InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "Wanna Bikkit!"

unsureidentity (unsureidentity) wrote in colligo_threads,
@ 2009-05-30 22:53:00

Entry tags:

!closed, #complete, claire winchester, gabriel 'sylar' gray

WHO: Gabriel "Sylar" Gray & Claire Bennet
WHAT: Gabriel doesn't feel completely comfortable with only a half understanding of himself and his relationships to others. Claire, for some reason he doesn't understand, is trying to help.
WHERE: Gabriel & Peter's apartment
WHEN:
RATING: PG
STATUS: In Progress

Gabriel had at least some idea who he was now. He had a name, an origin, a few very scant memories flittering across the forefront of his mind, but other than that, all understanding of his existence was scarce. He had a jumble of memories for different sources that made it next to impossible to pick out which ones were important to him. It was only a few that created an intense gut reaction that he was positive that they were his own. That, and a lingering fixation on snowglobes that he had no basis for but still couldn't shake from his mind.

He'd spent most of the day in his room. He was grateful that the apartments had changed. It was going to be difficult enough staying with Peter however long they were going to tolerate this arrangement like this. He wasn't sure how he could have done it if they had remained in one room.

Staring at the far wall, his head leaning back against the wall behind his bed, legs crossed over each other, stretched out on the bed, Gabriel was zoned, probing his own mind to try and sort things out, but no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't make any headway. And the frustration was only leading to a pile of accidentally disintegrated objects whose particle dust littered the floor.

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unsureidentity
2009-06-11 08:07 am UTC (link)

"A hundred years seems so far away," Gabriel said quietly. He hated to think about it, but he understood what Claire's ability meant. He didn't know why he'd wanted it so bad now. He couldn't contemplate it, knowing that he'd have to live with what he'd done for eternity. But maybe... Maybe that was easier to live with than the fear that someday, he'd die and have to suffer for what he'd done. "But compared to eternity, I suppose it's nothing," He said, looking up at her slowly, a soft fear in his eyes as he looked over at her.

"At least I won't be alone," He said gently, offering her a very timid and worried smile. "I don't think I could stand that. It'll be hard enough...having to watch everyone I know die. Even if they do hate me."

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x_clairebear_x
2009-06-11 11:12 pm UTC (link)

Claire agreed, albeit silently, that a hundred years did seem a long ways away. Truth be told it was rare for her to really dwell on what being 'immortal' meant. The fact that she would someday have to bury her family, the fact that she would reach a point where making and keeping friends would become part of a cycle so as not to draw attention to herself when they aged and she didn't, the fact that the world might very well go away and yet she could still not... it was all too much for her to really think about for long. She was glad when he changed the subject, even if it was only slightly and in a direction that was eerily similar, and yet not, to the one that Sylar had mentioned in that hotel room not that long ago.

The look - the timid smile and the obvious worry - was definitely not Sylar however. Which in a way made it much easier for Claire to stay relaxed and admit that he was right. He wouldn't be alone, and neither would she. And if he stayed Gabriel and didn't become the serial killer that he'd been before, she supposed that being stuck an eternity with him would be okay.

So she smiled back, her own not exactly warm and inviting but definitely more sincere than most she'd given him thus far. "You won't be alone," she agreed, "and I think if you give people time and don't go back to the way you were before, most of them will come around."

Claire's smile became a semi-bemused one. "I mean, if I can, there's hope for anyone, right?" she half-joked.

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unsureidentity
2009-06-15 08:47 pm UTC (link)

As much as Gabriel wanted to believe her, to believe that it was possible for people not to hate him, there was a part of him that was nagging that it wouldn't be possible for most. Peter, maybe. He had a distinct feeling that Peter had been able to do it before...but of course, that had been before he'd killed his brother. Gabriel attempted to muster up another, stronger smile, but it fell flat when the sudden doubt hit him.

Besides, what if he couldn't hold onto this? What if his mind slipped away from him again, and he was left as Sylar once more?

He would really be alone, then. And then what would he do? Just go back to killing in an attempt to make himself useful instead of the worthless nothing that he was and fill the void that had been left in his life with powers that he didn't even need or use?

Whoa. Where had that come from?

"I don't know," Gabriel said quietly after a moment, looking up at her. "About either of those. Sometimes... I'm not even sure that I'm any different than what I was."

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x_clairebear_x
2009-06-15 09:36 pm UTC (link)

Claire didn't wish that she could read minds. It was one ability, if she had to pick which one she did have, that she'd never want. To know what someone was thinking at all times would be exhausting, difficult, and a total invasion of someone's privacy.

Yet there were times, such as this one, when she had to admit it would come in handy. To know what Gabriel was thinking right this very minute would... well, it'd still be an invasion of his privacy and wrong, but it would make conversing with him much easier.

Still, she couldn't read minds anyway, so it was a moot point. All she could do was listen as he spoke and try to decide the best thing to say in reply. Which, this time around, she didn't have the first clue.

"What do you mean?" Claire questioned slowly, her forehead furrowing a bit in mild confusion. "You're not any different than what you were, when?" If he was referring to what he was like as Sylar, she would have to disagree. A lot. He was about as far removed from Sylar as he could be while still sharing the same body and brain. But if he meant something else... well, it was probably best she'd asked, just in case.

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unsureidentity
2009-06-15 09:48 pm UTC (link)

And now he had to explain the mess that was swirling around in his head, the vague thoughts that he got and the feelings that came along with them that made him wonder whether or not the man that he had been before he really been as much of a monster as he had tried to make himself out to be.

"You know how some people go around wearing a mask, pretending to be something that they're not because they either think people won't understand or won't appreciate who they really are?" Gabriel asked, a quiet hesitation in his voice. He didn't know how Claire would react to the suggestion that Sylar was really just him putting up a front of murder and psychosis because that was what he knew people expected of him.

"I think," Gabriel said, biting his inner cheek. "It feels... Sometimes it feels like after a point, Sylar was more of a front than a real identity. It doesn't... My memories are hazy anyway, but it doesn't feel solid, attached."

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x_clairebear_x
2009-06-15 10:51 pm UTC (link)

Claire nodded at his question, all too easily able to relate. Hadn't she told both of her fathers not long ago that she was always trying to be brave, to put up a front for them, so they would be proud of her? She never felt like she could just be herself, not really.

She almost explained as much out loud. Almost told Gabriel what she'd told both Noah and Nathan. Almost confessed right there, on the edge of the man's bed, how there were times when she wasn't even sure who she really was anymore because she was always pretending, always acting different because it seemed like the right thing to do.

When he made the correlation between his initial statement and Sylar, however, Claire found herself grateful she'd stayed silent. As it was she felt her stomach tighten and drop clear to her toes. No, she thought, vaguely horrified. No, Sylar has to be different. He has to. It was the only way to ensure that she could be rid of him forever. This abstract thought that Gabriel and Sylar weren't one in the same, were two separate identities... it was all she had, right now. It had to be true. There wasn't any other option.

Yet, the very man she had been hoping was so different from the one she loathed was saying otherwise. She frowned mildly as her gaze dropped to her lap and she tried to come to terms with his statement. After a moment, she exhaled slowly and returned her attention to Gabriel.

"So, Sylar was just your way of being accepted?" she questioned slowly, in a much more calm voice than she actually felt. "That, um... that," Claire shook her head, "that's a little self-defeating, don't you think?"

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unsureidentity
2009-06-15 11:00 pm UTC (link)

"I think... It was less about being accepted and more about feeling as though... I never would be?" Gabriel suggested, a quiet hesitation in the statement. He knew how crazy that sounded, how far-fetched and yes, self-defeating, but somehow in all of the twisted thought processes in his head, it sort of made sense. "That I'd rather be loathed than ignored, strong and in control rather than passive and easily manipulated. Almost as though it were a choice between the type of outcast that I was going to be."

Gabriel paused, pressing his hands against his forehead before rubbing them over his face, groaning and leaning back, tilting his head towards the ceiling before dropping his hands. "Either I was going to be the user, or I was going to be the used. No middle ground. This head seems to think in unrealistic extremes," Gabriel said, smacking himself in the forehead several times in frustration, the last sentence coming out as a grumble.

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x_clairebear_x
2009-06-16 01:21 pm UTC (link)

She tried to listen with as open of a mind as she could manage. She really did. It wasn't easy, when talking about Sylar, but Claire did her best to hear what Gabriel had to say before forming any opinions of her own. The only problem was, keeping her mind as clear as she had meant that when he'd finished speaking, she wasn't sure what to say exactly.

That didn't stop her from reacting, though, to his self-inflicted smacks to his forehead.

"Hey!" she exclaimed, reaching out to grasp his wrist to stop him from hitting himself again, "Don't do that." It upset her, to see him being so hard on himself, and Claire wasn't quite sure why it upset her. It shouldn't, not after everything he'd done, but it still did and part of her didn't even want to know why.

Turning a bit, one leg drawing up off the floor as she twisted to face him fully, Claire studied him for a long moment before speaking again. When she did, her voice was quiet and contained none of the hardened wariness she'd been using as of late.

"You're not being used here," she stated. "And I'm not going to let anyone in my family try it, either. You have just as much right to be here as the rest of us. You've made mistakes, sure, but beating yourself up over them isn't going to change that. Neither is going back to being Sylar. And it may take a while, or it may never happen at all, but I do think if you try to do the right thing and show people that you're trying, they'll come around." Her lips quirked upward into a hint of a smile. "It's not like we haven't all screwed up pretty fantastically before, too."

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unsureidentity
2009-06-16 01:38 pm UTC (link)

The tight grasp on his wrist coupled with her words yanked him back down, grounding him in reality and pulling him from the mass of confusion that were the thoughts that were swimming in his head before allowing one to slam forward in his mind so suddenly that it surprised him.

A face that he didn't recognize, a voice that was familiar but somehow still foreign, and a name, an alias, that flickered into his consciousness as the words rang in his head.

You've forgotten who you really are.

You don't have to be alone.

You could save us all.

"Does the name Rebel mean anything to you?" Gabriel asked after a moment as the memories settled firmly in his mind, twisting his gut.

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x_clairebear_x
2009-06-16 01:54 pm UTC (link)

Okay. Whatever Claire had been expecting him to say, that had most definitely not been it. Blinking in mild confusion, her gaze dropped as she realized belatedly that she was still holding onto his wrist. She pulled her hand away slowly, returning her attention to Gabriel.

"Yeah," she replied softly, "He... he was helping us, when the government was hunting us down. He sent me a few texts. Some were to help other people, and one was warning me to get out when the agents came after me." She stopped there, not having much else to say but not sure she'd say anything more even if she could.

After a heartbeat, almost afraid to say the words, or rather almost afraid of his answer, she questioned hesitantly, "Why do you ask?"

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unsureidentity
2009-06-16 02:02 pm UTC (link)

"I met him," Gabriel said before pausing and correcting himself. "Or Sylar met him. Couldn't have been much more than fourteen, if that. Just a kid," He said, the words lingering in his throat before he pulled at the memory, another name swirling into his mind. "Danko... was looking for him. Thought we had him pinned down. No electricity, no machines. Sent me, him, in to flush him out."

Gabriel stalled, turning over the memory in his mind's eye a few more times before the words came out of his mouth, almost unbidden, his voice altering between the soft tone that he'd been using and the hardened voice of Sylar.

"I know who you are."

"I sincerely doubt that."

"I know you have a problem, and I think I can help."

"And do tell me what is my problem."

"You've forgotten who you really are."

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