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...yeah, it just occurred to Stephen that he counts as a flier. You know, seeing as he owns an antigravitational device and is reaching the final leg of jet construction.

Go team him?

Anyway, he's now having a look around for Nathan Petrelli (the real one, please and thanks), for whom he also has some news on the making-holes-in-reality front. Not terribly exciting news, but a plan, at least. (He's also keeping an eye out for Thrust, for the purposes of getting blueprints. Yes, he's building a fighter jet and a kind of cross-reality teleport and a bit of alien robot tech in the same lifetime. It's possible that he's overbooked himself.) Plus: he's totally botherable by anyone with a hankering to chat.

Catch him anywhere, twirling a well-used spanner between his fingers and humming to himself as he walks.

[ooc: slowtimes will be the order of the day, I am afraid.]

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Shh. That wasn't teasing, that was utter belief and support!

"I will."

No, really.

He can and will.

Just give him time and maybe a gun to hold to the head of the laws of physics.

...all right, so Gray can tell what Gabriel sees in this kid.

It's not a path he'd pick himself, Ish or no Ish, but he can still tell.

The grin fades into a small smile, and he nods.

It's not an 'I have complete faith in you' smile, but neither is it a 'you're going to crash and burn and I mock you for it' smile, so Stephen's going to take it and be grateful.

...Sorry, Gray, but Steve has to indulge his curiosity.

"What happened with your name? I mean-- not with the colour thing, sorry, with the first name-- see, I know a couple of your doubles and Gray is a surname..."

...oh, damn. And did he not learn his lesson with Sylar? At least he waited until they were introduced this time?

"...it's a long story," he says, and only someone who knows him well would be able to sort out hesitation from his usual reserve.

Well. Damn.

A breath, and a reassuring check of his connection with Ish, as he waits to see whether Steve would like him to tell it.

So hesitation looks the same, even with x added years and spontaneous greyness.

"If it's... personal," he backtracks, "don't worry. Sorry."

A Gabriel's happiness > his curiosity.

"Under the circumstances," he says, smiling just a little, "you can hear it if you like."

Not an offer made to just anyone, but then Stephen's not just anyone, is he.

Well, if it's being offered.

(Shh. He's a nosy kinda guy.)

"...if that's all right?" :D

"Well."

--He doesn't know about the Company? Damn, that's going to make things more difficult.

"Back in my world there's a company that concerns itself with the capture, imprisonment, and exploitation of people with abilities."

If Steve is smart, he'll pretty much be able to extrapolate the gist of the tale right there. But Gray will wait to see if he needs to explain further.

Steve is a Genius.

A genius who is running through the implications and looking gradually more and more horrified.

"Oh."

And now he's imagining this happening to his-Gabriel and oh my God.

"Yes."

Has Steve ever seen Gabriel's lip-nibble of worry? Well, here it is. In, as they say, black and white. With an edge of Gray's reserve, to be sure, but still.

"They didn't take an interest in me," he begins, reassuring himself through the medium of Ish that this revelation will not be news, "until I started killing people."

The words and the expression are incongruous. It's a quieter, more self-assured Gabriel discussing the activities of a Sylar, with something that a keenly observant individual might call the barest hint of regret. But: "Then they caught me, and kept me for twenty years, and locked away every ability I'd stolen except for one. Cellular regeneration. It made me... useful."

As a combination human bloodbank and source of necromancy.

"I can't say the stay was pleasant," as the torture kind of precluded that, "but it gave me some time to think about things. I'm not Sylar anymore; you might say I grew out of him. You can ask the colourful Intuition to verify that if you like. I'm told you know her."

With a ghost of a smile, he finishes, "As for the name - it's what they called me. Twenty years of habit will tend to stick."

"Yrwk?" says Steve, in reply to the first sentence, because whilst 'Sylars-killing-people' might not be a revelation, 'hi-I-was-one-of-them' is an unpleasant thing to be told. Were it not for the particularly un-Sylar-like tone of confession, he's be making his excuses right then and there.

And from anyone not a viciously unrepentant serial murderer, that's a story to inspire pity. Hell, Steve suspects that you could even remove the disclaimer altogether.

...his face isn't quite sure what to do with itself.

Much like the rest of him.

"...God," will do for a start. It's chiefly sympathetic in tone.

Gray, actually, doesn't know what to do with Stephen's sympathy.

This is because it is a new experience.

After a short hesitation, and a shrug: "Yes. I did say it was a long story."

He's not used to people taking his side. Most of them are a little too hung up on the 'former murderer' aspect.

There's gratitude to be read in him, in considerable amounts under the reserve.

Well, Steve is the forgiving type, if you're not actively smacking him about the face with reasons why he shouldn't be. It's probably the reason why he hasn't become an evil genius. (That and the fact that Val and Marley would kick his ass.)

...also, the name thing is kind of a tear-jerker, come on.

"Did this place get you out?"

He nods.

"I turned up on the road outside of Kansas, just that way."

Point.

"Met a few people. Some of them are long stories in themselves. One of them is a colourless Intuition." There's an honest grin on his face when he adds, "It would appear her company has... effects."

Grins invite answering smiles, even when those smiles are still uncertain of themselves. So there's that explanation. ...all right, and now Steve is wondering just how close or extended that company has to be to completely rob you of colour, and a suspicion is edging in. (Well, if their doubles are, then...)

Eh, it's their business if they are. (Though he does find Gabriels with girlfriends unutterably strange.)

Um. He sort of has a question.

He's also sort of obviously awkward about asking it.

"...Did you stop before they... I mean... was it just because they... that you don't..."

Clear as a bell, our Steve.

Gray is just going to wait, friendly but neutral, for Stephen to untangle that question.

Oh, but can't you just pretend that he has already?

Eventually, the verbal flailing consolidates itself into something like: "Would you still be... if they hadn't... got you?"

It is apparently addressed to the ground. Steve didn't ever imagine himself asking this question, or at least not in a civil tone of voice.

That's... actually a very interesting question.

And one that Gray can spend days at a time thinking about.

Somehow, though, he expects Steve isn't in it for the philosophy.

"I've never been able to answer that question to my satisfaction," he admits softly. "But in the most practical of senses, it doesn't matter. As I said, I outgrew the Sylar name a long time ago. The question of what could have been is... somewhat academic."

...as reassurances of Gabriel-wide integrity go, it leaves a little to be desired. Then again, speaking only for himself, Gray does have a point.

"Oh." But he likes academic! "That's good."

Dryly, "I like to think so."

Considering, you know, he gave up a lifestyle of power and hedonism for the sake of moral values. And all that.

The narration is forced to concede that this is indeed charitable of him.

"...No, I mean it," he feels obliged to offer, because he has the impression that he wasn't all that convincing the first time around. He likes that you're on the light side of the Force, Gray! He just wishes that that the change could have been made under a little less duress. (Heck, he'd sell his eyeballs for there to have never been any such thing as Sylar, in any universe.)

Gray nods.

Yes, he gets it.

...Part of Steve, to be honest, is wondering why he didn't walk away at 'until I started killing people'. Maybe it has something to do with the subtle contrition, or the fact that they'd kind of been getting on before it. Or maybe the absence of evil expressions with accompanying requests-that-aren't that he meet Steve's Gabriel for apparently nefarious purposes. Those are all points in his favour.

"Have you... met any of the other yous?"

Headshake.

With another of his rare smiles, "Ish met Inty. That's the closest I've gotten."

It's not that he's avoiding them. There's just so much else to be done. They'll run into one another in time, he's sure of it.

"You haven't talked to them, then? Not... through the Intuitions?"

Steve hasn't quite gotten the hang of the intuitive link thing. He seems to be under the impression that it's like a psychic phone line.