John Gilstrap - Nathan’s Run

“We think he was born an asshole.” He looked directly at Petrelli as he spoke, lest there be any doubt. “Look, Stephanie, I need that number. The guy who was asking for it is our killer. Please. Tell me what it is.”

Petrelli made a move to wrestle the phone back, but retreated immediately from Warren’s threatening glare.

“You know if you use this, any evidence will be tainted,” Stephanie warned, a broad smile in her voice from Warren’s comments about her boss.

“I don’t care:’ Warren promised. “I just need that number.”

With more than a little hesitation, she gave him the number. As soon as the seventh digit passed Stephanie’s lips, Warren dropped the phone onto its cradle.

Without a word, Warren left Murphy’s office, dialing his cellular as he walked.

Denise marveled at the margin by which the afternoon callers were favoring Nathan’s side. Having been so terribly unnerved at first, Nathan seemed to have calmed down a lot, though he was a mere shadow of the jovial personality she’d had on the air yesterday. For the most part, he was sparing of the details surrounding his capture and escape. All she really knew for sure after nearly two hours on the phone with him was that he was convinced that he was the target of a police conspiracy to kill him, and that he had had nothing to do with those police officers’ deaths the night before.

When Denise pointed out that law enforcement people had an uncanny way of turning up dead in Nathan’s presence, he had no rehearsed response. He only reiterated that he was victim just like all the others—or a potential victim, anyway. And if cops were trying to kill you, what better place to do it than at a prison?

Much as she hated to admit it, today’s phone call with Nathan was getting repetitive and boring. Pretty soon she was going to have to cut him off and move on to other things. The thought tugged at her heart, though. It seemed as if he needed to talk on the radio today.

Carter from Tuscaloosa was on the phone asking Nathan about life with his Uncle Mark when a stranger joined them on the line. “Excuse me,” the voice said, “this is the telephone operator, with an emergency break-in call from Lieutenant Michaels from the police department. Go ahead, sir.”

There was a click, and then Warren’s voice joined the conversation. “Nathan, this is Lieutenant Michaels from the Braddock County Police Department,” he said officiously.

“Wait a minute, Lieutenant,” Denise protested. “How did you break in? In case you hadn’t heard, we won our case yesterday…”

“Yes, ma’am, you did,” Warren confirmed. “I’ll be happy to explain all the details to you later, but right now Nathan is in grave danger. Son, you need to run away from where you are. Now. The man who tried to kill you last night is on his way to do it again.”

Nathan turned pale, causing Billy to move closer to the receiver where he could hear. Barney followed. It didn’t even occur to him to turn on the radio.

The police had traced his call! They couldn’t do that! He’d heard this morning on the news that a judge had told them they couldn’t do that. Now a cop was telling him to run away, but it was cops who had tried to kill him in the first place.

“H-how do I know you’re not trying to trick me?” Nathan asked, his voice taking on a dazed quality.

“You don’t,” Warren answered simply. “You’ll just have to trust me.

Denise blurted, “Trust! You break into a private conversation—against court orders, I hasten to add—and you talk about trust? It seems to me…”

Warren cut her off. “Shut up, Bitch!” Boy, that didn’t sound right. “Nathan has no choice but to trust me, because if he doesn’t, he’ll get killed, and there’s nothing I can do about it. Believe it or not, son, I’m one of the good guys. Now, run!”

“Where to?” the boy asked, desperation building in the pit of his stomach.

Oh, shit! thought Warren. He hadn’t planned that far ahead. There was only one landmark he could think of, and it was out in the middle of everything: the obelisk in the town square.

“Can you take us off the air for just a minute, Bitch?” Warren asked, his tone pleading and polite.

Denise heard the sincerity in the police officer’s voice, the fear.

She didn’t have to do anything he asked, but she decided that she could ill afford not to.

“All right,” she agreed, “but I’ll be able to listen in.”

“Must you?” Warren asked.

“Unless you want an earful of dial tone,” Denise replied.

“Suppose you were to take your earphones off?”

Denise sighed loudly into the microphone. “Okay,” she conceded. “You’ve got thirty seconds of dead air.”

Enrique looked at her as if she’d gone completely over the edge, but followed suit anyway, removing his own earphones. In all his years in radio, this would be his first half-minute without his ears covered. They felt strangely cold.

“Go ahead, guys,” Denise instructed. “Your clock is running. Let’s go to commercials, Rick.”

As Nathan listened, he felt his world becoming very small, just himself and this cop named Michaels. He started to object twice, but Michaels wouldn’t let him. During the first ten seconds of the monologue, Nathan learned that there was a plot to kill him, and that it didn’t involve the police. In the next ten, he heard that most of the police who were on the street thought that Nathan had killed the cops in the jail last night, and that they were cleared to shoot him if he resisted arrest. Finally, he learned that this Lieutenant Michaels was the only person in the universe that he truly could trust, and that the most important thing that Nathan could do was let Michaels bring him in.

“The running’s over, Nathan,” Michaels concluded. “You have to trust somebody now, and I’m all you’ve got. Do you know where the Lewis and Clark Memorial is in the square?”

“You mean the tall pointy tower?” Nathan said. “Yeah.”

“Make your way over there and we’ll find each other. I’m wearing a brown suit with a blue shirt and a striped tie. You’ll see me. I look like a cop.”

In spite of the danger, Nathan smiled. “I guess you know what I look like,” he offered.

“The whole world knows what you look like, pal. Now, move! You’ve got no time left.”

Nathan hung up the phone and looked at Billy.

“Well, do you trust him?” Billy asked.

Nathan thought for a moment before answering. “Yes.” The answer surprised both of them.

The commercials had run a full five minutes, giving them an extra 270 seconds of privacy, not because Denise had been conned into it by the cop, but because she really feared for Nathan’s safety. When the spots were done, she and Enrique reentered the world of electronic noise, only to hear the screeching tone of a telephone that had been left off the hook.

“Well, folks,” she announced to her audience. “It seems we’re all alone here.. “

Billy’s directions to the obelisk were brief and complete, matching Nathan’s dimming memories of his flight the night before. The young fugitive was impressed by the distance he’d actually run: over two miles, according to Billy.

Nathan hurriedly tied his shoes and went to the front door, where Billy was waiting with Barney to say goodbye.

Nathan smiled sadly and nodded. “Thanks, Billy,” he said. “You didn’t have to help me. I appreciate it.”

Billy looked down at the floor. “Sure I did,” he joked halfheartedly. “You’re a murderer. You might have killed me.” He reached into his pants pocket and handed the older boy a three-inch-tall X-Men figure, Cyclops. “Here,” he said. “He brings me good luck.”