Sylar

Dissect a trillion sighs away -- will you get this letter?
Jagged pulp sliced in my veins, I write to remember
'Cause I'm a million miles away -- will you get this letter?
Jagged pulp sliced in my veins, I write to remember

War, he learns fairly quickly, is not pretty. Not that he was expecting it to be, but there's a difference between being told, hearing countless stories from Adam over the years, and actually seeing. Shadows of pain and death linger in every corner of the wasted battlefield, bathing him in horror as they latch on to an ability to empathize that's only grown stronger over the years. Could have dones and what ifs creep into the way he frames his shoulders, weighing him down. And all of it -- every corpse that used to house a friend that he stumbles by as his body puts itself back together; every voice he can make out, shrieking into the night as they suffer themselves to death, unable to be saved -- it takes a toll on him.

He manages to hide it from Claire, barely as she's known him for centuries now, and feigns tiredness after every battle, retreating to the barracks to try to remember how to breathe. It doesn't quite work for him, no matter how many times he tastes the horror that is war, but at least it gives him clarity of mind enough to block some of it out, pulling his arms away from his chest as the chill battle has left in its wake fades. He takes a moment, every time, to wonder why he came out here in the first place, and what it would cost to leave, and then he thinks better of it.

He's never been one to abandon the things that matter to him, too possessive even in his old age to change his opinions in that field, and he won't leave Claire to suffer the war alone. She's gotten so cold as the years have gone by, but he still likes to think things like this affect her in some way, and besides. He's seen what happens if he's not here -- his aptitude has gifted him with the ability to see how time lines run if he focuses hard enough, and he knows it's not pretty. He won't condemn her to that.

Pushing it out of mind, as he doesn't want to dwell too long on the things that hurt, in the wake of a sting of pain too sharp as it is, he sits on the bed for what feels like forever, blank. Then, slowly, he shifts, reaching for the trunk that he keeps at the end of the cot. He rifles through it, pushing away the things he's squirreled away over the course of the war -- clothing he never wears, weapons, and so on -- finding a stack of letters, bound in a leather cord, hiding at the bottom of the trunk.

He pulls them out, unwrapping them slowly, and sinks back into the cot as he settles them in his lap.

One by one, he reads them over, his own words, penned on anything he could find, and meant to be sent to Mohinder. He's never gotten around to sending them, isn't sure he even can this far out, but it doesn't stop him from writing them. The letters help him remember that somewhere, far away from here, things are saner -- that the Indian is waiting for him, somewhere. That the pain and fear and terror won't follow him home, when this is all over. That there's something untouched back home.

Marginally comforted, he pushes them out of his lap and leans over into the trunk again, pulling out a stub of a pencil he's managed to find and hold onto and a smattering of paper scraps. They're not much, but they're enough he figures, and that in mind, he rocks back, setting what little open space he has on folded legs and sets to writing. And slowly but surely, as he talks about things that have little to do with war and death, the chill falls away from his heart, giving him the strength to fight another day. Guiding him another day closer to being able to go home, to being able to see him.


Muse: Gabriel Gray (Sylar)
Fandom: Heroes
Word Count: 663 (without lyrics)
Note: Lyrics are from One Armed Scissor by At the Drive-In, and were included for flavor because they helped inspire the writing.

The world is ending, literally. Not that there aren't other worlds, other planets just as good as Earth sewn out among the stars that humanity is retreating to, but Earth itself is done. He shouldn't be surprised. Hell, he's not, having seen this coming for ages, and all without ever having to be a mind-reader or a precog, the signs all there as plain as day, humanity busily destroying their home. He shouldn't be surprised and he's not, but he is surprised to find that, even with all his foresight, it still hurts. He's seen decades of slow ruin, but he's never quite grieved for the looming loss of his planet--not until now.

He stands on what passes for a hill these days, the thing not made of stone or dirt or grass but of ruined buildings, looking down at what used to be New York. It hasn't been for years (decades? centuries? time is meaningless to him) of course, humanity renaming and rebuilding, before moving higher to carefully constructed platforms, leaving what once was to fester and decay, but he can still see it for what it once was. Home. Shining and alive. Maybe the memory has been tarnished by time, as he doesn't stop to think about all the darker areas of town that he used to use as his hunting grounds, back whe he was a younger man. Nor does he pay much attention to the sirens screaming into the distance, demanding evacuation. He'll go when he's damn ready, and not a moment sooner; he has things to say goodbye to, first.

Taking a deep breath, he throws himself off the hill, landing on the time-ruined pavement below, flawlessly. He lingers there for a moment, half-crouched and poised on the balls of his feet, and then he's pulling himself to his full height, weaving through the ruins leisurely. His fingers brush the remains of civilization as he passes, catching ghosts out of the corners of his eyes and on the edges of his hearing. He's out of practice using his abilities, but he can still make out phantoms, and he smiles a bit, though there's no joy in the expression. Leave it to him to torture himself in order to mourn. It's what he's always done, from the moment he started writing prayers on the walls of the back room of his apartment.

A sigh, letting out the air he'd drawn in a moment before, and he pulls his fingers away from stone and mortar, letting the remains of the city sleep for now, and moves further into the steelbound chaos. And it comes as a small shock to find what he's looking for among the wreckage. He wasn't expecting it to survive, not quite sure why he bothered looking in the first place, but there it is. Mohinder's loft. His home, moreso than his apartment, for more years than he bothers counting for.

He lets himself in effortlessly--not that it's much of an effort, really, the door long since missing--and meanders over to the explosion of New York on the floor, near-colorless now, thanks to time. Soundlessly, he sits down, and presses his hands to the ground, palms flat, summoning up shadows of him and the geneticist. They're welcome, the scenes that play out in ghostlight a comfort to watch, given what he pulled from the city moments ago, but he doesn't need them. He worked out how to keep him an age ago, even if he couldn't do the same for anyone else, not fast enough, and he knows Mohinder is waiting for him somewhere now, probably wondering where the hell he disappeared off to.

No, he's not here for this, and so he pushes further, eyes shuttering closed as he peels back layers of time and memory to find Mendez. And Nakamura. And his mother, the few times he was here. And so on and so forth, until he's covered everyone he's ever killed or lost; everyone who's ever been here.

He mutters apologies like prayers, putting his ghosts to bed one by one, and then he's pulling his hands away from the floor with a sharp intake of breath, his eyes snapping open. He sits there for a moment, no longer haunted, and then he's getting to his feet to move for the door. He hesitates, turns, and reaches for the watch at his wrist, still broken and still a festering scar. A moment of silence, and then for perhaps only the second time since he took the timepiece's name, he's taking it off, setting it down on the remains of the counter in the kitchen.

It's hard, so many good memories there, tangled with the bad ones and just a touch away, but he figures if he's going to put the past to rest, he needs to let go of the one thing still holding him back. Let it waste away, just like what remains of Earth. Let that person, the killer, sleep.

It's about time to leave the past behind, after all.


Muse: Gabriel Gray (Sylar)
Fandom: Heroes
Word Count: 837

"Captain?"

Sylar, or Gabriel Sylar as he was calling himself these days, looked up from the cargo manifest from their most recent job, frowning. Whether the expression was directed at his crewman or had simply been lingering distaste for the simplicity and subsequent tedium of their work, however, was anyone's guess, but regardless, he didn't look happy. And despite the fact that over the course of five hundred and some years, he'd managed to get a handle on his sanity, no longer one to fly off the handle over the smallest of things, there was still an unspoken rule on the ship. When the captain ain't happy, ain't nobody happy. So, naturally, his crewman retreated a few steps to linger in the doorway, not wanting to be caught simply standing in the middle of the common room.

"There's a wave waitin' for you," the boy started finally, considering the floor intently. A pause, and then hesitantly, he added, "It's that man from Londinium."

Not Mohinder--if it had been him, his crewman would have called him by name, or at very least referred to him as the doctor, as had become the norm. Not Sark either, as usually he let Baileigh put out the transmission, and then came on screen only once he was sure Sylar was alone--he was Alliance and they both knew that that wouldn't sit well with his crew, considering most of them were Browncoats. So that left only one person and that explained the mild stab of fear he could sense from the boy.

"Adam." The jury was still out on Adam, though most of his boys were convinced he was bad news in one way or another. It was almost funny, considering the fact that their ship had been a gift from the man himself, and he couldn't help but crack a small smile at the irony. "I'll take it in my cabin."

The kid nodded, retreating back out of the common room in full now, and an instant later, Sylar was on his feet, moving to follow him out, then heading towards his room. Settling down in a chair, he sighed, pressing his fingers to his nose briefly as he hoped this wasn't some sort of bad news, and then he was flicking on the screen on the table. Adam's face appeared on it a moment later, and all hopes for good news evaporated.

"Hello, Gabriel."

"Adam." He nodded a bit, frowning. "What happened?"

The other immortal flashed him a small, wry smile. "You need to come home."

"What happened?" he repeated, teeth clenching, his jaw steeled.

For a moment, Adam looked thoughtful, the sound of his fingers drumming on the desk caught on the recording, then he shook his head almost imperceptibly. "I'm afraid it's more than a little complicated, really, but ... details." He shrugged. "All you really need to know is this: Suresh needs you."

"We're on Persephone. I can be there by tomorrow morning." He barely paused long enough for Adam to register the fact that he had changed the subject, however minutely. "If he's dead or hurt--"

"He's fine," he assured him. "Physically fine, just upset."

"About what?"

"Get here, first. I'll fill you in, after you've seen to him." Assuming Mohinder didn't tell him first, and that much hung in the air, unspoken by either of them.

And Sylar let that linger for a moment, frowning, before he nodded. "I'll be there tomorrow morning," he said again, as if Adam had missed it the first time. Another pause, and then, "I'll see you then."

Then he was killing the screen, on his feet in a flash a second time that day, though this time his destination was the cockpit. He loomed in the doorway when he reached it, his shadow stretching out of his pilot, his niece, that and his expression more than a touch dangerous--something he hadn't been since the war. And forever covering fear with anger, unmoving, he hissed five simple words to Claire.

"Get us to Londinium. Now."


Muse: Gabriel Gray (Sylar)
Fandom: Heroes
Word Count: 671
Note: Adam is changehistory and is used with permission.