The Walking Shadow

Participants:

eve_icon.gif peter_icon.gif

Scene Title The Walking Shadow
Synopsis Eve's life imitates dreams when she tracks down Peter Petrelli for a conversation.
Date September 21, 2009

Long Island City


A single flickering streetlight sheds dingy yellow illumination down to a rain-slicked sidewalk. The air is bitterly cold, just enough for Eve's breath to be visible while she walks. The city is dark tonight, other streetlamps having ceased their shedding of light, casting wherever it is into darkness. It's hard to imagine why she'd put herself into this predicament, standing on the sidewalk under the glow of the lamp, listening to the distant hum of the bulb overhead.

She's been here before. The idea comes to her as she looks down the sidewalk and then back up to the light again. It's hard to tell why she's waiting here, specifically. Her clothing and hair are damp from the very faint, drizzling rain falling from the clouded skies. The streetlamp flickers again, buzzing and crackling as the yellowed spotlight it shines down on eve fades in and out of darkness.

The streetlight flickers again, making a crackling buzz before going out entirely. With the last vestige of light gone, only the ambient glow of a portion of New York city in the distance sheds a visible amount of illumination. The area is industrial, with tall brick-faced buildings showing signs of disrepair and abandonment. Many of the cars parked on the sides of the road are worn and stripped of some parts and sitting up on cinderblocks. Beyond the sidewalk, a chain-link fence cordons off the back lot of one of the brick buildings, overgrown with grass and weeds.

As Eve's eyes wander the plants, she notices something in their appearance. They're turning brown, withering and wilting before her very eyes. Rain-soaked grass loses its color, falling limp and flattening out before turning gray and shriveling up. The wilting spreads through one half of the fenced in yard, and after a moment the sound of hard-soled shoes on concrete can be heard; she's been here before. From the direction of the sound, Eve can make out a silhouette in the dark, backlit by the light of the distant city beyond. Dressed in a well-tailored black suit, one gloved hand tucked into his pockets, the other holding a black umbrella overhead. As he draws closer, Eve can see more of the overgrowth withering and dying, and it begins to get darker in the area around her.

She's been here before.

With the shadows dark around Eve and the feeling of a rat pass over her feet, she shudders and kicks the thing away. Eyes squinting in the darkness. "I was afraid of you… but not anymore!" she shouts but as she says this, she is backing away. Just like.. last time.

Eyes narrow at the man walking towards her. "You can't… hurt me. You're gone!" she says, teeth gritting against one another. Her dress rustles in the wind.

Stepping under the illumination of the streetlight, the figure stops, tipping the umbrella back to reveal the way shadows play on his face, darkening the cavities of eyes, the height of cheekbones and the downtorned corners of his mouth. But somewhere in those blue eyes is not malice, but rather recognition. "Eve?" It's the same recognition she now has for the voice of Peter Petrelli.

Stepping further into the light, Peter comes just a few feet from Eve, offering her shelter under the bough of his umbrella, "What're you doing out here in the rain?" the vegetation around her is fine, nothing beyond the chain-link is wilted at all. At least, not yet. The mind play terrible tricks, at times, and the similarities of these meetings couldn't help but pull at her fears. "…Who were you shouting at?"

"I could ask you the same question." Eve says with a narrowing of her eyes. "Nothing.. I was.. just reliving one of my dreams." The seer says and looks down before looking up into Peter's strange eyes.

"I have half a mind to cut you ear to ear right now." She says with a sigh. "Gillian and I stopped you from killing Else. It's what I dreamt. That's why we were there." Eve says and raises an eyebrow at Peter.

"You were in my way. I told you, either you let me help or you stay out of my way." The singer has not been happy with Peter lately. "I can tell the difference in you Peter.. the change." She shakes her head. "Why have you been lying to me?"

One black-gloved finger brushes over the crook of his umbrella, brows furrowed and blue eyes settled firmly on Eve. Peter's quiet for a moment, considering carefully his words. "You were in my way…" he says coldly to her explanation, "and I never lied to you," Peter starts to step around her, agetting a few steps past her before he adds, "I just don't tell you everything." His shoes click against the concrete, and once more the cold, drizzling rain falls down on Eve.

"Go home, get dry, and get some rest…" Peter sounds for all his worth as though she's actually going to listen. "You're not doing anyone any good by coming out here— not me, not you."

"Enough." Eve says, she doesn't mind the rain.. it's something she's always liked. "I didn't say you have to tell me everything but don't treat me like an idiot." The seer curls her hands into fist and strides up to Peter, she pushes him, hard.

"You were going to kill that woman and instead of taking responsibility or even saying thank you for us saving you from more guilt, you go and be an ass about it." Eve shakes her head, her whole body is shaking actually.

"I might be crazy, but I have a reason for my madness. What's your excuse for being such a cold, insensitive bastard?" The woman's light grey eyes study the man who use to have multiple abilities.

She looks away.. "I never thought of you as the next great messiah like the others did.. I never thought you were more than human.. but this.." Eve says softly as she shakes her head. "The Remnant is going to be killed.. and you order the execution in my dream. Code Niflheim."

Staggering back a few steps, Peter stops and stares levelly at Eve, his expression is passive, save for the glance down to his suit jacket to see the wet marks where her damp palms brushed it, one brow raised to the discovery. When he looks back to Eve, though, there's not much of a change in his attitude or demeanor towards her. "They know what they're getting themselves into…" his eyes wander to the concrete sidewalk underfoot, watching the rain patter and splash in the puddles. "I don't need an excuse, either…" he adds in a hushed tone of voice, "I have a reason too."

Blue eyes alight to Eve, brows tensed. "I know what having your ability can be like, Eve. I had it, I lived with it, and I lived with the repercussions of acting on vague dreams. Nothing ever happens quite like it seems like it is, nothing's ever as clear as the dreams make it seem…" He hesitates on continuing, tuning his focus out towards the darkened city beyond this stretch of sidewalk. When he does speak up again, he isn't even looking at her. "Let it go, Eve. All of this."

"And I guess you can only share that reason to people that would understand you huh?" Eve tilts her head.

Peter's account of coping with her ability leaves her closing her eyes and taking deep breaths.

"Vague.. is dreaming of the Narrows being blown to bits and then it happens.. vague is dreaming of the Evolved test kits and there coming out to the public."

"Vague.." this is the worst one that makes Eve choke up. "Is dreaming of the man you love being killed and not even realizing it until it's too late." Now she's the one not looking at Peter. Though her last point may seem irrelevant to Peter, it makes sense to Eve.

"I've let these dreams go before.. and it drove me mad. Got me into a whole lot more trouble than doing something about them does. I'm helping, and you can't change that."

This is said firmly but with a tinge of sadness, raindrops rolling down her face, not tears.

"That dream.. that I was reliving.. Kazimir was in the spot you were in.. it was the first dream I ever had of him. Before I knew his name." Eve shakes her head. "Do you feel him inside of you? His conscious, his mind?" Evie lets out a sigh.

Once more she continues to talk and talk and talk and all Peter does is stare at her with his eyes half-lidded. Ultimately, when he does choose to speak, he doesn't address a single thing she said. "You should go home, Eve. Go home, paint, call someone and talk to them about your dreams… not me." His blue eyes wander back to her, then close as he shakes his head. "Just let it go, or channel all this energy into something else, someone else. I don't want your help, Eve, even if you think I need it."

His umbrella turns slowly in one hand, slinging tiny beads of water off of it to the sidewalk. "You're not a part of this, and that's for the best. Just because you dream something, doesn't mean you can, or should get involved with it. Not every problem is yours to fix, dreamt up or not. Just go home, Eve…" one gloved hand comes out to rest on her shoulder, squeezing it gently.

"Go home and forget about this."

The seer is silent as she looks away. "I wasn't confiding in you. You don't care anyway." The woman says as she shrugs off Peter's hand and backs away, she turns around. Her boots clicking on the cracked pavement.

A reply to the comment of forgetting about it. "Tell that to my dreams." Then a thought makes Eve stop and walk back to Peter where she gives him a hug, burying her face in his chest. Then she pushes away and looks at Peter as she backs away again. "Be careful asshole, don't get killed or anything ok?" The seer is leaving the scene, done for the night. "I wish what you were saying was true. I guess you do care, for trying to keep me out of it." She says loud enough for Peter to hear as she walks away.

The seer's head is bowed as begins to walk away. So much for insensitive.

Swallowing audibly, Peter bites down on his lower lip, head tilting slightly to the side as he watches Eve dip her head down and start to walk away. He swallows, dryly, then furrows his brows and exhales a tired sigh. "I'm— just trying to protect you, Eve. Just stay away from me, you, Helena, Gillian, I— everyone has to stay away from me." His voice takes on a softer tone with that, eyes drifting to the concrete at his feet, watching the way the light of the street lamp reflects in the puddle. "I just want to be sure you're safe, it doesn't matter what happens to me."

Turning his back on Eve, Peter starts to walk, then pauses. "That you dreamt I kill people… that's all the more reason to stay away. Get as far away from me as you can…" His head tips down into a subtle nod, "and don't look back."

"It does matter, at least to us that you stay alive and safe. We care about you." Eve pauses and looks over her shoulder at Peter, her brother if she ever had one. "That's my problem, I always look back." A sad smile crosses her lips and she turns back around to move away. "Love you Peter." She says as her dress rustles in the night, marking her exit from the area.

There's no echo back, no response save for those cold blue eyes following Eve as she turns and starts to walk away in the rain. He doesn't offer her his umbrella, he doesn't offer to walk her to a bus stop, he just watches her leave, and as she disappears into the dark beyond the glow of the one working street light, Peter murmurs under his breath, "How does it feel… to have someone actually care?" One black brow rises to what seems like rhetoric.

There's no response, nothing more than a quiet sigh as he turns to walk in the opposite direction, off into the drizzling rain.


Unless otherwise stated, the content of this page is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License