Slave Verse 2, Chapter 6: Systems
A/N: Huh. More lack of sex. Not sure what’s going on here. But I forgive Peter-in-my-head because he at least gave me an intriguing insight on the possible pitfalls of time travel.
They spent the rest of the evening working out their strategy and settling on a plan. Sylar turned out to be a fairly good cook, which surprised Peter for some reason. Peter didn’t know a frying pan from a saucepan. He managed heating up corn out of a can. Sylar did the steaks.
As he slid Peter’s plate in front of his chair, Sylar said, “Peter… please. Put some clothes on. It…” He trailed off, unable to think of how to say that being naked all the time without being a slave was creeping him out. He felt self-conscious himself without a shirt and on the heels of that thought he went back to his bedroom to get one. When he came out, Peter was dressed in a plain white t-shirt, jeans and sneakers.
Huh. Where’d he get that stuff? “Thank you,” Sylar said as he settled into his chair. He looked at his food and took a moment. It almost looked like he was praying, but really, he was just reflecting on things, thinking about how long it had been since he’d sat down for a meal with a guest. He picked up his fork and began to cut his steak. Peter, who had been waiting, watching him, followed suit.
“So,” Sylar said, “Did you go visit Nathan in the nude?”
“What if I did? You jealous?”
“Yeah,” Sylar said bluntly.
“Oh.” It hadn’t been the reaction Peter had been expecting. “Um… no, not really. I was wearing what I am now.”
Sylar’s brows drew together and he looked over Peter’s clothes again. “Are you really wearing anything?”
“No,” Peter answered, also blunt.
“Oh.” Illusion then. Sylar considered what to do about this and decided that ‘nothing’ was a pretty good answer.
They ate slowly, Peter engaging Sylar to tell him the differences between top sirloin and ribeye and why he had ordered one as opposed to the other, what it meant for corn to be ‘niblet’ and a variety of other small questions. Sylar had gone through a phase a few years back of enrolling in classes in the community, trying to meet people. It hadn’t really worked out - he’d formed some casual acquaintances, but that was it - but he had learned a lot of small skills. The four part cooking class he’d taken had been one of the few that he still used. His perfect memory retained the rest, but he rarely had reason to use them. Peter excused himself after a while to go refill his drink.
Sylar finished off his steak, realizing Peter had been rather a while in the kitchen. More than half the man’s food remained untouched. He took his last bite and walked over to the doorway, leaning on the frame, arms crossed. Peter was stirring something rapidly, facing away. He watched how the motions jiggled his body for a while, sucking at his teeth. Finally Peter glanced back and said, “Like what you see?”
“Yeah. What are you beating off over there?” Sylar was pretty sure he knew, but he couldn’t pass up the line.
Peter snorted. “Whipped cream. Whip it good.”
Sylar laughed at that. “Devo.”
Peter nodded, a boyish cast coming to his features and he flashed that radiant smile that made Sylar’s chest tighten. “Yeah. Those were the days.” His eyes looked distant for a moment and very happy.
“You didn’t finish your steak. Moving on to dessert so fast?”
Peter shrugged, his good mood evaporating. “Stomach’s shrunk. Guess that’s what happens when you don’t eat much of anything for a week.”
Sylar frowned. “Don’t exaggerate. I didn’t starve you for a week. You haven’t even been here that long.”
Peter paused in his work. “Sylar, if it was just you, you’d be dead. But it’s not. It’s the whole system. Why would they feed slaves any more than the bare minimum to keep them alive? You heard what the doctor said. It’s not a secret - what they do to people.”
Sylar sighed. He really didn’t care what happened to slaves, but obviously Peter did. So he supposed that meant he needed to care about them. Or at least not object while Peter stood around and cared about them. He wasn’t very happy about that ‘you’d be dead’ part either, but he didn’t argue.
Peter tasted his product, folded in some sugar, and went back to using the whisk. “You remember when you first got your ability and tried to kill yourself because you didn’t want to be a killer?”
“How do you know about that?” Sylar snapped, walking closer to lean against the counter an arm’s length away from him. He didn’t like to think about that time. He’d been weak. He hadn’t been weak in a long time.
Peter rolled his eyes. “Assuming I didn’t download your whole life this morning, which I did, then there’s always the case file Nathan’s security has on you.”
“They have a file on me?”
“Yep. You’re powerful enough to be a threat. They have a file on you.”
“Then why haven’t they acted? Gotten rid of me?”
Peter gave a small smile. “You’ve never attacked them. You’ve never showed up on any of the probability calculations as even possibly attacking them. Never showed up in the precognition as being expected to attack them. I mean, sure, you’re there as an outside chance, but Nathan might choke to death on a pretzel too. Doesn’t mean he stops eating pretzels. If he killed everyone who might kill him, no one would be alive.”
“Huh.” They were right. He’d never seriously considered killing Nathan Petrelli, not even when he’d started seeking after Peter. There just wasn’t a need. Until Peter broached the subject just a few hours ago, killing Nathan had been like killing someone at random. Even though Sylar had lost track of his kills after eighty-three (he figured he was around one-fifty now), he never killed randomly.
Gabriel reached out and put his finger in the whipped cream, tasting a small dollop. “Mm,” he said appreciatively. “Not bad.”
Peter got more on his finger and offered it to him, so he ate that as well, sucking at the finger. Peter moved it in and out of his mouth as he sucked, in a slow, steady motion. Sylar blinked and jerked his head aside when he realized what that reminded him of, thoughts of Nathan and finger-fucking Peter on his mind. Peter gave him an odd look, but turned to the counter without exploring it.
“Why is it you know how to make whipped cream, but can’t cook a steak?” Sylar asked, his tone a little more acerbic than it needed to be.
Peter chuckled. “I know how to do the important stuff.” Sylar snorted at that. Peter went on, “But really, when you first found out about your ability, you might not have become a killer. At least, not the way you did - not so fast, not so much, not so out of control. But there was a group in place, a system at work, a bunch of people getting together and acting with a common purpose and that purpose included goading you into killing, so they could see how that worked and what you needed. Once they knew that, they didn’t need you anymore - Nathan had me anyway and was…”
Peter’s voice flagged. “He was afraid he couldn’t keep two under control. One he could do. And… he had a long time to… know me.”
Peter rubbed his forehead suddenly. Sylar frowned at him. Peter shoved the whipped cream to the side and got out a bowl roughly. He pulled over the ice cream that had been sitting out while he prepared the topping and scooped out a several rounds of it, dropping them in more forcefully than necessary.
“Peter?” Sylar asked. Peter just seemed to have run out of words and was now carrying out his tasks silently, tensely.
Peter looked at him like he didn’t even know who he was. Sylar stepped over to him and kissed him gently but firmly. Peter broke the kiss immediately and hugged him. His chest heaved a few times and then he calmed. “What was I even saying?” he asked, still embracing.
“I don’t know that we need to talk about that. It’s not important now.”
Peter pushed away from him and returned to the ice cream. He stared at it a moment, then put the container back in the freezer. “No. We do. You need to understand. It’s a system - not an individual. An individual can start a system and they can be the lynchpin for a system, but the problem is the system. An individual like you, if you work alone like you do, you don’t really have a big impact. It’s when you start working with other people, like the Company, or Samuel Sullivan, or like Nathan - that’s when you really start changing things. The whole world has changed, Sylar. And not for the better. We have to stop this.” He got out the chocolate syrup and drizzled it liberally over the ice cream. “Stop the president; stop the world.”
Sylar’s brows knit. “Wasn’t that… didn’t that Japanese guy say something like that a lot?”
“Yeah. Save the cheerleader; save the world.”
“Huh. He had a really cool power. What ever happened to him?”
“Dunno. I’ve thought about that a lot. An awful lot.” Peter put a ridiculous amount of whipped cream on top of the ice cream and drizzled it too with syrup. “If he were still around, none of this would have happened. This is a miserable timeline. Hiro wouldn’t allow this.”
Sylar interjected sourly, “This world doesn’t have heroes.”
Peter snorted and smiled, his humor temporarily restored. “Yeah. I’ve noticed. Remember when you wanted to be the hero, back at Kirby Plaza?”
Sylar huffed and said nothing, crossing his arms tightly across his chest.
Peter’s gaze lingered on that body language, correctly reading that Sylar wouldn’t have minded being cast as the good guy. He smiled softly to himself and turned back to his food prep, talking. “So anyway, if that Japanese guy were around, he’d have gone back in time and stopped it - so by default, if it is happening, then whatever attempt he made to stop it failed, as far as we’re concerned.
“Sometimes I wonder if he went back in time and changed things, and this is the timeline he left behind. He’s out there somewhen, living in a better timeline, thinking he averted all of this, and instead it’s just… this world went on without him.” He looked sideways at Sylar. “That’s why I won’t use time travel to solve this. I can’t risk…” He shook his head. “I can’t risk leaving this world to its fate.”
Peter put away the syrup and the rest of the whipped cream. He took out a single strawberry from the leftovers of the fruit tray. He perched it on top of the irregular mountain of whipped cream. He stabbed two long spoons in it and presented his masterpiece to Sylar.
“One bowl?”
Peter smiled. “Do we really need two?”
Sylar grinned. “No, I guess not.”
They spent the rest of the evening working out their strategy and settling on a plan. Sylar turned out to be a fairly good cook, which surprised Peter for some reason. Peter didn’t know a frying pan from a saucepan. He managed heating up corn out of a can. Sylar did the steaks.
As he slid Peter’s plate in front of his chair, Sylar said, “Peter… please. Put some clothes on. It…” He trailed off, unable to think of how to say that being naked all the time without being a slave was creeping him out. He felt self-conscious himself without a shirt and on the heels of that thought he went back to his bedroom to get one. When he came out, Peter was dressed in a plain white t-shirt, jeans and sneakers.
Huh. Where’d he get that stuff? “Thank you,” Sylar said as he settled into his chair. He looked at his food and took a moment. It almost looked like he was praying, but really, he was just reflecting on things, thinking about how long it had been since he’d sat down for a meal with a guest. He picked up his fork and began to cut his steak. Peter, who had been waiting, watching him, followed suit.
“So,” Sylar said, “Did you go visit Nathan in the nude?”
“What if I did? You jealous?”
“Yeah,” Sylar said bluntly.
“Oh.” It hadn’t been the reaction Peter had been expecting. “Um… no, not really. I was wearing what I am now.”
Sylar’s brows drew together and he looked over Peter’s clothes again. “Are you really wearing anything?”
“No,” Peter answered, also blunt.
“Oh.” Illusion then. Sylar considered what to do about this and decided that ‘nothing’ was a pretty good answer.
They ate slowly, Peter engaging Sylar to tell him the differences between top sirloin and ribeye and why he had ordered one as opposed to the other, what it meant for corn to be ‘niblet’ and a variety of other small questions. Sylar had gone through a phase a few years back of enrolling in classes in the community, trying to meet people. It hadn’t really worked out - he’d formed some casual acquaintances, but that was it - but he had learned a lot of small skills. The four part cooking class he’d taken had been one of the few that he still used. His perfect memory retained the rest, but he rarely had reason to use them. Peter excused himself after a while to go refill his drink.
Sylar finished off his steak, realizing Peter had been rather a while in the kitchen. More than half the man’s food remained untouched. He took his last bite and walked over to the doorway, leaning on the frame, arms crossed. Peter was stirring something rapidly, facing away. He watched how the motions jiggled his body for a while, sucking at his teeth. Finally Peter glanced back and said, “Like what you see?”
“Yeah. What are you beating off over there?” Sylar was pretty sure he knew, but he couldn’t pass up the line.
Peter snorted. “Whipped cream. Whip it good.”
Sylar laughed at that. “Devo.”
Peter nodded, a boyish cast coming to his features and he flashed that radiant smile that made Sylar’s chest tighten. “Yeah. Those were the days.” His eyes looked distant for a moment and very happy.
“You didn’t finish your steak. Moving on to dessert so fast?”
Peter shrugged, his good mood evaporating. “Stomach’s shrunk. Guess that’s what happens when you don’t eat much of anything for a week.”
Sylar frowned. “Don’t exaggerate. I didn’t starve you for a week. You haven’t even been here that long.”
Peter paused in his work. “Sylar, if it was just you, you’d be dead. But it’s not. It’s the whole system. Why would they feed slaves any more than the bare minimum to keep them alive? You heard what the doctor said. It’s not a secret - what they do to people.”
Sylar sighed. He really didn’t care what happened to slaves, but obviously Peter did. So he supposed that meant he needed to care about them. Or at least not object while Peter stood around and cared about them. He wasn’t very happy about that ‘you’d be dead’ part either, but he didn’t argue.
Peter tasted his product, folded in some sugar, and went back to using the whisk. “You remember when you first got your ability and tried to kill yourself because you didn’t want to be a killer?”
“How do you know about that?” Sylar snapped, walking closer to lean against the counter an arm’s length away from him. He didn’t like to think about that time. He’d been weak. He hadn’t been weak in a long time.
Peter rolled his eyes. “Assuming I didn’t download your whole life this morning, which I did, then there’s always the case file Nathan’s security has on you.”
“They have a file on me?”
“Yep. You’re powerful enough to be a threat. They have a file on you.”
“Then why haven’t they acted? Gotten rid of me?”
Peter gave a small smile. “You’ve never attacked them. You’ve never showed up on any of the probability calculations as even possibly attacking them. Never showed up in the precognition as being expected to attack them. I mean, sure, you’re there as an outside chance, but Nathan might choke to death on a pretzel too. Doesn’t mean he stops eating pretzels. If he killed everyone who might kill him, no one would be alive.”
“Huh.” They were right. He’d never seriously considered killing Nathan Petrelli, not even when he’d started seeking after Peter. There just wasn’t a need. Until Peter broached the subject just a few hours ago, killing Nathan had been like killing someone at random. Even though Sylar had lost track of his kills after eighty-three (he figured he was around one-fifty now), he never killed randomly.
Gabriel reached out and put his finger in the whipped cream, tasting a small dollop. “Mm,” he said appreciatively. “Not bad.”
Peter got more on his finger and offered it to him, so he ate that as well, sucking at the finger. Peter moved it in and out of his mouth as he sucked, in a slow, steady motion. Sylar blinked and jerked his head aside when he realized what that reminded him of, thoughts of Nathan and finger-fucking Peter on his mind. Peter gave him an odd look, but turned to the counter without exploring it.
“Why is it you know how to make whipped cream, but can’t cook a steak?” Sylar asked, his tone a little more acerbic than it needed to be.
Peter chuckled. “I know how to do the important stuff.” Sylar snorted at that. Peter went on, “But really, when you first found out about your ability, you might not have become a killer. At least, not the way you did - not so fast, not so much, not so out of control. But there was a group in place, a system at work, a bunch of people getting together and acting with a common purpose and that purpose included goading you into killing, so they could see how that worked and what you needed. Once they knew that, they didn’t need you anymore - Nathan had me anyway and was…”
Peter’s voice flagged. “He was afraid he couldn’t keep two under control. One he could do. And… he had a long time to… know me.”
Peter rubbed his forehead suddenly. Sylar frowned at him. Peter shoved the whipped cream to the side and got out a bowl roughly. He pulled over the ice cream that had been sitting out while he prepared the topping and scooped out a several rounds of it, dropping them in more forcefully than necessary.
“Peter?” Sylar asked. Peter just seemed to have run out of words and was now carrying out his tasks silently, tensely.
Peter looked at him like he didn’t even know who he was. Sylar stepped over to him and kissed him gently but firmly. Peter broke the kiss immediately and hugged him. His chest heaved a few times and then he calmed. “What was I even saying?” he asked, still embracing.
“I don’t know that we need to talk about that. It’s not important now.”
Peter pushed away from him and returned to the ice cream. He stared at it a moment, then put the container back in the freezer. “No. We do. You need to understand. It’s a system - not an individual. An individual can start a system and they can be the lynchpin for a system, but the problem is the system. An individual like you, if you work alone like you do, you don’t really have a big impact. It’s when you start working with other people, like the Company, or Samuel Sullivan, or like Nathan - that’s when you really start changing things. The whole world has changed, Sylar. And not for the better. We have to stop this.” He got out the chocolate syrup and drizzled it liberally over the ice cream. “Stop the president; stop the world.”
Sylar’s brows knit. “Wasn’t that… didn’t that Japanese guy say something like that a lot?”
“Yeah. Save the cheerleader; save the world.”
“Huh. He had a really cool power. What ever happened to him?”
“Dunno. I’ve thought about that a lot. An awful lot.” Peter put a ridiculous amount of whipped cream on top of the ice cream and drizzled it too with syrup. “If he were still around, none of this would have happened. This is a miserable timeline. Hiro wouldn’t allow this.”
Sylar interjected sourly, “This world doesn’t have heroes.”
Peter snorted and smiled, his humor temporarily restored. “Yeah. I’ve noticed. Remember when you wanted to be the hero, back at Kirby Plaza?”
Sylar huffed and said nothing, crossing his arms tightly across his chest.
Peter’s gaze lingered on that body language, correctly reading that Sylar wouldn’t have minded being cast as the good guy. He smiled softly to himself and turned back to his food prep, talking. “So anyway, if that Japanese guy were around, he’d have gone back in time and stopped it - so by default, if it is happening, then whatever attempt he made to stop it failed, as far as we’re concerned.
“Sometimes I wonder if he went back in time and changed things, and this is the timeline he left behind. He’s out there somewhen, living in a better timeline, thinking he averted all of this, and instead it’s just… this world went on without him.” He looked sideways at Sylar. “That’s why I won’t use time travel to solve this. I can’t risk…” He shook his head. “I can’t risk leaving this world to its fate.”
Peter put away the syrup and the rest of the whipped cream. He took out a single strawberry from the leftovers of the fruit tray. He perched it on top of the irregular mountain of whipped cream. He stabbed two long spoons in it and presented his masterpiece to Sylar.
“One bowl?”
Peter smiled. “Do we really need two?”
Sylar grinned. “No, I guess not.”