InsaneJournal

claire winchester is not your typical superhero (goallbuffyonus) wrote in colligo_threads,
@ 2011-04-23 23:52:00

Entry tags:

claire winchester, nathan petrelli

WHO: Claire Winchester, Jack & Meri Winchester (NPCs), and Nathan Petrelli
WHAT: Nathan's arrived in Colligo. Claire has a few surprises for him.
WHEN: About ten minutes after this.
WHERE: The Grand Library, to start.
RATING: TBD; doubt it'll be too high
STATUS: In Progres

As luck would have it, Claire just so happened to be at the video store when she'd spotted Nathan's post on the network. After assuring herself that yes, it very much was her bio-dad, she had wasted pretty much zero time in getting her things together and heading over to meet him. Her store wasn't far from the library and with both Meri and Jack along for the ride she didn't want to waste the time setting them both up in the car then fighting the traffic to go four blocks. So she'd decided to walk.

The weather was nice as she put her kids in the double stroller and began heading down the sidewalk. There was a definite bounce in her step and she periodically checked the network as she navigated past the other pedestrians. She even made sure to send texts to both Peter and Dean. It wasn't until she was less than a block away that she realized, in all of her excitement, that she had forgotten to tell Nathan a few things that were probably pretty important for him to know.

Like the fact that he had grandchildren.

Glancing down at her kids - Jack was busy trying to stuff Meri's hand into his mouth while Meri was equally busy trying to grab his nose - Claire hesitated. For one brief moment she worried he would be too upset to even try to get to know them. That it would be too much for him to take, all at once, and she'd wind up never seeing him because he couldn't cope. She glanced at her PDA, considering telling him that something had come up and she'd just talk to him later, but knew she couldn't do it. She had missed him far more than she had even realized until she'd seen him just now and she couldn't turn around and pretend he wasn't there. What's more, she didn't want to. She wanted him to meet her children, her husband, to be a part of her life, and she wanted to think he'd want the same.

As reassured as she was going to get, Claire continued moving forward. The bounce in her step was gone, replaced with determination and worry, but she was also still excited. For better or worse, she was going to see a man that she had honestly thought she was never going to see again. And with that thought, she rounded the corner that faced the library steps.

Freezing in place, her hands gripping the stroller tightly, she tried to remember to breathe as she stared, wide-eyed, at the figure just up ahead on the steps. Finally she managed to speak, her voice coming out choked and thick with emotion as she slowly took a few more steps forward.

"Nathan..."

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politicallygray
2011-04-24 04:28 am UTC (link)

Nathan wasn’t sure how this all happened. The last thing he remembered, he wasn’t even himself. He was in Sylar’s body and he was saying goodbye to Peter, falling to his death for a final time. He never came back from that, of course he’d really been dead a lot longer but Angela had not been able to let go. In some ways, he hated her for what she had done. Putting his memories…and everything he was into Sylar had been an abomination, simply put. But she was still his mother, and as a father, he realized he would probably do whatever he could to hang on to any one of his children, even if it meant lying to himself and everyone else.

And then, he was here. This strange place that he now knew as Colligo. The guards hadn’t been forthcoming by any means, and they weren’t that helpful, except for this PDA they’d given him. Personally, he would have preferred a BlackBerry. Confusion was imminent, especially when he read that post Rose had linked him to. All of that existed here? It was unbelievable. He almost wished the Haitian was here to take that all away from his mind. Almost.

But Claire was here. Nathan was excited to see her, but he was just as nervous too. He had not seen Claire, really since before Sylar slit his throat. He hadn’t treated her right, and he wanted to make up for that. Death really gave some perspective on things, he promised himself he would be a better person. For Claire. For Simon and Monty. And of course, for Peter. He was pleased to know that his brother was here, even if he didn’t know much about this place. Pete was everything that was good in the world, and Nathan had hated leaving him, but they both needed to accept that he was gone.

For Nathan, that hadn’t been easy. He’d held on for too long, but he had to let go. He couldn’t imagine what Peter must have gone through after that. And now, here he was in an expensive suit holding a PDA, standing on the stairs looking flabbergasted. How could he not though? And none of that was eased when he saw Claire approaching. Sure, he was happy to see her, but why did she have a stroller? Was she babysitting or something?

“Claire…” he greeted her back, coming down off the second to the bottom step and moving closer to her. She seemed…different, somehow.

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goallbuffyonus
2011-04-24 04:40 am UTC (link)

If Claire hadn't had her children with her, she would have likely rushed Nathan and thrown her arms around him in a hug to best all hugs. However she couldn't just leave her children unattended on the sidewalk, despite how much she might want to touch the man approaching her if only to assure herself that he was very much real and not some figment of her imagination thanks to the city going crazy. Again.

Pushing the stroller up the walkway, she stopped when she'd gotten far enough from the road and close enough to Nathan that she felt comfortable putting on the brakes and leaving her children, for the briefest of seconds, unattended. Making her way around the stroller, she rushed the remaining few feet to her bio-dad and wrapped her arms around him. All but clinging to him for a brief second, Claire closed her eyes to stave off the tears stinging them and smiled brightly into his shoulder.

"I've missed you," she murmured softly, half-laughing and half-crying as she pulled back enough to peer up at him and add, "I thought I was never going to see you again." With another half-sob, she hugged him once more. It wasn't until some seconds later, when she heard her son's steady proclamation of "Mamamamamama" that she drew away from Nathan and took a step back, toward the stroller.

"There's, um, something I need to tell you," she said, suddenly nervous. Smiling a watery smile, Claire corrected, "Well, there are a lot of somethings, really, but I think this one is probably the most important at the moment..."

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politicallygray
2011-04-24 05:19 am UTC (link)

All of this was not helping Nathan’s confusion, but he wasn’t going to get mad about it. He was going to wait it out and hear what she had to say. He was back from the dead, which meant he had a second, or was it a third? In any case he had another chance now and he was not about to waste that by being cold or judgmental. Here was his beautiful daughter, and she seemed so grown up now. Nathan did feel pangs of guilt for not being there for her and for what she had put him through, but now it could be different.

He couldn’t stop staring at the stroller, though. There were children in it. And they could possibly be… He tried to remain calm about this. He was going to let Claire explain, besides he could hardly be mad at her when she was hugging him like she was. It caught him off guard for a minute, and he almost didn’t wrap his arms around her. But he got his senses back after a moment and he hugged her to him tightly. It felt good to hold her. It felt good for her to not hate him.

And Nathan was not in the position to judge anyone, except maybe Angela. He felt he had a little right to judge her. But thinking about his mother was about the last thing he wanted to do right now. “I’ve missed you too.” He nodded, letting her step back. This was all a little strange. Did that child just say mama? Was he a grandfather?

“Okay…” he said, a little hesitantly. He wasn’t sure he was ready for his teenage daughter to tell him she had children. She was still a teenager, wasn’t she?

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goallbuffyonus
2011-04-24 05:50 am UTC (link)

Claire drew in a breath and tried to remind herself that it would be okay. No matter what happened, she would survive. It was what she did, the only thing she could do. Exhaling slowly, she placed her hand on the stroller and just spit it out.

"I'm not seventeen anymore, Nathan. And these..." She glanced down at Jack and Meri, then back to Nathan with a smile. "Well, they're my kids. They're four months old." She swallowed hard and remembered to breathe. Tucking some hair behind her ear if only to give her hands something to do, she kept speaking in the same calm tone, determined to just be done with it and let him sort it out as he saw fit.

"I've been here for a while, now. Obviously. I'm married." She supposed the ring on her finger was probably a giveaway for that, but she didn't make any mention of it or even try to show it to him. She just kept right on saying what she had to say, hoping she'd feel a little better once it was done. "His name is Dean and..." She hesitated, not wanting to say 'you'll like him' because she wasn't sure if that was going to be the case. Dean was very different from Nathan and, beside that, the last he'd remembered she was a teenager. Definitely not someone who was fit to be married. Finally she settled on, "He's a good man, Nathan."

And finally she stopped speaking, turning her attention to Meri as she began to whimper and root around, in search of her pacifier. Claire cast a nervous glance back to Nathan as she crouched down to help get her daughter settled. She was worried about his reaction, worried she'd dumped too much on him at once, but she had to admit she did feel a bit better having it all out in the open. Honesty was definitely the best policy, even if it might have been too much, too soon.

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politicallygray
2011-04-24 06:34 am UTC (link)

So they were her kids, he had been afraid of that. Well, not afraid exactly…but concerned. He couldn’t picture his teenage daughter as a mother. He wouldn’t have wanted that for her for a long long time. But clearly she wasn’t a teenager anymore, and really he could see that before she told him. Every father wanted to keep their little girl that way forever, right? He hadn’t been much of a father to her. Noah Bennet was her father, and Nathan could never fill those shoes. He’d never try to fill those shoes. The kids were cute, he could give her that. And she seemed happy, and at the end of the day that was what really mattered.

He hadn’t noticed the ring until she’d said something. This was all so much to take in. Claire was married, with children. His little girl really was all grown up. Nathan felt very old in that moment, as he stammered to think of something to say. He kept reminding himself that Claire was happy, and that was important. Stepping forward a little, he looked a little closer at his grandkids. He didn’t imagine being a grandfather so young, or really at all since he died, but he did want to know them. Nathan wanted a chance to make up for everything that he had done.

“I’m happy for you, Claire.” He finally said. What else could he say? It was stunning and would take him time to process everything, but he would do his best to accept the choices she had made. She was an adult now, and Nathan was proud of her. This might not have been the path he would have chosen for her, but he didn’t get to make that decision. Not even Noah would have, because Claire was smart and strong enough to do it on her own.

He crossed his arms as Claire moved down to get her daughter settled, and sighed a little. He could not believe what he was seeing, and yet there was something so beautiful about it. “So what are my grandkids names?” he asked, smiling. It was sort of a forced smile, but most of it was sincere. The rest was just because he was a little worried.

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goallbuffyonus
2011-04-24 05:21 pm UTC (link)

Claire had busied herself with getting Meri settled in the hopes of hiding her nervousness as she waited for his reaction. With Nathan, there wasn't any telling what he might say or do. He could be fine or he could wig out entirely. She hadn't spent nearly enough time with him to know which way he might go and felt a small pang that it was, at least in part, her own fault that he was such a stranger to her. Yes, she had tried to get to know him, had practically thrown herself at him in the hopes of being loved and accepted when she'd discovered he was her bio-dad, but she had also judged him harshly at every single turn. And eventually that had led to a wedge being driven between them that had only just started to dissipate when they'd run off to Mexico to escape the government persecution of specials that he'd started in the first place.

And then he'd been killed. Just like that, he was out of her life, only she hadn't discovered that until she'd been in this city and by then it was too late.

Claire had mourned Nathan then, in her own way, but never gave out hope he would turn up here. Having him here now was like some sort of dream come true and yet his reaction to everything she'd just dumped on him could wind up being such that her dream was going to be shattered on the spot. Only, when he finally spoke, that didn't seem to be the case. He wasn't screaming at her, wasn't threatening legal action or bodily harm against her husband. He was shocked, of course, but who wouldn't be?

Releasing a breath she hadn't even realized she was holding, Claire finally just scooped Meri out of the stroller and rose back to her feet. "This is Meredith and that's John," she said, nodding at each child in turn. "We call them Meri and Jack, for short." She glanced nervously at Nathan, her own smile hesitant but still very much sincere. Nervousness still shone in her eyes though, no matter how much she tried to quell it.

"They were born on Christmas day. This place went nuts and sent me into early labor but we're guessing my ability kept them from having any lasting side effects." And now she was babbling. Making herself stop speaking for a second, Claire swallowed hard and studied him. Then finally she asked hesitantly, "Do you want to hold her?"

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politicallygray
2011-04-24 06:25 pm UTC (link)

It was a little amusing to him that Claire seemed to be so nervous right now. Like she thought he might just turn his back on her and walk away or yell at her or something. He didn't have a right to do any of that, he hadn't been much of a father to her at all. He was just her biological father. He wanted a bond with her, but that never happened because his life was cut short. Maybe here everything could be different.

If Nathan was stuck in this place, then he was glad he wasn't alone. And he was alive, again. That was something. He could work on putting things back together and repairing all the damage he had done, starting with Claire. Now, if Angela were to show up? All bets were off, he still couldn't believe what she'd done to him. To all of them.

"Meredith." He repeated, nodding. It was fitting, Claire was honoring her biological mother. He liked it, and Meredith would have liked it too. He couldn't believe she was gone. They'd had something once, and every now and then he still thought about her. "That's great Claire, they're really adorable." An odd thing to say, perhaps but it fit. Kids usually were adorable. And these were his grandkids.

Nathan could learn to accept all this, and be involved in their lives. He made a mistake all those years ago and he was going to make up for it now. "Yes, I'd love to hold her."

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goallbuffyonus
2011-04-25 04:40 pm UTC (link)

Truth be told, Claire had opted for Meredith in lieu of Sandra solely because Dean's mother's name had been Mary and she'd wanted some acknowledgment of her in the process as well. Had that not been the case, there was a very good chance the little girl she was about to hand over to her bio-dad would be going by Sandy rather than Meri. However Claire saw no reason to explain all of that right now. It wasn't important and, if the topic did ever come up she would happily explain then. For now, she wanted to make the most of this moment between them and worrying over her choice in names for her children wasn't going to help with that.

Smiling, Claire held Meri out for him to take. "Careful," she warned. "She's just figured out she can grab hair and make grown-ups make funny faces if she pulls it hard enough." And sure enough, no sooner was Meri close enough to do it, she was reaching for Nathan's hair with a happy gurgle and squeal of excitement.

"That's probably mostly my fault," she admitted as she turned her own attention to Jack. He'd managed to doze off so she simply tucked his blanket around him a bit and let him sleep. There would be plenty of time for him to visit with his grandfather later. She glanced back up and over to Nathan, pausing to take in the sight of him holding her daughter, then explained, "Not feeling pain tends to mean I can make a game out of trying to rip Mommy's hair out. Dean keeps telling me to cut it out but..." She shrugged, leaving it at that because it was clear she had no intention of even considering doing so. If he was going to teach their daughter to repeat 'Dadadadadadada', Claire was going to play with her in a way that only she could.

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politicallygray
2011-04-26 04:21 pm UTC (link)

Claire seemed so genuinly happy and Nathan couldn't help but be happy for her. True, all of this was a shock but he could adjust to things. This whole world was a shock to him, but he liked to think he was adapting well, all things considered. And now his daughter was a mother and she looked like she was enjoying it. He already noticed that she seemed much more responsible than he imagined Meredith had been before the fire.

Taking the child from her arms, he held her gently, looking down at her. He saw a lot of Claire in her, and that made him smile, even after she said that Meri might pull his hair or something. He could handle that. He'd certainly had a lot worse. Holding her, he moved towards the stroller so he could get a good look at Jack. He was a grandfather, it was finally setting in with him and he couldn't help but let a tear fall. It was a joyful one though, because Claire was doing so well and Peter was here and he was going to get to share in their lives. That wasn't supposed to happen. God must have seen fit to bring him here so he could right his wrongs and see his family.

"Hello there, Jackie." He smiled at the boy. "I'm Grandpa Nathan." He laughed a little at Claire's game with Meri. Sometimes he forgot that Claire didn't feel pain and maybe it was a way for her to connect with her daughter. They certainly seemed like a well adjusted family. "I'll need to meet him." He told Claire, referring to Dean. He handed the fidgety Meri back to his mother for now. He'd need to go and get settled soon, and then start going through all of the information that woman had given him.

No matter what though, this was a new start for him. And he was glad to have it. "So you want to take me to where everyone is staying then?"

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