The Chinese culture has a respect for the past. Part of their religion is the reverence of their ancestors. It was Confucius who said “Study the past if you would define the future.” Perhaps for us, it is a lesson not to live solely in the present. Each of us has something to learn from the experiences that made us who we are today. It could be a defining moment. It could be an old friend that reminds us of a better time. It could be an ancestor who taught us something, even if it was something to avoid. It could even be the face in the mirror, whose past actions still haunt us. Regardless of which ghost of the past we face, can we really risk not heeding their advice?
: : :
2011
The ground of the Port Reyes Prison yard was bathed in red, both from blood and the rays of the setting sun. A lone figure stood among dozens of still, sprawled bodies, each one missing the top of the head and brain. Four of the bodies wore the red-and-khaki uniforms of the Powered Legion; the rest wore bright orange.
Brilliant orange flames flared around Sylar’s hands. He smiled evilly, “I’ve been waiting for that one for a while. And this one.” He leapt into the air, gliding to the north. On his way up, he passed Private George Palladino’s scalped body skewered on the prison’s barbed wire fence railing.
: : :
Nathan and
The Oval Office
2011
“I’m the President. It’s a very stressful job, you know.”
“I turned our kind into soldiers,” he admitted gravely.
“Nathan, they already were soldiers.”
“Can you keep a state secret?”
“It was part of the orientation,”
“The NSA has evidence that Dad has assembled a group of 109 military personnel, mostly Marines, and injected them all, in secret, with the Formula.”
“I don’t understand.”
“It’s his army, Trace. There are three and half billion people out there without abilities, and he intends to remedy that.”
“He’s going to have a hard time. With the formula missing, there are—what?—a few thousand shots left?”
“That and most of the remaining don’t want abilities. That’s what the army’s for.”
Steeling herself against the conclusion, she argued, “You don’t think he’d…”
“I don’t know what he’d do. It does beg the question, though, about why he needs an army.”
Half-grinning, half-scowling, he explained cryptically, “He proved too… gullible. Agent Landers is a lie detector. Much more effective.”
Marty, Nathan’s chief of staff, entered briskly. “Sir, we have Private Dalton Henry of the Powered Legion here. It sounds important.”
Nathan stood up at his desk, “Let him in.”
Nathan saluted, but
: : :
Monica and Lyle
2011
A truly spectacular ball of light below the surface of the bay caused the water to groan. All at once, a wall of water charged toward the bay.
“It’s happening again,” Monica said, her voice distant and full of dread.
Lyle grabbed his partner by the arm and started to pull her back. “Monica, come on.”
The wave of water knocked them off their feet. The wall of water soaked them, but otherwise caused no damage to them or the surrounding pier. Monica’s eyes, however, glazed over as she chanted to herself, “The levees’ll break.”
Lyle surveyed his drenched suit and told Monica, “It was one wave. The levees are fine. We need to find that guy and see if he’s okay.”
“The levees’ll break; they surely will,” Monica commented, her
Lyle sighed and looked out into the bay. He didn’t see anyone struggling, but he did notice the water’s strange steaming. “Monica…”
“Gov’ment ain’t gonna do nothing to help us. Our houses’ll fall down.”
Lyle surveyed the bay again. “Monica, we just had an IR explode underwater. He could have irradiated the water. We need to process the scene.”
“…doesn’t care about black folk.”
Screaming, Lyle related, “Monica, there was no hurricane. Katrina was six years ago. And, for the record, the President does care. He put you through college.”
“I gotta make sure Damon’s okay,” Monica told no one in particular, talking as if in a dream.
Lyle regardless picked up his phone, “Carlson? This is Bennet. We just had the IR we were chasing blow underwater. I need you to send a water specialist. And perhaps a psychiatrist.” He paused while Amy asked the inevitable question. “It’s for Monica.”
Removing his jacket and tie, Lyle dove into the gulf, hoping against all odds they hadn’t lost another target.
: : :
2011
Claire watched as the bodies were carried off. Agent Pall super-sped back and forth, loading the bodies in bags and dragging them off.
Echo DeMille approached her. “We found the tops of the heads, Miss Bennet. Still no sign of the brains. Maybe he really does eat them.” He gave her a half grin.
“He doesn’t eat them,” Claire replied firmly, not returning his smile. She continued to stoically survey the yard.
DeMille continued, “Look, ma’am, I just got a call from Gina. She’s got another appointment…”
“Go. Pall can take the rest.”
Pall stopped dead, “Hey, what?”
“Finish the job, Pall. It took four pints to heal you and I’m getting my blood’s worth. You’re lucky I didn’t make you pay for the twelve-course meal I had to inhale to recover.”
Pall scowled and continued moving bodies. DeMille tilted his head to the hole in the wall again. “Miss Bennet, we got media.”
Claire cursed under her breath and stomped her way over, where she saw two men in their twenties, one with a camera and the other talking into a microphone. “We’re here at the Port Reyes Prison just outside of
“Hey!” exclaimed Claire to the duo. “This area is off-limits to the media.”
“And just who are you?” The man with the microphone turned around. He found himself face-to-face with his old friend. “Claire?”
“Zach?”
“What’re you doing here? And barking orders?” Zach looked her up and down; and turned to his scowling cameraman to give him the “cut” sign.
“I could ask you the same question,” Claire automatically responded. She paused for a moment, shaking her head, and added, “I work for Pinehearst. Are you a reporter now?”
Zach looked down at himself, demonstrating his black jeans and a rock concert tee-shirt. “No, doing a documentary on Specials. Film project for school.”
Briskly herding them away, Claire commented, “Well, this is a restricted area by orders of the President. If you give me your card, I’d be glad to set up an interview…”
Zach spun around and with an accusing look, “Are you seriously brushing me off, Claire?”
Claire stood resolute, “Look, it’s been great to see you again, Zach, but a lot’s changed and I have a job to do.” She noticed Zach wasn’t paying attention. “Uh, Zach.”
“What the hell happened here?” Zach asked, looking past Claire at
“Zach, you don’t know what you’re getting into. Look, for your safety…”
Huffing, Zach spat, “Don’t bother with the bureaucratic mumbo-jumbo. It’s weird coming from you. Nice hair by the way.”
“Zach,” Claire pleaded.
Pall zipped behind her. “Ex-boyfriend?”
“Shouldn’t you be doing work? I’m seriously regretting giving you that last pint.”
Pall shrugged and zipped away.
The prison yard was suddenly lit with bright blue flames as
: : :
Matt Parkman
2011
Matt watched as Sylar approached another house. It was nice two-story in a beautiful suburban neighborhood. The sun was lemon-yellow, the trees spherical balls of green on brown tubes. Sylar knelt down beside the over-large doorknob to study it. He wiggled his fingers at it and an elaborate set of gears and pulleys disengaged the lock. Making sure to enter without making a sound, he entered, Matt following against his will like a ghost on a string. An unseen radio was playing “Lean on Me” by Bill Withers. A forty-ish man was sitting at the kitchen table eating a bowl of cereal featuring a smiling sun on the box and reading the comics in the Los Angeles Times. With Matt facing the man, Sylar removed the top of the man’s head with a quick wave of his hand; the skull cap bounced into the wall. Matt didn’t even wince when the spray of blood struck him, Garfield, and Charlie Brown. Sylar continued to hold one hand out, keeping the body still, as he carefully removed the brain with his other hand. It made a popping sound as it exited the skull. He surveyed it as one might an antique vase.
Sylar used the outstretched hand to touch the man’s body, covering it in a thin sheet of ice.
“James, Sweetie,” a woman’s voice suddenly came from the kitchen. “When you’re finished with breakfast, can you go check on…?” The woman entered the dining room, where she laid eyes on her scalped, popsicled husband. She turned her eyes to the black-clad Sylar and screamed, who with the wave of his wrist slammed her telekinetically against the stairs. He pulled a sheet of paper out of his pocket. He walked to face the terrified woman. “Are you Molly?”
After a pause, the woman nodded furiously. Sylar peered around the hallway and telekinetically yanked a framed certificate from the wall. He remarked icily, “So, either you let your husband keep a framed marriage certificate from a previous marriage on the wall,” Sylar challenged her, “or you’re lying to me and in actuality…” A framed picture of a 4-year-old girl flew from the wall. “…this is Molly.”
With tears in her eyes, the woman pleaded with a pathetic “Please,” before blanching. Matt noticed a spatula embedded in her stomach.
“It hurts,” the woman cried.
“It won’t hurt much longer.” He tilted his head.
She turned her eyes toward the dining room again and creaked out a groan. Matt followed her eyes and noticed the dozens of knifes and other kitchen implements hanging in the air. One by one, they lunged forward, claiming a portion of Mrs. Walker’s body.
While the implements were still piercing holes in the woman, Sylar began to ascend the stairs. Moments later, a young girl tiptoed back down, her face filled with intense concentration. Quietly, she opened a door underneath the stairs and slipped in, only inches from her slain mother, who she didn’t seem to even notice.
She then turned her head to look straight at Matt. For the last few hours, no one in the nightmare had taken notice of Matt. But Molly looked straight at him and he heard her voice in his head. “Help me.”
They heard Sylar coming back down the stairs and Molly shut the door silently. Sylar took a brief glance at Matt before continuing his search. Matt, determined, broke into a run and slammed Sylar into the wall, inches from Mrs. Walker.
“You won’t get her,” Matt promised as he laid a punch on Sylar’s face.
Unaffected by the blow, Sylar replied, “Oh, I will, Parkman. And when I do, I will take her ability.” He voice grew to a roar. “And I will tear this house apart until I do.” Sylar flailed his arms and the entire house came apart at the seams.
Matt found himself alone in a field, kneeling and agitated. He was no longer in
Resolutely, he walked down to the prison yard.
: : :
Adam Monroe
Primatech Research Facility
Hartsdale, New York
2000
When the door opened to his cell, Adam’s first thought was that Elle had come early. Adam lost his sense of time long ago, but his internal clock still told him it was too early for his daily Session o’ Pills ‘n’ Pain.
But his visitor was not Bob’s unbalanced, flirtatious teenage daughter but the austere, white-haired Daniel Linderman.
“Daniel, what brings you to my home sweet cell?”
“You’ve been in this cell for 8,409 days. It’s the fourth of September, 2000 and…” with a cursory glance at his watch, he finished, “2:08 in the afternoon.”
Adam absorbed this information and smiled, “Thank you. You’ve saved my sanity for a while.”
“Your time will come, my friend.”
“Or you could let me walk out,” Adam challenged.
Briskly, Daniel corrected him, “You’ll be recaptured, only with one less friend to visit you and one additional neighbor.”
“Why waste your time on me?”
“I’d like to think I might drop in on mates every once in a while.”
“You put me in here.”
Slighted, Linderman corrected, “Arthur put you in here. Bob keeps you in here. That’s a lot to go up against. You’ll be easier to free from the outside than the inside.”
“Why waste your time? I hear things are smashing in Vegas.”
“They are. But you’re important to me, Adam. I believe in you. You’re my captain. And I protect those close to me.”
Adam put a sarcastic hand over his heart, “That’s touching. How are the others?”
“Kaito is well. Haven’t heard from
“Always did fancy her a bit.”
“Once upon a time, you had quite the crush on her, too.”
“I’ve been married ten times. I’ve outgrown love.”
“Yet you say you’ll marry the woman who saves you.”
“It’s the least I can do. What woman wouldn’t want to marry a man fifteen times her age and die looking a third of his?” Adam sat back on his bunk, still appearing to be on the good side of thirty.
“Bob’s daughter seems to have a bit of a thing for you.”
“She gets me out, and I’ll make her my bride. Shag her then kill her ‘cause the broad’s a bit too mad for me.” He made the obligatory crazy gesture.
“I’m thinking about implementing the New York Plan.”
Adam sat up with an approving look. “You always were my favorite, but you’re not in charge. Arthur, correct me if I’m wrong, seems to favor the Dandelion Plan.”
Linderman scoffed, “It’s such an American idea. That anyone in the kingdom can have the treasure, not just the king.”
“Hey, I fought in the American War of Independence.”
“Support the home country?”
“Support the pocketbook.”
His voice haughty and accent thick, Linderman replied, “You scoundrel. I hold you in a level of contempt equal to Irishman.”
Adam laughed, “Says the ex-pat who’s spent more time in the States than the Mother Country.”
Linderman dropped his airs. “I support her. I am fiercely devoted to advancing the perception that Britons are intelligent and cultured.”
“You live in bloody
“Which is filled with Americans.” He then added, “And Japanese.”
“Don’t knock the Japanese. I’ve found them to be quite a good lay. Even English whores are a lot of work. I bedded a married noblewoman with less work.”
“I do wish you’d shut your gob.”
“Afraid it was one of your glorious ancestors?”
“I dread the day I realize my great-great-great-grandfather was your bastard child.”
“Perhaps we are closer. Did you bring a picture of your mother like I asked? Just in case?” Linderman remained stoic, and Adam abandoned his charade. “Daniel,” Adam asked sincerely, “…my sword.”
Gravely, Daniel noted, “I’m defending it with my life. From Kaito. From Arthur. From them all.”
: : :
Micah and Mohinder
Suresh’s Lab
2011
Mohinder finished covering Barbara in webbing.
“That’s really creepy, Mohinder,” Molly related. “She’s not…?”
“Dead?” Mohinder cut off, “Absolutely not. I can secrete a toxin which puts her in a temporary stasis. It’s only until we figure out what do to with her. Once Peter returns, he’s thinking of stranding somewhere deserted.”
Mohinder looked down at the remains of Micah’s robot. “That’s quite an interesting device you have there.”
“Thanks,” Micah related humbly, “it’s apparently not very durable.”
“You’d be surprised. Scientists have been studying spider-webbing to built better bullet-proof vests. It cut through mine quite effectively.”
“I know,” Micah noted.
“I can see the gears turning,” Molly stated to Mohinder.
“Crop-dusting.”
“Huh, random, I was expecting obscure,” Molly noted.
“The Formula, it’s a biological compound. It could be imbedded into some sort of airborne pathogen. Now, airplanes will be tightly controlled, but…”
“Small robots could fly under the radar. You want to use the dragonfly as a distribution system.”
Mohinder began to pace, “How long would it take you to build more?”
Micah’s answered honestly, “It took me months to build this guy.” Mohinder visibly frowned. “But,” Micah added, “I did give him some interesting skills.”
Micah took the wingless robot over to a damaged metal table and touched his creation. Immediately, it began to crawl along the table; a small tube emerged from below and a barely perceptible beam of light struck the table, causing it to smoke. After crab-walking a full loop, the robot lifted out the small rectangular scrap of metal and place it aside.
“I don’t understand,” Mohinder questioned.
Micah explained, proudly, “That would be the piece for the bug’s left side.”
“Are you telling me that your robot can…?”
“Self-replicate? Given sufficient scrap metal and computer leftovers, yes.”
: : :
Elle Gray
Level 5
Primatech Research Facility
2011
Elle briskly charged through Level 5 on the last leg of her monitor duty. In one hand she held her cell phone and the other she kept held up toward the windows. As she passed each room she would check to make sure each cell was appropriately occupied. Before any of them got a chance to make a lecherous comment at her, she fired a burst of electricity at the window which startled them enough for her to get by.
“Gabriel!” she seethed into the phone. “This is your wife! Message number twenty-four. I don’t know where the hell you are, but when I find you, I will kill you. And if you’re already dead, I’ll unkill you just so I can kill you! You know that’s possible!”
As Elle turned the corner, she encountered the source of her aggravation. Immediately, her anger melted as she raced to embrace her husband. “Babe, I was so worried. You know what I’m like when I’m angry.”
Danny Pine, from his corner cell, screamed out, “You f***ing bitch!”
“Gabriel, where’s your phone? And did Nathan’s little Boy Scout troop round up the bad guys? What the hell’s—”
Elle was shut up as her husband, now dressed in all black, telekinetically threw her into the far wall. Sylar grinned as he approached his wife.
“I can taste your power already.”
Elle discharged a massive burst of energy into Sylar. After a graceless landing, she commented dryly, “You always were a glutton for punishment.”
Sylar rolled and extended his hand again, but Elle was ready with another electrocution to his arm.
“Babe, don’t you realize what you’re doing? The consequences of your actions.” Intensely she told him, “If you kill me, you will never get laid again.”
Sylar just surveyed Elle with a perplexed expression.
Shaking her head with frustration, she picked up Gabriel by his not-yet-healed arm and dragged him down the hallway she had just exited. “You are in Level 5, where the world’s most dangerous Specials are kept in cages, and you go after my silly sparks? Look at this guy,” she gestured toward Danny Pine, who had formed two metallic arms with he strained to hold up threateningly as he inched backwards. Elle moved him forward to Eric Doyle. “And this one, he can make anyone do whatever he wants. I know a couple of times when you’ve probably wanted that.” He frowned at her. “Bad time for naughty jokes? Sorry. Or…” she dragged him to the end of the hall. “I know you’re a little death-phobic. I bet you couldn’t wait for this one.” She whispered in his ear enticingly as she laid her head over his shoulder.
Sylar’s evil grin returned as he looked into his son’s playpen.
Elle escorted her husband into the room. Noah tossed aside the saw blades he was folding and ran toward his parents, screaming with joy, “Mommy! Daddy!”
Before he could reach them, Sylar mentally threw his son into the far wall. The boy landed spread eagle, cracking the cement wall behind him, giggling. “That was fun, Daddy!”
“Then you’re gonna love this,” Sylar whispered to himself and he raised his hand with his finger pointed toward his son.Director’s Commentary: After the exciting headache that was last chapter, it was nice to slow things down for a drama-heavy episode. As always, random people wandered on to my set, so they got acting gigs. No, really, I have my casting department Alexa working her tail off to invite probably every speaking part ever on Heroes down here for a juicy scene. David Anders, who you would think have much better things to do, carved out some time to reprise his role as Adam Monroe, which we can all agree ended too soon. Malcolm McDowell, who I know has better things to do, showed up, too, to give us a glimpse in the friendship we never knew. And just because I didn’t think we had enough female fans screaming at the top of their lungs, I also invited back Thomas Dekker, freshly off the set of Sarah Connor Chronicles, to play Zach so that I will stop getting a hundred e-mails a day all requesting “Bring Back Zach!” There’s no way this wasn’t an organized fan campaign. Or conspiracy. Same difference.
Zach Q. got to delve into Sylar once again. I think he enjoys it a little too much. And Dana Davis returns, because frankly I like doing all the things that the fans want Tim Kring to do. And Randall is so polite: “Thanks for letting me do something besides be the annoying little brother.” My pleasure, Randall, my pleasure.
Written and Directed by Christopher VanDrey
Sendhil Ramamurthy ... Mohinder Suresh
Zachary Quinto ... Gabriel Gray/Sylar
Greg Grunberg ... Matt Parkman
Hayden Panettiere ... Claire Bennet
Kristen Bell ... Elle Gray
Adrian Pasdar ... Nathan Petrelli
Ali Larter ... Tracy Petrelli
Noah Gray-Cabey ... Micah Sanders
Blake Thomas ... Flint Gordon
Thomas Robinson ... Noah Gray
Kiko Ellworth ... Echo DeMille
Matt Dallas ... Edward Pall
Samuel Jones III ... Pvt. Dalton Henry
Thomas Dekker ... Zach
Ivan Shaw ... Archie the Cameraman
John Allen Nelson ... James Walker
Annabeth Gish ... Susan Walker
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