2008-02-20: My Own Private... Canada?

Starring:

Nathan_icon.gif Mariska_icon.gif

Summary: Mariska whisks Nathan away to "Canada" to ask him about his asshole parents. Everybody needs a vacation.

Date It Happened: February 20, 2008

My Own Private… Canada?


Downtown, NYC - Top of the Woolworth's Building

It had been an impulse, just yesterday, to fly out here, onto an upper level of the Woolworth's building. To be alone. Clear his head, lose himself, whatever bits and pieces of philosophy he'd shared with a somewhat long ago anonymous rooftop friend. They seem to apply these days, more than ever, and by chance, Nathan found a note waiting for him.

Meet me. Here. 9pm Tomorrow.

It was a bit like asking your parents if you could go to a sleep over. The tentative approach, the negotiations, the stamping of one's foot when not all goes your way. What could you possibly want with her? he asked Logan, despite the mutual knowledge that she is one of Pinehearst's own. Because it really could only be one person. Regardless of what strange history they've had, he also recognises her penmanship. You have all of them. Jessica, Cass. Let me see what she wants.

For some reason, it worked. But he's never far away.

Nathan touched down early, about half an hour before 9 pm would hit, a thick woolen coat wrapped around himself, held together with buttons and his own arms crossed over his chest. It's a dry, cold night, and he paces across the surface, feeling nervous. Curious. Wary. Expecting that surge of paralysis at any moment. But if the last week or so has taught him anything, it's that he's just as strong as he's alter ego.

It's not a long wait but it is most definitely a cold one. While New York City is currently wearing a white mantle of snow, the wind (especially way up here) doesn't dare let you forget that you've still got a good four weeks before springtime's even going to consider flirting with the weather. At nine o'clock in the evening, right on the dot, the tell-tale KRAK! of a familiar stranger erupts from the air not too far away from where Nathan's standing.

Mariska's dressed for the weather. In fact, she looks to be dressed for a significantly colder climate; all fur-lined hood and cuffs, gloves, scarf, heavy trousers, tall boots. For a moment after her arrival, she says nothing, but then there's the crunch of footfalls on gravel as she approaches the man's shoulder and says, "I was not sure you would come…"

It's been a long time. There's no real excuse. Well actually, there are a lot of real excuses, but none he can explain or sum up in a brief few words. Maybe he could say that the traffic's been a bitch, but then, Mariska knows snippets of stories. The virus. Getting kidnapped. His injuries. Nathan's gaze darts back over, as if re-acquainting himself with what this woman looks like, and offering a twist of a rueful smile. "I can't ever make promises," he agrees, turning towards her. "It's just been one thing after another." His hands aren't gloved against the weather, knuckles a little red from coldness but palms warm from preservation in fists and pockets, and now, he offers out his hand. "Nathan," he offers. They know each other's names by now, and irony is present in his voice as he makes this introduction.

Taking the Nathan's hand in hers, Mariska wagers a slight smile just above the top fold of her tightly-tucked wool scarf and speaks only two words that seem to serve sufficiently as reply for everything that just fell out of the man's mouth: "I know." Har. She thinks she's being clever. Or maybe that's supposed to be irony. Or perhaps she's just stating the obvious truth. She does know.

"Mariska," she offers up in eventual, reciprocal reply. Instead of letting go of his hand after the introduction is made, she asks with a slight tilt of her chin, "We don't have to stay here, you know. How about we find somewhere warmer to speak?"

Oh yeah, she teleports. Not that he forgot this merely five seconds after her arrival, but unlike those Nathan is continually surrounded by, his head doesn't immediately draw up 'super powers' as the thing to do. Even he generally checks the road for taxis before it occurs to him he has better modes of travel. His chin tips upwards, a moment of silent caution. Not for himself. But for her.

Still. What can happen here that can't happen somewhere else? Nathan shrugs a little, keeping his hand clasped with hers. "Sure. What the hell. I could use a break from this weather, what did you have in mind?"

Nothing verbal, apparently, as acquiring the man's spoken consent seems to be tantamount to pushing the big red GO! button on the magical Mariska teleporter train to… hey, where are going again?? KRAK!

Dubai, UAE - The World Islands

Somewhere that's else. Warm… but not hot. Not quite sunny so much as coasting on the heels of sunset… or is it really sunrise? Impossible to tell. Curiously, they're still on a rooftop, but the building they're on isn't nearly so tall. We're talking three (maybe four) stories, at best. The view is no less impressive, though, and the air smells like the salt of the sea and a spice that certainly isn't anything American.

And suddenly, his heavy woolen coat with ice crystals formed between the threads is entirely inappropriate. Nathan's hand withdraws from Mariska's as the setting seems to just transform around them in the next blink, the sudden light making him squint before he adjusts in the next few seconds. He turns away from her to take in their surroundings, his brain catching up with the idea that just like that, they are no longer in New York.

He unbuttons his coat, now, revealing a plain white shirt, untucked, and more of his dark grey slacks. "It's a wonder you don't migrate for the winter completely," Nathan says, looking back at her. "Where are we?"

"Canada… I think," she says while peeling out of her coat and hat. She keeps the articles close at hand, however, discarding them over the back of a convenient garden chair. Wait. Canada?? She thinks?! How can she not know?! If there's one thing Nathan's easily apt to be aware of is that this place — wherever this place is — is NOT Canada. Not even close. "I never could tell which of these was which…"

Now relieved of her too-thick outer layers, the Russian relocator relocates herself to the chair upon which all of her winterwear has been piled. Staring out at the open sea, she says, "I only come here for the view." And then she pitches a thumb over her shoulder as if to suggest that Nathan ought to turn around.

Shouldering off his coat, he drapes the garment over an arm, raising an eyebrow cynically at the answer of Canada. Flying men generally have a good sense of geography, and you don't even need that much to see through that. Nathan, as gestured to, glances over his shoulder at the view - all sparkling waters showing off the colours in the sky and it's far, far less dreary than New York City in the final days of wintertime, that's for damn sure.

He moves to sit down nearby, the old fashioned way what with walking, draping his own coat over it before taking a seat, running a hand through his hair as if to shake off the ghost feeling of cold. "Do you get used to this?" he asks her, settling back. Perhaps, before, he would be far more alarmed about being whisked away to some magical destination wherein he doesn't even know the name. But that was when he used to be in control of things. It's easier to let go, in these more recent times.

From their picture perfect panoramic vantage point, it becomes readily apparent that Mariska has not only whisked them away to the rooftop of some private island hideaway but that the island they're currently occupying is one of many miniature beaches that bespeckle the horizon almost as far as the eye can see. Almost directly south, far on the horizon, there's the glossy 'good morning' gleam of the sun as it paints all of the windows of a gargantuan architectural monstrosity that looks as if someone took a cruiseliner and jammed it nose-first into the Earth.

Once Nathan has taken a seat, Mariska retrieves her sea-green eyes from the impressive view and settles her gaze on the Senator from New York. "Tell me about your father," she says, utterly apropos of nothing.

It's a sensible question and Nathan tries not to let it surprise him, keeping an unseeing look towards the bizarre, impressive oceanic horizon. "I guess I shouldn't rundown the facts you can find on Wikipedia," he says, settling back into his chair and looking at her, now, gaze studious. "It'd tell you he's dead, anyway, which by now we probably both know is untrue." It's a verbal prod, waiting to see if it yields anything.

Mariska momentarily allows her indecision about something show as she sucks in a portion of her lower lip to be gnawed at gently between her teeth before she finds the time to speak up again. "You… don't remember that last time you saw me… do you?" It seems to be far more a statement than an actual inquiry but that's more due to the curl of her accent than anything else, perhaps.

Seems as though they are both trying to hide uncertainty, and Nathan too lets his show for a moment, a troubled look drifting over his face, skin around his eyes seeming to tense a little, brow furrowing. "I've lost some time," he says, carefully. Move on. He scratches his jaw lightly, clean shaven as much as a Senator should be. "What do you want to know about my father? And why."

See? This is the hazard of knowing a person's name. They become familiar. Intimate. And they feel compelled to sing our their sob stories, if they have any to tell. And Mariska does. "He told me that he could help me get my daughter back…" Back from who or where, however, she doesn't say. "I want to know if he can be trusted." Though, honestly, she reckons with only half-faith that she already knows the answer. Still, she's very obviously interested in whatever insight Nathan might be inclined to share.

This isn't as black and white as it should be. Despite his own issues of good and evil playing out quite literally inside his own skull, the lines are always blurred as far as Nathan is concerned. He's silent for a moment, uncertain, and wishing he knew more. "You can't trust his organisation," he decides upon, searching out her gaze again. "Pinehearst. As for my father, he's a liar. I don't know if he lied to you." The magic 8-Ball would probably say something about how the outcome is likely. Something sparks, not quite an idea, but something enough to prompt him to offer, "But I can find out."

That's what she was afraid of, dreading — she's come to loathe being right about anything anymore — but, still, she perseveres in her pursuit of the gospel according to Nathan Petrelli. "What of your mother?" she inquires, after Pinehearst and his father are disavowed and disparaged. Seems she's acquainted with the patriarch and the matriarch… could a query as to fraternal fidelity be very far from the tip of her tongue? Nathan's offer, however, intrigues. "How?"

A dry sounding laugh, joyless, almost a rusty sound as if he's not really accustomed to it. Nathan rubs his face, tip of his fingers smoothing against the skin beneath one eye before resting his head against that hand. "My mother is a liar," he says, in the same intonation save for a hint of irony. "Manipulative. Heads yet another organisation you shouldn't trust, probably even more so than Pinehearst. Pinehearst at least pretends to be legit." Company doesn't fuck around, he might have added, but growing up politician makes him restrain himself. "This isn't good news, is it."

"No. It is not." The Russian woman sucks in a heavy breath and exhales while arching back and allowing her eyes to wander over the increasingly lighter and bluer view overhead. The sun is definitely trying to climb its way up the sky here… in Canada… or wherever they really are. "Do you have any children?" she asks, eyes still elsewhere. This little trip was apparently sponsored by the number 20 and the letter Q.

"Two," Nathan answers, simply. Easy questions. "Two boys." It's a shard of ice, talking about certain things that branch off into more difficult answers, but Nathan isn't one for sob stories, regardless of what he knows about the person next to him. It's a form of protection, for everyone involved. He curbs it back to hers. "I can talk to him," he says, answering her question as to how he could help, or find out. "He believes I'm on his side, I'd like it if he went on believing that. He might tell me exactly the same story. He might not. But I can try. I can look to see what information they have, too. What did he promise you, specifically?"

That's actually not as simple a question for Mariska to define as it might initially seem and it takes her a little while to recall the psychic conversation she shared with a then-paralyzed Arthur Petrelli. Most of her memory has been lost in a muddle ever since… "He said that… he could help… that he had information… that he could get her back." Now knowing that Nathan's a father somehow warms her heart and she finally relinquishes her sights from the sky and fall back into keeping her companion within her green-eyed gaze. "I would do anything to have my daughter back." The absent emphasis is obviously on the word anything; up to and including becoming an unwitting accomplice to murder. But she doesn't dare breathe a word of that aloud. Not to Nathan. But, there's obviously something there in her words that suggests she's taken unusual measures that might have backfired or possibly brokered her soul to someone nefarious for that sake of reclaiming her stolen child. And all she has to show for it is the sky.

He gets it. You can't be a parent and not understand it, even if there are claims that nothing can compare to a mother's fierce devotions to her baby. But he at least has inkling, and what passes as sympathy for Nathan Petrelli shows. "If he has information, then I can probably get my hands on it," Nathan says, keeping his words carefully aloof. He isn't into giving false promises, really. Family motto, and all that. "And I will get it to you, if that's the case. Otherwise, you'll at least know what's a dead end and what isn't." No promises about further searching, either. On that note, he probably shouldn't have offered anything at all, considering his predicament, but. It's such a small thing.

With a brief pause, she reveals one of the little secrets she'd been keeping from him earlier. "I think you should know that your mother has people looking for me." And her husband. But, Felix is kept out of conversation… for now. Mariska's shrewd enough to know that while Nathan might be in the running for becoming her white knight, he's also a man. And men can't stand competition. He'll be more inclined to help her and less apt to ask any awkward questions, right? Right. Besides, Felix has totally been bogarting the role of 'damsel in distress'; it's her turn to have a go! "Anything you could do… I would appreciate it, Nathan." How odd it is to have his name on her lips, Mariska thinks, having gone for so long without ever knowing it. "You're a good man." If only she knew.

With the sky full bloom in blue now, it looks like this part of the world is waking up while New York was just on the verge of considering sleep. It must be getting late. Too late for a father to be away from his sons. If only she knew. "Come on," she says, standing up and stretching with a sad look temporarily scrawled over her face. "I think it's time I took you back…"

He's content with being a good man to at least one person. Nathan knows very well he's no better for keeping this very important detail from her, for vanity's sake, but he can believe that he's doing so for her peace of mind. Maybe both. He stands up as she does, picking up his coat and defying the tropical morning by draping the heavy fabric over himself once more, even doing up the buttons as they once were. He offers his hand out, palm up, silent consent to being taken home.

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