Gibberings: This idea came to me randomly, and as it is a Christmas story I wanted to go ahead and post it even though I'm in the middle of Open Wounds (Don't worry readers the next chapter of that is coming very soon).
This is for Val (theonebluegecko) a terrific beta, muse and an amazing friend! -hugs- Thank you so much girl. Merry Christmas!
Betaed by the ever amazing Stef (Greenleofiend)
AU Notes: So obviously from the summury Angela and Arthur are dead in this story...but otherwise this is not a deathfic, and since it's AU there are basically no spoilers. Enjoy!
Chapter 1: Dead on Arrival
Nathan runs through the hospital, the pound of adrenaline through his veins tunes out the woman behind the desk screaming at him to check in. He is barely aware of where he is going until he throws open the door and stares into the colorless hospital room.
He sees his brother first, sitting there with shoulders hunched. His hair is falling into his face, all the gel worn out from the many times he runs his fingers through it. It reminds Nathan so much of Peter at that moment.
The oldest Petrelli walks over and lays a hand on his brother's shoulder. "Are you alright Gabriel?"
"I wasn't with them," the younger answers. Them. Nathan steels himself and finally looks at the hospital bed. Peter is still. Nathan can't remember a time when Peter was so still, even in his sleep the kid tosses and turns. His normally expressive face would be lax if not for the lines of pain around his eyes. There is a tinge of blue to his lips and fingernails that compels Nathan to rest his hand on Peter's chest, just to feel the slow up and down rhythm. The other hand he brushes gingerly through Peter's messy bangs, being carefully of the bandage around his brow.
He looks up as the door opens, a blonde doctor walks in. She would be pretty if he wasn't so focused on other things right now.
"Mr. Petrelli?" she asks, her voice a little to deadpan for his liking, "I'm Dr. Laurell. Can I have a word?" Nathan quickly squeezes Gabriel's shoulder, offering the comfort that words could not, and followed her. She leads him out of the room and down the hall to a plastic chair. Whether it's his crossed arms or the look in his eyes, she seems to think better of asking him to sit.
"What happened?"
"You were not informed?"
"I know about the accident, I want to know their conditions," Nathan snaps, his nerves frayed. The tight mask of control slips now that he is out of his brother's earshot.
"The car hit front on," the doctor explains, "Your brother was lucky. He was wearing his seatbelt and he was in the backseat. It could have been a lot worse." Nathan hates how removed she sounds, hates her for the cold tone of voice.
"How bad is it?"
"Your brother sustained multiple fractures to his rib cage and his leg, but we're most concerned about the concussion." She replies, "The CAT scans show possible brain damage, we won't know the extent of it until he wakes up." Nathan feels behind him for the chair and falls heavily into it. A part of him understands why she sounded so robotic, separating yourself was the only way to not fall apart in the face of such pain. Nathan could separate himself from his parents, could separate from their life by miles, but he could never—would never—separate himself from his brothers.
A question comes through the haze of 'this cannot be happening' in his mind.
"What about my parents?"
There it is. The break in the shell, the crack in the barrier. "I'm sorry Mr. Petrelli…we did everything we could."
_-_-_
Gabriel clings to Peter's hand. His brother, his twin, the one who is so impossibly different from him and yet gets him so completely. He clings to him and prays. It's not something he learned from his parents. It's not something even Nathan does, but Peter always believed in prayer. He believed in miracles, in high power, in the things he could never see. At that moment Gabriel is not sure he could agree, but he prays anyway. Because he can't lose Peter. He can't lose his twin without losing himself.
Nathan is back then, Gabriel feels him more than sees him enter. The younger Petrelli looks up at those dark eyes and feels it hit. The doctors haven't told him a thing. They promise answers, but he knew they would never give them. Not to him. But when he sees his oldest brother walk in, he doesn't need to be told.
He knows.
_-_-_
"What is your name?"
He cringes at the flashlight being shined into his eyes and wonders how they expect him to answer anything with a nurse poking and prodding him like a fifth grade insect collection.
"Peter Petrelli," he answers, trying to look around the doctor to his brothers but she grabs his chin and forces his eyes back on her.
"And how old are you?"
"Fourteen," he mutters trying not to cringe as they examined the back of his head. "I want my brothers."
"I'm sorry sir?" the doctor with Laurell on her nametag asks.
"I want my brothers," he says, he doesn't care if it makes him sound childish, but he's scared and having a hard time focusing. He knows Nathan and Gabriel are close. They are never far from him when he's hurt. But it's more than that. He also feels them.
They were there when he woke up. When the darkness parted from his vision they were the first things he saw, but instantly the doctor and her nurses swarmed on him like flies with stethoscopes. They'd made his brothers leave, and Peter instantly felt that absence.
Laurell seemed to consider him for a moment, then nodded. "Amy let them back in." The door no sooner opened then Gabriel was at his side, Nathan not even a second behind him.
"Are you alright?" his twin asks.
"I feel ok," he replies, "I can't see very well…" He tries to sit up, but the instant he moves he feels himself fall back to the bed. Laurell is at his side then, one hand on his shoulder.
"What was that?" she asks."
"I can't move my legs…" Peter gasps. Gabriel looks scared and Nathan looks pale.
_-_-_
It's a specialist. Nathan hates that word. Specialists to some means a well trained individual who is better equipped to handle a situation, but Nathan isn't fooled. He knows that a specialist really means that the problem is too big to be handled by a regular doctor. Specialists never mean anything good.
"Everything is controlled by the brain so when something malfunctions due to injury it can affect any part of the body." The man—Dr. Hardy—is dumbing things down. Probably because Peter is there. It makes Nathan dislike the man more. It always frustrates Nathan that no one notices how smart his youngest brother is. One look at the day dreamy eyes and everyone assumes he's retarded. Nathan is feeling extra protective at the moment, and the stress and pain from everything is only helping to heighten the situation.
"So the head injury is why he can't…" Nathan can't get the words out, he forces himself not to look back at the twins. He already knows what they would look like anyway. Peter propped up by pillows because he can't sit up on his own, trying to be brave, and Gabriel perched protectively on the bed beside him.
"Yes," Hardy replies, "It's also the cause of his vision problems."
"Is it…" Peter speaks up, Nathan gets the feeling he is hesitating more for their sake than his own. "Permanent?" Hardy has one thing up on his female counterpart as he turns to the youngest Petrelli and his eyes feel with compassion.
"There's no way to tell yet."
"So…it might not be?" All the optimism in Peter's voice breaks Nathan's heart.
"It's a possibility," the doctor replies, and Nathan doesn't hate him as much now that he didn't crush Peter's spirits. Any relief Nathan is feeling at that moment dissolves as Peter looks at him and asks one question.
"When can we go home?"
_-_-_
They are dressed in black. Gabriel is always dressed in black but Peter never is. It bothers Gabriel to see his brother without color. The black makes him look even more pale and thin than he already is. Gabriel can't stand it so he turns away, focusing again on the mirror and the tie that refuses to work.
"Let me help," Peter says, his voice is thick from crying. Gabriel realizes that Nathan hasn't cried yet, at least not that he's seen. He kneels down in front of his twin and let's Peter's nimble fingers go to work on the necktie. "I'm worried about Nathan."
"He's just grieving," Gabriel replies, wondering again how Peter was so much better at the twin-mind-reading thing than he was. Peter nods and doesn't continue.
Gabriel stands and heads for the door before he stops himself. It's been four days since his brother got out of the hospital and he still hasn't gotten used to all the changes. He goes back to Peter and grabs onto the wheelchair. If Peter noticed that he forgot, he doesn't mention it.
_-_-_
The preacher is speaking and Peter feels the tears pooling in his eyes. He doesn't blink them away like Gabriel does, because it's easier to cry. Easier to release the painful emotions swirling inside of him than to hold them in. The words being spoken are good, but they are no comfort. Maybe one day they will be, but not then. Because at that moment a thought hits.
He's an orphan.
Peter turns instantly away from the stinging thought, turns away from the memories and focuses on Nathan. The oldest Petrelli's face could be made of stone. He looks straight ahead but he's not seeing, because in his mind he's not here. In his mind they are not dead. Peter has heard so much of denial, but he never understood how someone could be so blatantly faced with the truth of loss and not realize it. He never understood until he looked at Nathan.
_-_-_
"Mr. Petrelli the Will is very clear that everything is to go to you until your brothers reach their eighteenth birthday, wherein everything will be split equally," the lawyer informed him.
"What about my brothers?" Nathan asks. He was glad when the lawyer instantly understood, not asking what he meant. Everyone seems to be asking him what he means these days and he's tired of it. Tired of it and the apologies. Just tired of everything.
"They are to go into your custody if you chose to take them."
"Of course," Nathan says without hesitation. Everything else in his world seemed to have a question mark on it, but not that. At least one thing he can be sure of.
One Year Later
"Hey I'm back," Nathan calls into the house as he drops his briefcase on the floor.
"Hey Nate," Gabriel replies somewhere on his left. The oldest brother turns and sees him sitting on the window bench.
"Did you finish your homework?"
"Of course," Gabe snips back, peevishly. "And I'm fine thanks."
"You won't be fine if you bring home another report card like last one," Nathan replies, heading toward the kitchen.
"There's a note from one of the teacher for you on the desk."
Nathan stops and turns around, sighing in exasperation. "Gabriel."
"It wasn't for me this time ok?"
Nathan walks over to his father's old desk and picks up the green slip of paper. "Peter!" He calls up the steps, "Your teachers are complaining about you spacing out again." He hears the creak of floorboards above his head and looks up. "That's not something most teachers complain about unless they are teaching…kindergarten."
"It's not his fault that class is more boring than the inside of his head," Gabriel offers.
"Not helping." Nathan walks up to the top of the stairs and looks into those brown eyes.
"Sorry Nathan," the younger twin says. Nathan shakes his head.
"You two are gonna age me before my time."
"Distinguished gray hairs are in this year," Gabriel offers from down the stairs. Peter laughs and reaches up for Nathan. The older Petrelli lifts him out of the wheelchair and carries him back down the stairs. He tries not to think about the fact that he has to carry his little brother, or that Peter is so thin that he still can. He sets him down on the window seat beside Gabriel and heads back up for the chair.
It's been a year and Peter's not better.
_-_-_
Gabriel waits until Nathan has disappeared into the kitchen to talk to Rosy—the maid that had once worked for Angela and stayed on to help Nathan out of loyalty even with the cut in pay—before he turns to Peter.
"What were you day dreaming about this time, little brother?"
Peter huffs at the nickname and Gabriel just grins innocently at him. Peter hated the nickname—being only three minutes younger than his brother—which seems to make Gabe use it more.
"It was really weird actually…kind of awesome," Peter says, "I was standing on the sidewalk beside one of those modern art sculptures, and this guy comes up. He was…weird."
"Like two heads weird?" Gabe asks, and Peter can't help but notice how different his brother acts toward him than to the rest of the world. Gabriel has had a constant chip on his shoulder since their parents died. He gives teachers heck, and generally avoids talking to anyone but his brothers. Even his relationship with Nathan has been more volatile. But Peter realized that his relationship with the older twin has only become stronger. "Or did he have scales all over his body?"
"No not like that," Peter replies, "He just felt weird."
"He felt weird?"
"Like his presence," Peter waves his hands as if the gesture would help his point. "Then he threw a car."
"Was he like Superman or something?"
Peter shakes his head, and replies darkly, "He wasn't Superman."