Horn Rimmed Glasses man has taken his own measures to protect Claire from her impending run-in with Sylar. He has grounded her. Eden has been posted as look-out with orders to take out Sylar when he shows up. Peter arrives in Texas to discover that Hiro is still missing. Since the waitress he jumped back to save is still dead, it is uncertain just what Hiro's fate was. Ando discovers the snapshot of Hiro and the Waitress together and asks around, the waitress at the diner knows Hiro now, but says he disappeared out of their lives a couple weeks back. Does this spell doom for Hiro? On the other hand, Peter now finds himself alone in his pursuit of the cheerleader. With no power of his own, and no-one to draw a power from, he forges ahead determined to enact his destiny. This is where the episode has to deliver, and deliver BIG. For weeks we've heard "Save the Cheerleader, Save the world" without really knowing why she was so important. NBC marketing has been telling us this is a pivotal mantra; the center of the Heroes universe. For starters, there was no drawing of the specials for this confrontation. It was just Peter. So either NBC marketing was very wrong in their interpretation of what this event would entail, or they flat out over-sold it. At this point there are many specials who have done nothing more than bump into each other in less than casual ways. We are miles away from a super-team converging to battle an evil of unimaginable power. However, do we even know that he is that powerful at all? Back to what went down. Peter's first introduction to Claire is in the high school lobby where he eyes the newspaper clipping honoring the cheerleader who rescued the bum from the train. If you recall, it was not Claire who got credit but her cheering co-captain Jackie. Peter now thinks it is Jackie who he has to save, which is very much a harbinger of what follows. Claire meets up with Jackie in the locker room - they bicker a little bit, like high school girls are so famous for - and suddenly the lights go out. Claire sees a shadowy figure moving about. They weave around blocks of lockers, stumbling through the darkness towards the exit when Sylar appears, violently hurling Claire into the cement wall. He thinks Jackie is a special! He points a finger at her and a precision cut opens across her fore-head. Suddenly he catches site of Claire reassembling her broken body in the corner and realizes his mistake, but not before Claire is to her feet and scrambling for the exit. Meanwhile, Peter has caught the screams and rushes to her aid. He puts himself between Claire and Sylar and in the path of Sylar's powerful telekinetic abilities. Peter is easily outmatched and sets out after Claire who was run into the stadium and the penultimate frame of Isaac's series. Peter tells her to go into the crowd, Sylar does not want to be seen. She runs in the direction of the homecoming celebration and Sylar grabs peter and jumps from the top of the stadium. We see the final frame now, Peter lying dead on the pavement, Sylar apparently unconscious next to him. Of course, after a strategically placed commercial break, we return to see Claire rushing to Peter's side. Peter's absorbing abilities save his life as he inherits Claire's rejuvenating power and reassembles his broken body. He tells her to get help, but not before asking if she is the one. She says she doesn't know. And unfortunately, either do we. The cops show up and find Peter covered in blood, not his own, and unfortunately not a scratch on him. Looks like Nathan's campaign is really in the toilet now. As for Sylar, he escapes into the woods and meets up with Eden who successfully subdues him with her Jedi mind trick abilities, and a helping hand from quiet man. It's an embarrassingly easy take down, and a bit of a letdown, but we now have Sylar. It should be very interesting to see what Horn Rimmed Glasses man has in store for the man who tried to kill his daughter. The episode ends with a little wrap up on a few loose ends: Mohinder says goodbye to his mother and tells her that his father's theory was correct; Nikki draws a bead on DL, who may not be entirely unaware that a gun is trained on him; finally, Hiro arrives back in time, six months, at the moment of the waitresses birthday, the girl we know he failed to save, but not why. So "Save the cheerleader, save the world" comes to an end, but not in as big a way as we would have imagined. It was not the 'coming together' that we anticipated, nor was it a fruitful explanation of why Claire was so pivotal to begin with. On the other hand, should we be disappointed? The creators, after-all, have only one obligation: to tell a story at their own pace; regardless of how NBC marketing decides to sell it. It is up to us to choose to listen to it or not. Personally, I'm interested to see what long term set of events have been set off by this encounter. Was the right cheerleader saved? Is so, is she still safe? How did Hiro's tampering with time affect the delicate temporal balance of events that lead up to his initial vision of a holocaust? Did it alter things enough that saving the cheerleader is no longer the mission, and now a new quest will begin? As far as living up to the expectations of NBC marketing, I'd have to say the episode failed to deliver. As far as adding another compelling chapter to a story that just seems to get better every week... all I can say is: excelsior!