[Gargy]

And the mask falls

Title: And the mask falls.......
Rating: R (That's the lowest rating I give my fics)
Disclaimer: Heroes belongs to NBC and Tim Kring. The Story belongs to me.
Characters/Pairings: Claire/Zach
Subject: A psychological study of Claire Bennet. From Claire's POV.
A/N: I have only seen Part 1 of the Pilot. This story was started (if not completed) before author saw any other episodes of NBC Heroes.
Spoilers: Part 1 of the Pilot; any additional spoilers are purely coincidental, unless otherwise specified.



I awoke this morning with a since of dread, I just knew there was going to be something that would bring my world, as I know it at least, to a screeching end. Okay, so I've been feeling this way ever since I found out I am impervious to any kind of physical harm; but this morning it sat in the pit of my stomach like you just wouldn't believe. Today was the beginning of the rest of my life. No seventeen year old should have grow up this fast.

After getting up and forcing myself to get ready and eat breakfast, I thought I'd meet up with Zach. So, as we made our way to school we wouldn't have any interruptions. My “friends”, or should I say the peers I endure just to maintain a certain image, can be downright mean. I've tried to get them not to be so cruel, especially to Zach, needless to say they are very very slow learners. Now days they've been better about at least not being jackasses within my presence. Nonetheless, I meet up with Zach half-way to school and we talked; we were actually feeling back to normal (well, as normal as two friends in elementary school can be since they've not talked in like five to six years), just like the good old days-when image was not everything, we were just Zach and Claire hanging out like we always did.

We arrived at school and I leaned against an empty space on the bike rack as Zach locked his bike securely, neither us even noticed my pack of friends circling around us until we heard Brent speak.

“What you think you're doing Omega? Don't you remember you place? Or do you need a reminder? Omega's don't socialize with Alpha Bitches,” oh no, my friends were just like wolves-territorial and instinctual enough to believe in a pack hierarchy.

“You know Brent if you even hope to be Claire's 'mate', perhaps you should respect her enough to not refer to her as a female dog,” Zach was actually defending me and not all that concerned about his personal welfare.

“You dare to question my authority,” Brent was now angry.

“Whoa! We aren't animals. This is just high school and there's no need to start posturing,” I stepped in between the two males, knowing that Brent would kill Zach.

Needless, to say the pack dispersed but not without one of my poser friends, Megan, coming up to me and whispering not too quietly, “Well, you know that should you choose to 'mate' down people will at least stop saying you're a lesbian,” what the **** is that supposed to infer. Oh, yeah that's right I haven't been 'interested' in any one of the male species, so it's only appropriate for speculative rumors to float around about my sexual orientation. Not that being gay, lesbian, bi-sexual, or trans-whatever is wrong-it's just this IS Odessa, TX in the heart of the Bible Belt. We grow our bigots big and their bigotry even bigger here. Just because the bigots are the majority here, I want you to know that not everyone here agrees with it.

Not that I may not be bi-sexual but let's just say that there's being a member of the male population that I've kind of always known I was destined to 'mate' with, as it were. Our parents went through Lamaze classes together (becoming fast friends), we grew up not too far from each other, we grew up together, we were inseparable, oh who the hell am I kidding........it's Zach. It's always being Zach, it will always be Zach. Do you know how difficult it is to have to choose between your best friend/the boy you're going to marry and have children with AND being popular? What? I was only elven years old and yes being popular mattered to me, or at least I thought it did. I had almost all my classes with Zach and we'd always get seating assignments where I'd be in direct line of vision of him; it is torture knowing you can't go to him, you can't try to explain to him, and you can't escape the stupid tug-o-war between your heart and stupid hormonal thoughts of being a teenage girl. For goodness sake's, I still refer to the man who adopted me as his daughter as “daddy”.

Argh!! I just regressing and not getting on with my day, seems like I've been doing that a lot now days.
Anyway back to the day-shall we? After I stood there for awhile watching them leave and waiting for it to be relatively safe for me to relax from my protective stance; I turned at Zach telling me something to the effect of, “It is okay. You've talked to me in front of people at school today. Promised kept. Lets just do ourselves a big favor and go our separate ways.”

I didn't have a chance to respond as I stayed rooted their watching him walk off bravely. That's when I felt it. I turned to notice one of the younger goth like freshman coming up the walk, sullen as always, but the way she held her hands within her pocket just kind of creeped out. As she passed, I started to walk right behind her, not letting her out of my sight, and when we got inside she just kind of froze while scanning the hallway. I followed her train of vision, the teachers and some administrators were congregating at one end of the all. Then, we saw my friends standing in the middle of the hall and at the other end of the hall were Zach and his friends. I don't know why but I knew I had to get in-between her and Zach. As I stepped in front of her, that's when she had pulled out the six shot revolver. When she pointed it and saw I was standing in front of her, she backed off a few feet demanding I get out of her way. I held my hand out and sympathetically pleaded with her to give me the gun. She wouldn't and ranted about how little Ms. Perfect is going to get herself killed if she doesn't get out of her way. I told her I wasn't moving, I approached slowly, and still pleaded with her to give me the revolver. I saw the trigger begin to cock back and that's when I launched myself at her, grabbed a hold of the gun and her hand twisting it. As we fell back, as if in slow-motion, I heard a very loud bang ring through the air. The next thing I knew I had been kneeling over her with the gun in my hand, that I had wrestled free, with her looking at me in horror and not at my face. I followed her line of vision down to the bullet hole in my sweater and that's when I noticed the falling sparks that still rained down from the light that was shot out in midst of the commotion. I stood slowly still shocked by the hole in my top and when I heard a soft gasp break forth from the stunned into silence crowd, that's when I started to look up at the crowd that had gathered after they were finally alerted to the situation by the gun going off...............


To be continued.............

[Gargy]

Title: And the mask falls (Part 2)
Rating: R (That's the lowest rating I give my fics)
Disclaimer: Heroes belongs to NBC and Tim Kring. The Story belongs to me.
Characters/Pairings: Claire/Zach
Subject: A psychological study of Claire Bennet. From Claire's POV.
A/N: I have only seen Part 1 of the Pilot. This story was started (if not completed) before author saw any other episodes of NBC Heroes.
Spoilers: Part 1 of the Pilot; any additional spoilers are purely coincidental, unless otherwise specified.


The world began to move at the regular pace I was more frequently used to. I was soon surrounded by my friends asking me if I was alright, of course I was alright-well except for one little thing they must've not realized just yet. The teachers and administrators had pushed their way through the crowd, the women looked at me to make sure I wasn't in shock, as the guys took the gun from my hand and rounded up goth-girl. All off the sudden I felt my top being manipulated to searching eyes looking for my entrance and exit wounds both in my front and my back by two separate pair of eyes. I knew that my friends and other kids were standing around trying to peer over the adults shoulders.

“It is obvious she's been shot, there are two separate holes in her shirt, not to mention the blood staining the surrounding threads, and don't forget about the whole in the ceiling. So, why aren't there any bleeding holes in her,” The woman behind me said.

“I don't know she doesn't seem to be in pain of any kind........” the lady in front of me stated.

“They sealed up before my very eyes,” Goth-girl shouted out as she was being contained.

Everyones' eyes went between in her and me several times, before reality matched up with what that homicidal young lady was going on about. Shocked expressions took on everyones' faces as they all kind of backed away from me.

I felt a tug on my arm and was out the door before I realized it was Zach rescuing me from the situation. He got me out of their before fear took anger and turned the people that we left behind into a mob that would come after me with pitch folks and torches. He grabbed his bike and I hopped up onto the handle bars and we flew as fast as Zach could pedal.

He had gotten me home in what seemed like 5 minutes flat, because he never stopped nor slowed down until he got me into my driveway.

“We have to get the hell out of here, you've got to get in there in pack some bags, I'll pack up some of my own bags, and we will get out of this place before anyone can find out,” Zach commanded with a plan in mind.

“And just how would we go about doing that, Zach” I questioned Zach as it is apparent that neither one of us had a car of our own at our disposal.

“I am going to hot-wire my mom's car, today she rode with the carpool into work,” Zach said hopping right back onto his bike and heading off to his home, “Now get in there and start packing!”

I watched him leave and it wasn't until he had disappeared around the corner towards his house did I let myself into my house to get myself packed.

**About half an hour later**

I am still stuffing all kinds of clothes into overnight bag, a duffel bag that my dad gave me, and looking around my room to see if there was anything else I might want/need to take. As I was loading up my laptop/CPU into their carrying cases and stuffing cables-batteries-other accessories, plus my video iPod and accompanying files I have saved to disc. I guess in all my banging around getting stuff packed away, I never heard Zach come into the house and trip over a package that was delivered to my father.

“Claire, you've got to see this,” he had the package that had been ripped open by Zach when he fell onto it.

“What is it,” I stopped my loading/packing up in curious distraction.
“It contains all kinds of disc marked with titles like “Genesis”, “Human Flight Potential”, and “Rapid Cellular Regeneration”. There is this butt-load of cash and that's not even the thing that got my attention,” He handed me a disc and I read my name upon it with 'part of the next evolutionary step' in small font right under my name.

“Get my stuff into the car, I need to check somethings in my dad's office,” I said as I started to head to my dad's office that he keeps locked.

To Be Continued...................

[Gargy]

Title: And the mask falls (Part 3)
Rating: R (That's the lowest rating I give my fics)
Disclaimer: Heroes belongs to NBC and Tim Kring. The Story belongs to me.
Characters/Pairings: Claire/Zach
Subject: A psychological study of Claire Bennet. From Claire's POV.
A/N: I have only seen Part 1 of the Pilot. This story was started (if not completed) before author saw any other episodes of NBC Heroes.
Spoilers: Part 1 of the Pilot; any additional spoilers are purely coincidental, unless otherwise specified.


After using my library card to jimmy the lock, I began to scan the room. I saw newspaper clippings all over the walls, upon closer inspection I found they were stories of people displaying supernatural talents. I tore them off the wall and stacked them upon the desk, I started to collect the disc he had catalogued that he had out on the desk, and when I found a big enough box I dumped everything in it. I packed his CPU/Laptop up into their carrying cases, that I had gotten out the closet-that's when I noticed the safe, I decided to go with my birthday as the combination and it actually worked. Inside I found so much more information in files and they all seemed to be about me. I gathered those up and Zach helped me carry everything down to the car.

Then it occurred to me that Mr. Moguls had licked up my blood off the kitchen floor yesterday, not knowing what kind of affect my blood can have on the dog, I decided to load him up into his pet carrier and grab him some dog food.

Once everything and everyone was securely in the car we took off, the clock read that it was just before 10 in the morning. We drove until about 2 of the afternoon when we pulled into a gas station in Oklahoma City. Zach just parked the car and grabbed the money from the package and started counting it out.

“Zach it ain't going to take that much money to fill up you know,” I was almost laughing.

“Look straight across the street from me,” he stated and saw the car lot across the street. “We are getting a new ride, we are just too trackable this way. Wait here and I'll buy a new car and come back to change everything over.”

About 20 minutes later, Zach returned with a 2007 Black Jeep Grand Cherokee. It only took us about four minutes to change everything over. And we were on I-40 east bound at just after 3pm.

We drove for another seven hours pulling off to a motel in Memphis, TN. Zach checked us in and we unload everything and we the next two hours going through all the files, disc, and newspaper clippings that I found in my dad's office............

To be continued...............

[The_Heroic_Loser]

nice fanfic. 8)

[Nightcrawler]

Keep'em coming!

[Gargy]

Title: And the mask falls (Part 4)
Rating: R (That's the lowest rating I give my fics)
Disclaimer: Heroes belongs to NBC and Tim Kring. The Story belongs to me.
Characters/Pairings: Claire/Zach
Subject: A psychological study of Claire Bennet. From Claire's POV.
A/N: I have only seen Part 1 of the Pilot. This story was started (if not completed) before author saw any other episodes of NBC Heroes.
Spoilers: Part 1 of the Pilot; any additional spoilers are purely coincidental, unless otherwise specified.



I awoke the next morning to Mr. Moguls licking my face, my surrounding started to clear before me. I looked at the clock and it was now 10 in the morning and the sound of heavy downfall outside the room and pelting down on the roof started to become all so real. I could smell a take-out breakfast filling my nostrils and my stomach grumbled it's protest. Rolling over I saw Zach drying himself with a hand towel, I followed him over to the table that held the food still in it's bag. I mumbled gotten up, we must've falling asleep around just before 6 in the morning.

“Good morning there sleepy head. I hope your hungry because I got us some sausage in gravy on biscuits with some scrambled eggs plus some OJ,” Zach smiled up at me, too damn chipper for the little bit of sleep we gotten.

I refreshed Mr. Moguls' food and water bowl before I sat down and ate every bit of food that was placed before me before draining the juice. I was still groggy as I made my way into the bathroom and prepared/got into the steamy hot shower. I climbed out of the shower to find Zach must've put me some clothes inside on the closed toilet seat while I was in the refreshing spray of the shower, I tried myself out, applied the deodorant, and got myself dressed before exiting the tiny room. Grabbing my brush, I started to run it through my hair when Zach walked in with a very wet Mr. Moguls and after snatching up a change of clothes for himself he entered the bathroom to take his shower. When I finished brushing my teeth Zach exited the room with clean/wet hair and a clean set of dry clothes on.

I sat down back onto the bed to refresh my memory of the stuff that we started going over last night but were too tired (despite staying at it for nearly 6 full hours) to retain to memory. Zach had turned on the TV to the Weather Channel and the day was already beginning to look like we were rained in.

“It's a good thing I stopped by the front desk and retained the room for another night. We might be able to get out of here about this time tomorrow. Find anything of any relevance,” Zach reassured my apprehensions.

“Well, I am going to check this disc marked about 3 months before my birthday-the first in order of the information I took from my dad's safe. I plan to go in order chronological order, as to prevent in further confusion. After trying to go over all this stuff so late while so sleepy/tired, some of it is still fuzzy in my head,” I allowed Zach know.

Zach took the newspaper clippings and the disc/files that were not in my father's safe and started putting the hard copies of everything in a chronological order, agreeing that would be the best way to go about it.

Around 6 in the evening, after going through everything twice between the both of us, taking notes, comparing notes, and now finally rubbing our eyes while waiting for our Chinese to be delivered.

“So, after categorizing and put it in order of chronological order and in order of importance. With the most important on top and going to the lest of it all-starting to just months before your birth up to as late as the day before yesterday,” Zach started....................

To Be Continued............

[Gargy]

Title: And the mask falls (Part 5)
Rating: R (That's the lowest rating I give my fics)
Disclaimer: Heroes belongs to NBC and Tim Kring. The Story belongs to me.
Characters/Pairings: Claire/Zach
Subject: A psychological study of Claire Bennet. From Claire's POV.
A/N: I have only seen Part 1 of the Pilot. This story was started (if not completed) before author saw any other episodes of NBC Heroes.
Spoilers: Part 1 of the Pilot; any additional spoilers are purely coincidental, unless otherwise specified.



“Apparently, your biological mother was a scared sixteen year old who went by the name of Niki Sanders of Las Vegas, Nevada. Your biological father was one Nathan Peterilli of New York City, New York and he never knew of Niki's pregnancy; and still has no clue of your existence. From what we've been able to deduce that your real father is running for Congress in New York City's lower 8th district and your real mother was in Las Vegas doing stripper web cam up until yesterday morning, when apparently a couple of mob muscle was found murdered in her garage, Micah her other child and son was a part of a very prestigious private school also until yesterday morning. There was a plane ticket purchased underneath your biological half-brother's name with cash on non-stop one-way trip to JFK airport that's also in New York City,” Zach started.

“Obviously we will be shoving off for New York City tomorrow morning” Claire begun.

“Sing-Sing here we come,” Zach sounded non-to-enthused, “To see one Mr. D. L. Hawkins, Micah's biological father and apparent phaser that can walk through walls as described in your adopted daddy's notes.”

“After we have a little visit with Mr. Hawkins,” Claire proceeded in the logical path, “We will be off to see one Mr. Mohinder Suresh, ex-professor of The University of Modas in India. He's here to continue in his murdered father's footsteps to research people with extraordinary abilities.”

“Which include you, with what they define as having Rapid Cellular Regeneration. Your biological parents having some extraordinary gifts of their own, your dad has Human Flight Potential and your mother as what they can only classify as a mirror-image doubleganger self. There's your real dad's brother, Peter that is a male-nurse to terminally ill patients, you what they have described as an empathy-clairvoyance. A drug addict artist slash comic book illustrator with the ability to paint the future while high. A beat cop, that can't pass the detective test, that can hear others' thoughts,” Zach ran down the list of people on a watch list.

“I don't know what's more scary that me and the others' didn't even realize this things until recently, but we've been watched for over my lifetime or being so efficiently cataloged,” Claire sounded weary and creeped out.

Taking a break to eat the egg drop soup, beef lo mien noodles, and drink the decaf green tea they had ordered in. Refilling Mr. Mogul's food dish and refreshing the dog's water for the second time that day. Claire and Zach prepared for bed, Zach walked the dog while Claire changed and got ready for bed. Zach brushed his teeth and washed his face before pulling off his jeans and socks to climb into bed next to Claire.............

To Be Continued...........

[supergroovymama]

Oooooh...I really like it. Please give me more!

[Gargy]

Title: And the mask falls (Part 6)
Rating: R (That's the lowest rating I give my fics)
Disclaimer: Heroes belongs to NBC and Tim Kring. The Story belongs to me.
Characters/Pairings: Claire/Zach
Subject: A psychological study of Claire Bennet. From Claire's POV.
A/N: I have only seen Part 1 of the Pilot. This story was started (if not completed) before author saw any other episodes of NBC Heroes.
Spoilers: Part 1 of the Pilot; any additional spoilers are purely coincidental, unless otherwise specified.



Waking in the middle of the night, wide awake and staring at the clock reading 4:46am. I look over to see Mr. Moguls laying by the door, fast asleep and looking mighty peaceful. I would've resented that dog at that moment if I hadn't all of the sudden realized the feeling of a left arm draped around my mid-section. Smiling rather contently myself, this is how it's supposed to be. Zach and me snuggled up in bed together, happy and in-love.

I know Zach loves me, I mean who would so willingly put up with their best friend ditching them for popularity. He's never said one mean word to me, no matter what. Even though I've done some pretty cruel things to him, and just ended up feeling guilty for it later. I did eventually grow out of taunting and making fun of him and the others, I just would ignore them and try to lead by example for my poser friends. Its a delicate fine line to walk. To think I actually thought popularity was going to fill the void in my heart, the abandonment I've always felt due to being adopted. No being with Zach is the one true, real thing that keeps me content. In Zach's arms I am in heaven.

I know what possessed me, I've never being intimate with anyone before, I roll over and press my body as closely as I can to his body and just stare at him sleeping.

Sometime later I was awakened by Mr. Mogul's licking my face once again, but this time he was standing with his two front paws on Zach's shoulders. The blue tint of the rising sun was peeking through along the walls and I didn't want to move to see that it was just before 6 am, as I was practically beaming at Zach with my forehead pressed against his.

I whispered, “I love you, Zach. Always have and always will. We're destined, my soul-mate,” as I gave him a soft, gentle peck on the lips before I could stop myself.

He groggily started to rouse from his slumber and when he rolled away from me unconsciously. My smile slid from my face and I just got up and made a hasty escape to the bathroom.

To be continued.....................

[Gargy]

Title: And the mask falls (Part 7)
Rating: R (That's the lowest rating I give my fics)
Disclaimer: Heroes belongs to NBC and Tim Kring. The Story belongs to me.
Characters/Pairings: Claire/Zach
Subject: A psychological study of Claire Bennet. From Claire's POV.
A/N: I have only seen Part 1 of the Pilot. This story was started (if not completed) before author saw any other episodes of NBC Heroes.
Spoilers: Part 1 of the Pilot; any additional spoilers are purely coincidental, unless otherwise specified.



I came out the shower to find the room empty, Zach was gone and so was Mr. Moguls with the room nice and tidied up. I quickly ran to the door and as I reached for the door, it flung open while I was leaning in towards it, it flew open and smacked me against the wall and I slid down it. Looking up to see what happened, I saw Zach standing before me with yet another look of disgust on his face. The kind of look that toward me immediately that some part of my body was disjointed in one way or another. I felt some wet under my nose and as I went to sniffle it up, I heard the cracking of bones and so forth. I got up and looked into the mirror and saw the blood stains that were on my upper lip, while the the cut on the bridge of my nose and another cut just above my left eyebrow sealed up before my very eyes.

As I turned to ask Zach where he went and why everything was cleaned up, I saw Mr. Moguls standing next to him looking up at me with a towel inches above the dog's head. As my eyes got to Zach's face to start inquiring about the situation, that's when I noticed him gawking at me. At first I thought he had zoned out on me temporarily but it was the chill of the early morning autumn breeze that smoothed over my bare, still wet, skin that I realized I was naked as the day I was born.
Reaching over fairly nonchalantly and snatching the towel out Zach's grasp, I wrapped myself up into it again, “Well, what's the deal here?”

“Uh, um, er, geez,” Zach coming to his senses started looking anywhere but at me.

“Zach, it's okay. Just tell me why you and Mr. Moguls weren't here when I came out of the bathroom and the room is all tidied up,” I reassured him.

After catching his breath and getting his wits about him, Zach explained, “I heard the shower going and I thought we'd get a jump on the day, so I got everything all gathered up and loaded up into the car. That way we can just leave as soon as I am done getting cleaned up myself. And well, Mr. Moguls need to go for his morning constitutional.”

Satisfied with the explanation, I had no other reason not to believe it, and after watching Zach go into the bathroom with a clean change of clothes for himself. I started to get dressed and thinking back on the whole broken nose scenario, I couldn't help but get a huge smile on my face. I wasn't embarrassed and fact if the situation didn't require it, I wouldn't have snatched the towel in the first place. And even now if we weren't distracted by another pressing matter, I would've made sure Zach knew exactly how I feel, how I've always felt, and how I'll always feel about him.

To be continued...........