Rating: R
Characters: Claire/Sylar with shades of one sided Peter/Claire
Summary: He grunts, she gasps and her body spasms, jerks out. Oh, he says and she feels his hands inside her, gentle and careful, searching for what he came for.
Authors Note: Many thanks to jazmin22, my awesome beta. This story is a partial episodic tag for 3x01-The Second Coming.
Claire marvels at her own quietness, at the shallow and desperate draws for breath her body makes stilted under Sylar's hands. She can smell both their blood, taste the iron in the air. He grunts, she gasps and her body spasms, jerks out. Oh, he says and she feels his hands inside her, gentle and careful, searching for what he came for. She doesn't realize then, his breathe hot across her brow, that this would be her last memory of pain.
-
In the shower she cries with water hot enough to scald, cries for herself and for everything that's been taken from her. She rubs her skin raw, washes away the memory of his hands on her, inside her. She stays until the water turns cold, until she can trust herself not to cry, not drown in the agony she feels building inside.
Later she is calm for her mother, unmovable and firm when she asks.
Did he?
No, no, not that and Claire says because she does not know the words to tell her mother what he took, that what he stole from her was so much worse.
-
Claire chooses the train because it's bigger, grander than anything she's tried before. The first time she hesitates, fear and worry all bundled up inside because there's still some ragged belief left to her; but by the sixth time, when she drowns in her own blood, it's gone.
After that, death comes easy. Like falling asleep.
-
Peter comes, like he always does but he's different this time, changed in some way she doesn't understand. He pulls her close, his body a familiar comfort but he speaks to her like she isn't there and she's drowning in what he doesn't say.
Please she begs. I need someone to help me, to teach me.
No, not me, Claire he says and his eyes are colder, crueler than she remembers. The anger that boils up inside after he leaves surprises her. It's something new, something clean and pure from deep inside. She realizes, three years too late, that Peter Petrelli was never going to be the one that would help her.
-
Her father brings Sylar home, when her mother and Lyle are out, when she's supposed to be out. She doesn't see her father at first, only him in the kitchen and she stares, blinded by the flash of terror that steals through her. She doesn't scream, doesn't make a sound and it isn't until she sees her father, quick with his words and his hands that she remembers to breathe.
Sylar doesn't move towards her but he smiles, all teeth, "Hello, Claire."
She doesn't like her name in his mouth, the familiar curl of his voice around the letters.
"Honey," her father starts and she knows this tone, the expression on her father's face. She knows the words he's going to say; she's heard them a thousand times. "Trust me," he says, "It's going to be ok."
"Of course," she agrees and feels something shifting inside, an old wound reopening.
The lie taste bitter in her mouth.
-
It's Sylar that tells her about Peter.
She finds him in level 5, laid out on the stone table, pale and still. He's so lifeless that it scares Claire and she thinks about homecoming, about Kirby Plaza and swallows back tears, throat burning. She doesn't want to cry and she's shaking with the effort not to when the door creaks behind her, groaning under its own weight. Claire doesn't turn around, she stares at the concrete wall and pushes down the fear that's sprung up inside her. "What happened to him?" She asks.
"He has the hunger."
"Is he," she starts, the words lodging in her throat, "is he going to be ok?"
"Probably not," Sylar says and she can feel the heat of him behind her, the intensity of his presence. "We have to go back," he says and Claire reaches out to touch Peter, to press her fingers to his cheek.
His skin is cold beneath her hands.
-
She trips on the stairs on her way out, emotions all tied together and it's some long forgotten human instinct buried inside that makes him reach for her, touch the soft skin of her elbow to steady her. She turns away from him, tries to jerk away but his hand tightens around her. It's not painful but the pressure is uncomfortable and he stares at her, features heavy with some emotion she doesn't know.
His mouth opens to speak but her father rounds the corner unexpectedly, eyes dark when he sees Sylar's hand on her. He moves forward, swift with anger to pull Claire away and Sylar's expression hardens, sours with rage.
"Claire, did he hurt you?" her father asks, hands careful around her arm as he leads her away, out of Sylar's eye line.
She knows he can hear them still; that he can hear everything she could say, everything she will say.
"No," she tells her father, surprised by the truth.
-
Sylar crowds her into the corner, silences her with a hand over her mouth as the men run past, their frantic shouts of fear and terror drowned out by the staccato beat of her own heart. She can hear her father and the other men from the company dimly, the discharge of guns and screams. She closes her eyes, face awash with anguish and she starts at the gentle hands that fall over her ears. When she looks up all she sees is the pale expanse of Sylar's neck, the black stubble of his hair across his chin. There's a faint buzzing sound in her ears but the sound of those men dying is gone.
Claire counts the heartbeats that pass before he pulls away, grimaces as the world rushing back in with his absence. Her father is there a second later, hands on her face and shoulders, worried words bubbling out of him. "Thank God you're all right, I thought-we thought Arthur's men had taken you."
"No," Claire says, tries to smile past her fathers concern. "Sylar," she starts, swallowing down the rough edges of his name, "hid me, kept me safe."
"Oh, Claire," her father says, pulls her close and over his shoulders she watches Sylar, a dark shadow in the corner.
-
In the end she comes to him, down in level 5 with Peter only a few feet away. It's all that is left to her, the only answer to this terrifying numbness that's swallowed her whole. Sylar looks washed out, face pale against the white cotton of his clothes and he looks nothing like before, there's no menace in his expression. Claire stares at his bare feet through the window until he turns, expression blank except for the curious tilt of his head. Claire doesn't know why she's here, why she lets herself into his cell. There's fear inside her, something that'll always be there, no matter how much time passes. It's something sharp and hot inside her belly, something living. Despite it though, she does not flinch away like she expects when his hand falls to her face.
His fingers are cold, smooth and hard like marble across her cheek. He presses a thumb against her lip, presses until she opens her mouth, breath heavy and hot across his skin. She watches his eyes widen, the slight part of his lips. He crowds her against the concrete wall, into the shadows of his cell before he kisses her. His hand is gentle when he cups her neck but his mouth is hungry and seeking against hers as he holds her still. She doesn't push him away, doesn't deny him despite the roll of disgust and hate that rush through her. She feels…alive, whole again. She's drowning in her own senses,; in the soft, wetness of his mouth, the burn of his stubble against her chin, and the press of his thumb against the wild pulse of her neck.
"I painted this," he breathes, lips ghosting over her own, eyes searching. "Painted this in Isaac's loft last year."
His smile is lazy when he pulls away from her, loose with pride like he's won something.
-
"I'm always going to be a part of your life, Claire. I'm going to be a constant," he whispers. Claire shudders against the promise, hates the way her body trembles, a strange mix of fear and want that keeps her awake at night. She doesn't know what to do with this tangle of emotions inside. It used to be easy when there was just that sharp feel of anger and hate.
She wants to throw hurtful words at him but they are alone and all she can manage is a weak, breathy sigh before, "I know." Claire thinks about the knife in her pocket, imagines the hot, slick feel of his blood against her hands. She knows how he'd shudder in pain and laughter at her feeble attempts. She can't kill him, no more then she can kill herself. She doesn't know what to do with the knowledge that he'll be her only constant in the years to come, when the world changes around her and everyone she knows, every anchor she has is gone.
Just him and eternity.