Family Emergency

Chapter 2

The next day was a psychological hell for Peter Petrelli. He paced back and forth in his apartment, wondering frantically what the hell could be wrong with him. Minutes seemed liked hours to him, because all he wanted was the damn phone call from Dr. Cramer. And yet the prospect of the call terrified him. What if it really was something fatal. God, he wished he hadn't been so rude to Nathan, because he desperately wanted him there now.

Peter was practically sitting on pins and needles. He had tried to eat, but his stupid stomach didn't seem to let him keep anything down. All the vomiting had left him with an acrid, sour taste in his mouth, and his throat felt like it had been skinned and scraped over with sandpaper. A quarter to two in the afternoon, the long-awaited phone call finally came.

"Hello?!" Peter's voice was breathless.

"Hello, Mr. Petrelli, this is Doctor Cramer," the physician's familiar voice told him. "I have received the lab results from your tests..."

"And...?"

"I've checked and double checked them, and they just don't add up..."

"Just say what's wrong with me!" Peter cried out, and he almost saw the doctor flinch on the other side of the line.

"I... I'm not sure at the moment. I've consulted my colleagues, and we all agree that the best thing is to call you back here and take another set of tests."

Peter knew the doctor could hear his long, heavy sigh on the phone, and so it took all the control he had to finally say, ".... alright... when?"

"Actually one of my patients canceled her appointment with me this afternoon at 3:30, so how about coming then?"

Peter agreed without a second thought and the moment he hung up, he called Nathan.

***

Oddly enough during this visit, Peter thought he had heard someone say "imaging". The imaging wing? Were they going to have to perform x-ray scans on him? Already the young nurse's head hurt at the thought of what he may go through this afternoon. Nathan being impatient about returning to work did not make things any better.

"You said they were just gonna draw some blood, right, Pete?" the older man asked, his voice betraying his annoyance. "I don't have time to stay here all day, I've got an important meeting with the D.A. at 4:30, and"---

"What could possibly be more important than your own brother possibly having a fatal disease?" Peter snapped back.

"What kind of hack is this guy, anyway? Why can't they say what's wrong with you?"


Peter shivered, once again in a thin hospital gown that was open in the back. "You can leave if you want..." he muttered. "You don't care about me, anyway..."

Head bowed, Nathan sighed and put a hand to his eyes, looking to be developing a headache himself. "Oh god, Peter," he groaned. "I care about you, but you have to understand that I have just as much of a clue as you do about what's going on, and that this couldn't come at a more inconvenient time!"

Before Peter could press further about the subject, Dr. Cramer entered the office. "Alright, Mr. Petrelli. We're going to be taking some more tests today. That includes giving you an MRI so that we can take a closer look at what's going on with that stomach problem of yours."

Though his words were calm and dignified, once again, Peter could tell the doctor was hiding something, and it terrified him to know that he was not being told of what that something could be.

He had trouble staying still during the MRI, which he knew was important for good picture quality. However, it seemed his limbs were fidgeting on their own. For someone with a medical education, he was probably behaving really pathetically. Nathan stayed with his little brother even though it meant he was going to have to cancel the meeting. "Family business" he simply gave as the reason, not wanting to specify any further. If the D.A. found out he'd cancelled simply to hold his little brother's hand during a doctor's visit, his credibility as a future congressman would be in serious danger.

"I've ruined your plans today, haven't I?" Peter asked glumly as he sat with his brother, waiting for results from the doctor.

Nathan shook his head, giving the young man's hand a squeeze. The idea of being terminally ill must have been incredibly jarring to Peter, because had become so emotional lately, more so than usual. No, he wasn't terminally ill, the lawyer told himself. He couldn't be...

After what seemed like an eternity, Dr. Cramer finally returned. Nathan instantly stood, but Peter was slower to rise, as all of these tests and cryptic answers were doing nothing for his current physical and emotional state.

"Well, what's the verdict?" Nathan asked.

"I've talked to my colleagues..." the doctor began but quieted, as if he was frantically trying to find the perfect way to give the undoubtedly bad news. "All the test results inescapably point to the fact that..." He stopped once again, scratching his balding head.

For a professional, he looked incredibly nervous. It couldn't be the first time he had to tell a patient they were seriously ill, was it? Peter wondered.

"I have to ask you a personal question, Mr. Petrelli..."

"Go ahead," Peter said numbly.

"Were you born a biological male?"

Peter was caught off guard by the very absurdity of the question and he shook his head.
"What the fuck kind of question is that?" he asked, ignoring his vulgar approach. "Of course I was!"

"Peter, settle down, for god's sakes," Nathan interrupted, turning again to the doctor. "Just please... tell us what's going on with my brother."

"All of our tests, MRI included, point to this... well it's sound impossible, but you can"--

"PLEASE, Doctor."

"You can take a look at them yourself and see that it all points to your brother being pregnant."

Nathan looked like he'd been hit in the face with a log, and then he suddenly burst out laughing. Both Peter and the physician regarded him with confused disapproval.

"But that's ridiculous!" the lawyer exclaimed upon realizing that the doctor wasn't joking, after all. "Peter can't be pregnant! He's a man!"

"Oh, believe me, the thought has crossed our minds," Doctor Cramer replied with dry sarcasm. "It seems, however, that he's undergone some kind of anatomical transformation that could have..."

"What? You're saying he's transforming into... a woman?" Nathan asked dumbly.

"No, there's nothing pointing to that... His testosterone levels, for instance, are still normal. However... your brother has a fetus growing inside him. Judging from the development, he's in his second month of pregnancy."

Nathan, shaking his head in a state of denial masked by sheer amusement, stepped toward the doctor, whose face remained wooden and unwavering.

"And you're really serious...?"

The doctor nodded.

Just when a part of Nathan decided to truly believe the news, the sound of Peter vomiting into a waste basket rose through the still air.

"Hey, Pete!" the lawyer exclaimed at the sight, and he knelt by his sick brother's side. "Hang on... you okay?"

Peter's only response was to pass out.

*

When Peter finally drifted into consciousness, he could hear voices. His eyes remained shut, but he continued to listen as his senses fully awoke.

"...must admit that this is a scientific breakthrough that could change everything..."

"I don't give a SHIT what it changes. I'm not having my brother live in a hospital with nothing but strangers testing him day in and day out."

When Peter regained consciousness, he found himself lying in a hospital bed, and slowly the faces of Nathan and his mother cleared before his eyes.

"Where am I...?" he croaked, voice barely a whisper, and instantly tried to rise. Nathan's firm hands on his shoulders pressed him back down.

"Hold up there, now," the older man said. "You fainted, Peter. You're at the hospital."

"I... he said... I can't be, it has to be a mist"--

"Calm down, Peter. You're going to be just fine," their mother's even, hypnotic voice commanded, and Peter obediently shut his eyes again. He could remember it all very clearly. He'd been told by his doctor that he was expecting a child. In Peter's muddled mind managed to put two and two together; if it really was true, it could be no one else's but Nathan's. Oh God.

Angela Petrelli noticed the shift of color in her youngest son's face instantly and she nudged a waste basket closer to his bed side. She stepped back to watch the spectacle as Peter threw up once more, Nathan rushing to his side protectively. What a pair of sons she had raised.

"Oh... oh god... it's not real. Itisn'trealitisn'treal..."

"I'm sorry, Peter, it is," Nathan responded. "You have to stay calm and just accept it. It's the only thing we can do now without losing any rational thought."

"Peter..." Angela began, "when I found out about this ability of yours, I immediately suspected it might results in... disastrous consequences. It seems like a case where you have absorbed someone else's ability, which clearly turned out to be..." She gestured at his protruding belly. "...I'm not even sure what to call it."

"It's not my fault!" Peter snarled at her. "I can't control this!"

"Evidently not," the woman said curtly. "However, there is not a problem in this world that cannot be fixed. We keep it from the press, of course, and we'll find a way for you to have an abortion. There is one thing you'll have to tell me, Peter..."

"Which is?" Peter asked defensively.

"Who is the "other" father?"

Peter wanted to instinctively look to Nathan for help... but Nathan was part of the reason why this had happened.

"I don't..." he began, hesitant. His hands massaged his face, fingers sifting through long dark bangs. "I have no idea..."

"You can't just have no idea about something such as this," his mother said in a matter-of-factly tone which carried no regret. "You have to know who it was."

"I'm too tired to answer questions now," he snarled from under his hands. "I can't say anything that will make any sense."

Lifting a finely plucked eyebrow, Mrs. Petrelli cocked her head in a way that was familiar to both brothers by now: disbelief. But she allowed it this time. If she needed to, she could wait, and eventually she would have her questions answered. She always did.

***

Peter was released from the hospital the following day, Nathan having bribed the doctors to keep his brother's pregnancy a secret. He wasn't too worried about the press finding out; in order for someone to believe them, they'd need hard evidence. However, Peter being regarded as a "scientific breakthrough" was worse. They had to try staying under the radar until this... accident had been taken care of.

"We'll make sure you can have an abortion," Nathan assured the physically and mentally stressed out young man after driving Peter home. "There's no need to worry, you'll be just fine."

"No need to worry?" Peter repeated incredulously. "You're kidding, right? I'm a man, and I'm expecting my brother's child. Tell me that's completely no big deal, and I'll punch you."

Nathan cleared his throat. "Are you absolutely positive that it's mine?" he asked carefully.

Peter looked like me might cry. "Yes. And that's what scares me."

Nathan put his hands on his little brother's shoulders and looked him in the eye with the deepest concern.

"If it's yours then it's fucked up," the young man continued. "That's goddamn inbreeding, Nate. It'll have three legs or be a fucking retard, I know it. It's what happens..."

"Come here," Nathan whispered, and pulled his baby brother in a hug. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry..."

"I don't even know how this happened," the young nurse stated. "Maybe I took someone's power by accident, just from walking past them... whatever the hell their power was..."

Nathan had, early on in their forbidden relationship, excused the fact that what they did was incestuous and wrong by claiming that at least nothing they did could lead to inbreeding, which was the main reason why incest had always been taboo in every culture. They were both males, after all. Two males could not reproduce. Or that was what he'd learned to believe. Peter seemed to be an exception when it came to everything.

"You're not going to have this baby," Nathan stated, still cradling Peter in his arms. "We'll make sure you get rid of that... parasite as soon as possible."

"How?" a miserable Peter sobbed. "No gynecologist in the world will know what he's dealing with. Are they just gonna put me on an operating table and cut me open?"

"I don't know..." Nathan answered truthfully. "I just don't. For all the good that does, I might as well cut you open myself. You'd be able to heal..."

The younger brother leant against Nathan in defeat. He had thought briefly in the past about whether or not he wanted children, but never like this. Never.

"But... what if... what if I can't heal back?"

"Why wouldn't you?" Nathan asked incredulously. "You've had glass in your brain and you just got back up."

Peter swallowed, a painful sensation. He hardly wanted to tell his big brother, but he had no choice. Removing Nathan's pocket knife from his suit, he flicked open the blade and pressed down onto his hand. Before Nathan could ask the point of this action, he did a double take. The wound in the palm continued to bleed, no healing taking over.

A tear fell from Peter's eye. “Ever since I got... this way..." even saying the word pregnant made him ill, "I've... I've been feeling weaker. My powers haven’t been working."

Nathan was at a loss for words. "N-none of them?" he asked, briefly considering what it could mean. Peter's power was completely unstable; if he lost the previous powers he'd absorbed, at least he wouldn't be able to accidentally wreck havoc on those around him. But it also meant that without the acquired healing factor, the unnatural pregnancy could very well kill him. Meanwhile, the wound in Peter's palm continued to stay open. Nathan drew out a handkerchief from his inner jacket pocket and wrapped it around his brother's hand.

"I... I haven't tried *all* of them yet," Peter said shakily. "But I can't heal, can't fly, can't turn invisible... I don't think I can paint the future either. Which I suppose I should be happy about."

"That one's a pain in the ass anyway, right?" Nathan asked in a half-hearted attempt at humor.

"Maybe... but what if something happens?" the hospice nurse asked, the worry in his voice never more clear. "Something I could have seen..."

Nathan lifted an eyebrow. "What do you mean 'something'? Something like what?"

"Like anything!" Peter's voice broke within the response. His older brother could only stare, unsure of what to say or do to make things better. Hell, how could it get better? It felt like it could only get worse. Peter sobbed and turned away, covering his eyes.

"I'm scared to death! I'm scared to death, Nathan."

Nathan wasn't sure how to respond. Should he try to comfort Peter and reassure him that everything was going to be alright - even though he had no clue whether or not it was true - or should he just leave his brother alone and not pester him with useless, clichéd phrases of reassurance? However, knowing what a needy, clingy person Peter was, especially when it came to his older brother, Nathan figured that being alone was the last thing Peter wanted now.

"Hey, little guy..." He put an arm around Peter's quivering shoulders and started leading him toward the living room. "I'll stay with you tonight. This isn't a good time for you to be alone."

"You can't..." Peter sniffled. "If you're gone again, Heidi will wonder"--

"Don't worry about that. I'll just tell her the truth this time. My brother needs me."

Face lowered and hidden under long dark bangs, Peter stared at the floor, his stomach peeking into peripheral view. "I do... god forgive me... what are we gonna do?"

"We're gonna calm down," Nathan stated, nudging his brother to sit down on the sofa. "Getting upset is understandable, but it's not going to help, so stay there. You don't need to faint again."

Peter sighed miserably and stared at his growing middle. The baby... good lord, a baby was inside him. As if things could not be any further from normalcy in his life. He could not imagine what the life must be of the individual who had this before him. His hand moved to curiously touch the bulge, but he pulled away after only a second. Already the images of a deformed, unhealthy child stubbornly lingered in his brain.

"Can I get you anything?" Nathan inquired. "A beer, something to eat...?"

"I'm not hungry..." Peter murmured. "And I shouldn't drink while I'm... like this, not even beer..."

"You're not going to have it, remember?" Nathan said with a sigh. "We'll find a way to get it out of you ASAP. Don't worry."

"Yeah... one can always hope..." Peter muttered gloomily. Images of how he'd look in the last trimester popped up in his head, and he shook his head to get rid of them. He barely even noticed when Nathan got up to phone Heidi about his whereabouts the upcoming night. The call was brief - unusually so - and his brother quickly returned to his side.

"Wanna go take a shower?" Nathan asked, combing his fingers through Peter's hair.

"I took one before the doctor's appointment."

"You're still rattled," the lawyer replied, inspired to nuzzle the top of his brother's head. "It'll help."

"Doesn't matter..." Peter answered. "Look at me. I'm a nurse and I can't even take care of myself."

"This wasn't something you could predict..."

"Was it?" Peter asked, suddenly looking nervous. "Go find my notebook on the kitchen table.

Not questioning the reason behind the request, Nathan obeyed, and in seconds he returned to the other man's side with a small red notepad.

"Look," Peter said, and he flipped the pages to the last in which he had written. A crude sketch of an unborn infant curled up in sleep decorated the corner of the lined paper.

"I drew that on a whim a week before this all started."


"It doesn't have to mean anything..." Nathan began, unsure of how to tackle the subject. Of all the powers Peter had acquired, this one frightened him the most.

"Yeah, same old Nathan," Peter snapped back. "Deny the problem even exists and it'll go away - not!"

Nathan, having dealt with his brother's sudden mood swings and temper tantrums all his life, remained calm and didn't let the barb get to him. "I'm just saying it doesn't *have* to be related. And even if it was, how could you have possibly known what it meant? These... things aren't always easy to decipher."

Peter just shrugged. He didn't feel like discussing the sketch or his own condition any further. Talking had always been Nathan's thing; he himself preferred to sit in a corner and listen to what others had to say.

They sat together in silence for some time, Nathan zapping between the channels every once in a while. Peter didn't object when his big brother's arm came to rest around his shoulders, pulling him flush against Nathan's warm, solid body. Head no resting on the older man's chest, Peter quickly found himself getting sleepy.

As carefully as possible, Nathan put his arms around the young man's body and lifted him from the couch, walking slowly into the bedroom. Peter did not even move of his own accord when placed into his bed and tucked in. The poor boy must have been exhausted, and with good reason.

"Sleep tight, buddy," Nathan whispered, planting a small kiss on his brother's forehead.

Though Peter's powers were waning, they had not all completely disappeared yet. Every so often, he'd feel a flicker of one of the abilities as though it were an animal giving a final spasm before death. Tonight was different when he began to dream. He saw a woman's face and heard her soothing, husky voice. The ceiling shone with blinding lights, but there in silhouette above him was Nathan, smiling in a way which meant he was truly worried out of his mind. And then the pain rose up within the young man and he could not help but scream.

He woke up screaming and thrashing, part of his brain still stuck in the nightmare and refusing to let go despite the fact that he was sitting up in the bed with his eyes wide open. Peter instinctively began to struggle when a pair of strong arms wrapped around him from behind before realizing that this was Nathan, his brother, trying to still him. Sagging into Nathan's arms, Peter drew in a series of quick, heavy breaths. The room was dark and he was covered in cold sweat.

Wait... something wasn't right. It slowly dawned on Peter that he was still fully clothed. It puzzled and annoyed him. He never slept clothed. Never. Suddenly desperate to get out of the confining, sweat-soaked garments, he began tearing them off, popping a few buttons in the process. One or two seams were torn, as well.

"Hey, hey... calm down!" Nathan's voice said. "What's wrong, baby? You had a nightmare?"

Eyes closed, Peter drew in long, deep breaths to regain his composure. "I saw it..." he finally said, "I saw the future..."

"What happened?" Nathan inquired, slightly nervous of what the future might be to frighten his brother so.

"Was... in a hospital... in labor... it hurt so much..."

"Don't worry... don't think about it." A large hand rubbed the nurse's back. "We'll get someone to get rid of it. You won't have to have it."

"... what if I'm supposed to?" Peter asked, trying to will his hands to stop shaking. "I can't heal. I'm not a woman. What if I have no choice?"

"We'll find a way," Nathan said resolutely, pulling Peter into his arms. The young man was still trembling, and his skin was damp with sweat. When Peter was little, Nathan would often put him on his lap to comfort him or calm him down when something unpleasant had happened. Peter had grown since then, but Nathan was still the bigger of the two. He leant back against the headboard, taking Peter with him so that his little brother ended up sitting between his parted legs, pressed against his chest.

"Maybe we should get you something to calm your nerves..." Nathan finally said after Peter's heart had refused to slow down. "Like a Valium, or..."

"No!" The nurse's reply was quick and vehement. "I don't wanna go back to sleep! Not now. Please don't make me, Nathan..."

"You need sleep. Things have been so screwed up... you'll go crazy if you don't get rest."

Peter pressed his face into his brother's chest. "Please...? Please don't make me..."

Rubbing his brow, Nathan frowned tiredly. "I can't. Just sit tight for now. Calm down and you'll feel better... that's it..."

Peter would occasionally jolt awake and whisper another plea, but his brain was obviously flood with the desire for sleep. When Nathan finally felt the body against him go slack, he smirked. Perhaps he was the one who should have gone into the medical profession.

Poor Peter had gone through so much already in the day, and the weariness showed on his motionless face. Nathan hated to think of how the rest of the time would churn out before the parasite invading his baby brother was taken care of.

TBC...