April 2007, "Powerless"

[ellectrical]

Ten minutes after she had come back to her room, her father left the Facility.

She doesn't actually discover this for another three hours, when she finally wanders into the security office. No one bothers her; she often came in to watch the camera feeds - she had been doing that since she was twelve years old - and everyone had known it was better to ignore her since well before that.

The security logs tell her that her father was gone. Wherever he had went was undisclosed, so he could be back at any time. It's why she doesn't think on it much when they also indicate that Suresh had accessed his lab in the Mendez loft, despite that he was supposed to be in New Orleans. She isn't interested, and heads to her father's office.

There is one stop to double check the key code, but she finds and enters it, and the office is empty. Sunlight gleams in through the windows behind his desk (it's the only room in the Facility in which she sees sunlight – she's never noticed this until now), and she moves to a tall, dark wood shelf that sits to the side of the windows. It's lined with large white filing folders, all imprinted with names: Parkman – Petrelli –

Bishop
Robert

Bishop
Elle

She reaches to pull it out, thinking it will be more difficult with her right arm in this sling, but it quickly doesn't matter. The file is oddly light, too light – her fingers curl around the top, and the folder falls open.

It's empty.

Elle shoves it back on the shelf, and after glaring around the office for a moment, moves over to her father's computer instead. It's not likely that he would keep anything on there if her files are hidden, she knows this, and it's why the first thing she does is to click to his access to the security surveillance system. If he's coming back, she'd rather know that now, before looking for anything else.

But the first images that come up are not from the Facility – they're from the Mendez loft.

"Does Suresh know you have him on video surveillance?" she murmurs to herself. Suresh is there, like he's not suppose to be, doing something in one of the lab tables while... some guy watches.

Too much isn't right about it. Suresh would have left. She can't tell who the man is, he's turned away from the camera, but she does know him, something triggers in her mind –

He turns.

"Sylar."




She clicks the program closed. What she's supposed to do is call her father, find someone else, any agents who are actually on the job right now.

Elle looks to the only photograph her father keeps on his desk – one of himself, on some fishing trip. Nothing he'd ever done with her.





"Daddy, you're going to be so proud of me."


-


In the car, Elle puts her sling back on. She doesn't like it; even if Sylar doesn't have his abilities back (even if he doesn't, who knows what Suresh did in the time it took her to get here), nothing is going to change that she's better with her right than her left. Or really, that she just really hates the sling. But she can't risk Suresh seeing her without it, she can't risk the camera in the Mendez lab filming her without it, so she pulls it on hastily over her shoulder and slams her car door louder than necessary.

The Mendez loft is an elevator ride up to a hall lined with windows on both sides. Those to the right look into the apartment. The blinds are open, she can see them immediately: Suresh, Sylar, and that girl, Molly Walker. They're collected around what looks like someone lying on a cot – Elle can't see enough to recognize who it is, and she doesn't care. She moves quickly to the door, and enters the code on the keypad next to it, making little noise as she opens the door and steps into the apartment.

None of them look up. She takes a step forward on the landing, toward the glass walls that cut between it and the area of the loft where they've gathered.

Comments

[watchmakers_son]

It worked.

As Maya begins to breathe again, in small, shallow gasps, Mohinder stoops to pick up the bullet that fell from the wound in her chest. He examines it, wondering.

The box containing one last vial of the cheerleader's blood -- the blood that can heal anyone, cure anything -- lies open and ignored. Swiftly, before Mohinder can turn his attention in certain other directions, Sylar steps forward and gathers the box into his arms; he shuts it with a firm click and keeps his gun lifted.

"I'm sure Maya will understand if I'm not here when she wakes up," he says, anything but regretful, and starts to back away.

[ellectrical]

And that is as long as Elle can stay quiet.

Her left hand begins to glow with blue sparks, and she moves toward the glass, shouting as a sudden adrenaline rush pounds through her -

"Sylar!"

[watchmakers_son]

He knows that voice. Long ago as it was, he remembers their encounter in the bar, what her job was, what she could do --

He will not stand for interruption when he's this close.

Sylar whirls, and in the same movement, he aims and fires.

[ellectrical]

She ducks (or falls, it's a very quick movement) before the bullet shatters through the glass.

Molly screams at the sound at the sound of shots firing again, but Elle can't see her - the falling shards give her enough time to move completely out of their sight.

And she stays silent now - not to hide, but so that she can hear him.

[watchmakers_son]

He offers her no such courtesy; instead, Sylar pulls the trigger again without pausing to seek her out, or theorize the best place to put a bullet.

It's careless. Reckless.

Sylar can't even attempt to care.

If nothing else, perhaps, it'll offer a distraction as he sprints across Isaac's loft toward the nearest door.

[ellectrical]

The glass falls well away from her - Elle grabs the frame of one of the now shattered walls to pull herself up.

She doesn't have time to think on how this would be easier without the damn sling, only barely enough to register that she can't kill him as she raises her left hand and shoots a bright arc of electricity across the room.

It misses - one of the computers in Mohinder's lab erupts into a shower of white sparks, but she doesn't pause before firing another bolt toward him.

That one doesn't miss.

[watchmakers_son]

The bolt catches him square in the back. As one, every muscle in his body seizes up, white hot and burning; it wrenches the air out of his lungs and jerks him forward, as if being led along on puppet strings. Sylar can't even think through the buzzing pain, let alone try to control his body.

And he's close enough to the glass door that the spasm drags him straight through it with a resounding crash.

He gasps, stumbles, hits the ground hard amid bloodied shards of glass. Struggling to clear the haze from his vision, Sylar looks around. He can't find the gun.

The box, though, didn't land too far away.

He snatches it up and staggers back to his feet, weaving down the hallway.

[ellectrical]

Elle leaps into the room, gaze straying only briefly to Suresh and Molly (who both look fine) and - a woman, she seems familiar, but it's too distant to place - as she runs up to the stairs and through what's left of the door to the other hall.

Glass crunches under her shoes; she glances one way, but runs the other - she can still hear his footsteps.

And once she knows she's beyond what could possibly be Suresh's view, any view from those windows that line the apartment, Elle tears the sling off, leaving it on the floor. It's not worth keeping up the charade anymore.

[watchmakers_son]

Within ten steps, his vision's cleared and his steps have steadied -- at least, enough to move a little faster. Sylar tucks the case closer and lengthens his stride.

There's another door at the end of the hall: an emergency exit, leading out to the alley, presumably. Its alarm's been half torn out; for now, he'll have to take that as enough reassurance that it's broken.

Only for now.

He rams his shoulder into the door and stumbles through.

As it turns out, it doesn't lead to the alley after all.