A/N: I can think of a million reasons as to why I didn't update this story sooner, but I know you wouldn't want to read those excuses when you could read…
6 – Poverty, a Good Neighbor of Misery
1:23 p.m.
The Japanese businessman reluctantly tore his gaze away from his wristwatch. Time didn't mean much to him anyway, not anymore.
For the third time that hour, Hiro Nakumara folded up his map and looked at the road before him. The dusty highway was part of his destiny, no matter how hard he tried to change what he saw in the future.
The company he worked for had sent him on a business trip. Hiro looked behind him, back into the town he had come from and, if the future was any indication, was headed back to.
Neon signs blazed in the early afternoon sun, the largest one cheekily winking the slogan, "Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas!"
The businessman turned his attention from the bright, inviting city to the bleak and barren lane before him and sighed.
Dejectedly, Hiro stuck out his thumb and waited.
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Nathan felt like a lion; specifically one that was down and had been kicked repeatedly.
The walk sign lit up and he crossed the street, striding away from the hospital he had been visiting as fast as his legs could carry him.
I cost Niki her job. Nathan felt numb all over. He wasn't 100% sure how exactly it had happened since he was with her at the time; he assumed whoever was in charge of Niki's position had met with his co-chairs. When he called Joel and Simon about his role in the whole ordeal, a secretary had curtly informed him that the consequences had yet to be decided. At least they were waiting for his input.
He hadn't thought of the best way to break it to Niki yet. He has assured her friends and co-workers alike that he would handle the situation.
Once she woke up, he would find a way to make this up to her.
That's right, Nathan thought; as if it wasn't bad enough she was fired and the rumors that she had been sleeping with him, her boss, had sprung up along with the news of her "illegitimate" daughter, she had blacked out back at the diner and had yet to regain consciousness. For a waitress-slash-stripper in Vegas, her luck seemed to be running shorter by the minute.
Nathan quickened his pace as he crossed the next street, realizing a split-second later that no one had followed him. He was standing alone in the middle of the crosswalk with don't walk blazing above him in red-orange neon. He finished his sprint across the road, barely missing two on-coming cars.
He turned around to face the crowd he had separated from, now waiting for a break in the traffic, when something else caught his eye.
Nathan noticed the truck before anyone else. He wasn't sure why – it wasn't old or new, just a truck that looked fairly lived in, like it was used to travel.
Then he noticed the driver was aiming a gun at his passenger.
BANG!
As Nathan watched, three things happened at once, almost as if in slow motion.
The gun went off. The driver slumped over sideways across the console, leaving the passenger trapped in his seat. And the truck, losing the control of its driver, careened onto the wrong side of the street, jumped the curb, plowed into a fire hydrant, and flipped.
All the sound returned to the scene as people on the street started screaming and yelling, walking and talking. It was like twenty conversations had been interrupted and stuck up again simultaneously, and above all the chaos, a shrill, high-pitched ringing caught Nathan's attention.
"…I need a bus… 13th Street… four blocks… hospital…"
Nathan turned around to face a stern-looking Matt Parkman, whose broken phone call he had overheard.
With a grimace, Matt hung up on the 911 operator and looked up.
"How long?" Nathan asked. At this point, he didn't care if Parkman recognized him; his main concerns were the passengers trapped in the wreck, alive or not.
"15 minutes," Matt replied somewhat harshly, bitter disappointment clearly lacing his words.
Nathan swore. "The hospital is right there!" he shouted, gesturing backwards the four blocks he had just traveled.
"Exactly!" the detective argued. "The hospital is right there, the wreck is too close. The accident is blocking the ambulance's path to it!"
Nathan groaned; the irony of this was certainly not lost on him.
"Isn't somebody going to do something?" Nathan shouted over the din as more people fled past him.
"There's nothing anybody can do!" Matt shouted back. His words rang in Nathan's head and hung there like a double exposure, as if the cop had shouted twice. Nathan chalked it up to déjà vu and turned his attention back to the crisis at hand.
"Then I guess I'm not just anybody," he said to himself as he rolled up his sleeves.
"What are you doing?" he heard Matt scream as, in the midst of the all the dust and blood and people moving away, Nathan moved forward into the wreck without so much as a backwards glance.
As he approached the wreck, Nathan could barely make out the people inside, only noting that there were two men. Quickly assessing the mangled front end, Nathan decided it would be easiest to try going in through the already broken windshield; hopefully from the inside he would be able to more help than he was just by standing around outside.
It wasn't until he was halfway inside the wreck that someone recognized him. He almost cut his shoulder when he heard someone in the crowd shout out, "That's Johnathan Gray in there!" He definitely hit his head on the roof when he heard even more people calling out for help on his behalf.
"Nothing like an audience," he quipped under his breath before returning his focus to the task at hand.
Sliding into the cab between the two victims, Nathan quickly drew away from the driver in disgust – the nondescript man was soaked in blood and sporting a bullet wound in his stomach and extraordinarily glassy eyes. Nathan abruptly inferred that the shot he heard immediately before the accident was currently lodged in this man's intestines, which meant there wasn't much he could do for him now.
Nathan jumped about a foot and managed to hit his head on the roof again as the second passenger suddenly stirred, his shoulder brushing Nathan's arm.
"Where… am I?" the Asian-looking man asked in broken English. He squinted up at Nathan, his broken glasses preventing him from seeing much.
"It's okay," Nathan said as calmly as he could muster. "I'm going to get you out of here." He yanked on the man's seatbelt until the clasp broke free and quickly wrapped his arm under the victim's arms and around his back, eliciting a sharp cry of pain from the latter.
"Can you tell me anything about your friend over here?" Nathan asked, trying to distract the passenger as he figured out an escape route.
"I tried to stop him… saw the future…"
"You see the future, huh?" Nathan asked somewhat cheerfully, masking the sudden anxiety he felt knowing another person might have something in common with him, some sort of gift. "Well, then I hope you don't mind if I use my powers."
"Your powers?" the man asked, looking him square in the face. Nathan simply grinned before turning away.
Covering his face with his free arm, Nathan planted his feet on the truck's dashboard and prepared to launch.
One final tug to make sure the victim was free of the debris and he was off like a shot, quickly careening through the truck's mangled body and out the vehicle's back windshield.
Carefully, so as not to disturb the injured businessman, Nathan half-rolled, half-dragged himself and the man out from under the wreck.
By some stroke of luck, the few people on the back side of the truck didn't seem to have noticed anything unusual about Nathan's method of exit; instead, they swarmed the pair while shouting directions for others to alert the paramedics.
"Whew," Nathan managed to gasp as he sat up in the street with a strangled laugh, "I guess we made it, buddy." He looked over at the man he had rescued, concern quickly filling his features. "Buddy?"
"He's unconscious!" he heard one of the paramedics screech to no one in particular. Nathan hadn't even noticed they had arrived.
"Sir?" Nathan heard a hundred voices, varying distances near and far from him. He raised a hand to his temple in an attempt to shield the pain.
"Sir," a different, younger paramedic repeated. "You need to come with us to the hospital to get checked out."
Nathan stared up at him, almost starting to protest, but through the sudden silence in his head, something told him that maybe, just maybe, he should get his head checked out relatively soon, and as he lay back down on the debris-covered street, he could have sworn he heard Matt Parkman telling him from somewhere far away that he had done a good job for once.
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A few tiresome hours later, Nathan found himself back in Niki Sanders' hospital room. He sat down in one of the bedside chairs and grasped her IV-laced hand.
Relief flooded him, the internal knot of guilt and worry loosening for the first time in ages. The man he saved was going to be all right. Niki was going to be all right. Parkman had apparently forgotten about him in the melee or lost him once they arrived at the hospital. Things could be looking up for once.
The hand Nathan was holding spasmed suddenly and sharply. Niki's eyes flew open and she looked around wildly. It didn't take a doctor to realize something was wrong; the bone-crushing grip she had on Nathan's hand was enough to convince him.
Slowly, Niki turned her head until she was looking directly at Nathan, her eyes almost red with fury.
"Where's my daughter?" she hissed, her voice a dry, menacing whisper.
Nathan sat there in shock, wondering what the hell was happening. This was clearly not the Niki he had come to know, had come to…
The pop of one of Nathan's fingers breaking brought him back to reality and the madwoman with the merciless strength in her hands and heart.
"Where's my daughter?!" she shrieked again. Nathan expected to see tears in her clearly distraught eyes. None came.
"Niki?" he said, trying to remain calm. He wanted to reason with her, maybe get her to release his mangled hand, but it came out in the form of a one-word question.
Clearly, it was the right one to ask.
Niki's forehead creased, confusion radiating from her fearsome eyes. "No," she replied, gaining momentum again. "It's Jessica."
With that she lunged up and across the bed, straight for Nathan.
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Ando Masahashi sighed and flipped through another strange magazine. Why the hospital had so many about homes and gardens, he didn't understand. If he were in a hospital, the last thing on his mind would be gardening.
He shifted in the squeaky plastic chair, glancing up at his friend's burnt and battered form in the bed beside him. Ando shook his head. For weeks, Hiro had been going on about his 'destiny' and how something drastic was about to happen. Ando secretly thought if his friend had a death wish, he could have waited until he was closer to home to act upon it. Nothing screamed "erratic behavior" like getting in a massive car accident in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Hiro's eyelids fluttered. He looked so strange without his trademark glasses. His lips moved imperceptibly as he mumbled something.
Ando put down his magazine. "What did you say, Hiro?"
Hiro turned his head to look at Ando. A slight cloud of confusion hovered over his face; Ando figured the heavy medication was kicking in, especially after Hiro responded with:
"… Flying Man…?"
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"Sir! Mr. Gray!" Nathan didn't even bother to acknowledge the frantic nurse following him. "Sir, your discharge papers – "
"Were signed several hours ago," Nathan snapped, turning sharply on his heel to face the cowering brunette trailing him.
"Well, I don't think that covers your most recent injury," the nurse stated, drawing herself up to full height.
Nathan sighed. "I'll come by the nurse's station in a few hours. If anyone needs me, I'll be waiting in that lobby over there." He jabbed a finger in the direction he was headed. "Got it?" The meek worker simply nodded before retreating into another patient's room.
Nathan resumed his walk, trying to drape his jacket over his injured arm as casually as possible. He hadn't needed a full cast, but several of his metacarpals were either fractured or bruised, along with part of his ego.
His brave front was more of a mask for his inward shame than for any physical pain. Nathan kicked himself mentally for what seemed like the millionth time – how could he not have known?
Scratch that – how could he have known? How could she be in Niki's – nice, normal, family-oriented Niki – body when she was supposed to be six feet under. Jessica Sanders was supposed to be dead and buried, thanks to that conniving Daniel Linderman…
"Petrelli."
Nathan made the mistake of answering to his given surname and found himself face to face with Matt Parkman.
"Parkman," he responded curtly, deciding it best not to play any mind games. "Long time no see."
"Not long enough," Matt answered, a grin flitting across his features briefly. "You supposed to be here?"
"You mean the hospital? Apparently." Nathan proffered his injured wrist for Matt to inspect.
"Funny," Matt noted, sounding not the least bit amused. "This doesn't happen often, so bear with me." He shuffled in place for a moment before adding, "I'm here to apologize."
"Come again?" Nathan asked sounding innocent, hoping to make the cop suffer just a little more.
"It seems there was a mistake made on your case way back when," Matt explained.
"You would know," Nathan added. "I mean, after all, weren't you the one handling it way back when?"
Matt diplomatically ignored his jab. "Anyway, it seems that some of the charges made against you for assault weren't as rock-solid as the police would have liked. Some of the victims were questioned again and now claim they aren't sure one hundred percent sure who exactly it was."
"Really," Nathan stated, trying to hide his shock. Could he really be off the hook for one of his numerous crimes?
Matt shrugged. "Really," he replied before adding nonchalantly, "of course, we did track down the real criminal."
Nathan's heart stopped beating as the blood in his veins ran dry. "Really," he repeated again, hoarsely.
Matt nodded in consent, not seeming to notice his companion's pale and shaken demeanor. "Yeah, some junkie artist guy, Isaac Mendez. Does that name ring any bells?" Nathan shook his head, mostly in confusion, but Matt continued. "Did a search of his 'loft' and turned up quite a number of incriminating paintings."
"Incriminating?" Nathan asked with concern.
"Let's just say there's no way that guy could have painted something like that unless he was there, assaulting those people, at that exact point in time," Matt explained assuredly.
"So not unless he was seeing things?" Nathan joked half-heartedly.
Matt chuckled. "When you've done that many drugs, it's hard to say." Nathan forced a quiet smile before returning to gloom.
"But seriously, I apologize," Matt began, "on behalf of the whole station, and especially, for my own actions. I shouldn't have assumed…"
Nathan held up his uninjured hand to cut him off. "Really, that's not necessary."
Matt looked at his shoes for a moment before looking back up at Nathan. "So have you heard anything about that businessman you saved?" he inquired.
"The doctors say he's going to come out all right physically," Nathan replied. "Mentally, I'm not so sure. Something like that happens to you, who knows when you're gonna snap."
Matt nodded again and grinned slightly into the distance. "I hear from his friend he was already a little messed up in the head." Nathan looked at the officer questioningly. "He said he's been going on for months about destiny and saving people… as if one person could save the future."
"That can't be done," Nathan stated plainly as his brain protested. Casually, he gazed up at the nearest clock.
"Well, if you'll excuse me, Parkman, I believe I should get checked out, make room in this hospital for the next impending disaster."
"Right," Matt responded, "well, it was nice… talking to you?"
Nathan turned to look at him once again. "If you can get me off the hook for a crime every time we 'catch up,' I hope to see you a lot more in the future." With that, Nathan strode away.
"I have a feeling I will be seeing a lot more of you in the future," Matt remarked to himself smugly; he had Petrelli right where he wanted him. Upon hearing everything the 'reformed' man had thought during their conversation, Matt was relieved he had long ago perfected his poker face.
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After an extensive checkout from the hospital, Nathan retraced his path, darting around and between medical personnel of all sorts. He could picture the spot in his mind, if only he could reach it…
There. Nathan paused at the end of the hallway at the back of the hospital where no one resided. One wall was knocked down, the other covered in layers of yellow Caution tape. At the end of the remodeled hallway stood one perfect window, large enough for a person to fit through even while standing.
Nathan looked around to make sure no one was watching and took a running start.
He may have had his heartless (or thoughtless) moments, but this was not one of them. Nathan knew that, as much as he valued his freedom, he wasn't going to sit idly by while an innocent man got put in jail for a crime he committed.
Maybe the Japanese man believed one person could change the future. Maybe Parkman didn't. But Nathan knew he was man caught in the middle, one who wouldn't know until he tried.
Nathan broke through the glass, and as his body started to fall toward the alley below, his feet his the window ledge, and he took off in flight.
A/N: Since I conceived the idea for this story a long time ago, I probably won't be including any new characters. As of now, I'm using only Season 1 characters (plus Elle) as the main Les Mis players.