"That's all she wanted?"

"That's all she asked of me, but I know there's more to it than that. I mean, she wouldn't have let me travel across half the country just to check on the well-being of her son." Noah threw the last of his stuff in his bag and sighed. He had been intrigued from the moment his phone went off and Angela Petrelli's name appeared on the screen. And even though her request was small, he didn't hesitate when he told her he would do it. "I think her true intention was to get me back in the game somehow."

"She wants you to work for her again?"

"Not for her, no. She just made me realize that I'm not done with that part of my life yet."

"Does that mean you'll stay?"

"There's nothing left for me to do here. Talking to Peter didn't solve anything. I'm taking the first plane back to DC." Noah could have sworn he heard a sigh of relief coming from Lauren's side of the line just then. The thought of Lauren waiting for him at home made him smile. He looked up into the mirror and saw his stupid, boyish grin. Thank God there's no one else around to see this.

"I'll pick you up from the airport."

"Thanks, Lauren." He thought about ending the call by saying he loved her but decided against it. Neither of them had said those words out loud yet and he didn't think it wise to say them over the phone for the first time. Besides, he had said those words to Sandra more times than he could remember until the point that they started to lose their meaning. He didn't want it to be like that with Lauren.

Noah pocketed his phone and zipped his bag shut. He slung his bag over his shoulder, grabbed his crutches and cast one look at the empty motel room to make sure he had not forgotten anything. He had packed lightly, enough to be away for just a couple of days and so his room looked almost exactly like it did when he arrived. The place was spot clean, nothing left behind that could trace back to him. Once in the hallway, he took out his keycard and turned to lock the door behind him.

He was still holding the card in his hand when he heard something.

Without turning his head, Noah glanced sideways and into the long hallway. No one was there, yet he could have sworn he heard footsteps. Years of working for the Company had made him more sensitive to sounds and even though he'd grown older in body and mind, his hearing was still as fine as ever. Someone was there but whoever it was had stopped moving as soon as Noah became aware of them.

Noah had to make a quick decision. He was unarmed and vulnerable, the first time he felt that way since he gave away his gun. He still depended on his crutches for support because of his damn leg. His leg wouldn't hold him back if it came to a fight, but if he had the chance to avoid one he would take it. There was no point in making his injury worse.

The safest place for him to defend himself at that moment was inside his room, so he pretended to have forgotten something by lightly padding all his pants pockets and rummaging through his bag. He let out a dramatic sigh and quickly opened the door to go back into his room.

Someone caught the door just before he could close it.

Noah backed into the room, dropped one of his crutches on the floor and gripped the handle of the other one in both his hands. He was at a disadvantage having only one good leg to support his full weight, but he had his wit and it could be all he needed.

The door swung open, yet no one entered. For a moment he feared it was Rebecca Taylor, coming to finish him off. She had tried to do so twice before and almost succeeded. Noah gripped the crutch in his hands even tighter and thought about talking to her, maybe he could try to reason with her. It seemed futile but worth the shot. His life depended on it.

The door closed, but it wasn't Rebecca Taylor who closed it.

Noah dropped his head, chin to his chest, and breathed a sigh of relief as well as annoyance. He was so sure he was gonna be killed just then.

"Sorry for the intrusion," Peter said. His apology seemed sincere.

Noah grimaced, hopped over to the foot of the bed and sat down on it as he reconstructed his meeting with Peter from the day before in his head. It made sense to him now and he cursed himself for not seeing it. Of course, he wasn't alone. Damn you, Claude Rains. Maybe his hearing was getting worse after all. Maybe his other senses were too. "How's Claude? Or maybe I should ask him myself…" For a moment Noah looked around, but no response came. Either Claude wasn't in the room or he was but didn't want to be seen. "Did he offer you his ability or did you just take it?"

Peter didn't answer his questions and went straight the point. "I need your help."

"I offered you my help yesterday. You said you wanted none of it." Noah looked at Peter properly and noticed the black eye that had not been there when they met the day before. He looked like he had taken quite the beating. He couldn't even stand up straight. "Why the sudden change of heart?"

"I didn't know then what I know now."

Noah had a slight inkling as to what Peter was referring to but nevertheless chose to act ignorant. A moment ago, he thought he was going to be killed by a blood thirsty college kid. Peter seemed unaware of the danger he posed before he turned visible and it fueled Noah's anger. He had not travelled so far only to be disregarded, then threatened, then asked for help by a stubborn thirty-something-year-old with a drinking problem. That was not what he'd signed up for.

"I could really use your help."

Noah realized he was still clutching the crutch and quickly threw it behind him on the white bedspread. I should get a cane. He was still annoyed by Peter's antisocial behavior but, on the other hand, he knew it was exactly why Angela had asked him to come to New York. Something in her dreams must have told her to keep a close eye on her son but she, herself, could not intervene lest she altered the future to an outcome that was even worse. Noah simply had to trust her judgment and hope for the best, just as he had done so many times before.

He decided to let pass whatever grudge he held and reminded himself that subtlety had never been Peter's strong suit. Peter was reckless by nature and tended to rush head first into situations before thinking of the consequences. He had been like that as long as Noah remembered and that was most likely never going to change. "I know what happened."

Peter was taken aback. "You do?"

"I'm not a fool. I saw the state you were in yesterday. My guess is that it's been like that for a while now." Noah had seen the news. He knew all about the confession. "I know it can't be easy. People have been looking at you differently since you were exposed. You don't know whether it's jealousy or fear, but it's there. Yesterday you told me you were fired. So you got drunk and in your drunken stupor you did something stupid. Maybe they were suppressed feelings of guilt or anger. Maybe it was something left unspoken for far too long and it just came out. It doesn't matter now. What's done is done."

Peter stood in the middle of the room and straightened even though it seemed to cost him a lot of effort. His arms were no longer crossed but hanging loosely at his sides. Noah's words seemed to have angered and confused him at the same time.

"I suggest you go back to that police station and tell them what it was. A mistake…"

"Hang on a second," Peter interrupted. "You think it was me?"

"You don't?"

A look of uncertainty briefly crossed Peter's face. He shook his head slowly. "I didn't do it."

"Are you sure about that?"

Peter seriously seemed to consider it. He raked a hand through his untended hair and furrowed his brow. "No." He scratched at his chin, underneath his beard. "I think I would've remembered something like that."

"What makes you so sure?"

"I admit that I haven't been taking care of myself lately, but to go around and spread this kind of nonsense… Why? After everything you and I did to keep the truth from coming out... It doesn't make any sense. Besides, Claude was there the whole time. I know he would have said something."

Everything about Peter's demeanor suggested he was not entirely sober, but he was sober enough for Noah to take him seriously. "You're saying that it was someone looking like you who made that statement?"

"Exactly. Claude believes it was a shape-shifter."

"And now you've come to me because you think I can track this shape-shifter for you?"

"Can you?"

Noah took a deep breath and let it out as he came to another decision. He was going to help Peter because it was what Angela asked him to do, but not without being properly informed. He was going to hear the man out first. He wasn't going to make assumptions based on what he had heard so far. He needed to know everything that happened to Peter since that one night in Central Park. He needed to know Peter's thoughts on the whole thing as well as Claude's. He also needed to call Lauren and tell her that she didn't have to pick him up from the airport.

Peter had kept his summary brief and was now waiting for Noah to put his thoughts together. It was probably taking longer than he expected because after just a minute of silence he decided to break it. "You think it was Sylar, don't you?"

Noah looked up. "I've got it on good authority that Sylar is being held in a confined environment far away from here and has been for a while now, so no. I don't think it was him." He narrowed his eyes. "Unless you know something I don't."

"I know as much as you do."

"So, you went to see Heidi," Noah said to continue Peter's recollection of the past events.

"That's when I found out. I think Heidi was on the phone with my mother. She said she was scared. She thought I was gonna come after her and the boys..." Peter's voice trailed off.

"She saw you."

"I needed to talk to her. I had to tell her the truth." A moment of silence followed and then, "how do you know she saw me?"

Noah gestured at the television, indicating that Peter's brief visit to Heidi was now public knowledge. "I think you've made things worse for yourself by going there. If you hadn't gone to Heidi, if you had just stayed away, you could have made it seem like a drunken mistake and no charges would have been pressed. Now I'm not so sure." It was harsh, but it was the truth. Peter's actions were irreversible. "Tell me what happened next."

"Claude pulled me away from there, just in time. We got into a nasty fight, I… did something to him. Then we went to see my mother."

Noah raised his brow. What did you do to him, Peter? Something bad obviously happened between Claude and Peter and Noah knew almost for certain that it was the cause of Peter's black eye. Whatever it was, it piqued his interest. "So, where is your British friend? I would love to have a word with him."

"Oh, he's not coming. There's just too much history between you two, I guess."

"How unfortunate." Noah knew for a fact that Peter was lying. Peter was leaving out information on purpose and it made Noah wonder why. How was he supposed to help when he didn't have all the information? What was the real reason for Claude's absence? What did Peter do to chase him away? And more importantly, why did they go to see Angela the other night? I would have to pay her another visit.

"I've racked my brain all night, Noah. Nothing I come up with makes sense."

"Let's approach this from another direction," Noah suggested. Peter didn't think his quarrel with Claude was important to this case, so why should he? They had to move on. "We need to stop thinking about who could be responsible and start focusing on why this was done to you." Noah paused for a moment and then added, "or to Nathan." Maybe the goal was to expose Nathan as someone who possessed supernatural powers. It needed to be considered. "What do you think?"

"I can only come up with one," Peter turned his chair to face Noah, his left foot resting on his right knee. "Vengeance. I think I might have ticked somebody off without knowing it, or maybe I just don't remember... Somebody wants me to suffer."

Noah shook his head. "Somebody wants you to take the blame for Nathan's death. To what end?"

"I don't know. To make my life a living hell? It's hard enough now that people know what I can do. After this, no matter where I go, people will always see me as a murderer. They might even come to think of me as a… a second Sylar." Peter flinched at the thought.

"…lock you up." Noah murmured.

"What?"

"Hurting you is not the endgame here."

"It's not?" Peter started scratching at his beard again as he thought, but then suddenly stopped. He lifted his head to look at Noah. His eyes went wide. "Maybe you're right. Maybe they're not trying to hurt me. What if the point of all this is to stop me from hurting anyone else?" He stood up from his chair.

Noah nodded as Peter paced through the room. It seemed like a logical explanation. After Peter turned out to be 'the exploding man' many years ago, the Company locked him up in one of its cells and made sure he forgot who he was and what he could do in order stop him from hurting anyone ever again. The person who did this might have had the same idea.

However, the idea had a few holes in it.

First of all, this person couldn't possibly know about the exploding man nor his imprisonment by the Company that many years ago. Only a handful of people knew.

Secondly, what made this person think that Peter would just roll over and surrender himself to the authorities? If that was the case, they didn't know Peter at all.

And thirdly, why would anyone consider Peter as a dangerous individual? Peter's current ability allowed him to possess only one power at the time. The ability that he was exposed with was flight, an ability that was practically harmless. It just didn't make sense. Had they not heard about a certain serial killer who had murdered dozens of people for the sole purpose of gaining their unique abilities? Why focus on Peter? What about Claire? What about Edgar? Both had been on TV.

In the meanwhile, Peter was having his own brainstorm. He kept pacing back and forth across the room and occasionally cursed under his breath. He seemed to have forgotten that Noah was still there.

Noah had discarded the idea almost as soon as it came up, but Peter hadn't. He looked like had finally found the answer to his questions. Noah had to stop him from pondering on it for too long. They still needed to consider other possibilities. "Peter," he started, but Peter held up a hand to silence him. Noah didn't like the gesture but allowed it because Peter seemed to be on to something. Something about Noah's theory made sense to him and now he was using it to form his own theory. Noah very much wanted to be a part of it, but knew he had to be patient until Peter had figured it out.

At last he stopped pacing and turned to face Noah. "I think I know what's going on."

Noah was very eager to hear his conclusion, but the man had already vanished.

The door opened and closed on its own accord.

Peter had left without another word.

A simple thank you would have sufficed, Noah thought bitterly. Not his strong suit, he reminded himself. All he could do was take comfort in the fact that he had been able to help, and he had to admit, it felt good.

Yes, Peter had wasted a lot of his time, but Noah knew if he hurried he would still be able to catch his flight. He checked out of the motel as fast as he could and managed to get a cab in a matter of minutes. He was almost at the airport, excited at the prospect of seeing Lauren again, when he received a text message from Micah. It was sent under his alias name 'Rebel'. There was an address in it along with the words:

TS in trouble

"Turn around," he told the cab driver without the slightest hesitation. "I changed my mind." He'd have to go back to the motel, check himself in again and call Lauren to tell her that his trip to New York had just been extended by a few days. He wanted to see her, he really did. He also wanted to see if he could still be useful despite being physically compromised. He didn't even carry a gun, but Tracy needed help and that was all that mattered.

He still owed her for saving his life.

Next chapter: Emergency Meeting