AUTHOR'S NOTE: What can I say, guys? I just can't stay away. So here's another chapter for you—it's like I was never gone : ). Anyway, hang in there, thanks again for your patience, and…I'll see you on Saturday.

If you're really getting desperate for updates, feel free to check out my other long Heroes fic, "Magnolia". I actually almost like that one better : ) : )

---

"Oops," Peter said apologetically. "Sorry. This is definitely not where I meant to take you."

Adam looked stunned, spun, fish-out-of-water, staring at his surroundings like he thought they might snap back to normal any minute, smile at him and tell him they'd only been kidding. Peter watched him for signs of shock or panic, and saw a stark white fear in his eyes but also a kind of familiarity. If he had had to guess, he would have thought that Adam had done this before—not with this world, and not with such whiplash-inducing suddenness, but some kind of matter-shifting or teleportation. Then again, he had been a Company captive—chances were, this man was anything but normal.

"Where am I?" he demanded, shoving Peter away, glaring as if he suspected this was an ambush, a deliberate snatch by an unknown enemy. "What is this place?"

"You're not in any danger," Peter said soothingly, holding his hands up to show Adam there was no hidden weapon waiting to stab him. "I just messed up a little. Let me explain."

"I would appreciate it," Adam said tautly, cornflower-blue eyes still scanning the room for threats.

"Peter asked me to go back for you," he said, his own name sounding strange in his mouth. "I pulled him out of the cell and he wouldn't leave you, he was demanding that I go back and get you out, so I did. I teleported into your cell, and I grabbed you—you remember this part—but there was a lot of stress and danger and stuff, what with the guards trying to kill us, so I guess I kind of panicked. I was supposed to take you to the Brooklyn Bridge, where Peter is waiting for you, but somehow my mind latched onto my home universe instead, and—we ended up here."

"This is another universe, then?" Adam asked, eyebrows raised. Peter couldn't help but feel sorry for the guy—he knew how strange it felt to be in another dimension, so similar but so hair-raisingly wrong. "There really are ways to get to other worlds?" And now there was a spark in Adam's eyes that Peter couldn't quite recognize, a well-covered sort of avarice that made him suspect things that hadn't occurred to him before.

"Well, not for just anyone," he said lightly, "and it's definitely not worth the trouble, believe me. You just get people trying to kill you all the time."

"You say this isn't a trap," Adam said warily, still looking the room over as if he were casing it for a job, "and yet you haven't taken me home yet. Do you plan to keep me here forever?"

"God, no, that would screw all the other dimension to hell," Peter said immediately, thinking of Hiro's descriptions of Delta universe, with its two Hiros and it's irritating Hiro-sucking properties. "The only thing is—I'm not quite sure why I ended up here and not in your world. I assume it's just because I got spooked and I hooked onto the first thought that seemed safe, but I don't know. I don't really know what will happen if I try to take you back."

There was a sudden pop sound and then there was another silhouette on the bottom level of the Loft, moving between strings. "Hiro!" Peter called. "Good timing, man! I've got a delivery for you to make."

"What? What do you mean?" Hiro said, emerging from their growing chart of crisscrossed realities until he had a clear view of Adam, stark and blond and obviously out of place. "Oh."

Adam, on the other hand, had frozen the instant he'd heard Hiro's name, watching Hiro come forward with an even stranger expression, some kind of violence under restraint. Peter watched him for a second, trying to puzzle him out, and then gave him up as a very temporary problem. "I accidentally pulled him with me from Xi universe, and since I'm not really sure how it happened, I'm not feeling all that great about bringing him back. I don't know where we might end up this time."

"Okay, cool," Hiro said. "I guess just—put the location into my head, and I'll take him back? Hi, I'm Hiro, by the way," he said, holding out his hand to Adam.

Adam smiled like a normal person and took his hand, and for a moment Peter thought he had been mistaken about the eye-glints and the strange, predatory looks. Then, Adam's hand tightened over Hiro's and he pulled him forward, grabbing the hilt of the sword slung over Hiro's back and pulling it from it's sheath, dragging Hiro around to plunge the sword into him.

But this was not Hiro's first ambush. The surprise cost him a couple seconds, allowed Adam to get the weapon and the upper hand, but as Adam spun him back to stab him he brought his arms up and out, breaking Adam's grip and getting one of his own hand on the sword hilt. "Did I do something wrong?" he demanded of this confusingly violent stranger as they wrestled for the sword. "Hey Peter, a little help here?"

"I'm on it!" Peter said, and swung a chair at Adam's head, slamming him on the back of the skull so that he dropped instantly, bleeding onto their hardwood floors. "Damn. Suppose that'll come out with bleach?"

"It may not have to," Hiro said, frowning at his attacker as he sheathed his sword. He went to his knees beside the unconscious man, tipping his head to the side to confirm what he'd thought he'd seen—the wound was healing, knitting itself together quicker than he'd seen before. "Looks like we've got a Claire on our hands."

"Well, that rules out just killing him, then," Peter said pragmatically. "I don't suppose you can shed any light on the random homicidal attack?"

"Never seen the guy in my life," Hiro said, mystified. "What do you think we should do with him? He's obviously pretty dangerous, what with the murderous rage and the invincibility. Not my favorite combination ever."

"We're not going to do anything with him," Peter said suddenly. "He doesn't even belong here—I sort of forgot for a minute, but he's not from our universe. We just need to drop him right back where he was and let them deal with it."

"Oh yeah?" Hiro said, not thrilled with this new idea. "What if he kills you in that world? What if he kills me?"

"Then he kills you," Peter said firmly, arms crossed. "Remember Delta? I'm just trying not to break the universe, here."

"All right," Hiro grumbled. "Think those coordinates over to me, I'll get him back so he can potentially destroy the world."

"That's what I want to hear," Peter said, then frowned. "Sort of."

---

When Hiro got back from his "delivery", he found Peter rummaging through his desk drawers in a way that made him instantly angry. "Peter!" he said, watching his friend stack paper in no particular order all over the floor, not seeming to care if it slid into other piles or tore as he stepped on it. "What are you doing?"

"Have you seen my watch?" Peter wanted to know, not looking up to catch Hiro's extremely annoyed expression.

"Your watch?" Hiro asked, dumbfounded. "Why the hell would your watch be in my desk?"

"I don't know," Peter said, infuriatingly calm. "I've looked everywhere else—these things are always in the place you least expect them to be."

"Well, then, maybe you should check Australia!" Hiro said wildly, plucking his papers from the ground and trying to organize them. "Because it's more likely to be there than in my desk!"

"Oh," Peter said, looking around as if noticing the mess for the first time. "Sorry, man."

"Look, Peter," Hiro said, slightly mollified, "it's no big deal. I'll help you look later. It's just a watch—"

"It is not just a watch," Peter snapped, as suddenly angry as if someone had flipped a switch in his head.

"—that your brother gave you," Hiro remembered belatedly, wincing. "Yeah. Sorry. I forgot."

"You don't have to be sorry," Peter said with a terse smile. "I just want to find it, okay?"

"Hey Peter," Audrey said, sticking her head in the door. "Someone's on the phone for you."

"What?" Peter said, raising an eyebrow at her retreating back. "We have a phone?"

"Apparently we do," Hiro said, "and there's someone on it who wants to talk to you. Hop to it, emo boy."

"Who has phones anymore?" Peter muttered as he walked to the kitchen, where Audrey handed him a slim black receiver. "Why didn't they just call my cell?"

"Hello, wanted terrorist," Audrey said dryly as she handed it over. "You're not exactly in the yellow pages."

"Who is this?" Peter said into the phone, ignoring her.

"Hello, is this Peter Petrelli?" said a crisp female alto on the other side.

"Who is this?" he repeated, reminded by Audrey's 'wanted terrorist' comment just how careful he had to be.

"We were given this number by a Claire Bennet? She said we might reach you here," the voice explained. "This is Caffe Bianco, Mr. Petrelli—we just wanted to call to tell you we have a watch here? We thought it might be yours, it has an inscription—"

"Yeah, it's mine!" he said with sudden energy. "I've been looking for it, thank you so much! Where can I pick it up?"

"It will be at the front counter. Sorry about the inconvenience."

"No, no, it's no problem. Thank you so much, I'll be right over to get it."

He tossed the phone to Audrey and she barely caught it, yelling in surprise as it came flying toward her head. "I found it, Hiro!" he called back to his friend as he grabbed his coat. "That café place has it, they just called!"

Hiro came out of the back room, brow wrinkled with suspicion. "Well, that's awfully coincidental—" he started to say.

"Yeah, I know, isn't it crazy? I'm just glad they found it," Peter said as he opened the door, flashing them one last, rare smile.

"Peter, wait—!" Hiro yelled as he left the Loft.

But Peter was already gone.

---

"Hi," Peter said, using his best charming smile to win the girl at counter of Caffe Bianco. "My name is Peter Petrelli—you're holding a watch for me?"

"Peter Petrelli?" said the blond girl at the register, checking her notes as Peter scanned the room for possible danger. He had, after all, completely trashed this place not more than a few days earlier in a life-or-death struggle with Company thugs. There weren't many people that could have recognized him—only one, really, that pretty Irish waitress, Caitlin. She didn't seem to be anywhere in sight, but he kept an eye out just in case. It was a habit. "Oh yes, Mr. Petrelli. We moved the watch to the back—didn't want it to get stolen, it looks like a really nice watch."

"It is," he assured her.

"Just go through that door there. The girl in the kitchen will give it to you."

"Right," he said, flashing her another smile. "Thanks so much."

But when he went through the indicated door, he found himself in a very empty kitchen—all clean countertops and stainless steel that reflected a room with nobody in it. He was just starting to get a feeling of foreboding when, suddenly, it was justified—he heard the click of a gun loading behind him, and suddenly there was someone in the stainless steel after all.

"Don't move," said Caitlin in her pretty Irish brogue. "I know who you are."