Shades of Gray, 3x19 Part 1

The place was falling apart; it was a decrepid old trailer in the middle of the forest, and Claire couldn't help but think that it was so different from how Sylar would have kept his house. The man was a clean freak - by now, she'd noticed this. She'd noticed the way he always kept his toothbrush back on the shelf (never once had he just left it at the side of the sink), how he always capped the toothpaste (even though it was the cheap, motel kind) and how he always folded his towel. This overgrown, musty house was the furthest thing from what she had come to label as 'Sylar' in her head.

He didn't seem to notice, brushing the overgrown shrubs away and forcing his way through the door. She wasn't surprised by the dead animals this time. Instead she steeled herself against the gaze of the stuffed rabbits and otters. It still made the hair on her neck stand though.

She reached for his hand - grasping it tightly within hers; he looked at her oddly, but made no effort to pull away.

The house was quiet, but somehow that was worse.

They walked hand in hand till he reached a glass door; the air was thick and smelled of maybe fifty or so cigarettes. She was taken aback by how glad she was she didn't have to deal with second hand smoke.

There was a man; back turned toward them, sewing up a rabbit. Sylar rapped on the door, and Claire held her breath, crushing his fingers within hers.

"It's open," he called and Sylar withdrew his hand, his face drawing into a tight sneer as he walked through the door.

Claire knew that... Well, she knew that if he tried to kill his father now - she wouldn't be able to stop him.

She followed him anyway.

"...I wasn't aware you were picking it up today." His voice was old, full of cracks here and there.

"I'm not here for a pick-up." He said with disdain. "I'm your son."

Samson Gray had nerves of steel. He didn't seem surprised by this news at all - he lifted his head but didn't turn.

"Ah..." He turned, a familiar smirk on his face. "I see." He shrugged. "What brings you all the way out here?"

Sylar snorted, knocking over some tools on a table, flippantly making his way closer to his prey. Claire stood, back tensed, ready to pounce if she had to. There was something about this man - despite his less-than-impressive make, the hunched over effort of his shoulders, intelligence, the cunning of a snake glinted behind his eyes. Not the curious cleverness that Sylar had - no, his cleverness was cruel.

"And who's your friend?" His eyes crawled over her and Claire lit him on fire silently with her eyes.

"I was looking for answers..." Sylar said, ignoring his question. "I had questions about myself. I wanted to know where I came from. And then I found out..." He smiled with that bitter twist. "You killed my mother." He said the last part quietly, and Claire shivered inside.

"So?" Claire's lips twisted unpleasantly as the man turned back to his work-table, snipping the thread and knotting it carefully. As if it were okay to be accused of murdering your wife. As if everything was fine.

"So..." Sylar didn't seem surprised at his father's flippant attitude. She wondered briefly if he saw any of himself in the man - because she didn't. Or if she did, she was blocking it out.

"I kill you."

His father snorted. "It's either you or the cancer." He gave them a smile over his shoulder, completely at ease. "I'd prefer not to draw it out."

He got up abruptly and headed toward the backdoor. "I haven't got all day.." He threw over his shoulder. Claire stared at Sylar's back, tensing and relaxing constantly before he followed his father out the door.

Claire stayed where she was and tried not to stare the dead rabbit in the eyes.

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Lyle watched Alex get on the train, and was helpless to retain the soaring feeling that swelled in his heart.

This felt good.

He felt... Connected, somehow. And even though he'd got a mini-heart attack sneaking Alex out of his house, putting him in a grungy motel downtown for a few days and pulling him a fake ID from a friend, it was worth it to know he'd saved someone.

And someone good, judging from the few days he'd spent with the guy. It made him feel less like Lyle and more like Claire's brother.

He liked it, he decided, smiling.

His phone beeped and he jerked. He was getting a Pavlovian response to it now, with Rebel texting him every five minutes to update him on who was watching and what to do.

Good job, you ready to do this again?

Lyle breathed heavily, fingers hesitating over the keys.

Yes.

He pushed his phone back into his pocket and doubted his reply the rest of the drive home.

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There were only two of them and Ando felt painfully aware of the fact.

Hiro, however had not been phased. But then again, he hardly ever was.

Rebel had texted them twice over the hour, telling them to stay put, that someone would be coming, a girl, he said, with Peter Petrelli and Matt Parkman and they would help them to save Daphne.

Ando sighed again and waited, sipping from the American coffee they called a 'cappuccino'.

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"A man needs a hobby." Sylar glanced up at his father, needling through the rabbits soft fur. He could see Claire from where they were sitting. She was leaning on her hand, eyes closed and expression perturbed. He drew his eyes away, focusing back on his father.

"Something to occupy his hands." His father continued, and he recognized the curious look in his father's eyes when he looked at him. Sylar narrowed his eyes in response. "To stop the mind from thinking so much."

"I fix watches." He said, and then, reproachfully. "I wanted to please my father."

Samson just smiled. "How did that work out for you?"

The knot in Sylar's stomach, the one that wanted his father to pay with every breath in his body dissipated. He felt defeated by his father's nonchalance. By his lack of guilt. It tasted bitter in his mouth.

What was the point of making a person who didn't feel anything about their crimes, pay?

Samson sighed. "I guess the apple doesn't fall very far from the tree, anyway."

Sylar sneered. "I'm not your apple. You don't know anything about me."

Samson laughed. "Please. You and me must have something in common. Our powers are just one of the many." He stroked his goatee pensively while Sylar tried to unfurl his clenched fists.

"Take our victims, for example. All helpless, really not fair. Like that rabbit." His eyes glinted. "And that girl." He jutted his chin in the direction of Claire.

Sylar's jaw clenched. "She's not a victim."

"Isn't she?" His father asked, stabbing his needle through the skin of his rabbit. "What have you taken from her?" His father raised his eyebrows as he posed the question. "Her freedom? Her free will?" His father shrugged, smirking unpleasantly. "Girl's like her don't walk around with men like us without getting hurt, son."

Sylar snarled, mind flashing unpleasantly to Elle lying on a beach, thin red line drawn across her forehead. He pulled on the needle too hard and it rammed into his finger. He hissed, removing it and smirking as the cut knitted itself back together. He couldn't help himself. Claire's power was a trophy - something he held in a place of pride.

He felt even better when he saw Samson's face; mouth agape and eyes wondrous.

He raised a finger and cut into his palm, holding it up for Samson to see as he healed. "Where'd you get that?" Samson asked, reaching for Sylar's hand and wiping the trail of blood away, eyes lighting up as he saw the perfect skin left behind.

"That victim over there." Sylar drawled, jerking his head in Claire's direction. "It's rather hard to be a victim when you can't be one."

"Physically, I suppose." Samson said mildly. "But mentally I'd bet that girl's more scarred than a war veteran." He smiled up at Sylar, but there was something else in his expression now, something that Sylar recognized as greed. He saw it in himself often enough. "And you know that. And you still crave affection from her, like you crave it from me."

"I don't need affection from anyone." Sylar growled.

"Craving and needing are very different things, son." Samson said, eyes hungry. "You want a connection, I understand. But in time you'll learn that the only thing people are good for is disappointment."

Sylar tilted his head, watching his father carefully as he posed his next question. "Is that why you killed my mother?"

Samson glanced up from his work, lips pursing slightly. "Why you abandoned me?" Samson looked away, eyes pensive and shoulders tensed.

When he looked back at Sylar, his eyes were clear. There was no particular emotion there - annoyance, perhaps slight remorse. The kind of remorse you would feel if you fed your goldfish to the cat. It wasn't particularly comforting.

"I - I don't even remember." Samson said, and Sylar pursed his lips. "It doesn't even matter to me. So few things do." He turned back to his work. Sylar stared at him for a moment.

He'd learned one thing, perhaps, from this visit. He was not his father.

The knowledge was more comforting than anything he'd ever experienced. He rose to his feet and walked calmly back to the house. "Got all the answers you needed then?" Samson called after him.

"I don't need any answers from you." He retorted, lip curling as he swung open the screen door to the house. Claire jerked awake; she'd fallen asleep.

"We're leaving." He told her shortly.

Her eyebrows furrowed. "So soon?"

Sylar walked on, not stopping to explain. "You're welcome to stay if you want."

There was a soft 'shiook' and he heard Claire cry out, and then another 'shiook' and he groaned as something pierced through his body.

"What the hell are you doing?" He snarled, already picking at the arrow embedded in his body. The second one made him cry out. Then there was a noise, a whistling sound. He looked up, his father's hands outstretched toward him and his eyes focused on Claire as she struggled. Everything blurred and his eyes closed.

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Noah could only keep replaying the conversation he'd had with Micah over and over again.

"I know where your daughter is." The boy had said. Noah felt the numb defeat he'd felt settle through his body leave, replaced by adrenaline and invigoration.

"Tell me."

"The last I caught them was at a motel in North Dakota called Huntsmans. There was someone else I was looking for there and I ran across two names - alias's that looked like Claire's fingerprints. A booking under the name Noah Bennet. I looked into it and there they were."

"Thank you, Micah."

"Good luck, Noah." The line went dead.

Noah turned to the map on his wall. The Claire Map. He marked North Dakota off with a red 'x' and studied it carefully. Arlington to North Dakota. All heading in the same direction with a few twists here and there to throw them off. Why was Sylar headed in that direction? It wasn't just a regular hunt - Sylar was working in a fixed direction, which denoted a particular destination.

He had to consider Sylar's intentions.

He dialed in a memorized number, waiting somewhat impatiently for the answer.

"Angela Petrelli. Tell her it's Noah Bennet." There was a brief pause, and then the line went dead.

Noah scowled and slammed the phone back on the desk. It looked like he'd have to do his own research, then.

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"Nooooooo.." The sound was long drawn-out and unnatural, a sound so full of terror and fear that it made him tremble inside. He forced his eyes to open, and he saw it.

Claire was held up against the wall, eyes closed and tears already streaming down her face as she struggled futilely against the telekinesis holding her against the wall. He could feel her fear with every fiber in his being; he could understand her pain. Her fear of being the victim again; the un-ending victim of everyone and anyone who coveted her power, powerless to stop even the worst people from receiving eternal life. He could feel it.

The knowledge hit him over the head like a ton of bricks.

"Please..." She begged, and it was a hopeless sound full of despair. "Please." She said again, voice catching and the word ended in a sob.

"Shh..." His father crooned, brandishing a knife in his hand and drawing a faint line over her forehead with it. She visibly shivered at his touch, and Sylar had enough of watching.

His father plunged the knife forward, but Sylar was already there, his mind forcing the blade backward with such force that Samson flew into the table, tools clattering to the floor at the force.

"You don't get to touch her."

He didn't even remember removing the arrow. He was holding his father up against the wall, his mental hands snared around his neck - he could crush it, slowly and -

"No." There was something warm in the middle of his back. Claire. He closed his eyes, and he heard his father drop to the floor.

"Claire." He turned, and it felt natural to cup her face with his hands, natural to hold it there and brush away her tears with his thumbs. She didn't pull away, just stared up at him with confused, tempestuous green eyes, mouth hanging open slightly. He didn't say anything more, couldn't allow himself to, but he stayed the way he was, fingers on her cheeks, watching her look at him. Until - Claire jerked away from him, pushing herself in front of him to shield him from the arrow rushing towards him, but he was prepared this time.

He simply flung the arrow away, discarding it in the careless fashion one might discard a winter coat in the summer.

"You. You are going to die." Sylar promised.

"No." Claire was there again, tugging at his shirt, and he could feel the warmth of her fingers there, tugging at his heart and mind.

"He hurt you, Claire." He tried not to say it like it was important, that he hurt her. "He killed my mother." He was pleading with her. "He sold me like I was something to be traded."

Claire looked him in the eyes, her own screaming with anger and mutiny and he thought that maybe - Maybe she would let him.

But then she said again, her voice softer. "No." The relief hit him hard, and he relented.

"Please." She said, softer still, and clasped his hand in hers. "I just want to leave."

He looked back at Samson, held pathetically up by invisible strings, his breathing ragged and wanting, eyes bulging from his face, and let him drop. He clattered to the floor, a puppet without strings.

"Lucky man." He said, already turning away, the tears starting to cluster at the bottom of his throat. This was his legacy then. He smiled bitterly at the thought.

"Kill me." Samson rasped behind him, and Sylar froze like he'd been struck. His fingers twitched with the temptation, but Claire was already there, and she slapped the man across the face with such force that his glasses flew off his face, smacking the wall and clattering loudly to the floor.

"Don't tempt me more than I already am." She hissed. "But you know what? We're going to leave you alive, just so you can watch the days go by and watch yourself die little by little; helpless to do anything to stop it." Her lips curved in a venomous smile. "Not everyone grows old. Not everyone dies."

And then she rose to her feet, brushing past him as she all but ran past him to the door. He allowed himself one last look at his father, gasping for air and pathetic, before he left too.

Small game.

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Angela stared tight-lippedly at the map. Past, present and future.

The future was obviously the problem, she thought. She had seen it - Nathan dying and Parkman saving him, but then she had dreamt of something different and she didn't understand. The future hardly ever turned on it's axis like that.

She sighed, and sat, turning her head from the wall where she had everything marked out. Occasionally, she would have to wait to see her opponents hand. She tapped on her lip thoughtfully and pressed '2' on her speed dial.

"Rene."

"Mrs. Petrelli."

"How is that little assignment of yours going?"

"I cannot find who you seek, but I have found someone who he cares for."

"Better than nothing, I suppose." Angela scoffed, but her body hummed with excitement. "What's their name?"

"I believe she is called Vanessa Wheeler."

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"Claire?" She was waiting impatiently by the door of the car, foot tapping impatiently on the ground. When she saw him she opened the door and got in, and he followed suit wordlessly.

They drove in silence for maybe a half hour before she spoke.

"Pull over." She said, face shrouded by golden hair.

"Why?"

"Just do it." Rolling his eyes for show more than any real annoyance, he did as she asked.

The minute the car stopped he was assaulted, she lunged herself onto his lap, and then her shoulders were shaking and she was sobbing noiselessly onto his chest. His arms found their place on her back without having to think about it, his hands softly running over her back in soothing, repetitive circles.

Her arms crept up around his neck tentatively, then all at once they were intertwined there. "I'm sorry." She whispered into his neck. "I'm so sorry." He closed his eyes and breathed her in.

Hey there! A lot of Sylaire here, I know, I've practically abandoned the rest of the storyline with them, but the reason is *deep breath* Sylaire will be parting ways in the next chapter, but their relationship, as you can see above, is evolving already into something more. Soooo, to accomadate this big change, the next chapter is going to be very Sylaire-centric as well. After that the plot will be focused on a bit more, with sparse Sylaire moments in between. I hope you enjoy this chapter and the next, as much as I enjoyed writing them. The next update will be in late October or early November. Thanks for spurring me on with all your feedback and support, and I hope this was worth the wait:)