Participants:
| Scene Title | Secrets to Silence |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | After struggling under cover with Humanis First, Candace Allard finds her way to the last survivors of Pinehearst's legacy, to get what she was told would be her reward. |
| Date | October 20, 2009 |
The Chesterfield Campaign is an unrelenting machine of political activity. In the troubled times that New York City has been facing, the routine process of mayoral elections has become something unusually difficult to perform, between terrorist attacks and gang warfare in the streets. As such, the offices of the Chesterfield Campaign are somewhat like a battlefield themselves. It took three whole days for a single request to reach the ears of Jennifer Chesterfield once it was put in, three days of a single note sitting on her desk beneath a stack of more pressing issues and scheduling arrangements. When she finally read that missive, however, it only took her three minutes to place two phone calls.
An hour and a half later, after having made contact with the unexpectedly resurfaced Candace Allard, Jennifer Chesterfield finds herself waiting outside of the Solstice Condominiums in the back of a black limousine. This particular meeting is one that she can't afford to put off, but at the same time one she can't afford to have publicly known. The ghosts of pinehearst that manage to still haunt her are made manifest in this one woman, and it's here in the back of an idiling limo that the epilogue of their prior association will be written.
And, depending on the way the wind is blowing, the beginning of a new chapter entirely.
With a steady rainfall coming down on the streets of New York City, the upper east side is relatively quiet for the early afternoon hours. It's amidst this damp backdrop, in the shadow of the towering Solstice building that Candy's approach is set. She knows she'll be meeting Jennifer discretely, and that the black limousine waiting for her, with an attending holding an umbrella outside of it, is likely where she's expected.
Candy takes a glance at the man with the umbrella before she begins walking towards him. She offers him as much of a smile that she can, though it never reaches the haunted look in her eyes. Even after her talk with Cat, she can't quite get herself out of the remorse that she feels for each and every evolved that she helped to torture. The knowledge in the back of her head, that while doing it, she didn't feel the slightest twinge of a concious, that she didn't feel like she needed to stop it. She wants to blame it on the mission, she wants to blame it on keeping her cover, but the young woman can't.
When she reaches the man with the umbrella, she smiles lightly while he opens the door, before Candace Allard easily slips into the limo, being careful not to let her eyes slide over to Cat's mother.
There's silence that greets Candy when she moves into the back of the limo. The woman seated there on the seat opposite of her looks just as she remembers from Pinehearst's board room, save for a little more weight beneath her eyes, and signs of weariness that crinkle at the corners of her tired stare. Adjusting her glasses, she offers a smile that is given only for courtesy's sake. "It's been a while, Miss Allard." Her head tilts to the side, as if to imply that she isn't clear why this meeting has to take place.
"I didn't think I'd hear from you again, especially not after the Pinehearst company headquarters was demolished in July." The Chesterfield matriarch's eyes drift up and down the younger woman, and she closes a folder in her lap quietly, hands set atop it and a quiet sigh exhaled through her nose. "There is no more Pinehearst. No more Arthur Petrelli. No more Roger Goodman. They're all dead, Candace. If you came here to report in, you don't need to anymore." Her brows crease slightly. "Why did you come here?"
Candy continues to keep her eyes away from Jenn, being careful in case they have Peyton looking through her eyes. "Because, there was an exchange for me working for Pinehearst, and even if I did come here because I didn't know that the company had been completely dissolved. I do intend to be sure that those who were at Pinehearst uphold there end of the bargain. I was told my ability would be explained, I would be helped with training, I would learn why I am the way I am. I just spend three months under very deep cover in Humanis First to be able to infiltrate Phoenix as I was instructed. I spent three months murdering my own kind." Candy's voice suddenly gets hard, "And I had better get what I was promised, or I'll be sure that the last surviving board member doesn't stay surviving for long." If Jenn has read Candy's file, she'll more than likely know that that is no idle threat.
The sigh that comes isn't a frustrated one, it's just a tired one. It wordlessly says what am I going to do with you? "The people who made that arrangement are long dead, Candace." Candace, not Miss Allard. "It's not that I don't sympathize for your situation, but things at Pinehearst weren't exactly what they appeared to be. Nothing was… and," her brows crease together, "I'm sorry that the administration there may have been trying to lead you on."
Folding her hands on that document in her lap, Jennifer's head quirks to the side subtly. "I do know about your ability though, or… at least how you obtained it. The documents were destroyed with Pinehearst's collapse, but you and I had met prior to that day in New Jersey." It's with a heavy burden that Jennifer says those words. "You were a part of a clandestine experiment to deliver evolved powers to non-evolved children. It was called Project Icarus, and it was started by the United States Government in the 1950s. It was abandoned in the sixties, and pieces of that research have been adapted by other organizations since." The admittance, here, implies that the world knew about the Evolved long before 2006.
"You're not Candace Allard." She says with a noticable tension in her voice. "Your file at Pinehearst was listed as Noriko Amagi. You were the daughter of Ai and Souji Amagi, researchers who were killed to cover up the development of this formula. Your parents that raised you were adoptive, and your memories of your birth family were cleaned away at the age of five when you were delivered to your new family."
Swallowing anxiously, Jennifer drums her fingers on the folder in her lap. "The man responsible for the death of your biological parents has been killed. Pinehearst is gone. So is the Formula. I can't offer you much… not— " she shakes her head slowly, "not given everything else that has been forced on you. But I can at least make the offer of directing you to people who know about your past, people who can offer you training and education in your ability…"
Candy continues to keep focus on the seat cover in front of her, as the woman next to her literally takes her whole world, turns it upside down, shakes it around, and then uses a spatula to make sure you got everything out of it. "So… everything is a lie," she smirks lightly while she sits there, her eyes still focused on the seat in front of her. "Real parent's dead, person who killed them dead," she mutters while she looks forward.
"Yet you tell me you had nothing to do with this, at all," Candy excuses while she stares at the seat in front of her, steadfastly ignoring the tears that threaten to cloud her vision as more of her is literally torn from her. "All I've been through, as well? Do you know what all I've been through for that company? I was put in Moab for that company! To keep an eye on people. Then when I got out of that hell hole, I'm told to try and join another organization with the same people. To keep tabs on them of course. Do you know where that led me?! Do you know what its like to have to watch while someone tortures a sixteen year old kid? Do you know what it is like to have to worry about them wanting you to help? Do you know what it is fucking like to have to torture a sixteen year old? Whose only offense was that he could breathe underwater?! All in the name of a company that is gone… for information that is fucking useless to me." She shakes her head, the tears streaming heedlessly down her face for the moment before she asks, "Who?"
Swallowing tensely, Jennifer wrings her hands and stares down at her lap. There's an awkward silence that permeates the limo after the emotional outburst, and the candidate for Mayor is struggling to keep herself from doing the same. The tired look in her eyes has grown, fingers cling together, and it's with an unsteady voice that she finally offers some semblance of a response. "I knew… what was going on, not to any full extent, but I was aware. That makes me guilty enough, for… for what happened." Biting down on her lower lip, Jennifer looks to one of the tinted windows, and her own muted reflection therein.
"Nothing I say or do will ever make right what Arthur and Roger made you do. Absolutely nothing will ever— " her voice hitches in the back of her throat. "I'm sorry." Breathing in a very deep breath, Jennifer exhales a tired sigh and reaches down to a slip of paper on top of the documents she holds, folding it and offering it out to the young woman.
"This is the name of a man who can get you in touch with the proper people who can help you."
The smile offered is a tired one, but at least Jennifer can find some sympathy in this tragedy. "His name is Len Denton, and he works for an organization that trains people like you and I. He can help you figure out more about your ability, about what you can do and how to help you come to terms with your past. He's a very good person, trustworthy. I don't say that about many people." But, before she lets go of the piece of paper, she adds, "I'd ask you not talk about meeting with Mister Denton to anyone else. The organization he works for is very selective about the people it lets in, for his safety and your own."
"This will be another person that I need to keep secret from those whome I just rescued, I take it? Another time where I have to be careful of every word, keep everything locked inside," Candy asks, her voice bitter while she sits there in the car. She shakes her head just a little, before she says, "And you just remember, that you were there, you very well could have stopped what happened. And you delievered the orders. Remember that while you're running for Mayor and talking about making things better. Remember that, the next time you see a kid walking down the street." She shakes her head and opens the door, deciding that it is time to end the conversation.
Swallowing dryly, Jennifer only nods her head as that smile fades. When the door opens, rain pouring down outside adding sound to the relative silence of the back of the limo, it is accompanied by another sigh. This one, less tired, and more depressed in quality. Jennifer doesn't — can't — say anything in response to the meeting, to the accusations that are, in all rights, perfectly true. By the time Candy's door closes, Jennifer's head has sunk and one hand covers her face, a weary expression worn there, right up until the cell phone at her side begins to vibrate.
She blinks her eyes, repeatedly, and reaches out for the phone, flipping it open to look at the screen. There, a single text message remains the only tenuous link back to her conscience that she feels is slipping away from her more and more every day.
You did well.
We will remain in contact.
-Rebel