InsaneJournal

And now I scream about it and how it's so bad, it's so bad ... ( Part 3 )

So to recap, Peter was still defending him, his mother was sorry for the way things had turned out ( or as sorry as she was capable of being ), Claire was angry, and Parkman was in trouble.

Fortunately only one more visitor was scheduled to descend upon him that evening before the madness was officially over. Speak of the devil ...

When the third spirit appeared, he didn't say anything. Well, Nathan assumed it was a 'he.' The figure was cloaked in a black robe, his face hidden from sight, so it could've been anyone underneath there. He didn't give any verbal instructions: just slowly turned and started walking in the opposite direction. After unsuccessfully trying to find out where they were going, Nathan followed.

Unlike the other two 'time walks,' they would only be making one stop. Where? The building he'd designated for people with abilities. He'd only been given the grand tour once, but he recognized it instantly.

He should've seen this one coming. This was the part where he'd get a sneak peek at what the future would hold: the future he'd created. But something was wrong. The emergency power was on, yet there wasn't a single person in sight. That's when he heard the screams. He shot a confused glance over to his mute guide. Apparently he wasn't getting any answers out of this guy, so he hastily made his way down the corridor to locate the source of the cries. The sight he stumbled across was his mother finally paying the price for a lifetime of manipulation and lies. Her executioner? Sylar. Nathan tried to physically intervene, but he phased right through the monster who'd turned his lock-down facility into a slaughterhouse.

There was nothing he could do. She was dead before she ever hit the floor.

Crouching beside her body, he couldn't help but feel remorse. He doubted that they had resolved their issues, and now they would never get the chance. She was just as much to blame for that as he was, but she was still his mother. After seeing what Dad had done, he'd begun to understand why she acted the way she did: the method behind her thinking. It was a defense mechanism, one he recognized all too well. Maybe that's why they'd butted heads so much. They were a lot alike.

The sound of his brother calling his name drew his attention away, causing him to stand and head out into the hallway. What was Peter doing here? Nathan had made sure he had nothing to do with this place, which had been no easy task. Now he was here, and so was Sylar. He had to find Pete before the real villain did. He refused to lose another family member.

"Peter?" He followed the direction the voice had come from, winding down the endless hallways as he searched in vain. The other couldn't hear him, but that didn't prevent Nathan from trying to interact.

He caught a glimpse of movement in one of the rooms up ahead, so he rushed towards it, nearly tripping over two bodies sprawled out on the floor, surrounded by a pool of blood. At least he would have tripped had he been able to run into anything. One horrific moment was all it took to identify the fallen heroes as Matt Parkman and the blonde he'd become so attached to, Daphne. Obviously they'd gotten out of their cells and tried to escape, but they hadn't made it. The most disturbing observation he made was that they'd died holding hands, which meant it hadn't been instant. They'd suffered first, and the thought of it made him sick to his stomach. First Ma, now this ...

What had gone wrong?

Nathan reached the room he'd been approaching and stepped inside to find Peter and Claire having a heated discussion. He didn't pay attention to what was being said, not at first. This was good, right? Both of them in the same place meant that if he could figure out a way to get through to them, he could safely guide them off the premises. No one else had to get hurt. But he soon discovered that Sylar wasn't the only one out for blood. The things Claire was saying made no sense to him. She was accusing Peter of letting him live, and because of that decision, that moment of weakness, she'd had to kill her own father. This had to be a misunderstanding, but his misguided daughter seemed convinced that this had actually happened, and she blamed Pete.

The events that occurred next were so shocking that by the time he was able to react, it was already finished. Claire knew the right spot to hit: the one in the back of the head. Once she got positioned behind Peter, she pulled out a gun and shot him. Then she just walked away.

"No. No!" Eyes cut over to the one who'd brought him here as Nathan angrily spun around to face him. "Why didn't you do something? It wasn't supposed to end like this. He didn't do anything wrong! He was just ... he was just trying to protect me." When it was him that should've been protecting Peter.

Shock had turned into anger, and anger had turned into denial. He shook his head repeatedly before dropping to his knees beside his brother. "Come on, Pete. Don't do this. Wake up. You got to wake up." Lids came to a tight close as he tried to wish it all away: convince himself it was only a nightmare, and he'd snap out of it any minute now. But when he reopened his eyes, the scene hadn't changed. There was someone else in the room, but he didn't care about that. Not anymore. He'd lost everything: everyone. Why? All because he'd wanted to make the world a better place? Because he'd wanted to separate the bad from the good? Peter never should've been here. He wasn't supposed to be here ...

The other person present was Tracy Strauss, and if he'd been listening to her telephone conversation, he would've realized that she was calling him, claiming Peter was in the building. What she was really doing was setting a trap.

Nathan watched himself come into the room expecting to see Pete standing there, ready to fight like always about their differing opinions of right and wrong, but instead found him bleeding out all over the floor. His reaction was ... well, similar to the one he'd just had, only his physical self was able to cradle his brother in his arms as the tears welled in his eyes. What better opportunity to eliminate him from the picture than this.

Tracy was upset that he'd fired her: shut her out. This was her revenge. In a matter of seconds, his entire body froze and broke into dozens of pieces, coincidentally collapsing all around Peter's lifeless form.

... And so it ended ...

All he could do was remain knelt there on the floor, his face buried in his hands, silently begging whoever would listen to give him one more chance to make it right. Just one more chance ...