"No!" Hiro screamed, throwing himself across the roof. "No, stop! Don't do that!"
Peter and Claire jumped apart, alarmed at the sight of a short Japanese man with a samurai sword charging at them. It occurred to Hiro at the last second that they might not understand why he appeared to be attacking them, but Peter had already jumped the gun. Just as Hiro got within reach of them (he wasn't sure what he intended to do, actually—perhaps throw his body selflessly between them to save them from the dangers of inbreeding), he felt an invisible force shove him hard in the chest, tossing him back across the roof. He rolled with the fall and sat up wincing, glaring at Peter, who was glaring back with his body angled protectively in front of Claire.
"Okay, that probably wasn't the best way to handle that," he admitted, rubbing the back of his head where it had struck stone. "You just—really shouldn't kiss her, Peter."
"Do I know you?" Peter said angrily, looking quite ready to throw him again.
"Um," Hiro said. Another thing he hadn't stopped to consider. "Good question."
"What is that supposed to mean?" Claire said guardedly.
"Look," he said, seeing no good way to explain this. "I'm from an alternate universe, so you may not recognize me. Do you know a Hiro Nakamura?"
"We don't know anyone by that name," Peter told him, putting a protective arm around Claire, more suspicious every second.
"Okay," Hiro said, standing slowly with his hands up, trying to regroup. "That's not important. Never mind. Just please believe me when I tell you that this girl is your niece, and you really, really shouldn't kiss her!"
"My niece?" Peter said, disgusted. "Look, buddy, if this is supposed to be a joke, it's really not funny. In fact, it's kind of making me want to punch you."
Bad, Hiro thought. Bad, bad, bad! There is just no graceful way to say this, is there? "Your name is Claire Bennet," he said to the blond woman. "Your adoptive father is Noah Bennet, and your real father is—"
"My adoptive father is Charles Deveaux," Claire said sharply.
This threw Hiro. How…? he thought to himself. Something got very mixed up in this universe. "That's about enough of that," Peter said firmly. "Mr. Nakamura, I think you should leave now."
"Peter," Claire said in an odd voice. She was holding something in her hand that looked like a cell phone, which was now beeping softly. "Peter," she said again. "He's one of them."
"Huh," Peter said, studying the screen. Then he turned, pulled out his taser gun, and shot Hiro in the chest.
---
"You're kidding, right?" Claire said incredulously, arms crossed across her chest.
"Nope," Peter replied with a grin. "I carried him into the car, you get to carry him out."
They both looked thoughtfully at their captured harasser, unconscious in the backseat of Peter's red sedan. "That's not very chivalrous," she said sternly.
He smiled wider. "Haven't you heard? Nineteenth Amendment, women are equal now. I believe there's actually a specific clause about joint division of captive-carrying labor."
"On the off chance that you're not joking," Claire said, slyly sidling up to him, "how can I convince you to carry him for me?"
He bent his head down to her until their faces were inches apart, brushing noses like a grade-school Eskimo kiss. "I can think of a few ways," he murmured. She smiled slowly and leaned in for a kiss—and then stopped, frozen—and pulled away. "What is it?" he asked, puzzled.
"I don't know," she said, running a hand compulsively through her hair. "It's stupid, I just—keep thinking about what that guy said."
"What, that we're related?" Peter said with a raise of his eyebrow. "Come on, Claire, he was completely crazy, you can't think about the stuff he said."
"I guess not," Claire said, but she still didn't kiss him—she turned to the car and grabbed Hiro's boots, dragging his unconscious body out of the backseat.
"Whoa," Peter said. "I was kidding about making you carry him, babe."
"I can do it," she said stubbornly, pulling him upright and wrapping an arm around his shoulders, nearly collapsing but trying not to show it.
Silently, Peter slipped his arm around Hiro's other side, and together they carried Hiro Nakamura into Primatech Paper.
---
Peter's first hint that something wasn't right was the look on Thompson's face—surprise and confusion, concern. "Something wrong?" he said, hoping the answer would be 'no'—their capture was still unconscious, but that would only last another ten minutes or so. They needed to get him checked in, not stop and chat with Thompson, who Peter frankly disliked at the best of times. Claire hissed under her breath as Thompson walked toward them, tired of holding Hiro up and equally unappreciative of their gray-haired boss.
"Yes, there's something wrong," Thompson said immediately. "What are you doing?"
"Just bringing in a catch," Claire said steadily. "It's kind of our job."
"This is Hiro Nakamura!" Thompson said angrily, as if that explained everything.
Claire and Peter exchanged a look. "Should that mean something to us?" Peter said carefully.
"This is the son of Kyto Nakamura!" Thompson explained exasperatedly. "He's a board member, heads the whole company east of the U.K.! You can't kidnap his son!"
"Well, he's a Special," Claire offered defensively.
"So are you," Thompson shot back. "There are exceptions, of course, and this is a big one."
Under the support of their arms, Claire and Peter began to feel small stirrings and twitches, Hiro coming back to consciousness. Without thinking, Peter stepped quickly away from Hiro, and his semi-conscious body overbalanced at once, tipping him straight over onto Claire. There was a small distressed squeak as she collapsed under his weight, but he was already jumping up, sword clearing its sheath with a whisper of leather-on-metal. Peter jumped back in alarm, startled at this threatening behavior but too used to boss's-kid privilege to try to stop him.
"Whoa there, Hiro," Thompson said soothingly. "This has all been a huge mistake, and we're very sorry. There's nothing to be afraid of from us."
Okayyyy, Hiro thought slowly to himself, not lowering his sword. He just could not get the hang of this universe—one minute, he was being tasered by Peter Petrelli and the next, a high-ranking Company official was sucking up to him. It wasn't making any sense. "Where am I?" he asked, carefully testing the waters.
"Primatech Paper, New York branch," Thompson told him. "We apologize for the mixup, Hiro—just some overenthusiastic agents, no harm done." He glared at Peter over Hiro's shoulder, who made an expressive 'What?' gesture back at him. "Why don't you two find something useful to do?" he snapped at Peter and Claire. "Claire, your sister needs help in the records room—don't worry, it doesn't require any intellegence or judgement."
Peter had his mouth open for a smart remark, but Claire pulled him away, rolling her eyes. "Do not get into it with him," she murmured. "We're the ones who screwed up, remember?"
"That guy bugs the hell out of me," Peter complained. "He's got that smile, like he's talking to a six-year-old, you know?"
"I know, honey," Claire said patiently, pushing the door open to the Records Department. She hoped Simone would be able to calm him down—she was usually good at that, her and Peter got along so well. "Simone!" she called, unable to locate her adoptive sister from behind the rows of filing cabinets.
"Here!" came a voice from the far wall, and her sister's curly head popped into view. Another person stood up as well, and began walking toward them—Bennet, easily recognizable with his broad shoulders and horn-rimmed glasses.
"Claire, Peter," he said perfunctorily as he passed them on his way to the door.
"Bennet," Claire replied automatically, but she couldn't take her eyes off him after she'd looked, stared at him like an idiot as he moved toward the exit.
He noticed. "Something wrong, Claire?" he asked sardonically.
A voice slid into her head, a recent memory: Your name is Claire Bennet. Your father is Noah Bennet. She looked at his rigid shoulders, his scarred hands, his white shirt with a tiny spot of blood on the cuff—his greystone cold eyes behind the mirrored glass. No, she decided. There's no way he could be anyone's father. He's barely even human. "No," she told him calmly. "There's nothing wrong."
---
"I have to say, I'm surprised to see you, Hiro," Thompson said as they moved down the hallway.
Hiro was only half paying attention to him, furiously taking in the facility, its stainless steel and cinderblocks. "Um, yeah," he said vaguely. "Well, here I am!"
"Kyto mentioned you at the last board meeting."
Great, Hiro thought, something I'm expected to know about. "Oh," he improvised. "How were, the, uh…the boys?" he finished lamely.
"Generally well. Charles and Claude are both struggling with their health, but it's nothing serious. They will recover." And just as Hiro thought his bluff had gone through, he continued. "Kyto said you'd had a fight."
Huh. If he's with the Company in this universe, I'm not surprised. "It wasn't that bad," he tried, hoping for a successful misdirection. This conversation was rapidly turning to topics he knew nothing about, and he wasn't sure how long his bluffing would hold out—Peter was much better at this kind of deception, smiling in the way that Nathan had taught him, selling hooks, lines, sinkers.
"That's not what he told me," Thompson said, still smiling that obnoxious superior smile. "He told me it was very bad."
"Well—" Hiro tried to correct, but Thompson was not done.
"In fact, he said it was so bad that you'd run off," he said smoothly, and Hiro began to feel the first flutters of imminent disaster. "He told me he hadn't seen you for weeks. He told me," pause, "to call him if I knew where you were."
They had stopped walking and were frozen in the hallway, facing each other, anticipating showdown. "You don't need to do that," Hiro said, and his mind was screaming, no, you can't let him call, they'll know it's not you!
Thompson slid his skinny black phone out of his pocket. "I'm afraid I do, Hiro."
Hiro made a split-second decision and then he moved, taking a step forward and punching Thompson straight in the jaw. The man wasn't expecting it—he stumbled back into the wall and the phone flew out of his hand. Hiro brought his heel down on it, smashing it into satisfying small pieces, but Thompson was a Company employee and he didn't go down for long. Hiro felt Thompson grab his arm and twist it around behind his back—he reached behind him and got a handful of Thompson's shirt and flipped him straight over his shoulder, throwing him into the wall.
Time to get out of here, he thought, and as he closed his eyes he saw Thompson pulling out a gun, aiming it out at him. He closed his eyes and shoved himself away, and as the blackness folded in around him, he heard the pop of gunfire, then a sudden sharp angry pain in his chest. Hiro knew instantly what it was; he'd been shot before. He felt blood pumping hot from his chest, and he saw The Loft flash before him like a fever-dream, and he couldn't seem to hold it, it was sliding away, and then everything was sliding away, and then there was only black.
