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[watchmakers_son]

The door of apartment number seven at 215 Reed Street isn't locked. Sylar rests three careful fingers on the edge and pushes it open; it moves silently, without resistance.

Completed canvases rest everywhere in the studio, on the walls, the floor, arrayed in a circle around Isaac Mendez, who's feverishly painting another one with his back turned to Sylar. It's of the two of them: Isaac on the ground in a pool of his own blood, Sylar standing above him, regarding the corpse dispassionately.

It's more than mere painting, though. He can (tick) see that. And on the floor beneath the painter's feet, as he continues to work --

Sylar freezes mid-step when he recognizes the shape to the spirals of yellow and orange.

New York, Frank Black had rasped. The explosion.

There had been truth to it, hadn't there.

Two seconds pass before he raises his eyes back to Isaac and takes another step closer, still listening.

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[viridian-hue.livejournal.com]

It's all color. Color color movement line contrast strokes intensity hue shading colorcolorcolor and the strange sensation of floating above it all until he comes right back down hard into the concrete and into flesh and bone and blood and reality and the world is there again, in front of him.

Isaac drops the brush.

It's still daylight and that almost hurts his eyes when he realizes he's seeing the real world again. Well, real's relative, everything he paints is real but it's not necessarily current, he's learned that, but this is real, this cramping in his hand and arm and the way his neck feels a little funny, like he needs to pop it and the ache in the back of his calves from standing for so long, canvas after canvas. He pulls the scrap of fabric from his head, letting his hair fall around his face and he pushes it back with a paint-smeared hand as he surveys what he's done. It should horrify him. Really, it is horrifying and objectively, he sees that.

But all he feels is a strange sense of completion. He wonders if this is how Eden felt when she came to him that last time, a tying up of loose ends, captured in crimson and cadmium grey and ochre. It's satisfying. He's making a good death, and the last pieces are falling into place, this is how it starts. Now all that's left is the actor on the stage. The scene's been set.

[watchmakers_son]

"You really can paint the future."

He speaks with a detached wonder, surveying the rest of the paintings around them. A woman framed in silhouette in a doorway. A man -- Peter Petrelli? -- falling from a rooftop with his coat spread behind him like wings.

Deliberately, he does not look at the floor.

"Just like the professor said. It's fantastic."

[viridian-hue.livejournal.com]

The actor is here. Isaac feels the strangest sense descend over him, a sort of detachment of his own, like he's not even here anymore. He's not afraid. How can he be afraid? He knew this was coming. He knew. It's a gift, the chance to come to grips with what's about to happen, to be able to face it with dignity. Dignity is about all he has. He's done so much, he's committed so many sins. There's no telling if there is any forgiveness on the other side, but he's asked for as much of it as he can.

"You're late," Isaac finally says, turning to look at the man who is Death to him, studying him with an artist's eye. Strong brows and a wicked sort of smirk to his mouth even when he's not smirking at all, and intense, glittering eyes. Just the way he painted him. Perfect. He's done him justice.

[watchmakers_son]

...This is new.

Perhaps something to be expected, but nevertheless, Sylar pauses in his examination of the artwork, mildly startled. (Being on the receiving end of that critical, familiar look: this is new as well.)

He tips his head to the side, slightly. "I guess you know why I'm here," he says as he begins to close the space between them.

[viridian-hue.livejournal.com]

There's confidence in his step as he walks closer to Death, looking at him critically still. Maybe he made the line of his jaw too hard, a touch too tall. It's not a major flaw, but Isaac sees it all the same. In another time and place, he might notice that Death's handsome in a quirky sort of way. But even Satan can take on a pleasing shape, Isaac knows his Catechism.

"You're the one who's gonna kill me," Isaac says evenly, meeting Death's eyes calmly, clearly.

[watchmakers_son]

"That's true," he agrees in the same calm tone as Isaac, stopping several yards away. Both hands remain at his sides, though his fingers curl loosely, waiting.

When he receives no response, the tilt to Sylar's head angles a little sharper as he studies the painter from the corners of his eyes.

Like a scientist remarking on the existence of gravity, he adds, mildly, "This is usually the part when people start screaming."

[viridian-hue.livejournal.com]

Isaac shrugs a little, the movement barely perceptible, a hint of motion instead of anything defined. He's not afraid. In fact, he's trying to care. It's like he's hollow and if he's shaken too hard, he'll rattle inside. Death is trying to rattle him, but there's nothing in there yet that's come loose.

"I tried fighting the future," Isaac says, and oh, God, how much truth is there in that? He fought and railed and rallied and gave up and gave in. There's no fighting what will come. It's like trying to stop the tide. "It's too big for me. Maybe you can do better."

[watchmakers_son]

Sylar's assessing gaze sharpens. His fingers loosen. "Why me?" he asks.

Somehow it's both of you --

"Do you see some special future for me?" It verges on a mocking sing-song, but curiosity skims just beneath it; curiosity, and a fierce need. The orange and yellow splays across nearly the entire floor, impossible to avoid, and there are shadows of buildings beneath it, the New York skyline burning bright.

[viridian-hue.livejournal.com]

Death is mocking him, ever so slightly, but he has something he wants. Isaac thinks for a moment of a snatch of poetry--because I could not stop for Death, he kindly stopped for me--recited in a child's sing-song in his mind, but he clears it and focuses. Too much detachment won't let him have a good death, and that's his focus now, it has to be.

"They stop you," he explains, "and you die."

[watchmakers_son]

The thought snaps across his mind instantly, matter-of-factly: that can't be true.

Sylar smiles, then begins to chuckle, and he keeps chuckling until the moment it's met by a second thought, edged with traces of Raven's laughter.

There's a portrait of what looks like Bennet's daughter, face twisted in horror. Another of a bloodied Homecoming banner. Sylar's gaze ticks away from Isaac.

"You painted all that, too?" he asks, searching the paintings along the walls. "Show me."

There's nothing more to be seen. He whips back to Isaac. "Show me."

[viridian-hue.livejournal.com]

Isaac flinches and his mind scatters like dandelion seeds blown into the wind. What can he do what can he do what can he do? The gun. There's the gun on the table, the one that Bennet left, the one that he used to destroy everything, the one tool of darkness that he can't let go. He turns, thinking about going for it and his hand moves before he can decide what to do. He just acts.

So much for making a good death. This is a struggle waiting to happen.

[watchmakers_son]

But before Isaac can reach it, the gun abruptly skids across the table, like someone's yanked it along on strings, and clatters to the ground on the opposite side of the room.

Nobody's touched it.

Sylar lowers his hand and snaps, as if scolding a child, "Now, now."

He's wasted enough time. A precise second ticks by before Sylar lifts his hand again and taps two fingers against nothing, the gesture sharp and precise.

[viridian-hue.livejournal.com]

Isaac's head whips around, following the gun's path. It moved. It moved and he didn't touch it, no-one did. He turns to look at Death, and realises: this is the moment. It's pregnant and heavy and Isaac knows this is all there is to his last moments. The chill of his studio and the smell of the paint, the turpentine and treated canvas, the vague hum of electricity and the noises of the city outside, all of these things are the last things he will ever know. And he's ready. He's ready.

[watchmakers_son]

The telekinesis punches Isaac in the chest, throwing him backward onto the painting of the city going up in flames, and pins him down, spreadeagled like an insect.

Sylar glances at the paints, the brushes -- another sharp twist of his fingers, and two of them rise into the air, spinning like propellers before they rocket toward Isaac.

One slams straight through his right wrist and into the floor. The other does the same to his left wrist a split-second later.

[viridian-hue.livejournal.com]

It takes a moment for the pain to start in earnest, to really register, and all of a sudden, it's there in a rush, white hot and burning, a lemon-dill-bleach-vomit taste in his mouth. So he does the only thing he can do: he cries out. He's laying there, stretched out like Christ on the cross--forgive me Father, for I have sinned, through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault--and he can't keep silent in the fact of that sort of pain. The cries turn into something resembling words, and a moment later, he remembers English, too. "It's already gone!"

[watchmakers_son]

He steps closer until he's level with Isaac's feet.

"Why don't you tell me all about it, then?" he growls.

[viridian-hue.livejournal.com]

Isaac's breathing hard, and he licks his lips, struggling to keep his voice steady. "I've seen enough of the future. I don't need to watch it happen," he says, coughing a little, feeling like he can't breathe. It's all threatening to drown him and he struggles, struggles, struggles, as if his efforts might purify him, even though he knows it won't. It can't. There's no absolution, none.

"I've wasted my life, destroyed everything good that ever came to me. At least I did one good thing before I died." He doesn't know if it's enough. Maybe it never could be. But he tried, doesn't that count, doesn't it?

[watchmakers_son]

That isn't an answer.

It's not an answer, and Sylar has so rarely been one to tolerate objects lacking in purpose, in use; even less so when the one thing that might be of any benefit is that sweep of a mushroom cloud over the floor. But even that one isn't anything but a single part, isolated from its others, and until he learns of the rest, there is no way for it to work properly --

Jaw tight, Sylar flicks his wrist again to lift two more brushes from the table. They shoot to the ground and impale both of Isaac's ankles with a crunch.

[viridian-hue.livejournal.com]

Isaac makes a keening, choked sound like a wounded animal. Maybe he is a wounded animal. He's being crucified with the only tools he could trust. There's irony there. He doesn't notice it, but it's there.

The pain wells up, a tidal wave of visceral red, red he could never, ever capture (not that he'll ever get the chance now), cadmium red and naphthol red and quinacridone red and red oxide and colors he doesn't even know, blends and cocktails that he wishes he could have used somewhere, somewhere. The detachment is starting to set in; the pain is too great for his body to handle, and his brain is just pulling away, drifting away. It's almost a relief. It means relief is coming, anyway. The angel of death is on his way, Gabriel, the Left Hand of God. There's no escaping his sword, and Isaac hopes for it. It's what he's been chasing all these years, after all.

"You can't fight the future," Isaac rasps.

[watchmakers_son]

Silently, Sylar steps over Isaac's foot and circles around to his side. He glances to his right at the canvases next to them, almost lifts a hand to touch the drying paint.

They all show the same thing, from different angles: Isaac with the top of his head sheared off, the skull hollowed out like a shell.

Below him, he can hear the thready, fading unevenness in the painter's heartbeat.

"Neither can you," he says at last, softly, as he turns back. Each movement careful and meticulous, Sylar laces his fingers together and crouches beside him.

[viridian-hue.livejournal.com]

Isaac's head lolls. He meant to shake it, but this is the best he can manage. His body isn't responding the way it ought to, and that should scare him. Instead, he just lets it go. "It's all right. I finally know my part in all of this. To die here with you," he says in a low voice, looking up at Death's face with wide eyes, his pupils dilated, blown out, ringed with hazel. There's almost a sort of kindness in their depths. Death doesn't know what's coming for him; Isaac at least knows.

"But not before I show them how to kill you..." he continues, breathing heavily. "And stop the bomb. I finally get to be a hero." He hears Eden's voice ringing in the last, in those words. She told him to be a hero for her. And now he is. She's gone, and Simone's gone, and now he'll be gone, all gone, all fall down, ashes, ashes, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

The blood is pooling under his arms and legs, hot and sticky and staining the floor like paint, and he's just staring up at Death, waiting. Death doesn't know what he's doing, he thinks. Death can't know. No-one knows the future, no-one but him, and he has this intense calm about it. He's the pascal lamb, the sacred feast. He's giving himself up to the salvation of the world, a hero at last. It's all he wanted, and in the end, it's all he has. Maybe his own blood will finally wash away his sins.

Confiteor Deo omnipotenti, beatæ Mariæ semper Virgini, his lips forming the words, but he can't get them out, he can only think them, bits and pieces of a dying confession.

[watchmakers_son]

As Isaac speaks, Sylar regards him steadily, unmoving. This one, too, is someone who knows; he can see the discrete pieces of the world better than any of the others could hope to see it, and there is a peace and a steadiness to that kind of knowing. Sylar will not say that it isn't supposed to go like this.

Yet to maintain that calm, even in death...

(Beato Michæli Archangelo, beato Ioanni Baptistæ, sanctis Apostolis Petro et Paulo: it's like a distant echo when he recognizes what Isaac is struggling to say, a reflection in a smudged mirror. He remembers it. He's spoken it himself.)

...and to believe yourself a hero in your sacrifice.

He shakes his head, slightly, and rises back to his feet. One more step, to place him near Isaac's shoulder.

Sylar will have to see for himself how much the painter truly understands.

He points.

[viridian-hue.livejournal.com]

The last words Isaac's lips ever form are a mea maxima culpa that turn into a long, drawn out scream. He didn't want to scream. He didn't want to lose that calm. He wanted to be a worthy sacrifice. But Christ cried out from the cross and Isaac's screams turn into a liquid gurgle.

Death throes. These are death throes. His body strains, heaves, struggles, protests the dimming of the light. Put out the light and then put out the light, but once put out thy light, I cannot give it vital growth again...

And then, that's it. That's all of him. All of his blood and his passion and his hopes and his pain, all of his fears and his needs and his love and his efforts. It's all spilling across the floor, spilling out of his head like an overturned chalice, blood for the world outpoured. The world goes white, blindingly white, white as the Virgin's mantel, white as the Magedelene's ointment jar, white as the Lamb's coat. White, white white white white...

...and then he's gone. Silent, still. Gone.