Chapter Eighteen

“The Greater Good”

Peter Petrelli and Mohinder Suresh

Suresh’s Apartment, Brooklyn

Mohinder was still dumbfounded from Peter’s decision, even as he sealed and marked the empath’s blood sample. After all this struggle and argument, pomp and circumstance, Peter just showed up at Suresh’s apartment and caved into giving his DNA.

“If I may ask,” began Mohinder, stashing away the glass test tube in his freezer. “What made you change your mind about all this?”

Peter pulled his sleeve down, no trace of blood or mark from the needle remaining on his arm.

“I realized how important it is, and selfish of me not to help out. Mainly, there’s this woman I met that really opened my eyes.”

Mohinder smirked, showing his perfect white teeth in contrast to coffee colored skin. “Girlfriend?”

“Oh, no,” Peter grimaced. Niki was gorgeous, but he felt no attraction to her in that way. “I already have one. No, Niki’s got a power that’s been pretty much ruining her life. And…that’s sort of the catch I’m offering you.”

Cocking his head, Mohinder stared at his donor suspiciously. “There’s a catch? I should have known.”

Peter leaned forward. “How many cures can you make in the next four days?”

“One, if lucky.”

“Alright, then. I want that first injection to go to Niki. Not right now though…we need her and her ability for something, but…if the world’s still standing on November 9^th.”

The geneticist was more interested in other things. “But why? I’m fascinated; what can she do?”

“It’s hard to explain,” Peter replied honestly. “Her base power is simple, but the things it’s doing to her are really complicated.”

“Complicated how?”

“Look, just,” Peter spat, impatiently waving his arms around. “Don’t worry about that. All I need you to do is to get one dose worth; one dose that you’re sure won’t hurt her, and call me when you have it, okay?”

“And where am I supposed to get a test subject?” Mohinder bit back.

Peter thought of Sylar. “I had a suggestion for one, but he’s put on a vanishing act. Matt said his shop was abandoned, and I can’t sense him anywhere near us.”

“Who are you even talking about!?”

“A man-a monster- named Sylar,” Peter gritted out, voice dripping with hatred at what the creature had done to Claire’s father. Peter expected Mohinder to blow it off like most of the things he told the scientist, but the actual reaction was reasonably different.

“Did you just say Sylar?” choked Mohinder, his eyes glazed and distant all of a sudden. Peter’s eyebrows went up into his bangs.

“You’ve heard of him? Did he come by here?”

Mohinder sat down against his messy desk, bowing his head, ebony curls masking his eyes. Peter crossed his arms over his chest and stepped closer, sensing something utterly wrong.

“He murdered my father,” Suresh whispered emotionlessly. The words had become like sand in his mouth, he’d said them so many times. Long gone were the days when Mohinder actually felt emotion about it. Now it was reduced to just a simple, blunt fact.

“Chandra? No way!” Peter blurted out, recalling the urn of ashes on the table when he first went for answers from the Indian man. “Are you sure it was him, Sylar?”

“I watched it with my own eyes,” Mohinder snapped back, looking up at Peter. Then he softly added, “So to speak.”

“I guess you and Claire have something in common, then,” Peter muttered back, leaning forward against the desk.

“Claire?”

“She’s the…girlfriend I mentioned,” Peter explained awkwardly. It was the first time he’d ever referred to Claire as his girlfriend. Not that he wasn’t open to the idea, but their relationship was not petty enough to earn titles like that. Other ‘girlfriends’ of his he took to the movies. With Claire, they learned to use superpowers together with a grumpy old British man.

“Sylar killed her dad too. Not her biological dad, he’s still around. But the foster father who raised her was kidnapped and murdered.” Peter shrugged weakly, not knowing any gentler way to put it.

Mohinder cleared his throat. “Well, is there anything else about that ‘catch’ you aforementioned?” he asked, quickly changing the subject.

“I’m not taking the cure, under any conditions. These people need my help, and my abilities. I don’t care what I said to Nathan. He wants me to go back to a normal life and job, but if I don’t do this, there isn’t going to be life anymore. Not even for him. Instead of being the esteemed Congressman of New York, he’ll be leader of a nuclear wasteland. And…that’s it, I guess. One cure for Niki and her alone.”

Peter walked towards the front door to leave Mohinder with that being his final statement.

“Nathan mentioned that your apprehension is because of dreams,” Suresh admitted frankly.

Peter’s eyes narrowed. “They’re not just dreams.”

“I believe you,” Mohinder surprised him by saying. “I saw my father’s death in a dream, after all.”

Features softening, Peter nodded understandingly. He opened the front door, walked out, and let it slam behind him as Mohinder’s words still rang in his ears.

*

Though the maiden voyage of Claude’s venture into teaching didn’t go quite well, his pupils did fare better independently. Over the next three days, Matt, Hiro, and Niki all had individual sessions with the mentor, Peter training alongside them. It was three times harder for him, having to learn the in depth details of three powers (four, technically), rather than one, like his peers. However, the fate of the world depended on it, and he take on a little more weight for a worthy cause. Plus, with Claire shyly smiling at him in encouragement, he found no reason to complain.

Isaac refrained from these outings, seeing nothing Claude could do for him. Which Claude didn’t mind a lick, already tearing his hair out with training three, strictly speaking six students a day.

Hiro sent Ando back to Japan, much to his best friend’s chagrin. However, the teleporter was for once, no giggles about his decision. If anything happened to his sidekick, Hiro wouldn’t be able to go on with life. Peter had already noticed a change in the young Japanese man, who seemed more determined then anyone else to save Claire.

“Sylar killed person I loved, too,” Hiro told him solemnly one day, during break. “You should not have to see a same thing happen.”

Matt was, by far, the valedictorian of their little class. He seemed to have picked up mind reading rather well (possibly natural curiosity), and gleefully annoyed Claude by projecting his own thoughts into the invisible man’s head. Mostly, whenever Matt felt Claude was being too harsh, he thought various Disney songs at his teacher until Claude couldn’t take it anymore.

Conversely, Niki felt completely unaccomplished. Her husband and son were the only things in her life that were taken care of; she’d called DL and Micah, explaining her situation and ordering them to stay in Las Vegas. However, control ended there.

Niki hadn’t been able to channel Tammy yet, or anyone for that matter. Meditating, metronomes, and even the ‘field trip’ to the graveyard hadn’t done anything, and she was getting increasingly more frustrated. Thankfully, Peter hadn’t been able to get squat for results either, which made her feel slightly relieved. Neither of them was doing much for Claude’s patience, though. Quite frankly, the older man had nearly run out of ideas. And if Tammy couldn’t help them fight…

As Claude would say, they’d all be ‘up a bloody creek.’

Nathan Petrelli

Nathan’s Office, Mid-Town Manhattan

Unlike even Niki, Nathan Petrelli wanted nothing to do with classes, superheroes, or saving the world in the least bit. It was often stated that Black Friday, the day taxes are due, are Memorial Day weekend are the busiest times of the year. For him, today was.

Six months of pre-production for an event that was almost there, and Nathan felt like he hadn’t taken one step forward from when he began. Funny how planning things makes them seem like they’ll never happen, and when they finally arrive, it all blows to nothing.

Luckily, his frets were mostly in his head. Assistants and interns scurried about upstairs, while Nathan himself sat in peaceful solitude in his personal office. Two speeches lay in front of him; one for a win, and the other for if he wasn’t so fortunate. Nathan had mostly completed his solemn statements…but as for the victory address, he was stuck between a rock and a hard place.

It would be so easy just to bullshit his way through it. Announce some changes that he had no intention of acting out, smile pretty, and get off the stage. Why did he have to think so hard on this one anyway? He was down in the polls; Nathan probably wouldn’t even win the thing in the first place.

A whoosh of air and the creak of hinges broke him out of his reverie. The door to his office had been opened, and standing in front of it was his irresponsible brother.

“Peter,” Nathan warned, standing up. “You shouldn’t be here.”

The last time he’d seen Peter was when Simone had been murdered. So what, was he supposed to invite his sibling into the office with open arms?

“Oh, shut up, Nathan. I’m not here to kill you.”

Peter invited himself in, letting the metal door close behind him. Even though Nathan was apprehensive, his lawyer’s ability to read people told him to act otherwise. Peter looked like his old nature; navy hoodie, dark wash jeans, polo shirt. Pitch black, floppy, little boy bangs that had now grown to his chin and needed to be cut. Big pouty eyes with that weird color. Brown usually, but grey when the light hit them just right (if that was possible). He no longer looked like the menacing knight from last week. Peter looked like…Peter. Nathan’s little brother.

“How did you get in?” Nathan asked distrustfully, still on guard. “I told my interns to keep you from coming in here.”

Peter shrugged. “Invisibility.”

He walked closer to Nathan’s desk, casually leaning forward against the edge. Nathan recognized the habit, and wondered if Peter was doing it to intentionally provoke him into trust.

“What do you want?” Nathan muttered, finally sitting down in his revolving desk chair.

“You know what tomorrow is,” Peter stated, now serious, as if that explained everything.

Nathan nearly guffawed. “Of course I know what tomorrow is! It’s the most important day of my life! And you need to just stay locked up in your apartment, Peter, just…don’t even risk screwing this over for me.”

Peter was used to his brother’s obsession. “I’m not talking about the election, Nathan. I’m talking ‘bout the day after that. November 8^th. That’s the day the bomb is going off, remember?”

“You and that bomb…” Nathan began under his breath, rolling his eyes beneath closed lids.

“It’s not just me!” exclaimed Peter. “Look, I’ve met other people like me! People who are trying to help me stop it! The only one that’s not in is YOU, and we need all the help we can get!”

His voice cracked. “We need you, Nathan.”

Nathan opened his eyes and stared up at his brother, aghast. “And why the hell is that? I can fly, Pete; I don’t have some magical ability to save the world.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Peter protested firmly, craning himself across the desk so his face was inches from Nathan’s. “You’re still one of us, at least for now, when it matters.”

“At least for now?” frowned Nathan.

“I gave Suresh my DNA so that he could make the cure,” Peter said quietly. Then, he looked up, fierce again. “But it’s not for you. It’s for Niki Sanders, who actually needs it. And even she’s not getting it until after Wednesday.”

“Niki Sanders?” Nathan asked, with a look on his face that gave away a secret.

“You know her?” Peter sighed, beginning to get sick of everyone’s connections to one another.

“I slept with her,” Nathan bluntly corrected him. “It was a blackmail tape that Linderman set up. Goddammit, she shows up to you right before the election? I bet she’s got it with her, ready to show it if she doesn’t get cured. And you fell right for it,” he groaned, as Peter looked on, stupefied.

“You’re such a…” Peter began, looking around in frustration. “She’s not a spy, okay? This isn’t all about you! And even if it was just a set up, so be it! If you did something wrong, you should face the cost!”

“Yeah, like you’re a real saint,” Nathan snapped back, and that silenced Peter. He got up from his chair, crossed around his desk, and grasped Peter by the shoulders. Peter’s arms folded across his chest did not give the impression of welcomeness, either.

“I know this election hasn’t been good for us, Pete,” he admitted softly. “But one more day, man, just…” Nathan closed his eyes and considered what he was about to say. “Tell you what; after tomorrow, I’ll put on a cape and fly to Detroit, waving at the cameras, for all I care. But November 7^th is the single most important day of my life. I cannot. Do anything. To mess. It. Up.”

Peter stared boredly. “I guess your wedding and the birth of your children don’t count as important days?”

Nathan was tempted to whop his brother on the side of the head like they when Nathan was a teenager and Peter was just a little kid. However, back then, Peter and his heart of gold would always come running back, latching onto Nathan’s leg, and beaming up at his big brother with those doe eyes. Times had changed, though, and it took Nathan this long to realize that Peter had been grown up for a lengthy time. The boy’d just recently grown out of his dreamy rose-colored glasses, but the dependency on Nathan had been dead and buried.

“A cape?” Peter asked abruptly, arching an eyebrow. Nathan shrugged impatiently.

“I’ll hold you to it,” the younger Petrelli smirked, and he backed out of Nathan’s grip.

He didn’t walk into that office intending to be cheery with his brother, but it couldn’t help to be on good terms with as many people as possible. After all the folks that Peter had pissed off as of the time being, he was definitely one that needed to be extra accepting on a daily basis. And the way Nathan had acted, spoken…they were all puzzle pieces that when fit together, showed an underlying truth. Nathan quite liked his ability, but was afraid of it. Too afraid of what other people would think, or what it could do to his career. It was like hiding a strong opinion or event in his past. He was not ashamed of it; simply aware of how the public would view it.

Needless to say, Peter’s own view of his brother was shifted to a lighter tone after their latest conversation. With a typical goodbye, Peter slid through the front door with the thick blinds, leaving big brother to think alone.

Nathan reached for his acceptance speech and a pen.

*