FIC: Save My Brother, Nathan/Peter, rated R (NPMKM fic)
Title: Save My Brother
Authors: henrika_amanda
Fandom: Heroes
Genre: Angst, drama
Rating: R for the theme
Prompt: "Nathan/whore!Peter. Nathan rescues Peter from a brothel and Peter shows his gratitude."
A/N: Not exactly what was prompted, but hey; this story wrote itself, and all I could do was go along with it. :)
* ~ * ~*
//Save my brother//
//Kill the bastard//
The two competing desires were still very much competing in Nathan’s mind when he reached his destination, heart pounding and light-headed with fury. Still, one of them was clearly a priority.
The miserable old bastard Nathan had until this day thought of as his father had sold Peter to a brothel! Believing that his baby brother had run away from home and not knowing whether or not he was safe or even alive had been hellish, but this…
Nathan squeezed the gun he kept hidden under his coat. He would not hesitate to use it, in case the brothel manager refused to cooperate. Hell, maybe he’d use it anyway, just to take vengeance for what had been done to his little brother.
As soon as he burst through the door, Nathan was approached by a fawning hispanic middle-aged man quickly reciting the various offers of the brothel in belief of having scored a potential new customer. What he had not expected, however, was the revolver, cocked and ready, being placed against his forehead. His expression at the time was almost comical.
“Are you in charge here?” Nathan asked coldly.
“N-no, I… I’m just the d-desk clerk…” the man managed to stutter, his complexion now ashen grey. “P-please don’t s-shoot me, I---”
“Then take me to whoever is in charge of this place!”
Nathan had been prepared to do more than simply aim a loaded gun, but no further coercion was required with the desk clerk. He was obviously just a lowly servant, not prepared to die - or risk even a broken finger or a knocked out tooth - for the sake of his employers.
Further into the building, the man who had presented himself as “the desk clerk” stopped outside a closed door. “Mr Reznik is in charge,” he quickly informed Nathan. “This is his office.”
The lawyer cocked an eyebrow. “What are you waiting for? Knock on the door!”
“But…” the man tried and cowered away from him. “I showed you who’s in charge… can’t I go… now?”
“You can go when I’ve gotten my brother back!” Nathan hissed, barely able to contain his fury. “Now do as I say!”
Not one to protest a second time, the man obeyed.
“Who is it?” an authoritative, slightly accented voice replied from within the room.
“It’s Enrique, sir. There is a gentleman here that wishes to see you.”
The man inside the room was not slow retort that he was too busy accept visitors, but before he could finish berating Enrique, Nathan threw the door open and cut the man off mid-sentence.
Mr Reznik’s face paled when he noticed the gun now trained on him. He was so similar in age and appearance to Arthur Petrelli - Nathan’s own father - that Nathan was momentarily thrown off ground, but he quickly regained his composure and his eyes did not waver for a second.
“I’m looking for someone,” the young lawyer said. “Someone I believe you’re keeping here against his will.”
“Sir, I assure you, we don’t keep anyone here against their will…” Reznik tried, but his pathetic attempts to convince Nathan were replaced by panicked cries when a bullet whistled past only inches from his left ear. Nathan was hoping the bang had shattered the man’s eardrum.
“Save your useless lies. I am looking for this person.”
A photo of Peter taken roughly a year ago, on his 17th birthday, was thrown onto the desk before Reznik. Recognition instantly flashed in the man’s eyes, and Nathan was prepared to blast Reznik’s other eardrum if the scum had the audacity to lie to him.
“I know you’re keeping him here, Mr Reznik,” Nathan continued. “Don’t even think about denying it.”
“Yes… This is Angel,” the man said with a small, inward smile. “Pretty little thing…”
Angel? Nathan’s features were distorted from disgust. Was that the name they used to market Peter under? Given the obvious allusion to their mother’s name, Nathan could only assume that Arthur had chosen it.
“Take me to him.” He positioned the revolver’s muzzle under Reznik’s chin, forcing the man’s head up. “Or they’ll be scraping grey matter off the walls for weeks.”
Reznik’s face stretched into something resembling a mixture between a grin and a grimace. “As you wish.”
*
Gun positioned against his target’s back, Nathan followed the man through the building to the block where the prostitutes were kept. The combined smell of sweat, semen, urine and various other bodily odours told of the activities going on behind the closed doors (and probably sometimes out in the hallways as well).
In a narrow hallway, the two encountered a man leading a naked woman with long, black hair and large, hollow eyes on a leash. Her momentarily striking similarity to Peter made Nathan want to turn his head to follow her with his gaze, but he held back, thinking he was not allowed any distractions at this point. Not when he was so close to achieving his goal.
Reznik suddenly stopped at a door with the numbers 276 sloppily scribbled onto it. Nathan listened for any possible sounds from behind the door, but he heard nothing, only the furious pounding of his own heart in his ears.
“Open the door,” the ordered, poking Reznik between the shoulder blades with his revolver muzzle. The man obeyed, even though the process of searching his bunch of keys for the right one was torturously slow to Nathan.
Since Peter was kept behind locked doors, it must mean that he had tried to escape, perhaps more than once, Nathan thought. He felt another swell of pitch black hatred toward Arthur Petrelli, and for a moment he was certain it could be seen radiating from him in waves. His little brother had been gone for five whole months, and to think he had been used all that time as a sex slave…
The door swung open and Nathan was finally able to view the scene inside.
Not even the images conjured up by his sometimes morbid imagination could have prepared him for the sight now before his eyes. A small very pallid shape lay curled up on a filthy mattress in an otherwise naked room with no windows. The combined foul stench of mold and urine inside the small chamber made Nathan want to take a step back, but he did not, partly because he did not want to give the sack of shit standing next to him the pleasure of seeing his reaction, but also because this was Peter. This was his brother.
“Oh my God… Peter…” Almost completely forgetting about Reznik, Nathan stumbled inside the room and fell to his knees next to the naked figure huddling on the mattress. Touching Peter’s shoulder, he gently turned the boy onto his back.
Peter’s head first lolled limply from one side to another, and for a brief but terrifying moment, Nathan feared that his brother was already dead. Then his eyelids opened, revealing sunken and hollow but still beautifully hazel eyes. There was, however, no recognition in them, only fear.
The boy had lost a considerable amount of weight from his already slender frame, which gave his face a gaunt and somehow aged appearance, ill-fitting for his mere eighteen years.
Nathan tucked his right hand, still holding the gun, in under Peter’s neck and slowly lifted. “Pete?” he whispered, desperate for a response, something that would hint toward Peter recognizing him, although he would not hold it against the boy if he did not. How many men had come into this room and used Peter during the months that he had been imprisoned? How many times had Peter had to endure being taken against his will by a total stranger who had paid to use him as a sexual outlet?
Nathan did not know, nor did he want to.
“He’s coming with me!” he hissed at Reznik, who still stood in the doorway, now with a small smile on his rat-like face.
“I don’t see why not,” he replied. “He’s spent. No one will pay for him anymore.”
Nathan sent a murderous glare at the brothel owner. “I should shoot you where you stand, Mr Reznik.”
“Go ahead, Mr Petrelli,” the man known as Reznik said calmly. “I’m sure that would make your father proud.”
It had no occurred to Nathan until now that Reznik recognized him or knew who he was. Had he known five months ago that Arthur Petrelli had come to sell him his own son? Or was he downright one of his father’s acquaintances? It horrified Nathan knowing that this man could pick up the phone and alert the Petrelli patriarch the minute Nathan left the premises with Peter.
//Not that it matters either way. I will kill him myself once Peter is safe//
Nathan holstered the revolver he had used to threaten Reznik and his lowly desk clerk and turned his attention back to Peter. His brother’s eyes were still open, and for the first time since he discovered Peter, a small spark of hope ignited in Nathan’s heart. Peter recognized him now. The boy even made an attempt to smile and reach for his older brother’s face, though his eyesight must have been poor, since his hand missed Nathan’s face by several inches. When Peter’s lips were pulled back from his teeth, Nathan could see that his gums were bleeding and swollen, and that his brother also lacked several teeth. The cause was most likely chronic malnutrition, although he could have lost those teeth due to a beating, as well. This made Nathan suspect that he had come for Peter in the nick of time, as his baby brother hardly would have survived this treatment for much longer.
“Pete…shhh…” Nathan gently hushed the boy when Peter made several unsuccessful attempts to speak. “I’m taking you home, okay? Can you hold on for a little while longer?”
Peter’s dry, cracked lips kept mouthing his big brother’s name even after no more sounds exited his throat. Nathan carefully lifted him, wrapped up warmly in his coat, as Peter did not have any clothes of his own.
Reznik held up the door for him with mock chivalry when Nathan turned to exit with his bundle, and the lawyer could clearly see the ill-contained mirth in the man’s eyes. Obviously the guy got off on watching other people suffer.
“Your name is “Nathan”, isn’t it?” Reznik asked. “That’s the name little Angel here cried himself hoarse over for two weeks straight after he arrived.”
Nathan was certain that if he had been holding the gun now, Reznik would already be lying dead on the floor with a fresh bullet hole between his eyes. Instead the older Petrelli brother repressed any emotional response and simply walked past the man, pretending not to have heard him. Knowing that his baby brother had cried his name for weeks on end without getting any response almost broke his heart.
“It’s alright now, Pete… We’re going home,” Nathan repeated, lips against the boy’s filthy, oily hair. “No one’s ever touching you again. I can promise you that.”
END