Participants:
| Scene Title | A Captive Audience |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Peter interrogates Agent Ivanov about his knowledge on Sylar, and the pair come to a mutual understanding. |
| Date | November 13, 2008 |
Abandoned Subway: Empty Tunnel
Without electricity in this portion of the subway tunnels, there's no ambient light to help people along. The tracks are empty and dirty. Some patches of the walls and ceiling have fallen away, leaving behind chunks of rock intermittently. The tracks curve a little in places, but stay mostly straight for long areas. A large pile of rubble blocks the way to one of the stations, somewhat conspicuous because the ceiling seems stable around it. Almost as if this blockage had been intentionally made somehow.
It's hard to tell just how much time has passed.
The groggy sensation of waking from blunt-force trauma to the head is a painful and blurry feeling. The world spins and tilts, the claustrophobic darkness that deadens the senses only adds to the feeling of confusion and disorientation. Wetness slicks bare skin; cheeks and palms. Then, as eyes adjust, a glimmer of light flickers and crackles in the distance, a florescent light suspended from a metal cage in the ceiling, unevenly distributing light amidst broken concrete, gravel, stagnant water that reeks of mildew, and corroded metal.
The sound of dripping water soon comes to fill the senses as well. A loud crackling snap comes from directly overhead, followed by a shower of sparks as long florescent bulbs glimmer and sputter for a brief moment, unable to shed enough light to truly give detail on Felix Ivanov's immediate surroundings.
In a jerking motion, he is quick to discover hands and feet are restrained, bound in so much duct tape an entire roll must have been expended in the endeavor. Laying on his side as he is, the agent's jacket and clothing are soaked through with the brackish water that has settled in the low areas of this concrete tunnel. As his eyes adjust to the odd lighting, something else comes into view; a mural. Painted on one concrete wall with spraypaint is a gray hand reaching out from the darkness, ashen and burned, grasping for something unseen.
Such welcoming imagery.
Welcome to your own little corner of hell. Because Fel's nightmares…..they involve drowning. And suffocating in a cargo container. He's never gotten over finding six girls dead in a false-backed shipping container, back when he was working the Harbor beat - blood on the walls where they'd clawed to try and get out. He spasms and coughs on awakening - no attempt at feigning further unconsciousness. With neither contacts nor glasses, he doesn't see well at the best of times, so he squints dimly, eyes still blurred by the blows to the head. He does not, however, call out or speak, merely testing the strength of his bonds with little spasmodic jerks.
The duct tape is loose, likely waterlogged from baving been laid out in a puddle for so long. Given a few hours of work, the agent could probably wrench them free. Whoever bound him up doesn't seem to have much experience in the work itself. But regretably for Felix, the opportunity to escape isn't one on the table.
"You're alive." The shadows say in a low, amused voice. The darkness ripples, coalescing into a black-clad form that emerges from within, face half lit by the flickering florescent light down the tunnel. Finally, Felix can make out what feels like steel pressed up against his shoulder — a rail track. "You're a whole lot tougher than you look, Mister Ivanov." Motorcycle boots crunch the gravel underfoot, and the scarred assailant who had struck Felix unconscious comes to crouch down at his side, forarms resting over his knees, head cockec to one side.
"That's not saying much," Felix rasps, voice gone gravelly, as he rolls his good eye to try and get a better look at Peter. "I know how I look. How…what happened? I remember the girl with the gun….." He trails off. Blows to the head tend to impair the memories that come right before the trauma. "Who're you?" He doesn't bother to fight the bonds in Peter's presence, though even subtle movement reveals that the Walther is still riding under his arm. He frowns a little, perplexed.
"Peter Petrelli." There's no response to how the agent looks, no need to rub salt in those very open wounds. "Maybe you've heard of my piece of shit brother?" His tone is sardonic, but not entirely without humor in it. "What happened, that's a bit longer of a story." Pushing himself up to stand up straight again, "You hit a wall, hard. Then I questioned that girl about a certain brain-sucking sociopath…" One hand waves flippantly in the air as Peter stalks a few paces away with crunching footfalls. "It didn't go quite as planned, so I took you, and here we are…" It's abridged, and doesn't explain the why of the matter at all.
And there's goes Fel's face again. Oh, this is bad, by the way he goes utterly immobile at that name. "Suffice to say I've heard of you," he says, drily. The mental litany behind the attempt at impassivity is borderline panic, and a certain almost hysterical amusement. <Just my fucking luck. The most wanted man in New York who isn't Gabriel Gray, and I'm trussed like a Thanksgiving turkey.> He tries to move, and hisses, as cracked ribs twinge. "What did you do with her?" he wonders, looking up. And nevermind that he's bound and captive, the idea of getting at Sylar has him as eager as a greyhound at the gate. Talk about bent for his job.
"Nothing. She got away." Peter blinks his eyes and looks over to Felix, "I tried to read her mind, and it didn't go as planned." There's a hint of a smile that creeps up on his lips. "So, I think I'm going to try and pull some of the information i wanted from you." He turns his attention back to the agent, walking over towards him with slow footsteps. "Either you can tell me what I want to know, or I can start digging around inside of that head of yours." Both of Peter's brows raise, a crooked smile falling into placeon his lips. "I can't say the latter will be comfortable."
Fel goes… pale. Paler. Which is quite a feat, considering. His lips thin out at that, and his eyes narrow. But his voice is even, as he replies. "If you're after Gray, well. The enemy of my enemy is my friend? Try the questions - there may be no need to get rough," he grates. "And listen, kid, if you're gonna mindfuck me, at least let me have some water before you whip it out? Something that doesn't look like a puddle in a dungeon, please." IT's all revulsion behind that. Peter's a terrorist, not much better than Osama himself, by Fel's lights. But there's also that self-deprecating amusement, threaded through the fear. «I'm fucked. I don't know anything he needs. Wonder if I'll be coherent when he's done, or just a vegetable?»
"That depends on what my compatriots might want you for." Peter answers the unsaid question with a grin, walking over to settle down in the doorway of a derailed subway car, the sliding doors having long since been trapped in the open position. "I want to know what you know about Gabrial Gray. You share, I let you go without question. Unlike Sylar, I'm not a killer." Or so he says, anyway. "I want to know where he's been living, what he's been doing… anything you know about his activities." Peter's eyes narrow slightly, "I want to know who that girl is, if she has any relation to Gillian Childs, and…" Brows riase briefly as Peter's eyes drift away from Felix, wandering the room as if searching for a lost point of interest, "…and anything else that you might think is interesting."
"Since serial killers are our specialty, we've been after him for years," Felix says, closing his eyes against a wave of dizziness. "Not me, personally. Another agent had his case until the Bomb. He's on the High Value Target List. He's still not officially my target, but he lived -down the hall- from me for a while apparently. Out in Cliffside Apartments in Queens. He came after me one evening, but I escaped. He's been killing since - we've had bodies that bear his signature show up recently. That girl is Eileen Ruskin. She also lived down the hall, but not actually with Gray at the time. I suspect she's some sort of Evolved. I don't know how or why they're working together, but she's clearly with him in some way. I've no knowledge of Gillian Childs," Fel trails off, clearly woozy, but he looks expectantly. "And that's all the news that's fit to print." He doesn't argue with Pete's assertion that he's not a killer, but there's the mental equivalent of a disdainful snort. «And PARIAH never hurt anyone. Sure, buddy.» "Can you at least roll me outta this puddle?"
Listening, Peter watches the agent with narrowed eyes, less so due to a derisive expression and more out of focus. One hand raises at the request, and a light tug of Felix's shoulders shifts him up into the air with a sensation of weightlessness. There's a scuttling sound in the dark, followed by the clack and clatter of plastic as an old milk crate comes tumbling down the tunnel, settling on a mostly level piece of concrete as a makeshift seat. Tipping two fingers down, Peter settles Felix in an upright position, seated on the crate.
"Ruskin…" The surname is rolled over his tongue, in the way some people would taste wine. Peter nods to a private thought, then focuses dark eyes on Felix again. "She is. Animal telepathy of some kind — Maybe birds. I'm still trying to get used to it." One of his brows lower, leaving the other one up. "So, you don't know about Gillian…"
Leaning forward, Peter folds his hands and rests his forearms across his knees. "I looked inside of her head. She knows Sylar — She's Evolved too, a power augmentor of some kind. She almost drove me out of control…" His words fade off, then pick up at another point of interest entirely. "I saw glimpses of books in her mind, a library." Peter finally settles his gaze on Felix again. "They're close. I didn't get a good chance to dig deep in her head… I had a monkey on my back."
Fel stifles a pained cry, and sags to one side, but keeps himself upright. There's a few hissing breaths indrawn, before he can talk again. But his answering grin is feral, if distorted by the bruising all along one side of his face. "Hitchcock power, huh? Good to know. I knew we had someone who could affect the behavior of birds running around, but I thought……" Fel goes utterly rigid in shock, as everything locks into place with the inexorability of dominoes falling. "Oh, shit, oh shit," he says, coughing. "Two of them. Oh, Jesus, they can't be linked. Not through this girl….."
Peter's brows knit together, creasing that distinctive scar across his forehead as he moves one hand, lifting Felix's chin up with a slight twist of two fingers. "Two of who?" It's an accusatory tone, the way someone might get defensive when a large and unfortunate secret is rolled out of a bloodied carpet. He draws the wrong conclusions, enough to have him rise up from his seated position, taking a few steps across the gravel underfoot back towards the agent. "Less hysterics, please."
"Remember those kids who got murdered earlier this year?" Fel says, desperately. "There's another killer hunting Evolved. Different MO from Gray. Had the balls to kidnap a cop, and he was working with an Evolved who could use birds to kill. I saw his face, and I saw Gray's face. Not the same guy." Fel is shuddering in pain and stress, working unthinkingly at the hands bound behind his back. "We'd no indication of any ties, until now. But if this girl is the bird master, and she's with Gray, and somehow still serving this other guy….oh, fuck," He laughs, though it's a bellows wheeze, considering. "A master and an apprentice. Gray and Santiago."
"Santiago?" Peter's eyes narrow slightly, lips pursed in thought for a moment before he shakes his head. "Sylar can adopt other appearances, he's a shapeshifter." There's a slight inclination of Peter's head, "He can look like anyone." With a blink, Peter's eyes divert to the ashen gray hand spraypainted on the concrete wall behind Felix. "…Wait."
Circling around Felix, Peter steps over to the spraypaint mural, looking at the grasping gray hand covered with ash, "The bodies from that, they — " Peter's dark eyes flit back to the wall, and he lets out a frustrated snap of a growl, "Damnit." The water around him ripples from some unfelt vibration as he turns back towards the agent. His fingers flex, and the duct-tape restraints do as well, and then in a single twist of his wrists they snap unbound.
"Follow the tunnel out, go towards the sound of running water. It'll take you out to the streets in Midtown about a block from the crater." Peter covers his face with on ehand, a scowl hidden behind that hand, "Start limping before I change my mind."
And here's where Felix's innate and massive idiocy comes into play. He doesn't run. Far from it. He rises, unsteadily, but stands his ground. "No. Fair's fair, Petrelli. I can't offer you any deals on behalf of the Bureau. But personally….I want these fuckers taken down. And in all honesty, you're more likely to be the one to do it. Yes. The bodies were ashen, like they'd come out of Pompeii. Now, who's this Gillian? Another ally of Sylar's? And she works in a library?" He glares at Peter, settling his jacket more comfortably, and surreptitiously checking the status of his gun.
The gun is a bit water-logged, but the cased rounds should be fine. Felix's cell phone on the other hand has seen better days. "Don't know, she knew who Sylar was and didn't seem afraid of him. I tried to dig around in her skull, but like I said — monkey on my back. It was a bad time." He smirks, crookedly, "Dig up what you can about her, might lead you in the right direction." There's an assessing glance given to Felix, eyes wandering up and down slowly. "You find anything out, come back to Midtown. There's a building near the south end of Central Park, used to belong to a guy named Charles Deveaux. If the pigeons up there see you, they'll let me know." Peter cracks a smile, finding a common ground for the use of his newfound ability. "Likewise. If I find anything, I'll leave you a note there, under the pigeon coops."
Felix is clearly miserable - battered, bruises, lip split, one side entirely sodden. But the blue eyes are glittering with eagerness. "Call me," he says, taking a business card from his pocket and slotting it into a crack in the brick of the wall. "And I will do. Talk to you later, Doctor Doolittle," With that, he turns to start hobbling out, as directed, mind already working as fast as it can. Ironic that it's a terrorist that might've provided such an insight…..the last Peter can 'hear' is an amused resolve to get Peter later, once Santiago and Sylar are dealt with. «Here's hoping they all destroy each other.»
Peter watches as Felix makes his departure, and then steps back towards the wall. His body wavers, then discorporates as he slips into the concrete, and begins drifting upwards, phasing thorugh earth stone and metal to the street above. Hopefully the exit he remembers being in that direction is still there, for Agent Ivanov's sake…
 November 13th: Strangers |
Previously in this storyline… Next in this storyline… |
 November 13th: The New TA |