2

Premonitions

Rain pouring down into dark, almost empty streets. An ambulance racing past, lights flashing, sirens wailing. Inside, a flurry of activity as paramedics fight for the life of a man on the stretcher. Blood everywhere, quick commands going back and forth. One of the medics, a heavy-set woman, preparing an injection. The other, a man, reaching for the defibrillator. The body jerks as it is hit by an electric jolt. A flat line on the monitor. One of the paramedics shifting to reveal the sleeve of the man on the stretcher: a blood-smeared paramedic patch.

Peter arrived at the hospital twenty minutes early for his shift, as usual. He got the keys and radios and went to the garage to check the equipment when Hesam arrived, also as usual. Hesam had a record of being chronically late (or last minute) for work, but he had recently made an effort of arriving not long after Peter.

"Hey," Peter said as he saw him. "How was your day off?"

Hesam nodded. "It was good," he replied. "Had a quiet Friday… went out for lunch… and stayed clear of Central Park." One look at his partner's face told Peter that small talk was over.

Peter turned back to the spare oxygen cylinders he'd been checking and lightly said, "Lucky nobody got hurt there, huh?"

"Yeah," Hesam replied, and Peter could almost feel his eyes on him. "Like that girl falling sixty feet without a scratch on her. Claire Bennet, her name was?"

Peter had taken the paediatric box from the side door rack to check its contents, but didn't open it. He slowly turned to face Hesam. "I think so, yeah?"

The Iranian was looking at Peter intently. "I'd been kind of hoping you'd be able to tell me more about all this."

Peter ostentatiously returned his attention to the paediatric box, but Hesam had to see he wasn't actually doing anything with it. "Why would I?"

"We treated a Noah Bennet for stab wounds last September. Or rather, you did. I arrived some ten minutes after you. I did write up the run form, though. You told me he was a friend of yours."

Peter was about to make a reply about the commonness of the name "Bennet", but he swallowed it, and waited.

"And then I remembered that someone named Claire called you on the phone last summer. That was just before you vanished for weeks."

Peter finally looked at Hesam again, slowly putting back the paediatric box. He hoped this was all. He might still be able to contain the damage.

"And then," Hesam finished, as if he had kept this item until last on purpose, "that guy who supposedly caused an earthquake on Friday night – Samuel Sullivan? They were showing his photo on the news. I could have sworn I knew him as William Hooper."

Peter stood there, his jaw working, and didn't answer.

"You think you're the only one around here who remembers his patients by name? I added two and two yesterday. And somehow felt like I was in the middle of things I totally didn't understand. Only it wasn't me, it was you."

Peter still made no reply, and this time, Hesam seemed to struggle for how to continue.

"So," he finally said, not taking his eyes off Peter. "Getting clam chowder down from Boston. Running off when we get on scene, pulling pregnant women from crashed cars suspended in mid-air. People I could have sworn were this short of traumatic arrest miraculously arriving at the hospital just 'slightly shaken'. Peter, I'm not an idiot. If I thought what you were doing was wrong in the slightest, I'd have reported you a long time ago. I didn't. Now just return the favour, and be honest with me."

Peter had never realised just how much of the math Hesam had done in the previous months. Or maybe, now that he thought about it, of course he had. Anyone but an idiot would have had to notice that strange things kept happening around Peter. He'd just been grateful that Hesam was usually willing to let most matters go.

Until yesterday, he had been under the impression that Claire really hadn't exposed anyone but herself. Now he found how wrong that impression had been.

He was still groping for an answer when he was rescued by his cell phone ringing. He cast Hesam a glance that he hoped was apologetic, and was surprised to see his mother's number on the display. She knew he was about to go on shift, and never tried to call him at work.

"Mom?" he said. "What's the matter?" He waited for Hesam to jerk his head in the direction of the back door, in obvious annoyance, and jumped out to have some more privacy.

"You're at work?" Angela asked.

"Yeah, course I am."

He heard her exhale sharply. "Peter, I know you won't break off your shift if I ask you to, but… you need to promise me you'll be careful."

"You've had a dream?" he asked, almost matter-of-factly, but quietly, with a look over his shoulder into the back of the ambulance. Hesam had turned to the paediatric box in order to finally check if it was stocked properly, and had his back to him.

"For the second time last night. Just promise me you won't do anything reckless."

He could sense her concern again, as well as her resignation that he would never miss a shift because of a dream. "Do I want to know the details?" he finally asked.

"I couldn't give you any. The dream was very confused. Just… be careful. OK?"

"I will be. Talk to you later, Mom." Peter kept his tone light.

As he pocketed the phone again and went back up into the rig, he wished she hadn't called. He'd be careful. Fine, so he wouldn't go after homicidal maniacs today, something which he hadn't been planning on doing in the first place. But apart from that, he'd most likely be better off pushing the phone call from his mind, or he would spend most of the day worrying about freak accidents.

She probably wouldn't even have called him, he thought, if it hadn't been for Nathan.

Hesam had almost finished the checkup in the meantime, and gave Peter another look under raised eyebrows while he was checking the drug box. Peter had almost forgotten that he had other problems than his mother's vague dreams.

"Listen, man," he said heavily, as it became clear Hesam was not going to just let the matter rest this time. "I can… do stuff. And it's such a long story that I couldn't begin to explain it over restocking the drug box. I'll fill you in, OK? Just not right now."

Hesam hesitated, then nodded.

"And one other thing." Peter looked at Hesam intently. "I really appreciate that you've kept quiet about me until now. I'm asking you to keep it like this. At least for the time being. OK?"

Hesam returned his partner's intent gaze, then he shook his head with a chuckle. "I must be crazy for even putting up with you for this long. OK, I'll keep shut, and patiently wait to be clued in." He glanced at his watch. "Damn, let's call dispatch and clear. It's already five minutes past. And this time, it really wasn't my fault for once."