(no subject)

[ace_of_knaves]

Who: Peter and the Joker
When: Evening, before Sirens
Where: The Roof of Peter's apartment
Summary: The Joker lures a police tail after him...just so he can have Voids close by when he draws Peter up to the roof...
Warnings: Violence, shenanigans, Joker

The red corvette spun around the corner on two wheels, nearly running down a man who was rushing his two children home before the sirens rang. That was the adorable thing about Sector Four to the Joker; it was such a wholesome place in the light of day. At night it was still part of the Port. It was the place family dreams went to die.

Joker wrenched sharply at the wheel of the corvette and glanced back at the trail of police cars behind him. The officer in the front car was yelling something at him but he did not bother listening. The officer had told him his name but Joker had not listened to that either. Guy had a funny nose, though. It was big, bulbous and red. Joker liked the nose.

"'Scuse me!" this was shouted to a pedestrian as he spun around another corner and ground to a halt, hitting a fire hydrant. The corvette failed to knock the metal aside which was disappointing. But the roof was already down and this allowed the Joker to leap nimbly from the vehicle and run for the nearest apartment building. Convenient things, removable roofs. He made a mental note to visit the late Doctor Slavkov's grave and thank him for the car.

The apartment was Joker's real target. Somewhere inside was Peter, a man important to Sylar. Sylar. The name alone raised the poison in his veins. Unfortunately, Sylar had made it clear that he didn't care about living or dying. So that meant going after his little nemesis...it was a more worthy vengeance, anyway. It was something The Persian would not have thought up.

Joker reached out and grabbed a thin, weasely man who was trying to slink away from the sidewalk. The clown's eyes were electric with malicious intent and the man lifted his hands, energy crackling at his fingertips. The glow lasted for only a moment before fizzling.

The Police Voids are in range. Good.

Joker dragged the man over to the apartment's fire escape. "Nothing personal, old chum, you're just a hostage. You know how it is when the fuzz is on your keister."

Of course, this has nothing to do with the cops either. And everything to do with Peter!

"STOP!" yelled Officer Nose, pulling over next to the abandoned corvette. Joker was already half way up the fire escape with his hostage locked in his grip. This was easy for him. When you've run up and down buildings being chased by the Bat, nothing else compared.

"PUT YOUR HANDS IN THE AIR!"

Or maybe it was "hair". Joker wasn't listening again. He dragged the squirming weasel to the edge of the roof and dangled him.

"CALL OFF YOUR BOYS, FUNNY FACE!" Joker yowled down at Nose. "OR THE CORONER WILL BE PICKING THE ASPHALT OUTTA THIS GUY'S TEETH!"

Come on out, Peter. Come stop the Big, Bad Clown.

Comments

[askedtobe]

"Yeah.." Glancing down at the floor of the bathroom as they went, Peter thought briefly to himself that the whole apartment was going to need a good dousing of bleach tomorrow, but he'd worry about that later, because he was being led to his bedroom and falling asleep, not dying, sounded beautifully pleasant.

Peter, however, had other ideas about where Sylar was going to locate himself for the rest of the night. And he's not entirely sure what gave him the bravado to make his sentiments known apart from the fact that being exhausted had seemingly removed his filter, both in terms of actions and words.

Staring at his bed and letting his hands fall to his hips to fidget with where he has his towel tied, Peter looks over his shoulder and up at Sylar. "Can you stay here?" It didn't sound pathetic, or all that pitiful. It just sounded like a question, and a tired one at that. Sylar had stuck with him the entire evening thus far, and for some reason, Peter just didn't want to have to do without.

[gabriel_gray]

Sylar was already looking thoughtfully toward the door when he noticed that Peter was watching him, and he turned back, his expression questioning, and listened. It was the first truly lucid thing that Peter had said since he'd met him in the dark the other day, and invited himself back to his apartment. It didn't sound pitiful. It didn't sound pathetic. It just sounded... Normal. Like for once Peter was truly himself. Inviting him to stay.

"I can," he answered, and glanced toward the bed. It was still perfectly made, the way he'd left it. He lifted one hand, rubbing at his hair with the towel on his head, and shuffled over to his side of the bed - the side he'd stayed on before - sitting on the edge of it and looking up at Peter as though there was nothing at all odd about him putting himself there.

He reached across to pat the other side of the bed, then dropped his shoulder against the headboard.

"Someone has to keep an eye on you," he said, as though that was the only explanation for his actions, nothing more. "Are you feeling any warmer?"

[askedtobe]

Maybe he was just too tired to sound strained, or concerned, or broken, or anything else that usually weighed down on his shoulders as well as the rest of him. He was just blatantly Peter -- albiet a sleepy Peter -- who didn't have the energy to struggle with himself the way he usually did.

Watching Sylar move to his side of the bed (when had it become Sylar's side?), Peter yawned, ruffling up his still damp, but no longer bloody, hair. After another moment, he finally moved, nodding at Sylar's question as he walked around the other side of the bed. "Warm enough."

Dropping onto the edge of it, Peter hesitated with his hand on the towel around his waist, and then truly decided that he just didn't care anymore, didn't have it in him to care as he shoved aside the sheets and pulled off his towel all at once before rolling under the covers. Whatever Sylar saw, he saw -- so be it. Neither of them had to say a word one way or another. It was rather like his own interests in asking Sylar to stay: as long as he didn't have to explain why he wanted him there, the answer didn't really matter. Or so he told himself.

Burrowing under the covers was enough to make Peter's eyes nearly drop closed, but he couldn't keep himself from saying one last thing, though sleep wasn't dragging him off just quite yet. "You don't have to sleep on top of the covers, y'know. It's up to you."

[gabriel_gray]

He didn't see anything except the very interesting floor. His mind caught up with him a moment later, because he was blushing, and he schooled his expression and turned his face back toward Peter as he settled under the blankets, as though nothing had changed, as though he wasn't flustered, doing his best to stay aloof and calculating. But his eyes dragged down despite his best efforts, following the line of the blankets, and he had to look away.

He'd already said that he'd stay, so there was no backing out now, no matter how uncomfortable he now felt. He shifted out of his own towels, not wanting to get the bed bloodied after their efforts to the contrary, and pulled himself under the sheets too, lying flat and awkward on his back. Glanced toward Peter.

Sylar opened his mouth to speak, checked himself, then looked back at the ceiling again. His mind whirred.

"He did it because of me," he said, very softly. "He knew how important you were." The 'to me' went unspoken, oddly enough.

[askedtobe]

For a dramatic change, Peter was the one who wasn't hideously uncomfortable in this situation simply because he believed nothing could possibly happen. His interests weren't exactly secret between them, so much as unspoken, and Peter simply expected Sylar to handle himself the same way he always did, which was with far more confidence than Peter'd ever possessed. He was too out of it to even try and sneak any kind of a look, though the opportunity obviously provided for one.

Not to mention, Peter was a little busy curling into himself, the same way he slept every night -- like a puppy wound into a tight ball.

But at the other man's words, he shifted, stretching out enough so that he coud glance over his shoulder through the dark at the other man and stare at him for a few moments while he spoke, remaining silent a few more afterward. "Doesn't mean you have to do anything about it." Peter yawned, rubbed at his eyes. He'd been murdered in the Port before, along with tortured and killed and nobody had done a single thing. Along similar lines, he didn't think anybody needed to do anything about this particular event, especially not Sylar.

[gabriel_gray]

Gabriel lifted his hand, but Sylar stopped it before it could reach Peter, dropping it onto the pillow between them. He didn't know when the sun had gone down, but it wasn't light in the apartment any more, and neither of them had thought about turning on the lights, but his hand was in a pool of light on the pillow between them, and he was extra conscious of it there than he might have been just dropping it onto Peter's shoulder.

"You still don't get it, even now, do you?" he said, and it wasn't really condemning; his voice was gentle, warily testing the water between them. "You're mine, Peter. That's why he attacked you. I killed his hero, so he came to kill mine. It's my fault that this happened."

He drew his hand back, winding the top of the blanket around his fist as though if he covered it with several layers of blankets he could erase the faux pas of reaching toward Peter.

"I'll kill him for that."

[askedtobe]

Gaze jumping from Sylar's hand back to his face, he simply stays quiet and listens. Swallowing thickly, he opens his mouth to say something the instant the other man is finished, and then closes it again, telling himself he needs a few more seconds to think it through.

Because even though the concept is that Sylar is his villain, Sylar keeps calling Peter his and it's enough to make Peter flush all over again in ways that might make this situation far more uncomfortable on his end.

"I get it, I just--" There was something challenging about talking about this while he's curled up in bed, something that added far too much meaning to it while talking away a solid standing ground that Peter would have usually wanted. Practically nosing down into the blankets, Peter exhales, wishing Sylar would just go through with his reaching. Would do something to add a little more emphasis to his words.

"I know that's why he did it. Now at least, maybe not when I went up on the roof. I didn't even know it was him up there." Flicking his gaze back towards Sylar, he looks moderately concerned, chewing on his lower lip for a second. "Sylar, you're collared. How exactly are you going to kill him?"

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[gabriel_gray]

Sylar did recoil his hand then. He reached up and ran his thumb across the collar, which was flat and tight against his skin, but didn't itch, that almost at time didn't seem like it was really there. Despite the blood and the shower it was still shining, though he couldn't see it even when he squinted, but he knew full well it was the case; that it would catch any hint of light in the room, and gave him away if he was trying not to be seen. He paused, then reached out for Peter's hand, finding it in the dark without - fortunately - coming across anything else in the process, and guided Peter's hand up to touch it. He closed his own over the back of Peter's, and just stayed still.

Just beside the silver collar, his heart was racing, and it puzzled him, because he had spent months now being too close to Peter, getting into his face at any opportunity, bearing down on him--why was it awkward now?

"The first man that I killed was Brian Davis. He had the power to move things with his mind, but he was afraid of it. So afraid. I killed him almost by accident, without any power. I just killed him." And how long had he spent thinking about that? He had almost taken his own life. He closed his eyes for a long moment, gathering himself. "All the powers that you've taken from me are powers that I took from other people. The telekinesis you use was Brian's, and I gave it to you." His eyes only looked blacker in the dark room, but they didn't move; he kept them on Peter. "And that's only one part of what links us, Peter."

He ran his hand down the other man's arm, but stopped at his elbow, keeping Peter's gaze.

"I'm not asking you to remove my collar. I can kill him with or without my powers, choke the life out of him, hurt him the way he hurt you." But it went unspoken that just because he wasn't asking didn't mean he didn't invite it.

[askedtobe]

Watching Sylar inspect his collar, Peter hadn't expected that Sylar would want him to get a feel for it too. His eyes go a litte bit wider when Sylar pulls his hand up to his neck and it's all Peter can do to let his fingers neatly curl against the metal, chewing on his lower lip as his thumb slides across the flat portion of it. He has to wonder how he'd feel if he was the one in Sylar's situation. If he was the one who'd had his powers cut off, who'd had that part of him stolen away.

But his thoughts are interrupted by Sylar's story and Peter blinks sleepily, shifting his gaze from the collar to Sylar's face as he listens. And while it's not so much a story as it is some kind of explanation, a further understanding of their connection, it's all Peter can do to keep from squirming as the other man's fingers slide down his arm, shifting under the sheets.

"I- Sylar." Back to chewing on his lower lip, he's still got his fingers wrapped around the collar, almost possessively, in the same way that Sylar seemingly has Peter wrapped possessively around his own fingers.

"Can I think I about it?" Because he knows if he makes a decision now, it might be one he regrets out of sheer sleepiness, the need to rest pulling at his conscious and tugging on his eyelids. Slowly, he uncurls his fingers, sliding his arm back down against Sylar's hand until he has it safely tucked under the covers. But he's still staring, still looking up at Sylar, still thinking with eyes that are barely staying open. "I'll think about it, okay? I promise, I just--" Rubbing at his face, and going quiet for a second, the pull of sleep was suddenly atrociously strong. "I'm tired."

[gabriel_gray]

He didn't answer out loud but with the slightest nod, because it's not something he means to make Peter rush. If he sets him free, it'll be because he wants Sylar to be free, will accept the consequences of what that means, and he had promised to fix him. He couldn't do that if he made his decisions for him.

So he let Peter recoil his hand, and he looked right back, his own eyes part lidden, and he raised his own abandoned hand up from the space between them, and brushed Peter's drying hair back out of his eyes, not forcing himself to stop halfway this time.

"You've had a difficult day, I don't blame you for wanting to sleep it off." He drew his hand back, still without even a flicker of a smile. "If you feel short of breath wake me up."

[askedtobe]

The only reaction Peter gives to the hand brushing his hair from his forehead is a quiet sigh, and not one of even remote resistance as his eyes fall the rest of the way closed.

"Yeah, sure," is the last thing he manages to mumble before he's nosing into his pillow and falling asleep, a little bit less curled into a ball than he originally planned on, but asleep nonetheless.