You're Broken

She just wanted the pain to go away. Sure it was a dangerous place where mysteriously unpowered Peter Petrellis tended to be thrown out second-story windows, but even if she lost her powers, it would be worth the relief.

She electrocuted the friendly receptionist who tried to welcome her. In retrospect, the woman might have been able to tell Elle where she needed to go.

She got within ten feet of the elevator before she realized it would probably be better to take the stairs. The people in the stuck elevator would survive.

She stumbled around aimlessly on the second floor, trying to find anyone who could help. She burst into a large conference room just as another surge hit her. She collapsed and through the pain could see two men. They looked familiar; the first man was an older gentleman with dark graying hair. He kind of looked like Nathan Petrelli. No, that’s Arthur Petrelli, one of Dad’s friends. I thought he died?

The other figure kind of looked like Sylar. He looked a lot like Sylar. When he ran to her, she could see that it was Sylar. This was not the way she wanted the pain to go away. She struggled to get up, but the next surge racked her body so hard, she fell back onto the floor, shaking.

“You’re broken,” she heard his voice say.

The older man’s voice commented, “Her powers are unstable. I can fix this.”

“Dad, no.”

Dad? What’s going on? The pain overwhelmed her thoughts.

Sylar kept talking, “I can fix her.”

Elle felt her body being lifted telekinetically. Fueled by adrenaline (which didn’t help her condition), she struggled against his iron grip and let loose as powerful of a shock as she could muster. Sylar just reached around and held her by the stomach, channeling the energy.

“Shh,” he whispered, so close she could feel the breath on her ear, “I’m going to fix you. It’s going to hurt a little bit.”

A small groan escaped. She waited for the telltale pain on her forehead, but something else happened. She felt Sylar gather a large chuck of hair from the back of her head and hold it out. She felt the cutting sensation she was anticipating, but instead around the clump of hair he was holding. It was excruciatingly painful, no better and no worse than the rogue lightning in her system.

She felt him pull off that part of her scalp. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw it floating gaily to the side. Then, she felt rhythmic burst of electricity course through her and in an ornate mirror across the room, she noticed that he was poking around in her head. Surreally, she felt the pain disappear and for a moment, it was like her disconnected mind was trapped in her body.

All at once, she felt a massive discharge of electricity. But slowly she felt the electricity filling her body again. She felt sweat on the back of her neck. But it wasn’t sweat; it was blood.

“Just kill me, please,” she spoke weakly.

“No need,” he answered, still intimately close. She watched him pluck her scalp out of the air and felt him attach it back to her scalp, stimulating the pain nerves around the area all at once. Then, a strip of cloth was torn from the bottom of her sweater. He pulled a paper clip out of his pocket and used his heat power to melt it and mold it into a thin, curved needle.

“Oh, god,” she breathed. Directly by Sylar’s powers, the needle went to work sewing her scalp closed with the thread from her sweater in a long, rapid series of stitches much denser than any surgeon could pull off.

She felt him tie off the end before saying, “All done.”

She promptly passed out into what were probably his arms.

: : :

He was sitting in a chair looking like a worried family member when she awoke again with a pounding headache.

“Sylar?”

“Call me Gabriel, please.”

“I’m… I’m alive. You didn’t kill me?”

“No, I’m trying to cut back on that. Not healthy.” He attempted a grin.

She wiggled her fingers and found her lightning ability was still active. Except there weren’t any ominous fluctuations in the charge like before. “Did you… fix me?”

“Yes. You shouldn’t have those pesky overloads anymore.”

She reached for her head. He tried to catch her hand but she was able to touch the wound, causing her a flood of pain.

“You just had the equivalent of brain surgery. It’s not a smart idea to touch.”

She looked up and saw that he was still holding his hand. She yanked it away.

“You think that’s going to fix the fact that you murdered by father?”

Gabriel looked hurt. “No, I just… thought I’d do something nice.”

“Nice? You’re trying to do something nice? You’re a killer; you just don’t recover from that!”

“I guess you’re speaking from experience,” he snapped.

Defensively, she shot back, “Hey, the people I killed, I killed for a good reason. Some of them were bad people like you. And some of them were unhelpful, so I had to kill them a little bit to show them I was annoyed with them. I didn’t kill them because I enjoy it like you do.”

“You’re a sadist,” he commented plainly.

“Okay, sometimes I like to hurt people. But I’m warped. And no amount of mind-power brain surgery is going to fix that.”

“So, Ma said you were fired from the Company.”

“Ma? Did you get adopted by the Petrellis while I was gone?”

“I’m their biological son. Peter and Nathan are my brothers.”

“That whole family is screwed up.”

“Look, if you need money. Or work. Or a purpose… we have a very aggressive recruiting program for people like us with abilities.”

Elle gave him a glare that clearly showed she’d like to take his job opportunity and reduce it to a smoking lump of carbon and, while it was still hot, stick it where the sun don’t shine, but she didn’t refuse.

Gabriel put on a calm smile. “You get some rest.” He brushed the hair out of her face and kissed her on the forehead. He got zapped for his trouble, but didn’t even blink as his lip healed.

He met his father outside.

“I could have just absorbed her ability.”

“You already have her power from Peter. What’s the use?”

“She’s unstable. She’s Bob’s daughter. She’s loyal to the Company.”

“She was loyal to her father and now he’s dead. Ma rather unceremoniously fired her. And we helped her. And the kind of work we do is right down her alley.”

“You care for her.”

“I hurt her in unimaginable ways. I owe it to her to help.”

“Careful, son. Women are a wily species.”

“Don’t project your marriage troubles on me.”

“You are attracted to her, though.”

“She’s an attractive woman,” Gabriel replied evenly.

“If she’s that important to you, she can stay.” He patted his son on the shoulder and walked away, leaving Gabriel to watch as Elle practiced with her newly controllable powers, smiling.