I asked you all to work with me. I wanted you all to understand. But powered or not, your vision was too limited. I thought you, at least, grasped something of it. I didn't want a plaything. I wanted partners, people who finally understood.
Meant by whom, Angela? Who "means" mortality? Who "means" the things Peter can do? Man is not "meant" to be anything but the height of what he can achieve, if he is meant to do anything at all.
If by limited you mean unwilling to commit genocide on all, powered or not. You never made it seem like partners, Adam. But in fairness, no one did. We were all powerful, dangerous children seeking the best toys. We've grown up, little has changed. We see where it's gotten us though. On the run, hunted, hated, locked up. Was that the vision you had, Adam? Is that how you saw it thirty years ago. Because this is most certainly NOT the vision I had for our world!
Your insanity is the height of what you could acheive? Maury's sadism? Bob's lack of conscience? I don't think one of us that remains living can say THIS is what we meant to achieve when we came together.
Of course it's not how I saw it. You know how I saw it. Us, in charge as we should be, leading the world into something better for the next generations. But you took the vision away, threw me in that cell, and if the world hates you and hunts you now, it's your own fault for your myriad failures to control your children.
No, it's not. And did it ever occur to you that locking me away was not the best way to achieve what you wanted? That none of you had any idea, none of you had walked this path before, and that maybe, just maybe, you actually needed me?
But your vision didn't include a world, Adam. It included decimating everyone. Truthfully, who could trust you not to make us next? That you would ensure we had what we needed from you to live? If you were willing to kill millions, how soon before we were next? You knew better than to cross Kaito. Or you should have. Others have feared Linderman, or now Bob though only God knows why, but then, in our day, you knew you were pissing off the wrong man, Adam. You had to have known that.
You have no right to speak on how we have handled anything, especially the children! You were not there, and don't you dare start in on your infintile whining that if you hadn't been locked up you would have been. Whose side would you have choosen? Enough had begun to lose faith in you that the rest had to follow. So what, Adam? Would you have killed off those that didn't agree with you? Played alpha line and killed off each child that stepped out of line? Worked to father than whole line as your own? Even with my own ability, you can only control them so long, so far.
No, you're right. I could have drugged them, systematically since they were my grandchildrens age until they were nothing but mindless, useless drones. Would that have been preferable, Adam? Maybe that was what you wanted of us all when having a mind of our own made us dangerous.
Not all agreed with Kaito's decision, but we had to stand by someone. You were making people nervous, worried about how far you would go and just where they would stand. You brought that on yourself. You made them fear even their place in your heirarchy. Maybe we did need you, but you made it clear that maybe, just maybe, you didn't need us. Being expendable to an immortal with a less than stellar record at sanity? Not comforting. We came together seeking a better world, not trying to change one death for another.
If I didn't need you, I never would have brought you all together. I never would have taken the time to find you. If I wanted to walk a world alone, I could have kept doing what I had been doing. You all never grasped that, did you? How truly important you were to me. How I had searched for you for centuries, waiting until you came. I didn't need you, no. I don't need anyone. I learned that lesson a long time ago. But it was more than that. I wanted you, and I wanted you to understand, to share my vision of a world reborn, something new for all of us, for our children.
I didn't think Kaito would be so unreasonable. That was my error, yes. He turned out to be far more like his son than I thought he would be, when we first met.
I never would have killed the children, or any of you, in anything but self-defense. Not then. Now, obviously, is a different matter all together. But then? I would have protected you, all of you, but you especially. You weren't expendable.
The children should have been taught what they were. Raised and cherished for what they were. Not used the way Bob used Elle, or hidden the way Noah hid Claire. Even if their abilities didn't manifest, someone should have told them that something might. You all should have shared what you could do with them. Nathan should never have been afraid of his gift, and Peter...god. Peter. He should have been nurtured, guided, shown who he was instead of meeting with fear and ridicule from his own family until he was twisted into the wreck of guilt that he is now, ashamed of himself and what he can do, and just wanting to be normal.
They should all be proud, all be pleased, all know how special they are to their parents and to the world, instead of longing, always, for something they're not, that they were never going to be.
I wouldn't have killed them, Angela. I would have loved them--those that were mine and those that weren't, because they are the future.
Kaito was always a man of honour and devotion. It was how he was raised, how he would always be. His strength led us through many dark moments. That said, he was a tight assed bastard. A trait, at least in part, you should understand. But in those moments, faced with Kaito or your rantings about the virus, whom do you think sounded more balanced? I might also note you made more than a few enemies with, shall we call it, your want for certain people? You weren't exactly subtle in your desires in anything. Jealousy is not easy to combat. I did not turn on you for that, but I could well name a few that did.
There was no way to groom Nathan for his place in our world and tell him. He needed to be a certain way, a certain kind of man. I couldn't do that and tell him his parents had powers like the super heroes in his brother's comics. I couldn't tell him what I could do or he might have fought it. They still don't know, nor will they ever.
You weren't there! You didn't raise Peter, nor would you have if we hadn't locked you up so don't even start that song and dance again, Adam. He was not the easiest child, not like Nathan. Not like, apparently, Claire was before she went rogue.
Me especially? I wasn't expendable but now I am? Do you still seek to kill me, Adam? You marked me for death. Should I still be waiting for you? Shall I leave the bedroom window unlocked, lay upon my death bed and wait for you?
We never had that, Adam. Not even you! Why coddle them when we weren't coddled? Despite where your DNA may lie, you have never been a parent. I doubt you would have had the time for it had you not been locked up. Tell me I'm wrong, it changes little. You brought fear to a group that hoped for a better future, a place where we didn't have to hide. One of our own made us fear for the future of humanity, that there would be a humanity to have a future.
Balance is what this world keeps fighting for and it only leads us deeper into a hell of our own creating. You haven't seen what I have. You all read your history books and assume you know, when you know nothing of the reality, of the patterns that repeat again and again. You want to change the world, but you don't even know what you're changing. And to let jealousy influence the shape that the world takes is childish and trivial.
I haven't told them. I haven't meddled with your precious lies and cover ups, no matter how I despise them. I could have turned Peter from you completely, but I didn't. I never mentioned your name. And I think, perhaps, that you underestimate Nathan. A man can still be a certain way, even knowing what he can do, if he isn't taught to fear it, to suppress it.
No, I wasn't. And I wouldn't have...But what you have done to that boy is inexcusable. Arthur was always weak, but I had hoped you would do better. He needed someone who understood him, and none of you could give him that.
Yes, you especially. And if I meant to kill you Angela, really kill you, do you think I would have sent Maury to do it? You deserve better than that. Death is too easy for you, either way, but death by his hands would just have been an insult. If I want you dead, you will die. I have all the time in the world to make that decision. You live, now, because I wish it.
No, I had nothing like that. And perhaps that's why they should have. A new world. A new way. Honesty. Truth. A vision to guide them. Acceptance for who they are and what they can do instead of fear and lies from the people who are supposed to love them. Just because I have never been given that chance to raise those that are mine, don't think that I wouldn't have, or that I haven't ideas of what a parent should be. You know nothing about that part of my life and are in no position to speak about it.
I brought you a vision of a world where you didn't have to hide. Where we could start again and rebuild something beautiful, something pure, something good for the Earth and those upon it.
That! That is part of what you did and you still don't see it. Stop playing God, Adam. You brought together powerful people and then lorded over them you could take it away. Some might have found it charming and sexy but it becomes nerve wracking. You did send him after me though. In public. Where god and everyone saw. Do you still wonder why I'm cross with you? Is it that hard to understand? You attacked my pride, Adam. Intentionally. How should I feel?
I raised my children the way I saw fit. You have no right to judge when you can not prove you would have done better. I was not merely raising them but ensuring that the Petrelli name lived on long past my years. Arthur's name. Arthur's world. But that is neither here nor there. Just as you think you were doing what was best, I feel the same. I did what I must, what I had to, to ensure that what I needed was accomplished. It's almost cute how you defend Peter. Should I worry when I look on how you sometimes defended me to the others, and what we sometimes shared?
Your vision ensured we didn't have to hide because we were all there would be! I am tied to all of you for all my mortal years, I highly doubt I could endure to have ONLY those same people as my only companionship because everyone else was dead! Excuse me for not seeing in some what you do. Maury for one. Bob another. Kaito was one of the few I could endure and he's gone. Victoria and Arthur the only I was close to. Seeing a trend? We're what remains of the old guard, Adam. By nature and design, we're what's left. I could make note of what that should say to you, but I'm certain you would turn it back into a thinly veiled insult while telling me how special I am. There's times when I miss one of those actions.
You left me in there, shut away from anything and anyone except Bob and Elle's tender attentions. The lot of you could have stood up to Kaito, or you could at least have visited me in my exile. Is it any wonder I'm cross with you, for that? You tried to pretend I never even existed, forgotten and reviled. Your pride will recover. You're strong enough to pull back from this. I lost thirty years. Perhaps that doesn't seem like much given my lifespan, but I assure you, it is. You all would have left me there for eternity if Peter hadn't come along.
And yet nothing you needed was accomplished, was it? Where are you and your children and Arthur's name now, Angela? Everything Nathan gained he has lost, and from what I hear on the news, you could lose him entirely. I could...but you'll never let me near him, will you? Or if I tried, would you throw me back there in your gratitude? As for Peter, Bob nearly broke him. It took me months to get him back in fighting form, into caring again. Almost cute? Is it so far from belief to think that I might care for your son, as a person, beyond what I needed him for?
Maury is worthless. Bob will be dead soon enough, for what he did to me, to Elle, and what he set on Nathan. Don't think I'll let him survive. He signed his own death warrant long ago and has used up any reprieves. Arthur...I had nothing to do with your loss of him, no matter what came before. That will leave just us, Angela. I will not apologize for taking Kaito and Victoria--not after what they set in motion against me. I am not sorry. But I have left you alive.
You can't know it would have worked your way, anymore than then we could have known our way wouldn't either.
Am I capable of throwing you back on my own, Adam? My own ability had it's uses with you but, knowing what you do, would you let me that near? You know the one secret that no one else knows. Make of that what you will. But you know how often, how little, I used it on you before. But then we were allies and not... whatever this is, weren't we? Would you call us enemies, Adam?
What came before was a long time ago, Adam. Thirty years is a lifetime with what has changed for me. I was a different woman then. Some days? I don't think I remember that woman. See seems like a naive girl some days. So innocent compared to how I feel now.
Killing Kaito was a mistake. He wasn't the man he was either, but I think now you've set the boy up to be everything his Father was. Nathan... he had the potential to be what you were, what I saw in you then. I think he's lost that now. Peter has always been Arthur's child, more than I think he'll ever know.
But now you know. Now is a time for new choices, new decisions, looking at where we go form here.
Alone? No. But you have your children and Bob has turned them against me. You have Parkman and what he can do. I don't dare offer to help for fear of what you would do in response.
I don't know what we are anymore, Angela. I haven't for years. We have both changed, and so many things I never told you in the first place, about who I was. I don't think any of you ever knew things you should.
Nathan can find it again. And Peter is far more than Arthur ever was. As for Hiro...he will never become his father while I have breath in my body. Never.
And where do we go from here, Adam? It's my understanding the virus is gone. What will you do now to destroy them all and begin anew?
Peter was prepared to kick me out of Nathan's hospital room. I'm certain Nathan's not dead but I will be honest with you, I do not know where either of my boys are at this moment. So have them? No, I most certainly do not. As we have said before, take that as you will.
I may have secrets now, but in that day and time, I was honest with you, Adam. As honest as I could be and not betray Arthur. Of course, he couldn't betray Daniel and so on and so forth.
Peter has Arthur's fatal flaw. An inability to seperate himself from his own emotions. Given a choice between his own life and his emotions, he'll be playing the regeneration game for all eternity rather than working to ensure he doesn't continue to take those chances.
I didn't mean I was dishonest. I told you the truth. We just never covered 400 years, none of us. I was what I was. It always felt as if the fact that my cells regenerated was more important than the men I had been, the life I lived before the lot of you came along. And without that--how could any of you really understand?
Yes. That I can see. It will be...interesting to watch.
A rather useless one, I admit. Rather hard to make decisions based on lack of planning and drive. But it's an admission in honesty so it will do.
Nathan has disappeared from the hospital. Only Peter could help him do that. No word, no idea. My boys, both of them, are gone. With that girl, I assume.
There was nothing that made it seem relevant. What mattered was the man you'd become, the man we knew. The man that would lead us, keep us together. If you had thought it important, you would have told me. I didn't pry into your past, just as you didn't pry into my privacy... that you let me know. Maury wasn't subtle but he was easily detected.
As he self destructs, and takes Nathan with him. Yes, won't that be grand. Does sarcasm translate in text?
What girl? Why would she help them leave? Did someone...Claire? Was Claire there?
It should have been. I should have told you more, perhaps. Not Kaito, but you. To explain...I see so many places now where I went wrong. How I failed to show you all what everything meant, what I meant, and the whys and whens of it. I kept too much to myself.
If it were in my power, I would stop that from happening.
That does not make you unique, Adam. Not by a long shot.
My, likely, future daughter in law. Sasha... something. It makes me shudder. Sasha Petrelli? What sort of name is that? As for Claire... I assume she's with the family she choose. Where they are now is beyond me. Noah went and got himself shot, brilliant man that he is.
I'll be honest. I don't know if you're suddenly about me and what I should have known because you felt that way at the time, or because I'm what you have left of that time. It's disconcerting, to say the least. You showed us nothing but power, fun and then destruction. Wrong or not, I don't see how you fault us the reaction you received.
This is between you and I and if you ever repeat it, I will find a way to see you pay. You know I am good for my word, Adam but... It's all gone. Arthur, my boys, my grandsons. I got them away. Only Daniel stopped them from being treated as others were. But look at the children, Adam. Maury's boy has turned into his father. He was willing to nearly destroy me to get what he wanted. My boys are out of control. Mendez's boy was a druggie before Sylar got him. Hiro? Elle? You blame my parenting skills but it's... something. I don't even know what but look at them all. You can't stop it. It's meant to be, and this time I think it's beyond what we've done.
Hiro Nakamura buried me alive in a coffin next to Kaito. Only by the grace of a very good friend did I get out. That boy has a twisted sense of revenge. ... I taught him too well, apparently.
Then why would Peter move Nathan when he was so critical? Risking his life? He wouldn't be that irresponsible.
I don't remember why I didn't then. Perhaps I didn't think it important, either. I've had a lot of time to think about the things I would do differently, to change what happened. If anything would have made it work, made it all come together properly.
Angela--I've kept the rest of your secrets. No reason to start betraying them now. It can't be meant to be, Angela, not that they're meant to be as they have been. They are the most powerful generation I have ever seen come forth, in all these centuries. And no one has led them. No one has taught them. Hiro is the closest to stable with his power of any of them. Bob tortured Elle. Nathan and Peter were kept in the dark. Maury...well. There's always bad seeds. Isaac never learned to control his power...
They weren't taught, Angela. They weren't led. It's not just you, no. But it's as if you all got so frightened of me you shut down letting the children flounder in a world where they didn't fit and didn't know how to fit. They need someone to lead them, and there has been no one.
I shouldn't be amused but, truly, it is something Kaito would have done.. and appreciated. I might have smiled.
Yes! Yes he would! Peter has never put his full thought into anything in his life. Not to mention that if Nathan told him to do it, he would jump. Nathan has a missing sense of self preservation sometimes. Leads him to making dicey gambles. Sometimes they pay off. Sometimes they get him in a bed, charred and ruined. That day, the day I came in and he was healed. I knew you were loose. Before Maury attacked me and before the pictures, I knew and it terrified me.
Nathan was the only leader in the bunch, Adam. And he turned on what he was offered to protect Peter, rather than making his brother grow up.
And all of them nearly got themselves killed by a sociopathic rogue that that damned geneticist unleashed on the world.
From what I heard on the news, Nathan wasn't talking much. Were his injuries exaggerated? Terrified? That I was coming? Of what I would do when I found you? Healing him...Yes. Well. I suppose you were right to be frightened.
If they had both been prepared...No. Even that...did you underestimate them that much? The bond between them? Even I knew how to win Peter's absolute loyalty.
Yes, well. Even I couldn't have foressen Sylar or Suresh's work with him.
No, they were not exaggerated. He was touch and go for most of his first night. Yes, I was worried. You made quite a few threats in the end, the last I saw you. Not to mention you were planning genocide at the time you were locked up. What was I to think when I realised you were free? And then the picture. I'm still not sure what to think of that given what you did, or had done, to Kaito. Not to mention Victoria.
We tried to raise them to both be as Nathan was. Strong, determined, no nonsense. Boys that could become men to lead. None of us were leaders on our own and I think that was our downfall. Yourself, Nakamura, Bob and Linderman all vying for control, for power. I wanted my boys to be designed to be leaders. President and Vice President. Peter never lived up to his potential. Perhaps I underestimated their bond. It didn't help the control I lost within our organization and was unable to guide certain events. Daniel's treatment of Nathan. The Company taking Peter after he failed at Kirby.
I always found it interesting they found your plan, with the virus, to be unacceptable. But they would destroy New York to obtain the same end - the World recognizing us for what we are.
They have no leader, they have no desire to further our goals. I'm not certain constant immersion would have changed that. Our generation had vision, we had grown up in the spector of war and sought Nirvana from it. They constantly see perfection in the most broken things and call it beauty.
Suresh should have been destroyed early on. I'm sure he would have had they known how he was treating his patients, and the sort he was willing to take on as part of his experiments. This boy, Gabriel Gray, was never stable it would seem and is now wanted for murdering his mother, over and above what Sylar has done to the evolved.
No, I don't suppose there is. At least my bad week brightened yours.
But he stabilized? Still...why would Peter take him? Where would he take him? I was cranky. I had cause to be. I'm calmer now. Mostly. Hiro and I still have a reckoning coming. And Victoria was about to kill Peter. I killed her in self-defense and defending him.
That was another mistake--this whole collegiate atmosphere. We needed a leader and they ought not to have thought they were in any position to take that control. Linderman and Bob never respected you as they should have. I would have. I do.
Yes, the irony of that kept me rather infuriated for a good couple of years.
But they could have had a leader. They could have fallen in line behind us, if we had...if you had taught them. Shown them what the world was. This culture of entitlement that has sprung up, that I see everywhere will cause this world's downfall more surely than anything I could ever bring about--what will be left will be a rudderless generation unfit for anything.
I agree. But they have a very bad habit of underestimating most people.
I'm alone in a very large home. All of my family is gone. My last true friend - you notwithstanding because I still am not sure where we stand - is dead and you killed her. The brightness is a very dim brightening indeed.
He was doing well, but in a coma, when he went missing. It could well be he woke up and demanded Peter get him out of there. I wouldn't put it past him at this point. I'm beginning to think if I told him to go out and save the world, to be a hero, he'd sit around and do nothing and stop interfering, just because he thinks it's not what I want.
It was, always has been, a good old boys club. You have to admit, you did little to stop that in your time. Victoria was a scientist. I was, am, more powerful in a very subtle way than most of them. But it wasn't flashy, nothing to show off overt power. And easily circumvented. I was little more to them than Arthur's wife, a lover to some, a friend to very few. The desire to destroy them now is strong. But I know my place and I do not have the resources I once did. Not with Arthur gone. Kaito as well. You know, if it had been you and not Daniel that had brought about Arthur's death, I could blame you for the death of everyone close to me. Two out of three, Adam.
If I had taught them. Dammit, Adam, you weren't there! You think it's easy. Children are the most vicious beings on the planet. It was hard enough for them, despite the money and the name, to be that different? To constantly wonder if and when? Nathan didn't even manifest until a year ago! He was older than you were when you finally realised what you could do. Peter was the same. They aren't like Claire and that child of the Sanders woman. Like Molly Walker. It's THAT generation that we have a chance with. All the planning and breeding is paying off. Most of our generation did not manifest until recently. Adults with fully formed psyches. It's like herding cats.
Constantly. Again, Arthur's influence. Perhaps my own if I look over my friends, living and dead.
I'm sorry I haven't anything else to offer to brighten it more.
How very contrary of him. I think that just made me smile.
I have always appreciated subtle. If my treatment of you and Victoria as equals was lacking, I apologize and blame my upbringing and the majority of my life. I'm still adjusting to the shifts in social mores. Being locked away from them for 30 years didn't help me acclimate. As for the death of everyone close to you...welcome to my world. And I gave you your children back, or at least got Peter out of a cell. That you lost them again is not my fault, and my assistance there should balance something on the scale.
Would Bob's head on a platter, metaphorically of course, because that would be far too messy, cheer you up? For what he did to Peter? For the things he told Nathan?
Then we focus in on the next generation. On the children. The rest of them are so self-involved I doubt they'd even notice. If they can't be reached, then we go beyond them. Though, personally, Peter and Claire are rather special to me--two others with a chance to stand the test of time. Do you know what it's like to not have that? Can you imagine it, Angela?
I made my decisions, Adam. I live with them. I did what was best, what I knew. We came from diverse backgrounds, from cultures a world apart. We all did what we thought we could. Or what we had to. Do you think I wanted Bennet raising Claire? Nathan wasn't ready when she was born but Bennet? She should have been with me, where she was raised a Petrelli, not some simpering cheerleader with more bravada than brains! She made be special to you but that man ruined her.
Please, don't smile over your perceived reasonings for Nathan's rebellion. If that were the case, don't you think he'd have more sight than that, more vision for the future we once held precious?
I could then, and perhaps now, excuse your actions as a man of another time. That does not excuse the others. They were of my generation, my world. I blame breeding. Though one other treated me fairly. He's gone now due to illness. Deveraux. He was a good man in a pit of vipers.
I would almost endure the messing for literal, but metaphorically shall do. He destroyed what chance we had, Adam. I tried to fight back once. rthur's dead and Heidi was left in a wheelchair. Nathan could have been killed. I stopped fighting then. My grandsons would have been next.
You give Peter too much credit and Nathan too little but self involved is true.
You know, the Walker child is technically an orphan being raised by a cop with a bad record and an abusive, criminal father and the son of an insane geneticist. A good lawyer and we could start over with that generation.
Can't she be taken away, as well? Surely you and Nathan have rights?
My smile had nothing to do with any perceived reasonings--for once. Just amusement at the image.
I am glad to be excused, for all that I'm trying to do better. And, yes. Charles was special.
Oh, if you want literal, I can give you literal. I'm fine with literally taking his head from his shoulders. I just thought it might muss your drawing room.
I think you underestimate Peter--blinded by Nathan. Who I want to believe in, but if he can't be brought to see reason, then we'll have to go around him.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2007-12-11 09:12 pm (UTC)Meant by whom, Angela? Who "means" mortality? Who "means" the things Peter can do? Man is not "meant" to be anything but the height of what he can achieve, if he is meant to do anything at all.
Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-12 05:36 am (UTC)Your insanity is the height of what you could acheive? Maury's sadism? Bob's lack of conscience? I don't think one of us that remains living can say THIS is what we meant to achieve when we came together.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-12 04:55 pm (UTC)No, it's not. And did it ever occur to you that locking me away was not the best way to achieve what you wanted? That none of you had any idea, none of you had walked this path before, and that maybe, just maybe, you actually needed me?
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-12 05:12 pm (UTC)You have no right to speak on how we have handled anything, especially the children! You were not there, and don't you dare start in on your infintile whining that if you hadn't been locked up you would have been. Whose side would you have choosen? Enough had begun to lose faith in you that the rest had to follow. So what, Adam? Would you have killed off those that didn't agree with you? Played alpha line and killed off each child that stepped out of line? Worked to father than whole line as your own? Even with my own ability, you can only control them so long, so far.
No, you're right. I could have drugged them, systematically since they were my grandchildrens age until they were nothing but mindless, useless drones. Would that have been preferable, Adam? Maybe that was what you wanted of us all when having a mind of our own made us dangerous.
Not all agreed with Kaito's decision, but we had to stand by someone. You were making people nervous, worried about how far you would go and just where they would stand. You brought that on yourself. You made them fear even their place in your heirarchy. Maybe we did need you, but you made it clear that maybe, just maybe, you didn't need us. Being expendable to an immortal with a less than stellar record at sanity? Not comforting. We came together seeking a better world, not trying to change one death for another.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-12 05:43 pm (UTC)I didn't think Kaito would be so unreasonable. That was my error, yes. He turned out to be far more like his son than I thought he would be, when we first met.
I never would have killed the children, or any of you, in anything but self-defense. Not then. Now, obviously, is a different matter all together. But then? I would have protected you, all of you, but you especially. You weren't expendable.
The children should have been taught what they were. Raised and cherished for what they were. Not used the way Bob used Elle, or hidden the way Noah hid Claire. Even if their abilities didn't manifest, someone should have told them that something might. You all should have shared what you could do with them. Nathan should never have been afraid of his gift, and Peter...god. Peter. He should have been nurtured, guided, shown who he was instead of meeting with fear and ridicule from his own family until he was twisted into the wreck of guilt that he is now, ashamed of himself and what he can do, and just wanting to be normal.
They should all be proud, all be pleased, all know how special they are to their parents and to the world, instead of longing, always, for something they're not, that they were never going to be.
I wouldn't have killed them, Angela. I would have loved them--those that were mine and those that weren't, because they are the future.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-12 06:06 pm (UTC)There was no way to groom Nathan for his place in our world and tell him. He needed to be a certain way, a certain kind of man. I couldn't do that and tell him his parents had powers like the super heroes in his brother's comics. I couldn't tell him what I could do or he might have fought it. They still don't know, nor will they ever.
You weren't there! You didn't raise Peter, nor would you have if we hadn't locked you up so don't even start that song and dance again, Adam. He was not the easiest child, not like Nathan. Not like, apparently, Claire was before she went rogue.
Me especially? I wasn't expendable but now I am? Do you still seek to kill me, Adam? You marked me for death. Should I still be waiting for you? Shall I leave the bedroom window unlocked, lay upon my death bed and wait for you?
We never had that, Adam. Not even you! Why coddle them when we weren't coddled? Despite where your DNA may lie, you have never been a parent. I doubt you would have had the time for it had you not been locked up. Tell me I'm wrong, it changes little. You brought fear to a group that hoped for a better future, a place where we didn't have to hide. One of our own made us fear for the future of humanity, that there would be a humanity to have a future.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-12 06:37 pm (UTC)I haven't told them. I haven't meddled with your precious lies and cover ups, no matter how I despise them. I could have turned Peter from you completely, but I didn't. I never mentioned your name. And I think, perhaps, that you underestimate Nathan. A man can still be a certain way, even knowing what he can do, if he isn't taught to fear it, to suppress it.
No, I wasn't. And I wouldn't have...But what you have done to that boy is inexcusable. Arthur was always weak, but I had hoped you would do better. He needed someone who understood him, and none of you could give him that.
Yes, you especially. And if I meant to kill you Angela, really kill you, do you think I would have sent Maury to do it? You deserve better than that. Death is too easy for you, either way, but death by his hands would just have been an insult. If I want you dead, you will die. I have all the time in the world to make that decision. You live, now, because I wish it.
No, I had nothing like that. And perhaps that's why they should have. A new world. A new way. Honesty. Truth. A vision to guide them. Acceptance for who they are and what they can do instead of fear and lies from the people who are supposed to love them. Just because I have never been given that chance to raise those that are mine, don't think that I wouldn't have, or that I haven't ideas of what a parent should be. You know nothing about that part of my life and are in no position to speak about it.
I brought you a vision of a world where you didn't have to hide. Where we could start again and rebuild something beautiful, something pure, something good for the Earth and those upon it.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-12 07:18 pm (UTC)I raised my children the way I saw fit. You have no right to judge when you can not prove you would have done better. I was not merely raising them but ensuring that the Petrelli name lived on long past my years. Arthur's name. Arthur's world. But that is neither here nor there. Just as you think you were doing what was best, I feel the same. I did what I must, what I had to, to ensure that what I needed was accomplished. It's almost cute how you defend Peter. Should I worry when I look on how you sometimes defended me to the others, and what we sometimes shared?
Your vision ensured we didn't have to hide because we were all there would be! I am tied to all of you for all my mortal years, I highly doubt I could endure to have ONLY those same people as my only companionship because everyone else was dead! Excuse me for not seeing in some what you do. Maury for one. Bob another. Kaito was one of the few I could endure and he's gone. Victoria and Arthur the only I was close to. Seeing a trend? We're what remains of the old guard, Adam. By nature and design, we're what's left. I could make note of what that should say to you, but I'm certain you would turn it back into a thinly veiled insult while telling me how special I am. There's times when I miss one of those actions.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-12 09:38 pm (UTC)And yet nothing you needed was accomplished, was it? Where are you and your children and Arthur's name now, Angela? Everything Nathan gained he has lost, and from what I hear on the news, you could lose him entirely. I could...but you'll never let me near him, will you? Or if I tried, would you throw me back there in your gratitude? As for Peter, Bob nearly broke him. It took me months to get him back in fighting form, into caring again. Almost cute? Is it so far from belief to think that I might care for your son, as a person, beyond what I needed him for?
Maury is worthless. Bob will be dead soon enough, for what he did to me, to Elle, and what he set on Nathan. Don't think I'll let him survive. He signed his own death warrant long ago and has used up any reprieves. Arthur...I had nothing to do with your loss of him, no matter what came before. That will leave just us, Angela. I will not apologize for taking Kaito and Victoria--not after what they set in motion against me. I am not sorry. But I have left you alive.
Make of that what you will.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-13 03:40 am (UTC)Am I capable of throwing you back on my own, Adam? My own ability had it's uses with you but, knowing what you do, would you let me that near? You know the one secret that no one else knows. Make of that what you will. But you know how often, how little, I used it on you before. But then we were allies and not... whatever this is, weren't we? Would you call us enemies, Adam?
What came before was a long time ago, Adam. Thirty years is a lifetime with what has changed for me. I was a different woman then. Some days? I don't think I remember that woman. See seems like a naive girl some days. So innocent compared to how I feel now.
Killing Kaito was a mistake. He wasn't the man he was either, but I think now you've set the boy up to be everything his Father was. Nathan... he had the potential to be what you were, what I saw in you then. I think he's lost that now. Peter has always been Arthur's child, more than I think he'll ever know.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-13 07:15 am (UTC)Alone? No. But you have your children and Bob has turned them against me. You have Parkman and what he can do. I don't dare offer to help for fear of what you would do in response.
I don't know what we are anymore, Angela. I haven't for years. We have both changed, and so many things I never told you in the first place, about who I was. I don't think any of you ever knew things you should.
Nathan can find it again. And Peter is far more than Arthur ever was. As for Hiro...he will never become his father while I have breath in my body. Never.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-13 12:13 pm (UTC)Peter was prepared to kick me out of Nathan's hospital room. I'm certain Nathan's not dead but I will be honest with you, I do not know where either of my boys are at this moment. So have them? No, I most certainly do not. As we have said before, take that as you will.
I may have secrets now, but in that day and time, I was honest with you, Adam. As honest as I could be and not betray Arthur. Of course, he couldn't betray Daniel and so on and so forth.
Peter has Arthur's fatal flaw. An inability to seperate himself from his own emotions. Given a choice between his own life and his emotions, he'll be playing the regeneration game for all eternity rather than working to ensure he doesn't continue to take those chances.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-13 08:19 pm (UTC)They've disappeared? Both of them?
I didn't mean I was dishonest. I told you the truth. We just never covered 400 years, none of us. I was what I was. It always felt as if the fact that my cells regenerated was more important than the men I had been, the life I lived before the lot of you came along. And without that--how could any of you really understand?
Yes. That I can see. It will be...interesting to watch.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-14 04:27 am (UTC)Nathan has disappeared from the hospital. Only Peter could help him do that. No word, no idea. My boys, both of them, are gone. With that girl, I assume.
There was nothing that made it seem relevant. What mattered was the man you'd become, the man we knew. The man that would lead us, keep us together. If you had thought it important, you would have told me. I didn't pry into your past, just as you didn't pry into my privacy... that you let me know. Maury wasn't subtle but he was easily detected.
As he self destructs, and takes Nathan with him. Yes, won't that be grand. Does sarcasm translate in text?
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-14 05:50 am (UTC)Did that translate appropriately?
What girl? Why would she help them leave? Did someone...Claire? Was Claire there?
It should have been. I should have told you more, perhaps. Not Kaito, but you. To explain...I see so many places now where I went wrong. How I failed to show you all what everything meant, what I meant, and the whys and whens of it. I kept too much to myself.
If it were in my power, I would stop that from happening.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-14 06:03 am (UTC)My, likely, future daughter in law. Sasha... something. It makes me shudder. Sasha Petrelli? What sort of name is that? As for Claire... I assume she's with the family she choose. Where they are now is beyond me. Noah went and got himself shot, brilliant man that he is.
I'll be honest. I don't know if you're suddenly about me and what I should have known because you felt that way at the time, or because I'm what you have left of that time. It's disconcerting, to say the least. You showed us nothing but power, fun and then destruction. Wrong or not, I don't see how you fault us the reaction you received.
This is between you and I and if you ever repeat it, I will find a way to see you pay. You know I am good for my word, Adam but... It's all gone. Arthur, my boys, my grandsons. I got them away. Only Daniel stopped them from being treated as others were. But look at the children, Adam. Maury's boy has turned into his father. He was willing to nearly destroy me to get what he wanted. My boys are out of control. Mendez's boy was a druggie before Sylar got him. Hiro? Elle? You blame my parenting skills but it's... something. I don't even know what but look at them all. You can't stop it. It's meant to be, and this time I think it's beyond what we've done.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-14 06:35 am (UTC)Then why would Peter move Nathan when he was so critical? Risking his life? He wouldn't be that irresponsible.
I don't remember why I didn't then. Perhaps I didn't think it important, either. I've had a lot of time to think about the things I would do differently, to change what happened. If anything would have made it work, made it all come together properly.
Angela--I've kept the rest of your secrets. No reason to start betraying them now. It can't be meant to be, Angela, not that they're meant to be as they have been. They are the most powerful generation I have ever seen come forth, in all these centuries. And no one has led them. No one has taught them. Hiro is the closest to stable with his power of any of them. Bob tortured Elle. Nathan and Peter were kept in the dark. Maury...well. There's always bad seeds. Isaac never learned to control his power...
They weren't taught, Angela. They weren't led. It's not just you, no. But it's as if you all got so frightened of me you shut down letting the children flounder in a world where they didn't fit and didn't know how to fit. They need someone to lead them, and there has been no one.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-14 06:45 am (UTC)Yes! Yes he would! Peter has never put his full thought into anything in his life. Not to mention that if Nathan told him to do it, he would jump. Nathan has a missing sense of self preservation sometimes. Leads him to making dicey gambles. Sometimes they pay off. Sometimes they get him in a bed, charred and ruined. That day, the day I came in and he was healed. I knew you were loose. Before Maury attacked me and before the pictures, I knew and it terrified me.
Nathan was the only leader in the bunch, Adam. And he turned on what he was offered to protect Peter, rather than making his brother grow up.
And all of them nearly got themselves killed by a sociopathic rogue that that damned geneticist unleashed on the world.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-14 07:09 am (UTC)From what I heard on the news, Nathan wasn't talking much. Were his injuries exaggerated? Terrified? That I was coming? Of what I would do when I found you? Healing him...Yes. Well. I suppose you were right to be frightened.
If they had both been prepared...No. Even that...did you underestimate them that much? The bond between them? Even I knew how to win Peter's absolute loyalty.
Yes, well. Even I couldn't have foressen Sylar or Suresh's work with him.
Re: Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-14 12:03 pm (UTC)No, they were not exaggerated. He was touch and go for most of his first night. Yes, I was worried. You made quite a few threats in the end, the last I saw you. Not to mention you were planning genocide at the time you were locked up. What was I to think when I realised you were free? And then the picture. I'm still not sure what to think of that given what you did, or had done, to Kaito. Not to mention Victoria.
We tried to raise them to both be as Nathan was. Strong, determined, no nonsense. Boys that could become men to lead. None of us were leaders on our own and I think that was our downfall. Yourself, Nakamura, Bob and Linderman all vying for control, for power. I wanted my boys to be designed to be leaders. President and Vice President. Peter never lived up to his potential. Perhaps I underestimated their bond. It didn't help the control I lost within our organization and was unable to guide certain events. Daniel's treatment of Nathan. The Company taking Peter after he failed at Kirby.
I always found it interesting they found your plan, with the virus, to be unacceptable. But they would destroy New York to obtain the same end - the World recognizing us for what we are.
They have no leader, they have no desire to further our goals. I'm not certain constant immersion would have changed that. Our generation had vision, we had grown up in the spector of war and sought Nirvana from it. They constantly see perfection in the most broken things and call it beauty.
Suresh should have been destroyed early on. I'm sure he would have had they known how he was treating his patients, and the sort he was willing to take on as part of his experiments. This boy, Gabriel Gray, was never stable it would seem and is now wanted for murdering his mother, over and above what Sylar has done to the evolved.
Locked to Angela
Date: 2007-12-14 05:22 pm (UTC)But he stabilized? Still...why would Peter take him? Where would he take him? I was cranky. I had cause to be. I'm calmer now. Mostly. Hiro and I still have a reckoning coming. And Victoria was about to kill Peter. I killed her in self-defense and defending him.
That was another mistake--this whole collegiate atmosphere. We needed a leader and they ought not to have thought they were in any position to take that control. Linderman and Bob never respected you as they should have. I would have. I do.
Yes, the irony of that kept me rather infuriated for a good couple of years.
But they could have had a leader. They could have fallen in line behind us, if we had...if you had taught them. Shown them what the world was. This culture of entitlement that has sprung up, that I see everywhere will cause this world's downfall more surely than anything I could ever bring about--what will be left will be a rudderless generation unfit for anything.
I agree. But they have a very bad habit of underestimating most people.
Locked to Adam
Date: 2007-12-14 05:40 pm (UTC)He was doing well, but in a coma, when he went missing. It could well be he woke up and demanded Peter get him out of there. I wouldn't put it past him at this point. I'm beginning to think if I told him to go out and save the world, to be a hero, he'd sit around and do nothing and stop interfering, just because he thinks it's not what I want.
It was, always has been, a good old boys club. You have to admit, you did little to stop that in your time. Victoria was a scientist. I was, am, more powerful in a very subtle way than most of them. But it wasn't flashy, nothing to show off overt power. And easily circumvented. I was little more to them than Arthur's wife, a lover to some, a friend to very few. The desire to destroy them now is strong. But I know my place and I do not have the resources I once did. Not with Arthur gone. Kaito as well. You know, if it had been you and not Daniel that had brought about Arthur's death, I could blame you for the death of everyone close to me. Two out of three, Adam.
If I had taught them. Dammit, Adam, you weren't there! You think it's easy. Children are the most vicious beings on the planet. It was hard enough for them, despite the money and the name, to be that different? To constantly wonder if and when? Nathan didn't even manifest until a year ago! He was older than you were when you finally realised what you could do. Peter was the same. They aren't like Claire and that child of the Sanders woman. Like Molly Walker. It's THAT generation that we have a chance with. All the planning and breeding is paying off. Most of our generation did not manifest until recently. Adults with fully formed psyches. It's like herding cats.
Constantly. Again, Arthur's influence. Perhaps my own if I look over my friends, living and dead.
Locked to Angela
Date: 2007-12-14 05:52 pm (UTC)How very contrary of him. I think that just made me smile.
I have always appreciated subtle. If my treatment of you and Victoria as equals was lacking, I apologize and blame my upbringing and the majority of my life. I'm still adjusting to the shifts in social mores. Being locked away from them for 30 years didn't help me acclimate. As for the death of everyone close to you...welcome to my world. And I gave you your children back, or at least got Peter out of a cell. That you lost them again is not my fault, and my assistance there should balance something on the scale.
Would Bob's head on a platter, metaphorically of course, because that would be far too messy, cheer you up? For what he did to Peter? For the things he told Nathan?
Then we focus in on the next generation. On the children. The rest of them are so self-involved I doubt they'd even notice. If they can't be reached, then we go beyond them. Though, personally, Peter and Claire are rather special to me--two others with a chance to stand the test of time. Do you know what it's like to not have that? Can you imagine it, Angela?
It's not a mistake I'll make again.
Re: Locked to Angela
Date: 2007-12-14 06:03 pm (UTC)Please, don't smile over your perceived reasonings for Nathan's rebellion. If that were the case, don't you think he'd have more sight than that, more vision for the future we once held precious?
I could then, and perhaps now, excuse your actions as a man of another time. That does not excuse the others. They were of my generation, my world. I blame breeding. Though one other treated me fairly. He's gone now due to illness. Deveraux. He was a good man in a pit of vipers.
I would almost endure the messing for literal, but metaphorically shall do. He destroyed what chance we had, Adam. I tried to fight back once. rthur's dead and Heidi was left in a wheelchair. Nathan could have been killed. I stopped fighting then. My grandsons would have been next.
You give Peter too much credit and Nathan too little but self involved is true.
You know, the Walker child is technically an orphan being raised by a cop with a bad record and an abusive, criminal father and the son of an insane geneticist. A good lawyer and we could start over with that generation.
Locked to Angela
Date: 2007-12-15 04:11 am (UTC)My smile had nothing to do with any perceived reasonings--for once. Just amusement at the image.
I am glad to be excused, for all that I'm trying to do better. And, yes. Charles was special.
Oh, if you want literal, I can give you literal. I'm fine with literally taking his head from his shoulders. I just thought it might muss your drawing room.
I think you underestimate Peter--blinded by Nathan. Who I want to believe in, but if he can't be brought to see reason, then we'll have to go around him.
...The idea has more than a little merit.
Re: Locked to Angela
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