A/N: So...parts of this chapter I really love, and parts of it I'm a little iffy on. I don't pick up directly where I left off, but pieces from the previous chapter are in italics. Enjoy!
Mercy Heights Hospital, New York
Emma aimlessly wandered the halls. She wasn't entirely sure what happened earlier with Peter. It scared her how comfortable she'd become with him in a relatively short amount of time. She was only that comfortable and open with her parents, and at one time, her brother. She'd had very few outside relationships, romantic or otherwise, and she hadn't thought that maybe he was just as frightened as she.
She stopped when she realized she was at Elle's room. The petite blonde was sitting awkwardly on the floor, playfully grabbing at her son as he ran circles around her.
"What are you doing?" Emma asked her.
"Oh, we were bored," Elle answered sheepishly.
"You shouldn't be out of bed," Emma told her. "You could make your injuries worse."
"But…Mikey wanted to play," Elle explained in a mildly whiny voice.
"You won't be able to play with him if your leg opens up and you bleed to death."
"Well, you're just full of sunshine and roses today," Elle said as Emma helped her to her one good leg. Mikey wailed as his mother got farther away from him.
"Mikey, sweetie, it's okay," Elle assured him.
Once Emma had the other woman ensconced on the bed, she hoisted Mikey up on her hip. The boy immediately stopped crying and cooed pleasantly.
"He likes you," Elle said, signing awkwardly with her left hand.
"You sign?" Emma asked as she sat Mikey down on the bed and put up the barriers on the sides.
"Oh, that's a good idea," Elle commented. "And I know a lot of languages. It was a requirement of my last job."
"Oh," Emma said, suddenly a little uncomfortable. "You mean the job where you held people prisoner?"
It was then Elle's turn to be uncomfortable. "So, I guess Peter told you about that. Makes sense."
"What do you mean?"
Elle bit her lip considering what to say next. "You know, I'm probably the last person that should be saying this to you, or at all, but Peter really likes you. And I mean really likes you," Elle told her, signing as well to emphasize her point. "He should give you the details sometime, but he made a huge emotional sacrifice to save you from Samuel."
"I, uh…" Emma stammered, looking for an exit.
"He'll probably kill me for saying this later, but you should know because the only reason that alter boy would make the first move would be to lull you into a false sense of security so he can escape."
"What?" Emma asked, her brow furrowed in confusion.
"Never mind," Elle quickly excused. "It's just…Peter is good to the point of being annoying. That's something you should remember."
"I'll, um, do that," Emma said before leaving the room as politely as possible. Elle was strange, but her opinion on Peter's feelings made Emma's stomach flip. She could mull it over in her head repeatedly, but coming out of someone else's mouth made the whole situation far too real.
When she got closer to her office, she noticed a lot of people running toward the main desk just to apparently listen to the radio. Normally she wouldn't care, but worry etched the faces of everyone around.
"What's going on?" she asked one of the orderlies.
Confusion passed his face for half a second before he answered, "A couple of our paramedics got called to a robbery, and now they're stuck in the middle of a shootout."
"Which paramedics?"
"Hesam Fallahi and Peter Petrelli."
Emma swore her heart stopped. The orderly moved away from her and she couldn't get his attention again. Everyone drew closer to the radio and she could read their lips to figure out what was happening. An angry, red color drifted up from the crowd and she closed her eyes and turned away from it. She rushed back to her office as unbidden tears started flowing from her eyes.
Midtown Manhattan
"Peter!" he yelled, catching the other man and pressing a hand to the side of his neck. "Shit! I need some help over here!"
Peter was already turning white as the blood gushed through Hesam's fingers. Hesam pressed down harder and said, "You gotta stay with me, man. Come on!"
Peter's eyes rolled back in his head and his body suddenly stilled.
"Shit shit shit! Peter, no! I need some help over here!" Hesam screamed into a crowd still focusing on bringing down the new shooter.
"Damn it!" Hesam moaned in defeat.
He jumped back when Peter's chest heaved. He gasped for air and his eyes rolled back to the front. Hesam looked in his hand and found a tiny pieced of metal in the mass of blood. He sat there slack-jawed as his partner coughed and pushed himself to an upright position.
"What the hell?"
"I don't know," Peter answered, still out of breath.
Hesam looked around to find that the police were hauling the shooter out of the building and things started to calm down. He pulled Peter to his feet, and, noticing the massive amount of blood on his white shirt, said, "You might want to put your jacket on. Let's get the hell out of here."
Parkman House, Los Angeles
Molly rolled over on her cot and picked up her beeping phone. It was a long message, but it came with the author's usual jollity and optimism. She got up, careful not to wake the toddler in his crib.
"…a terrible idea, Matt. It's only been a couple of days. We don't even know what this Claire girl is dealing with right now," she heard Janice say.
"Actually, I kind of do," Molly said, stepping into the living room.
"Um, how?" Matt asked with a quirked eyebrow.
"Well…" Molly began cautiously, "um, last year, when the government was tracking us down, do you remember getting messages from 'Rebel'?"
"Yeah."
"I'm fairly sure all of us did at one point or another," Mohinder said from the doorway of the guest bedroom. "Why do you ask?"
"Rebel is Micah Sanders. Do you remember him from Kirby Plaza?"
"You're telling us Rebel was a kid?" Matt asked incredulously.
"Molly, how do you know any of this?" Mohinder asked, taking a seat across from Matt.
She smiled slyly. "How do you think Micah knew where any of you were at any given moment?"
"Molly, that's dangerous!"
"What were you thinking?"
"You could have exposed yourself."
Molly folded her arms across her chest and glared at the two men across the room. Janice looked between all of them and cleared her throat.
"Molly, you said you knew something about Claire," she pointed out.
"Oh, yeah, Micah's with her, and they're on their way to Tracy Strauss' safe house in Georgia," she muttered before turning back toward the room she shared with Matty.
"Molly, wait—"
Janice took over the glare Molly had previously fixed on them. "Excuse me, but what gives you the right judge her decisions?"
"Janice, we—"
"You what? You played her two dads for a year? Where have you guys been for the last two years?"
"We had no choice," Mohinder argued. "All we wanted was to keep her safe."
"She's not twelve," Janice replied. "She's fifteen and when you two can figure that out, maybe you'll have a shot at picking up where you left off."
Matt and Mohinder looked at one another sheepishly as Janice stalked off toward the kitchen.
Peter Petrelli's Apartment, Lower East Side
A knock sounded at the door just as Gabriel finished screwing the outer cover onto a thirty-year-old television. He looked out the peephole and his stomach flipped involuntarily.
"I know you're in there, Gabriel. Open the door," Angela Petrelli told him in her all-too-calm manner.
Reluctantly, he opened the door, but said nothing as she came inside. She looked as imperious as ever and Gabriel vaguely wondered why the woman owned so many suits. It wasn't as though she ever had a job, not one that could be taxed anyway.
"I want you to leave," she told him as he closed the door.
He smirked slightly and said, "That really doesn't surprise me."
"I think you misunderstand me," she replied, smiling in a way that would make lesser men shiver. "I want you to leave now. Here is a key to my family's cabin on Lake Placid. Take your son and his mother and stay up there."
Gabriel regarded the key in his hand briefly and asked, "Why?"
"Because a reporter has nearly made the connection between Claire and my family, and when she finds out the truth, Peter will be right in the middle," Angela explained. "He doesn't need a wanted murderer or his psychotic girlfriend hanging around to make things even more difficult for him."
He scoffed and shook his head. "Like you suddenly care for Peter's well-being?"
"He's my son. I love him."
"Just because you believe that doesn't make it true."
She smiled at him coolly. "Leave today, Gabriel. I won't ask again."
Mercy Heights Hospital, New York
"We thought you boys were in some serious trouble," the nurse said as Peter and Hesam filled out their paperwork.
"Yeah, well, we thought we were in some serious trouble for a minute there, too," Hesam replied tightly.
"Everyone was worried," the nurse went on. "Even that quiet girl from the file room was out here."
Peter finally looked up, and Hesam took the clipboard from him. "Go on. I'll finish this."
"Thanks," Peter muttered before walking toward the filing room.
He found Emma behind her desk and her back toward the door. She flinched when he gently placed a hand on her shoulder, but she jumped out of her chair and threw her arms around his neck when she saw it was him. Peter sighed in relief as he returned her embrace. She let go of him slightly and he could see that her eyes were red and puffy from crying.
"They-they said you were in trouble, but I couldn't hear, and no one would tell me anything, and-and—"
"It's okay. I'm fine," he said, trying to smile reassuringly.
Her brow furrowed when she saw the blood on his collar. She pushed his jacket aside and her jaw went slack from sight of the large red stain on his shirt. He backed away slightly and covered the stain back up with his jacket.
"Peter, did-did your patient die?"
"No."
"Then—"
"It's my blood."
Her eyes widened. "If-if you lost that much blood, you should be dead."
He shifted nervously. "I did die. I didn't know I still had that power, but I'm fine. I think the shirt's done for, though," he said, chuckling.
Emma suddenly grabbed his face and kissed him hard on the mouth. Before Peter's brain could tell his body to respond, however, she backed away and kept her eyes from his face. "I have to go," she said, grabbing her purse and jacket.
"What? Wait-Emma!" he yelled after her even though he knew it would do him no good. She already bolted around the corner and out of the building. It took all of his strength to keep from punching a hole in the wall.
"Peter?"
He turned to find Gabriel walking toward him from the other end of the hallway. "What?" Peter asked, his voice thoroughly defeated.
"Are you okay? You don't look so good."
"I'm fine," Peter replied firmly.
"Your shirt's covered in blood."
"I'm a paramedic."
Gabriel furrowed his brow dubiously and said, "The last time my shirt was that messed up, I'd been laying in a pool of my own blood."
"Lay off," Peter growled.
"Fine," Gabriel replied, his hands held up in a motion of surrender. "Your mother came by your apartment."
Peter sighed deeply and rolled his eyes. "What the hell did she want?"
"She told me there was a reporter about to uncover the truth about Claire and the Petrellis and she didn't want me around you when the truth came out," Gabriel explained. "She gave me a key to a cabin on Lake Placid and told me to take Elle and Mikey with me."
Peter shook his head. "It figures she already knew about the reporter. She's probably right, though. You should go. You need to keep your family safe."
Gabriel scoffed slightly and replied, "Family. That sounds strange."
"That's what they are," Peter told him. "If Mom wanted all of you to leave, she probably arranged an early release for Elle. Go on upstairs and get her out of here."
"You sure you'll be okay?"
"I'm fine," Peter told him firmly. "Now, go."
Brooklyn
"Can I help you?"
Remy Griffith turned around and flashed the balding, flannel-clad man a winning smile. "Yes, actually. I'm looking for Mohinder Suresh. His father wrote this book and I hav?e so many questions, but his father passed away so I thought Mohinder might be able to help me. Google says this building was his last known address."
"He went back to India, or Iran, or wherever the hell he was from," the super answered.
"Oh," Remy replied feigning surprise. "Well, did he have a roommate or someone that could help me get in contact with him?"
"Lady, those guys were into some seriously messed up shit. I'm talking Feds-breaking-down-the-doors type shit," the super told her. "I am not going to get involved in that mess again."
"Please," Remy said, grabbing his arm. "It's very, very important to me."
The super looked down at the hundred-dollar bill Remy had slipped into his hand. He sighed heavily and said, "Matt Parkman. Kind of a big guy. Cop. I think he went back to L.A. That's all I know."
"You've been very helpful," Remy told him, smiling widely.
