snowblindrpg | [log] Scared of Lonely [closed]

Godsend.

[Yeah, he remembers that username and he's definitely seen those confessions. Stephen's gaze returns more sharply to the bandaged leg and to the cane, trying to guess at the man's likely level of mobility, before he returns to Sylar's face. Stephen gives the other man a tight smile.]

You here alone?

[ Ah, of course. He smirks slightly and nods at the mention of his username. ]

Alphonse Elric is upstairs. He's been keeping an eye out for me.

[ Which has taken on something of a different meaning since a couple nights ago, when he'd spilled his fears all over Al, and the kid just promised to help him through even the worst of it. ]

We've been traveling together for awhile, so you can ask him how dangerous I am, if you want. With this leg, it's not very. At least I'm shuffling around on my own now.

[He blinks in mild surprise -- Al's just a kid, but he showed his hand as far as that self-sacrificing streak went. If anyone's going to hang out with an admitted serial killer....

He gives a little nod, but doesn't move from where he is. He hasn't seen anything to indicate Gabriel is an immediate threat; he'll just have to watch his back tonight. He nods at the leg.]

What happened to it?

[ He takes a moment to stare down at his leg, as if it had betrayed him somehow. ]

Remember that day when we were told to run? Star path, not supposed to stray, all of that?

This was what happened when we didn't do that. A monster showed up- some sort of robot monstrosity walking on human legs. And we were the lucky ones finding out how it got said legs. It drilled an inch wide hole through, here- [ He points to the outside of his left leg, just below the knee. ] -and thank goodness Al was there or it probably would've ripped the whole thing off. Not that it works now, but-

[ He shrugs, pretending it bothers him way less than it actually does. ]

Could you ask Al about his leg, by the way? He doesn't complain but I think he hurt it worse than he wants to tell me. I don't know if he's had a chance to heal it up.

[Stephen grimaces in empathy -- specialist though he may be, he's automatically visualizing the kind of damage that would have been caused, the poor prognosis he'd give anyone who went through that, let alone went through it without so much as the option of hospitalization.]

I can have a look at it, but there might not be much I can do for you. Or him. I'm guessing it was the same thing for both of you?

[Even though Al is...armor. He's waiting to hear how that worked.]

[ Yeah, he totally gets that grimace. He wasn't too happy about it, either, although dealing with it for so long has at least gotten him used to the idea. ]

Yeah, it was. It got confused when it started trying to drill through Al's armor. That's the only thing that distracted it long enough.

And- [ He gestures at his leg and shrugs. ] Yeah, I'm not expecting to use it again. I know that's not something that'll heal. I'm just hoping to keep it from getting infected, at this point.

[ He'd be able to tell on his own, if he could get a clear view of it. But it wasn't exactly a good idea for him to twist his leg that way- something he had to learn through experience. ]

It's kind of amazing, too. I've been told you can see right through it.

Oh, yeah, that's super cool.

[Your leg is fucked, bro. At least Gabrielseems to have come to terms with it...more gracefully than Stephen came to terms with the loss of his hands, frankly, but he doesn't entirely trust appearances here. It'd be a special kind of stupid to trust appearances when it comes to a serial killer.]

I can help with that part, though. I mean, provided you don't knife me or anything.

[Stephen doesn't expect he will, so at least his tone is light when he says it.]

[ It's smart to not trust appearances here. He's hardly going to let on to another passing 'resident' just how bothered he is about his now-useless leg. It had been bad enough losing the telekinesis, now he can't even walk without help. But maybe- just maybe- it would be healed before they reached the end of this.

He smirks at that last comment. ]

Considering I'm going to need your help getting my pants off so we can unwrap the bandages? I don't think you've got too much to be worried about.

[ The smirk fades and he continues on in a slightly more serious tone: ] If it would make you feel better, I can explain why I did what I did back home. It had to do with stealing people's superpowers. As you can imagine, there's not much of that going on over here.

Oh, so you were just killing them to absorb their powers. Very reassuring.

[How is that supposed to make him feel better? Stephen doesn't get up or move away, though; he actually shrugs his way out of his pack and swings it around in front of him on the counter.]

But alright, I'll bite. Not like there's much else to do but talk, right?

[ He shrugs in response to Strange's sarcasm. It's helped a lot of the people he's talked to, but a lot of those people are practically sociopaths themselves. So maybe that's not the best frame of reference.

Regardless, Stephen's sticking around, so Sylar's happy to go into it. ]

I have a special ability back home. It lets me understand the entirety of how complex structures work by merely looking at a small piece of it. But it also pushes me to find more and more. If I see something I could understand, I have to understand it. And the human mind is the most complex thing there is. Finding those unique abilities within it was even more of a challenge...

Since I've been here, I haven't had that push. I've realized my 'mission' back home was not really my idea.

[ It's far more complicated than that, of course. It sounds nice, though, doesn't it? The idea that he wasn't in control of his own actions, and now he is? And he's gotten to the point where even he'd like it to be true, too. ]

I don't actually want to hurt people here. Al's been keeping an eye on me to make sure that's the case.

You think it was a compulsion with a physiological link to whatever the nanomachines have taken away from you.

[That's actually really interesting. If Gabriel is right, then the powers held by the people of his world could very well be variations on some kind of latent psychic ability governed by differences in brain structure...with accompanying mental disorders. The implications are downright fun to think about.

Or it could be that Gabriel is just completely insane, though that wouldn't explain his change of heart since coming here. As far as Stephen knows, Sylar's the only one here from his world, and it hasn't escaped him that some of the people claiming that they used to have powers might not actually be right about that.]

It's possible. I'll give you that, it's possible. Nothing like that since you came here? No compulsive behaviors, intrusive thoughts...?

Well, I imagine every watchmaker gets a little OCD by the time they reach a decade into their career.
[ The joke falls kind of flat and Sylar moves on. ] But no. Nothing other than whatever Norfinbury hit us all with.

[ He's looking down, clearly lost in thought. Stephen was more receptive to the idea than he thought, so that was going well, at least. He decides to hold off on the more truthful revelations for now- no need to confess to his one in-Norfinbury murder at the moment. ]

I knew I felt different, but I didn't notice what it was until night 180, when our eyes changed. I had my mind but others didn't- [ He sighs, still not looking up. ] ...it seemed similar.

Murder night. That was before my time here.

[He's still trying to decide how much of this he believes. Gabriel seems to believe it himself, which Stephen wishes he could think was more promising than it is.]

You were the one who asked me if I would keep track of powers on the census. Were you looking for something?

[ That's right, he did do that. As Sylar speaks, his eyes shine with curiosity. ]

Just because I don't have the hunger to collect powers anymore, it doesn't mean I'm not interested. So many of us are exceptional in our own worlds- I thought there might be a pattern there. Perhaps the Admin had brought us in according to specific traits, even if those ended up muted. Maybe she wanted people who had been through exceptional circumstances.

[ As he pauses, he looks back up to Stephen. He sighs and shrugs, leaning back against the wall. ]

I'd hoped we could piece together some of what we had to do if we had clues about why we were here. But I doubt it would've helped. We're cut off by all these damn puzzles.

[It's a good argument for gathering the information, and an idea that might have merit. It's also a nice excuse if Gabriel is still interested for more dangerous reasons. Stephen hasn't been collecting more than the bare minimum for probably a week now anyway, though. It's harder to find enthusiasm for the project now that he knows the people behind the names on the obituaries.]

Maybe. I don't doubt there's some kind of pattern to it, but I've begun to think it probably doesn't matter.

[He doesn't matter. He wasn't chosen to be brought here because he's needed here. He was brought here to fill a quota; his conviction of that has been settling deeper as he's watched good people, smart people die and not return. If it mattered to the system which specific people were here, Natasha and Clint would be alive right now.]

I should have a look at that leg.

[ Sylar's reasons tend to align with both his reasonable self and his more predatory instincts. He'd already become a master of rationalization back home, why not continue the trend here?

He does raise an eyebrow with Stephen's response. But he also nods when Stephen moves on, and begins unwrapping the cloth bandage, with a slight wince. ]

All right. I'll need your help with my jeans- wasn't kidding about that one.

[ This was going to be painful, and he frequently couldn't control his left leg when he had to try to bend it. Best to leave it straight as much as possible. He takes a piece of a pill out of a bottle in his pocket and dry-swallows it before they start.

They manage to get the jeans off and now he's half-wrapped up in his constellation throw blanket. There's a much cleaner bandage that had been hiding under his jeans, with gauze underneath. And it's now that he decides to start speaking again. ]

I still think it matters. No matter how we manage here, they have to have brought us all for some reason. Have you met any of the children here? They're all exceptionally bright and resilient. Someone brought in people with the tools to maybe make it through this place. I'm starting to think it's Andromeda.

[Stephen does his best to help, but it'll become clear pretty quickly that he has only limited use of his hands. Still, between the two of them they get it done, and he's as careful as he can be. Stephen lifts an eyebrow at the pill, trying to catch a glimpse of the label on the bottle -- if Sylar doesn't volunteer the information as they're getting his jeans off, he'll have to bring it up once the exam proper is under way.

He looks up from where his trembling hands hover above that bandage, having thought that topic of conversation was closed.]

Interesting theory. We know she's tried to protect us at least once.

[Gently as he can, he starts to peel away the bandage. Alright, if Gabriel wants to argue for meaning, he'll see how well he can refute the thoughts that have made looking for meaning seem pointless recently.]

I could argue, though, that signs point to the system being predisposed to pull from certain dimensions. Nearly everyone here is human, and most of us are from something recognizable as Earth. If we're exceptional, it might be only a byproduct of how the machine works across dimensions.

[ Sylar doesn't call attention to the shaky hands- it's still more helpful than trying to do this himself. He raises an eyebrow back when he's got the bottle out. He holds it out for Stephen to see that it is, indeed, prescribed to Gabriel Gray, even if the prescribing doctor is House. It's also still mostly full. ]

The population of people with special abilities in my world is something like .0001 percent. If you had the whole range of dimensions to go with, mine would not be the place to look, I'd think. But you do have a point about the majority of humans. Again, we're talking about having the right tool- nngh.

[ He winces and tries to be quiet, but once the wound is exposed to the air, the pain's worse. There's gauze stuffed in the hole, and he reaches forward himself to start tugging it out. The wound has been trying to heal onto it, so it's more messy than the rest of the bandages. If Stephen gets a good look at the bone, he can see just how perfect the circle was that went through Sylar's leg- it's more like it had been stamped out than drilled. ]

I have more gauze in my bag. It'd clearly been needing a change.

[ Trying to distract himself with theorizing hasn't worked too well. It had been worth a try, at least. ]

[Outwardly, Stephen's expression remains cool and clinical as he takes the opportunity to examine the wound. Inwardly, he feels a wave of pity as he sees the damage for himself.]

Hang on, I'm going to try to get some more light on it.

[All he has for that is his tablet, but it's the work of a moment to get it out of his bag and switched on. Absently, he swings the Cloak off his shoulders and pushes the tablet into its folds as it hangs in midair.]

Hold this for me, please.

[To Gabriel again:]

Where'd you get the gauze? And did Doctor House prescribe you anything other than the painkillers?

[ Sylar can't help it, he smiles disbelievingly at the cloak as it shifts and moves and holds the tablet. He had nearly forgotten about that cloak, how could he have done that? He stares at it, his eyes sharp as he tries to figure out how it works, his voice a little distant as he answers Strange. ]

Doctor Volakis had the gauze. That's the last of it, in the bag. [ And unfortunately, it wasn't much. ] Nothing else from House. The Vicodin I got for MN poisoning initially, but that's gone now. Thankfully.

...does your cloak have a name?

[ At least he's less focused on the pain now? ]

[The Cloak, for its part, seems focused on its task -- it keeps shifting minutely to keep the meager light trained on Sylar's wound.]

The Cloak of Levitation.

[It's...not a great name. Stephen gently pinches the remaining bit of gauze in Gabriel's leg, drawing it out as carefully as he's able. He's not going to be much help repacking it.]

Doctor Watson suggested Levi. We're trying it out.

[ Gabriel sees that Stephen's not going to be help getting new gauze in there. Well, he's dealt with worse conditions, fixing himself up. He can do this, too. He closes his eyes tight in a prolonged wince as the last bit of gauze pull away. When his eyes open again, he's clearly focusing on the cloak- staring at it so hard that it seems like he's trying to see the nanites in it. ]

Levi? I like it. Although I guess the big question is how does it like it?

[ He should probably address the cloak itself, huh? ] What do you think, you like Levi all right? You can understand me, right? Or do you just pay attention to the doctor?

[Stephen frowns at the wound, his concentration on the problems there though he does his best to keep up the conversation. Smart man, choosing something else to focus on. There's not much he can do beyond a visual examination, not without so much as a saline solution with which to irrigate it.]

Oh, it understands. It picks up on a lot more than you'd think.

[The Cloak ripples, nudging in closer with the tablet, its collar perked. It's an acknowledgment, at least, if a somewhat ambiguous response to the question.]

Good luck getting it to answer any questions, though.

[ Sylar loves this thing. The way it ripples in acknowledgement makes him smile, even if its laced with pain. ]

Of course you pick up on a lot, Levi. You were important enough to shove nanites in, after all, huh?

I wonder...if we could take them out of you, if you'd even notice. Or maybe you'd feel better. I wouldn't think a Cloak of Levitation would get bogged down by radiation, after all.

We'd be able to fly, then.

[It's a wistful comment, but it's followed by a one-shouldered shrug from Stephen.]

Radiation is energy, same as magic. I honestly don't know what would happen.

[log] Scared of Lonely [closed]

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cw: addiction

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