ellectrical | (no subject)

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Dreamless sleep, or at least not remembering the dreams after, is one unknown benefit of losing too many memories.

It hadn't taken her that long to actually lie across the bed, rest the left side of her head into the pillow, and close her eyes. X being there had helped, but there was little more her body could do, and she could at least be moderately certain she wouldn't set the unmoved bed sheets on fire.

It's several hours, and maybe a couple of IV changes before Elle, having been entirely still her sleep, shifts slightly – she rolls onto her back, and then back to her left side.

After another moment, her eyes open.

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She doesn't say anything. At first.

But very carefully, she reaches up to her throat, and hooks one finger around the necklace that's still there, tucked beneath the neckline of her blouse. She tugs it out - the charm swings a little at the end, and the chain glints gold under the infirmary lights.

Elle knows X will remember that it wasn't gold when she last saw it.

X frowns, gaze flicking from the chain, to Elle's face, and back again.

And after a few moments of silence.

"I do not understand. Your father, he -- "

But why would Elle's father turn --

X goes very still.

"Sylar?"

Elle releases the chain again, letting it fall back against her chest.

"He was dead when I got there."

She was too late. Again. Elle's voice is low, but stays steady.

"I found him, and then I - had to find Sylar."

"I am sorry," X says, shoulders hunching very slightly.

There are things she remembers very well.

Some of them hurt.

"That he -- "

She cuts herself off, because there are some things X does not know how to say. Even when she wants to.

"He ran? Sylar."

The truth is, the only reality that's really sunk into Elle is that whatever happens, she's not going home.

At least, not to the way things were.

So when X's shoulders move, Elle glances away, almost embarrassed at making X -

Well. Her hand moves again but stops short of actually reaching out to X, instead staying still at the edge of the bed.

Then, she shakes her head. "There're - a lot of people like me. In there. I thought he'd - try to find them."

Beat. "And I'm - supposed to have someone. Else."

X's gaze follows the movement of Elle's hand, the aborted gesture that leaves her fingers near the edge of the bed.

She is not sure about acceptable reactions, not completely, but --

X shifts her own position until one of her hands can comfortably rest on the bed next to Elle's, close enough to touch.

In case.

Then --

"He did not try to get to them? The others."

Beat.

"They were not backup?"

And Elle moves her hand in return, just enough for their fingers to touch.

"Most of them - they're like Sylar."

Or herself. She's not sure how else to explain it.

"And we - kept them there, because they did things - killed people or whatever. With their abilities."

She glances down, briefly, before, "But - one of them was Bennet."

"Oh."

X absorbs that, eyes narrowing slightly as she runs through the available data.

Her hand stays right next to Elle's.

"He had abilities? Bennet."

Considering Sylar, the past tense would seem to make sense.

Though X does seem surprised at the thought that Bennet has abilities like theirs.

Just a little.

Elle shakes her head.

"He used to - work for us."

Beat. "And he hates Sylar."

And that was most of what she needed, or had thought she needed, in any case.

"Oh."

She absorbs that, too, running through the possibilities.

Then --

"There was a reason for Sylar not to kill him?"

It does not seem as if it would be difficult, otherwise. Considering.

"Sylar didn't want him."

But Elle thinks she can see the real question, and isn't sure she really knows the answer. It was just what you did. One of us, and one of them.

"But he's - used to dealing with people like us."

A little more quietly, Elle repeats, "I was supposed to have someone else."

Edited 2009-10-18 08:54 (UTC)

X knows about having a handler, but she does not know whether or not this is something similar.

She may not even be thinking about it on those terms.

Which is why she follows Elle's repetition with --

"He did not help? Bennet. Even if Sylar did not want him."

There are uses for distractions, if he could have been one.

Edited 2009-10-19 00:47 (UTC)

"He - shot Sylar. And Sylar could've stopped it, he's telekinetic again, but he didn't."

Elle doesn't touch her necklace once more.

"Claire - he's - like her Dad."

Her voice is becoming stiff, but it's not clear why.

"That's why he left."

X frowns, considering that.

"And it is why he shot Sylar. Because of Claire?"

She falls silent, trying to piece that together.

"Why did Sylar let him?"

Elle shakes her head, very slightly.

"I didn't - he didn't know."

Beat. "So Sylar wanted him to see. When he came back."

"Oh."

X can understand that.

If she were anyone else, she might find that worrisome.

"It was effective? Letting him see?"

"He didn't do anything else. And Sylar threw him."

As angry as she had felt at the time, Elle shifts her free arm into a shrug.

"He didn't get up, then."

X offers her own one-shouldered shrug in reply.

The pause that follows is not very long, but still obvious.

"And that is when Sylar hurt you?"

"We were in a fight."

It's not a sharp correction.

But that's only because it's X.

X nods, just once.

"He would have died if he had not met Claire."

It's half-question, and half confirmation of Elle's earlier words when Kim was around.

It's true. But it's not how Elle starts.

"I - thought I had him down. And then -"

She doesn't know how to explain Jesse Murphy, still has no idea what any of that was about. Instead, she holds out her other hand toward X.

"He thought it'd make me stop."

X is quiet again, gaze flicking from Elle's hand on the bed to her other hand in the air.

It seems as if she is not sure whether she is meant to take it or not.

Some things X is still very bad at.

"But it did not."

X sounds very sure of that.

"I think he is stupid sometimes. Sylar."

Not that this is a bad thing. Just. Sometimes he is.

Elle lowers her hand again, without any sign that she had expected something else.

The fingers of her left hand now curl very slightly around X's.

"It wasn't - I don't usually do that. What stopped him."

Her gaze flickers down to X's hand.

"It's - a lot of it. Like a bomb."

X shifts her own hand so that she can tangle her fingers with Elle's.

Carefully.

It seems the thing to do. And words are --

X is not as good with those.

"But it is effective. When it is necessary."

Beat.

"That is important."

She blinks away from X, down to their hands on the bed.

"It - knocks out the power. In a building."

Or several. For miles.

"Everyone we were keeping there got out."

Her tone is still steady as she says it. Elle might know it's her fault, but now, like then, she's unwilling to make it her job.

Her fingers grip X's tighter, before -

"I could've let him do it. Instead."