Claire Bennet (
regenerated) wrote2011-02-19 05:02 pm
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Entry tags:
how to stop an exploding man.
The papers read November 7th, 2006. The much anticipated New York congressional elections were underway as people all around the city were filing in lines, some staring with a bit of curiosity or trepidation at the new booths provided by one Daniel Linderman, a big name throughout the whole of New York, but one who came with his share of shadiness as well. Not every household trusted him, the most wary sticking in their apartments, offices, and classrooms, absentee ballots clutched in their hands, but the turnout was decent on the whole, the only event which seemed to set that day apart from most others in that gray city, skyscrapers stretching all the way up into the clouds above.
But, unknown to the general populace, there were a group of individuals scattered around the whole of the city, some whose faces were plastered on posters at every turn, others making it onto national television, and still more trying their best to avoid any detection altogether. And those individuals were special, the pinnacle of human evolution, some believed. Destined to do something great.
A hospice nurse.
A taxi driver.
A watchmaker.
A girl next door.
An office worker.
A policeman.
A socialite.
A soon-to-be Congressman for the 14th District.
A manager at a paper factory.
A cheerleader.
Heroes and villains.
This was their story.
But, unknown to the general populace, there were a group of individuals scattered around the whole of the city, some whose faces were plastered on posters at every turn, others making it onto national television, and still more trying their best to avoid any detection altogether. And those individuals were special, the pinnacle of human evolution, some believed. Destined to do something great.
A hospice nurse.
A taxi driver.
A watchmaker.
A girl next door.
An office worker.
A policeman.
A socialite.
A soon-to-be Congressman for the 14th District.
A manager at a paper factory.
A cheerleader.
Heroes and villains.
This was their story.
kirby plaza
She remembered, first of all. Remembered all of Tabula Rasa, the friends she'd made, the tears she'd shed, the kisses she'd shared. That was never part of the bargain. She never wanted to remember, to be pulled back by nostalgia.
Besides, it was daytime. And the last thing she remembered in Kirby Plaza was, well. The spread of colors through the sky. An explosion that lingered in a burst of fire.
Claire's eyes opened and her expression fell, looking around until she saw a leaf of a newspaper flying through Kirby Plaza, running toward it with all her might until she stamped it down with her foot.
Nathan Petrelli Wins in Landslide
November 7th.
"I've got a day," Claire suddenly whispered to herself, eyes going wide.
Re: kirby plaza
She caught sight of a familiar looking face and ran towards her, hoping that this was Claire and she'd know who she was. If she didn't... well. She just had to hope for the best and panic later.
"Claire? Is that you?"
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All of those thoughts came to a screeching halt as Claire blinked, whirling around at the familiar voice.
"...Cissie?"
Now, that made no sense. She was pretty sure that Cissie had never come from her world, her reality. Claire's breath caught in her throat.
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Belatedly, she realized that Claire probably had no idea what she was talking about but it was a little late now. They were here, wherever this was, and they had to make the best of it. "Sorry. Long story."
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Her eyes rose up to trace along the skyscrapers.
"What's the Slag?"
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"They're a group of aliens who like to go around challenging worlds to a game of baseball. If they win, they take over. I only got involved with them because when Young Justice needed an additional member on the team, they thought of me. Apparently I rank over Superman or Wonder Woman." She paused and shrugged wryly. "Yeah, I don't even know."
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In a quieter tone, Claire leaned in, barely speaking above a whisper.
"Cissie, I think we're in a lot of danger. Serious, explosion might just take out most of the city level of danger."
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"What? How? Who?" Cissie lowered her voice to match Claire's. "What can we do?"
She had never been normal to begin with and she wasn't going to start now.
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It'd hurt me just as much as it'd hurt you, if anything happened.
But it was too superior, too condescending, reminded Claire too much of her father, and her heart hurt at that thought, too, missing him so dearly and heart quick with the anticipation of getting to see him again soon. So instead, she tried to temper her voice, not treating the obviosu for what it was, because she'd never really made it clear what she could do. Was it at all unreasonable for others to think that they could do just as much as she?
"Hide," Claire instructed. "We need to find someplace to hide, where the enemy can't find us, and then we can discuss our next steps."
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She bit her lip, not liking the idea of running away but it made sense. She didn't know what was going on, but Claire did. It would be stupid to discuss things here and out in the open if the enemy was around. "Okay. We hide. And then you tell me what's going on because I'm not letting you do this alone. I've... I have some experience with this kind of thing."
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"Let's head inside," Claire suggested quietly, an apologetic look already in her eyes, almost pained as the mere mention of experience had her reliving her own in her head, over and over. "I've had experience with this kind of thing too, you know."
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"I don't know if I should be glad or sad you know what it's like." She wondered if Claire was a metahuman or someone like her or Tim. It didn't matter either way - she had a feeling it would take more than the two of them to stop this thing.
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Although the words were delivered a bit flippantly, Claire just sighed and rushes them toward the nearest building anyway, glancing over her shoulder as though she'd be able to find Sylar right then.
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"Okay," she said once they were relatively safe. "What's going on?"
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She shifted her weight from foot to foot. "But I'm not sure that he survives all that and so I want to, I need to find him, just to make sure."
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"So we need to find your uncle then," she said, much more quietly then before. "Is he here? And what about this bad guy? Do we know what all powers he has?"
It was beyond frightening to be thinking like this when it wasn't really her fight and she had nothing to throw at other than herself but the thought of hiding somewhere and doing nothing was even worse. In her own world it'd be different - there were plenty of superheros and/or teams who could jump on this and shut this guy down. She wasn't there, though, she was here and it was just her and Claire. It was wrong to sit this out.
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She closed her eyes, feeling a wave of hopelessness pass over her as she tried to steel her stomach, willing herself to manage through it. "I think he might have super-hearing, though. Or invincibility, something... god, something that let him totally overhear a conversation I had when he was nowhere I could see. So I think the best thing for me to do is to find my dad, because I know he's close, and he's so much better than I am at things like this. But I don't want to draw too much attention to a group without an adult here."
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"What do you want me to do? Stay here and kind of keep an eye on the fort, so to speak? Or do you think that would be too obvious?"
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"Yeah, keep an eye on the fort, and..." Claire grabbed Cissie's wrist and pulled her over to the nearest pay phone, grabbing for the pen which hung from the phone from a thin chain, and writing a number down in the other blonde's palm. "And call this number if anything happens, okay? It's my phone number. I've got my Sidekick on me."
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"Hey. Don't worry about me. You go and get your dad and when you guys get back, I'll be here."
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"Yeah," she nodded quickly, rushing forward to squeeze Cissie in a tight hug. "Yeah, I'll be right back. Stay safe, okay?"
And with a whirl of hair, she turned around with one last look over her shoulder, then ran toward where she knew her father would be.
Re: kirby plaza
Coraline wanted to cry, she wanted to go home to the island but she didn't cry. Coraline was strong and brave.
"Excuse me, where- Claire!" Coraline yelled happily as she recognised the familiar blonde.
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What was going on? Were the island and New York melding together, the boundaries breaking down?
"Coraline?" Claire breathed, blinking as she ran her fingers through her hair. "Coraline, what are you doing here?"
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Coraline looked around, trying to figure out where they were exactly but she wasn't sure if she wanted to ask a grown up. Asking grown ups usually led to Police. But Coraline could ask Claire, Coraline could trust Claire.
"Where are we?" Coraline asked curiously. "Are we home? This doesn't look like home, I think we're in America. Everyone sounds funny."
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Her lungs filled with the air from the place (not like it was going to kill her, anyway), before Claire exhaled, slowly. A sigh. Looking at Coraline after.
"We're in New York," Claire explained, brow furrowed. "This is where I... where I was last, before getting to Tabula Rasa. I don't know why we're here. Cissie, Cissie King-Jones is here too, and she's also from the island and definitely not my world. But we're come back like, the day before I found myself on the island instead."
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Coraline bounced on her toes, taking Claire's hand as she strained to see above the buildings. They were too tall though but Coraline still tried. Coraline's excited face fell though when Claire mentioned they'd come back.
"But we can't be back, I don't want to be back. I mean, New York is nice I'm sure... broadway Claire and all the museums..." Coraline trailed off before snapping out of it. "But I want to be on the island. Bill will really worry."
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"New York isn't nice to us right now, Coraline, and no, we can't see the Statue of Liberty here," Claire said quietly, ushering Coraline away from the statue in the middle of the plaza. "Remember my nightmare? That's... all real, here."
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Coraline bit her lip before stamping her closed fist into her hand. Coraline was brave and Claire was a superhero, they could take on one little tick-tock man. One terribly scary tick tock man. "We'll be okay Claire. I'll make sure we're safe even if it means we have to run away. I'll protect you."
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She drifted off, eyes looking around before she snapped back to attention and shook her head, quickly, her curls bouncing around her shoulders. "No, Coraline, you're not going to protect me. You need to get away, okay? Leave this to me, he won't come after you if you're not... if you can't do things like I can, okay? There's no need for all of us to be in danger here."
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"I don't know what I can do but what I know I won't do is leave you here. I've defeated a scarier villain than a tick-tock man." Coraline said. She didn't say that she was scared to be alone in a place that wasn't her home. She had no money, no passport, no friends here except Claire. And even if she had those things, Coraline wasn't the type of girl to leave her friends behind. "I'll be okay Claire, we'll be okay but I don't think we should stay here if you say it's not safe. We should go somewhere safe."
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He was it.
"It's not about whether or not you've defeated other people, though, Coraline, it's... what he's after, what he can do, I'm the only person who can get by that right now. Or, well, my uncle too but that's beside the point," Claire stressed anxiously. "You need to hide, you and all the others who might be here, you need to hide and I need to find my dad and figure out what's going on."
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Coraline looked at Claire and folded her arms across her chest. Coraline wasn't going anywhere and Claire had to get used to that.
"We'll find your dad together, with everyone and then he can tell us what to do. And then if we need to hide, we'll hide together." Coraline said before taking Claire's hand and squeezing it.
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Otherwise, she would have mentioned it in the nightmare.
"He's after what I can do. He wants to kill everyone in the world who's special, but he knows that it's not going to be easy to kill me, because I keep on coming back," Claire explained, trying to keep the deepest details private still, before shaking her head, almost vigorously. "You can't follow me everywhere, Coraline. It doesn't... it makes more sense for the rest of you to run. You could be a hero by leading people away from here, because this is one area where larger numbers aren't going to help. He'll just find us more easily this way."
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"I don't want to leave you," Coraline said. She wouldn't admit to being scared, she was brave but she didn't want to be alone. She was somewhere new and that was exciting but terrifying too. She wanted her dad, she wanted Adam. "And I'm not a hero, heroes save people Claire. All I've ever done is take people to the next place after they're dead and I don't want to do that again. And I don't want to be alone."
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"Coraline, you have to listen to me," Claire said firmly. "I can't... I can't do this if I think that I need to be watching out for someone else the entire time. I'm only brave when I know that I have nothing to lose, so you can't just follow me the whole time, okay? Because I've watched... I've seen so many people die because of this, I'm not even sure if my biological father and uncle are going to survive this. I'm not brave, but when it's just me out there, I've got nothing to lose. And I need that, to try and keep my family out of trouble. You, too."
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One second, Chris was sure he'd been asleep, back in his hut, half tangled in a blanket, and the next he's waking up in an alley somewhere. Chris has had nights where he's gotten so fucked that he doesn't remember heading home, but he's always made it there. And besides, this isn't the island anymore. It's not even Bristol. Chris doesn't think there's a level of fucked that even exists for something like this.
He's only in a tee shirt and his pants when he walks out into a crowd of people. This is beyond fuckin' weird.
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And the last thing she can ever let herself do is get Chris tangled up in all of that.
It's only when she's merely a couple of yards away from Chris that she realizes. He doesn't know. He doesn't know what she is, what she can do, and seeing that might drive him away more quickly than anything else. She can't be fully sure, and that thought is enough to make her want to run in the other direction entirely. She can't afford to lose him.
"Chris?" she calls out anyway, dread in her voice.
so we could save the world
She starts crying earlier this time, the pounding in her ears deep, warm, so much that the words barely come clear from Nathan's end.
"You saved the cheerleader... so we could save the world."
And in spite of the tears blurring her vision, she keeps her eyes open, because the thing she'd kill herself for most is not seeing this time how everything unfolds. The island's probably not generous enough, it may end up sweeping her under the rug as soon as that critical moment hits, but she's got to try, her body fighting to move forward until she feels a pair of arms wrapping around her, she doesn't even know whose. She just knows that she's being stopped, held back, and this time when Nathan takes off into the air there's a strangled cry in her throat that wasn't there before, because it's over, it's ending.
She's failed them both.
Everything in her body comes to a still when those colors spread out over the sky again, like a spill of oil turned into dust, but before she can try to make out anything there, it's dark again.
The air humid on her lips, lips that feel too dry now. In the background there's a hum, a hum that she doesn't remember being in her room in Odessa, doesn't remember being in any of the hotels she's stayed in, not even in the hut that she shares with Eden. It's the hum of machinery, one that mixes with the medicinal smell in the air to tell that Claire's in the clinic now. Her eyes grope through the darkness, arms throwing aside blankets and spotting the familiar silhouette in the darkness, of people sleeping, of the room not being hers.
That's the worst of it.
The cry dies in her throat as she turns over, silent sobs as her hand grips and digs into the padding of the pillow, cloth already warm with her tears.