As stated by Claire's father, Mr. Bennet, to Isaac Mendez in the episode "Seven Minutes to Midnight",Claire's biological mother died during an "accident" fourteen years before the series began. Bennet and his wife, Sandra, were having trouble conceiving a child at the time, so they happily adopted the toddler Claire.

Six months priorto the start of the series, Claire was preparing to become cheerleader at her high school and living an active but normal life. Jackie Wilcox,another cheerleader, helps befriends Claire and helps her join. Though Claire is "popular" like Jackie and others, she tries not to "be a bitch", unlike Jackie.

In the pilot episode, set several months later, Claire has recently become worried and frightened after discovering she is virtually indestructible, due to a healing factor which enables her to recover almost instantly from any injury. To help cope and test her powers, Claire confides in Zach, a high-school classmate who videotapesClaire testing her regenerative power by attempting to injure herself.Zach thinks Claire's powers are the "coolest thing to ever happen in[their] town"; Claire believes they make her a freak and is afraid of being discovered.

Her adoptive father, Mr. Bennet,appears to merely be a mild-mannered paper mill businessman at first glance, always loving and supportive of Claire. In reality, he is shadowy figure who secretly travels the world investigating superhuman phenomena. Claire is still unaware of her father's activities, but Mr.Bennet knows of his daughter's powers, having observed them after stealing a videotape from Zach's backpack, and secretly returning it to his bedroom. Her younger brother, Lyle, also discovers Claire's powers after finding the same tape. Claire swears him to secrecy.

Despite wanting nothing more than a normal life, Claire has been through her share of harrowing experiences. In the pilot episode,she saves a fireman from a burning train wreck. The credit for the rescue is later claimed by her friend Jackie. Wishing to avoid publicity, Claire is only too happy to let Jackie take the credit.

Later, a burgeoning romance with Brody Mitchum, a quarterback from the school's football team, goes horribly wrong when a drunken Brody tries to rapeClaire. The encounter ends after she is "killed" when he knocks her down on a pile of wood, a branch rupturing the back of her neck,embedding itself into her skull. Claire later revives on the autopsy table when the branch is removed. She manages to escape when the coroner steps out of the room. Brody is stunned to see Claire alive at school the next day, but apparently decides he misremembered the incident due to his drunken state.

Discovering she isn't the first girl Brody molested, Claire decides to take revenge. She asks Brody for a ride home and then to drive hi scar. During the drive, she confronts him about his behavior, but Brody is unrepentant and indicates he'll continue assaulting girls. Claire then purposefully crashes the car into the wall of a building at high speed. They're both taken to the hospital, even though Claire is unhurt due to her powers. When her father comes to visit her, Claire breaksdown and tells him of Brody's assault. Mr. Bennet then makes use of his assistant, the mysterious Haitian, to completely wipe Brody's memories.

In the episode "Better Halves", Mr. Bennet arranges for Claire to meet Hank and Lisa,a couple that is presented as her biological parents. She tries to subtly pump them for information about her superhuman power, but they seem unaware of anything abnormal about Claire. In line with what Mr.Bennett revealed to Isaac about Claire's biological mother, a later conversation between Mr. Bennet and them implies that Hank and Lisa work for Bennet and are not Claire's true parents after all.

After the first four episodes of the series, a story arccalled "Save the cheerleader, save the word" began. Claire's ultimate fate was implied be tied to the fate of the entire world. A future version of Hiro Nakamura told Peter Petrelli: "Save the cheerleader, save the world." In a painting Peter Petrelli finished for Isaac Mendez,a cheerleader is seen dead, with her brain removed from her skull.Isaac also experiences a vision of Claire being chased at her school.In the episode "Seven Minutes to Midnight", Mr. Bennet tells Isaac that Sylar will kill Claire at her school's homecoming game, and he needs Isaac to help him prevent the crime by completing a painting of Claire being murdered.

In the episode "Homecoming",Claire was elected homecoming queen after her friend Zach campaigned for her, persuading all of the school's unpopular students to vote forcer. Claire punches fellow cheerleader Jackie after Jackie taunts Zach about his sexuality. Claire's father grounds her, ostensibly for punching Jackie, but really intending to keep her out of harm's way by preventing her from fulfilling Isaac's "prophecies." Zach persuades Claire to sneak out her bedroom window and go to the game anyway.

At the game, Claire meets Peter Petrelli,but after seeing the newspaper article where Jackie took credit for the fire rescue, Peter believes Jackie is the cheerleader he is there to save. An argument between Claire and Jackie in the school locker roomies interrupted when the lights suddenly turn off and Claire hears someone approach. Claire tells Jackie to run, but Sylar catches them and cuts Jackie's scalp telekinetic allyand throws Claire against a wall when she attempts to intervene.Claire, splattered with blood, quickly recovers from her broken bone sand recovers her sight, gets up, and runs away from Sylar, who notices her regeneration and realizes he has made a mistake as Jackie dies from massive blood loss. In the hallway, she finds Peter and the two of them flee the building. Claire takes Peter's advice to run toward the stadium full of people, but then turns back to find him laying in pool of blood. She is then astonished to see him heal himself just like her.As Claire goes to get help, she runs into the arms of her relieved father, who says the police will handle things at the school. He also says she is lucky to be alive, leading Claire to admit that her survival isn't due to luck.

In the episode "Fallout"Claire's father informs her that he has always known about her powers and has done things he isn't proud of to protect her. He tells her Sylar has been taken care of, but warns Claire not to tell anyone about her powers because there are others who would want to harm her. Claire recovers the remaining video tapes depicting her powers from Zach and destroys them. She warns Zach not to tell anyone about her healing abilities. Claire and her father are interviewed by law enforcement officials, but Claire tells them both she and Peter must have been"just lucky" to have survived Sylar's attack. Claire later meets with Peter alone and is fascinated to meet someone who also has powers like her own. She tells him he is "totally [her] hero." Claire later discovers that both her brother and Zach no longer remember what she told them about her unusual healing abilities. Claire panics and calls her father, frightened that someone has also wiped his memory. Mr.Bennet reassures her that he remembers and everything will be alright. The Haitianthen appears out of the shadows and covers Claire's mouth with his hand. He tells Claire that Mr. Bennet sent him to wipe her memory of the preceding events, just as he has wiped the memories of her mother multiple times in the past. However, the Haitian said there is a reason Claire must remember. He asks her if she can keep a secret just before the scene cuts off.

Powers and abilities

Claire possesses an ability called spontaneous regeneration,a power allowing her to quickly recover from any injury. While she is able to take physical damage and recover swiftly, she also shows no visible sign of pain from burns or even compound fractures. She did,however, grimace when her hand was damaged during her retrieval of a class ring from an active garbage disposaland when her brother fired a staple into her hand. Series writers Joe Pokaski and Aron Coleite would only comment that she "feels pain, but not the way most of us do."^[2]She has not yet reached a limitation in her powers. Along with the injuries stated above, she suffered an injury in the second episode where her neck was turned around 180 degrees. This would be fatal for most humans. Indeed, between her tolerance for pain and seemingly unlimited healing potential, Claire is similar to the X-Men character Wolverine, although she is "less hairy and without claws" according to Panettiere.^[3]

Apparently, Claire cannot heal herself if a foreign object is left in the injured area. The October 9episode was billed by a TV Guide article as an extreme test of her powers. True to this claim, she was apparently killed, only to revive when the object which had killed her was removed. This is true of other characters with healing factors who can still heal incorrectly,incompletely or not at all if certain conditions are not met, just like normal humans. For example, in the first episode, the bones of Claire''s ribs were sticking out at one point. After a comment from Zach brought this to her attention, Claire had to move them around a bit before they would heal properly.

The third episode also proved that her healing powers seem to restore her to health even from the destructive biological processes that happen to bodies immediately upon severe trauma or death (braindeath, lividity of blood in the tissues and coagulation of same, et al.).Despite suffering a fatal puncture wound in the base of her brain, and having been clinically dead for what was most likely hours, Claire returned to life fairly quickly. She also showed no apparent sign of the normally irreversible destructive processes that would undoubtedly have occurred in her body. Still, as stated before, there were limitations to this healing effect: because her upper torso had been spread open from the classic "Y-Incision" made in the chest of autopsy subjects, she had to close the flaps of skin back into place manually before they could heal.

In the episode "Six Months Ago",Claire severely cuts her hand and her mother takes her to the hospital to receive stitches. When her father asks to see the bandaged wound later, Claire remarks that the pain is gone and she thinks the wound is healing well. She removes the bandage and the skin is shown to be completely healed. This is the earliest example of Claire's healing ability in the series thus far.

Trivia

• A scene in the episode "Genesis", in which Claire puts her hand into an activated In-Sink-Erator garbage disposal, provoked Emerson Electric Company, manufacturer of the In-Sink-Erator, to sue NBC for pecuniary damages.
• Claire's MySpace site^[4] says that she is a cheerleader for the Wildcats, although her uniform logo suggests a team name of Greek origin.
• Her MySpace site^[4] also lists one of her favorite films as Unbreakable, which also features an indestructible character.
• On E!'s The Soup, Joel McHalesays he considers Claire to be his "dream girl" and shows clips of her healing abilities. His own "indestructible cheerleader" appears on the show, but when he attempts to kill her, he doesn't seem to hear her complain, "I'm not indestructible! But I am a cheerleader!"

Character history

Niki grew up with an abusive, alcoholic father named Hal Sanders.Hal would often beat Niki and her sister, Jessica, during his drunk enrages. Eventually, Hal choked Jessica to death and left his remaining daughter. As an adult, Niki had no memory of her father's actions and simply believed he ran out on her. At some point in her life, Niki herself became an alcoholic and a problem gambler, but managed to overcome her problems. On her first anniversary of sobriety (April 24, 2006), Niki attended an Alcoholics Anonymousmeeting. There she was reunited with her father, Hal, who wanted to make amends for his mistakes. Niki introduced Hal to her husband, D.L.,and her son, Micah. Hal gave the boy a computer, but when he became angry at his grandson for taking the expensive gift apart, Niki demanded that he leave. After her father's departure, Niki's alternate personality surfaced and she went to confront him. Jessica told her father that she remembers everything he did to her, including his responsibility in "[her] death," even though Niki doesn't remember any of it. After assaulting him, she forced the check Hal gave Niki into his mouth and ordered him never to contact her again.^[3]

As of October 2006, Niki was living in Las Vegas, Nevada and struggling to raise her ten-year-old son, Micah. She had been working as an internee stripper to pay the bills. Her husband, small-time criminal D.L. Hawkins, was in jail, accused of stealing two million dollars from a sports booker and murdering his own gang. To help pay Micah's tuition at a very expensive school that Niki believed would encourage his gifts, Niki borrowed money from a Mr. Linderman,a reputed mobster who used to employ her husband. Not having enough money to continue paying tuition or repay the loan, she withdrew Micah from the school.^[4] The two went on the run,as they attempted to elude thugs and police that Linderman sent after her. As Niki attempted to deal with her predicament, she occasionally left Micah with her friend Tina.Niki ran an online porn site to pay off the debt, but eventually finished the payments to Linderman after she seduced and slept with congressional candidate Nathan Petrelli, producing blackmail material Linderman could use against Petrelli later.^[5]

During times of stress, Niki began seeing her reflection in mirrors and other reflective surfaces moving differently than herself, leading her to be concerned about her sanity. After Linderman sent two thugs to her house to collect the money she owed him, an altercation occurred,with Niki apparently blacking out after being hit by one of the thugs.When Niki recovered consciousness some time later, she was shocked to find the dead, bloody bodies of the two thugs.^[6]Niki would have other blackout spells over the following days, one time losing four hours, always with no recollection of what has transpired.Niki eventually realized that she possessed a split personality, the other being far more sinister and amoral than her usual self, and which had superhuman strength.

Niki was reunited with her husband D.L. for a time. He had escaped from jail to return home and clear his name, maintaining that he was framed. Later, Niki's alter-ego revealed that she was the one who stole the money, killed D.L.'s crew, and framed him, planning to use the money to give her son a better life and keep him out of D.L.'s influence. After a short but violent fight, when D.L. revealed the phasing powers that he had used to escape from jail, Niki was defeated and lay unmoving on the floor while D.L. took Micah away.^[7]

The next day, Niki recovered from her injuries and confided in her friend Tina about her dreams and her alternate personality. When she called Nathan for assistance, he simply pretended he did not know who she was. Jessica then resurfaced and told Tina that Niki would no longer need Tina's help. That night Jessica answered a telephone call from Micah. She persuaded Micah, who knows that she is not his mother,to tell her where he and D.L. were staying.Soon after that, Jessica purchased a sniper rifle, and went in search of D.L. and Micah. When she finally found them, she took aim at D.L.from a hidden location across the street and attempted to kill him.Her first shot hit D.L in the shoulder, but he phased through the one meant for his head and successfully escaped with Micah by the time she reached their car. After a short chase through the woods, during which Niki fought Jessica for dominance, Jessica attempted to kill D.L.again. She inadvertently threw Micah against some rocks when he tried to restrain her, which allowed Niki to regain control. Concerned that Jessica would eventually take over and put her family in danger, Niki turned herself in for murder.

Powers and abilities

Niki Sanders has a split personality-type power in the form of an alter-ego who identifies herself as Niki's late sister, Jessica. Jessica surfaces during times of great stress.^[10]When the Jessica personality surfaces, the transformation is instantaneous and almost unnoticeable; Niki becomes violent and strong-willed with seemingly no warning almost like She-Hulk.When she undergoes the drastic personality change, she gains superhuman strength, being able to pull out the door of a safe box with her own hands,^[11] throw her husband across their bedroom with a single hit, or tear men to pieces with her bare hands. She also gains a peculiar tattoo resembling an RNA helix on her right shoulder, a symbol which has appeared often throughout the Heroes series.

Jessica seems to have been aware that she is sharing Niki's body for longer than Niki, leaving notes, gifts, and instructions for Niki, and telling a thug not to "threaten our son". When Niki reasserts control of her body, she can't remember anything that has happened while the Jessica persona was dominant, feeling as if she had blacked out. Eventually, Niki became aware of Jessica with the aid of reflective surfaces such as mirrors and has begun communicating wither.