that was what he was doing) before he hurried off towards interior stairs, leaving Ron and Ando to exchange glances and then walk swiftly after Hiro. As they descended through the battered building, Ron followed his new friends in silence, unsure if it would be appropriate to ask any questions when the priority right now was getting to the street safely. Feeling a treble in his pocket, Ron reached down to give Rufus a comforting stroke before he continued down towards the main street.

As they reached the bottom level, Ron wasn't entirely surprised to find that the situation on the ground wasn't much better than what they'd seen up top. The street wasn't so battered that it would be impossible for them to walk along it, but when he compared it to everything he'd seen before Hiro's jump to the future, it was hard for Ron to stop himself feeling like he was suddenly in some kind of zombie movie (the most obvious post-apocalypse movie genre he could think of).

"So… Isaac?" he said at last, once he was sure they were on a fairly stable bit of road. "Why are we going to his place?"

"Mr Isaac dead on first trip I make to future," Hiro explained with a cautious smile. "If he alive now, sign that history can change."

"…Works for me," Ron conceded, falling into silence as he focused on following the other two. He suddenly had this worrying thought about how taking in too many details about this future might make it more 'real' before they could get away from it, but pushed that aside to focus on finding their way through the rubble. The city was pretty much deserted, but occasionally Ron thought he saw other people walking through the streets, although it was hard to tell from this distance if anyone lived here or were basically just squatters…

It was frankly a relief when they reached Isaac's building and headed up to the loft, but that relief was swiftly tempered by the sight of the room on the other side of the door. While there were still a few paintings scattered around the room, it was now dominated by an elaborate string of threads spread out across the ceiling, with photographs and handwritten notes mixed in with newspaper clippings in some kind of elaborate display Ron didn't have a name for. One section of the display included a piece of paper folded up in a style that Ron thought was known as 'origami', a photo of Claire in her cheerleader uniform, and a post-it with 'SAVE THE CHEERLEADER' attached to a photo of a painting showing a man looking at blood on the floor. Another section of the timeline had a cut-out taken from the painting of Peter flying, and there were probably other familiar items here if Ron had the time to look for them.

"Is this… a timeline?" Ron looked uncertainly at the elaborate display around them, as he followed the two older men into the room.

"Maybe…" Hiro nodded uncertainly, sword raised defensively.

"Timeline of what?" Ando asked hesitantly, shooting a glance at Ron that showed he was sticking to English for Ron's benefit. As though in response, Hiro paused in front of a news article with the headline 'NYC DEVASTED', accompanied by what looked like the top few lines of a story. He caught a reference to a mother trying to rescue her son from some kind of cult, but then he saw another article with a photo of Nathan's face, under a headline proclaiming 'Our Strength in Dark Times'.

"Huh," Ron looked thoughtfully at the article, before the sound of something metallic behind him prompted him to freeze. He felt Rufus trembling in his pocket as he stood still, unsure if this was going to be an attack or something else, only to glance up and see Hiro drawing his sword while Ando raised his gun.

"Mr Isaac?" Hiro called out tentatively, stepping towards Ron with the sword pointing at whatever was behind him, only to freeze as though he'd seen something shocking. When Ando lowered the gun he'd been pointing, Ron swallowed and turned around, only to stare in shock at the figure standing behind them.

He wasn't wearing glasses, he had slicked-back hair, and at some point he had adopted a black coat that gave the impression of a robe and put Ron in mind of some kind of ninja or samurai warrior, but this guy was clearly Hiro Nakamura, if Hiro had spent a few years training to be a badass.

Which he obviously did; post-apocalyptic future, anyone?

"You," the older Hiro looked at his younger self.

"Me?" Hiro said as he lowered his sword.

"What are you doing here?" Future Hiro said (Ron would refer to him as such until a better idea occurred) as he walked into the apartment. "You're not supposed to be here… none of this is supposed to be here."

"It was an accident," Hiro explained, as his future self walked over to a desk at the other side of the room. "We time-travelled."

"What happened to the city?" Ando asked, as Future Hiro stopped in front of a table and sheathed his sword.

"The bomb," Future Hiro explained, opening a window to display the ruined city outside. "The bomb still happened. It was all supposed to change."

"…Huh?" Ron looked at the older Hiro in confusion, as the man turned to walk back into the room, staring at the complex string network above him.

"Five years ago," Future Hiro said, pacing around the timeline as though he was talking to himself, "a man named Sylar exploded in the heart of the city, changing the world forever. I thought I had it all figured out… I thought I had it beat."

"…Had what beat?" Ron asked at last, looking over to confirm that Hiro and Ando were talking about something with each other. "I mean… what's with the string web?"

"Ron 'Stoppable' Sinclair…" Future Hiro looked at him with a slight smile. "So young…"

"Ron Stoppable?" Ron repeated, before he smiled slightly as he heard the words out loud. "As in 'Unstoppable', right?"

"Right," Future Hiro nodded, before he adopted a more curious expression. "You… you met me already?"

"…Is this like that bit in the X-Men cartoon where Forge sent Bishop back to stop that plague and then Forge didn't know what he was talking about when he went back?" Ron asked.

"…I believe so," Future Hiro nodded tentatively, a brief smile on his face at the analogy before his expression became grim once again. "I have spent years going over the events leading up to the bomb, trying to determine the exact moment to go back in time to change the future. I believed I had found it…"

As the older Hiro reached out, Ron saw he was looking at a painting of what looked like Future Hiro and Peter on a subway, with a date scrawled beside it; OCT 4th, N.Y. SUBWAY.

"Hold on… I think Peter mentioned this," Ron looked back at Hiro and Ando. "Didn't you say Peter told you guys he met… this you on a subway?"

"Save the cheerleader-" Future Hiro began.

"Save the world!" Hiro grinned. "You visited Peter Petrelli with this message!"

"Yes," Future Hiro smiled. "Did he do it? Did Peter save her?"

"And that's how I got here," Ron grinned. "KP and I were friends with the cheerleader."

"Kim Pierce?" Future Hiro looked at Ron with a slight smile. "Your history went back that far?"

"Wait a- do you know us?" Ron grinned at the older time-traveller. "I mean, do you know future me and future KP?"

"I…" Future Hiro began, before he shook his head. "But if Claire survived and Sylar never took her power… you were able to kill him, right?"

"Me?" Hiro repeated in shock. "Kill Sylar?"

"We haven't even had the chance to fight the guy yet; we were trying to find that sword to give… little you… the power boost!" Ron explained.

"Little Me?" Future Hiro repeated.

"Little?" Hiro yelled indignantly.

"Well, I have to call you something to tell you guys apart; I can't just-!"

"You want Hiro to kill someone?" Ando cut in, looking uncertainly at the future version of his friend.

"Here," Future Hiro said, standing up and indicating a point where a red string, a black string and a blue string connected on his strange timeline, moving past an article proclaiming 'PETRELLI WINS' and pausing before another article announcing 'NYC DEVASTATED'. "This is the moment when Sylar must die. I stabbed him the day after the election, but he regenerated."

"Because he had the cheerleader's power," Ando observed.

"He killed Claire?" Ron asked urgently before he shook his head. "In… your timeline, I mean?"

"Exactly," Future Hiro nodded. "But if Peter saved her, Sylar can now be killed."

"But we can't go back," Hiro said. "I can't control my powers. If I try, Ando, Ron and I could appear anywhere-"

Further explanation was interrupted when the door of the loft suddenly broke open and what seemed like a small army of men in black SWAT armour carrying guns rushed into the room.

"GO! GO!" the apparent leader of the team yelled, weapons indicating all around the room.

"What the-?" Ron yelled, as Future Hiro called something out in Japanese and grabbed for Ando. Ron's eyes widened in apprehension when he saw the dark-skinned power-blocking guy as part of the assault team, but soon focused on something more urgent as he anxiously checked his pocket for Rufus and tried to run away. He noticed the older Hiro hurrying out of another door with Ando, but before he could run for the door himself, he found a gun aimed at his face, prompting him to step back and anxiously raise his hands.

"I surrender!" he yelled, praying that whatever this was about wasn't the kind of black ops group that would kill everyone in the room. When his captor grabbed his arms and turned him around, Ron was briefly relieved to see that Hiro was still with him, but sharply reminded himself that wasn't a good thing even before he realised that the power-negating guy was the one holding him. As the initial calls between the SWAT members began to die down, Ron looked up to see a tall, heavyset man with dark hair walk into the room, wearing no body armour and carrying no weapon but with an air about him that made it clear he was some kind of leader to this group.

"Well, what do you know?" the large man said, looking between the two. "Hiro Nakamura and Ron 'Stoppable' Sinclair."

Ron resisted the urge to grin at the notion that he had a badass nickname in the future; if these guys were law enforcement, his older self (and that was a weird thing to think) probably hadn't gained that kind of name for a good reason.

"Go after his friends," the large man called out to the officers . "The Haitian stays with me; I want to take these ones in personally."

Ando was never quite as 'committed' to the superhero genre as Hiro was, but when he thought about heroes making contact with other heroes to prepare for some kind of team-up fight, meeting in a strip club was definitely not the kind of scenario that immediately came to mind.

Admittedly, the new clothes were more comfortable than the stolen uniform he'd been wearing earlier, and he wasn't going to complain about the chance to see Nikki Saunders dancing like this, but when he and Future Hiro had to spend five hundred dollars just to get some enigmatic comment about Bennet rustling cattle in Texas…

"Sorry about her," another voice said. Looking up, Ando's eyes widened as a beautiful redhead sat down opposite him and the older Hiro, a familiar gleam in her eyes even if he'd only seen the girl briefly a few days ago.

"Kim Pierce?" he asked.

"That's me," the redhead nodded, a wistful smile on her face as she looked at Ando before she turned back to Future Hiro. "I just wanted to apologise about Nikki, but you know how she is, particularly around this time of year."

"I had hoped that if she let you stay-" Future Hiro began.

"That's mainly because I make it easier for Peter to stay under the radar," Kim conceded, as she looked between the two men. "You have to keep in mind, as President Petrelli's brother and the most powerful man on the planet, Peter is not exactly someone who can get involved in everything."

"Godzilla threshold?" Ando asked, recalling a term he'd heard Hiro use in particular.

"Not for the reasons you might think, but pretty much," the redheaded woman nodded at him. "If anyone in the right places knew where he was, he'd attract a lot of attention from the wrong kind of people. It's not that he'd immediately give himself away if I wasn't here, but when I'm near I boost his own abilities enough to make it easier for him to deflect interest."

"Because… your power helps him survive?" Ando asked, recalling what Kim had told them after Peter began his own training.

"Exactly," Future Hiro nodded, looking at Ando with a brief smile Ando wasn't sure how to interpret. "With constant access to Miss Sinclair's power, he can maintain his more… defensive abilities."

"And," Kim gave the two men a cautious smile, "since I'm the only one who can do that for him, I can even talk him into the occasional mission if we're sure it's worth it… is this one?"

"It is."

"How big are we talking?"

"We have to rescue my younger self from the Haitian and Matt Parkman."

"And Ron!" Ando added.

"Ron?" Kim looked sharply at Ando, her expression more intense at this news. "As in Ron Stoppable?"

"…Yes?" Ando said.

"You're not serious?" Kim shifted her gaze to Future Hiro. "Ron's here? Past Ron is stuck in this time?"

"I assumed he was-"

"You know he's needed here!" the young woman glared at Hiro's future self. "I get that you're trying to stop this all happening in the first place, but right now it's all intact and several people owe Ron their lives-"

"Ron saved lives?" Ando looked at Kim in surprise. "How-?"

His eyes widened. "He has ability?"

"Wait a- you're saying the government has captured a version of Ron who doesn't even know he has powers yet?" Kim glared between Ando and Future Hiro in escalating exasperation before she stood up. "OK, that's it; if this doesn't get Peter to step up, I'm coming with you myself."

Chapter Text

Ron fully appreciated that heroes going to the future never turned out well for them in the comics. If it wasn't Iron Man learning that his descendant from 2020 was a total psycho or the Hulk finding out that he'd become some crazy dictator after a nuclear war, than it was Hal Jordan's past self getting sent to the future and learning he destroyed the Green Lantern Corps after losing his city (and Ron still wasn't that sure if that storyline where Superman learned he'd be alive over eight hundred thousand years in the future was meant to be a happy ending for the big guy).

Granted, so far he and Hiro hadn't clearly learned that anything bad was going to happen to them in this future, and the way everyone addressed them at least suggested his future self was still alive here too, but the fact that they had been outright arrested said some very worrying things about his future activities. Right now, with the dark-skinned power blocker sitting beside them in what looked like some old storeroom, Hiro was even more powerless than he had been before this mess started, and Rufus was trembling with fear in Ron's pocket while Ron tried to keep himself from fidgeting.

God, what did Mrs Dr P say the guilty always do in interrogations… did she ever even mention that kind of thing to us…?

"This is all misunderstanding," Hiro said, at least trying to sound casual as he spoke for the two of them.

"Hiro Nakamura," the fat man said as he placed a file in front of Hiro. "Born Osaka, Japan, to Kaito and Ishi. Teleportation. Stopping time." He placed another file in front of Ron. "Ron Sinclair, who likes to be termed 'Ron Stoppable'. Animal empathy and control-"

"WHAT?!" Ron and Hiro yelled simultaneously.

"Sit," the large man said, a cold glare in his eyes that halted any thought either of them might have had about trying to find out more about that topic.

I have powers? Ron thought, trying to process the implications of that casual comment. He could swear that Rufus was basically frozen with shock in his pocket, the small rodent not even making a squeak as though even he was surprised at this news.

"You're both wanted for prison breaks and attacks against US interests," the man continued with a cool tone that put Ron in mind of a teacher ignoring his latest weird comment in class in favour of getting on with business. "I don't think there's any misunderstanding."

"Prison breaks?" Hiro repeated, a brief smile on his face as though he was trying to suggest that the idea was absurd.

"Two years ago," the man continued as he took out Hiro's sword and paced around the table with the blade outstretched, "you killed a lot of good men when you raided the National Science Centre in Raleigh."

"No," Hiro said firmly. "I know myself. I'm no killer."

"And Mr Sinclair here has trashed more than a few containment camps over the years," the large man said, looking intently at the two young men for a few moments before his expression shifted from probing to curious. "How can you not remember that?"

"Because… we're not the droids you're looking for?" Ron asked hopefully, wishing he could kick himself after he'd said those words; this was not the time to make stupid jokes to lighten the mood.

"I'm talking about men like you and Sylar ruining it for the rest of us," the man said, bitterly tossing the sword onto the table. "Making us live in fear, captivity and hiding, making us choose sides, tearing families apart."

"I would never tear a family apart," Hiro said, looking at the other man with an earnest expression on his face that gave the impression he was trying to stop himself crying.

"And I… well, I wouldn't hurt people," Ron said, lost for anything better to say. He particularly resisted the temptation to say that he might hurt other people if he was sure they'd seriously hurt someone first, but in all honesty he just wasn't sure how he'd react in a fight; Kim had always been good at stopping people from going too far when they started picking on him…

"I don't know what kind of game you two are playing," the man said, looking grimly between Hiro and Ron as though he'd given up looking for some particular reaction, "but I'm going to get it out of you."

With that said, the two men got up and walked out of the room, leaving Hiro and Ron to look apprehensively at each other.

"…OK," Ron said at last. "Can you get us out of here?"

"No," Hiro shook his head. "Already tried; can't use power."

"So the Haitian guy's still near us," Ron nodded in grim acknowledgement. "That's not gonna make this easy…"

"Haitian?"

"The guy who didn't talk," Ron clarified. "KP, Peter, Claire and I ran into him back when we first met after Sylar's attack; he's got this whole ability to… well, shut down other peoples' abilities, but Peter was able to turn that back on him by copying the guy's ability and basically using it to shut the guy's own power off…"

"That… 'something'," Hiro conceded, glancing around the room as though trying to find its exit before he looked at Ron. "He say you have ability-"

"Which I did not know about before now, so I'm honestly just as surprised to learn that detail as you are and I haven't been lying to anyone, I promise," Ron held up his hands anxiously.

"I believe you," Hiro said, his expression becoming thoughtful as he looked at Ron. "He say you have… animal empathy… and you say Peter Petrelli has that power?"

"Well, from what KP said, the invisible guy described Peter's ability as 'empathy', which let him copy other people's abilities…" Ron trailed off as he looked at Hiro with new understanding. "You think I'm like Peter?"

"But for animals," Hiro nodded, a cautious grin growing on his face. "You… like Vixen!"

"Vixen?" Ron asked, before he snapped his fingers. "Didn't she date Green Lantern in Justice League Unlimited?"

"She copy animals in comic," Hiro explained. "If you animal empathy, you do same?"

"…Makes sense," Ron said, as his hand suddenly reached towards his pocket. "And… maybe that's why I've got this… bond with Rufus?"

"Rufus rat?"

"I mean, if I'm an animal empath… and it works like Peter's ability… wouldn't I be copying Rufus constantly by now?"

"Duh!" Rufus poked his head out of the pocket and looked up at Ron with an expression that nobody could mistake for anything other than a grin.

When Ron shifted his gaze from Rufus to Hiro, it was only slightly comforting to see that his friend was just as shocked by that development as he was.

Ron had always liked to basically imagine that Rufus was reacting to him, but the idea that he could do something that obvious…

"Uh… Rufus?" he looked tentatively at his pet. "Did you… can you understand me?"

"Uh-huh!" the naked mole rat nodded enthusiastically up at him.

It said something about how truly bizarre this situation was that even the normally enthusiastic Hiro was clearly confused at this turn of events.

It wasn't as though Rufus being able to think really changed much about their situation, but added on to Ron's own discovery about his apparent ability, it raised some interesting possibilities…

While Hiro was off running down a few of his other contacts for the next stage of his plan, Kim Pierce was left to sit with the time-displaced Ando Masahashi in a quieter part of the bar, neither party sure how to feel about the apparent upcoming turn of events.

The idea that Ron's younger self was active in this time period was a strange one even for the mess that Kim Pierce's life had become, but Kim supposed she had been lucky that it was just Ron's younger self rather than her own. She had her reasons for staying close to Peter and Nikki in the years since the explosion, just as they appreciated that she had her reasons for occasionally leaving them to do her own thing, but while she could see a younger Ron eager to understand what she had made of herself in this time, her past self…

Kim recognised that she'd been forced to compromise her own ethics both to keep people safe and due to some unfortunately circumstances, but she knew her younger self likely wouldn't see it that way at first, and if this situation was anything like what Hiro had claimed they wouldn't have had time for her to properly explain herself to herself.

"Uh…"

"Yes?" Kim looked over at Ando with a brief smile, grateful for once that she hadn't spent much time with him before the explosion. She'd spent years regretting not getting to know Hiro's friend so that she could properly mourn him with Ron and the others, but this way it was easier to just treat him as a visitor and not think about the fact that he had been dead for years.

"Why… so willing… to help?" Ando asked (As Kim recalled, he'd been reasonably good at English before his death, but she'd give him some leeway and assume that learning everything he'd found out so far made it harder for him to concentrate). "If you stay with Peter-?"

"Shouldn't I share his and Nikki's views on staying out of things?" Kim finished for Ando with a brief smile. "It's… well, you kind of have to thank my ability for that."

"Your ability?"

"The thing about having an instinctive knowledge of how to survive is that your body always wants to survive," Kim explained, allowing herself a bitter smile as she held up her hand. "After the explosion, it just made sense to stick with Peter so that we could protect each other; he needed to be sure nobody could find him, and with my gift boosting his own, it wasn't hard for him to keep us both off the radar. We tried to do what we could to help the general public, but with the likes of Andrea Washington, Camille Evans and Montgomery Fiske making themselves basically the public face of what we were…"

"They bad people?" Ando asked.

"Andrea gained strength if people around her are afraid or at least apprehensive; can you imagine what she'd do to get the kind of strength that would really scare people?"

"…Not good."

"And she wasn't exactly a nice person before she realised what she could do," Kim nodded. "And as for what happened to me… I think Hiro compared me once to this guy in X-Men… Darwin, I think the name was…"

"I remember!" Ando smiled as he looked at her, glad to be back to more familiar territory. "He evolve to survive… whatever he up against!"

"Yeah, that sounds right," Kim nodded, returning his smile with one of her own before she became more subdued. "Anyway, the analogy was relevant because there was one story where Darwin was fighting the Hulk- something about the Hulk being angry with the X-Men's leader for some reason- and Darwin was trying to channel his power so that he'd get the ability to drain off the Hulk's energy."

"World War Hulk?"

"Probably; I never got around to reading it myself. Anyway, from what Hiro told me, Darwin's idea worked at first, but when the Hulk got angry enough, Darwin's body decided it was safer to run away and he developed the ability to teleport instead."

"But why- oh," Ando's eyes widened with new understanding. "Your ability… do something similar?"

"Obviously I can't teleport my way out of a fight I can't win, but like with Darwin's ability, I can't exactly… choose whether I'm going to fight or run according to my instincts," Kim affirmed grimly. "It was easier to pick 'fight' at first, but as the world became more dangerous for people like us, and even some of our known friends ended up choosing sides… well, it's hard to resist the urge to stay safe when so many people are trying to kill you."

"Ah," Ando nodded in understanding. "Hard to make yourself go out and fight?"

"It's easier when I have a suitably powerful ally as back-up, but on my own… well, it's hard," Kim sighed. "Ron was my partner for a while at first, but back when I still didn't entirely understand what my ability was doing to me, we had an argument about the risks he was taking when he was helping strangers while our friends and contacts were trying to make a difference themselves…"

"You think… he need… different focus?"

"It wasn't that I didn't approve of what he was doing, I just… I ended up trying to convince him that there could have been a different way to do it," Kim clarified. "Back then it was just us and Hiro acting out when we could find some kind of reports or news about what they were going to do; if we'd been able to get things more organised and work out a clear plan…"

"What if?" Ando said, shrugging as though he wasn't sure what else he could say to that comment.

"I could have driven myself crazy wondering about that," Kim conceded. "It took a while, but I was able to work out a way to use my instincts in small doses without basically making them useless."

"Choose carefully?"

"Bingo," Kim nodded at him. "Which is why Hiro had to go on his current recon mission alone; you're safe enough here with me giving Peter a boost, but if I went with you I'd… well, I'd wear myself out too fast."

Noticing the uncomfortable expression on Ando's face, Kim smiled at him in understanding. "You can say it; I'm basically overly paranoid, but I'm not overly sensitive."

"…It like you… addicted to safety?" Ando said tentatively.

"Probably a fair description of my situation, actually," Kim nodded at him with a wistful smile. "I can go without the sense of safety for a while if I have a clear goal, but if I stayed away from Peter for too long…"

She sighed and glanced at the back door where Peter spent most of his time these days. "So much for the days when Peter and I were going to try and not get stuck together…"

"I hate my life," ex-special agent Audrey Hanson reflected, not for the first time in the last five years, as she looked at the latest news reports on superhuman-related activity.

It wasn't as though she didn't get why people were worried about what these abilities could do in the wrong hands- this story about a kid accidentally suffocating his elementary school class would definitely start a panic- but was it so hard for people to work on accepting these abilities instead of basically treating them as an automatic threat?

As far as Audrey was concerned, the true tragedy of life since the explosion was what this world had done to Matt Parkman. She understood how he had become so bitter over the years- constant exposure to the thoughts of the more evil superhumans out there mixed in with the bitter desperation of others would be enough to leave anyone with issues- but that should make it more important to find the good ones rather than focus on the bad ones…

She still couldn't entirely believe that this had become her life since the explosion. She'd agreed with the initial idea to try and capture the worse examples of the new 'superhumans' to prevent anyone doing something on the same scale as Sylar's 'attack' on New York (even if there was still a lot of debate on what he'd been trying to accomplish with that kind of mass murder), but when Matt and the Haitian started capturing anyone who displayed powers, it hadn't taken Audrey long to conclude that she couldn't keep towing the party line. She had withdrawn from the active field agents as discreetly as possible, unable to keep going along with the agency's increasingly harsh methods of dealing with their targets, but she still sometimes wondered if she was actually accomplishing anything even with her new approach.

The explosion kicked it off, the likes of Andrea fed the paranoia, and then Petrelli took power and it's become all anyone wants to talk about any more…

In a strange way, the hardest part was seeing how interest in the comics had fallen by the wayside since this all happened. She'd never actually read them herself, but it had still been a kind of comfort to walk into shops and see those graphic novels, the colourful costumes of Superman or Spider-Man ready to swing into action… and now interest in them had practically plummeted, as so many people became scared of the 'reality' of superhumans and decided to try and suppress any ideas people might have to 'follow their examples'.

"Anything new?"

"No news so far," the ex-agent smiled wistfully as she looked up at the dark-skinned woman who had walked into her makeshift office. "The lines are still open as far as I can tell, but these days… well, either our inside guys can handle it themselves or everyone who's worth capturing is good enough that they don't need our help to stay away."

"It never hurts to keep ourselves available," Simone Deveaux said with a solemn nod. The other woman had lost her boyfriend to Sylar's murder spree shortly before he detonated himself, but as she'd explained to Audrey when the two started working together, she had used some of Isaac's last warnings (based on the man's paintings of the future, and Audrey still couldn't believe that was an actual thing) to find a few crucial people who could help her put this all together. "Besides, we both know the system's never let us down yet."

"That's true," Audrey gave a wistful smile as she looked at her computer screen. She had no idea how it had been set up, but apparently their search and monitoring algorithms had been written by some kid named Micah, who'd died in the explosion but left behind a laptop that had been acquired by some of Simone's earlier contacts that contained the programs they'd been able to adapt for their current purposes. Audrey didn't understand how, but this laptop apparently automatically upgraded any program that they ran through it, and had managed to keep track of any search parameters they used to find new superhumans no matter how much data it had to search through. It was getting slower in its old age, and Audrey was sure she wasn't the only one dreading how they'd cope once its hardware finally gave up the ghost- copying the files to another computer hadn't worked out the last time they're tried that- but for the moment, it was still enough to get the job done…

An alert from one of the other computers in the office drew Audrey's attention to a different screen. Booting up the screen, she was initially just intrigued at the email she'd received from the mysterious Bennett- even after working with the guy in various ways for the last five years she didn't think she knew anyone who knew his first name- but that intrigue shifted to greater interest as she read the message.

"What?" Simone asked as Audrey turned to look at her in surprise. "What's up?"

"Get the Goghs," Audrey said grimly. "If this is right, we might have just been given our best chance to make a real impact."

Two versions of Hiro Nakamura… all this speculation about time travel…

It might be a drastic solution, but considering what the world had become, didn't they need a drastic solution to what they'd been dealing with since Sylar went off in Kirby Plaza?

The more time he spent looking at this version of Kim Pierce, a girl he'd heard so much about from Ron Sinclair and only met briefly back in his time, Ando wondered at what this world could do to people.

He had started to get a better sense of the negative consequences of Hiro's power after his friend had walked back into the diner and revealed that he had spent the last few months basically trapped in the past after failing to save someone's life, but it was one thing to see how an individual could change and another to see how so many could change. The idea of seeing the future might have just been interesting if he was only looking at it from a distance, even if the sight of a post-apocalyptic New York was a terrifying one, but seeing the friend Ron Sinclair had described reduced to a bitter woman defined by her power and her inability to fight the way she wanted to…

A ringing phone drew Ando's thoughts back to the present. He looked up to see Kim pick up the phone and listen to whoever was on the other end for a moment, but she hung up without saying anything.

"That was Hiro," she explained. "He's spoken with a contact who spoke with someone else, and we might have some allies we can use to get the younger Hiro out."

"Who?" Ando asked.

"If I've got your dates right, you haven't met any of them yet, but they might have had a run-in with me, Peter and Claire before you got here…"

"And they… good?"

"They're good at what they do," Kim shrugged. "It just depends on if enough of them are still free…"

Chapter Text

The more Mohinder Suresh looked at his work over the last few years, the more he wondered how he had come to this point. He'd come to America with the relatively vague idea of continuing his father's research and investigating the circumstances of his death in the process, and now here he was, five years later, acting as the personal advisor to the President on a secret government project.

If it wasn't for the fact that he was experimenting on living people, he would have been immensely proud of his accomplishment; as it was, he was never sure if he should be fascinated at his current scientific accomplishments or hate what he had become.

"How's the work coming along?"

"Ah, Henry," Mohinder looked over at the large man who served as his main security during his research. "Just… testing the new samples…"

"Do you need a new test subject?"

"Your brothers provided enough-"

"Once again, Doctor Suresh, I respect your consideration, but those are not my brothers," Henry said firmly. "Wendell and Wallace are safely contained; you have studied their clones and nothing more."

The way he drew that kind of line had always worried Mohinder; as much as he appreciated the practical benefits of Henry Gough's assistance, he was never sure how to react to the way he treated his brother's duplicates. He could recognise where the other man was coming from with his declaration that the clones weren't his 'real' brothers, considering that there was a definite difference on the cellular level to confirm which ones had just been generated versus which ones were actually 'real', but the way he just dismissed them like that…

"Getting back to the original point, how is your research coming along?"

"…Tricky," Mohinder observed; as long as he had someone willing to listen, he might as well take the opportunity to talk it out. "Your DNA is so fundamentally different it's like you're essentially a different species; we can't simply… remove that without killing the subjects anyway. We can contain the spread of the species, but if we're going to ensure that there's never going to be another Sylar, we need something else…"

"Then it's a good thing you've got a limitless supply of expendable test subject."

"You… really feel that way?" Mohinder looked at Henry, curious despite the grim nature of this topic. "Considering your own use of your abilities-?"

"I have seen enough to know that I was one of the fortunate few who are capable of using his gifts properly," Henry replied. "Even many of my own siblings chose to indulge rather than dedicate themselves to service; humanity as a whole is not ready to use these gifts appropriately. If the few must suffer to prevent the majority abusing power they should never have possessed, it is all for the greater good."

Somehow the intensity of Henry's words made it all the more disturbing. Nathan Petrelli was so focused on his goal that Mohinder could at least believe that the older Petrelli brother genuinely wanted to keep people safe and just wasn't the best at showing it, but the fanaticism in the other man's words…

I started this because I wanted to protect people from those who didn't know how to use their abilities safely; how did I reach a point where I'm taking active part in planning genocide?

He'd put up with this for so long by telling himself that he was protecting people, but if he was right about how Hiro's power actually worked, was it possible there was another way he could deal with this mess?

"DL can phase inside the buildings and Candice's illusions can distract the guards," the older Hiro explained as he paced around the small room where they were currently waiting. Lost for anything better to do with himself, Ando could only look uncertainly at the files and equipment around them, wondering if anything there might be useful, while Kim stood in a corner with a contemplative expression on her face. "With Kim to help us trace the safest route through the facility, this can work…"

"What about me?"

"You'll help-"

"But if you're asking about your future, we can't tell you that."

"Why not?" Ando looked at Kim in surprise. "You tell me about you-"

"Because I trust you to help the younger me avoid those issues when you get back," Kim clarified, looking at Ando with a brief smile before her expression became more serious. "It's easier to talk about the future when it's at least one degree distant; if we start talking about your future, you're more emotionally invested, and you might end up distracting yourself at a crucial moment…"

"That is… an excuse," the older Hiro put in, looking grimly over at Ando. "I must tell you-"

He was cut off as a stun gun electrode suddenly struck him in the chest, prompting an agonised scream from Hiro before he fell to the ground. Ando could only look around in a panic as the room filled with various uniformed and armed officers, Kim shifting into a combat stance beside him as a large man walked up to the fallen Hiro to look at him incredulously.

"We already caught you," the man said, walking up to stand over the fallen future Hiro. "Two Hiros… son of a bitch! He really can-!"

The large man was interrupted from finishing that sentence when something barged into him from the side, knocking him to the ground and throwing him into one of his own men before he could properly react to the attack. As the attacker stood up, Ando jumped back in shock at the sight of a man with shaggy blond hair and long nails, putting Ando in mind of some sketches of Sabretooth except not quite as muscled as the evil mutant. He was almost prepared to assume that he was just looking at someone who bore a striking resemblance to his new friend, but that idea was dashed when he saw a pink thing in what looked for all the world like blue armour, a couple of feet tall, dash in after the first figure and take out another couple of guards.

"Hey, KP," the feral-looking man said, looking at Kim with a ruthless grin.

"Hi, Ron," Kim replied, nodding back at the feral man before she glanced over with a wistful smile. "I see Rufus is… coming along?"

"Rufus?" Ando repeated, following Kim's gaze towards the pink creature now standing on the back of a fallen guard. Like his initial glance had confirmed, it was indeed a pink creature a couple of feet tall with some kind of blue armour on its chest and arms, but when he got a proper look at it, he could see that it was indeed a larger form of Ron Sinclair's unusual pet. "What-?"

Ando never had the chance to finish his sentence as Ron and Rufus lashed out in a display of violence that left Ando reminded of how he'd always imagined Wolverine would move if the comics were real (Jackman was good but he was very brutal and direct). The pink thing in blue that had once just been Ron's pet moved with a quickness and precision that surprised him given its comparative bulk, leaping around the walls to strike its targets, moving on to the next one before the last had even finished falling down, while Ron lashed out with such force that everyone he hit ended up falling into someone else. They moved with such speed and efficiency that Ando felt as though he had only just processed what he was looking at before the fight had ended, Ron and Rufus standing over their fallen foes while Kim smiled in approval at the new arrivals.

"Good job," she nodded.

"I've been practising," Ron replied as the blue-and-pink thing walked over to stand beside him.

"So… you… powers?" Ando looked at the older Ron in surprise. "And… Rufus?"

"From what I heard about when you're from, I haven't realised I've got my powers yet in your time, but I have them," Ron nodded. "If it helps, I've been compared to Vixen from DC Comics; I can copy the natural strengths and abilities of any animals in my vicinity."

"And as for Rufus, what happened to him is basically a side-effect of Ron's ability," Kim explained, looking at the naked mole rat with a wistful smile. "Before he started working for the government, Doctor Suresh speculated that Ron spent so much of his time synced up to Rufus that Rufus ended up taking on some of Ron's… what was the term he used?"

"Human-ness," Ron answered with a smile as Rufus moved over to stand beside Ron. "Always annoyed the doc that he couldn't think of something better."

"That is one theory, certainly," the creature in blue said-

"He talks?" Ando yelled, so stunned he didn't realise that he had spoken in Japanese until he saw Kim and Ron looking uncertainly at him.

"Uh… yeah, Rufus can talk," Ron nodded at Ando, before he turned to look at Kim. "Sorry I wasn't here sooner. Agent Hanson received your message, but when I got here there was some concern from the local birds about why so many people with weapons were hanging around this building, so I figured it would be best to wait off to the side until they made their own move."

"Birds… worried?" Ando looked uncertainly at Ron, suddenly wondering just how self-aware animals could be.

"Not in the sense that they knew what they were looking at and why it might be dangerous to them, but… well, my ability taps into something a bit deeper than the animals' conscious thoughts," the other man explained, indicating Rufus with a grin. "They can't always articulate it, but when I reach out just right… it's complicated to explain, but I'm aware enough of what they've seen that that I can reinterpret it into something I canunderstand."

"Which is one reason I don't tap into Ron's power beyond the surface benefits," Peter Petrelli said as he appeared in the middle of the room, nodding at the other man even as Ando clasped a hand to his head to try and stop the sense that his brain was about to explode from all this new information. "The additional sensory input is… complicated."

The next moment Ando felt a sense of disorientation as Peter was suddenly standing in the middle of the group, crouched down to take hold of the older Hiro. Ando was lost for what had just happened, but his other new friends seemed to understand what had happened, Rufus scampering over to take hold of Ron's leg while Ron and Kim reached out to place a hand on each of Peter's shoulders.

If Ando was asked to measure it, it felt as though the current transition was a moment slower than it had been when he made this kind of 'trip' with Hiro, but it was still a surprise to find himself moving from some unknown basement room to what looked like the back of the club he had originally met this older Kim and Peter in the first place.

It was particularly surprising when he realised that there were two new faces standing on either side of the large room, looking at the new arrivals with a nonchalance that suggested to Ando they had been expecting the teleportation. One of them was a woman who seemed to be a few years older than Kim, with dark hair and wearing a green jacket, and the other was a man seemingly a little older than the girl wearing a dark suit that actually seemed to be purple in the right light.

"You got 'em, huh?" the woman in green said with an edge to her voice Ando wasn't sure how to define.

"All but the young ones," Kim replied as she moved Future Hiro to a nearby chair. "Hiro will need to sleep it off, but once he's back up, we're going in to get them out."

"Is he really needed?" the unknown man asked.

"You know how it works, Mike," the scar-faced Peter Petrelli looked over at the other man. "Even with Ron giving me a boost, for something like this I'd prefer to have Hiro fully conscious so that he can actively assist; with these stakes, the last thing I want is to risk missing my target."

"Uh… who you?" Ando indicated the two new faces uncertainly.

"Sheila Gogh, and this is my brother Michael," the woman in green replied. "Bit cocky at times, but at least he didn't stab our brothers in the back like Henry did…"

"Yeah, do you have to keep bringing that up?" Michael looked at her in exasperation. "He betrayed all of us and we weren't exactly friendly before that shit happened; we don't need you rubbing our faces in how you hate his guts to keep hating him ourselves."

"Can I help it if he's easy to dislike these days?" Sheila shrugged.

"Still no need to go on about it," Kim pointed out before she smiled at the two. "Good to see you, by the way."

"Did you have any doubts?" Michael asked with a cool smile.

"The odds are getting steep and they already captured young Hiro and Ron; I'm allowed to be paranoid with these kind of stakes."

"Which is why having our Sinclair on site is a good call," Sheila indicated Ron. "Helps the big guy toughen up, after all."

"Oh, so I'm just Peter's booster pack to you?"

"Booster pack?" Ando asked, hoping he'd picked up enough active English over the last few weeks that he was interpreting this correctly.

In response, the other people in the room exchanged foreboding glances with each other for a few seconds, before the scarred Peter Petrelli (how could he have that scar if he had the cheerleader's healing ability?) looked at Ron with an inquiring expression that was met with a polite nod.

"Basically," the scarred man said as he looked at Ando, "since Ron can mimic abilities as well, even if his own focus on animals rather than other people, when I copy him the most obvious advantage I get from it is that his abilities basically enhances my own by default."

"Enhances?"

"We worked out the hard way over the years that Double P here is never stronger than the person he's copying, and even that's only when he's in their presence," Sheila took up the explanation with her own bitter smile. "Most of the time he has to know someone really well to copy their little gift to the owner's level when he's not within proximity of the original party. Even then, no matter how well he knows the other party, the only exceptions to that rule occur when he's tapping Sinclair's power as well."

"If I'm focusing on Ron and someone else at the same time, I can at least match what that person was capable of if not outright surpass it," Peter continued, even as he gave Ron an appreciative smile. "It's a bit rough at times, particularly if I get the power without the control the other person's developed, but it's a useful edge when we really need it."

For a moment Peter just smiled wistfully at his friend before he turned back to the woman in green. "You spoke with Audrey?"

"She gave us the plans for the area where they're most likely to be keeping the younger ones," Sheila said, before looking more cautiously at him. "You sure you want to do this? We go in like that, it's all or nothing…"

"If we can pull this off, we have a very good chance of averting all the damage of the last five years; I'd say that's worth the risk," Peter said, before he turned back to Ando. "And to answer what's probably your most significant question right now, just so we can get it out of the way; you're dead."

"Dead?" Ando repeated, more disturbed at the nonchalance of the tone than anything else.

"You died in the explosion," Peter said, in a tone that Ando could only think of as bitter. "I think that was what really changed Hiro to make him so… grim these days; he's become what he feels he has to be so that he can find some way to save you."

Ando had no idea what was the appropriate response to a declaration like that. It was almost a relief when Niki Sanders walked into the room and saw the rest of the people standing around talking with Peter. There was still some tension in the room after Peter left to talk with her, but no more than the kind of tension Ando was used to feeling when he was in a room with other people and had no idea what to say to everyone else.

Despite the knowledge of his potential death back in his own time, as he looked around the room, for the first time since Hiro and Ron were left behind in Isaac's loft, Ando felt that his 'new' allies might genuinely have a chance at pulling this off…

Chapter Text

If Mohinder had been feeling conflicted about his work since the explosion the day before, the revelation about the full extent of Hiro Nakamura's powers made him feel even worse about his choices. Working with President Nathan Petrelli had given him access to the research materials and resources he needed to gain a better understanding of the genetics of the superhumans emerging across the world, but what had he actually done with that knowledge apart from try to take that power away from people and experiment on living test subjects?

Oh, Henry Gough had tried to justify it as he was only experimenting on 'expendable' clones rather than the originals, but that suddenly made it even worse; what right did any of them have to define what made a person human?

The human race had experienced a terrible tragedy when New York City was destroyed, but did that mean that the most remarkable evolutionary step made in all of recorded history should be constantly suppressed like it was only something to fear? There could have been so much potential if those with abilities had been allowed to come out at their own pace, but after the destruction of New York, people were searching for answers, and then…

Can I even remember how it all started?

That was the terrible thing about such devastating events; you could always remember where you were when it happened (much like so many people had said they could remember where they were when President Kennedy was assassinated), but sometimes it was hard to trace how you could end up making the decisions you made afterwards.

Somehow, the idea that things could be traced back to some particular moments had become more intriguing to him since he found Hiro Nakamura's complex timeline in what had once been Isaac Mendez's loft. He wasn't entirely sure how to follow the chain of events depicted there, and wondered if the arrangement only made sense to Hiro because of his abilities, but the central concept was fascinating in its own right.

Unfortunately, with Parkman so focused on 'fixing' things in the present that he couldn't even bring himself to look at the past, Bennett likewise caught up in trying to control things now rather than thinking about a wider issue… and President Petrelli so determined to basically deny that he even had abilities…

Mohinder had spent years hearing reports about how Hiro and his friends were essentially terrorists lashing out against the government, but the earnest way the Hiro in their custody had talked about taking risks to save millions of lives… on top of Ron Sinclair's urgent rejection of the idea that he could even be capable of some of his more extreme actions, Mohinder had to admit that he actually liked their attitude. He had spent so long working with people who seemed to feel that the only solution was to put things back to the way they were by containing or eliminating the evolved humans on a large scale. The idea of going back and erasing it all might be a significant leap, but it wasn't as though anything good had happened in these last five years that anyone would actually want to preserve.

God, in his position as one of the president's advisors, Mohinder had even noticed a fall in birth rates across America; it was as though couples didn't want to risk bringing a new Sylar into the world until they could be sure there wouldn't be a risk of their children manifesting such powers.

Even with the implications of such power, the thing that disturbed him the most was the way President Petrelli had dismissed his idea so easily to focus on the present. The way Nathan had talked about it as though nothing mattered but the world he had essentially created, and then been so easy to fall back on the idea of actual genocide as a solution when literally anything else should have been the first option…

Mohinder didn't know how the man he thought he'd been working for at the start of this presidential run could have fallen this far, but he knew that he couldn't continue to go along with this latest plan. If the proposed 'cure' was going to be distributed knowing that it would kill everyone who used it, then this whole world had reached a point where he couldn't condone what he was a part of.

He didn't know what would happen if he helped the younger Hiro escape into the past. He had read some superhero comics to get a different perspective on his father's research, so he was aware of at least the concept of alternate timelines, but the idea that he could be erased from history if he did this…

It doesn't matter.

Even if he considered the notion of changing history as a real possibility, the last five years had been so increasingly grim that he couldn't help but think that if he had to erase them from history, it wouldn't be that great of a loss…

When his phone began to ring, Mohinder answered it on automatic, only to be shocked when he heard a voice on the other end that he hadn't heard for years.

"Doctor Suresh," ex-agent Audrey Hanson's voice said firmly, "I was told to call you on behalf of Peter Petrelli, and tell you to do what you know is right if you want to save the world."

"How did you-?"

"He drew it, apparently," Hanson replied with a resigned edge to her voice that Mohinder had come to expect of this strange new world. "He's getting a team together to mount an assault, but it apparently doesn't work if you do what the president wants you to do."

"And… if I do this?" Mohinder asked.

"The world gets another shot."

Temporal mechanics aside, Mohinder knew that there was only one choice to make in that situation.

He'd already been making tentative plans to get the young Hiro and Ron to safety, but if Peter and his associates could actually help get these two young men back to the past…

Standing on the edge of the club, part way between the stage and the dressing rooms, Kim allowed herself a smile as she pondered the contrast between the current actions of her allies. She was never sure if it was a matter of simple training or some subtle effect of her own ability, but her hearing had become noticeably sharper over the years since she learnt exactly what she could do, and right now what she was hearing raised some subtle concerns about what they would do in this upcoming assault. In a booth in the club, Hiro was talking with Ando about how he hadn't truly been able to enjoy being a hero without Ando there to share it with him, while Sheila and Michael checked their equipment in preparation for the upcoming attack on the bar, and down in the changing room…

"…is gone," Peter was saying with a bitter edge to his voice. "You have to accept your loss."

"Jessica was right all along," Nikki said, sounding like she was on the verge of angry tears. Kim could picture her sitting in front of her dressing mirror, brushes and pictures all around it. "Look out for yourself; don't get attached."

"I don't buy it," Peter replied. The simplicity of that statement was enough to assure Kim that she was right to still have faith in him; no matter what had happened to him over the last few years, at his core Peter's first goal was to help people.

"Then why are you in such a hurry to leave me?" Nikki asked, her voice now clearly displaying a desperate attempt to suppress tears.

"My own reasons, and I'm not leaving anything," Peter retorted. "I'll be back."

"What reasons?" Nikki asked, a slight sound suggesting that she had stood up to address Peter more directly. "What makes you think that you are so important that you have to fix everything?"

"Because I do," Peter replied, a similar sound suggesting that he was now standing up as well.

"Why?" Nikki yelled, her voice becoming more 'screechy' as Kim heard a hand slamming against something else (probably Peter himself). "Why does it fall on your shoulders to save everyone?"

"Because it was me!" Peter yelled. "The bomb? It was me! I killed all those people. I killed Micah."

Kim had only heard about Nikki's son after the fact, apart from some comments that Peter had copied Micah's ability at some point before his death, but she knew that the whole subject of his death was still a sensitive issue for Nikki at best. Just the idea that the man she had been involved with would have been responsible for her son's death must be the most devastating news Nikki had ever heard since Micah had been lost…

By the time Kim realised that Peter had left the room and was heading towards the door, she didn't have time to move out of the way before Peter would see her and realise that she had been listening to it all. Resigned to the situation, she looked past him to see Nikki's back as she stood in the middle of her dressing room.

"You walk out that door, you don't come back," Nikki called after him.

Peter only paused for a moment before he kept on walking, nodding in acknowledgement at Kim as he paused on the edge of the corridor before he would enter the club itself.

"You know you probably won't come back either way, right?" Kim kept her voice low as Peter looked at her.

"Like I said," the most powerful man on the planet replied grimly, "this is my mess to undo."

Kim had nothing better to say to that, so she just nodded as the rest of the group began to gather around the scar-faced man.

She didn't like that her friend blamed himself for something that was still fundamentally an accident, no matter how devastating an accident it had actually been, but how could she criticise him for that when she could never stop herself wondering if she could have made a difference on that last day? If she'd been there to help him fight Sylar… if she hadn't gone off to try and meet up with Ron when he called to tell her his group had found Hiro's sword…

Hopefully if Hiro can get them back to New York just after they left the past, they can avoid that little detour…

Ron wasn't sure what it said about his personal priorities that he would have felt more comfortable in this situation if Kim had been his companion rather than Hiro. He liked the Japanese man well enough, and they'd had some interesting chats as they were travelling to Vegas, but something about Kim just always made Ron feel more confident…

Then again, maybe it was the idea that he had a power that was really giving Ron trouble at the moment. The idea that Kim Pierce had an ability almost seemed natural- Kim was so incredible at everything she tried that he wasn't surprised she was an actual superhero- but the thought that he was somehow one as well just left him wondering if the universe had screwed up somewhere. He was the goofy sidekick or plucky comic relief, guys like him didn't have powers!

They also don't get stuck in a post-apocalyptic future where they're seen as terrorists…

"You ever feel like we're in the wrong genre?"

"Wrong genre?" Hiro looked curiously at Ron.

"Like we're meant to be in a cheerier story than this?" Ron waved his hands at the room around them. "Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to be some idiot who's denying the problem in the hope that everything's going to go away, but this whole thing… I feel like we got dropped into something way darker than we were ever meant to deal with…"

"…Maybe," Hiro nodded thoughtfully before he gave Ron a more encouraging smile. "But maybe that good thing?"

"Huh?"

"Maybe we here to remind others what they have to be?" Hiro suggested, looking at Ron with that strange optimism that had seemingly never faltered since the two of them had met. "Where others deal with world letting them down, we remind them to enjoy being heroes?"

"That…" Ron began before he stopped himself with a thoughtful nod. "That could actually work… lot of responsibility, maybe, but we can work with that…"

"We must," Hiro nodded. "If Peter Petrelli Superman and Kim Pierce Batman, we must be Jimmy and Robin."

"Batman?" Ron repeated in surprise.

"She do with ability what Batman do with training; she still has cool ability."

When Hiro put it that way, Ron could kind of see his point. Maybe Kim would never have Batman's gadgets or Bruce Wayne's money, but wasn't Batman so popular these days because he could plan his way out of a fight with any foe if he had enough time? With Kim's powers, she could basically save time on research and just let her instincts take control when she was facing a big enough threat…

When the door opened and the Haitian walked into the room, Ron's already-tentative good mood faltered even further. He and Hiro were each fairly sure that there was something here stopping Hiro just teleporting them out of here, even if whatever his ability was still seemed to be keeping up whatever his link was to Rufus, but if this guy was actually in the room with them, there was definitely some reason they wanted to keep him weak…

The sound of battle being waged further down in this building was so intense Kim wondered if they had gone too far. As much as she resented the way Nathan Petrelli's laws had manipulated so many of them into turning against each other, the man didn't exactly recruit idiots, and if he was truly concerned about the consequences of letting Hiro change history, he was going to pull out all the stops to make sure their history remained intact.

Sometimes Kim still wondered how the man who had just wanted to protect his brother had reached the point where he was basically mounting a genocidal campaign against his own kind, but she had long ago decided to focus on the situation in front of them rather than question the motives of all involved parties. Right now, that situation was Peter, Hiro, and Sheila drawing most of the building's available security teams to the main entrance while she, Ron and Michael got inside through a vent on an upper level near the rear end of the building. It was a bit of a jump from the nearest building to that one, but with Ron's enhancements and Kim's own skills all Michael had to do was stay small and hold on to them as they made the jump.

Strictly speaking, getting inside via the vent hadn't been hard once Peter managed to 'instruct' the security system to ignore any alerts around that particular area, but she knew from past missions with Peter that he sometimes had trouble controlling that particular talent. Knowing what she now knew about its source, she wondered if that had anything to do with his guilt over Micah's death, but that wasn't an issue right now. Peter could keep the security system down long enough for her team to get through, and after that Ron's feral instincts, Michael's shrinking, and Kim's own enhanced instincts could help them evade any internal security systems.

Kim still wasn't entirely comfortable about leaving Ando with the more public team, considering he was the only one without any powers, but she had to concede that it would have been too risky to let him come with them this way. Add in that anyone who knew the truth about Hiro and Ron probably knew about Ando right now, and it really made sense for him to join the frontal assault so that their enemy would think they were throwing everything into one attack.

Glancing at her phone, Kim nodded as she compared a number on the vent wall to the map on her screen.

"We're almost there," she said, keeping her voice low as she glanced back at her partners. "Ron, get ready to move; Mike, take a look."

"Check," Michael Gough replied, the small man running briskly past her, looking for all the world like a living action figure, before he jumped towards a nearby vent and vanished through the slits. Kim was still surprised that Michael could do that without worrying about being hurt, but apparently his power also gave him some degree of control of his density so that he could make himself strong enough to withstand any impacts he might sustain, whether from jumping down or being potentially stepped on. He couldn't entirely explain how his body could do all that, but Kim supposed Michael was one of those people who didn't care that much how his body could do all this strange stuff so long as he wasn't being hurt by it.

For the next few moments, Kim and Ron simply squatted in the vent, anxiously waiting for Michael to get back. Kim wanted to believe that they were just silent because talking in this situation might draw the attention of someone else in the building, but she couldn't make herself forget how the two had drifted apart over the years. As much as they both understood how the other had reached this point, it was still hard to know how to talk together like they had when they were both at school…

A slight knocking at the vent was the only advance notice the two had when Michael returned, his small form climbing back into the vent with casual ease.

"How are you?" Kim asked.

"All right," Michael replied, still looking more like an action figure than a real human being even as he shrugged his shoulders and stretched. "Climbing those walls is always rough…"

"What are we dealing with?" Ron asked.

"About a dozen SWAT officers led by Matt Parkman, lined up opposite the elevator."

"Parkman… he's the telepath, right?" Kim asked. She tried to keep track of all potential threats in the government's anti-superhuman programs, but it was hard to keep track of everyone when she had spent so long trying to be discreet.

"Bingo," Michael nodded. "I think he missed me because he's focusing on what's in front of him right now, but we have a whole SWAT team ready to take on whoever comes up to this level and I'm fairly sure he mentioned the Haitian's in the area too…"

"Which means it's time for me to get into the mood," Ron said, looking grimly up at her. "Move forward."

Kim nodded in understanding, once again fighting down the brief pain she felt at the implications. What Ron was attempting had always been a risk, but the idea that he still resented her enough that he had to tell her to get out of his way…

Once she had moved far enough away from her old friend, Kim could only watch as Ron's face twisted and his body tensed, drawing on the memories of rage and pain that Kim doubted he had ever shared with anyone. As much as she wished she could help Ron with whatever had caused these issues, another part of Kim had always stopped herself from daring to ask the question, not wanting to know what could have made Ron so mad.

It seemed like hours as Kim watched, Michael and Rufus pressed anxiously against her arms, before Ron let out a loud roar, putting her in mind of The Lion King, as he literally punched the vent open and leapt out of it. Kim allowed herself a brief glimpse through the hole to watch as Ron charged towards the SWAT team, striking the group before the large man Kim now recognised as Matt Parkman could turn around to face the attacker.

Kim turned away when she saw the first spurt of blood from his initial target, listening for a few moments as she heard claws tearing through flesh and something cracking that she at least strongly suspected was bone. After a few moments of violence and brief moments of gunfire, the sound of violence faded, leaving Kim to exchange glances with the shrunken Michael before he jumped back through the hole. A call of confirmation from the other side was enough of a cue for Kim to jump down after him, looking up ahead to see Ron standing in the middle of the fallen SWAT officers, Parkman lying off to the side with a few distinct scars on his face and chest. Ron turned to look at Kim and Michael as the Gough sibling returned to regular height, but her friend was suddenly struck from the side by a punch from a man in a blue suit.

"Hey!" Kim yelled, shifting urgently into a combat stance.

"Oh," the man said, turning from the downed Ron to look at Kim before his eyes widened as he took in her companion. "Michael?"

"Henry," Michael responded, fists clenched as he glared at the other man. "You just keep finding new ways to annoy us all, don't you?"

"You know him?" Kim asked.

"He's my brother," Michael clarified, before he looked bitterly at Henry. "Or he was before he sold us out."

"Sold you out?" Henry countered with a raised eyebrow. "I'm the only one who's actually still trying to do the right thing; is it my fault that you can't take the greater good into account?"

"Greater good- you think all this crap is you doing the right thing?" Michael repeated incredulously.

"It's become all too clear that the world isn't ready for us; I'm only doing the sensible thing by helping to ensure the worst of us can't do any damage-"

"Which means helping the government exterminate us?" Kim asked indignantly. "I didn't realise we were in Nazi Germany!"

"It won't be like that," Henry said with the kind of cool certainty that Kim almost hated more than an outright fanatic. "They will only keep the more dangerous of us contained; anyone with lesser powers will be moved to a secure location and kept under observation-"

"And if you believe that you really do have muscles for brains," another voice said. Henry had barely turned in the direction of the voice when a familiar green figure lunged forwards, fist glowing with green energy as it struck Henry in the face. The impact sent Henry flying before he hit the floor with a pained thud, Sheila Gough standing over him and Peter Petrelli, the older Hiro and Ando standing behind her.

"Sheila?" Henry looked up at his sister, actually looking disappointed to see her. "I thought that you would-"

"Decide to sell out and help the guys trying to wipe us out?" Sheila shook her head even as she held out an arm to help Ron get back to his feet. "No, because unlike you, I actually have some common sense."

"I was doing what's right; we're dangerous-!"

"Let me guess, the government told you that and you just believed it?" Ron snorted dismissively at the other man while rubbing his bruised face. "That is exactly why government-sponsored heroes never worked in the comics; if they weren't the freakin' Suicide Squad, it always comes down to their supervisors telling them who they should consider the bad guys, and most of the time the only real problem is that the other guys just don't play by government rules."

"These people are elected officials; they've earned our trust-"

"And everyone has their own agenda," Kim affirmed. "Maybe some people out there in Washington genuinely just want to do the right thing, but this is the kind of area where we shouldn't have to compromise, so it's best not to put ourselves in that position in the first place."

"Yeah, that's always been Hank's problem," Sheila waved a dismissive hand as Peter and the older Hiro looked grimly at the man in blue. "He wants to do the 'right' thing, but he's too trusting that just because someone's a public figure they're automatically trustworthy. Seriously, if they sold it the right way someone could convince him that basically anything can be the 'right thing', even all this crap we've been dealing with lately."

"New York was destroyed because one of us lost control; I am trying to help-!"

"By treating your own kind like experiments?" Sheila glared at him. "You can't exactly say that you've got the moral high ground when you let these assholes torture our brothers-"

"It's always the copies-"

Shelia let out a snort of disgust as she punched Henry firmly in the face once again.

"They still remember being your brothers, you bastard," she said scathingly to the unconscious body before she turned back to the others. "C'mon, let's find Beast Boy and Little Clock and get them outta here."

"You know the first one's copyright," Ron observed with a brief grin.

"Who cares?" Sheila replied with her own smirk. "We're about to change history; legality isn't a big deal."

"Let's just-" Kim began, before a door down the corridor opened and the young Hiro and Ron hurried out, followed by an Indian man in glasses with a thick black beard, wearing a brown suit that gave Kim the impression it was naturally dirty in some way, who looked at the assembled group in surprise.

"Peter?" the Indian man said at last, his gaze focused on the scarred man.

"Mohinder," Peter replied with a brief nod.

"Hiro!" Ando yelled, running past Peter to hug the younger Hiro.

"Gang's all here!" Ron grinned as he looked at the new arrivals, Rufus perched on his shoulder, before he looked past Kim and his jaw dropped. "Holy…"

"Yeah, I know," the older Ron commented with a dark grin as he exchanged glances with his younger self. "Foreboding look, right?"

"Uh… I have no idea what you're trying for there, buddy…" Ron said at last, waving a hand at him. "I mean, I'm getting a bit of a Sabretooth vibe, but I really hope it's meant to be more feral Wolverine…"

"I stopped thinking about that kind of thing a long time ago; this is who I am and I accept it," future Ron shrugged. "I take it they told you about your ability?"

"Copying animals?" Ron nodded, Rufus imitating the gesture from Ron's shoulder. "Oh yeah; any advice?"

"Be careful about how long you spend tapping into certain animals; relying on it can be dangerous to your psychological state," the older Ron observed with a brief grim smile. "Frankly, if you're going to learn anything from me… don't be me."

"…It's that kind of future, huh?"

"I may have just killed my own brother because he's been killing clones of our other brothers for the last few years; what do you think?" Sheila asked the younger Ron.

"What?" Hiro looked at the woman in green in shock. "Your brother?"

"That's not really-" Kim began, before she suddenly felt a strong sense of dread in the back of her skull, looking anxiously down the corridor. "What the-?"

She would never know what had prompted it, but suddenly the older Hiro was standing in front of her only to be struck in the back by something that left a sharp protrusion sticking out of his chest. Ron and Ando yelled in shock while Hiro could only stare at his future self in silent shock, while the others shifted into a combat stance to look at the figure now standing at the other end of the corridor with an outstretched hand.

"Nathan?" Peter looked at his brother in surprise.

"Peter," Nathan nodded as he lowered his arm.

"How did you even know we were here, Mr President?" Michael asked scathingly.

"Oh, Henry Gough was a loyal employee who kept me up-to-date with events down here," Nathan replied with a shrug. "He alerted me to the attack on this facility, and I flew here as soon as I got the news; I can't exactly allow you all to ruin the world I've created here, can I?"

"You've created?" Sheila repeated.

"Oh God…" Kim said, eyes widening in horror as the final piece fell into place.

Her instincts had always been able to pick up things she wouldn't have known consciously… and right now, even if it probably was dangerous to be face-to-face with the president who had basically made it illegal for people like her to exist, there was only one person who had ever inspired the level of fear she was experiencing right now.

"Sylar?"

The shocked glances she received from the rest of her allies might have made Kim doubt herself if she'd been paying attention to them, but all her attention was on the man in front of her, as Nathan Pretelli seemed to warp into the long-missing form of Sylar, wearing black jacket, shirt and trousers with a mess of dark hair at odds with Nathan's perfectly manicured appearance.

"Too bad you couldn't believe it was me for a few more moments," the serial killer observed as he looked at Peter. "I was looking forward to making a Biblical analogy."

"Oh, you absolute bastard," Sheila said, her hands glowing green once again. "What was all this; one massive ego trip?"

"Just making sure the unworthy can be cleared out," Sylar grinned mockingly at the young woman before he turned to Peter. "It's actually been rather amusing, really; everyone thinks of me as a monster when I never committed my greatest crime-"

"What Peter did was a tragic accident he'd do anything to undo; you did all this to the world on purpose, you sick fuck," Ron spat at the killer.

"You're going to pay for all that," Peter said, his hands raised and glowing with red fire. "Especially what you did to Nathan."

"What I did?" Sylar retorted, his hands glowing with blue energy that made Kim think of ice. "When I killed Nathan, he had already turned against his own kind."

"Liar!" Peter yelled, his feet lifting off the ground as he charged at Sylar, the technical president (Kim strongly doubted this guy could have won a campaign on his own even if he'd been disguised as Nathan at the time) only just managing to get his own feet off the ground before Peter hit him.

As the two men wrestled in the air in a manner that briefly made Kim think of that bit in the third Matrix film, her instincts drew her attention back to where the three time-displaced young men were still watching the fight in horror, as well as Hiro's corpse. Letting her instincts drive her actions, Kim quickly examined Hiro's body and found a bloodstained, slightly damp comic that she handed to Hiro.

"You'll need this," she said, her attention focused on the three time-travellers as Sheila and the older Ron began to run towards the battle behind her. "Get back there, and make sure I'm with Peter until you catch Sylar."

"KP-!" Ron began, even as Mohinder and Michael grabbed the three and hurried them back towards the room they'd been held in earlier. Kim didn't question the decision; Michael's power would just make him potential collateral damage if he tried to get involved right now, but making sure Ron and the others were safe was the only way this was ever going to end well.

Even as she saw them enter the room, Kim turned back to look at the fight being waged in front of her, Sylar back on his feet as he created a sharp wall covered in icicles between him and his enemies. When another pair of Sylars appeared in the air above them, Kim felt a new sense of terror, only to be given a new sense of hope as Sheila let out a roar of rage and launched herself into the air to take down one Sylar with a powerful kick to the head. Quickly taking in her surroundings, Kim jumped up to kick herself off a wall and push herself towards the other airborne Sylar, knocking him down to the ground with such force that the flying Sylar was left dazed.

As Kim hit the ground with a roll, she glanced back to confirm that Peter was currently wrestling with Sylar directly, each man holding the other by a wrist as they struggled. Satisfied that the main Sylar wasn't a threat, Kim turned back to her own downed Sylar and slammed her foot into his chest with such force that she felt a few ribs crack. The Sylar she had just kicked glowed red and vanished from view, but she didn't have time to analyse that before a sudden burst of energy from Peter and Sylar sent her flying down the corridor. She looked up in time to see Ron hit the wall further down the other side of the fight with a particularly loud crack, but then Rufus was jumping towards Sylar with a loud shriek of rage- Sheila was charging another blast of green fire- everything was fading-

Everything was fading.

Kim didn't know exactly what was happening, but for the first time in years, she felt as though she was able to relax when faced with danger.

If we're fading now… they did it then…

That thought was the last thing to cross her mind before this timeline ceased to exist.

Chapter Text

Even with Doctor Suresh and the man in purple desperately pressed against the door of the former storage room, whatever was going on outside was clearly causing a lot of damage as Peter and the others fought against what was apparently the version of Sylar from this timeline. A part of Ron was still trying to process the idea that he had actually met his future self, but the rest of him was more focused on trying to contain his sheer panic at the notion that the two most powerful men on the planet were duking it out a few yards away with only a stone wall and a metal door protecting them from what was going on. As Rufus trembled in Ron's pocket, Ando took hold of Hiro's shoulders and spoke reassuringly to his friend in Japanese, his tone urgent but comforting.

"Get going, you idiots!" the man in purple yelled at them as he helped Mohinder hold the door shut. "Stop this fucking mess!"

"And protect Ted Sprauge!" Mohinder added even as his feet scrambled for purchase against the ground. "Whatever you do in the past, don't let Ted-!"

"Keep Ted Sprague safe, I got that, and we're working on it!" Ron called desperately back at the older men as he placed his free hand on Hiro's shoulder; the last thing he wanted was to get left behind when Hiro got over himself and managed to get his powers working again. "This is just-!"

Ando clapped a hand over Ron's mouth and shot him a brief warning glare before he fixed his gaze back on Hiro and said a final reassuring sentence that Ron still couldn't understand (he told himself not to take it personally; when the goal was to make Hiro feel more confident, of course the two old friends would talk in their native language).

"Good luck!" a voice called out to them. Ron just had time to look down and see what looked like a larger version of Rufus standing at their feet- the blue armour was cool but how could Rufus be talking like that?- before everything seemed to shift around them-

Suddenly there was silence around them apart from the tamer, more familiar sounds of cars going by far below and pigeons cooing from somewhere nearby. Looking around himself, Ron smiled with relief when he saw that he, Hiro, Ando and Rufus were now standing on the roof of a building in a clearly still-intact New York, with no sign of the devastation that had been so apparent in the future.

"Nice!" he turned to grin at Hiro, giving the shorter man a grateful thump on the back that sent Hiro stumbling forward a couple of steps. "Uh, sorry about that…"

"No apology," Hiro grinned over at Ron before he reached into his pocket and took out the comic book that the older Kim had given him. Once he was sure that he had Ron and Ando's attention, Hiro opened the comic to reveal a panel showing a man who had to be Hiro stabbing a figure that was definitely meant to be Sylar with the sword.

"Now hard part," Hiro said solemnly, as he reached up to push his glasses back on his nose. "We find Sylar."

"And Ted Sprague."

"Who?" Hiro and Ando looked at Ron in confusion.

"Ted Sprague," Ron repeated, briefly wondering how they'd missed that before concluding that they had both needed to focus on something during the chaos of the last few minutes, so they could have easily missed that last warning. "Don't know exactly who he is, but it sounded like he's got something to do with the upcoming explosion."

"That… something," Hiro nodded thoughtfully as he looked at Ron. "We seek Sylar; you call friends."

"On it," Ron said, hurrying into the house and grabbing a phone from the wall; he had no idea if this place would still have a workable phone, but it was better than just waiting around. Fingers crossed, he dialled Peter's cell number, and smiled in relief when it was picked up. "Hello?"

"Ron?" Peter's voice said from the other end. "Where are you?"

"Back in New York after one really freaky detour," Ron replied; talking about their trip to the future could wait until they were meeting up directly. "Oh, and we ran into your brother in Vegas."

"You met Nathan?"

"He helped us get inside Linderman's building and get our hands on the sword," Ron shrugged. "Seemed like a decent guy, really."

"That's… yeah," Peter replied awkwardly, before there was a series of sounds at the other end followed by a new voice on the other end.

"Hey, Ron."

"KP!" Ron grinned in relief before his smile faltered as he took in his friend's tone. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing's wrong, exactly," Kim replied quickly. "It's just that… well, Peter had a run-in with Sylar earlier, but he had to run for it after he took a beating-"

"He took a beating?" Ron repeated in surprise. "Couldn't he just-?"

"Imitating Claire is easier when she's there; as he puts it, it's hard to think positive when he's up against a total psycho," Kim cut Ron off, a slight edge of amusement in her voice that made Ron suddenly think of all the times Kim had teasingly talked about the latest crush of one of the other cheer squad members. "The point is that Peter's been kicking himself for not finding a way to stop Sylar right then, so now we're trying to work out what we should do next…"

"We might have… something on that, actually," Ron replied, fingers crossed that he'd interpreted that last warning from the future correctly. "Whatever's going to happen with the explosion, we think it might involve someone called Ted Sprague; does that name mean anything to you?"

"You're certain that this is a good idea?" Mohinder looked questioningly at Bennett as their small group sat around a table in the diner. "Walking right into their territory-"

"On your own terms," Bennett cut him off. "If we're going to find Sylar, we're going to need access to their resources; we can't fight a war on two fronts right now."

"You all realise we're getting into some really legally grey shit here, right?" Agent Hanson looked around at the five men. "Don't get me wrong, I'm not exactly happy that a private company has this level of access to the general public, but sending someone in to deliberately sabotage private property-"

"Is the best chance we have of stopping Sylar from killing any more innocent people," Mohinder said firmly. "We already know that these people are interested in my father's work, which means they will be open to a meeting, but bringing anyone else along is too great a risk."

"And you're sure that wearing a wire isn't going to set something off?"

"Not if we're careful about it," Bennett nodded. "Any agent they might send to meet with Doctor Suresh… well, I won't deny we have a couple of tricky cases, but none of them would be qualified for this kind of meeting."

"Qualified?" Matt repeated.

"As an example, if he was going to be meeting with Elle Bishop I'd be concerned that she'd detect the electrical energy, but nobody would send that girl to make diplomatic contact with somebody."

"Girl?" Hanson repeated with a particular stare. "This company sends girls into the field?"

"Elle's in her twenties and has been trained in her ability since she was a child; she's hardly-"

"You're expecting someone that age to go up against people like-?"

"Sylar's a particularly exceptional case-"

"Can we talk about that after we've dealt with the real problem?" Matt interjected, shaking his head as he looked between the two with a brief smile before he looked at Mohinder with a more solemn expression. "Do you think you can even pull this off?"

"So long as the Company has nobody like yourself in their employ, I should be able to at least get inside," Mohinder nodded at Matt before he looked at Bennett. "They don't, do they?"

"Telepathy is one of those well-known powers that doesn't actually manifest that often," Bennett nodded. "Officer Parkman would be an… interesting asset if we managed to recruit him, and we've had some instruction in dealing with telepaths, but as far as I know we don't have someone like him on the payroll directly."

"You have instructions for dealing with people who can read minds?" Ted looked at Bennet in surprise. "How?"

"The default strategy is to train yourself to think in a language the other party can't understand," Bennett replied nonchalantly, before he turned his attention back to Mohinder. "But like I said, you shouldn't have to worry about that; your sole priority is to get in there and get access to the tracking system so that we can find Sylar before shutting it down."

"…Very well," Mohinder nodded grimly. "Let's-"

He was saved from delivering what in hindsight would have been a rather stupid attempt to sound 'badass' when his phone rang. Taking it out, he glanced at the number in surprise, but it didn't take long for him to decide to take it despite Bennett's warning glare.

"Peter?" he said in surprise. "Why are you calling?"

"Firstly, you should know that your apartment was attacked by Sylar last night."

"What?" Mohinder yelled, sitting up sharply in his chair, drawing anxious stares from the rest of the group.

"I managed to fight him off and get most of your research material out, but… well, I can't be sure if I left something behind, and I don't have time to search through all of this stuff, so I need to ask if there's anything here about someone called Ted Sprague."

If Mohinder hadn't already sat back down, he was sure that he would have fallen over when he heard Peter ask that question.

"Well," Kim looked at her two friends as they sat grimly around Peter's apartment, thinking about their latest revelations, "at least we know where that exploding man stuff fits into the picture."

"Except that we don't know if that's because I'm going to have trouble with this Ted guy's power, if Ted's going to have a meltdown on his own, or if…" Peter trailed off.

"Or if Sylar's going to take that particular power for himself," Claire finished grimly. "We've all seen him at least try to do it by now; we can say it."

Peter tried not to show his discomfort at that notion as he looked between the two girls. Considering what both could do, he knew that neither of them were exactly squeamish, but it was hard to shake the notion that he should be protecting them as the 'older' of their group no matter how they'd handled themselves so far.

"Look," Claire continued, "the point is that we know what we're dealing with now, so we can at least come up with a better plan than 'run away', right?"

"She's right," Kim nodded. "If we're dealing with a radioactive guy… OK, it's a problem, but at least we have options. If Claire can survive whatever radiation he or you end up putting out, she can probably… well, there's got to be some way to put him down without outright killing him, right?"

"And in my case you can probably take me out for a bit with something to the head," Peter observed, only to be met by a cool stare from the girls.

"You're… not seriously implying that we kill you, right?" Kim said.

"What? Look, we know from what you told me that a shot to the head isn't permanently fatal-"

"But I have to live with the memory of killing you?" Claire cut him off, looking at him with an earnest expression and the hint of tears in the corners of her eyes. "I… I can't do that…"

"Nobody does," Kim said, looking apologetically at the other girl. "But… well, we have to think about the bigger picture right now."

"How can you be so-?"

"I guess this is what keeps me alive right now," Kim cut Claire off, before she gave Claire a more hopeful smile. "We still have a chance to stop this before things get that bad, but we need to… be prepared for anything."

"…Right," Claire nodded before she looked over at Peter. "So what now?"

"Mohinder's keeping an eye on Ted Sprague with his new associates, which means that our goal right now has to be to find Sylar," Peter said.

"How?" Claire asked. "Didn't Mohinder say one of his team was in the FBI? If she can't find anything-"

"We have more government contacts than Mohinder," Peter pointed out.

Kim suddenly had a feeling that she knew what Peter was thinking, but she also wasn't sure if it was the right call. Nathan might have helped Hiro and Ron in Vegas, but there was still something about that flying man she didn't entirely trust…

Chapter Text

As he walked through the city, Mohinder still found it hard to believe that his life had come to this. His amateurish plans to find his father's killer or continue his work had already been a considerable stretch beyond what he would have believed himself to be capable of before he came to New York, and now he was essentially part of a secret FBI task force tracking a serial killer…

"Hello?" he answered his phone, broken out of his thoughts when his phone began to ring.

"Mohinder," an unexpected voice said at the other end. "I need your help."

"Sylar?" Mohinder said, so shocked at this turn of events that he almost forgot to feel the same intensity of anger he'd felt in their last confrontation.

"I think I'm going to do something bad."

"You're a murderer," Mohinder said, unable to restrain his bitterness. "You don't get the luxury of regret."

"You don't understand," Sylar said, and the man actually had the nerve to sound apprehensive about the idea. "I think I'm going to kill a lot more people… a lot more. I understood it before- the killing. I had a reason. To take what others didn't deserve. It was natural selection."

"What are you talking about?" Mohinder asked, even as he made a mental note of this interesting new insight into Sylar's psychology; it didn't excuse his actions, but anything that could be a weakness would be useful right now.

"An apocalypse," Sylar replied solemnly. "A massacre… half the city gone in an instant. They mean nothing. They're innocent. There's no gain, so why would I do it? What possible reason could I have for killing so many?"

"Wait, listen," Mohinder said, suddenly hopeful that he could have a chance to talk this man down before he did anything too big. "You don't have to do that. If you're truly repentant about what you've done, turn yourself in."

"…I can't do that," Sylar said after a period of silence. "This isn't about my main goal… but you can't see past the necessity of what I've been doing."

"No, wait-!" Mohinder began before the call ended, leaving him staring at the phone in frustration before he put it back in his pocket. He was fairly sure there was no way to trace a call once it was over, particularly not one that short, and Sylar would almost certainly have moved on by the time anyone else managed to get to wherever he had been when he made it anyway.

In other words, the priority is still to stick to the original plan to get inside that company and hope we can shut them down while also using them to stop a serial killer… when did this become my life?

"Hey," Peter said, nodding politely at Simone as he walked into her apartment, Kim and Claire behind him. It was strange to look at Simone and feel… it wasn't as though he felt nothing for her any more, but he had been through so much since he first went to Texas to save the cheerleader that it was hard to muster up the same emotional intensity he'd felt in the past. He still cared about her, but it just wasn't as intense as it had been before, as though he was looking back on a part of his life he'd grown past…

"Hey," Simone nodded back at him as she stood up, a few sheets of paper in her hands and an uncomfortable expression on her face. "Are you… how are you all doing? I mean, after you-"

"We're… still trying to avoid certain people, but on the upside, we're making good progress in training this guy in what he can do," Kim grinned as she patted Peter's shoulder. "There've been a couple of close calls, but we're building to… well, we'll work that out once he's got full control."

"If we're talking about the future, I… might have something that could help with that," Simone said, walking over to a nearby desk and laying the paper in her hands across it, displaying the sketches on the other side to the group. "Isaac sent me these earlier; do any of them mean anything to you?"

Sensing that there was something Simone wasn't ready to discuss, Peter turned his attention to the desk, Kim and Claire on either side of him. For a moment Peter's focus was drawn to the bright colours of the exploding man picture he'd seen in Isaac's apartment, albeit now in a smaller form, but soon his attention was drawn to a picture of two men, standing in some kind of park…

He might be making a few mental leaps here, but Peter was getting familiar with Isaac's style by now, and one of those guys definitely looked like him… which meant the other could easily be…

"Is that… me?" Kim asked, drawing Peter's attention as she picked up two of the pictures in particular. In response to Peter and Claire's looks, she turned the pieces of paper around so that her friends could see the two pictures, one showing a redhead who definitely looked like Kim confronting a man in a suit, while the other showed that girl with a blonde young man and a dark-skinned boy who looked a few years younger than the other two.

"Yeah… and that guy could be Ron…" Claire nodded thoughtfully as she indicated the picture of the trio. "No idea who the kid is though…"

"And that guy… looks like Nathan…" Peter began, before his attention moved past Kim to re-focus on the exploding man picture. "And this guy all over again…"

"Well, at least this one doesn't look obviously like you," Kim said, trying to smile at him as she casually traced a finger over the figure's head. "I mean, the hairstyle looks pretty standard compared to a couple of those exploding man figures-"

"Hold on; exploding man figures?" Simone looked between the three with new apprehension. "That's actually a thing? An exploding man?"

"We just have a theory or two that anyone's actually going to 'explode', we're still trying to work out who this figure's meant to be, and frankly I really think we should stop describing this image like that," Kim cut in as she put down the pictures. "It's not like anyone would develop a power that would actually kill them if they used it; this guy's generatingthe energy, so there's no way it would actually hurt him…"

"How do you know that?" Claire asked.

"For the same reason your ability always heals you the right way, remember?"

"Oh yeah…"

"The 'right way'?" Simone looked curiously at the girls. "I mean, I get that she heals, but-?"

"We realised after we learned about Claire's ability that her bones must automatically reset themselves once they've been broken so that they'll heal in a normal position or she would have… well, in one case she could have healed with her head basically stuck on backwards."

"You broke your neck?" Simone looked at Claire in shock.

"By accident," Claire shrugged. "The point is that Kim's friend Ron pointed out that my ability is probably the only reason my body always heals everything the right way the first time. He's read comics where other people with healing factors need to set the bones themselves, and apparently one time a hero with enhanced healing had to re-break his wrist a dozen times to get the bones to set properly after he broke it taking out a particularly powerful enemy."

"…Does anyone else find it weird that we're in a world where we can talk about that kind of thing and seriously mean it?" Kim smiled incredulously at her friends, before she looked back at Simone. "And talking of the weird becoming normal, has Isaac sketched anything new recently? We just got a-"

"Isaac is dead."

"Dead?" the three of them repeated.

"The police called me earlier to say I was the last number he rang before… well, they apparently estimate he died shortly afterwards," Simone explained, clenching her fists as her eyes gleamed with unshod tears. "After his last call, I went over to check up on him, and he was… it was… God, he'd drawn it…"

Peter couldn't say anything else in response to that revelation, instead walking over to give Simone a cautious, sympathetic hug as she bent over the table, as though she was fighting to stay on her feet. After holding her for a moment, Peter helped Simone make her way over to a nearby chair, setting her down before he turned to Kim and Claire.

"So… what now?" Claire asked.

"Well," Kim held up the paper showing her apparent meeting with Nathan, "personally, I think I need to do this."

"Need?"

"Everything Peter or Isaac have sketched has always happened so far, right?"

"Right…" Peter nodded cautiously.

"So the best way we can use these sketches to our advantage is to make sure that whatever happens in them happens on our terms, right?" Kim explained. "I mean, I'm not in favour of us going to look for Sylar right now, I have no idea why Hiro and Ron would be looking at all those strings, and we don't know who this kid is or why he's with me and Ron, but we have a good idea about this one and it won't be dangerous for me to do something about it."

"…That makes sense," Claire nodded, before she looked at Kim with the kind of anxious fear that could only come from a horrible thought. "Hold on… if painting the future means that it's always going to happen-"

"We can work out the loopholes later; let's stick with what we know right now," Kim cut her off, unsure if her friend was thinking of the exploding man or that big picture Isaac had done of the explosion. "You two find Hiro and Ron and see if they understand that one; I'll… where's Nathan likely to be right now?"

"Probably his campaign headquarters," Peter replied after glancing up at a clock, pulling out his wallet and passing Kim a small printed card. When Kim saw that it was a publicity card identifying the location of Nathan Petrelli's campaign headquarters, Peter responded to her quizzical expression with a shrug. "He insisted I keep that on me, and frankly he's been spending more time at the office since… well, things are difficult back home."

"Right; I'll look for him there," Kim nodded as she put the card in her pocket and gave her friends a brief joking salute before she headed for the stairs to the ground floor, leaving Peter and Claire to spend a little time with Simone. Going off alone might be a risk, but considering that Claire was still potentially a target for Sylar and Peter was getting a good handle on his other abilities, it made sense for them to stay together to keep each other safe, while Kim could probably rely on her instincts to at least get away from Sylar if they ran into each other.

The subsequent walk through New York was actually relatively pleasant, even if Kim had to stop and ask for directions a couple of times once she reminded herself that she was looking for Nathan. She managed to take a loop around so that she got a good look up at the Statue of Liberty, but this wasn't the time to indulge in sightseeing when she had a prophecy to 'fulfil'; she could enjoy the sights once she was sure they weren't going to get blown away any minute.

When that particular thought crossed her mind, Kim suddenly felt like laughing; what kind of teenager could be this casual facing a potential threat to an entire city? It wasn't as though she wasn't aware of the dangers of the current situation, but at the same time… it felt like she'd found what she was always meant to do, no matter how weird it was.

Save the world and try to maintain some kind of regular schedule in between crises, Kim thought as she looked at the people walking around her, unaware that she was trying to save their lives. It's not a normal life, but like Ron says, 'Never be normal'.

Despite her occasional detour, Kim eventually found her way to Nathan's campaign office, the hustle of activity as people prepared for the final vote in a couple of days making it relatively easy for her to sneak in. Kim wasn't sure at first if her ability would help her in this situation, but she could see how being stealthy was always a useful asset, as she managed to avoid a few security staff by joining suitably large groups and breaking off before anybody could realise that she wasn't meant to be there. She eventually noticed an older woman with dark hair walking towards a door near the back of the building, and took a moment to recognise the woman from photos Peter had briefly shown her and Claire during their time in his flat.

OK, so the mother visiting the son is odd timing, but maybe she's just wishing him luck…

Even as Kim tried to tell herself that there was nothing to worry about, she was already sneaking her way towards the office, noting with a smile that the door was relatively out-of-the-way of the rest of the building. Satisfied that nobody could see her in this position, Kim moved in to press her ear against the relatively thin wood; if she just focused…

"…election is in hand," an older woman said, Kim deciding to name that voice 'Mrs Petrelli' until she knew otherwise.

"When all the pundits think I'm going to lose?" Nathan's voice responded. "And I just got a call from Peter warning me about someone named Ted Sprague; ring a bell?"

"You're worried about the plan?"

"You're talking about blowing up half of New York."

"For the best of reasons."

Kim had to force herself to keep listening at that particular revelation; the idea that Peter's brother could know about what they were dealing with… that his own mother saw it as part of a plan…

"You can't afford to get cold feet at this time," Mrs Petrelli said. "It's natural to feel ambivalent- nobody expects you to feel otherwise- but I wanted to give you some perspective."

"You know about Linderman's plan?"

"Yes. Well, they're not just Linderman's. A lot of people put time and care into making this a reality. Myself included."

"You?" Nathan's voice made his surprise at his mother's revelation clear, which at least assured Kim he wasn't as far gone as he might have been but still didn't comfort her.

"You don't know everything about me, Nathan," his mother replied. "But I do know everything about you. And I know what you're capable of."

"Do you think I'm a mass murderer?" Nathan countered, which at least gave Kim some hope that he wasn't as morally bankrupt as their mother seemed to be.

"Important men make impossible decisions," Mrs Petrelli responded. "President Truman dropped two atomic bombs on Japan to end World War II. Killed thousands to save millions."

"That was different, Ma; we were at war," Nathan countered. "I can't accept this."

"That is your one weakness, Nathan; you have no faith," Mrs Petrelli said. "How could you possibly believe this bomb could actually heal the world if you have no faith in the idea of destiny?"

There was a sound of something moving on the other side of the door, but while nobody spoke, Kim chose to assume someone was just moving a chair or something like that.

"Your destiny, Nathan, is to set the course of history after this unspeakable act has occurred," his mother continued. "The people will look back on what you do as the freshman congressman from New York, and they will thank you–for your strength, for your conviction, for your faith… in my day, we called it being presidential."

Looking up, Kim saw a man walking towards the office doors, but made a few cautious gestures that she hoped would convey the idea that Nathan was busy with something else; she could cope with the idea that this man might think that she was facilitating some kind of 'booty call' (she thought that was the term Ron would use in this situation) if it meant she could keep listening.

"Can you believe?" the older woman said again, once Kim had returned her attention to the conversation. "Can you be the one we need?"

Kim moved to the side at that comment, waiting in a corner until the door opened and Mrs Petrelli walked out, leaving Nathan alone in the office. Before she could talk herself out of it, Kim walked into the office and closed the door behind her, glaring in outrage at the older man.

"You bastard," she said simply.

"Who-?" Nathan began before his eyes widened in recognition. "Kim, right? You're Peter's friend?"

"And clearly he actually got all the damn decency in this family if you and your mother are seriously planning to let this city get blown up!"

"It's… not like that," Nathan said, an edge to his voice that suggested to Kim he was defending his actions to himself as much as he was trying to justify it to her. "The world needs… something big to make it change; if that means… if that explosion goes off, it's just point zero seven percent of the human population-"

"Oh, it's just point zero seven percent, is that it?" Kim spat bitterly at the older man, refusing to back down even as the perfect counter-argument came to her. "Then tell your family to stay here."

"…What?"

"You have a wife and kids, right?" Kim clarified, rolling her eyes as she gave him a cold glare, trying not to take pleasure in the sight of Nathan being shocked at her declaration. "If we're only talking about killing off point zero seven percent of the human race, what does it matter who's in that percentage, right? So long as you get what you want, is it really an issue if a few more people die in the blast that gets you there?"

"You're seriously… you can't be asking me to leave my family-"

"They'd only be part of that point zero seven percent of the population; that's not such a large number of people, right?" Kim cut Nathan off, hoping that she could at least make him listen to her point. "You get to be the big shot who takes over afterwards and leads humanity to a bright shining future, so what does it matter if point zero seven percent of the human race gets killed off even if that includes your family?"

"Stop saying that-"

"What, you can justify killing point zero seven percent of the population to yourself except when you know any of them, is that it?"

"Those deaths are for the best-"

"Then leave your family; they'll just be part of that point zero seven percent-"

"It's my family!" Nathan yelled, suddenly leaping from his desk with a move that was so fast Kim could have sworn he was using his ability as he leapt towards her. Despite his speed and size, Kim felt her own body move almost without her own input, grabbing Nathan by his wrists and placing one foot on his chest so that she could spin him around. Rather than grabbing her, the older man hit the wall behind her, falling to the ground with a sharp yell of pain.

"And everyone who'll be part of that point zero seven percent is someone else's family," Kim said, looking coolly at Peter's brother as he lay sprawled on the floor of his office in shock. "Can you honestly tell yourself that you're willing to risk putting even one other family through what you'd be dealing with if you left your family there?"

"Linderman… Ma… they're right…" Nathan said, looking up at her with what was probably intended to be a glare if he hadn't been winching from the impact. "We're at our best… after attacks… look at 9/11…"

"You- you seriously think you're going to win me over by comparing this to 9/11?" Kim looked at Nathan in shock. "God, if you really think that the only way to save humanity starts with mass murder… I never thought I'd say this, but I'm not sure we'd deserve to be saved."

"Sometimes hard decisions are necessary-"

"This isn't Hiroshima and you're not dealing with active military targets!" Kim yelled. "It was bad enough when we dropped the most powerful weapon ever developed on civilian targets, but this is you deciding you're fine letting thousands of innocent people die in the name of your own reputation for some… abstract idea that you can make the world better that way!"

"I can make this country better-"

"By letting people die?" Kim just stood and looked at Nathan, waiting to test his reaction to her words, but then she shook her head and walked over him. "Go and be a killer and tell yourself you're not guilty just because you're not the one arming the bomb; I'm going to help the people who actually want to help people."

To his credit, Nathan said nothing as she opened the door and left his office, making her way towards a rear exit she'd noticed earlier. She was fairly sure Nathan wasn't going to actually try and press charges for what had just happened, since he couldn't exactly risk her explaining why she'd confronted him like that in the first place, but she wasn't going to stick around here longer than she had to.

That's one picture down, anyway… now it's just a case of finding some way around that image of the explosion… and telling Peter just how big a jerk his brother actually is…

It was almost a relief when her phone rang once she was a few streets away from the campaign office.

"Ron?" she said with a grin. "Is everything-?"

"We need help, KP," Ron's voice said, her friend sounding unnaturally grim. "Sylar just killed his mother and broke Hiro's sword."

Chapter Text

"Sylar actually called him?" Audrey looked at Bennett in surprise as the amateur team sat around the Indian doctor's flat, trying to go over available evidence or planning their next move against the killer. The flat was in a bit of a state, giving the impression that there'd been a fight here at some point since Mohinder left it, but the door was still lockable and it made a convenient place to hide out anyway.

"According to Doctor Suresh, and I think we can all agree he has no reason to lie about that," the man in glasses observed.

"Why would he even do that?" Ted put in uncertainly. "I mean, after what he's done so far… Sylar's worried about killing people now?"

"It's hard to be sure what's motivating him," Bennett observed. "From what Doctor Suresh told us during that call, it sounds like Sylar seems to have convinced himself that he's pursuing this… hunt to take powers from those who don't deserve them, whereas what we're talking about here is mass death of innocent people…"

"And he'd care about that?"

"Even psychopaths have their own warped standards most of the time," Audrey observed grimly before she shrugged. "Anyway, what Sylar does or doesn't want to do isn't relevant right now; what is relevant is working out how to contain him."

"Which also depends on finding him before we disable the company's tracking system."

"And then what?" Ted asked. "How do we stop Sylar when he's already… seriously, does anyone know what he's capable of right now?"

"There is one who can match him."

Audrey was ashamed to admit that it took her a moment to realise who had just spoken, even if it was possibly justified that she hadn't heard the man speak before now.

"You can speak?" Bennett looked at the Haitian incredulously, before looking at Audrey and the others as though realising how that statement made him sound.

"Did anyone actually ask him- sorry, you- anything before?" Audrey began, turning to the Haitian mid-sentence.

"It suited me to be seen as silent," the Haitian replied, giving the agent a brief smile of acknowledgement before he turned to address the room. "And there is one man who may be capable of matching Sylar in battle, because he is the only man to have defeated me."

"Defeated you?" Bennett repeated, his expression a kind of cautious shock as he looked at the partner he now realised he knew so little about. "How?"

"He has the ability to imitate the powers of others," the Haitian explained with a solemn expression as he focused his attention on Bennett. "He used my own power to stop me… And he is the one who has been protecting your daughter since Sylar attacked her."

"What?" Bennett's expression became more intense as he glared at the Haitian. "You've known where Claire was this whole time-?"

"I knew who was looking after her, not where she was," the Haitian replied. "I was not anticipating that he would be able to defeat me when I first confronted them, and after that… I had faith that he could guard her."

"OK, who are we talking about here?" Audrey put in.

"Peter Petrelli," the Haitian replied.

"Well, at least I know I wasn't that far off," Bennett muttered, shooting an annoyed glare at the man he'd assumed was a literal silent partner all this time. "And there was me thinking he was just a person of interest in that assault…"

"We can worry about your ego being dented later," Audrey said before she turned back to the Haitian. "So this 'Peter'… I think Doctor Suresh mentioned that he had a tricky ability a while back; you're saying that he can… copy other people's abilities?"

"Without needing to kill them first?" Ted raised an urgent hand.

"At his full potential, it is possible that he could be capable of imitating every power he has ever encountered."

"Damn…" Audrey said with a grim nod. "We definitely need to find that guy…"

"And then-" Bennett began.

"Maybe we don't consider trying to attack the guy who might help us stop the real problem?" Audrey shot the older man a firm glare.

"I thought kidnapping was a crime?"

"Assuming your daughter chose to go with him because she felt that her life was in danger if she stayed home, it gets into an area where I'm personally willing to acknowledge the potential shades of grey," Audrey observed in turn. "If your daughter survived an attack by Sylar because of this guy, I can see her deciding to stay with him would be a good call."

"And could we even charge him with anything without getting into issues I don't think any of us want to go public?" Matt added.

"Pardon?" Bennett looked sharply at the telepathic cop.

"I mean, in any criminal case, both parties are allowed to say their piece, so even if you wanted to take the matter to trial, your daughter would have the right to explain why she felt running away with a stranger was safer than staying at home…" Matt shrugged. "Not saying she made the right call, but I can see why she did it and I don't think we're in a position to debate the legalities."

Bennett looked around the room with an expression that made it clear he wanted to vent his frustrations in some way, but he finally settled on just making a frustrated snort and nodding in resignation.

"Right," Audrey smiled around the room. "With that sorted, do we focus on finding Sylar or Peter Petrelli first?"

As he followed Thompson into the medical lab at their Kirby Plaza address, Mohinder wondered at the implications of the man's previous observation. He couldn't entirely deny the idea that he was motivated by a sense of guilt at his father's role in helping Sylar become the killer he was now, but at the same time, his father hadn't done anything to provoke Sylar on purpose. From everything he'd learnt from Bennett, this company had managed to capture Sylar for a time and failed to keep him contained; it wasn't like he was condemning their methods for no reason.

In any case, the priority now was to find out what he could about how this company worked and figure out how best to use that knowledge to find Sylar and then shut these people down for good. The first step was finding this 'Walker System' Bennett had told him about, and while he still wasn't sure what he was looking for, there was no reason to disbelieve in the existence of such a system…

"What is this place?" he asked as he was led into a lab, various displays on the walls and equipment and computers on the desks.

"There's someone you need to meet," Thompson explained as he closed the door. "Molly Walker; does the name ring any bells?"

"Yes, she was on my father's list," Mohinder replied, his mind already flying to the worst possible implications of this news.

"That's right," Thompson said, still talking in a self-satisfied manner that made it clear he wanted Mohinder to feel guilt about this. "Your father led Sylar right to her. He slaughtered her parents, then attacked her."

"How did she survive?" Mohinder asked, choosing not to get into a particular debate about who was responsible for Sylar claiming his victims, his attention briefly focused on a nearby computer monitor.

"Well, luckily, we got to her," Thompson explained, his manner now a cool, collected one that made Mohinder briefly feel like he was being treated like a fool. "That's what we do. We find people with abilities, help them, protect them."

"And she's sick, isn't she?" Mohinder said, choosing to focus on the essential details of what he'd just put together.

"How can you tell?" Thompson asked, moving to stand beside Mohinder and study the screen himself.

"Her nucleotides are decomposing," Mohinder indicated the red blood cells on the monitor before him, although with some of the data displayed on either side of the image. "You need to get her to a doctor."

"A doctor can't help her," Thompson shook his head. "I'm thinking… maybe you can."

"I'm a geneticist," Mohinder countered coolly; he wasn't going to let this man make him feel guilty about something he wouldn't be able to do. "I wouldn't know the first thing about this-"

"Molly's virus is very rare," Thompson cut him off. "It's destroying her nervous system; prevents her from accessing her ability. There's been one other case; an Indian girl, 1974."

"My sister," Mohinder said, suddenly realising where the company man was going with this. "Shanti died."

"Yes, we know," Thompson affirmed, moving to place a hand on Mohinder's back and lead him away from the screen. "Sadly, your father developed a cure months too late. Unfortunately for Molly, our people can't figure out what that cure is."

The two men now standing in front of a thick white curtain, Thompson moved away from Mohinder to pull the curtain open. On the other side of the curtain was a glass-walled room, where a dark-haired woman in a purple jumper was sitting beside a little girl in a pink top, the girl currently colouring with crayons at a desk. The room itself wasn't large, but there was a bed in it and various toys scattered around, ranging from horses near a window to some other books above the bed. The girl looked up from her book and waved at Thompson with a warm smile before she turned her attention back to what she was colouring.

"Cute, huh?" the white-haired man said.

"You're trying to manipulate me?" Mohinder countered, taking care to keep his voice low; he didn't know if the glass was soundproof and didn't want to disturb a little girl in an uncertain state of health. "Showing me this poor girl, preying on Shanti's memory? Sylar is out there, and he's planning a slaughter; everyone is in danger, and this- none of this is going to help."

"You just don't get it," Thompson said grimly. "Molly is the only one who can stop Sylar."

As much as Mohinder wanted to object to the idea of putting that much pressure on a child, he couldn't deny that there were obvious advantages to the idea of them 'using' Molly's ability to find the killer. So far he, his allies and any other parties seeking Sylar were basically playing catch-up, only able to track the man by his latest victim or when they had some way to anticipate his next target, but if they could take him by surprise at least once…

Granted, it wouldn't help if they didn't have a plan for how to stop him after that point, but the idea still had potential.

So much for just shutting down the tracking system, but while I hate it, he has a point; I can't just let Molly die if I can help, even if she wasn't a potential key player in how to find Sylar.

Of course, he had no intention of forcing this innocent girl to face Sylar again even indirectly if he could help it; if he could just work out a way to treat her condition, maybe he could introduce her to Peter Petrelli and have her give him a lesson in using it…

Chapter Text

When Mohinder walked into the room, he was pleased to note that it actually seemed rather comfortable from the inside. Obviously he was trying to avoid making any snap assessments, and the fact that they were keeping a little girl locked up like this didn't make him feel comfortable about this situation in the first place, but at least Molly didn't seem to be too upset about what had led her here.

"Hi, Molly," he said, smiling politely at her as he held up the tray with the syringe on it. He didn't have much experience with children, but what he knew suggested it was best to be open with them about his intentions. "I'm Doctor Suresh, and, uh, I need to take some blood, if that's OK."

As though it was an automatic reaction from her by this time, Molly stuck out her arm and pushed her sleeve up.

"Molly," he continued, as he set the tray down and took the low seat next to her. "I want to stop the man who… hurt your family, and who tried to hurt you-"

"You can't stop the boogeyman," Molly replied, her expression disturbingly fixed. "He sees into your soul, and then he eats your brain."

Mohinder had to wonder if that was actually how Sylar's power worked, but already knew he wasn't going to ask Molly to elaborate. There were times when it was appropriate to indulge his academic curiosity, and times when such a thing would just be cruel.

"Well, you know who can stop the boogeyman?" the doctor continued, as he prepared her arm to take the injection. "You. I hear you have an amazing ability."

"It's not so amazing," Molly said, as Mohinder tied the band around her arm. "They ask me where people are, and I find them."

"You find them?" Mohinder repeated. "Anywhere in the world?"

"Yeah," Molly said. "I just think about them, and then I know where they are."

Even as he reminded himself that he was talking to a little girl who had been through a traumatic experience, Mohinder had to wonder how that ability worked on a larger scale. Was Molly able to find people she hadn't met personally? Was it easier for her to find people she already knew in places she had already at least heard of? Was there a distance limit to her powers…?

"But it doesn't work right now," Molly's words interrupted his speculation.

"Well," Mohinder said, deciding to focus on the positives of this new knowledge, "that is a very special ability, Molly, because the boogeyman… he likes to hide. But if you can tell us where he is, we can make sure he never comes back again."

"You're different from the other doctors," Molly said, glancing at her arm with a smile. "They're much better at this."

"Thanks," Mohinder chuckled, choosing to accept the implied compliment in her words.

He still wasn't sure what was wrong with Molly's ability or how his father's work could help, but if he could study her blood, he might be able to come up with a few ideas…

In hindsight, Peter was embarrassed he hadn't done this earlier. His close call with Sylar during his last attempt to make contact with Doctor Suresh gave him a valid reason to wait, but from what he'd seen about Sylar so far the man was unlikely to wait in that area. From what they'd read in those files he took from the police station back when he first met Kim and Ron, Sylar's methods always seemed to involve a direct assault on his targets, and there had been some notes from a psychiatrist suggesting that he almost didn't have the patience for any kind of long-term strategy.

Peter wasn't sure how much faith he should put in an evaluation carried out by someone who didn't know about Sylar's real motives or anything about 'superpowers' in general, but the concept made sense. In any case, with Kim having sent a quick update that her meeting with Nathan had been unsatisfactory and she was off to rendezvous with Ron, Hiro and Ando, that left Peter and Claire with no better idea than trying to go back to Doctor Suresh. They had some promising theories about the Exploding Man situation, but if the doctor was available, it couldn't hurt to get a more professional opinion while they were returning his paperwork.

"Pity we don't have the natural survivalist here, huh?" Claire smiled over at Peter as the two of them walked up to the door of the doctor's flat, the papers packed into a bag under Peter's arm.

"Says the girl who can't die anyway?"

"There's a difference between not being able to die and being able to avoid dying in the first place."

"You know, we kind of do have her…"

"Yeah, but didn't you tell us that you're only as strong as the original owner if you're in the same room as them or something?"

"That doesn't mean I'm useless without Kim here, you know," Peter countered with a brief smile, raising his hand to generate a green fireball before he snuffed the flame out. "Besides, she has important things to do herself; we can't put all our eggs in one basket."

"Yeah, we can't exactly take chances with something on this scale…" Claire agreed, as Peter came to a halt in front of the familiar door. "Is this-?"

Peter was just about to knock when the door opened on its own, revealing a tall man in glasses and a suit who looked at Peter in surprise for a moment before his gaze turned to Claire and his expression shifted to outright shock.

"Claire?" the man yelled.

"Dad?" Claire retorted, stepping back from the door as Peter moved to stand in front of her. The man who was apparently Claire's father pulled out a gun and aimed it at Peter's head with the kind of speed that even Peter's inexperienced eye could tell indicated someone with professional training. Peter was just fortunate that the sight of an obvious threat to his life triggered Kim's talent; he had dropped the bag, knocked the gun out of Mr Bennett's hands and was aiming it at the older man almost before he was consciously aware he was even moving.

"Don't," he said firmly, hoping that an authoritative tone would hide the fact that he didn't actually want to shoot the man in front of him. "This isn't-"

He winced as he suddenly felt something… he could only describe it as a sense of something trying to reach into his mind from somewhere in front of him. Peter tried to keep hold of the gun as he fought against the intruder, but suddenly it seemed to turn around and he was reaching out-

Peter bit down a yell as he suddenly felt as though he was simultaneously in his head somewhere in the room in front of him. For a moment he thought he'd activated that cloning power by mistake, but he soon confirmed that whatever was in the room wasn't him; he had a sense of looking through other eyes, but the body he felt with them was definitely not his own-

For a moment, Peter fell backwards as the strange sensation in his head shifted to outright pain, as though something had just rammed a nail into his skull, but then Claire grabbed his arm and it became easier for him to move past the pain. He wasn't sure if the pain had stopped or if contact with Claire was helping him deal with it, but so long as he felt better he wasn't complaining. He gave Claire a brief nod of thanks as he stood up, but then focused his attention on the man who had almost shot him. To his credit, Claire's father hadn't moved to pick up the gun, but the tense expression on his face made it clear that Peter was still in trouble.

"I take it you're Peter Petrelli?" he said at last.

"Yeah," Peter replied with a nod. "And you're Claire's father?"

"Your daughter?" another voice said from inside the room, followed by an unfamiliar short blonde walking out to stand beside Bennett and look at the two in the corridor with a barely-concealed look of surprise. "Huh… what are the odds?"

"The odds?" Peter repeated.

"We were discussing how she ran off with you just a short while ago," the woman explained with a slight smile that Peter couldn't properly read on her face. "Some of us thought you might be able to help out against this Sylar sucker; take it you've heard of him?"

"Yeah," Peter said, returning the woman's stare with his own cool expression. "Had a run-in or two with him in the past week."

"And you survived it?" Bennett asked.

"I got lucky," Peter shrugged, deciding that Claire's father at least deserved some extra details. "When you meet someone whose whole thing is always knowing how to survive, you get used to staying alive."

"Well, that's…" the woman trailed off as she looked at Peter with a new sense of caution. "Hold on a bit… you were in Odessa?"

"How- oh," Peter said, the question prompting his own memory to fall into place.

"You've met?" Claire looked between Peter and the woman in surprise.

"Briefly," Peter clarified, turning to look at Claire. "Remember when Kim and I broke into the station to get the files on Sylar?"

"Yeah…"

"She was one of the investigating agents."

"And it was a bit off-putting to find that I'd fallen asleep on the job," the woman looked at Peter with a particularly pointed stare. "I take it that was you?"

"…Yeah," Peter nodded cautiously at her. "Sorry, but if I was going to protect the kids, I needed to know what I was dealing with."

"'Kids'?" Bennett looked at Peter and Claire in surprise.

"Kim Pierce and Ron Sinclair?" Claire clarified as she looked at her father in exasperation. "Did you even know anyone else had left school with me?"

"I… knew they'd disappeared, but I…" Bennett trailed off as he took in the glares on the faces of Peter and the other woman, for once put out to be faced with this kind of disapproval. "Look, I couldn't know where they were but I knew enough about Claire to-"

"Let's not get into that," Peter shook his head as he picked the bag back up and walked past Bennett into the apartment, Claire shooting her father a warning look before she followed Peter. Inside the room, Peter was briefly regretful at the sight of the water damage and torn materials that he must have left behind after his last 'visit', but reminded himself that it had been damage the room at that moment or leave them for Sylar to study later. His attention was more immediately focused on the other three men in the room, which included the bald dark-skinned man who'd initially confronted him and his three new allies, a somewhat overweight man he recognised from the Odessa station, and an unfamiliar man with a scraggy beard and shaggy hair that suggested to Peter he hadn't been to a barber's for a while.

"Uh… hi?" Claire waved a cautious hand at the others.

"Hey," the overweight man nodded at Peter and Claire. "Matt Parkman; good to meet you."

"Ted Sprague," the man with the beard added. The dark-skinned simply nodded at them in a manner that made it clear he wasn't prepared to reveal his name, and considering his potential power Peter wasn't going to press the issue.

"Hi," Peter nodded back at the other men before looking curiously around the room. "So… is Doctor Suresh here, or not?"

"He's… dealing with another issue," Parkman clarified.

"Right," Peter said, deciding that he wasn't going to make this more difficult as he put the bag down on the table. "That's got what I managed to save of Mohinder's paperwork last time I was here; hope it helps."

"Thanks," the woman nodded at him.

"So from what we've heard… you can imitate what anyone else can do?" Ted looked at Peter curiously.

"You know about that?" Claire asked.

"We got the details," Parkman explained.

"Your company knew about Peter?" Claire looked over at her father.

"Actually, Doctor Suresh made that observation," Bennett clarified with a slight smile. "His methods are unorthodox, but they make some interesting results."

"He's that good?" Peter asked. "I mean, if he knew what I did and you didn't-?"

"Your secrecy was also aided by the fact that certain parties had an interest in keeping you under the radar," the dark-skinned man put in.

"Huh?" Peter looked at the other man in surprise. "What are-?"

"OK, probably some interesting history there, but can we focus on discussing that after the serial killer's been dealt with?" the woman put in, before she looked over at Peter. "Audrey Hanson, by the way; just the FBI agent in this little task force."

"Yeah," Parkman put in with his own smile. "I read minds, Ted generates radiation, and he keeps us all under control."

"You read minds?" Peter looked at Parkman with new understanding. "That explains the headache…"

"Headache?" Parkman repeated. "I just… had one…"

"Yeah," Peter nodded at him, glad that they were both thinking on the same lines. "I'm thinking it must have been some kind of feedback thing; you were reading my mind as I was reading your mind, and we just… ended up in some kind of feedback loop."

"That… makes sense," Parkman nodded.

"Uh… you said you were Ted Sprague, right?" Claire looked over at Ted as an anxious expression crossed her face.

"Yeah…" Ted nodded uncertainly at her.

"So… you're the other exploding man?"

"…I'm the other what?" Ted looked at her with a new sense of uncertainty.

"…Nobody told you that yet," Claire groaned in frustration as she looked around the room. "Please tell me it's just that Doctor Suresh didn't tell you anything?"

"What did Mohinder not tell us?" Agent Hanson looked at Claire with a resolved glare.

"We've been… long story short, various sources have told us that there's going to be an explosion in New York in the next few days," Peter explained, stepping in to stand between Claire and Ted. "We've found other sources suggesting that there's an exploding man involved in causing it, and…"

"And you think that's me?" Ted looked sharply at the two new arrivals.

"We're not thinking that you're going to do it on purpose, but-" Peter began.

"Oh, that's just great!" Ted yelled, looking around the room in exasperation. "I came here because I trusted that you were all going to help me, and now these people are telling me I'm going to blow up New York?"

"Ted, we're not going to- just calm down-" Parkman began.

"You try being calm when you just heard you might be going to blow up the damn city!" Ted yelled, swinging his hands out in exasperation and striking the bald man in the face. The blow itself wouldn't have been much, but when the other man struck a wall head-first, he was sent staggering back, clutching his bleeding head-

Peter felt a new surge of power hit him as he looked down at his hands, which had suddenly started glowing with a new energy, combined with a renewed headache as he began to tap Parkman's powers all over again. He had enough time to realise that the other man must have been keeping the powers of the other people in the room contained before he took that blow to his head, but then he was feeling the power build in his hands and he was panicking and he was going to lose control and this was too much power-

"Peter!" a voice yelled, as he felt something clasp him by the arms. He yelled in horror when he realised that Claire had grabbed his forearms even as her own hands burned from the energy he was generating, but the way her eyes fixed on his made it clear that she wasn't going to accept any attempt he made to get her to let go. Peter wasn't sure if it was the physical contact or just seeing Claire that helped him focus, but the reminder that she was there gave him the incentive he needed to focus his powers in another direction and teleport out of the apartment before he could do more than burn himself. He wasn't sure where they had arrived at first, but the easing pain in his head and the sudden cooling of his limbs assured him that he was out of range of Parkman and Sprague. A series of loud yells caused him to spin around anxiously, but he relaxed when he saw Kim, Ron, and Ando standing in a room with all kinds of swords on display.

"What- CLAIRE!" Kim began before she ran past Peter to look at Claire. Turning around, Peter suddenly felt ill when he took in Claire's hands and forearms, which looked like someone had turned a flamethrower on them.

"I'm… OK," Claire said, waving Kim back as she held up her limbs to confirm to the rest of the group that her injuries were already healing. "Shirt's… a write-off… but I'll live."

"OK, so… what just happened?" Ron looked uncertainly at the two new arrivals. Peter was unable to stop himself shaking at just how close their recent call had been, but Ron and Ando's simple curiosity was strangely reassuring.

"Well," Claire looked around at the others, "the good news is that we've found Ted Sprague."

"Boo-yah!" Ron grinned, before his face fell as he took in Peter's shaken expression. "What's the bad news?"

"His power is the ability to generate radiation," Peter explained. "Which means that not only did I just copy a very unstable power, but if we can't keep an eye on Ted…"

"Then you may have just found the exploding man," Kim finished with a grim nod. "And it doesn't matter if he does it himself or Sylar takes his power to do it himself; either way, we're in trouble until we can get Mr Sprague somewhere safe."

"There's also-"

"No," Kim looked at Peter with an intensity that was still strange to see from a teenage girl. "You can control this power, Peter; every time you end up tapping it, just focus on me and how much you don't want to kill people, and you'll be fine."

"Exactamundo!" Ron grinned at Peter with the kind of casual confidence Peter wished he felt about this situation. "Seriously, whatever Sprague's got, he just needs one bad day with his powers to get into trouble but you've got a lot of options to make sure you don't go that far… and Claire and KP are going to be here whenever you need help controlling it."

"Ron's right," Claire nodded at him, the only sign of her previous injuries the burnt sleeves of her shirt even as her arms were now fully healed. "Kim can help you find the right way to stay alive, and I'm there to keep you alive, so consider us your personal bomb squad until you've got a good handle on this new ability."

Even as part of Peter wanted to get away from these two teenage girls as they volunteered for a duty that nobody should have to deal with, when he looked at them both… Kim's firm faith in his own ability to control himself and the warmth in Claire's eyes he couldn't let himself analyse too closely…

Still, when he pulled both girls towards him for a grateful hug, he didn't bother to stop himself from kissing Claire's forehead as thanks for what she'd just done for him, one part of his brain trying to place the scent of her hair as it filled his nostrils.

Chapter Text

Once Claire was satisfied that Peter was safe (and she was not thinking about how it had felt when he kissed her forehead like that; she was trying to stop New York being blown up, this was not the time to get caught up in a crush), she turned her attention to the questions that she hadn't been able to focus on earlier.

"So… what are you all doing here?" she looked curiously around the room at Kim, Ron and their new friends. Her hands still felt a bit tender from where she had literally regrown her skin, but when the alternative had been to let Peter explode, she could cope with sore fingers for a while.

"Sylar broke Hiro's sword," Ando explained. "We come here to fix it, and…"

"Hiro's dad was in the back room," Ron finished.

"Hiro's dad?" Claire looked at Ron incredulously. "Wait a- I thought you said he went back to Japan?"

"We thought he did," Ando shrugged. "He wish to talk with Hiro about something; Hiro chose to listen."

"To the guy who… didn't he try and make you both go back to Japan earlier?" Claire looked uncertainly at Ando and Ron.

"Hiro… want to be true hero," Ando said.

"And seeing his future self probably means he's trying to over-compensate right now," Ron observed.

"Saw his future?" Claire said in surprise.

"We didn't mention that we got all that info from a trip to the future?" Ron put in.

"You didn't." Kim gave Ron a pointed stare. "You only told me that Hiro's sword was broken and kept sending me new instructions on where to meet you to deal with it; you didn't say anything about where you've been before it broke."

"And… you were in the future?" Claire looked at Ando and Ron with a new sense of… she wasn't even sure how to define what she suddenly felt. The idea that Peter and that artist he was copying had painted a future tragedy was one thing, but the idea that they could actually travel to the future…

"Yeah, but it sucked," Ron shrugged. "I mean, New York was decimated after the explosion, people like us were being hunted for what we were, Sylar had replaced Peter's brother and become President to make sure he was the only guy with powers- oh, and you told me that we had to make sure that you stayed close to Peter until we dealt with Sylar!"

"I told- you met me in the future?" Kim looked at Ron with a cautious grin as she processed that particular sentence.

"Oh yeah; actually, we met both of you," Ron grinned at Kim and Peter, before his expression faltered and he focused on Kim. "Which reminds me; future you basically told me to tell you to take care about how often you rely on your… staying alive thing."

"Are you saying my ability has a downside?" Kim's cautious grin shifted to a more intense expression.

"More that… as you explained it, it's basically that you relied on it so much that your body wouldn't even let you leave Peter alone for that long because everything was so bad you only really felt safe with him…"

"Right…" Kim nodded, before she gave a cautious shrug out of a lack of any other ideas for how to respond. "Well, at least I know about that now…"

"Talking of knowing things," Peter glanced over at Claire, "you… might want to call your dad."

"Her dad?" Kim repeated. "Why would we want to-?"

"He was at Doctor Suresh's apartment with Ted and some of the others," Peter said.

"Which means he's probably working with Doctor Suresh, right?" Ron asked.

"We… there's no reason not to think that, anyway," Peter nodded, before he looked at Claire. "And considering how we left…"

"Fine," Claire nodded, as she walked over to the desk and picked up the phone. "Do you have the number for Suresh's flat?"

"Doesn't your dad have a-?"

"Do we really want to rely on the idea that my dad brought the phone I know about with him when he's actively hunting a superpowered serial killer?" Claire pointed out.

"She's right," Kim nodded. "It's probably pretty much standard procedure for active agents not to use a personal phone on that kind of assignment in case they're caught and someone manages to use their phone to find who they are… and wow, that's weird."

"What weird?" Ando looked at her.

"I… didn't even think about what someone would do in that kind of situation; I just… knew it," Kim clarified, looking around the room with a cautious smile. "This… I wonder what else I could just know if someone brought it up near me?"

"Something we can think about later," Peter said, as he checked his wallet and passed Claire a card. "There; pretty sure that's Doctor Suresh's home number."

"Thanks," Claire said, dialling the number at the bottom of the small card. As she entered the last digit, Claire spent a few moments staring at the number on the screen as though she had suddenly forgotten how to use it before she hit the 'CALL' button.

"Hello?" a familiar voice said at the other end.

"Dad," Claire said firmly.

"Claire?" her father said anxiously. "What happened? Where are you? Did that man-?"

"Peter would never hurt me, Dad; he just had… a bad reaction to a new ability," Claire said, taking care to reach over and place a reassuring hand on Peter's arm as she spoke. "He's not a danger to anyone; we're just… we needed to get to our friends."

"Your friends?" her father repeated. "Your mother and I have been out of our minds-!"

"Because your friend from Haiti couldn't wipe mine?" Claire interjected, moving away from Peter to stand behind the counter; she wasn't going to hide her conversation from her friends, but at the same time she wanted to make it clear she was dealing with this on her own. "Maybe running away wasn't the smartest call I could have made, but at least I could trust that the people I was running away with wouldn't try and erase my memory if I did something they didn't approve of."

"I was trying to protect you-"

"By taking away my ability to choose?" Claire countered. "Dad, just erasing things doesn't change the fact that they happened; I have the right to make my own choice. I was willing to accept the fact that you lied about my parents because you maybe just didn't want me to feel bad-"

"You know about that?"

"And thank you for admitting to that," Claire said bitterly. "If you couldn't find them you could have just said; you didn't have to… hire actors or bring in other agents or whatever you did-"

"I may have killed your birth mother."

Claire only just remembered to grab the nearby desk to stop herself falling over at that statement.

"My… my mother?" she repeated. "You killed her?"

"He what?" Ron and Kim yelled in shock, while Peter and Ando looked at her sympathetically.

"It wasn't intentional-"

"Not intentional?" Claire repeated, glad to see that her friends were just as sceptical as she felt at that statement. "How do you do something like that by accident?"

"Your mother had the ability to generate fire."

"Oh," Claire said, various unpleasant images springing to mind that might reasonably justify that explanation. She might be lucky enough to have a relatively passive power, but if Peter could lose control of any of his powers like he had earlier… and if her mother had been scared enough…

"So… what?" she asked, deciding to focus on the obvious questions. "You tried to capture her and things went wrong?"

"At the time, it was speculated that she was tipped off that we were coming and tried to escape, but she lost control of her powers in a panic," her father explained. "None of the bodies were ever conclusively identified as hers, but among all the other casualties-"

"I get it," Claire cut him off, not wanting further reasons to picture her unknown mother being apparently destroyed by her own powers. "And where did I fit into this?"

"The fire spread through her apartment complex so rapidly she… as far as we can tell, didn't have time to retrieve you from your rooms. You were… found… after it was all over, and DNA testing was able to confirm that you were Meredith's daughter, even if we couldn't explain how you survived at the time."

"I… see," Claire said. She thought about yelling at him more about not sharing this with her earlier, but right now there were more urgent matters to focus on. "So… if that's what happened to my mother… what about my birth father?"

"I was never told anything," her father replied, accepting the clarification with no obvious reaction. "An old… he was a partner of mine early on… had a theory that someone was acting to conceal that side of your heritage from everyone else, but he was always a bit hostile about our work; it could just as easily be that nobody genuinely knew anything."

"Are you seriously suggesting that someone working with you had a conspiracy theory about your work?" Claire asked incredulously. "You're already a genuine conspiracy case-"

"Which can make people even more paranoid when they know what there is to be worried about," her father observed. "The point is… bringing up the truth about your mother felt like it would have involved bringing up everything that happened around your adoption, and I had so few answers I didn't feel right sharing them with you at that time. If I couldn't give you the full truth… well, I decided that a comforting lie was better."

"That wasn't your choice to make."

"I felt like it was."

"You know, this is the main reason I've been staying with Peter since this happened," Claire observed. "At least he tries to explain himself when he makes decision like this that are going to affect my life."

"I can accept that," her father said (Claire wasn't going to think about the hurt tone in his voice; the man had lied to her for years, she had a right to be angry with him right now). "Anyway, given the number you called, I take it you want to talk to Doctor Suresh?"

"We need to work out what we're going to do about Ted Sprage," Claire replied; whatever her issues with her father as a person at the moment, he at least had experience in dealing with superhumans. "Considering that everything we've found out so far suggests that someone is going to blow up New York… we're not saying that Ted's going to do anything on purpose, but we need to work out alternatives."

"And you're not worried about your friend?"

"Peter can control himself and we're here to help him do that; Ted… I'm not saying he's a bad guy, but Peter has options that Ted just won't have," Claire said, hoping that Ted wouldn't learn what she'd said and think she was dismissing him as a hopeless case. Her reasoning was just that Peter's mimicry gave him access to other powers that gave him ways to get away or help control himself if he had another 'meltdown', whereas if Ted had an 'accident' that was basically it for everything around him.

"We'll get back to you," Noah said at last. "Shall I call this number in an hour or so?"

"That should work," Claire responded, before her eyes narrowed. "But if you try anything, remember that Peter can teleport and he's already beaten your power-blocking guy before; if we don't like what's happening, we're out of there."

"Fair enough," her father responded before he ended the call.

"I take it that wasn't Doctor Suresh?" Ron asked.

"It was my dad," Claire nodded at Ron. "He'll call us back later."

"And we're trusting him now?"

"We're trusting that he wants to stop Sylar as much as we do," Claire affirmed, before she shook her head. "Beyond that… I don't know."

"And nobody's saying you have to figure it out any time soon," Peter nodded at her. "Trust me, nobody's going to judge you for feeling conflicted about your dad; look at what I've been putting up with from my brother for years."

"Yeah, trying to present you as going mad is crossing a few lines," Ron smiled over at Peter before he winced. "Uh… sorry if that came across a bit-"

"I get it," Peter smiled reassuringly at Ron, before he looked over at Ando. "Getting back to Sylar… when he broke Hiro's sword, did he grab it by the blade and then do something to the metal?"

"How-?" Ando looked at him in shock.

"We saw it in a sketch of Isaac's," Peter answered, anticipating Ando's question before he looked grimly around at the others. "And the next one in that particular set was me facing Sylar… somewhere."

"Alone?" Ando asked.

"Alone in that picture," Kim stated resolutely. "It's not like we were looking at a full-page spread of… wherever you were; it would be easy for someone to be off to the side."

"Maybe," Peter nodded at her even as his expression turned grim. "But that doesn't mean I want to risk it; right now I'm basically the only one here who can hope to match Sylar if he goes all-out, but if he gets to the girls we're going to be in new kinds of trouble."

"I choose to take that as a compliment and point out that we're not just going to sit back while you go off into a dangerous situation-" Kim began.

"And I'm not asking you to stay out full-time; I just want you to be careful about it," Peter assured her. "Sylar's tough enough as it is; if he managed to take any of our abilities…"

"Point," Kim nodded in acknowledgement; the last thing any of them wanted was Sylar acquiring any kind of enhanced survival skills, whether that was Kim's instincts or Claire's healing. "So assuming the picture itself is inevitable, what do we do to make sure we can control how we get to that point?"

"Focus on keeping Ted away from Sylar?" Ron put in.

"That's a start," Peter nodded at Ron. "If we can make sure Sylar doesn't acquire that ability, we can at least keep the damage contained to a local level…"

Looking over at Kim, Claire wasn't sure how to feel about the grim expression on her friend's face, as she simultaneously understood what Kim must be thinking and dreaded the thought of things going that far.

If Sylar was as powerful as he seemed so far, keeping him contained wasn't a practical option unless that Haitian guy was able to block his powers and was willing to just sit outside Sylar's cell for the rest of the villain's life, but the thought of just planning to outright kill someone…

Chapter Text

When the phone rang with Peter's ringtone, Simone didn't even hesitate to answer it.

"Hello?" she said.

"Hey, Simone," Peter said. She appreciated that it made her sound arrogant to herself, but she wasn't sure how to deal with Peter's cooler manner towards her. It wasn't as though he was actually rude to her or anything like that, but when she thought back on his declaration of love after her father died, he was definitely more distant than he had been.

"Do you… have any news?" she asked, deciding to cut to the chase. She might still be shaken from trying to deal with the knowledge of Isaac's death and the apparently imminent destruction of New York, but at least she knew that some people were trying to solve that particular problem.

"That's… it gets complicated," Peter said. "We've found the exploding man, and we're working on keeping him safe so he won't be a threat, but it turns out there's… some people want this explosion to happen."

"What?" Simone repeated in horror. "But who- why would anyone want to blow up the city?"

"It's some whole power grab to give everyone something to be afraid of; I don't get it myself, but the point is that people are willing to let this happen," Peter explained. "The best I can tell you now is that they don't seem to be planning to actually set off a bomb themselves, but if they're going to all this trouble to make sure the explosion goes off, it's not exactly important what they're not doing personally."

"Right…" Simone said, fighting down the urge to panic. The situation might feel like something out of a comic, but at least she knew that good people she trusted were trying to stop whoever was behind this. "So… Nathan can't help you?"

"…No," Peter said, an edge to his voice that Simone had never heard before. "We're meeting a few other people who can hopefully take this guy somewhere safe, but… you might want to see about getting people out of here if we can't stop this."

"I can't evacuate a whole city-!"

"Just save who you can," Peter interrupted. "That might be the best we can do now…"

The idea of Peter preparing for defeat disturbed Simone almost as much as the idea of their situation in the first place. He had never been arrogant, but since he'd started to learn about his powers he'd gained a greater confidence in himself; the notion that he found it this easy to accept that he couldn't do something…

"Kim, Claire and I have a meeting soon, so call Ron if something comes up," Peter said at last. "After that… just do what you can at your end."

"Of course," Simone said, lost for anything better to say in this situation.

As Peter ended the call, Simone wondered at how it had just been a couple of weeks since she believed the biggest problem she had to face was that superhumanly strong thief she'd asked Kim to look into. That might have been a problem, but at least a thief was something she could understand; the idea that Peter and his friends were facing someone who wanted to destroy New York…

The more time Kim spent thinking about the chaos her life had become, the more she wondered if this was what it would have been like for any real-life superheroes if anything in the comics was real or if they were just in a very unconventional situation. They knew that Nathan was working with Linderman with the goal of somehow rigging the election in his favour, but beyond that there was just the vague details of the plan to let New York get blown up by whoever had Ted Sprague's power at the right/wrong time, which was simultaneously a lot of information and practically all useless.

Without knowing what Nathan and Linderman were doing, they had no way of knowing how they could expose that part of the scheme, so it just made sense to focus on keeping Ted away from Sylar and the city. To that end, while Ando and Ron waited for Hiro in the shop, Peter, Kim and Claire had agreed to meet with Claire's father, Doctor Suresh, Officer Parkman and Agent Hanson at a suitable park to discuss their next move. It was felt that it was best the Haitian stay with Ted to make sure he stayed under control until they were sure what they wanted to do next. Ron had given Kim Rufus in case they needed an extra pair of eyes, and he'd expressed an interest in seeing how Rufus coped on his own given what he'd learnt about how his own ability might affect Rufus, but there was also the simple fact that Rufus was getting bored in the shop whereas at least with the others he would be going somewhere new.

When the meeting had been decided, the others had all expressed concerns about Claire attending after what her father had just told her, but Claire had assured them that she could keep it together. As disturbing as it was to know that her adopted father had at least been involved in the death of her biological mother, Claire had decided that it was more important that they focus on the wider situation. Kim and the others had all agreed to help her look into the alleged fire in more detail once Sylar had been dealt with, which at least gave them something to look forward to even if they had more immediate priorities.

Once they reached the park where the meeting was scheduled, the trio spent a few moments exploring their surroundings, keeping the other two in sight even as they checked the park for any sign of something they should be worried about. They were all fairly sure that Sylar wouldn't try anything in daylight, and Claire in particular trusted that her father wouldn't do anything to blatantly attack them, but when Kim's instincts insisted on making sure it didn't hurt to prioritise.

Kim understood that Claire still wasn't comfortable with everything they'd learnt about her father in the last few hours, but at least the other cheerleader agreed that they needed to cover all options when Sylar was still an active threat. Peter was doing his best to practice using the abilities he had copied so far, and he was doing fairly well in alternating from one power to another, but it still seemed as though Kim needed to be there if he was going to use multiple powers simultaneously. Kim had no problem with helping Peter in a crisis, but like Peter had pointed out, one of the last things they wanted was for Sylar to gain access to Kim's ability, so drawing attention to her wouldn't be a good call. Add in that Ted's ability seemed to be particularly destructive, and it was best to be sure they were covering all possible angles to keep Peter in good shape during whatever might be coming up.

Finally, the trio saw Noah Bennett walk into the park, accompanied by an Indian man who matched Peter's description of Doctor Suresh and a short blonde woman who was likely the FBI agent that had been mentioned in their previous call. Kim took a final look around the area to be sure that there was no sign of the Haitian or anyone else that might have been able to help them set a trap, and then walked out towards the new arrivals. Peter and Claire emerged from the surroundings as soon as they saw Kim making her move; considering Kim's natural talents, it was agreed that if she didn't 'sense' anything wrong the others were free to make a move themselves. As the two groups met along the path, they walked along in silence for a short while before they found a suitable park table, sitting around it on either side, lines clearly drawn between the two.

"You're looking well, Mr Petrelli," Agent Hanson broke the silence, nodding briefly at him. "I take it absorbing Ted didn't entirely agree with you?"

"It was… unexpected," Peter decided to concede.

"But he's better," Kim put in firmly.

"Because of… how can you be sure?" Doctor Suresh began, before he looked curiously at the young redhead.

"Because he's practicing with my ability to control the rest of his arsenal."

"You have an ability?" Claire's father looked at Kim with a new level of interest.

"For the record, we worked that out after Sylar's attack, and we'd prefer to make sure he doesn't find out about it," Claire said. "If you think it would suck if Sylar got my power… well, it wouldn't exactly be great if he got Kim's either."

"What can you do?" Agent Hanson looked at Kim.

"The best term is that I'm a natural survivor," Kim explained. "To put it in a practical context, if you put me on the spot in a dangerous situation, I'll be automatically able to think and move quickly enough to survive it, even if it's something like adjust my position while I'm being thrown through the air so that I won't hit something at a fatal angle."

"Fascinating," Doctor Suresh looked at Kim with a thoughtful smile. "So essentially your survival instinct and 'fight or flight' response is upgraded to a level where you always know how to survive when something threatens your life?"

"Pretty much," Kim nodded. "It's not the flashiest ability out there, but it's been enough to get me out of a few tight spots."

"…How screwed up is this mess?" Agent Hanson said with a bitter edge to her voice. "What kind of world is this where I've got a couple of teenagers as any kind of asset against a serial killer?"

"The kind of world where extreme situations call for unconventional measures," Kim replied as she indicated Peter. "Just count yourself lucky we've got the most powerful man on the planet to stop the most deranged superhuman psychopath on said planet."

"I really wish you wouldn't call me that," Peter said, an embarrassed expression on his face. "I'm still working out everything I can do; it's not like I'm an automatic one-man army even with your support…"

"But you're still the best powerhouse we've got on our side," Kim said with a reassuring grin.

"And you've kept us safe so far," Claire added, reaching over to take Peter's hand and give it an affectionate squeeze. "Even if you don't believe in yourself, believe that we believe in you."

Noticing the glare Claire's father was giving Peter, Kim extended her leg just enough to give the side of his own leg a brief kick, followed by a warning glare of her own when he turned to look at her. She wasn't sure what was going on between Peter and Claire, but she knew that they deserved to have the chance to figure it out for themselves rather than worry about a disapproving parent on top of their other problems.

"So," Doctor Suresh said as he turned to look at Peter, "given your own ability… if I might ask, has your brother-?"

"He can fly."

"Fly?" Mohinder repeated in surprise. "I… no offence intended to your brother, but compared to your own potential-"

"Nathan's very… focused on reaching high, but he… it's complicated, but let's just say for now I can see how flying suits him," Peter said, his tone suddenly bitter. For a moment Kim wondered if they should mention Nathan's current plans, but decided it wasn't worth it. They didn't know how Linderman intended to rig the election and they had so many other things going on right now that giving Agent Hanson anything else to worry about wouldn't help any of them. Even if she wanted to expose Linderman, they didn't have any actual evidence of anything he was doing that would hold up in any kind of court that she knew of, so it was best to focus on stopping Sylar and worry about Linderman and Nathan's schemes later.

"Anyway," the agent in question said as she looked between the teenage girls and the older man, "you're sure that Ted's going to be Sylar's next target?"

"We can't say if it's a plan or not, but Sylar's last known victim… well, he could paint the future."

"Isaac Mendez?" Doctor Suresh looked at Peter in shock. "He's dead?"

"Yes," Peter nodded at the doctor. "He was able to leave us a few final sketches with some warning of what's coming up, but… well, all we know for sure now is that I'm going to face Sylar one-on-one soon; either everything else he's painted has happened already or we don't know the significance of what his work's telling us about."

"Not much to go on," Bennett observed.

"We're all still alive and we know what we're trying to stop, so I'd call that a win," Claire countered.

"And like we said, the priority now is to get Ted out of the city so that Sylar can't use his power to cause the explosion."

"I… I'll see what I can do," Agent Hanson nodded after a moment's silent thought. "I can see about getting him moved into witness protection somewhere until we're sure that the danger's passed."

"Risky," Bennett observed. "We'd need to make sure the Haitian stays with him during transit; we have to be sure he doesn't have any kind of… problem before he gets out of the city…"

"Tricky, but not impossible," Agent Hanson nodded, before she looked back to Peter. "Do we have any kind of time frame for the explosion?"

"Everything we've found so far suggests it's going to happen shortly after the upcoming election," Peter replied. "We're doing what we can to prepare at this end, but…"

Peter trailed off, clearly unsure how to finish that explanation, but he didn't need to elaborate. Whatever the opinions and perspectives of everyone at the table, they were all aware of the stakes if they couldn't stop the planned destruction of New York. Kim still wasn't sure about Claire's father's motives for doing this, considering some of the shadier stuff he'd apparently done in the past, but at least for the moment he seemed to be on their side in terms of stopping Sylar.

What happens after this is over… well, that's another matter.

Chapter Text

With everything else that had been going on in her life over the last few weeks, Audrey was surprised to find herself grateful to be back doing something she had some actual control over. Organising protective custody was at least something she had some experience with from past cases, so it wasn't too hard to make the obvious arrangements, but the trick lay in finding a way to justify the situation. Matt in particular had made it clear that he wasn't totally comfortable with the plan, and Bennett had observed that his company would be better suited to keep Ted contained, but at the same time they all agreed that this was the best plan they had right now. Bennett was concerned about what his former employers would do to Claire if they knew about her ability, and Audrey certainly wasn't going to rely on people who'd have no problem experimenting in teenage girls, which left them with the option of relying on the FBI and hoping for the best.

Still, when the team arrived to take Ted into 'custody', Audrey was relieved when she looked over the planned details and confirmed that everything was just as she'd requested. Protective custody was at least more straightforward than witness protection, so all they had to worry about for the moment was finding somewhere secure to keep Ted until they were sure that Sylar wasn't a further threat. They had even managed to arrange for the Haitian to accompany Ted during the transit, which would provide further assurance that he wouldn't have a 'meltdown' until he got to safety.

"You're certain of this?" Bennet looked uncertainly at the FBI agent as they waited outside the FBI safehouse that they had declared the meeting point for the pickup.

"I made all the necessary preparations," Audrey nodded at the older man. "I've worked with everyone coming here and I trust them not to ask too many questions."

Her gaze narrowed as she looked at Bennett. "Just make sure the others don't get careless with Kim on your own mission."

"We'll be careful," Bennett nodded, even as he gave her a brief smile. "Be assured I'm also interested to learn how Miss Pierce performs in the field-"

"You better not be planning on trying to recruit that girl for your group," Audrey shot him a firm stare to counter his slight grin.

"Believe me, I'm fully aware that Kim Pierce would not make a good Company agent at any point in her life," Bennett nodded at her, his expression solemn once again. "Which is one reason she's better off following your plans at this time; your side can focus on getting the innocent out of there while I deal with things from… a different angle."

Audrey decided that was as good as she was going to get from him at the moment. She still wasn't comfortable with everything this man had admitted to doing when he worked with this company, but for the moment the priority was saving New York from an unprecedented danger; she'd worry about charging Bennet's old employers with numerous human rights violations when this crisis was resolved.

When the van finally pulled up, Audrey was grateful that she wouldn't have to worry about this part of things for much longer. Ted Sprague was a decent enough person, but considering the potential for his power to go out of his control, it would frankly be a relief once he basically stopped being her problem.

Hate treating the guy like some unexploded bomb, but Ted wants to get away from the city; he'll be safer when he's somewhere less stressful and away from all this…

Sitting opposite the dark-skinned man everyone knew as the Haitian, Ted wondered at the direction his life had taken over the last few weeks. Losing his wife would have been a devastating event on its own, but finding out that he was part of the next step in human evolution only to be stuck with one of the worst kind of superpowers a person could get.

Seriously, when there was men out there who could apparently fly or manipulate time, and he'd met a girl who could heal herself from any injury and a cop that could read minds, the notion that he was stuck generating lethal radiation without any ability to control it just sucked…

At this point, it was frankly a relief to know he was going to have guaranteed peace and control for the next few days. The chains on his arms and legs were a bit uncomfortable, but if they were going to sell him as a dangerous criminal he understood that Agent Hanson had to give these kind of instructions to sell the illusion properly.

Frankly, the only thing Ted truly regretted that he had to have this Haitian guy come along with him just to be sure he wouldn't do anything until they got somewhere private. He wasn't even sure if the plan was just to drop him off or if the other man was staying with him full-time for the duration of this mess, but for the moment the man was just sitting in silence across from him, with no sign that he had any particular issue with what he was doing.

"So…" Ted said at last, feeling a need to break the silence even as he wasn't sure if they were being watched from somewhere outside, "how did you… get into this group?"

"I was found as a child and trained in my particular skills," the Haitian replied. "As you can imagine, my talents were of great use to my employers."

Ted just nodded at that comment at first, but as the silence dragged on, he felt as though it was time to ask a question he had been pondering for a while.

"Do you ever… feel like you got cheated?"

"Cheated?"

"It's just… well, everyone else I've met so far has some kind of ability they can use anywhere, and I'm not exactly a fan of mine because of my control issues, but do you ever resent that your thing is basically… stopping other people?" Ted asked. "Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the help controlling my ability right now, but compared to everything else we've seen…"

"I do not feel short-changed," the Haitian said, looking at Ted with a thoughtful expression. "The powers we wield have been a great gift to many, but there are those who would abuse them to darker purposes. I do my part to help contain those who would abuse those powers, and give those who are simply out of their depth a chance to change and do better."

"Huh," Ted said, smiling thoughtfully as he considered that statement. "That's… an interesting way to look at it."

"We must all find the right way to view our gifts," the Haitian said. "I regret that your own talent has brought you pain so far, but I will do what I can to help you find control until you are sure you will be safe."

"Thanks," Ted nodded briefly at the other man, before he sighed. "It's just… it's hard to see what I could do with this. Officer Parkman's already using his talent to help him crack cases, Claire can survive things that would kill most people, and don't get me started on what Peter's capable of, while here I am stuck between shutting myself off and irradiating anyone close by if I lose control…"

"You will get there," the Haitian said, his tone firm. "We will never receive what we cannot control. You will find your purpose-"

Without warning, the whole van suddenly flipped over at least ninety degrees so that Ted was now hanging from his chains and the Haitian was lying against the floor that had previously been a wall. Ted tried to call out to the other man to ask if he was all right, but then the van flipped again and Ted was left hanging from the 'ceiling' as the van skidded along the road. Ted at least had enough space that his head didn't crash against the 'floor' as the van moved, but he definitely felt something crack as he was sent swinging back and forth between the walls of the van, until the vehicle came to a stop and the doors opened.

"I'm hurt!" Ted called out to the man on the other side of the door. The light behind the new arrival and the pain he was currently feeling made it hard to be sure, but Ted thought the new arrival had Peter's build, which at least seemed like a positive step. "I think it's bad!"

"Let me help."

The cold voice was enough to confirm that he wasn't dealing with Peter Petrelli right now, but for a moment, Ted held out hope that he was dealing with someone friendly before he clearly saw the dark-haired man who had so nearly killed him and some of his new allies the first time they'd gathered together in that hut what seemed like months ago.

When he felt the first flash of pain in his skull, all Ted could do was hope that it would be over quickly and that the people who had tried to help him would be able to stop this man before he could do anything too serious…

Even when Hiro was fully aware that he was being a bit of a fanboy about the opportunity to train with his father, he wondered what had prompted Kaito Nakamura to make the offer to train him after the initial attempts to get him to abandon his journey. His father's explanation that the recent journey had been part of a test to ascend to a new level at least sounded good, and Hiro wasn't going to complain about having a chance to prove himself, but he had to wonder what had happened in his father's past with those old allies who had lost their way.

Considering the precedent set by the likes of Magneto and Professor X, those words raised some disturbing possibilities in Hiro's mind, and he had a feeling he would have to learn the answers to those questions once this particular situation was over. As much as he liked the idea of being a more classic hero, he couldn't ignore that the worlds were becoming more complicated as time went by. Even superheroes had come a long way from the days when it was just beating up the latest plan of the Injustice Gang and the Masters of Evil; these days it was Batman being paranoid enough to come up with plans to kill the other members of the Justice League and Iron Man and Captain America dividing the entire superhero community because of their different beliefs about the Registration Act.

Maybe we can be simpler, Hiro thought hopefully to himself as he exchanged his final bow with his father. We know what not to do already; we just need to talk to right people…

Still, as promising as it was to consider such issues, for the moment his priority had to be Sylar and the explosion. He liked to think that he had responded well to his father's training, and he had hope that the other heroes he had met over the last month would also step in (even if he was worried by Flying Man's claim that the explosion couldn't be stopped), but there was still that nagging fear that his friend would meet the same fate that he had faced in that dark future…

"Ando!" he called out as he walked out of the training room. "I am ready to face Sylar!"

It was only when he looked around the shop that he realised his friend had vanished, while Ron Sinclair was standing at the corner of the main desk with an awkward expression.

"Where is Ando?" Hiro asked.

"He… well, he bought a sword and left," Ron said with a helpless shrug. "I tried to talk him down, but he basically said that he was going to save the world if you wouldn't, and-"

"Ando is after Sylar alone?" Hiro looked at Ron in horror. "He cannot-!"

"I get that, but it's not like I could talk him out of it; I don't even really know how to do anything with my talent yet-!"

Hiro didn't have time to continue this conversation; if he didn't find Ando fast, the most personally devastating part of the future he was trying to prevent would come to pass even if he was able to stop everything else.

Chapter Text

"You're sure that this is going to work?" Kim asked Mohinder as she walked alongside him and Officer Parkman towards the Primatech building. She had been allowed to borrow one of Agent Hanson's suits, and had done up her hair in a manner that she felt made her look a bit older, but at this point she was just hoping she wouldn't make a fool of herself.

"I informed them that Molly was responding well to the treatment but recommended a follow-up before she attempted to use her powers again," Mohinder explained with a reassuring smile. "Since they already expect me to come back and most people should have left by now anyway, all we have to do is get inside, get through the desk, and then get to Molly's rooms."

"She'll be safe to leave once she's… can I say cured?" Matt asked.

"Molly's not a Patient Zero or anything like that right now; from what I can determine the virus that infected her is a relatively contained mutation that occasionally occurs in people who manifest more… subtle… abilities," Mohinder explained. "I was specifically conceived and born so that my antibodies could be used to save my sister when she contracted a similar virus due to her own abilities, and have every reason to believe I have the right antibodies to treat her condition."

"Sounds… workable," Kim nodded cautiously at him, hoping she wasn't putting her faith in a scientist who was just grasping at straws.

"You're sure she'll be safe if we take her away?" Matt asked.

"I wouldn't have suggested this if I didn't think Molly would be fine," Mohinder assured him. "Just stay alert and we can do this."

Matt nodded, looking anxiously around himself as they walked even as he kept up the pace. Kim understood his anxieties, considering that there was a big difference between her past confrontations with troublesome people and actually entering a 'villain stronghold' (as Ron might put it), but at this point the best thing to do was go with it and hope for the best. She felt slightly guilty for leaving Peter behind, but she was satisfied that he still had Claire to help out if anything happened.

I make it easier for Peter to stay alive, but Claire gives him a reason to stay alive… and that's not just because of her powers…

Kim wondered if she should find it worrying that she was focusing on her friends' potential love lives when they had so many other things to be worried about right now, but she chose to view it as a good sign. Whatever was going on in her life right now, she still wanted at least the option of going back to school once this was all over, and part of that meant keeping hold of a childish interest in her friends' love lives.

"You know," Kim said as they approached the door, "as fancy as this place looks, I still find it hard to believe that anyone could just use a twelve-year-old girl as a tracking system; these people must have really screwed priorities."

"To say the least," Mohinder said, looking cautiously up at the building. "I can understand wanting to keep her safe when Sylar is still a factor, but from everything I've heard, they clearly intend to keep her here long-term…"

"Let's just do this," Matt said, anxiously flexing his shoulders as he looked up at the building one last time before they walked inside. The building itself seemed almost disturbingly empty, but in a dark way Kim had to admire the scale of the architecture around them. The elegant black marble of the entrance created a suitably intimidating presence, but at the same time it seemed so open that you wouldn't think this was a secret base for an organisation hunting superhumans even if you thought that was an option.

"OK, you're up," Kim whispered over to Matt. "Get a read on someone and take it from there; remember, we need to get upstairs discreetly and quickly."

To his credit, Matt didn't have a problem taking Kim's suggestion, recognising that her ability made her best-suited for keeping track of what had to be done. After looking around for a moment, the telepathic cop focused his gaze on a security guard talking with another member of the building staff. Nodding in resolution, Matt walked up to the guard, Kim and Mohinder close behind.

"Stanley," Matt said, his tone casual as he addressed a bald man in a suit. "Hey, man, I was just out for dinner and realised I forgot my ID; could you buzz us through?"

"I don't know you," the guard said.

"It's Matt from accounting on 3-6," Matt responded with a sarcastic laugh. "What are you talking about? We just went out and decided it was better to get it now-"

"I'm going to need to see your ID, buddy," the guard cut Matt off.

"Stan, come on, buddy, you don't remember?" Matt said promptingly, still laughing as though at some memory. "Remember on the weekend, I ran into you at the, um… at that restaurant?" He paused for a moment and then continued. "Shopsins, right? You introduced me to Tanya."

Kim suddenly found herself hoping that telepathy wasn't a common superpower; Bennett had mentioned that he'd been taught how to deflect mind-readers by thinking in other languages, but would a standard guard be prepared for something like that?

"You OK, Stan?" Matt continued, chuckling slightly as he lowered his voice. "Remember? You were really drunk. And you were worried about people finding out about the ... uh, you know, the…"

Kim didn't quite hear what Matt whispered as a follow-up (she guessed that she could if she tried, but it wasn't relevant right now), but it was enough to prompt the guard to wave them through the gate with embarrassed hopes that they might have a good day. Kim and Doctor Suresh nodded in acknowledgement as they followed Matt through the barrier and up to the elevator. At that point it was simple enough for Mohinder to enter his own code for the elevator and wait for the doors to open, leaving the three of them free to enter.

"To confirm, why did we have to do this when you've got a reason to be here?" Kim glanced at Doctor Suresh as he pressed the button for the relevant floor.

"Because if I announced my presence in advance then the officials I've already spoken to would be keeping a close eye on me while I'm working," Mohinder said as the elevator began to move. "With few people in the office at this hour, we have a better chance of staying under the radar until we've retrieved Molly and gotten out."

"And using your code wouldn't do that anyway?"

"None of the people I've made contact with should have any reason to look at the security access log right now," Mohinder assured her. "We'll be fine until we can confirm Molly's condition and leave once her final treatment is completed."

"Right," Kim nodded in cautious acknowledgement as she waited for the door to open. This was still a bit of a risk, but she acknowledged that Mohinder's assessment seemed accurate enough. So long as nobody here knew that he was working with them, they should still be able to get Molly Walker and go…

Once they left the elevator, Mohinder led the way to a laboratory that connected up to a smaller room that put Kim in mind of a children's ward in a standard hospital. Sitting at a desk colouring quietly was a small brown-haired girl, about half Kim's height, with long brown hair and wearing a light green shirt under a dark jacket.

"Doctor Suresh?" the girl looked curiously at him.

"Hello, Molly," Mohinder smiled at her as he indicated the other two. "These are friends of mine; this is Kim Pierce, and this is-"

"Officer Parkman?" Molly interrupted, looking at Matt with a smile

"Molly?" Matt returned her smile with one of his own.

"You know each other?" Mohinder looked between them in surprise.

"And you didn't mention it earlier?" Kim gave Matt a critical glare.

"I… guess I thought it was a coincidence," Matt said with an awkward shrug, even as he smiled at Molly. "But I should have known you'd be remarkable enough to be involved in all this."

"You said you'd keep me safe," Molly smiled at the technically ex-cop.

"That's right," Matt nodded, before indicating Kim. "And Kim here's been helping me work out the best way to do that."

"It's kind of my thing," Kim said, picking up on Matt's intentions as she grinned at Molly. "Like yours is finding people."

"Really?"

"Really," Kim nodded. "Put me in any dangerous situation, and I always know how to find my way out of it just on instinct."

"Anything?"

"Whether it's passing a tricky test or being shoved into a road, I'll get through it like that," Kim affirmed, snapping her fingers as she smiled at Molly. "And right now, Doctor Suresh just needs to finish your treatments and we can get on with getting you out of here."

Staring at the TV screen as he sat in his apartment, while Claire rested in his bed after a stressful few hours, for the first time in his life Peter had no idea how to feel about his brother's success. The reports of the landslide victory would have been good news under normal circumstances, but considering what Kim had heard about Nathan and his mother agreeing with the plan to just let the city get blown up, at this point Peter was automatically uncomfortable with the idea of putting Nathan in a position of power. Maybe the plan Kim had overheard them discussing would pay off and they'd be able to 'rebuild the world' after the devastation, but if peace could only be achieved through mass murder then as far as Peter was concerned that was already too high a price to pay…

The sound of his phone ringing was actually welcome to Peter at this point; even if this was about Sylar or the explosion, at least those were easier to face than his rapidly-disintegrating opinion of his brother.

"Ted Sprague is dead."

"What?" Peter yelled, standing up in shock as he heard Agent Hanson's voice at the other end of the line. "How did- I thought we were taking care?"

"Don't ask me how Sylar found him, but he intercepted the convoy and literally turned the whole transport truck upside down," Hanson replied. "Only good news is that he missed the Haitian; apparently the guy lost consciousness when Sylar attacked the truck, and apparently he needs to be actively concentrating to stop someone as powerful as Sylar is now from doing anything."

"That's… something, I suppose," Peter said. He felt a bit cold thinking of it this way, but the idea of Sylar acquiring the Haitian's power was definitely not something he wanted to face. "How is he?"

"The Haitian? Banged up a bit, but doctors tell me he should be back to normal in a couple of weeks. Of course, from everything we've heard we don't have that long before everything goes boom, and now we've got a guy in play who might actually want to do that…"

"And people who are actively interested in setting that up," Peter observed grimly. "I don't suppose we can… do something about that?"

"Problem with criminals like Linderman is that they're very careful," Hanson responded apologetically. "It's like what you've heard about Capone; even if we're all fairly sure what Linderman's doing, we don't have any concrete proof of any of it, and that's before you bring in the superhuman angle."

"No way to prove any of that without it getting complicated, huh?"

"I don't exactly like what Bennett's old employers are doing to people, but I can get behind the idea that keeping these powers secret from the general public is a good call," Hanson affirmed.

"In other words, right now it's still on us to stop the explosion and deal with Linderman?"

"Looks like it," Hanson confirmed. "Right now we're still waiting for Doctor Suresh's team to finish up at Primatech; if we can at least get that tracker girl out of there we'll have more options, both when it comes to keeping people safe and dealing with Sylar."

"Right," Peter nodded. "I'll keep an eye on Claire and get ready; we still have that picture of Sylar facing me somewhere to deal with, but if we can be ready for that…"

"Again, we'll take it as it comes and hope for the best," Hanson agreed. "I'll let you know if I find anything at my end, so long as you do the same."

"Right," Peter said before he ended the call and turned his thoughts to this new knowledge. If Sylar had taken Ted's powers, the most obvious question right now was how he had found out about Ted. Unfortunately only one explanation was coming to Peter right now; Sylar had used Isaac's ability and painted where to go to find what he was looking for. Peter might try the same method to find Sylar right now, but he couldn't be sure if he'd paint where Sylar was at the present (based on when he might finish such a painting) or where he'd be at some future moment, and with the explosion this close based on Hiro's information they couldn't afford for him to miss the deadline.

Right now, the best chance of finding Sylar was the little girl Mohinder had told him about; either she could direct Peter to Sylar herself, or she could teach Peter how to use her power to find the villain. The doctor had assured them that Molly's treatment should be going well, but he still had to actually get her out of the building, and even if he found Sylar there was still the question of Linderman…

"You're responding well to the treatment," Mohinder said, studying the test tube that now held a sample of Molly's blood. "The important question is how are you feeling, Molly?"

"Good, I guess," Molly said, looking up from a book full of pictures she'd been looking over with Kim. "As long as I don't get any more shots."

"Yeah, those are never fun," Kim smiled at the little girl.

"Unfortunately, we need to continue the treatments until you have a sufficient amount of my antibodies in your blood," Mohinder said.

"I'm all better," Molly said, taking a thumbtack out of the glass cup and turning to the map book on another part of the desk. "See? Look what I can do? Just like before I was sick; I think about someone, and I know where they are in my head."

"Molly…" Mohinder began cautiously. "If your power has returned, we can stop the bogeyman so he never hurts anyone else. Can you think about him? Show me where he is?"

"You sure you want to know?" Molly asked.

The response was interrupted when the door to the lab opened and a grey-haired man in a dark suit walked in. Kim had a brief sense that she had seen this man somewhere before, but pushed that thought back as she moved to stand between this man and Mohinder; they couldn't afford to have the doctor forced to leave right now.

"Doctor Suresh," the man said with an insincere smile that put Kim immediately on edge. "I have to tell you, I was surprised to see you drop in unannounced."

"And I'm surprised to learn that you were paying enough attention to realise I was here," Mohinder said, trying to keep his own tone lighter.

"Just a matter of looking at the right time," the other man said before he turned to look at Matt. "And who is-?"

Seizing the momentary distraction, Kim stepped forward and grabbed the grey-haired man's arm, twisting it behind his back with one hand and instinctively grabbing at a point on his neck with the other. Cut off mid-sentence, the man fell silent and his mouth opened in a silent yell, unable to vocalise the shock he must be feeling.

"And you should know better than to interrupt a doctor when he's treating a patient," Kim said, working to keep her own voice light as she looked over at the others. "We'll just wait outside until you're done, OK?"

"Right," Matt said, nodding in agreement as he followed her example, placing a hand on the grey-haired man's other shoulder and leading him out of the lab. "We'll be right outside; don't worry about us."

Molly smiled in innocent reassurance at Matt as he and Kim led the new arrival back into the thankfully-deserted corridor, but Kim's full attention was on the man in front of her. It had been a long time since her mother signed her up for those martial arts classes, but Kim guessed her ability helped her remember even the details she hadn't fully realised she was being taught at the time. Once the door to the lab was closed behind them and they were a satisfactory distance away from the girl and the doctor, Kim adjusted her grip on the man's neck, his silent pain audible once again.

"What the Hell?" he looked at her in rage. "That was-!"

"We're taking Molly out of here as soon as she's well, and then we will deal with Sylar," Kim stared resolutely at the grey-haired man.

"We?" the man repeated, looking sceptically between her and Matt. "You two and Doctor Suresh?"

"It's more involved than that, and if you think I'm giving you anything more you're not as smart as you people are meant to be," Kim said.

"You already made a bad call when you came after us rather than our colleagues," Matt said, smirking slightly at the other man.

"You were coming after the key to stopping Sylar-!"

"Molly can help us find Sylar, but that's not the same as stopping him," Matt corrected. "Believe me, we've got more people capable of dealing with Sylar when the time comes… and I have a feeling that you're about to lose the man who's been leading this particular campaign."

"Linderman doesn't go down that easily-"

"And from what I can hear these people are really determined," Matt said with a slight smirk.

"Talking of people being determined, how many people are here in this building right now?" Kim asked, giving Matt a brief glance.

"Not many," Matt said, anticipating Kim's request. "There's a long-term security staff on the lower levels, but Molly's the most important thing here and she's considered 'self-sufficient'…"

The glare Matt directed at Thompson as he spoke those words was enough to assure Kim that her next call was the right one. Kim released her grip on his neck and delivered a powerful punch to the man's face, sending him to the ground in an unconscious heap.

"That was deserved, right?" she asked.

"Yeah," Matt nodded. "And we'd gotten everything we needed out of him anyway."

"Does that anything to do with those 'really determined' people you mentioned?"

"Thompson saw a man and a woman on the security cameras heading for Linderman's office, but he decided to check us out first," Matt explained. "I took a quick check of their minds once I knew there was something to look for-"

"You heard them from this far away?" Kim looked curiously at Matt.

"I could guess where they were going and I knew what I was looking for," Matt said. "I wouldn't like to try and do that in a crowded area, but in an empty building like this, it's not that hard to focus on two people if I know where they are and have an idea what to look for."

"Such as people who aren't meant to be here," Kim nodded in understanding. "So right now it's basically us, Mohinder, Molly, and these people who want to deal with Linderman?"

"There might be a couple of other people with Linderman, but from what I'm hearing…" Matt shrugged. "I wouldn't say I'm getting the full picture, but I'm fairly sure there are more people here who don't like Linderman than there are people who do."

"Good," Kim smiled at him. "Time to update the others, and then shall we see if we can make a few new friends?"

Chapter Text

Kim had been concerned about leaving Mohinder and Molly alone in what was essentially 'enemy territory' at first, but with Matt's assurance that he'd be aware if anyone else in the building tried to go after them, she had decided to trust his particular talent and go with what felt right. She had remembered to send Peter a quick text to assure him that everything was in order at their end before she followed Matt to the upper office, but at the moment the priority was to deal with things at this end. Sylar might be the larger problem, but these people could still be a long-term problem if they didn't deal with the situation right now.

"Anything new?" she looked over at Matt as they approached the door that was apparently Linderman's private section of the building. Claire's father hadn't said anything about how to get into this part of the facility, but if someone was already here breaking in shouldn't be much of a problem.

"Not distinctly," Matt said, frowning as they drew closer to the door. "Someone's in pain…"

His eyes widened and he turned around, Kim following his gaze as a group of around half a dozen men in suits came around the corner, guns in their hands as they saw two people standing in front of the door who clearly weren't meant to be here. Kim was briefly anxious about what to do, but then something fell into place in her mind and her eyes narrowed.

"Read me," she said to Matt, hoping that what she understood about Matt's powers so far was accurate. If her ability could properly work with his, she might be able to pass on the plan she'd just come up with before they were in serious trouble…

If she hadn't been keeping an eye on Matt, she might have missed the nod he gave her, but she couldn't have missed the moment when the six men facing them suddenly reeled over and clutched at their heads as though they'd all suddenly suffered simultaneous migraines. Seizing the opportunity, Kim charged forward, kicking one man in the head and punching another in the chest before they could stand up properly.

She was briefly aware of Matt coming up after her, but she kept her focus on the men immediately in front of her, jumping up so that she basically landed on the shoulders of one of the men. The force of the sudden impact sent the man to the ground, leaving Kim to finish him off with a more decisive punch to the face before she rolled along the ground and got back to her feet to face the fourth. She didn't even think about what she was doing before she struck this man in the shoulder, leaving him writhing in pain on the ground. Turning around to look back at Matt, she saw that he was exchanging blows with one of the two men she hadn't confronted yet, although the sixth man was lying on the ground clutching at an arm that had clearly been bent the wrong way against the wall. Kim almost moved to help her new friend, but then Matt delivered a final punch and the other man went down.

"Nice work," she nodded at him.

"Thanks," Matt said, looking around the corridor with a slight smile. "I still don't know how I did that… what were you thinking?"

"It just made sense at the time," Kim explained with an apologetic shrug. "Ron's told me a few stories about people in comics managing to attack enemies through telepathy, so I thought… maybe you could do something like that, and if I just thought it hard enough your ability would fill in the gaps?"

"Because your own power would basically help me understand what I had to do with my ability to save us both?" Matt finished, looking at her with a sense of respect that felt strange coming from an adult looking at a teenager. "You have a really scary ability at times, you know that?"

"I'm starting to realise that," Kim nodded before she indicated the large door. "Still, shall we see what they were trying to protect?"

Once Matt nodded in agreement, she walked up and turned the handle, only to be shocked as she found the dark-skinned bald man she'd seen earlier lying on the ground, clutching at a bleeding wound on his chest. Kim moved to examine the man, only to be shocked when she saw a body in a business suit with white hair, who she assumed was Linderman, face-down on the ground with a large hole in the back of his head. She quickly placed a hand over her mouth to stop the instinctive scream she would have otherwise let out and tried to focus on examining the area around her for further clues. The room had various fancy chairs and some artworks in a range of styles on the walls, giving the impression of a living area rather than an office. Even as Kim's hands worked to confirm the condition of the bleeding man, her eyes were drawn to an open door at the back of the room, clearly designed in a way that it would look like just part of the wall if it wasn't open.

"There's someone that way," Matt said, indicating the open door as he knelt down beside Kim. "They're fighting someone… I don't know what it is, but the other person has something like my ability…"

"OK," Kim said, still checking over the man on the ground. "I think I can keep this man going for the moment; can you see about… chasing that up?"

"I'm on it," Matt said, standing up to head for the door before he paused to look at her. "Uh… you sure he'll be all right?"

"I'm not saying I can get a bullet out with my fingers, but I should be able to do something," Kim smiled reassuringly at him before she indicated the door. "Go for it; if there's anyone else down here we need to get them out of here."

Peter had always known that he had a difficult relationship with the rest of his family, but even he couldn't believe that it had actually come to this. As much as he wanted to believe that he could trust Nathan like he always had in the past, he couldn't shake the sense that this time his brother had crossed too many lines for him to just forgive and forget. Nathan might not have instigated whatever was going on here, but he'd also made it clear to Kim that he had no problem going along with the plan to basically let New York get blown up.

At this point, Peter was just trying not to think about the implication that his family were comfortable with the idea that he might be the one who was going to explode. The idea that his own family had no problem with essentially letting him before a weapon of mass destruction to further their own warped agenda was so warped he was going to ignore that until this particular nightmare was over.

He didn't know if it was stupid to plan on giving Nathan one more chance to explain himself before he went off to Kirby Plaza to help the others rescue Molly Walker, but Peter was at least going to give Nathan one more chance before he gave up. When he reached the car park he'd selected as the meeting, he noted with relief that Nathan was at least there alone as he'd requested; this would all be simpler if their mother wasn't there.

"Hey," he said briefly to his brother.

"Glad you came," Nathan nodded in response. "Ma's preparing the helicopter for us; Heidi and the kids are out of the city already, but we should-"

"So that's it?"

"That's it?" Nathan looked at Peter in a pointed manner. "That explosion is going to go off in less than an hour-"

"And you're focused on Ma's plan rather than actually helping anyone," Peter cut him off, hoping that his brother could see his contempt at this attitude. "Seriously, how can you justify this?"

"The world needs a wake-up call-"

"If you think talking about the 'big picture' makes this anything but a horrible act of death, forget it." Peter shook his head, fighting down the urge to hit Nathan; his brother could almost certainly take him if they were just trading punches like normal people, but there might still be a chance to talk sense to him. "There is no argument you can make that will convince me that letting everyone in New York die in the name of your own reputation is OK."

"You could never see the big picture; we're doing this to help the world-"

"So it's all right to let people die if you can argue that it will make things 'better' in the future?" Peter clenched his fists as he looked at his brother. "I never thought I'd say this, but I have to agree with Kim; if you seriously believe that crap, leave Heidi and the kids here."

"…What?" Nathan's self-control faltered as he registered Peter's words, looking at his brother in barely-contained shock. "You can't just-"

"It's like Kim said, Nathan," Peter retorted, keeping his tone controlled as he addressed his brother. "If individual people don't matter to you so long as you win this election and can go along with Ma's plans, you can't claim that you wouldn't just let your family die for the ratings."

"Those are your nephews you're talking about-!"

"I'm not saying I'd do it; I'm saying that right now you seem to be the type of person who would," Peter corrected, still giving his brother a cold glare. "So go off with Ma and let the city get blown up in the name of your 'big picture'; I'm going to help my friends try and stop this crap."

With that Peter turned invisible, turned around, flew off into the night sky. He still wasn't comfortable attempting to use the abilities he'd copied from Hiro just yet- from everything he'd heard Hiro still didn't have a handle on his own powers, so trying to use them himself might be risky at best- but he didn't want to draw attention to himself while flying if there was a choice.

Claude and Nathan had each been awkward teachers in their own distinct ways, but Peter liked to think they'd at least taught him what he didn't want to be in this kind of situation. If his family were willing to let this happen, Peter was going to do his best to stop it; he could worry about what this said about his mother and brother once he was sure that New York had been saved.

Better to die trying to save the city then live and wonder if you could have done something later…

Hurrying down the corridor behind the secret door, Matt wondered what it said about his life that he was so accepting about something he would have dismissed as a fictional cliché just a few weeks ago. Secret passages made for an interesting concept in the right novels, but actually facing them in real life just felt… extremely strange…

He wasn't sure if he could explain it even to himself, but as he made his way down the corridor, that same sense of something… as though he was aware of something familiar, but he couldn't find the words to describe how he knew it…

Suddenly reminded of what he had done after reading Kim's mind during the fight outside, he 'reached' out with his mind and suddenly sensed something that he couldn't explain. It was hard to define, but the best way he could explain it was that he was suddenly aware of a switch that only he could turn on or off. Acting on impulse, he reached out and 'flicked' the switch, only to find himself forced to keep 'pressing' forward with his mind for a few moments until something happened to end that sense of pressure. That sense ended, he moved with greater haste along the corridor until he found himself in a fancy apartment at the other end, including an elaborate kitchen in one area and a comfortable lounge in the other. There was an unconscious brunette in a dark top and jeans lying on the ground, but Matt's own focus right now was the blonde in a white jacket hugging a darker-skinned boy with curly hair, both of whom parted to look at him as he entered.

"Whoa!" he held up his hands as the blonde woman gave him a particularly hostile glare. "I'm not part of this place; my friends and I came here to stop Linderman!"

"Stop him?" the blonde stood up, moving the boy behind her back as she kept her eyes fixed on Matt. "Who are you?"

"Matt Parkman," Matt replied. "I'm… well, that's complicated; simplest way to say it is that I'm part of an FBI team that's been investigating him for the last month or so…"

"And you have powers too, right?"

"What?" Matt and the blonde turned to look at the boy, who was looking at Matt with a cautious smile.

"Well… she stopped using her abilities on Mom and then you showed up," the boy said, indicating the unconscious woman on the floor. "I know we didn't do anything to her, so I don't think you turning up here is a coincidence… right?"

"…Yeah," Matt nodded at last. "I'm… well, I can read minds."

"Cool!" the boy smiled at Matt.

"You read minds?" the blonde looked at Matt with renewed apprehension.

"I'm… working on controlling it, so believe me that I don't want to hear everything you're thinking," Matt said, hoping that honesty would make up for any concerns he was violating her privacy. "I came here with some friends; we were going to deal with Linderman, but a couple of us have to help another prisoner and then we found this guy in Linderman's office-"

"That's DL," the blonde said. "He's my husband; is he all right?"

"All right?" the boy looked anxiously at the blonde. "Why wouldn't Dad be all right?"

"He got shot," Matt said (he'd normally be more delicate about that kind of news, but if the kid was here in the first place he had probably already dealt with a few strange things). "Another friend of mine's keeping an eye on him, but we should get out of here soon; from what I saw, he needs medical attention."

"Yeah," the blonde nodded, placing a protective arm around her son as she looked at Matt. "Let's get your friends and get out of here."

Peter had to remind himself that landing directly in Kirby Plaza wouldn't be the best idea in the current situation. He might be committed to stopping Sylar and the explosion, but if there was a chance of catching Sylar by surprise, he didn't want to fly in and give the killer an obvious target. After finding a suitable-looking alley a short distance from the plaza, Peter touched down and made his way towards his destination on the ground.

It was surprising how quiet this part of town was, now that he was actually there. The building couldn't have closed that long ago, but there was no sign of anyone else walking around the buildings surrounding him, no trace of people through the large windows…

"What took you so long?" a voice said from behind him.

Turning around, Peter tensed as he found himself facing Sylar once again, the man standing in a confident manner further inside the square.

"Don't think you're going to get out of this fight that easily," the killer said, confidence in his voice as he looked at Peter.

"Who said I wanted to leave?" Peter countered, already mentally shifting through his 'rolodex' as he approached the killer, keeping the man's attention on him. So long as Peter kept Kim and Claire at the forefront of his mind, he should still have a chance to pull this off, but if he let his focus slip-

He felt something tighten around his throat as Sylar held out a hand towards him, immediately putting Peter in mind of Darth Vader.

"You think I'm going to let you ruin it all?" Sylar glared contemptuously at him as he paced around the square, his gaze fixed on Peter. "Take all the glory?"

It was thoughts like that which reinforced for Peter how he would never understand men like Sylar- why would anyone think there was anything glorious about blowing up a city?- but he couldn't focus on that right now; if he could just get his head around whatever ability was letting Sylar do this-

The sound of a gun being fired drew his and Sylar's attention to another part of the square, and Peter was shocked to see Matt standing there, pointing a gun at Sylar. Even as the telepath continued to fire, Sylar held up his other hand to stop the bullets, letting Matt see what he was doing before the killer flicked his fingers and the bullets flew back towards their source.

"NO!" Peter called out, only realising he could talk now as he reached out with Sylar's own ability and diverted most of the bullets into the pillars on either side of Matt. A couple still managed to graze his arms and shoulders, forcing Matt to the ground; Peter didn't think Matt was seriously hurt, but his arms were clearly injured-

And I know that, Peter thought, mind racing as he took in Matt's injuries and how he'd just stopped his opponent actually killing his new acquaintance. If he was thinking this fast- if he'd been able to basically beat Sylar with his own power that quickly- then from what he'd worked out about his ability…

Kim's here, he thought with a sense of relief as he turned his attention to his enemy; if his friend was in his presence, he didn't need to focus on her ability to use his other talents properly. Time to kick ass.

The sound of something off to the side drew Peter's attention to the side as he saw a parking meter flying through the air towards Sylar's hand, before he redirected it towards Peter. Acting on instinct, Peter reached out to 'grab' the meter with his own borrowed telekinesis and tried to redirect it towards Sylar, only to find himself straining against the killer's mental grasp, unable to overpower the other man with his own ability-

The stalemate ended when an unfamiliar blonde woman walked up, grabbed the meter by the metal pole beneath it, and slammed it into Sylar's face. The killer was sent staggering backwards, bleeding from his now-broken nose, leaving the blonde free to slam her weapon into his chest with the kind of force that no human could match.

Which adds another power to the rolodex, Peter grinned. Glancing back at Matt, he saw Doctor Suresh tending to the injured cop while Kim crouched beside them, but there was also a dark-skinned man with a bloodstained shirt and a couple of young kids.

"Mom!" one of the kids suddenly called out. "Dad needs your help!"

Peter wasn't sure who the others were, but he wasn't going to leave children defenceless when Sylar was present. Stepping forward, he took hold of the meter as the woman raised it up again, waiting for her to look back at him with a hostile glare.

"I've got this," he said in a cool tone. "Go back to your family."

"…You're lucky you're cute," the woman said with a brief nod, before she released her grip on the meter and ran back to the kids (he wasn't sure if they were a full family, but he at least knew that the boy was apparently the blonde's son). Drawing on the pleasant surprise he'd felt when the new arrival stepped in, Peter swung the meter another couple of times before he tossed it aside and began to punch Sylar with his bare fists. He wasn't a violent person normally, but after everything he'd had to deal with over the last few weeks, it was refreshing to have everything reduced to something he could hit; he could freely pummel Sylar for everything he'd done in the name of his own sick quest for power-

The burning sensation in his hand drew Peter's attention away from his current focus, stepping back from Sylar as he realised that he was starting to glow as he drew on Ted's power once again. Even worse, he could spot some flecks of green in the radioactive energy he was currently generating, which put him in mind of that woman Kim had briefly fought back in that club-

DON'T! he thought to himself, clenching his fists as he stepped back from Sylar, fighting to get himself under control. He wasn't sure if it was his rage against Sylar, his stress about rejecting his family, or a mix of everything over the last few weeks coming together to push him this far, but he couldn't stop himself thinking about what he was up against… he was facing the man who'd destroyed so many lives for no better reason than that he wanted to be 'special'… the man who'd nearly killed Claire before Peter could get to know her…

"How about that?" Sylar grinned up at him, bleeding from the side of his mouth but still looking smugly up at him. "Looks like you're going to be the villain after all-"

"Sylar!" a voice called out from behind him. Fighting down the sense of power in his body, Peter turned his attention to the source of the yell in time to see Hiro standing in the square, a sword clutched in his hands, before he rammed the blade into Sylar's chest.

Even when he'd just been beating Sylar with his bare hands, Peter couldn't restrain a wince as he saw the sword emerge from Sylar's back, stained with blood and in a position where Peter was fairly sure it would have punctured something important.

"Hiro!" Peter said, looking anxiously at the Japanese man whose future self had started him on this journey so many days ago. "You've got to-"

Peter wasn't even sure what he would have said before Sylar stretched out his hands and sent Hiro flying backwards and into the air, sword still clutched in his hands as he hurtled towards another building. Hiro vanished mid-flight before Peter could try and do something to help his friend, but he managed to turn his attention back towards Sylar in time to fire a blast of green-tinted yellow energy at his enemy. Sylar was sent flying backwards in another direction, crashing down in a more distant corner of the square. Peter had some vague hope that venting some of his energy against Sylar would help him burn off the worst of it, but he could tell that he hadn't done enough, and he couldn't calm himself down enough to focus on flight as a means of getting out of this.

No, he told himself, fighting down the surge of power in his body as he tried to tap into Kim's power, hoping that she and the others were far enough away that he wasn't contaminating them just by standing here. I couldn't live with myself if I did this… I have to control this… I need to stop this…

"Peter?"

"Claire?" Peter turned to look incredulously at the blonde teenager now standing before him, a tearful smile on her face as she looked at him. "What are you-?"

"Ron decided that if we were going to be heroes we should be here at the big finale," Claire said, indicating an area off to the side where Peter presumed Ron was standing even as he kept his gaze focused on Claire. "Is Sylar-?"

"He's gone," Peter said, hoping that he was telling the truth; getting stabbed right through and hit with a blast of whatever he was generating should be enough to put most people down, but it wasn't like he knew everything Sylar could do. "But I… I think I'm losing control…"

"You're not," Claire said, her tone certain as she took another few steps towards him, giving him a warm smile. "You're the hero; you're not the bomb."

"I… I don't know if I can control this…" Peter admitted, staring down at his blazing hands as the gold energy mixed with that strange green fire. "Everything's just… it's all been so much… Nathan and my mother want this to happen because they think it'll save everything, and I've got all this power when all I wanted was just to do something to help people, and the world's just gone crazy…"

"But you're not," Claire cut in, now standing right in front of him, ignoring the way her clothes were starting to burn even as Peter fought to keep his energy in check. "Peter… since this started, you've never been anything less than the bravest, most selfless guy I've ever met… and if you doubt yourself… please don't doubt me."

Peter wasn't sure if he could really believe that, but he found himself unable to come up with a compelling counter-argument even before Claire reached up and pulled his head down so that their lips met. For a moment he registered the scent of burning flesh as the energy he was generating began to attack her, but just like last time she'd attempted this, he soon pushed that aside to focus on the simple pleasure of Claire's presence, her faith and trust in him to protect her, the way she made him want to live up to that faith without ever making him feel pressured or force him to become something he didn't want to be…

He only realised that he'd stopped generating the energy when Claire finally pulled back, leaving him to give her a cautious, grateful smile even as he tried to keep his gaze on her face. Her body was healing from the burns he'd unintentionally inflicted on her, but her clothing hadn't been as fortunate, and for a teenage girl Claire already had good… development…

"OK!" another voice yelled, followed by Kim walking up and draping a coat over Claire that fortunately covered what he'd been trying not to look at. "Glad you both had that moment, but maybe save anything further for when it won't get anyone arrested for public indecency."

"What is it with these powers, huh?" Ron cut in, the boy grinning as he walked up to indicate Peter. "Seriously, you generate all that oomph and your clothes are fine."

"Just… one of those things, I guess," Peter said, restraining the urge to smile as Claire gave him a tentative grin at the reminder that there were other people involved in what had just happened.

"So… it's over, right?" Kim looked between Peter and Claire before her gaze settled on him. "You've got it under control, I mean?"

"…Yeah," Peter nodded, giving the redhead a confirming nod as he felt his body properly 'sync' to her power once again, Ted's ability returning to dormancy. "I was… in a rough place for a bit… but I think I've got it under control."

"Just so long as you don't mind me sticking around for a bit to be sure you've got it," Kim put in.

"And so long as you remember who's staying really close," Claire put in, giving a slightly flirtatious grin as she moved over to take Peter's hand and give it a confirming squeeze.

As he looked between the two teenage girls and the young man who had done so much to help him even as he tried to protect them over the last few weeks, Peter wasn't sure what his life was going to be like from this point onwards.

The only thing he knew for sure was that, with friends like these, he was going to be in a position to make a very interesting impact on the world…