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Perchance To Dream (Gen, AU, 2/2)

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  • Perchance To Dream (Gen, AU, 2/2)

    Title: Perchance To Dream (2/2)

    Characters: Claire, HRG, Sandra Bennet, Elle Bishop, Angela Petrelli, Nathan Petrelli, and Peter Petrelli (Others
Mentioned)
    Rating: PG-13
for themes and language

    Type: AU, Gen


    Disclaimer: Copyright of Heroes is held by the respective owners. No infringement is intended.


    Spoiler alert: Spoilers through #3.09


    Summary: Elle visits with revelations and consequences.


    Noah Bennet drove his daughter to their new Costa Verde home after cheerleading practice, so they could talk. “What’s bothering you, Sweetheart?”

    “I’ve been thinking about Oscar Leeson,” answered Claire after a long silence. “About whether it was right for him to clean up my mess.”

    “Could you have dealt with Sylar on your own?,” asked Bennet.

    “No,” Claire replied.

    “Then, you had to use someone else,” said Bennet coolly.

    “An innocent man may be trapped forever with a killer inside the Deathscape end of a black hole, and it’s about use?” Claire fought her rising temper.

    “No, Claire-Bear,” answered her father. “It’s about catalysts – the things and people that cause everything important and meaningful to happen in the world. You and our family are my catalysts, my meaning.”

    “So, as long as we’re okay,” continued Claire, “everything’s justifiable? That’s scary, Dad.”

    “I know, Baby,” he said.

    “And before this family, before Mom? What were your catalysts, then?,” she asked. Claire would ponder his answer all of her life and all of her deaths.

    “I had none before your mother,” he answered.

    Saying that, he drove up to the garage, a message burned into the door: “POM POM, TALK INSIDE! ELLE”

    “Peachy,” said father and daughter in unison.

    Inside, they found Sandra and Lyle Bennet sitting at the dining room table with Elle Bishop. Lyle was singed; Elle was wet; Sandra was stricken. There were files in front of them. “Look at these, Noah,” said Sandra, crying. “Look at them, Claire.”

    There were three files in all, labeled “Claire Bennet,” “Adam Monroe,” and “Project Folly,” respectively. Pushing aside their anger toward Elle, father and daughter did as they were asked. Both read, and both absorbed the contents – blood supply, selective breeding, and immortality. When Claire finally spoke, she said to Bennet, “When I accused you of adopting me as part of an experiment, I was accidentally right. I was just yelling at the wrong family member.”

    Claire spoke those words into her father’s chest, as the family held on to each other for dear life. Bennet focused, telling Claire, “You’ll need false documentation, short and long-term capital, deep cover training, and…”

    “Catalysts,” she said, kissing her father, mother, brother, and dog on the head.

    “I’m being ignored,” now dry Elle said petulantly, ball of electricity in hand.

    Bennet spoke, her display flickering to nothing, as he met her gaze. “What do you want, Elle?”

    “Irony’s a *****,” she said. “I want my past in exchange for the cheerleader’s. According to those files, her blood can heal memories back.”

    Sandra put her hand on Elle’s arm. “Noah tried to protect me by having that man who takes memories take mine. I got sick from it, got better, and relapsed after we moved into this house.”

    Sandra continued, as she poured Elle a glass of chocolate milk. “Claire figured if her blood could bring her dad back from the dead, it could help me out before I was dead.”

    “It worked, right?,” Elle asked, expectantly.

    “It did,” affirmed Sandra, “and I’m happy I recognize the people I love. But, I have to live with everything else I remember, now, and so would you.”

    Elle drank the chocolate milk and sat deep in thought. “I have to,” she finally said.

    “But, you don’t have to, Claire,” said Sandra. “You’re not a blood bank.”

    “No, I’m not,” agreed Claire. “I’m a Bennet.”

    Claire got the infusion paraphernalia she kept for family emergencies. She watched as Elle took her blood, injected her blood, and screamed as the memories returned with her blood. Elle screamed pain, lithium, glass, and gold. Claire died, as Elle screamed agonized electricity into her body. Claire died, as she absorbed the echoes of tests her father had fought to spare her.

    Within the Deathscape, Claire explored a large, well-kept hedge maze. She found tower structures dotted amid the straight paths and dead ends. These towers were odd in that they were shaped like D.N.A. helixes and had no entrances. At the center of the maze, Claire found Angela, Nathan, and Peter Petrelli standing around a large, old-fashioned, wooden bed. The occupant of the bed, an older man, appeared to be connected to life support machines. Nathan and Peter were glaring at their mother and the unresponsive man in turns. Unsure, Claire stood behind a center hedge, listening to their conversation.

    “I don’t know which is crazier, Ma,” said Nathan, angrily, “the fact that you poisoned Dad, or the reason why.”

    “It’s perfectly reasonable that a leader shouldn’t send others somewhere he isn’t prepared to go himself,” Angela defended. “I saw how the Futurescape intersected with the Deathscape, knew that many would be crossing the curtain, if our plans were successful. I thought I’d convinced your father he should be our representative among the dead, since Adam couldn’t be trusted. But, his first two suicide attempts were half-hearted, so I decided to help him along.”

    “If this is what you wanted,” asked Nathan, “why are you so bitter about it?”

    “Because,” Angela answered icily, “I learned that love was over-rated and that your father was as weak as Linderman warned me he would be. He should’ve trusted my vision. Instead, he gave into fear and became a paralyzed husk within the Deathscape, when he should be moving freely.”

    “Don’t you get how presumptuous that is, Mom?,” asked Peter. “You can’t look at the edges of death and assume you know what the whole experience will be or whether anyone’s reaction to it is weak. And say Dad had been the representative,” he continued. “His view was so warped that he would’ve found dead people to be as flawed as living ones, destroying the utopia Adam inspired just when it was created.”

    At this point, Claire entered their center space. “Hello,” she said, softly, glancing at her grandfather.

    “What are you doing here?,” asked Nathan, concerned. “I told you to live.”

    “Stuff happened,” said Claire matter-of-factly. “We need to talk.”

    When Claire finished explaining, she watched the Deathscape forms of her biological father and uncle turn colors she had never seen before. Nathan spoke, struggling with reality. “They paid Meredith to take fertility drugs and have you, so they’d have a replacement for Monroe they could control. So, they’d have a permanent…” He winced at the word.

    “So, they’d have a permanent test subject, blood supply, and indestructible bomb maker,” finished Peter.

    “What I saw came to pass,” said Angela within the Futurescape. “But, free will altered the context a bit. Meredith was supposed to give us Claire for $100,000 – money she took. But, she got attached, and made things difficult. So, you ended up with the Bennets, Claire, and things stayed difficult.” Her grandmother smiled ruefully.

    “Not that I’m complaining, but, why am I with the Bennets?,” asked Claire. “Why didn’t you just bring me into the Company?”

    “While I appreciated your future contributions to our plans,” answered Angela, “I didn’t want you to become Elle. Bob Bishop has no concept of parenting.” At this, Angela’s sons and granddaughter shook their heads in disbelief.

    Later, alive, Claire did homework. Bennet knocked, entering the room with a sober expression on his face. “Bob’s dead – fried, face forward, in his desk chair.”

    Claire nodded solemnly. “Elle?”

    “She just walked,” said Bennet, “straight from his office into a Level 5 cell. She only said one word.”

    “What?,” asked Claire, sadness welling within her.

    “Disappointment,” said her father, holding his daughter close.

  • #2
    wow... that was a really wicked second chapter...

    can't believe that elle killed bob... alright... so i actually do... i guess i would have done the same, if he had done the same things to me...

    great story!!!

    Comment


    • #3
      Thanks.

      Comment

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