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selenakTitle: Five Uses For The Modern Cell Phone
Disclaimer: Situation and characters owned by NBC.
Spoilers: For episode 2.01.
Timeline: Between How to stop an exploding man and Four months later.
Characters: . Claire, Nathan, ensemble cameos.
Summary: Claire in snapshots.
Rating: G
Five Uses For The Modern Cell Phone
I. Voicemail
“Hi, Claire, Zach here. Yes, that Zach from High School. Don’t know why I’m calling you, really, I mean, we didn’t really talk since sixth grade, but for some reason your number is on my mobile on speed dial, and you left me these weird text messages. Is this a prank or something? Anyway. There were some guys here asking whether any of us had heard of you since your house got torched, and I said I hadn’t. Since I really don’t know what you’re on about. But I guess you had a rough year, what with your best friend dying and the house and stuff. Everyone freaks out, that’s okay. Just – well, take care of yourself, wherever you are.”
“Claire, this is your grandmother. As you are undoubtedly aware, New York City is still intact. It seems that the future can indeed be changed. Are you aware of the price, though? Are you?”
“Claire Bennet? This is Special Agent Audrey Hanson, FBI. Look, maybe I’m crazy, but I think I saw you on a crime scene yesterday. In New York City. The crime scene in question involves the guy who has been stalking you in Texas, Sylar, and later Ted Sprague who is on record for burning down your parents’ house was killed by Sylar, so – look, kid, just call me. It will be off the record, I promise. We can meet wherever you want, and I promise I won’t try to arrest you. I just don’t want another corpse on my conscience.”
II. Wi Fi access
You can get all kind of information via online news services available via your cell phone. The weather reports, for example. Sunny for Odessa, Texas (no kidding), snow for New York City. It’s late November there, so that’s not so surprising, but Claire knows snow only from tv. She can’t imagine what it feels like on the skin. Like ice cream, only less sticky. So cold. So very cold.
The online headlines also say that the recently elected Congressman Nathan Petrelli has resigned for personal reasons, no further explanation given. There is a link to an older story, something about his father committing suicide and his brother trying to, all revealed by N. Petrelli during a campaign speech. There’s even a photo of the event, but that’s really too tiny to be recognizable on Claire’s mobile. It blurs in front of her eyes. It all blurs.
III. Memory Recall
They can track you down via GPS. The last thing Claire does before getting a new mobile, with a new number no one in her old life is familiar with, is go to the list of calls made from her old cell phone. Right there, at the top, is the last number dialled, and not by her. She never saw that number in her life, and yet she knows exactly whom it belongs to, and who dialled it.
”You won’t call him, right? We can’t trust him. Promise you won’t call him, Peter.”
“I promise.”
She should have suspected something then, because he gave in that easily instead of protesting. But she had divided them in her mind; she had to. It was the other one who was the liar, the betrayer. Peter was her hero who would never lie to her. He wasn’t really part of that family, no more than she was. Just by accident. There was nothing connecting him to the other, just as there wasn’t for her, only a shared genetic sequence that didn’t mean anything.
Claire writes the number down. It’s the first one she enters in the address book of her new mobile. But she waits until she’s alone until she calls.
IV. Photography
The new mobile is great for making photos. Claire didn’t use to, but now she does it all the time. Of Mom and Lyle and Dad, of course, but also of the landscapes they pass through until they arrive in Cobra Verde, California, where Dad found a job for himself and a home for them, he says. All those pixels added together are proof that what she sees does exist. It’s hot in California, just as it used to be in Texas, and sometimes she feels like she never moved at all, or only sideways. Being on the road with the Haitian, watching her Dad take a bullet, New York, that house of full of secrets and low voices and the gun in her hand, unfired, watching them take to the sky with tears in her eyes, that all happened to someone else.
Every time she makes her secret calls and hears Nathan’s voice she knows it was real, that the Claire who threw herself out of a window still is there. She doesn’t just make calls, though. She mails him those snapshots, without explanations. He never asks why. She’d think he doesn’t download them, except then she wouldn’t have been able to message the pictures anymore after a while; the storage would have been full. So he must look at them. Then he probably deletes them, so she can’t count on them being saved elsewhere if one day this new life, too, will have to be left behind.
Still, it’s something, Claire supposes. The knowledge that they both have looked at the same things, and neither of them will forget.
V. Ordering takeout
It’s the one time he calls her instead of the other way around. She’s busy helping Mom bake cookies, and almost doesn’t answer her mobile. Lyle is about to since it’s lying on the living room desk, and that’s when Claire recalls that nobody else has her new number, almost drops the plate with the cookies in her haste to put them down and gets the phone just in time. Lyle gives her a funny look. He hasn’t made friends here yet. When they talked about it, the two of them walking Mr. Muggles to give Mom and Dad some alone time, he said that he didn’t want someone else to get their memory deleted. Claire was about to say Dad didn’t do that sort of thing anymore and didn’t have the guy who could do it around anymore, either, but then she recalled Zach’s message on her voice mail and said “yeah, me too”. So now Lyle is understandably confused when Claire excuses herself and takes herself and her mobile upstairs, to her room.
“Did you order pizza for me?” Nathan says without preambles, but then, they never say hello to each other. Nathan’s usual opening is some variation of “you shouldn’t call”, and she doesn’t bother with greetings, either. Claire looks at her watch. It’s still early afternoon in California, but evening in New York City, so that worked out.
“Yes,” she says. There is a short silence on the other end. Then he says, sounding less dead and more irritated than he usually does: “Why?”
“Because,” Claire says. “It’s New Year’s Eve. And you should eat something. And pizza guys delivering on New Year’s Eve should get a fat tip, and you can give fat tips. You can make his day when you pay him. You should.”
It’s one way of saying that the thought of him getting drunk alone in Peter’s apartment is something she couldn’t stand any longer without doing something about it.
“Don’t do it again,” Nathan says.
“Did you give him a tip?” Claire insists, and there is another short silence.
“Yes,” he says, and hangs up. For the next months, the advertisements from that particular pizza service won’t stop coming, all showing up via SMS or email on her cell phone. That must have been one hell of a tip.
Disclaimer: Situation and characters owned by NBC.
Spoilers: For episode 2.01.
Timeline: Between How to stop an exploding man and Four months later.
Characters: . Claire, Nathan, ensemble cameos.
Summary: Claire in snapshots.
Rating: G
Five Uses For The Modern Cell Phone
I. Voicemail
“Hi, Claire, Zach here. Yes, that Zach from High School. Don’t know why I’m calling you, really, I mean, we didn’t really talk since sixth grade, but for some reason your number is on my mobile on speed dial, and you left me these weird text messages. Is this a prank or something? Anyway. There were some guys here asking whether any of us had heard of you since your house got torched, and I said I hadn’t. Since I really don’t know what you’re on about. But I guess you had a rough year, what with your best friend dying and the house and stuff. Everyone freaks out, that’s okay. Just – well, take care of yourself, wherever you are.”
“Claire, this is your grandmother. As you are undoubtedly aware, New York City is still intact. It seems that the future can indeed be changed. Are you aware of the price, though? Are you?”
“Claire Bennet? This is Special Agent Audrey Hanson, FBI. Look, maybe I’m crazy, but I think I saw you on a crime scene yesterday. In New York City. The crime scene in question involves the guy who has been stalking you in Texas, Sylar, and later Ted Sprague who is on record for burning down your parents’ house was killed by Sylar, so – look, kid, just call me. It will be off the record, I promise. We can meet wherever you want, and I promise I won’t try to arrest you. I just don’t want another corpse on my conscience.”
II. Wi Fi access
You can get all kind of information via online news services available via your cell phone. The weather reports, for example. Sunny for Odessa, Texas (no kidding), snow for New York City. It’s late November there, so that’s not so surprising, but Claire knows snow only from tv. She can’t imagine what it feels like on the skin. Like ice cream, only less sticky. So cold. So very cold.
The online headlines also say that the recently elected Congressman Nathan Petrelli has resigned for personal reasons, no further explanation given. There is a link to an older story, something about his father committing suicide and his brother trying to, all revealed by N. Petrelli during a campaign speech. There’s even a photo of the event, but that’s really too tiny to be recognizable on Claire’s mobile. It blurs in front of her eyes. It all blurs.
III. Memory Recall
They can track you down via GPS. The last thing Claire does before getting a new mobile, with a new number no one in her old life is familiar with, is go to the list of calls made from her old cell phone. Right there, at the top, is the last number dialled, and not by her. She never saw that number in her life, and yet she knows exactly whom it belongs to, and who dialled it.
”You won’t call him, right? We can’t trust him. Promise you won’t call him, Peter.”
“I promise.”
She should have suspected something then, because he gave in that easily instead of protesting. But she had divided them in her mind; she had to. It was the other one who was the liar, the betrayer. Peter was her hero who would never lie to her. He wasn’t really part of that family, no more than she was. Just by accident. There was nothing connecting him to the other, just as there wasn’t for her, only a shared genetic sequence that didn’t mean anything.
Claire writes the number down. It’s the first one she enters in the address book of her new mobile. But she waits until she’s alone until she calls.
IV. Photography
The new mobile is great for making photos. Claire didn’t use to, but now she does it all the time. Of Mom and Lyle and Dad, of course, but also of the landscapes they pass through until they arrive in Cobra Verde, California, where Dad found a job for himself and a home for them, he says. All those pixels added together are proof that what she sees does exist. It’s hot in California, just as it used to be in Texas, and sometimes she feels like she never moved at all, or only sideways. Being on the road with the Haitian, watching her Dad take a bullet, New York, that house of full of secrets and low voices and the gun in her hand, unfired, watching them take to the sky with tears in her eyes, that all happened to someone else.
Every time she makes her secret calls and hears Nathan’s voice she knows it was real, that the Claire who threw herself out of a window still is there. She doesn’t just make calls, though. She mails him those snapshots, without explanations. He never asks why. She’d think he doesn’t download them, except then she wouldn’t have been able to message the pictures anymore after a while; the storage would have been full. So he must look at them. Then he probably deletes them, so she can’t count on them being saved elsewhere if one day this new life, too, will have to be left behind.
Still, it’s something, Claire supposes. The knowledge that they both have looked at the same things, and neither of them will forget.
V. Ordering takeout
It’s the one time he calls her instead of the other way around. She’s busy helping Mom bake cookies, and almost doesn’t answer her mobile. Lyle is about to since it’s lying on the living room desk, and that’s when Claire recalls that nobody else has her new number, almost drops the plate with the cookies in her haste to put them down and gets the phone just in time. Lyle gives her a funny look. He hasn’t made friends here yet. When they talked about it, the two of them walking Mr. Muggles to give Mom and Dad some alone time, he said that he didn’t want someone else to get their memory deleted. Claire was about to say Dad didn’t do that sort of thing anymore and didn’t have the guy who could do it around anymore, either, but then she recalled Zach’s message on her voice mail and said “yeah, me too”. So now Lyle is understandably confused when Claire excuses herself and takes herself and her mobile upstairs, to her room.
“Did you order pizza for me?” Nathan says without preambles, but then, they never say hello to each other. Nathan’s usual opening is some variation of “you shouldn’t call”, and she doesn’t bother with greetings, either. Claire looks at her watch. It’s still early afternoon in California, but evening in New York City, so that worked out.
“Yes,” she says. There is a short silence on the other end. Then he says, sounding less dead and more irritated than he usually does: “Why?”
“Because,” Claire says. “It’s New Year’s Eve. And you should eat something. And pizza guys delivering on New Year’s Eve should get a fat tip, and you can give fat tips. You can make his day when you pay him. You should.”
It’s one way of saying that the thought of him getting drunk alone in Peter’s apartment is something she couldn’t stand any longer without doing something about it.
“Don’t do it again,” Nathan says.
“Did you give him a tip?” Claire insists, and there is another short silence.
“Yes,” he says, and hangs up. For the next months, the advertisements from that particular pizza service won’t stop coming, all showing up via SMS or email on her cell phone. That must have been one hell of a tip.
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no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 12:19 pm (UTC)Great story. I like it for its shortness and being to the point in these short scenes. Thanks for sharing :))
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Date: 2007-09-30 12:21 pm (UTC)Thank you!
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Date: 2007-09-30 12:51 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 12:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 01:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 01:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 01:28 pm (UTC)*sniff*
Thank you for this. Oh, Claire.
But she had divided them in her mind; she had to. It was the other one who was the liar, the betrayer. Peter was her hero who would never lie to her. He wasn’t really part of that family, no more than she was. Just by accident. There was nothing connecting him to the other, just as there wasn’t for her, just a shared genetic sequence that didn’t mean anything.
I particularly loved this line. Because she wants it to be that simple. She wants it to be the Good Petrelli and the Bad Petrelli, her Ally and her Enemy, and it's nowhere near that easy. And in a way, she wanted Peter to be all hers, not Nathan's or Angela's: she wanted to take him away from that and into what she'd assigned as *her* family, the Bennets. And I think the premiere showed us that she realizes now that it's not that simple.
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Date: 2007-09-30 01:50 pm (UTC)*shares the Claire love*
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Date: 2007-09-30 03:28 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 03:34 pm (UTC)Lyle: it was something that occured to me when I saw him sitting at that dinner table and just had to use.
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Date: 2007-09-30 03:41 pm (UTC)Really nicely done!
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Date: 2007-09-30 03:45 pm (UTC)Claire ordering pizza for Nathan was the first idea I had for this particular one. Clearly, someone has to, and she so would!
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Date: 2007-09-30 03:44 pm (UTC)This show certainly makes an art of phone calls, doesn't it? *g*
I adore everything about the pizza one. It says so much about the two of them and what they can't say because they're them. Though really my favorite part of it was this:
>he didn’t want someone else to get their memory deleted<
Because, wow, poor Lyle. They made a joke on the commentary that Lyle still thought they were in Texas and it hurt because, with the way they treat poor Lyle, it might even be true.
Audrey's voicemail though is what I really adore. Audrey is a kick-ass character, but she makes some phenomenal fuck-ups through-out the series and it's nice to see her owning up to that and trying to prevent future ones from happening.
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Date: 2007-09-30 03:54 pm (UTC)Indeed, though as of now, my nonimation for "phone call of the year" still goes to Dr. Who for the one depicted in this icon.*veg*
They made a joke on the commentary that Lyle still thought they were in Texas and it hurt because, with the way they treat poor Lyle, it might even be true.
Ouch, yes. Lyla and Nathan's two sons are the ignored kids of this show, only there when the writers remember they should be indicated to still exist, as opposed to Micah and Molly who are the central-to-the-plot kids, of course. Doesn't mean we fanfic writers can't treat them as real people!
Audrey is a kick-ass character, but she makes some phenomenal fuck-ups through-out the series and it's nice to see her owning up to that and trying to prevent future ones from happening.
I think she would, and really hope Audrey will be back. As you said, she was kick-ass, and no one's love interest, which alas is all too rare still with female characters, and she had a mission of her own in the story.
It says so much about the two of them and what they can't say because they're them.
Yes indeed. As you show in your own story, one can't let Claire and Nathan go all open verbally at each other (though their brief conversation in 2.01 is still way more open to each other than anything they said in s1), let alone touchy-feely, but pizza, I've found, works.
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Date: 2007-09-30 04:03 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 04:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 04:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 04:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 04:18 pm (UTC)I do have to wonder if Noah checks Claire's cellphone bill, btw.
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Date: 2007-09-30 08:12 pm (UTC)Also, if he does check it, and finds out whom she's calling, I don't think he'll mention it to her, because of the supreme awkwardness this would result in.
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Date: 2007-09-30 04:54 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 08:14 pm (UTC)Say, since you were in glorious Istambul while I started posting it - have you read my recent Heroes magnum opus, Runaways? Which stars young Nathan, baby Claire, and teenage Hiro, Peter, Niki and Simone and is less insane than this sounds.
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Date: 2007-09-30 05:30 pm (UTC)Gorgeous and poignant. Angela's message had me literally gasping out loud and your Nathan-Claire dynamic leaves me yearning for more. I want so see more of their interaction in canon. Don't disappoint me, Kring!
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Date: 2007-09-30 08:15 pm (UTC)I think we all have our fingers crossed for more Nathan-Claire in canon. Surely all those fannish prayers must be heard!
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Date: 2007-09-30 06:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 08:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 06:53 pm (UTC)Poor Zach though!
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Date: 2007-09-30 08:18 pm (UTC)And yes, the dynamic is. That phonecall was my favourite scene in the episode.
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Date: 2007-09-30 07:46 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 08:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 07:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 08:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 08:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 08:20 pm (UTC)Also, thank you. It seems the Heroes muse is chatty again.*g*
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Date: 2007-09-30 09:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-01 05:09 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-09-30 11:50 pm (UTC)or we could if anybody would write herand that makes it a little better.(I also heartily approve of the pizza. Got to make sure that boy eats, Claire. You know he wouldn't if he had nobody to remind him.)
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Date: 2007-10-01 05:12 am (UTC)So very true, both.
Audrey: I feel guilty because Audrey fanfic was one of the things missing I complained about, and I haven't written any myself! So the least I can do is to include her here.
The pizza clearly is the star of the story.*g*
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Date: 2007-09-30 11:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-01 05:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-01 12:01 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-01 05:13 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-01 07:56 am (UTC)Very well-written. ♥
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Date: 2007-10-01 09:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-01 09:18 am (UTC)UNSUBTLE You know what else would make a great fic? An ensemble fic about the
worst Christmases everChristmastime experiences of all the characters. :DDDDD /UNSUBTLEno subject
Date: 2007-10-01 09:28 am (UTC)It makes sense, being on the run, afraid of losing her life and her memories, that she'd both be taking pictures to ground herself and sending them to Nathan to try to tie herself to the world outside the tiny Bennet unit.
That was what I was thinking when contemplating Claire's situation between seasons and right now.
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Date: 2007-10-01 12:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-01 01:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-10-01 03:11 pm (UTC)Oh, Nathan.
You two love each other - you are family, even if you don't want to think about it. Claire ordering pizza for Nathan just about broke my heart because she cares about him and he did it for her, and the tip because he's still Nathan, and it would have been what Peter wanted and Nathan, for all his boorishness and bluster, is certainly not stingy.
I love my Petrellis. I love your Petrellis. I loved Claire sending Nathan the pictures. He aches. He aches for Peter, he aches for Claire, he aches for what could have been, what was, and what might be.
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Date: 2007-10-01 08:20 pm (UTC)