Participants:
| Scene Title | You Faked Her Death |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | While catching up with Peyton, Cat makes a potential discovery among printed pages. |
| Date | March 20, 2010 |
Peyton's Place
An upscale apartment in Frozen York City.
Saturday morning still, as the clocks pass 11:00, and Cat's back to Manhattan. Has been for a few hours and change, in fact. Ate, read her newspapers, changed, and took off again across the island. It's brought her to Peyton's door where knuckles are applied in calm fashion three times. Then she waits, standing on a slice of hallway in thick winter coat, knit winter cap, scarf covering part of her face, and gloves.
There's no snowmobile outside, this time she chose to come by car instead. Perhaps a credit to the herculean efforts of New York city employees working to clear streets, blind luck she didn't hit a patch of nasty ice and crash, or both.
Peyton is dressed for staying in — pink and green checked flannel PJ bottoms and a green sweatshirt to match. She peers through the peep hole to see who is at the door in the hallway. The door opens, and Peyton glances down the hallway before stepping back to let Cat in. Clearly she's being cautious about something.
"Hey, Cat. Come on in. Don't talk to loudly. Might be bugged," she says quietly. "But down in the hallway or maybe my room, I'm not sure. Can I get you some coffee?" If she's surprised to see the other woman at her door, she doesn't act it. She's getting used to having strange visitors, it would seem.
Eyebrows are raised at the greeting, the word bug being used. Cat steps in, nodding once to signify understanding. "Morning, Peyton," she offers in return as sturdy booted feet locomote her across the threshold. "It's been a while, all's good? Coffee… yes. Very much yes." And with the potential of bugging in mind, Cat is applying her mnemonic talents subtly. Eyes scan the room to perhaps spot anything that doesn't match with her last visit, that she might thereby spot a monitoring device if it's in plain sight and looks like something innocuous.
"Come in the kitchen, then." Peyton heads to the kitchen, to the cupboard to pull out two coffee mugs and pour the steaming brew into them. She nods to the assortment of condiments near the coffee pot. "It should be safe in here. Company. One asked to use my restroom, so he went down my hall — I'm not sure. I've been careful not to talk in that area aside from the normal stuff. I don't think it would pick up all the way over here."
The hallway is on the far side of the apartment's spread of kitchen and dining room, followed by living room, before the corridor leads to restrooms and the three bedrooms. She stirs creamer and Splenda into her own cup, then leans against the counter. She doesn't seem like she's going to explain the dropping of the word 'Company' unless asked.
"Those guys," Cat remarks with a brief roll of her eyes after entering the kitchen, "I wouldn't put it past them to try. Are you supposed to be pretending you've got no idea they exist?" Her head tilts, she looks at the back of Peyton's neck to see if there are a pair of dark parallel lines. Just in case. "What'd they want with you, anyway?" Her original agenda for the visit is set aside at least briefly, while gloves are removed from hands.
"Well, I'm not supposed to know they were Company. DHS and all that noise," Peyton says with a shrug, nodding to the kitchen table and heading to go sit there so her guest doesn't have to stand. "They actually were all right. Some guy was found with a bunch of my photos. Stalker or something." She leaves out the details of who 'some guy' is — both in regards to his suspected murders and the fact that he is supposedly her father — not that she learned that from the two agents. "They might be watching me though… I'm sorry. I should have put out a message not to come visit me but I didn't expect anyone would. Since if they're watching the place, they might wonder why I know you, but for all they know we could be old 'society' friends. I mean, our parents probably did know each other at some level, even if only in passing."
"Or I'm your lawyer," Cat tacks on with an understanding nod, "you do qualify as one of the few I'd practice that profession for." A thin smile is afforded as she moves toward the kitchen table. "Maybe both. But if it's Company handling this, he'd be more than a simple garden variety stalker," she concludes, "at the very least one with some form of enhanced ability." Legs cross at the ankles as she sits, back straight and head up.
"Do you believe you're in danger? Because I can make arrangements. Security is good, all camera feeds go to me, and I've got room in the penthouse."
The clairvoyant slips into the chair across from Cat and shakes her head. "I don't think I am," she says quietly. She looks down into her coffee cup, staring at it for a moment as if to find the answers there. "I actually knew about it before they came. But I pretended I didn't. Someone I know warned me before they came to see me. He's apparently my father. He didn't want me to know about him, but apparently he's watched me … over the years. I just never knew."
She brings her dark eyes up to meet Cat's. "Don't say anything to anyone. It's not something I … I don't want anyone to know about it. But since you're offering me … refuge… and because you're my friend… you should know. Thank you for the offer. I don't think I'm in danger. He doesn't want to hurt me — he would have by now, if he did."
"It's best if Company people don't know you're aware of them," Cat agrees, "they have nasty habits like making people forget things." Her eyes flash in contact with Peyton's, dark brown showing a hint of her emnity toward that operation. "If you feel safe, that's good," she goes on to say. "Offer stands, if you want it, also. Same for Aaron and Gillian." A momentary pause is taken, coffee cup interior regarded.
"Do you maybe have a copy of Pause magazine's April issue around?"
"Thanks, Cat. I appreciate it. I think … I'm okay. I don't feel danger from him. Danko scares me more," Peyton says softly. She frowns a little at the mention of Pause, and nods, getting up and heading to the dining room table in the other room, where it still lies open to Luis' page. She picks it up, closing it, and returns into the kitchen and sets the magazine down in front of Cat. She has a guess which article the other woman is interested in, but waits to see if it's the same one that Cardinal and she read together.
The magazine is taken with a quietly spoken "Thanks, Peyton," and the pages flipped through. Cat's face shows reactions as she moves along, and some articles are stopped at to be seen for a moment, maybe that's all she needs to remember them later. She looks mildly surprised Elisabeth would allow herself to be in such a tawdry publication. Peter's article draws a slow exhale of breath. Tamsine's seems to spark a touch of curiosity. Dr. Brennan's causes brows to furrow and head to shake slightly. Vincent Lazzaro and Robert Caliban draw clear expressions of distaste. Bao Wei-Cong elicits a slightly longer study, the mental comparison of the man they saw in that lab Harlow gave up with the DragonMan from the battle vs Hokuto Ichihara. "Remember him?" she asks briefly. Leonardo Maxwell draws a bit of attention, neither negative nor positive. Heidi Petrelli causes her to simply snort derisively.
Finally she reaches page 57, and there she stops. Reading the article from start to finish. "I still refuse to buy a copy of this rag," she notes, "I won't be giving money to the woman who tried to frame one of the Ferrypeople."
She nods at the image of Bao-Wei — she hadn't noticed him before when looking through it with Cardinal, actually. "My parents were subscribers. I just never stopped the payments," Peyton says, perhaps defensively, as to why she has the magazine at all. Her eyes study the page with the third of the doctors on it. "Before you ask, I still can't go off of a photograph. I'm working on it but … it just doesn't work. I think I need a three-dimensional image or something in my head or something, I don't know. Who knows why we can and can't do some things. Is there any limit to your own power like that? Like… if it's written in purple ink, you can't recall it?" It's a joke.
She lets out a quiet laugh, acknowleging she heard the joke and found it at least partly amusing, but Cat continues to read over the article. "Doctor Jean Martin Luis," she muses, "Commonwealth Institute of Scientific Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Same city near Boston as Harvard and MIT. MIT, where Edward Ray worked. I'll have to research the place, and him." Then she's silent again, eyes continuing with the article, until something else written there makes her stop and look up.
"Bullshit, Doctor Luis. Bullshit. Your daughter didn't die at age six. You faked her death and kept her chained in as a lab rat for the past nine years. She's the girl, Liette, in Doctor Brennan's hands. Peyton, have you shown this to Mr. Clemens?"
Peyton closes her eyes and shakes her head. "God, I'm stupid. Liette. Juliette." She snorts, and then opens her eyes, frowning a little. She hates being sort of caught between her friends. "He saw it, yeah. I mean, it's something I would have showed him anyway." Since she's the file clerk. There are too many people in the magazine that go in the files!
"I met and spoke with her," Cat shares, "a few days ago. Sent Mr. Clemens word after, but I've not heard from him yet. Don't know if he got the message. Liette seems to know little of the world, but has a solid knowledge of powers and how they work. She's able to absorb some of them, sees it as a game or hobby like collecting stamps. I think I gained her trust when we spoke, have a foothold to work from in learning more. But the issue of sending her back to her father may be troublesome. That's really not even close to a good idea. Nor is handing her over to any Federal agency, and I certainly won't be telling Rebel where she is. Not after Wireless counseled against it." She lifts her coffee cup and sips from it.
When the cup is set down with a quiet sound, Cat is speaking again. "Thought about telling the doctor Mr. Clemens would want to see them, but chose against it. One, it'd mean revealing he isn't dead and two, it's too soon. Brennan just got over being spooked and going to ground. Bringing someone else into the mix, who can't even come out of shadow form, hell… Brennan might run straight to the Feds. But… I also know time might be short. People are looking for Liette, and there's no telling when they'll find her."
Peyton's brow furrows as Cat speaks, giving a shake of her head as if she doesn't understand what most of that means. "I don't know why she is important, just that she is. But now it makes sense." She shakes her head. "He used her as a lab rat? And he makes it sound like he's so … and Suresh worked with him? Does that mean Suresh is a bad person? Is he part of … whatever it is this doctor is part of?"
"She talks about being taken from place to place to meet people and copy their abilities, there are some she isn't allowed to copy because they're dangerous. By her account, the abilities she absorbs eventually metabolize away, but leave genetic markers in her DNA," Cat supplies. "So yes, I believe she's been used as a lab rat. Why else would he claim she's been dead and keep her hidden for all these years?" Her head shakes, the eyes are dark with unpleasant things.
"Liette wouldn't say if her Pop does tests on people, says it's a secret. I think he might have the same capacity to copy, or someone else there does. Liette said specifically 'our ability'. I don't know if Mohinder works there, that's to be checked out. Liette recognized Doc Carpenter, said he's sleeping in a tank. She claims Zimmerman works at the lab with Pop, stated she'd never seen Gregor before, and ignored Dr. Luis's image completely. I also think she might have something to do with all the snow. Making wind happen is one of her copied abilities. As are telepathy, and panmnesia."
After another sip of her coffee, Doctor Chesterfield asks "Do you know if Mr. Clemens got my message? It's odd he hasn't asked me to take him there, or even to ask if he can meet with Brennan."
"I don't know, Cat. I'm sort of holed up here due to the fact that Company agents might be watching me. I can't go out to him — it was already getting risky in all this snow but with them possibly watching me, it's just not safe," Peyton says quietly. "I can share this information with him?" she asks, tilting her head curiously. "Since you're telling me."
"Please do," Cat requests. "All he needs to do is ask, and we can go from there. There'd not be any need to do anything crazy like shadowtailing me when I go places and talk to people, or asking you to look through my eyes." She flashes a slight smile and lifts the coffee cup again. A sip is taken, then it's lowered. "Whatever I find I share, just as I have been."
"If he's 'shadowtailed' you," Peyton says, brows furrowing slightly, her own hands wrapped around her cup, "I have no idea, but he's never asked me to look through your eyes, Cat. Nor have I." That much is true. "I'll tell him the next time I see him, though."
"Thanks," Cat replies quietly. "I'm also researching the virus and the possible camps, as well as things Else Kjelstrom wrote about. There's evidence, and trends, reason to believe, but still no proof strong enough to convince skeptics that 510 is engineered or that the Feds plan to create ghettos. It all might tie into Dr. Luis and the other scientists, it might not. Right now. it's all investigation and speculation most are just beginning to see as other than conspiracy theories."
"I suppose maybe all this is that's keeping me inside is a good thing, right? Less chance to get sick," Peyton says with a smile. "We looked at the notes from Else too. I don't get all of it. Card said the French part was bout Francois, whoever that is." She still doesn't know that she knows him. "And I think the one part was a date. It's the five year anniversary of the bomb, but … I don't know what it would be suggesting is happening. Do you know her?" Else. She vaguely recalls the woman played at the Rock Cellar once.
"Il viendra du passe pour changer son futur mais nous resterons les memes." Cat then translates. "He will come from the past to change his future, but we stay the same. That does fit Francois. And I do know Else. Her songs put me on the trail of that thing we went overseas for. Shores of the Empire State, beaches of 34th Street, Munin swallowing the moon…" More coffee drinking.
"Fifth anniversary of the bomb… maybe. If that's a sideways eight. Could be an infinity symbol. Or what I thought it was at first, and still think it could be. Binary code, for computers. Ones and zeroes."
"I don't know Francois. I liked Else's music when I heard it though. She doesn't know what those notes mean? I guess it's just words or something that flow through her, and she has no idea what they mean, when she looks at them later?" Peyton asks, finally lifting the cup of coffee for another sip. "I'm so glad I'm not a precog. They're weird. Not their fault, but you know." She offers a wry smile.
"They can be confusing," Cat agrees mildly, "but I've learned to pay attention. And when one of them walks up and hands me a plane ticket, I pack a bag. It'll be some time before Else writes anything like it. She's been infected with 510."
"Petrelli has it too. Peter, that is. I don't know about his brother," Peyton says a little darkly. "Sorry to hear that. And yeah, the one precog I know has been mostly right." She's not sure that she agrees with Tamara's assessment that all her friends were going to return home safely. Cardinal might disagree as well.
"I generally prefer to take what they say and work to make them be wrong," Cat remarks. "Their best value is in being taken as warning, planting signs about the road ahead, nothing chiseled into slabs of rock on mountainsides. If it were, there'd be no point. We'd all have died fourteen months ago, and again between early January and now."
Moving on, she asks "How're the Krav Maga sessions?"
Peyton looks amused at that. "Funny, Cardinal pretty much has the same philosophy." Murdering futures. "I haven't been. I asked a couple of the guys to help me out but things have just been busy… you know." Between searching for missing girls and finding out her birth father is a dangerous Evolved murderer! "I'll look into it soon," she says with a shrug.
With that in mind, Cat opts not to bring things down by asking if she hired Rebecca Nakano. No need to remind her of that event. Or to dwell on death herself, Cat's had more than enough losses in her own life. Dani. The Chesterfields. The Forrests before she even got to know them.
"Fair enough," she replies. Offering to spar is pointless, by extension. No routines to practice. Yet. She's content to enjoy her coffee and talk of things which aren't insane scientists, viruses, possible camps, and murders for a while.