The Price of Selfishness
Story Info
Title: The Price of Selfishness
Author: Del Rion (delrion.mail (at) gmail.com)
Fandom: Heroes
Era: Possibly AU Volume 5
Genre: Drama, angst
Rating: T/ FRT
Characters: Peter Petrelli (, Angela Petrelli, Nathan Petrelli, Sylar)
Summary: Peter is bearing a slight grudge against his mother.
Complete.
Written for: Heroes_Contest’s (heroes-contest) Drabble Challenge 14: Price
Warnings: Implied death, murder, and violence.
Beta: Mythra (mythras-fire)
Disclaimer: The show, its characters, the places, and everything else belong to Tim Kring, NBC, and the other respective creators and owners of the TV show ‘Heroes’. I have made no profit by writing this story, and make no claim over the show.
Feedback: Very much appreciated.
About The Price of Selfishness: A little piece slightly inspired by season 1 and season 3, and the connection drawn between them. Stealing socks might be a family trait, who knows…
Story and status: Below you see the writing process of the story. If there is no text after the title, then it is finished and checked. Possible updates shall be marked after the title.
The Price of Selfishness
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Written for Heroes_Contest’s Drabble Challenge 14 (Price).
The Price of Selfishness
“What could you possibly need so bad that you had to steal it?”
“Socks.”
Peter smiles, much like his mother did that day. Back then it was just one of her stunts; meaningless if you dismissed her need for attention.
“Hey, Mom,” he finally greets her and sits down on the freshly cut grass. “I stole you socks today,” Peter informs her, and keeping a straight face should be harder than it is.
“Nathan was so pissed that day,” he ventures on. “But he isn’t here to nag at me today… Just like you, or dad,” he muses, fondling the soft, fresh socks in his hands.
The three gravestones in front of him offer no comment. It’s ironic that here in the cemetery they look almost like an idyllic family - with the slight dent that Peter’s the only one alive.
“They didn’t cost all that much, if one’s thinking about the price; they were on sale.” Even in theft, Peter apparently has an unconscious need to do as little harm to others as possible. Perhaps it’s some kind of compensation for all the bad things he’s done.
An old woman walks past him, then halts beside the grave next to the Petrellis. She looks at him, and Peter offers her a smile.
“It’s so nice to see young people here. Usually they are… too busy. I think they are simply too selfish to bother.”
Selfish.
Peter wonders how selfish his mother was, not telling them that Nathan was dead. How selfish she was when she turned Sylar into Peter’s brother.
Of course that was the case until Sylar broke free and killed Angela as his first victim. He called it ‘justified revenge’.
Peter was the one who had to deal with the madman whose new favorite pastime was to antagonize Peter with the face of his brother. Once Peter knew the truth, though… he never looked at him the same way again; never looked at pictures of Nathan the same way again.
Eventually he ripped Sylar’s head off, figuring the only way to finish him for sure, and to make him stay dead, was to separate his brain from the rest of his nervous system. That Sylar wore Nathan’s face when he died wasn’t lost on Peter. One more thing he could never erase from his mind…
The woman next to him goes on with her business, and Peter gently places the socks next to Angela’s headstone. Maybe someone will find them there and take them, gaining some warm comfort on a cold night. Peter is beyond any such simple joy, though, and so he wonders why he even bothered in the first place. After all, he now knows why Angela stole socks.
But perhaps it isn’t about socks. Maybe it’s about the lonely echo inside all of them; a faint call of something long lost. Something they yearn to get back so that they can do better next time, knowing the price it may otherwise cost them.
The End